Nana raises her glass and says: I am quite certain granddad that they will all do very nicely and that we will be even more proud of them than we are right now. And if their answers match up with our hopes as I expect they will, then we can inform our pastor that we have seven new members to be Baptized in to the Church, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, on the following Sunday. They all sat dumb founded and silent for ten minutes before Clifford spoke up and said, Do you really think, we will be good enough for that? Because he knew as they all did that according to their grand parents they were as yet still unregenerated, even though they had been going to Church on and off since they were five years of age, and less in the last ten years.
They even thought that their parent's had doubts about their being regenerated, even though they could recite all of the Larger and Shorter Catechism's, and most of the Westminster Confession of Faith. Yet it was a task their grand father had given them, and that both he and grand mother, were confident enough in them to want to put them forward to their pastor as to be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ as new members of their Church, if their answers were right enough.
Grace looked at her grand parents wistfully and asked, Nanna, why did you make a toast at us like that for? because now we will be thinking we know all the answers. And their Nanna said, a compliment is a compliment only when it comes from the heart, and each of you is able to carry a compliment with you, with out it going to your heads. And remember do not forget about the triune trinity of God and why Jesus as God, in him self, had to come in to the World in the flesh, born of a woman, to take himself and our form on him self with him to the cross.
And granddad smiled and raised his glass of milk again and said, I salute you one and all for your brilliant conduct and success so far, in the face of terrible odds. Your selves. You are all heroes thus far. You have survived tremendous battle scars and wounds to your ego's and pride and intelligence and will. This mighty effort that by God's grace and sustenance you have endured, has produced in you a humbleness that is truly a miracle, so thank God for it, and for His helping and guiding hand thus far.
P12………….And remember the significance of the effect of the amount of total damage that is done to the seed of Man, in and because of the Total Fall of Mankind in Adam. Remembering also that your explanation's about the totally damaged and corrupted seed in Man and Mankind, prevents any of our good works from ever making us Christian, and why it does not? O.k. good……..
They all left happy and nervous, wondering how they can ever produce such a great works of five thousand words in an essay, in three weeks time. For it had been more than Ten years for most of them, since their school days and essay writing. But they were all prepared to give it a go, some how.
It took them the whole of the three weeks to put their essays together, especially as they were still meeting in Sam and Maureen's home on the Monday and Wednesday nights, for study time and research work. They had cheated a little by using Strong's concordance for particular word usuages and where in the passages they could be quickly referenced from. But they did do the right thing and mentioned this in their foot notes at the bottom of their pages.
Well the three weeks was up, and they all arrived at granddads at exactly 9 am once more, and with brimming smiles, handed their works over to their grand dad, with a kind of triumph, that they could not hide.
But what they did not expect was their grand mothers exclamation, and statutory declaration, that as soon as they have finished their drinks of milk and biscuits, they were to march in to Grandpa's study, one at a time, and be examined verbally as well, about their work, and that no one who comes out is to talk with the others till every one has been assessed by grandpa. And that it is in the order of their ages that they will go in by. And that no one is to talk about what Grandpa says to them to any person, family, friend, parent or Minister,or Elder, once they leave the room for ever more. And every one else is to sit quietly or go some where to pray quietly by them selves to God, to help them in the study with their grandpa, and thank God, for having brought them this far.
