“Oh To See Ourselves As Others See Us”

It is impossible to judge ones self accurately. I can picture in my mind myself as a thirteen year old. In one picture I am on my way to the county fair. I have on my head (I am so ashamed to admit it) a long haired, gray, winter hat (yes HAT, not wig) that I have brushed down to look like hair. I am wearing it in August. I thought I looked adorable. I didn’t.

So I ask myself, where was my mother!!! She was a sensible, wise and good woman who loved me dearly. Surely she could have put a stop to such poor judgment? But I feel certain that she just couldn’t bring herself to tell me I looked ridiculous and so said nothing. I wish she had.

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We had completed the first twelve DVDs. We would force our family members to watch every one of them and they always gave raved reviews. But like my mother, family can not always be trusted to give an accurate opinion.


Though we had talked to a few churches, no church had jumped at the chance to use them for their ladies ministry. In fact, one church had rejected them after viewing the first video because of a theological difference. (They would later embrace the study and incorporate it into their highly successful Women’s Ministry program.)


The truth is we had no idea if the work we had done would resonate with other women. We simply could not judge it accurately. We had begged God to help the women who watched the programs to truly “learn for life” through our teaching. But in order for the student to learn, the teacher must have presented the material in an interesting and understandable way. We just didn’t know if we had accomplished that or not.


Susan Frost was director of the Women’s Ministry at Eastside Baptist Church in Marietta Georgia. She was a friend and knew about what we were trying to do. She took a leap of faith and added The Amazing Collection: The Bible for Women Book By Book to their fall program. And with that we waited.


Waiting is not fun especially when a lot is hanging on the outcome. We had a great deal tied up in the work. Not only a large amount of money been donated and spent but also a tremendous amount of work had gone into the project by forty plus people. Still we had no guarantee that what we had done was “good enough” for women and ministry.


On February 13, 2002 I got a call. The Eastside ladies loved the videos! They were learning so much. And YES they were learning for life.


I am not sure what happens between the confidence of a thirteen year old and the lack of confidence of fifty plus year old but I do know that at thirteen we can think more highly of ourselves then perhaps we ought. But later in life it can be just the opposite. Life has shown us that there are many others who are smarter and better at any given talent and yes, even have more fashion sense then we do! Eleanor, Linda, Margie and I all struggled with trying to see the filmed sessions with clear eyes but we just couldn’t. We would find every flaw and grieve over not doing a better job. At last we had to go to the only source of comfort and help we knew. “Lord, please give us Your power and wisdom to do the best that we can. But where it is not good enough change it and make it so.


These days as I receive words of praise from as far away as the Middle East, England, Scotland, New Zealand and Australia not to mention the many emails of encouragement from the states, we all realize that God heard our prayers. He has literally “cooked the DVDs” in the can” and has helped us produce a tool that greatly impacts women and helps them learn for life about every book in God’s Word. It is His and He has done it.

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The amazing thing was that on that fateful night as a thirteen year old, I met my future husband for the first time. He was fourteen and at the fair with a mutual friend. It is evidence of God’s grace and mercy that I would even be considered to be his wife after such an unfortunate first impression. It is also evidence that it is not our great wisdom that matters but God’s great intervention, kindness, strength and mercy.


Yes, judging oneself accurately is impossible.

Our soul waits for the Lord;

He is our help and our shield.

Our heart shall rejoice in Him,

Because we have trusted in His holy name.

Let Your mercy, O Lord, be upon us,

Just as we hope in You.

Psalm 33:20-22

Unsung Heroes

There is a lot of talk these days about vision. I have been in on a couple of “corporate type” talks that focus on the importance of vision and staying the course and leadership and making goals. I think that is all well and good. But it does leave out a most significant fact that I think in many ways is an important one. It is not all about the leader. It is about the followers. Anyone can have a vision. But not everyone can do the work. In other words, you have to have the expertise and the talent to get the job done. Those unsung people who can get the job done are the true heroes of any endeavor.

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The first five times we filmed, we did it in the Fellowship Bible Church auditorium. It was a rather barren place at that time and there was much that needed to be done. The stage for the teachers was a mess. One of the cameras needed to be on a platform five feet high. The sound needed to be coordinated with the tech man at the church. Lighting needed to be just so. The audience (which at that time was 500 excited women) needed to be managed. All details that I, the visionary, had not thought about! But someone had.

And so the day before filming when I arrived at the church, Kay Centurione was on the stage doing wondrous, creative things to make it beautiful. Dennis Law had worked overtime with our crew to make sure the hundreds of sound cords were all in place. Chuck Harley (my Beloved) had built a perfect five-foot platform that would hold a ton if needed. Genie Brady was there setting the tables with the necessary information. The talented detail people were doing their thing, making it all happen.

After we moved to the Walk Through the Bible studios, there were added complications. We had about 50 people arriving every day of filming and they came hungry. We needed food. And so in the well equipped kitchen Robin Rosebrough, Juanita Lott, Jan Butler and a whole team of talented women dished out two meals and numerous snacks daily. These were not just run of the mill lunches but beautiful-to-look-at, delicious-to-eat feasts.

Though our workbooks had not gone to print yet, copies had been made and placed at every chair along with a small gift. Flowers were in the foyer, welcoming each person. Names and addresses were taken and “permission to film” agreements were signed at a table someone remembered to not only set up as each person came through the door, but that was beautifully set with flowers, plenty of pens and a cheerful attendant.

Kelle and Shane had a whole crew including a talented stage designer, a sound guy, a gaffer plus assistant, three camera men, a switcher and makeup lady. We had earlier hired a wonderful lady to help with the wardrobe. It sounds like an easy thing but Trudy Davies’s eye for color, camera, design and timeless sense of style was a huge help to those of us who are fashion-challenged. Rosemary Nelson kept the teachers on time and tracked their talks so nothing would be left out.

The list of behind-the-scenes, dedicated, cheerful folks is longer than I have space. So in the end, it wasn’t the vision that made it happen. All would have remained nothing more than just that…a vision, a dream, an idea, a hope. It was the heroes who made a vision become a reality that went across country and now around the world.

For as we have many members in one body, but all the members do not have the same function, so we being many, are one body in Christ, and individually members of one another. Having then gifts differing according to the grace that is given to us, let us use them.

Romans 12:4-6

A Change of Mind

A mind is a difficult thing to change. I have been told that sugar and fats are harmful to the body. I have read it in articles, books, heard it on TV and from my doctor but I have not changed my mind. I simply do not agree. Though many voices say one thing, I think fats and sugar now and then are pleasures everyone should have and that it indeed is good for my (mental) health. Therefore, I still enjoy a brownie or chocolate chip cookie from time to time. (By the way, so does my doctor!)

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I was having a conversation with a successful business man one afternoon. He wanted to learn more about the ministry and asked many excellent and intelligent questions. I answered them as best as I could and in doing so explained our position on raising money. We would not ask for anything. We would not fund raise. We would not seek grants or loans. We would pray.

He thought it was a strange and very idealistic method. He thought that Christ would want us to ask. He thought that it was naïve, simplistic and surely not the way God would expect us to minister.

He supported many ministries and was beyond generous. But he made it very clear that he would not consider giving to any ministry that refused to ask him for money. To him, asking for money was a sign of a passionate belief in what the ministry stood for.

I thanked him for being interested in our endeavors but made it clear that we had asked God to provide as a way of assuring us we were doing exactly what HE wanted us to do. Therefore, I would not ask him or anyone for money. I know when we parted he was having difficulty understanding our stance. And after this conversation with such a godly, intelligent, successful man, I have to confess, I worried that perhaps indeed we were presuming on God.

A few weeks later we had run out of money. In the next week or two we would need about $30,000 to produce materials. Already Kelle and Shane, our production company, had been warned by us that funds were low and were taking on outside jobs to supplement in case we could not make the next payment.

Around this time, I was at a Christmas party and though the evening was most festive I was worried about the “what if’s”. What if God did not provide? What if we had been naïve? What if we had to shut down production? What if….?

The business man I had had such a challenging conversation with motioned to me from across the room and as I approached he asked if I could step outside for a minute. I was curious and thought perhaps he was going to chide me for being so foolish, but once outside, he pulled an envelope out from his sport coat pocket. “Here”, he said. “It is a check.” I was dumbfounded.

“But I thought you had decided not to give to this ministry!” I exclaimed.

He looked down at his shoes and then very sheepishly said, “God told me to give this.”

I opened the envelope and pulled out a check for $25,000! I was overwhelmed by his great generosity, but even more so by God’s great faithfulness!

In the next week we would receive the rest of the monies needed. But through it all his words rang in my ears. “God told me to give this.”

And that is the way it should be.

Matthew 7:11
If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask Him.

Who Needs an Audience?

As a kid I had the great talent of being able to walk on stilts. I could walk up and down stairs. I could walk around the block. And the best part is that I was the only child in my child-populated neighborhood who could do such a thing. But I always was “better and more talented” when I had an audience.

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An audience helps. Though it can be immensely terrifying, it can also be the source of energy. As a speaker one can “play off” the audience. As a teacher, one can see if the message is hitting the mark simply by watching the faces of the people in the audience. So for many reasons an audience plays an important part.

But when it came to filming, the audience became another sign of the faithfulness of God. It wasn’t that we were negligent when it came to selecting and gathering a film audience. We just did not have the time. The entire team was going ninety miles an hour just trying to take care of all of the details required to produce the teaching DVDs. And so we did the only thing we ever knew to do and that was to simply pray.

By now we were learning that prayer was not just talking into the wind but was a powerful tool that God had given us to unleash heaven to accomplish that which we could not do. We asked Him to bring us an audience and then we moved forward.

There were several times that we were shocked by God’s recruitment policies! The truth is we never figured them out but quickly saw that He had a plan and it was a good one.

The first time we saw His audience recruitment power was when we filmed the music video “Come on into the House” with Jennifer Carozza. We had secured the First Presbyterian Church in the historic part of Roswell. It was perfect and we were delighted that the church elders decided to charge us nothing for the use of the old chapel that dates back to the 1800’s. It was full of architectural details and great lighting that made it ideal for our purpose.

Jennifer was to perform but we needed a pianist, a bass guitar player and a drummer. Now they did not need to actually play the instruments because this would all be lip/instrument synched. Kelle and Shane invited his brother to play the drums (he really could play!) and her father to play the piano (he really couldn’t play!) and a wonderful man with long dreadlocks to play the guitar. He had at one time been an accomplished guitarist but because of hard living before giving his life to Jesus had lost some fingers necessary to play.

Now we also needed some back up singers. Again, Kelle came to the rescue and found two women and a man to “play act” back-up. So there we were…a mixed bag of folks from all walks of life wrapped in the love of Jesus relating to one another as sisters and brothers. It was an incredible experience.

By twelve thirty we were about ready. Cameras were in place, back up singers were practicing, the musicians were chatting and I was pacing. You see we had made a blanket invitation to be an audience at our Women’s Fellowship ladies a week before. “Please come if you can….” and then gave details like where to be and the most important part they had to show up before 1:00!!!!

I had little faith that anyone would have the time or the inclination to arrive for a two hour long film shoot. I knew our prayer team was praying. I knew I was praying. But no one was coming….. I mean NO ONE! I felt shame and frustration arise as I could see we would have to shut all production down if we did not have an audience.

Now to film this particular session with no audience would simply not work. They were an integral part of the whole music DVD. Twelve forty-five and there was not one person in sight. Ten to one and still no one. Seven to one and three ladies came strolling in. Five to one and we now had about ten folks….all women…all white women! One minute to one the heavens opened and we looked out to see a stream of folks coming up the side walk…women, men, children, black, white, old, young!!! The perfect audience! It was absolutely overwhelming!

And they did not just COME! They came to make a perfect video. They clapped, they laughed, they sang along, they did the same scene over and over until it was just right. They were wonderful. They were God’s audience and they did it all for Him

Indeed none of those who wait for Thee will be ashamed.
Psalm 25:3