By Gordon “Dickie” Soutar
In hindsight hearing and responding to God’s call was in three stages over a long period. For me it was never just “a me thing”. From the very first encounter there was always a three-fold witness working with me for God’s good:
- the power of God’s Holy scripture,
- the presence of God’s Holy Spirit, and
- three people, God’s holy servants – my mother, my homeroom teacher at high school, and a missionary –the dorm mother at Bible School. These three were faithful not only to their calling but to God’s commands for the rest of their lives concerning me.
Therefore, there was no excuse for me not to hear and respond to God’s call. Believe me, I was prepared for what would come to be known by me as “special moments”.
My first encounter with hearing God’s call was in church when I was only 10 years old. The message that night was on the “call of Samuel”. Every word seemed like arrows of fire shot straight at my tender soul. It was as if every word of the text leapt out of the page of scripture and burned its way into my heart. A strong presence of the Holy Spirit seemed to be speaking to me loud and clear by name. This caused my tears to flow non-stop throughout the message that night.
At the end of the sermon the pastor closed the service with “Hushed was the evening hymn”. It served as a prayer for me as I dedicated my young life to the service of the Lord in answer to His call. That hymn left its mark on my life forever; and its melody was imprinted on my spirit’s memory. Verse three of the hymn says
O give me Samuels’ ear. The open ear O Lord. Alive and quick to hear.
Each whisper of your Word. Like him to answer at Your call. And to obey You first of all.
I never heard that hymn before and I haven’t heard it in any service since; but I still sing it privately to remind and renew my call to the Lord. Beloved, the Lord has not stopped whispering to me since. My mother explained to me what was taking place. “My child” she said, “tonight, you, like Samuel, heard and responded to the voice of God. This is what you were born for”. She then explained to me how she had dedicated me to the Lord from the womb, for this very purpose. She promised that blessed assured she would be praying to this end. Sometime later that year she called me to her side, and told me that I was not to marry a Jamaican but a Belizean , a girl from the country she was born. But at ten years old this meant nothing to me.
During my high school days, my homeroom teacher, who had spent some time in Belize showed a special interest in me that would last for the next 47years. Burdened for the Brethren work in Belize he quietly prayed that the Lord would raise up one of his students to serve in Belize. I learnt of this 14 years later when I was about to depart to Belize. What a man of prayer.
Now at a missionary meeting 15 years after my first call, the Word of the Lord spoke to me again. This time the Holy Spirit identified both the 1) person I would marry (a young lady from Belize) and 2) the place where I would serve – Belize. When I told my mother she was again overjoyed, and said “Son, this is where you were born to serve.”
To prepare myself for missionary service on the advice of my elders, I enrolled at Midland Bible Institute. The dorm mother was a former missionary in Belize. She was a prayer warrior who trained me in righteousness. She made it her promised duty to pray with me and for me. Many years later on her dying bed she held my hand and told me faintly she had not stopped praying for me.
Now after all this encouraging background of witnesses, when I came to Belize the leaders of the church told me I was not the man they were praying for. I could not understand it. All my life I prepared myself to come here, first studying at Midland Bible Institute then the International Seminary in Florida. When I informed my Brethren leaders in Jamaica they wisely told me that I was in the place God wanted me to be – that they were convinced. Brother Clyde Edwards told me that maybe the Lord wants to use me for the redemption of the Brethren work in Belize – be patient. I received that Godly advice as a word from the Lord as I waited. While still doing the work of the Lord I began teaching.
Some 20 years after coming to Belize, God spoke again from His word. This time it came with commands and a promise- II Corinthians 6:17 “Come out from among them and be ye separate saith the Lord and Isiah 43:18-19. “Do not remember the former things. Nor consider the former things of old. Behold I will do a new thing. Now it shall spring forth, shall you not know it?”
In 1998, the year of jubilee – the new thing – Open Door Believers Chapel was raised up by the Lord. It was 40 years after I heard and responded to my first call. It has been a patient, sometimes painful but precious journey; a journey I will always treasure, for now I knew without the shadow of a doubt – This was the work I was born for.