From sorrow to Joy

September 30, 1986: A lanky and frail in flesh but superbly strong in Spirit man was taken into an operating room in the Christian Medical College, Vellore, for a triple bypass open heart surgery. Even on his way to the operating room, he was recorded to have been cheerful as he was always. He was joking with the doctors telling them that they should not stitch him after the surgery but just sew a zip on him so that they could easily open him should there be a need to in the future, as he was taken to the surgery which nearly took six hours to complete. Following the surgery, the heart that was in his frail body failed. It was a heart that was dedicated to take the good news of the Gospel of Jesus Christ to the Bondo tribe in Malkangiri, Orissa, as no one else had. It was the heart of the missionary, Dr. R.A.C. Paul. It was a heart that was a heart after God’s own heart. It was the heart of my earthly father, my ‘Appa’.

A few days later, when my brother Ragland Remo Paul and I came to learn of my father’s departure from this present world into the glorious one that is to come, I wailed and cried with deep sorrow in my heart, accepting little to no consolation from my mother, Dr. Iris. G.R. Paul or Dr. Jeyapaul Sitther and his family, the missionary friends who accompanied her. I missed my dad and I was sorrowful.

September 30, 1990: I, an young child was on my knees in the cold floor of the service hall in Public School in Sunabeda, Orissa as the lanky preacher, Dr. R. Stanley who founded Blessing Youth Mission (BYM) was giving a fiery message in which I remember, he was calling out a  checklist of sins. I also remember that I seemed to have a check mark, pretty much against every sin that was on that list. It weighed heavy in me and as I knelt down, tears were streaming from my eyes when I recognized that while I was still a sinner and an enemy of God, God sent His Only begotten Son Jesus Christ, who sacrificed Himself and died for me to pay the wages of my sins.  Preacher Stanley then proceeded to give the call to Salvation stating that all who put their trust in Jesus will not be ashamed and all who believe in Him [Jesus] will have  their mourning turned in joy for He shall turn their sorrows into joy. In response, I committed my life to the Lordship of Jesus accepting his Grace and Salvation, Trusting and Believing in Him. After trusting and placing my faith in Jesus by praying the prayer of repentance (2 Chronicles 7:14), I remember vividly that I felt elated and joyous when I learned that a byproduct of my confession in faith, snatched me from the clutches of eternal death, where I was heading otherwise. I had been adopted into the family of God, and the Creator God, who had made me had now remade me as a new creature who could address Him as ‘Abba’ father.

Not until late that evening while traveling back home to Malkangiri from Sunabeda, did it dawn on me that four years earlier, exactly to that day, I had lost my earthly father.

September 30, 1986 was a day of sorrow, robbing me of the joy of being a son to a father, as I had lost my wonderful earthly father, Dr. R.A.C. Paul.
September 30, 1990 was a day of joy, a joy that no man can take away from me, as I had gained the Wonderful heavenly Father, the Great I AM.

Today, many years later since that life changing day, I can confidently state that My God is indeed the Father to the fatherless.
He [Jesus] had turned my day of sorrows into a day of joy (literally).

Jeremiah 31:13 (KJV)
¹³ Then shall the virgin rejoice in the dance, both young men and old together: for I will turn their mourning into joy, and will comfort them, and make them rejoice from their sorrow.

John 16:20,22 (KJV)
²⁰ Verily, verily, I say unto you, That ye shall weep and lament, but the world shall rejoice: and ye shall be sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy.
²² And ye now therefore have sorrow: but I will see you again, and your heart shall rejoice, and your joy no man taketh from you.