Lesson 10

MY ANSWER TO CHRIST

These pages have told a story, a remarkable story of great love. They have told me of God’s love for me. If there is a real difficulty in believing it all, it comes from the doubt whether God’s love for me could be so great.

We have seen how God created this whole marvelous universe for man, with all its wonders that our scientists today are still discovering. He created man, He created us with a powerful mind which makes us masters of the universe, and he gave us a free-will with which we can make our own decisions and govern our own lives, and with which we are able to love God and our fellow human beings.

But part of my story is that, with terrible ingratitude, I turned my back on God’s love for me, and like the selfish younger son, I used the very gifts God has given me to sin against His love. I destroyed God’s friendship with me. I made myself His enemy.

THE HOUND OF HEAVEN

Yet God’s love pursued me, even when I fled away from Him, as the poet says;

I fled Him, down the nights and down the days;

I fled Him, down the arches of the years;

I fled Him, down the labyrinthine ways

Of my own mind; and in the mist of tears

I hid from Him, and under running laughter.

Up vistaed hopes, I sped;

And shot, precipitated,

Adown Titanic glooms of chasmed fears,

From those strong Feet that followed, followed after; 

But with unhurrying chase,

And unperturbed pace,

Deliberate speed, majestic instancy,

They beat – and a Voice beat

More instant than the Feet –