I'll Cling To You!

After graduating from West Point , Ulysses S. Grant accepted a position in the army.  
He first served as a second lieutenant at a base in St. Louis , Missouri .  While stationed there, Grant went to visit the family of an old college friend, Fred Dent.  He would make many subsequent trips to the Dent family farm, known as White Haven, for there he met and fell in love with Dent’s sister, Julia.

Grant soon learned that his company was about to be moved to Louisiana .  Before leaving for Louisiana , he returned to White Haven to see Julia.  He took Julia for a ride in a borrowed carriage.  Coming to a flooded creek spanned by a flimsy bridge, Grant assured Julia that it was safe to cross. “Don’t be frightened,” he said. “I’ll look after you.”

“Well,” replied Julia, “I shall cling to you whatever happens.”

True to her word, she clung tightly to Grant’s arm as they drove safely across. Grant drove on in thoughtful silence for a few minutes, then cleared his throat and said…

“Julia, you said back there that you would cling to me whatever happened. Would you like to cling to me for the rest of our lives?”

She said “yes”, and they were married in August 1848.  Julia kept “clinging” to her husband until he died on July 23, 1885.

In our lives, due to our sins, we are separated from God.  As Isaiah told the people of Israel , “Your iniquities have separated you from your God; And your sins have hidden His face from you, So that He will not hear” (Isaiah 59:2).  We find ourselves, as it were, separated from God by a gulf flooded with our sins, impossible 
to CROSS  by our own actions.

But God loved us so much that He gave His Son Jesus to come to our rescue (John 3:16).  Jesus died on the CROSS to pay the price of redemption for our sins (Ephesians 1:7).  Jesus said, “I AM the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me” (John 14:6).  He invites us to “cling” to Him in trusting obedience, a-CROSS the Bridge of Reconciliation (Jesus Himself) to a relationship with God that leads to eternal life in heaven.

To “cling” to Jesus, we must: believe and trust in Him (Acts 16:30-31), put our sins behind us in repentance (2 Corinthians 7:9-10), confess Jesus as the Son of God, the Savior of the World (Romans 10:9-10), and be baptized (immersed) in His name for the forgiveness of sins (Acts 2:38).  Then, if we continue to “cling” to Him in faithful obedience, He will carry us to heaven one day (1 John 1:7).

Won’t YOU “cling” to Jesus in trusting obedience and find safe passage to eternal life?

David A. Sargent, Minister

Church of Christ at Creekwood 
1901 Schillinger Rd. S.
Mobile, Alabama  36695

To Subscribe to "Living Water" send a blank e-mail to:

                      HTML version:  subscribe-livingwater@lyris.dundee.net
                   TEXT version:  subscribe-livingwater-text@lyris.dundee.net

Follow this link to locate the church of Christ nearest you: www.churchzip.com

Archived issues of "Living Water" can be accessed from our website at: www.creekwoodcc.org