Rev. A.J. Ogden

From my earliest childhood days, I wondered what it would take to have assurance that when life was over I would be in Heaven. Never quite sure, I heard many different voices with many different opinions, but most of them wrong. Some of my closest family members told me, “Just be good and you‘ll be saved.” Others said, “You will have to work your way into Heaven.” Finally at age of 25 I went to hear an old time preacher who cleared it all up for me. He said Romans 3:23, “For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God.” He explained how we need to repent of our sins, accept Jesus Christ as our Saviour and be born again. Swiftly I responded favorably to God’s call to salvation, and later to His call to preach. In all my quarter of a century before, no one had witnessed to me or explained the plan of salvation.

After all the wasted years, I now started to understand that life is short like a vapor. James 4:14, “Whereas ye know not what shall be on the morrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapor, that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth away.” It is over before we know it. I began to tell others that life is short, Heaven is wonderful, Hell is horrible, but Christ is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to him for salvation. I’ve tried to say salvation is available to as many people as possible. Someone must tell the story!

The physical birth got me into this natural world. But it took the second birth to save me for Heaven’s fair and happy land. My first birth, the physical birth, was the sun rise or beginning of life. Middle age is like the middle of the day when we are at our prime, and the sun is bright overhead. Now my old age is like the sun almost setting in the west, and the time of my departure is real close. The evening shadows are lengthening and night is near when life’s work is over.