July Newsletter 2018
Faithful is He who calls you
A few days ago, I called my good friend Dale Howard in Woodstock, which is very close to Baltimore. He answered his cell phone and took a break from his work to talk. In the course of the conversation, our stint in basic training at Fort Lewis, Washington was brought up. There were some things about the story I had forgotten.
When we arrived at Fort Lewis for basic training, we landed in the same barracks for a brief time. Dale was 20 years old and I was 21. I stayed to my bunk most of the time because I wasn’t interested in the conversations that went on in various groups around the barracks. They were uncomfortable and offensive to me. When Dale found out I was a Christian, he promptly informed me that he was an atheist. It didn’t end there, however, as he often came over to my bunk to ask me questions. They were always about God and Christianity. I felt quite inadequate, but did my best to answer his questions. I really didn’t think I was getting anywhere with him, but I was wrong.
After basic was completed, and we had moved on to our next assignments, I was greatly surprised to get a letter from Dale. He stated that he had become a Christian due to my life and witness. I wrote back to tell him how very cool that was and to encourage him. I also included a scripture.
Well, in our recent conversation, he encouraged me with a scripture. It was the one I had sent him in that first letter, and he said the very first scripture he ever memorized.
“Faithful is He that calleth you,
who also will do it.”
1 Thessalonians 5:24 KJV
However Dale quoted me the scripture like this
“Faithful is He that calls you,
who also will do it.”
I love this version because it is the way I first learned it and it just seems to have a magical ring to it.
Well, I got to thinking about the verse, and I wondered what it meant to Dale at the time, and what it means to him now, so I called him again.
“At the time you sent it, it didn’t mean anything to me. It was strange,” he said. But as time went on, it meant more and more to him until it has become one of his favorite verses. It means a lot to him now, and also to his wife, Marge.
“He loved us when we were still sinners. He was here long before we were,” Dale said. “He’s the alpha and omega. He started it and He’ll finish it. It’s the bedrock of our faith (and I could hear through the phone his wife, Marge agreeing.)
Dale continued, “Sometimes things don’t work out the way I want them to, but God’s got it. In the end, it’s going to be okay. It’s not that we are to do nothing, but that we put our trust in his great ability to finish what He started.”
Faithful is he that calls you, who also will do it.
What an incredible promise from our loving Father!
There is balance in the Christian life, a balance between works and rest. James says that works are evidence of inward faith. He says that if he see no works in a person’s life, then he wonders if there is any genuine faith.
The flip side of that is that we are not to strive and struggle and work ourselves into a lather. Hebrews 4 speaks about a rest for the child of God. The writer admonishes us to enter into the rest that God has for us.
Our Friends,
Dale and Marge Howard
The sooner we are fully convinced that he will do it, the sooner we will enter into his rest. Having full confidence in God’s ability to make it happen, takes a lot of the stress and strain out of the journey.
When I gave my life to Christ as a senior in high school, I knew immediately that God wanted to use me to reach young people. I went to Bible College, got a degree and then began working in advertising. I’m not sure how I got into advertising, except the opportunity was there and I needed to provide for my family. That stint lasted for twenty five years, and there were times I thought surely I had missed the call of God on my life.
The climax of that frustration came one night as I was visiting my son at the service station where he was fulfilling his work/study program. “I don’t get it,” I said. “I’m called to ministry, and I’m working in advertising.”
One year later, I was reaching youth in a way that I could have never felt possible, producing an event that drew about 2800 young people. At the altar call, people were backed up into the aisles halfway to the back of the gym.
The twenty five years of advertising was preparation, and it was perfect training for doing large youth events. The kicker is that I didn’t have an inkling that I would produce events. I thought I had missed it working in advertising, but it was God’s training for something I didn’t know I would ever do, produce outreach events for youth.
It is evidence that God directs your steps even when you don’t know He’s doing it. The steps of a good man (or woman, or young person) are ordered by the Lord. Psalm 37:23
God did it perfectly, and while he was doing it, I didn’t even know what He was doing.
Faithful is He that calls you,
who also will do it.
Christian, trust God. Trust Him, that whatever He has called you to, He also will do it!
What is going on in the month of July
We are ready to create our web site. We are hoping to have an appointment with our web designer this month yet. Please keep this in your prayers. This will be a key tool in launching George’s first book. We also still need finances to print the paper version of his book.
July 10th-16th we will be in Waskish, Minnesota to work on our books. Lorraine will be working on her illustrations for her children’s book and George is working on his second book. We will also be spending some concentrated time in prayer.
Sunday July 15th, 2018 – Big Bog Festival Ecumenical Church Service @9:00 a.m. Located in Homestead Park Waskish, Minnesota
We will be ministering with music.
In His Service,
George and Lorraine Halama