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This edition is sponsored by Zonderkidz |
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Debbie Dortzbach was 24, pregnant, and stitching Psalm 34:4 onto a white bandage. She'd found it in her captors' first aid kit. Less than two days before, she and a Dutch woman named Anna Strikwerda had been kidnapped from the Compassion of Jesus Hospital in Ethiopia, where they worked as volunteer nurses. Within the first few hours of their capture, the guerrillas who took the women had killed Strikwerda.
Dortzbach was held for twenty-six days. Her husband, Karl, negotiated her release through letters.
That was 1974. The couple was nearing the end of a yearlong vision trip to explore overseas ministry. Once Debbie and Karl were reunited, one might think they would return to the West and pursue a safer life. Instead, they returned to Africa, where they spent more than 20 years as missionaries.
"God met us in our pain," Karl told CT, "and gave us something to share with those in the depth of trauma and violent conflict, who cannot imagine a way out."
Debbie's embroidery still hangs on the wall in the Dortzbach's home.
"I sought the Lord and he heard me," it reads. "He delivered me from all my fears." |
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Are you looking for a meaningful way to open conversations about burdens, trust, and casting our cares on God with the little ones in your life? The Good Farmer and the Worried Donkey offers Christian families something they deeply need: a beautiful reminder that we are never alone and that God is our strength. Through the journey of Charlie—a small donkey who fears he'll never measure up—Hannah Harrison brings Matthew 11 and the parable of the sower to life in ways even young children can grasp and hold onto. |
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This new children’s book from Hannah Harrison, award-winning, ECPA bestselling author-illustrator of The Good Shepherd and the Stubborn Sheep, grounds young readers in Scripture as the parable of the sower becomes a story they can grasp at any age. The heart of the book is a truth as old as Scripture itself: God is patient, wise, and strong, and we can trust Him with everything we carry. Parents, grandparents, and ministry leaders will find that Charlie the donkey’s journey quietly models what it looks like to cast our cares on God. Purchase your copy of The Good Farmer and the Worried Donkey today! |
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For our 70th anniversary issue, we’re studying the past. Excerpts from our archives show evangelicals in Billy Graham’s day and our own grappling with our place in public life. A new book offers a fascinating history of Christian womanhood—but makes a misleading argument, according to our reviewer. We’re also peering into the future. Artificial intelligence, GLP-1 drugs, anti-aging surgeries, next steps for the pro-life movement: These are some of the issues likely to occupy Christians for the next seven decades. But mostly, we’re spending time in the present: With a Honduran man who found himself pastoring in a Massachusetts jail while detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement. With the evangelical owners of a traditional Korean spa engaged in a religious freedom showdown. With faithful believers doing good work—a chef, an architect, a ball boy, a teacher (who, at age 91, is older than CT!). And with the writers of our newly expanded testimony section, who found God’s faithfulness in the midst of alien conspiracies, after a bad accident, and via an envelope in a refrigerator. Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever. Amid our own era’s change, conflict, and uncertainty, we hope this issue declares that reassuring truth. |
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