Testimonies on the Road

People of all ages often excitedly tell me (especially after our conferences or after having used our website regularly) that God used AiG to provide the “right direction” in their lives.

Perhaps it was through previous conferences, or because of the impact of our books, videos—maybe our growing Answers radio program around the world.

I’d love to be able to transport you right there to our conferences (if only “beam me up Scotty” was a reality!) so you could listen in to these conversations. You’d be tremendously encouraged.

After speaking in Virginia a few weeks ago, I asked some AiG supporters there if I could interview them and record my conversations for this letter to you.

M.B., a grandmother, said:

“Our grandson, who’s 15 and has been home-schooled all his life, is now in the public school. When he was a little guy, his grandfather gave him a Creation magazine subscription, and he enjoyed the pictures.

“As he got older, he devoured the magazines. Now he’s in public school and being presented with what that educational system is giving the students—but he has a firm foundation and knows the truth.

“[Recently he called my husband] to say, ‘Granddaddy, thank you for the Creation magazines, because I know the answers to what they’re telling us in school!””

“So, he’s kept all those magazines?” I asked.

“His mother says he’s got a box in his closet full of magazines! We’re thrilled. We have 11 grandchildren and have [given subscriptions] for all of them.

“My husband became convinced, as the grandchildren were coming along, that this was a really important issue for them to be well grounded.”

Now there’s an idea! A gift subscription to Creation for every grandchild!

What a thrill to learn how people, like these grandparents, are spreading the message to the coming generation!

Another husband and wife that I interviewed declared:

“We just finished the Creation Series and some other [AiG] videos in our church. We’re both physicians.”

I asked, “What was the response from the others who watched the videos?”

Husband: “Oh, it was incredibly eye-opening.

“We’re a product of public schools and grew up in Christian homes. But we really never got the hard facts.”

“So, did the videos have a great effect on your faith?”

Wife: “Oh, absolutely, absolutely. At the beginning of the class, I was wondering: What is he going to say about dinosaurs? How is all of this going to fit in?

“But something that you touched on—about the biases: THAT is the way to get to the scientific community. This completely hit home when you were talking about the different dating methods.”

“As I said this morning: you learn one thing at church, and another thing at school. You identified with that?”

Both: “Right, right!”

You know, I’ve heard so many wonderful testimonies from people who have watched our videos. I don’t think we could even guess the number of lives that have been touched. I often think of my friend Dan E., here in our Cincinnati area, who became a Christian after one of his sisters showed him our video set.

Something else has really touched me lately. There are now so many young people—elementary, high school and college age—coming up to me at our meetings to thank us for the AiG ministry, and to explain how they have been blessed.

In Indiana recently, two rather scruffy-looking teenagers approached me after my talk and said, “We just wanted to tell you: we think you’re cool!”

I laughed and said, “Why’s that?” They replied, “Because it makes sense—you make the Bible real!”

Who knows how that conference will impact their young lives?

At the Virginia conference, I recorded interviews with many young people. One teenager told me:

“I’d been brought up that you needed to believe the Bible, but I didn’t know why. I asked my parents, and they didn’t have answers.

“When I went to the [Denver AiG] seminar, it was so cool to finally know that, yes, it is true! I can believe it, and I can stand on it.”

So I asked, “The people you talk to—do you find that creation/evolution comes up?”

“Yes. ‘Where did Cain get his wife?’ comes up a lot.”

“Really? Why do you think they ask that question?”

“Because nobody’s answered it.

“One guy, who came to clean our ducts, actually saw a flyer that we had from AiG and he asked, ‘Where did Cain get his wife?’

“He had been brought up in the church, and he asked his parents and grandparents—and they didn’t know. So he’d just brushed the issue aside and decided the Bible wasn’t good.”

Then I interviewed a student attending a community college:

“Do you find a lot of non-Christians there?”

“An awful lot … as soon as I start to witness and share my beliefs with them, they completely ignore you, or have questions.”

“Do the questions relate to evolution, science or something?”

“Most of them do. One of the most common is with dinosaurs, and the other one is: How did God get here, and if He created, who created God?”

“Have you found the answers from this ministry have helped you witness?”

“Yes, very much. My church did a study of the AiG [video series] … and that helped me to be so much better equipped.”

Another teenage student explained to me that her parents brought her up on AiG materials, and how this helped her in sharing her faith.

She then told me of a sad (but all-too-common) tale of students her age who were brought up in the church, but without the answers provided by AiG. She told me that some have told her that “when I get out of college, I’ll stop going to church as soon as I get out of my parent’s influence.”

By the way, my experience (as well as statistics I’ve read on the web) confirms that this is happening all the time across the nation.

Yes, young people do need answers.

Then a young lady at the conference told me:

“I’m just excited about what I learned today. I’m the oldest of six kids, and we home-schooled.

“I’m just excited I could cry … it [the authority of the Bible] is key to regaining our nation and our Christian heritage. The Lord has really burdened me about this ever since I was little … [and now] I’m so excited because I can train little ones now.”

In North Carolina recently, a young man came up and said: “I was a militant atheist. But after reading your book The Lie, I became a Christian! Thank you.”

When I hear such testimonies over and over again, it just revitalizes me. It makes me even more zealous to spread the vital creation/gospel message (with all the answers)—a message that God has entrusted us with.

As these thrilling testimonies above have shown you, God has been mightily blessing AiG this year. So many lives have been changed for eternity.

The blessings this year include financial ones also. In fact, donations to AiG in the first half of the year were better than expected in this slumping economy!

However, as we were getting this letter off to the printer, we closed our books for the third quarter, and saw that donations had taken a sudden, unexpected drop. This was significantly lower than what was reasonably projected.

Surprisingly, gifts were almost half of what they were in August and September last year. (I’m hearing, too, that many ministries have seen a recent, similar decline—it’s quite a puzzling nationwide phenomenon.)

I’ve never had to share such a “business matter” with you. Those who know me are aware that I would prefer not to bring such “odious” (but still needed) matters to your attention.

But just as Paul asked the Corinthian church (2 Cor. 9: 5-7) to help in a special need, I’m asking you to help with a special gift this month to get us back on track.

I’m sure you join us in wanting AiG to end the year “in the black.” We certainly don’t want to scale back any of our programs for 2004. As you have read, AiG’s outreaches—conferences, website, radio ministry, etc.—are impacting lives for Christ! We will trust that God through His people will supply.