December 26, 2022
Dear Grandchildren:
This month I’m sharing personal insights in three areas of my life: my vocational or work life, my marriage to your grandmother Sandy Catt Freeman, and how it involves my spiritual life. God used these three areas to impact my life without violating my will to decide.
Psalms 139:13 NKJV says: “For You formed my inward parts; You covered me in my mother’s womb.”
God was always present in my life but was waiting for me to realize he’s the creator of the world.
My childhood was pretty normal, and I graduated from Corunna High School in 1961. I attended Central Michigan University in the fall with the desire to become a teacher. My second year started with me becoming the Sophomore class President and my girlfriend, Grandma, attending C.M.U. as a freshman.
Everything was falling into place, but in January 1963, Grandma’s father approached me about working in his company. He had three grocery stores and wanted to buy a fourth in East Jordan. I knew nothing about the grocery business, but on March 23, 1963, I traded living with twenty brothers in a fraternity house in Mount Pleasant to working with twenty employees in East Jordan. You could imagine how this decision turned my world upside down.
As I mentioned my girlfriend, Grandma, was attending school at Mt. Pleasant and she’d visit me on weekends. One of my grandchildren asked me, “How did you decide to marry Grandma?” My answer? “When Grandma told me she was pregnant.”
We were married June 1st of 1963 and Laurie Ann came along on December 29th of that same year.
Imagine this scenario for a minute. In less than a year, I learned how to be a grocery store manager, how to be a husband, and how to be a father to a baby girl.
Fast forward eight years when we lived in Grayling, Michigan. I was a store manager, and we had five children. Our second child, Susan, died of a heart defect. I’d like to say everything was great and I was in full control of my life, but that would be a lie. I was doing my thing as the center of my universe while Grandma was holding our family together.
About that time, Grandma at a women’s luncheon received Jesus Christ into her heart and life as “her” personal Savior and Lord. The Bible states in 2 Corinthians 5:17 (NKJV), “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new.”
When you accept Jesus as your Lord and Savior, you become a brand-new person and she did. Even though it shook me, I could see the difference in her life.
I had to face the reality of knowing many facts about Jesus but didn’t know him as my Savior and Lord. I had to answer the Jesus question for myself.
It doesn’t matter what others say who Jesus is! Not what your parents, teachers, spouse, or friends say Jesus is, but who “you” say he is! This is the inescapable question about the unavoidable Jesus. Eventually, we each must proclaim who we think Jesus is.
Our culture is content with placing Jesus in the same category as Santa Claus and the Easter bunny. But Jesus isn’t a figment of a Christian’s imagination. He lived in a place and a time, walking the earth as you and I do today. The historical evidence of Jesus is irrefutable.
There are also a growing number of people who want to reduce Jesus to just a nice guy. Because of this thinking, there are many who want to reduce the essence of Christianity to simply being a nice person.
Next month, it will be fifty-one years ago when I answered the question of who Jesus Christ is for me. Grandma and I are thankful we placed our trust in him. He no doubt saved our marriage and we’re still learning how to grow into the people he called us to be.
Merry Christmas and always know how much I love you,
Grandpa