HIS ONLY BEGOTTEN SON

In these days of broken homes and warring nations, how hard it is for us to appreciate the depth of God's love! How hard it is to accept as fact a caring God Who sent His Son to indwell a human frame—or, accepting the fact, to weigh its immensity against our human concept of love!



For many of us, our youth was passed in days of war. Untimely death was never far afield; sometimes it hit our very home. Men, in growing cynicism, spoke in idle chat of teens as "cannon fodder"; I know my grandfather often did, for wars were seen as often engineered for private gain. Reported causes were regarded with a grain of salt, perceived as "necessary" distortions of the truth.



For once men were not unhappy to be old—"too old," became their grim security.



We came of age amidst uneasy peace, with scattered wars that only dimly shadowed our selfish lives. We met and married sweethearts—lovely faces, curving lines—and worked long hours lining our homely nest with prideful things. Our children were a weekend occupation, once all our interests elsewhere were deferred. We loved our kids, although we barely knew them. We loved our spouses, too—some more, some less.



Yet another intruder pried its way into our family circle, hard on the heels of wars and work and woes. Television brought a greedy lifestyle, flaunting things to buy, creating "need" where none should dwell. We worked in greater frenzy to purchase what this pictured life displayed . . . and as we worked, our families decayed. Our children grew apart and found their own lives, and all too often spouses did the same.



Love was the name bestowed upon a lusting spirit, and homelife suffered greatly from the strain. When at last our marriage fell in rocky pieces, and family ties were splintered all around, we wept and mourned for missing children.



At last we treasured what had been our home. We hadn't fully counted all its blessings, when sitting, feet up, tired, sipping brew. We hadn't known what love in all its splendour could be, nor what it could do.



We wept, and thousands wept just like us. We mourned the passing marriage at its end. Our love had not been proof against the tempter; our passions, dying, made a bitter blend.



And yet . . . and yet . . . look at what God has done! He sent His Son - not a remote infant scarce known amidst life's daily strain, but that Son Who had shared His glory since Creation's dawn.



He sent His Son—not blindly assuming that all would be well, but knowing that He went, a sacrifice, to Hell.



He sent His Son—in loving grace—to save us from ourselves, a race gone mad with grasping.



He sent His Son, that, dying, we might live.



My God, my God, why have I forsaken Thee?



Teach me, I pray, to love Thy love . . . and live!