Jason Sliger serves with Adventist Frontier Missions in Papua New Guinea.
We’ll be sending you a check for . . .” I almost dropped my phone when I heard it. I tried to say something but could not think of any intelligible response to this miracle. I managed to stutter, “Thank you.”
Rewind. About five months before this, our family had felt the leading of God to go into foreign missions and to serve among the Gogodala tribe of Papua New Guinea, a river-going people in the Western Province. This was a radical change from the steady, comfortable, though sometimes challenging, life of a North American pastor. This decision triggered an avalanche of changes in our lives.
As my wife and I poured our hearts out to God asking for His leading, we sensed His moving us to step out in faith and for me to quit my job. Getting to the mission field as quickly as possible was top priority for us, so I notified the conference of our decision to move into full-time support-raising for our project. With their blessing and the blessing of our local churches, we began to pray that the Lord would supply our needs and be our Support during this huge transition.
Slowly, I am learning that God steps in when we are utterly and completely dependent on Him.
About two months into my unemployment, I was suffering from mental fatigue. “Give us this day our daily bread” meant increased faith but diminished finances. The Lord had provided for our needs with helping hands and funds to live on, but one particular day I felt a storm cloud over my head. Overwhelmed and needing a sympathetic ear, I looked for my wife. I found her—balancing our three young kids circling stacks of moving boxes. I saw half-finished DIY projects clamoring for consideration in the middle of the room—and dust bunnies that seemed to be yelling for attention in the corners of the room.
I collapsed into a folding chair, about to succumb to despair, when my phone rang. I looked down at my caller ID. The conference president! “Hello Jason!” came the friendly voice over the phone. “How are you doing?”
“I’m doing great!” I responded automatically. “How are you?”
It was then that God overwhelmed me with the miracle. We had changed church districts about three and a half years before this.
Apparently, I should have received an increase in my cost-of-living allowance, but it had been overlooked. Hence the phone call.
“Jason, we owe you some money, and we want to make it right. So, we’ll be sending you a check for eighteen thousand dollars.” I finished the call and hung up. In complete shock and disbelief, I told my wife. She started crying tears of joy. I just stood there with my head in a fog. Did that just really happen? Later it struck me. Three and a half years before, God had impressed us to open a savings account so that when we needed to know that He was still in control in our lives and that we were in the center of His will, He could drop a blessing in our lap. This was an unbelievable blessing. “But my God shall supply all your need according to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus” (Phil. 4:19, KJV).
Slowly, I am learning that God steps in when we are utterly and completely dependent on Him. May our revival prayer be as David Livingstone is said to have prayed, “God, send me anywhere, only go with me. Lay any burden on me, only sustain me. And sever any tie in my heart except the tie that binds my heart to Yours.”
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