Old Friends

This past week I took eight other men with me (six from our congregation) to Concord, North Carolina for the car show that was held at Lowe's Motor Speedway. I had the good fortune to pastor the Branchview First Church of God in Concord for nearly ten years. The Lord blessed our time there in some remarkable ways. We saw a number of people won to Christ during those ten years. I naturally officiated a lot of weddings and funerals and dedicated a lot of babies. If memory serves me correctly we had about 45 babies born into the congregation during my stay. That is a lot of babies for a congregation that never exceeded 151 in average attendance for any year that we served there. Someone might wonder how that could be. You would need to understand how fluid the economy was there at that time. We would have maybe three or four new families move into our area from out of state while at the same time see the same number of families be transfered through their jobs and leave us. We got really good and unloading and loading moving vans!

One of the great things about my time there was the friends we made while we were there. Unfortunately many of them have passed on. One of the most notable people in my life was a friend I made there by the name of J.O. Fletcher. J.O. died nearly 19 years ago but many of the lessons I learned from watching his life still serves me well. One of the greatest of those lessons was the unwavering confidence that J.O. demonstrated in God's ability to take care of His Church. This was a lesson J.O. had learned from his walk with the Lord. On many occasions J.O. would reassure me everything would be okay when a problem arose because it was "GOD'S" Church and God would take care of the problem if we would only seek His face and allow the Holy Spirit to work.

J.O. is not the only friend I made while I was in North Carolina. There are several others such as Brett & Cindy Wood, Wimp & Bett Kindley, Bill & Atha Gray, Charles & Gladys Lambert, Frank & Barbara Patterson and a host of others.

Two of the best friends I have form that area did not attend our church, Clifford and Margaret Ferguson. They are dear christian people but they attended a Baptist church in the area. Clifford and I got acquainted through his sister Evelyn who did attend our church. We spent many hours behind Clifford's pack of beagle dogs, fixing fence, cutting firewood and doing a host of other things together. I moved from Concord on the 20th day of December, 1993 and yet during all those years Clifford and I have missed talking to each other only a few weeks in those 14 plus years.

I was reminded this past week how special all of those friendships have been to me down through the years. The same could be said of the other places I have served the Lord. All of this friendships came about because of our common relationship in Jesus Christ. He is my best friend and I have come to realize that almost every other great relationship I have with some one else is rooted in Him. These are people who really loved me. People who have prayed for me. People who wanted me to succeed. I was reminded last week how bland my life would be if it were not for my many christian friends. I was also reminded of the great contribution each of those friends have made to my life. I know where I would be without Christ but where would I be without my christian friends, nay more, much more than friends, my Brothers and Sisters in Christ?

I have learned this lesson: never take the people God has placed in your path for granted. Time may very well prove they are the greatest people you will ever know in this life!

Just something to think about.

Pastor Jordan