Elisabeth Elliot: "The eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth." And she thought, "Lord, You can see all these mountains. You know every single stone and leaf that's on those mountains, and You know exactly where my contact lens is. But I'll never see it again."

Lisa Barry: Have you ever lost something that was very dear to you? Have you ever prayed for divine intervention to help you find it? Well, such is the case for a woman you're about to meet. The stories Elisabeth Elliot will be telling today are all true stories, sent in by listeners of Gateway To Joy. More than likely as you listen, it will prick your memory of a time when God came through in your hour of need.

But more than anything, I hope today's program serves as a reminder that God is alive and active in the lives of His children. So whether you're facing a perilous situation right now or you just need to be gently reminded of God's care and love for you, I think you'll find all of those things as you listen today. So let's get started with this Friday edition of Gateway To Joy. 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, concluding a week of stories which I hope were listened to not only by the children who love stories, but also by people at least as old as I am. I love these stories myself and have loved them ever since I was a child. I also love true stories, so I'm going to be telling you some true stories today.

The first one was sent to me in a letter by a woman named Brenda Foltz. Brenda was a young woman. She wanted to learn to go rock climbing. So although she was scared to death, she went with a group and they faced this tremendous cliff of rock, practically perpendicular. In spite of her fear, she put on the gear and she took a hold of the rope and she started up the face of that rock.

Well, she got to a ledge where she could take a breather. As she was sitting there or hanging on there, whatever she was doing, whoever was holding the rope up at the top of the cliff made a mistake and snapped the rope. They pulled it too suddenly or jerked it in some way, so that the rope snapped against Brenda's eye and knocked out her contact lens.

You know how tiny contact lenses are and how almost impossible they are to find. Well, here she is on a rock ledge, with who knows how many hundreds of feet behind and hundreds of feet above her. Of course, she looked and looked and looked, hoping that she would be able to find that contact lens. Here she was, very far from home. Her sight was now blurry. She was very upset by the fact that she wouldn't be anywhere near a place where she could get a new contact lens. And she prayed that the Lord would help her to find it. She couldn't find it.

Well, her last hope was that perhaps when she got to the top of the cliff, one of the girls that was up there on the top might be able to find her contact lens in the corner of her eye, because apparently that can happen. A contact lens can slide around into the corner of an eye so that the person who is wearing it can't really find it easily.

So when she got to the top, a friend examined her eye. There was no contact lens to be found. So she sat down with the rest of the party, waiting for the rest of them to come up the face of the cliff. She looked out across range after range of mountains, thinking of that Bible verse that says, "The eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth." She thought, "Lord, You can see all these mountains. You know every single stone and leaf that's on those mountains and You know exactly where my contact lens is. But I'll never see it again."

Finally, the time came when it was time to go down. So they walked down the trail to the bottom. Just as they got there, there was a new party of rock climbers coming along. As one of them started up the face of the cliff, she shouted out, "Hey, you guys! Anybody lose a contact lens?"

Well, that would be startling enough, wouldn't it? She had found the contact lens. But you know why she saw it? An ant was carrying that contact lens so that it was moving slowly across the face of the rock.

What does that tell you about the God of the universe? Is He in charge of the tiniest things? Do ants matter to Him? Of course they do. He made them. He designed them. Brenda told me that her father is a cartoonist. So when she told him this incredible story, he drew a picture of that ant lugging that contact lens. As you see in the comics, there's a balloon with words in it over the person's head. Over this ant's head were these words, "Lord, I don't know why You want me to carry this thing. I can't eat it and it's awfully heavy. But if this is what You want me to do, I'll carry it for You." That is a true story. God is in charge of the ants. Don't you think He cares about you and me?

Then I received another letter from a Gateway To Joy listener telling me this story, which she said was her grandmother's experience.

One night her grandfather became very ill and had run out of medicine. Her grandmother could not drive a car. She had never learned to drive a car. She told her husband that she would walk to the drugstore to get the medicine. He did not want her to do this, because it was late at night. It was only a few blocks, but he did not want his wife having to walk those few blocks alone. So he told her to call the drugstore and see if there was someone there who could deliver the medicine. She called. There was no one there. There was just one person there and he said, "I'm sorry, but I can't leave the shop. There isn't anyone else here."

So she and her husband prayed together for protection and she started out the door. What should she find on the front porch but a large German shepherd dog? He turned and looked at her and then trotted down the steps and walked with her to the drugstore. She went in to get the medicine. She came out and there sat the dog. He trotted home with her and disappeared.

He was not wearing a collar. Nobody in that town had ever seen that dog before, nor was he ever seen again. Do you think the dog was an angel in disguise? He could have been. Or maybe there was an invisible angel who chose a dog from perhaps far away and brought that dog and put him right there on that porch and told him what to do. Isn't it amazing to hear these stories of what God can do?

Then we heard a story from our friend Christie Wilson. There were two Christian men who were smuggling Bibles into one of those countries over there in somewhere near India, I believe, or near Russia. I'm not sure exactly where it was. But it was one of those countries where it is forbidden to bring Bibles in.

These men had the whole trunk of the car filled with Bibles and they were traveling in a very remote area. Suddenly, the steering wheel froze. They couldn't budge it. Well, you can't drive a car if you can't move the steering wheel. They sat there, bewildered. They prayed. They got out of the car. They walked around. There wasn't a living soul around. Certainly no place where they could go for repairs. No telephone to call a garage. What to do? Even if they had been able to repair the thing themselves, there was no place to buy parts. This was a real dilemma, wasn't it?

Well, they prayed. Suddenly a man appeared, just seemingly from nowhere and said, "Did you bring the Bibles?" They were astonished. They said, "What do you mean?" "Well," he said, "Jesus came to our village yesterday and He told us to send a man here to this road because there would be Bibles for us to buy. May we have them?" Of course, the men gave them the Bibles.

They got back into the car and guess what? Nothing wrong with the steering wheel. Not a thing wrong with it. So on they went on their way.

My father had an angel story. When he was just a young boy, he and a buddy were doing what young boys often do-climbing around in a dangerous place. It was a partially finished house that was being built. My father walked out onto the end of a plank which he thought was nailed on the other end. It wasn't. As he was standing on the end of the plank, it gradually began to go down in such a way that there was absolutely no way that it could go back up.

But it went back up. His friend was nowhere near it. My father said it could only have been the hand of an angel. We don't think enough about angels, do we? The Bible is full of angel stories. I love those stories.

My brother heard a story about a prisoner in Asia who was in a miserable cell. He had only one thin blanket. He had hardly anything to eat. He was taken out of his cell one day to be interrogated and whipped and flogged. He was flogged to such a point where he just felt that he was going to die. The only comfort that he had in the world was that one thin blanket on the stone floor of his prison cell.

He was taken back to his prison cell. To his dismay, someone was wrapped up in that blanket. He sat down and began to sob. It was his only comfort. His back was bleeding from the beatings. He was starving. He was cold. But a voice came from inside the blanket and said, "Have you forgotten My promise? I will never leave you nor forsake you." Was Jesus in the blanket? But of course the man didn't see Him. He got into the blanket and wrapped himself up.

The Lord Jesus said, "Lo, I am with you all the days." Will you trust Him?

Lisa Barry: Well, as we close for today, I want to give you a quick recap of the resources we have available this week for you to purchase. The first is this one-week tape series called STORIES FOR YOUNG AND OLD. For those of you looking for a daily dose of encouragement and challenge, I would recommend the devotional book, JOY AND STRENGTH.

For information on either of these resources, you can call us at this toll-free number: 1-800-759-4JOY. That's 1-800-759-4569. Or you can write to us at Gateway To Joy, Box 82500, Lincoln, Nebraska, 68501. Our Internet ministry address is gatewaytojoy.org. Gateway To Joy has been a production of Back to the Bible.

Monday Elisabeth begins a brand-new series that will prepare our thoughts for Good Friday and Easter, so make it a point to join us then for another Gateway To Joy.