November Ministry Update

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Subject: November Ministry Update

John Davis's Testimony

“The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; His mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is Your faithfulness.” (Lamentations 3:22-23 ESV)

I will always be thankful to the Lord that I was born into a home where Jesus was known and grew up within a church that taught the Word of God. What I recall being my salvation experience occurred when I was young, around the age of six. From then on, I professed to be a believer in Jesus, but my spiritual life was empty and consisted of no more than going to church with my parents. Stumbling upon pornography as a pre-teen, I was immediately fascinated by it, and pursued porn and lust every chance I had. I was careful to keep up the appearance of a good church kid through the middle school, high school, and even into the college years. No one really knew who I was. It was in college when I met other young men my age who actually pursued the Lord that I began to see the futility of the false Christian pretense I had been holding onto for so long. Danielle married me in 2001 while we were still in college, and God used her and our relationship in so many ways to begin the long and painful work of disentangling me from the false life I had lived until then.

Although the Lord was incredibly merciful to me by providing a Christ-centered church community, godly men who mentored me, and a wife who loved and pursued Jesus, lust lingered in my heart, and I grew in spiritual pride. I developed a habit of confession without deep repentance, which manifested in an impotent and ineffective faith. In 2015, circumstances in my life revealed that I was headed in the wrong direction and had finally hit the bottom. Having four kids and being self-employed, I had made every excuse imaginable up to this point to avoid going to a nine-month program. But the Lord gently revealed first to my wife, and then to me that Pure Life Ministries was where I needed to go.

I set foot on the residential campus New Year’s Day, 2016 with hope in my heart for perhaps the first time in my adult life. God proved Himself faithful as I submitted to the teaching and counseling provided to me. Jesus Himself, met me there on those hallowed hills. He lifted my eyes off of myself and my half-hearted striving, and onto Himself and His perfect work. Worship became whole-hearted, His Word became living, prayer became powerful, and love for others became real. Mercy was no longer an abstract character trait of the Lord, but a powerful and tangible reality to be received and given.

Since graduating from Pure Life, God has been and continues to be so faithful and so merciful to our family as Danielle and I imperfectly walk out this Christian faith together. We face challenges and struggles daily, but the Lord continues to be our great hope!

Babylon: The Seat of Satan's Power

I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but Pure Life Ministries has been blessed with a very talented video department. Each year, our two Josh’s churn out an impressive array of videos—sermons, teaching videos, testimonies, and more. In 2022, we took on a fairly large project called Babylon: The Seat of Satan’s Power. This series is loosely based on Pastor Steve Gallagher’s book, Intoxicated with Babylon.

We had a number of goals for the series. We wanted our audience (including you) to gain a deeper understanding of the spirit of this world: where it came from, what its real purposes are, and how it has developed throughout the centuries. But we tried to avoid being overly theoretical; we also wanted to be intensely practical. We knew that one of the best things we could do is to help our viewers understand the very real danger this demonic spirit presents to us as believers. And we knew that if we could identify specific ways this spirit tries to infect us with his God-hating mindset, we would arm Christians with valuable weapons; weapons that would enable them to fight more effectively in this perilous age.

Each episode begins with an 8-10 minute monologue from Pastor Steve. We’ve supplemented those monologues with interviews about related topics, and then added discussions with our staff to help ensure that every episode clearly connects with what we face in our daily lives. If you’re interested in Babylon: The Seat of Satan’s Power, the videos are available on YouTube, our website and our smartphone app. We’ve also produced a series of podcasts using the same content, and that’s available wherever you get your podcasts. May God richly bless this series to create in you a strong resistance to the spirit of the age, and a wide entrance for the Spirit of the Lord.

New Audiobooks!

Last year we took our first plunge into the audiobook realm and were very happy (and a little surprised) with the results! In fact, we were so pleased to see our resources reaching new audiences that we decided to produce four more audiobooks this year! Our growing list of audiobooks now includes Living in Victory, Intoxicated with Babylon, Standing Firm through the Great Apostasy, and Walking in Truth in a World of Lies.

Our hope is that through this new medium, more people than ever will be exposed to the tremendous promise of freedom available in Christ for those struggling with sexual sin.

We’d encourage you to check out these tremendous resources on your favorite audiobook platform or by simply visiting store.purelifeministries.org. On our bookstore, our three “end times” audiobooks are also available as a package for a discounted price.

Glorifying God Through Thanksgiving

by Michael Wheaton

Senior Administrator

It’s hard to approach this time of year without being drawn into thoughts of gratitude. After all, we have a national holiday that is meant to be observed not only with a harvest feast, but with a grateful heart. Of course, we are all aware that the feast, perhaps even the football, has become more dominant than the gratitude at Thanksgiving.

But here at Pure Life it’s a good opportunity to remind us that giving thanks to the Lord plays a critical role in helping us overcome sin, especially lust. In his book At the Altar of Sexual Idolatry, Pastor Steve Gallagher says, “A grateful heart is a full heart. When a person is content with life, he will not be driven by the lust for what he should not have” (p. 243).

When someone fails to honor God and give Him thanks, they are taking the first of seven steps in a descent away from God, a tragic spiral that culminates in being “filled with all manner of unrighteousness” (see Romans 1:21-32 ESV). It’s a downward path that often takes men (or women) deep into the bondage and perversion of sexual sin; and the first step is being ungrateful.

But gratitude is vital to our spiritual life. So even those who never wind their way down that terrible spiral of degradation need to develop a grateful heart. The simple truth is, if we’re going to escape the “corruption that is in the world by lust” (2 Peter 1:4 NASB), we must cultivate thankfulness. We must remain vigilant in keeping our hearts in a continual flow of gratitude.

As Nancy Leigh DeMoss writes in her book Choosing Gratitude, “Ungrateful people are much like a container that has a hole in it, leaking out every blessing that’s been poured in, always needing something else, something new to consume for satisfaction fuel. They are like the children of Israel from distant centuries past, whom Moses warned, ‘Take care…lest, when you have eaten and are full and have built good houses to live in them, and when your herds and flocks multiply and your silver and gold is multiplied and all that you have is multiplied, then your heart be lifted up, and you forget the Lord your God’ (Deuteronomy 8:11-14 ESV). Full, but never full enough” (Moody Publishers, 2011, p. 86).

Usually, it is when things are going well and we have more than enough to provide for our own needs, that we are most tempted to be lifted up in our hearts and forget the Lord. That’s precisely why Israel was often in far better shape spiritually during periods of hardship or suffering, than when they began to prosper. And it isn’t much different for us, today.

For many, it is truly time to heed Jesus’ warning in Revelation to the Church of Laodicea: “For you say, I am rich, I have prospered, and I need nothing, not realizing that you are wretched, pitiable, poor, blind, and naked. I counsel you to buy from me gold refined by fire, so that you may be rich, and white garments so that you may clothe yourself and the shame of your nakedness may not be seen, and salve to anoint your eyes, so that you may see. Those whom I love, I reprove and discipline, so be zealous and repent.” (Revelation 3:17-19 ESV)

Our prayer is that many will join us in turning to the Lord and bringing Him the thanksgiving offering He deserves. As for us, we are so blessed to have His abiding Presence here as we minister to men and families whose lives have been devastated by the power of lust and sexual sin. We are thankful for the faithful staff members the Lord has called into this great harvest of souls and the unity He has blessed us with. And we are so grateful for the many generous donations that sustain this work. May the Lord bless each one of you with a grateful heart!

“Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good,

For His mercy is everlasting.”

(Psalm 107:1 NASB)

Special Meetings

Over the past several months, students in our Residential Program had the opportunity to hear from numerous guest speakers. David Moriel, a graduate who quietly lives out his faith with his family in Southern California, shared the testimony of how God changed the flow of his life from self-centeredness to a focus on the needs of others. Mark Haney told about God’s work in his mission field of East Africa; and Ofer Amitai, a former Faith Homes minister now pastoring in Israel, encouraged us all to long after a deeper revelation of God’s mercy through brokenness and a sight of the cross. In October, we had the opportunity to host Dave Leopold for a series of special meetings. He shared about God’s Mercy not matching our expectations at times, as well as the need for a strong faith in the face of our ever-wavering emotions. And Frank Leonetti, a graduate of the Residential Program serving as a missionary in India, shared about the magnitude of God’s mercy. Each guest speaker seemed divinely appointed to both challenge and encourage the students here in the Residential Program.

Maintenance Updates

If you remember, back in August we sent an appeal letter for a new staff house we would be building to help meet the need for our growing staff. Since the appeal went out, we have seen an amazing response from our donors and want to express our gratitude to those of you who have contributed to this need so far. We are nearly two-thirds of the way to our $400,000 goal! And thanks to your generosity, this project is already well underway. Our maintenance team has already laid the foundation and completed the flooring and walls for the main floor. Also, back in July, our maintenance team completed long overdue bathroom renovations in the Main House dorm on the residential campus. We are extremely grateful for how the Lord has blessed us with such excellent facilities. For more updates on current ministry projects, please visit our donor webpage: www.purelifeministries.org/donate.

The Ministry is Growing!

2022 has seen some significant additions to our Pure Life family. Earlier this year, Austin Kropf, one of our biblical counselors, and his wife Tabitha were married in Wisconsin. The ceremony was officiated by our very own Pastor Ed Buch, with many staff members in attendance. In late September, Director of the Residential Program, Luke Imperato and his bride Courtney were married here in Williamstown. The outdoor ceremony, officiated by Pastor Steve, saw perfect weather as the couple exchanged vows they wrote themselves and were exhorted with words from 1 Corinthians 13. We are thrilled to see the Pure Life family increase and are so thankful for the additions of Tabitha and Courtney to our ever-growing family!

The ministry is growing in other ways too – just a few weeks ago, Pastor Ed and his wife Karla welcomed a new addition to their family – a golden retriever puppy named Tucker. He has already made himself at home and brings a smile to everyone he meets!

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Subject: November Ministry Update