Goodbye! I love you so much. It’s been a great journey and I have enjoyed every bit.
My parting words:
- Be kind;
- Love one another;
- Forgive one another;
- Make the main thing the main thing;
- Money is not everything because you can’t take it with you;
- You can’t take stuff with you either as it weighs you down;
- Give your kids less stuff and more of you;
- Education is as much about peer group as it is about academics;
- Your children are not defined by their marks but by their kindness;
- God thinks your kids are gorgeous and so do I;
- Pray for your children, but pray for yourself first;
- What is unseen is just as important as what can be seen;
- Christian Education is a worthwhile investment with eternal ramifications;
- Because of Jesus we have life now and forever.
- JESUS IS LORD!
Let me conclude where I began. In May 2004 this is what I wrote, (although I’ve added our Charlton name instead of Lake Macquarie Christian College):
2 Corinthians Chapter 6: “Dear, dear Corinthians (read Charlton Christian College community), I can’t tell you how much I long for you to enter this wide open, spacious life. We didn’t fence you in. The smallness you feel comes from within you. Your lives aren’t small, but you’re living them in a small way. I’m speaking as openly as I can and with great affection. Open up your lives. Live openly and expansively!”
I realised that the Christian life looks a bit like the TARDIS from Dr Who the science fiction TV series. From the outside the TARDIS (Time And Relative Dimensions In Space) is just an English telephone box – big enough for only one person. However, when Dr Who and his companions walk inside, it opens up into a large building with many rooms. The Bible tells us that the Christian life begins as journey of faith by going in through a “narrow gate”. But upon entering this new life, a whole Kingdom experience opens up to the believer. It is a place where we can live “openly and expansively!”
To the outsider the Christian life looks boring or plain. But I can testify that the Christian walk is anything but that. It is a journey of love and hope and power and significance and purpose. It is exciting and is shared with wonderful people whom I will know into eternity. When the TARDIS of my belief takes me into the next dimension I will be with friends and with my Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.
May God bless you dear, dear Charlton friends, families and colleagues.
May your lives be spacious and generous! May you be open to God’s Word working in your lives!
Let me know how you go. I’ll be back for Grandparents day at the least.
Mrs Sue Skuthorpe
