Woman On A Mission Ministry

On Sun­days for the last 3 years, I have noticed Jimmy sit­ting by him­self, a few rows in front of us on the aisle for the hand­i­capped at St. Andrews. He’s most notice­able because he sings praises to God with such gusto. Lean­ing on his metal walker, he raises his hands heav­en­ward. Seem­ingly unaware of any­one except Jesus, I could tell that he truly was wor­ship­ing the One who saved him. Some­times Jimmy would begin to joy­fully clap his hands, caus­ing a rip­ple of praise all around him as oth­ers would join in.

At com­mu­nion time, every­one could hear the sound of his walker as he made his way to the altar. Clunk, clunk, clunk came the sound as he slowly pro­ceeded for­ward among the crowds to be blessed with the bread and wine.

A few weeks ago, I real­ized I’d not seen Jimmy at church in a long time. I called the church office to get his phone num­ber or even his last name, but it seemed there was no record of Jimmy at all. I won­dered if he’d been sick or per­haps even died with­out any­one knowing.

Then in early Decem­ber, there he was again in his reg­u­lar spot qui­etly read­ing his Bible before the ser­vice, his walker rest­ing by the pew. Glad to see him, I gave him a hug and asked, “Jimmy, where have you been?” Smil­ing, he told me he’d been sick and in the VA hos­pi­tal. This dear man had fought for our coun­try but now he seemed nearly lost in the crowd and ignored at this time in his life. I invited him to come to the prayer room after com­mu­nion so that our team could pray for his health, and he nod­ded, promis­ing that he’d be there.

Then I asked for his phone num­ber. Low­er­ing his head, Jimmy said, “Mam, I’ve had a few finan­cial set­backs lately. I’ll give you my num­ber but you won’t be able to reach me until I pay my bill. Then you can call me anytime.”

Return­ing to my seat beside my hus­band, I asked him if he had any cash that we could give Jimmy to pay his phone bill. Wayne gladly gave me a suf­fi­cient bill.

When it was time for com­mu­nion, I slipped in beside Jimmy and placed the bill in his had. When he saw what it was, his mouth fell open, tears sprang to his eyes and he looked almost shocked. I made my way to the alter think­ing that Jimmy may indeed be often forgotten.

As the ser­vice came to a close, Jimmy entered the prayer room with the famil­iar clunk, clunk, clunk. As he approached my friend and me, we asked him how we could pray for him. A big smile broke across his face and he exclaimed, “I don’t need a thing! I just came back here to get some­one to thank the Lord with me for meet­ing my needs!” As tears rolled down his face, Jimmy said, “After all these years, I almost lost my faith a few weeks ago. I was sick. I felt like Jesus didn’t hear me any­more, like He’d for­got­ten me. This morn­ing Jesus showed me that He did hear my prayers. I know today that Jesus remem­bers Jimmy.”

We laid hands on him, joined him in thanks­giv­ing, and prayed for his health. As Jimmy left the prayer room, his tears rolled across a big smile as he made his way back to his seat.

Our Lord can do great things with even the small things we give in His name. No only may we meet a need, we may even have the chance to see Him do far more–restore the faith of some­one who feels forgotten.

I Peter 5: 6, 10: There­fore, hum­ble your­selves, lower your­selves in your esti­ma­tion under the shadow of Almighty God, that in due time, He may exalt you. Cast­ing all your anx­i­eties on Him, all your wor­ries and concerns–once and for all–upon Him who cares for you watch­fully. After you have suf­fered a lit­tle while, the God of all grace–Who imparts bless­ing and favor —will com­plete and make you what you ought to be, estab­lish and ground you securely, strengthen and set­tle you.

Friends, let us be alert to the Jim­mys in our path–and sen­si­tive to the Spirit who loves them with the great­est love of all.

My dear friend, Lynda Elliott is an author, life coach, speaker, and, most impor­tantly, NOTa for­get­ful hearer, but a faith­ful doer, of the Word.

A week ago I came home from work early with the worst migraine of my life. Think­ing I shouldn’t drive, I called my hus­band to pick me up. Wise choice. As soon as I got home, I began throw­ing up and later passed out cold on the bath­room floor, frac­tur­ing sev­eral bones in my face. A trip to the ER by ambulance–a first for me–and test after test, I was sent home after deter­min­ing it was “just” a migraine and not some­thing worse.

Pain has a sober­ing effect on the soul. Unex­pected bless­ing is found in hav­ing the time to reflect, pray and read. I have a renewed deter­mi­na­tion to live the motto my friend Bob Buford intro­duced me to a while back: Go bold or go home.” To live unafraid for Jesus, uncon­cerned with people-pleasing and mate­ri­al­is­tic triv­ial pur­suits. To be about the work God pre­pared before­hand for me to do, with­out fear-driven hes­i­tancy. Ordi­nary inse­cu­ri­ties still plague me far too much. God wants me–us–free.

My head–it hurts some­thing awful but my heart is full and happy.

Tears are falling.
Hearts are break­ing.
How we need to hear from God.

Though a Christ­mas song about the birth of the Christ child, the haunt­ing lyrics keep ring­ing in my head this mid-September. Every Thurs­day evening when 10 women on the Woman on a Mis­sion lead­er­ship team and I visit a prison in Pine Bluff, we hear story after story of sor­row, pain, and regret. They are women very much like you and me– they love their chil­dren, enjoy a good laugh, com­pas­sion­ately care for fel­low inmates, long for dig­nity, respect, love. They want to know they mat­ter.

Most of their pain seems to cen­ter on the deep heav­i­ness they feel over the fool­ish choices that landed them there–behind razor wire, away from chil­dren, friends and free­dom. Lately it seems prac­ti­cally every­one of the 60 in our class has lost a loved one to death or fear they soon will.

“My mother is dying of heart fail­ure –and I’m here… I may never see her again, the god­liest woman I know.”

“My brother –only 49–died sud­denly on Sun­day of a heart attack.”

“Rebecca, an inmate in my unit, her hus­band, dad, and daugh­ter were killed in a car wreck on the way home from vis­it­ing her this week. She got an early release to go home and care for the baby, a one month old, and her 9 year old daughter.”

Tears are falling.
Hearts are break­ing.
How we need to hear from God.
You’ve been promised; we’ve been wait­ing.
Wel­come to our world.
Wel­come to our world.

The dif­fer­ence between them and me, and per­haps between them and you, is the polar oppo­site start they had in life. Abused, neglected, aban­doned, exposed to the under­belly of soci­ety at ten­der ages, they per­haps did the best they could, at least most of the time. Per­haps not. Hard truth is, they are where they are today –in what is pos­si­bly the best prison in the state–yet impris­oned all the same. Lonely, afflicted, needy, oppressed, out­cast, poor, bro­ken­hearted. Not across the big blue ocean in a remote vil­lage in Africa. Right here, 50 min­utes from Lit­tle Rock. Hun­gry for every morsel we toss them, grate­ful beyond belief that some­one cares.

Jesus said Fol­low me, not Come sit and study. Fol­low. Me.

What do you have to give oth­ers? Give it to Me first and I’ll bless it. Then you offer it to oth­ers. Be a part of a mir­a­cle. Come, walk on water –just like Me. (See Matthew 14 and Mark 6.)