October 20, 2016 (Thursday)
I was a pastor in Dallas, Texas for 3 1/2 years in the early 1960s. My family and I lived in a church parsonage near the church. It was an old house, needing maintenance and repairs. Fortunately, there were men in the church who knew how to do the kind of work that was needed. Some of them were retired and volunteered their services.
One such man, in his seventies, offered his help and he came to the house to do some work. We were in the front yard, working on windows, and we used the opportunity to become good friends, getting to know each other better.
I remember our conversation today, 55 years later. I complimented Brother Campbell on his willingness to help, and suggested he had probably done things like this many times through the years. He replied that he had been a member of the church only a few short years.
He had accepted Christ and been baptized at age 72.
Knowing how rare his experience was, being saved late in life, I expressed joy and thanksgiving that he had accepted Christ as his Savior so late in life. “Yes,” he said, tears in his eyes, “I guess you are right, but I can’t help but think of all those years I wasted before I came to know the Lord.”
Several times during my lifetime I have been privileged to see elderly people come to Christ. That’s wonderful, isn’t it?
How much more wonderful, however, to come to Christ at an early age so that one can give his or her entire life to the Lord.
“If you’re saved at seventy, or even at seven,
You’re going to be with the Lord in Heaven.”