“Let Us Go On” – Poem by Grandpa Phelps – FANNING THE FLAME

I wish you could meet my Grandpa Phelps. If you did you would know him to be a great man of God. During his journey on earth God has placed him through a great deal of trials but in the midst of each valley he has learned to trust in God. Through each of the trials that grandpa went through he learned to “go on.” 

Grandpa wrote this about learning to “go on” in a biography he penned for his family to read: 

J.R.R. Tolken said it well when he wrote, “Faithless is he who says, ‘Farewell’ when the road darkens.” Grandpa continued to act out his faith even in the most difficult of circumstances. In the midst of trail it can be easy to sit idly by and do nothing, but trusting God is always evidenced by action. 

Let us Go On
(Read Hebrews 6:1-8)

Let us go on to perfect what we lack,
Not staying with principle or turning our back
On things so important as faith in the soul,
Needed patience, endurance, and reaching our goal.

Let us go on God’s will to pursue,
Not falling away as some foolish ones do.
For those who stand off and heed not His call
Cannot be renewed to repentance at all.

Like Israel of old they wander around
Till their bodies return to the dust of the ground.
Better had it been to have moved on ahead
Than to draw back in fear and face only dread.

Let us go on, not crucifying again our Lord;
Not shaming His person, not rejecting His Word.
For those who say “no” to this One who died
Are friends of His foes and stand at their side.

Let us go on and produce for our King;
Tilling our ground so that herbs it might bring,
Not thorns, not briers, as others have born,
But fruit to present Him on that blissful morn.

Poem by Charles Richard Phelps Sr.