Rusty Benson

AFA Journal associate editor

July/August 2014 – By 1969, Linfield College, about an hour south of Portland, Oregon, was rife with illegal drug use. James “Lee” Lambert had avoided the drug scene during his freshman year. That was before he fell in with a circle of friends experimenting with LSD. It only took one hit for the California sophomore to descend into a terrifying three-month episode of recurring hallucinations.

In his junior year, bad matters grew worse with frequent use of marijuana, amphetamines and hallucinogens. Confused and withdrawn, Lambert found himself in a fog of anxiety, paranoia and delusions. Then, in a rude awakening to his own mortality, the fog began to lift.

Heading toward Santa Cruz for the Thanksgiving holiday, Lambert crashed his Ford van. The bridge railing was driven through the van barely missing his right leg. That brush with death proved to be a severe mercy and the beginning of life for Lambert and eventually many others.

“Little did I know, my neighbor, a World War II chaplain, was praying for me,” Lambert said. “Then a friend of mine, who had come to Christ through Campus Crusade, started praying for me.”

On February 12, 1971, that friend knocked on Lambert’s dorm room door. Through a haze of pot smoke, Lambert heard the gospel with new ears. A light switched on, a life was changed. Soon many others would follow.

“I was so excited that I went to a friend a couple of rooms away and told him about Jesus,” Lambert said. “He accepted Christ, his roommate accepted Christ and it just carried on.” During the next two years about 15% of the students on campus came to Christ, he said.

In the 45 years since, Lambert’s zeal for telling others about Jesus, particularly high school and college students, has never waned. Today he meets many of them on the sidewalks and street corners surrounding their campuses.

Lambert spent some 35 years in the banking and finance industry, but never forgot God’s deliverance at Linfield College. “I know what happened to me when I was in college,” he said, “so I have some understanding about that side of campus life.”

Retired from the business, now Lambert pulls a small Airstream travel trailer from school to school boldly handing out gospel tracts and talking to students one-on-one about Jesus. He sees his calling and methodology as simple obedience to God.

“I pray about where God wants me to go,” he said. “I park my trailer somewhere I won’t get a parking violation and simply walk on campus.” His near future plans include an evangelistic effort at University of California-Berkeley on the eastern side of San Francisco Bay. The university is famous for its liberal political climate.

Highways and hedges
Being open to God’s leading, Lambert, now 64, sometimes finds himself off the beaten path pressing the gospel on an unlikely heart.

While driving through Michigan in the summer of 2012, Lambert says the Lord directed him to stop in Traverse City. A couple of months earlier he had read an article about the singer Madonna’s then homeless brother living in Traverse City.

 “As I parked my car and got out,” Lambert said, “I literally felt like angels were pushing me. Then in front of me, down a small path, there he was – Madonna’s brother. I shared the gospel with him and he started crying. He wasn’t really overly receptive, but I felt I had planted a seed and was being faithful to the Holy Spirit’s leading.”

Lambert’s personal story
Lambert is also an author and funds his ministry through sales of his most recent book, 16 Amazing Stories of Divine Intervention. The book profiles notable Christians such as Mickey Mantle and Steve McQueen, and how they came to faith in Christ. No less remarkable is Lambert’s own amazing story of divine intervention, a chapter still being written.  

Available at 16amazingstories.com or 800-656-8603. Lambert is also available for speaking engagements.