From day of birth
my life thou’st led; Thy faithfulness ever my guest; with loving grace Thou
cov’r’st my head; Thy plan for me Thy gracious best.
Today is my birthday. (The day I write this, not the day
you read it.) It is a day to reflect on
the great grace of God in Christ. For
many years my flesh, in body and mind, has been plagued by various ills from
petty to profound. For those same years
my income has ranged from little to a little more than that. But these are not the issues that life is
made of or to be about. Jesus said that
our life does not consist in the abundance of things we possess. Our wealth is His grace. Our thorns in the flesh are the opportunities
for His grace to be manifest through us.
Today I reflect on the wonderful riches of the grace of God to me. These are riches that cannot be taken away or
lost in earthly calamity.
First there is peace with God through our Lord Jesus
Christ. 42 years ago I was at enmity
with God and He with me. I was a child
of wrath in mind, body and spirit. My
destiny was sorrow in this life and greater sorrow for eternity. Then, in a grand revelation of His grace, I
was no longer an alien to the life and hope and peace of God. He saved me and forgave my sins and made me
His child. He did this because of His
grace in Christ who died for my sins and rose again for my justification.
Secondly He set me on a path of wonderful adventure with
Him. It has included taking me to four
universities, colleges and seminaries to graduate with ever greater preparation
for His service. This even though I thought I would never go to college. It brought me to meet
my dear wife whose only goal in life was to serve her Savior. What a perfect companion He gave me. It has taken us across America to serve in
pastoral ministry, music ministry, education ministry and missionary
ministry. We have learned languages we
didn’t know existed and led people to the Savior from many places we had never
even imagined visiting. This path has
given us six wonderful children who are all active in their own churches with
two of them in full time ministry. This
path has seen our bank account never run dry even when my income was
insufficient to pay just the rent and we had no other income. God has been ever faithful. He has been ever gracious. He has been ever the wonderful Savior who
wooed me from sin to salvation in His dear Son.
This day is really a celebration of His goodness and love.
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