American Missionary Fellowship

RobAnne is my wife.  We’ve been married for thirty-five years. There’s a lot I know about RobAnne. When you live with someone for that long, you know her inside and out. You know when she’s happy and sad; you know when she’s fulfilled. Well, in less than a week, our national staff meeting takes place, and I have seen RobAnne working in her passion.

Our son, R.W., is working full-time, going to graduate school full-time, and living in the Chicago area in the middle of winter. Until recently, his only form of transportation was a bike. For the past eight years, we’ve had a Jeep for our kids to use. It’s been sitting in front of our house, and I decided to drive it to Chicago so R.W. could have a form of transportation other than his feet or his bike during the cold winter months.

It’s twenty-eight hours of pure driving time from southern California to Chicago. It took me just over two days to get there. I used the time to think about what was important, about what was happening in my life, and about the kinds of things that are important to the future of the mission. During those twenty-eight hours of think time, I came up with three things that are very important to the life of the mission.

I’m amazed at how little decisions that seem insignificant can become huge in our lives. They become life-changing decisions. For me, it was being a boy from Michigan going to school in California. From there I met RobAnne, got involved in ministry, and had wonderful experiences that changed my life.

A year ago, RobAnne and I and our daughter, Barrett, came to Westmont College to participate in the competition for four Monroe Scholarships. It’s a great scholarship, pays for almost everything, and they bring together the top students in the admitting class for this competition. It involves interviews, testing, and a variety of other things.

We were invited back this year to participate in the parents’ panel, where we would answer questions from parents whose students were participating in this competition.

I was preaching last week, and I was on that verse in Exodus that talks about God punishing disobedience to the third and fourth generation. I began to think about the opposite kind of legacy that my family and RobAnne’s family have given us – a legacy of hope, faith, peace, and security.