No, not the Monday morning quarterback Super Bowl call, but that call we’ve been talking about to that person you love while you still can.
Some of you took the time to write and tell us what happened when you “made that call.” I’ve been saving up your comments, waiting for the right time to share them with everyone. Now’s the time. I’m sure we will all identify with some of these.
And don’t forget to make plans now to “make that call” Wednesday night and get in on our teleconference Bible study.
Yes, I did call. When I was a young girl my mother helped the neighbor’s daughter who had lost her mother. This young girl is now 57, and, as I found out last week, has had a year of unimaginable health issues and for whatever reasons is still alive. I haven’t spoken with her in about 2 years and I called her to see how she was. As I listened to her story, I was humbled by my multiple blessings and how grateful I was that I was having this conversation with her. I was fighting the tears so I could respond to her, but her story absolutely blew me away.
Yes, I called, I was blessed, a friendship was renewed and I am able to lift her up in prayer for the surgery she will have this Thursday to remove a tumor. – Janet
I am a member of Alcoholics Anonymous and got taught early on that the phone calls aren’t about me (all the time), it is about reaching out to others.
I make that call as often as I am able. I realized that if I am thinking about someone, I give them a call. How are they to know I am thinking about them if I don’t let them know? Amazing how sometimes that call has perfect timing for maybe something they have going on that they just need to talk about.
I learned this by realizing that if I am in a dilemma or need some help to call someone, it makes picking up the phone a lot easier if I practice this. – Wayne
Actually I did call some people last week – my two brothers who always can help me with jocularity and nonsense. I also talked to two of my sisters who always think they know what’s best for me. The Lord has blessed me with 2 brothers and 4 sisters. The blessing in this is that we all love each other and are very close even tho we live in separate places. I also called a friend from 20+ yrs ago. I lost track of him for 17 years when he joined the Navy. We have recently reconnected thru our sons who ran into each other on Facebook. – Keith
My mom was in a car accident last week. It was bad, but there was not a scratch on her. In the process of checking her out, the doctor reminded us that she is frail and that her heart is not as strong as we thought. She has such a spunky personality; it’s easy to go into denial about her heart condition. So I am in the process of changing my schedule so I can make the drive to see her and my dad more often. So worth it! — Barbara
Dare I admit that it’s my 2012 resolution to be more intentional to stay in touch with those I care about? Called an older brother on New Years Day. He’s a wise old geezer and asked me, ”Why’d ya call?” I told him. It started a really nice exchange of dialogue that I would have missed if I had ignored the nudge. My job and some of my hobbies involve continual communication with virtual strangers, and I realized that I hadn’t left any energy for those I say I love. Wake up call! — Ruth
John Fischer The Catch 
“I make that call as often as I am able. I realized that if I am thinking about someone, I give them a call. How are they to know I am thinking about them if I don’t let them know? Amazing how sometimes that call has perfect timing for maybe something they have going on that they just need to talk about.”
I think, all too often, we try to make something happen, when really it is God who makes things happen. He is just waiting for “our call.” I’m talking about prayer. When I think about someone, I don’t think, “I should call them.” Instead, I think, “I should talk to Daddy about them.” So I pray.
I’m all for calling. But I believe in prayer first. All too often we make the call and forget to pray. Prayer should ALWAYS be our first response. Then, if Daddy tells us to, we should call.
My friend was a descendant of Dutch royalty. illegitemately, back about 200 years ago. A dutch king had carousing problems in the local pubs. He had the royal dutch name ‘der Nederlanden’. We used to joke about that as teenagers. We were best friends from 7th grade through college and then ‘we lost touch’. He came to visit his parents in my home town and he would come and visit once in a while. I made no such overtures. We always had great conversations about the Lord we both love. He was a brilliant man with a photographic memory. He used to ‘tick me off’ because he would ace an exam with an hour study, and it would take me long hours plus cramming and still get a mediocre grade. He read theology and philosophy books and would tell me about it in layman terms. Today this has helped me to read similar books and not feel that I am too stupid to understand them.
We grew apart further and further. About five years ago I found out that he was an editor of a christian publication. He was brutally honest, vulnerable and a brilliant writer. I got his email address and sent him an inquisitive email about his life. We emailed back and forth a bit. In one of the emails he stated that I was the only best friend, in fact the only friend he ever had. I dittoed the sentiment. Do you think that was enough to make us keep contact…..NO! We stopped communicating and three years ago I heard he died of cancer. I don’t have regrets in my life but I have huge trouble forgiving myself for not being with him in his hour of need to tell him how much I love him.
After moping about that for a number of months and feeling sorry for myself, I realized that maybe I should find another friend. I prayed to God that He would send me one. Shortly thereafter an acquaintance phoned me and said, “Peter, I am learning to become a spiritual director, would you like to become more like Jesus”, my immediate response was yes. We are now best friends and I have told him this story. I am in the process of becoming more like Jesus. Sanctification is a wonderful out of the box experience, but extremely difficult. Cleaning up the sinful mess in my life is hard but rewarding work.
John your post hit me right in the heart, in the pit of my gut, thank you for that. This is not your first post on ‘making that call’ but I have been procrastinating about telling this story, because it still hurts to write about it. I haven’t recently texted my sons that I love them, I will do that today.
Your post has made me get it in gear and call my daughter and son tonight – something I’ve been “meaning to do” for a few weeks now. We’ve been estranged for the past several years and are only gradually mending that relationship — truly, God at work.
But let me tell you about two other calls that were made recently. Just before Christmas, one of the local TV stations did a feature about me – I’m a spokesperson for the regional transit authority, so I get a fair bit of “face time” responding to issues – but this feature focused on “the other (or lesser-known) side”, namely Gospel Mission. The night that it aired, I was in a meeting at the Mission and my cell phone rang. It was my daughter. She had seen the feature while at work and initially called my home and told my wife (not her mother) to say she wanted to tell me she was proud of me. She didn’t use those words when she called me — they had morphed into, “that was really good, dad” — but close enough.
The other call was made back in June, when I phoned my dad, who was in extended care in Victoria after a major heart attack. We talked about practically anything … the Vancouver Canucks (“it only encourages them,” he would say when I’d mention they were winning), what my wife was up to, how his new TV worked … and then the conversation hit a point where he was clearly tired and losing coherence so we wound down the call and as we were about to hang up, I said, “I love you.”
Those were the last words I said to him. He died in his sleep the next night. Saying the L-word was not something dad said or received easily (“I think you’re swell,” was the substitute he and my mother used), so saying it in as many words definitely required “making a call”. I thank God I did.
My sister-in-law died suddenly of a heart attack last Monday. She was 48 years old. When we were talking to my brother this weekend he shared a story.
My sister-in-law had a large family and a couple of years ago one of her brothers phoned her and was upset with her for some reason. He yelled at her over the phone and they stopped talking. It had been over two years since they spoke. Another brother encouraged her to reconnect this Christmas. She felt it shouldn’t be her making the call, it was her brother who needed to apologize so he should phone her.
Well she did phone and he came to my brothers 51st birthday dinner. She died two days later.
Make the call!
Yes. Jesus said that you should go to someone if you think they have something against you. That’s because if they do, they probably aren’t going to come to you.