I met Jesus personally in my late 20s and changed my life's purpose. After thinking about what would please and glorify the Lord, I chose the path of a pastor. The time I have been walking for so long is now over my mid-50s, which seems like it will never come in my life. And when I look at the people around me, it seems like they haven't changed much. That's right! I hadn't been paying attention because I was growing old and maturing with them.

  Once I went beyond recognizing this fact and faced it, I was able to make some solid predictions. The first thing I can be sure of is that I will die, and the second is that I will definitely grow old and sick. I don't need to explain this to you. In the face of this, I began to observe adults who are ten years ahead of me in life and who have reached a high level(senior) of maturity.

  My parents have gone to heaven already. So I try to serve the elderly as I would my own parents. Being in the ministry as a pastor, I get to meet a lot of retired pastors and their wives. They were so powerful 20-30 years ago that they were nowhere to be seen, and their appearance was stunning and beautiful. But now that they are old, weak, and suffering from various illnesses, their words seem to be organized into sentences. 

  They say that they are suffering from the feeling of being forgotten. They didn't say it directly in these sentences, but if we listen to them collectively, it's like this. Fewer and fewer people visit or call. The breadth of their relationships narrows, as it should. The traces of their contributions are still there, and the fruits of their labor are still there, but they don't know if they're bitter or happy to be forgotten. I guess I'll find out in about 20-30 years later.

  Looking back from this perspective, I realize that there are people I have passed by in the past in ministries that I have carried out with great passion and zeal. I also recall experiences of loneliness and isolation, feeling like they were forgotten. During those times, I realized one thing, which is the core topic I want to talk about.

  I go back to the story of the retired pastors and their wives. Where did their sense of being forgotten come from? When I think about it, I think it comes from themselves, because their deeds are remembered by many people who clearly know their past lives. The deeds of the advanced ones in our past history are always remembered.

  A Bible verse quoted by a testimony some time ago has stuck in my mind. The Apostle Paul seems to have lived up to this confession: "I am a man of sorrows, yet always rejoicing; I am a man of poverty, yet making many rich; I am a man of nothing, yet having all things" (2 Corinthians 6:10). And I've seen some of the most revered adults in my life live up to the memory of Paul.