"David said to him, ‘do not fear, for I will surely show kindness to you for the sake of your father Jonathan, and will restore to you all the land of your grandfather Saul; and you shall eat at my table regularly.’  Again he prostrated himself and said, ‘what is your servant, that you should regard a dead dog like me?’” 2^nd Samuel 9:7, 8

Dear Friends and Family,

David loved Jonathan’s son Mephibosheth, not because this lame footed man was lovable in and of himself, but because of who David saw in Mephibosheth.  In him, David could see the attributes and likeness of his beloved friend Jonathan.  Because of this likeness, and because of David’s great love for Jonathan, Mephibosheth was made supremely rich, considered royalty, and would sit at the King’s table for the rest of his life.  Herein is yet another wonderful picture of the efficacious and electing love of God in Old Testament type.

We are so much like Mephibosheth before our Heavenly Father!  Why would the King of Glory regard a bunch of dead, lame dogs like us?  For one reason and one reason only…because of Who He sees within our countenance and likeness, namely, His beloved Son the Lord Jesus Christ.  Because of His Son, our Father lifts our head and raises us up into the loftiest of positions and invites us to come and eat and drink at His own table.  Simply put, we are loved because of another.  No longer regarded as His (deformed) enemy or even a (limping) servant, he now calls us His children, Holy and beloved.  This is our new position before the King.  Practically, we still suffer from the deformities of sin.  In so doing, we too often behave shamefully and in a manner unworthy to be considered of the King’s ward.  Positionally, we have been healed of all our infirmities and lifted up into the highest of all Families. God’s own table hides our disfigured legs and He gives us a nobility and honor that we did not earn and do not deserve apart from Christ.  He bestowed His majesty onto us and we are now even more honored than earthly nobility.  Biblically speaking, we are now called Saints.

This truth of our “Saintly” position in Christ may not seem to be all that significant at first glance now.  However, there is a day and hour coming (soon) in which this doctrine will be to us the singularly most important truth of all time. When we appear before the Lord, it will be our position in Christ that enables us entrance into His Kingdom and reign, a position given and bestowed on us by Him.

These are the foundational and fundamental truths that we teach all who come to TFR for help.  Without Christ, we are spiritually dead and enemies of the King.  This is the practice and position of the “natural” man.  (A far cry from the damning “self-esteem” ideology is it not?)  Only when He chooses to bestow on us His grace and mercy are we given life, title, and honor.  Salvation is all of Him and none of us.  Praise the Lord.

I have asked Dorothy, who is responsible for the horticultural and agricultural activities here at TFR, for some help in getting you all up to date with some "facility news".  I'm sure you will enjoy her contribution.

Facility News:

Hello everyone!  This is Dorothy, and I have been asked to give you a quick update on the facility.  Things have been bustling and quite exciting around here in the last few months.  Our new ball field that we planted this spring is growing up very well – so  well in fact that mowing has become quite the chore as it is becoming very thick and growing rapidly.  While we look forward to playing baseball and wiffle ball on it throughout the year, the horses look forward to the weekly mowing.  They are Pavlovian horses!  At the sound of a lawn mower, they come running for the clippings!  The garden is also doing well.  While we had a late start, everything is up and flourishing now.  In fact, we have already processed 100 quarts of green beans, 100 quarts of squash, 50 quarts of peas, lots of spinach, and tons of fresh lettuce, carrots, onions, peppers, radishes, and tomatoes.  Our corn is just ripening now, and the winter squashes continue to grow.  However, in these last days of summer our nightly temperatures have been dipping down quite low – nearing the frost mark.  Please pray that if it is the Lord’s will He will sustain the temperatures long enough for us to finish processing vegetables for our winter food supply.  We are really hoping for at least a couple more weeks of warm weather.  In the same vein, canning each year takes it toll on jars, equipment, etc.  While it looks like we will have enough jars for the canning season, our wide mouth canning lid supply is running low. Additionally, we could also use one more large coil canning element (a special stove element designed specifically for the weight of canners and prolonged high temperatures). While we enjoy a harvest from the garden, we are not the only ones.  The goats are also enjoying all our processing.  It is said that a goat will eat anything.  Our goats live up to that by devouring all of our excess greenery from processing (carrot tops, radish tops, squash ends, etc).  The other barn animals are doing well also.  The chickens continue to provide fresh eggs and the goats continue maintaining weeds around the property.  We have a new llama named Jacob (on the right in picture).  He was acquired to be a "companion" for Leah our female llama.  Hopefully, next spring Jacob and Leah will have a baby llama. The cows had an adventurous month.  They decided that the grass was greener on the other side of the fence.  They took an unauthorized leave of absence from the ranch.  For one week, we did not know where our three cows were!  On a Saturday afternoon we were able to get the two bottle calves (hand-raised on milk) back without a problem.  They came to grain and loaded up without a problem.  The last black heifer was a rogue.  She had no interest in being caught and returned to captivity.  After trying unsuccessfully for hours, creating pens and using a horse, we called it a day when the cow spooked and made a mad dash down the steep mountain incline.  We loaded up and headed home hoping we would get another sighting of the cow.  All night the two (captured) cows balled for their companion.  Upon waking from a Sunday afternoon nap, I could not believe my eyes when I looked out the front window…there she was…our last wayward cow, right in our front pasture!  God alone and not our human efforts brought our wayward cow home.  We are truly thankful for God’s grace, mercy, and provision in bringing the cows home again.  Fall is quickly coming upon us which means winter is just around the corner.  As we look to feeding all our animals for the winter, we find that we are in need of 7 tons of hay (about $1,000).  Please pray for the Lord’s provision in this.  I hope you have enjoyed this update.  By His grace, Dorothy

BCCO News:

This summer has been an extremely busy time for the Biblical Counseling Center of Okanogan (BCCO).  TFR's female counseling staff have been meeting with women at the BCCO and I (Craig) have been counseling with the men.  When couples are in need of help, my wife Sharon and I counsel with them together.  No one affiliated with the BCCO ever counsels across gender lines.  That's bad business.  Counseling requests always seem to spike during the summer time and over 75% of all counseling requests are for some kind of marital problem.  We do our very best to remain thoroughly biblical, knowing that God is the creator of marriage and His Word is totally sufficient to handle any marital difficulties that may come our way.  It is always a blessing to watch the Lord do a mighty work in a marital relationship and to see that couple come into conformity with Christ and His Church.

Finances:

Things are extremely hard for us financially, but we have lots of company to be sure!  This economy is testing the foundation and footing of many families, businesses, and ministries alike.  Giving is down across the board for all ministries, and TFR has been given no guarantee by the Lord that we were to be exempt from this kind of struggle. However, every bill continues to be met.  He does continue to meet our every need and we continue to go forward being as faithful as we can with what He has entrusted to us, the Gospel being primary.

TFR's mortgage debt is now down to about 12k.  Our ministry directors have strong convictions regarding the faithful stewardship of His resources and we here at TFR have been blessed because of it.  We believe that your investment in this ministry is a strong and solid investment into faithful Kingdom work.  Not one fraction of a percent is lost on paying an administration staff team or other administration costs that are typically associated with running a ministry.  The full impact of your gift goes directly into this work.  All of our staff members are supported as domestic missionaries and do not receive a salary or even an occasional stipend.  This is a hard, high road, but it is one that we have subscribed ourselves to from the very beginning and one that we will do everything we can to maintain.

Please do pray for us.  We are heading into what is typically our most expensive time of year.  We still have hay to buy for the wintering-out of our animals, we have septic tanks that need to be emptied before the ground freezes and receives the snow, we have slaughtering, cut and wrapping costs for the production of our yearly meat supply, and we have canning costs to preserve all of the wonderful produce the Lord has blessed us with.  In addition, our yearly insurance premium comes due very soon with at least half of it required up front.  Yes, fall is an expensive season to be sure, but the Lord has always provided for us in the past and we have absolutely no good reason to turn our faces away from Him now.  Please do pray for our faith and for His provision.  We are in dire need of both on a daily basis.

Student Testimonial:

As you know, TFR’s teen program has been up and running now for about eight months.  We've been able to serve hurting and wounded teens on an individual basis in the past, but "officially" this particular aspect of TFR is brand new.  Our first graduate, Lord willing, is going to be a young lady named Abbigale.  She's a 15 year old and hails from the great state ofMinnesota.  We asked her if she would be interested in giving us her story. She took the opportunity and I'm glad she did.  The following is straight from her pen:  "About eight months ago, I came to the ranch.  I left my home and family in Minnesota as a last resort to death.  By this point I was so engulfed with my eating disorder, I wasn’t really eating.  When I did eat, I was doing a lot of dieting and highly restrictive eating.  In addition, I was consumed with exercising to the extent that exercise was governing my life.  This left me unable to function, much less able to think for myself.  By the time I came to the ranch, I had been struggling in this destructive and painful lifestyle for four years (11 to 15 years).  Out of love for me, my parents had already placed me in and out of hospitals over eight times, just trying to keep me from being a heart attack risk.  Doctors and therapist kept telling me that it was always someone else’s fault, or it was the environment, or a pill would fix everything.   A pill?  Obviously not!  I took plenty of them and was there 8 different times!! Finally, things hit rock bottom for me.  Physically, I was at death’s door, but beyond that, I was going to be pulled from my family and placed into foster care if I did not find a residential program that would bring lasting change. TFR was just that place.  They were able to accept me when several other programs I called couldn't or wouldn't.  Besides that, it was a more "home environment", not like a hospital at all.  They had animals, a small, family-like environment, and most of all, they were Christians. During my stay here I have become physically and spiritually healthy.  Physically, I have gotten to and maintained a healthy weight that has left me feeling much more refreshed and having more energy.  Ensure shakes were my best friend for a while there...how sad is that? Spiritually, this has been a season of growth for me.  I have learned that my life is not my own.  As Romans 14:7, 8 says:  “For none of us lives to himself alone and none of us dies to himself alone.  If we live, we live to the Lord; and if we die, we die to the Lord. So, whether we live or die, we belong to the Lord.” I must glorify God in all that I do.

Glorifying God should be my main focus and not myself.  Getting the focus off of me and putting it onto Christ and Him alone is so key.  “Whether, then, you eat or drink or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God” 1 Corinthians 10:31.  I have also learned more biblical ways of dealing with life’s problems – using His Word, trusting in His truths, and replacing unbiblical thoughts with God’s truth.  As I look towards going home, I would appreciate prayer for several things - that I would continue to grow in my relationship with the Lord, that He would strengthen me in areas of weakness and temptation, that I would continue to be diligent in being in His word and memorizing it daily, and that I would glorify God with the choices I make when I go home in November.  Thank you all.

Just in case there is a reader out there that isn't quite sure, this is why we do what we do.  For TFR, it's all about rescuing the perishing by offering the hope found only in Jesus Christ, and teaching them to obey all that He has commanded.  We're small potatoes right now in regards to our ministry scope.  However, I would match the depth, quality, and content of TFR's program up with any on the face of the earth.  Braggadocios?  It would be if somehow we thought we were the source of this depth and quality.  We're not.  Christ and His authoritative and sufficient Word flat-out works in the life of a committed Believer.  We, as fellow believers, simply point the way.  No psychologist, psychiatrist, or mental health professional in the world can address the inner man or the condition of the human heart (soul) like the Word of God can and does.  After almost a decade of results, this is not just philosophical theory, it’s our practice and here’s our proof.

In Loving Remembrance:

Two very dear friends of TFR went to be with the Lord recently.  Mike Jovich served as one of our original board members who helped discover, inspect, and acquire TFR’s facility.  He was a man who wasn’t afraid to get his hands dirty in the dust and sweat of facility development or in the “dirty soil” of a life stained by sin.  Mike, just like his Lord, had a heart of mercy and service.  To his wonderful surprise and our momentary sadness, the Lord called him Home suddenly and unexpectedly on June 25^th.

Bob Hanson was a trusted and valued discipler of mine (Craig) and the man whom the Lord used to bring the original idea of The Father’s Ranch into existence.  Bob was a hospital administrator and in the course of his duties, discovered a Christ-centered, residential, counseling ministry on the east coast that served hurting and wounded young adults.  Recognizing the need for such a facility closer to the Pacific Northwest, Bob shared this vision but lamented his age in being able to establish it himself.  Bob longed for Heaven for many years and was finally given his hearts’ desire on July 22^nd.

For those who trust in the same Source for their salvation as Mike and Bob, there is a wonderful reunion to look forward to just across the river in the King’s courtyard.  Even more importantly, we will finally see the One who bequeathed to us our royal pedigree and privilege, He who causes the mute to speak, the blind to see, and the lame to leap.  I'm looking forward to seeing you all there soon.  "At the smiling of the river, Mirror of the Savior's face, Saints whom death will never sever, lift their songs of saving grace.  Yes, we'll gather at the river, the beautiful, the beautiful river; Gather with the Saints at the river, that flows by the throne of God." Robert Lowry, 1864

Soli Deo Gloria,

Craig Lofthus