YET perhaps for the majority of those living with us on Earth this remains just a beautiful concept, and the reality either non existent or just too spirituall to be of any earthly use!
We need to FEEL those loving arms around us, we need to HEAR the welcoming voice, and we need to KNOW the loving breast to lean our head upon. For the majority it is a longed for dream.!
In the story told in the Bible - Luke 15v11-24 - often referred to as The Story of the Prodigal Son, we see a runaway son returning later to his home and to his father, ruined, penniless, and desperately destitute. His father is longing and waiting for him to come, and when he sees him afar off, he runs to him and welcomes him without reservation. BUT how often do we find this actually happening - either in or outside of the Christian Family? The picture to the right is certainly a perfect rendering of that welcome. It is what we imagine COULD happen to us in the hear and now of our extremity; it is not so misty and dreamlike as the one at the top ......... YET which is the MOST REAL in fact and in experience?RECENTLY I read these words form one of our Old Boys, who is today a young of 32 now; a sign-writer by profession, but fallen on hard times.
He writes -
"I feel too much; that's what's going on in me.
Do you think one can feel too much? Or we just feel in the wrong way?
My insides don't match up with my outsides!
Do anyone's insides and outsides match up?
I don't know. I'm only me.
Maybe that's what a person's personally is'
the difference between the inside and outside. But its worse for me.
I wonder if everyone thinks it's worse for them?
Probably - but it really is worse for me!
Knowing him well, as I do, I found these words very poignant and sad.
He has not found the everlasting arms of Christ to surround and comfort him in his human heartache and pain. He runs home often - trusting in the arms of those who who were family to him here in Testimony. But does he find it? Is his welcome all embracing, so that all his need both emotional and material is met? NO! Of course we do what we can to comfort, advise and encourage, but we cannot give him the needed security of home - the home he left - nor that of ongoing safety and material well-being. WE do not have it. SO - (and we have a number of children now grown up, who are jobless now, and wresting with worldly problems common to life) - we often find ourselves unable to embrace to the full! We DO embrace, hug, pour out words of gladness to SEE the struggling son or daughter - but we are unable to ' put a ring on his finger, provide new clothes, or restore to the family prosperity he had once enjoyed when a child. The leave then disappointed and perhaps even disillusioned about US, and we watch them go, helplessly and often our heart broken to see their plight. WE are helpless to help ......or is that our help is not enough. GOD OPENS HIS ARMS ABUNDANTLY. He offers, and happily provides the COMFORT and the RELIEF of an affectionate heart that is ever waiting to be called upon for welcome and embrace. Thereafter comes the materially re-enforced evidence of the sincerity of that welcome - BUT we humans in our human situation may not always be able to extend the welcome beyond the physical embrace and loving words - OUR cupboard might be bare, our wardrobe empty, and our available cash not there! We may not have the FUTURE needed in our hands to give - and thus we try to open up the eyes and heart of expectation in this desperate life to CHRIST once more. If we fail in this, there is nothing left but, after a brief time, to turn our lost child to the door, and back to the situation he is running from as an adult, adrift and alone without the Everlasting Arms of Jesus.........We are left to lift the life to God in Christ, and to believe for the best. I personally have had no human recourse but to do just this to TWO of our former children now grown to manhood and out there in the world, ALONE.
We should - as imitators of Christ - always be THERE for the lost one, family or stranger; always willing to assist even with the material necessity that we might have first call upon. You know - willing to give MY bread (my own meal) to the hungry; My own home to the homeless; My own clothes to the naked..
Isaiah 58v6-12. This IS a BIG deal. This is CHRIST living in me in the fullest way - it will mean ME living for YOU in Christ's Name, and trusting HIM for the increase. It sounds RIGHT, and I believe it IS perfectly right, but the DOING of it needs FAITH beyond what any of us normally feel that we have.
We REASON for our OWN security, safety - considering that we do not KNOW, always for sure, where OUR next need is coming from. God may forget, overlook, or be asleep. WELL it is clearly that if we have the help needed by the one asking and we refrain from letting him/her have it, we do not well. It is more than clear that if we know to do what is GOOD in God's sight and we refrain from doing it - it IS sin!
Likewise we know that whatever we do without FAITH in God to secure us IS also SIN. Proverbs 3v27 / Galatians 6v10 / Romans 14v23 / James 4v17. So where do we stand? I believe that we are only ALIVE on any one day in order to IMPROVE His Life in us. We are alive by His GRACE - his undeserved kindness - that we might GROW in grace toward others, so that we might ever, increasingly, be ready to Love them, Forgive them, show Mercy toward them, and to extend whatever help they may require of us that might be actually available to us. At 73+ I feel more and more propelled towards this outlook and goal. I feel the need to more and more take care that I do not fail of the Grace of God.... Hebrews 12v15 Thanks for one more day Lord to apply myself towards it.
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THE WEATHER here in 'sunny' Kenya is OVERCAST and DRAB. No sun here. RAIN in plenty still, and cool temperatures. Looks as if it might continue a while - indeed all of this current year has been such as to dissuade any in believing we live in the tropics. Really reminds me of Manchester right now - though that's OK by me as it keeps me sharp and feeling good. Only the tourist gets disappointed.
The EXAMINATIONS have continued and although we went ahead and reported the problems we had discovered to the Authorities there has been no actual disturbance. Those students concerned were warned and their phones taken away for further examination. They were all allowed to continue on to completion. We think that nothing more will happen until the actual 'Marking of Papers' is also completed sometime in December. NOW the internal End Term Exams are taking place and soon ALL will be ended and the School finally closed for Christmas.
A LONG holiday is before us, and we are all getting ready to make sure all the children will be occupied and given enough work and play to occupy them happily. We will need your prayers. Christmas here is without the glamour or glitter of Christmas in the West. Reading of all the Christmas Readiness being seen in London we feel very much BEHIND in being ready in any way. Eldoret streets never change; no special Christmas lighting in streets or shops generally speaking. One or two small exceptions. All will look the same throughout. We ourselves usually start putting up some decorations on or around the 12th December No presents and few innovations in the diet apart from Road Chicken on Christmas Day.
NEXT YEAR we shall have TWELVE new students for the Homes entering Secondary School for the first time, and we have to look to provide School uniform for all of them additionally to our other usual expenses.
God is over all, and we look to Him. OH! Esther has just discovered two jars of mincemeat for Mince Pies - must have been in a cupboard for more than two years!! But they have not yet expired so we MIGHT find a few pies being made this Christmas as an added surprise.
Take care everyone. Remember the BIRTH of Jesus and keep Him in mind and heart through this period in our calender. What can we all give HIM this year I wonder. I must keep alert and listen to the prompting of the Holy Spirit........We love YOU all. God BLESS and surround you with His Love.
John and Esther
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