"The Key to the Kingdom.................."

Last night’s visit to the rescue mission was one of the best we’ve known there, the room almost packed and a couple of the men sharing testimony with us after an old Gaither hymn. Dave would speak to them afterwards on “trusting the Lord”, followed by my son-in-law making his sax sing. I would have about seven minutes to tie the hour together with a final point and take them into final prayer after Tony closed; but, in truth, needed no more than that, everyone there one in spirit after hearing him share. It was no big theological message. He only used one verse of Scripture and that only in ending. It was not what he had intended to say, just something that had passed through his thoughts earlier and then dismissed. Something said in our midst, though, took him again to his father’s ninetieth birthday having just occurred; and, with a tear in his eye, he began to tell of how his dad, as a young man, felt a call of God on his life. A few years into Bible college, however, when he and a few others came to believe that the ecclesiastical community had it all wrong, they abandoned further education in favor of creating their own branch of Christianity. Down the road, of course, people being people, they found themselves with but one more tarnished copy of what they had sought to avoid and their little group eventually folded. Pop was now in his seventies and left with the knowledge of having “missed the mark”. When his son called, therefore, trying to enlist his help in the remodeling of an inner city cinema, an effort to reach the poor in downtown Cincinnati, he was reluctant at first; but an inner “anchor-line” yet held him to his Savior and his surrender to the request became a commitment that has lasted not quite two decades. At one point his wife questioned the matter, why such devotion to this at his age, especially after the journey already taken in error. Tony had tears in his eyes as he repeated his father’s answer. Pointing to his copy of the Book, Mr. Foote replies: “Somewhere in here it’s written that love covers a multitude of sins.” Closing in prayer came easy……