Chapter Ten - God Loved My Father

CHAPTER TEN



GOD LOVED MY FATHER


God loved my father -- and He has given him the most precious gift of life in the hereafter. If God was able to put life into a little new born baby, God is able also to raise us from the dead.


BELIEVING IN CHRIST, as someone puts it – there is nothing to lose but everything to gain. Life, as my father put it, is precious. No amount of money can buy it. But, when God gives us life everlasting, not on the basis of our good works but because of His abundant grace and mercy, we have everything to win both in this life and in the life to come. There is light at the end of the tunnel. The endless love of God will accomplish all His purposes for mankind.

Your love, O LORD, reaches to the heavens,
your faithfulness to the skies.
Your righteousness is like the mighty mountains,
your justice like the great deep.
O LORD, you preserve both man and beast.
How priceless is your unfailing love!
Both high and low among men
find refuge in the shadow of your wings.
They feast in the abundance of your house;
you give them drink from your river of delights.
For with you is the fountain of life;
in your light we see light.

PSALM 36: 5 - 9


His Faith Sure as Rock

Father had confessed Christ as his personal Saviour on several occasions. The most convincing part was on Monday, October 5 where he prayed on his own accord: "My heart, Jesus, come in." Even as he had prayed the sinner's prayer when I first led him, he had personally become a child of God. Jesus said in John 6: 37: "All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never drive away." It is very clear that anyone who has personally accepted Christ as his personal Saviour will not be lost forever. Jesus will always seek out those sheep that went astray. None of his sheep will be lost.

" I am the good shepherd; I know my sheep and my sheep know me – just as the Father knows me and I know the Father – and I lay down my life for the sheep. I must bring them also. They too will listen to my voice, and there shall be one flock and one shepherd. " (JOHN 10:14-17)

" What do you think? If a man owns a hundred sheep, and one of them wanders away, will he not leave the ninety-nine on the hills and go to look for the one that wandered off? And if he finds it, I tell you the truth, he is happier about that one sheep than about the ninety-nine that did not wander off. In the same way your Father in Heaven is not willing that any of these little ones should be lost. "
(MATTHEW 18:12-14)


What About Us?
Like my father, who was saved in his last days, many of us need to ask ourselves:

What is the meaning of life?

What is the use of having lots of money when our health is failing us?

Do we have the assurance of a place in Heaven should we die tomorrow?

On what basis is this assurance that we have?

On the basis of good works which must overweigh our wicked thoughts
and actions?

Or, is it on the basis of God's grace and mercy for all mankind?

To save us, God had to send Jesus to be nailed to the Cross. His blood was shed for the forgiveness of our sins, so that we may be cross over to the right side of the ravine – on God's side, – instead of being cast into the lake of fire. Yes, every drop of blood that Jesus shed on the Cross of Calvary was indeed a symbol of God's eternal love for all mankind – that is, for you and me.

God loved my father – and He has given him the most precious gift of life in the hereafter. If God was able to put life into a little new born baby, God is able also to raise us from the dead. Death for my father was just a passage into the kingdom of Heaven. He found the Shepherd of Love while walking through the valley of the shadow of death. Jesus held his hands for more than three days, even as he was waiting anxiously to see all his relatives and family members. The Bible assures us that when Father finally breathed his last, his entrance into the kingdom of God was joyously welcomed by myriads of angels. There is truly rejoicing in heaven over one soul who repented. As a son, I wanted my father to have the best – and this was the best that I could offer him before he passed away. The gift of life. The knowledge of salvation. The love of God. Indeed, GOD LOVED MY FATHER!