Memorable People and Memorable Experiences ~Pastor Bob Mankaka

I hope you all had a happy Memorial Day holiday. God bless you as you remember Father God for how He took you off death row through His love and the sacrifice of Jesus Christ (Colossians 2:13-15). Make your personal time and talking with Him a memorable experience.

It is surprising to hear my son Michael remind me of the little things I told him when he came to sit with me or when he laid his head on my lap. Sometimes I hear him recount those same things to his friends. Does that tell you anything? Oh yes. It tells us that the time this boy is spending with his dad has been slowly impacting him, and he won’t forget it. In fact, I can go in my “computer memory” . . . oh sorry, I should say my brain . . . as far back as possible in my youth and bring back the file of my experience with my late dad. There are times we spent together and experiences with him that I can bring back today and see crystal clear. Those are memorable experiences with my dad that I will never forget. Do you really want me to open that old file and recount to you one of those good experiences with my dad? Very well.

We were in a very hot region of the tropics. (By the way, the equator cuts my native country in half, so you know how hot it gets.) I was ten, and one day my dad asked me to accompany him to the forest and cut down the field (deforest). In my mind I can still see the road that took us into the valley that led into the forest. I was so very hot in that giant tropical forest. The river was a couple of miles away from the field, and water was nowhere to be gotten. I got so thirsty that I could not bear it anymore. Tears started streaming down my cheeks.

Three days earlier we’d had a visit from a friend of my parents, Papa Gaston, who lived in Pembe, a village five miles uphill. We loved Papa Gaston because he always brought very sweet oranges that were so sought after in that hot region. Now, as you may guess, Papa Gaston brought us a sack of oranges that day, which we had fallen on and eaten. (We were a very large family including adopted kids and nephews and nieces that my parents joined to the family - we were an army indeed!) We ate all the oranges.

Now in the forest that day with the thirst that was killing me, I started being so upset with myself, "Ho! How foolish I was to have eaten all those sweet juicy oranges. Why didn’t I think to hide one or two? Oh, imagine if I had Papa Gaston's orange right now! How long will it be before Papa Gaston visits us again?" So I went on rehashing in my thirsty thoughts while, koko, koko, ko ko ko, my father continued to hack and chop down those tall tropical trees. When the hacking ko ko ko ceased for two minutes, krwash-krwash, I heard the noise of dried tropical leaves crushing under walking feet. There was my sweating dad walking toward me in the dark forest, "Hhhhh, it is break time," he said. Then, he reached down for the small bag he had hidden in the forest the day before, "Here," he said to me, tending something like a yellow, round tennis ball. Oh no, it is a nice ripened orange!

It was Papa Gaston's juicy sweet orange! Then out came another one, then another. Imagine my joy! When we were eating three days earlier, Dad had put away a bunch and taken them to the forest, so they served their purpose in a due time. I will never forget that forest experience with my dad. So you want the next story? No, I will tell you more on Sunday if you want.

You see, the way is open, the door is wide open, and Father God has also gotten every necessary thing ready for you to make the time you spend before Him (pouring your heart before Him) such a memorable experience. Yes, the Living God, your Father has designed and intended for a live relationship with Him so that your time with Him will grab your deeper soul and will remain a memorable experience that will quicken your faith and explode your zeal for Him more and more. Come near your Father God, and he will come near to you his son/daughter (Heb. 4:8). "But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you" (Matt 6:6). Go before your Father and lay out before Him the plan you have for the week, telling Him what you would like to see done this week.