Epilogue

“Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious
appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus
Christ;”

—Titus 2:13

The calling of God to be a missionary is a monumental
challenge to any Christian, his spouse,
and his family. It is life-changing and ongoing—
not a one-day process. One person said it this way:
“You cannot rush the brush.”
    Being a missionary often means going in another
direction from that which had been planned. My
wife and I had planned for a normal working future,
but the Lord planned a future totally dependent upon
Him for the provision of all our needs, financial and
otherwise. At the time of the call, I looked forward
to being in His service, and today I still look forward
to it with all my being because I am totally His.
    Because the call came early in my Christian life
and was distinctly from the Lord, it was not difficult
for me to respond. It did mean, however, that I must
convince my wife that God had called us into His
service (which was not difficult) and that I would
have to give up my job and the security that went
with it. It meant leaving our country, our family,
and our friends. It meant living a life of dependence
upon the Lord, a life of faith rather than a life of
dependence upon our abilities and ourselves. When
we ventured forth on our journey with the Lord, we
burned all bridges so that turning back would never
be an option.
    To be called of the Lord to serve Him for life
is really a wonderful, incredible, and adventurous
experience! To realize, first of all, that God will personally
communicate with you is amazing. To have
faith that God can prepare you to serve Him in a different
nation and tongue is an exceptional blessing.
In the jargon of the day, “It is awesome.”
    As a Christian a person must be willing to die to
self and to be alive unto the Lord. As Isaiah responded,
“...Here am I; send me.” (Isaiah 6:8) And as the apostle
Paul said in answering God’s call, “...Lord, what wilt
thou have me to do?” (Acts 9:6)
    As missionaries we have learned the real meaning
of living by faith. In times of difficulty and lack,
when our faith begins to falter, God always comes
to the rescue. God has emphatically taught us that
He is still in command and still meets our needs in
response to our prayers. These are times of great
thankfulness and praise to our Lord and Saviour.
    The Savior was clear when He said,

“…Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel
to every creature.”
Mark 16:15

    We must not fail to realize that this command is for
every believer.

“…he that winneth souls is wise.”
Proverbs 11:30

    It has even been suggested that all Christians
should willingly surrender to the Lord for missions,
unless the Lord specifically directs them elsewhere.
    It has been a special blessing for me to recall
the actual events of our lives as missionaries to
Africa and Belize, Canada and the United States.
Each account recorded in our book "Oh Yes...God Can!"
either met a certain urgent need or caused us to lean
more heavilyupon our Lord. Each praise to the Lord
Jesus Christresulted in our loving Him more with a desire
to serve Him futher. Each soul won to the Lord brought
joy in heaven and joy to those involved.
    Every true Christian, young and old, may be used
of God to reach others. We are called to those who
need to be assured that their sins can be forgiven
and a place reserved for them in Heaven. Let us not
be satisfied until and unless we are reaching souls
for Christ, and let us never forget (Jeremiah 33:3),

“Call unto Me, and I will answer thee, and shew
thee great and mighty things, which thou knoweth
not.”
  
    My prayer is that these stories in the book "Oh Yes...God Can!"
will be an encouragementand blessing to all who read them.
Together we can look forward to the great and mighty things
God will do in the future, whether here on Earth or
there in Heaven. Let's git er done!

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Chapter 63

 

Faith in Action

.

“Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall

find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you.”

—Matthew 7:7 We had not been back to this church since the

early 80s when they started supporting our

ministry. Linda and I were very excited about the

opportunity to give an update of what God had been

doing for the last twenty years. We were also looking

forward to getting reacquainted with some dear friends.

Having left Belize for a six-month furlough, we

had three goals in mind for spending this time: one was

to pray for a vehicle for our ministry. We were driving

our daughter’s car, for which we were thankful, but

we needed one of our own. We continued to pray and

trust the Lord to fulfill this need.

We packed the car and headed off to Aubrey,

Texas, about an eight-hour drive. As we arrived,

the church looked much different than we last

remembered. It had been about twenty years or more

since our last visit. A small building which still stood

to the right was the old meeting place. Now we saw

that a massive and beautiful church building had

been erected to the left. This is where services are

held today. The attendance for the Sunday morning

church services used to run about one hundred fifty

persons, and now it had grown to over five hundred.

The hosts for our visit were Bill and Joann,

whom we had known for all these years; they are

our liaison at this church. We had the privilege to

lodge in their beautiful home for one night, and the

hospitality that was shown to us was so generous

that we didn’t want to leave. Thank you Bill and

Joann for your kindness and love for others.

Sunday morning came quickly with a delicious

breakfast that Joann had prepared for us, and then

off to church where we were to set up our display of

Belize.

I met with the Pastor and he explained to me what

was going to transpire that morning during the service.

After we had prayer together it was time for service to

start. The congregation joined in praying and singing

and then the time came for me to give an update.

I had ten minutes to speak, and I packed into those

ten minutes all that I could. After finishing, I headed

to my seat, which was way in the back row. As soon

as I sat down I was aware that I had forgotten to say

something and, before realizing it, I was standing up

in the aisle shouting and waving my hands in the

air at the Pastor. “Pastor, wait a minute! I forgot to

mention something!” It felt like all five hundred sets

of eyes turned around to see who was shouting from

the back row. The Pastor shouted back at me and

said, “Yes, Brother Ayers, what is it?”

“Pastor, I forgot to mention that we need something

to drive.” The Pastor announced to the congregation,

“You heard him, he needs something to drive.”

The Pastor preached, gave an invitation, and

dismissed everyone. We headed to our display and

waited to shake hands with the congregation. The

first couple out of the doors came directly to our

table; the wife did all the talking. “Bro. Ayers, we

have a vehicle we would like to give you.” “Yes!”

I said excitedly. She explained, “It is a Ford.”

“Yes!” I answered. “It is a 2003 Ford Escape.” I

happily replied, “Yes!” yet again. She continued to

say, “We will have it here at the church tonight.”

With slight disappointment I replied, “We won’t

be here tonight. Can you bring it about three

o’clock this afternoon?” “We want to clean it up,”

she told us. “Do not worry about cleaning it,” I

said with a smile. “Okay,” she said, “we will have

it here at three o’clock this afternoon.” Then they

quickly left as fast as they had come. Here we

stood amazed at what God had just done! We were

excited and eager to see our new vehicle that He

had so miraculously supplied!

When we met up with our hosts and told them

all about how the Lord had supplied a vehicle, they

were delighted for us. We also told them that we had

to be back at the church at three o’clock to receive it.

They told us not to worry, we would be there.

We all piled into our vehicles, and went off to

lunch together with our hosts and the Pastor and his

wife. We all had a great time of fellowship and a

delicious meal, but the main thing on our minds was

that 2003 Ford Escape the Lord had just given us! All

I wanted to know was what color it was. Our favorite

color is white. Will it be white or some other color?

Many questions were running through our minds,

and it would not be long until they were all answered.

Praise the Lord! It was almost three o’clock and

we headed back to the church to get our 2003 Ford

Escape. Our hosts were with us and they entered into

the church to see the action. Here we all stood in eager

anticipation! Slowly, a beautiful WHITE 2003 Ford

Escape drove up! We were all smiles! The husband

was driving the Escape and his wife pulled up behind

him in another car. He got out of the Escape and left

it running. His wife got out of the other car with the

title in hand which she signed and gave to me. We

shook hands and gave them a big thank you, and they

were gone in what seemed like in an instant! There

we stood in awe, beside our new 2003 WHITE Ford

Escape. Words cannot describe how we felt at this

moment. Our host came out of the church and we all

had a good time rejoicing. We loaded up our brand

new 2003 WHITE Ford Escape, which was full of

gas and the AC blowing cold, and we were ready to

head to our next church. Thanking our hosts, Bill left

us with these words: “I have heard of faith all my life,

but today I saw faith in action.”

Chapter 62

 

Cell Phone to the Rescue

.

“…For your Father knoweth what things ye have

need of, before ye ask Him.”

—Matthew 6:8 Furlough was on the horizon. Bro. Jack and Lois

McLain had traveled down to Belize to take our

place while we were in the USA. We were in need

of a place to live for a year while visiting our supporting

churches. We wanted to give a report and to

seek funds to buy land and erect a church building

in Orange Walk Town. This is the town where the

Lord had blessed us with the starting of Freedom

Baptist Church.

In Jacksonville, Florida, our youngest daughter,

Joy, had been attending a church and wanted us

to visit it with her. It was an absolutely beautiful

Sunday morning. My wife and I, together with

Joy and our two grandchildren headed to church.

Arriving, we were greeted by some of the members

and led to our seats.

The service was great with good singing and

preaching from the Word of God. The Pastor just

happened to mention that their missionaries, who

were living in the mission house of the church, were

leaving for Russia in a few weeks. My mind went

into overdrive thinking that here is a mission house

that would be empty in a little while, and we needed a

place to live during our furlough. I did not know these

Christians, and they did not know us, though we all

had one Person in common and His Name was Jesus.

When the service ended we headed to the

nursery, picked up our grandchildren, and headed

to my daughter’s SUV. Although I had wanted to

talk to the Pastor about the mission house, I didn’t

get the opportunity, so we all headed to Famous

Amos for some lunch. As we were driving down the

road my cell phone rang, and I saw that it was my

daughter Joy, who was in the back seat, calling. So I

asked her, “Joy, why are you calling me when I am

right here?” “Dad, I’m not calling you,” she replied.

Well, the cell phone indicated that Joy was calling,

so I answered it and heard a voice say, “Is this Joy’s

dad?” I was a little shocked to say the least, but I

said, “Yes, it is.”

The lady calling said that she was the daughter

of the Pastor whose church we had just visited. She

explained that she had been walking to her car in

the parking lot when she spotted a cell phone lying

on the pavement. She picked it up and called the

number that said “Dad.” Meanwhile, Joy had been

looking for her cell phone, and when she couldn’t

find it concluded that it must have dropped out of

her purse. The Pastor’s daughter said that she would

wait in the parking lot for us to return.

We whipped around faster than a tornado and

headed back to the church. When we arrived, guess

who else was there? Yes, the Pastor and his wife. Joy

recovered her cell phone and we had our little chit chat.

You know, of course, what I was thinking all the while.

This was a great opportunity to talk about the mission

house since the opportunity had presented itself.

“Pastor, do you think it might be possible when

your missionaries leave for Russia, that we could

use the mission house while on furlough?” To my

amazement, the Pastor replied, “Yes, that might be

a possibility.” Wow, did that make my day! We all

thanked the Pastor’s daughter for rescuing Joy’s cell

phone and thanked the Pastor and his wife for the

possibility of using the mission home. Only God

could arrange this little episode.

We headed off to lunch again discussing what

had transpired because of a dropped cell phone at a

church we had visited for the first time. We talked

about how loving the Christians had been to us

without even knowing anything about us except that

we were missionaries to Belize. I suppose that was

enough for brothers and sisters in Christ.

We continued to visit this church when we were

in town, and about a month later the Pastor suggested

that I come by, and he would give us the keys to the

mission house. Praise the Lord! The church had

decided to let us use it while on furlough. The house

was beautiful, comfortable, and exactly what we

needed for our furlough time.

What are the odds that the only person out of the

entire congregation to find the cell phone would be

the Pastor’s daughter? When we had left the parking

lot on that day it was still full of cars, and the Pastor’s

daughter was next to the last one to leave. It is awe

inspiring to see the amazing ways that God chooses

to place you where He wants you to be.

This time it was a small cell phone!