Editor’s note: Columns in the Faith section reflect opinions and perspectives of the writer and are not necessarily those of The Republic.
In 1992, I was accepted by Focus On The Family to take part in a graduate counseling program. This program existed for five years and had a total of 275 people to go through it.
This is the backstory of my involvement:
March 27, 1992 — Before I began my morning devotions, I read an ad in a Christian magazine that was informing its readers about a graduate program being offered by the ministry at its then-new campus in Colorado Springs, Colorado.
After reading the ad, I believed the Holy Spirit was impressing upon me that I would be taking part in this. In prayer, these were the words that came out of my mouth as I said back to the Spirit, “I can’t do this (because):
1. I will get homesick and miss the green carpet that runs throughout my house.
2. I will miss my family too much (my daughters were 7 and 9 at the time).
3. I don’t have the money. The Spirit then impressed upon me that I would be going and I would be just fine.
March 28, 1992 — While cleaning in my garage the next day, I believed the Spirit revealed to me that I would be paying for the class by collecting pennies. This meant I would have to collect 102,500 pennies by July 6.
April 1, 1992 — At this point, it was clear that I was going to go, so I opened a savings account at Centra Credit Union with the 608 pennies I had in my piggy Focus On the Family bank. My plan from then on was to go each Monday to Centra and deposit all the pennies I had collected the week before. I would be able to keep a running total.
When people all over Columbus heard what I was doing, they started saving their pennies for me. Even if I didn’t know them, when they saw me out anywhere, they would reach into their pants pockets and purses and give me all the pennies they had on them without me saying a word to them.
There were some people who gave large amounts of pennies. Some brought them to my house. Others I picked up at their house.
Here are some of their stories:
One single woman told me that 20 years earlier the Holy Spirit had impressed her to start saving pennies and that she had no idea why she was to do this. She then said now she believed I was the reason. So, she gave me her 20 years of pennies which totaled 5,335.
15 years earlier, a couple started saving pennies and put them into a special account at their bank. They wanted me to have them. The total was 3,352.
A husband and wife teacher duo at St. Peter’s Lutheran School had two gallons of pennies they had been collecting for years just sitting on the floor in her closet. The total was 2,936.
A woman found a bucket of pennies in her basement that her grandmother had collected. There were several wheat pennies mixed in so I gave these back to them. The total was 2,619.
July 3, 1992 — I closed my “pennies” savings account with an ending amount of 54,347. I was given a bank draft to cover this amount.
July 4, 1992 — Some people dropped off 3,923 pennies by my house. One of these was a woman who told me she was giving me her son’s piggy bank. He had told her he wanted me to have it. Wow, this hit me right in the heart.
July 5, 1992 — My Sunday School class had taken up a collection of pennies and gave them to me in class that morning. The amount was 2,138. I announced to them that day that I would be taking every one of their pennies on the plane that afternoon when I flew to the ministry.
By this time, I now had collected 60,408 pennies, which meant I was still short 42,092. But God had impressed upon me that I would have the full amount of money for my class. He had encouraged me all the way along that this would happen. I didn’t know “how” he was going to provide it. All I knew was that I was going to trust him to.
Later that afternoon, I left for the Indianapolis airport. While I was waiting for my flight, which was already two hours late, I just sat and watched people.
All of a sudden something caught the corner of my left eye. When I looked to see what it was, I saw three college-aged guys standing over by a big cement pole. One of them stooped down to pick something up. I noticed it just happened to be a penny.
I thought to myself, “I sure would like to have that penny,” so I walked over to the three guys, told them my story and without any of them saying a word, the one still holding the penny gave it to me.
I just know those guys thought I was some crazy woman, but I didn’t care. After all, I was one penny closer to my goal of 102,500. I now was bringing a total of 60,409 pennies with me to Focus on the Family, part pennies and part bank draft.
July 6, 1992 — After breakfast at the hotel, I went up a few floors to register for the class. There were a total of 72 registering and we were all flowing through three lines.
As I waited my turn, I looked kind of funny standing there holding 13 pounds of rolled up pennies in a clear plastic bag. Everyone wanted to know what the story was on them so I told them. For some reason they seemed astonished.
Then, it was my turn to register. I set the pennies and bank draft down on the table.
Later, I found out the names of the two women registering me were Barbara and Laura. I told them a brief story on the pennies. Part of what I told them was that God had given me the responsibility to be obedient to him. Then I reminded them about Moses and that he didn’t get to go into the Promised Land because he disobeyed.
Finally, I told the two that this was the first time in my life that I’d ever written a check that I didn’t have one penny in the bank to cover it. Then, I wrote out a check for $420.91.
Barbara, said to me, “You’ve done the right thing. You’ve been obedient.” I handed her the check, turned around and walked off in peace knowing I had been faithful to God in all He had asked me to do. I had no regrets about anything I had done.
July 9, 1992 — That evening I was in my hotel room waiting to go to supper when I remembered that Laura, three days earlier, had given me a note. I had forgotten to read it. I pulled it out of my Bible and read, “Nita, someone provided the funds for your class balance, so I’m returning your check.” Also, included was a receipt that read, “balance paid in full” and the check for $420.91 that I had written at registration. It had the word “void” written across the front in large letters.
I was overwhelmed and broke down and wept out loud. Only the God I love, serve and follow who lives inside of me through His Holy Spirit could have pulled this off. He again, as always before, had been faithful to me.
July 24, 1992 — Graduation. My diploma reads, “Focus On The Family and Azusa Pacific University, School of Theology.” It remains on my office wall at Confidential Christian Counseling to this day.
Nita Evans of Columbus is host of “The Chat” Saturdays on WYGS Radio, owner of Confidential Christian Counseling, a national conference speaker, and Columbus Police Department chaplain. She can be reached at her website at specialspeaker.com. Send comments to editorial@therepublic.com.
