Live on American Family Radio, this is Peter Rosenberg and this is Hope for the Caregiver. This is the nation's number one show for you as a family caregiver. For those of you knowingly, voluntarily putting yourself between a vulnerable loved one and even worse disaster. How are you holding up? How are you doing?
888-589-8840. We've been dealing with the corona up here. Gracie's completely clear of it. I'm clear of it. They said I was certain to have it because I was her caregiver through it and so they tested me and now I do not have the corona.
I don't have the antibodies. I don't have anything but I did get a haircut yesterday. We live in Montana. They opened up some of the state here and I was able to get a haircut.
There were a lot of waivers signed, ordinances, monitoring. No, I'm just kidding but I did get a haircut. Felt good. I'm starting to look a little mountain man up here. I've got a very special guest on my show today. We're going to do something a little different but I had a chance to spend some time with him this week. I've worked with this organization for a couple of years now and they've got a new aspect to their ministry that I felt like would be very, very, very helpful to you today to know about and so I want to bring him on. It's Dr. Chuck Betters.
Dr. Chuck Betters of Mark Inc. Ministries up in Delaware. They have an extraordinary thrust of what they do to help delve into the difficult things that families deal with and so I am really happy to have him here and so I want to just jump right into that. Dr. Betters, how are you feeling this morning? Hey, Peter. How are you? I'm doing fairly well. How are you doing?
Great. Well, you know, I'm a little groggy this morning. It's been a long week. It's been a long couple of decades but we're rocking and rolling. Now, you and your wife Sharon are healthy. We are doing well. We're holed up here in Florida right now and been this way for the last six weeks but so far more healthy.
Thank you. I'm glad to hear you and Grace are healthy as well. We are moving past all this thing and like I said, have you had a haircut recently? My niece was visiting with us and she gave me two haircuts actually so I'm hair free.
Well, I wasn't going to let Gracie take a stab at mine because otherwise I'd get the Mo Howard and she'd get the big old bowl out and no, I'm just kidding. Tell me a little bit of the history of Mark Inc. and then let's talk about why you're on today for this thing so just jump right into it. Well, Mark Inc. ministry, the word Mark Inc. stands for making abundant riches known in the name of Christ started 25 years ago just after we lost our youngest of four children, Mark, to a car accident.
He and his friend were both killed in the car accident and we really needed help. We needed people who were ahead of us in the race to help us, to look back, and to help us understand what had just happened and how to handle the grief and the short story of Mark Inc. ministries is that we decided that we would do the same thing for other people in a variety of hurtful places. We address topics that just you don't hear about in church. They are they're difficult topics to deal with but they're all of our resources are designed to take people who have walked the walk and have them look back to help those who are coming behind them and so Mark Inc. ministries was birthed that way 25 years ago. We have, I think, over 130 different resources right now in addition to the books that we read and the broadcasts, et cetera, and I have the privilege of conducting a twice a week broadcast where I answer questions that people from all over the world have to the best of my ability as I try to address whatever their need might be in light of scripture and that's called Ask the Dr. Betters.
And from that our our need for the counseling center was established. Well give me an example of some of the topics that you got. Now these are things that people can go to your website they can click on.
It's free. You've got an entire library of things from from all these walks of life. So give me an example of where they can just go and they can access some of the books that you've got. Somebody else has been there, they've done it, they've walked through it, they've gotten stronger. As a result of this they have encountered God through this process. So give me an example of some of the topics you guys cover. Well we, as you said, all of our resources are free and we really try to help people to understand difficult topics. For example, we have dealt with incest and rape and post-abortion, same-sex attraction, sex trafficking, the adultery, both in the situations where there was reconciliation and in those situations where there wasn't. I mean these are some just some of the topics that we cover and of course they're all very, very difficult because the people who are who are serving as the ministering angels, so to speak, are having to rip open some of the wounds that were there. I apologize for my voice.
It's early here too as well. So I apologize for my face but, you know. Yeah, our website is markinc.org, markinc.org, where you can find these resources. We also have caregiving resources.
You and Gracie were gracious enough to be two of our interviewees and we have interviews with those who have special needs and, you know, on and on the list goes. Like I said, I think we have over 130. Our goal is to have at least 200 resources available to people on a whole variety of different topics and I'll tell you, some of them are really moving and all of them are very moving.
Well, people right now are in quarantine. They're stuck in their binge watching on, you know, Netflix and everything else but what you guys have provided is you could go through and you could pick any topic. I don't think there's any topic you've left uncovered.
I was looking at your stuff and I don't think that you guys have left out anything. I mean, I think that you have developed a whole series of these video interviews with people who have walked through these things and from what I can see, there's nothing. So whatever, and I'm talking to my audience right now, whatever you are struggling with, whatever you know someone else is struggling with, they've covered it at Mark Inc. And what I'm asking you to do is instead of spending so much time on the list, I'm asking you to do and what I'm asking you to do is instead of spending so much time watching what Hollywood is putting out, why don't you take a few moments to go, it's free, you don't have to do anything other than just click and you can start participating in the ministry and healing that has been going on and people who have dealt with what you're struggling with.
Name it, he's got it there and you don't have to be in that isolation and that's what I think. What are some of the most moving testimonials of people who have encountered this ministry? What are some of those things that have really touched your heart that you've heard back from people that were in isolation dealing with whatever and then all of a sudden they found you guys and it was life changing for them or something happened, it was that last little moment they had to take them into the next level of walking in some victory in these things.
What are some of those things that you've heard? Well, we interviewed a grandmother and her grandson on drug addiction. Her grandson was addicted to drugs, she had brought him to go to the Lord and I remember the interview well because that young man is not dead. Wait a minute, Doc, hang on just a second, we've got to go to a quick break.
Don't lose that thought because I want to hear this story. This is Peter Rosenberger, this is Hope for the Caregiver. I'm talking to Dr. Chuck Betters who's on the phone with us of Mark Inc. Ministries.
We've got more to go. Welcome back to Hope for the Caregiver here on American Family Radio. I am Peter Rosenberger. This is the nation's number one show for you as a family caregiver. 888-589-8840. 888-589-8840. I'm talking to my friend Dr. Chuck Betters.
He is the founder and head of Mark Inc. Ministries. Now this is an unusual ministry that has provided a resource, that's why I'm here today to talk about this, for you as a caregiver. One of the struggles we have as caregivers, we're isolated.
Okay? And we think that whatever we're going through, we're doing it by ourselves. And we're so cut off from folks.
Guess what? This ministry, Mark Inc. Ministries, has something uniquely designed for those people who are struggling with these things, who don't know where to turn, topics that are not being discussed regularly in Sunday school. Things you don't feel very comfortable raising your hand in church or Sunday school about, which is really sad. That's a sad commentary.
And I get it. I'm not here to try to fix that particular issue. I just want to tell you, here is a path for you to be able to access a community of believers who have worked through and walked through those kinds of things. So Dr. Betters, you were telling me one of the stories that meant so much to you about this grandmother with the grandson who had an addiction issue.
I'm sorry I had to cut you off on that, but go ahead and finish that, please. That was a powerful story. Joey, a young man, was addicted to drugs, and his grandmother kind of took the bull by the horns, led him to know Christ. And I remember asking Joey the question, do you feel as though you are clear of drugs, or are you fearful of a relapse? And he readily admitted he was fearful of a relapse.
Well, Joey did relapse, and he lost his life as a result of it. But his grandmother took that interview and passed it on to other people, drug centers, drug rehab centers, etc. And some people got a hold of that interview, and they came to know Christ. One lady in particular talked about how she was really coming to the end of her life, and she made her way to our site, and she started hearing the stories of other people who are suffering greatly. And she was able to say to us that she feels as though for the first time in her life she was seeing light. And these stories get passed on and on and on to other people, and we won't know the full results of what we do until we enter into glory and Christ is able to retrace the effectiveness of our ministry.
But people from all over the world, and I mean literally from all over the world, many from South America and the Middle East, some of the countries in the Middle East that are at closed borders, they write to us, and they tell us what these resources mean to them. The one we did that also is extremely memorable is the one on a woman who actually survived abortion, and to hear her story, just to hear the powerful testimony behind her story, she wouldn't be here. She wouldn't be here if they had succeeded in aborting her. And to hear the power behind that story, to be able to take that resource and hand it off to somebody who maybe is considering having an abortion. One of the most memorable, Peter, was I had three men, all of whom have same-sex attraction. Two of these men are married to women, and that interview brought me to tears. I just, listening to these men and the struggles they were having, and one of them, I asked the question, I said, does your wife, is your wife aware of the struggles that you have? And he said she will be after she listens to this. He had me told her, and he shared that with me, and I'm sitting there trying to hold back the tears from the struggles that these men who are Christian men, who really wanted to have victory over this temptation, and to hear their stories and the desire of their hearts to see victory in the pain that they were experiencing, it's heart-wrenching. And I was so moved by that.
And who knows where that has gone? I mean, his wife was going to hear it for the first time with the interview, that the man is struggling. And he used our forum to make that known, because he was so concerned about how his wife would respond. He wanted her to hear the whole story and to hear it in the context of two other men who were also struggling with the very same thing. So those are the kinds of things that we talk about. A pediatrician that we interviewed talks about a lifelong battle with her father, who sexually abused her, and ponder off to other men to have their turn, so to speak, doing it for money, and to hear her tell her story and to see where she has come with her life, and to know that that resource is now out there to help other people who might be struggling with the same thing. And of course, your interview and Gracie's interview, talking about the real struggles of caregiving and how you and Gracie have teamed up, teamed up, so to speak, to accept this challenge that God has given to you, I am sure has helped many, many people. Those are just some of the stories, and I could spend hours with you talking about that. Well, and that's okay. I mean, that's why I had you on here, because I want to hear these things, because I think one of the issues that struggle, one of the issues that caused so many caregivers to struggle, and my audience here, is that they just feel so alone.
They feel so lonely, and they feel so guilty about things that they're carrying in their own lives. And here, you guys have provided a library that shows whatever they're dealing with, somebody else is dealing with it, and here's what they learned about God through this process. Here's what they learned about victory and hope and healing and ministry through this. And that's why I wanted you on the show this morning, because people need to have these things available. They didn't... We suffer in isolation, and here we are now with this quarantine, and everybody's isolated even further. And instead of just clicking on things that are going to just rot your soul, here's something that's going to reach into you and give you a path to walking through some healing in your life, no matter what the issue.
And you guys really have literally covered every issue, and I know that they're heavy topics, but that's what people live with, you know? And I gotta ask, before we get into this new venture that you guys have taken, I gotta ask you, what does this do for you and Sharon, knowing that all of this was birthed out of your great sorrow and your great sadness of losing your son? None of this would have happened were it not for that. It doesn't make it better.
It doesn't offset it. But what does that do for you when you see the countless lives and hear these stories of people who have encountered healing, true healing, in these issues, and it all came from such grievous injury to you and Sharon and your family? Well, we look at God's purpose for our lives, and for Sharon and I, of course, we would prefer to have our son back, but that is not God's plan for us. And so we have had to step into the gap and minister to people who are hurting and grieving in different ways than us. They may not have lost a child or experienced the death of some sort, but grief is grief. And to know that people are grieving, and as you said earlier, living in isolation, maybe not even knowing how to articulate or verbalize exactly how deep their pain is, that is what keeps us going.
That is what moves us ahead. And through Marking Ministries, we have seen incredible stories of pain and sorrow. I know early on in the ministry, we were trying to help everybody personally.
We were getting letters from all over the country, people wanting to know if I would be willing or Sharon would be willing to talk to someone who had just lost a child. And every time we did that, it ripped the scabs off. And when people who are caregivers talk about caregiving, or people like us in ministry who are trying to apply balm to wounds that are wide open, oftentimes our wounds are ripped off, and we start bleeding again, because we're really just two wounded soldiers trying to drag each other off the battlefield. And the satisfaction we get is knowing that that's why Jesus came in the first place. He came to heal the broken-hearted. He came to minister to the lonely. He came to show that even though you may feel as though you are alone, He has promised to never leave you and never forsake you. And we want that story to be repeated again and again and again in the lives of those who have felt the same way, those who felt deserted, isolated, lonely, those who are in the throes of great grief, to be able to get up and tell their stories, to be able to stand up and say, this is how God has redeemed or is redeeming my pain and my sorrow, and how He wants to do the same in your life.
That's the gospel. That's exactly why we do this, because it is the call of the gospel for Christ to minister to the broken-hearted, to minister to those who are in need of a physician, and to know that we're part of that. To know that God has called Marking Ministries, a ministry that has again and again and again seen God work miracle after miracle to bring the message of hope to broken-hearted people, that's what keeps us going. That's why we do what we're doing, because we know how much we needed it at that time. I wish we had Marking Ministries when we were struggling, but we had we had one woman in California who was willing to enter to put their surgical gown on and enter into the operating room with us where there was a bloody mess, and to minister to us because she had lost three sons, and so she was reaching back and saying, I am here to show you that a lot of what you're going through is normal, a lot of what you're going through, here's how you're going to come out on the other side. We needed to hear that, we needed to have hope, and if people don't have hope, what do they have? And so that's why we do what we do, that's why Marking Ministries exists. Our basic theme is this, we offer helping hope to hurting people.
Well I love the verse in scripture that says they overcame by the blood of the lamb and the word of their testimony, that's what you're doing. You guys have started a whole new project that we're going to talk about in the next segment, so stay with us. This is Hope for the Caregiver, this is Peter Rosenberger, 888-589-8840. Welcome back to Hope for the Caregiver.
I am Peter Rosenberger, this is the show for you as a family caregiver. He'll give you hope for your sorrow, hope for tomorrow, and that is my wife Gracie from her new record, Resilient. Chuck, I gotta send you that CD, I'm sorry I haven't done that. I'm gonna send you that CD, Gracie's new record, and I think that you and Sharon will find it very meaningful.
In fact, I'll tell you what, I will give that away to a caller today, if anybody wants it, 888-589-8840. The CD is called Resilient, you can see more about it at hopeforthecaregiver.com. I love listening to her sing because she's lived to sing about it, and your whole ministry is about equipping people to live to talk about it, to live to share it with other people, that we're going to get through these things. We're not going to get through them unscathed, we're going to have scars, we're going to have all these things, but we're going to do it because it's all part of this sanctification process as God is working us through and revealing himself to us in ways in the midst of this, and that's the whole point. Before I let you go, I want you to tell me quickly about your new venture that you're doing, because one of the things I push on this show a lot is the need for caregivers to be able to have good quality professional counseling, and you get that as well. This is your whole thrust of what you're doing is to go elbows deep into people's suffering and heartache, just like somebody did for you. You've created a way that people can do that because a lot of people are so remote physically, and now because of all the quarantine stuff they can't get out. Tell us about this new venture that you have with Marking Ministries. Well, we have a feature on our site called Ask Dr. Betters, and I'm actually getting questions on the spot. I don't know the questions ahead of time, and so they wanted to gather the first reaction from these questions that people send in by way of Ask Dr. Betters. You know, Peter, when I read these questions and I have my first reaction, I'm thinking this person has no hope, and looking at their situation I have to wonder whether or not they do have any hope, and that gave birth to the idea that some of these people from all over the world, many of them, they need more than a few minutes on the phone or a few minutes watching a video. They need hands-on care, and so Anchored Hope biblical counseling, the vision for that a few years ago, started coming to fruition, and we are pleased to announce that we are in our soft launch right now.
We just opened it. It's an online biblical counseling ministry where folks can sit in the convenience and privacy and confidentiality. We're HIPAA compliant right in the comfort of their own homes and meet face-to-face with a counselor, a qualified, biblically trained counselor, to bring scriptures together into the context of your life to help you navigate the spiritual journey that is your pain. And that is a, we have researched our people, we have hired our first crop of counselors from California to Washington D.C., and they are here, they're waiting, they're online, they're one click away, as we like to say, for folks to look through our bios and our videos, and then to select a counselor who with flexible scheduling throughout the day will be able to come into your home, in the comfort of your home, without you ever leaving your living room chair, and offering you help and hope, and biblically trained counselors showing you how to marry your problem to what the scriptures have to say about your problem. And so they're there, they're ready to go, and our website for this is called biblical counseling, one word, biblicalcounseling.online, that dot online is important, biblicalcounseling.online, and they will be able to select a person to help them.
We have a couple of our counselors who are bilingual, especially with Spanish, we even have one who speaks Mandarin and Chinese, they are there available to help you if you have a bilingual problem or issue, and so we're excited about that. We have been in the making of this counseling center for, I don't know, four or five years, and it has been a lot of work to get it going, but we're ready, we're there, we're available, biblicalcounseling.online. The name of the ministry, it's part of marketing ministry, it's called Anchored Hope Biblical Counseling, and we're there for you, we're just, like I said, one click away from offering you help and hope directly and personally with a counselor that you select, you decide, you look at our list and you decide who your preferred counselor is going to be. And as I said, it's convenient, it's private, it's confidential, it's available to people maybe who are isolated right now or unable, physically unable to go to a brick and mortar place, and it's done with quality, and we're just so excited about getting the opportunity to minister in a more practical way to you personally, to tailor a program just for you to look at the scriptures, look at your life, and figure out how we're going to marry these two.
Again, it's biblicalcounseling.online. Everything's done right online, and it is, like I said, HIPAA compliant, you'll not lose any confidentiality or privacy, and I think you'll enjoy meeting our counselors and deciding whether or not this is something for you. Well, caregivers suffer from three I's.
We lose our identity, we become isolated, and we lose our independence. And how do you receive effective counseling care with those three things? And one of the things this show is all about is penetrating into that, and now, like you said, it takes more than just a phone call on an hour-long radio show to be able to deal with some of these things, and I want to be able to hand them off to people that I know that can give them some help. This is affordable, it is private, and a lot of caregivers who are stuck at home maybe, and they can't get out, they can't leave their loved one, and here they can, right there, and not miss a moment of caregiving duty, receive quality biblical care, and this is why I had you on the show this morning, and I'm very grateful that you took the time on this. We're going to have you back on, because this is an important part of what we're doing here, and I just love your heart, I love the work that you do, I love what you and Sharon have done through this enormous loss that you experienced, and yet you trusted God in it, and you're seeing, over and over and over, lives are being changed through this.
It doesn't make it go away, like Gracie said, you know, we do our prosthetic limb outreach over in West Africa, because, you know, that was her vision after losing her legs. She'd still like to have her legs back, you know, but it's one of those things that you realize, okay, I'm going to trust God with my loss, and watch him work through this, and it's an extraordinary work that you guys are doing, and I'm just grateful to be a part of it in a small way, and thank you for trusting us with this, and with the message of what you guys are about. I'm going to put all this out on the podcast, and on our website, and so forth, and people can go and access it, and I want you to take this podcast, when you get the recording of it, share it with your pastor, not you, Chuck, I'm talking to the audience. Chuck, you'd share it with your pastor too, but I'm talking to the audience here. I would really encourage you to share this with the pastors of your church, because this is one more resource that pastors need. The deluge on the pastor is overpowering at times. My dad's a minister, I know, I've seen the journey, and we need to equip our pastors with every possible resource and tool that they can use in the care of the people that God has brought into their congregations and their church, and they have stewardship with them. This is an extraordinary resource, and it provides yet one more opportunity for intensive ministry, and people are just in that player, they just have to, in fact, we're all there, and it's like, I love the analogy you gave about this doctor that, or the lady lost three sons and came into your lives. I'm reading a new book by Diane Landberg, I don't know if you've read any of her stuff, but it's called Suffering in the Heart of God, and I'm going to have her on the show here in a couple of weeks or so, but it's not like we go into these situations that we're healed up and not dealing with these things. We're plunging ourselves into people's heartbreak, but we ourselves are carrying heartbreak. But scripture says in Corinthians, the God of all comfort, who comforts us in our own troubles, in our own sorrows, in our own affliction, so that we may extend that same comfort to others. Last question, then I'll let you go here, Chuck.
Do you, this is a loaded question, it's a leading question, but I think I can ask you this one. Every time you talk about these things, do you feel yourself being strengthened through that process? Well, as you mentioned, that we are afflicted with something, and we receive comfort, and the purpose of receiving that comfort is to share that comfort with other people. And yes, it does, it puts a little spark in our step when we know that God is using us in whatever way he is using us, whatever small way or large way to draw people to himself, using us as the means by which he points people to Jesus. That does put a spark in your step to know that God is using you in ways that maybe yesterday he didn't use you.
We are walking in the Spirit, which means very simply, step by step, we're trusting that God is going to open doors and close doors all according to his will. And if I may mention just very quickly, Peter, there is, you challenged your listeners to take the podcast to their pastors. We have a mechanism in place where we can partner with local churches in this counseling ministry, where folks from their congregations can receive some additional benefits from us if they come from a partner church. So maybe if you take this to your pastor, you can point him to that section in biblicalcounseling.online.
Yes, it does. Let them know that we are going to use the message. I'm going to put everybody this out there at hopeforthecaregiver.com.
People will see it. And then Chuck, we're going to have you back on the show, okay? Thanks so much for being with us. Dr. Chuck Matters of Mark, Inc. Ministries. This is Hope for the Caregiver.
I'm Peter Rosenberger, 888-589-8840. Have you ever helped somebody walk for the first time? I've had that privilege many times through our organization Standing with Hope. When my wife Gracie gave up both of her legs following this horrible wreck that she had as a teenager, and she tried to save them for years, and it just wouldn't work out, and finally she relinquished them and thought, wow, this is it. I mean, I don't have any legs anymore.
What can God do with that? And then she had this vision for using prosthetic limbs as a means of sharing the gospel, to put legs on her fellow amputees, and that's what we've been doing now since 2005 with Standing with Hope. We work in the West African country of Ghana, and you can be a part of that through supplies, through supporting team members, through supporting the work that we're doing over there.
You could designate a limb. There's all kinds of ways that you could be a part of giving the gift that keeps on walking at standingwithhope.com. Would you take a moment to go out to standingwithhope.com and see how you can give? They go walking and leaping and praising God. You can be a part of that at standingwithhope.com.
Whisper: medium.en / 2024-01-23 13:28:21 / 2024-01-23 13:41:23 / 13
