Title:- Some Words From The Weaponry of The Marching Man
Luke 18:29,30 “Assuredly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or parents or brothers or wife or children, for the sake of the kingdom of God, who shall not receive many times more in this present time, and in the age to come eternal life.”
After many disconnected years, I remember receiving the letter from a couple of old Calebs. In the photographs they sent, I could still see the light of Jesus shining from their eyes. For decades, they had lived a life of faith and trust in God, and had influenced countless thousands. It did not come without a cost, but they had borne it well and counted it a privilege to serve the Lord. They had given up the American dream many years ago, and sought a better dream, if you will, an heavenly vision, even a city whose builder and maker was God. It did not come without a cost, but their reward shall be great. Loving; leaving; cost and reward, should all be familiar words in the weaponry of the marching man.
Kipling in his poem ‘Harp Song of a Dane Woman’ talks of the astonishment of women who see their Viking men going off to sea again and again, going out to court, as it were, the ‘Old Grey Widow Maker’ of the sea, and in so doing always taking the chance that they might not return to their own loving arms.
In Louisville Kentucky, in the centre of the Ohio river, lay many islands, but it is ‘Sand Island’ that contains the evidence of pre-pilgrim sea faring settlers, that also coincides with an old Indian legend of a tribe of fierce white warriors with golden hair who used to live there in the long, long, long ago. Who knows for sure, but maybe the Welsh or even the Vikings made it to Louisville, way, way before the pilgrim fathers ever landed on these American shores? If so, it was a long and costly journey that left many perplexed and watching loved ones behind. It was a journey they never came back from:
Then you drive out where the storm clouds swallow
And the sound of your oar blades falling hollow
Is all that we have left through months to follow
What is a woman that you forsake her,
And the hearth fire and the home acre,
To go with the old grey Widow-maker?
It was two brave Mennonite missionaries who sold themselves into a lifetime of slavery that they might wait upon three thousand British slaves held in isolated captivity from the rest of the world. It was two brave Mennonite missionaries who having sold themselves, used the money to buy passage to that island, where as slaves, they would minister Christ to slaves. It was these same two Mennonite missionaries who linked arms and waved at their weeping relatives on the Dockside. It was these same two Mennonite missionaries who cried out to their relatives who they would NEVER see again and left a prophetic shout that would energise Mennonite missions for countelss years to come, “May the Lamb that was slain, receive the reward of His suffering!”They sailed over the Horizon and were never seen or heard of again.I wonder if there are still many Christian soldiers around who would be willing to forsake all things for the sake of the Gospel, and the Lord Himself? I wonder if this generation has any Amy Carmichaels or Jim Elliot’s and other brave sacrificial souls, of whom the world is not worthy? I wonder if there are any waiting warriors, the all-forsaking kind I mean, fierce and familiar with the words and weaponry of the marching man? If there are, then they shall go down to the sea in ships, and see the wonders of the Lord.
Listen: - Three times I was beaten with rods; once I was stoned; three times I was shipwrecked; a night and a day I have been in the deep; in journeys often, in perils of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils of my own countrymen, in perils of the Gentiles, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils among false brethren; in weariness and toil, in sleeplessness often, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness — besides the other things, what comes upon me daily: my deep concern for all the churches. 2 Corinthians 11:25-28
Pray: - Take my life and let it be, consecrated Lord to thee. Take care of those we love who are not forsaken by us, but are, never the less, so very left behind. In Jesus name we ask it, amen and amen.
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