Change -- what lies on the horizon?

Life seems filled with uncertainty. Change, constant change. I don't find change any easier than I ever did and, yet, it is one of the few constants in life.

Of all the changes I've experienced, the one that took place the day I realized the truth of my salvation was the greatest. That experience didn't bring about any great life-style changes because I had been raised in a Christian home where obedience and good behavior were simply expected of us kids.

But, the assurance that if and when "anything happens to me", I'll go to heaven because I believe in Jesus -- that was a life-changing assurance, a life-changing truth. I need not fear.

Sometime during my teen years, I believed I was to be a missionary -- yes, a missionary to Africa. I went to Bible school and graduated from the missions course, still with the intent of becoming a missionary, but I struggled with the "how to" of seeing that come to fruition.

While in Bible school, I discovered that being a missionary in some foreign land is not a paid job. One had to live by faith.

I would have to convince other people their money would be well invested by sending and supporting me on the foreign mission field.

Faith? I guess I didn't have a large enough dose of that! I was certain I could never raise enough support for the foreign field. I didn't have a clue even how to begin. So I settled for other work.

Still, God has blessed my life and since the mid 1990s I have been privileged to serve on many short-term mission teams in foreign lands (though never in Africa). Most trips have been thrilling spiritual experiences.

He has also opened the door for me to serve Him in other ways, one of which is to write this column -- a ministry I never dreamed of!

As I have watched my life unfold, I have usually been looking ahead -- to the next page, the next horizon. I wonder what's around the next curve, over the next hill and in the next valley. I don't know.

But, one thing I do know -- that same Jesus I have trusted since childhood will walk me through it and when life is over, He will escort me into the very throne room of God.

I attended a funeral this week. The 98-year-old gentleman had adamantly declared there was to be no service because "I'm so old no one remembers me." No one would come? No one would remember? At the visitation, we stood in line for nearly an hour.

He was a dearly beloved pastor who had never attended seminary but was approved and appointed by the church to serve. People of his pastorates came to pay their respects and spend time remembering good times with his children.

The service celebrated a life spent in service for Jesus.

I hope that will be the case when I, too, am called to that "home" I see on the horizon. In fact, I hope when people observe my life here they see a life being spent for Jesus.

After all, He saved me. It is only right that I serve Him.