Just a few weeks ago, I received a phone call from a Greenville City Detective asking me to describe my ring that was stolen. After giving great detail, I was excited when he said, “Rev. Atkins, we have found your ring.” I almost shouted for joy when he said those words to me, and then I told him how thankful I was that he had found my ring. “Yes sir, we found it. It has been melted down for scrap.” Just seconds before, I was thinking about how amazing it was that I would be given back what had been taken from me, and in that brief span of time my heart sank.
AtkinsMy friends, the reality of the whole situation is this. A replacement ring has been ordered; my insurance has paid for about two-thirds of the cost; a friend of mine, along with my parents, have given some money to help pay for the difference; and in six to eight weeks, I will be wearing another ring. People will see the ring when I wear it, some will comment about what a nice ring it is, and it will spend the majority of the time in a drawer for safe keeping. But no matter how much joy that ring may bring in identifying me as a graduate from North Greenville College, in my heart I will know that it is not the ring that my mom and dad gave me when I graduated.
“The day before” I graduated NGC, my mom and dad gave me that ring as a symbol of my accomplishment and as a symbol of just how proud I had made them by following God’s will for my life. “The day before” that ring was stolen I gave no thought whatsoever that it would ever be taken from me. “The day before” the detective called me, in my heart I still had hope that it would come back to me and that I would once again have it as a reminder of that special day in my life. It is amazing that sometimes when we look back in our life at “the day before,” something we will never forget takes place.
“The day before” I was elected president of the South Carolina Baptist Convention, I had asked my dad while we were on the elevator together if he ever thought his son might one day be elected to such a position. He told me, “No, son, I didn’t, but I always knew God would do something amazing with your life.” As a 39-year-old man, I cannot tell you the emotions that welled up inside of me. I wished for that brief moment in time that the elevator would never move again and I could stay in that moment.
Gold rings, plaques on a wall, and the applause of men all lose their significance when they are compared to the praise of a father. “The day before” I step into eternity, a lot of things might take place. I could be robbed again, I could be fighting for my life, but it really does not matter what takes place “the day before.” If I have been striving for Great Commission Living on “the day before,” I will hear my Heavenly Father say to me, “Well done,” and that moment in time will last for all eternity.
– Atkins is pastor of Powdersville First Baptist Church and president of the South Carolina Baptist Convention.