At a Christmas conference that year, Jaime was challenged to spend time with the Lord in prayer and in the Bible. She also heard about summer projects in which college students move to a resort area, form new friendships, and receive training and discipleship. Jaime tucked away the idea in the back of her mind.
All that next spring semester, she enjoyed having her first quiet times with the Lord. Jaime loved her new relationship with God. During this time, He kept nudging the young woman toward a summer project. But all the while, she continued to struggle terribly with her body image. She had given Jesus her life, but she couldn’t trust Him with her eating and desire to lose weight. Jaime just felt the whole thing was too vain and unimportant. Why would God want to answer her prayer to lose weight?
Jaime grew excited about the upcoming summer project but was nervous that her obsessive thoughts would distract her. She marveled at how on one hand, she could experience victory, but on the other, she still was losing other battles. The night before she left, Jaime pleaded with the Lord to change all her thoughts from food and her body to Him: “Holy Fire, burn away my desire for anything that is not of You and is of me. I want more of You and less of me. Empty me and fill me with You. Jesus, only You truly satisfy.”
God answered Jaime’s prayer! She saw firsthand His ability to bring victory over that huge stronghold. She was able to go on the project and completely focus on the Lord. Still, in light of all He had done for her, the idea of having confidence still seemed impossible. In desperation, Jaime studied the characteristics of God and what He said about His children.
Jaime started learning how to share her faith. On her first outreach, she was so nervous she was sick to her stomach. She remembers seeing the bathroom in the distance, wishing she could run and hide in there for the rest of the day. Later that day, she was having a quiet time at a picnic table when the Lord prompted her to go over and talk to a girl.
Finally Jaime obeyed and introduced herself to Lana. Jaime explained about why she was in Lake Tahoe and asked if Lana would read a little booklet with her. When she finished, Lana said the message was exactly what she had been looking for. She had actually been meeting with a cult and was about to join. She recognized this message was different and true, and she thanked Jaime for talking to her.
The Holy Spirit’s work overwhelmed Jaime, and she realized that sharing the gospel was something God had called her to do for the rest of her life, no matter how scary it seemed.
Most of the time these days, Jaime just feels swept away with Him, trying to keep up with what He is doing through her. She even moved back into the dorms, where He’s used her to reach out to incoming freshmen. Jaime also got the chance to share the gospel with some Japanese students throughout the year, and the following spring God sent her on a mission trip to Japan.
All the while, Jaime has learned she must daily lay down her need to be perfect, rejecting such thoughts as:
I need to pray more, share my faith more, have greater faith, love God more.
She continues to pray that God will reveal and heal her unhealthy ideas. He’s shown Jaime that she is still in process. She’s always known intellectually that God loved her, but she has found it difficult to accept His profound love for her apart from her servanthood.
Is she sold out for Jesus? You bet. But for Jaime that is the easy part. She’s still on a more difficult journey in her heart: learning to believe Jesus is sold out for her too.
You then, my son, be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus. And the things you have heard me say in the presence of many witnesses, entrust to reliable men who will also be qualified to teach others.
(2 Timothy
2:1-2
)
perpetua and felicitas
Giving Their All
T
he time was around
AD
200 in North Africa. Rome was under the rule of Septimus Severus. As emperor, he proposed to bring all citizens under syncretism, which meant the acceptance of all gods under the worship of
Sol invictus
—the Unconquered Sun. But two groups would not conform to this type of religion: Jews and Christians. Severus decided to stop the spread of both, and persecution of Christians (as well as Jews) quickly increased.
But within this religious culture a strong Christian community existed. Perpetua, a young, educated, well-to-do woman, had become a Christian. She lived with her husband, her infant son, and her beloved slave, Felicitas, in Carthage.
Though she was still nursing her infant son, Perpetua and Felicitas were arrested by Roman officials, who threw them into prison. Quickly, Perpetua’s father went to rescue her. He knew she was in danger of losing her life and that there was an easy escape: deny she was a Christian.
She responded, “Father, do you see this vase here?”
“Yes, I do.”
“Could it be called by any other name than what it is?”
“No.”
“I cannot be called anything other than what I am—a Christian.”
The word angered her father. He pleaded, “Think of your mother, your brother, your aunt. Please, Perpetua, think of me, your aging father. But most of all, think of your little baby!”
She agonized over her father’s pain, but she knew there was no turning back. Young women did not deny their fathers’ pleas in that patriarchal society. Perpetua’s choice to remain faithful to God had disgraced her family. Finally, her father left her and Felicitas to suffer the consequences of their decision: being devoured by beasts.
Two deacons, Tertius and Pomponius, tried to take care of Perpetua and Felicitas while they awaited their death sentence. The two men bribed the prison soldiers to give Perpetua permission to nurse her baby. The young mother wrote in her journal: “My prison had suddenly become a palace, so that I wanted to be there rather than anywhere else.”
Felicitas was expecting a child at the time of the arrest. During her eighth month of pregnancy, the faithful slave gave birth. She told the jailers, “Now my sufferings are only mine. But when I face the beasts there will be another who will live in me, and will suffer for me since I shall be suffering for him.” Providentially, Felicitas’s child was adopted by a Christian woman.
Perpetua saw the profound grief her decision was causing her brother. He said, “Dear sister, you are greatly privileged; surely you might ask for a vision to discover whether you are to be condemned or freed.” Faithfully, she asked the Lord for a vision.
She then saw a bronze ladder reaching to the heavens. It was narrow and looked as if only one person could climb the steps. On the side of the ladder were many weapons—swords, spears, hooks, and spikes. Perpetua knew that if she were to try to climb the ladder without caution and care, she would be mangled. At the bottom of the ladder lay a dragon, waiting to attack anyone who would try and climb the ladder. Perpetua then saw Saturus, the mentor who taught her about Christianity, beckoning her to follow him to the heavens. She sensed the dragon was afraid of her and dreaded her strength. Once she had witnessed this vision, she told her brother that she believed she must suffer for the faith and not go free.
One morning, Roman guards hurried Perpetua and Felicitas to their hearing. Her father appeared, pleading with her one final time to have mercy on her baby and burn incense to the gods. The governor asked Perpetua to have pity on her father and offer the sacrifice for the welfare of her family.
“I will not!” she vehemently cried.
“Are you a Christian?” asked the governor.
“Yes, I am.”
When her father continued to plead for Perpetua to renounce her faith, the governor ordered her father to be beaten. She felt as if the blows actually landed on her body. Finally, Perpetua and Felicitus were condemned to the beasts. They returned to their cell knowing their sentence, yet in high spirits.
On March 7, 203, marching to the amphitheater with calm hearts, the women trembled with joy rather than fear. Perpetua’s countenance was one of peace, testifying to her love for God. The two sisters in Christ were led to the gates, where they were forced to wear the robes of the god Ceres. Perpetua begged for the freedom to declare Jesus as Lord. The officials finally complied with her request and she began to sing hymns to the Lord, rejoicing that she had fellowship with the sufferings of Christ.
The two young women were stripped naked, and the officials set loose a mad heifer to devour their flesh. The crowd was horrified to see that a young girl and a nursing mother were to die, so the officials gave them tunics to cover their bodies.
The mad animal violently tossed Perpetua and crushed Felicitas. The Christian men to be martyred entered the stadium, and Perpetua encouraged them to stand strong to the end despite the savage death they faced.
Shortly after the death of these women, Christian persecution subsided for a time. Perhaps the Roman world glimpsed its own savagery and was repelled by the cruelty of the human heart. Maybe the spectators who witnessed the testimony of the young women saw a glimpse of Jesus as the windows of heaven opened and He welcomed them with loving arms.
I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.
(Galatians
2:20
)
karen myers
Not Guilty
W
ichita’s newspaper headline read, “Abortion Protester Vindicated in Jury Trial.”
Karen Myers was among a small group of protesters holding signs in the grassy pedestrian right-of-way outside the local coliseum entrance on March 14, 2003. Karen had been going to abortion clinics since she was about six years old. Her dad made cardboard signs to string around Karen and her siblings’ necks that said, “We are glad to be alive.” This was an every-Saturday event for the Myers family. Even at her young age, Karen knew people were changing their minds and babies were being saved just from reading their signs.
Her grandmother, Ellen Myers, was a cofounder of Right to Life of Kansas, a pro-life organization formed in 1969 even before Kansas legalized abortion. Ellen, a survivor of the Holocaust who became a Christian when she came to America, saw the same evils in the act of abortion.
Karen says, “When I was five years old, I saw a picture of an actual aborted baby. I knew it was wrong even then. My mom and dad aren’t the kind of parents who hide things from their kids. They told us about abortion and that it was wrong.”
March 13 started out like many other nights Karen had participated in. Karen always arrived at the designated venue an hour or so before an event or concert to engage in outreach. That night, Cher, a strong voice for a woman’s right to choose, would be performing at the coliseum. The poster in Karen’s hand read, “Hurting after abortion? Call us!”
Suddenly a deputy shouted, “Move one hundred feet back!” Without warning, Karen felt him twist her arms twice into a double hammerlock. As he jerked her back and forth, she felt as if her arms were being torn off. She begged him to stop hurting her.
Then he slammed Karen to the ground, pushing all of his weight against her small-framed body, smashing her face into the dirt. The deputy didn’t read her rights or indicate he was arresting her. Karen was unsure of what was really happening. She cried out in pain. Were her arms broken, or dislocated?
Fiery sensations ran up and down her shoulders, and she knew she was injured. Deputy Simpson dragged Karen over to the landscaped entrance of the coliseum. She begged that paramedics be called, as her arms continued to swell and throb. With dried dirt and tears covering her cheeks, she waited an hour for medical help, watching the concert spectators pass her, staring. But in those moments, Karen felt the presence of Jesus with her as never before.
Karen eventually was allowed to go home. Ten months passed, and she attended another pro-life outreach. Officials said it was perfectly legal to be there but asked to run a routine ID record check on everyone present. Karen was shocked to learn there was a warrant out for her arrest. Deputy Simpson had filed charges against her five months after the concert without telling her. She had no idea she had committed any kind of violation.
After receiving counsel, Karen decided to turn herself over to the authorities, even though she was not guilty. It was a horrible afternoon. Placed in a large holding cell, Karen took the opportunity to witness to the other women there. The guards didn’t like that and pulled her out to harass her. Sexual innuendo and perverse language filled the air. Then they placed her alone in a four-by-four-foot cell, where she had room only to stand. The cell reeked of excrement and vomit. It was a long four hours.
Finally, Karen got a trial date, although she never received a standard hearing first. She tried to get answers about her wrongful arrest. After she made many calls to Christian lawyers, none agreed to represent Karen in court. The case was against the county, they said, and it was risky. “You won’t win” kept ringing in her ears.
Karen tried to formally file an assault-and-battery charge against Deputy Simpson but was told she could not do so. The injuries to her arms caused such severe pain that she had to quit her job. Emotional scars, such as panic attacks and nightmares, haunted her. Phone call after phone call, she sought justice by talking with lawyers and legal advisors.
Out of desperation, Karen finally called a contract lawyer. He knew a criminal defense attorney who agreed to help fight the county. An out-of-state Christian legal group promised to assist.
Seventeen months after the assault, Karen went to trial. Relieved, yet apprehensive about reliving the trauma of the event, she faced the jury, knowing two members were strong abortion advocates. The horror of the night of the Cher concert came flooding back and Karen had to compose herself to respond to the questions and interrogation. She knew lots of people were praying for her. “As I walked in the court room, peace filled my heart,” she says today. “I knew that even if I was found guilty, God would take care of me and His will would be done. Even though my future was in jeopardy, I was able to trust Him with the outcome.”