"What Have You Done With My Son" (Panama - June 16, 2003

I’m back in Lawrenceville, GA now – it was great to spend Father’s Day with my family! Thanks for holding the rope while we were in Panama this past week. God used YOUR prayers in mighty ways. We saw 310 people accept Christ as their Savior and over 80 of them were followed up and started on the discipleship process in the first few days as believers! We had dozens of people trained to share the gospel and make disciples . . . in short, God truly glorified Himself working through us weak vessels. I’ll be sending “stories from the field” over the next few days as I get a chance to write them up. Please read them, pray for the people involved, and give glory to God for the great things He has done. I love you each!


“What have you done with my son?”

“What have you done with my son?” she said. It was testimony time in the tiny little house church that met under a tin shed in the village of Comejen, Panama. The stern looking, well-dressed woman didn’t look familiar to me after the long day of going house-by-house to share the gospel. We had spent the first half of the day in a neighboring village called “El Nance” where this one-year old congregation was already planning to give birth to another church. And now it was about eight in the evening and the rain had been pouring down from the dark sky for several hours. But when the pastor asked if there was anyone that had something to share, this unfamiliar woman stood up and uttered words that stirred my curiosity. Who was she? Was she accusing us of doing something wrong? No. On the contrary, as her story began to unfold the stern look on her face began to lift and her face reflected a nervous smile. It was obvious that she was not a regular attendee of this tight-knit church – so she was justified in her hesitation. But as the words flowed from her mouth into my ears, I eagerly tried to translate from Spanish to English for myself to find out the meaning of her opening question. After a minute or so I turned to Moises Vega, my dear friend and translator and he was grinning ear to ear. I nudged him gently trying not to interrupt her story or his listening to it. Moises leaned over and began to whisper a summary of all that was pouring forth from this dear mother’s lips. And as he began to translate I immediately knew the identity of the woman. She was the mother of Marcos – a nineteen year-old young man that lived next door to the El Nance feeding center that was being partially run by the members of this little church. Earlier that morning we had gone to the feeding center to see where they were planning for the anticipated new church to meet. They had started this feeding center several months ago so that the children that lived in the small fishing village could come and receive a free meal every day, along with a short bible lesson and some Christian love. Abel, the pastor of the mother church, felt that by reaching these children he could raise up a generation of pastors and missionaries. So we went to see what it was all about. After looking around for a few minutes we decided to go ahead and visit a few homes in the community to share the gospel and invite them to an evening bible study. The first house we stopped at belonged to Marcos. He was a typical looking teenaged boy and when we asked if we could come in and share with him, he seemed pleased with the idea. So we went in and sat down and began by sharing a testimony. After that, we started a gospel presentation and handed it off to Kayla, one of the female leaders from the mother church who was out with us. After a few minutes Kayla looked at us and said, “He’s ready to pray and receive Jesus!” So we bowed with him and led him in prayer. When Marcos looked up there was a huge grin on his face and so we decided to go ahead and begin the discipleship process by helping him to get started on a follow-up bible study lesson. As we demonstrated for him how to find various passages in the bible, his grin grew ever larger and he wrote the answers out on the paper with precision and care. After about a half hour with Marcos we prayed for him again and told him that we would be praying for him and with that, we left for the next house. And now, here we sat with the rain banging out a steady hum on the tin roof listening to Marcos’ mother give us the rest of the story. As tears welled up in her eyes she described how for years Marcos had caused her heartache and grief by being rebellious and disrespectful. He even ran away from home a few times not telling her where he was going. And then without a sign, with no hope that he would ever change, the Holy Spirit sent us to talk with him. The mother explained that she had arrived home that afternoon and the Marcos that she had known was gone – and there was a new Marcos there – one that was respectful and loving. When she entered the house she had found Marcos right where we had left him – sitting on the sofa reading his mother’s bible and writing out the answers to those discipleship questions. As we listened to her story that night we were reminded that even against all hope, our Merciful God and Father desires to radically change our lives. So much so that we don’t even remotely resemble who we were prior to our encounter with Him. After praying for the woman the twenty or so members of the little church lined up to embrace and encourage her – and I with them. And as we wandered out into the rain to head back to the Camp at which we were staying, I gave thanks to God that in a single moment old things can pass away and all things can be made new. And in some strange way, the question that Marcos’ mother asked that night is the same question that our Heavenly Father asks of each of us, albeit in a different since: “What have you done with my Son?” And the answer to that question is one changed my life, and Marcos’ life as well.