Our Path to FamilyLife
As late as 1998, if you would have asked us whether we thought we’d ever be missionaries, we would have without hesitation said no, not really. But as we look back, we see evidence clear back to 1990 that God was preparing us for a time when our vocation would be the same as our occupation, in full-time ministry. At the time, Bruce was an actuary with State Farm, but he sensed that the corporate world was not the place for him in the long-term. His heart was in helping kids, and when an opportunity to teach high school math presented itself (because of a maternity leave), Bruce took it, though at the time he did not realize that he was leaving his secure job for a position that was only promised through the Spring of 1991. It went well, and God provided a full-time position at the same school the following year. All told, he went on to teach a total of 9 ½ years.
Toward the end of the teaching years and particularly as the 1999-2000 school year opened, Bruce felt an increasing desire togoback to State Farm, as a computer programmer rather than as an actuary. This was somewhat confusing and made us question whether the Lord was truly leading in that direction, because he enjoyed being a positive influence in the lives of young people at school, which he considered his mission field. Also, as mentioned before, the corporate world hadn’t seemed the place for him. The turning point occurred during a missions conference at our church in November of 1999. We attended a workshop about FamilyLife, whose representatives were Gary and Cindy Blunier, formerly of central Illinois. During their talk, they happened to mention that FamilyLife had a need for computer programmers, among other specific positions. That was revelation time for us. To that point, we had only seen the “face” of FamilyLife, namely the speakers at the marriage conference we had attended in 1998. God used that workshop to impress upon us that He needs people of all kinds of abilities to be full-time missionaries, and the seed for FamilyLife was planted in our hearts. Also, we thought we could now make sense of the “State Farm thing.” We figured that Bruce could return to State Farm for a few years to refine his programming skills and thendown the road perhaps go into some ministry.
The only problem with our figuring was, it didn’t work out! When Bruce applied in February of 2000, State Farm didn’t even call him for a screening interview, which stumped us. Meanwhile Bruce still sensed that it was his last year of teaching, so he applied at Caterpillar and eventually Country Companies, two other businesses in the local area. After a fruitless interview at Caterpillar, things were quite confusing. During March of 2000, however, we attended another FamilyLife conference, on parenting, in Chicago. During that weekend, the idea of further inquiry into FamilyLife staff repeatedly came up, and we decided to attend the staff opportunities meeting that they hold at each conference event. Oddly enough, the person presenting the meeting was again Gary Blunier, who shared some of what it was like being on staff, including raising their own support. This triggered a flashback for Cindy. A few years prior, we had had friends of our visit us as they raised support to enter ministry with The Navigators. As they left, Cindy said “I could never do that!” (We think we’ve now learned our lesson about saying that!) But at the time, sitting in the meeting getting more information about being on staff seemedright.
A couple of weeks later, Gary inquired as to our interest level about FamilyLife. We stated rather simply, that we were fairly serious, but we thought it would be a few years down the road. Gary’s response challenged us. He said “Understand that if you apply to FamilyLife now, it’s not as if you are committing at this point. In fact, we consider the whole application process to be a huge part of determining whether God is in fact leading a couple to join the ministry, and the whole process typically takes 2-3 years from application to support-raising to reporting to Little Rock.” After some prayer, we felt it would be disobedient of us to delay applying any longer – concluding that perhaps the only way to determine what God wanted of us in this regard was to begin the application process. So in May of 2000, we filed our application with FamilyLife.
Meanwhile, Bruce interviewed twice with Country Companies, and in early June, they offered him a job. Before taking it, he made it clear that we had applied for a ministry position which could ultimately take him away from Country Companies after only a year or two. His boss’s response a day later was “We think you’ll like it so much that you’ll stay here forever, so do you want the job?” Well, Bruce took it, starting in July of 2000, and we realize now that God was way ahead of us in providing that job. Had Bruce stayed in teaching the following schoolyear, two major time conflicts would have emerged. First, as a teacher, he only had two personal days per schoolyear to use. It turned out during that next year that between visiting the ministry in Little Rock and attending new staff training in May of 2001, we needed a total of nine days! Second, his teaching schedule would have demanded much more evening time and would therefore have made raising support in the evenings difficult.
During the summer, we became aware that FamilyLife was working rather intensely on our applications in hopes that they could invite us to their “Ministry Preview” to be held Labor Day weekend. Ministry Preview is the final step of the application process, where applicants spend several days at the ministry, after which FamilyLife issues invitations to join staff to those they believe God may be calling. They did in fact invite us to Preview that Labor Day, but the trip to Little Rock did not work out because Bruce had just started his new job and did not have vacation days available yet. This was the source of great relief for us. Upon being invited, we were quite scared, because up to that point, our willingness to apply to FamilyLife was mostly out of obedience, and not so much out of passionate enthusiasm. We felt that if we were invited to join staff at that point, we were no where near the point where we could feel at peace about any decision. In fact, we felt that God needed to do a great work within us before we would reach that point.
Well, God did have a great work in store for us! Our home church had scheduled a revival ministry, Life Action, to conduct a crusade during two weeks in November of 2000. Though we were not initially excited at the thought of attending some “revival meetings” for 13 out of 15 evenings, those two weeks turned out to be a pivotal point. God did indeed revive us personally! It wasn’t just a spiritual “oil change” for us, but rather a complete a spiritual “overhaul,” including the revelation of sin in our own hearts that we did not even recognize. One particular illustration really caught our attention because it so well represented the attitude we needed to have. It went like this:
Surrender is not like writing out on a sheet of paper what we’ll do for God, signing the bottom, and handing to Him saying “this is what I’ll do for you, God.” It is rather like taking a blank sheet of paper, signing the bottom, and handing it back to God, saying “You fill it out, God, and I’ll do it!”
As that illustration hit home, we were changed, and that became the point at which our approach to the prospect of joining FamilyLife staff became enthusiastic, and we felt a real sense of peace as we surrendered to Him in our willingness to do full-time missionary work.
Exactly one day after the Life Action buses pulled away from our church, our FamilyLife contact called us again to set up some phone interviews. As those calls came to a close, he mentioned that we seemed “different” lately, and not so hesitant in our conversations with him. We verified that we felt different, and explained that our experience with Life Action had much to do with that. It was so encouraging to us that just over the phone he could sense a real difference in us. We were excited then, when they invited us to their next Preview which would be held in March of 2001.
One further note about our Life Action experience: Shortly after the crusade, another couple from church, whom we did not know real well at the time, gave us several hundred dollars because they simply“felt God telling us to give it to you.” The cool thing about this is that they knew nothing of our application to FamilyLife, but we immediately knew that God had provided this money as a means to pay for the airfare to attend Ministry Preview. This was a great encouragement to us that no matter what our future held, God would provide!
During the four months leading up to Preview, God continually gently nudging us toward FamilyLife. Among the tools He used were the book “The Prayer of Jabez,” and our Bible Study Fellowship study of Matthew.
The Ministry Preview experience was uplifting unlike any experience we have had. We sensed the Lord’s Presence there in a BIG way as we heard from various ones in the ministry and visited one-on-one with FamilyLife staff and other couples attending Preview. We did assume one thing too many, though – we thought God would reveal His will to us while we were there, but either He didn’t, or we weren’t listening well enough. Nevertheless, three days after returning from Little Rock, they called to invite us to join staff . . . now the pressure was on!
By this point, Cindy was pretty positive about saying yes, but it took Bruce a couple more days, and after a stirring devotional time Friday morning, he knew the decision needed to be “YES!” After confirming that decision with FamilyLife, it was on to the next phase – staff training and support raising – where God would again show His incredible ways to us. “For My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways My ways, says the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts.” Isaiah 55:8-9 We also continue to see God’s incredible provision for us, as He promised: “My God shall supply all your need, according to His riches in Gloryby Christ Jesus.” Philippians 4:19
Hopefully this helps you capture a snapshot of God’s leading in our path to FamilyLife. It is by no means exhaustive of all He did, and all we felt. Nevertheless, it is our joy to share this much with you. If you’d like more, talk to us. It’s fun to share, and it’s even more fun to revisit the story of God’s faithfulness to us!
Bruce & Cindy Maurer FamilyLife