I first attended the Ranch when I was 8 years old and then off and on while I was growing up. I still think about the anticipation I felt when we would see the Ranch sign at the bottom of the hill. What adventures would lay ahead for me? I still feel that same anticipation with each week of summer camp as I see the kids roll in, with each retreat group that arrives, and with the beginning of each apprentice year. What adventures lay ahead for us? I am so blessed to be in a position where I get a great seat to watch the Lord at work. I hear it in the testimonies of ranchers and apprentices. It’s the testimony of change.

Change is our testimony. God is faithfully at work to change us and make us like His son Jesus and will use whatever He sees fit to accomplish this goal (Phil. 1:6). We as a ministry are, and have been, walking through change. They say that change is inevitable (except from vending machines). I must admit I have not always embraced change well or given it a fair shake. We are often quick to categorize change as the ending of something. My family moved several times when I was a kid and that meant a change of schools, homes, or in some cases even cultures. It was the end of something I had known and an entering into the unknown. Our security is often put into what we know and are familiar with, but while change may mean an ending it also means a new beginning.

Even though my first experience at Miracle Mountain Ranch was 34 years ago, Ralph still affectionately refers to me as “the kid”. I have been serving on staff here for the past 20 years, and in many ways I have grown up here. The staff members have not only been my friends, leaders, and fellow laborers; they have become like family. Both Ralph and Lew have been my mentors and source of counsel on everything from business to personal matters. They have challenged me, confronted me, believed in me, encouraged me, and wept with me. God has used them to help facilitate change in my life, as they lived out before me the changes God was affecting in their own lives. As followers of Jesus Christ not only is our testimony change, but it is our heritage as well.

I believe that heritage is caught more than it’s taught. I was reminded of this just last week while doing a sermon presentation with the horses. At the end of the message I held my 2 year old son Jonathan and used his relationship to me in an illustration of God knowing our names. When I was done I removed my hat and closed in prayer. I felt Jonathan squirm just a bit and was concerned that he was going to reach for my wireless microphone. I opened my eyes to check only to find that he too had removed his hat and was tightly holding his eyes closed. I hadn’t taught him that. He had simply observed it and followed my lead.
This ministry has been blessed over its years to have strong Godly leadership. These leaders have passed on a heritage that ministry is not a vocation but a lifestyle and that only what we do for Christ will count. They have also taught that this ministry is God’s. It is God who has sustained it, and it is He who will continue to sustain it so that many more may come to have a “mountaintop experience that will last a lifetime”.

I pray that you will see change as your testimony and heritage. What a great adventure it is to follow Christ and just like those kids on the first day of camp or the new class of apprentices on orientation weekend, I hope you too will approach it with the anticipation and excitement of what God will do.

- Matt Cox Executive Director