Let me clarify: I don’t have a grandfather in the sense of a clumsy, amusing old man who visits me at Christmas, Easter, or Birthdays. There is no grey-haired man who wipes away my tears over the trivial things like if I’ll ever make friends at school, or my mum stopping me going to the park.
Both grandfathers aren’t in the picture, by way of death, divorce, or both in tandem.
But when I became a Christian, I found myself navigating something that needed a senior citizen’s two cents.
Reading the bible was awkward. Abstract. Abstruse to be honest. However, I knew that it was important.
When I went looking for answers to apply to my new walk with Christ, I came across soft-spoken (I mean in character, definitely not content) older man from Virginia who was able to help me to understand what this awkward, abstract and abstruse book meant. Not only what it meant for me, but for relating to others and God. He showed me how to be confident in the Lord and to put my trust in His word.
The Scriptures contain many stories of people who waited years or even decades before the Lord’s promises came to pass. What modern believers can learn from the patience of biblical saints like Abraham, Joseph, David, and Paul is that waiting upon the Lord has eternal rewards.
– Dr. Charles F. Stanley
I don’t think people really understand how this older man from a Southern Baptist background captivated me. Firstly, you must understand that I don’t take anything that Americans say seriously. Secondly, you need to have seen my roster of friends and acquaintances at the time. The idea that someone who looked and thought so differently to me could speak so clearly to me was astounding. In a world where an elderly white man and a young black woman are diametrically opposed, he was able to tell me something that I wasn’t able to hear in my circle.
It was only in his death that I really understood what his sermons, breakdowns of God’s word and words of encouragement were to me and what he was to me, in his corner of the world that was so removed from mine.
I really felt for the first time that I had a grandfather figure. Not a clumsy and amusing person who visited on special occasions or wiped my tears but a man who was able to pull me out of the foulest of moods and speak in such a way that enabled me to wipe my own tears and try again. A man who took God’s word so seriously and lived by it, encouraging me to do the same.
If I could sum up His words…
I don’t think I’d try. I’ve benefitted greatly from In Touch Ministries and from his sermons on hearing God’s voice, standing in faith and living a life of service to the Lord. However, my final goodbye was listening today to one of his sermons from his earlier life when he was more fiery. I feel it sums up his ministry very well.
Pepper 