\u201cI don\u2019t suppose you want this, do you? I found it when I was cleaning out the garage.\u201d<\/p>\n
I glanced up to see my dad holding a dusty and tattered cardboard box. \u201cWhat is<\/i> that?\u201d I asked, crinkling my nose as he blew the dust from the top in my general direction.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a box of my old sermons I didn\u2019t throw away when I cleaned out the church office all those years ago.\u201d<\/p>\n
Instantly, my demeanor changed. \u201cOf course I want them!\u201d I took the box from his hands and put it in my car before Dad could change his mind.<\/p>\n
He was still shaking his head when I returned to Mom\u2019s kitchen. He slurped his steaming coffee and muttered, \u201cDon\u2019t know why you want those old things. Not sure there\u2019s anything worth reading. That\u2019s why I threw out the rest.\u201d<\/p>\n
If he only knew\u2026<\/p>\n
Before my head hit the pillow that night, I had read the entire box\u2014sermon after sermon, outline after outline, point after point. I drank in my spiritual heritage with great gulps. It\u2019s not that Dad was the greatest theologian, orator, or expositor. In fact, most of his sermons were pithy and practical\u2014often topical and heavy on application. He aimed bullet point outlines at specific simple targets and hit them most every time.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n However, what his sermons lacked in flowery elegance, they made up for in the power of personal example. Dad loved Scripture\u2014still does. It is hard to remember a morning in my childhood when I didn\u2019t find him at the kitchen table with a Bible in one hand, pen and notebook in the other. I knew he had been there for hours\u2014three hours to be exact. Every morning, from 3:00 a.m. to 6:00 a.m., dad sought to understand the mysteries of Scripture, tuck them away in his heart, and apply them to his life. This love of Scripture carried over to his preaching. He couldn\u2019t help it. His simple points and sub-points found power in the memorized verses that flowed like water throughout his delivery.<\/p>\n Yet, perhaps the most powerful sermon Dad preached was through his life. Don\u2019t get the idea he was perfect. He wasn\u2019t; no one is. But his life\u00a0reflected powerful principles I have never forgotten and want to emulate: share the gospel at every opportunity; embrace the outcast, because no one is beyond the reach of God\u2019s grace; give second chances, even the third time;<\/i> and you can never, ever get too much of God\u2019s Word.<\/i><\/p>\n The world may not mention Dad\u2019s preaching in the same breath as Spurgeon, Robinson, or Sunday, but as his son, I can tell you I have few greater treasures than the \u201cgold\u201d in that old, cardboard box.<\/p>\n About the Writer: <\/b>Eric K. Thomsen is managing editor of ONE Magazine<\/a> and former president of the Evangelical Press Association.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n