P.O. Box 53055    
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CONNIE: Have you ever wished for a crystal ball that would let you gaze into the future? Or would you rather not know what’s coming? Join us today as we look forward to a new year with our hand in the hand of God. Giving God’s trumpet a Certain Sound for more than 70 years, this is the Voice of Prophecy.

CONNIE: Hello, I’m Connie Jeffery,

LONNIE: and I’m Lonnie Melashenko.

CONNIE: Lonnie, I remember that at the beginning of this year, we called it the year “aught 2” for 02, and talked about it as a year when we “ought to” do certain things. Have we accomplished everything we ought to have?

LONNIE: A very good question. I’m not one to write down a list of resolutions for the year, so I don’t have a list to go back and look over, but I must say it has been a very busy, very productive year with God’s blessing.

CONNIE: Voice of Prophecy has had a very strong emphasis on soul winning through evangelism this year, hasn’t it?

LONNIE: We sure have. We’ve been involved in major evangelistic outreaches in the Cayman Islands and right here in Los Angeles, and we’ve spent a lot of our time laying plans for even greater outreaches in the year to come.

CONNIE: Our new executive director for the ministry, Benny Moore is very involved—and very enthusiastic about—evangelism, isn’t he?

LONNIE: I think our listeners should have a chance to hear him talk about evangelism, and decide for themselves. So I invited him into the studio recently, to talk about some of our plans for the future.

CONNIE: Let’s listen to that little discussion right now.

LONNIE: Lonnie and Benny talk about evangelistic plans for 2003.

CONNIE: Wow! Lonnie, it sounds like 2003 is going to be a very busy year for you!

LONNIE: Not only busy, but very exciting. Voice of Prophecy has always had a strong emphasis on evangelism. Our founder, H. M. S. Richards, first went on radio in 1929 in order to expand the reach of the evangelistic meetings he was holding in the Los Angeles area.

CONNIE: And of course, his son Harold, who took over as director-speaker when his father retired, loved doing evangelism.

LONNIE: I think it was his favorite part of the ministry—and he was very good at it. He loved giving a call and seeing people respond, turning their lives over to Jesus. But my own ministry, since I became director-speaker in 1992, has focused more on pastoral aspects of ministry I suppose. It’s only in the past couple of years that I’ve been able to move more into the evangelistic field. And I’ve been loving it. And it’s been a tremendous blessing to me as well.

CONNIE: And we’ve certainly seen God blessing in our efforts.

LONNIE: I believe it’s time for the gospel to go out to the whole world—in preparation for Jesus’ soon return.

CONNIE: Amen! That’s a hope that’s echoed in our first song today, “It May Be at Morn,” sung by The King’s Men.

CONNIE: The second coming of Jesus is the Christian’s hope, whether it happens in the morning, evening, or whenever.

LONNIE: We’ll just be glad to see it! And you know, Connie, we’re living in uncertain times, so it’s good to be able to point people to the sure words of the Bible—particularly the prophetic portions—as we look to the future.

CONNIE: Almost everyone within the reach of our radio voice will have the opportunity to participate in the evangelistic outreach coming up in April—via Satellite. You can access information about the meetings and local downlink sites through our web page at vop.com.

LONNIE: In the meantime, if you’d like to understand the Bible’s great prophecies better, I’d encourage you to enroll in the Focus on Prophecy Bible course. It’s absolutely free, and you can enroll just by calling our toll-free number, 1-800-872-0055.

CONNIE: Be sure to ask for the Focus on Prophecy correspondence Bible course. We’ll give the phone number and mailing address again after Lonnie’s New Year’s message, “Safe in the Hands of God.”

Safe in the Hands of God

It was Christmas Day. Monday, December 25, 1939. A young man—a Canadian citizen—sat alone in his room in near _______, Saskatchewan Pondering what the future might hold.

Many of his friends had already received their notice from the government: Report for duty. You’ve been conscripted into the Canadian armed forces. There’s a war going on, and the king needs your services. Joseph couldn’t help wondering how long it would be before his letter would come.

It seemed certain that his peaceful life on the family farm was about to end, and he had no idea where he might be the following Christmas—or even if he would be alive. Heavy, foreboding thoughts troubled his mind.

Christmas, 1939. Many people were calling the recently-started war in Europe “the phony war.” Three months earlier Adolf Hitler’s vaunted lightning war—“Blitzkrieg”—had made mincemeat of Poland, but now people were referring to his strategy as “Sitzkrieg,” not “Blitzkrieg.” Although France and England had declared war on Germany, few shots had been hired—on land anyhow.

But the news that burdened young Joseph’s mind concerned troop movements and naval operations.

Just two days ago the first shipload of Canadian troops had landed in England to help defend the island from German attack—and no doubt to participate in an offensive on the continent. Those troops were lucky to have made it. During the preceding 10 days and 9, other ships had been sunk by mines or bombers on their way to England. German U-boats, cruisers, battleships, and bombers were patrolling the sea lanes, trying to cut off any traffic between Europe and North America.

Joseph would be glad to serve his country in this troubled time. But still, what did the future hold? Would there even be a future for him?

Thoughts such as these circled like vultures his mind as the young man sat down on his bed and idly began to fool with the little cat-whisker radio set he had built himself.

The airwaves crackled and popped mainly with static, but somehow by perseverance he managed to find the BBC [CBC] signal. He sat for a while, listening to the news. And then it was announced that King George VI was about to give his Christmas address to the nation.

Joseph listened expectantly, wondering what the monarch would say. Wondering if somehow the king’s words would enlighten his own future—give him something to trust in and look forward too.

King George spoke for only nine minutes. From those nine minutes, history has preserved the last minute or so.

A minute’s worth of words that moved Joseph—my father—so deeply, that he still remembers them and can recite them for memory more than 60 years later.

The king said: “A new year is at hand. We cannot tell what it will bring. If it brings peace, how thankful we shall all be. If it brings us continued struggle we shall remain undaunted.

“In the meantime I feel that we may all find a message of encouragement in the lines which, in my closing words, I would like to say to you all.”

Then he spoke these timeless words from a poem by Minnie Louise Haskins:

And I said to the man who stood at the gate of the year:
"Give me a light, that I may tread safely into the unknown!"
And he replied:
"Go out into the darkness and put your hand into the Hand of God.
That shall be to you better than light and safer than a known way."

And yes, you guessed it. That was my father, Joe Melashenko, reciting those lines that had such a profound effect on him.

In those dark days at the beginning of World War II, millions of people took courage in the thought: “Put your hand into the Hand of God.” That will be better than having a light to show you exactly what is ahead of you.

Friend, as we look ahead to another new year, let me challenge you with a question: Is that still good advice?

We have no way to know for sure what the New Year will bring. Nations the world over have been rattling their sabers lately—and these aren’t mere steel swords. The saber rattling we hear these days includes nuclear weapons, biological weapons, and chemical weapons. Tools of destruction far more menacing than anything my dad had to worry about in 1939.

But have things really changed so much?

Should we think that the God who brought the world through its greatest armed conflict ever has lost His power today? Just because man’s power for self-destruction has multiplied in the past six decades, does that mean that God’s power has decreased? Of course not.

It goes without saying that young Joseph—my father—lived through World War II. If he hadn’t, I wouldn’t be here today, and neither would my four brothers. There never would have been a musical group called The Melashenko Family Singers. And you would be hearing a different voice as the speaker of the Voice of Prophecy radio broadcast.

Yes, Joe made it through the war.

But some of his friends did not.

British battle deaths exceeded 300,000 before the war was over. The Americans lost nearly as many. The Soviet Union’s military lost seven-and-one-half million. Total deaths resulting from the war are estimated to have exceeded 50 million!

What can we say about those who were not survivors? Should we assume that God did not care about them—or perhaps they did not put their hand in the hand of God, and that’s why their path was not “safer than a known way”?

No. Of course not.

Yes, we do hear stories about young men and women whose lives were miraculously spared—perhaps a bullet struck them in the chest, but the little pocket Bible their mother had given them absorbed its force.

But there were others who launched out onto beaches codenamed Omaha or Utah on June 6, 1944, clutching crucifixes or saying the Lord’s Prayer, only to be mowed down like the dry grass of autumn.

What can we say about them?

How will God answer our questions about these dear fathers, brothers, husbands, uncles, who didn’t come back from the war?

I confess. That’s not an easy question to answer. There is no pat answer that totally satisfies.

I have no word of assurance that I can broadcast today that says, “Everything’s going to be all right. No harm will come your way in the year that lies ahead.”

You know, our staff here at Voice of Prophecy in Southern California, and in our offices all around the world, meets every Thursday morning and reads through the hundreds of prayer requests that have come in during the preceding week. And sometimes we find ourselves literally crying out to the Lord: Father, please help this dear one who is suffering so much! Help this expectant mother whose husband has just died. Help this young father whose wife has just been diagnosed with terminal cancer. Help that family whose toddler is fighting leukemia! Bless that high school life whose students live in such rough circumstances that most haven’t yet learned to read or do simple math. Strengthen that woman who says “I know I’m headed for a nervous breakdown, but no one seems to care what happens to me.”

And our hearts just ache, and sometimes the tears flow as we read these letters. We wish we could just reach out and touch every one of these people with healing, as Jesus did.

But this old earth isn’t heaven. My good friend Del Delker has often reminded me that right now we’re living in the devil’s concentration camp. And as the commandant, Satan doesn’t much care how much suffering there is down here. In fact he enjoys causing suffering!

But there’s a day coming, friend, when it’s all going to be put right.

In his missionary endeavors the apostle Paul witnessed much suffering. And of course he endured many hardships himself. But it didn’t make him lose hope for the future. No, he spoke of the troubles of this old world in this way: “For we know that the whole creation groans and labors with birth pangs together until now” (Romans 8:22, NKJV).

He knew there was trouble in the world, but he also knew that it wouldn’t last forever. Because he had caught a vision that changed everything about the way he viewed life. Paul had seen Jesus in heaven, at the right hand of God, and that vision had given him courage to trust that God had not abandoned our planet to unending trouble. He knew that God has a glorious plan for our future, and he wrote, “I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us. . . . Because the creation itself also will be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God” (Romans 8:18, 21, NKJV).

The glory that will be revealed!

My dad, sitting there alone in his room on that cold Christmas day in 1939 couldn’t possibly have imagined the life he would lead in the future, or how the Lord would lead and bless him. But he took the king’s words to heart, and went out into the future with his hand in the hand of God.

And my friend, we all can do that. Whether life seems to be handing you roses, or just the thorns right now, may I say to you, there is a God in heaven who has not forgotten you. He has not abandoned you. And He won’t.

As we peer forward to the New Year, we wish you a happy New Year. And more than that, we wish you a happy forever, as you go forward, with your hand in the hand of God.

“I Know Who Holds Tomorrow”, Emily Felts Jones.