Jackie's Journey "Amazing Exchange!"

I thought we were out of the woods with the opening of retail stores, restaurants, elementary schools, universities, etc.…  However, that was short-lived!  Again, we find ourselves subjected to closed churches and beaches, missed fireworks on the fourth of July and avoidance of social gatherings. Each restriction of our “old” life is compounded by our unwilling acceptance.  For me, the old normal was good enough…there is no need for a “new” normal.

 There is an interesting exchange in II Kings 6 between Elisha and his faithful servant.  In my opinion, prophets don’t “get a break” because they consistently cry out truth and no one wants to hear it!  So enraged by this prophet’s message, King Ben-hadad sent his soldiers by night to surround the town where the prophet ministered and the object was to kill Elisha and everyone in Dothan!  

 With so many depictions of this scenario currently on TV in mini-series, complete with swords and armor, it is not difficult to visualize this happening (not to forget...the riots in our streets!).  Elisha’s servant had risen early and gone out, only to become acutely aware of the overwhelming presence of horses and chariots swirling around the city.  He ran in fear to tell his master Elisha and ask, “Alas, my Lord, what shall we do?”

 Elisha, the hated prophet, simply stated,” Do not fear …for those who are with us are more than those who are with them.”  Then, Elisha prayed and asked to the Lord to “open the eyes of his servant, so he could see.”  

See what??

This is the good part…

 “And the Lord opened the servant’s eyes and he saw the mountain full of horses and chariots of fire all around Elisha!  I don’t know about you, but I am mighty glad for those chariots of fire, as I face life and the days ahead. 

  It gets better…

Elisha prayed to God, “Strike the people with blindness.”  And HE did!  And they never returned!

 It is easy to be blinded by the world and its false message.  The prophet Elisha led the way in exposing those of us who know God’s ways and follow Him, to the undeniable truth that “those who are with us are more than those who are with them”.

 Let’s ask God to… “Open our eyes”!

Little eyes are watching…

~Jackie Johnson - I am a former tribal missionary to the Kuna Indians on the Colombian border in Central America.  Fluent in several languages, my husband and I currently pastor a Spanish-speaking church in Southern California.  My passion is mentoring and equipping dedicated young women for life, marriage, motherhood, and beyond. I am the mother of two daughters and the grandmother of three Princesses and four young Knights. 

Jackie's Journey "The Get-Closer Quiz"

It is looking like the beginning of an interesting spring and summer with our  welcoming our freedom again to move around, albeit, with modifications.  Nonetheless, the joy of stirring about, without restraint is long-awaited and timely.

 Looking for a summer activity or a late “lockdown” 

suggestion to do with your family?

  I have a few questions you could ask your children, if you want to have some fun while sitting at the beach or B-B-Q-ing in the back-yard. I have two daughters and seven grand-children.  Questions always bring the brain into action and tickle the funny bone when the environment is casual and trusting.  For example…

 1.     If you could trade lives with someone, who would it be?

2.     What is the most enjoyable thing our family has done in the past year?

3.     What is the most precious thing you own?

4.     Do you have a dream for the future that keeps popping up?  What is it?

5.     Name your three favorite movies or bible characters.

6.     Do you believe there is life on other planets?

7.     Do you believe in eternal life?  How do you see it?

Here are a few they could ask you:

1.     If you were going to describe me to a friend, what three adjectives would you use?

2.     What was the best present I ever gave you?

3.     What did you get into trouble for when you were a kid?

4.      What makes you cry?

5.     Who was your best friend in high school?

6.     How would you describe Dad (or Mom) when you first meet him (or her)?

7.     What do you think is the meaning of success?

Does your child easily talk about his/her emotions?  What about empathy for others?  Would you describe your prince or princess as optimistic and able to comfortably handle himself or herself well in a group of  his/her own age?  Have you talked about reasonable goals for your child’s age and some thoughts on how to reach those goals?  What about their ability to wait patiently and listen attentively?

 How do you see the need of your child?

 Questions help evaluate the trust your child has in you and increases their skill to verbalize their values, point of view and what is important to them.  Being transparent and honest opens the box for an entertaining and enjoyable time together. With social media so prevalent and time consuming…conversation has become a lost art!

Scoop that prince and princess up this week 

and find a moment to “face to face” communicate

and let them experience the preciousness of 

“real” interaction over the superficial!

 “I saw tomorrow look at me from little children’s eyes and thought…

how carefully we would speak if we were really wise.”

~Jackie Johnson - I am a former tribal missionary to the Kuna Indians on the Colombian border in Central America.  Fluent in several languages, my husband and I currently pastor a Spanish-speaking church in Southern California.  My passion is mentoring and equipping dedicated young women for life, marriage, motherhood, and beyond. I am the mother of two daughters and the grandmother of three Princesses and four young Knights. 

Jackie's Journey "Good-bye...for Now"

There is no more influential or powerful role on earth than a mother.  As significant as political, military, educational, or religious public figures may be, none can compare to the impact made by mothers.  Their words are never fully forgotten, their touch leaves an indelible impression and the memory of the presence lasts a lifetime.

I ask you, “Who else is anywhere near that influential?”

 For seventy-seven years my beautiful mother taught me about genuine love and Motherhood.  She said, “Jackie, love is NOT a passion.  It is the pulse of sacrifice…”

 I watched her, as she maneuvered through the ups and downs of life.

 She was fierce, strong and courageous, especially in the latter years without my Father.

She faced life with grace each day with acceptance of God’s hand and timing.  She wanted to go with Dad seven years ago!

She had no fear of old age (which is the assumption that we still have many years of life ahead of us!)

 “The length of our days is seventy years or eighty,

IF we have the strength; yet this span is but trouble and sorrow

And passes quickly and then we fly away.!” (Psa. 90:10)

 She learned to be satisfied in the morning with His unfailing love.  She was sometimes disappointed because at 101 and in perfect health, she thought she would just quietly slip away in her sleep, but alas,…she would awaken to another morning here.

 She may not have sung out loud for joy (music was not her thing!), but she was glad for everyday.

She still looked forward to any, or all of us coming and visiting with her in her home.

She was a good listener…and I can remember my high school friends coming home with me…just to talk and be with her!

She was wise and discerning.  It was impossible to fool her.  She saw right through all of us!

She taught me, by example:

·      To number my days… “Jackie, make them count!”

·      To live in love and loyalty to my husband

·      To be deliberate with my heritage

·      To think generations and

·      To see how short and quickly time passes.

 See, Mama, I am paying attention.  Your job has been well done…even up to the finish line…

 Thank you for leading the way, for

Leaving a print for me to step into and

For showing me the pulse of sacrificial love…

I will love you forever…

~Jackie Johnson - I am a former tribal missionary to the Kuna Indians on the Colombian border in Central America.  Fluent in several languages, my husband and I currently pastor a Spanish-speaking church in Southern California.  My passion is mentoring and equipping dedicated young women for life, marriage, motherhood, and beyond. I am the mother of two daughters and the grandmother of three Princesses and four young Knights. 

Jackie's Journey "Final Farewell??"

Kim, my constant companion in those days…

“On my bed I remember you; I think of you through the watches of the night.  Because you are my help, I sing in the shadow of your wings. 

 My soul clings to you; your right hand upholds me.”

Psalm 63: 6,7,8.

 The Darien is an earthy, steamy environment of thick rainforest.  The humidity was thick enough to slice and the heat was barely bearable.  With our return to Pucuro after my major surgery came the responsibilities that we had left three months prior.  Our partners, Jay and Sue Gunsteens and their family, had gone on furlough and returned to the States. My strength had not returned and I tired very easily.  I started resting in the afternoon and within a few months I was having difficulty getting up at all.  

 Ralph had fastened a battery tape recorder to the wall above the bed so I could listen to the Book of Psalms.  They brought me great comfort as I listened to David in his distress and God’s continual deliverance.  God became my refuge and consolation in ways I had never experienced before.  The isolation from civilization, the absence of medical convenience and the sense I was dying was exchanged for finding Him more than enough to meet all my apprehension. 

 How does God meet you in a tight spot?

  The daily opening of the clinic, delivering babies in the night, homeschooling Christina, the care of toddler Kimberly, the linguistic work and the daily opportunity to share Christ… all brought profound joy.  In spite of my physical state, my circumstances brought life-lessons I would never have recognized, experienced or understood apart from this plan God had for me.

 “If you have raced with men on foot and they have worn you out,

how can you compete with horses?  If you stumble in safe country, 

how will you manage in the thickets by the Jordan?

Jeremiah 12: 5; Proverbs 24:10

  We kept thinking if we could just persevere a few more months we would see our Kuna family in a spiritual place where we were comfortable leaving for an extended furlough and seek medical help.  We did not want both missionary families among our tribe to be on furlough at the same time.

 The people would come and sit with me as I lay in bed.  Nangel, pictured beloow with Ralph, the village midwife, grandma, and precious new Christian came daily and I looked forward to her visit.  One day she kept saying to the other women gathered around my bed, “Purkwis tani!”.  Usually, that phrase is reserved for those who are dying.  It is translated, “Death comes!”  I remember thinking…it had been over a year since the surgery and I must look horrendously bad!  As a young mother, death seemed illusive, an impossibility…until my health failed and God began to speak to me gently, resolutely and unmistakably through His Word…

Did Nangel see something I couldn’t? 

 A few weeks later a couple on the field committee, Don and Pat Barger, came in by plane for a day visit. The look on their faces when they entered our home told me that what Nangel had said might be true!  They immediately encouraged us to leave the village with them and to take an early furlough and get medical help in the States.  I had one small round mirror interior and I had watched my face become thin and gaunt over the months, but I did not realize how tiny I was all over!

Waiting with Kim in Panama City for our flight to the states.

 I will forever be grateful for their divine intervention in our lives that day.  After a few days and friendly persuasion, we packed a few things, said our good-byes and headed to Scripps Diagnostic Hospital in the States.

 As the plane lifted into the sky, I caught a glimpse of the entire village waving to us in what Scripps confirmed could have been our final farewell!  

 Do you hear His voice daily speaking to you through Scripture? 

Gently?  Resolutely?  Unmistakably?

 Are you listening?

~Jackie Johnson - I am a former tribal missionary to the Kuna Indians on the Colombian border in Central America.  Fluent in several languages, my husband and I currently pastor a Spanish-speaking church in Southern California.  My passion is mentoring and equipping dedicated young women for life, marriage, motherhood, and beyond. I am the mother of two daughters and the grandmother of three Princesses and four young Knights. 

Jackie's Journey "Betrayed!"

“…for they have dug a pit to capture me and have hidden snares for my feet,

 but you know, Oh, Lord, all their plots to kill me.” Jeremiah 18:23

 Has anyone ever set a snare for your life?

 Shortly after we returned to our village in the remote jungles of Panama after a two-month absence, a young Kuna man came to our door, obviously troubled.  He faltered and then blurted out with no care for his terminology, that Aquileo, the town representative to the Panamanian government, was plotting to kill us!  

The only word that would describe my shock was…INCONCEIVABLE!

Where can we run?

How do we …ESCAPE!

Our isolated village made any getaway… IMPOSSIBLE!

 In my traumatized state of mind, a verse in Jeremiah raced into my consciousness…  Jeremiah was facing his plotting antagonists and said, “But the Lord is with us like a mighty warrior; so my persecutors will stumble and not prevail…” Jer. 20:11   This plan had taken Aquileo two years to put together and why were we now…TWO YEARS LATER…being informed that the time had come to eliminate us!  I knew we were expendable…but….

 My first thought…my two little girls…what could I do?  

Would we be disposed of in the river?  

No one would find us…ever!

 This had to be a nightmare…this could not be happening!

 My heart was stunned, on the one hand, because Aquileo and his wife had been consistently friendly to us, visiting in our jungle home, laughing and sharing with us. The terrifying reality was, they were planning to kill us at the same time!!  I was terrified… I felt betrayed because so many in our Kuna family had known of this plan and no one, until now, had told us.  I felt indebted to the young man who had risked his tribal reputation to protect us. 

 When?…Where?…How would this be carried out??  

What should we do?  

What could we do! 

 Ralph, took one look at me and instantly, reminded me that I should “joyfully” be giving thanks to God that for the two years of planning I had been spared the stress of knowing about this development!  He had recently given me a mathematical “formula”, as a reminder, for just this kind of situation.   It went like this:

 Trials + Acceptance of the Trial with Joy = Maturity

 I asked myself these 6 questions:

 1.     Could I trust God’s Sovereign plan?  Romans 8:28

2.     Did I believe God would never give me a trial too big?  1 Cor. 10:13

3.     Would He give me a way of escape? 1 Cor. 10:13

4.     Is every trial given with divine purpose and benefit?  Rom. 8:18; 11 Cor. 4: 17

5.     Am I convinced the Holy Spirit will help, comfort and carry me through this trial? Rom. 8: 26

6.     Do I believe that testing will produce Godly character in me?  Job 23: 10

 For the formula to work growth and maturity in me

 I would have to answer each of these questions with a resounding… “YES”!

 Ralph’s response was, “This is preposterous, Aquileo is my friend!”   Denial was never an option in my thinking!  Ralph immediately stood up and bolted out the front door, swiftly crossing the village… to confront his nemesis!  

 In that talk Aquileo shared a verbal wound that he had received from my husband when we first moved into Pucuro.  He felt he had “lost face” among the men in our very tight community.  Ralph had no idea that the result of his jesting had caused such pain and immediately humbled his heart and asked forgiveness. 

 In the days to come, I found that accepting the trial (even this one!) with joy proved to be a life-lesson that made a permanent imprint on me to this day, as I face life daily.  Accepting not just the formula, but also its applied truth with a joyful and resounding “YES” has changed my life!  The struggles continue to come, but accepting God’s purpose, provision and control with joy is the quickest path to peace, growth and maturity. 

 JOY is not the absence of suffering but the presence of the Lord.

C.S. Lewis said, “Joy is never in our power, it is the fruit of accepting God’s provision in difficult circumstances!”

 Well…we waited to see what would happen to us.  Days passed slowly, the nights were even longer (!), and then, one bright morning, Aquileo and his entire family arrived at our front door… smiling!  

 I cannot put into words the delight and relief

I felt as I opened the door and invited them inside!

 “Consider it PURE JOY whenever you face many trials 

of many kinds because you know that the testing of your faith 

develops perseverance.

 Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be 

MATURE AND COMPLETE, not lacking anything…!”

James 1: 1-4

Are you finding joy in your times of difficulty?  

 How do you respond to distresses, trials, rejections and betrayal’s?

~Jackie Johnson - I am a former tribal missionary to the Kuna Indians on the Colombian border in Central America.  Fluent in several languages, my husband and I currently pastor a Spanish-speaking church in Southern California.  My passion is mentoring and equipping dedicated young women for life, marriage, motherhood, and beyond. I am the mother of two daughters and the grandmother of three Princesses and four young Knights. 

Jackie's Journey "The Empowerment Issue!"

Each year I read the Bible through.  I read a Proverb of the day…there are 31 Proverbs…so in a month I have completed reading the book of instruction in Wisdom, Knowledge, Discernment, Discretion, Understanding, Righteousness, Justice, and Equity.  The purpose would be that understanding comes from increased learning which allows me to acquire Biblical wise counsel in knowing how to live as a godly mother with the power of influence. Proverbs 1:1-7  

 Because we are mom’s, we have the biggest responsibility and privilege of schooling and equipping our children in how to maneuver through life and one day teach their own children.  Worldly wisdom will bring their destruction.  Biblical wisdom will bring the fear of the Lord and the beginning of knowledge that will guarantee protection and success in life.  Proverbs is a textbook for truth regarding a person’s relationship to God, Oneself and Other’s.  It supersedes personality type and is designed to teach us to contemplate the fear of God and what it is to live by His wisdom.

 When the Author and Creator of All that is…gives me a manual or workbook, you can bet I’m in…and I’m on it!  My course was set many years ago and the simple comparisons between common, concrete images and life’s most profound truths has challenged me to look at life through another-worldly lense.  “Proverbs are simple, moral statements (or illustrations) that highlight and teach fundamental realities about life.” (John MacArthur)

 As chaotic and divisive as our world is at this moment, there is still a book that is packed with help, instruction and teaching! The author, Solomon, gives insight into the tricky issues of life facing us today. I love this book because it clearly addresses the importance of imparting a pattern of undeniable absolute truth from generation to generation.  That speaks to this Mom!  

 What will I leave behind?

Did I do a good job with what was entrusted to me?

 My heritage (children and grandchildren) is “my truth”, to coin the popular phrase today…

How did I use “my empowerment” for the success of my heritage, to coin another popular phrase…?

 In the end it will ONLY be:

 Did I seek and find HIS TRUTH?

and was I EMPOWERED by HIS Spirit??

 My Heritage

~Jackie Johnson - I am a former tribal missionary to the Kuna Indians on the Colombian border in Central America.  Fluent in several languages, my husband and I currently pastor a Spanish-speaking church in Southern California.  My passion is mentoring and equipping dedicated young women for life, marriage, motherhood, and beyond. I am the mother of two daughters and the grandmother of three Princesses and four young Knights. 

Jackie's Journey "The Silent Cry!"

          “…and I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, 

may have power to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ,

and to know this love surpasses knowledge…”  Ephesians 3: 18

 If you are struggling this morning

in some way that you do not understand…this blog is for you…

  Recently, a stranger placed a small book in my hand written by Amy Carmichael (a missionary to India 1867-1951).  Immediately, upon hearing her name, a vivid memory came knocking at the door of my heart. While we were in Boot Camp in Fredonia (make that "Freeze-don't ya"), Wisconsin!), preparing for missionary service I became so sick that I wasn't sure we would be able to finish the course.  Yet, my husband and I knew God had brought us this far.  There was a tribe, deep in the rain forest of Panama that had never heard the name of Jesus Christ and they were waiting for someone to come and bring His Name to them.

 We had been seeking medical help for over two months.  I was in my first trimester with our first child. My physical symptoms were severe, I had lost six weeks of missionary training and I was lost in my understanding of it all when diagnosed with an unyielding case of pneumonia!  The infection was suffocating my compromised lung and I would have to take a drug that could adversely affect my unborn child!  The choice was my recovering or possibly both of us not going full term!  I wasconfused and consumed by fear.  

           Have you ever been there?

Faced with impossible decisions and lost in your worst  imaginations?

  At this juncture of my journey, someone gave me a quote of Amy Carmichael that stopped me in my tracks and I realized I had the concept of my Father's love and means of communication to me all wrong!   

 “If I cannot catch the ‘sound of the rain’ long before the rain falls, and going to some hilltop of the spirit, as near to my God as I can, have not faith to wait there with my face between my knees, though six times or sixty times I am told ‘there is nothing’ till at last ‘there arises a little cloud out of the sea’, then I know nothing of Calvary love!"

 I Kings 18: 41 says, “And Elijah said to Ahab, ‘Go, eat and drink, for there

            Is the sound of heavy rain’.  So Ahab went off to eat and drink, but Elijah

            climbed to the top of Carmel, bent down to the ground and put his face 

            between his knees.  “Go and look toward the sea”, he told his servant. 

            And he went up and looked.  “There is nothing there’, he said.  Seven times

            Elijah said, ‘Go back!’  The seventh time the servant reported, ‘A cloud, as 

            small as a man’s hand, is rising from the sea’…The sky grew black with 

            clouds, the wind rose, a heavy rain came…’”

I felt a little like Elijah may have felt when he was in danger for his life.  Why didn’t I understand?   I should, shouldn’t I?  I was a missionary candidate (soon to be deployed!), I had spent a year at the University of Arizona, 4 years of Bible School, 2 yrs. of Boot Camp and Language School...I was completely committed to God with everything I knew, in all the light I had …

But God always has much to teach me about Himself.  I waited for Him at the front door of my heart and He silently entered through the back door and shattered my concept of Him and His promises!  He came with new light, new peace and new understanding of His divine nature. I re-focused, solely, on the author and finisher of my faith…

 “There are times when something comes into our lives which is charged with love in such a way that it seems to open the Eternal to us for a moment...it may be a small and intimate touch, as the touch of the dawn wind or it may be the pain experienced in the storm of life along the way... But we know it is our Lord.  And then perhaps the room where we are, with its books and furniture and flowers, seem less ‘present’ than His presence, and the heart is drawn into His sweetness… Can we ever cease to wonder at the love of our companion?  And then suddenly we recognize our Lord holding us in a new way?  Dimness seems to be more wholesome for us here...not understood by us.  After all, how little we see!    Confounded and abased, we continue to hold fast to the Rock and hide in the dust, before the glory of the Majesty of love--the love whose symbol is the Cross.  

         And the piercing question then:  What do I know of Calvary love?” 

 I am praying for you, this morning,

for your sensing the whisper of His Presence in that "cloud out of the sea"

in a new way and for the power of His healing…

~Jackie Johnson - I am a former tribal missionary to the Kuna Indians on the Colombian border in Central America.  Fluent in several languages, my husband and I currently pastor a Spanish-speaking church in Southern California.  My passion is mentoring and equipping dedicated young women for life, marriage, motherhood, and beyond. I am the mother of two daughters and the grandmother of three Princesses and four young Knights. 

Jackie's Journey "Never Sacrifice the Permanent on the Altar of the Immediate!"

I had never had a website, a Facebook page, Pinterest account, Instagram, tweeted or read a Blog until January of 2015!  I officially welcomed a new world of technological communication with the opening of all five at once!  With its availability came a huge responsibility to use them wisely…they can become time consuming! 

 “Our greatest danger in life is in permitting

the urgent things to crowd out the important.”

 Dr. Bob Jones, Sr. used to say, “Never sacrifice the permanent on the altar of the immediate.”  

 Everyone receives an equal supply of time.  The only difference between us is in the way we spend it.  Each week brings us 168 golden hours.  We spend approximately 56 hours for sleep and recuperation.  We spend approximately 28 hours for eating and personal duties.  We spend approximately 40-50 hours for earning a living. We have 30-40 hours left to spend just as we wish.  But how do we spend them?  How many hours for recreation?  How many hours for family communication?  How many hours for the regular worship of God (devotion, fellowship, meditation, etc.)?  How many hours for personal service in the name of Christ? 

 Will we rob God?  

We can and we do!

 Perhaps we may be very busy with good things, yet too busy for the best things.  The real question is: 

 Have we made wise use of our time as good stewards of Christ? 

Henry Clay Trumbull said, “Today is, for all that we know, the opportunity and occasion of our lives.  On what we do or say today may depend the success and completeness of our entire life struggle.  It is for us, therefore, to use every moment of today as if our very eternity were dependent on its words and deeds” …

 I know for me with this new year 2020, I am so challenged to be circumspect with the “Steps of ACTION” I am setting for myself to stay focused.

 Here are my first two:

1.  Define my goal and set the priorities necessary to hit the mark. This will fill my life with godly purpose and direction.  My commitment is to your personal success each Monday morning and my first priority will be to set a defined amount of time to reach that goal.  That will entail allowing the Word of God to “dwell richly” in me during my daily devotional and worship time with Him (Matt. 6:33).  My goal is to please Him first!  Gal.3:3 is my monitor for it admonishes and asks me “…Are you now trying to attain your goal by human effort?” Never!…it cannot be done with eternal purpose!

2.  I am taking some of that time given each week to ask myself some important questions. 

  When I get to the end of this year, what do I want to look back on and say                        

 I accomplished?

  Did I give personally with my service to God, with my family, friends,                                     

  professionally…?  

 Who did I glorify…myself or my God?

How can I reach the full potential of what God has planned for me this year?

 “We are to press on toward the (set) goal,

forgetting the past (no bitterness)

and reach toward the future…  Philippians 3:12-14

~Jackie Johnson - I am a former tribal missionary to the Kuna Indians on the Colombian border in Central America.  Fluent in several languages, my husband and I currently pastor a Spanish-speaking church in Southern California.  My passion is mentoring and equipping dedicated young women for life, marriage, motherhood, and beyond. I am the mother of two daughters and the grandmother of three Princesses and four young Knights. 

Jackie's Journey "Where Do You Keep Your BUT?"

In the Princess Parable Series Princess Hope is the oldest of the five princesses and carries the responsibility of setting a good example and leading the way for her four younger sisters who are watching and learning from her.  She experiences first-hand what it takes to “count the cost” when she sees her grandmother’s priceless ring in a store window in the village. She has to get it back…but how…and at what cost?

Meet Princess Hope

How many of us understand what it means 

to “count the cost” 

for someone or something 

that is so important 

that we will not hesitate to boldly step up to the plate?

Before leaving for the shores of Panama I was cognizant of the cost it might take to leave the U.S. and live in a foreign country.  But it was not until Christina, my first daughter, was born that I became acutely aware of the expanse of what it might actually demand.  I was leaving my homeland with my parents first and only, two-year-old grandchild. After arriving in Panama, it would take us two days by three different means of transportation to land on the muddy banks of the river Pucuro.  It would include living in an “off the grid” bark-walled house with no running water, no electricity and an outhouse that screamed “unfriendly”. 

 Would the cost be too great?

 Our jungle house was located in an extremely dense and remote area of the jungle. There was malaria and T.B.  There would be hairy eight-legged creatures, not to mention venomous insects and reptiles of every kind the imagination could conjure up and worse!  We would be called to cook, eat and drink unidentifiable “chicha’s”, mammals, reptiles and even rodents!  It would be on the Colombian border where drug runners passed through our village routinely.  My neighbors would speak a different language and have a strange culture.  There would be no privacy, no hospital, no urgent care facility, no contact with the outside world, except for an often-unreliable two-way radio!  On top of that, on our first trek in, I would have two little girls.  Christina had just turned three and our second daughter was a tiny three-month-old nursing baby on my lap…

This is an aerial veiw of our house with the tin roof in the foreground

 I would be the first to admit that life brings serious unknowns, struggles, doubts, fears, and temptations from the enemy, even if you have “counted the cost” in all the light you have.

 On one of the many rainy days in the rainforest, I began to share my heart and woes with a seasoned missionary who was listening intently.  To every comment of comfort, she gave me, I responded,“BUT you don’t understand; I know GOD says that BUT what about…?”

 When I paused to catch my breath, she asked me if, “I thought God’s grace was sufficient enough for me for today?”   

 What!???… I’m a missionary living in the jungle…I could hardly say “No”!  Of course, I answered, “Yes!” 

 She followed up with, “Then… would His Grace be sufficient for tomorrow?!” 

 She had firmly and graciously admonished me to keep my BUT on the appropriate side of the word GOD! NOT, “Ok,GOD, BUT…” (we always have a good excuse for not trusting Him); rather, this is my situation, BUT GOD is more than sufficient and faithful.  He has proven Himself over and over again, when I keep my BUT on the right side of God.

 Is living for God, demonstrating genuine Christianity

and claiming Christ as Lord and Master of my life

for His glory… too much?

 If I can trust Him for today; then, I can trust Him for tomorrow!

 A wise woman counts the cost… 

 Princess Hope’s recapturing a stolen ring and me moving into a dense jungle do not, on the surface, seem comparable; yet, the point is ,what do we treasure enough to pay the ultimate price to achieve?  What is important enough for us to “count the cost” and plunge into whatever sacrifice it takes to see it accomplished?

 There was no call to the jungle; BUT GOD did call us to respond to the need in that jungle…to open up a work among an unreached group of people who had yet to hear His Name spoken, even once, or to hear the news of His wonderful redeeming message.

 “The house of the righteous contains great treasure”! (Pro. 15:6)

Moms…your house is full of eternal treasure…

treasure that will spend eternity somewhere.

 When all is said and done and we have reached the end of this life…what will be said of us?  Did we choose the most important?  Did we succeed in our calling?  Did we “count the cost” for what was on His heart in His perfect will for us or did we do our own thing and hope for the best?  

 How does the fruit of your commitment look so far?  

We only pass this way once!

It WILL be worth it all…!

~Jackie Johnson - I am a former tribal missionary to the Kuna Indians on the Colombian border in Central America.  Fluent in several languages, my husband and I currently pastor a Spanish-speaking church in Southern California.  My passion is discipling and equipping dedicated young women for life, marriage, motherhood, and beyond. I am the mother of two daughters and the grandmother of three Princesses and four young Knights.