.

He of course was a war hero serving his country as all veterans are in reality, no matter if they happened to be at Pearl Harbor or in another conflict. For sixty years he never spoke of his experience on December 7^th 1941. But when he felt people were forgetting about the lessons from World War II and patriotism he began to speak. Those who heard him speak said he was like a grandfather and was well loved by everyone who heard him.

Today I see him as another kind of hero, another dying breed that I find more important these days. I find him as a hero of love. Packed away in an article about him was the fact that he had been married for 60 years.

Imagine all the experiences that a couple could go through in 60 years. The good times of family, friends, graduations, celebrations, vacations and time together. Then of course there are the dark days that a couple would go through, the deaths, disappointments, dreams unfulfilled. Think too of all the times someone could have walked out, could have found greener pastures on some other hill.

Listen to a quote from a friend about his last days, “At the last minute he was trying to stay alive, not in a frantic sort of way, but because he wanted to take care of his wife.” To his final moments his final thoughts were of his wife and caring for her. A hero of love always is thinking of the other person.

His wife, well she is a hero of love herself. Listen to her words about the final moments with the man she had loved and walked through life with for 60 years, “I knew he was dying…but I just wanted to love him and take care of him and hold him. And that’s what I did.” To hold him one more time, to take care of him for his last moments, that was her only desire, how great it would be if we all could die in the arms of someone who loved us so much.

I stand humbled in the presence of such love and privileged to have read about it. Hero’s of love both of them. Hear the words once spoken in every wedding, ‘for better, for worse, for richer and for poorer, in sickness and in health.’ It is rare to say these words in a wedding any longer but to be a hero of love those words of commitment must ring true. For the Ferguson’s it was and there reward is great because of it.

Love is a fruit in season at all times, and within the reach of every hand.

Mother Teresa

It is within all of our grasp to be hero’s of love. Let us ignore the world’s outlook on life that emphasis short term gain, lust and getting what you want at all cost.

Perhaps you have failed at love in the past and fallen for the world’s traps. Today is another day it is never too late; today commit to be a hero of love. To see love from a Biblical view and not a worldly one, and you too will receive a rich reward.

Let us close by reading the scripture form our guideline for love, 1 Corinthians 13:4-8a, 13, “Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails…..And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.”

Prayer: Dear Lord, help us to keep out commitments, to love as you would have us to, to be quick to care, to put others first and to be quick to forgive. Help us to lean upon your Holy Spirit when the flesh tempts us. We thank you for your great love, that though others will let us down and that at times we may not feel loved or even feel loveable, we can always know we are loved by you. We ask these things in the name of Christ, Amen.