He would give me a godly wife. I prayed for children yet to be born.
I asked God that they would give their lives to Christ at an early age,
and that they would walk with God and be used by Him.
Several years later, while I was a student at Philadelphia Biblical
University, I met Karen Williams and she became my wife. She is the
joy of my life and the mother of our five children. She loves Jesus
more than anything in this life. I am blessed beyond measure. I don’t
deserve her. God answered my prayer.
In the early years of my ministry with Campus Crusade for
Christ, I traveled from one campus to another on speaking tours, and
often Karen and the kids stayed home. Many an evening in a small
motel in some little college town I would awake late at night, slip out
of bed, fall on my knees and, often in tears, cry out to God, asking Him
to not let my kids grow up bitter because I had to be away. I prayed
that God would keep His hand on them and bless them. And God
answered that prayer. Today our children are grown and are all walk-
ing with the Lord. Our oldest son is a pastor. Our youngest son left a
promising baseball career and is preparing for the ministry. Both of
our daughters (we have a daughter in heaven, too) are actively
involved in ministering to others.
And so on that afternoon as I stared at that chapel, where as a sev-
enteen-year-old I sought the face of God to provide for an unseen
future, God flooded my soul with His grace and mercy. He reminded
me that the blessing and favor we as a family have enjoyed and are expe-
riencing are not because of our knowledge and expertise. It is precisely
because I didn’t (and still don’t!) know what I was doing! But I did have
an acute awareness that I needed Him—to provide a life partner for me,
and to give me the wisdom and courage to know how to love her and
to lead my family. In a word, anything of lasting value in my family is
anchored in brokenness and produced by the Spirit of God.
Nothing but a family’s surrender to the Lordship of Christ will
transform it. You cannot program or demand revival in your home any
more than you can program revival in your church. Sheer pragmatism
will not produce spiritual results. But a family’s life of brokenness and
dependence on God will.
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