Taking CFO To the World

Taking CFO To the World

by Ruth Robison

Transcribed from the original recording; may contain errors.

Many years ago, Glenn, with Glenn Harding and Roland and Marcia, had taken their first tour around the world and contacted people, shared with them personally the whole vision of CFO. Others have gone since that time. And the Foundation has, for the past number of years, sent couples to these various camps. And you know, the amazing thing to me is how we inherit environment. I inherit… Lee and I inherited this wonderful environment of the birth of CFO in these various countries. We were quite aware of the fact that these people had been before. Everywhere we went, we were conscious of their contribution to these different groups. And we were so conscious of the contribution that all of you people in CFO who knew we were going, are in your prayer for us, as you sent your power and your love to us as we went around. I know that we could not have taken the schedule that we took, had we not been supported by the love and prayers of our family and our friends. So it was a great opportunity and we loved it. Now, as we got ready to go in preparation and prayer and other ways, we were quite conscious of the fact that we were going not only to give something, but to learn something from these other people.

You know, the amazing thing is that people everywhere have something to give to each other. Too long have we felt that we are the people who have so much to give. Materially, yes. But spiritually, in many ways, we have so much to learn from these people. And I think the one thing that impressed me more than anything else, out of the total picture, was the CFO’s use of silence. We had a little touch of it today, Starr, in our session here. Oh, they would go into silence in such amazing ways. After one person prayed in the prayer group, nobody would think of starting to pray. I suppose I would pray. The whole group seated around here would be in silence after my prayer. They would be lifting my prayer up to God in just powerful silence. They didn’t have to hurry. These people don’t have to hurry. They don’t even have to hurry to pray. They are so respectful in spirit of my prayer that they would wait until they felt that God could take my prayer and make it useful. And then somebody else would pray. Oh, they taught us so much in the way of the use of silence and meditation. And we are so deeply grateful and we want to pass it on to others.

Now, let me begin our journey a little bit and go to the Philippines. I want to give you the picture of the experience in the CFO’s. We are to be so proud in the right sort of a way, that God has put it in the minds of some of our leaders in our national foundation and in our national CFO council ring, that CFO should expand itself in a larger way into a world vision. And I believe with all my heart, Tony and others, that this has come out of the world broadcast. I believe that when we started years ago, as Alice told us this morning, to have a world broadcast, we started the preparation for the camps farthest out. And these camps are the ones farthest out in the Philippines and Japan. So, let us think of them. And I feel that you can pray for them in a new way when you accept the challenge, which we hope we are able through the Spirit to give you. I had written to friends in the Philippines and in Japan that I was going to wear a very crazy hat. I had a hat that I had been given to Frankie and Frankie had used it and given it to me. And that’s the way we work in our family.

So anyhow, this was a dark blue straw hat with big white daisies on it with a black center. So I thought that nobody in the world will ever have a hat like that. So I wrote these people that when they see us get off the airplane, they can recognize Lee and me by my hat with the white daisies and the black spot. Well, somewhere between the airport in Washington, D.C., the National Airport and Dulles, I lost the hat.

I’ve never lost a hat before, but how in the world that hat got out of my hands, I just will never know. But I didn’t even think about it until we were almost ready to land in Manila. And I turned to Lee and said, “Oh, honey, do you know that they will never recognize us? I haven’t got my hat.” And he said, “Well, what are you talking about?” But, oh, it’s wonderful. We went on through this mass of people. And pretty soon here came a man and his wife. And the man came up to us and he said, “CFO.” Oh, I said, “Yes, sir, CFO.” Oh, and you know, I never heard such sweet music. It was just music because here we were with masses of people and we knew nobody. But the minute somebody said CFO out, we just felt perfectly at home. So as Lee said, we got in the car and drove on to the campsite. And this was just the fourth camp of the Philippines. And the council ring in the Philippine camp had not caught, as we could say, the vision that we have of the work of a council ring. And the foundation had told us in correspondence that one of the things that we were to contribute to the camps this year was to especially work with the council rings, to help them understand how a council ring is organized, how it does its work, and so forth.

Now, the council ring in the Philippines was an uncertain group of people, as we first felt, because we really couldn’t find out who was on the council ring. But we went on to camp and here these people gathered. And there were just three foreigners there. We were two of them. And then Daraith and Neuben from the CFO camp in California was there. Her husband had been sent out to Manila for the government. And so she was with us this year at the CFO camp. So the rest of the people were Filipinos. And they had such a leisurely way of doing things. And as Lee told you, when I got there and I looked at the program, bless Pat, I was down to direct the singing and the arts. I was to lead the singing and direct the arts. And I looked at that program. My goodness. What has the Lord done to me?

So finally, I went up to the chairman of the council ring. I called him aside. I said, “Mr. Hernandez, may I speak to you just a minute?” I said, “You know, in America, they do let women speak.” I said, “You know, I’m a speaker. I don’t know how to direct the singing. I don’t know how to direct the arts. Now, of course, if you have nobody to do any of this, I will lead the singing and I will direct the arts. But I’ll tell you the truth. I can’t guarantee you the results.” So, he said, “Well, I’ll tell you what.” He says, “I think we have two of our people who will… We have a person who… We have two people who can lead the singing.” Boy, they were good. You should hear them, Gordon. They were tremendous. And then she said, “I think we have two ladies that can take care of the arts.” But he didn’t say anything more. So, I finally decided it was nothing for me to do. And so, I waited around a little while and that was the end of the conference. So, finally, I went on back to my room and me and I thought… And then I thought, oh boy, I’ve got it. I know what I’m going to do.

So, I’m going to just introduce the idea of prayer preparation. So, when the council ring met again, I said, “You know, the most wonderful thing we have in America is a period of prayer preparation. Getting people ready to pray.” And then to try to take charge of the… to teach people how to lead in the prayer groups. And it was. It is. It’s one of the most important things in their group. I don’t even think it comes second to speaking leaders, as somebody said. I think it’s the most important. Anyway, my job here was to… and my privilege to always have the prayer preparation time. And finally, after the first day of prayer preparation and I spoke, they decided that I should have morning meditations too. So, you see, I really had a very wonderful part in the camp program. The second day… the first day went beautifully. The second day went beautifully until the afternoon when they decided to make this trip that Lee was talking about to the Rice Institute. They had not caught the vision of the importance of prayer groups, as I am going to tell you about. So, they just decided that they’d take a tour instead of prayer groups. Well, all right, the council ring decided that, and we were all put in buses and cars and we went on our tour.

When we got back at five o’clock, they were so tired. Everybody was so tired. There had been no prayer groups, no prayer preparation. And they could scarcely eat dinner. We were both very weary from the experience of getting mixed up in the tour and so forth. And we had dinner. Then we had the evening session. And the way the council ring did, this is what they knew, they thought was right, wonderful people, was just to decide this hour who was going to do something the next hour. So, this evening they decided that two new people had come in and they would have three talks that night. And then that would be it for the night. Well, I happened to go back into the little room. I’ll describe the place where we stayed. It was one great big building. Here was a screen on this side. The men slept on that side. A green screen on this side. And the women slept on that side. We met here in the middle. Well, I went back in there and the women were packing their suitcases to go home. They were all so tired they couldn’t stand it any longer. So, I went, I didn’t say anything. Lee was weary. He didn’t, he went for a little rest.

And so I stayed down that night just to get some guidance of what the Spirit wanted done. With the situation. So, I went on back after the session. I didn’t say anything. Just went on back to my room. And of course stayed many hours awake for guidance. I knew as I always know that anything that appears to be a crisis is a marvelous opportunity for the Spirit of God to break through in a new way into some new pattern. And I knew this was the moment. Strange how you have a feeling that this is the moment that God can come through if we provide the right environment for such a breakthrough. So, I lay awake until I got an idea. You know, you don’t want to talk to people unless you’ve got something to present. About four o’clock in the morning, I woke Lee and I said, “Honey, this has come to me that we should be in prayer now. And if this is right, if it checks with you, this will be our procedure for the morning meditation.” So, Lee said, “Oh, I do. I do agree.” And we spent now in prayer together that God would guide the morning meditation. It was a strange thing that morning, but I knew that whatever was said then would be a turning tide to a new Filipino camp.

I just knew it. I knew that God had sent us for this purpose. It’s a strange thing how you go on a mission and you don’t know until a moment, a moment of crisis, that this is the reason that you came. So, that morning in meditation, I just said to the group, I just would like to talk heart to heart with you about the purpose of CFO. So, God gave, how God gave Glenn the vision and what the CFO has accomplished in America and the way of so many changed lives. So many people have found God in a new way. So many people have gotten to know the Holy Spirit and the Holy Spirit has come into their hearts and minds through quiet, lovely ways. And they have become new people. So, I said, “I want to share that with you this morning. And I want to tell you the great challenge that you have here to be an open door to a new life for your Filipino people and for your friends here.” So, we spoke. And God used us to speak and gave His contribution. We spoke for about three quarters of an hour. Everything was very still. Finally, I said, “You know, I can’t go back to America and say that you have a CFO unless you really do think seriously about these challenges which we bring to you as messengers from the National Foundation.”

Now, I said, “If you don’t want to be a CFO,” oh my, this took courage. Sometimes you just have to break through with a great thrust. I said, “If you don’t want to be a CFO, that’s all right. We’ll just go back and take that report. But my precious friends of the Philippines, if you want to be a CFO, there is something so wonderful ahead for you. And there is such a great challenge for you that you will dedicate yourself to it as you have never done before.” Now, I said, “We’re going to have a little time of silence.” And I said, “Not only are you going to dedicate yourself to it, but you’re going to listen to us talk to you about what accounts for you. And you’re going to welcome it with all your heart because it’s going to be a new life for your CFO experience in the Philippines.” I really called silence, called them into silence with a sort of taking a deep breath. I didn’t really know what the response was going to be. And on the line, I knew what it had to be. Because you see, one can’t let God down under these circumstances. And it was the great challenge to let this great fellowship, this different kind of fellowship of CFO, break through into the Philippines.

So anyhow, after a time of silence, I just waited. I knew my job was done. I had spoken, and so I sat down. I don’t know how long we sat in silence, but pretty soon the secretary of the Filipino camp got up and went up to the front of the room, up to the desk. And he said, “Do I speak for you folks on the council ring? Do I… Can I say to Ruth and Lee that by all means we want CFO and that we’ll give our best to it from now on?” Well, there was still silence. Then pretty soon the whole bunch broke out with such wonderful applause that honestly we could scarcely take it. Then new life came. It was a resurrection style. What you were talking about this morning, it was a resurrection really. Because you know, we finished the meditation, we went to breakfast. The whole atmosphere was lifted up in a marvelous way. May I, may I, would you put this just a comma here and there and let me put something in a parenthesis. I went to breakfast after this experience and I looked down at my plate. And they are my plate. Rice. Oh yes, rice. When I come see you, don’t give me rice the first thing. But, here, I’ll take it the second day.

But here is rice. A big plate of rice. And I looked down on top of you. Now this is, listen, folks, this is no criticism. I’m just reporting situations. Because you see, people do different. And to them it’s wonderful and it’s lovely. But this is just the way it appeared to me. So this is just me. Please, if you tell it, no criticism of anybody. And you, we must share it in this spirit. But I looked down at my plate and here was the lovest big fish head, with eyes as big as my thumb, just looking up at me.

I said to myself, “Oh, Father. If it’s gotta be this, I promise You anything, I take it. But how in the world am I gonna eat this fish head?” I couldn’t see it. So I sat there just waiting. I’d seen God do wonderful things that morning. I still… He could still work miracles. Of course, I didn’t expect Him to turn it into a loaf of bread. But anyway, I sat there. And here, I looked over here and over this side, here was the lady with the plate of rice. And in her plate was a lovely slice of the middle of the fish. Now, of course, we had fish for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. That was part of the menu. Fish every meal. Cause such a little meat, see. But anyway, here was her slice of meat, a slice of fish. And it really did look so good to me for breakfast. So anyhow, I was sitting here quiet and she punched me a little. She said, “If you don’t like your plate, would you mind if I had it?” Thank you.

So I said, “Oh, Holy Spirit, don’t let me rush at this thing.” So anyhow, I handed her the plate very quietly and I said, “Oh, I’d just love for you to have it. I would enjoy your plate too.” She said, “Would you really?” I said, “Yes, I would.” And so we exchanged plates. After we finished eating, I said, “You know, may I ask you really a question? Just because I need to learn some things.” “Oh, yes,” she said. I said, “Why do you just love that fish head like that?” “Oh,” she said, “Don’t you know, Ruth, why those eyes are the most wonderful things?” She said, “They are just full of vitamins.”

Of course, of course, I was so happy for her to have the vitamins. A little while after breakfast, I went back up to our cabin, I just had to go back to the cabin to fall on my knees and lead it to the bed. We just had to fall on my knees to thank God for the resurrection of the spirit of CFO at this point. So anyhow, when I came on down before the morning talk, I went back into the ladies’ section. And I saw everybody unpacking the suitcases. It was the most beautiful thing I ever saw. All the women were unpacking the suitcases. And they said, “Oh, no, Ruth, we couldn’t think of going home. We just couldn’t think of going home. But we’re going to have the most wonderful two days left for our camp that we’ve ever had.” I said, “Yes, you sure are.” So, but we’re going to have prayer preparation this afternoon, and we are going to have our prayer groups. And Lee and I are going to take the prayer groups and teach you something about the wonders of an experience of prayer together as we have it in CFO at home. Thank you so much for joining with me in this adventure. Now we can say it’s up to You, Father.

In talking to the Philippine Council ring after this morning of challenge, I told them that there were five things they had to do. Sometimes we have to speak with authority to our children and say, regardless of whether you like this or not, this you must do. And when the Father has given you superior wisdom, and I’m using the term superior in the right way, God has superior wisdom. When God has given to each one of us superior wisdom in any field, we must speak with authority. Lee and I could see that this council ring was utterly confused, simply not because they didn’t want to do, but because they didn’t know what to do. And therefore, I said to the chairman, there are five things you must do. And I wrote them down. You know, we need to write down things so people can see, not only hear, but see. I said to him, “The first thing you’re going to do… I don’t mean chairman, I mean secretary.” Yes, it was the chairman. It’s not, it’s the secretary. Anyhow, I said to him, “The first thing you’re going to do is get a new chairman.”

It was the vice chairman. I’ve got it now. Thank you, mine. It was the vice chairman. I said, “The first thing you’re going to do is get a new chairman. The second thing you’re going to do is put some new members on your council ring.” Not for six years have they added a new member to the council ring. “The third thing you’re going to do is plan for regular meetings of your council ring during the year so that you keep in fellowship and a fellowship of prayer in the council ring. The fourth thing you’re going to do is begin immediately to plan for next year.” They have left their plans for this year up to three months before the camp started. “The fifth thing is that all that you do as a council ring is going to be done in the spirit of prayer, asking your Heavenly Father for wisdom to do the four first things.” He looked at me and took a deep breath and I said, “Don’t forget, you accepted the challenge.” He said, “Yes, I know, and we’re going to take the challenge. So will you meet with us in the council ring meeting right after lunch today?” See, this is the last day. I went to the council ring and he had the list as I had given him a copy of this one.

And he said to the council ring members, “Now, we have five challenges that we must accept. And we just are going through these and each one we’re taking prayer. And we’ve got to do it as a group.” I told him that they had also to learn how to move as a council ring group. Before this, three or four would make a decision. So, out of this, I want to read just a little portion of a letter just arrived yesterday from the Philippines.

The chairman, who was Bishop Dr. Supaprina, who was former general moderator of the United Church of Japan, had been so busy, he had not been able to give time to CFO. So that’s the reason they needed a new chairman. Dr. Supaprina was very pleased to relinquish his office and be made an honorary chairman. And the waters were all calm. I’m reading from Dorothy Newman, who was one of the new members elected to the council ring. Attorney Tranquilo Salvador was elected the new chairman. And let me tell you something here, friends. You know, one evening, I was sitting there in the group, and I just felt the guidance of God to pick out this man, this attorney, lawyer, and have a little conference with him. I said to him, “I’m going to do a strange thing.” I said, “I don’t know that you’ll ever have the opportunity of being chairman of CFO in the Philippines. I hope someday you will. I don’t know when it will come. But I’d just like to ask the question, may I pray for you as chairman someday of the Philippine CFO?” Tears came in his eyes, and he looked at me, and he said, “Ruth, I would rather do that than anything else I know at this moment.” He’s the one that was elected chairman.

Attorney Tranquilo Salvador was elected the new chairman. Reverend Hernandez was elected vice chairman. And then they had a new secretary. This new secretary is secretary to the bishop. I’ll tell you these things not to give you your title, the titles of these people, but to show you the caliber of people that we have that are becoming so loyal to our CFO movement in these various places.

She says, “I’ll ask the secretary to send you a copy of names and addresses of all the council. It’s a big group. Many I have never seen. Teeny, the secretary, will be very businesslike, and he will send you the list. They’re going to ask Dr. Lobach to come next year.” And as they discuss that in the council ring, this is Dr. Lobach’s home. You know, Mendino, right across from the Philippines, not too far away, a part of the Philippines, and they felt that Dr. Lobach would come back and would come back primarily for CFO next year, that this would give CFO the boost in all of the islands that will be necessary. And I can see, and Lee can see, a tremendous surge for CFO in the Philippines. I don’t need to read you any more of this letter except to tell you that all of these things… Oh, yes. She did say, “We have decided on a regular time to meet. We spent a long time in prayer. We had a good prayer session for both of you also. So keep us in your prayers.” God answers prayer so quickly when we believe that He will. When our faith, and come back to the faith of the first morning, if you might say that, when our faith in God and people becomes alive, and this morning when Paul was talking, Paul and our little family, and I were talking at the breakfast table, and he asked the question about faith in the grain of mustard seed.

Of course, it does not mean size. It means that if I have faith with the same vitality, and if the mustard seed could talk, would say to himself, “God has put this little speck of life in me, and I know because He’s put this little speck of life in me, one day I’ll be a great tree.” That’s the faith of a grain of mustard seed. You see, it’s the quality of the faith. If I have this quality of faith in just a tiny spoonful, God can remove mountains. You see that? Because this quality of faith becomes so active, and not only that, but I use it. I have such faith in my faith, and I have to have faith in my faith. See? Now let’s go on back. That’s enough for you to think on that. We left the Philippines, and of course went to Honolulu, and there we talked with many people about CFO, and we know we planted some seeds, as Lee said last night. Not only that, but we will be corresponding with these people through the year on CFO, because we feel this is their responsibility to follow up. And then we went on to Japan. Oh, my. The CFO in Japan was such a blessing in so many ways to me.

So many of these young people, mostly young people, young students, university students, college students, here in our CFO group. Not a large group. I guess all together there were 35 full-time people. And then I should say, we’ll get the full report, but guessing about 15 who came for two days, three days, and so forth. But a very powerful group, a very dedicated group of people. And as I sat there looking at the 35, I thought, well, Father, this 35 is enough to move many mountains in Japan, really, and to bring to Christianity in Japan a new vitality that our Christian movement, through education, through medicine, as I have said before, our evangelism has already started in Japan. But we need these three groups. And the reason I’m saying this is because I talked. We had three missionaries in our group that two were Methodists and one was president that came to the CFO because they came so hungry for Christian fellowships. You know, strange enough, you can be in a group of ministers and have no Christian fellowships. They are all just ministers. You can be in a group of Christian, of directors of religious education. They are seeking something different. They are seeking understanding.

They are seeking understanding. That’s good. It’s all good. But the contribution that CFO has in the world is on the basis of simple, divine Christian fellowships. That’s just interflowing and outflowing of divine love person to person, on a simple, everyday, loving basis. See? We don’t have to be afraid of each other because some of us have more of a clear intellect than the others. We don’t have to be afraid of each other because some of us are God-women.

In our CFO group, as we are here, we have deep respect for each other. On whatever level you’re working, whatever your mind, God has revealed to your mind, whatever gifts you have to contribute, we love you. We love you because you are a child of God, not because of anything that you have whatsoever. See? Now, we appreciate what you have. We love it. And your children. We love your children equally, young people equally. And you love us equally. But this type of a fellowship has not yet been developed. And if we fail in our mission in this throughout our world, I feel that we really have become… Well, I don’t have the words for that, but we are not the kind Father’s sake. Now, this challenge of being Father’s sake and our spiritual experience and laying our minds all along the world with people is the challenge of today. I knew this before I went. And the past few years, I’ve been hearing that the shell of the evil has to be cracked, in a sense. That in every form, upon the scalp and testicles in flesh, we need to keep this down.

Now, you can be assured of that. So it will be true of the skeleton of CFOs. But we need to let the Holy Spirit grow bigger minds, larger spirits of love in our CFOs. Two or three little experiences in the Japanese camp. When we got to the hotel, of course, we arrived at the airport. There was nobody to meet us there in Japan, but it didn’t matter. We took the camp to the hotel. And then just soon after we arrived, the secretary, Mrs. Jessie Bando, called us up. And you know, really. And Lee and I have talked about this so many times. I don’t think we ever met a more wonderful person than Mrs. Bando. She is just a fully dedicated person to the pattern and contribution and spirit and place of CFO. She loves young people. Her home is always filled with young people. Her own son is very active. He’s co-treasurer of the CFO group. And the young people love coming to her. She’s the person that they can talk to. And just to see this CFO camp almost filled with young Japanese men and young girls just made your heart so glad. They are our hope, just like our young people here are the hope for our future. You see? So we were very happy.

Jessie and Mr. Hisi Hiroshi, now in Japanese that would be Hiroshi Hisi-san, meaning Mr., co-chairman, came to see us at the hotel. And you know, again, we never were with such wonderful people, really. People who just wanted to do everything in the world to make us supremely happy and comfortable while we were there. The CFO spirit. And you know, I just listened for fun to find out how many times they said, “Ruth, can we help you?” What does that say? Kai-hoo. Kai-hoo. “Can we help you?” Now, they didn’t know necessarily that they were saying Kai-hoo, but it was always, “Can we help you?” To Lee, “Can we help you?” And Mr. Hiroshi, we like to call him Heathen now, feel like him, we know him so well. He’s in the theological seminary. He wants someday to be a minister in the United Church of Japan. We went to a small group meeting. We got in Japan in time to participate in some things before the camp came. And that’s such an important part of a person’s visit. We met with Jessie in her home on Sunday evening. And the home was filled with people. Next to us, next to Lee, sat the dean of one of the universities in Japan. And Jessie, having worked in the YWCA in the university, had extended to him an invitation to come to this meeting.

And so he came. She had given him the little leaflet that Lee had sent over both of us, and he had read it. And so he wanted to come. And after it was all over, he said to Lee, “You know, there isn’t any reason why the notice of CFO shouldn’t be on our university in Japan next year.” You see the unfolding of the expansion of CFO. But I said to both CFOs, “Now listen. We are not praying for you to grow. We are praying for you to be centered in Jesus Christ and that you keep your center. If you keep your center in Christ, God’s going to grow you.” You know, this is the basis of prayer groups. A prayer group who is more concerned about his numbers than it is about his contact with God is going to die. Is going to die. Now, if we keep ourselves centered in Jesus Christ, everything about us is going to expand and grow. We have only to keep centered. And then the Holy Spirit of God is going to come in and expand and flow out. And like the time came, something like this anyway, when I was getting well from my experience 22 years ago or more, I got to the place where I said, “Oh, Heavenly Father, don’t let me get well too quick.”

I began to see the marvelous unfolding of the work of God in the midst of reconstruction. Yes, He was reconstructing my body and my mind and my spirit. But I wanted so much to catch the implications of the work of God within me, my body and mind and spirit, so that someday I could be sharing it with somebody else. And that’s… and the answer to that prayer was my first coming into CFO to begin to share my experience years ago. So if we do keep centered in Christ, and if these groups in the Philippines and in Japan keep centered in Christ, they’re going to grow. The big thing was the marvelous spirit of these 35 people as the week… as the five days move forward to become one, just like we become one and will. This whole group here, by the end of the time, we will have such a sense of oneness that we… Well, anything I have is yours, we’ll say. You see? That’s what I mean. Take what you need. Anything I have is yours. That is the state of the early Christian church, really. You see? Where they felt like they loved each other so much that whatever another needed, they could have. And this was the spirit of the group in Japan.

I, again, in the Japan camp, I had prayer preparation and the direction of the prayer group leaders. And all those wonderful prayer groups. One day, I’ll just share just one little thing about prayer groups. We were in my prayer group. And I wasn’t leading. In these prayer groups, the leaders had already been prepared in the six years. They had plenty of leaders in the Japanese camps to take the prayer groups. And so Lee and I just… Lee led one group. I didn’t. I just went in as just an observer. And I sat there and I listened to the… To this young man. And he is an oil salesman. Quite a responsible job. He sells oil. He gets oil from America. He comes over to America to negotiate for oil from Texas. And then he goes back to Japan and sells it to the oil companies in Japan. Well, he had been a friend of Paul Rush. And he had come to… His father had been a large contributor to the work at Paul Rush’s place. But he’d come over each summer to visit Mr. Rush just for Friendship Day. He had a big office down in… Downtown in Tokyo. So he’d come up to… Keith to see Paul. Anyway, last summer… Not this summer, but last summer…

He had come up and somebody in CFO last summer had seen him on the grounds just walking around and said to him, “We are meeting here in our CFO. Would you love to come in? We’d love to have you.” And he said, “Well, what is it?” So he said, “I came in just for one day and stayed through the day’s program.” And he said, “You know, I found something in this group that I have never found any place else in my life. So I made my application immediately to be a member, a full-time member of CFO this year.” And he was. In our prayer group, Lee was leading this afternoon. And he suggested that we have a prayer for Paul Rush because Mr. Rush is not well. He has a little feeling that he may not live to see two projects fulfilled out of his dreams. I mean, become realized. And he said, “So Lee said, Let us have a prayer that he relinquishes that sense of not being able to fulfill something and that he be filled with new life.” And then Lee turned to this young man and he said to him, “Would you pray the prayer for Paul?” And I think almost before he realized what he was doing, he replied to Lee and said, “Yes, I think I’d like to.”

So we bowed our heads and in Japanese, he prayed a long prayer. And later on, the prayer group went on. But after that, he came up to me and he said, “You know, Ruth, that’s the first time in my life I ever prayed a free prayer,” he called it. He was Episcopalian. He said, “I’ve always read the prayers from the books, from our prayer book.” But he said, “It’s the first time in my life I ever really spoke to God.” You see, this is what happened in that group. Another thing is this. One day, one of the young girls was not feeling so good. Of course, where did it keep? We were right far away from things, but it didn’t matter. I said to the chairman, “Jessie, would you like me to have a prayer with her?” She had stayed on her mat. Of course, we had rooms with our furniture in it, the western furniture, and we were so comfortable. But of course, they had their own rooms. And in each room, about three of them had their own mats. So I went in and knelt down. I sat on the floor. I couldn’t kneel there. I sat on the floor by her mat and talked to her about the healing power of Jesus.

And how Jesus healed people when He was here. And that He had used me as an instrument for His power to heal. And I said to this young girl, “Would you like me to pray for you?” And she began to cry. She said, “Yes.” She said, I said, “Tell me, do you know why you’re not feeling good today?” She says, “Yes. You know, my mother is not a Christian. Then my mother is not a Christian. And neither is my daddy.” And she said, “Whenever I come to any Christian groups, they’re not too happy.” And she said, “That makes me unhappy.” I said, “Of course it does. Suppose we then pray first of all for mother and daddy that through you they catch the spirit of something new. Now when you go home, all you have to do is just shine with love and joy and be such a good daughter to your parents. Just be such a good daughter to your mother and your father that they will know that something’s happened to you.” So we prayed. Now I said, “I think we need a second prayer. Let’s just pray that God will heal this pain and that you can come back to the group and finish up the camp with a wonderful experience.” So we did.

And you know, the thing that overwhelms me really is the confidence and faith that people have in you. When you speak with authority, they can’t help it. And she looked at me and said, “Oh yes, please do.” So I laid my hand on her side and we prayed. When I started, I thought she was going to take a rest. And when I turned around and looked, bless her heart, she was up putting on her clothes and I looked at her. I said, “You’re coming here?” She said, “Yes, I’m coming with you. Isn’t that what you expected?”

I didn’t say a word. No, it wasn’t what I expected. I thought she’d take a rest. So you see, my faith wasn’t that great, but her faith was greater. So we get caught in that. Then out of that grew… That’s… Oh my… I tell you, a gossip… Holy gossip is such a wonderful thing. Of course, evil gossip is terrible.

But holy gossip is such a wonderful thing. The news began to spread that God used me for this purpose. And of course, there were quite many people that had troubles after that. It was such a lovely experience. And finally, the secretary, Jessie, bless her heart, someday she’s going to be with us, came to me. She says, “Ruth, I’ve had trouble in my side for so many months.” She said, “I’ve been to the doctors. They can’t find anything, but I’m still disturbed.” I had asked her if she had a medical checkup. She said, “Yes, I have. And still, it doesn’t give me any comfort. Would you pray?” I said, “All right, now, tonight, when you get ready to go to sleep, send someone for me and we will pray.” The next morning, she said, “It’s all taken care of. I’ll never have any trouble again.” So that’s the way it went. And God, in His wonderful way, opened up the door for me the next afternoon in prayer to speak on a healing experience, which I did. God’s answer to prayer. God’s answer to prayer. This awakened in the group a new avenue of insight into God’s caring for people, you see, into God’s love and caring for people. And so the minister who was co-speaker with me, Dr. Jarvis, who has been in so many places in our world and quite a wonderful person, really, he came to me and he said, “Please let me have a conference with you,” because he said, “All my ministry, I’ve been afraid.”

I’ve been afraid. I’ve spoke on television, radio, oh, for so many years. I’ve been speaking on television, radio in Japan. He said, “I’ve been afraid to speak on the healing power of Jesus.” And then we spent about three quarters of an hour together. I was witnessing to my own experience and to other experiences. And then I said to him, “Would you like me to pray that you be given the courage and the wisdom and very great wisdom, when to, when not to, how to and how not to speak on this subject as part of your ministry?” And with tears in his eyes, he said, “Please do.” So it seems to me that out of this great experience of CFO in Japan is coming, has already come and is coming something that you and I have not realized that it was possible for the movement, the spiritual movement of CFO to contribute to the rest of our world. And I believe that after hearing us, that you’ll go home and you will be thinking about this movement. You’ll not only be thinking about it, you’ll be a part of this greater movement of CFO in other parts of the world. It’s given, it gave us such great joy in the close at the sharing meeting. We were to have had the blessing time and CFO, oh, oh, I must go back and tell you this one thing that was necessary for the council ring here. I had missed that in the beginning. I realized in the early morning after in my quiet time there that they should have something in their hands. So I took a sheet of plain paper and made it each day’s program. For instance, a breakfast, I mean, meditation breakfast, so forth and so on, just like our program. And I said, “Now what you do, Jessie, is take this into your council ring.”

And after a period of silence and prayer, you look over this and you say, “Heavenly Father, who’s to speak this morning? Who’s to speak this evening? Well, who’s to have meditation in the morning? Who’s to have prayer preparation time?” And the prayer preparation time, getting people’s minds in tune for the, for entrance into the presence of God, like started yesterday afternoon. That was so tremendous. Every one of us who were here felt that we, did not step out of His presence as we moved into our prayer experience yesterday afternoon. We did that every day, in Japan to get them ready to go into the time of prayer. So we’re every morning, the first morning they took the sheet that went through and after they finished, they lifted it up and they gave it to God and saying to them, “Father, and if there are any changes through the day, You can make them and we will listen.” Each day they did that. We made it, made it a sheet for each day, each day they did it. At the end of the time, I told them they needed new members, just as we had Philippines. They did not need a new chairman. For the present time, after much prayer, we knew that Jessie was to remain chairman of the CFO for next year’s, CFO in Japan. But they elected, four new members.

And, again, this young lad, the young man, he isn’t a lad, a lad. He’s, well, I guess he’s 40. You know, quite young. Anyway, they put him on the council ring, even though it was his first time, for a full-time CFO. He was ready. If there was anybody ready to go on the council ring to dedicate all his, worldly wisdom, all his business sense and everything else, he was ready to go on the council ring. And it was such an honor. The last morning when they met and brought in the new members of the council ring again, which we had written on the page, this, yeah, this man was so overwhelmed with people’s confidence in him that he said that his faith in God had been completely restored. He had lost it because some experiences he said, I said to him, “Fella, you can’t lose faith. You cannot lose it. But when God puts faith in you, that faith is there. It can lie dormant, but you do not lose it. And any moment that you are willing to believe that you have that faith and you ask the Holy Spirit to stir up the faith that’s in you, which Paul told Timothy to do, get on fire that little spark, which is there, something’s going to happen to your life. And you’re going to begin a new pattern of Christian living, Christ-like living that you’ve never experienced before.” Coming to a close of our experience, of course, we went to Honolulu, to Honolulu. And you know, really, I guess we went there just for fun. I was going straight to Wisconsin camp and coming to you here. And after the experiences we had had for four weeks, five weeks for me, I felt that two days would be so wonderful to just to lay in the sun and see the sun and see the waves and the beauties and everything else. So those two days, we just spent giving thanks to the Foundation Father Estoute and to you people who make the Foundation Father Estoute a possibility through your gifts and through your love and prayers, who had sent us on this journey. We will, as I said last night, we’ll never be quite to say them. And we hope you won’t either. If you can believe what we have told you. May we pray.