“Give away our home?” I asked. The discernment that my wife Mary had was right. This act of obedience was to be the biggest step of faith that has taken us to where we are today.
Our family of six, by today’s standards lived a very comfortable and blessed existence. We owned a paid off, cherry wood furnished 3X2 condominium in Miami, Florida. I had a successful career with the second largest Hispanic television network, and our future finances were virtually secured due to family wealth. We owned to paid off cars and no absolutely no debt. God had bonded us as a tightly knit and loving family. Does it sound like the perfect American dream? Yet Mary and I were terribly disillusioned. Christianity, as we knew it, had become disappointing and boring. It seemed for us that Jesus represented no more than Sunday church, cell groups, and an occasional outreach to the lost. All of this, in a frantic city that seemingly had little time for the things of God.
Years of cries, and prayers to the Lord for the Book of Acts, were to be answered in a way that has caused us to live out the gospel. God’s answer came, or so we thought, as a call for revival work to the West Indies, specifically in the Virgin Islands. We knew that the cost of island living was so high, that financially we could not make it. Even with the best of financial scenarios, selling the condo, would give us only half of what was needed to place us in the same rent free position that we had come to enjoy. We could not believe that God would have us leave a debt free environment and be forced into the struggles of mortgage payments. The Lord challenged us to obey Matthew 19:29. He that forsakes home and property for the gospel’s sake would receive a hundredfold return. To live a life of supernatural returns, as we desired, would obligate us to one of supernatural giving and trusting, such as forsaking home and property for the glory of God.
After making a first “contact establishing” trip to the Virgin Islands, the idea of giving away the condo pursued us more hotly than ever before. Mary and I finally decided to telephone old Christian friends, who now have a family of nine, and proposed to them what we felt led to do.
In this “teary eyed” meeting we informed them that the home was theirs, conditional upon the Lord giving us a large sum of money that would sweep us to the islands.
A second trip was needed to investigate property leads. Mary and I sipped coffee from the balcony of the hotel that we were staying at overlooking the beautiful Caribbean Sea. The beauty of comet Hale Bopp shone in the eastern sky. Then the Lord dropped a bombshell upon us. “Giving the condo, conditional upon My supplying you with money, is not faith. You have not given away anything! You are not living by faith!” The agonizing reality of giving the condo away with no guarantee of money or even of a future roof over our heads and especially of our four young children was slow in digesting. We met with our pastor who confirmed the decision. He told us, “ Do what’s in your heart.” Days later all parties executed a “Quit Claim Deed” with a Florida lawyer, on our condo and furniture, legally giving away everything to this other family and agreeing upon a date on which we would vacate, money or no money.
As the time approached, the Lord surprised us once again. The Virgin Islands had been a training ground for what was to really come. We were to pack up our vans and travel north sharing our testimony.
The dreaded date came and the Lord still had brought nothing. We were forced to use our credit cards. We had loathed debt, had always paid cash, and had credit cards exclusively for car rentals and reservations. We put our personal belongings into storage, packed up our van with numerous duffel bags, left the condo, and checked into a motel. Three days later, after being sent out by our church, we traveled north as Abraham did, not knowing where we were to go. The Lord led us to the great revival in Pensacola Florida, and a smaller one in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. Our spiritual batteries were charged up.
In Tuscaloosa, the Lord spoke the word “New Mexico”. We felt relieved because it felt as if it were to be our final destination. Our credit cards were quickly being depleted. In Longview, Texas, the Lord spoke to us the word “pueblo.” We only knew a pueblo to mean a small town. Upon pulling out a map of the state of New Mexico, lo and behold, we saw numerous names that had the word pueblo on it. We were to find out later, that these are the nineteen Pueblo Indian Tribes of New Mexico. In a map of New Mexico, the Spirit pointed out a place by the name of Pueblo Santo Domingo. Days later, as we arrived into Pueblo Santo Domingo situated between Albuquerque and Santa Fe. There a precious Native lady that was selling jewelry from her adobe home met us. As we talked with her, the Lord placed such a supernatural love for Native Americans in our hearts that we knew that this was to be our calling. We were to serve the Native American people with the gospel of Jesus Christ.
We found out from her, that white people like us were not allowed to live in the Pueblos. Her suggestion was for us to go to the nearby town of Peña Blanca sandwiched between Cochiti and Santo Domingo Pueblo. Through the hand of God we were able to move into a one-bedroom efficiency with only $10.00 in our pockets. The very nice landlady, who knew nothing of our circumstances, did not require us to pay her for a week. The next day we attended a church in Santa Fe whose pastor we had met a few days earlier upon visiting Santa Fe. This pastor, knowing nothing of our finances, felt led to take up an offering for us, which came to over $700.00. We paid our first rent from that. Several days later, local believers in Pena Blanca of whom we had asked nothing, totally furnished our apartment.
I desired greatly to apply for work at a local television station, but the Lord would not allow it, knowing that the faith level that would be required to bring His mission about must grow even more. One great frustration that we encountered was that in the Pueblo Nations, the preaching of the gospel is strictly prohibited. At this time, all that we felt to do was to build relationships and start up Bible studies in Peña Blanca. Through these three years God has taught us that we must first serve, and lay down our lives for the First Nations people. Then He will give us a platform to preach the gospel to them in a way that is worthy.
After moving to Pena Blanca our credit cards became quickly depleted. We had four dollars to our name, one diaper for our son, and our auto insurance was to be canceled on the following day. As I knelt in prayer, calmly reminding the Lord that our son had one diaper left, Mary gleefully entered our home with a $10,000.00 check in her hand. Her aunt had unexpectedly passed away and had desired to give Mary this money. Needless to say, our debt and credit cards suddenly were paid off. Praise the Lord!
Another time that we had ran out of money and food having only flour and water, God sent us the ravens as with Elijah. This time, however, the ravens were dogs. On that day our adopted pets showed up with an unopened bag of beans, and numerous unopened cans of food, including a huge jar of peanut butter! Their saliva covered all of these unopened items of food.
Lastly, Mary’s parents blessed their three children at the end of 1997 with a large sum of money. We never asked them for any of these finances. With this financial blessing we are now living in a brand new 1999 model 5 X 3 mobile home twice the size of what we gave away! It is fully furnished and we own over an acre of land of which we had none in Miami. On top of that all home repairs, property taxes and property insurance will be always paid off for us. You cannot out give the Lord!
Several years back now we were invited to preach at a Navajo Church in Tuba City, Arizona. The Spirit of God is being poured out in His native churches. We saw a considerable amount of instantaneous healings in both services. One Navajo lady, most probably in her eighties, after prayer, was able to walk about her home without the use of a walker. She exclaimed in Navajo,“ I had legs of Jell-O but the Lord has given me new legs.” One Pueblo lady that I prayed for in Peña Blanca received back her temporarily lost eyesight. She said to me, “ Thanks to your Lord Jesus I can see again.”
As we traveled to Tuba City, through Navajo and Hopi country, I could not help but notice the great amount of satellite dishes on the Indian reservations. I was informed later that satellite TV is a popular commodity amongst the reservations, due to their remote locations.
Shortly after our trip, the Lord challenged us with something that we could never have dreamed of. He said,“ What about building a Christian Indian television network that would have a strictly Native American gospel format? There are many good Christian programs, but Christian TV by Native Americans and for Native Americans is very scarce. Next week I will be going to Anchorage Alaska to assist other people in developing Christian First Nation’s television for the fifty states.
How great is our God! How unfathomable are His ways! He takes the little that we give Him and greatly multiplies it in His Hands. We knew now why God had brought us 2,200 miles. We also understood why He had us give everything away. Apart from the faith that was developed, we were called to those that had everything taken away, and today virtually still possess nothing. How could we minister to those to whom we could not identify with?
1. The Native body of Christ is greatly deficient in comparison with its Anglo, African American, and Hispanic counterparts. The impact of the Native Christian voice, especially in the area of telecommunications, is at best minimal.
2. The money that is present in and for Native ministries, programming, church planting and building, discipleship, and network resources, is far below national cultural levels. Fewer ministers want to harvest the Native fields, because money is scarce and conditions are more difficult.
3. The “conversion rate” in the Indian population is less than 3%. The Indian believer needs more discipleship than any other cultural group. The hundreds of years of rejection, prejudice, and pain have left many in the Native body without the initiative and vision to lead and build up their own.
4. Many which are coming out of traditional Indian religions through conversions, struggle against extremely powerful strongholds, temptations, and traditional family ties that must be broken and overcome. I remember praying for an Indian boy who had cancer. The bondage of rejection and pain, and the demonic attacks that I sensed, have been unparalleled in my twenty years of ministry as a believer.
5. For some, becoming a Christian entails persecution that is rarely seen in this country. There are today, Indian nations where conversion entails ostracism, tribunal court hearings, expulsion from the tribe, and confiscation of tribal property.
6. Because of the remote localities of reservations, it is much more difficult for the Native church with its ministers and ministries to network and resource together. Where in traditional cultures, there is literally a“church on every corner”, in the Native body; churches are sparsely situated, separated by long distances, with some areas hardly having a recognizable witness.
First Nations Christian television would address every single ones of these needs, at least in part.
· The gospel for the first time on a national broadcasting level, could be proclaimed by Native American to Native American.
· The use of satellite television amongst Native Americans is more feasible than for any other cultural groups due to their popularity.
· A television network could assist the Native body greatly to resource and network ministers, and ministries, in a dimension and speed that they have not been able to acquire n the past.
· The reservations in remote areas would receive the “ministry of the airwaves.”
In God’s economy the last shall be first. There is no doubt in our minds that the Native American population qualifies well for this position. On numerous occasions we have been deeply touched by the beauty and spirituality of the Native believer. Their sensitivity to the Lord, their tears, humility, and simplicity, is beautiful to behold. Some of the most anointed preaching that we have witnessed has come from the hearts and mouths of Native American preachers. Our Native American friends have a deep hunger for the Lord emanating from a sincerity, humility, simplicity, and soberness for the things of God. Native worship to the Lord is unsurpassed in beauty and anointing. We believe that the Lord gifted the Native American with a deep spirituality, and a powerful “Joshua” spirit that would conquer and possess the land, thereby glorifying the Lord. Satan, sin, and the world have tried their hardest to rob from these precious people their God given destiny. It would not surprise us that if in this end time revival, God would raise the Native body as one of its main participants. One prominent national Native ministry has on its logo, “Victor, not Victim”. The editor of a National Pentecostal Native publication calls the Indian church a “sleeping brown skin giant”, one that will be aroused by the Lord, before His coming. We believe that Indian Christian TV will be an important catalyst.