Are You Missing Someone?

          We, Diane and myself, were recently sitting and talking about the fact that we missed our parents. Mother's Day and Father's Day are not usually great days of celebration for us since our Mothers and Fathers are all gone. While thinking about this for a moment, I realized that I had not heard a comment from one of my cousins, Phyllis Miller of La Porte, Indiana. She made many a comment on the devotions as they were on Facebook. I googled the home time paper in La Porte and didn't find anything, but then went to Google and put her name in the search box. The first entry was her obituary. Phyllis had passed away on December 14, 2018. Well, I guess that is the reason I have not seen her “amen” at the end of the devotions. Second Corinthians 5:6-8 says, “Therefore we are always confident, knowing that, whilst we are at home in the body, we are absent from the Lord: (For we walk by faith, not by sight:) We are confident, I say, and willing rather to be absent from the body, and to be present with the Lord.” 

         I often use this passage when I have the opportunity to preach a funeral. It is a real hope for those of us that have been left behind as it tells us what happens at death. I don't know of too many people who are looking forward to the actual event, but what takes place and the results are fantastic. I am preparing a song to sing this month with the choral group that Diane and I not participate in and the title is, “Finally Home.” That is the excitement of the passage above. If we are at home here on this earth in this body, then we absent, physically from the Lord, but if we are absent from the body, then we are present with the Lord. Solomon also reminded us of this in Ecclesiastes 12:7 where the body returns to dust but the soul returns to God which gave it. I haven't spoken with Phyllis for many years but lately, here comments were present as a response to the devotions. From her comments one could see her love for the Lord Jesus Christ and so I am confident that she is with the Lord and participating in the wonders and beauty of heaven. She has found her new home in heaven itself. I have one friend who when he doesn't get his copy of the devotion for a couple of days, will call me and see if I answer the phone and that I am still alive. So, life is short and if you are missing someone you haven't heard from for awhile, check them out to see how they are doing. Above all, keep looking up. As I have said at the end of these devotion for the past twenty years, “Jesus is coming again.” You may meet Him in death, or you may meet Him in the rapture. Praise God for the place He is preparing for each and every believer.