TFR, by the grace and power of the Lord, has helped change lives. Here are just a few testimonials that reflect these works of God through The Father’s Ranch Ministries:
Student Testimonials:
Learning to Serve
I have learned a lot here at TFR during the past six months. Learning the basics of cooking, food prep, canning, gardening, house cleaning, and barn chores has all been helpful. All these things have been good for me in that they teach me practical skills and how to use my time wisely instead of sitting around not doing anything like I did before coming to the ranch. But these have not been the ultimate help for me. The ultimate help came on a spiritual level.
I have learned to hide God’s Word in my heart by memorizing Scripture. It’s so incredibly helpful to have these skills so I can push temptation away. One of my favorite verses is Philippians 4:6-7, “Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” I can sing to God now, focusing on Him and His word to get unhealthy thoughts out of my mind. I have learned to replace the sinful with the biblical through “putting on and putting off” principles. I have learned to be busy and take responsibility. All of this has helped me to avoid laziness and the depression that often came with it. I have learned to serve others and to submit to a higher authority, the Lord Jesus Christ. I’m so thankful that God has given TFR to me in my time of need. Thank you all for helping me.
Forgiven and Forgiving
I was raised by loving parents who took us to church regularly, although we weren’t saved. I received Christ at the age of thirteen, but at age fifteen, I was taught that if I sinned, I had to earn back my salvation. I thought I couldn’t do it and gave up hope. I acted as if everything was okay and became involved with activities at church, but in my heart I grew cold. For almost ten years I tried to fix my problems in my own strength while feeling empty and alone. When I became broken through a series of difficult trials, a friend gave me sermon videos that taught I couldn’t lose my salvation. I finally had hope, but due to my sinful life style, I still doubted if I was God’s child.
With the help of my parents (who received Christ during my teen years), I attended a one-week program. I received the peace of knowing I was God’s child and He had washed away my sins, but I was still struggling with lack of forgiveness and bitterness towards those in my past. Another friend encouraged me to go to TFR, and the Lord worked out every detail. During my time at TFR I have learned much about God and being a Christian. The Lord has corrected the wrong teaching I had believed. Through His Word He has shown me my sins, and He has forgiven me. I have learned that God is sovereign, holy, and I can trust Him. I find encouragement in Hebrews 13:5, “I will never desert you, nor will I ever forsake you.”
I now know I must fear God and not man. I’ve learned that Christians need to have prayer and devotion time with the Lord, and we must meditate on His Word, as it says in Psalm 119:11, “Your word I have treasured in my heart, that I may not sin against You.” We do not need to worry about the future; 1 Peter 5:7 says, “…casting all your desires on Him because He cares for you.” God has also given me the strength to forgive the people in my past because I see how much more God has forgiven me.
I don’t know what my future will hold but I will trust in the Lord, because He says in Jeremiah 29:11, “For I know the plans that I have for you…plans for welfare and not for calamity to give you a future and a hope.” I am looking forward to going home (Mexico), teaching in a Christian school, and being a light so people see Christ in me. I also now have a family here at TFR who are very dear to me. I’m thankful to the Lord for giving His beloved Son for my sins, bringing me to TFR, and I’m even thankful for my past. I want to glorify Him in my life.
Galatians 2:20 “I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me.”
Joyfully Restored in Christ
For two years leading up to being a student at TFR my marriage and family were in shambles. I was living a life of lies and deception in a “full on” rebellion toward God and others. The only person I cared about was me. I needed help but was so entangled in sin that I felt helpless to do anything about it. I had lost everything and still refused to change.
I had spent the last 20+ years on medications for bipolar disorder and clinical depression, and battled eating disorders since my teens. There were many times I was rendered incapacitated due to sadness and had to rely on family and friends to step in and care for my husband and children. I was told that I would need to be on medication the rest of my life because of how “sick” I would get when I wasn’t taking them. I was a wreck! I had believed most of my life that I had a disease that I had no control over. In early June I came to TFR scared and desperately wanting help.
During my time as a student at The Father’s Ranch God has shown me that I lacked a holy fear of Him and that I lacked submission to Him and to others. I also realize now that I have never truly known God or had a proper perspective of who He is or who I am in light of the cross. I’m so thankful that the Lord revealed to me that the real issues weren’t “chemical imbalances” but deeply rooted sin. I weaned off of all my medications not long after coming here and God has been so faithful to be my all in all. He is sufficient for me. Psalm 73:26 says, “My flesh and my heart may fail but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.”
Through weekly counseling and Bible study, Scripture memorization/meditation, and lots of hard work, God has truly restored my life and redeemed my heart. He fills me with gratitude and joy each and every day because of who He is. I look forward to being a wife and a mother the way God designed from the beginning. Proverbs 31:29-31 says, “Many women do noble things but you surpass them all.
Charm is deceptive and beauty is fleeting, but a woman who fears the Lord is to be
praised. Give her the reward she has earned and let her works bring her praise at the
city gate.”
Released from Slavery to Sin
Coming from a childhood in a drug house with consistently abusive men, by the age of five I was desperately seeking attention and acceptance from the opposite sex. By fifteen it developed into immorality, drinking, and an all-around party lifestyle. I was a new mom at seventeen, and a mother of two at twenty-one. My problem kept getting worse as I struggled trying to be an adult and a mom, while balancing all the habits I had developed to gain what I felt I needed from the men around me. I fell deeper and harder as time went on.
I moved back home with my dad and step-mom (who are both Christians) and I was blessed to see God working in the lives of the struggling men in their ministry and the transformation that occurred the longer they were there. By the end of two months, I had realized that God was very real, and if He could change those men, maybe He could change my life as well.
After I decided I also wanted a relationship with the Lord I began doing all the things a believer would do and what I was being told by the believers around me. Life got a lot better, but my “need” for attention and acceptance didn’t go away, I had just found new, less destructive ways to satisfy those desires. Within just a few weeks I was back where I started and it got worse.
A year later, I hit rock bottom. I wasn’t being the mom my kids needed me to be, the employee my boss needed me to be, or the daughter and sister my family needed me to be. I showed up at my church, ashamed and broken. My parents and the pastors at my church, with their families, worked together to get me help. About six weeks later I arrived at TFR. Since then, God has shown me that you can’t be saved by works, but we are saved by God’s grace, through faith (Eph. 2:8-9). I no longer seek the things I fought so hard for before. I have realized that the deepest desires of our hearts can’t be filled by any person or thing; only God can fill that empty place inside me.
By God’s grace, I now understand that Christ is sufficient for all things and I am called to seek His Kingdom and glorify Him in all that I do. Thanks to the staff and people involved here at TFR that God has used to teach and guide me, I have been released from my slavery to the sin that I have struggled with for the last twenty years (since I was five) and all the fears that came along with it. I can now live the rest of my life as a God-fearing woman and a good mother, now a slave of righteousness. Romans 6:18, “You have been set free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness.”
An Escaped Soul
“Our soul is escaped as a bird out of the snare of the fowlers: the snare is broken, and we are escaped” Psalm 124:7. This is how I feel. My soul is escaped from the snare of this world that I had been living in before I came to the ranch and I want to thank you for helping me turn my life around and also the staff for what they did to show me the right way. I have to admit since I’ve been home it’s been quite a long time since I’ve been depressed and if I do get down and out, I now know how to deal with it. I’m growing closer to God and love to spend time reading His Word and just being in His presence. It’s so awesome.
A New Creation
Before I came to The Father’s Ranch I was enveloped and enslaved by my sin. I had tried everything I could to fix my problems in my own strength with no Biblical knowledge or spiritual guidance. I was lost, and going down the wrong road fast! I was choosing the road that was wide and easy (Matthew 7:14). I was close to losing everything and I knew that the only answer was living a life that was pleasing to God, but how and where?
I had tried secular routes to find happiness and guidance, but it never gave me the conviction to change my life or mindsets that had been engrained for 27 years! I had gone to some churches that for the most part, were very superficial and provided me with no accountability. I was able to come and go as I pleased and no one knew me or realized the state I was really in. I had a lot of wreckage in my past, and it seemed hopeless.
Providentially I had heard about TFR through someone who runs a similar program for men in Western Washington. I had no idea what to expect but I knew God wanted me here. I have learned so much about God and being a Christian since I’ve come here. I have never felt so healthy spiritually and physically. I’ve learned what the life of a Christian should look like and God has brought forth all my sins so that I could deal with them head on. The Lord has been so merciful towards me.
I am looking forward to going home and starting a new healthy life, serving God, and starting fresh with all the skills and knowledge I’ve obtained while here. God provided a Christian roommate for me when I return and I’m looking into starting classes in the summer. It is a far cry from where I was six months ago. I feel like a burden has been lifted, I know now that my past sins have been put away completely and buried in the sea of God’s forgetfulness.
2 Corinthians 5:17 “Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation, the old has
gone, the new has come.”
Other Testimonials
Grateful Father
I often think about each of you and the ministry you are doing for our Heavenly Father and for the girls who come to The Father’s Ranch. I am so blessed to be able to daily see the results of the work that is being done there in the changed life of my daughter. It’s been more than five months since she returned to me from your care and she continues to do well. May God continue to bless His work there and guide you in all of His plans.
Thankful Parents
We want to thank you all…our daughter is really, really doing great! It’s like a miracle to us. We’re just so thankful for everything you guys have done to help make the change. She’s almost like a different person. She can handle stress so much better and she has a different perspective. Somehow, with the Lord’s help, you guys were able to get her to look and think about things differently. It’s been a God-send. I thought it would be more than fair to let you all know that she’s doing really great. We appreciate everything you guys did and we thank the Lord for it, and for you guys. She’s really doing well, really great. Thanks a lot.
A Blessed 90-Year-Old Widow
I wanted to let you know how much your visits to me mean. When you are here one can feel the Holy Spirit. When you leave, I feel so blessed. Your prayers and guidance stay with me always. The work you do at the ranch, for the young folks, is beyond words. Bless you in the name of Jesus.