Perspectives Course & Strength from God's Word

Perspectives is a course being taught in Bible Schools, Seminaries, and churches around the world and also online. Covering the Biblical, Historical, Cultural, and Strategic Perspectives, this course challenges every believer to understand and commit to fulfilling God's mandate. (http://www.perspectives.org/)

This awesome 15 week course Perspectives Study Program is a ministry of the U.S. Center for World Missions. I am participating in the January 11- May 3 Indialantic, FL (Melbourne area) course on Sunday nights when I'm not traveling to share my missions assignment and raise support. It's a combination of speakers, readings, reviews, and an integrative project. This is a life altering experience to study how God’s call to missions started with Abraham in Genesis and runs through the Bible to Revelation.
I have enjoyed and been blessed by each of our speakers, but the one that has impacted my missionary prep and inspired me the most was Chuck Walton (pic) with Wycliffe Bible Translators, Philadelphia. What pierced my heart was how scripture sustained him during his 23 days of captivity and repeated threats of death after being seized by Muslim extremists in 1993 while working as a language researcher with the Summer Institute of Linguistics in the Philippines. Mr. Walton was translating the New Testament into the Samal language when he was seized by gunmen on the island of Pangutaran.

God gave to both his wife Janice (at that time in the U.S.) and him Psalm 27 - the whole Psalm, but especially verses 1, 12, 13, and 14 helped sustain them.

Walton also referred in class to Psalm 139:7-12, Isa. 26:3, Psalm 23 and Psalm 1, as well as Proverbs 21:1.

In Charles Walton's own words from an email: "What a blessing it is to have these passages hidden in the heart so they can help us in our time of need as well as just for meditation purposes. I also thought my way through whole passages that I was familiar with but had not memorized. It is good to learn to think ones way through a book of the Bible."


For decades I've incorporated memory verses into my Christian Education ministry and that will definitely continue - with all ages. I am reminded of one of the morning devotional times at my October 2007 CE Seminar with Ivorian pastors and church leaders. I read 2 Timothy 3:16, then asked folks to share a favorite scripture and a "brief" story illustrating how it has impacted their life. It took 1 hour 45 minutes for 13 people to share the power of one scripture each...a rich, precious time together.

I must significantly prune my resource collection before going back to Cote d'Ivoire, but I sense God telling me to hold on to many of my Bible memorization resources. I also sense God nudging me to update my old “Scripture Memory Alive” workshop, combine it with the 2007 creative teaching methods training I did Cote d’Ivore to have available to share in the U.S.