“I never thought I would live to be this old,” Admits the author as he introduces you to his call to the service of God with the benefit of years already spent seeking and finding his presence.
“All my life,” he says I was taught how to die as a Christian, but no one ever taught me how I ought to live in the years before I die. I wish they had because I am an old man now, and believe me, it’s not easy.”
In this candid style, Billy Graham talks about the burdens and sorrows that press down upon me at this stage of my life will be over sooner rather than later, and that, during the last year, the physical ailments common to old age really have taken their toll on him.
He looks forward to the day he will be reunited with Ruth, his beloved wife and best friend for almost sixty-four years, who went home t God in 2007. Although he rejoices that her struggles with weakness and pain have come to an end, he still feels as if a part of his has been ripped out, and he misses her far more than he ever could have imagined.
As he says, with good humour: “No, old age is not for sissies.” Yet that isn’t the whole story, nor did God intend for it to be. Because although the Bible doesn’t gloss over the problems we face as we grow older, neither does it paint old age as a time to be despised or a burden to be merely endured. Nor does it condemn us to useless and ineffectiveness, endless boredom or meaningless activity.
Rather the Bible says that God has a reason for keeping us here; if He didn’t, He would take us to Heaven far sooner.
In this book, Billy Graham invites you to explore not only the realities of later life but the hope, fulfilment and joy that can be yours once you learn to look at these years from God’s point of view and discover His strength that sustain you day by day. His book helps you discover what it means not only to grow older, but, with God’s help, to grow older in grace.
For yourself or for another, this is the book for helping you to build strong foundations on the gift of years, facing life’s transitions such as retirement and the loss of loved ones, continuing to make wise decisions and deepening your understanding of our glorious hope.
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