Flight Paths

This year’s garden made me even more aware that I am growing older.  The heat made me woozier than ever before.  The bending over gave me a backache that lasted all day and usually into the night.  My hands no longer have the strength to win the tug of war with most weeds.  And I just plain wear out faster.  We looked at one another and asked, “How much longer can we do this?”  It’s not the only time we ask that question.
           Will this be our last dog?  Will this one be our last car?  How much longer can we take care of this acreage with a shovel, a tiller, and a chainsaw?  We did, in fact, decide that our last camping trip was probably the “last.”  The drive is harder on us.  The set-up takes longer and longer and more and more energy.  We often wind up just sitting around the fire a whole day afterward to recover.  Then there is the pull down and the drive home, and the seemingly endless unpacking and putting up.  When we found ourselves dreading the next trip, we knew it was time to quit.
            And so I look at our work in the kingdom and think, “How much longer do we have?”  How many more classes will we be able to teach?  How many more “weekends” will I be able to travel and teach large groups of ladies?  And the more I wonder these things, the more I feel like screaming out, “You need to call while you can!  You need to come while I am still able to see my notes and talk!  You need to arrange your schedule and get here if you want anything I have left to give.”  Because I really do want to share it with you, and I never know what tomorrow will bring. 
            I know several other older women who feel exactly the same way.  None of us are getting any younger and it is precisely that problem that gives us so much to share with you—experience only comes with age, but age makes life precarious.
            Every day we are closer to the last, and before that, we are closer to an age when our service will become limited, when all we may be able to do is offer to someone younger an opportunity to serve an older brother or sister.  We will eventually become like Barzillai, the wealthy old man who supported David when Absalom rebelled.  As David headed back to the palace, he asked Barzillai to come with him so he could be honored for his loyalty and service in an appropriate way.  But Barzillai said to the king, “How many years have I still to live, that I should go up with the king to Jerusalem? I am this day eighty years old. Can I discern what is pleasant and what is not? Can your servant taste what he eats or what he drinks? Can I still listen to the voice of singing men and singing women? Why then should your servant be an added burden to my lord the king? 2Sam 19:34-35.  But even at 80 he had served as he could, even if all it amounted to was using his wealth and his servants to do for his king, rather than doing the serving himself. 
           It is said of David after he had served the purpose of God in his own generation he fell asleep, Acts 13:36.  As long as we are still alive, there is still a purpose of God to be served—we just have to use a little more creativity in finding it!
           And for those who are young and reading this, your time is running out too.  None of us really knows how long we have left.  “All things being equal” we say about the young outliving us, but in this life nothing is ever “equal.”  I have seen too many young people lose their lives to disease and accident to feel at all comfortable for you.  You need to make the most of your time too.  The purpose God has in mind for you may be a very short one.
           And so it is up to all of us to make the most of the time, to “redeem it” as Paul told the Ephesians.  Do not put off the spiritual things—Bible study, prayer, meditating, serving.  Do not think that “someday” you will be in an easier time of life, a time when you can become a better Christian, a better father or mother, a better husband or wife.  That time will never come unless you make it happen.
          The years of our life are seventy, or even by reason of strength eighty; yet their span is but toil and trouble; they are soon gone, and we fly away. Ps 90:10 
          It flies faster than you can ever imagine, and if you have not prepared yourself properly, eternity will last longer than you ever thought possible.
 
O God, from my youth you have taught me, and I still proclaim your wondrous deeds. So even to old age and gray hairs, O God, do not forsake me, until I proclaim your might to another generation, your power to all those to come. Ps 71:17-18
 
Dene Ward

Aspirin may be the most widely used over- the- counter drug in the world.  In fact, it has been a commonly used drug for thousands of years.  Acetylsalicylic acid (aspirin) comes from salicin, which is derived from various natural sources including willow bark and the spirea plant.  Ancient Sumerians and Egyptians knew about this substance as far back as 3000 BC and used it for pain and inflammation.  Hippocrates used it for fever and pain, including childbirth pain.  I have news for him.  Aspirin won't even come close for that!  Native Americans were known to chew on willow bark to relieve their aches and pains.  But most all these people also knew that too much of it would harm the stomach.  They had to know how to use it so that wouldn't happen.  They also knew which ailments it would not help.
            On March 6, 1899, Bayer was able to patent aspirin.  It isn't a package of powdered willow bark or spirea, but actual tablets, which did not appear until after the turn of the twentieth century.  And over the years, chemists have learned various ways to "buffer" its effects on the stomach.  They have also learned new uses for it.  A "heart attack aspirin" is only steps away in my home and maybe in yours as well.  But I do not use it for my various eye maladies and I doubt it has ever been used for serious illnesses such as leukemia or ALS.  It may have been labeled a "wonder drug" but it doesn't fix everything.
The other morning I noticed Chloe’s left ear sagging to the side.  No matter what was going on or how excited she was, that ear would not stand up as it normally did, over half as tall as her head in the manner of all Australian cattle dogs’ ears.  She reminded me of the antenna that sat on top of our television when I was a child, one leg of it straight up in the air, and the other at nearly ninety degrees.
            Then she started scratching at it and shaking her head and I knew—ear mites.  So we searched through the cabinet until we found the white squeeze bottle of ear mite treatment.  We had never used it on her so she came willingly, even when she saw us with the bottle.  In fact, we had not used it in so long that it took a while to get any out of the bottle, and then when it came, it came with a rush, completely filling her ear canal.  We held her long and massaged it in, but it was still too much.  As soon as we let go she shook her head and slung a big glop of it right into my eye.
            Canine ear mite medicine is not made for human eyeballs.  I rushed inside half blinded and flushed my eye for several minutes, then used up several vials of saline completely clearing the stuff out of my burning eye.  I think the contact lens helped shield it, or it might have been much worse.
            Some things don’t need medicating, especially with the wrong medicine, and some things we think need our ministrations just need to be left alone.
            John said unto him, Teacher, we saw one casting out demons in your name; and we forbade him, because he followed not us. But Jesus said, Forbid him not: for there is no man who shall do a mighty work in my name, and be able quickly to speak evil of me. For he that is not against us is for us, Mark 9:38-40.
            Many times we disagree with a brother about a subject that makes no difference at all in our ability to worship together.  Many times we disagree with each other about things that seem fairly important, but we can still sit on the same pew and worship our God in complete harmony.  The disharmony is caused only when we make something out of it.  As long as your beliefs do not hinder me from mine, where is the problem?  As long as I do not force mine on you as a condition of fellowship when it shouldn’t be, why can’t we get along?  You say you see something you believe might lead to a problem?  As long as it isn’t one, don’t force the issue.  Don’t deliberately do something that will bring discord into the family of God and call it “fighting for the truth,” when it is only wrangling about words or, at its heart, bickering about power.
            Sometimes we need to remember the Lord’s reply to his overzealous disciples:  “He that is not against us is for us.”  And we especially need to remember his absolute loathing of anything and anyone who disrupts the unity of his body.  Paul tells us in Ephesians 2 that Christ came to create unity, and that we are “one new man,” “one body,” “fellow citizens,” and “a family.” Why did he do that?  So that we might “grow into a holy temple in the Lord; in whom you also are built together for a habitation of God.”  The God of peace cannot dwell in a temple that is not at peace.  We destroy the mission of Christ when we make it so.
            Be careful about diagnosing others’ beliefs.  Be careful about making things matters of spiritual life and death, when they are simply non-life-threatening “bugs.”  Maybe by our sitting together every Sunday, studying together with respect for one another instead of accusations, we can come even closer to agreement on those very bugs, and they will run their course and disappear.
 
One man esteems one day above another; another esteems every day alike.  Let each man be fully assured in his own mind…Why do you pass judgment on your brother? Or you, why do you despise your brother? For we will all stand before the judgment seat of God; for it is written, "As I live, says the Lord, every knee shall bow to me, and every tongue shall confess to God." So then each of us will give an account of himself to God, Rom 14:5, 10-12.
 
Dene Ward
 

A few weeks ago I took a few minutes to show my class how to figure out Jacob's age when he left home for Haran.  It took putting together a lot of different verses and you had to start with his age when he went to Egypt and back up, but it only required simple math, in this case subtraction.  I had already shown them how to show that neither Shem nor Abram were the eldest brothers, more simple math, both adding and subtracting.  We have also discussed the cultural norms for weaning and for young girls' "marriageable age," along with how much wood a young man can carry at what age.  When we came up with Jacob's age when he made that original deal for Rachel, they were shocked at the number.  So what was it?  Well, about that…
            Some folks wonder, what's the big deal?  Why figure this out in the first place?  I'll tell you one quick reason—it completely undoes a lot of false pictures we have in our minds when we try to visualize these Bible narratives.  For another, it can explain what we originally considered inexplicable behavior when we realize how old someone was—or wasn't.  You might just want to throw away a lot of those coloring sheets you have used for your Bible classes and maybe create a few of your own.
            But the larger lesson for today is this.  Just who figured all this out in the first place?  Who took the time to find passage after passage, research history, geography, and other assorted minutiae, and then carefully put it all together?  Some of it came from scholars whose work was to do just that.  But some has come from ordinary people like you and me who simply spend time in the Word, many of whom did so a couple of centuries ago.
            They took care of their day to day existence, which meant tilling, planting, and growing everything they ate, preserving the things they would eat during the winter, weaving the cloth to make every item they wore, and carrying water for everything from drinking and cooking, to cleaning and bathing, to watering their considerable livestock, which they also fed and cared for as required, by the way.  And they did everything without power equipment or time saving devices.  Then they came in worn out at night and by candle or lamplight opened God's Word.  They spent so much time in the Word that they could write hymns not based upon one passage, but with each line quoting or alluding to a different passage.  Any time something happened in their lives they could quote a scripture that applied.  They spent all their "spare" time in that, rather than watching TV, scrolling through Facebook or otherwise surfing the internet, or texting, talking, or simply staring rapt at their phones.  That's how those people "had more time than we do."  Nonsense.
            Some still might think those pieces of information I mentioned above are trivial or even pointless.  Seems to me that if God made it possible to figure them out, then just maybe that is exactly what we ought to be doing.  As for Jacob's age when he bargained for Rachel, why don't you try that one yourself?  Things like that and knowing Jacob's age at the birth of Joseph (that one's easy) might not be essential to my salvation, but spending so much time in the Word of God that I can figure that out too, might just be.
 
Oh how I love your law! It is my meditation all the day. Your commandment makes me wiser than my enemies, for it is ever with me. I have more understanding than all my teachers, for your testimonies are my meditation (Ps 119:97-99).
 
Dene Ward

When I am speaking to several hundred ladies, I cannot see the faces in front of me much past the first row.  But more often than not, I speak to much smaller groups, as few as a dozen up to fifty or sixty.  I can usually see more of those faces, at least the ones in the front half of the room.  Other speakers do not have my problem.  The preacher in your congregation may well be able to see every one of you.  You might be surprised at what you tell him as you sit there.  I have seen all of these things myself, just in the first few rows, so I know it’s true.
            A speaker knows when your mind is on something else.  You have a tendency to stare.  Your eyes glaze over and you miss all the cues—everyone laughs but you don’t; people turn pages in their Bibles and yours sits in your lap untouched; an inappropriate smile creases your face after a serious and sober statement.
            A speaker knows when you have somewhere to be right after services.  You keep looking at your watch.  You start patting your foot about 5 minutes before the usual ending time.  You stack up your Bibles before he even begins the invitation and have the songbook ready as if you could actually rush the song leader through the invitation song.
            A speaker knows when you are bored.  You stop looking at him and start fiddling with things—doodling, flipping through your Bible or the song book, making notes about something even when he hasn’t clicked the Power Point or listed a passage. 
            A speaker knows when you disagree with him.  You squint and pull that lower lip into a frown.  You start rapidly flipping through your Bible and running your fingers down the pages looking for ways to contradict him.  You cross your arms and huff.  Sometimes you even shake your head for all to see.
            A speaker knows when you are sick or just plain tired.  You try your best to listen, but keep losing interest.  You grimace.  You touch your stomach or rub your head or try gallantly not to nod off, only to do so at least three or four times.
            A speaker also knows when you are eagerly listening, trying your best to take in what he is saying and accommodate it to all the other things you have learned about that particular subject.  He recognizes a lover of God’s Word and that person, and his fellows, are why he does what he does, week after week, no matter how few of you there might be.
            Do you think God doesn’t know the same things about us?  Sometimes I wonder.  It doesn’t really matter what the preacher sees on our faces or in our actions.  No matter how far back I sit, God still knows the heart I bring to His worship.  He knows whether I am coming to please Him or to see how much everyone can please me.  He knows whether I have a heart of repentance or one that just goes through the motions.
            So this Sunday, be careful the tales you tell from your seat—even without opening your mouth.
 
“As for you, son of man, your people who talk together about you by the walls and at the doors of the houses, say to one another, each to his brother, ‘Come, and hear what the word is that comes from the LORD.’ And they come to you as people come, and they sit before you as my people, and they hear what you say but they will not do it; for with lustful talk in their mouths they act; their heart is set on their gain. And behold, you are to them like one who sings lustful songs with a beautiful voice and plays well on an instrument, for they hear what you say, but they will not do it. Ezek 33:30-32
 
Dene Ward

George Matheson was a blind Presbyterian minister in Scotland, born in 1842.  Perhaps that accounts for the egregious errors in this book—he couldn't read the Bible due to his blindness and so his speculations took him far afield from the written facts.  Probably not, but I am trying to give him some sort of excuse for what he has written.
            In this book you will read that Eve was just wandering around the Garden like all the other creatures, with Adam having no idea who she was and why she was there until, as recorded in Genesis 2 (the author says), he fell asleep and had a dream in which God took his rib and made a woman.  When he woke up, he suddenly understood that Eve was his equal and his companion and began to treat her that way.
            You will read that Abraham was afraid to ask Sarah to go with him when God called because they would have to leave all their family and all their belongings and he didn't think she would do that.  Finally, he did ask, and the two of them left Ur, alone and penniless, and their journey to Canaan was their honeymoon!
            You will find out that Rebekah already had a proposal of marriage from a Hittite (which the author has living in Haran instead of Canaan) and she had to choose between a wealthy Hittite and a decidedly unambitious Isaac.  Then you will read how she loved Isaac like a mother when they first met—despite the fact (the scriptures tell us) that he was old enough to be her father!
            You will find out that Jacob was a hot-blooded young man when he first saw Rachel (though you can easily figure out that he was 77 at the time), and that Rachel was the blameless sister—despite stealing her father's idols, among other glaring faults.
            You will learn that Deborah sullied her white robes by praising Jael for her actions against Sisera—this in her inspired song, by the way.  And just what would he have had Jael do, completely alone in her encampment?  Meet the enemy army captain in a "fair fight?"
            You will also discover that Mary's job in raising Jesus was to keep him grounded in his humanity because otherwise, he might have starved to death. He couldn't be bothered to do such mundane things as eat and drink in his human body because of his important spiritual mission without her constant reminders.
            The best essay in this book is the one about Mary Magdalene, which the author includes as an appendix.  But it is only two and a half pages, so he didn't have time to speculate and embroider as he did in the others, which run roughly 20-25 pages each. 
            This author is best known for writing hymn lyrics, particularly those to "O Love that Will Not Let Me Go."  I have to tell you this.  After reading this book, I will go look at those lyrics carefully before I ever sing that hymn again.  There is no telling what odd notions I might have missed.
            This particular edition of Portraits of Bible Women was published by Kregel Publications.
 
Dene Ward

If you have been following this series on various hymns and their sometimes mysterious meanings, we will take a bit of a detour today with something that has worried me a lot lately.
            With the proliferation of more modern hymns, especially those called “praise songs,” I have started wondering if we have completely lost our understanding of the purpose of singing.  It isn’t “because I like the tune,” or “the beat.”  It isn’t “because it makes me feel good.”  Singing in the services is not, not, not, capital N-O-T, not done to please ourselves.  Singing is part of our worship of God and therefore to please Him, and it is an extremely important part of our teaching.  After all, how did you learn your alphabet?  You sang it until you had it memorized.  I am sure that is true of most of your Bible class memory work too—the twelve apostles, the books of the Bible, the sons of Jacob—you learned by singing.
            Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God. Col 3:16
            What is it then, brethren? When ye come together, each one hath a psalm, hath a teaching, hath a revelation, hath a tongue, hath an interpretation. Let all things be done unto edifying. 1Cor 14:26
            Yes, I can also find verses that tell us to praise God in song (e.g., Psalm 100:2; James 5:13).  When I was a child we had about a six hymn repertoire of praise songs.  But just like usual, that old pendulum has swung way too far and now that’s just about all some of us sing. 
            As I was going through some old hymnals recently I found a hymn that stopped me in my tracks.  Read these lyrics and then think about a few things with me:

And Yet You’re Sinning Still
By J. G. Dailey
(inside cover – The Life of Victory by Meade MacGuire)

When Moses led his people from Egypt’s sunny plain,
From bondage sore and grievous, from hardship, toil, and plain.
They soon began to murmur against the sovereign will;
Forgetting God’s deliverance, we find them sinning still.

When Moses on the mountain had talked with God alone,
Receiving His commandments on tables made of stone,
The people brought their jewels, the sacrifice did kill,
The golden calf they worshiped, and kept on sinning still.

How often when your dear ones were lying near to death,
You earnestly entreated with every passing breath,
“O Father, spare my darling, and I will do Thy will!”
Your prayer was heard and answered, and yet you’re sinning still.

When sickness overtook you, when sorely racked with pain,
You said if God would spare you, you’d bear the cross again;
He gave you strength of body. He gave you strength of will,
But you forgot your promise, and you are sinning still.

How graciously the Savior has lengthened out your days!
His mercy, never ending, is guiding all your ways.
O brother, heed the warning, your broken vows fulfill,
Lest death should overtake you, and find you sinning still.

Chorus:
Oh, flee the wrath impending, and learn His gracious will,
Lest Jesus, coming quickly, should find you sinning still!
           
           Trust me as a musician when I say the music to this song is pleasant and easy to sing.  Now ask yourself this question:  how well would this go over if you sang it in your assembly this coming Sunday?  I have a feeling more than one group would want to run the song leader out on a rail.  Who would want to sing such harsh accusations to one another?  Who would want to be forced to really look at their lives?  Who would want to face up to their hypocrisy, a hypocrisy we all practice occasionally when we excuse our behavior with a “That’s different?”  Who among us really wants admonition after all, even if God did say that was an important purpose in singing (Col 3:16)?
            Look at the songs you sing this coming Sunday.  If you strike out all the repetitious phrases, how much “meat” are you really singing to one another?  Or is it just a bunch of feel good fluff?  How many times is it a matter of patting your feet instead of buffeting your body?  How many times do we want to lift our spirits instead of bowing our hearts in repentance?          No, we had rather sing songs we like, songs that pat us on the back and make us feel good.  We all want to be told we are just fine and nothing needs to change at all.
            “Teaching and admonishing one another,” God said.  “Let all things be done unto edifying,” He added.  Sometimes those things are painful.  You cannot anesthetize yourself to that pain and think it will still do you any good.  Godly repentance includes sorrow, Paul tells us.  We need to add that to our repertoire too.
 
Then I will teach transgressors your ways, and sinners will return to you. Deliver me from bloodguiltiness, O God, O God of my salvation, and my tongue will sing aloud of your righteousness. Ps 51:13-14
 
To find the music go to: 
http://remnant-online.com/smf/index.php?topic=15818.0
 
Dene Ward

On March 13, 2014, Walter Williams, a seventy-eight year old Mississippi farmer, died.  It was the second time.  On February 27, he had been declared dead when neither the coroner nor attending nurses could find a pulse.  He was transported to the funeral home.  While workers prepared to embalm him, he suddenly began kicking in the body bag.  An ambulance was called and he was taken to the hospital.  He survived another two weeks before death finally claimed him.  What happened to this man is sometimes the stuff of my nightmares.
           Beta blockers are wonderful things if you have high blood pressure.  They block the effects of the hormone epinephrine, which we usually call adrenaline.  In doing so they lower both your pulse and your blood pressure and open the blood vessels allowing blood to flow more easily, at least that is what the Mayo Clinic website tells me.
            I do not have high blood pressure.  I do have narrow angle glaucoma, complicated by severe nanophthalmus and a handful of other things, so I take four eye medications, several of which contain beta blockers to help lower eye pressure.  So, because my blood pressure is not high, it is now very low, as is my pulse.  High these days is 100/70 and it often runs 90/60 with an accompanying pulse no higher than 60—and that’s when I am excited.  It usually runs much lower than that.  In my recent bout with kidney stones, the alarm they hooked me up to in the ER kept going off because my pulse kept dropping to 40.  Even experienced nurses have difficulty finding my pulse and it often takes two or three tries to get any blood pressure reading.  I told Keith a few weeks ago, if I ever pass out, please make sure they call an ambulance instead of the coroner’s van.
            Needless to say, I do not have much energy these days.  I wear out quickly and my vision begins to fade.  Doing anything in the evening when the usual weariness of the day compounds the problem is a major ordeal.  But do I mind?  Not on your life—I can still see well enough to function, something no one would have predicted 40 years ago.  But I do have to fight exhaustion constantly.
            Sometimes our spiritual vital signs sound an alarm to the people around us.  We may not notice, but they can see the flagging interest and sagging strength.  So I wondered what sort of spiritual beta-blockers we ought to be looking out for.
            The biggest may be distractions in our lives.  It is possible to be too busy—not with sinful things, but completely neutral things, maybe even good things.  Work, entertainment, exercise, travel, sports, the hours we spend on social media and keeping our eyes glued to a screen of some sort all rob us of time we could be spending on thoughtful meditation or  becoming more familiar with God’s word.  Shame on us, we do it to our children too, and often as yet another status symbol.  We enroll them in everything possible and rob them of their childhood by running them back and forth and driving them literally to exhaustion—not to mention the pressure on them to succeed in every single one of these activities.  Do children even know how to play anymore?  I remember having voice students nearly fall asleep standing up!
            Failure to communicate with God may be one of the biggest spiritual beta blockers.  How can we expect to know Him, to know how to please Him, to know why we should want to please Him, to know the direction He wants us to take when we ignore His Word and never speak to Him except at meals—if He’s lucky!  Of course our faith will weaken—our faith is in a Who not a what, and knowing that Who is absolutely necessary to keep from losing it.
            This one may sound a little strange, but bear with me.  Sometimes our busyness is not a busyness in worldly endeavors, it’s a busyness in good works, and even that busyness can weaken us. 
            In Twelve Extraordinary Women John MacArthur says, “It is a danger, even for people who love Christ, that we not become so concerned with doing things for Him that we begin to neglect hearing Him and remembering what He has done for us.  We must never allow our service for Christ to crowd out our worship of Him.  The moment our works become more important than our worship we have turned the true spiritual priorities on their heads…Whenever you elevate good deeds over sound doctrine and true worship, you ruin the works too.  Doing good works for the works’ sake has a tendency to exalt self and depreciate the work of Christ.  Good deeds, human charity, and acts of kindness are crucial expressions of real faith, but they must flow from a true reliance on God’s redemption and His righteousness…Observe any form of religion where good works are ranked as more important than authentic faith or sound doctrine and you’ll discover a system the denigrates Christ while unduly magnifying self.” 
            I have seen people literally work themselves to death for others, visiting, carrying food, taking the elderly to the doctor, cleaning houses and doing yard work and then when their lives take a tragic turn, fall completely apart.  In all their “doing” they had neglected to shore up their own faith with time for prayer, personal Bible study, and taking a real interest in the studies offered during the usual assembly times or extras on the side.  Their lack of theological understanding left them floundering for answers they had never taken the time to look for and learn, and then when they needed them, they had nothing to lean on.
            And so in all these cases, the blood pressure plummets and the pulse fades and soon they may be gone.  I am sure you can think of other spiritual beta blockers.  Today, for your own good, look for them in your life.  How long has it been since you gave yourself a good shot of spiritual adrenaline—zeal? 
If you suffered a spiritual collapse, should we call an ambulance or a hearse?
 
…“Awake, O sleeper, and arise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.” Look carefully then how you walk, not as unwise but as wise, making the best use of the time, because the days are evil. Eph 5:14-16
 
Dene Ward

On February 26, 2008, the Svalbard Global Seed Vault first opened.  In case you are mystified, this seed vault holds samples of as many seeds in the world as the operators can lay hands on.  The point is to have a way to restore plant life if some cataclysmic event destroys it all on this planet.  Maybe I remember my biology class wrong, after all it was over fifty years ago, but I thought that if there were no plants, there would be no humans either so who will plant those seeds?  Well, actually, that's not the only point.  It seems someone who is supposed to know about these things and probably knows far more than I, says that 90% of the plant life that has ever existed on this planet is now extinct so they are also trying to keep the rest from becoming extinct.
            Many seed banks exist in the world, but all the others exist in places where the building itself can be destroyed—and then what happens to all those seeds?  This one is located in the side of a mountain in an archipelago in the Arctic Ocean, about halfway between continental Norway and the North Pole.  Even if the machinery that runs the freezers were to break down, the seeds would stay frozen because the temperature in that mountain is below zero.  Which also makes me wonder why they need the machinery, but I'll be nice and move on.
           Inspired by this amazing structure and its mission, Nabisco has built a Global Oreo Vault (no, I am not making this up) just down the road from the seed vault in which they have placed their famous recipe along with a large stockpile of Oreos "in case of asteroids" or other doomsday event on Planet Earth.  We may all be dead, but there will always be Oreos.  Who will make more of them with that recipe no one has said.
            I should mention that those Oreos are wrapped in Mylar that will protect them from moisture, air, and chemical reactions, and from temperatures ranging from -80 degrees to 300 degrees Fahrenheit.  And yet someone will still be alive and caring whether or not they have Oreos?  In the interests of fairness, Nabisco did this with a bit of tongue in cheek humor, but still it was done and it does make for a good lesson today.
            We are just as silly, and actually mean it, about our material wealth.  Silly enough that Jesus reminds us, Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon the earth, where moth and rust consume, and where thieves break through and steal: but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth consume, and where thieves do not break through nor steal (Matt 6:19-20).  We might think we would never build a Global vault of our own, but the truth of the matter shows when we spend more on our own pleasure and entertainment than on spiritual matters, when those in the world who know us personally would never think to describe us as generous and charitable, and when a downturn in the stock market scares us more than a sermon about Hell.
            I recently found a passage in Job that blew me away.  If I have made gold my hope, And have said to the fine gold, You are my confidence; If I have rejoiced because my wealth was great, And because my hand had gotten much; If I have beheld the sun when it shined, Or the moon walking in brightness, And my heart has been secretly enticed, And my mouth has kissed my hand: This also is an iniquity to be punished by the judges; For I should have denied the God that is above (Job 31:24-28).  Many of us are so ignorant of scripture that we miss the references here.  Idols were "kissed" (1 Kings 19:18; Hos 13:2), and here we have someone kissing his own hand, the hand that "had gotten much" or in our words, was responsible for all this person's material blessings.  His wealth was his "confidence" instead of God, and therefore he was worthy of judgment—for idolatry.  He was his own idol.
            If you had one of those Global Vaults, what would you put in it?  Even if you did have one, it won't do a bit of good when the True Cataclysmic Event takes place.  You might as well have put Oreos in it.
 
And he said to them, “Take care, and be on your guard against all covetousness, for one's life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions.” And he told them a parable, saying, “The land of a rich man produced plentifully, and he thought to himself, ‘What shall I do, for I have nowhere to store my crops?’ And he said, ‘I will do this: I will tear down my barns and build larger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods. And I will say to my soul, “Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; relax, eat, drink, be merry.”’ But God said to him, ‘Fool! This night your soul is required of you, and the things you have prepared, whose will they be?’ So is the one who lays up treasure for himself and is not rich toward God  (Luke 12:15-21).
 
Dene Ward

I was watching a ball game a few weeks ago when the school promos aired.  Evidently one of them now has the slogan “I can only count on what I earn.”  I must have heard it ten times in that thirty second spot.
            Every Christian ought to jump back in horror when they hear such a thing.  What I earn?  My life is a hopeless downhill plunge to destruction if I am counting on what I earn.  For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, Rom 3:23.
            Okay, you say, but they are talking about getting along in life, not the afterlife.  Really?  I can count on my money, my career, my social status?  All these things can be taken away in a flash by an illness, an accident, a bad investment, a downturn in the economy, even someone else’s crime.  How can I count on those for anything?  You see, that is the problem when you don’t believe in God, as a good many professors no longer do.  What a miserable life to live. 
            What’s that?  You are not miserable because you can do what you want to do instead of answering to a higher power?  I suppose, but then you live a life without hope, without purpose.  One of these days that will hit you right between the eyes and you will be miserable.  All the intellectualism in the world has yet to find a cure for that. 
            I can only count on God, on His help, on His promises, on His love and grace and mercy.  A God by the way, who changes not, who has proven Himself to His people for thousands of years.  A God who is always there regardless of the balance in my bank account, the progress of my career, or my status in society. 
            What are you depending on today, a life of uncertainty, or a God who inhabits eternity and controls it all?
 
But now being made free from sin and become servants to God you have your fruit unto sanctification, and the end eternal life.  For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life through Christ Jesus our Lord, Rom 6:22,23.
 
Dene Ward

Today's post is by guest writer Keith Ward.

For those who have never tented, campgrounds have bathhouses. The people with RV’s or tow-campers also have a bathroom in those. But they often use the Bathhouse to avoid having to empty their sewage tanks.
 
Bathhouses are usually at reasonable intervals, each one serving a set number of sites. We have never preferred sites near the bathhouse since everyone in your loop walks past you several times a day—no privacy. But, this last one set a record. We camped in Black Rock Mountain, a state park on the Eastern Continental Divide. We had stayed there the past year and as our custom is, walked through and picked the best sites. Even the hosts said that our #21 was about the best, though they slightly preferred #16.
 
#21 is the highest site, a constant uphill walk, a steep incline.  Though we were a bit cramped with our huge tents (for comfort), we had a marvelous view every day of the mountains to the East and every night 3000ft straight down to sparkling city lights. It was situated so that a shoulder of the hillside protected us from the winds. But there was that hill to the bathhouse. You think, “No problem going down.” Hah! That shows your lack of experience. Walking down a steep hill stresses the muscles in a different way, but still leaves one sore. The climb up was difficult. The hill was about a 30 degree incline except in the steep spots (In some spots, even the rotund could have touched the ground by reaching downward only a few inches—it was right out in front of you.) I counted 140 left steps when going up. On level ground, you can tape measure my military correct paces at 30”. Correcting that due to the grade still leaves the uphill climb at 150 yards or more, several times a day.
 
I would carry Dene’s necessary bag down for her and wait to carry it back when we brushed our teeth morning and evening. I carried it down earlier in the evening for her shower and got the fire going and the coffee on and returned to carry it back (40 lbs penalty weight kept my pace down with hers).  Even so, sometimes we’d stop and catch a breath on the way back up (Of course, I was just being gentlemanly and courteous to wait for her).
 
Adds new meaning to, “I’m pressing on the upward way….”
 
Would we do it over, certainly. The good stuff is at the top. Views do not come cheap.
 
Breakfasts alternated between 1) bacon, eggs, biscuits. 2) sausage & pancakes 3) sausage gravy and leftover biscuits, and repeat. One day, fried apples by the fire for dessert—yes, dessert for breakfast.
 
I grilled over open coals from oak kindling for our evening meals—chicken, pork chops, steak with baked potatoes done in the coals, burgers, chopped sirloin, except for one night when we had spaghetti and another with sausage and peppers we packed from our garden.
 
Thanks to the hill, we gained little, very little, weight.
 
People want to reach goals without paying the price. Trying to be spiritually healthy without climbing the hill means you will just become a fat pew potato. Dene and I are often told, "I wish I had your Bible knowledge." We did not levitate to that site and the knowledge came step by painful step. Often, we paused for breath and wondered whether we would make it. People with strong faith usually climbed over some tough times, those who express tenderness and lovingkindness often got there by overcoming the same natural reactions that plague us all.
 
The quiet times, the good food and the view allowed us to "catch a gleam of glory bright." Who will pay the price to enter the narrow door without the glimpses of the hope that God has laid up for us in every beauty of life?
 
 "And someone said to Him, “Lord, are there just a few who are saved?” And He said to them, “STRIVE to enter through the narrow door; for many, I tell you, will SEEK to enter and will NOT be able. “Once the head of the house gets up and shuts the door, and you begin to stand outside and knock on the door, saying, ‘Lord, open up to us!’ then He will answer and say to you, ‘I do not know where you are from.’ “Then you will begin to say, ‘We ate and drank the Lord's Supper, and You were taught in our church’; " (Luke 13:23-26, modified, kw).
 
"Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, " (Rom 5:3).
 
Keith Ward