After doing some genealogical research this past year my son Jon came across an electronic copy of my grandpa’s World War II draft registration card. To us, this was a great discovery. It is so hard to find much else on my grandpa. Reportedly, he came to the U.S.A. some time before 1920, arriving at Ellis Island but, so far, no record of this fact.

According to his draft registration card, Paul Macinta was born June 5, 1885, in Russia. He died of a stroke in 1957, so I only personally knew of him during the first five years of my life.

Some time after I committed to Christ in 1970, I realized the providential hand of God in this matter. Grandpa Paul had the wisdom and the ability to flee the impending communist takeover of Russia and come to the United States. He passed the various tests at Ellis Island, took U.S. citizenship, and found employment. All of this was for freedom from tyranny.

I’m very grateful Grandpa Paul did what he had to do for liberty. Of course, there is a parallel to this in the spiritual realm. Time and time again in the written Word of God people are called to forsake the material world and fixate their hearts upon the spiritual through Christ.

The LORD God says in Isaiah 45:22, “Look unto me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth: for I am God, and there is none else.” The Hebrew for “saved” in this passage can mean to be liberated. The general context of the verse shows that the world was steeped in idolatry at the time those words came to Isaiah. People were serving things that they could see and ignoring their creator.

The same is true for much of the world today in that most follow after money, power, lusts and a many other material things which will all pass away.

However, the same call from God to look to Him goes out today. In a way, we have it better in our time because we know that God, through His Son Christ, can cure us of our attachment to the material so we may truly walk by the faith that pleases Him.

As my Grandpa Paul made a commitment to leave his native surroundings in pursuit of liberty, may all those who read this decide, and remained decided, to commit to and follow Christ, receiving an eternal inheritance after this life.