Podcast: 365 Christian Men

January 24. Patrick Morley. In 1973, Patrick founded Morley Properties, which for several years was one of Florida’s 100 largest privately held companies. At the same time, he was the president or managing partner of 59 other companies and partnerships. 

In 1986, Patrick started The Man in the Mirror Bible Study, which has grown to include approximately 10,000 men, and Man in the Mirror Ministries has helped 35,000 churches impact the lives of 12 million men worldwide. 

In the middle of all this work, Patrick came to believe “that 90 percent of Christian men lead lukewarm, stagnant, defeated lives—and they hate it.” So he wrote a book for them: Man Alive, which shows men how they can “experience a powerful life transformed by Christ.” On this date in 2012, Patrick released the audio version of his book Man Alive. 

“The ministry of Man in the Mirror exists,” says Patrick, “in answer to the prayers of all those wives, mothers, and grandmothers who have for decades been praying for the men in their lives.” Today’s story is partly about one of those wives. 

A man’s life can only be satisfied by the Giver of life. 

Patrick didn’t know he had a problem until the day his wife Patsy—tears flowing down her face—asked him if there was anything he liked about her. Unable to put what he was feeling into words, he just left the house and went to work. 

As far as things like success and money went, Patrick had it all. But he was as miserable as he had been in high school. And now he was taking it out on his beautiful wife. Her tears made him feel like a selfish fool. 

The truth was for years Patrick had been waging a personal battle against meaninglessness. Though he didn’t know how to spell it out, truth was that school, work, and life in general had left him feeling hollow. 

After Patrick quit high school as a senior, his dad sensed the lack of direction in his son’s life and pushed him to join the army. 

And the army was a perfect fit. It gave Patrick a sense of purpose and identity, and he thrived in the disciplined atmosphere. He also obtained his GED and later graduated from college and earned a PhD. 

But the thrill of being in the army didn’t last forever, and soon the gnawing sense of dissatisfaction returned. After his discharge, Patrick was back to staring at himself in the mirror and wondering: what’s the point? 

Patrick had to find something new—some new purpose that could ward off the meaninglessness he felt—and he wouldn’t settle for mediocre. It had to be something big. 

Financial success would solve all his problems—he told himself. 

So, Patrick got into the real-estate business. He set big goals and achieved them. In six years, money was piling up faster than he knew how to spend it. He accumulated everything a man of stature could want: beautiful wife, lovely home, luxury car, tailored-for-him suits, and a Rolex watch. 

But Patrick felt empty. Every goal conquered brought a temporary fix, but then he needed an even grander goal to accomplish. After all this, he was sitting at his fancy desk with beautiful Patsy in his lovely home—and she was wondering if there was even one thing that he liked about her. 

Driving home from church, with all the grace of a charging grizzly, Patrick had complained to Patsy about something she had done that had embarrassed him. 

Patsy cried. 

The Spirit of God touched Patrick’s heart, and the mean grizzly cried, too. 

Patrick waved his white handkerchief before the Lord. He surrendered. A broken man, he prayed that God would make his life worthwhile. He couldn’t manage anymore without Jesus. 

“‘Meaningless! Meaningless!’ says the Teacher. ‘Utterly meaningless! Everything is meaningless. What do people gain from all their labors at which they toil under the sun?’” (Ecclesiastes 1:2–3 NIV). 

What purpose does the Lord have for your life? A man’s life can only be satisfied by the Giver of life. 

Morley, Patrick. Man Alive. Colorado Springs: Multnomah Books, 2012. 

Morley, Patrick. Seven Seasons of the Man in the Mirror. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2002. 

Story written by: Toni M Babcock, https://www.facebook.com/toni.babcock.1 

January 23. Telemachus. By the year 404, bloody gladiatorial battles had been going on for 140 years. 

On this date in 393, Honorius became Emperor of Rome. Five years before today’s story starts, the Emperor had decreed the violent games should stop, but they went right on—until Telemachus showed up. 

Sizewise, he was a little man, but he has an important story. In 1984, President Ronald Reagan “told the story of ‘the little monk’” at the Annual National Prayer Breakfast. Here it is for you now. 

When a godly man stands, evil falls. 

In shiny armor and distinctive helmets crowned with ostrich and peacock feathers, the gladiators strode into the packed arena, some carrying swords and others holding spears or nets. They were professional warriors who fought to the death—supposedly for the glory of Caesar. 

Some gladiators were slaves, and some were criminals condemned to the arena. They marched around the arena crowded with 87,000 spectators, who—anticipating the carnage to come—cheered. 

These spectators loved to see bloodshed. 

In front of the Emperor’s box, the combatants stopped, raised their arms in salute, and in one voice they shouted, “Hail, Caesar, those who are about to die salute thee!” 

The crowd cheered again. 

On the first day of January in 404, a monk named Telemachus happened to be walking past the coliseum. He was from Asia and on a pilgrimage to visit the churches and encourage the Christians in Rome. Dressed in his simple monk’s mantle, which reflected his holy life of prayer and self-denial, Telemachus stood in sharp contrast to all the spectators flocking into the coliseum. What he saw overwhelmed him. 

Drawn by the noise, Telemachus got sucked into a crowd, and the crowd pressed him forward into the coliseum. There before him were the gladiators, engaged in combat. 

The crowd loved long and skillful battles, but when one fighter was obviously overmatched, the spectators voted on whether the loser would live or die. 

With each thumbs-down, the superior fighter thrust his weapon into the loser, and another person entered the arena and clubbed him on the head with a mallet. His corpse was dragged away, and Rome’s death-roar intensified. They called it entertainment and paid heavy purses to the winners. 

The brutality of the crowd stunned Telemachus. The greedy acceptance of violence and death opposed the vow he had taken as a monk. His life was about structure that allowed him to live a life of prayer and work. The sight and sound of tens of thousands of screaming people rejoicing in this slaughter grieved his spirit. 

He raced down to the arena floor and pushed his way through the rabid crowd until he reached the wall, jumped over it, and strode out onto the field of battle. He went unnoticed by the crowd until he got close to two gladiators engaged in a life-and-death struggle. Telemachus stepped between the two battling gladiators and cried out, “In the name of Christ, stop. In the name of Christ, stop.” 

Enraged, the gladiators turned their anger on Telemachus. They stabbed him to death. The crowd joined in and rained rocks down upon him, and his lifeless body lay at the gladiators’ feet. 

When the news of what Telemachus had done reached Emperor Honorius, who had been taught by the Church, he was so affected that he immediately counted Telemachus among the victorious martyrs. Within three days, he proclaimed an end to the gladiator games that had been going on in Rome since 264 BC There was never another battle between gladiators. 

“Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good” (Romans 12:21 ESV). 

What ongoing evil has God shown you that calls for you to speak out in love and overcome it with good? When a godly man stands, evil falls. 

Cartwright, Mark. “Roman Gladiator.” Published May 3, 2018. ANCIENT HISTORY ENCYCLOPEDIA. https://​www.ancient.eu/​gladiator/. 

Foxe, John. “The Last Roman Triumph.” Foxe’s Book of Martyrs. New Kensington, PA: Whitaker House, 1981. 

Theodoret, Bishop of Cyrrhus, “Honorius the Emperor, and the Monk Telemachus” Ecclesiastical History: A history of the church in 5 books from A.D.322 to the death of Theodore of Mopsuestia, A.D.427. Book 5. London: Samuel Bagster and Sons, 1843. 

Matthews, Rupert. “The end of the gladiators.” From The Age of the Gladiators by Rupert Matthews. Accessed September 10, 2020. The History Notes. http://​www.historynotes.info/​the-end-of-the-gladiators-3180/? __cf_​chl_​jschl_​tk__=6f957a7c75faa6c7a815f848f0432137cc1553a2–1582664923–0-AQbYgcqFAIMmFJFf14hPExlDRxB_​lyiu0C4D6GZmMIx1lfK7K3rkmY61q_​6ktapxvaViZAdMUqzQMt1P_​ht1a04m4xiJQMEve_​MuyWNTH4vx-e41M_​nEinsQMkoE0Pdptej3JBW3eItbf9ei8UCIsUgnyoqWTWqqgHgRXKaBlxXHPgZDaYzsFEqfwZFlJXmIuai1NeBMUCpHxnefGAFOIRT10Xij0F-WExNXD43WVUg-I7dvfEht9WBdmUPcug6I5–6YVaKjzoxN6G6WPK9XDeku3ZfnQyjsOknEoIJ6XvQMc9UUFrhxKXr-fzewXJZWUA. 

Preston, Monk. “Favorite Monks: Telemachus: The Monk Who Ended the Coliseum Games.” Prayer Foundation. Published 2002. https://​www.prayerfoundation.org/​favoritemonks/​favorite_​monks_​telemachus_​coliseum.htm. 

Would You Like to Learn More About This Man? 

First century philosopher and lawyer Seneca wrote about the gladiatorial games: “Man is a thing which is sacred to humanity, but nowadays he is killed in play or for fun. It was once a sin to teach how to inflict wounds, but now a man is led out naked and defenseless and provides a good show by his death.” 

At another time, Seneca wrote: “It is pure murder. The men have no armour. They are exposed to blows at all points, and no one ever strikes in vain. Many prefer this event to the usual pairs (of gladiators) and to the bouts by request. Of course they do, there is no helmet or shield to deflect the weapon. What is the need of defensive armour or of skill? All these mean delaying death. In the morning they throw men to the lions and the bears: at noon they throw them to the spectators. The crowd demands that the slayer shall face the man who is to slay him in his turn; and they always reserve the latest killer for another killing.”  

Story written by: Thomas Mitchell, http://www.walkwithgod.org/ 

January 22. Horst Schulze. Schulze is a man whose biblical beliefs aren’t pasted on. He lives according to the Word of God at home and at work. He believes employees are “ladies and gentlemen serving ladies and gentlemen.” Employees are not mere functional warm-bodies. They are valued, gifted, worthy creations of a living God. 

Schulze established this core value, and upon it he built success. In 1991, HOTELS magazine named Schulze “corporate hotelier of the world.” He was co-founder of Ritz-Carlton Hotels and managed their worldwide $2 billion operations. On this date in 2014, Schulze was awarded the Forbes 5-Star Award for the Naples Hotel and Resort. 

In 2020, Schulze spearheaded a new luxury hotel project based on serving customers. Today’s story starts at the beginning of a similar great project in Schulze’s life. 

With influence comes power; with power comes responsibility. Handle with care. 

Pittsburgh’s dilapidated Howard Johnson was on a death vigil. Its nightly occupancy rate was dismal. But Hyatt hired Schulze to resuscitate the place, breathe some life into it, and make it profitable again. 

On a sticky Monday in June of 1976, Schulze arrived. To experience the hotel as paying customers did, he ignored the door marked “private” and strode toward the front entrance used by guests. 

“Hey.” A uniformed doorman said, “Come here.” 

How unprofessional. Rude even. 

“You know what I do here?” The nametag read Jim. 

“You greet the guests,” Schulze said. 

Jim showed Schulze a roll of pennies. “I keep this here inside my hand. If I need to crack somebody in the face, I’ll break their jaw.” 

Schulze’s mouth went dry. But Jim’s uniform—supplied by the previous owner—had holes in it. If management treated Jim with such little respect, it made sense that Jim would treat others disrespectfully. 

“Look,” Jim said. “If you play ball with us, you’ll be okay.” 

Us. The Union. Schultz replied, “Let’s play ball together by doing a good job for the owners, the guests, and you the employees.” 

Schulze wasn’t in his office long when he heard shouting, “Where’s that—” 

The vulgar name-calling was an emotional slap. 

His secretary rushed in, afraid. “The Union’s here.” 

Six Union leaders marched in. Five sat in chairs facing him, and the sixth gave Schulze his back. He spoke to his cronies. “Ask him if he ever saw a car blown up.” Then the rude man faced Schulze, “I mean with someone in it.” 

Schulze denied the gulp rising in his throat. 

After that, each day at one o’clock Schulze heard profane name-calling. The Union man started yelling before he reached Schulze’s door. Once in the office, the man complained. Knit-picked. Threatened. 

Schulze clung to his belief in his own worth and the worth of others. He refused to be intimidated and fought for culture change. 

Winter descended. His relationship with the Union seemed more balanced. For a holiday gift, the hotel gave each employee a turkey.  

But Union leaders called the gift bribery. Within minutes, they called a strike. Out in the snow in front of the hotel, the employees picketed. As they chanted in the frigid air, their breath puffed into white clouds. Scrawled signs read, “Unfair to Labor.” 

Schulze gathered kitchen-and-restaurant supervisors and asked them to make hot cider and to collect sweet rolls and coffee. Then Schulze and his team rushed into the cold with the treats. Everyone’s noses were red. 

News crews arrived. Schulze handed a cup of steaming cider to one of his picketing employees. 

A confused TV reporter shoved a microphone into Schulze’s face. “What are you doing?” 

“These are still our employees,” he said. “The fact that there’s been a misunderstanding so that they’re missing a little work has nothing to do with the fact that they’re a vital part of this hotel, and I love them. It’s cold out here. I just thought they should have something hot to drink and sweet to eat.” 

From that day on, the Union became more civil. 

Over time the once-faltering hotel became the place to stay in Pittsburgh. The mayor even honored it. And Schulze gained Jim the doorman’s respect. 

“Love your neighbor as yourself,” Schulze said. “I have a responsibility for those neighbors. To work for them and fight for them … The values of the Word [of God] do not change because it is work.” 

For Schulze, each employee was a neighbor and a valued person God had created. “When we identify an operational function and then go looking for a warm body to fill that function, we are being short-sighted,” Schulze said. “We’re treating people as just another category of things.… this is not only bad practice, but even immoral. It ignores the God-given talent and worth of the human being. It depersonalizes them, reducing them to the level of office supplies.” 

“Yes indeed, it is good when you obey the royal law as found in the Scriptures: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself’” (James 2:8 NLT). 

Do you depersonalize others or treat them with dignity? With influence comes power; with power comes responsibility. Handle with care. 

Based on an interview with Horst Schulze, October 28, 2019 and on his book, Excellence Wins, Zondervan, 2019. 

Would You Like to Learn More About This Man?  

“Do not let your light go out,” Schulze said. “You are a light to everyone that you come in contact with, so make sure that you do not dim your light and make sure you value everyone.” 

~Horst Schulze 

Story written by: Paula Moldenhauer, http://paulamoldenhauer.com/ 

January 21. Peter Muhlenberg. When Peter was in his early twenties and a mere deacon, a family friend suggested Peter might make a good missionary to Native Americans. But Peter’s father vetoed the idea and said Peter might ‘turn Indian sooner than turn the Indians Christian.’” 

But Peter knew how to work hard. When he was assigned a job, he did it. He could be counted on. He became a real pastor. On this date in 1776, Peter preached his farewell sermon, recruited a battalion, and led them into the war. 

By the time his life story was done, Peter had been promoted to brigadier general and assigned to George Washington’s army in Pennsylvania. 

But today’s story starts in Peter’s early days, when he first arrived in North America to preach. 

There’s a time to talk and a time to fight. Be like those who don’t shrink back. 

Lutheran minister Peter Muhlenberg was only twenty-nine years old, but this young man could work. He spoke German and English, and anytime the Lord called him to a task, Peter was right there. 

Preaching, baptizing, marrying, and burying, he pastored two English-speaking churches and six German-speaking churches—all at the same time. The congregations were spread far apart, even up to a hundred miles, and the previous rector had only managed to see some of them twice a year. 

But Peter managed it and fished and hunted with his parishioners and gained their friendship, their respect, and their trust. 

Because of his education and his ability to speak both German and English, he got pressured to become magistrate for the newly formed region. 

But Peter wrestled with the idea of political service. Should he, a preacher, participate in government? Some of his fellow spiritual leaders said no. He wasn’t sure, so a few months later he resigned his post as magistrate. However, the people voted him Chairman of the Committee of Correspondence, a phantom government created in the shadows by the Colonies. They spread the colonial interpretation of British actions among the colonies and to foreign governments. 

This time, he accepted that serving his congregation meant seeing to both their spiritual and civic needs. He wrote to his brother: “I am again chosen chairman, so that, whether I choose or not, I am to be a politician.” Holding this post automatically made him Dunmore County’s representative to Virginia’s Convention. 

And that is how the political leadership learned about the extraordinary qualities of Peter Muhlenberg. 

Early in 1776, Virginia’s Revolutionary leaders formed eight new battalions, one of them to be German speaking. And—of course—they chose Peter to lead this unit. 

Peter continued to work in church and government, but the new call to serve his community required an even greater step of faith—to resign his spiritual and civic leadership posts and step into a role of military authority. 

He knew God had called him to serve the people of Virginia—especially the German-speaking population. So he saw this military appointment to be God’s invitation to use his leadership skills in a new way. He accepted the commission of colonel. 

On January 21, 1776, Peter donned his ministerial robes one last time and preached a rousing farewell sermon. He told his congregation that the time for preaching and praying had passed; now was the time to fight. After the congregation sang “A Mighty Fortress is Our God,” Peter spoke the benediction and pulled off his ministerial robes. 

He was dressed in his military uniform. 

Stepping down from the pulpit, he strapped his sword to his side and recruited an entire battalion from his congregation. Several hundred men answered his call. And Peter led them. 

“Therefore, do not throw away your confidence, which has a great reward. For you have need of endurance, so that when you have done the will of God, you may receive what was promised.… But we are not of those who shrink back to destruction, but of those who have faith to the preserving of the soul” (Hebrews 10:35–36, 39 NASB). 

Is there a strength God has given you that He is asking you to use? There’s a time to talk and a time to fight. Be like those who don’t shrink back. 

Hocker, Edward W. The Fighting Parson of the American Revolution: a Biography of GENERAL PETER MUHLENBERG, Lutheran Clergyman, Military Chieftain, and Political Leader. (Philadelphia: Published by the author, 1936) p 59. Accessed September 9, 2020. https://‌babel.hathitrust.org/‌cgi/‌pt?id=mdp.39015027039075&view=1up&seq=7. 

Smith, George M. “THE REVEREND PETER MUHLENBERG: A SYMBIOTIC ADVENTURE IN VIRGINIA, 1772–1783.” p 55, 56. Accessed September 9, 2020. https://‌loyolanotredamelib.org/‌php/report05/‌articles/‌pdfs/‌Report36Smithp51-65.pdf. 

January 19. James Tour. James was already brilliant when he entered college. But he didn’t know everything. He didn’t know Christ, and the language of the Christians around him started out confusing, but he soon became intrigued.  

James is still brilliant. He is now a nanotechnologist and a Professor of Materials Science and NanoEngineering, and Professor of Computer Science.  

In 2008, James won the Feynman Prize in Experimental Nanotechnology and the NASA Space Act Award. In fact, if you type up his list of awards in 12-point type, the list is six-inches wide and a foot long. Today’s story begins with James in his first year in college—when he was still confused about those Christians. 

The heart of the problem is a problem of the heart.  

Having grown up in a Jewish community outside of New York City, James Tour was unfamiliar with some of the catchwords he kept hearing in his first year at college. One was: was “born-again.”  

Born-again—what’s that?  

One day, in the dorm’s laundry room, he asked a football player, “What are your plans after school?”  

“I want to do lay ministry,” the guy said. 

Lay ministry. He didn’t know what that meant either, but he figured this guy must be ‘born-again.’ 

The football jock asked if he could draw James an illustration showing how to have a right relationship with God, and James agreed. 

The football player whipped out a sheet of paper and quickly sketched a tall cliff on the left side of the paper and a stick-figure MAN standing on top of the cliff.  

On the right side of the paper, football guy drew another tall cliff and labeled it: GOD. 

Between the cliffs, a chasm stretched from the base of one cliff to the base of the other. And he labeled the chasm: SIN.  

“Sin separates man from God,” he said. 

“But I’m not a sinner,” James said. “I haven’t murdered anyone or robbed any banks, so how can I be a sinner?” 

The guy pulled out his bible and showed James a verse. “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23). “All” meant everybody—everywhere—anytime. 

In that steamy room full of spinning washers and dryers, God was exposing sin—a kind of dirty that didn’t come clean with soap and water. 

The jock showed James another verse where Jesus said, “You have heard that it was said, do not commit adultery. But I tell you, everyone who looks at a woman with lust has already committed adultery with her in his heart” (Matthew 5:27-28, NRSV). 

The words hit James like a punch in the face. How did he know? How could this man Jesus know about James’s addiction to pornography? 

The trouble had started when James was fourteen and worked at a gas-station. When his co-workers ended their shifts on Fridays, he fished for the magazines they’d thrown away so he could look through them.  

Now, in the laundry room and listening to the football player, James heard how Jesus died for his sins and rose again to make a way for him to find peace with God and eternal life.  

Jesus bridged the gap between God and man. Jesus was the bridge from one clifftop to the other. And it wasn’t a toll bridge. A man could trust that bridge and walk right across.  

But James didn’t accept all the guy had said right then. He studied the Bible himself. He discovered that the prophet Isaiah foretold how the Messiah would be whipped and executed.  

“All of us like sheep have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way; but the LORD has caused the iniquity of us all to fall on Him. …Therefore, I will allot Him a portion with the great, And He will divide the booty with the strong; because He poured out Himself to death, and was numbered with the transgressors; yet He Himself bore the sin of many, and interceded for the transgressors” (Isaiah 53:6, 12, NASB). 

Gradually James became convinced Jesus was who he said he was—the Son of God.  

He got down on his knees in his dorm room and prayed, “Lord, forgive me. I’m a sinner. Come into my life.” 

Later, he described it. “All of a sudden Someone was in my room…I opened my eyes. Who was in my room? That man Jesus Christ, he stood in my room. This amazing sense of God …” 

The sheer kindness of God’s forgiveness washed over James. And he no longer felt compelled to mess with pornography.  

Today James is an acclaimed scientist, researcher, and professor, but his passion is sharing his faith. God uses James to help people know about the man on the cliff separated by SIN from the God who loves him—and Jesus, the bridge, the way for the two to connect.  

Have you realized we are all sinners? Have you discovered the remedy who is Jesus Christ? The heart of the problem is a problem of the heart.  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=szbli4m11Lk Video program published by Shalom World December 26, 2018, Dr. James Tour, Star of the World 

https://billygraham.org/decision-magazine/march-2019/renowned-chemist-bold-witness-for-christ/ article by Richard Greene, Renowned Chemist is a Bold Witness for Christ, March 4, 2019, Billy Graham Evangelistic Association website 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QNGLZvtRoiU youtube video, One for Israel.org 

Would You Like to Learn More About This Man? 

In an article in Scientific American “Better Killing Through Chemistry,” which appeared a few months after the September 11, 2001 attacks on the Towers, Tour highlights how easy it is to get what’s needed to create chemical weapons.  

Story written by: Toni M Babcock, https://www.facebook.com/toni.babcock.1 

January 17. Antony the Great. According to theologian Athanasius, when Antony was about 20, the devil afflicted him with boredom, laziness, and phantoms of women, which Antony overcame by waging a war of prayer. 

After fifteen years of this battle, at 35, Anthony withdrew from public life and lived in absolute solitude in an abandoned Roman fortress, where people tossed food to him over the wall. Still people found him. Over the years, many people had flocked to the hermit Antony and returned healed of their ailments. The man was gifted with discernment and steadfast faith. 

Some people asked the monk to pray, and some simply slept outside his door, believing that they could be healed just by being in his presence. It was never Antony himself who healed them, but God, who was working through Antony. Yet Antony’s faith meant life-changing rescue to everyone who sought him. 

The way you live out your faith may be another man’s lifeline. 

There was an honorable military officer named Martinian, who was raising a family, and he believed in God. But one day he found his sweet daughter afflicted with an evil spirit. 

Horrified, Martinian would have done anything to see his daughter in her right mind again. Antony was the man for the job. 

So Martinian hiked into the desert, where Antony lived alone on a mountain near the east bank of the Nile River. Martinian walked and kept walking and eventually came upon the abandoned Roman fort where Antony had lived for nearly twenty years. 

Martinian knocked on the door and waited. He listened for any sign of movement from inside, but he heard nothing. 

Again, he knocked—longer—and he yelled for the hermit. 

Still, there was no answer. Desperate, Martinian resolved to knock until the hermit answered, and he kept knocking and pleading for Antony to come out and pray to God for his little girl. 

Finally, though he would not open the door, Antony’s voice rose above the noise of the officer’s pounding. 

Martinian stopped and listened. 

“Man, why do you call on me?” Antony said. “I also am a man even as you. But if you believe on Christ whom I serve, go, and according as you believe, pray to God, and it shall come to pass.” 

Martinian did not protest, as other pilgrims had, but he left immediately. Believing Antony’s instruction, he called out to God and asked Him to heal his daughter. 

When Martinian got home, he saw his daughter free from the evil spirit, and he was so happy. 

Antony had never seen the girl but found confirming joy in his heart. 

“When Jesus had entered Capernaum, a centurion came to him, asking for help. ‘Lord,’ he said, ‘my servant lies at home paralyzed, suffering terribly.’ 

“Jesus said to him, ‘Shall I come and heal him?’ 

“The centurion replied, ‘Lord, I do not deserve to have you come under my roof. But just say the word, and my servant will be healed. For I myself am a man under authority, with soldiers under me. I tell this one, “Go,” and he goes; and that one, “Come,” and he comes. I say to my servant, “Do this,” and he does it.’ 

“When Jesus heard this, he was amazed and said to those following him, ‘Truly I tell you, I have not found anyone in Israel with such great faith.…’ Then Jesus said to the centurion, ‘Go! Let it be done just as you believed it would.’ And his servant was healed at that moment” (Matthew 8:5–10, 13 NIV). 

How can you use your own gifts in faith to strengthen someone else today? The way you live out your faith may be another man’s lifeline. 

Servants’ Preparation Program. Nashville: Coptic Orthodox Diocese of the Southern United States, 2002. http://docshare01.docshare.tips/files/2097/20971251.pdf. 

“St. Anthony of Egypt: Egyptian Monk.” Encyclopaedia Britannica, Jan. 12, 2000, https://‌www.britannica.com/‌biography/‌Saint-Anthony-of-Egypt. 

St. Athanasius. “Life of St. Antony.” St. Athanasius: Select Works and Letters, edited by Philip Schaff and Henry Wace. New York: Christian Literature Publishing Co., 1892. pp. 188–221. 

January 16. Malcolm Gladwell. In 2013, Malcom published David and Goliath: Underdogs, Misfits, and the Art of Battling Giants. Throughout the first year of research on this book, he collected examples of people’s disadvantages turning into advantages. 

For example, many American presidents and British prime ministers had lost a parent in childhood. A young shepherd boy beat the giant Goliath. 

Malcolm spent time in libraries and talking to social scientists, pouring over research to find how this had happened. Today’s story begins as Malcom meets the Derksens, whose daughter has just been murdered. Surely this disadvantage could never be turned to any kind of good. 

Turns out: it took more than twenty years for Candace’s killer to be found. Here’s what Malcolm found out. 

Jesus gives ordinary people extraordinary power, if they’re willing. 

Malcolm was on his way to Winnipeg to interview Wilma Derksen, whose teenaged daughter, Candace had disappeared on her way home from school. A week later, she was found—her hands and feet bound—and she was dead. 

At the time, the search for Candace had become Winnipeg’s biggest manhunt in the city’s history, and as the tragedy unfolded, Wilma and her husband Cliff were called to a news conference. 

One of the reporters asked, “How do you feel about whoever did this to Candace?” 

Cliff said, “We would like to know who the person or persons are so we could share, hopefully, a love that seems to be missing in these people’s lives.” 

Wilma added, “I can’t say at this point I forgive the person. We have all done something dreadful in our lives, or have felt the urge to.” 

The Derksen’s lack of vengeance and anger intrigued Malcolm, and he wondered how a family—whose daughter had been brutally murdered—could find such strength. 

Wilma told Malcom that her family had emigrated from Russia after suffering persecution for their faith, and she grew up in the Mennonite tradition. “I was taught that there was an alternative way to deal with injustice,” she said. “I was taught it in school. We were taught the history of persecution. We had this picture of martyrdom that went right back to the sixteenth century. The whole Mennonite philosophy is that we forgive and we move on.” 

Ironic. Malcolm had grown up in a Mennonite community in Ontario, and his family was full of seminarians and preachers. The running joke back then had been that Malcolm was the only one who hadn’t preached a sermon. 

But when he moved to New York, he stopped attending church. He still believed in God. He just held onto the evidence and physical side of God—the logic of the Christian faith. Outside of logic, there wasn’t much he was holding onto. 

But with Wilma in her garden, he felt a change in his heart. She was so normal. How could she overcome something so horrible? And he saw what he had been missing in his own faith: the power of Christ. 

“It was one thing to read in a history book about people empowered by their faith,” Malcolm wrote. “But it is quite another to meet an otherwise very ordinary person, in the backyard of a very ordinary house, who has managed to do something utterly extraordinary.” The Derksens—through their press conference—showed the whole country the path to forgiveness. That could only be explained by the power of Christ at work in their lives. It was what Malcolm had been missing. He knew he had his own journey to take, just like the people in his interviews. He had been missing the power and beauty of the faith he grew up in. “Here I was writing about people of extraordinary circumstances,” he wrote, “and it slowly dawned on me that I can have that too.” 

“My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever” (Psalm 73:26 NIV). 

Do you see the power of God working in your life? Do you want to? Jesus gives ordinary people extraordinary power, if they’re willing. 

“Malcolm Gladwell: How I Rediscovered Faith.” Published July 27, 2020. Relevant Magazine. https://​relevantmagazine.com/​life5/​malcolm-gladwell-how-i-rediscovered-faith/. 

Gladwell, Malcolm. David and Goliath: Underdogs, Misfits, and the Art of Battling Giants. New York: Little, Brown and Company, 2013.  

Bailey, Sarah Pulliam. “Author Malcolm Gladwell finds his faith again.” Published October 11, 2013. The Washington Post. https://​www.washingtonpost.com/​local/​author-malcolm-gladwell-finds-his-faith-again/​2013/​10/​11/​d633d8f4–3266–11e3–89ae-16e186e117d8_​story.html. 

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