John 14: 28-29
My childhood shaped me and so did yours. Often it takes many years to reflect on how
our parents have molded and formed our character. If we are too harsh we can damage our
children, and giving them too much can also damage them. My dad was into sports, and he should have
been a high school coach, he would have been a good one. His problem was that one son had little
interest in sports, and the other was too small to be considered, so when he
was not working (shift-work, or trying to sell uniforms) he was at the high
school talking with the coaches or watching a practice. The message to his youngest child was, sports
are important! Mom was sick a lot and
she was very talented, she could look at a dress in a store display window and
sketch it and then go and buy material for a dress for my sister and make a
pattern and the dress. That made my
sister look like one of the best-dressed girls at school, and her friends could
not tell it from the one in the display case.
She also was one great grandmother to our children, they loved going to
mother’s house at 3738 Liberty drive, in Corpus Christi, for none other reason
than they were going to have fun with grandmother.
But those are not all my memoirs, one came into my mind when
I was only a child of about 4 or 5, we were walking to church, we did not own a
car, and it was a good 2 ½ to 3 mile walk to Ebony Acres Baptist church. Dad was working at the plant and mother had
three young kids walking by her side on Navigation Blvd. My sister Doris who is 18 months older than I
and brother Fred who is three years older, were behind mother and I by a good
twenty yards, when mother stopped and said in a very loud voice, children run
to me quickly! We made a habit of walking
in the edge of the farmer’s field and both my sister and brother were not on
the road when mother yelled at them, and about the time they reached mother and
I, and the 18-wheeler trailer came loose and exited the road in the area of
where my sister and brother had been.
Mother began to thank the Lord and she told us that God had told her to
call her children because a truck was going to lose it’s trailer, and that one
act had a great impact on my life.
This morning as I was reading John 14:28-29, I was reminded
that the One who told my mother to call her children is speaking to me in these
verses. “You heard me say to you, ‘I am going away, and
I will come to you.’ If you loved me, you would have rejoiced, because I am
going to the Father, for the Father is greater than I. And now I have told you
before it takes place, so that when it does take place you may believe.” Jesus is giving His disciples
a heads-up on what is going to happen, and why so they would believe. We act on our beliefs, and that is precisely
what mother did on Navigation Blvd, the day she save the live of my brother and
sister, in that she believed the voice that spoke to her. Jesus is telling His disciples and us to be
confident of His existence with the Father, even and especially when the world
system tells us there is no physical proof of Him being at the right hand of
the Father. So Jesus told them and us to
run to Him and be safe, from all the things that entice our flesh to live independent
of God and His provision. And He told us
before it happen.
From the Back Porch,
Bob Rice
No comments:
Post a Comment