Árdís - 01.01.1955, Page 17

Ársrit Bandalags lúterskra kvenna
15
The Best Years of Your Life
BY ELEANORE L. GILLSTROM
What was the best year of your life? Was it when as a baby
you were fed and clothed and all your needs cared for by your
parents? Or when you were in school and the year of graduation
meant entrance upon your life work? Was it when you were
married and later children completed your family circle? Or was
it the years your first child was married?
Those were good years. But something more is needed to make
them the best years of your life. Birth into a family was given
new meaning when through baptism we became members of God’s
family, the Church. School years were leavened with Sunday
School instruction. A sure foundation for our life was laid in
catechetical instruction and confession of Christ as Saviour and
Lord was made upon the day of confirmation. Services of worship
and young people’s groups helped in the expression of our faith
and discussion of our problems. When the wedding day approached
it was highlighted by mutual decision to have a Christian home
and family. As years went by opportunities came for service in the
Church. Blessings were balanced by sorrows and hardships. Look-
ing back some will say that the years of sorrows and hardships
were the best for it was then that they came to know the Lord and
His purposes for their life even better than before. The good years
were the best years when each was “Anno Domini”—the year of
our Lord.
The best years of your life were when the shadow of the Lord
fell upon them, were they not? When the Church was there guiding
through a pastor, a Sunday School teacher, a friend, parents and
family? An explanation of the truth of the gospel, a word of comfort
in sorrow, a home where Christ was more than a guest, a mother or
father who showed by life as well as word that the Christian way
was the glorious way of life yet not always the easiest—all these
helped. It was the Church, the fellowship of believers, and the Head
of the Church working in your life that made those good years the
best years of your life.