Remembering a Life of Service and Sacrifice

I have been given an awesome privilege today.  I get to sing at the Memorial Service for Pioneer Missionary Ike Foster, who went home to be with the Lord recently after 62 years on the mission field.  The Foster's legacy of passionate service for Christ is one that I have admired for years.  Their son, Paul is a good friend of mine and pastor's in Jenks, OK.  He asked me to sing a song that I sang at a fellowship meeting in our church a few years ago.  It is called Faces, by Greater Vision, and it speaks of those who have served faithfully, not always seeing the fruit of their labors, but when they stand before God, they will see the faces of those who have come to Christ because of their efforts.  I will also be singing, Thank You For Giving to The Lord.  While I sing, there will be a PowerPoint of pictures from the life and ministry of Ike Foster and his wife Jane, who graduated to heaven in 2006. 
This honor is very special to me, because it was at a service very much like this that God did a major work in my own heart in my early formative years.  Two days after I arrived on campus as a freshman at Baptist Bible College in 1976, they held a memorial service for Missionary Bob Hughes, one of my foremost heroes in the faith.  The powerful testimonies of those that Bob had won to Christ and the impassioned preaching of his sending pastor planted in my heart a fervor for service to God and for reaching the world for Christ that has never subsided.  I can still remember like it was yesterday the preacher saying, "And though he be dead, yet he speaketh..." and they turned on a tape of Bro. Hughes's famous missionary sermon, "I Sat Where They Sat," and he was proclaiming, "Why do you need a call when you have a command?  Why do you need a voice when you have a verse?  You want a call?  I'll give you a call,  There's a call comes ringing oer the restless wave, Send the Light! Send the Light!..."  I am sitting here now typing through the tears as I remember the impact of that day on my life and ministry.  Over 170 people surrendered their lives to the mission field during that memorial service, many of them serving God all around the world today.
I hope that the service today will touch someone in the same way that I was touched so many years ago.
At the very least, I know that it will be a challenge to my heart not to let that passion die.
I was blessed to visit camp last night and see our young people making decisions for the Lord.  We have had four receive Christ this week and several surrender their lives to serve Him in one way or another.  It was exciting to me to see how God is working in the hearts of our workers as well.  I hope that these kids can come home fired up and that the rest of us will catch the passion instead of extinguishing it. I believe that God is preparing to do great things among us.  I hope that you will be a part of what He is doing.