My mom on my wedding day. Photo credit: Bob Schueler

What’s our greatest hope for our sons and daughters? Is it to see them grow up to be happy, healthy, and wealthy, living close to us in a house with a white picket fence? Or can we imagine a higher purpose for their lives?

For as long as I can remember, my mom has had a magnet on her fridge that reads, “I have no greater joy than to hear that my children are walking in the truth” (3 John 1:4, ESV). But time would test that declaration.

Halfway Around the World to Halfway Across the Country

After my sophomore year of college, I spent a month in China and returned to tell Mom I was thinking of moving there. Though extended family members feared for my safety and tried to convince me to stay in the good ol’ USA, she encouraged me to go wherever God led, even if that was to the other side of the planet.

Photo credit: John Moser

After serving overseas for two years and then spending another year studying at a seminary in North Carolina, I returned to Maryland to reconnect with my family and teach drama and music.

While there, a friend who pastored a church near Chicago dropped by. Mom had raved about the multi-site community church where he ministered ever since she’d attended his wedding.

But when she suggested I visit one weekend, Pastor John said they needed help in their office and with their youth ministry. Would I consider working and volunteering there for six months?

After two weekend trips to the Windy City, I sensed my Shepherd calling me away from home once more to be a part of this dynamic ministry. And, once again, Mom encouraged me to go.

But six months turned into six years.

A Man Called Mark

During that time, I met and married my wonderful husband, Mark. A year after we said, “I do,” he graduated from Moody Bible Institute and applied for pastoral positions in Illinois and Maryland. The Lord led us to a Chinese church in Oak Park, so we served in Chicagoland for another six years.

By 2015, almost a dozen years had passed since I’d moved to the Midwest, and I now had little ones of my own. Mom continued to support us, but she longed to have her only daughter and grandchildren living nearby.

Surrender’s Reward

Last year, our Savior called us back to Maryland.

Photo credit: Ben Stafford

Mark became the youth and young adult pastor at Greenridge Baptist Church in Montgomery County, and Mom was overjoyed. (Read the story in “Open Doors” and “Somewhere That’s Green.” )

Now Mom supports us another way: she babysits her grandkids while Mark and I minister at youth and young adult events and retreats.

Following Mom’s example, I aspire to give my children back to God. (Tweet that!) Then I can watch them impact eternity, whether that’s next door or halfway around the world.

As we celebrate the life of Nancy Reagan in the wake of her March 6th passing, I thought it would be fun to explore the life of another potential First Lady. Heidi Cruz has been fascinated by politics since she read a Time magazine article about the race between Ronald Reagan and Walter Mondale when she was only 12. But who is this now 43-year-old woman whose husband is seeking to serve in the Oval Office?

Elegant and Experienced

Photo courtesy of: wikipedia.org

CNN said, “Nearly every candidate heralds their spouse as an asset, but few significant others in this election season — with the exception of Hillary Clinton’s — have the same level of political experience as Heidi Cruz.”

Heidi has worked in the Treasury Department, in the U.S. trade representative’s office, and on the National Security Council, as the director for the Western Hemisphere. While serving as an economic policy aide for George W. Bush’s 2000 presidential campaign, she met Ted, who was also an aide, but for domestic policy.

He asked Heidi out two days later, and five months after that, they said, “I do.” Several years after they got married, she stepped out of politics to pursue a career in the business world. She’s currently taking leave from her job as the managing director of an investment banking firm to assist Ted with his campaign.

“The sense of genuine concern was elegant,” said Eddie Nabors, an alderman from Mississippi, who met Heidi at a rally. He praised the way she “meets, greets and identifies” people. “I have one afterthought,” he said. “Get her on the podium.”

Gifted and Gracious

Heidi earned a degree in economics and international relations from Claremont McKenna College in California where she was known as being “whip-smart” and then went on to complete her MBA at Harvard.

Photo courtesy of: pulse.ncpolicywatch.org

When Heidi met Ted, her friends said she’d met her match and intellectual equal. P. Edward Haley, a professor of international strategic studies at Claremont McKenna, said, “They’re both extremely bright.”

Cruz describes Heidi as “beautiful, brilliant and my very best friend in the whole wide world.”

“Heidi could get along with almost anyone,” said Lawrence B. Lindsey, the chief economic adviser for the 2000 Bush campaign.

“Mrs. Cruz comes across as confident but gracious,” said The New York Times. “She disarms by asking personal questions, and answers those put to her directly and candidly.”

“I want to make sure that everybody is comfortable,” Heidi said. “I want to make sure that everybody is talking to each other.”

Productive and Persuasive

Photo courtesy of: business.rice.edu

When she was only six, Heidi was making $150 a week baking and selling bread with her brother. She later used that money toward college and a car. “I think it definitely taught us the value of hard work,” she said. “We were used to being highly productive at all times.”

Today, Heidi applies her energy to Ted’s campaign where their friends and advisers describe her as “a competitive fundraising dynamo.”

“There are very few spouses who can get on the phone on a cold call to a prospective donor and make a more compelling case in a personal and effective way than Heidi Cruz,” said Chad Sweet, the Cruz’s campaign chairman.

Ted said, “She is disciplined and she engenders trust, which is a powerful thing in life.”

Servant-Hearted and Self-Sacrificing

You might say serving is in Heidi Cruz’s DNA. (Tweet that!) The daughter and granddaughter of medical missionaries, Heidi was raised around the world as her family helped the less fortunate in developing countries like Kenya, Nigeria, and the former Belgian Congo.

“I think those early travels made me expansive in terms of the things I wanted to do,” Heidi said.

Her brother became a pediatric orthopedic surgeon and cared for the wounded poor in Haiti for a year following the 2010 earthquake. Heidi felt called to a different cause.

Her friend Julie Sweet said, “The way she always phrased it was people are called in different ways to serve.”

During Reagan’s administration, her parents took her and her brother to D.C. “I . . . got inspired by the history of our country and leadership and saw a direct tie to the service orientation of my family to public policy.”

Photo courtesy of: wusa9.com

When Ted was behind in the polls for the Senate primary, he came to Heidi with a proposal.  “Sweetheart, I’d like us to liquidate our entire net worth, liquid net worth, and put it into the campaign.”

“What astonished me, then and now, was Heidi within 60 seconds said, ‘Absolutely,’ with no hesitation.” They invested over a million dollars, “which is all we had saved,” Cruz added.

Want to learn more about Heidi’s husband and the policies he supports? Check out “Ten Reasons to Vote for Ted.”