Originally posted on Facebook January 4, 2021
Theme Verse:
“For whosoever will save his life shall lose it; but whosoever shall lose his life for my sake and the gospel's, the same shall save it.” Mark 8:35
“Lose” from the Greek word “Apollymi” means “to destroy fully.” It is translated “perish” in our verse for today.
“And if thy right hand offend thee, cut it off, and cast it from thee: for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not that thy whole body should be cast into hell.”
Matthew 5:30
From the very first day I met Dan it was obvious he had suffered loss. Great loss.
After knowing Dan for over 10 years, I sat in a church service hearing him preach. My first husband, Jeff Jones, had just lost his battle with leukemia. Jeff and I had been married 8 years and had 3 beautiful children. We lost an amazing husband and father. He gained Heaven.
“For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain.”
Philippians 1:21
In Dan’s sermon that day, he spoke of the loss of his right arm as a six year old boy. He talked of eternal gains from that loss. Dan shared his daughter, Tiffany’s, story. Tiffany contracted bacterial meningitis when she was 5 months old. Her brain badly damaged from the high fever, she was sent home. The family was told she would live as a “vegetable.” She would never walk or talk.
Dan spoke of a program they found to retrain Tiffany’s brain. Then spoke of the gains she had made. And I sat knowing in my heart there had been even more loss in this man’s life. Dan was a single father of 4. Yet, here he was preaching about his losses and encouraging me during my time of loss.
Acceptance is a fundamental step towards healing and helping others during their time of loss. We have much to gain when we learn to accept loss as a part of God’s plan for our life.
“Blessed be God, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies, and the God of all comfort; Who comforteth us in all our tribulation, that we may be able to comfort them which are in any trouble, by the comfort wherewith we ourselves are comforted of God.”
2 Corinthians 1:3-4
** Photo of my husband, Dan Wolfe.
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