Elisabeth Elliot: "You are loved with an everlasting love." That's what the Bible says. "And underneath are the everlasting arms." This is your friend Elisabeth Elliot, talking with you today about...

Lisa Barry: The words I'm sure you recognize but the tune you might not. That's because this theme song was the very first one we ever used for Gateway To Joy. Why is that significant? Well, it's because this month, we're celebrating our 10th anniversary on the air. And we've got a lot of great things planned for you during these next few weeks. You could call it "The Best of Gateway To Joy" because we'll be sharing highlights from a variety of topics from the last 10 years.

Do you have a favorite program or topic? Well, chances are you'll hear it during this month of anniversary specials. We thought it would be fitting to start off this special occasion with a little background on how Gateway To Joy got started and what a typical day is like around Elisabeth Elliot's home. So with that introduction, let's get started with day one in this 10th anniversary special. Here's Elisabeth.

Elisabeth Elliot: "You are loved with an everlasting love." That's what the Bible says. "And underneath are the everlasting arms." This is your friend Elisabeth Elliot, and I'm going to be talking to you very informally during this week. I'm very aware of the fact that the material that I've been giving you over the past few weeks has been pretty heavy stuff. Some of you may feel, "Oh, I don't think I can take any more of that. I just have to start putting some of it into practice and thinking over it. She gives me too much. I've got spiritual indigestion."

So that by way of introduction, for those of you who may be tuning in for the first time today, and you may think, "Goodness! What a fluff-brain Elisabeth Elliot must be, if this is all the kind of stuff she gives!" But I've got so many good friends out there-people who introduce themselves to me at meetings and places where our paths cross and they tell them that they listen to me every day. So many of you have said, "I sit down in my kitchen with a cup of coffee and Elisabeth Elliot every day." That really touches me, and I do want to say thank you for that. I'm glad that you feel as though I'm sitting across the table with you. It would be lovely if I could do that with each one of you.

But I thought, "These good friends-these faithful listeners who earnestly take notes sometimes and listen with both ears and pray for me and put the things that I say into practice-maybe you'd just like to hear a little bit about what a day in the life of Elisabeth Elliot Gren and her husband, Lars, is like on Strawberry Cove in Magnolia." We live in this little tiny lobster town called Magnolia in Massachusetts. Our street is just a little cul-de-sac called Strawberry Cove.

I do want to say hello especially to those 46 people that came with Melanie Smith to Victoria. I just couldn't get over that. Melanie Smith is a woman who made 50 phone calls when she heard I was going to be speaking in Victoria, B.C. Out of those 50 phone calls, she managed to get 46 people to come with her. Thanks, too, to you people in Baltimore and Tidewater, Virginia and Lancaster-those are places from which I get a lot of mail, and I thank you. All letter writers and those of you who contribute to the financial needs of the program, we just want to say thank you.

I want to tell you how Gateway To Joy started, just very briefly. It was because of a young woman named Jan Anderson. Her name was Jan Anderson back then. Jan had followed me around and read my books and introduced herself to me at Urbana, Illinois one time. Then she wrote me letters. She ended up going to Ecuador, working with radio station HCJB in Quito for a couple of years. Then she worked on the borders of Texas doing Spanish programs, also under the auspices of HCJB.

But when she came one time to a conference in Georgia, she just made up her mind at the end of that that she was going to make sure that this woman, who had been the speaker at the conference, Elisabeth Elliot, was going to go on the radio. Although other people had from time to time suggested such a thing, nobody had ever actually done anything about it.

So Jan Anderson went out on a limb, walked into the offices of Back to the Bible Broadcast in Lincoln, Nebraska, and suggested to them that they might do a women's program. They said they were interested in a women's program, but everything would depend on who the speaker was. When she mentioned my name, they decided that they would be interested in exploring that possibility. So the program began.

The references to the Scriptures that I start with, "You are loved with an everlasting love," that's from Jeremiah 31:3. "And underneath are the everlasting arms" is from Deuteronomy 33:27.

So I thought I'd just give you a little glimpse of what a day is like. I have literally put down what was happening on the day that I prepared this program. This morning, for example, my husband Lars was in Florida. I got up, weighed myself as I always do, drank my three glasses of water, had my quiet time, read prayer letters from my friend Mardelle Brown in Texas and my friend Kathy Whit in Cambridge, England and prayed for them.

My reading this morning--and when I say this morning, of course I'm speaking of the day on which I prepared the program--was in the Book of Ruth. One verse in there jumped out at me. It was one of my mother's favorite verses and one that she often quoted to me and one that I often need. It says, "Sit still, my daughter, until thou see how the matter will fall." I particularly needed that word, "sit still," this morning, because I was perplexed about a certain person that I felt as though I needed to talk to. It was a difficult subject and I didn't know when or how or whether I should talk to her. This, I felt, was God's answer. "Sit still until thou see how the matter will fall."

Then I also read Psalm 74, in which the psalmist says, "Why?" and "How long?" "But You, O God, it was You." I liked that sequence. The ordinary human question, "Why?" and another human question, "How long?" and then, "But You, O God, it was You."

Well, I got dressed. I listen to the news while I get dressed. Then I made my bed, emptied the trash, carried the laundry basket downstairs, talked to Jung. Jung is a Korean student who lives in our house. He is a seminary student. Ate my breakfast. Read some of the poem by Longfellow, "Evangeline." Copied notes on "the fear of the Lord" into 3x5 files. Then Lars called and told me that I had to make sure to call the church and let them know that he was not going to be there for a certain coffee time when he had signed up to wash the dishes, and he wasn't going to be able to make it then.

Then I looked over my Christmas list. I prepared last Friday's Gateway To Joy program. I wrote out a schedule for Linda, who is the coordinator of the Gateway To Joy program. I wrote a blurb for my friend Linda McGinn's RESOURCE GUIDE FOR WOMEN'S MINISTRIES, and that's a book that I strongly want to recommend to you, published by Broadman Press. Linda McGinn. The book is RESOURCE GUIDE FOR WOMEN'S MINISTRIES. It's an excellent handbook. She wanted me to read the book and possibly write a blurb, which I did.

Then the mail came, so that took a chunk of time to read and to answer. Then one of the most delightful things that I ever do is to eat a solitary lunch in my study. When it's cold downstairs, I carry my lunch to my study. I sit there with my sandwich and my tea and I read. So of course, I was reading "Evangeline" again.

Then it's time for a two-mile walk, which includes going to the post office and the bank and the convenience store to Xerox some things. More dictation. I thought I'd just give you a little sampler from the mail. What kind of mail did I get today?

Well, a letter from Val. It was her first try on their new word processor. Somebody had given them a gift that was designated for their home education. She is homeschooling four of her six children, and so they were thrilled to be able to buy a word processor. This was her first try on that. She told me that for Sunday dinner they had had six guests. She served Chicken Brazilia, which I haven't any idea about; tabouli, which I love; stir-fried bok choy. Sounds like a pretty exotic meal, doesn't it? Rice. Hollandaise sauce and rye bread. Her son Walter, who is thirteen, pronounced it "an awesome meal." Dessert, she said, was cheesecake.

Then I had a letter from a woman who had had a hysterectomy, the final assurance that she would never have any children, a huge disappointment. Then she learned that the family is to go to a foreign country instead of to a state. I want to read a part of her letter.

"In spite of hard times and even because of them, there have been periods when I have felt that God has poured out precious jewels all around me, as He has given me assurances of His love, presence, ability to change my heart's attitudes, and intervention in the circumstances I'm in. I keep picturing myself as the little mother bird, sitting quietly on her nest, which is built into the old bare branches of a tree, sitting firmly in the cleft of a rock on a small island surrounded by a rough river. When the wind kicks in, a few drops of water come into her nest, but she is not worried because her nest is firmly secured in a tree that has held her for years. Even as the painting is called 'Peace,' I imagine myself as firmly placed in Christ; and that in spite of rather turbulent circumstances at times, I too can experience peace and calm. I hope my life will be one of consistency and that others will be motivated to follow the Lord closer because of me."

Lisa Barry: As you can tell from this closing letter, your words have a way of speaking to Elisabeth as well. But even if you've never sent a letter, your faithfulness to tune in each day, to Gateway To Joy is what has kept us going strong for these 10 years. Some of you have been listening since day one. And others of you, only one day. No matter if you're an old friend or a new one, we're thankful that you're tuning in.

Why not take send a note or call this radio station and thank them for carrying Gateway To Joy? We'd also like to hear from you! We're gathering stories from listeners like you about how Gateway To Joy has changed their lives. So if you have a story you'd like to share on how Gateway To Joy has inspired you, why not write? Address the envelope "My Gateway To Joy Story."

And send it in care of Gateway To Joy, Box 82500, Lincoln, Nebraska, 68501. Be sure and include your name and address so we can get back to you.

If you'd like a copy of the tape series that today's program originally came from, just ask for the tape entitled LIFE AT STRAWBERRY COVE. The cost is $7.00. You can mail that to the same address, which is Gateway To Joy, Box 82500, Lincoln, Nebraska, 68501. Today's program has been a production of Back to the Bible.

We've got a lot more celebrating to do tomorrow, so make it a point to join us then when Elisabeth talks about the gift of femininity. See you then.