WHAT KIND OF CHRISTIAN ARE YOU?

(I found this letter in an old office file. It was written by Merle Craigmiles, a member of the first church I served as pastor. I found it so touching that I wanted to share it with you. It uniquely starts with a “P.S.” and addresses the question that I borrowed as the title of this post.)

P.S. This is full of mistakes and scratched up pretty bad, but I didn’t have the time or patience to rewrite it. I know if I laid it aside to redo it, you would never get it.

Dear Mike,

Your sermon Sunday morning reminded me of something I wrote more than thirty years ago (about 1942). At that time we were living in Huntington, West Virginia. I was a member of Temple Baptist Church. We always spoke of the church building as the Temple. My hometown was just about fifty miles away, Portsmouth, Ohio. So many times, instead of going to church, we would go home. I didn’t consider myself a very faithful church member.

On one of these trips home we went visiting out in the country one Sunday evening. It was summer; she had chairs out on the lawn. When she invited us in, we said, “Let’s just sit out here.” In a few minutes a church bell started ringing. The sound of that church bell did something to me. I had a real homesick feeling to be back in church. When I explained to my friend how I felt, she said, “Let’s go. We have a good preacher. We have as good singers as you would find in any church.”

When we went inside the church, the first thing I noticed was a plaque on the wall that read:

     If every member of this church

     Was a member just like me,

     What kind of church

     Would this church be?

The preacher’s sermon was good. I enjoyed the singing so much; also the fellowship of the friendly people. But the verse I read on that plaque stayed with me.

I would sit in the Temple at Huntington, West Virginia and have a mental picture of what the church would look like if all the members were like me.

One day I went home from church and wrote this down. I called it:

Something to Think About

Then I thought of the Heavenly Father

as He looks down from His throne on High,

and I wondered what He thought

of Christians such as I.

I thought of the sorrow ‘twould give Him

I thought of the anguish, the pain

He would feel He had sent Christ Jesus

To die on Calvary, in vain.

Then I thought of the joy ‘twould give Him

If we were all like the faithful few;

Now friends, think this over,

What kind of Christian are you?

                     Merle Craigmiles