These are all important concerns and need to be addressed in due time, but they pale next to another matter—God’s impending judgment. As incredible as it may sound, never once has a man or woman responded to my question by saying, “I am condemned by God. How can I escape his wrath?”

This ignorance or indifference to our sin plight seems to be the overall spiritual state of the population in general. Whether churched or unchurched, few people are even remotely aware that they are but a breath away from an eternity in hell.

The other day I was searching the internet for some of the most frequently asked questions by Americans:
• How can I lose weight and keep it off?
• What’s the weather going to be like?
• When is dinner going to be ready?
• Is that what you’re wearing?
• Why do men lose their hair (yeh, what’s up with that?)?

So many of the questions with which we are preoccupied border on the inane if not the ridiculous. But that’s not all.

A quick glance at some of the daily headlines will also reveal the pathetic shallowness of our culture:
• “Scandal, Scandal: Madonna Reminisces”
• “How Free Sperm Donation Works”
• “Support for ‘Bald Barbie’ Swells”
• “Giant Paper Airplane Takes Flight”
• “Etch-A-Sketch Stock Soaring”

What does the Word of God say is the primary crisis facing us? It is not AIDS or the threat of nuclear war or radical Islamic fundamentalism or world hunger or health care, urban decay, education, the environment, or our national debt. These are all important but not ultimate.

It has to do with God’s judgment. The Apostle Paul declares: “The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men ” (Rom. 1:18).

This is not a very popular subject. In fact, talk of God’s wrath is unintelligible to most. Why? Because we have so little comprehension of God’s unbounded holiness and righteousness. We have little understanding of his majesty and sovereign power. To loosely quote John Piper, “God rests lightly on the minds of most. He is not felt as a weighty concern.”

The Bible reveals to us that we have scorned and rebelled against the infinitely glorious Creator of the universe. We have besmeared his great name and squandered his gifts. As such, we are now objects of his wrath and subject to his almighty, merciless damnation.

Consequently, escaping his wrath must be the chief business of our lives. This is the question with which we must concern ourselves. The ministry of John the Baptist is telling confirmation of this. Speaking against the sinfulness of his generation, he asked, “Who warned you to flee from the coming wrath?” (Luke 3:8)

It is time for us to wake up.

I am deeply troubled about the overall state of the church today (let alone the world).  I am worried that we are missing the true head-line story of the Bible as reflected in our songs, sermons, and prayers. Pragmatism and relevance seem to be the engines that drive us.

My question is this, What could be more practical than the subject of God’s wrath? The ultimate source of our guilt, anxiety, insecurity, and stress is our sin and the condemnation awaiting us. More than anything else, we need forgiveness. This is the grand cure-all.

And this is where the good news of the gospel comes in.

Jesus Christ bore our sin in his body on the cross, absorbing God’s wrath against us. “He Himself is the propitiation for our sins” (1 Jn. 2:2). He “was delivered up for our offenses and was raised for our justification” (Rom. 4:25). “Therefore, . . . we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ” (Rom. 5:1). Amazing grace!

“I am not ashamed of the gospel,
because is it the power of God for the salvation
of everyone who believes.” (Rom. 1:16)

We inherited a $50,000 debt, and all of that has either been paid or forgiven (GLORY!). We have made several improvements on the building (renovated the main lobby and dorms, constructed a chapel, updated the landscaping and signage, etc). Things look so much better.

However, we still have some hills to climb—one being, a new driveway and parking lot. The present condition of both makes it even difficult to navigate at times (unless you have a 4 x 4!). This is not something that normally excites the multitudes, but property and building maintenance communicate several things—not the least of which is care and competence.

We want parents, spouses and other family members who drive their loved ones to our facility to immediately sense upon arrival that we know what we are doing, and have confidence that we can help them.

Would you consider assisting us in taking care of this need?  The total cost: $20,000.

May the Lord richly bless you,

Jeff Bonzelaar
Executive Director

Born in 1936 in Brooklyn, New York, her parents saw to it that she went to public school and, when she was old enough, to Hebrew school. Her mother was a seamstress and her father a grocer. “I was well into adulthood before I realized we were actually poor,” she says, “Mother always had to supplement the income. We lived extremely modestly, but I never felt deprived.”

Renee grew up in a predominantly Jewish neighborhood. Her aunts and uncles were all within walking distance, just a few blocks from her tenement. Renee describes her religious training in the home as “moderately orthodox.” Her mother’s kitchen was kosher and the family observed all the traditional holidays. “Religion was just ‘there,’” she says,  “I don’t remember discussing God, or having anything impressed upon me spiritually.”

In Hebrew school it was a different story. There she got a solid training in the faith. She remembers that her mother would come early to pick her up from public school and walk her a few blocks over to the school where she learned to read and write in Hebrew; and where she would hear the rich stories of the sacred Torah. “As a child,” she says, “I would think about how Abraham and Isaac knew God as I would know the Rabbi, or as I might know someone in the neighborhood. They knew Him personally. They talked to Him. Then I would think, ‘that was then.’”  She says she would wonder once in awhile if her people, the Jews, missed the boat when it came to Jesus. It was a fleeting thought. It would vanish.

After college Renee taught in the public schools in Brooklyn. Her students were mostly Black and Puerto Rican, the “underprivileged.” She taught there for six years before moving to Michigan to teach in the Warren school district

“By the time I came to Michigan, I was a non-practicing Jew, not religious at all.”

One day Renee heard Jim Winters, a graduate of Life Challenge, talking about the Bible. She and Jim worked at he Detroit Symphony Orchestra as telemarketers and between calls Jim would give testimony to Christ. Renee noticed that Jim spoke knowledgeably about the Old Testament. “As I listened to him, I knew from my own training in Hebrew School that what Jim was saying was accurate.”  Then when she heard Jim talk about the New Testament, about Jesus as the Messiah, “I knew immediately that what he said had the ring of truth.” Renee says God put this man in her life at just the right moment. After six months she knew that Jesus was everything Jim said He was, “I knew that Jesus was the Messiah. He was therefore my Messiah.”

“Now, if someone invited me into his home the way I invited Jesus into my heart, I would have said “No thank you!” I was tentative, unsure when I said “Jesus, if you are the one you say you are, come into my heart and change my life, ” but that invitation was enough for Jesus. My life was changed forever by His grace.”  When she finally screwed up the courage to tell Jim Winters of her conversion, she was amazed at what a big deal it was, how he and his wife rejoiced.

Jim and his wife attended Brightmoor. Renee knew she would now go to church, but she had no idea what to expect. It was a foreign language and a foreign place but, “as soon as Pastor Trask began to speak, I was sold.”

“I am a Jew. That’s part of who I am”, she says. At the same time, she says, she is also a Christian, a follower of Christ, a Messianic Jew. Renee attended Brightmoor for twelve years following her conversion. She now attends Congregation Shema Yisrael, a place of worship for Messianic Jews in West Bloomfield Hills.

Renee first learned of Life Challenge from Jim Winters. Renee says she only recently learned of Jim’s untimely death, when Life Challenge received a gift in his memory. Whatever struggles in life Jim may have had, she says, Jim loved sharing Jesus with anyone who would listen.

Renee began working at Life Challenge on the recommendation of Judy Dubiel. Judy met Renee in church and recommended her for a position at the ministry. Cal Bonzelaar, Jeff’s father, wasted no time asking her to come aboard to “run the banquets.”  This was in 1993. She tried, but running banquets, she realized, was not her gift. By the end of the spring season she knew it just wouldn’t work. She decided to quit. Being a gracious and persuasive man, Cal talked her into staying but with a new role.

Since that time Renee has filled a very important role at Life Challenge. As Program Secretary she acts as liaisson to the court system, working on behalf of the students to report to their parole,  probation and corrections officers. The job can be demanding with lots of detailed requirements to satisfy, letters to write and accountability procedures to put in place. Renee sums it up as only a New York Jew could, “My job,”  she says with a grin, “is helping Life Challenge students avoid the whole shemozzle.”

As Renee looks back on her career she gains perspective, “Life Challenge is like a world of its own,” she says, “It can be trying, but it is where God wants me, the best of all possible worlds for me. It’s a wonderful ministry and I am blessed to be part of it.”

Cody’s journey from Highland Park, Michigan to Life Challenge has been, as Bilbo Baggins so aptly put it in his memoirs There and Back Again, mostly unexpected.  Along the way there has been some pain and disappointment to be sure, but also great joy and satisfaction. “God uses every scrap,” he says, “turning the shards of our lives into something of worth and value. This is what I try to teach the students at Life Challenge.”  In the next breath he paraphrases C.S. Lewis, “ We have no doubt that God works for good in our lives. Our only question is how much pain will be involved.”

Cody will tell you that great students make great teachers. A love of learning is what sets them apart. When one loves to learn, one tends to become learned and Cody is nothing if not learned. In fact, he says without any hint of irony, graduating from Evangel was “the saddest day of my life.”  It’s perhaps not surprising. In those early days of Evangel, a young student could rub shoulders with many giants of the faith, men like E. S. Williams, Ralph Riggs, Frank Boyd, J. Roswell Flower and Robert Cummings. These were founding fathers of the pentecostal movement and men of great learning in their own right. They imparted their wisdom to the next generation of God-fearing men and women who are now, in turn, “giving prudence to those who are simple, knowledge and discretion to the young” (Proverbs 1:4). Cody’s fellow dorm mate at Evangel is the current General Superintendent of the Assemblies of God, Dr. George Wood (Little known fact: Cody says that, as an 18 year-old student, during a late night, dorm room bull-session, George predicted that he would someday become General Superintendent. Cody stops short of calling it prophesy, but certainly it would show uncommon resolve in a teenager).

Cody came to teach at Life Challenge shortly after Education Director Dave Ytterock passed away. Rev. Ytterock had been a good friend and through their relationship, Cody came to appreciate the ministry in a very special way. Knowing how much Rev. Ytterock respected Jeff Bonzelaar, Cody felt honored to be asked by Jeff to carry on part of the teaching ministry at Life Challenge.

“The one thing that pleased me and, I must say, surprised me, is the level of academic quality that is maintained at Life Challenge. I now teach classes that are essentially no different than I would expect to teach at the University level.”

One of the classes that Cody teaches is Paul’s Letter to the Ephesians. “To see the students come to understand that they have been chosen, adopted; that they are children of light” this, he says, is what he loves most about teaching. To be called to be an eyewitness to that light as it comes on, to see the students directly as they turn from darkness to the light of the glory of Christ, “that,” he says, “is my greatest satisfaction.”  When it happens, Cody often repeats to his students Paul’s instruction to the Ephesians: “For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Live as children of light” (Ephesians 5:8). Cody is one among many God-fearing, wise and learned men and women who have been called to Life Challenge to be one of His “leading lights.”  “What a precious privilege it is,” Cody says as he settles comfortably back in his chair.

Among those who did not were Etienne and Glaudine Durand. This devout couple chose to remain in their homeland, raise a family, and continue practicing their faith. They gave birth to a girl in 1715 whom they named Marie. When Marie was only 4 years of age, her mother was arrested after attending a secret Protestant service and died shortly thereafter. At 13, Marie’s father was arrested.

Marie inherited her parents’ courage and determination. She loved the Bible and, more importantly, the Christ of the Scriptures. Two years after her father had been taken by the authorities, Marie and her newly wed husband were apprehended. It was the year 1730. Marie was taken to the Tower of Constance in Aigues-Mortes.  She never saw her husband again. She was 15 years old.

Because Marie refused to renounce her faith, she remained locked in the Tower of Constance for almost four decades. Conditions were horrific. It was cold. Quarters were cramped. Prisoners were malnourished. Little light and air came through the narrow openings in the walls that served as windows.

In his book, Passion, Karl Olsson writes: “To sit in a prison room with thirty others and to see the day change into night and summer into autumn, to feel the slow systemic changes within one’s flesh: the drying and wrinkling of the skin, the loss of muscle tone, the stiffening of the joints, the slow stupefaction of the senses—to feel all this and still to persevere seems almost idiotic to a generation which has no capacity to wait and endure.”

All Marie had to do to end her misery was recant. Olsson picks up: “(Marie) was not asked to commit an immoral act, to become a criminal, or even to change the day-to-day quality of her behavior. She was only asked to say, ‘J’abjure.’ No more, no less. She did not comply…For thirty-eight years she (remained steadfast)…And instead of the hated words J’abjure she, together with her fellow martyrs, scratched on the wall of the prison tower the single word Resistez, resist!”

Surely Marie could not have anticipated as a little girl sitting on her father’s lap or taking walks through the countryside with her brother the fate that would await her in the years ahead. Undoubtedly she could never have imagined the excruciating pain and grief before her. She lived life—and lived it well—in an unplanned place.

Some of you are in a very unplanned place. Perhaps you are behind bars for a crime you deeply regret committing or are recovering from a terrible accident in a rehabilitation center. Maybe you find yourself in an abusive marriage or still single after many long years of searching for the right partner. Perhaps you are unemployed for the first time in your life or caring for aging and sickly parents. Whatever it is, this is not the life you expected.  You are in an unplanned place.

Suffering.

So what empowers the fortitude and resilience needed in times of great difficulty? How do you exert the patience necessary to not become embittered, and more, to move forward and prosper?

James tells us: “Be patient, then, brothers, until the Lord’s coming…be patient and stand firm, because the Lord’s coming is near” (5:7-8). The Lord is coming. James links patience with hope. He calls believers to be patient in light of what (I should say who) is ahead—the Lord! He is coming. He will arrive. He will intervene.

And he will reward. James reminds us of Job and all the suffering he experienced: “You have heard of Job’s perseverance and have seen what the Lord finally brought about” (v. 11). Anyone who has read the last chapter of Job knows that the prophet was rewarded double for his patience.

But the key to all this is faith. Pastor and author John Piper writes, “The strength of patience hangs on our capacity to believe that God is up to something good for us in all our delays and detours.” In the midst of all our interruptions, we must have faith in the sovereign purposes of God to bring something magnificent to pass. We must believe that God is coming and with his coming, he will turn all barriers into glorious blessings.

James concludes his exhortation with these encouraging words, “The Lord is full of compassion and mercy.” He will not permit you to be tempted beyond what you can bear (1 Cor. 10:13). He “remembers that we are dust” (Ps. 103:14). He is kind and can be trusted.

Hang in there, friend. Unplanned places bring unplanned graces.

“May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.” (Romans 15:13)

Some might question Lori’s and my parenting for allowing Johnny to have a wish list in the first place: “You are feeding his materialistic bents and fueling his self-centeredness. You should take your Christmas money and buy presents for the poor.” Probably.

It is a challenge here in America to live simple lives. Being content and not desiring more is a daily battle. On top of that is the challenge of teaching my children generosity and concern for others when each one of us is by nature selfish. Tough business.

So you may ask, “Why do you permit this ‘sinfulness’?” Because I want Johnny to know that he has a mother and father who love giving to him. I want Johnny to be confident that Lori and I have hearts that are favorably disposed towards him.

And how much more does God the Father have a heart that is favorably disposed towards us! Jesus put it like this, “If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him!” (Mt. 7:11).

Christmas is a time when we are reminded afresh that God is rich in kindness and great in mercy: “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son” (Jn. 3:16). “He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things?” (Rom. 8:32). The Father’s generosity knows no limits.

There is a story (probably apocryphal) about famed Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte. After a long and brutal battle, he and his army conquered a highly prized Mediterranean island. As Napoleon and his generals were sitting and drinking, savoring the victory, a young officer came up and approached him. When Napoleon asked the man what he wanted, the man looked straight at him and said, “I want this island!” At this, the generals began laughing and mocking the young man, until Napoleon asked one of them for a pen and paper. To their utter amazement, he wrote out a deed to the island, signed it, and handed it to the bold, but lowly soldier. “How could you do that?” asked one of his generals, “What made him worthy to receive this great island?” Napoleon answered, “I gave him this island because he honored me by the magnitude of his request.” The young man perceived a gracious heart and requested accordingly.

So do not be timid. Do not shrink back. God is good. “Ask and it will be given to you” (Mt. 7:7).

Johnny honors his mother and me by his bold, audacious requests. You and I honor the Father by our bold and audacious requests.

Thank you for all your love and support through the year. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!