THE SHEPHERD’S CORNER

On Tuesday we cremated Oom Tek Bien and on Friday, we released his ashes to the Pacific Ocean via Long Beach. We will not see him at church—or anywhere on this side of the heavens—because he is already on the other side of the heavens. Based on John 5:24, we can say with confidence, he “has crossed over from death to life.”

We, Christians, are not perfect; we are only confident—that we became children of God not based on our goodness but on God’s goodness. And, that one day we will live in His Heavenly Home not because we have reserved it but because Jesus has prepared it for us. We are confident because we believe in what God has told us.

Life is a journey. We do not know all the details of the way or what will happen on the way. What we do know is the final destination—God’s eternal home. And, the reason we know is because someone left heaven for the earth 2,000 years ago. The Son of God left the splendor of heaven for the sorrow of the world. It was in and through Him we have been assured of our final destination.

One of the spiritual giants who served the Lord in a mission field was Amy Carmichael, a British woman who went to India and died in India. At the latter part of her life she suffered from severe neuralgia—an intense burning and stabbing pain caused by irritation of or damage to a nerve—in the right shoulder and hand. This condition rendered her fingers almost immovable.

When she learned that in all probability she would never be able to write anymore, this was what she said to her nurse, “I gave that hand to the Lord for Him to use and now He has taken it again.” This is what we also have to say as well as we travel home.

Pastor Paul