Chuck Swindoll is a well known author and preacher. He describes a moment of crisis in his life. He was speaking at a pastor’s conference. By any measure it was successful. Participants begged him to speak longer and were very engaged. But when he was alone in his room at the end of each day he felt an emptyness and frustration.
Sensing God was wanting to do something in his life Chuck called four trusted friends. “I want you to listen to my life story and see if anything stands out to you.” And so the four friends and Chuck Swindoll gathered. Beginning with his earliest memory Chuck poured out his life story.
When he had finished, one of the friends asked him a few questions and then said, “Chuck, I want you to put your head on the table and close your eyes.” Chuck put his head on the table and closed his eyes.
“Now I want you to imagine your father is holding you in his arms. What do you feel?”
Almost instantly Chuck began to cry. For thirty minutes he cried his eyes out. You see Chuck’s father had died when Chuck was seven months old. And as he closed his eyes what he felt was pure unconditional love.
What Chuck also realised that day was that while he had preached many times about God’s great love he had never made that personal. With his head on the table that day he really felt, for the first time, that Got loved him, that his heavenly father loved him deeply, richly and unconditionally.
And by his own testimony, he was never the same again.
Source: heard in a talk by Swindoll