All that Ends Well

May 31, 2019

For the most part, it was a pretty crappy day. My original plans were to visit my mother whom I haven’t seen since the first of the month, but plans are apparently often meant to be dashed. I’m not a complete dolt when it comes to technology, but I’m pretty close. Just scratch the “complete” part. Earlier in the week, I thought preparations for Sunday were pretty much wrapped up until I discovered that getting photo files from my iPhone to an aging PC laptop was nearly impossible. My long overdue mom visit had to wait, which always makes me nervous; her greatest disappointment every day is waking up to find out she’s still alive. 

Linda knows me; she left me alone, for which I am thankful. Here’s the kicker: while in Cuba, among other topics, I was teaching about anger. One of the sources of anger is frustration, and I was feeling lots of it today, but having that teaching fresh in my mind helped me process it so it didn’t rattle or control me. It took most of the day, but I finally won. I am master of the computer; just don’t ask me to do it again. I’m not sure what I did.

It wasn’t my ultimate success that made the day however. It was watching granddaughter Eliza’s last softball game of the season. She made some great defensive plays and drove in the winning run in a come-from-behind nail biter, earning the game ball in the process. They started out slowly, but clawed their way back, turning what originally looked like a blowout loss into a squeaker victory. I am thankful tonight for the teaching in Cuba that came back to haunt me in a good way when anger was knocking on my door, and for Eliza, whose performance this afternoon was like the sun breaking through the clouds after a storm.

In Kathmandu

May 30, 2019

I stood in the window of the hotel looking out across the rooftops of neighboring homes with the Himalayas rising out of the mist in the distance. Kathmandu. The very name conjures up exotic images from old Hollywood thrillers and romances. Reality is somewhat different; pollution from poorly maintained vehicles makes the eyes water and smart. Even new construction often looks old and decrepit. But there is a fascination with a culture so different. The only remaining Hindu monarchy in the world back then, Communist insurgents were threatening Nepalese sovereignty in the countryside, waiting for the opportune time to openly challenge the government in the capital.

As prayer flags fluttered in the breeze and the sun slowly rose over the horizon, a pretty young woman appeared on the flat rooftop of the house before me. Her arms were full of laundry, while more hung on clotheslines strung from poles behind her. She dropped the laundry on the roof and poured water into a tub. Sipping my morning’s coffee, I was mesmerized, witnessing local customs up close and personal.

She looked right at me, smiled, and stepped into the tub. Keeping her eyes fixed on mine, suddenly she dropped her sari and stood before me completely naked. Like a lightening bolt, there flashed through my mind the story of David and Bathsheba, and I turned away, choking on my coffee. 

In the Biblical story, king David saw the beautiful Bathsheba bathing on a rooftop. He did not avert his eyes. He sent for her, sexually assaulted her, tried in vain to cover up her resulting pregnancy, and when his maneuvering failed, had her husband killed. The Bible states God’s response quite plainly: “The thing that David had done displeased the LORD” (2 Samuel 11:27). The consequences were catastrophic. Prior to this, David could do no wrong; his rule was characterized by a steady ascent that had no apparent end. From this moment on however, his rule was plagued by family intrigue, treachery, and even civil war. The message is hard to miss, and it hit me between the eyes that morning years ago. 

St. Paul says, “All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work” (II Timothy 3:16-17 NKJV). It did just that those years ago, accomplishing God’s purposes in me (Isaiah 55:11), coming to mind in that split second when I needed it most. Tonight as I remember that incident years ago, I am again thankful for the Word of God and the Holy Spirit who uses it to mold the believer into the image of Christ.

Fanning the Flame

May 29, 2019

“Next year...” I listened to her, hearing for the first time in almost a year a glimmer of hope that there might actually be a future. Exactly 100 years earlier, our forebears in faith laid the cornerstone for the Methodist church building that still stood tall and proud on the corner. We were celebrating our centennial with a neighborhood block party with free food, games, prizes, and music. And hope.

It was a lot of work, but we had other churches pitch in for what may not have been a runaway success, but was pretty good. And this morning I sat with five other pastors, planning a second neighborhood block party designed as a kickoff to a summer-long outreach to the families in central Dunkirk. Every Wednesday evening, we’ll have people in the park with games and activities for the neighborhood kids, doing our best to build relationships with entire families that we might earn their trust enough to be able to share the gospel with them. What began as a celebration of our heritage is being transformed into a celebration of our hope. We looked back, but are now looking forward, shoulder to shoulder with other churches, not to proselytize, but to invite people to Christ. None of us cares which congregation someone might join; our sole concern is making disciples—followers of Jesus Christ, knowing that when people get serious about knowing him, lives, families, and entire communities can be transformed. 

Last summer’s spark of hope is being fanned into flame, and I am privileged to have a front row seat, for which I am deeply grateful tonight.

Flowers and Flamingoes

May 28, 2019

“No plastic flowers and no pink flamingoes!” I’ve lost count of the times I’ve heard these words or a variation of them. My wife thinks it’s not just tacky—it’s scandalous that people put plastic flowers on a grave, and insists she’ll come back to haunt anyone who dares such sacrilege on hers. Of course, that only adds fuel to the fire, provoking our kids to expostulate at length about how they plan to decorate her final resting place.

After a couple years of talking about it, this past February we finally forked over the cash to purchase two gravesites in Sinclairville’s Evergreen Cemetery. The association had recently opened up a new section overlooking our home, and I told the caretaker I wanted the last two spots nearest the edge. He told me that they were going to put an access road between the gravesites and the bank that drops from the cemetery to the road in front of our house, and I responded that if they ever decided to get rid of the road and plant people there, he had instructions to dig me up and put me right on the edge. I’ve even toyed with the idea of having a periscope installed so whatever’s left of me can keep an eye on the place. 

Memorial Day is not only for parades and picnics; it’s when Linda takes the grandkids to plant flowers on the graves of some of the people who were influential in their lives. Polly Webb was one of those people who every Wednesday when they were little, had Nate’s girls over for the evening. Polly’s grave is just a stone’s throw from our plot, and there were a couple flowers left over from their work, so it turned out that the commotion I heard while working in the yard yesterday afternoon was our very own grandchildren practicing the routine by planting marigolds where we will someday reside. Fortunately for Linda, no plastic flowers were available yesterday.

Being able to joke about our eventual demise is possible because we know death is not the end of the story for us. Jesus’ death and resurrection is our guarantee and the foundation of our hope. Death has truly lost it’s sting. Life has been good, an we’re in no hurry to leave this world, but when that time comes, we’re ready. I’m guessing there’ll be a bit less joviality when that day comes, but who knows? Maybe instead of flowers there’ll be flamingoes. She’s not even there yet, so she won’t be turning over in her grave, but she might just toss and turn tonight at the prospect.

Valley of Tears, Valley of Hope

May 26, 2019

Some 250 years after the founding of the nation, the economy which had been languishing is finally booming, prosperity is evident everywhere you turn, and the head of state is both praised and vilified. At the same time, the political and religious culture is corrupt, bribery is rampant, and in both public and private spheres, the moral decay is apparent to anyone with an eye to see. Violence is rampant, the poor are victimized by the wealthy, sexual ethics are almost non-existent. 

No, I’m not talking about 21st century USA. This was life more than 700 years BC in ancient Israel. Jeroboam II was leader of a nation that had been founded a mere 250 years before. His ascent to the throne marked the beginning of a stretch of prosperity and wealth the nation had not seen for two hundred years. But that prosperity came at a price. Women and children were bought and sold like cattle, the poor had no recourse when oppressed by the rich, and courts were rife with bribery and corruption. Here’s the kicker: within a generation, the nation would be wiped off the map by an ascendant and aggressive Assyria. Does history repeat itself? 

Into this cauldron of dissipation and corruption strides the prophet Hosea, whose personal life story is a sad tale of betrayal played out in counterpoint to unfailing love. His story was an object lesson revealing God’s unfailing love for his people. In 4:6, God laments that his people “are destroyed for lack of knowledge.” This wasn’t an indictment of educational or intellectual failure, but of the collapse of community and personal relationships. In Hebrew parlance, “knowledge” was used of the most intimate of relationships, the sexual union of husband and wife. God bemoans people who know everything but know nothing of themselves, of others, or of God.

In 2:15, God tells how he will turn “the valley of Achor into a Door of Hope.” Referring back to the pre-national history of Israel, he hints at the story of Achan whose greed became the occasion of the defeat of the nation (Joshua 7). Achan was executed and buried in what became known as the Valley of Achor (Tears). God’s promise to his people in Hosea’s book is that if we are willing to revisit the place of our defeats and failures with repentance and honesty, he can turn even the darkest of valleys into doorways of hope. 6:1 points us to this hope when Hosea says, “Let us return to the LORD...he will heal us.” And in 10:12, we are told to sow righteousness, to break up the fallow ground.” Most of us have events in our lives that have been buried and perhaps even forgotten. But because instead of dealing with issues we’ve buried them, there is no fruitfulness. The ground of our souls lies fallow, unproductive. Only by breaking up and exposing that which has been buried and by walking through the Valley of Tears can we begin to sow the better seed of righteousness and find healing.

Towards the end of Hosea, God himself wails in sorrow: “How can I give you up?” God cannot bring himself to abandon his people, no matter what they’ve done. Instead, he redeemed us from the power of death (13:16), which is exactly what Jesus did for us. We were being auctioned off in the slave-market of sin, used up, broken, and hopeless, when Jesus steps up and says, “I’ll buy that one!” He measures out the price, drop by drop of his blood, reaches out and takes us by the hand and leads us home where he places his own robe of righteousness upon us, the ring of authority on our finger, and calls on all heaven to rejoice. 

It may seem like the world is falling apart and there is little hope for the future, but that is not the Gospel. The world as we know it may indeed collapse, but God’s love will never fail. No matter how unfaithful we’ve been, no matter how lost or how low we’ve sunk, Jesus Christ reaches out and says, “This isn’t who you really are. Your real self is who you are when you know you are loved by Me.”

Clutch

May 25, 2019

It’s been somewhat wonky for awhile now, but I didn’t think anything of it. Occasionally the clutch on my truck would stick when I depressed it all the way. I thought it was catching the floor mat and a tap with my toe would bring it back in line. That ended this afternoon. I had been asked to say a few words and offer a prayer at a memorial gathering for a woman from our Dunkirk church. I did so, spent some time with the family and got up to leave. 

Climbing into my truck, I depressed the clutch, turned the key and started up. The clutch was stuck, so I shifted to neutral so I could tap it with my toe. It popped up, but when I went to shift into reverse, the clutch wouldn’t budge. I all but stood on it; it was like a rock. There was no moving it. After calling Linda to come get me, I called AAA. When Linda arrived, she called Matt who suggested I Google the problem. I did. It sounds expensive. I don’t have much choice. 

That’s the bad news. The good news is that even though it’s never fun to pay repair bills, whatever it costs we can afford. There was a time when this wasn’t the case. Early on in our marriage, I did full brake jobs, tore into motors, replaced ball joints and radiators. I even did body work. It wasn’t pretty, but it did the job. I’be never been a mechanic, but when you don’t have the money, you have to do the best you can. It’s even worse when time is of the essence. There were way too many times I had to have the car ready by the next day. Stress is when you have neither the skills nor the tools but have to get the job done. So tonight I am grateful for AAA which towed the truck, for competent mechanics who will fix it properly, and for the resources God has given to get me back on the road.

The Great Scuba Caper

May 24, 2019

“Please, dad—don’t do it!” My son’s eyes were pleading as desperately as his mouth, but I remained resolute.

“Something isn’t right, and we need to know. Get in the car!” There was no use resisting, so fourteen-year-old Matt slumped in the passenger seat as I backed out of the driveway and headed down the road to the scuba shop. We pulled in and I mounted the stairs. “Junior,” I shouted, “I want you to take a look at something.” Junior, the owner of the shop followed me down the stairs to my car. I opened the trunk and he peered in.

“That’s mine! And that, and that, and that! I’ve wondered what was going on. Where did you get this?” I filled him in on the last few days before calling the sheriff, while Matt sat dejectedly in the car. 

For his fourteenth birthday, Linda and I bought our son scuba lessons, and since one should never dive alone, I joined him once a week at the high school pool where we learned the ins and outs of scuba diving from Junior, the Red Cross instructor. We rented equipment for the classes and put together a wish list for the future. One day while getting some work done on my car, the proprietor of the garage, who knew we were taking lessons, mentioned that he knew someone who had some equipment for sale and gave me a phone number. I called.

In retrospect, when the phone rang and the voice on the other end identified himself as “Spot,” I should have foreseen that things might not turn out too well, but the lust for a bargain often clouds even the best judgment. I know it did for me. We agreed on a time, and on the appointed day, Matt and I pulled into Spot’s driveway. He greeted us at the front door and welcomed us into his home, a nice ranch. The living room looked like a scuba showroom, and we were like kids in a candy store, picking out gear for ten cents on the dollar. I paid and we loaded everything in the trunk when my conscience kicked in. After all, Junior’s shop was only a half mile down the road. Turns out, Spot and Junior’s son had been heisting things for months and fencing them around town.

Fortunately, the law didn’t charge me with receiving stolen property, and most of the gear was recovered. I thought Junior might give us a discount on future purchases, but the only reward was a clear conscience and a lesson in greed and wisdom. Matt eventually forgave me, and today when we rode our bikes past Riverside Drive, I chuckled to myself as I thought of that long-ago incident I dubbed “The Great Scuba Caper.” I wonder whatever became of Spot or of Junior’s son. I imagine things were a bit tense around that household for awhile. As we rode by, I also gave thanks that I was able to not only teach, but demonstrate to my impressionable son the importance of honesty even when it comes at personal cost, and hope Spot and Junior’s son learned as valuable a lesson as did Matt and myself.

Schoolhouse Clock

May 23, 2015

Behind me hangs on the wall an ancient schoolhouse clock steadily ticking its way through the day. A few hours ago I gave it its weekly wind, and it’ll run contentedly till this time next week. There’s no chime, just a steady tick-tock; after all, it is a schoolhouse clock. For years it hung in my father-in-law’s little study above his desk. In the more than forty years I observed it hanging there, never once did I see it running. He had rescued it years ago from the old abandoned one-room schoolhouse he attended as a boy, and somehow never bothered to get it running. Shortly before he died, he gave it to me and I promptly took it to the repair shop. It’s been running almost non-stop since then.

Granddaughter Abi wouldn’t agree, but I think there’s something viscerally soothing about the ticking of an old wind-up clock. Like an old car, it requires the kind of attention we aren’t accustomed to give anymore. Today’s cars—you fill the tank, change the oil occasionally, but other than that, they’re pretty maintenance free. Old school mechanics needed someone to adjust the carburetor and points, take up slack in the clutch, adjust the brakes, and attend to a dozen other regularly scheduled maintenance routines. Similarly, today’s clocks, if you have one, runs on a battery that needs to be changed once a year. I’ve noticed too, that except for factories, offices, and schools, wall clocks have pretty much gone the way of the dodo bird. Who needs to look at a clock when they can pull out their phone or look at their smart watch?

In 1876, Henry Clay Work, who wrote the tune “Marching Through Georgia,” penned a ditty entitled, “My Grandfather’s Clock,” which told of a clock that mirrored the life of an old man. “Bought on the morn that the old man was born,” it seemed to keep time with the joys and sorrows of the 90 years of his life till “it stopped short, never to go again, when the old man died.” The electric clocks and watches don’t tick or tock. Without gears and cogs, the steady ticking of the seconds and minutes is lost in a ceaseless hum that hasn’t the ability to audibly mark the passage of time. The schoolhouse clock behind me is counting out the beating of my heart, reminding me of my mortality, and of the necessity of regular winding—renewing the wellsprings of my life in prayer and solitude, that the hours and days spent in other places may bear fruit that will last. I like the ticking of old clocks, and am thankful for this particular one steadily keeping time over my shoulder.

Back

May 22, 2019

Back to work. For some, the mere thought of going back to work after a week or two away is enough to send them into a depression. I have to admit, there are those Mondays (and for this preacher, some Sundays) when I wake up with the first thought on my mind being, “Do I HAVE to do this?” But not today. After three Sundays away and the funeral of a good friend Monday, I was ready to get back to it today. The coffee was ready when at 8:00 my friends arrived for our regular Wednesday morning prayer time. 

It was a full morning, prayer shaped by Scripture, planning for the summer’s community outreach, and outlining Sunday’s service and sermon. The time away wasn’t exactly vacation; the usual teaching and preaching in Cuba was compounded with counseling and pastoral visitation in peoples’ homes, something I never imagined doing in another country. It wasn’t vacation, but it was fulfilling. Experiences like this help me understand what Jesus meant when he told his disciples, “My food is to do the will of my Heavenly Father.” It’s really true—no matter how much work is involved, a life centered on God doesn’t drain us; it fulfills us. Tonight my heart is full and I am thankful. As the psalmist says, “My soul shall praise him.” Mine does. It truly does.

Eliminating Hurry

May 21, 2019

It’s a regular routine at the Bailey household; family comes for Sunday dinner, and when the table is cleared and the dishes done, everyone begins to drift towards the front door and home. But not everything. With the last goodbye, there are usually shoes, coats, and other sundry items forgotten and left behind. It’s even more pronounced on the weekends when the grandkids spend the night. It can take an entire week to get everything back home where it belongs. 

Sunday was no exception, except it wasn’t one of the kids. It was friend Bob who left behind the book his group is reading, “Soul Keeping,” by John Ortberg, and as long as it was sitting on the arm of my chair, I thought it fitting to take a look inside. I didn’t even get to the first chapter before my attention was arrested. In the prologue, Ortberg relates his first encounter with Dallas Willard, former professor of philosophy at USC and thoughtful author of many books on spiritual disciplines. Ortberg asked him what he needed to do to stay spiritually healthy. Willard paused before responding, “You must ruthlessly eliminate hurry from your life.” 

It sounds so simple, and it is. But simple and easy are two very different things, and in a culture obsessed with bigger and better, more and more, eliminating hurry from our lives is no small endeavor. There is always one more meeting, one more activity we believe necessary to cram into our already hectic schedules, and the cultivation of our souls and our relationship with God often becomes just another task we check off our list for the day. And we wonder why we feel so empty, so devoid of meaning and purpose. 

I used to wonder about the mystics and monks of the Church; who were they, and how did they manage to order their lives so there were great blocks of time devoted to prayer and worship? For that matter, how did Moses dare spend forty days and nights on the mountain with God, and not doing anything with or for the people? Weren’t there things to be done, people to be served, miles to be trekked? We can get from place to place in record time, save hours upon hours of work with the tools available to us, yet we drop into bed at night exhausted because there was so much to do and we couldn’t get to it all. Meanwhile, something inside us is dying.

Every so often, someone comes along who challenges this American-style ‘Get-R-Done’ mentality with a whispering, diaphanous call to slow down and pay attention to that inner unrest, to listen to my heart...my soul. I am thankful to Ortberg, Willard, and to many others who have invited me to a different world, and to Bob who left his book on the arm of my chair. It’s time to do exactly what Willard suggested.

Resurrection Hope

May 20, 2019

Day to day we might not think much about it, but sooner or later the day comes when we cannot escape it—Death visits us all. Today I had the sad honor of officiating the funeral of my good friend Willie. As I mentioned yesterday, I last saw him as we left breakfast at a diner in town where we have been meeting almost every Tuesday morning for nearly ten years, fully expecting that we would see each other in a couple weeks. 

While I was gone, death came knocking, which is why I am so thankful tonight for the promise and hope of the resurrection. Some would say it’s all just wishful thinking, religious delusion, and there’s really no way to prove otherwise, but we aren’t hoping in some vague immortality of the soul, some shadowy existence in the spirit world. The Christian doctrine of resurrection is rooted in the Biblical doctrine of Creation which values this bodily, physical life. We are seeing in our society today the result of fuzzy philosophical and theological thinking, not to mention biological. Our bodies were given us by God, and are a vital part of our identity. Jesus’ resurrection is confirmation of this doctrine, and is the basis of our hope. 

I am sad tonight that tomorrow I’ll go to the diner and eat alone. I am comforted in the knowledge that death does not have the final word; Jesus Christ, our risen and reigning Lord has that word. So I lay my head down in sorrow, but also in peace and gratitude. Peace, knowing Christ and knowing Willie did, too. Gratitude for the nearly twenty years I have known him, and the nearly ten years we shared breakfast together.  

Willie

May 19, 2019

Just a few short weeks ago, we celebrated Easter, the resurrection of our Lord. My preaching text for that day came from 1 Corinthians 15 where the apostle Paul declares the centrality of this event to our faith, to the extent that he says, “If Christ be not risen, our faith is empty and we are of all men most miserable.” That phrase caught my attention back then, and continues to haunt me as tomorrow I will lay to rest one of my dearest friends who died suddenly and unexpectedly while I was in Cuba. Willie and I have had breakfast together Tuesday mornings for nearly ten years. Two weeks ago as we left the restaurant, we shook hands and said we’d see each other when I got home. 

St. James said, “Now listen, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money.” Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. Instead, you ought to say, “If it is the Lord’s will, we will live and do this or that.”” James 4:13-15 NIV

We never know, which is one reason it is so important to keep short accounts. We never know when we’ll say our last “I love you,” or our last, “I’m proud of you.” We never know if those words spoken in anger will be the last that spring forth from our lips, or when it will be too late to offer forgiveness. 

Willie invested his life in people. He was a probation officer who often saw people at their worst, but worked to bring the best out of them. We talked more than once of what often seemed the futility of our work amidst the collapse of the American family and absence of civility in our world. He spoke often of treating even the most despicable of people with dignity, and we together thanked God for our parents who taught us right from wrong, who were not afraid to correct and challenge us. We also talked of our faith, and the importance of our hope in the Gospel that God will in Christ redeem this sad world and restore to it the glory originally given in Creation. It is that hope that will sustain me tomorrow as I offer whatever comfort I can to his wife, daughters, and sisters. Without Christ, we are as Paul said, “miserable.” But we have Christ, and having him, even in the midst of this world’s misery, we have hope and joy.

Fathers and Friends

May 18, 2019

Once your kids are grown and have families of their own, the opportunities to connect  one-on-one with them can be hard to come by, especially for any length of time. Last night, son Matt and I drove to Pittsburgh to attend the national USCCA convention. Informative seminars and more vendors and products than I could imagine, we spent a full five hours wandering around, listening to spiels and trying out products before deciding to come home a day early. Seminars we could afford to miss coupled with the unexpected death of a close friend meant that there was no real reason to stay for another day.

We both enjoy the shooting sports, so this convention simply gave us an excuse to spend this time together, and I think we did a pretty good job of it. Linda and I have often watched young parents trying to be best friends with their kids, and when given the opportunity, remind them that their kids have lots of friends and don’t need parents to take on that role. They need parents to be parents. We never worried much if our kids liked us. Our job was to do the often difficult work of training young minds and spirits to become responsible adults. I remember years ago telling a young father that  if you do your job early on, when your kids are grown, you can be friends. Matt and I had that opportunity this weekend, and I got to enjoy the fruit of our early labors. I sleep tonight a very thankful (old) father.

Last Night’s post

May 4, 2019

“Moreover the Hebrews who were with the Philistines before that time, who went up with them into the camp from the surrounding country, they also joined the Israelites who were with Saul and Jonathan. Likewise all the men of Israel who had hidden in the mountains of Ephraim, when they heard that the Philistines fled, they also followed hard after them in the battle.” —I Samuel 14:21-22 NKJV

King Saul sat under his pomegranate tree unwilling or unable to rouse himself to lead his people. It took his brave/foolhardy son Jonathan to make a daring special ops raid on an enemy garrison to awaken Saul to leadership. In fact, it was Jonathan who was the leader, not Saul. One of the amazing results of genuine leadership is how it brings people out of the woodwork. Jonathan’s aggressiveness inspired Hebrews who had defected to the enemy to join the fight. Those who had hidden in fear were suddenly emboldened to become the warriors they were meant to be. 

Leaders often succumb to the temptation to reject or punish those whose weaknesses induce them to become traitors or simply retreat in fear. “I’ll never trust him again!” Is an emotion that too often becomes a self-defeating reality. Jonathan didn’t reject the delayed loyalty of those who weren’t brave enough to continue in what appeared to be a lost cause. He prefigures Jesus who instead of writing off Peter after the latter’s threefold denial, reaches out and welcomes the now humbled fisherman, entrusting him with the responsibility of leading the fledgling church. 

Real leadership is not only a matter of vision and inspiration. It requires character strong enough to forgive and lead those who have disappointed and even betrayed you. There is an abundance of “almost” leaders, but a dearth of those strong enough to lead as Jonathan and Jesus. I am grateful for those who have led me like this, and pray for wisdom and grace to be that kind of leader myself.

Monuments

May 3, 2019

The story of Saul never ceases to trouble me. Samuel’s command to wait 7 days was given in1 Samuel 10:8, but his rebuke is Saul for not waiting doesn’t come till 13:8-14, some two or more years later. The text of 1 Samuel 13:1 is corrupt; what we have is, “Saul was … years old when he began to reign; and he reigned … and two years over Israel.” The first number is totally missing, and the second is incomplete, leading to much confusion over the chronology of the events recorded here. The time frame doesn’t add up, but the overall message is clear: Saul’s pride got the best of him; even to the point of building a monument to himself (15:12). He was no longer “little in his own eyes” (15:17). 

Building monuments to ourselves is more common than we imagine. These days they are unlikely to be made of stone or bronze, but they are self-promoting monuments just the same. Politicians pose and posture, especially when campaigning. Preachers look to build the bigger and better church or ministry. Professors publish, compete for trophies. Rare is the person who deflects glory to another, but it’s still true: the greater we make of ourselves, the lesser we make of God, which is always a recipe for disaster.

Aromas

May 2, 2019

Some people turn up their noses; as long as it’s not too close, I breathe in deeply, inhaling the pungent aroma that says, “Spring is here!” Linda and I went to town this afternoon to pick up a few gifts for our Cuban friends, and we could smell it as soon as we pulled in the driveway. The skunks are awake and looking for juicy grubs and worms. When Linda opened the front door, our dog Emma, who usually is whining and jumping to greet us, instead bounded out the door and across the backyard, barking and baying for all she was worth. Fortunately, she never catches whatever it is she is chasing, and we just keep our fingers crossed, hoping Mr. Polecat doesn’t catch her. It would only happen once. A snootful of skunk spray is a lesson not soon forgotten. 

Scents and aromas have an uncanny way of embedding themselves into our souls. A few years ago, they were drilling gas wells in the swamplands between Gerry and Sinclairville, and every time we drove by and caught the fragrance of gas in the air, I was immediately transported back forty years to when we were first married and living in Alma, NY. It was old-time oil and gas country, harking back to when the leases that dotted the hillsides were run by huge one lung gas engines with sucker lines radiating through the woods to the surrounding wells. Even a slight sniff of that gassy air conjures up images of friends long since gone, and times of youthful joy. 

Rudolf Horton was one of the old-timers. He and his wife Helen ran the only general store/post office/gas station/apartment house I’ve ever seen. Their own living quarters were paneled in solid cherry taken from trees he had harvested from his land. Rudolf had a pronounced limp from the tuberculosis that ate away the ball of one femur. X-rays showed the bone narrowing to a point that ground into his hip socket, but Rudolf never complained, and was always ready with a pithy saying as he leaned across the counter of his store. “If wishes were fishes, we’d eat ourselves to death,” is the one that comes most readily to mind.

Although we only lived there five and a half years, I can dredge up more stories about the people whose homes and lives stretched along the two valleys that intersected in that little hamlet than anywhere else. The people of the little church I served there saw it as their mission in life to get young pastors started, and they did it well. When I review the sermons I preached then, I can only shake my head in amazement at the grace with which they endured my early efforts. Sadly, the church closed some years ago, effectively denying a future generation of would-be preachers the education I received as I cut my ministry teeth in that place.

See what I mean about aromas? That spring-fresh fragrance of skunk reminded me of the summer sweetness of the gas wells, and immediately, I was transported to another time and place. No wonder God calls the prayers of the saints a “sweet-smelling aroma;” our prayers remind God of his promises, reaching into the depth of his heart even as aromas do the same for us.

Heartburn

May 1, 2019

Mr. Heartburn seems to have gone on holiday. He’s done that before, only to return unbidden and unwelcome to wreak his havoc on my esophagus. Tums, Prilosec, and other antacids help, but I don’t like taking medicines unnecessarily, and it’s always unnecessary for me. I know what I have to do to send him packing: lose a few pounds. When my weight starts edging towards the top end of the 180s, I have to start popping the pills and cut out things like spaghetti sauce and pizza. Since I like both of those, the only alternative is to shed the pounds.

Last week Linda and I got to discussing our health which is good, but at our age, we don’t take anything for granted. The scales for me were creeping towards the 188 mark; whenever I bent over and the heartburn would grab me, so we decided to do something about it. Recently when visiting my 96 year old mother, she commented, “I don’t know when I went from getting old to being old.” Since she has twenty seven years on me, I’m still in the “getting old” stage, and I’m not ready to concede “old” yet. So we decided together to be more careful about our diet. I downloaded an app that supposedly tracked carbohydrate intake, but in fact only calories. No matter. I filled in the general information of height, weight, age, sex, and voila! It calculated my appropriate daily caloric intake as about 1500.

It’s not completely accurate, listing the caloric value of mostly prepared foods which we never eat. We made a few adjustments, I stopped snacking and second helpings, and in less than a week, I’ve dropped five pounds. I don’t look any different, but Mr. Heartburn has packed his bags. For good. Yes, I admit—I like my snacks and seconds, but I like feeling better even more. I am thankful for the modern knowledge of nutrition, for a wife who is with me on this, and for the success I’ve already seen. Years ago, I started exercising because the Lord reminded me of the Scripture that says my body is his temple. “I don’t like the shape it’s in,” he said. Well, I don’t like the fiery feeling in my chest, so it’s on to step two: exercise and now, diet.