Full-Time Training - Testimonies

Making My Joy Full, Joanna Betz

As one who was raised in a strong Christian home, I am extremely grateful to the Lord for my heritage and His preserving my heart to love Him in my years of growing up. My parents, also having been raised in Christian homes, came in contact with the ministry of Watchman Nee and Witness Lee at the time of their marriage. Nee and Lee's ministry provided a powerful impetus for their Christian lives, and hence a major influence on my own life. After my salvation as a child and consecration to the Lord as a young teenager, I attended a university in Virginia where I majored in violin performance and music history and literature, with a view to attend the Full-Time Training in Anaheim.

Prior to coming to the Training I saw something of the Lord's purpose, loved Him a great deal, and enjoyed meeting together with other believers. Once in the Training, I began to see more. Beyond the many wonderful Biblical truths and spiritual principles I have learned in the Training, a sensitivity has been cultivated in me. I have been indelibly impressed with the Lord's need for people in His plan and His care for humanity. Furthermore, because of His great care for man, He Himself became a man (John 1:1, 14). Having seen God's intense need and love for man, I am seeing that I need to care for others with the care which the Lord has for them (John 10:11; 21:15-17).

I am appreciating this increasing care for humanity in several venues, most notably, on the campus of a nearby university. Four days a week I and my fellow trainees go to the campus for two hours to preach the gospel and hold informal Bible studies with students. There, as I gaze out into the crowds of young students of many backgrounds swarming around me, I wonder about what each one is like. What do they think about, how do they perceive things, what are their values? What characterized their up-bringings, which formed so much of who they are? Moreover, how many of them realize that they were created in the image and likeness of God (Genesis 1:26) and have an awareness of the void within them, which nothing but God can satisfy (Ecclesiastes 3:11) As I go out to preach the gospel of the kingdom (Matthew 24:14) to them, my heart yearns that each one would come to know the Lord Jesus in a personal way and would be brought fully into God's eternal plan. I endeavor to aim my speaking at that part of them that cries out for God and, by doing so, touch the deepest part of their being so that they would come to repentance and full salvation (Acts 26:18). Reading the Bible and sharing so many aspects of my rich Christ with seeking young Christians has proven to be one of my greatest joys (Ephesians 3:8). (Well has the Lord Jesus spoken of bearing spiritual fruit: “These things I have spoken to you that My joy may be in you and that your joy may be made full” [John 15:11]).

My time in the Full-Time Training has not only fostered my personal relationship with the Lord, but it has also nurtured my awareness of and care for others. In fact, as I come prayerfully to the Lord daily in reading the Bible, I see more of the Lord in His care for people. It is with this care that I intend to serve the Lord for the rest of my life.

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