Saturday, February 26, 2011

"Here she comes!"

"  I am standing upon the seashore.  A ship at my side spreads her white sails to the morning breeze and starts for the blue ocean.  She is an object of beauty and strength.  I stand and watch her until at length she hangs like a speck of white cloud just where the sea and sky come to mingle with each other.

Then someone at my side says:  "There, she is gone!"

"Gone where?"

Gone from my sight.  That is all.  She is just as large in mast and hull and spar as she was when she left my side and she is just as able to bear the load of living freight to her destined port.

Her diminished size is in me, not in her.  And just at the moment when someone at my side says:  "There she is gone!"  There are other eyes watching her coming, and other voices ready to take the glad shout:  "Here she comes!"

And that is dying."

- Henry Van Dyke

"There are many rooms in my Father's house; I would not tell you this were it not true.  I am going there to prepare a place for you.  After I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me so that you may be where I am. John 14: 2-3

Note the promise of Jesus.  "I will come back and take you to be with me."  He pledges to take us home. He does not delegate this task.  He may send missionaries to teach you, angels to protect you, teachers to guide you, singers to inspire you and physicians to heal you, but he sends no one to take you.  He reserves this job for himself.  " I will come back and take you home." He is your personal Shepherd.  And he is personally responsible to lead you home.  And because He is present when any of His sheep die, you can say what David said "I will fear no evil."

-Max Lucado "Traveling Light"