AL: Joni, I'm at the age where, well… so many of my friends are leaving Margaret and me for that better land, that Beulah-land, and I tell you, it’s hard saying goodbye to these loved ones who have gone home to heaven…
JONI: Well, Al, I think you may be speaking to lots of our listeners today. I can just guess that your words are resonating in the hearts of a few older saints who are tuning in. They, too, have had to say goodbye this year to their long-time Christian friends who have gone on to glory.
AL: And you know, as much as Margaret and I try to prepare for these passages, there’s no way we can ever “ready” ourselves enough… it’s always a bit of a shock… a blow… but our main comfort is having the solid assurance that one day we will be with, well… Dave Crane, our 81 year old Christian friend; we knew Dave and his wife, Elaine, for many, many decades. Dave was born in China of missionary parents… Dave’s father built a church in Hoi-ping where he had a ministry to blind women (years ago Chinese parents felt that the birth of a girl was a bad omen… they would either kill their girl infant or rub poisonous plants in their eyes which caused blindness).When the Cultural Revolution swept across China in the 50’s, Dave’s family was forced out of the country – the Communists took the church Dave’s father built and turned it into a chicken manure factory; and they also took over the dormitory he had built to care for the blind women.
JONI: And, Al, you and Margaret traveled to China to be apart of dedicating a new church building Dave and Elaine helped build, isn’t that right?
AL: Yes, and that’s a story in itself! You see, because the Communists felt Dave was a “son of the sod,” (that is he grew up in China), they’ve given numerous churches back to the Christians, all of which are now flourishing in many regions in southern China.
JONI: Well, that’s wonderful!
AL: Anyway, while we were back in Hoi-ping helping to dedicate a new church building, we were thrilled to meet some of the elderly blind ladies who remembered Dave when he was in Hoi-ping as a boy – we watched them touch Dave’s face and, oh, was there ever rejoicing that day! It warms my heart, Joni, to think of the many people in China who will join him in heaven one day! Speaking of which, when we went to see Dave as he was dying, one of the songs we sang around the bedside was a hymn his father used to sing standing on the roof of the church in Hoi-ping. It was "Bringing in the Sheaves;" however, he always sang it "Bringing in Chinese." (Al and Joni sing this a little)…
JONI: And you know, that’s the bottom-line, isn’t it? Heaven is the bottom-line for us all. And although the cancer which took Dave, was difficult and heartbreaking, I always think of the painful throes of dying as kind of birth pangs…
AL: … “birth pangs that will one day spill us out into heaven’s lap,” as I believe you wrote in a note to Dave the day before he died, Joni. What a touching image, a beautiful picture that was to him and his wife.
JONI: That means a lot, Al. And I don’t mean to cast a pall here, but it’s what we all will face one day…
AL: … those birth pangs! (Ouch)…
JONI: It ain’t gonna be easy. Yep, that’s right! But just as an infant must travel down that dark and narrow pathway to be born out into a new world – a world he never, ever could have possibly pictured, it’s so bright and wonderfully different, in the same way one day we will be born into that heavenly world and will be welcomed by the open and extended arms of many loved ones who have gone before. Heaven is the bottom-line, the landscape, the finish line, and the open door of welcome for us all.
AL: And the challenge is for us to get ready for that journey… because everything we do here, has a direct bearing on our capacity for joy and worship, and service over there.
JONI: That’s right, and heaven may be as near as next year, or next week. So it sure makes good sense to take some time talking candidly about that future reserved for us, right? And today, I thank Dave Crane for getting the conversation started.
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