On Hearing the Call

I seek at the beginning to get my heart into such a state that it has no will of its own in regard to a given matter. Nine-tenths of the trouble with people generally is just here. Nine-tenths of the difficulties are over come when our hearts are ready to do the Lord's will, whatever it may be. When one is truly in this state, it is usually but a little way to the knowledge of what His will is.

-George Muller

In the past few months I've heard much discussion on the topic of knowing God's will. I have given a lot thought to this subject and I would thoroughly enjoy saying that I know with certainty how anyone can know God's will. Mainly I would like to be able to honestly say that because it would make following hard after Jesus a lot easier for me personally! However, often the painful truth is that knowing God's will is an incredibly and powerfully personal issue and therefore discerning His will is most likely just a little different for each individual. One thing I do know is that our God is not a God of "formulas," He is much more personal than that.

So, how do I know that Mark and I are following God's plan for our lives through Touching Lives? Well, we do have circumstantial evidence. For instance, through a series of events God led us to the couple we are partnering with in India, the person He'd chosen to guide us through the process of filing for non-profit status, the people He wanted on our Board of Directors and I could go on...

There are also areas in this calling that line up directly with what God's Word tells us about the kind of people God uses. In 2 Corinthians 12:10 Paul says that "...when I am weak, then I am strong." 1 Corinthians 1: 27 tells us, "But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to put to shame the things which are mighty..." Time after time all through out the Bible God did things in ways that just makes you scratch you head and say, "If I were God I don't think I would have done it that way!" He rose up the nation of Israel through a barren couple, He had Noah build a boat nowhere near water, Joseph was put in prison to become a government official, Moses was much too young at the age of forty to lead the Jews out of Egypt, the Son of God was born in a barn, Paul - a Jewish rabbi - became the apostle to the Gentiles - need I continue?

So, the fact that this ministry is "being born" smack dab in the middle of the worst financial time since the Great Depression and that God has chosen to use a disabled chemical operator and a part-time obstetrical nurse who live in the poorest city in Pennsylvania, helps to confirm that this "craziness" is God's doing! I often tell people that if I were God I certainly would not choose Mark and Kathi Evans for this task!

Another confirmation of this calling is that God brought Godly people to us, some we knew and some who were strangers to us, who affirmed the calling. There are several other things that contribute to our ability to say that, "we know that we know that we know" that God has carved out this road for us but what I'd really like to share is how God communicated to me that it was His will to use me to help take others onto the foreign mission field.

It started with me begging! You see, God put in me a burning, and I do mean burning, desire to serve Him. Of course that is true of all His followers, but I had a gut-wrenching passion to serve Him on the mission field. On May 29, 2004 I wrote the following entry in my journal: "Jesus, I know what I want to do – so many things, so many visions. But, Master, I lay down all those aspirations so that I can be unencumbered to do what You want me to do. I want Your vision. I want Your will to be done, but it’s got to start inside me. I need courage, boldness, meekness.
You know I can speak, Lord, help me be silent. You know I can lead, help me to follow. Show me, help me, teach me, fill me, break me, but Sovereign God, in Your love, mercy, grace and faithfulness, please, I beseech You, use me!"

It wasn't until September 14 of that same year that God whispered to my spirit that He wanted to use me to train, equip, and take others onto the mission field, especially those who might not otherwise go. While I was confused and overwhelmed by that I was also excited about it. How? When? Where? Me?

Since that day God lead us to two locations that provide many of the luxuries of the United States - and us medical people do enjoy our luxuries. Our missions will not be "roughing it" like some missions and I believe that God designed our ministry that way to allow more people an insight into the plight of the starving and lost in under-developed and developing countries.

On September 14, 2004 I did not have the slightest clue how God was going to fulfill this new call on my life. And I did think that the call was pure lunacy. But I knew in my spirit that some day I would understand what He was up too! I guess that's what He meant when He said that we should "walk by faith, not by sight."

Forward...to India!

Faith is to believe what you do not see;

the reward of this faith is to see what you believe.
Saint Augustine

In May of 2006 I found myself in Hyderabad, India on a mission "scouting trip" with another ministry. The last few days before going home were spent with the Amrutharaj's, a lovely couple who had a burden and vision for the poor in their area. They shared their calling to open a medical clinic in the Papireddy Colony and asked that we pray about partnering with them in this endeavor. After I recovered from yet another "spirit jumping in me" episode, we attended a church service in another of the slums in the area.

Throughout the service I could not help but notice a woman who sat on the floor across the room from me. She had the countenance of someone with the weight of the world on her shoulders. She rarely looked up and, as far as I could see, never looked anyone in the eyes. God broke my heart for this dear woman that day and for the many, many women just like her in this city. It appeared that God was using this woman to answer my prayers regarding partnering with Drs. Joseph and Vimala even before I prayed them! I pray that God will allow me to see this precious woman again while we're still on earth but if that is not God's will I look forward to telling her about the impact she had on my life and my calling!

I wasn't to return to Hyderabad until November of 2007, a full year and one half after my first visit. However this second mission was also a "scouting trip" only this time it was on behalf of Touching Lives! And this time my sweet sister in the Lord and now fellow Touching Lives Board Member, Darien, accompanied me.

As we discussed the future partnership between Touching Lives and Drs. Joseph and Vimala, once again my spirit leaped (my body should do as much jumping as my spirit does!) when I heard that their dream is not to open one but five clinics. To this day I don't quite understand why that felt so right, I can only tell you that it did!
Over the course of this mission we were able to visit the construction site of the first clinic. As the Amrutharaj's posed in what would become the doorway of the structure for us to take pictures of them, tears came to my eyes. Before me was God's visual confirmation that this crazy adventure we were on was His will. This was a wonderfully humbling moment!

One of the few regrets I have had in regard to participating in short-term missions has always been that, either because of his work schedule or his health, I have never be able to share a mission with Mark first hand. But while in India this second time I began to ask God to bring Mark here. It only felt right that he would meet Drs. Joseph and Vimala "up close and personal" as we begin this ministry partnership. The morning after we returned home as Mark "debriefed" me on the trip, he told me that he felt God leading him to go to Hyderabad! And, you guessed it, I got that spirit-jumping thing going again! So, we have begun to pray that God would open the doors for us to visit India this coming May. Please join with us in praying that 1) God's will is done and 2) that He receives all the glory, honor, and praise due Him as He carries out His will in our lives.

The Call to Missions Realized

Today is the first day of your life because it has never been before, and today is the last day of your life becasue it will never be again.

- Frederick Buechner

As Jason reached his teenage years I began to feel the pull of the call to missions I heard when I was eleven. I still had not been introduced to ministries or organizations that could help me walk in that call but I had begun to do some research when God led Mark and me to a missions-minded church for the first time in our adult lives. I still remember feeling my spirit leap within me the Sunday morning I first heard the annoucement that our new church was having an informational meeting about their next mission to Trinidad in 2001.

Over the next 5 years I averaged two foreign missions per year. As I prepared for each mission I would send out support letters to family and friends, make items to sell, and pray for opportunities to work extra time to finance the missions. And God used these efforts to provide all the resources I needed for each mission. But God had something new for us in the spring of 2006.

Mark had triple by-pass surgery on January 31, 2006 and although there were a few "bumps in the road" of his recovery, overall it was fairly uneventful. So, at the beginning of April he was feeling well enough to be antsy but was not quite ready physically to return to his 48-72 hour work weeks and he began to "putz", as he puts it, around our home office. One of the end points of his putz-ing was that after 8 years he found that book CD!

One month later while on my first mission to India, the Holy Spirit made it clear to me that He did not want me to ask people for financial support for my missions any longer.

"So...you don't want me to go on the mission field any more?"

"I didn't say that, Kathi, I just want you to trust me to provide the funds for your missions."

"Ok, Lord," gulp, "with your help I'll trust you."

In July of 2006 I finished the book, in September we signed a contract with our publisher - Wheatmark, and in April of 2007 the book was published! As we prayed about what we should do with the funds from our book it was obvious that this way one of the means that God intended to use to provide resources for my missions. God was using Peanut's life to fulfill His call on my life!

So, why the 8 year delay? I asked the same question! In that time God introduced me to my now cherished friend and divinely gifted artist, Connie Beecher, who did all of the art for my book. He brought us to Calvary Chapel of Delaware County, the vehicle He intended to use to "launch" me onto the mission field. He introduced us to various mission ministries including PUMA that would mentor us on our road to Touching Lives. He introduced us to the ministries in India and Kenya with whom we would eventually partner. And He introduced and reunited us with the people He had choosen to be on the TLM board at the birth of this ministry. During those 8 years God was working "behind the scenes" to do His perfect will in His perfect time!

We're Not in Hawaii Any More, Peanut

Faith is deliberate confidence in the character of God whose

ways you may not understand at the time.

-Oswald Chambers

I share the details of Peanut's short life in my book Our Baby, Our Love, Our Loss. But the lessons I've learned and the twists and turns of my life's journey that have resulted from Peanut's 16 weeks of life would take volumes to communicate. However I can tell you that there is one thing of which I am convinced: returning to work just 2 weeks after we lost Peanut was one of the top five most difficult things I've ever done. Suddenly working in Labor and Delivery seemed more like a sacrifice than a privilege. Watching a woman deliver a baby she did not want while I longed for the baby I could not have was excruciating.

As time passed God gave me opportunities to reach out to other couples who were experiencing the gut-wrenching pain of losing a child and I slowly realized that my "cushy" job was being transformed into a ministry. I had become a member of a club that I would never want to join but with that membership came the realization that the call I felt on my life and career back in college really was a call and not just a desire. The cost of this ministry was indeed high, higher than I could ever have imagined, but that did not alter the call in any way.

After several years I began to "hear" God's Spirit speak to my spirit, this time telling me He could minister to many more couples through our experience if I wrote a book. I argued with God (talk about an exercise in futility!) but finally began to write. Interestingly after writing all but the last 2 chapters I misplaced the CD with the manuscript on it! When Mark and I were unable to find it we assumed that God's purpose in having me write our story was a cathartic one. The whereabouts of the manuscript remained a mystery to us for 8 years. During that time God was busy preparing the way...

The Time of Preparation

If you put off everything till you're sure of it,

you'll never get anything done.

-Norman Vincent Peale

After our honeymoon Mark and I moved into a small apartment just south of Wilmington, De. and I took a position at what was then Wilmington Medical Center on an oncology unit. I learned tons on that unit and was tempted to change my site from obstetrics to oncology but God very sternly turned me back again. He has a way of doing that! So a little over a year after I started at the medical center I accepted a position in Labor and Delivery.

Talk about learning! At that time Wilmington Medical Center, now Christiana Medical Center, did over 6,000 deliveries a year. It was the third largest maternity center in the United States and I lovingly dubbed it a "baby factory"! For the most part I loved working there and learning the kind of things that only experience can teach.

Then on the same day that my maternal grandmother passed away we learned that I was pregnant. Can you say "mixed emotions"? The very next day I began to bleed and that began a 3 month emotional roller coaster of being uncertain that I would be able to carry the pregnancy to term. But praise God, I went back to work in the 13th week of the pregnancy and had to call in sick when I went into labor on my due date! Jason Zachary Evans entered the world!

By this time we had moved back to Pennsylvania and when the time came to go back to work I wanted to work closer to home so that I could get to Jason quickly if he needed me. So in October of 1983 I began to work at Crozer Chester Medical Center in Upland, Pa. I worked for a year on the maternity floor and then moved to Labor and Delivery, where I've been ever since.

I continued to learn over the next 4 years but always in the back of my mind was that nagging question: if God called me to Labor and Delivery, why?

And then came Peanut...

The Call to Hawaii!

Courage is the bridge between good ideas and action.

-Tim Hansel in Holy Sweat

The day I walked into the auditorium with the rest of the nursing class of 1977 to meet the Dean of Nursing and the nursing faculty at Widener University I felt in my spirit that God was calling me to work in Labor and Delivery. In all honesty I have to admit that for years I doubted the validity of that calling. In my mind it was akin to being called as a missionary to Hawaii, there aren't many who would refuse that calling! Many years later I would clearly understand that God did indeed call me to be an obstetrical nurse. I would also come to intimately see that, if God is in the calling - whether it be Hawaii or Labor and Delivery, sacrifice will be involved.
In fact, God in His kindness to His kids warns us that we should always "count the cost" when we accept His call on our lives. "For which of you, intending to build a tower, does not sit down first and count the cost, whether he has enough to finish it." Luke 14:28 For Mark and me the cost of this luxuriant call was quite high. But I'm getting ahead of myself.
Let me take you back to one year before I entered that university auditorium: my father, who was the pastor of the church I attended, brought a group in to perform a musical. These Christian musicals were born out of the hippie generation and had become quite popular at the time. As I sat watching the performance my eyes kept wandering to one particular young man in the group. I did get a few moments following the service to talk to him briefly. I believe the conversation basically consisted of me drooling while I verbally gushed about his performance! After the group left I remember thinking with a sigh that it would be wonderful to get to know him but, alas I would probably never see him again. Imagine my surprise a few months later when he was one of the first people I saw as I walked into the church I would be attending during my college years! I do believe that God delights in setting up these little treats for His kids! Long story short: one month after I graduated from college I married that young man in that very church! And the rest, as they say, is...an adventure!


I'd like to add a P.S. to today's blog. We received word on Tuesday that our application for Touching Lives Ministry's non-profit status was received by the I.R.S. Please join with us in praying that God will grant TLM favor with the government in this process - to the glory of God!

How the adventure began

"We need people who are more afraid of missing opportunities than making mistakes. People who are more afraid of lifelong regrets than temporary failure. People who dare to dream the unthinkable and attempt the impossible." Mark Batterson in Wild Goose Chase

I know that it's hard to believe - when I say it out loud even I find it some what incredible - but this passion began when I was 11 years old! At that tender age I "heard" the Holy Spirit call me to missions. Don't ask me how, I can't explain it except to say that I did not hear an audible voice. It was more like God's Spirit spoke to my spirit through my thoughts. So, how did I know that it was God's "voice"? Good question! I just knew. Not such a good answer! But I can tell you that my life's experiences since that time have repeatedly confirmed the original call.
Again, I can't tell you exactly why, but I thought that God was calling me to a Hispanic country so I proceeded to study Spanish all 4 years of high school. It turned out that my call has been predominately to Asia and Africa (although God's not done with me yet!). OK, so my spiritual "ears" don't always hear correctly, I guess that's why God instructed us in His word to test everything.
Any way, when I graduated from high school there was only one "vehicle" or organization that I knew of at that time that could get me onto the mission field. But I didn't have peace in my spirit about partnering with that group. As I was praying about what direction to go my mother came home from a hospital stay saying that she had a student nurse care for her in the hospital. Something about this nurse reminded her of me so she asked what I thought about majoring in nursing in college. It was one of a hand-full of times in my life that I almost physically felt my spirit leap within me! Yes, yes, why didn't I think of that sooner?
So, off to college I went...