Sid Roth

Sid: I’ve been talking all this week to another Jewish believer in the Messiah Lonnie Lane who happens to be the International Prayer co-Coordinator for Messianic Vision. Of course I come from a traditional Jewish background, and the thing that is so wonderful is God interested and desirous for entire families to come to know Him. In my life, every member of my immediate Jewish family has come to know the Messiah, and in Lonnie Lanes life it is so wonderful. We’ve already found out that Lonnie came to know the Messiah, and Lonnie’s father came to know the Messiah; Lonnie’s brother came to know the Messiah, but what about your mother-in-law. Tell me about her.

Lonnie: Well I started doing Bible studies with my mother and my mother-in-law. I would tell them what the Old Testament had to say about who the Messiah would be, and here’s the fulfillment in the New Testament. We would go through this week after week, but somehow I could never get any closure for either one of them. Then one day my mother was just… it just all fell together for her. She had been afraid that her mother, who she assumed was in heaven was watching her and would be unhappy with her if she came to the Messiah. It was raining cats and dogs the night I got saved with thunder and lightning, and she was sure it was because her mother was angry, and I tried to tell her mother didn’t have that kind of authority or power.

Sid: (Laughing)

Lonnie: Finally it just all went together for her, and she accepted the Lord and got healed of migraine headaches. She’s the one… in fact that night we were supposed to have some Israeli’s for dinner, and I had made a very special dinner, and the Israeli’s cancelled.  I had left everything on the table because I said “Lord you didn’t have me make all this special kosher dinner just for nothing, you knew this would get cancelled. So I’m going to leave it there and see for what reason you had me make this celebration.” That was the day that my mother got saved where we went to an Aglow luncheon. So we had cause for celebration; so we called my mother-in-law, who’d been at the luncheon with us, she came too. When my mother had told she had accepted the Lord because she had left the luncheon early, she said “Oh I’m so jealous.” So I said to her “You can accept the Lord now too” and she said “Well it just doesn’t seem to be my time.” That’s what she kept saying. Finally that Yom Kippur that same year, the Lord told me to call my mother-in-law who was somewhat…

Sid: I love it when you say that Lonnie because I’m reminded of that young Jewish girl who went to her rabbi and said “How come God doesn’t talk to us anymore today?”

Lonnie: Oh He does, oh bless the Lord He does and I thank Him for ears to hear. He told me on this Yom Kippur, it’s a good thing I knew His voice because when you think God is saying to you on Yom Kippur “Call your mother-in-law and take her to the mall for lunch.” You know it’s got to be God because that’s not something you would expect not to do.

Sid: No.

Lonnie: To tell you to go eat first of all, or go to the mall on the holiest day of the year. I obeyed and took my mother-in-law to lunch at the mall, and it was during a conversation there when I said to her “Mom why do you keep saying it’s not my time? What do you think is your time?” She said “Well I’m waiting for my testimony” because I had given tapes and books, and watching things on television, she had been hearing so many just extraordinary testimonies that she was waiting for hers to happen. When I said to her “Well for a Jewish woman to come to see who the Messiah is, is just as extraordinary as any of these other things that you’ve heard.” I said “Do you know who He is?” She said “Oh yeah I know that He is the Messiah” I said “You know He died for your sins?” She said “Oh yes I know that.” So I said “Well you could accept Him right now.” “Oh I didn’t know that” she said, “I can do it now?” I said “Yes” and she took my hand and she said “Lord I’m sorry it took me so long, I didn’t understand would you please come into my heart and fill me with Your Spirit and forgive me for my sins.” She got gloriously saved right there in the mall.

Sid: This is on Yom Kippur?

Lonnie: In the mall on Yom Kippur.

Sid: You know Lonnie we really didn’t finish about your brother Michael. Michael on his birthday came to know the Messiah…

Lonnie: Yes he did.

Sid: What about the fact that he spent all those years in Yoga type meditation, and taking various… well marijuana I know. From what I understand his mind was so destroyed from those years with the guru and everything that he couldn’t even an intelligent sentence.

Lonnie: Well the amazing thing is that when he got saved first he saw some demons that were in his house. He saw them in his dog and we told him “The name of Yeshua has authority over the demons.” When he saw them he told the demon to leave and he actually saw the demon leave, and at that point he also got delivered form the drugs, from marijuana. If tried to put one in his mouth he go too nauseous to be able to do that. At the same time he started reading things like Andrew Murray’s “The Power of the Blood.” He said he understood spiritual dynamics because he had been involved with the other team for several years. Now that he knew who Yeshua was he started praying for people. Somebody with cancer was healed, somebody in a neck brace got to take the brace off. He just got so completely transferred from the dominion of darkness…

Sid: What about his mind?

Lonnie: Well he wound up going to Bible school and getting straight A’s in all the Bible classes. He didn’t do so well in the English and the history, but in everything that had to do with the Bible he got straight A’s. He had not even been able to do well in high school because he had petit mal and the Lord healed that too. So he’s an extraordinary Bible teacher now, and if you ask him where any verse is anywhere in the Bible he knows where it is and where to go. He can just be such a spontaneous teacher of the word.

Sid: You know Lonnie you have a lot to be grateful for.

Lonnie: Oh I do, and I am.

Sid: I have a lot to be grateful for. As your sharing a little bit about Michael I’m thinking about myself. I’m thinking about where I would be today if it wasn’t, not for me, but for God having mercy on me it was that simple.

Lonnie: Amen.

Sid: If He had not had mercy on me, I could tell you I would be in one of three places; I would be in a mental institution, or I would be in prison, or I would dead without knowing the Messiah, meaning eternity separated from God in hell with knowledge of the suffering that is going on. Now none of those three were very good choices. For me I came from a traditional Jewish background; I had a college degree; I got married young, age twenty-nine I decided there had to be something more. In fact I wrote a song by that title in college called “There Must Be Something More.” Not one Christian shared Jesus with me, not one, my entire life up until that point. The only thing I knew about Jesus Lonnie is I read in a book of “Ripley’s Amazing Believe It or Not Facts” that Jesus is Jewish. I got so angry I went to my parents and my mother said “Yes I think Jesus is Jewish.” I mean doesn’t Jesus have a better witness than Mr. Ripley? Anyway, I left my wife, I’m not proud of it; I left my daughter and I went searching for happiness and got involved in the New Age. I’m amazed in the number of Jewish people that are involved in the New Age, and the number of people who call themselves Christians that are involved in the New Age. One Christian man, for the first time a Christian man started witnessing to me. He showed me Deuteronomy 18, and he showed me that every single thing that I, and all the other Jewish people, and I might add nuns and priests, and ministers, we’re all dabbling in was an abomination called spiritual adultery, and people were stoned to death in the days of Moses. Here it’s worse, you have an eternity separated from God. You can’t even turn on TV today without seeing something about the New Age or the occult. So I almost lost my life, I didn’t even want to live. I wanted to commit suicide, I mean life was just too hard. I had so much fear that there was just no purpose in living. Jesus walked into my bedroom; he restored my mind; he restored my family; he reunited me with my wife, and my daughter. Joy and I have celebrated 43 years of marriage now; my daughter now is married with grand-daughters to a Godly man they all know the Messiah. My whole family, my Jewish mother, my Jewish father came to know the Messiah. I mean God is such a good God, and this is God’s moment in history for Jewish people to come to know Him. This is His moment. Lonnie we would be remiss if we didn’t say God loves all people; He loves Jewish people; He loves Gentile people; He loves Muslims; He loves Hindus; He loves all people, but will you love Him? There’s no other name given unto men in heaven and earth in which we must be saved, but the name of Yeshua, the name of Jesus. If you repent of your sins tell God you’re sorry for the sins. What sins have you committed? Lying, stealing, adultery… you name it look at the 10 Commandments, you know them even if they’re not posted in schools. Repent tell God you’re sorry ask for His help to be free and believe Jesus died for your sins, then read your Bible live for Him.