Christian Living

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Larry Lilly's Letter Thursday April 7, 2011

Every now and then the phone rings and it is a surprisingly refreshing conversation that follows. Such happened to me on Tuesday evening.

I immediately recognized the man's voice, though I had not seen or heard him speak for 16 or 17 years. When I met him we were going through what many would refer to as the toughest time in life. Statistically our families were in serious danger, as was our very life and through it all we learned to truly trust in Jesus.

My long lost friend let me know in no uncertain terms that I had been a tremendous influence in his life through simply being real in a false world. I was in one of those moods where I really needed to hear that at least some of my life has not been in vain.

He told me that after and in spite of many dangers toils and snares as Newton has it, he and his wife and children worked things out and he is now a preacher of the gospel of Christ on radio and television and does a lot of special work among the poorest of the poor in the inner city. He loves every minute of his ministry. I actually fought back tears when he shared his testimony of God's amazing grace in his life.

The only thing he could have told me that would have more miraculous would have been to hear that he is now a gospel singer. I have heard him sing in chapel services and perhaps the producers of his TV program pay him to sing in the shower.

As my friend and I talked I thought of the grunts and groans, often accompanied with a praise, that passed for congregational singing in a prison chapel, usually without piano accompaniment. Awful was a very good day. Yet in the midst of this time God put a song in this man's heart.

I pass through his part of the country and the next time through I am invited to visit etc. I am looking forward to this.

After the long phone call I set to recalling many of the events and people mentioned. It was a good time. I thought of the chaplain's wife, Luann Woodcox, who could sing with an angelic voice that moved the men closer to heaven. I remember watching many a man, considered little more than a hardened criminal shed a tear and experience a truly life changing encounter with Jesus in these services. I recall hearing her sing, "His Eye Is OnThe Sparrow" and knowing the Lord lifted me higher than ever.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow wrote:

"God sent His singers upon the earth with songs of sadness and of mirth that they might touch the hearts of men and bring them back to heaven again."

In another time, another place it is said of Paul and Silas in the prison at Philippi that they had the real deal as recorded in Acts 16:25:

And at midnight Paul and Silas prayed, and sang praises unto God: and the prisoners heard them.

Larry Lilly Copyright © 2011 Use with Credit

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