Flight Paths

It’s happened twice now.  I leave my campsite loaded down with shower gear and clean clothes, only to walk into what should be a sanctuary for women only and find a couple of little boys running around—not three year olds, mind you, but boys who are well into grade school, probably 8 or 9.

A campground bathhouse is a bit like a locker room.  Yes, there are shower stalls with curtains, but often the dressing area in those stalls becomes nearly as wet as the tiles behind the shower itself.  Sometimes you have to open the curtain so you can step out and put on your jeans without dragging them through a puddle.  On our last trip a woman came marching out of the stall in her jeans and bra, flapping her arms and exclaiming how hot it was.  What would have happened if those two little boys had been in there then?

Even the little boys cared.  They were showering when I came in to brush my teeth late one night.  Their mother had all their clothes piled in a far corner of the room. 

“Come on out,” she called through the shower curtain.

“But there’s a woman out there,” the older boy said.

“I’m sure she’s seen it before,” she hollered back, and suddenly in the mirror I saw a naked child streaking behind me.  For his sake I kept my eyes averted from the embarrassed little boy crouching behind the sinks.  If it bothers the boys, surely that’s the time to put them in the men’s bathhouse, isn’t it?

Then I got an even bigger shock.  “I’ll be right back,” the mom told the boys.  “I have to take this to your dad.”

Dad?  Why didn’t Dad have them in the men’s bathhouse to begin with?  No, dad was absent, as so many are these days, watching TV in the trailer by the satellite dish he had hauled along on a two night camping trip on top of a beautiful mountain.  I wonder if he ever noticed the scenery, much less his sons. 

My boys were blessed to have a father who took his role seriously.  He didn’t leave everything to me until they got “bigger.”  He changed diapers.  He rolled around on the floor with them.  He played every ball game in season, even when they weren’t very good at it yet.  He read the Bible to them every morning while they ate breakfast, and a Bible story every night before bed, even before they were able to understand what he was reading.  Nearly every night he was the one who gave them their baths so I had time to clean up the supper dishes.  And yes, he took them into the men’s bathhouse whenever we camped, which began when Nathan was only three.

For awhile Keith worked nights.  He would not have seen the boys except right before school and on weekends, but he got up early every morning, despite his late hours, to walk them to the bus stop.  He left them notes in the middle of table every day, pieces of advice, Bible verses to memorize before the weekend, and always an “I love you.”  They usually ran straight for the table when the bus dropped them off, and I still have a notebook with those little yellow notes taped to the pages.  It wasn’t long before he changed jobs, taking one at far less salary because being with his boys was more important than money.

Fathers, you have a more important calling than the one that pays your bills.  Boys need to know what it takes to be a man of God.  Girls need to see the kind of man they should look for one day.  If all you do is let mama handle things till they get a little bigger, you are missing the most precious years of their lives.  You still won’t have a relationship with your child, because you didn’t build one when the building came naturally.  They won’t trust you to really care, and no one will much blame them.

And you fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord, Ephesians 6:4.

Dene Ward

I thought it was just because I was a classical voice teacher who, since I live in a rural county in the South, spent a lot of time on diction--clean enunciation, and particularly those wide Southern diphthongs.  What is the point of singing if no one can understand the words?  So I thought it was just because I was sensitive to it that I kept noticing that I could not understand the words in a lot of pop music.  Finally, one day when the boys were playing a “Best Of…” tape in the car, I asked them, “Is he really saying ‘dancin’ in the fryin’ pan?’”

“No, mom.  It’s dancin’ an’ prancin,’” accompanied by exaggerated eye rolls and head shakes as only teenagers can.

Recently I discovered a whole website devoted to “Misheard Lyrics.”  I feel vindicated at last.

But pop music is not the problem.  The singers are the problem.  Most of us can tell stories of our children just beginning to sing our hymns and the often hilarious mistakes they make.

In the middle of the grocery store one morning, three year old Nathan said, “Sing the song about the sandals, mom.”

“Sandals?  A church song?”

“Yes.  All other ground is sinking sandals, other ground is sinking sand.”

Lucas at the same age asked his grandfather to sing the song about the peas.  “He whispers sweet peas to me.”  And a few months later I heard him singing, “When the roll is called under the water.”

Do you wonder if God has the same problem understanding our singing?  Not as long as we sing and make melody with our hearts, Eph 5:19, rather than muttering half-memorized words on automatic pilot.  What about our prayers?

Once in a women’s class, a dear friend was praying and had trouble with a certain phrase.  No matter how she tried, it kept coming out backwards to what she intended.  Finally she just said, “Lord, you know what I mean!”

Of course He does.  Why was that such a revelation and comfort to me?  Because we spend so much time legislating prayer, telling folks which person of the Godhead they can and cannot pray to, what things they can and cannot ask for, and what things they MUST say if they expect their prayer to get past the ceiling when the real problem is, we don’t pray enough.  No wonder!  Everyone’s afraid of doing it wrong.  Just as the Pharisees made the Law of Moses a burden (Matt 23:4), we are making what should be one of our greatest comforts in this life, a burden instead. 

Just pray!  We have an intercessor, a mediator who is on our side and pleads our cases.  He is not standing their just waiting to stamp my particular prayer, “Disqualified!” and send it back unheard.  There are no misheard prayers in Heaven.

For there is one God, one mediator between God and man, himself man, Christ Jesus, who gave himself a ransom for all…1 Tim 2:3.4a

And he who searches the hearts knows what is the mind of the spirit, because he makes intercession for the saints according to the will of God.  Rom 8:27

These things says the Son of God…I am he who searches the reins and the hearts…Rev 2:18,23

Dene Ward

Wives of probation officers learn to live with a lot of things, including fear.  As certified law enforcement officers their husbands regularly go into neighborhoods that well-armed policemen will not enter without back-up.  Yet they do it on a regular basis to keep track of their caseload, making sure they are where they are supposed to be and not out getting into trouble again.  Keeping the community safe by supervising convicted felons is their job.  They knock on doors every day, never knowing who might answer, or what condition they might be in (drunk, high, angry) and what they might be carrying with them.  Yes, it’s illegal for them to have a weapon, but they broke the law already, remember?  One time Keith came upon one of his people parked in front of a convenience store with a shotgun in the front seat next to him.

One of the other rules for the probationer is never to go near their supervising officer’s residence.  Most of them have no idea where their officers live anyway, and the office is not allowed to pass out that information, but when you live in a tiny rural county where practically everyone is related to or otherwise knows everyone else, they don’t even need a phone book to find their officers.  Twice I have had one of those people knock on the door, once when Keith had already left for work.  That is why I always lock my doors when I come inside, and why, since we had a fence put up, we lock the gate 24/7.

It’s a habit now.  I come in the door and shut it with a twist of the wrist and it’s locked.  I don’t even know I’ve done it. In fact, one time I walked outside to do something and locked myself out without realizing it. 

On the weekends, I regularly lock Keith out too.  He will be chopping wood or mowing the yard and I come back in from taking him a jug of water and—flip—it’s locked.  I don’t know until I hear him knocking at the door.  He never gets angry; he always says, “Good job,” and goes about his business.  Now, if I didn’t respond to his knock, that might be a different story.

Acts 6:7 tells us that many of the priests were “obedient to the faith.”  That word “obedient” is the same Greek word used in Acts 12:13.  Peter had been miraculously released from prison and ran to Mary’s house, where the church had met to pray.  He knocked at the door and Rhoda came to “answer”—that’s the word “obedient.”  Just as a knock on the door requires a response, the gospel knocking on our hearts requires one too.

First, let me praise poor little Rhoda.  This was a time of danger for the church.  Two had been arrested and one of those already killed.  The use of the word “maid[en]” or “damsel” tells me she was unmarried and therefore quite young.  Yet she is the one who was sent to answer the door.  What if it had been Herod’s soldiers?  Then she finds Peter standing there and is so excited she forgets to let him in.  It takes others coming to respond to the continued knocking for Peter to actually get into the house.

A lot of charlatans who claim to be preachers of the faith will tell you that all you have to do is look out the door and recognize the Lord and you will be saved.  Faith is merely mental assent, with perhaps a lot of excitement thrown in, too much to actually get the door opened, to prove its sincerity, but this word requires some action.  Those priests in Acts 6 were “obedient” to the faith.  They responded completely and fully to whatever was asked of them.  “Mental assent” is not an appropriate response to the gospel, any more than me looking out the diamond-shaped pane of glass at my locked-out husband and waving, “Hi!”

How many professional athletes have you seen wearing crosses and “thanking their Lord” before going out to live exactly the way they want to instead of the way He wants them to?  Too many.  But what about those of us who do not live with such public scrutiny?  How many times do we tell the Lord, even after having “obeyed the gospel” as if it were a one-and-done deal, I’m happy to serve as long as it doesn’t cost too much money or take too much of my precious time, as long as everyone does things my way (which is the only smart way), or calls me every day to check on me and take care of my every whim?

The Lord is knocking on the door and He wants far more than your words.  He wants all of you, your heart and your life, your total submission to His way of doing things.  Don’t just nod at Him through the peephole.  Either answer the door and let Him in, or allow Him to go on to someone who really wants Him there.

As many as I love, I reprove and chasten: be zealous therefore, and repent. Behold, I stand at the door and knock: if any man hear my voice and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me. He who overcomes, I will give to him to sit down with me in my throne, as I also overcame, and sat down with my Father in his throne. Revelation 3:19-21

Dene Ward

by guest writer, Keith Ward

I was born on the side of a mountain. We only had one car which Dad took to work, so we walked everywhere and climbing on the bluffs was a form of recreation. Walking on a trail comes naturally to me and I rarely watch my feet. My feet automatically find the easiest path and long ago I had to learn to be consciously careful about this or I would push Dene off into the rough when we were strolling about our property. 

Not only is Dene a city girl who never stepped off a sidewalk in her life prior to our marriage, she had serious vision problems even before the surgeries began in 2005.  She has no natural ability to walk a path.  Always on our hikes, I get ahead and then wait for her, especially at a rough spot, to help her through.  Since 2005, the problem has grown so that a 4 hour hike for me is 3 hours hiking and 1 hour waiting (at best). But, we still have fun and enjoy all the same things others do on a hike.

I suppose I could search a concordance and count all the times the Christian life is called a walk and add in all the references to a path or a way or some synonym, but you already know there are a lot.  Some find the path fairly easy while others view the same part of the trail with trepidation and slowly and fearfully take each step.  Shall the stronger just rush on ahead and leave the weaker ones behind?  Or should their love overcome their desire to push onward and cause them to wait for and help the weak?  Can the “natural” point out a view or a wonder while the handicapped leans on his shoulder for a moment’s respite?  Can he not see that the trail he thinks is so easy now may up ahead become much harder for him in some way that the one who now struggles will find to be a highway? Their roles will be reversed.

Some hikers quit.  It is too hot, too far, there are too many bugs, the trail is too difficult for my skill level, etc.  In some cases, we simply must leave them and go on ahead.  However, I suspect we take this option much sooner than we would in “real life.”  Should I turn and Dene was not back there at all, how far would I search?  Or would I shrug my shoulders and return to the campsite and fix supper for one?  Should she become discouraged and sit down on a boulder, saying, “I quit!” how long would I linger and encourage and persuade?  I once became a long term crutch when she twisted her ankle, and found an unmapped short-cut to a nearby road. Do we call out search and rescue or do we have difficulty remembering the names of all the people littering the trail behind us?

Love came to seek and save that which was lost. Love built a highway.  Can we be pilgrims on His road and not love and reach out to fellow travelers? Let us determine to make their path smooth and to wait for them to set them forward on their journey.

Wherefore lift up the hands that hang down, and the palsied knees; and make straight paths for your feet, that that which is lame be not turned out of the way, but rather be healed. Hebrews 12:12-13

While I was teaching music I was a member of several professional organizations.  My favorite was the local group which met seven times a year in members’ homes for business, some high-spirited performances, and a potluck lunch.  Once we met in a house just off the highway, down a lime rock road.  In the middle of the meeting, a rain came up—not just any rain, but one we around here call a “toad strangler,” several inches in less than an hour—they happen all the time in Florida. 

The rain had stopped when it was time to leave and we took off down the dirt road shortcut in a caravan of cars headed to our various studios to meet the students for the day.  Suddenly, the cars ahead of me came to a halt, and ladies started climbing out, gathering together and peering up ahead.  I turned off the engine and joined the milling crowd at the head of the line. 

Water had run across the road.  It had not cut a deep rut, and in fact, was a nice shallow-looking, easily fordable stream, but we had all lived in the country long enough to know you don’t just drive through water running across an unpaved road.  “Someone needs to walk out there and check the road,” was the consensus. 

Have I mentioned that at 35 I was the youngest in the group by about thirty years?  Instantly, all heads turned toward me.  Having been silently elected, I slipped off my shoes and started across the newly created waterway.  I took five firm steps only to have to grab my skirt and hike it up over my knees as I sank exactly that deep on the sixth.  Instantly I had visions of those jungle movies I used to watch on Saturday afternoons as a kid, where the first one in the safari line sinks in the quicksand because, in spite of everyone telling him to be still, he wiggles and squirms and sinks before anyone can even think to cut a vine and use it to pull him out—or if some bright fellow does think of it, twenty people on the other end cannot out-pull the suction of a big mud puddle.. 

A good minute later it dawned on me that my name was being called, and I still had not sunk any farther.  My feet had found a solid layer of hardpan about two feet below the surface so Tarzan swinging to the rescue was totally unnecessary.  I made my way back to the group with the most unladylike thwock, thwock, thwock noises as the suction released with each step.  We all carefully backed our cars down the one lane road, turned around in the driveway from where we had started and went the long way home, down the paved state highway.

Hopelessness in the scriptures is often pictured as “sinking.”  Jeremiah prophesies that Babylon will sink and shall not rise again because of the evil I will bring upon her, 51:64.  Amos warns Israel that they are in for the same punishment: they shall sink again like the River of Egypt, 8:8; 9:5.  And all because of sin.  Even Peter, when he tried to walk on water, began to sink because of little faith and doubt, Matt 14:31.  And truly, just like sinking in the quicksand (at least in the old grade B movies), there is nothing we can do but hope a savior happens along.  Praise God, he has!

The Psalmist pleads in 22:8 Commit yourself to Jehovah, let him deliver you; let him rescue you, seeing he delights in you.  In spite of the fact that, like an ignorant city slicker, we walked out into that mud on purpose, in spite of the fact that we ignored warning after warning, and kept right on wiggling and squirming, and even when we have been pulled out before, but keep stepping right back into the same pool of quicksand, Jesus is ready to hold out a hand and save us. 

Deliver me out of the mire and let me not sink… Let not the waterflood overwhelm me and swallow me up…Answer me, oh Jehovah, for your lovingkindness is good.  According to the multitude of your tender mercies, turn to me; and hide not your face from your servant, for I am in distress; answer me quickly. Psa 69:14-17

Dene Ward

Last year we made a distressing discovery—the seam sealing tape on the rain fly to our tent had come loose.  Unfortunately, we made this discovery in the middle of the night during a driving rainstorm when water suddenly began pouring on us as we lay in our sleeping bags.

So before our latest camping trip, we pulled out the fly and set about resealing the tape.  We found out that not all the tape had come undone, just the places where more stress was put on the fly—at the staking points and over the top where it stretched tightly across the tent poles.  I suppose that makes sense.  After all, where is it that your pants are more likely to rip but where and when you stretch those seams the most?  In the back when you bend over.

That brought to mind the disciples’ request for the Lord to “Increase our faith.”  I had always thought of this as a simple request, sort of a “Help me get better” generic prayer.  Suddenly I thought to check the context.  Maybe there was a reason for the request, maybe those men were under some sort of stress.  So I looked up Luke 17:5 and checked the verses immediately ahead of that one.

Stress?  Jesus had just given them a laundry list of commands that would have stressed anyone out.

“Temptation is sure to come,” he begins in verse 1.  Not “may come” or even “will probably come,” but “sure to come.”  If ever a Christian feels stress it is during temptation.  Yes, I think I might need increased faith to handle those times. 

Then he goes on to talk about those who cause others to stumble.  I suppose nothing stresses me out more than worrying about how what I say or do may affect others, especially since I teach and write so much.  Yes, I need more faith to keep teaching and keep writing, especially when I receive negative reactions or hear of someone who misused what I have said, and even more when I realize I have made a careless word choice.

Then Jesus tells them to forgive, even if the same person does the same thing over and over and over and over.  This is where, in an almost comedic outcry, we hear them shout, “Lord!  Increase our faith!”  As often as those same men misunderstood and failed to comprehend Jesus’ teaching, they certainly understood the need for faith when it comes to mercy and forgiveness.  We really haven’t reached the pinnacle of that Divine trait until we can say, “I forgive you,” without adding or even thinking, “Again.”

Look up the other places where we are told to strengthen or increase or add to our faith and you will discover other areas of stress that could trip you up—times when divisions occur, when sinful desires rear their ugly heads, when we need to love the unlovable, when we are told to obey whether we understand it or not.  All of these things can create stress in our lives, and endanger our souls.

“Pay attention to yourselves,” Jesus told those men in the midst of his teaching (v 3).  Don’t be caught unawares in the middle of a storm.  “Increase your faith” and so be prepared. 

We ought always to give thanks to God for you, brothers, as is right, because your faith is growing abundantly, and the love of every one of you for one another is increasing. Therefore we ourselves boast about you in the churches of God for your steadfastness and faith in all your persecutions and in the afflictions that you are enduring. This is evidence of the righteous judgment of God, that you may be considered worthy of the kingdom of God, for which you are also suffering-- 2 Thessalonians 1:3-5.   

Dene Ward

I never thought about sodas having a shelf life until a couple of years ago.  We bought several boxes at a great sale and stacked them out of the way until needed.  We put one on the floor of the pantry back behind the potatoes, onions, and other odds and ends that won’t fit on a shelf.  It takes us 2 or 3 months to go through one 12 pack, so by the time we had finished the first few, we had totally forgotten about that one.  I only found it because I dropped something that rolled into the back of the pantry and had to pull everything out to find it. 

We decided to celebrate our discovery with a soda.  It wasn’t just flat.  It was the worst thing I ever put in my mouth.  On a whim, we searched the box, and sure enough, there was a sell-by date that was about a year past.

We all have shelf lives too, as much as we hate to think about it.  But instead of viewing this from the perspective of immortality—how short our lives really are--we seem to view it from the perspective of the shelf life of a bottle of milk—compared to that we live practically forever.  Maybe that is why we view death as a tragedy instead of a victory.  We keep looking through the wrong end of the binoculars.  One of the most difficult things we have to do as Christians is constantly changing our perspectives,  re-focusing our hearts from things in plain sight to things which the world cannot, and will not, see.

2 Chron 34 and 35 tell us the story of Josiah, the last good king of Judah.  He tried to clean up a Temple that was in disrepair and a worship that was in disarray.  As his reward God said he would not live to see destruction brought upon Judah.  What!?  Dying was a reward?  Yes, because this godly man had his perspective correct.  He viewed going on to the next life as far preferable to seeing God’s people destroyed.

Josiah died in battle at the age of 39.  Dying young was his reward for faithfulness.. What one of us would not look at that fact superficially and say, What a tragedy for such a good man to die so young?  Maybe I need to rethink my attitude about death.  I may grieve, but faith means my life will not be ruined by the death of a loved one.  I may have a little concern about how it will be to die, but faith means I should not be terrified. 

I hope I am not coming across as morbid.  Maybe having nearly become a relatively young widow twice in eight years has me more aware of the possibilities these days.  I simply mean to remind us that we have hopes and comforts the rest of the world doesn’t. 

I have a shelf life and so do you.  It is shorter than we think, and it will mean nothing to us in that first glimpse of Eternity.  I imagine we will be glad to be there, and wonder why we worried even a little.

For me to live is Christ and to die is gain…I am in a strait between the two, having the desire to depart and be with Christ, for it is far better…Phil 1:21,23

Dene Ward

When I was teaching piano and voice, besides my own annual Spring Program and Awards Ceremony, my students sometimes participated in as many as seven joint recitals a year, programs featuring the students of several teachers at once. 

Sometimes the students were chosen according to their age—the Young Performer’s Recital was strictly for talented beginners.  It was their chance to shine rather than being lost among a studio’s advanced students.  Sometimes it was all about their music—the Parade of American Music featured students playing or singing the music of American composers.  If his best piece that year was Mozart’s Rondo in D, that particular student was ineligible.

Sometimes a panel of judges chose the students based on their performances in a recent competition.  The year we had five chosen for the Student Day Honors Recital was a banner year for us.  To have one or two chosen from a group of over two hundred students from a dozen studios was a good showing.  Five was almost unheard of.

At the receptions after these events, we teachers always enjoyed basking in our students’ successes.  We mined each other for teaching strategies and resources.  The experience exposed us to more crowd-pleasing music we could use with our own students, and our students to teachable moments we could discuss at the next lesson.  They could see for themselves why I insisted on such picky things as not taking your fanny off the seat until your hands left the keys when a student from another studio stood up without doing so, looking as if someone had glued her fingers to the ivory.  They could hear why long fingernails were verboten when it sounded like someone was trying to tap dance to Debussy and Haydn.  It also worked wonders for parental attitudes—suddenly they appreciated things they had before viewed as silly.

My favorite moments after these recitals came when people approached me with these words:  “I can always tell which ones are yours.”  It wasn’t because they played or sang particularly well—every student at these recitals did that—but not every student performed well.  We spent hours on things like how to approach or leave the piano, how to hold a pose over a final note, what to do in a memory lapse, how a singer should hold the mood until the accompaniment stops, and especially how to bow.  It’s one thing to know your piece; it’s another to be able to present a polished performance of it to an audience.

Sometimes I imagine God as the teacher watching our performances.  He knows we can do it.  I can do all things through him who strengthens me, Phil 4:13.  He gave His Son to show us how.  …because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example that you might follow in his steps, 1 Pet 2:21.  I don’t think it is out of line to think of the angels saying to Him, “I can always tell which ones are yours.”  Isn’t that the picture we get in Job 1?  Perhaps not literally, but in essence if nothing else. 

If life is one big recital, we should learn from the performances of others—what to do, what not to do, why some of the picky things we have always heard are important after all.  We should learn from our own mistakes as well—why do I always miss the same note?!  Your daily practice should take of that.

God is in the audience.  What He wants to hear more than anything is, “I can always tell which ones are yours.”

By this it is evident who are the children of God, and who are the children of the devil: whoever does not practice righteousness is not of God, nor is the one who does not love his brother. 1 John 3:10

Dene Ward

Imagine for a minute that you are vacationing in a five star resort for which you have paid big money, more than you probably should have.  The flimsy shower curtain doesn’t quite reach side to side in the bathtub, the shower stream is thin and continues to drip after you turn it off.  The room is so cold you have to dress at the speed of light.  There is no television, telephone, refrigerator, or microwave, and the bed is hard.  No toiletries are offered, no room service, and you even have to carry your own linens with you.  How happy would you be?  You would probably not have lasted one night before you demanded your money back.

Campers put up with all of that, particularly tent campers, and they have a fine old time.  They understand going in what to expect, especially since they are paying a fraction of the amount of even a moderately priced motel.  Even when the weather is dismal, they seldom complain.  You take your chances when you live outdoors for a week.  Isn’t it interesting that the same circumstances can produce both happy people and unhappy people?

The only time we ever wrote a letter of complaint in 30 years of camping was last year.  Even campers in a state park campground have every right to expect a well-drained campsite.  When it rained our last night there, not only did the site not drain well, it collected water from all the surrounding sites.  We woke up in a pool of water.  The tent floor billowed up around us when we took a step.  At least it was waterproof, or the thousands of dollars worth of Keith’s hearing paraphernalia that we keep charging in the floor overnight (since there is no furniture in a tent) would have been ruined.

But we didn’t complain because of the rain.  We didn’t complain because it was cold enough for a foot high icicle to form under the water spigot.  We didn’t complain because the wind blew our light pole over, or the bathhouse only had two shower stalls for the whole campground.  That’s what you expect when you camp.  At least there was a bathhouse with hot running water and a heater in it!

It doesn’t take much to be a happy camper.  Maybe that’s why God has always warned his people about a life of ease.  Take care lest… when you have eaten and are full and have built good houses and live in them, and when your herds and flocks multiply and your silver and gold is multiplied and all that you have is multiplied, then your heart be lifted up, and you forget the LORD your God…(Deuteronomy 8:11-14).

Our lives on this earth are often depicted as camping.  We are sojourners.  We are just passing through.  Or are we?  How much do we take for granted in these days of luxury?  Every so often I remind myself to thank God for the running water, for the electricity, for the air conditioning.  I have lost them often enough, and for long enough at times, to remember that they don’t just happen; they aren’t “inalienable rights”—they are blessings.

Ask people today what is on their list of necessities and it will scare you to death.  An easy life makes a soft people.  Self-discipline disappears.  The ability to endure hardship is practically non-existent.  Complaining becomes an art form, and my problems are always someone else’s fault.  The worst result is the pride that causes us to forget God, Prov 30:8,9.

The results of trials and afflictions, on the other hand, are good, Deut 8:15,16; Psa 126:5,6; 1 Pet 1:6-8; 4:13,14. They make us stronger; they remind us who is in control, and build our faith and dependence upon God.  They remind us of the love God has for his children.  I know, O Lord, that your rules are righteous, that in faithfulness you have afflicted me, Psa 119:75. 

A parent who never says no, who never makes his child earn anything with his own hard work, who always gets him out of trouble instead of allowing him to reap the consequences of his mistakes, is not a faithful, loving parent.  These things build character.  Wealth doesn’t.  Luxury doesn’t.  Anyone who “needs” that to be happy will never in this life be a happy camper.

As for the rich in this present age, charge them not to be haughty, nor to set their hopes on the uncertainty of riches, but on God, who richly provides us with everything to enjoy. They are to do good, to be rich in good works, to be generous and ready to share, thus storing up treasure for themselves as a good foundation for the future, so that they may take hold of that which is truly life. 1 Timothy 6:17-19

Dene Ward

Have you seen the commercial where the father is playing hide and seek and finds his little boy up near the ceiling as his mother says, “We have a climber?”  I have one too.

Lucas, my older son, climbs.  If there is anything around taller than he is, he is on it without even conscious thought.  When he was a teenager, I would hear him call from outside.  When I got there, I could not see him anywhere.  Finally I would hear laughter coming from above me—way above me.  If there is a tree on our property he has not climbed, it was just not big enough to hold him.  I should have known. 

When he was about 8 months old and had just started pulling up on things and walking around them while hanging on (four weeks later he let go!), I had a cake sitting on my countertop, freshly frosted and ready for a potluck.  The kitchen I had at the time was a horseshoe shape, with a lower eating bar on the side of the counter that faced the family room.  I just turned around toward the oopposite leg of the counter for two minutes, wiping up crumbs.  Someone had left a chair pulled out (we won’t say who is guilty of never pushing his chair in).  Lucas pulled up on the chair, lifted a little leg, climbed into it, pulled himself up on the bar, then up onto the countertop and was literally two inches from planting his little fist in the cake as he crawled across the countertop when I turned around, gasped, and grabbed him. 

If you had seen an 8 month old baby, still crawling on the floor, and the height of the countertop, you would have thought the cake was safe too.  There was no way he would ever get near it, especially not that fast.  But for him, there was no way he could not get to it if he wanted it badly enough.

Too many times we give up without trying.  We look at the difficulty ahead of us and say, “I can’t.”  We excuse our faults by blaming God, “I’m only human.  I can’t help it.”  You know what that translates to?  “God made me this way.  It’s His fault I can’t do any better.”  What way exactly did God makes us?  And God created man in His own image, in the image of God did he make him. Gen 1:27.  Seems like a pretty good way to be made to me.  Every excuse we can come up with is just as baseless as this one.

“I can’t handle this, God.  You’re asking too much.”  Which means God is not faithful.  He will ask more than I can bear.  There has no temptation taken you but such as man can bear; but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that you are able… 1 Cor 10:13.

“How can you allow this to happen, God?”  Which means God can be tempted with evil, and he does tempt us.  Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God, for God cannot be tempted with evil, and he himself tempts no man.  James 1:13

“Every day I have to fight this battle.  It’s just too hard for me.”  Which means you can sin with impunity?  Watch, stand fast in the faith, behave like men! Be strong.  1 Cor 16:13.

“I quit.  I just can’t do it.”  Oh?  I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.  Phil 4:13.

There was a little baby once who was just old enough to recognize a cake when he saw it.  It did not matter that it was up three or four times higher than his head.  It did not matter that he had to work hard to get there.  It did not matter that it was dangerous going.  He could have fallen and hurt himself badly at any time.  Did he care?  No, he wanted that cake and was determined to have it. 

Isn’t Heaven a little more important than a piece of cake?

Dene Ward