I believe in Prayer. I need Prayers.
Pray for me if you believe in Prayer. I am
asking.
Marriage in the Horizon? This is not funny!
The following is a letter from a friend of many years for your prayers.
Gerry.
Hi Gerry.
I am going to be very (“forward today”). I am sending you this letter from
a couple that worked in Peru. I want you to know a little about him. He was a
widower when we met him. He was pastoring in a Spanish-speaking congregation
here in California.
Well, being Peruvian, he went to Peru. He had two sons, maybe three, who
were grown--maybe in college, but pretty much grown. Well, in Peru he met this
young missionary. I say young because she was over 15 years younger than him.
BUT, she was working with indigenous peoples, maybe Yanesha
(an Amazon Jungle tribe) already. They talked at length and realized that their
ministries (“fit”) perfectly. They ended up getting married and have been
working, as they mention in the letter, for 6 years there in Peru, after
raising support together. He had to leave the pastorate here, of course.
Gerry, don't know about your health, but I wish God
had something like that for you. It is so wonderful to have company. I just
wish there were someone for you.
Please do not be upset with me. God knows your needs
and will continue to supply them, according to His riches in glory in Christ
Jesus. I know you trust Him.
Your friend,
xxxxxxx (I have not as her authorization to share her name).
Dear xxxxxxx,
I must look so pitifully in you eyes for you to write to me as you did.
“Gerry, don't know about your health, but I wish God had
something like that for you. It is so wonderful to have company. I just wish
there were someone for you”.
Please do not be upset with me. God knows your needs
and will continue to supply them, according to His riches in glory in Christ
Jesus. I know you trust Him.
How dare you treat me as if I have nothing better to do but chase
after girls, as if Jesus is not enough for me and, as if I am idle, doing
nothing but being miserable without women? Who do you think you
are? Are you some sort of “Your brother’s keeper or something?
Of course I want to be angry with you (Yente the
matchmaker) for about two seconds then I immediately I got over it. How
could I fail to see the force of your caring heart and concern for my
happiness “in your view.”
In honor of the
truth I will answer to your letter as clear as I can.
It
is my conviction that I am the happiest man I know, on this side of heaven
and among the living; not that there are not others happier that I on earth,
but I do not know them as much I know myself, in spite of all my sorrows.
But in the same breath I must admit that I am also the most miserable man
on earth that I know because I feel the weight of the world on my
shoulders as if the coming of the Kingdom of God would depend on me and my
faithful work for God. I know that sounds crazy, but to me that is the
only reality there is and worth living and dying for.
As you know my friend, my wife Ruthie, was a lady in a class of
her own and my daughter Keila was the “Chip of the
old block” like her mother, also a legend of her own and a faithful servant of our
Lord Jesus.
Having lived as one with such a company of “Gentle Officers and gentlewomen
of the Lord” I have the daunting task to live a life honoring their legacy and
that of our Lord Jesus whom they loved unto death.
At the second year after Ruthie died and at the counsel of others like
you who care for me and said, “It is not good for a man to be alone”. I married
again with the determination to make another woman just as happy as my Ruthie.
I thought I was qualified to succeed only to find out that it takes two to
“Tango.”
Soon we both stop recognizing Jesus one in the other and the human strength
was proved once again not enough to keep us together let along united.
She left me seven times and she return to me seven
times. The last time she left it was the unanimous counsel of the Godly to let
her go. The great pain of the experience has left a deep scar similar to
the pierced hands of Jesus.
But the side effect on my life at knowing the Love of God in Jesus and the
cost he paid for loving me has made the experience worth everything to me. I would not change
a thing because above all I have come to know the sovereignty of God in the
most intimate way.
On the other hand I have come to know the jealous love of God for me and his ever-sufficient love for all my needs and wants. Therefore
I must tell you that I fear seeking on my own initiative another girl as much
as I have a need for her.
I am only open to that where our Lord’s will and initiative leads.
I will welcome it even if it kills me or again I might be humiliated
in failure unto death.
As things are in my life
I hate loneliness but at the same time I treasure it because I am not alone,
the presence and the hand of the Lord is with me.
I might look to you and others as who have become an idle
man doing nothing.
That is not the case; it is true that all I have is time but not enough to
change the world in my lifetime. I am still committed to “Speed the Lord’s
return” 2 Peter 3:12, so I really do not have enough time to do all that I
want to do.
I will keep focusing on the Power of “Faith Full”
Prayer according to the will of God as revealed in the Word of God that leads
men into alignment with God and ultimate oneness, where power and authority in
Jesus are no longer a necessity but a priceless possession. F=PW2
Reading between the lines, I gather that you must be happy in
your marriage and ministry because you mention in your letter “it is
wonderful to have company.” Are you in Africa, California or Peru at the
present time?
I have not seen you for over ten
years. I send my greetings to your, husband and your children. Thank
you for thinking of me as you do my friend.
Gerry
Gutierrez.
PS. I long to go back to Peru but only for one reason and one reason only. To reach out my people whom I dearly love and miss and want to be
buried with them. I do want to work myself to death, but for what I want
to do I need 1.5 million dollars. One million to build a building and ½
million for operating expenses for five years and “guarantee success.”
Pray because I am still standing like a bullock in front of the altar ready to
plow or ready to be sacrificed as the saints of old said, “Ready for either”.
PS. 2. In regards to girls, I know how to love them and love them well and
I can marry any woman regardless of her looks but I prefer the unfading beauty
of godliness of a girl who is in love with Jesus above anything and everything
in life.
I truly love, admire and adore godly
woman and I pity the fool who does not recognize Jesus and his godly
wife.
He who does not treasure his godly wife does not treasure the Holy
Spirit for without either a Christian man cannot make it alone as a believer or
a man.
We men need godly helper, counsel, encouragement from one who knows us best
and in whom we trust and rest as in ourselves.
“Never
compete in any thing with your husband or wife.”
GG.