It's only been a few weeks since our Missions Pastor, Gary Lawton, announced his departure from Maranatha to lead Calvary Chapel Santee. However, it was in God’s plan long before that day. The story of His confirmation in leading Gary and his wife, Meef, to Santee is a beautiful example of servant lives obedient to His providence, His guidance and His voice.
About a year ago at a Missions Ministry Meeting, Gary shared his vision for the group from Acts 13.
In the church at Antioch there were prophets and teachers: Barnabas, Simeon called Niger, Lucius of Cyrene, Manaen (who had been brought up with Herod the tetrarch) and Saul. While they were worshiping the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, "Set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them." So after they had fasted and prayed, they placed their hands on them and sent them off. Acts 13:1-3
The church at Antioch ministered to and waited upon the Holy Spirit for guidance in sending out those He called from the body and to the place He had chosen. They prayed over and sent out their leaders. A year ago, no one realized that we were re-enacting that very thing.
“The whole thing started with the tragic death of their pastor,” said Gary as he began to recount the story that led him to be a senior pastor again. “I had been filling in occasionally for Ron Hubbard in Ramona and he was connected to the church in Santee. He talked with Ray and we swapped emails about how things were going and he asked if I would be willing to fill in sometimes until they were able to get back on their feet. At that point, I was already wondering if there was something more to this than a sad situation, but was afraid,” shared Gary. “I was so blessed at Maranatha. Serving with Ray was wonderful and I was enjoying my life. I was not looking to go and do anything else; I had enough on my plate,” he said.
“Meef and I have a history with the East County. Our first home was in Santee in the late ‘70’s. I was serving at Calvary Chapel El Cajon with Ray and we had a big Bible study going on in Santee. There wasn’t a Calvary Chapel there in those days and we prayed about starting a church in Santee,” he continued, “but, we sensed that the Lord had something else for us and shortly thereafter a door opened in New Jersey and that was our exit from California in 1984.”
“When Rob at Calvary Chapel Ramona asked if we would pray about going to Santee, my list for staying at Maranatha was very long and my list for going anywhere else was very short,” Gary said. “I agreed to fill in at Santee but only to be viewed as a helper from Maranatha, not a prospect for their new pastor.”
Jesus asks Peterthree times if he loves Him and the Lord says ‘tend my sheep, love my sheep, feed my sheep’ and that was a sword in my heart.
“I think I filled in about three times in a 3-4 month period,” Gary said, “and I was warming up to the idea. I had a formal interview with the Santee Board members and after that, I left for Africa. During the time I was away, Rob encouraged the Board to pray, ask for scripture and come to a consensus. I received the formal invitation by email in Africa.”
“One day I’d read a verse that said don’t go,” he shared, “and the next day it would say go; I was schizophrenic, really. So, I emailed my wife and said that I was going to be out of communication for about six days, and asked her to seek the Lord and get scripture from Him. I sent the email and prayed, ‘Lord, this is so huge, I really need you to give her the same verse or verses that you give me. I really need it to be something so specific that I will have no regrets if we go and it doesn’t work perfectly.’”
“I have to admit, I wish I was more spiritual,” Gary confessed, “you’d think at this point, I’d just say this is the Lord’s will and just go; but, it wasn’t that way at all. I returned from my missions trip and at breakfast with my wife the next morning, I shared what the Lord gave me.”
Gary relayed his account, “He gave me John 21 which is the story of Jesus renewing His call on the disciples after His Resurrection. He took them back to the beginning where He found them as fisherman and called them away from their nets. He was renewing the call to be His apostles. Although they had kind of gone backwards, He hadn’t changed His mind. Go back to the beginning; Santee is where it began for us. His call was for me to be a senior pastor,” said Gary as he started connecting the dots.
“Later in the chapter, Jesus asks Peter three times if he loves Him and the Lord says ‘tend my sheep, love my sheep, feed my sheep’ and that was a sword in my heart. That’s what I am. That’s what He’s made me to be,” said Gary. “The verse at the end says when you were young you got to go where you wanted, and now that you’re old, you go where you don’t want,” Gary explained, “and it wasn’t so much a matter of God making me go somewhere I didn’t want to go, but rather when you’re older you shouldn’t have any arguments about where God wants you to go. His track record is so awesome that if He says we’re going here, I shouldn’t question it.”
“The other verse He gave me was Jeremiah 29,” he continued, “where the people of God were receiving a letter from Jeremiah and they misunderstood their circumstances; God wasn’t sending them to Babylon so much for their discipline as for their ultimate benefit. God had done good things for them and they misunderstood God’s plan and purpose for them, culminating with verse 29:11:
For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”
Gary then shared his wife’s story which began with a visit to a little Nazarene church with her mother. Meef was wrestling with her role. She was a nurse and had recently been laid off. He said “She always prayed, ‘Lord if You are done with me being a nurse, You need to close the door for me - I can’t quit. I need you to make the choice for me.’ It was really an amazing thing; she got laid off in a fluke, the day I emailed her! She understood that as a call to return to minister to women, although she was resisting it.”
“At the church that morning,” he went on, “a little missionary man from Africa gave a 12-minute devotion during which Meef said she couldn’t write quick enough and could hardly keep her composure. The message was that God has a plan and we need to step into what He has for us, and not be stiff necked and resist it. She went home and wrote in her journal. At the bottom of the page was Jeremiah 29:11. That was the verse the Lord gave her.” Gary paused for a moment, his eyes watered a bit and he said, “She showed me her journal and there it was, circled at the bottom of the page. My jaw hit the table. We looked at each other and knew that it was the Lord.”
“I’ve always felt that the Lord told me we were going to have three seasons in life, like Moses had three seasons. He had a season in Egypt, a season on the backside of the desert and a season as the deliverer out of Egypt. I knew the Lord had one more season for us, still,” Gary shared, “I was content to stay at Maranatha until the Lord comes back, but if there was one more thing, then I was not going to resist. Once I admitted that I thought this was it, she agreed. We felt very comfortable with God’s assurance and guidance to us individually and collectively that this was of Him.”
But the story didn’t end there. The night that Gary was on his way to a Board Meeting in Santee to officially accept the position, he said that he was in great turmoil, “…the closer I got, the more uncomfortable I got and I started complaining. I was praying but it was more like complaining,” he said, “‘Lord, shouldn’t I have peace?’ I was really unsettled and I looked over to the right and there on a marquee outside a little Baptist church was Jeremiah 29:11. I had to pull over and compose myself. Then I continued on and said yes and amen.”
Four weeks ago Gary was introduced to the body at Calvary Chapel in Santee as their pastor. I asked if God had given him a vision for the body there. “I really want to stay in step with Ray,” he said, “we’ve been partners since 1980 and I like what God has done at Maranatha and in a lot of respects, I want to continue it in Santee. I feel a real kinship with the vision here,” Gary said, “and I want to go on missions trips with Maranatha. Just this morning I was discussing the design for a missions/outreach page for the website.”
He continued, “We have three missionaries and I just spoke with a guy who has received an invitation to be a youth pastor in England. I shared with him about our trips to Ireland and some other things we’d done in the UK. There’s also a guy going to Australia that just took over Calvary Chapel Sydney, so he’ll be in Daniel and Amelia’s (Maranatha missionaries) backyard.” Continuing to connect the dots of history, Gary shared that this new pastor of CC Sydney is the son of a man who attended CC El Cajon when Gary and Ray were there.
Meef’s first step back into women’s ministry will begin in a couple of weeks with a short women’s Bible study in a book by Cynthia Heald. Her plan is to emphasize it as an opportunity to get to know the women better and tell them her story. There have already been sign ups. “It’s been 8-9 years since she’s taught consistently like that,” Gary commented, “She’s fully engaged and it’s neat to see her excited about that again.”
“And the men that God has put around me are just outstanding guys,” said Gary. “One of them told me ‘we don’t want to hang on your arms, we want to lift your arms up.’ They are really humble. They want what God wants MORE than they want to be in a leadership position and that’s been displayed in really unconscious ways, too.” Gary paused for a moment and then continued, “This could be a really difficult transition; they loved their pastor. I’ve learned to show up, teach the word, be faithful and trust God for the results,” he finished. And there is Gary’s hallmark: From his story comes a gem, a nugget of truth that cuts to the heart and stays with you.
“We have about 100 people in the congregation and three men on the Board of Elders. We rely totally on volunteers, so when I come back to this ‘little city’ at Maranatha, yes, it’s different,” granted Gary, “There’s a good mix of people in the church at Santee. I’ve met people who are pretty influential and there are people who are auto mechanics and that’s the world I come from. I grew up in El Cajon, so it’s like putting on a shoe that fits. It doesn’t chafe at all. I sense God’s peace and I’m having a good time. It’s fun. I feel very comfortable. It’s different, but it’s not foreign. It’s good. It feels like it fits.”
See the welcome message for Gary at www.ccsantee.com
