"A Message In The Sand" a personal testimony

Have you ever found a seashell on a beach?  Many of you have no doubt found some beautiful specimens.  I have found many dozens myself and keep them displayed in a large wicker basket in my home.

I found a very special shell in the middle of sand in Virginia Beach one Easter Sunday when visiting my family.  Let me just say as a precursor that God can do anything and He is in total control of all things. 

During that visit I really needed some encouragement because I lamented over the fact that my family did not share my faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.  I had made many attempts to convince them over the years but nothing seemed to work.  I verbally told them the Gospel truth.  I gave them literature to read including books, Gospel tracts and of course the Holy Bible all of which contained the message of salvation.

I also pointed out the testimony of my own life which was completely transformed after my conversion.  My personal story of how God moved me out of darkness into His marvelous light can only be described as miraculous.  Yet, to this day no one in my family (except my son - Praise God) has believed or expressed any genuine interest in God, His Son, His Holy Word or His church.

All of these realities weighed heavy on my mind as I drove down to the VA Beach.  On this trip I purposed to finally stop striving with my family so I just left it to the Lord.

Strangely, soon after we arrived at my parent’s house my mother pointed out a newspaper article that she had clipped out advertising a sunrise Christian worship service near the beach on Easter morning. I immediately suggested that we all should go.  There was a long silence.  I’m quite sure none of my family had planned to go to church at all on Easter Sunday let alone to a service that started at seven in the morning.

My mother, son, niece and nephew agreed to go.  It was a faithful service and the Gospel was presented clearly.  When we got home we had a typical secular Easter day with food and festivities.

Later that evening before sundown I suggested that my niece, nephew and son go to the beach with me to mess around before Easter dinner.  Virginia Beach is huge and is very long and very wide.  We played and ran around on the sand for about an hour.  It was right before dusk so there were very few people out and we had almost the entire beach to ourselves.  We were in the middle of that very wide beach when I saw my niece drawing circles in the sand.  I immediately thought, "Wouldn’t it be nice if someone on Easter Sunday had written the name of Jesus in the sand".  Suddenly, an idea popped into my head. I gathered the kids around me and said, "Let's play a new game.  Let's look down at the sand and try and find the funniest looking footprint or something strange".

We lined up shoulder-to-shoulder and started to look down as we walked slowly forward. We saw human footprints, bird footprints, and dog footprints.  After about thirty seconds, I noticed something like a tiny red dot just under the sand. I reached down and pulled out a small, extremely thin, very fragile shell from under the sand.  It was odd finding a shell in the middle of the beach when most were located near the water’s edge.  I picked it up and immediately knew that something wonderful and amazing had happened.  I called everyone near and we knelt down and I showed my find to the children.

The shell we found had something painted on it in red and black and had little sequins glued underneath.  The words read, “I Love You Jesus” with a little black and red cross.  Here is a picture of the front of the shell, we found.