Posted in The Christian Life

This last week, as I mentioned yesterday, I attended the Pastor's and Leader's Conference for our church movement for all of the Northwest Region of the United States. Wonderful event, and God spoke to me in so many ways. I wanted to share with you my favorite.

On the drive to Spokane, I was listening to John Loeffler's radio show on CD (you'll find a link to his website on my side bar under Steel on Steel, I believe). He was discussing the problems with the emergent church and seeker church movements, and mentioned yet again the classic work by Francis Schaeffer. I've wanted to read this book for quite a while, but always seem to forget to put it on my shopping list; the man spoke of the direction the church was taking and where it would end up, much of which is coming to pass today.

That afternoon, I saw again a gentleman I met last year by the name of Paul Smith. If you're familiar with Calvary Chapel, he's the brother of the founder of our movement, Chuck Smith. Paul is a sweet, grandpa type, with a shy smile, deep intelligence, and a heart for his Savior. I didn't get to talk to him until the second night, and that's a story in itself. A friend from my church had invited me to stay at her mom's place with her in Hillyard, and made sure to show me how to get there the first night from the Spokane church; this night owl needed to get there on my own, while she went home as soon as we let out to be with her family. After she left, I then decided to go back into the side hall (where all the books, CDs and other info tables were) to look again at a new textbook on apologetics for kids (more on that another day). This particular lady left after half an hour, so I moved on to Paul's table to peek at whatever books he might have available.

The background on him involves the structure of our movement. We are a loose band of churches with the same beliefs and basic format, unlike denominations such as the Assemblies of God, which have a clear church hierarchy and national office. So, for us, the publications, books, and general information department, called Calvary Chapel Outreach Fellowship, serves to link us all together. Hence Paul being present at this conference.

On his table, was a DVD of Francis Schaeffer with the same title as his classic work. I asked the man behind the table if it was just a collection of talks that Schaeffer gave on the subject, or did it actually include the text as well. He didn't know, and called Paul over to give me what info he knew. We ended up in a fascinating discussion of church history, current church movements, and the recently released papers of a scholar named Harold LIndsell. Paul suddenly stops and says, "Here, why don't I give you a copy of a paper I just wrote?" We continued the discussion for a while, then I left to go "home" for the night.

I only read half of the document before really needing sleep, but I was noticing typos and minor corrections that needed to be made -- call it my background doing proofreading, but things like that are very obvious to me. I concluded that he hadn't published it yet, and considered offering him my services in proofreading the next morning first thing. I fell asleep wondering why he had given it to me, and not someone else of greater stature, or at least greater age.

I didn't catch him again until the conference was over the next afternoon. More than 3/4 of the attendees had left already, and I thought I'd just check the side room one more time before leaving myself. As I turned the corner, he was coming right at me on his way out. He confirmed that he had not published it yet, and I asked if he'd like my help in proofreading it. I thought he was going to cry! He simply said, "That's an answer to my prayers!" He gave me his contact info, and we went our separate ways.

If you have been following my writing at all, you know that my heart is to write, and in fact, that seems to be part of the call on my life. The main problem I face is location; I'm a stay-at-home mom in a rural part of Washington, so how do I get to use my talents? I can write for my local paper, teach my local women's Bible study, do a little blogging here and there, but nothing on the kind of scale that I'd love to do. Here I get wrapped up in proofreading for a man involved in the distribution of Christian materials from California! Who knows where this will lead, but I see a bit of light through a doorway that I didn't notice before.

So, paper is proofed. I need to mail it off, and see what happens from there. God's ways are truly mysterious, above my own, and greater than I could ever ask or hope.