1987 March/April issue Part 1

My Life for Yours

Ten years ago a young Canadian woman sat in the assembly hall at the University of Illinois in Urbana, along with 17,000 other students attending Inter-Varsity's missionary convention. She thrilled to the singing of the great hymns, led by Bernie Smith. She heard the speakers, "and I remember the incredible excitement and desire to know and serve God that I experienced at that time. Now I have walked through some deep waters, and I feel compelled to write to you," her letter to me said. She had

read two of my books just before the convention, and I happened to be among the speakers. Another was Helen Roseveare, author of Give Me This Mountain and other books. Barbara was especially moved by the thought of the cost of declaring God's glory. Her letter told me this story:

Three years after Urbana she married Gerry Fuller, "a wonderful man who demonstrated zeal for Christ, a passion for souls, a beautiful compassion for hurting, broken people who needed to know the healing love of Jesus Christ." Following seminary and student pastorates, he became a prison chaplain and an inner-city missionary. Then he married Barbara and together they worked in Saint John, New Brunswick, with street kids, ex-convicts, and glue-sniffers.

  The time came when Barbara saw Gerry seeking the Lord with such great intensity it made her question her own commitment to Christ. Was she prepared to die to self as he was? What was it that drove him to pray as he did-at least once until four in the morning? Was her own love for the Lord as deep as his, or was it perhaps shadowed by her love for her husband?

  Gerry had a nephew named Gary, "a quiet guy with an artistic nature and talents that had beenundisciplined." He couldn't hold down a job, got in trouble with the law. When relatives consented to his using their vacation cottage, a neighboring cottage was broken into. The owner called Gerry to say that his gun had been taken; Gary was the prime suspect, but they didn't want to call the police until they'd called Gerry.

  Gerry was "scared stiff," but knew what he had to do: put his whole trust in God, go to the cottage, try to persuade his nephew to turn himself in. He and Barbara went to bed.

  Next morning when they prayed together he asked the Holy Spirit especially to strengthen Barbara in raising little Josh and Ben. Should she go with him to see Gary? She was relieved that his answer was no-"If anything happens to him, the children will need me," was the thought that flashed into her mind.

  Gerry said goodbye. Barbara fasted, prayed, cared for the little boys, worked in the garden, waited. All day she waited. He did not come. Oh well, Gerry was always late for everything. No doubt they were deep in conversation. He had tried so often to help Gary. Lord, may he help him now.

  At last the sound of a car. Eagerly Barbara looked up from her weeding. It was the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. She froze, then fell to the ground sobbing. Gerry was dead. But looking up at the bewildered faces of her sons, four and two years old, she pulled herself together, took their little hands, and told them Daddy was with Jesus and they wouldn't see him again for a long time. "From that point on there was the sense of being carried through the whole dream-like event. God surrounded me with His presence and an overwhelming sense that 'It's all right.' I knew He was in charge."

  The murder was a deliberate act. Gary is serving a life sentence in a penitentiary with some who were led to Christ through Gerry's witness. They loved Gerry, but for love of his Lord they have forgiven his killer. A number of lives have been changed as a result of his testimony, but "in spite of the good things that came of his death there is always the WHY," Barbara writes. "As you say, we must let God be God. It's hard to explain, though, to a tired three-year-old when he wails, 'I miss Daddy!'

  "One of my greatest blessings and comforts came as a surprise about six weeks after my husband's death when I discovered that I was pregnant with a baby conceived the eve of his homegoing. And how like the Lord and His perfect timing to present me with a beautiful child on Easter Sunday-the girl I had prayed for. Her name is Marah Grace and it is by God's grace that she has made my bitter waters sweet.

  "People say I am brave but I don't see any great bravery in walking through one of the difficult experiences of life. God is the One who strengthens us at the time for the things we must face. My greatest fear was the fear of losing Gerry, but when the time came God swooped under me as a great bird and carried me on eagle's wings above the storm.

  "So that is my story. I wanted to share it with you-I feel somewhat akin to you. My husband went in obedience to God, well aware of the danger, and laid down his life for Christ's sake. My task is to follow that example and to instill in my children the values Gerry and I shared: the supreme value of knowing Jesus Christ and serving Him with our whole selves."

  Thank you, dear Barbara, for being one more faithful witness to a wholly faithful and sovereign Lord. Like Jim Elliot, Gerry knew that "he is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose." Like the coastguardsmen, he knew "You have to go out, you don't have to come back."

  I had thought of "all that comes to me" as coming from outside, that is, from the action of others. Today what came to me was the sudden sickening realization that I had forgotten a speaking engagement last night. It was on my calendar but not in my engagement book. I had looked only at the latter.

  I did not treat this with peace of soul. The pastor was very gracious when I called. "God is in control," was his word of comfort.

  Yes. He is still there in spite of my inexcusable failures. What destroyed my peace was not only the thought of those I had sinned against-their inconvenience, disappointment, offense-but the thought of my reputation for faithfulness. I had to confess that subtle form of pride.

  Nothing that comes to me is devoid of divine purpose. In seeking to see the whole with God's eyes, we can find the peace which human events so often destroy. He is the God who is able even to "restore ... the years which the swarming locust has eaten," (Joel 2:25, RSV) and to turn "the Vale of Trouble into the Gate of Hope" 

(Hosea 2:15, NEB).