Functioning from a Broken Heart

In 1947, Robert Pierce worked for a religious non-profit organization called Youth for Christ. Its mission was to evangelize the world with the gospel of Jesus Christ. The young evangelist started toward China with only enough money to buy a ticket to Honolulu. On the trip, he met Tena Hoelkedoer, a teacher. She introduced him to a battered and abandoned child named White Jade. Unable to care for the child herself, she asked Pierce, “What are you going to do about her?” Pierce gave the woman his last five dollars and agreed to send the same amount each month to help the woman care for the child.

Pierce eventually made it to China, where thousands made public commitments as followers of Christ during four months of evangelistic rallies. While there Pierce saw widespread hunger. He felt intense compassion for these people.

Pierce later wrote these words in the flyleaf of his Bible:

“Let my heart be broken with the things that break the heart of God.”

Dragging a movie camera across Asia – China was soon closed – Pierce showed the resulting pictures to church audiences in North America. He asked for money to help children. He showed their faces and begged Christians to “adopt” one. In 1950 he incorporated this personal crusade as World Vision.

It was said of Robert Pierce,

“He prayed more earnestly and importunely than anyone else I have ever known. It was as though prayer burned within him…he functioned from a broken heart.”

– From a sermon by Rick Ezell, pastor of First Baptist Church, Greer, South Carolina, entitled “Let Your Heart be Troubled”

This was the Moment

Recently, many have asked, “At what point did you know the Lord was calling you to leave McLean Bible Church to serve in missions?” The answer is: the day this picture above was taken. After years of experiencing missions across the globe in places as far away as Africa and The Philippines, it was in April of last year, as we walked the streets of Santo Domingo, and experienced for the first time the intense plight and ministry potential of urban poverty. Both Dale and I, in hindsight, point to that experience, as the moment we knew the Lord had called us to move from sending and supporting others to going and serving ourselves, by leaving behind a much loved ministry family of students and staff to respond in obedience to Proverbs 31:8-9, which states,

“Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves, for the rights of all the destitute. Speak up…defend the rights of the poor and needy.” 

Thank you in advance for your prayer and financial support.  There’s a great passage in Nehemiah 2 where Nehemiah makes clear that “contribution enables one to lay claim to what follows.”  Responding to those who sought to hinder his efforts to rebuild the wall of Jerusalem Nehemiah says,

“The God of heaven will help us succeed. We, his servants, will start rebuilding this wall. But you have no share, legal right, or historic claim in Jerusalem.” (Nehemiah 2:20)

Rest assured your prayer and financial contributions to enable our team to serve on the field means you personally can lay claim to everything that God graciously allows to occur in the days, weeks, months and years to come.