Thursday, April 11, 2024
A TRIBUTE TO THE BEST DAD EVER
About twenty-five years ago, Herb and a mission team came to our home in India. Following a week of mission work in my town, the team moved on to another city and took me along for learning experience. While everyone else on the team were relaxing at the catholic center on a Sunday afternoon, I saw Herb standing restlessly outside the phone booth. He told me he was trying to make a telephone call to his wife but the call wasn't getting through. When I tried connecting the call, a voice on the other end said, "Janice here,". When I looked for Herb he wasn't in the vicinity of the phone booth. I had to answer the call and said hello to Mom for the first time. Following the phone call, Herb and I went to sit under a mango tree and started talking about our lives. We spoke for nearly three hours, and from then we have been together as Father and Son for 25 years now.
Whether it was selecting a career, a life partner, or answering the Lord's call to full-time ministry, DAD and MOM were vital in helping me make the proper choices. Later, in 2007, when we started the New Life Community College, Dad came to visit, stayed with us, ate the Indian food, went with us for shopping and blessed our newborns too. Dad introduced us to Bob and Sandy, Pas. Wesly Zinn, and to the Wellspring Church.
We had a routine of having video calls on WhatsApp, but he departed to be with the Lord before we could make the call this time. We've always had happy, light-hearted face time over WhatsApp, and the call always ended with his concern over our health, the future of our kids, and the land we are attempting to buy for our ministry. I'm not sure why, but whenever we talk on the phone, the subject of chicken soup always made us laugh louder.
I am aware that he ministered as a Father figure to many people like me, and I can totally comprehend how he could be a Father figure to many, because He was created to be just that. Everyone who had contact with him, I'm sure, would have experienced the true love and affection, which is like getting a peek of the love of the heavenly Father.
We are aware that DAD is currently in a secure place, where he is continuing his mission of spreading happiness. However, the lessons he instilled in us endure, and it is our duty to impart them: be content and contribute to the happiness of others, be lovable and show love to others.
Dad, you will always be remembered by us, WE WILL GREATLY, SADLY MISS YOU HERE ON EARTH. LOVE YOU DAD.
Sarah, Jabez, Sangeetha and Sam Sunder Singh
Your Indian family.
