Among my childhood memories is an anxious period during the Cold War, when President John Kennedy issued an ultimatum to Russian leader Nikita Khruschev to remove missiles from a Cuban launch site. My wife and I both recall school drills that involved crouching under desks in case of nuclear attack.
Those who study history realize how very close this world came to disaster during this standoff, which ended with Khruschev removing the missiles. I was blessed this Christmas with discovery of a sermon my father shared during that "crisis season" of 1962.
In the midst of that time of high anxiety, Dad posed this question: "Will you believe that there are people who do not worry about the prospect of atomic death without warning?"
He then answered boldly: "There is a way to a sure confidence that were death to come this day, life will have just begun."
He continued: "Ways and means of waging war and inflicting destruction become more terrible, but men do not change in their basic nature, loves, loyalties, fears and hopes -- because God has planted in the soul of every man a hunger to know Him and His peace."
"That desire is often perverted," he continued, "and many die trying alone to find their destiny. How tragic this is so! Still, Christ stands with open arms and calls confused, twisted and lost men and women to His peace, His salvation for now and all eternity."
The Christmas message ended with this prayer: "Dear Heavenly Father, let this be the last hopeless Christmas for all who hear, and the first joyous Christmas for as many as yet wander apart from your peace and assurance that life was given to all this day in Bethlehem -- if we will but take the gift of Jesus in whose name we pray. Amen."
We pray that prayer again today, 50 years later. May all who are fearful and alone come to know the peace of a life lived in and through Jesus Christ.
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