(What If I Give All)
A couple of months ago, I lost my favorite watch. It’s the kind that easily slips off when I remove my coat or shirt, so I’ve lost it before. That day, I claimed my favorite promise for lost things… There is nothing hidden that shall not be revealed and nothing in darkness that shall not be brought into the light (Luke 8:17) but days went by without my watch turning up.
Finally, I gave up searching and decided this time the watch was gone for good. I started wearing another watch that I don’t really like or stopped wearing a watch at all.
The other evening, I was lying in bed reading when my IPhone music alarm came on to remind me to take a pill. I rummaged around in the sheets and blankets but couldn’t find my phone. I leaned over and looked on the floor beside our bed. Not there.
Then, annoyed and groaning, I got out of bed, knelt on the floor, lifted our bed skirt, peered under the bed and saw… my watch! I grabbed it, all my grumbling and groaning forgotten and told Donn, “I found my watch!!”
I also found my IPhone, realizing that if the music alarm hadn’t continued playing, convincing me that my phone was near by, I might not have found my watch until Christmas. (I keep Christmas wrapping paper in a tote under the bed.)
I was amazed at how God had used what seemed like just an aggravating, annoying situation like losing my IPhone, to prompt me to get down on my hands and knees to look under the bed—a place I would never have searched for my watch! And then finding not only my phone but also something else I’d thought was gone for ever.
How thankful I am that we serve a God who cares about lost things and will go to great lengths to make sure they are found! It reminds me of a parable that Jesus told about lost things.
Jesus said, “Or suppose a woman has ten silver coins[a] and loses one. Doesn’t she light a lamp, sweep the house and search carefully until she finds it? And when she finds it, she calls her friends and neighbors together and says, ‘Rejoice with me; I have found my lost coin.’ In the same way, I tell you, there is rejoicing in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents.” (Luke 15:8-10.)
I’m writing a book called Diary of a Call, The Story Behind Our Call to Japan, Volume Two. As I read my journals kept while God was calling us, I’m reminded that God asked us to go to a lot of trouble to go to Japan to help Him search for lost people.
He asked Donn to take a sabbatical and then an early retirement so that we could answer His call. He also asked me to give up half of my inheritance to pay for our first year in Japan, and later to sell our house, leave our children and grandchildren, and raise funds to go to Japan, the most expensive country in the world (at that time) to serve as missionaries.
At one of the conferences we attended, the children were asked to approach other attendees to ask for money for missions. One little boy asked the speaker, Bruce Wilkinson, for funds. Bruce asked him, “What did you give? I’ll give whatever you gave.”
The little boy responded, “Oh, I gave all I had.”
Bruce said, “I gulped and emptied my wallet of all the traveling funds I brought with me.”
As we did Japan Presentations in churches and conferences to raise the funds we needed, we sang a song at the end of almost every event, “What If I Give All?” In the end, God didn’t ask it of us, but we were prepared to give all we had—including Donn’s retirement, the funds we had from the sale of our house, the rest of my inheritance. God cares about lost people and He wants us to be willing to give all we have if He should ask it of us.
V. 1
He heard the preacher say
“A single dime could feed A hungry boy or girl with
Nothing to eat”
So he pulled a dollar From the pocket of his jeans
He asked his Mama “How many will this feed?”
She just smiled when she told him ten,
He reached back in again.
Chorus
“What if I give all I have?What will that gift do?”
“My child a gift like that could change the world
Could feed a multitude!”
He didn’t close his eyes or turn away, I can see him standing tall
He saw the need and I can hear him say
Chorus “What if I give all?”
V 2
Three birthday dollars could of bought a special toy
But he reminds of another little boy
Who gave to Jesus a gift of fish and bread
I wonder if he said?
Chorus “What if I give all I have
V 3
Long ago, a Father and His Son
Saw the children lost in sin
Can you see the tears in Father’s eyes
As Jesus says to him?
Chorus
“What if I give all I have
What will that gift do?”
“My son that gift will change the world
It will feed the multitude”
“So what if I give all I have
What will that gift do?
My child a gift like that could change the world
It could feed a multitude
We cannot close our eyes and turn away
When we hear his Spirit call
We see the need, now let him hear us say
“What if I give all?
What if I give all?”
(Songwriters: Ray Boltz, Mark Pay, Raymond H Boltz)
Heavenly Father, if you care about the little things we lose, how much more you care about men and women, girls and boys, who are lost. Help us to join you in your efforts to search for them until they are found. Help us to be willing to give all we have. Amen.