Leon's Personal Reflections

909 Months

My father was born July 3, 1917, and died March 13, 1994. He lived for 909 months. It doesn’t seem very long when you say “909 months” out loud. My father’s spiritual journey during this time dipped, dipped, and then it finally soared!

In the mid 1970s, when we’d discuss spiritual things such as God, Jesus, sin, heaven, and hell, he told me he was an atheist. It was a good place to start a discussion. Later, he progressed to the point of being an agnostic. By the late 1970s, he once told me he had done too many wrong things for God to accept him. Finally, in the late 1980s, my father told me he was a good man and that God had no reason to reject him. Quite a roller coaster ride, spiritually speaking. It was the last attitude that concerned me the most of all. A “good” man has no use for Jesus, the Savior.

In July 1993, he entered the hospital for a “routine serious” operation, a two-week-maximum stay in Virginia. His recovery period turned into a six-month nightmare in the ICU unit. His body didn’t respond well to the operation, and then various infections attacked it. He became bed-ridden, ventilator dependent. His leg muscles became useless. He became despondent, lacking the will to continue living. It was a difficult situation for all of us, but God was at work in his life.

In November of 1993, Marilyn, from Michigan, visited my father in that ICU ward. She described Jesus and His life, death, and resurrection. She invited my dad to receive Jesus and to come to him for forgiveness and eternal life. She asked my father if he needed a Savior. He responded, “Yes.” They prayed together in that hospital ward. This marked the beginning of his new birth, a spiritual birth. Five months later my father died, his cause of death listed as pneumonia. My father lived 904 months in rebellion and ignorance toward God and only 5 months as a Christian—909 months total.

I’ve lived 912 months, 644 months as a Jesus follower. It sounds long compared to 5 months, but the Bible says all of my dad’s sins are forgiven, just like mine. He’s under no condemnation before God, just like me. The Jesus of the Bible is a living, forgiving God.

Jesus says, “I am, right now, Resurrection and Life. The one who believes in me, even though he or she dies, will live. And everyone who lives believing in me does not ultimately die at all. Do you believe this?” (John 11:25-26, The Message).

I do believe it. When my departure comes from this earth, I’ll join my Heavenly Father, and my dad. Saying “I believe” marks the difference between life and death.

Your friend,

Leon Alderman, CDR, USN (Ret.)

Leon’s Lessons

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Leon Alderman, CDR, USN (Ret.)

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