Harold Shank

The large and influential book of Isaiah continues to speak with relevance.  The strong images of God and his concerns emerge in all 66 chapters.  Yet the book remains

unexplored by many.

A complete 26 part study of Isaiah is available for free at www.haroldshank.com.  Each unit contains a lesson, a teacher’s guide and a student sheet.   Go to the buy cheap cialis online web site and choose “Bible studies.”  Other Isaiah materials are available under “Audio Sermons.”

     It’s an odd habit. 

    I keep birthday cards in

order to reread them four or so months later.  I just went through the stack from my last birthday.  I reviewed them all, including the one from my “friend” who sent a newspaper clipping on “getting older means getting better deals,” a step-by-step guide to all the senior discounts.

     Maybe I keep them because they represent the deep value we place on relationships.  Each friend carefully picked out an appropriate card, signed, stamped and sent it.  Maybe I hold on to them because I am by nature a “keeper.”  It’s hard to throw away the cards with their pictures suitable for framing and their wise advice.

      Whatever the real reason, as I revisited them this morning, I was struck by how the words never grow old.   People age and retire, but words seem to remain young and employed.  The words wishing me well, poking fun at the growing number representing my age, calling on God to bless me, affirming their friendship, expressing their admiration resonated in my heart today just as on my actual birthday. 

      We do well to attend to the words of our lives.  God himself knew the significance of words.  He used them to carry the message of his Bible.  He sent a book not a video.  He turned words into flesh.  Not a single word of God

has retired or ceased to have value.  

      Birthdays are so important. I just threw the cards away, but not the words.  Words!  What would we do without them?

Bible Study About Children

Part I: Hosea–A Biblical Book for Child Care Workers!

Hosea is a seldom-read, fourteen-chapter Minor Prophet that remains a remarkably relevant book. Those who work with hurting children will find the painful images and harsh descriptions all too familiar. Contemporary foster parents, today’s case workers, and those who serve the church’s most vulnerable children walk in Hosea’s footsteps. They hear what he heard. They wince at what he saw. They cry at what made him sad.

Context Parallels Our Own

Written to people who benefited from a half-century of economic expansion, government stability, and world peace, the people of Hosea’s day lived in a time remarkably similar to the life Americans have enjoyed for the last half-century. Unfortunately, their culture drifted into the same injustices faced in our time: Israel developed into a two-class society of the rich and poor, the nice side of town and the ghetto. Much of the population seemed obsessed with a popular, sexually-charged, imported religion. Attendance at religious events hit record levels, but worshipers paid scant attention to the God of Scripture. The social, religious and cultural observations one might draw from the Hosea’s eighth century B.C. world echo the way in which many Christians see their contemporary society.

Why Hosea Used Children

In order to get the people’s attention, to crack open their lives of denial, and to convey to them the intent of the Biblical God, Hosea used children. Jesus brought a child into the midst of the disciples to illustrate innocence and blessing. Hosea used children to tell the people of how their lives offended God and to provide insight into an increasingly dark future.

Understanding How Hosea, the Book, Unfolds

Hosea’s work revolves around two personal stories. From a close reading, we might recreate the stories in this way: In chapters 1-3, Hosea marries an adulterous woman named Gomer. After their son is born, she has two more children apparently by other men. Gomer returns to a life of promiscuity leaving Hosea to raise the kids. Finally, Hosea brings Gomer home. In chapter 11, Hosea finds himself a single parent with rebellious teenagers. After recalling tender moments from their childhood, Hosea anguishes over how to discipline them.

The prophet’s personal stories reflect God’s experience with Israel. As chapters 1-3 unfold, Hosea the husband becomes God the spouse seeking the return of his adulterous wife, Israel. In chapter 11, the story quickly turns to God as a father agonizing over the discipline he must impose on his wayward child, Israel.

The Old Testament prophet, Hosea, knew all about pain. We imagine that he could remember the moment when he found out the second and third children were not his. He recalled the day he found his wife with a neighbor man. Despite all his efforts and his love, she still moved out of his house, but never out of his heart.

Hosea uses the pain of life’s most intimate relationships to reveal God’s agony when humans reject his offer of relationship. By using the pain of children, Hosea hopes to blast through their massive denial and lead Israel back into a relationship with God. Despite his gallant effort of using some of life’s most painful images, few responded to Hosea’s invitation. In his own time, many would consider Hosea a failure since few changed after his preaching and he was unable to call the people to repentance.

What Hosea Says About Children

Although Hosea is not primarily about young people, there is considerable material in the book about them. Consider these insights into hurting children:

Adult Decisions Hurt Children. Key text: Hosea 1. Hosea’s three children bore revolting names given to them by God’s command in order to spread the message of the consequences of adult decisions. The effect of their names would be like naming a child “Ugly” or “Stupid.” Even without such revolting names, these children faced a stormy future. God hoped that such drastic names might prompt real change in Israelite society, a transformation that might give Hosea’s three children the hope of living in peace.

Children Live in a Painful World That They Did Not Create. Key text: Hosea 9. Throughout Hosea, the prophet announces that God will discipline the nation for its sins. The consequences of their wicked ways would fall most heavily on their children. The punishment comes because of the sins of the parents, but the children bear the pain of the consequences. In that context, God reveals “I also will forget your children” (Hosea 4:6). Just as Israel had intentionally rejected God despite the consequences for their own offspring, God must block the children out of his mind as he acts in tough love.

Chapter 9 deals with the “days of punishment” (9:7). Birth rates will drop, infant mortality will rise, and civilian deaths will involve large numbers of children (9:11-13). Obituaries will include an uncommon number of young people (9:14). Hosea’s words are not easy to hear, even more difficult to imagine, but reflect the ever-present consequences of a world gone mad with sin. Children did not create this world, but they endure the pain.

Rebellious Children Means Tough Love. Key text: Hosea 11. Just as parents agonize over invoking a policy of tough love on a wayward child, so Hosea describes how God ponders when and how to punish his disobedient people: “How can I give you up, O Ephraim! How can I hand you over, O Israel! …My heart recoils within me, my compassion grows warm and tender. I will not execute my fierce anger, I will not again destroy Ephraim” (Hosea 11:8-9). Hosea’s description of God reveals how the divine mind wavers between sending the discipline and giving them more time. Finally, God acts out of a deep love for his people. Just as a parent reluctantly invokes a policy of tough love, so God seeks their ultimate good through discipline.

God is the Only Hope for the World’s Hurting Children. Key text: Hosea 14. Hosea imagines a day when adult hearts respond to the invitation of God. So inept in matters of faith, Hosea gives them the words to say and the actions to do as they return to God. They are to ask for forgiveness, confess their sins, admit that they cannot live life on their own, reject all human alternatives and refuse all false gods. Then Hosea tells them one more thing to say, one final admission: They are to admit that God is the only hope for the world’s hurting children: “In you the orphan finds mercy” (Hos 14:3).

In a world before video, Hosea uses words that describe misery, pain, slaughter, and destruction. No contemporary film maker can out do the revolting images of Hosea. The close reader of Hosea sees war orphans, children who witness what no youngster should ever see, nine and ten year olds heading households, and young hands scavenging for food. Then in his final words, he describes new life that begins with the mercy of the Almighty falling on those left parentless in the painful consequences of their wicked lifestyles.

Articles to Use in Raising Biblical Awareness About Vulnerable Children.

The following short essays further develop the reflections on children in Hosea. Each piece is intended to stand on its own and can be used in printed material advocating for today’s hurting children.

Part II: It’s Got You Written All Over It

She hated her name. When she was little, she didn’t understand. But when she learned the whole story, her name became a burden. Some think it has a pretty sound: Lo-Ruhamah, accent on the last syllable. Children often dislike the names their parents give them, but Lo-Ruhamah had more reason than most.

Her name preached a sermon about her parents. Lo-Ruhamah’s mother had multiple sexual partners, seldom remained faithful to any one, and often disappeared from her life for long periods of time. Lo-Ruhamah lived with her step father, Hosea, who also had a name that preached a sermon.

But her name also described the shortcomings of her nation. Her name was meant to announce again and again the most negative aspect of the world where she grew up.

Not Loved. That’s what Lo-Ruhamah meant. Not that she grew up entirely unlovable or without love, although her mother’s promiscuity hung like a cloud over her life, but rather this little girl’s name pointed to a family and national disgrace.

Her story unfolds in the first chapters of Hosea. Gomer lived an adulterous life. Hosea tried to hold the family together even raising two of the children Gomer had to other men including Lo-Ruhamah.

In fact, all three of Hosea’s children had ugly names. Every trip to the market, each time he summoned them to supper, whenever they were called on in class, their names conjured up negative images, announced bad news, and reminded people of pain they tried to forget.

Most parents use more positive names, but parents still pass on to their children pain that they created. Lo-Ruhamah’s name had the sins of her parents and her nation written all over it. Children still grow up with the sins of their parents written on their lives. She’s a child of divorce. His father is an alcoholic. Son of an ex-con, child of the ghetto, foster child, infected with HIV at birth, illegitimate—the list goes on of how children live in the shadow of the sins of their parents and their nation.

We have many unanswered questions about this little girl who briefly walks across a couple of Old Testament chapters, but her name tells us that God knows all about how children grow up down stream from the pollution their parents and culture dump into the rivers of life. Incredibly this little girl’s name reveals how much God himself struggles with that polluted flow, how much he seeks to purify and clean even when we keep soiling it with our lives.

All who work on behalf of our world’s hurting children

can find hope in little Lo-Ruhamah, hope in the fact that God knows and that God works to stop the hurt. He even asks Hosea to give this child a negative name to make it clear to all adults the pain and anguish they bring on children’s lives. Through this child’s name he hoped to convince people to live a different way so that their children would have a brighter future. They did not listen.

Despite their refusal, God did not give up. In fact, his dedication to rescue humanity from its continual decisions that put the next generation at risk is reflected in the name he gave his prophet, Hosea. Every time people called out the prophet’s name, they announced God’s great dream and intention for all people including the sadly named little girl.

Hosea means salvation.

Part III: A Terrible Prayer

Hosea started to pray, and then stopped. “Give them, O LORD—.” What he wanted to ask was so horrible. His prayer (Hosea 9:14) seemed so unacceptable. How could he ask God to do what he was about to ask?

“Give them a miscarrying womb and dry breasts.”

There he prayed it. I want you to send miscarriages to Israel. Make it so Israel’s mothers can’t nurse. Increase the premature births. Raise the infant mortality rate. “Give them, O LORD—.”

Hosea spoke out of deep compassion. He wished for less pain. He spoke on behalf of children. He knew that the consequences of North Israel’s wicked society would fall most heavily on the children. Dedicated to sounding the alarm, the people regarded him as a fool. He preached and nobody came forward. Seldom has there been a preacher so unsuccessful as Hosea.

So his prayer. “Give them, O LORD—.”

It was the only way out of inflicting pain on the little ones. Ask God to spare them the pain of living through what was about to come. Let them die before they are born. Let them die in their mother’s arms while they still have a mother. Dark days prompted Hosea’s dark prayer.

Knowing Hosea, he likely prayed this prayer in a public forum. He didn’t like spreading doom. He was not a bitter old man. He was a prophet, one who warned, who spoke out on behalf of those who could not speak out for themselves.

His prayer was a sermon. Listen to my prayer, people. Do you really want me to pray this prayer? I don’t think so. Yet this prayer is more godly than the lives you live.

Maybe Hosea’s prayer is for our time, too. Maybe this prayer sermon needs preached in some of our churches. Perhaps this prayer should be on more Sunday night power point presentations to jar some of us out of our denial. But it’s so ugly. It’s so negative.

So is ignoring the children.

Part IV: A Forgotten God Remembers

God said it. He was talking about the Israel of the eighth century B.C. They lived in Samaria and Bethel and Gilgal. It’s a line so brief, most people likely miss it. Three words that give a glimpse into God’s heart. What did God say?

“They forgot me” (Hosea 13:6).

The Power who freed them from slavery, delivered them from oppressive domination, provided them a fruitful land, presented them with instruction for living, chose them out of all the nations on the earth, loved them, blessed them, and cared for them.

“They forgot me.”

There’s a related line in Hosea that might equally be missed. We remember the awful names Hosea gives to his children. We quote the line about there being no knowledge of God in the land. We love God’s clearly stated hope: I desire steadfast love and not sacrifice, the knowledge of God, rather than burnt offerings. But there’s one line we might miss.

“In you the orphan finds mercy” (Hosea 14:3). Our first thought might be that Hosea never says anything about orphans and that it seems out of place in the last chapter. We might read over it because the line seems to contribute little to the central themes of the book. But think again.

The one who was forgotten remembered the ones who were forgotten.

Hosea 13 describes the three year siege of Samaria. We imagine the shortages, the daily casualty reports, the death wagons in the streets, the disease. Most of us dare not read what really happened at such times anticipated in Deuteronomy 28:52-57

(don’t read it if you are at all squeamish).

Hosea 13 has orphans written all over it. Fathers dead from battle. Mothers taken by disease. Uncles among the captured. Older sister raped and mutilated. Somehow the enemy army entering the city for the final sweep cared little for the little ones.

The one who was forgotten remembered the ones who were forgotten. “In you the orphan finds mercy.”

The line is consistent with the heart of God who made care of orphans the core of real religion. The line fits with the notice in the Old Testament that God serves as the father of the fatherless. The words we read over are the reason Proverbs has to remind us to speak for those who have no voice (Prov 31:8).

Despite his own agony at being forgotten by his people, God did not forget the vulnerable children.

Have we forgotten the hurting children of our world?

Part V: Abandoned Children and Attachment Disorders

It was an international adoption. The abandoned boy came to the attention of a single parent in a neighboring nation. The paperwork was the easy part. The problems started when the youngster seemed unable to respond to the tenderness of his adopted father.

He taught him to walk, caught him when he fell, spoke to him with tenderness, wrapped him in bonds of love, but the boy did not respond. The child never acknowledged the affection of his adopted father and seemed intent on taking up the values and concerns that his father most abhorred. The harder the father tried to express his love, the more the boy rebelled.

Those who work with abandoned children commonly encounter attachment disorders, the difficulties that uncared for children have in responding to compassion. What may be uncommon about this particular story is its source.

The child’s name was Israel. Abandoned in Egypt, they cried out. God, the Father, responded to their cries and made Israel his son. The new father showed the child how to walk in the living room of Sinai, but young Israel seemed unable to fully comprehend the love that was offered and the beneficial instruction he had received. So he rebelled against his adopted father.

Hosea may tell the story out of his own anguish of being stepfather to teenage children of his promiscuous wife, Gomer. Jesus may have Hosea’s words in mind when he told about the Prodigal Son. Hosea’s touching words are in chapter 11 of his book where he finally cries out “How can I give you up….How can I hand you over?”

Hosea has two points in mind: First, we never give up on children because God never gives up on us. That takes attachment disorders out of the social work manual and frames them with the love of God. We have yet to meet a child who has more resistance to the adoptive parent than Israel had to the love of God.

Second, we never give up because we celebrate the smallest victories that love has over injustice. Hosea’s last chapter dreams of restless Israel taking root in the deep soil of God’s love just as we dream of the unsettled child at last finding home in the love we offer. At times, God seems to have planted and replanted the seedling Israel so many times that the soil would be worn out with the shoveling, but God takes each brief glimpse of growth as reason to go on.

The whole premise of Hosea’s book may be illogical: to go on loving those who seldom respond to that love. In that premise, a whole host of child care workers and foster or adoptive parents find hope, and like God, reason to go on.

We met at a local restaurant. Barely 16, she displayed all the classic signs of anxiety-tapping her cup, pushing back her hair, stealing quick glances at her father. Unmarried. Pregnant. Scared.

I was glad they had at least agreed to talk. Her mother argued for teenage marriage. Acceptable. Quick. Proper. Her father pushed abortion. Fast. Clean. Final. She thought it over slowly. Nothing seemed right. How could she ever make such a decision?

What could I saw that would give direction to this troubled adolescent Christian and her tense parents? How do we know what to do in troubling circumstances? Where do we look for direction? Fortunately, the book of Ephesians tells us that Christians face moral dilemmas with three distinct advantages. That’s good, because if anyone needed some edge it was this troubled teen.

First, Ephesians tell us great news! Even though the Ephesian Christians often made bad moral decisions, leaving them in moral bankruptcy, the author calls them the “faithful.” In the same book, he refers to them as “holy” and “blameless” but also as “darkened in their understanding” and “practicing all kinds of wickedness”! How could that be? How can somebody make bad judgments and still be called good? Don’t we have to make good moral decisions to keep our relationship with God?

Christians must comprehend grace before making moral decisions. Grace tells us: “I’m good not because of my moral life, but I’m good because of Jesus’ death on the cross; I’m not saved because I’ve struggled up some mountain, but I’m saved because Jesus has lifted me to the top; I’m not forgiven because I’m perfect, but I’m forgiven because of the blood of Jesus.” We conclude, “I don’t need to make good moral decisions in order to be saved and pure. I make moral decisions because I am saved and pure.”

As a result, we refocus the decision-making process from “Make something of yourself,” to “God has made something out of you, so act like it.” We don’t need to hear, “You ought to act like you’re somebody,” but rather “God has made you somebody. Respond accordingly.”

Outside of grace, we’re like the students the teacher warns on the first day of school, “If you study hard, you’ll get an A. If you don’t cause problems, you’ll do well. If you do your homework, you’ll pass this year.”

Inside of grace, we’re in cap and gown listening to the graduation speaker: “You’ve got your degree. Now use it. You’ve got your education. Now put it to work. You’ve got the knowledge. Now make the world a better place.”

Against all human reason, the troubled teenage Christian sitting across from me in the restaurant booth was a pure and holy child of God, not because of her own judgment and actions but because of the cross. Now God called her to walk in the light because God had saved her. We wondered whether she would stay with Christ or choose ignorance.

Paul’s letter to the Ephesians also emphasizes the work of God in making moral decisions. There are two sides to God’s role: modeling and power. In describing God as a model, the text urges “Put on the new nature, created after the likeness of God” and “be imitators of God.”

The Gospels show us how Jesus made moral decisions. From the temptation of Satan, through the interruptions of the crowds, to the interrogations of deceptive religious leaders-Jesus models proper decision making. Christian decision making doesn’t depend on clean movies and wholesome TV. We are not called to be like culture but like God. A moral culture may make it easier to live a godly life, to raise good kids, and to teach pure ways, but the Bible says our model, our hero is God!  (See Eph 4:24; 5:1).

Jesus’ example helped us in our restaurant conference. What would be the response of Christ, who allowed the sinful woman to wash his feet? Suddenly things became clearer, remembering that Jesus on another occasion wrote in the sand while the accusers dropped their stones.

The other side of God’s work in making moral decisions is his power. Ephesians 3:20 affirms that God’s power works in many ways. But how? The text tells us: When we fully understand grace, our lives change. When God’s love fills our hearts, our perspective improves. When God seals us with the Holy Spirit, our actions reflect him.

Paul contrasts what the Christians have with what the world has. Light, not darkness. Hope, not despair. Wisdom, not ignorance. Tender

hearts, not hard hearts. Prayer, not alienation. Body, not loneliness.

My young friend in the restaurant struggled with whether to walk with God or to go it alone. She knew his standard, yet her youthful innocence provided little experience of his power. In the coming days, she seemed moved by the prayers and expressions of support from other Christians. As her parents increasingly insisted on their way, we all watched in amazement at her growing faith and deepening maturity.

Third, Ephesians tells us that the moral decisions we wrestle with over cups of coffee have a heavenly context. Ephesians 6:12 states that we battle not just with flesh and blood, but with Satan and his armies in heavenly places. We make moral decisions in a heavenly, spiritual context. When a Christian decides moral issues, the whole spiritual world is involved. God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit are present, as are Satan, all the forces of wickedness, and all the evil angels. We’re not alone. God lifts Christians into heavenly places. Forces for good stand on our side. The Father, his Spirit and his Son witness every decision.

Ephesians reports that when we bow to evil, we “grieve the Holy Spirit of God” (Eph 4:30).   After each sin, the Holy Spirit cries. When we enter darkness, we hear wailing from the Spirit’s heart. The sobbing of the Holy Spirit echoes off the walls in the corridors of wickedness.

Other diners at the restaurant saw four people in a corner booth. Unknown to them, spirits from heaven and hell packed the room as that young Christian girl engaged in moral decision making. In the days to follow, the armies of righteousness fought skirmish after skirmish. Finally the forces of wickedness retreated. A few months later, she had a wonderful little baby girl. Careful premarital counseling prepared the new father and mother for marriage. One Sunday morning, God brought the father to Christ.

Ironically, moral dilemmas which leave us feeling isolated and confused are in reality the times when God most comes to our aid, reminding us of our grace-filled lives, leading us by his example and power, and surrounding us with the superior forces of righteousness. Don’t ever underestimate what may be going on in the corner of a restaurant. It may well be God winning another victory!

“The Unseen World of Moral Decision Making” was originally published in  UpReach (Apr.-June 1993) 19-21.  Used by permission.  UpReach was a publication of Herald of Truth Ministries.

THE POWER OF ONE
Harold & Sally Shank

Ruth and Mike were different. Ruth was a grandmother; Mike a student. Ruth was the daughter of a German woman who immigrated to Milwaukee; Mike grew up in the same southern town where his great-grandfather lived. Ruth clung to her family; Mike moved away from his. Most of Ruth’s relatives worked in the huge Milwaukee factories; many of Mike’s had been school teachers or professional people.

It’s doubtful that Ruth and Mike ever met. Yet what Mike did changed Ruth’s life because the Gospel travels through networks of human relationships. It moves from one person to another. While we may know the person who told us about Christ, we may have no idea who led our teacher to the Lord. Although we can name the person who learned about Christ through us, we may have little idea of our own “grandchildren” in Jesus. Even though Ruth and Mike are not aware of their relationship, we watched the Gospel travel from one to the other.

While a student in Milwaukee, Mike took his soiled jeans and dirty bedclothes to the Laundromat. As Mike loaded the washer, another young man named Tim put quarters in the dryer. As they sat on the purple plastic chairs, Tim noticed that Mike read from his Bible. Tim had questions. Maybe Mike had the answers. Mike was a Christian. Tim was searching. Soon the two were talking. The conversation wasn’t about soiled clothes, but about stained lives. As clothes cycled through the wash and rinse, Mike and Tim talked about life and Jesus.

A conversation that started while washing clothes led to a washing of Tim’s soul. After that first meeting, Mike and Tim studied again. Mike offered biblical answers to Tim’s difficult questions. Once Tim started on the Christian walk, he felt a need to tell others. Tim shared the Good News with his wife, Judy. Suspicious of what Tim had learned at the Laundromat, she resisted. He continued to teach her about the Christ of Scripture. One night, he baptized her in their bathtub.

Judy told her friend Audrey. Soon both Audrey and her son, Steve, came to church. Because of what they heard from Judy and then at church, they, too, became followers of Jesus. Steve started dating the girl who would become his wife. Christy not only fell in love with Steve, but with Jesus, too.

One night, Tim and Judy shared their new treasure with Greg. From their days in a rock band, Tim knew about Greg’s search for meaning in life. His investment in sex, drugs, and alcohol only landed him in a California rehabilitation hospital. Tim’s excitement about Christ touched Greg. One cold January morning, he went to the third floor or an office building where a young church rented facilities. Greg would recall that visit often.

“I sat on a broken folding chair, singing songs I didn’t know with people I’d never met, but I decided to return. There was something about the love in that room that drew me back.”

In the following weeks, an older Christian named Raymond befriended Greg. Raymond knew all about 2 Timothy 2:2, “what you have heard from me before many witnesses entrust to faithful men who will be able to teach others also.” What Paul did to Timothy, Raymond did to Greg. What Timothy did to others, Greg did to his friends.

The first friend Greg touched was Jeanne. Her parents loved Greg but despised his faith. They encouraged the courtship, but discouraged church attendance. Rising early Sunday morning, they read the Bible before going off to church. It wasn’t long before Jeanne asked to be baptized.

While Greg worked with Jeanne, Tim and Judy moved to a lower flat. Two single girls, Carol and Sue, lived upstairs. Soon the back steps became well worn as the relationships among the four grew. Friendship lead to talk about Jesus. Carol followed Christ first. Later Sue took the same step.

Greg and Jeanne began talking to her family. When they told Jeanne’s brother, Tom, about Jesus, Tom called his sister-in-law, Vickie. Vickie passed it on to her mother, Caroline. Caroline and Vickie both embraced Christ and then started working with Tom. Tom was willing to be a conduit, but never became convinced that he should follow Jesus.

Meanwhile, Tim’s classes at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee allowed him to meet other searching people. Just as he had gone to the Laundromat wondering about life, others took their questions to college. Tim wanted to be there for others just as Mike had been there for him. In one class, Tim met Angie. Two years before, her search led her to a cult group that practiced mind control and took all her money. Now she wanted out, but there didn’t seem to be any doors. Tim knew the way and helped Angie find freedom, not slavery, in Christ.

As Christ drew Angie out of the cult, she held on to the hand of her dear friend, Martha. Martha held on to her husband, Stan. Soon all three found relief and salvation in Christ. Martha’s mother, aghast at what the cult had done to her daughter, saw the healing that Christ brought to Martha’s life.

Martha’s mother was, you guessed it, Ruth.

Because Mike was willing to be used by God, a remarkable chain of events unfolded. Mike reached Tim. Tim touched Judy, Greg, Carol, Sue, and Angie. Through Judy, Christ came to Audrey, Steve and Christy. From Greg the line followed Jeanne to

Mary and Caroline. Angie linked with Martha, Stan, and Ruth. Fifteen people came to know Christ because one man was willing. A woman Mike would likely have never met, with whom he had almost nothing in common, came to Christ through the power of one.

The links in this chain were not forged in one week. The relationships in this network began long before Mike loaded up his dirty clothes. The domino effect of one man talking to another moved slow motion through a period of about six years. Not every story has ended on a positive note. Some on the chain have lost their love for Christ.

What Mike did that night in the laundromat continues to have its effect. Mike started a process that led Tim to Greg and that eventually led Greg to Raymond. About two years ago, Greg stood before the congregation as they selected him as one of their first two elders. From rock band to angel band. From high on drugs to high on Jesus. From following the scene of alcohol to leading the flock for Christ.

Paul to Timothy to Timothy’s convert to the next generations, and finally to us. From Mike to Tim to Greg. The Gospel travels through human networks. Each person in the chain is critical. The power of one makes a difference.

“The Power of One: Soul Mining” was originally published in 21st Century Christian (April 1995) 10-13.  Used by permission.