ONE SMALL CANDLE

 The turn of the year is a time both for looking back and reflecting ahead. When we look back at the past, we realize that we could have done things differently, should have, in fact, that mistakes were made but there were a myriad of successes as well. While we may revel in our triumphs and regret our tragedies, we also realize that the past is passed and cannot be undone and that only the future is in our hands.

What that future will be like will only be known when it is past, when it can be viewed from the perspective of the present, just as we now reflect on the past of last year that was our future when that year began. As we reflect back, we wonder if we made a difference in the world, if what we did really mattered. As we look ahead, we ask ourselves the same question: will my life matter? Will I make a difference?

The late scholar Sir James Dowling, who did make a difference in the world in his time, when he was 90 and looked back on his life, came to this conclusion: “When you’re young, you think you’re going to reform the world, that you’re going to make a great impression. When you get old, you realize that, at best, you have only lit one small candle.” You also realize, if you think about it, that one small candle can light a very, very dark room.

We light candles, you and I, by the way we live our lives. They are small candles, to be sure. But without our candle being lit, the world would be darker. To discount our light would be wrong and it would diminish us as a person. No one is unimportant. Everyone has a candle to light. The reason we were born, the reason God created us, was to give light to the world. And as Jesus said, that light of ours is not to be hidden under a bushel basket but to be placed on a stand to give light to those around us. That’s parabolic language to be sure but it is also the truth.

At this time of year we often make resolutions about doing things differently, living life better, making changes in our life that need to be made but won’t come easily. More often than not we bite off more than we can chew and wind up giving up or settling for much less than we could or should. That may be human nature but it is also no excuse. What we often end up doing is nothing: no reflections on the past, no thoughts about what lies ahead, just living from day to day.

What we cannot not do is snuff out the candle. We light the way, whatever that way may be, good or bad, wherever it leads, because doing so comes with the territory of being human. There is no way around it. And even though our light may not be very bright, even though we may be embarrassed because of where it is going and what others saw us doing, we are a candle in the world.

If for this year we resolve to do nothing else, perhaps what we can do, perhaps what we should do, is simply, each morning of each day, remind ourselves that we are a candle, one small candle, yes, but one candle that God has put on this earth to light the way for others. We won’t make a great impression but we will make a difference

THE WORD WE HEARD

I sit and think and wonder why                                             

God’s first sound was a baby’s cry.

He spoke before to those who heard

what sounded like the spoken word --

Adam, Noah, and Abraham,

even Jacob while on the lam --

all heard him speak, or so they said,

and all obeyed in fear and dread.

 

Well, maybe not or maybe so

truth or legend, you never know:

we often hear what sounds like words

when all it is are chirps of birds.

We say we heard God speak to us;

then we wonder what’s all the fuss

from those who heard nary a sound

not even steps upon the ground.

 

God has spoken, yes, this I know;

it all began not long ago

when Jesus Christ was born that day

to come and take my sins away.

From that day on in words and deeds

with picture words -- like mustard seeds --

he told us all about himself

and showed us all about ourselves.

 

He lived; he loved; he laughed; he cried.

He gave his all until he died.

It all began that quiet day

amid the smell of old wet hay

when in that cry -- a baby’s word --

t’was God’s own voice, was what we heard.

We heard him say to you and me,

“I love you all. Why can’t you see

that I was born so you could know

how much your God loves all you so?”

 

The message of this Christmas Day

is how God speaks in his own way.

So let us pause and say a word

of thanks to God,  the Son, Our Lord.

“We thank you, God, for your dear Son

who came to us that cold dark morn.”

We hear him now and ever more

as we look out our own front doors,

hear him speaking, “Now come to me.

just take my hand and you’ll be free.”

So Christmas comes and Christmas goes,

but Jesus stays, yes, this we know.

He is inside both you and me

and speaks his love eternally.

 

 

THE LEAP OF FAITH AND UNFAITH

Faith by its very nature includes doubt. Faith is not knowledge. Faith is a belief that something is true even though one cannot prove its veracity. We believe God exists, that God loves and forgives us, that we will be with God forever in our death but we also have some doubts, whether we admit to them or not. We have those doubts because we cannot prove any of that which we believe.

That does not mean that which we believe is simply unbelievable. It merely means that we cannot prove it to be by some scientific means. That is why there always seems to be this battle between faith and science. A scientist seems to need prove beyond a shadow of a doubt whereas a believer only demands enough evidence to accept the truth of what just might be true if one could only prove it scientifically.

Thus, for any believer there comes a moment in his or her seeking for the scientific truth that s/he must take what Kierkegaard called a “leap of faith”. Christianity, for instance, makes complete sense, even scientifically, until one comes up against the Trinity. Then one has to take that leap and say, “I believe even though I don’t completely understand. It makes enough sense, not complete sense, even if I cannot prove it empirically.”

People of faith take those leaps on a daily basis. We believe people will be trustworthy and true. We believe it is best to love our neighbors and even to love our enemies, not because as G. K. Chesterton once bemused “they are one and the same”, but because we have learned that loving is better than hating, that loving brings with it rewards and benefits that hating cannot and will not.

Yet people of faith are also tempted every day to take a leap of unfaith. That happens when our prayers to the God we believe in don’t seem to be answered, when something horrible happens to someone we love for no good or apparent reason, when our neighbor responds to our love not with indifference but with downright cruelty. In those times why believe? Why be a Christian? Why not leap back and away?

It would be wonderful and so much easier to live this life were there be no necessity to believe, where we could know all, where we would not have to trust in another, even in our God, but simply to know for sure and for certain. Or maybe not. As painful as it is sometimes to live this life as a believer, it is certainly not as dull and boring as it would be if everything were known for certain.

That truth may not help when we are in the midst of doubt and even despair because our faith has been tried and seems to have lost the battle. The grace is that our faith is strong enough that we keep on going rather than turn around and leap away from the God we believe in even though we cannot prove God’s existence.

In fact, it is when we seem to be most at a loss, most distant and most doubtful that we take that leap of faith. It is in those moments when we are tempted to turn around and turn away that God gives us a push and we leap further into God’s loving arms.

WHERE IS THERE?

Those who have children have heard the plaint many, many times, almost too many times it seems. We’re in the car and going somewhere and from somewhere behind us we hear the cranky question “Are we there yet?”. Of course, we’re not there yet. If we were, why would we still be driving and the complainer(s) from the back seat would be now running around to drive us even more crazy.

In life there is always a there. We are going somewhere: to the store, to school, to work, to play, over the river and through the woods to grandmother’s house, wherever. Once we get there, we think we are there; and so we are, for a while anyway. Then it’s back on the road to where we came from. Another there. Life is full of journeys from here to there and back again. Sometimes, truly, when we get where we are going, we do not ever go back to from where we came.

Someone once observed that the road to success is always under construction. And the truth is that it truly is. For how do we define “success”? Probably in the same way we answer the question, “How much is enough?”. My suspicion is that those who deem themselves successful always wonder if they are really that successful, if they really do have enough. I would leave that for such to struggle with.

Another truth is life, the road through life, is always under construction. In this life we never really get there because we cannot define what that there is. We never know for sure if we have arrived there because tomorrow may move us from where we are to another there. Only in death have we finally arrived at the end of our destination. That’s when God says to us, “You’re there. You’re here. The journey is over.”

Thus, every day is a day on the road. As we go through the day, we construct that day by what we say and do. At the end of the day, we fall asleep and then wake up the next day to get on the road again: another day of construction. How well or how poorly our construction efforts are is up to us. Yes, so many others have an effect on what we are doing just as we have an effect on what they are doing, the day they are constructing. But what is ultimately important is what we are doing on our own behalf.

We can always build better, or if we have messed up the construction for the day, build back better tomorrow. If we do not, we’ll have even more work to do the next day. Yes, we need to be appreciative of the construction we did when we reflect back on the day at days end. But we must never believe that tomorrow cannot be better, that we nailed it. If sit back on our laurels and believe we have done enough, those nails will rust and our building will collapse.

Every day is a new day, an opportunity to construct it as best we can. You see, we’re never there until we’re finally there with God in eternity.

WHICH WAY TO GO?

The late, great philosopher Yogi Berra once opined, “When you come to a fork in the road, take it.” Well, of course! We’ve all been there in our lives. We come to a point where we have to make a decision on what to do, which way to go, which option to choose. We can’t just stand there and gape. We have to make a decision and hope and pray that it is the right one, that we take the correct fork in the road.

How do we know what to do? Sometimes the answer is clear and we have no doubts about what to do. But not always given all the uncertainties in life. Even when we truly believe we made the right decision, events can happen that prevent the outcome that we had hoped. Perhaps we can never know for sure that we are taking the right fork in the road, but we have to take one anyway.

So how do we move on in quiet confidence even, with some trepidation of course? There’s an old African proverb that might help. “If you keep your head and heart going in the right direction, you won’t have to worry about your feet.” Exactly! My Mom used to tell us, “Use your head” after we had done something foolish, made the wrong choice. It was too late to undo what happened. She was just reminding us that if we had indeed used our head, we wouldn’t have done what we did.

Managers and coaches always tell their players the same thing: “Keep you head in the game.” When they do not, bad things happen. So, too, in life. If we keep using our head, keeping it in the game of life, if you will, we will more often than not make the right decision, take the right fork in the road.

But sometime more is also decided. If our heart is not into what we are doing, we will get into trouble, make wrong decisions. Athletes often retire earlier than what might seem normal because they will tell us that their hearts aren’t in it any more. People change jobs even though they are doing great work where they are because their heart isn’t in it any more. They need to move on and take another fork in their road in life.

When our head and our heart into what we are doing, where we are going, more often than not our feet will take us in the right direction. Yes, given the fact that we are not in total control of our life, the road we take, the decisions we make, might not turn out the way we had anticipated or hoped. That’s simply life. But even when that happened, what we discovered was that we made the best of it.

That is all we can hope for and, I believe, all that God asks of us or we can ask of ourselves. If we use our head, keep it in the game, and if we put our heart and soul into what we are doing and how we are living, more often than not our feet will take us where we need to go. And even when we do take the wrong road, somehow our head and our heart will get us back onto the right path – as we have all learned from experience.

LEARNING FROM OUR MISTAKES

As we grow older, there are times, probably too, too many, when we reflect back on the mistakes we made, we say to ourselves, “If I only knew then what I know now”. But by now, of course, it is too late to undo the mistakes, the wrongs, the foolish decisions we made back then. We have had to live with the consequences whatever those consequences have been. We had no choice. We couldn’t undo what we did.

We move on in life for that is how life is. To be sure there are times when we get stuck in the present as the present moves into the future and becomes the past. Something happened and we can’t seem to move on. Whether that something was of our own making or because it was something that happened to us, we got stuck. And we stayed stuck until somehow in some way we were able to move on.

Hopefully, when we finally did move on, we learned from whatever it was that caused us to get stuck in the first place. If we did not learn, we were and still are prone to get stuck again when something of the same sort happens again. And it will. Mistakes, wrongs done to or by us, foolish decisions, somehow never seem to vanish from our lives. They rise up to bite us every now and then. Such is life!

The good part is that as we grow older, these events become less as less. We have learned from the past. We move on and continue to do so, but we move on not so much looking over our shoulders for something bad to happen, but from the perspective of having learned from the past. A wise person once observed that life is lived forward but understood backward.

Isn’t that the truth?! (Double punctuation mark) We both realize that we have learned from the past on the one hand and are surprised to realize how much we did learn. Not only that, when reflecting back on those unfortunate incidents in the past, we often have to admit that, as bad as they might have been, as traumatic and painful they were, we are glad they happened because they led us to where we are today and we are thankful for where we are.

You see, if the bad had not happened, our life would have turned out differently and we have no idea what that life would have become. We may think it would have been better, but that is a moot point. Our life now is the result of everything in our life that has led us to where we are right now. We only understand where we are now when we look back on from where we came.

The blessing is that we have come this far because we have learned from the past, the good and the bad. And we will continue to be blessed in spite of the mistakes and foolish decisions and the bad that happens and which, given human nature we cannot avoid, if we continue to look forward, always learning from those backward glances.

DON’T THANK GOD TODAY

I would like to begin with a word of advice. And that is: Don't thank God. Not today, anyway. Tomorrow. The next day; but don't thank God today. Do something else. That something else is to thank all God's helpers: our mom and dad, the teachers we have or had in school; Peter, Paul and Mary; the neighbor down the street; even our brothers and sisters. They are all God's helpers.

For it is all of these people who make us realize that God is what it is all about. God does everything for us, but so much of what God does for us is done indirectly through others. He feeds us and clothes us as we grow up through mom and dad. He teaches us how to live in His world through the words and examples of Miss Simms in first grade and Mr. Johnson in eighth grade.  He encourages us through the examples of his saints and enlivens us through the music of his singers and the paintings of his artists. God works through others most of the time. Sure, in a pinch, God does it all by himself. But by and large God works through his children -- through you and through me.

For example: Is that old but warm coat you decided to get one more year out of still hanging in the closet from last year when you didn't get that year out of it that you said you would? Today would be a good day to take it to someone who needs it. That's God taking care of his children through his children. Matter of fact, the only way that God can and will see to it that that cold, little old lady has a warm coat to wear is through one of us getting it to her. God does not work like Cinderella's Fairy Godmother and wave a magic wand and poof!! new coat. We have to be that real Godchild who works, not magic, but love.

The Apostle John tells us that God is Love and he or she who lives in love, lives in God and God lives in that person. When we do something loving, it is God living in us who does it. And when someone does something loving for us, it is God living in the other who does it. Sometimes we forget about the God living in us and in others.

We must not. We need to spend some time, you and I, thinking about how much God really does love us: how God gave his son to us to live and die and be raised up -- all for us, all because God loves us. But as great an act of love that Jesus' death on the cross was for us, it would all be in vain if God did not continue to love us in those around us and love us in ourselves.

Jesus's death on the cross forgives all our sins. His resurrection from the dead gives us eternal life, even though we really don't deserve it. Those are great and fantastic gifts. But the greatest gift God gives us every day is his continual love for us that is shown to us in and through other people: mom and dad and teacher and friend and neighbor.

Knowing that I am forgiven and will have eternal life is great. But knowing that I am loved is absolutely necessary. I know God loves me because I see him loving me through you. You and I are called to make God's love known to others by our very lives. Thank God for his love. But don't thank God today. Thank those who love us through him.

VIRTUE

"Virtue is its own punishment", says Denniston, whoever Denniston may be. Obviously he is a pessimist, albeit a realist, and that for two reasons. First of all, those who do good are always suspect. "Nobody is that good," we say. "What's her motive?" we wonder. Somehow we seem to get the impression that people are good either because they are afraid of being bad or because they want to get something in return for their good actions – something even better.

But is that really true for you and for me?  Granted, we are not always all that good. Granted, there is a little sin in each one of us, a little too much perhaps. But we are not good simply because we are afraid of what will happen to us were we to stray from the path of righteousness. Let's give ourselves and our God a little credit. We are basically good people who do good because that is the way God created us. That's the way we are.

And, granted, sometimes we do have ulterior motives for being good, or at least better than we might be. For children it is the Santa Claus Syndrome: "Better watch out...Santa Claus is coming to town" For adults, it is the Selfish Syndrome: "I want something I may not really deserve, all else being equal."

So, in all honesty, we are good sometimes for the wrong reasons. We are virtuous sometimes for other than the right or best reasons. But that is no reason not to be virtuous. Contrary to Denniston, virtue is its own reward: just knowing we are doing what we should be doing makes us feel good. And isn't that sometimes, even always, reward enough for us??

Denniston is a realist, secondly, however, because he realizes that those who do good are called upon to do good again...and again and again. Denniston might call such people "suckers." I suspect God would call them Christians, call them his children.  Yes, if we do good for others, we get a reputation. People begin to expect it of us. Churches and pastors who are generous in helping people who knock on their doors soon find a line of people looking for help. But is helping another person, deserving or not, a form of punishment? Really?

If we took Denniston seriously, the only reason to be virtuous is so that we can get something out of our actions. Virtue would not be its own reward. On the contrary, if we listen to Denniston, we would be virtuous because we were looking for a reward. Obviously, I don't buy that. Virtue is its own reward.

All you and I need do to verify that is look back upon those times when we were good, selfless. Selfishness, on the other hand is its own punishment. All we need do to verify that is remember those times when we have been selfish.

If we are looking for rewards for our actions, there is only one way to go: the way of the virtuous, the way of Jesus which, yes, is sometimes the way of the cross. But that, too, that cross, is the way to the reward in this life and the life to come. The choice is ours.

TO WHOM ARE WE LISTENING?

Jean Kerr tells the story. Her young child came home from school all teary-eyed and sad. When she asked what was the matter, he told her about the play he was in in grade school. The play was about Adam and Eve and he was Adam. Jean had a quizzical look on her face and asked, "Why so sad?  That's wonderful. You have the best part. You are the leading man." "Maybe so," her son replied, "but the snake has all the lines."

That is a funny story. And it's a good reminder to you and me. The problem that I have – and I suspect, the problem you have – is not so much that the snake has all the lines. It is rather that we believe all the lines that the snake feeds us. Remember the snake's first line in the Bible, in Genesis? "If you eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, you will become like God." Now that is a classic line. Who wouldn't like to be like God? Imagine the power to eliminate disease and famine and poverty. The power to make everything right. The power, the power, the power. Even if we use all that power correctly, it's a wonderful thought, a wonderful temptation.

Like Adam and his wife, we, too, bought the snake's line, all of it: hook, line and sinker. We grabbed the bait. And we got hooked. Boy did we get hooked. And we've been swallowing the bait ever since, choking on it. You see, back in the very beginning man and woman did not need to become like God. They already were. That is how God created them. But by doing whatever they did, by buying the snake's line, they became unlike God. Now, ever since then, we have been trying to become like God again.

Becoming like God, however, is not, no matter how it seems, having illusions of grandeur. Nothing of the sort. Becoming like God, becoming perfect as God is perfect, is what being human is all about. Once mankind bought the snake's line, once we became imperfect, we could no longer be and no longer were perfect.

The Old Testament is a record of the beginning of that journey on the road back to perfection, that trek down the path to becoming like God once again. The journey, of course, ends in Jesus, who through his death and resurrection gives us the means to perfection. The only hindrance is that whereas in the beginning perfection was a fact, was a reality in this life, that is no longer so. We now can become perfect only in and through our own death and resurrection.

That may be unfortunate because it then becomes all too easy to not try. I mean, why make the effort when we won't see the results, when we won't see perfection, in this life? Why indeed? If we buy that reasoning, we've swallowed the snake's line once again.

The reality of the situation is to understand that even the attempt is worth the effort; the struggle itself is worthwhile, that carrying a cross is good and necessary. That's another line, of course. It can be grabbed onto or it can be passed up. But whose line are we going to believe, the snake's or Jesus'? Seems to me that the snake has had all the lines long enough. It's time we started listening to the Writer, the Director, the Playwright in the drama of Salvation instead of listening to one of the actors.

A BIZARRE REQUEST

As I walked into her hospital room, she said to me, "Sit down so that I can see you better." So I did. But before I could say much of anything or even ask how she was doing, she said, "I have a bizarre request." When I started to smile, she asked why I was laughing. "I'm just wondering what you mean by 'bizarre'," I replied. "Get a paper and a pencil and I'll tell you," she said. So I did.

"These are the songs I want played at my funeral," she said. "First, I want 'The Poor People of Paris' before the service starts. Then I want 'I Wish You Love.' That's were the kids cry. Then I want 'Amazing Grace.' Then you, meaning me, get to say a few words." She caught my smile but said nothing. "Then I want 'The Entertainer.' as they go out. Life is for the living and I don't want anyone dragging their feet at my funeral."

No one did either. When Trudie died six days later, she was ready. Her family and I spent those six days alternately remembering and forgetting the tune to "Poor People of Paris." It became a running joke, and not gallows humor either. Trudie wouldn't stand for that. At the funeral, I had to play the tune over a tape recorder. When I announced the song that I had just played, the expression on the faces of the people present said, "I knew

I heard that song somewhere." And when I told them why it was played, they also had a knowing look. Typical Trudie. The kids cried in the proper place. I said two words, give or take a few hundred. And we went to the cemetery humming Scott Joplin's music. Some tears, yes; but mostly it was good feeling and joy and happiness.

Bizarre? Depends. You can't find two of those songs in any church hymnal. It wasn't bizarre music, just not typical. It certainly was different, but "different" is not a synonym for "bizarre." What made Trudie's funeral different was not so much the music but the fact that she actually selected it. What was even more different, maybe even bizarre, meaning "remarkable," is that she was willing, even wanted, in fact, to talk about her funeral while she was alive, albeit on her death bed.

That is remarkable, and, all right, bizarre. We just don't like to talk about death, you and I; death in general and our own death in particular. That is bizarre, weird, you name it. A lot of us have a great difficulty simply writing a will so afraid are we to even broach the subject of our own mortality. And age makes no difference. Young or old, death is a subject we avoid even more than we avoid talking about religion and politics.

It does no good to ask "why?". We really can't explain why we avoid the subject of death whether we are in the prime of life or in the prime of death. Death frightens us because it is an unknown. Of course ten minutes from now is just as an unknown even though we might not admit it. Now I am not advocating that we start talking about death, although there is nothing wrong with that. Nor am I proposing that we sit down and decide what music we want played at our funeral, although that, too, would be a good idea. The fact is, I am not proposing anything. I just thought you might like to know how someone I knew approached and prepared for her own death.  There was nothing bizarre about it.

I LOST BECAUSE THEY CHEATED

It’s an interesting time in which we are now living. But, then, interesting may not be the correct word. How about frightening? The mindset for so many is that if we lost, whatever it is that we lost, it was not our fault. It was because someone else, or many other someones. did something, somehow in some way, to make sure we came out on the short end of the stick and now it’s payback-time. That scares me.

Sometimes the loser or losers are correct. The Black Sox Scandal back in the early 20^th century and the Houston Astro cheating a few years back are testaments that cheaters sometimes win. But what price that kind of victory? The players on both of those teams who engaged in the cheating were and will be marked for life.

This mindset that “We was robbed!”, as the old Brooklyn Dodger mantra had it years ago, is still very much prevalent. The last presidential election is a glaring manifestation of this false belief, but it is belief nevertheless and one that seems not to want to go away quietly. In fact, it is not going away and certainly not quietly. I just shake my head in sad disbelief and wonder why. That mindset interests me but is also frightens me.

Perhaps it goes back to a time not so long ago and, unfortunately is still present, that everyone wins; everyone gets a trophy. I can’t image my Little League baseball manager giving each of us a trophy because we finished dead last with a 3 and 18 record. We enjoyed our few wins, moped when we lost, but quickly got over it. It was the simple joy of playing the game that mattered. Winning wasn’t the be all or end all. Now that’s what it seems to be. What is even worse is that we get angry and act out to the harm of others.

As Christians our hero was considered a very big loser, even among his closet friends. He was kind and caring and loving and healing and forgiving, a real hero; and yet they hung him out to dry on a cross. And when Peter tried to defend him, he told him to put down the sword. Some winner he turned out to be! Some winner he did turn out to be! But the victory came in ways no one expected: resurrection and new life.

But that is how all seeming and even real loses turn to victories: through resurrection and new life. They don’t come from trying to undo the past, take away the victory from someone else and claim it should have been ours. It comes from acknowledging the loss, whatever that loss was, and doing what needs to be done to find resurrection and new life in the days and weeks and years to come.

There will always be winners and losers. Reflecting on our past, we learned more from our defeats than from our victories. My team lost all those games back then not because the other teams cheated but because we weren’t a very good baseball team. Resurrection and new life only come from loss because that is often the only way we learn. Cheaters, in the end, never win. Losers usually do if we are willing to admit defeat and move on.

ACTING OUR AGE

At one time another, perhaps more times than we would like to admit, have been told, "Act your age!" We were doing something silly, maybe downright immature, and an elder called us to task by reminding us that someone of our years does not act in that sort of manner. They were right; but they were also wrong, for the most part most of the time.

So, too, would someone be wrong if we were told to "Act like a Christian" when catching us doing something that is unchristian. You see, the problem we all have is not so much in acting our age or acting like a Christian. We do that all of the time. I act like a seventy-nine-year-old, almost all of the time.  What I don't always do is react as a Christian. We all know what actions are demanded of us both by society and by ourselves according to our age. We don't expect a six-year-old to act like one who is sixty – and vice versa.

With age and maturity come a knowledge of how to act, how to live. The same is true for us acting like a Christian. Six-year-olds and sixty-year-olds act differently. The emphasis is not on acting, as in faking it, pretending, playing at it. It is on acting as in actions, Our actions, what we do, should be done according to what our age and maturity require.

Our reactions, often, are not. All too often we tend to react, not according to our age, not according to our faith. Someone hurts us and we react quickly. And in that reaction we turn, not the other cheek but the back of our hand or the backside of our character. We do and say things that, given time, given thought, we would not say or do. Reactions, all too often, are passionate responses to a situation.

What all this means is that we must react like a Christian. Our quick response should be the same as our slower, thought-out, reflective response. If that were always the case, we would save ourselves much grief and torment. But it is not always the case. I suspect that in the vast majority of the situations where we do something selfish, sinful, foolish, what we do is react in an unchristlike way. They are reactions of passion. We get hurt and we immediately react. We become defensive. We pout. We shout. We repay in kind or worse.

Acting as Jesus would, responding as Jesus would have us, is not in the forefront of our thinking at that moment of real hurting, at that moment of our life. What we wind up doing then is something stupid...and paying for it for a long time because the person whom we are reacting to reacts to our immature, unchristlike reaction -- and then the whole vicious cycle goes on and on and on.

There will probably never be a time when we always say and do what we should.  We will never always react as a Christian. But that does not mean that we give up. We must keep working at it through prayer, good works, reading of Scripture – through doing all those actions we know are necessary in order to grow up into a Christian person. When we fail, we ask for forgiveness and start over. When we succeed, we simply thank God for he is the One, through his Son and Spirit, who enables us to react our age, to react our faith.

ALEXA

No, not that one. Not the one that can tell you the time, play a favorite sone, show you a recipe to make chocolate chip cookies, turn your lights off and on – do lots of things almost beyond your imagination, at least beyond a seventy-nine-year-old’s one-time imagination. No, not that Alexa. This one: the one who was my 7:00 PM to 7:00 AM nurse for the three nights I was in the hospital to have a pace maker installed in my body. That Alexa.

She is in her mid-twenties, a very recent graduate from nursing school. She is an RN and will soon begin studies to obtain her BSN. She was once very overweight having lost 150 pounds in the past year. She told me that most of her friends hardly recognize her now. I told her she should be very proud and she said she was. I was proud for her having been on countless diets over all these years, knowing how difficult it is to not only stay on one through it but to maintain the weight afterwards. That Alexa.

The difference in the two is, of course, profound. While the virtual one can keep us informed and up to date on myriads of subjects, it cannot provide what we really need when we really need it: TLC, tender, loving care. That is what my Alexa provided. And it wasn’t easy, not because I was a bad or contrary patient but because she was/is such a loving and caring nurse. She always apologized for waking me up in the middle of the night, several times at least, to take my vital signs or hand me a pill the doctor ordered. She did not have to, of course, but she did, and I always told her that she didn’t have to. She was taking care of me. What was there to apologize for anyway?! That Alexa.

She worked three straight twelve-hour shifts, actually twelve-and-a-half, because she and the nurse she replaced and the one who replaced her always came into your room to discuss your situation before handing on nursing duties to the other. It was comforting to be in attendance as they conversed. They cared. And it was not as if my Alexa cared more than the nurses who worked that day shift. They were simply busier running here and there as their patients were being moved from here to there on a constant basis as I was on the cardiology floor and every other person on my floor had serious heart problems. Mine was simply a tune-up, if you will.

For my Alexa her job is her ministry, her vocation. In fact, it isn’t a job. It is easy to spot the difference in any field: for all-too-many what one does is simply a job, a pay check. For many others, like Alexa and, truly all the staff who attended me, what they did was, yes, a pay check, but it was also their vocation. Even the three transporters who wheeled me here and there for tests loved their job. Imagine that!

I am not saying that my Alexa was more special than all the other nurses who ministered to me. It is simply to say that it is heart-warming and uplifting to have had the opportunity to get to know, even in such a small way, someone who is a true caregiver. There are millions of them and we sadly take them so much for granted. No virtual Alexa, no matter how smart, can replace my Alexa. She was such a blessing and I will always be grateful and thankful for her.

POSITIVE THINKING

The Power of Positive Thinking, Norman Vincent Peale's landmark book, has some basis in Scripture. Offhand I don't know where. For the present moment it really doesn't make any difference. The point is simply well-taken and very important. Peale spent a lifetime trying to convince everyone that there is indeed power in positive thinking.

Yes, there is power in the cross and power in the blood, as those old hymns remind us. No doubt about that. But neither the cross of Jesus Christ nor his death on that cross nor even his resurrection from the dead to eternal life mean very much if we are down on ourselves or down on our faith or down on our church. Nor can even they do very much for us either. If we do not want to get well, or worse, if we feel that we are so ill that we will never get well, we won't, no matter how good the medical team, no matter what is done for us medically, physically or spiritually. No matter anything.

The first step toward a healthy anything is to be convinced that there is a road to recovery, that good health and vitality is indeed possible no matter how gloomy the prognosis. Doctors have been known to be wrong. And miracles do happen. Wonders never cease if one expects something wonderful to happen. The most difficult thing to do is convince ourselves that something wonderful can and will happen, if we want it. That's positive thinking.

Positive thinking is the important first step. Without it we are doomed to trip, stumble and fall. With it we can take the next step and the next and the next: one step at a time. No leaps and bounds right off. Save that for later. Right now: one step at a time. Positive thinking is first, the first step.

But positive thinking is not enough. All the positive thinking and all the faith in the world won't do us one bit of good if we don't do something, if we don't help the situation to improve. Work, a lot of hard work, is also demanded – on everyone's part. No idlers, no shirkers, no buck-passers if we want something done. We all have to pitch in and lend a hand and an arm and a leg. Then our dreams and hopes, our positive thoughts, will begin to become realities.

We're not looking for miracles. That would be nice, of course. But even those who looked for miracles from Jesus had to have positive thinking. They had to believe that he could and would do something good, something positive for them. And then they had to do something in return: they had to go up and ask. And if a miracle did happen, they had to go on living it and not revert back to their old ways.

But thinking positively is where we must first begin in any endeavor as individual people and as a community. Negativity never builds up. It always tears down. Add prayer to thinking positively and we have step two. Steps three and four, whatever they are, will follow. The future for us as individuals, as a community, as a world, is only as bright as we think it will be. I happen to think that it can be very bright. I pray that it will be, but I must do my part. So do each one of us.

AND YET…

God does not play favorites and yet it surely does seem that way, doesn’t it? Personally, I know I am abundantly blessed, especially when I compare my gifts to those of so many people I know and the millions I do not know. Their gifts, or I should say, seemingly lack of them, pale in comparison to my abundant gifts. I am very blessed. But that certainly unanswered question is: “Why me and not them?”

I believe God loves each and every one of us to the same degree, namely, totally. But if measured by gifts given, it certainly does not seem that way: not in any way and not in the least. And yet, doesn’t that seem the way we measure God’s love for us: by the gifts given, the prayers answered, the blessings received – or not? That is how we often measure love in this life anyway, is it not?

The truth is that no one of us knows the mind of God let alone even begins to understand it. We don’t even understand God: how God is God or simply how God is. When I try to, I quickly change the subject. God is completely beyond my comprehension. All I can do is believe and trust that God knows what is best for me even if I, at times, at many times, think otherwise.

So what does God ask of me, ask of each one of us who believe but do not understand or even begin to comprehend? The simple answer, but not the easy one, is to do the best we can with the gifts we have been given, no matter how many or how few. It is useless to ask why we are blessed (or unblessed as the case may be) because we will never know the answer, not in this life anyway.

But it is not useless and, in fact vital, that we ask about our response to our blessings an un-blessings, if you will, as vast or as limited they may be. On the one hand, while we certainly do not like the bad that happens to us for whatever reason it happens, we can certainly ask why we have failed to use our gifts as we could and should have. On the other, while we may and often do place God on the hook for the bad that happens, we are left on the hook for the bad we have caused because we failed to do our best or maybe even failed to do anything.

None of this, of course, answers the question as to why bad things happen to people who do not deserve what happened to have happened. Is it God’s will that the baby dies, the cancer kills, the accident happens? I don’t believe it is. What I do believe is that God does not abandon us but gives us all the grace and strength we need to make resurrection and new life from it. That will never be easy and it certainly does not answer our question about why the bad happened.

What we have all discovered, and hopefully learned, is that is sometimes the greatest gift, the greatest blessing of all, is finding and living that new life in whatever form it takes.

WHO DO YOU SAY I AM?

Jesus is Lord!” “Jesus is the Messiah!” “Jesus is my personal Lord and Savior!” We see those words written on subway walls and tenement halls, to steal a line from Simon and Garfunkle. We also see them written on rocks along the highway, on placards at football games, and on billboards next to buildings. We hear people say those words on television, in church and standing on the street corner.

And Jesus would have none of it. “Don’t tell anyone who I am,” Jesus said to the disciples; ordered the disciples. “You know who I am. That’s enough for now.” And it was, for that moment. Yet I don’t think Jesus would say it any differently today. Telling everyone who Jesus is is the easy part. It’s really no big deal. The harder part and the bigger deal is to live what we say, who we say, Jesus is.

It is fine to tell the world that Jesus is our personal Lord and Savior. We can even purchase space along the highway to profess our beliefs on billboards. We can buy expensive seats at big-time games in order to hold up a placard that will be picked up by the ubiquitous television camera. But nobody really cares what we say we believe or who we say Jesus is. What they really care about is what we do about what we say we believe about Jesus.

What does it mean to us and to everyone we encounter when we say that we believe Jesus is the Messiah? What does it mean, not theologically or in words, but what does it mean in our relationships one to another, personal relationships? How is that belief lived out as we encounter others on our daily journeys? At the point in the Gospel story where Jesus told the disciples not to say anything about who they said he was, Jesus’ admonition was correct: they still did not know what that meant. They thought it meant that they would become very powerful people. They thought wrong.

Sometimes we also think wrong. Sometimes we think that believing in Jesus will make us powerful, bring us material possessions, wealth, prestige and all the trappings of the good life – just as the disciples supposed it would bring them whenever Jesus the Messiah came into power, worldly power. Sometimes that is still the message that is conveyed by all those signs and words and professions of faith. It was then, still is and always will be the wrong message. The only real message is the cross, quite the opposite of what we might think, what Jesus’ disciples thought.

In a sense, they learned the truth of what it meant to follow Jesus and they learned it the hard way: by living out their faith in Jesus. That was the only way for them and that has been the only way for us, if we must admit to that truth. It is not easy being a follower of Jesus: turning the other cheek, walking the extra mile, forgiving those who have harmed us. The list is long and we know it.

If we truly believe that Jesus is our Lord and Savior, we do so by living out that faith in him by our very lives, not so much in word but always in whatever we do so that others make come to know our love for Jesus through our love for them.

 

GOD DOESN’T PLAY FAVORITES

Sunday’s Gospel about the Syrophoenician woman who came to Jesus begging him to heal her daughter who was possessed by an unclean spirit and her own personal faith made me think about my own. When I am honest with myself, I have to admit that I see so much of that woman in me, at least, thankfully, only at times. But even so, I can relate to her situation.

And so I wonder if, at a first reflection on the story, if Jesus was simply testing the Syrophoenician woman. I wonder if he simply wanted to see if her request was based on her own faith that he could really do what she wanted him to do or if she simply had heard about Jesus and was taking a chance. As the Gospel points out, she certainly knew of Jesus and what he had been doing, the miracles he had been working. Maybe she truly believed Jesus could cure her daughter or maybe it was simply a case of nothing ventured, nothing gained. I wonder.

That is not uncommon in this life. People who have no faith often say a prayer just before surgery or just before embarking on some risky venture. If God answers their prayers, if the surgery is successful, if the adventure turns out well, well and good. If God does not answer the prayer, well God never did anyway, so they think. They say that there are no atheists in a foxhole. There may be no atheists when the last resort is prayer even to a God one does not believe in.

Sometimes, even in the lives of the faithful, even in my own life, I must admit, God is the one we turn to as a last resort. We do all we can, all we can think of, and then when we have run out of options, we turn to God. Sometimes, instead of putting the need in God’s hands up front, we do so almost in hindsight. That is not to say that when we do turn over the situation to God, we back off and let God do the rest. God always expects us to do what we can do while God is doing God’s part.

The woman in the Gospel had done all she could to get help for her daughter. Her daughter was still possessed. She had run out of options. But, as the conversation between her and Jesus seems to indicate, certainly as Jesus’ words and actions seem to attest, the woman truly believed that Jesus could do something. Moreover, she believed that Jesus should do something even if she was a Gentile. Her faith brought her the miracle she wanted and needed.

At first glance this passage seems to indicate that God plays favorites. I suspect that it sometimes seems that way. “Seems” is the operative word. Why do some people suffer more than others? Why are some prayers answered and some not? Truly God hears our prayers no matter who we are. In fact, we know God knows are needs and wants even before we open our mouth in prayer. Our prayers are answered or not, not because God plays favorites but because God knows what is best for us better than we know what is best.  What was best for that woman was that her daughter be healed, and she was. Isn’t that what, too, want when we pray: what is best for us?

HOLY COMMUNIONS

A few weeks ago in one of my rare occasions to preach now being retired, I was reflecting on Jesus’ words that we need to eat his body and drink his blood and how that all relates to my First Holy Communion (in caps) back in 1950 when I was eight years old. My point was, and still is of course, that Sunday in May was really not my first holy communion (not in caps). Rather my first holy communion and the holy communions thereafter took place at my grandfather’s home.

For whatever reason as a toddler Grandpa allowed me to share coffee with him. It was and still is the best coffee I have ever had. When I told my mom in later years how much I loved that coffee, she said that she thought it was awful and that the only reason I loved it was because I loved grandpa. Maybe so. Drinking coffee with Grandpa was a holy communion for me.

So were Sunday afternoons at his home. Each Sunday Grandpa would walk a mile or so to church, attend Mass and then return home to make Sunday dinner for our family. My parents, siblings and I would arrive around 4:00, have dinner and then spend some time in Grandpa’s and Uncle Dom’s company. Those Sunday afternoons were also times of holy communion.

Granted, I never realized they were such, until, in all honesty after all these years of preaching, I started to reflect on that Gospel passage about eating Jesus’ body and drinking his blood. I suspect that over the years I was too caught up on visualizing such a reality, as did all those who walked away because they, too, could not imagine eating anyone’s body or drinking that person’s blood.

Jesus’ point was that his whole message was about how we are to form holy communions one with another, like drinking a cup of coffee or eating a meal with someone we love. In fact, the way to begin working towards holy communion with another or others is to first sit down and share a cup of coffee or a meal. If we cannot do that, there is no possibility of being in any communion, let alone a holy one, with another.

Sometimes that is easy as it was with Grandpa. Often, not so. Following Jesus is, at times, very difficult, as we all know. Sometimes we are not in communion with him because we deliberately do what we know such a communion would forbid, namely, when we act selfishly and hurt those we are in communion with or wish to be in communion.

Those holy communions I have been in and still are over the years have made me a better person, and I hope, helped me make others better as well. What I also know is that I am thankful for each and every one of them. I need to remember this the next time we share a cup of coffee or sit down to a meal together. How about you?

BACKGROUND AND FOREGROUND

 No two people are alike. We do not think alike, act or react alike, like alike. Each of us is unique, one of a kind. There was no one like us before nor will there ever be one just like us again. Never. While we may have very, very much in common, even sharing many of the same genes, no one of us is exactly alike.

Sometimes we forget that. And even when we remember how different we really are one from another, we usually do not give that fact much thought, especially in those moments when we most should. When we find ourselves in disagreement with another over a matter, be that matter large or small, theological, logical or simply a matter of taste, the main reason why we do not see eye to eye is that our backgrounds are different. Those backgrounds color what we see in the foreground. And it can be no other. We may overcome some of what happened to us as we grew up, but we cannot act as if it were never there. It is still very much a part of us, and always will be.

Our background is made up of many different and varying components. Where we were raised: country, city, small town, metropolis; how much money our family had: ranging from the hovels of poverty to the mansions of wealth or somewhere in between; the amount of formal education we had or did not have; whether we were an only child or had many siblings – all these color our foreground.

Even more: health issues, past or present, bear upon how we act or react, on how we think or what we think. So does our personal experience with other people and other cultures. If we have never left home, we will see reality differently than one who has “seen the world”. Our diet, our physical condition, our sense of humor, the climate in which we live all have an effect on our response to any given situation.

For the most part we are never all that conscious of our background. We know who we are and where we come from and all the rest. But it is back there in our unconsciousness somewhere and not up close and personal whenever we interact with someone else. The same is true for the other. And so when we argue about some point of personal importance, it is important that we understand not only our background but also where the other comes from as well. Until we do, we will never understand the other nor the other us.

What is more important than understanding the other, why the other thinks the way he does, we need to understand why we think and act the way we do. What we will discover is that as unique as we are, we are just as complicated. So much has gone into making us who we are that it is no wonder we often wonder why we do what we do, why we think the way we think, why we react the way we do. If we cannot understand ourselves, why we are the way we are, is it any wonder we cannot understand someone else?

The point is not that we are doomed to disagree or that we will never understand others. It is simply to say that we need to be less judgmental about why another is the way s/he is and ask the other to be the same for us. It will make life so much easier.

 

JESUS JOSEPHSON

From the day he was born over 2000 years ago to the day he died thirty-three years later he was known as Jesus Josephson, the son of Joseph, the carpenter from Nazareth. For millions of people over the succeeding centuries he was never more than that. To be sure everyone who knew him said he was the kindest, gentlest, most loving person they ever met.  Good man, they said, a very good man. Too bad he was killed as a common criminal even though the authorities who ordered his death really had no legal reason to do so. He had broken no law. But bad things have always happened to good people haven't they?

Jesus Josephson: some said he not only was kind and caring, he was a good preacher, too. They did wonder how he got so smart with what little schooling he had. They said he could keep an audience enthralled for hours. They even missed a meal and did not even realize it. They seemed to be only hungry for the food for thought that flowed so easily and readily from him.

Jesus Josephson: not only was he a good man, one who spoke both well and profoundly, some said he even worked miracles. He gave sight to the blind, made lepers clean, healed the paralyzed and even, believe it or not, raised people from death. But you had to be there to believe Jesus Josephson was more than a special and gifted man. To believe Jesus Josephson was anything, any one, more than that, well, there have been countless people over the millennia who did not and have not.

On the other hand, there have been countless millions more who believe Jesus Josephson was more than a very, very good man who loved deeply, taught well, worked miracles and was put to death because he was somehow perceived as a threat to the authorities. There are those of us who believe this Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, God’s anointed one, and not just the earthly son of Joseph the Carpenter.

Not only do we believe that Jesus Josephson, Jesus Godson, if you will, was put to death; we believe he was raised from death. What’s more, we even believe that we will be raised from our death to new life with this very same Jesus. What this new life will be like we have not the foggiest notion. But we also believe that it does not matter. What matters is that we will be raised to new life in our death just as Jesus was raised to new life in his death. We are willing to be surprised as to what that life will be like.

And so we who believe that Jesus was always more than Jesus Josephson, was God’s son, is God’s son, come together every Sunday (hopefully!) to celebrate our belief that he is who we say he is, that he was indeed raised from the dead, that we will be raised as well. 

For those who believe Jesus was no more special than any other good person unjustly put to death, Sunday is just another day. But for those of us who believe Jesus is the reason for the way we choose to live our lives, the model and example of what it means to be human, then every day, not just Sunday or even special days, is a very special day indeed. Celebrate today!

 

 

 

WHOSE WILL IS IT ANYWAY?

I know that God hears me, anytime, every time, all the time. God hears every word that comes from my mouth, sees everything I do, knows all of my innermost thoughts. Of that I have not the slightest doubt. So I know God hears me whenever I pray and for whatever I ask. I also know that I have not obtained all the requests I have made of God. A lot of my prayers go unanswered.

Or do they? I have not obtained all my requests. But they were my requests, what I wanted in perhaps my selfishness, even when I asked for something good for someone else: like a cure for cancer. It was my request, my wish, my will. When it was only mine and not God’s, my request went unanswered, unless the answer was “No.” That is an answer even if it is not the one I wanted.

The difficulty for me is to discern my will, my wishes, from God’s. That does not mean that my wishes are in opposition to God’s. What it means is that I have to discern what the real motive behind my prayer really is. The motive can seem so good, so pure, so holy, so right, when, in fact, in may simply be very selfish. It is not always that easy to discern which is which. Seeming good sometimes looks awfully good, even Godly. It is so easy for me to fool myself.

Sometimes I need to remind myself that whenever I discover that a prayer I have addressed to God is not answered the way I had desired, I must remember that the “I had desired” was not what God intended, wanted, desired. That is not easy for me because I so often think I know what God should do, what God should want. It is easy for me to play God. I do it every day. Often I do it when I open my mouth in prayer.

I also know that it is a very, very good thing that God does not think as I think and act as I do in response to what I am thinking. If God did, I would be one sorry person. My instinct, for instance, when someone hurts me is to hurt in return, repay an eye for an eye, if not worse. God’s immediate and first instinct, God being God, God being good, is to forgive. That is not the way I think nor the way I immediately react, I, in all honesty, must admit. I wish I were as immediately and totally forgiving as God.

I, we, need to let God be God. Then miracles will really happen as our prayers are truly answered by God in God’s own way in God’s own time. That will be a struggle because it has always been. Letting go and allowing God to be the God of my life does not come easy for me. I suspect it does not come easy for any one of us, human nature being what it is. On the one hand we are selfish, often vindictive, and sometimes reluctant to forgive, while on the other we are just the opposite. Is it any wonder that life often seems so confusing especially when we want to play God all the while wanting God to be God?

Daily we want to play God, to fix something, to do something, to change something, even to redress a wrong, because we will think we know best. It is in those moments we need to realize that only God knows what is best and that our prayer is to do God’s will and not our own, to let God be in charge, working in our lives God’s will and not our own.

NO GOOD REASON TO FEAR

 In the midst of the Great Depression, which ended before many of us were born or were too young to remember, when many people wondered if things would ever get better, President Franklin Roosevelt reminded the nation that there was nothing to fear but fear itself. Nineteen hundred years before that Jesus reminded his listeners that they had no reason to fear those who could kill the body. Rather, Jesus said and Roosevelt hinted, we need only fear those who can kill the soul.

We need to be reminded of such these days, it seems to me. We are being told either directly or indirectly that we need to live in fear: fear of terrorists, fear of immigrants (the illegal kind), fear of inflation, fear that our safe little world is no longer safe, fear that “they” (whoever “they are) are taking over or planning to take over our country; fear, fear, fear. To further inflate this fear we are pummeled with bad news, so much bad news that one is led to believe that there is no good news anywhere.

But we know, we know, we know differently. Let me emphasize that: WE KNOW DIFFERENTLY. We know there is more good news than bad news because we know there are more good things going on in our lives than bad no matter how bad the bad is at the moment. Every minute of every hour of every day more good things happen than bad. We know that to be a fact without having to prove it scientifically. For if the bad so outweighed the good, we would not be here to even reflect about it.

None of this is to downplay the evil in this world or that we should not fear those who would do us harm. It is to say that much harm is being done already, harm where it really matters, harm to our soul: the soul of our country, the soul of our church, the soul of our being. It is being done by those who want us to be afraid, who count on our being afraid of whatever fear it is they can instill in us.

I am not afraid of the terrorists of whatever ilk they may be. They cannot take away my soul because I will not allow them to do that. They cannot take away the soul of this country or the soul of our church. Oh, they can, as Roosevelt opined, if we allow them to do so. If we allow the prophets of doom and gloom, if we allow the fear mongers to have their way with us, we will indeed lose our very soul.

We won’t. That is the good news. They can’t. That is even better news. The reason they won’t is that we will not allow them. They cannot because we have one another and we have our love for our country and love for our church and love for one another. As Jesus reminds us in John’s Gospel, perfect love casts out fear. We are not there, of course. We do not love perfectly. But we do not not love. As imperfect as our love is, it is enough to waylay fear.

We cannot avoid the bad news nor should we. To believe nothing is bad or everything is bad is to live in a fantasy world. Our role is to overcome evil not with other forms of evil but with good. At the same time while we cannot escape the fear mongers, we can refuse to allow them to capture our soul. So we must.

 

NANNY

“Nanny” was the name her five granddaughters and five great-grandsons called her. She was always “Nanny” to me as well, from the first time I met her almost 35 years ago until she passed away three days ago at 99. She lived a long and full life surviving, if that is the word, the Great Depression and World War II when life was really difficult. Those of us who think the restrictions we had to endure during the pandemic were hard don’t know what hard is. Those were tough times.

She raised two sons and a daughter while working fulltime. Both sons, tragically, as far as a mother is concerned, proceeded her in death, as did both of her husbands. Both of them were PTSD victims of the War in the Pacific and made her life sometimes not so pleasant and certainly not easy. What made it worse was back then there was no notion of PTSD. They just called it Battle Shock or something, as if the sights you saw were supposed to be forgotten when they never could be. When they were haunted by those memories and images and acted out, she paid part of the price. It wasn’t easy.

Even though I called her Nanny, she always regarded me as another son. I still remember the time when we showed up and she yelled at her husband, “Bill, the kids are here.” At that time I was a kid of about 65. At 79 I was still a kid in her eyes, a big kid who did for her what her sons who had passed away could no longer do for her what I could and, of course, did lovingly and thankfully.

She lived a full life almost to the end. She only stopped driving two years ago, albeit no more than two miles to Kroger, only because her arthritis had gotten so bad that she could not turn the ignition in her big Lincoln Town Car. (God does work in mysterious ways.) But that arthritis did not stop her from doing fantastic needle work. In her closet are dozens of quilts she made over the years. Her daughter has carried on that legacy.

If you could ask her, she would tell you that she indeed lived a full life and had few regrets, the biggest ones certainly being the loss of her sons before their time. Even during those times of loss, she was a trooper. It had to be what we call Those Lighthtner Genes: the women in that family seemed to live forever and, more importantly, took and continue to take no guff from anyone, especially any man, son-in-law included.

She will be missed but she will always be remembered. And she will live on especially in her granddaughters who have inherited those Lightner Genes. They have her spunk and determination and, as I am well aware and as the men in their lives are quite aware, they take no guff from them either.

We give thanks for the life she lived and give thanks for all she was for us. We rejoice now with her knowing that she is now rejoicing with all those she loved who proceeded her in death. Rest in peace, Nanny.

GRANDPARENTS REVENGE

My wife and I love being grandparents and, in all honesty, more that we loved being parents. The only downside for us is that the grandchildren live so far away that we hardly ever get to see them. And even though we are retired, the distances are still a little overwhelming especially when we want to see them and be with them as much as possible. Besides, if we wanted to move to be near them, they do not live near one another. So we are reduced to phone calls, texts, emails and face time. 

But when we do get to see them, especially when we have them to ourselves, it’s payback time. It’s grandparent’s revenge time. The idea is that you spoil them enough that it takes two weeks, once they get back home, to undo what we did. Carter still reminds his parents that he didn’t have to eat vegetables when he spent a week with us last summer and that he really doesn’t need to wear a pajama top to bed because Pap doesn’t. We just smile and smile.

One of the responsibilities of being a grandparent is to be the giver of unconditional love. It comes with the job description. And while we always truly loved our children unconditionally as they were growing up, it was often hard to love them in that manner. When they acted their age, especially as teenagers, we still loved them but certainly didn’t like the way they behaved even though we knew that a lot of that acting out was because of their hormones acting out. We knew because we were their age once and realized what our parents had to endure. Of course we were never that bad. Of course!

What enables grandparents to be so loving is that we have time on our hands to do just that: love them, love them, love them. Parents have to work in that love between work, whatever that work is, and there are all sorts of it in raising a family. It sometimes seems overwhelming being a parent and, in truth, sometimes it is. It’s no wonder trying to love your children seems to have conditions attached to that love. Unconditional love? Who are you kidding?!

That’s where grandparents come in. Yes, when the grandchildren are with us and away from their parents, we spoil them. But that is the price their parents are willing to pay for a break in their responsibilities as parents. By the time Carter, for instance, comes to visit, his parents are ready for a break. And he’s not even in first grade yet! Our spoiling, of course, is nothing huge: no vegetables, no night shirt, a few more snacks and a little later in going to bed get redone when he gets home. It may take a week or two for the remake to take, but it does.

What is left are fond memories for grandparents and grandchild that can never be taken away and always relived. Grandparent’s revenge? Tongue-in-cheek really. Rather, grandparent’s reward and joy and pleasure to love someone unconditionally and not care about the consequences because they will only be good ones.

THE PLEASURE IN PAIN

Sometimes in life doing good things can cause us pain: mentally, physically and spiritually. We help a neighbor put in a fence and the body aches with pain afterwards. We sit with an aging parent and are mentally stressed. We see so much hatred and division around us and are spiritually wrought with pain: mankind’s inhumanity to one another that should not be.

The pain can sometimes be overwhelming and, yet, at the same time there can be pleasure in the pain. It is good that we can help a neighbor in need; and though our body aches afterwards, the joy and pleasure we feel having done something good alleviates the pain to a great degree. It doesn’t remove it, nor should it; but the pleasure makes the suffering worthwhile.

Sitting with a parent who is near death is painful. We can do nothing to relieve whatever suffering the person is going through nor can we make it end. We are there to hold hands, to make a meal, to help bathe and dress. There is joy in the thankfulness that is ours because we are doing all we can do for the one we love. We’re still mentally and physically exhausted doing what we do. It is painful. That is a given, but joyful in its own way even though it’s difficult to explain or even understand that joy and pleasure.

Trying to find joy and pleasure amidst the anger and division among us is certainly difficult to do, sometimes seemingly impossible. But it is accomplished in the same way as helping a neighbor build a fence or tending to the needs of an ailing loved one: it is done one-on-one, one person at a time. And because it is so much of a spiritual dialogue that is going on we can never be certain if the anger has abated or the division begun to heal. But the inner joy comes because we tried as painful and as difficult the effort was.

The pleasure that comes in pain is almost always and after-awareness. We tend to be oblivious while enduring the pain. The body aches from all the lifting. The mind is overwhelmed with all that we have to do to make her as comfortable as possible. Our souls are heavy because we feel we are up against it when in conversation with someone who believes we are the enemy. There is no pleasure in the here-and-now. It only comes in the hereafter, sometimes the real Hereafter: Death. But it comes.

When we set out to help another in need, we do not do so because we are looking for some kind of reward in doing so. We do so because that is what our faith is calling us to do at that moment in time. Then, afterwards, when we have time to look back on what we did and reflect upon the pain we endured, we also become aware that we are pleased, pleasured, by what we were able to say and do.

In many ways I think that finding that there is pleasure in pain is life’s, God’s, little secret that we only discover afterwards. And what a joy and pleasure that is!

THE SCARS ARE THERE FOR A REASON

If anyone were to look at my unclad body (perish the thought), one would see very clearly two four-inch scars on my right hip and one on my left, the result of three hip surgeries. I also have one on my knee and another on my shoulder, each the result of surgery. Each also the result of some physical abuse on that body over the years. The scars, thus, are there for a reason.

Scars are reminders of the past and warnings for the present and future. If we ignore the scars, we are primed for more of them somewhere down the line. That is why I find it foolish, and I dare say wrong, for this obsession on the part of many to remove statues of former heroes (at least in the eyes of many) because they and their deeds were wrong. Removing the statues will not remove the scars. It will simply make it easier for the present and future generations to forget the lessons those statues are reminding us about.

My scars are a constant reminder that if I abuse my body, I will pay a price for it now and in the days (and years, God granting them) to come. Erasing the past won’t make the past go away but it will also lessen our abilities and even willingness to address the mistakes, sins, wrongs of the past and the lessons we have or should have learned from them. Those reminders of the past that many want to erase, those real scars on our history, need to remind us that we must never forget what happened and, most importantly, why.

As we have so often been told and have, if we are honest, experienced it in our own lives, that when we forget our past mistakes, we are set up to make them again and again. Those past sins, wrongs, foolishness have left scars on our personal and national psyches that will not go away as much as we might want them to or try to erase or forget about them. They are there for a reason.  

That reason, of course, is to teach us about how to live in the present and to try to ensure that the mistakes we made in the past are not made now and in the days and weeks and months and years to come. We certainly do not like to be reminded of our wrongful and foolish past because we believe it somehow lessens who we are in the present. But there is nothing wrong and, in fact, a blessing to acknowledge our humanness and frailness and, yes, sinfulness. That’s why those scars are so important, so vital, so necessary for us as individuals and as a society.

The saving grace about most scars is that they don’t constantly stare us in the face. Yes, some do and we have to live with the pain they are still inflicting. They are there to remind us of the lessons we have, or should have learned. As painful a reminder it is, Germany has not erased Auschwitz. That scar is a continual reminder of a sinful past and has made them a better country. All those scars in our personal and collective past are meant to do the same for us: make us a better person and a better people. There is a reason for them. Trying to erase them is foolish and wrong.