Flight Paths

A Word from the Ignorant Generation

6/8/2015 0 Comments

If you are over fifty it has already happened to you at least once.  If you are over sixty, it has become commonplace.  Whenever you must tell a younger person a problem you are having, he will instantly have the solution, not because he has experience you don’t, but because you are old.  Every younger generation thinks that way.  You did, too, when you were younger.  

We recently bought a computer.   This new computer was embedded with adware.  We discovered that the hard way when every time we tried to call up a website, including this blog, we were besieged by pop-ups.  If you weren’t quick enough, you clicked on something before you even realized it was there.  Eventually the computer became impossible to even use.  We couldn’t install programs we needed, including Bible study software, or if we did manage to install something it was pushed off the screen enough to make it unusable.  

And so we called in the technicians to help us out.  You know who I mean, those young people who seem to eat and breathe anything high tech, who intuitively know where to go and what to look for when you don’t even know what buttons to push to find out, who speak in a language only they can understand.  And so their directions were just so much gobbled-gook to me, but at least they made enough sense to Keith for him to try it himself.  Still no go.  So he called in a friend, one far more tech-savvy than we, but also close to our age.  He couldn’t do it either.

And so we called the technicians again and told them nothing they said to do had worked.  Well, we must have done it wrong, or so their tone implied, and they went to work themselves.  They accomplished this by gaining control of our computer from offsite.  It’s a little spooky to watch the cursor move without you doing any of the handwork, and have it suddenly type, asking you questions.  It was easy to believe the machine itself was talking instead of a young man a couple hundred miles away.  But it was highly gratifying to watch him have exactly the same problems we did.  I was working in the kitchen and listened to Keith and our friend laugh out loud.  “Aha!” they cried with glee.  “Told you it wouldn’t work!” as if the young man could hear them through all those wires, or in this case no wires.  

I have had the same thing happen when I go to the eye clinic.  All those good-looking young residents are sure they know more than I do about my eyes.  They get ready to do something and I tell them it is impossible with my eyes.  “Sure,” their smirk says, and sure enough they cannot do it and head for the big man himself who puts them in their place.  Sometimes we old folks know what we are talking about.  And sometimes we know enough to keep quiet too.

Which brings me to today’s point.  Please be careful out there when you think you can give advice in an area of life in which you have no, or only limited, experience.  I have heard young, inexperienced, and very sheltered young Christians plunge in with both feet about things like whether a woman should leave, not a philandering husband, but a controlling one; about when a woman should disobey her husband; about the point that disavowing family becomes necessary; about when to administer tough love to a wayward child, and what exactly “tough” means.  These are things best left to people who have been there, or at least to older people who have seen these situations in all their various permutations and realize that circumstances can alter the answer. 

When you give definite answers to things you have no real perspective on, you can damage a soul.  You can give a person an out they should not use, just as Adam tried to use Eve and Eve the serpent. I can’t blame someone else for telling me the wrong thing to do.  But God can blame me for causing someone else to sin with my careless, or ignorant, advice, Rom 14:13.  You know how I know all this?  Because I was one of those careless ignorant people many years ago who was oh so sure she knew the right answers, and many of those answers I would give anything to take back now.

Elihu came at Job as a young man thoroughly disgusted with the older “friends” because they couldn’t answer Job as he thought he should be answered.  “Listen to me and learn some wisdom,” he told them in 33:33.  Truth to be told, he had a few good things to say, but he was not as right as he thought he was, and Job had to offer sacrifices for his sin as well as the three older men.

Please be careful when you hand out advice that can affect not just someone’s life but their eternal destiny.  Just because the answer looks pat to you does not mean it is.  And can this member of a generation you probably consider ignorant beyond all measure remind you—we may well have been there before you.  We have tried to help, believe it or not.  We have offered careful advice, advice that considers circumstances and does not push to have its way because my way is the only right answer.  It may well be that you can fix the problem we could not fix.  But don’t fall into the trap of believing that makes you God’s gift to the troubled.  You just might find yourself more lost than the ones you were trying to save.

Rejoice, O young man, in your youth, and let your heart cheer you in the days of your youth. Walk in the ways of your heart and the sight of your eyes. But know that for all these things God will bring you into judgment.  Eccl 11:9

Dene Ward

Fret Not

6/5/2015 2 Comments

Fret not yourself because of evildoers…Psa 37:1.

    Psalm 37 is one of several psalms that takes up this perennial problem among God’s people.  We become outraged when we see the wicked prosper and the righteous suffer, when we see a government ordained by God try to push Him out of our lives, when we see it run over the faithful in favor of any and all who claim He doesn’t exist.  Especially in today’s political environment, how many times do you find yourself caught up in arguments that leave you steamed and incensed, a fire burning in you to undo the wrong and fix the problem at any cost?  You see, that’s what “fret” means.  

    At first glance I pictured someone pacing the floor and wringing their hands.  “Fret” sounds so trivial.  The Hebrew word is anything but.  

    …And Cain was very wroth and his countenance fell, Gen 4:5.
    …And let not your anger burn…Gen 44:18.
    And my wrath shall wax hot…Ex 22:24.
    …And his anger was kindled...Num 11:1.
    …And all that are incensed against him…Isa 45:24.

    All these words are the same word translated “fret” in Psalm 37.  It is not a mild word, but it accurately describes the way so many of my brothers and sisters work themselves up into something they want to call righteous indignation over the way the world works.  Stop, the psalmist says by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.  In fact, he says it three times in the first 8 verses of this psalm.  

    And why?  Because it robs God of the things we should be doing and the kind of people we ought to be.  It turns us into the very people we are complaining about.  The psalmist goes on to tell us exactly how to stop all this fretting.

    First of all, consider where the wicked will wind up in the near future.  They shall soon fade like the grass, v 2, and In just a little while the wicked shall be no more, v 10.  It may not seem “soon” to us.  It may seem more like “a long while,” but don’t we trust our Father to do what He says He will?  Fretting over these things is nothing more than a lack of faith in God to handle things, and denial of His control over this world.  

    In fact, the psalmist tells us to concentrate on God.  Trust in the Lord (v 3), delight yourself in the Lord (v4), commit your way to the Lord (v5), be still and wait for the Lord (v7).  I defy anyone to do those things and still be able to “fret” about the wickedness in the world.

    Then he tells us to use all that energy we’ve been expending to “do good” (v 3).  As long as we are busy with negative thoughts and actions, we will never do anything positive.  

    Then he gives us this little bit of wisdom:  Refrain from anger, and forsake wrath! Fret not yourself; it tends only to evil (v8).  Anger and wrath are sure paths to sin if you are not very, very careful.  It has been so since Cain and Abel.  As we saw in Gen 4:5 above,  Cain “fretted,” that is, he became “wroth,” and God told him that as long as he was in that mood “sin couches at the door.”  Satan has you right where he wants you when you let things of this world upset you so much that you become “hot” over them.  

    Zorn says, “Do not let what happens [with the wicked] interfere with your own faithfulness to God nor to your commitment to what is right.”  Christians do not mind the things of this world.  They set their hopes on the next world, on the eternal existence they have waiting for them.  What difference will all this injustice we keep fretting over make then?  You might as well believe you can take your wealth with you; you might as well believe in a physical thousand year kingdom on this earth; you might as well believe that your fretting will matter when you first feel the fires of Hell.
    
Jesus answered, “My kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, my servants would have been fighting…” John 18:36
…for the wrath of man works not the righteousness of God. James 1:20

Dene Ward

Taking the Time

6/4/2015 0 Comments

Lucas manages in a supermarket deli.  He had to run to another store, one he had worked in a year and a half before, to pick up something his store had run out of.  Several customers recognized him, asked how he was, told him how much they missed him since his promotion, and asked where he was working.  It made him feel good; what would have done even more for him, was for those same folks to take the time to tell the store manager the same thing or, better yet, go to the company website and send an email to corporate, or a snail mail to the district office.  “Lucas Ward is a great guy.  We really miss him at the Spring Hill store.  He deserves a promotion.”  (If you live in the area, please take careful notes!)

    Lucas tells us that for every compliment, the store receives at least 5 or 6 complaints.  It isn’t because the store is so bad, or the employees. It is because we are all far quicker to complain than to compliment.  When you remember that your words can make or break a career, shouldn’t Christians be far more careful about this?  I have made it a point in the past few years to compliment workers who go out of their way for me.  I also try to speak to a manager or send a letter.  I listen for people’s names and repeat them back at some point.  If you are not receiving good service, you might be surprised at how much better your service instantly becomes when the server knows you can call him by name.  They know you have noticed them as people.   Isn’t that what Jesus always did, notice the folks that no one else ever paid any attention to?

    In our travels to other cities for my medical treatments, we stayed in one hotel twice within a six month period.  On the second visit, the waitress in the restaurant remembered us.  “You are the only ones who ever talked to me like I was a real person,” she said.  “The others treat me like furniture.”  That same morning I left my purse in the restaurant.  Most of our travel money was in that purse, which was why I did not leave it in the room.  That waitress did not know our names, but she described us to the front desk—“A couple from Florida.  The wife is here for eye surgery”—and was standing outside our hotel room door with the purse before I even noticed it was missing.  The hotel received a letter about her after we returned home.  I hope it helped her as much as she helped us.

    Christians should never be the ones making a scene at the supermarket because we opened up the flour and found weevils in it.  Christians simply take it back and quietly ask for a refund or a replacement.  Christians should never be the ones ordering waitresses around as if they were slaves, or barking at every little thing that isn’t just right.  Surely we can ask for something in a civil tone and say thank you when the item is brought to us.  Surely we can say, “I’m sorry to cause you trouble but this steak is a little underdone.  Could you possibly give it another minute or two?”  How much does it hurt to be kind instead of mean?  How much does it hurt to be like Jesus?

    And think about this:  What if that waitress walks into services Sunday morning because she has seen a sign or a tract, or a neighbor has invited her, and there sits the biggest grouch she ever waited on?  What is it the Lord said about millstones and stumblingblocks?

    If instead, she sees some of the nicest people she has ever served, I bet she will be more likely to listen and then to come back.  I had much rather be in that situation than the other.

Give no occasions of stumbling, either to Jews, or to Greeks, or to the church of God: even as I also please all men in all things, not seeking my own profit, but the profit of the many, that they may be saved, 1 Cor 10:32,33.

Dene Ward

As the Butterfly Goes

6/3/2015 0 Comments

My big flower bed on the south side of the shed attracts butterflies by the score.  Every day I see both white and yellow sulfurs, tiny blue hairstreaks, huge brown and yellow swallowtails, and glorious orange monarchs and viceroys flitting from bloom to bloom.  Sometimes it’s hard to tell where the bloom stops and the butterfly begins amid all those big yellow black-eyed Susans, multicolored zinnias, and purple petunias.  

    But have you ever watched a butterfly?  If you and I decided to go somewhere the way a butterfly goes, it would take all day to get there.  We have a saying: “as the crow flies,” meaning a straight line course.  A butterfly couldn’t fly a straight line no matter how hard it tried—it would always fail the state trooper’s sobriety test.

    Some of us live our spiritual lives like butterflies.  We seem to think that waking up in the morning and allowing life to just “happen” is the way to go.  No wonder we don’t grow.  No wonder we fail again and again at the same temptations.  No wonder we don’t know more about the Word of God this year than last, and no wonder we can’t stand the trials of faith.

    Some folks think that going to church is the plan.  That’s why their neighbors would be surprised to find out they are Christians—Sunday is their only day of service.  Others refuse to acknowledge any weakness they need to work on.  It rankles their pride to admit they need to improve on anything, and because they won’t admit anything specific, they never do improve.  

    Some folks make their life decisions with no consideration at all for their spiritual health, or the good of the kingdom.  The stuff of this life matters the most, and only after that do they give the spiritual a thought, if at all, and it is to be dismissed if it means anything untoward for their physical comfort, convenience, status, or wealth.  

    The only plans they have for their children is their physical welfare—how they will do in school, where they will go to college, what career they will pursue.  They must get their schoolwork, but their parents don’t even know what they are studying in Bible classes, much less make sure they get their lessons.  It’s too much trouble to take them to spiritual gatherings of other young Christians.  And have you seen how much those camps cost?!  Probably less than a year’s worth of cell phone service and much less than the car they buy those same kids.  

    Where is the plan for this family’s spiritual growth?  Where is their devotion to a God they claim as Lord?  If their children do end up faithful, it will be in spite of these parents, not because of them.

    God expects us to have a plan.  The writer of the seventeenth psalm had one.  “I have purposed that my mouth will not transgress,” he says in verse 3, and then later, “I have avoided the ways of the violent, my steps have held fast to your paths,” (4b,5a).  He made a vow and he kept it.  He mapped his life out to stay away from evil and on the road to his Father.

    How are you doing as you fly through life—and it does fly, people!  Are you flitting here and there, around one bush and over another, out of the flower bed entirely once in awhile, then back in for a quick sip of nectar before heading off in whichever direction the wind blows?  Or do you have a plan, a map to get you past the pitfalls with as little danger as possible, to the necessary stops for revival and refreshing, but then straight back on the road to your next life?

    Do you know what the term social butterfly means?  It’s someone who flits from group to group.  Perhaps not so much now, but originally the term was one of ridicule.  I wonder what God would think of a spiritual butterfly who has no focus on the spiritual things of this life, but flits from one thing to other and always on a carnal whim rather than a spiritual one.  I wonder if He would think that butterfly wouldn’t be able to appreciate an eternity of spiritual things either.

…And [Barnabas] exhorted them all to remain faithful to the Lord with steadfast purpose, for he was a good man, full of the Holy Spirit and of faith...  Acts 11:23,24.

Dene Ward

Sage Advice

6/2/2015 1 Comments

I get these questions so often, let’s kill two birds with one stone today.  
    
    Q.  How do you use all those herbs you grow?

    A.  Dill is good in any mayonnaise based salad—potato salad, tuna salad, macaroni salad, etc.  I use it in a great cucumber salad and also in my own homemade tartar sauce and deviled eggs.  

    Basil is good in anything with tomatoes.  Throw the leaves of red basil leaves whole in a salad for color as well as taste.  When using basil in long cooking items like marinara, be sure to add another sprinkle fresh at the end, just before serving.  And anyone with a basil plant needs to learn how to make pesto, the ultimate basil sauce.

    Rosemary goes with poultry, pork, and lamb.  Sage goes with poultry, pork and beef.  Thyme is good with chicken and beef.  Tarragon is good with veal and chicken, particularly chicken salad.  Use chives when you want a mild onion flavor but not the sharpness of a raw onion.  Parsley goes just about anywhere, and not just for garnish.

    At Thanksgiving, think of Simon and Garfunkel when you season your bird:  “parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme,” but I usually leave rosemary out of the dressing.  And the best potatoes you will ever eat are small red potatoes, steamed about twenty minutes with butter, salt, and pepper only, and finished with a heaping handful of mixed chives, parsley, and dill.  That will get you started using herbs, and you can experiment to discover more.

    Q.  How do you take care of herbs?  

    A.  Generally speaking, herbs do not like wet feet, so use well-drained soil.  During our recent drought years, I have never gone wrong by watering several days a week, and fertilizing at least once a week with a liquid fertilizer for house plants or vegetables.  Better soils might not need so much.

    When you harvest, cut the thickest stems near the bottom.  In fact, cut chives at ground level to insure continued growth.  Most of the time you only use the leaves.  With rosemary and thyme, pull backwards down the stems to remove the leaves easily.  If the stem is so tender that it breaks, then just chop it along with the leaves.  For other plants, the leaves will easily pull off.

    As a general rule, don’t let your herbs bloom.  Pinch the buds off as they appear, as well as any leaves or stems that get past their prime and turn yellow.  Blossoms will take away from the leaves and will turn some herbs bitter.
    
    Now what is all that advice worth?  Well, if you don’t live in Florida, it is not worth as much as if you do.  If you live in South Florida, it might not be worth much either.  For you to be sure my advice will work for you, we have to live in the same place.  I am in Zone 9 on all those gardening maps, a zone unto itself.  We have frosts and freezes fairly often in December and January, and even as late as April or as early as November.  On the other hand, once the nighttime temperatures stay above 72, which can happen in early June, the tomatoes stop setting their blooms, and by late June tomatoes and melons may boil in the afternoon sun.  

    We all understand that you should think about where you get your advice.  I use the Union County (Florida) Extension Office.  If you live anywhere else, you shouldn’t.  As many questions as I get, it seems to me that many people are anxious to receive advice on this subject.  Why aren’t we that smart with spiritual things?  I think the answer is a five letter word—pride. How much sense does that make?  Wouldn’t it be a shame if that kept us from finding help with things much more important that growing and cooking with herbs?  

    Consider for a moment, the young teenager who was told that she would give birth to the Son of God.  Think about the difficulties she was about to face—perhaps the most difficult ones of telling her parents and her betrothed husband that she was pregnant by the Holy Spirit; even if they believed her, the rest of the community could still count to nine and Gabriel was not likely to visit them all.  Where did she immediately turn for support and advice?  She went to her older, wiser relative Elizabeth, herself a mother-to-be under miraculous and difficult circumstances.  She had already dealt with whispers for six months and became an example of reward after long endurance. They shared faith in a common destiny, evidenced by continuing miracles, including the silence of a miraculously stricken Zacharias.  Even at her young age, Mary was wise in choosing to whom she would turn for advice.  

    On the hand we have Rehoboam, Solomon’s son, who, instead of listening to the older wiser counselors who had been there with his father, listened to his young hot-headed friends and wound up losing the majority of his kingdom for it, 1 Kings 12:6-11.

    God knew we would need help as we lived our lives.  That is one reason he set things up as he did—families with older generations to help the younger, and churches with the wisdom of elders and older brethren.  Look for people who have more knowledge of the scriptures than you do.  Look for people who have had success, who have come safely through the same trials you are facing, who, in other words, live where you do.  God has given us ample help if we will only take advantage of it, so much, in fact, that ignorance will be no excuse.  It will simply be a mask for pride.

Aged women likewise be reverent in demeanor, not slanderers nor enslaved to much wine, teachers of that which is good; that they may train the young women to love their husbands, to love their children, to be sober-minded, chaste, workers at home, kind, being in subjection to their own husbands, that the word of God be not blasphemed: the younger men likewise exhort to be sober-minded…likewise, ye younger, be subject unto the elder. Yea, all of you gird yourselves with humility, to serve one another: for God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble, Titus 2:3-6; 1 Pet 5:5.

Dene Ward

A Handful of Wildflowers

6/1/2015 0 Comments

Every afternoon following our midday meal, we walk our property, counting new blooms on the roses, smelling the jasmine, looking beneath those large scratchy leaves for new squash blossoms.  Usually I end up with a handful of wildflowers, blooms so tiny I cannot see them until Keith hands me one I can pull up close.
    
Do you know what I see?  Blooms of all colors--red, pink, blue, white, yellow, orange, purple in all shades and combinations—and shapes—bells, tubes, bowls, cups, stars with five or six points, some flared, some rayed, some as complex as orchids.  And did you know that even the stems are different?  Some are wiry, some are leafless, some are hairy, some sprawl and others stand up straight, and some are square!  Some of these flowers are exquisite, but most of us don’t know that.  We’ve never taken the time to bend over and really look.

    A long time ago a woman who has since become a close friend, told me that looking across the pews at Keith had made her think he was stern and unapproachable, and so she had decided to make it a point to get to know him.  It wasn’t really Keith’s fault.  He has large, piercing blue eyes that look like they’re boring into you, a strong Roman nose, and a voice that, because he is profoundly deaf, is always in projection mode.  Even when he isn’t, he often sounds disapproving, and is always loud, which is often translated “angry.”  A lot of people just go with that first impression.  This woman did not, and she proclaimed that year of getting to know him “delightful.”   I wonder how many others have missed out on that delight, how many have formed an opinion, and kept it despite what others might have said.

    How many do we overlook?  The elderly because we think them dull and uninteresting?  The teenagers because we’ve branded them all shallow and naïve?  The disabled because we think they have nothing to offer?  The scholarly and intellectual because we think those dry old men can’t possibly know how to have any fun?  The ones who seems so well put-together because we think they wouldn’t possibly want anything to do with “someone like me?”  None of these judgments is fair.      

Jesus told the Jews, “Judge not according to appearance, but judge righteous judgment,” John 7:24.  Maybe I should take the time (sacrifice) to bend over (be humble) and examine (make some effort) a few wildflowers out there, instead of passing over them (negligence) as if they weren’t worth my trouble (arrogance).  When I think of it that way, I finally understand why judging by appearance is NOT righteous.

But the LORD said to Samuel, “Do not look on his appearance or on the height of his stature, because I have rejected him. For the LORD sees not as man sees: man looks on the outward appearance, but the LORD looks on the heart.”  1Sam 16:7                                 Dene Ward

Addicts: Everyone of Us!

5/29/2015 0 Comments

Today's post is by guest writer Keith Ward.

“Remember not the sins of my youth” -- These are words from a currently popular song, in turn taken from David’s words in Psa 25:7.

Now why should we or David either be worried about sins of long ago –long, long ago for some of us?  We and he repented, we/he confessed, we/he prayed.  We were forgiven—long ago.

But, I confess that the temptations that BESET me are those same sins that started in my youth.  Perhaps in that time of hubris, Satan finds our weakest character trait and attacks and lodges arrows whose tips bedevil us with the pain of sin all our lives.

To illustrate: The popular kids in high school cussed and so did I.  (Shame on me).  I kept that world separate from home and Mom never knew—provable by the fact that the only scars on my hide are bullet holes and various self-inflicted accidental wounds.  I got to college and waxed worse, still leading singing and making talks.  Then I obtained a master’s degree in bad language in the USMC.  I went to Florida College 3 years, preached full time for 10 and part time for years, and have been a deacon for decades.  I cleaned it up.  But when frustration builds up, I still fight the battle over, when multiple things go wrong in a short time and I am tired and, and, and….the words are at the tip of my tongue, in the edge of my mind.  Shame on me.

I wish I could say that is the only sin that began in my youth, battles I still fight too often.  I suspect David was warning young people—don’t start.  It never stops.  The appetites that you do not learn to control now will haunt you all your lives.

For that same reason, Paul warns a middle-aged Timothy, “Flee youthful lusts.”  Old people are bothered by the same temptations that plague young ones.  Problems may vary from vulgar language to pornography to covetous materialism to sexual fantasies to lying to envy, or a host of others, but the principle remains that it is easier to never begin than to stop, easier to stop when you are young than later.  Now is the time.

So, with David and Paul, I would also warn:  Learn now to control yourself.  Every indulgence will weaken you and haunt you all your life.  Not because it is unforgiven but because it never goes away.  Like an addiction, sin/Satan never leaves you alone.  You can control it, but you are never over it.

So you too consider yourselves dead to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus. Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its desires, and do not present your members to sin as instruments to be used for unrighteousness, but present yourselves to God as those who are alive from the dead and your members to God as instruments to be used for righteousness. For sin will have no mastery over you, because you are not under law but under grace.  (Rom 6:11-14, NET)

Keith Ward

Pot-bound

5/28/2015 1 Comments

In our quest to diligently teach our children, I think we often overlook something.  We care for our children, nurturing both body and soul.  Our task, though, is to work our way out of the job.  If my thirty year old child still cannot dress himself, or needs to be reminded to brush his teeth, I have failed miserably.  In the same way, our children cannot make it to Heaven on our spiritual coattails.

            It is often difficult for a parent to realize that his child’s faith should be his own, not an exact replica of his.  A child who does nothing but ape his father’s opinions has, like the Jews of Isaiah’s day, a faith which is a commandment of men learned by rote, Isa 29:13,  rather than learned by personal study, meditation, and conviction. 

            Both of my sons have slightly differing views from mine about some passages of scripture.  I’m glad.  It means they have taken root on their own and, though there is never any guarantee, I feel much more optimistic about their remaining faithful when I am gone.  If you remember the story of the orange tree my mother-in-law gave us, which rooted itself while we were trying to find a place to put it, here is yet another application:  children need to have a little freedom in their quest for spirituality, freedom to spread their own roots.  Parents who demand exact conformity, treating any difference as a sign of disrespect, are spoon-feeding their children’s spirituality while at the same time stunting their growth.  They might as well be carrying them off the ground in a black plastic nursery pot so their roots won’t branch out.  Sooner or later they will become pot-bound and die.

            While you expect to shape their values and instill basic concepts of spirituality and faith, God expected that they would ask, “Why?” and that you would give them real and sensible answers.  “Because I said so,” does have an appropriate time and place in teaching them authority, but not in teaching the word of God.  If you cannot tell them why, then when you are gone why should they continue?

            Encourage them to study and develop on their own.  Treat their discoveries as equally interesting as yours. You may think Paul wrote Hebrews and they may not.  You may believe the three-person interpretation of the Song of Solomon and they may prefer the two-person.  You may look at Romans 7 as any man without Christ, while they believe Paul is talking about himself before his conversion.  Isn’t it great?  You will most likely have an eternity to discuss these things together and with the authors themselves, while the parents who demanded absolute conformity and automaton feedback, may find themselves looking around, wondering where their children are.

           

And the people came up out of the Jordan on the tenth day of the first month, and encamped in Gilgal, on the east border of Jericho.  And those twelve stones, which they took out of the Jordan, did Joshua set up in Gilgal. And he spoke unto the children of Israel, saying, When your children shall ask their fathers in time to come, saying, What mean these stones?  Then you shall let your children know, saying, Israel came over this Jordan on dry land.  For Jehovah your God dried up the waters of the Jordan from before you, until you were passed over, as Jehovah your God did to the Red Sea, which he dried up from before us, until we were passed over;  that all the peoples of the earth may know the hand of Jehovah, that it is mighty; that you may fear Jehovah your God for ever. Josh 4:19-24.

 

 Dene Ward

The Natural Reaction

5/27/2015 0 Comments

I recently came across an article titled “How to Avoid the Natural Reactions that Affect Good Decision Making.”  It is too long to go over here, but it did make me realize that natural reactions can be controlled.  How?  The author, who was not interested in spiritual matters at all, listed several ways, but they all boiled down to this—control yourself and do not let those “natural” reactions rule you.  The Sermon on the Mount is full of exactly those kinds of statements.

            Rejoice and be glad [when others revile you and persecute you] for so persecuted they the prophets before you.

            But I say to you, Do not resist the one who is evil. But if anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also. And if anyone would sue you and take your tunic, let him have your cloak as well. And if anyone forces you to go one mile, go with him two miles.

            But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.

            And that’s only a few from Matthew 5.  This is not easy, but I think the key is this:  God doesn’t expect us to control our natural reactions—he expects us to change what comes naturally to us.  And He expects us to do it during the most difficult times of our lives.  His people have been doing it for thousands of years.

            Jesus went to Peter’s house one evening and found his mother-in-law lying sick with a fever.  What did she do the moment she was healed?  And he came and took her by the hand and lifted her up, and the fever left her, and she began to serve them, Mark 1:30.  How many of us would have taken the next few days off to recuperate, expecting a little more sympathy too?

            The apostles were arrested and put in prison, then brought out and beaten.  What did they do? Then they left the presence of the council, rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer dishonor for the name, Acts 5:41.  Rejoicing at being beaten?  That certainly wouldn’t be my natural reaction.

            Stephen was stoned for what he preached and what did he do as he lay dying?  And as they were stoning Stephen, he called out, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.” And falling to his knees he cried out with a loud voice, “Lord, do not hold this sin against them.” And when he had said this, he fell asleep, Acts 7:59-60.  Impossible, you think, to forgive your murderers, but not for Stephen, a man “full of grace” Acts 6:8.

            Aquila and Priscilla were run out of Rome, forced to leave their home because of persecution.  What did they do?  They set up shop in Corinth and offered Paul a place to stay for as long as he needed (Acts 18:1-3).  Me? I probably would have pleaded a need for time to get organized and put my life back together before I put my home in the upheaval of a long term guest.

            Paul and Silas were beaten and thrown into prison.  What was their reaction?  About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, Acts 16:24.  They were aware that “others were listening to them.”  I’m not sure I would have been aware of anything but my own aches and pains, and completely unconcerned about what others were going through.

            And what did David do immediately after his child died?  Then David arose from the earth and washed and anointed himself and changed his clothes. And he went into the house of the LORD and worshiped, 2 Sam 12:20.  At this most horrible time for any parent, David worshipped.  Is it really surprising?  Job did the same thing, and he had lost all his children.  Then Job arose and tore his robe and shaved his head and fell on the ground and worshiped, Job 1:20. 

            It seems that the natural reaction for a true child of God who undergoes any sort of trial is to turn to his Father, to serve, to worship, to pray, to sing, even to forgive.  I am usually more interested in my own welfare than anyone else’s.  I tend to forget anything spiritual and concentrate on my own physical or emotional pain as if it were the most important thing there is.  Is that what a Christian should do?  These people tell me otherwise, and I could have found many more examples. 

            Truly I have a long way to go, but this maybe I can remember:  If I have become a new creature, then what is “natural” about me, including my reactions, should have changed too.

Now the natural man receives not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him; and he cannot know them, because they are spiritually judged. But he that is spiritual judges all things, and he himself is judged of no man, 1 Cor 2:14,15.          

Dene Ward

Putting Down Roots

5/26/2015 1 Comments

Keith’s mother once gave him a tiny orange tree, maybe six inches tall, which she had planted from seed into a coffee can.  He brought it home, transplanted it into a black plastic nursery pot and set it next to the shed, continuing to water and feed it until he could find a permanent place for it.

    It had grown to a height of three feet when he finally decided where to put it.  Bending down, he grabbed the pot with both hands and tugged.  Nothing happened.  The tree had made its own decision, its roots bursting through the bottom of the pot and digging their way firmly into the ground.  It’s still there, now over twice as tall as the shed and bearing fruit nearly year round.

    Our children are like that little tree.  Wherever you leave them is where they will put down roots.  The atmosphere you raise them in, the people they spend the most time with, the friends they make and the activities they participate in, whether you are aware of them or not, will all have their effects on your children and will influence who they eventually become.

    Children are growing every minute of every day, not only in body, but also in mind.  You cannot set them aside until you have more time, you cannot leave them on their own without guidance, you cannot give them into the charge of another whose belief system does not match yours and still expect your children to follow in your footsteps.  You cannot tell them, not even with all the sincerity you can muster, “Just wait till I finish this degree; just wait till my career is more established; just wait till I can pay off all these bills I ran up, then I will be a good parent to you.”  If nothing else, you are teaching them exactly what is most important to you--career, status, “things.”  Meanwhile, they may put down their roots in places you wish they never knew of, with people you wish they had never met, and develop a character that may appall you.  

    “Where did they learn that?” you might wonder.  In the place where you left them while you were too busy to be a parent.  

Unless the LORD builds the house, those who build it labor in vain.
Unless the LORD watches over the city, the watchman stays awake in vain.
It is in vain that you rise up early and go late to rest,
eating the bread of anxious toil; for he gives to his beloved sleep.
Behold, children are a heritage from the LORD, the fruit of the womb a reward.
Like arrows in the hand of a warrior are the children of one's youth.
Blessed is the man who fills his quiver with them!
He shall not be put to shame when he speaks with his enemies in the gate,
Psalm 127.

Dene Ward