MFT39

What a wonderful gift faith is. It is given to us by God and he expects us to make the best possible use of it that we are capable of. It is not an alternative to knowledge. It is a path to knowledge. Hence it is up to us to make use of it when confronted with the most significant questions that we face in life. I invite you to a kind of openness that believes that truth is more important than anything else. I certainly believe that God is the source of all truth.

If you will only be fair and honest in your asking, seeking and knocking you will be surprised at the results, for God has inexplic- able ways of making his will known to us through the power of faith. There will come to you an assurance, as it came to Saul of Tarsus so many years ago, probably not by blinding as it did for Saul, but in no uncertain means God will come to you from the inside out, not in reverse order. Let me assure you that you will know beyond a shadow of a doubt what God's purpose is for your life.

I can tell you from my own experience that it took a while for God to get through to me but when he finally did there was no question about what I had to do. I had felt the urge to go into the ministry in my teen years, but I didn't follow the leading. Instead I got a job in a factory, got married to my sweetheart, and we produced three of the most wonderful girls on earth (doesn't every parent feel that way). But I'm sure it must be true the way they look after me.

But then God spoke to me again and I couldn't ignore his calling me this time. It was a difficult decision to make, what with four mouths to feed besides my own, and me without a college education and no experience in the field of ministry. However, this time we answered the innermost call of the Spirit and launched out in faith on that new road that took us into four Yearly Meetings and to the International Headquarters of Friends where we spent 17 years , for a total of 39 years in ministry in a variety of ways.

Yes, dear friends, there is a God, and he doesn't leave you forsaken. His gift of faith will carry you through. Of that I have absolutely no doubt. None!

I am now 89 years old and have found another wonderful wife after 61 years of marriage, to comfort and care for me in my declining years. She too had 57 years of marriage behind her. Ours has been and still is an amazing second love relationship. We neither one believe that it has been anything but God's will for our lives. We have had over seven years of a wonderful relationship in spite of my emergency surgery and the following strokes just four months following our wedding. Yes God is good!

My prayer is that you, dear reader, will find God as authentic in your life as I have in mine.