AN APPOINTED TIME
"The vision is yet for an appointed time, but at the end it shall speak, and not lie: though it tarry, wait for it; because it will surely come, it will not tarry."
(Habakkuk 2: 2- 3 --NIV)
I remember one time counting all the different places in which I had lived while growing up. There were 16 by the time I was sixteen, including one in Michigan where my father worked in a factory building Army tanks. Almost all of those places hold precious memories, although one stands out more than all the rest, a little wooden cabin nestled in the woods near a covered bridge.
The memories are truly precious, although life there was anything but easy, especially for my mother, with seven of her eight children still at home. From the coal fired 'cook stove' on which mom cooked meals, to the pot-bellied 'coal stove' in the living room, which never, ever heated the entire house, to coal oil lights, and an outside 'privy', my mother had her hands full 24 / 7. But those hands were also filled with an abundance of love for each one of us.
I recall how, in the summer, my brother Ted and I were often busy helping our father in his search of scrap metal, and then getting it to the junkyard for the few dollars it might bring. On many days during winter months, Dad would have us trekking over 'bony piles' (discarded coal refuse) to gather the 'good lumps' of coal that the miners inadvertently discarded, which he would then sell to bring in a few dollars for family needs. More often than not though, he'd take it home to fire the coal stoves.
It's strange how adversity will often direct one to his path of destiny. I remember one day learning the dreadful news that my mother was diagnosed with terminal cancer. I watched as dad quickly accepted a neighbor's invitation, many times offered before, to bring us all to church. My life was changed forever by those factors, Mom contracting cancer, the humble environment of that little wooden cabin, and the invitation of a Christian neighbor just down the lane.
Church was an awesome experience for a boy of 10, from the bright florescent lights to the dazzling red carpet to the beautiful music and singing and the compelling stories of Jesus' love, which I believed, and accepted. Not long after that, we moved away from our little cabin nestled in the woods, taking the memories with us.
During the years that followed, I attended church faithfully, never missing a Sunday even if it meant walking or hitchhiking. I had a '4-Year-Perfect- Attendance' pin to prove it.
At age fourteen, during a summer camp meeting for boys at Living Waters Campground, near Cherry Tree, PA, on a dirt and straw floor near the altar one evening, God very clearly spoke to me about taking the Gospel to Africa, even though I wandered from His path shortly afterwards. In those dark years that followed, His call to Africa never left my spirit not even for one second.
This coming August 21st, 31 years will have passed since rededicating my life to God, and pursuing the mission work to which He called me in Africa.
"After this I looked, and there before me was a door standing open in heaven. And the voice I had first heard speaking to me like a trumpet, said, "Come up here, and
I will show you what must take place after this." (Rev 4:1-NIV)
God opened a door for me to visit Kenya, East Africa in January of 1987, and I've returned many times since, to minister, forge vital relationships and lay essential groundwork for establishing The Grace Christian Mission Hospital (GCMH). It will be a healing place, a multi-functional facility prayerfully designed to administer cost-free help and healing, medically, educationally and spiritually, to the sick, the poverty-stricken, the hurting and dying and, really, to all who are in need and enter its doors.
"Let us rise up and build" (Nehemiah 2:18)
In 1991, the ministry purchased a ten-acre site near Nakuru on which to construct the GCMH facility. Nakuru is located in the center of Kenya near the equator, and lies within the Nakuru District, which has a population of several million souls, and growing.
As the 'appointed time' has now come and construction of GCMH is underway, I am so grateful as I'm reminded of you, our faithful supporters and your prayers and help over the years. From the significant gift of the small church group in New England, which enabled us to purchase the ten-acre site without borrowing, (Its value, by the way, has quadrupled!), to others who gave special gifts, and the daily 'Manna', which supplies our every 'need'. Because of your faithful support even as we are now deeply into the project's first phase, 'The Nehemiah Walls', JSMI remains debt free! Luke 1:37!
"Blessed is he who has regard for the weak; the LORD delivers him in times of trouble. The LORD will protect him and preserve his life; he will bless him in the land and not
surrender him to the desire of his foes." (Psalm 41:1-2 -NIV)
