O Lord, I’m 71 Years Old Today!

The rootin’ tootin’ square shooting’ young hombre riding his imaginary steed and wearing black KEDS sneakers has turned seventy years old  today. O Lord!

The Searchers, starring John Wayne, Jeff Hunter, Ward Bond, Vera Miles, and Natalie Wood, is one of my favorite western movies. It tells the story of Ethan and Martin tracking down fifteen year-old Debbie, who had been captured in an Indian raid years earlier. But a side story holds my interest today.

Mose Harper, an old Indian scout for the U.S. Calvary, had one hope for his senior years: sitting in a rocking chair on a front porch so he could watch time pass by. Mose eventually got his wish at the end of the movie.

Well, I’m not a Mose Harper.

The passion the Lord placed in my heart almost thirty-two years ago has not lessened in the least. Oh, it’s been contained and hidden on the back side of the desert for years, but it’s still ready to explode forth for the Gospel of the Kingdom of God.

You see, my heroes are not John Wayne and Jeff Hunter, but rather, Paul the Apostle, General William Booth of the Salvation Army, Hudson Taylor, and every believer who has advanced the Kingdom in his generation without regard to his own welfare.

“When the Apostle Paul traveled to a city, a riot or a revival was the end result.” (Leonard Ravenhill)

So, hopefully by my 72nd birthday, I will either be stirring up believers or in jail.