A Global Gift
Toni Dolfo-Smith’s help to me in Germany was but a glimmer of what he offered to the global work of Living Waters. He has since come alongside of me to release Living Waters in humility and power; he is matchless in mercy.
I first met Toni 20 years ago at a Leanne Payne conference in Canada. I was on her team; he was curious. As a man vital in faith who had come out of homosexuality and recently married, he wanted to understand the ministry of ‘Living Waters’ and to benefit from it.
That conveys Toni’s humility. He is infinitely more gifted and well-rounded than me. As a young political activist, he fought apartheid in his native South Africa, then became a doctor of architecture (he taught at University), a seasoned businessman and trained therapist, not to mention a world-class painter, interior designer and florist. My former assistant Char rightly described Toni as a new ‘concept’ in human possibility. I alternate between weariness and envy in considering his many talents.
Try gratitude. Toni is worldly in the truest and best sense. It cost him. Satan led him out to the end of his earth and offered Toni everything. Toni chose the narrow way of Jesus: death unto real life, the kind of influence that only pure mercy can afford one. He makes my heart glad.
He slowly—one by one—released his grip on a variety of enterprises in order to dig ditches of Living Waters in Canada. God increased his measure. He helped me navigate the development of Living Waters in South Africa then took it over. He has come alongside of many to help release Living Waters on every continent; he now oversees the development of Living Waters in Asia.
Toni in his exotic good looks is perfect in appearance for the role. He is the ‘international man of mystery’—as Indonesian as he is Turkish, Mexican, or Brazilian. Airport immigration likes him; they ask him a lot of questions.
In his mercy-giving, Toni combines the wisdom of a learned man, the tenderness of a man humbled by weakness and grateful for healing, the creativity of a fine artist, and the drive of a disciplined achiever. I hope that God used Living Waters to help bring out the best in Toni; certainly He has given His best to Living Waters through Toni.
I do not know of one who had so much to give and yet who came alongside of me to serve and to learn. He worked really hard to trust me, even as I did the same.
I trust Toni. We work out hard things, and they get harder as he steps out more in the authority God has given him to release Living Waters. It is a blessed challenge—it has made me grow. It has made our global offering of mercy grow.
I trust him with the ‘water world’ God has entrusted to me.
Would you please agree with me: ‘Please God, bless Toni Dolfo-Smith (and wife Mardi plus kids Cal, Mackenzie, Dakota, and Garrison) as he has blessed me and countless others with the work of Living Waters. Pour out abundant mercy on them as they have given their lives for the sake of Your mercy.’
‘As You have shown us mercy, O God, in the desert places of our lives, would You show mercy to the beleaguered state of marriage in the USA? As the Perry vs. Schw. case wends its way to the National Supreme Court, prepare for Yourself a victory. We shall render to Caesar what is Caesar’s but we shall prayerfully fight for what is Yours, O God. Prepare the hearts of each justice, especially Justice Anthony Kennedy, to uphold marriage according to Your merciful design. Remember mercy, O God.’
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