Vision Week Radio Special - Part E

Today, we will connect with Lenya Heitzig in the studio as we continue Vision Week on Connect with Skip Heitzig. Lenya will talk about her days as a co-ed atheist and what she's learned about saying yes to God. I think I've learned more and more my job in life is to say yes to God. And as long as I say yes, he keeps doing things that are exceedingly abundantly above all I could ask or hope.

And I think that that's part of it. Just say yes. You know, we were willing to, if you will, recklessly abandon family, lifestyle, jobs, etc. And we just kept saying yes to the next thing. Now, let's join Lenya Heitzig in the studio for a conversation with Chip Lusko on Vision Week. Well, Lenya, good to have you in the studio.

This is Vision Week on Connect with your husband, but you're his wife. I know. And you've been with us on the majority of the journey.

True. So it's good to be together. It really is. And the purpose of this week is really to give folks just an idea of the past, to look back, to look around and look forward. And, you know, Skip gets to tell his testimony and we all know it.

It's wonderful. At last. It's my turn.

Yes. And, you know, I know it, but I know that the folks listening would like to hear it. So let's go back to Michigan, which we have roots in, and the Western Michigan and all the rest.

And walk us through with Lenya. I was an atheist if we go back to the Michigan days. My parents divorced when I was relatively young. I was a bartender and a discotheque and college coed after that and started experimenting with sex, drugs and rock and roll. I think that's what we all did during that time. So I dropped acid, took speed, loved bongs, that kind of stuff.

So it was a pretty wild background. And during my sophomore year of college, my dad was a doctor. He'd written a book on the power of positive thinking and he was taking law classes, wanted to become an attorney. And during that semester, in between heavy studying law, he decided to read the Bible to see if Jesus was a positive person. And he called us and said he got saved. He went to Chuck Smith's church, was baptized in Pirate's Cove.

Chuck took him down there. Just he and his wife was a beautiful thing. And as this college coed, I thought, my dad, like Festus, your much learning has made you mad.

And I just thought, he's off the deep end. But in the darkness of night, in the quietness of my room, I think, what if he's right and I'm wrong and I'm going to hell? And it haunted me. And yet I didn't see a compelling reason to believe in Christ. All my friends were, you know, Lutheran, Catholic, Baptist, whatever, but it didn't change their lives.

We were smoking the same joint and I'd ask them about my dad. Oh, he's become a Christian. So why are you a Christian?

And it didn't seem to move the needle. You know, there was no true repentance, no true lifestyle that had changed. And so I took a class at Western Michigan University on Eastern religions, so Hinduism, Taoism, Buddhism, and they just didn't enamor me in any way. My high school friend became a Jesus freak and I got stuck in a car ride home from Kalamazoo to Ludington, Michigan, and I asked her about Jesus. And it was the first time anyone explained to me in a articulate way the creation, the fall, the need for redemption, the blood of Jesus Christ.

And so I understood for the first time what Christianity was and it sounded appealing. And she left to four spiritual laws in my car, got back, and I was smoking a joint with my friends and that track fell out. And when I read the track, there's this picture at the end that has a throne with you on it and all the things in your life, marriage, finances, career, kids are just kind of akimbo. And then if you get off this throne in Jesus, the cross is on the throne, then everything works like in concentric circles. From a positive thinking perspective, to me, it was like that's the ultimate positive confession. If I confess Jesus, then everything in life comes into order.

So that's kind of what I was thinking, but I was willing to say the sinner's prayer at the end of the track. And when I did, I started crying. I mean, it must have hit something deep, even though I didn't know much more than that. And one of my friends came in the room, wanted to play cards while we were getting high and saw me crying and said, so why are you crying? And these are the same people at the keg and smoking the joint that would tell me I was going to hell and they were going to heaven simply because I did not believe in God, but we were doing the same things.

So I said, I don't know. I just read this track and I asked to receive Jesus and I repented of my sins. And immediately they turned on me and said, what makes you think you're going to heaven and we're going to hell?

So there was clearly, you know, a dividing line in this moment. So after that, I went to visit my dad in California. He was going to Calvary Costa Mesa and I was going to church with him to hear Pastor Chuck, but I kept saying, I don't feel saved. I'm coming here and I'm going through the motions, but I don't feel saved. And so one week they were doing an altar call and Malcolm Wild was there and I went forward. And as I was walking down the aisle, the weight of my sin was heavy. I felt like the scarlet letter, you know, all the things I'd ever done. Everybody could see what a sinner I was going down the aisle. And so I got back to the prayer room and Malcolm said to me, so why are you here? And I said, well, I had the four spiritual laws track. I said the prayer, but I don't feel saved. And he said, have you ever repented of your sins? And we don't talk enough about that anymore. And I said, well, nope, but I don't even know what the word repent means.

I mean, I have no concept. That's a Christianese word, really, from a college co-ed. So he explained, though your sins be as scarlet, he will make you as white as snow that we confess those sins. And then Jesus gives us this new start. And I started sobbing again and realized how much I needed that forgiveness. And he said, do you want to pray? And I nodded my head and he said, do you want me to pray for you? And I said, yes, because I couldn't even really articulate.

And he did. But from that day forward, I never had a doubt that I was a Christian and where I was headed and what God was calling me to do. And he gave me a voracious appetite for his word. I was going to Calvary Costa Mesa six nights a week to the concerts, to Chuck Missler's class, to everything I could after that moment. I'd like your thoughts on the campus era, because we went to comparable campuses. You were in Kalamazoo.

I was in Mount Pleasant in the same era. And I thought back then, why did I get saved earlier? And I thought, well, I didn't really hear about Jesus that much. I mean, I went to a comparative religion class with a girlfriend and never heard about Jesus. I think once a year, Youth for Christ guys came around and knocked on our doors and we just waited for them to mock them. But you didn't really, Jesus was not a presence on my campus. Was he on yours? No.

And I think that that's, you know, part of the issue. I can remember in my hometown of Ludington, not college campus, some Jesus freak person came through town and were giving the smiley stickers, smile God loves you, kind of Forrest Gump that smiley face, you know. But on campus, there was no witness.

And it worked out for this friend who got saved and, you know, shared with me on this ride home. And that was a really good point, Chip, because when I went to California to visit my dad and I was going to Calvary Costa Mesa, I had never been in a church because I went to church with these Baptist Catholics at Christmastime or whatever. And it was just mumbo jumbo to me. It was nothing. At Calvary Costa Mesa, expositionally teaching and the anointing that God had on Chuck's life was rivers of living water.

I was voracious for the truth. And there was none of that, you know, back in Michigan at that time. It was all, you know, formalized religion and it just seemed to be sucked dry of anything of any value.

So, yeah, I didn't find it. But then, of course, going to California, as you know, the Jesus movement was really starting there. So I just happened to land on maybe the end of the first wave of the Jesus movements because this was 76. And it was just such fresh life. You know, God was doing something new and different.

And that was also what was endearing about the Calvary movement is you'd come in and there were barefooted hippies sitting on the front row. And it was so different than these formalized Baptists with their slicked back hair and, you know, Pat Boone, patent leather, white shoes or whatever. And I got invited to a potluck and I got saved. And my dad would say, well, now that you're saved, you have to marry a Christian. I was like, I have never met a Christian I would want to marry. I mean, to me, they were all really not appealing. And so I said, well, I'll be a Christian, but I'm never marrying a Christian.

I'm not sure he really liked that. But then when you come to Calvary Costa Mesa and you see people that you relate to, you're like, oh, OK, maybe this is something different than what I had expected. And my dad and my grandpa had set me up on two blind dates that were absolute disasters. The first one, the guy was a very large guy like Chris Farley, and he came in in a plaid suit and oh, it was bad.

He had a tee top Camaro and he took the top down and that song, Brandi, you're a fine girl, what a good wife, came on and the dude started singing it to me. And I'm like, oh, my gosh, please let me out of this. Stop it.

It's Saturday night live skit and I'm stuck in it. So that didn't go well. So then they set me up on this next one and it was a friend of the family and he was a pilot and they said he was a Christian. So I'm still dying to meet a Christian, you know, to ask a million questions to. So this guy, I keep saying, so blah, blah, blah, blah.

This question, can Christians listen to rock and roll music or whatever? And the guy dodged him and I went, oh, maybe Christians don't talk about being Christians. And I went to a family wedding with this guy and his sister was there and she was born again and went to Costa Mesa. So I'm telling her my story and she goes, why are you dating my brother? And I go, well, my family said he's a Christian.

She's like, no, he has a girl in every port, like abort, abort. So she invited me to a potluck at her house and in walks, Skip Heitzigs. That's the Christian you met. I was at your wedding. I know you were. And so, yeah, you and Skip are good friends way back in Calvary South Bay and go back a long way.

Yeah. So Skip walked in, you know, tall, blonde, beautiful surfer. And he just looked like, thank goodness, you know, someone I can relate to. And so I did. I got to ask him the questions I was really grappling with.

Can a Christian listen to rock and roll music? And so he took me to his car and played Randy Stonehill and Larry Norman. And I was like, wow, you know, okay, this is great. And then I said, you know, I just think it's really hokey when Christians say praise the Lord or hallelujah. And again, I had all these stereotypes and he said, yeah, me too. But I ride a motorcycle and one day I decided while I was riding my motorcycle, I'd practice. And so I'd go hallelujah, you know, on the motorcycle when no one could hear you or praise the Lord.

And then, you know, you kind of develop the sincerity of it, you know, not just the awkwardness of it. And so there were just a million questions like that that I was asking Skip. And I was there with the girl that I had dated her brother and he was there because he had dated the roommate.

And I was spending the night that night. And after everybody left, the girl that had dated Skip said, gosh, I really feel sorry for Skip. And I went, I don't think anyone should feel sorry for Skip, I'd say. I go, the dude's, you know, brilliant. He's got a good, you know, life.

He loves the Lord and he's handsome. You know, I don't think you have to worry about him, which seemed, you know, kind of condescending. But so anyway, I went back home.

I was staying with my dad in the region. And about a week later, Skip called. He was out surfing and he just thought of me and put a quarter in a phone box on Huntington Beach somewhere near the pier and asked his ex-girlfriend for my phone number. And so he called and our first date was going to a Randy Stonehill concert. So nice.

Yeah. Let's move from that era on to getting in the car and heading out I-40. Because Skip had a ministry career, could have been in Southern California easily. We both know that we were there, but he elected to come to Albuquerque. It's interesting that God did such a parallel in our hearts, even though we were not together after this period where I met Skip. I went to Youth with a Mission in Hawaii and then Skip stayed in California. And while I was in Youth with a Mission, I recognized that my call was very unique. I was in a mission organization and never going on a mission. I was invited to go to Thailand, pray, and God said, no, go to Indonesia. No, the mission director brought me in and said, so, you know, you're in a mission organization.

Eventually you have to say yes. And I said, you know what? I think God's calling me to be a pastor's wife. I think my gifts and callings are more discipleship than evangelism. And inevitably, if I was out street witnessing, I'd find a backslidden Christian and talk to them. So my gifting isn't strong in evangelism. Parallel to that, Skip's in California, and his heart is to take the gospel as we know it, the Calvary, the liberated Jesus freak, non-denominational expression, somewhere that didn't have it.

And so he would go into Chuck Smith's office and read letters from people in different regions. Can you start a Calvary here? Please send a pastor there. And he was praying where that would be. And so you guys have a mutual friend, Kent Bagdasar, whom we love. And Kent was being on a trip to come to Albuquerque to take over a radio station here. And he goes, hey, Skip, why don't you come to Albuquerque with me and I'll do radio. You can do a church and we'll see if God's in it.

So while I was in Hawaii, Skip and I started writing letters back and forth to each other. And he had said, hey, I'm praying about Albuquerque, you know, let's see what God does. So I was praying for him, but there was no I love you, baby, let's get married. There was no understanding at all of that, just, you know, praying for one another. And he came with Kent and he had a fleece before the Lord where he said, if I can get a job doing X-ray tech, CAT scans, then I'll move. And he got three offers.

So, I mean, that's history. So in the meantime, Skip had been writing me and he said, you know, I think it's time for you to come home and to see if God has anything in this relationship to, you know, kind of, you know, see what the Lord's doing. So I came home just before he was going to come to Albuquerque for the first time or the second time.

And so he picks me up at the airport with a rose and everything's amazing. And he comes back out with Kent to do this thing and look for an apartment. And Kent says to him, so what are you going to do with that girl? Why would you bring her all the way home from Hawaii?

Just dump her. There's plenty of fish in the sea and, you know, you're leaving, just leave that all behind. And he said, no, I think I'm going to marry her.

I think I'm going to marry her and move to New Mexico. So he came home from that trip and within a couple of days asked me to marry him. And as you know, we got in that blue Datsun pickup truck with Give Jesus a Chance on the back of it, packed everything up, the Beverly Hillbillies in reverse. And he asked me to get married. Two months later, we were married and then our honeymoon was driving to New Mexico.

You know, some might look at the history of Calvary Chapel, now Calvary Church of Albuquerque and go, wow, that was smooth. I just blew up. You were at the Foreign Art Theater, you were at the Lakes and then now you got 10,000 people. It wasn't quite that easy, was it?

No. We were at the Lakes apartment, which was fabulous. It was incredible to meet people who were longing for the experience that was happening, the Jesus movement in California. So that was neat to see that the spirit was moving other places and people were hungering for that. Also, we met a lot of older people who had been praying for it, that were going to other churches and just asking God, you know, to have that in their community. So it was beautiful to see that God precedes you.

You know, it's like the pillar of cloud by day or the pillar of fire by night, that he's ahead of you and he's leading you. And so just finding other like-minded people. But Skip was working doing CAT scans. I had a job at KKIM working for Kent at the radio station.

And so both of us are working, you know, to make this happen. Honestly, Skip and I never thought we'd own a home. I mean, it was just this is our mission call. And then that Bible study just kept growing until there were so many people in it that we said we'd go to the Lakes apartment, not the Lakes, the theater, the Far North Theater. And the Far North Theater, it was almost full the first time. And then it's like, oh, where are we going to put kids?

And, you know, that kind of expression. By the time we moved up on Eubank, it was just growing so fast that I was overwhelmed. And I honestly prayed and said, God, make it stop. Like, it's too much. I can't do it. This is overwhelming. And the Lord just reminded me, you're not doing anything.

You know, why are you struggling with this? It's kind of just like lay back and float. Just float on this wave and it's going to be fine. But, of course, there were seasons we had a friend come out that we thought would do worship and they just couldn't handle Albuquerque and then the disappointment. You thought you had another person who was going to be alongside of you on that journey. But in some ways, it was hard. In some ways, it was like a fairy tale. You know, you landed into a fairy tale and you just said yes to God and God already had an amazing plan.

And I think I've learned more and more. My job in life is to say yes to God. And as long as I say yes, he keeps doing things that are exceedingly abundantly above all I could ask or hope.

And I think that that's part of it. Just say yes. You know, we were willing to, if you will, recklessly abandon family, lifestyle, jobs, etc.

And we just kept saying yes to the next thing. So you've seen the highs, Lenya, and the lows of being a pastor's wife. I know we have women listening right now who are involved in ministry at many different levels. Would you just say a word of encouragement to them about the discouragement that can come?

Yeah. I think, first of all, you should know the Lord for sure. And then know your gifts and callings and have confidence and rest in those things. Because whom God anoints, he appoints, right? If you have his anointing and he's called you to become a pastor's wife, to start a mission, to do whatever it is, trust that. You know, don't let anybody else be a God pleaser, not a man pleaser. And as a pastor's wife, so many people want to pick you out or tell you what you should be doing.

You should be a soprano with a bouffant playing an organ or whatever it is. But God has a unique calling for you, and we are not carbon copies. We're not cookie cutter. You know, what I do is not what Kay did, is not what Kathy Laurie does, is not what, you know, other people do. We each have our unique calling and expression. And also know your husband, that you are coming alongside of him to fulfill that.

And so the compliment that you are to that mate, I mean, Jenny and Levi have a beautiful relationship, and the way they compliment each other is just not the way someone else is, because they have these different personalities. So just rest in knowing some of those things. And I think mostly please God, don't please men. You know, when you're in those critical situations, if you come back to knowing God and knowing what he's called you to, rest in that. So at this stage of life, we both have children involved in ministry, and I never push my kids one inch towards it. They adopted the idea.

But, you know, I was glad, but I said, I know some of the pain they're going to face, the inevitability of that. How have you tried to prepare your son for that? I think it's, I've heard actors say this, that they never tried to make their kids become actors because they know what the business is like. I would say it's the same for ministry. I would never try and talk someone into the ministry. If God hasn't called you, you will not survive.

Really, I don't want to say it's bloodsport, but it's not easy, and you need the calling, and that's super important. And so as I was watching Nathan grow up, of course, every son idolizes their dad, right? Whether he's an attorney or a car salesman, whatever it is, you think, I'm going to be like dad. You know, it'll be Lusco and Sons and that kind of thing. And Nathan, I remember around mid-high, wrote a report, and when he grew up, he was going to be a surfer, and he was going to play guitar and have a motorcycle and be a pastor. I'm like, okay, he wants to be his dad, which is a good thing. But the important thing is the calling.

And so a couple of really amazing things happened in our lives. One of them is Levi Lusco. Levi was Nate's youth pastor, and under Levi's ministry, Nathan became real and honest about his relationship with Jesus. And as a pastor's wife, you're afraid your kid's not the real thing. You know what I mean? I think every pastor's wife is, is my kid— God has no grandchildren, right?

He just has children, and you cannot enforce that. So I saw Jesus move in Nathan's life, and so I knew he was legit with the Lord. Well, Lenya Heitzig had much more to say in this conversation with Chip Lusco for Vision Week, including her burden to help the hurting through Reload Love and her trips to the front lines of missions to Iraq, Jordan, and the Far East.

We have posted this full conversation with Lenya and Chip at ConnectWithSkip.com. For regular supporters to this program, we want to thank you for your support. In the past few years, this teaching ministry has continued its growth trend. We want to do more, grow more, and reach more people with verse-by-verse Bible teaching. Will you help us do that during Vision Week? Please consider a one-time growth gift right now.

It is easy to do. Either call 1-800-922-1888 or go online to ConnectWithSkip.com. And when you do give this week, we have a special resource package for you. Here are the details. We'd like to send you a signed copy of Skip's latest book, The Biography of God. You will also receive a hardcover copy of Joe Rosenberg's excellent new book, Enemies and Allies.

Skip plays a part in this story of seismic changes in the Middle East. Get your copy of both books with your gift of $50 or more to Connect with Skip to support the growth of these Bible teachings. If you've been impacted by Skip's messages, your gift is your vote for growth. Either call 1-800-922-1888 or go online to ConnectWithSkip.com. I hope you will make that tax-deductible gift now. I can assure you it will make a difference here at this ministry.

Either call 1-800-922-1888 or give online at ConnectWithSkip.com. Join us next time as Skip will begin the new series, Fight for the House. Make a connection, make a connection at the foot of the cross and cast all burdens on His Word. Make a connection, connection. Connect with Skip Hyten is a presentation of Connection Communications, connecting you to God's never-changing truth in ever-changing times.