To laugh often and
love much; to win the respect of intelligent persons and the affection of
children; to earn the approbation of honest citizens and endure the betrayal of
false friends; to appreciate beauty; to find the best in others; to give of
one’s self; to leave the world a bit better, whether by a healthy child, a
garden patch or a redeemed social condition; to have played and laughed with
enthusiasm and sung with exultation; to know even one life has breathed easier
because you have lived—this is to have succeeded.
--Ralph Waldo Emerson
The real Christian, and certainly not the pretenders or
onlookers, have no concept of the blessings involved in being chosen by God. Worth
more than all the gold of Midas, the wealth of a Bill Gates or Warren Buffet,
is the knowledge that you have been chosen by God, drawn by God, as Jesus said.
(John 6:44). There are evidently those whom God does not want-- such as the
Pharoah of Egypt. God hardened his heart.
And
I will harden Pharaoh's heart, and multiply my signs and my wonders in the land of Egypt.
Exodus 7:3
God is in charge. The design must
have a designer. He planned it all before the foundation of the world. He is
boss and will show mercy on whom he chooses to show mercy.
For he saith to Moses,
I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom
I will have compassion.
Romans 9:15
So many have asked this world traveler-- and I have even
asked myself-- having seen the decadence and depravity of so many people in the
world, "Why does God allow so much suffering?" Because, our God of
glory (omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent, sovereign, long-suffering) is not
willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. (John
3:17, 2 Peter 3:9)
Only those who know they are saved-- and 14 times in John's
epistles we are told that we can know-- and can, like Paul, rejoice. The 21st
century has so cheapened Christianity-- made a beggar of God. Thank God that we
can know what we know. Have sympathy for those that are just playing games.
I'm an old man, but it seems like yesterday when this 10
year old boy was baptized in Holland's
fish pond. I had been to the Lord's table for the first time as a new church member.
My ancestors had brought down from up New Jersey
(founded Morristown),
along with Palmer and others, the Free Will Baptist denomination, which has in
it's communion service, foot washing (following the example of our blessed Lord
in humbleness, washing his disciples' feet). I know now that it was my own
father's doing. I can still see him, a deacon, bringing in buckets of water
from the well in the church yard. Buckets for the women's side of the church
and buckets for the men's side (this was before the time of power lines, phone
lines, and water lines-- churches on dirt roads, such as the community where I
was raised). Every rural church had a well in the front yard. Some even had a
trough for the watering of horses. My father had surely asked Mr. Frank, one of
the old men of the church, a man whose Christianity he so admired, to instruct
me in the ordinance of foot washing. He had probably instructed my own father
when he was a boy. The old man showed me how to gird the towel around my waist,
after taking off shoes and socks, to just gently rub some water over the feet from
a basin and then wipe them with a towel. The old man said to me, "Thomas,
you are very special. I knew here, in this church, your great grandparents,
your grandparents, your parents. Never forget the humility of this act, because
you are going places. God, who created the world was willing to wash his
betrayer's feet (Judas)."
I have clung to these words, as I plowed the field of life--
atheist university professors, scamming/scorning business associates, a
social/climbing wife, a family who thought you were a religious fanatic/nuts
because you believe what you believe. You see, my definition of faith is
"action based on belief, sustained by confidence." How else could a
boy, born in poverty on a dirt road, with none of the conveniences of life,
graduating from a small country school with 13 in my graduating class, have the
God-given ambition to work my way through 8 years of university education. The
scar tissue left from disappointments, discouragements, depression was enough
to get me through many years of living in a black cocoon of blindness (totally
blind, 100% disabled, service-connected, medical officer veteran of the Korean
conflict era).
We so limit the power of God, just as we limit the power of
Satan. Just as God made arrangements for my education, he made the arrangements
for me to travel the world-- speak/ write/ give to his causes around the world.
Only God could take a farm boy from the poverty of tobacco fields in eastern NC
and prepare him for writing this article. Please God, help those who have never
known wounds, needs, those things that develop scar tissue. The apostle Paul
said, "I bear in my body the marks of the Lord Jesus." (Galatians
6:17)
This Christian writer does not get excited about streets of
gold or mansions. I get very excited about seeing again-- seeing the savior who
got me through it all. Think of the crippled man who laid by the temple gate,
Beautiful, for 40 years. Christ certainly passed him on his way to the temple.
He healed many, but not all. He preached himself-- our sicknesses,
disabilities, warts and scars are in no way comparable to His atonement and our
redemption.
Behold, what manner of
love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of
God: therefore the world knoweth us not, because it knew him not.
1 John 3:1
