This Life is not the End

It is Good Friday evening, and a song I wrote about 25 years ago just came to my mind.

The Dawn

If I had stood at Calvary, and viewed the darkness there,

Looked up and seen my dying friend, and felt the deep despair,

Of seeing helpless, him on whom, I thought I could depend,

I think I would have cried out, "Oh, God, this is the end."

If I had stood outside the tomb and seen the awful stone,

That sealed in the kindest man that I had ever known,

I might have thought, "He wasn't God, he was only just a friend."

And in my grief, I would have cried, "Oh, God, this is the end."

But a new day was coming. There was sunrise near at hand.

There would be a brand new morning. New life was in the plan,

For Christ conquered death, and rose again, upon an Easter morn.

And just as surely as He lives, we too with see the dawn.

And if today you stand here, so overwhelmed by life,

If you cannot make sense of the confusion and the strife,

Put your faith in Him who conquered death, eternity you'll spend,

In lifting up your praise to Him. This life is not the end.

For a new day is coming. There is sunrise near at hand.

There will be a brand new morning. New life is in the plan.

For Christ conquered death, and rose again, upon an Easter morn.

And just as surely as He lives, we too will see the dawn.

It is hard to imagine the overwhelming grief that Christ's friends must have experienced on Good Friday, but joy was just around the corner. Morning was coming.

And....morning is coming!

I love my house, but....

I love my house....all eleven rooms and four full bathrooms of Victorian charm with 10 foot ceilings on the first floor and 9 foot ceilings on the second floor. I love the two fireplaces, prism glass windows, built in buffet in the dining room, leaded glass doors on the book cabinets, claw foot tubs in two of the bathrooms and hardwood floors.

I love the fact that when we moved in 33 years ago we had all of the plumbing and wiring updated and some areas modernized without losing too much of the home's character. The two bathtubs that aren't old are a tub with jets and one that is extra deep for "steeping."

But...

Two people do not need four bathrooms. It is expensive to heat a house this size with such high ceilings. It is a lot of effort to clean this enormous place. I don't want my husband climbing ladders to change storm windows anymore.

So...

We are going to move into something smaller and more realistic for people who are card-carrying members of the Medicare generation. Our purchase offer on a smaller home has been accepted. Now we just have to figure out how to get rid of the collection of "stuff" that results from not moving in over three decades.

What was he thinking??!

"Vindicate me, O Lord, for I have led a blameless life"....so begins Psalm 26 written by David.

This would be the same David, who as King of Israel, saw a beautiful woman, desired her, called her to the palace, and engaged in sexual relations with her although she was married to a soldier in his army. When she notified him that she was pregnant, he arranged for her husband to be placed on the front lines in battle, and then abandoned by his fellow soldiers, so that he would be killed. I have to assume that Psalm 26 was written prior to this incident, which is certainly not characteristic of a blameless life.

But, even if this was written when David was a poor shepherd boy, what was he thinking? No matter how earnest we are within our own hearts, who among us is blameless? We may have every intention of doing the right thing, but there are just way too many ways to mess up.

I knew this by the time I was seven years old. I clearly remember my frustration with myself. I wanted to be good. I wanted to cooperate with my mother. I knew I should be kind to my younger brother. It was the practical out-working of this that tripped me up on a daily basis. I was told that I needed to invite Jesus into my heart, so I did. Night after night, I would apologize to God for my bad behavior, and ask Jesus to come into my heart. Then I would get up the next day and discover I was still the same rotten little kid.

Finally, I had the opportunity to talk to a Sunday School teacher, who explained to me that inviting Jesus in my heart would not make me perfect. Jesus died for my sins, and they were paid for by His sacrifice, but I was still going to struggle to be good. I just had to keep asking him to help me. An enormous weight lifted off my seven-year-old shoulders on November 2, 1952. I have spent the last 57 + years knowing that my sins were forgiven, but also knowing that living a "blameless" life is exceedingly difficult! Perfection doesn't come in this life-time.

Since that day, I can honestly say that my intentions within my innermost being have always been to do the right thing...the thing that most honors and pleases God. I can also honestly say that I have not always succeeded at that. I am not excusing myself based on personality quirks and human frailty, but it is a fact that we all have such.....some of us have more than others!

So, dear David, what were you thinking when you declared yourself blameless? Did you not understand your own weakness? Did you think you could not be tempted as other men? The fact that you were usually a "good boy" did not mean you always would be. The person who does what is right 99% of the time, still has the other 1% to deal with.

Perhaps it was an older and wiser David who said, "You know my folly, O God; my guilt is not hidden from you. May those who hope in you not be disgraced because of me." (Psalm 69:5-6)

Have you ever seen a flashdark?

Tomorrow for my Children's Sermon, I am planning to answer the question, "If God is good and He created everything, where does evil come from."

So....have you ever seen a flashdark? That would be a device that projects darkness into a sunlit room. Flashlights are common, but I haven't heard of anyone owning a flashdark.

When we go to bed at night, we don't turn on the dark, we turn off the light.

Darkness is the absence of light.

It is interesting that God is often referred to as Light.

God is light; in him there is no darkness at all. If we claim to have fellowship with him, yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not live by the truth. But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin. I John 1:5-7

Light has come into the world, but men loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that his deeds will be exposed. John 3:19-20

Just as darkness is the absence of light, so evil is the absence of God. God is good. God is light. Where He is not present, evil and darkness dwell.

Evil didn't need to be created. It is a natural consequence of God's absence.

When what is vile, is honored....

The wicked freely strut about when what is vile is honored among men. Psalm 12:8

A look around at our society can be very discouraging. That which is vile is everywhere. It is on magazine stands, bumper stickers, T-shirts and television. What is done in the name of free speech is horrifying, and I'm pretty sure, not what the Founding Fathers intended when the Bill of Rights was written.

A couple of years ago, when a construction project was going on where I work, I followed a pickup truck out of the parking lot and down the street. At eye level and unavoidable on the back of the pickup was a bumper sticker with a revolting message. It was offensive to me, but all I could think of was, "What if I had a child in the car, and the child asked me what that meant?"

Later when I returned to the parking lot, I noticed the pickup truck parked near the construction site. I assumed it belonged to one of the workers. I walked over and discovered that the driver had left the window open. I wrote a note and placed it on his seat. "Have you thought about the fact that a child might see your bumper sticker?"

The next time I saw the pickup, there was a clean rectangular spot on the back where the bumper sticker had been. I don't know whether the driver himself had listened to his conscience, or whether he complained to fellow-workers about the note and a supervisor overheard it and told him to remove the sticker. No matter...it was gone, and fortunately without confrontation.

What does it mean to honor what is vile? I think we "honor" that which we allow to have a place in our lives, that which we allow to seem "normal," that on which we spend time and money. It could be a television show we watch, a movie we go to, a magazine we buy, or a story that we listen to that we know we should avoid.

Apparently this has been the case for thousands of years. David, who wrote Psalm 12, lived a long, long time ago. The basic nature of man has not changed. We humans are not becoming more noble and upright.

When we give place to what is vile, we should not be surprised that the wicked strut about freely. We are indicating that we are willing to play by their rules. Their conduct becomes the norm. They are free of censure.

We should not allow them this.

Yes, we have to allow for free speech, but we don't have to approve of what others say. We have free speech too. We can stand against the filth in this world. We are allowed to express our opinions. We should not accept the accusation that we are intolerant. There is way too much at stake here. If we are afraid to speak up, we should not be surprised at the overwhelming tide of wickedness that flaunts itself.

Spring Thaw

Northern New York is beautiful at most times during the year....this is not one of those times.

The trees appear lifeless...not one hint of a bud or bit of greenery. The maple trees are producing that wondrous sap, which after hours of boiling becomes liquid gold maple syrup, but the trees certainly don't look pretty at this stage. Gray skeletons are stark against a frequently gray sky.

The snow banks are melting, but the grass that is revealed as they recede is dead and matted down like a head of hair that has been unbrushed all winter. No tulips, crocuses or daffodils have ventured the smallest green shoot.

Worse yet is all the debris that becomes apparent as the snow banks melt away. I walked several blocks today noting plastic bags and bottle caps, cardboard tubes, chunks of styrofoam, stray Christmas decorations, and worst of all....the canine feces which has been frozen in the snow banks is now thawing out everywhere.

Dog owners are supposed to pick up after their dogs, and some do. I have seen one lady in the neighborhood who gets behind her dog as soon as he squats and places a plastic bag strategically to catch the foul waste. Not everyone is as thoughtful. And so, the entire winter's inventory of doggy doo is now thawing where it was deposited during November, December, January and February.

When my son was a little guy and tried to play outside at this time of year, it was not uncommon to find him at the door nearly in tears wailing, "Oh, no! Puppy-doo!" It's tough on a kid to avoid a whole winter's worth of the stuff.

Ah, well....in a few short weeks, the spring rains will have washed the disgusting plops into the soil, the grass will be greening, violets will appear in the lawn, and the limbs of the trees will have little swelling buds that are a promise of leaves.

But, if you are planning a trip to northern New York before that, watch out where you step.

You know you are in California when...

We are in California visiting with our son and his wife. Today while they were at work, we decided to drive from Mountain View through San Francisco and across the Golden Gate Bridge to the Muir Woods National Monument to see the redwoods.

On the way there, I realized, much to my annoyance, that I had forgotten my camera. It was in the side pocket of my backpack which I had left at their apartment. I would have loved to have taken a picture of the bridge or a picture from the bridge of San Francisco Bay. The coastal redwoods are much too impressive to actually be captured in a photo.

We hiked through the forest...further than we meant to when we started out. The trail was muddy and slippery from recent rain, but the trees were awe-inspiring. It is overwhelming to stand among them looking up and realize their immensity. Later we drove further up the mountain and then down the west side where we could see the ocean from a lookout area. Way below us was the Pacific crashing against the shoreline. Again, it would have made an amazing photo.

However, the picture I most missed taking was of a sign I saw on the way back to the parking lot. You know you are in California when you see a sign that says, "First Amendment Rights Area." Underneath the title was the explanation that this was the designated area in which individuals wishing to express their first amendment rights could do so. Seriously??? There are designated areas for such?! Does any other state in the union do this?

I once heard someone say that a long time ago, the country was tilted to the west, and all the nuts rolled to California. Maybe he was right.