A Date to Remember

I'm honored to bring you this month's story to The Faith Factor. This story occurred when Miss Monica June was just a baby, so she asked me to write about this date to remember.

There was a time when Miss Moni's dad didn't walk with the Lord. He had previously been introduced to the Lord in 1990, but his relationship with the Saviour didn't have a stable foundation. After many years of trying to live life his own way, like so many of us do, he was faced with needing to make a change.

There was a time when he wasn't in our lives at all. He had chosen to walk his own journey without the family and we didn't know if he was dead or alive. We prayed every day that God would send a Christian into his life. We knew that even though we didn't know where he was, God did know. There was a night when I had tucked Lady Jess into bed, prayed with her, and kissed her goodnight. She was about five years old at the time and I could hear talking coming from the room. Of course, being the mother that I am I thought she was still up playing when she should have been sleeping. I approached the door when I realized she wasn't playing. I cracked the door just slightly and quietly. As I peeked inside the room I saw her down on her knees next to the bed praying with tears in her eyes and barely a breath as she said, "Daddy, please bring my daddy home!" She was crying so hard she could barely speak.

She was using force to bring her prayers to her lips and she prayed again, "Oh God PLEASE save my daddy, I miss him so much. Please bring my daddy home."

As a mother I wanted to rush to her side and hold her in my arms, but I sensed the Holy Spirit telling me, " Let me be the one who holds her." I closed the door and I walked away. I knew this was a moment that she needed to have with the Lord. I didn't ask her about that moment until she was a bit older. It wasn't long after that when I received a letter from my husband. He explained that he was in another state and that he started attending church. The pastor there counseled him to, "go home and make right with your wife and children. Be the husband and father God wants you to be." Within a few weeks he had moved back to our area and lived with his dad. We continued to pray for him and he sought work in our community.

A dear gentleman of our church named Mr. Kempton, who is now with our Lord, faithfully visited the girls' daddy. He would pick him up for church and help disciple him. One Saturday morning as we arrived at the church for our outreach ministry, we saw Mr. Kempton walk in with her daddy. (The church also had men's Bible study that morning.) She looked up at Mr. Kempton and with gleeful delight and sincerity said, "Oh Mr. Kempton, thank you so much for bringing my daddy to men's Bible study." This dear saint of God began to cry. He was so touched by Jessica's sweet countenance.

About a week later, on a Saturday night, I began to pray with ferverance and detail. I begged God for the soul of my husband. I knew that he had a previous relationship with the Lord, but his life lacked evidence of salvation. I recalled a verse that promised me that I could come boldly to the throne of God.

Hebrews 4:16, "Let us therefore come unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need."(KJV)

I sought the Lord for my husband to not only come to church the next morning, that he would come forward during the invitation to be saved. I prayed for a man named Mr. Colombo to be the one that would met him for prayer and that he would be baptized. This was a very tall order after seeing my husband walk away from God for such a long time. I was asking for what others called, 'The Impossible'. I ended my prayer with thanksgiving and went to bed.

The next morning was Sunday. We went to church as we did every week and when we arrived my husband was there for Sunday School. Jessica and Moni were in their classes and I taught a class during that time as well. The second hour was the church service and I sang in the choir while the kids remained in their children's church. After the preaching was over and the invitation had begun a woman asked me to prayer with her. I went to pray with this sweet lady and then when I returned to my seat, all my friends were staring at me with smiles on their faces. One friend motioned to me to come pray with her. As I knelt down she began to cry out these words, "Your husband just got saved Lisa!" I was astonished! "Where is he? Who prayed with him?" She replied, "Mr. Colombo prayed with him! I saw his lips moving, I could see that he was praying top be saved!" I began to sob uncontrollably. I asked her to pray that he would be baptized and she said, "He is, look" As she pointed I saw Mr. Colombo leading him to the back room to be baptized.

She prayed and praised God for this tremendous victory and then I went to get my children from their classes. As I knocked on the door and the teacher opened she saw the tears in my eyes and was concerned, "What's wrong Lisa?" With a release of emotions I answered back, "My husband got saved today!" She began to cry herself and she turned to shout to Jessica, "Jessi, your daddy got saved come quick!!!" All the children rejoiced as Jess ran to the door with giddy laughter. We ran back to the auditorium and the lights were dim. We went to the very front row where Jess hopped on the lap of the friend who had just prayed with me. Suddenly, my five year old Jess began to sob.

Our friend asked her why she was crying and she was crying so hard that she had to once again force the words out, "I'm just so happy my daddy finally got saved!"

As my husband entered the water, I shouted like a cheerleader at a football game, "THAT'S MY HUSBAND!!" I was so happy that I couldn't hold back the excitement. A soul had been saved! The entire church cheered as well. It was a date to remember. Each time I tell this story I cry and as I sit here now typing this for you, I have piles of tissue at my side. We thanked God for the victory that we saw that wonderful Sunday morning and our family was restored. But not just our family, it was the family of God that had been healed. Our church family had prayed for so long! It has been many years now, but whenever I tell this story the emotions flood back as if it was yesterday.

Is there someone you have been praying for? Does it seem like God isn't hearing your prayers? Have you lost hope and given up on ever getting the answer you desire? There was a time when I had given up as well, but a woman once wrote in my Bible, "Don't Give Up Praying! Mrs. Delashmit" She was the wife of an evangelist who had at one time been a Hell's Angel. God gloriously saved him and his testimony is one that my husband never got to hear before Dr. Delashmit went to be with our Saviour. However, he has listened to his testimony on tape many times and has given the tape to many others to listen to.

My husband now works at a Recovery Mission aiding and counseling men with broken lives and helping them to restore their own families. It is clearly evident that he walks with the Lord now and we have been so blessed by the new man God gave to our family.

Mark 9:29, "And he said unto them, This kind can come forth by nothing, but by prayer and fasting."(KJV)

You can order tapes and CD's of Dr. Jim Delashmit's songs at Valley Baptist Church.
To hear the story 'From Dope to Hope', of how God delivered Dr. Delashmit from the life of a Hell's Angel, you can contact me. I had been saved during a night that he preached in our church. I'll be sharing my salvation story in an upcoming issue. If you would like your salvation story to be featured in GGM, send your story to us.