​THE LAST LEAF
The leaf hung on to its twig, determined not to let go.  It watched as the other leaves fell to the ground, or blew into piles along fences and around tree trunks.  It thought, ‘I will not follow them, I will not fall and die and rot in the ground, I will live on.’
The wind blew, but the leaf hung on, the frost settled over everything, the leaf shivered but hung on. It would not let go.  Its determination was supernatural.
What the leaf didn’t know was that when it fell, when it rotted into the ground, it fed next year’s next year’s young shoots, next year’s fruit.  I t would live again in another form or body. It would rise to a new life. It would not die.
Like the leaf we hang onto life, we don’t want to die.  We make the Doctors affluent in our search for life. The chemist is wealthy as he searches for the elixir of youth or the skin cream that dissolves the wrinkles.

​Jesus said, ‘I am the resurrection and life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies; and whoever lives and believes in me will never die.’  John 11: 25. Jesus had to die, to overcome death and rise again and when we believe and accept Jesus as our saviour, he raises us with him and we overcome death and live forever.  Jesus rose to a new life, a new life in us.  Jesus lives in us and through us. ‘I no longer live, but Christ lives in me.’ Gal. 2: 20
In following Jesus, like the leaf, we have to let go of our twig and drop off and accept the fact that in dying to our old life we will be living a new life through Jesus.  We will serve others, our community, our families, our children.  We will not die but multiply in the lives we touch, and we will leave a deposit in whatever we touch. 
The leaf is determined to save its life; it will shrivel and disintegrate and be good for nothing if it stays on the tree. The same principle applies to our lives, live for our self alone and our life will disintegrate. Lose our life in and for Jesus, and we will live a rich and abundant life and live for eternity.
 Jesus said, ‘Whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me and the gospel will save it.’ Mark 8: 35. 

THE MAGIC OF LOVE
WHAT IS LOVE?
 Our first love is magical and wondrous, goose-bump material.
​My first love was an exploration of romance. We were both fourteen. He was short and tubby, I was tall, slim and gawky. He was not a prince on a white charger, I was no Barby doll, but we were attracted to each other.
Our first kiss was heart-stopping, a stolen moment at the primary school break-up.  Not the practised film-star passion but a wet fumbling.  Our relationship never grew, my parents moved to another district and we never met again.

​MY SECOND LOVE
My second love was my prince on an iron horse or bicycle.  He was too poor to own a car, the car would come later. Dark, handsome, average height. The chemistry was there from the start. Cupid’s arrow found its target and we married.  Seventy years later we still fizz with the magic, though age has taken its toll.

​MY THIRD LOVE
My third love is Christ, Son of God. This is not an Eros or romantic love but an agape love.  The love of God for man and of man for God, a self-less, sacrificial love.
God’s love for us is beyond magical, it is jealous, possessive, transforming, redeeming, healing and liberating. There is no end to his love for us, no bottom, no height or width. God’s love is radical, it doesn’t matter who we are, famous or non-famous, murderous or sweet,  rich or poor, successful or a dismal failure, God love us, his creation.  We are the apple of his eye. D L Moody once said, ‘If you ask me why God should love us, I cannot tell. I suppose it is because he is a true Father.’ 
Such unconditional love is known as the grace of God, the unearned favour of God given to us not for what we have done or haven’t done, not for who we are or aren’t. Philip Yancey wrote, ‘Grace means there is nothing I can add to make God love me more, and nothing I can do to make him love me less.’ Such love is the sacrificial love of agape. ‘For God loved the world so much that he gave his only Son so that anyone who believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life… There is no eternal doom awaiting those who trust him (Jesus) to save them.’ I have no concept of such love, it is beyond my understanding that anyone could love me so much.

MY LOVE GAVE TO ME
When this wonderful truth of God’s unearned favour dawned on me the colours became brighter and prettier, I felt clean and new, I had a purpose to live.  I felt I wanted to dance for a million years. I had been floundering, searching for what? Suddenly I was found and I had found Jesus, my third love, a self-sacrificing, agape love. This Agape love, this unmerited favour of God, does wonders for the self-esteem.
I want to close with this thought expressed by Paul Ellis, ‘he who has Christ lacks no good thing. In him we are fully, completely, and totally sanctified.’  A quote from an ancient letter by an early believer, ‘So you have everything when you have Christ, and you are filled with God through your union with Christ.’ (Colossians 2: 10)