Flight Paths

Hurricane season is now at its peak.  As a child I remember one hurricane—Donna, who arrived on Sept 10, 1960.  She struck south Florida as a category 4 storm, turned and came back east across the middle of the state, then veered north, becoming the only hurricane of record to produce hurricane force winds in every state on the US Atlantic coast from Florida to New England.

            She blew through Orlando on a Saturday night.  Our parents woke my sister and me and moved us to the center of the house because the wind was blowing rain up under the eaves and it was running down through the walls and seeping in at the baseboards next to our beds.  While they packed towels around those baseboards, I slept through what were probably the scariest moments of my childhood—I was 6 at the time.  The next morning church services were cancelled, a first in my life, and I was a little afraid we would all wind up in Hell, especially when the sun began to shine mid-morning. 

            After that it seemed that we always managed to live in the right place.  For forty-four years the storms always went another way.  Then 2004 happened.  Charlie, Frances, Jeanne, and Ivan all hit Florida within a few weeks of each other.  Frances and Jeanne descended upon our area of North Central Florida.  Seventeen inches of rain were followed by twelve more only two weeks later.  By then, the pine trees were like spoons standing in thick soup, and many fell.  We were in constant prayer that they would not fall on us.  We went a day and a half without power or telephone, which could have been much worse.  People just a mile east of us were without power for ten days.  A neighbor loaned us his generator for a few hours, and we saved the produce and meat in the freezer.  Others had to list their losses on insurance reports.

            This time, though, was much different than my childhood experience.  As a child you really have no idea of the possibilities.  As an adult you understand that a direct hit could completely destroy everything you have, and, though we all joked about getting together to blow in the same direction at the same time, huffing and puffing like the Big Bad Wolf to push the storm the other way, there is nothing at all you can do about it.

            Far from sleeping through it, I remember lying in the dark in the wee hours of the morning, listening.  When the rain let up for awhile, I could hear a gust of wind coming from a long way off.  “It sounds like a train,” people always say about tornadoes, and the same was true of that wind.  It came closer and closer, louder and louder, finally slamming against the house, followed by complete silence, except for the sloshing of water in the water heater. 

            A minute later it started again.  And again.  And again.  I lay there for an hour listening to the gusts come over and over, praying fervently every time that I would not hear a tree cracking just before it fell on us, or the screaming of the roof as it tore off the rafters, but only the water heater sloshing its load back and forth as the house was once again nudged just a bit on its pillars.

            Helplessness can be paralyzing, but to a child of God, it should be empowering.  For He has said to me, My grace is sufficient for my power is made perfect in weakness.  Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses so that the power of Christ may rest upon me, 2 Cor 12:9.  When you finally realize that you are not in control, you can stop worrying about it.  What will happen, will happen.  Things may turn out all right in this life, and they may not, but whatever happens, you can deal with it.  Christ has promised that His grace is sufficient to bear any burden.

            In our society with all its various insurances, retirement accounts, and pension plans, we may never truly grasp our dependence upon God.  We may give lip service to the notion that we depend on Him for everything, but the comprehension just isn’t there, and it shows when our “things” and our “plans” are more important than our service and our trust, when the loss of those things sends us into a tailspin we cannot pull out of.  I cannot save myself; neither can you.  I do not deserve to be saved; neither do you.  If I really understand that—if you really understand that—it will make all the difference.

            So if you have ever experienced helplessness in life, a moment when you finally realize that you cannot fix things yourself, it is both a devastating and a glorious moment.  Thank God that it finally happened.  It cannot help but spill over into your spiritual awareness as well—you will finally begin to understand and appreciate grace.

I will give you thanks with my whole heart…I will worship toward your holy temple, and give thanks to your name for your lovingkindness and for your truth…In the day that I called, you answered.  You encouraged me with strength in my soul…Though I walk in the midst of trouble you will revive me...The Lord will fulfill His purpose in me. Your lovingkindness, O Jehovah, endures forever, selected from Psalm 138.

Dene Ward

A couple of months ago we met Nathan and his family at a restaurant about 15 miles south of here.  It has always been one of his favorites, primarily for their signature dish:  The Stogie, a one pound hamburger that is indeed one of the best I have ever eaten out.

            Having arrived early, we sat where we could see the street, so we did not miss their vehicle as it passed by the front windows.  Keith went out to help them unload and before long two little boys came running in with smiles, hugs, and kisses.  Judah, in fact, climbed right into my lap and did not leave it the whole time.  Trying to eat even half of my Stogie around him was an adventure, but do you think for one minute I would have told him he needed to leave my lap?  Not this grandma.  I did have to be careful not to drip hamburger grease on his shirt, or drop a tomato or pickle slice on his little head.  But Judah did not think about any of those things.   He just assumed he was safe in grandma’s lap.

            A few months earlier the boys stayed here for several days instead of just a few hours.  They immediately picked up words, phrases, and songs.  When one of them popped up that first night, I reminded myself then to be extra careful.  Aren’t I careful all the time?  Of course, but these little souls were learning from me even when I didn’t think I was teaching!  And what was dropping into their hearts and minds was a whole lot more important than a drop of mustard on their heads.

            If you are acting in any capacity as a teacher in the Lord’s household, the same is true of you.  Keep a close watch on yourself and on the teaching. Persist in this, for by so doing you will save both yourself and your hearers,  Paul told Timothy in 1 Tim 4:16.  First look to yourself, for it is often said that a person learns more from a sermon seen than one heard.  Make sure your life matches what you teach in every particular.  It is too easy to blind ourselves to things that are obvious to others. 

Then make sure over and over that what you teach is correct.  Do not ever give an answer you are unsure of.  Never be afraid to say, “I don’t know, but I will find out.”  Never speak off the top of your head if you are at all uncertain.  Make sure the student knows if something is an opinion only.  I can tell you from experience that people will take things to heart you meant as a side note of no importance and they will repeat your words more than once to others, not out of spite but out of respect—they think you know what you are talking about, even when you don’t.

And it may not be a class situation.  There may be someone out there who watches you with admiration.  Maybe in the past you said something kind to them.  Maybe they saw you do a good deed.  Maybe someone else they respect told them about you.  You are being watched whether you know it or not—every one of you!  Take heed to yourself!

It isn’t just the little ears you have to worry about out there.  And just like a grandchild implicitly trusts that his grandparents would never teach him anything wrong whether by word or example, there may be others out there who believe the same of you.  What you do and say may indeed save them—and maybe not.

Show yourself in all respects to be a model of good works, and in your teaching show integrity, dignity, and sound speech that cannot be condemned…Titus 2:7,8.

Dene Ward

We tend to think that legalism and emotionalism are the only dangers we need to be wary of in our worship to God.  We must be careful that the ritual aspect of our group worship be neither heartless in thought nor perverted by passion.  But in 1 Samuel 4-6, God’s people found yet another way to distort their spiritual worship.

            As was so often the case, the Philistines once again troubled them.  They went to battle and promptly lost 4000 soldiers.  What should they do?  Talk to God about it?  No, they said.  Instead, Let us bring the ark of the covenant of the Lord here from Shiloh that it may save us, 4:3.  Not that God may save us, but that IT may save us, treating it like some sort of magic charm.

            When the ark was brought into the camp, the people roared with such a shout that it scared the Philistines.  A god has come into the camp, 4:7, they said.  Note that there was little difference in the way these pagans thought about the ark and the way the Israelites did.        During the next battle 30,000 Israelites lost their lives and the Ark of the Covenant was captured.

            The story of how the ark was returned to Israel is an interesting one that would take too much time for this little essay.  Suffice it to say that when it found its way home, the Israelites who greeted it said, Who is able to stand before the Lord, this Holy God? 6:20. At least a few people had learned a lesson.

            Surrounded by paganism on all sides, they had become tainted by its beliefs, many of which were bound up in sorcery and witchcraft.  They equated Jehovah with the idols, and the rituals of His worship with the rituals of the heathens.

            Do you think that cannot happen to us today?  I have lost track of the number of times I have heard a fallen Christian end his litany of faults with the disclaimer, “But I’ve been baptized!”  Somehow that is supposed to keep him safe from the wrath of God, no matter how much he has deliberately provoked that wrath and willingly continues to do so with no intention to change.  Baptism, instead of a union of the believer with the sacrifice of his Lord and the resurrection to a new life, has become to such people a ritual performed to break a curse.  “Pour the ashes of a rat’s tail on a bird’s wing, and hop on one foot three times with your eyes closed,” would have had as much meaning.

            Then there is the matter of the Lord’s Supper.  Rather than a memorial feast we celebrate with the Lord and our spiritual family, it is treated as a magic potion.  “At least I got there in time for the Lord’s Supper,” is uttered with a “Whew!” and a sigh of relief.  Visitors come in late and demand to be served even if the assembly worship is finished.  Some members show up only for those “magical” few minutes as if nothing else were worth their trouble.

            The same sorts of things happen with prayer, as if it were some magic formula that can only be repeated in certain ways, rather than a pouring out of the heart to a loving Father.  And we think we don’t have the same problems as those Old Testament Israelites?

            Treating God as if He were on the same level as a pagan deity and could be appeased the same way earned those people some of the most scathing indictments in the Old Testament.  The danger is that one will think Jehovah can be swapped out in a fair trade.  God took care of that notion in the book of Hosea.  Israel actually thought that those pagan gods were her source of blessings, 2:5, and so God said, For she did not know that I gave her the grain, and the new wine, and the oil, and multiplied unto her silver and gold, which they used for Baal. Therefore will I take back my grain in the time thereof, and my new wine in the season thereof, and will pluck away my wool and my flax which should have covered her nakedness, 2:8.9.  Suddenly, she figured out where it really came from.

            Attitudes that treat God and His worship in such a pagan manner are no better.  Rather than reverencing God they demean Him.  Rather than showing awe for an all-powerful Creator, they minimize that feeling into nothing more than pacifying a petty, capricious tyrant.

            Serving our God is a duty certainly, but not one we can fulfill in a slapdash, haphazard fashion just so we get it done in time to avoid the consequences.  It is a service He wants us to willingly offer in a careful, obedient, heartfelt manner—an obligation certainly, but also a privilege.

For thus says the LORD, who created the heavens (he is God!), who formed the earth and made it (he established it; he did not create it empty, he formed it to be inhabited!): "I am the LORD, and there is no other. I did not speak in secret, in a land of darkness; I did not say to the offspring of Jacob, 'Seek me in vain. I the LORD speak the truth; I declare what is right. "Assemble yourselves and come; draw near together, you survivors of the nations! They have no knowledge who carry about their wooden idols, and keep on praying to a god that cannot save. Declare and present your case; let them take counsel together! Who told this long ago? Who declared it of old? Was it not I, the LORD? And there is no other god besides me, a righteous God and a Savior; there is none besides me. "Turn to me and be saved, all the ends of the earth! For I am God, and there is no other. By myself I have sworn; From my mouth has gone out in righteousness a word that shall not return: 'To me every knee shall bow, every tongue shall swear allegiance. "Only in the LORD, it shall be said of me, are righteousness and strength; to him shall come and be ashamed all who were incensed against him. In the LORD all the offspring of Israel shall be justified and shall glory," Isa 45:18-25.

 

Dene Ward

I’ve often thought that Keith is a frustrated farmer.  If things had worked out differently, perhaps in another era even, that is exactly what he would have been.  Working the ground suits him well because he cannot sit still and he doesn’t think he has really worked unless he gets filthy in the process. 

            That garden of his has also done well by us.  I do not know how we would have survived without it.  Others with teenage boys spent nearly twice as much as we did on groceries and we ate as well or better than they, especially in the middle of summer.  For weeks the table was loaded with platters of fresh corn and tomatoes, and bowls of whatever beans or peas were producing at the time, with other extras added in as they ripened—fried okra, cucumber salads, cherry tomato salads, and homemade pickles, fried, or scalloped or “parmagiana-ed” eggplant, peppers stuffed with ground beef, rice, onions, and herbs and baked in a homemade tomato sauce, squash stir-fried or layered in casseroles with cheese sauce and cracker crumbs, homemade biscuits slathered with blueberry jam, muscadine, scuppernong, and blackberry jellies, and anything else I could come up with to use up all the bounty and fill up all the men.  

            They say there are holidays between May and September.  Really?  I suppose there are days when Keith does not go to work, but those just mean more work in the garden.  We spend Memorial Day snapping green beans and shelling peas, and putting the first of those in the freezer along with the last of the blueberries, and canning blueberry jam.  July 4th means corn shucking time--usually the second patch is in by then--and an assembly line in the kitchen putting up a couple dozen quarts.  The rest of the summer “break” we spend with yet more “putting up” of pickles, limas, black-eyes, and zipper peas, tomatoes, tomato sauce, salsa, chili powder, herb vinegars, and finally, the muscadine jelly in August.  Labor Day means catching up on all the things we had to let go when the fruits and vegetables came in, plus tilling the now spent and bedraggled garden under to help prepare the ground for next year. 

            We often missed outings, barbecues, and other summer events because of the garden work.  Why?  Because without that garden we would not have made it.  What may be a hobby for some was a necessity for us.  Times have been rough and it was the only way to feed our family well for the money we had.  I did not buy a jar of tomatoes, tomato sauce, jelly, jam, salsa, or pickles for twenty years.  You want to hear some stories?  I can tell you how to make one chicken feed your family for four days.

            Some of us want to treat our service to God like a hobby, like a garden we don’t really need, we just go out and putter around in it when the notion suits us.  We fail to realize that it is necessary to our survival.  We have mistaken the fact that we have enough in this life to mean that we have enough for the next too, without all that commitment, service, and labor nonsense.  So we go out once or twice a week and pull a weed, thinking that is all that is necessary, that God will supply the water and fertilizer for us and give us a bumper crop, which He will reap and can for us to enjoy some time in the future.  Why, isn’t that what grace is?

            As long as Christianity is nothing more than a pleasant little pastime, and the church a nice little social club, we are more than happy to take up some time with it.  But we will never reap any rewards until we treat it as a career necessary to keep us and our families alive. 

            Many of us are willing to throw money at practically any cause.  It makes us feel good.  What God demands is our time and our labor, things we Americans are often loath to give to anyone but ourselves.  There are no holidays for Christians, not until you understand that the blessings a Christian receives make every day a holiday from the curse of sin and the chains of Satan.

Therefore, my beloved brothers, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain.  1 Cor 15:58.

Dene Ward

 

Then Shemaiah the prophet came to Rehoboam and to the princes of Judah, who had gathered at Jerusalem because of Shishak, and said to them, “Thus says the LORD, ‘You abandoned me, so I have abandoned you to the hand of Shishak.’” Then the princes of Israel and the king humbled themselves and said, “The LORD is righteous.” When the LORD saw that they humbled themselves, the word of the LORD came to Shemaiah: “They have humbled themselves. I will not destroy them, but I will grant them some deliverance, and my wrath shall not be poured out on Jerusalem by the hand of Shishak. Nevertheless, they shall be servants to him, that they may know my service and the service of the kingdoms of the countries,.” 2Chr 12:5-8.

            It’s easy, when you find yourself in a trying situation, to make excuses for your behavior; to say, “Woe is me,” and expect everyone to sympathize with you and pat you on the back, not just occasionally or even often, but almost as if it were a daily penance on their part because you have to deal with the difficult and they don’t—at least in your mind.

            “Why is this happening to me?” can become a mantra if you aren’t careful.  Maybe God, in the passage above, answers that question.

            Judah repented when they learned the consequences of their disobedience and God repented their destruction.  But He did not stop their servitude to the king of Egypt.  “This way they will learn how to serve me,” he told the prophet.

            Did you ever think that maybe that “unjust” master (boss) was there to teach you service?  Or that difficult spouse? 

            Servants, be subject to your masters with all respect, not only to the good and gentle but also to the unjust. For this is a gracious thing, when, mindful of God, one endures sorrows while suffering unjustly, 1Pet 2:18-19.

            Likewise, wives, be subject to your own husbands, so that even if some do not obey the word, they may be won without a word by the conduct of their wives, when they see your respectful and pure conduct, 1Pet 3:1-2.

            Did you ever think that maybe that obnoxious neighbor or ornery brother in the Lord might be there to teach you patience and forbearance?

            Do not repay evil for evil or reviling for reviling, but on the contrary, bless, for to this you were called, that you may obtain a blessing, 1Pet 3:9.

In fact, doesn’t God expect us to use every situation, whether blessing or trial, to improve as His servant?  The sufferings we endure are meant to be opportunities for growth, not merit badges on a boastful sash.

            Suffering does not make us exempt to the call to service.  People in all situations of life have been serving God as hard as they can for as long as they can, whether rich or poor, sick or healthy, hungry or full, old or young, even in slavery, for thousands of years.  The place God puts us is not only the test of our faith, but the textbook from which we learn our service.  What lesson would God have you learn today? 

And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish you, 1Pet 5:10.

Dene Ward

Due to the huge number of college football games seen in my home, that commercial in which cows turn on lights, parachute onto a football field, and stand on top of a car pestering the little boy in the back seat has evidently made an impression on me.  A survey company called the other day. A long time ago I made a few dollars doing phone surveys and appreciated anyone who did not slam the phone down, so I answered their questions. “Which fast food chain comes to mind first?”  I answered immediately, not with any of the hamburger, pizza, sandwich, or taco joints; but the chicken place with the name I never knew how to pronounce until I was grown.

            Those commercials stand out to me for a reason—those are dairy cows!  They don’t need to worry about becoming someone’s hamburger. 

            Does it make a difference?  Only to purists, I suppose.  The commercials certainly do what they are designed to do as evidenced by my quick answer to the survey question.

            But for some things it does make a difference.  Jesus warned that blind leaders will cause others to fall into the ditch too; God wasn’t going to save them because someone led them the wrong way.  John tells us in the fourth chapter of his first epistle that God expects us to “prove the spirits” because many false ones have gone out into the world.  Paul marveled in chapter one that the Galatians had been fooled so soon after their conversion.  None of them told us not to worry, that God would save us if we were tricked into believing something that wasn’t so.

            A long time ago, a prophet was sent to warn King Jeroboam about his sinful ways.  God told that prophet not to stop anywhere on his way home.  An older prophet sent word for him to come by for dinner.  When the younger prophet told him he could not, the older prophet lied, saying, “God said it was all right for you to eat with me.”  Instead of checking with God first, the younger prophet stopped by the older prophet’s home.  Before they had finished their meal God came to him and told him he would be punished for his disobedience, and, sure enough, on the way home he was killed by a lion (1 Kings 13).

            Not knowing the difference between what God said and what this man had said, even a prophet of God, cut his life short.  God expected that young man to check with Him when he heard a command other than the original.  God expects the same of you and me.  And even though this young prophet probably thought he could rely on one of his own, one older and supposedly wiser as well, that didn’t mean the message was correct. 

            One cow is not the same as the other, no matter what it looks like, or what we think about it.  Believe me, you could tell the difference between steaks cut from dairy cattle and those cut from beef cattle.  And the first time you tried to milk a steer would definitely be the last.  Believing a false message, no matter who tells you and no matter what you want to believe, will not make that message true, and the results will be much more serious than a tough steak or even a kick in the head. .

But evil men and impostors shall wax worse and worse, deceiving and being deceived. But you abide in the things which you have learned and have been assured of, knowing of whom you have learned them, 2 Tim 3:13,14.

Dene Ward

            The garden has come and gone.  Day after hot, humid day I stood in the kitchen, scalding, blanching, peeling, seeding, chopping, mixing, packing, freezing, pickling, preserving and canning.  After an hour or more in the garden, followed by six hours of standing in the kitchen, my back ached, my feet throbbed, and I had a knot between my shoulders blades.  Then the next day I got up and did it again.  In the evenings we shelled and snapped until midnight or our hands ached too much to continue, whichever came first. 

            So why did I do it?  Because it had to be done.  This is one way we manage not only to survive on what we make, but to eat fairly well in spite of what we make.  This is how we fed two teenage boys and remained financially solvent.  And it wasn’t all bad.

            Some days I managed to do a lot of meditating while I worked.  When you must do the same action over and over, like peeling four hundred tomatoes, it becomes automatic, so you can use your mind for better things, pondering recent lessons you have heard, drawing conclusions from verses you have read, and praying through some of the problems that beset you. 

            Keith helped me out.  I am not quite what I used to be, and the live-in help left quite a few years ago.  We cannot “chat” over our work as most couples can.  Sometimes I touched his arm to get his attention so I could tell him something I thought important.  Other times he spoke (since I don’t have to see to hear) and then I could reply when he looked up.  Once or twice we got into a friendly competition.  He still cannot fill a jar as quickly as I can—his hands are bigger and not as well trained, but what he could do still meant jars I did not have to fill myself.  And even after forty-one years, or more probably because of them, it was pleasant to be together.

            The other day Lucas said something like, “Isn’t it funny how we look forward to the garden starting, and then near the end look forward to it ending?”  And he is right—except for the peppers, things are nearly at an end, and I am glad.  Still, at the end of each day’s work the past few months, I looked on the rows of jars cooling on an old rag of a towel laid across the countertop and felt a sense of accomplishment, despite the occasional tedium, the many aches, and the pools of sweat on the floor from the rising steam in the kitchen.

            I wish you could see my pantry—twenty-three jars of tomatoes, fifteen jars of salsa, eighteen jars of dill pickles, a dozen jars each of okra dills and pickled banana pepper rings, and thirty jars of three kinds of jellies and jams.  Then open the freezer—two dozen bags of corn, twenty bags of green beans, ten bags of lima beans, eight bags of zipper cream peas, twelve quarts of tomato sauce, and eight quarts of blueberries.  The best is yet to come though, when my grocery bill totals half what it might have been and ultimately, when we eat it all.

            So maybe it was not what some might consider a “summer vacation.”  In fact, I also had a couple of days worth of testing at the eye clinic mixed in there somewhere, but it was a worthwhile venture that did us far more good than tanning at a beach might have. 

            I think living a Christian life might be the same sort of vacation.  Some days it is hard work.  Some days it is tedious.  Some days it causes us pain.  But we can make even the worst days better by meditating on the comfort in God’s word, and by talking to Him whenever we want to.  We have a spiritual family who will help bear our burdens, who will weep when we weep and rejoice when we rejoice, people who will make the bad days go quicker and the good days even happier.

            And then before you know it, it’s almost over.  But there are things we can look back on with satisfaction, unlike our friends in the world who will have so much to regret.  They will also have nothing to look forward to, while for us the best is yet to come, and aren’t we looking forward to that? 

            For all of us summer will soon turn to fall, and after that the winter.  Make sure your pantry is full.

And I heard the voice from heaven saying, Write, Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from henceforth, yes, says the Spirit, that they may rest from their labors, for their works follow with them, Rev 14:13.

Dene Ward

Today’s post is by guest writer, Keith Ward.

It is easy to read a passage and go right past an important thought without catching the Holy Spirit’s intent. This is a major reason those of us who have been studying for years are still discovering new truths.

It is also the reason I do not mark up my Bible. When your Bible has underlines, highlights and notes, all you see when you return to a passage is the same points you marked the last time, or wrote. It is difficult to see or think anything else.

Such a verse is Heb 12:1-3, “Therefore let us also, seeing we are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus the author and perfecter of [our] faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising shame, and hath sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.”  We often jump right to the cross and to our need to look to him for an example without considering his motivation.

“Who for the joy that was set before him, endured the cross, despising shame”

What was “the joy set before him,” Jesus, that made the cross worthwhile? Years ago, I did a Lord’s Supper talk in which I stated the following position.

First, it cannot be Heaven, or returning to the Father. He had those before he came. If that were his goal, he need not have become incarnate in the first place. Or, as late as the betrayal night, he said that he could ask the Father and receive deliverance by legions of angels. No, the cross was not necessary for returning to the Father, neither was any form of death.

So what one thing did the cross gain? He endured the cross for us. We are the “Joy set before him”; the goal that kept him nailed there instead of crying out for the angels of deliverance. Considering him doing so is our motivation for perseverance, per vs 3. We see this more easily if we think about it in abstract terms--he endured for the church, his bride, his body. Otherwise, we must face things inside us that we hope no one else ever finds out, not even our spouses. We know that it is a joke to think that we personally could ever be a joy to the Lord sufficient for such a sacrifice.

But it is true, that is the Holy Spirit’s meaning. You, with all the warts, blemishes and faults that you have not overcome with grace yet (because you have not applied yourself to grace with sufficient devotion), YOU are so great a joy to Jesus that he died that shameful death willingly and with the joy of anticipation of having you for his friend. He is not ashamed to call you “family” (Heb 2:11).

If that is true for you, then I can hope that it is for me too, though, having known better for so long and having not gotten any better than this keeps me doubting.

Let us then “not wax weary fainting in [our] souls”.

Keith Ward

Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in Heaven, Matt 6:10.

            All my life I have thought of this in a passive sense.  I pray for something, just as the Lord did in Matt 26:39, 42, and then add, “But thy will be done,” as if God is the only who expected to do His will.  Then suddenly one day I thought, “Doing God’s will is the simple definition for obedience.”  If I am praying for His will to be done, I have an obligation to do that will myself.

            I cannot pray, “Thy will be done” if I look at one of his commands and say, “But God wouldn’t mind if…”  I can’t expect an answer to my prayers if my answer to His will is, “I do well at everything else and this is such a small thing.”  If I do not obey in even one instance I am not doing His will.

            So I did a quick little study.  I may have thought that “God’s will” had more to do with what He does, but I was wrong.  Notice the following.

            “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven, Matt 7:21.  A lot of people out there go around doing “good deeds,” but if doing God’s will doesn’t come first, it isn’t worth a thing.

            For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother, Matt 12:50.  You are not in the Lord’s family if you are finding excuses for your disobedience.

            Jesus said to them, “My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to accomplish his work, John 4:34    If you want to follow in his footsteps, doing the Father’s will must become an essential of life, every bit as much as food.

            If anyone's will is to do God's will, he will know whether the teaching is from God or whether I am speaking on my own authority, John 7:17.  You can’t go around claiming to know Jesus if you are not obeying the Father.

            Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect, Rom 12:2.  The only way to know God’s will is to change your life.

            For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you abstain from sexual immorality, 1Thess 4:3.  You are not doing the Father’s will if you are engaging in sexual sins of any kind.

            Give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you, 1Thess 5:18. You are not doing God’s will if you are whining and complaining about your station in life, about your trials, about the suffering you must deal with, especially those due to your faith.

            For you have need of endurance, so that when you have done the will of God you may receive what is promised, Heb 10:36.  It isn’t always easy to do the Father’s will and the task is never completed.  One good deed doesn’t mean your work is finished.

            [God will] equip you with everything good that you may do his will, working in us that which is pleasing in his sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen, Heb 13:21.  No matter how hard it seems, he will see that you have whatever you need to do His will.  If you didn’t manage to do it, it was your fault, not His.

            The next time you end a prayer, “Thy will be done,” remember that you are as much responsible for that as He is.  If you aren’t willing to do His will in every aspect of your life, why should He believe you mean it when you pray?  And why should He do what YOU want, when you won’t do what HE wants?

Since therefore Christ suffered in the flesh, arm yourselves with the same way of thinking, for whoever has suffered in the flesh has ceased from sin, so as to live for the rest of the time in the flesh no longer for human passions but for the will of God, 1Pet 4:1-2.

Dene Ward

This is an old one, but the lesson is always current--for someone out there.

            Magdi is now eleven years old.  She was the first dog we ever had that would not only chase a ball and bring it back, but catch it in the air like a fly ball, or chase a ball on the bounce, leaping four feet into the air to catch it.  If you said, “Bring me a ball,” she ran to the nearest one, picked it up, and brought it to you.  If you said, “Give it to me,” she would drop it on the ground next to your feet or place it in your hands if you bent over.  It was almost as if she really understood English.

            She also loved to play “soccer,” chasing a soccer ball around the field, then guarding it when one of us ran up as if to take it away, and take off again after she caught her breath, even balancing it on her shoulders or head or nose as she ran.  She had a large exercise ball, nearly a foot higher than her shoulders, that she would treat the same way.  Once in awhile, it rolled so fast that as she tried to jump up to grab it, it threw her over the top.  She would simply get up and go again.

             Her bones and joints have steadily betrayed her this last year.  She drags one hind foot occasionally because it hurts too much to pick it up.  Her knees are swollen and stiff and some days she doesn’t even try to get up when we go outside; she simply looks up and gives one floppy tail wag—thump, glad to see you, boss.  She has stopped racing to the gate to greet us when we come home, but if we have been away awhile, she will slowly walk until she gets there.  I always feel so bad when we get the gate closed and start down the drive before she makes it.  She has to turn and retrace those several hundred steps, but if we stand and wait at the door, she will eventually make it for a pat on the head and the words she wants most to hear, “Good dog.”

            Pick up a ball, though, and her ears stand up even if she does not.  If you bounce it, she will rise to her feet, though a bit unsteadily, and stand poised ready to run.  We have learned to merely toss it now, rather than throwing it as hard and far as we can, and she hobbles after it, all thought of pain and age and weariness abandoned. 

            The other day Keith blew off the roof, leaving piles of leaves around the house, and wads of moss clinging in the topmost branches of the azaleas.  I spent the next morning trying to “rake” it down to the ground.  Magdi thought I had something--something that might be interesting, like a snake or a lizard--and she was up instantly, running from bush to bush, even standing precariously on her aching hind legs, trying to help me get whatever it was I didn’t want in those bushes.  She has “taken care of” many snakes and lizards over the years, as well as moles, tortoises, armadillos, and possums.  It’s her job, and since all these surgeries started, she has taken her duty as my protector much more seriously.  Despite her creaking joints she was ready to work and if necessary, rescue me from whatever monster lurked in the azaleas.

            I have been reading through the Old Testament laws concerning the elderly lately for some classes I have been teaching.  What has become most apparent is how carefully God made arrangements for those and other equally helpless people like orphans and strangers, to be taken care of.  Did you know that the penalty for oppressing a widow or orphan was death (Ex 22:22-24)?  Did you know that sin is listed in the same category as adultery and witchcraft (Mal 3:5)?  Truly we need to take this more to heart than we usually do.

            But I also noticed God’s expectations for those same people themselves.  The older men and women are to train the younger (Titus 2).  In times of struggle they should be fonts of wisdom, not buckets of bitter resentments and regrets.  In the midst of fiery disputes they should be sources of temperance and cooling thoughts not fanners of the flame.

            As to the widows indeed, widows with no family who had met certain qualifications and were still able-bodied, they were to pledge themselves to work for the church in return for monetary support.  All those women were over sixty mind you, yet God said if they could still work for Him, they should, (1 Tim 5:9-12).

            What about Anna?  She stayed at the temple, prophesying every day.  She might possibly have been one of those women who worked there (Ex 38:8), even though she was over eighty.

            Simeon, who was also elderly, was still actively searching for the Messiah when Mary and Joseph brought Jesus to the Temple that first time.  The Spirit sent him that special day not only to see the answer to his many prayers, but to testify to the identity of the young babe.

            People of God work for God and serve Him as long as they possibly can.  Working for God takes one’s mind off himself, off her own problems and pains.  As long as I can, I should do what I can, perhaps adapting to new circumstances, but never sitting back and saying, “Well that’s it, I’m done.”  I have known mortally ill Christians who were still talking with people who needed help, still holding the hands of those who came to visit and cheering them up instead, while only days from death. 

            I know an old dog who still loves to play, who still wants more than anything to please her masters.  I think she will probably die with a ball in her mouth, trying to bring it back for one last throw.  I hope I never drop the ball for the Lord.

The righteous shall flourish like the palm tree; he shall grow like a cedar in Lebanon. They are planted in the house of Jehovah; they shall flourish in the courts of our God.  They shall still bring forth fruit in old age; they shall be full of sap and green to show that Jehovah is upright; He is my rock and there is no unrighteousness in Him, Psalm 92:12-15.

Dene Ward