I received an email notification reminding me of the tenth anniversary of a dear friend's passing. I do not know for sure how the email was generated, but maybe because I left a condolence on the funeral home website in 2011.
The reminder brought both tears and smiles. Our friend that passed had been a big part of so many events in our lives. He has been gone ten years and we still miss him and look for him at certain times and at certain events. He was a fixture in our lives.
I have found that remembering old friends that have gone home often provokes such a response in me. I miss my friends and that sometimes brings buckets of tears, yet their memory produces smiles as well.
I am not very sentimental about things. Kelly Jo says we have trained ourselves not to be sentimental, because of the mobile lifestyle we have lived. I think she has a point. Things come and go and they do not have much importance to us. We do not allow ourselves to get attached to things or even places.
However, we are deeply attached to people. We are sentimental about people in churches and communities and families all over the USA and in Nigeria as well. We are firmly attached to people that have become near and dear to us and we can not imagine life without them.
The churches where we have ministered for years are full of individuals and families that have become family to us. We have enjoyed the blessings of God together on many occasions and we will never forget the joy and peace we have experienced in their presence.
They pray for us with sincerity and passion. I know God hears them when they pray. We pray for them and we can not wait until the next time we see them and worship God with them again.
Yes, we are definitely sentimental about people in our lives. While typing, my mind is flying from state to state. I am thinking about people in Ohio, Indiana, Kentucky, Tennessee, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Texas and on and on and on.
You may see I did not name your state, but you know I am thinking about your state, your church and you. You are family. You are special. You have embraced us and we embrace you in return.
Some of you read my ramblings every day and you must know that we love you and think of you often. We are not ready to turn any of you loose. We are way past ready to crank the BoggsMobile, back out of this barn, hook up the jeep and roll these wheels!
This is the reality, though. We must turn people loose at times. We have turned friends loose over the last year due to COVID and its effects. We turned a dear friend loose this week after he battled horrible illness for years.
Jeff Ward, from our home church, slipped into eternity this week at 42 years old. It is so incredibly sad. His wife and children and grandchildren are left without him. His church and friends are left without him.
We are weeping. We are grieving. We are confused. We are hurting.
But we do not sorrow as those which have no hope. Our sorrow is not the sorrow of those that do not know Christ and have no prospect at all of a reunion. We are going to see Bro. Jeff again. We are going to see the saints again. We are going to spend eternity with Christ and with one another!
We are instructed to comfort one another with these words. Even in painful, awful, dreadful death, the hope of the reunion in resurrection should bring us comfort.
I Thessalonians 4:13 But I would not have you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning them which are asleep, that ye sorrow not, even as others which have no hope.
14 For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so them also which sleep in Jesus will God bring with him.
15 For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent them which are asleep.
16 For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first:
17 Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord.
18 Wherefore comfort one another with these words.
Oh, God, help us to believe. Help us to receive.
May God bless you, dear friends. Thank you for spending a few moments with me today.
Davy
