My father was a young boy in the Depression and grew up on a small farm where they made use of everything.  He cannot stand to see something going to waste, even if he can’t at that moment find a use for it.  Before his retirement he often pulled stacks of paper out of the company trash bins, that old, wide, green and white striped computer paper with the holes in the sides.  He pulled out card stock that had been run through a printer of some sort leaving thin black lines on one side only.  Then he brought them all to me. 
 
           We were usually with a small church all those years ago, with a limited budget, and our own was even more limited.  What did I do with all that paper and cardstock?  The computer paper graced the walls of many a Bible class.  You want to know how tall Goliath was?  Unroll a ten foot long length of it, tear it off along the perforations and then measure out Goliath’s six cubits and a span on it and tack it to the wall.  In a high ceiling-ed room it was easy, but in others Goliath had to bend over, with the paper running up the wall then along the ceiling.  Suddenly you really understood what a “giant” was.  It wasn’t just the height.  It was how massive his body must have been to support that height.

            You want to know how tall Saul was?  The scriptures say he was “from his shoulders upward” taller than any of the men of Israel.  So we asked tallest man in the church to come in and stand by our computer paper.  We marked his height, then went up as much more as his head and shoulders.  Saul was no Lilliputian himself.  Those lengths of paper also made great time lines.  Other times they were “missionary journeys,” an attendance chart for each student, each one measured out according to scale and then “journeyed” with a felt pen to the next stop each time a student came to class.  If he didn’t make it back to Antioch or Jerusalem by the time we finished the lesson book it was a sure sign he had missed too many classes!

            And the card stock?  I must have cut out thousands of flash cards for memory verses, apostles, judges, and prophets, anything that could be represented with a line drawing and a stick man, as well as the question cards for board games I made and Bible Jeopardy boards I constructed.  The trash that no one else wanted found a spiritual use that helped hundreds of children learn about God and His word.

            God has a habit of taking things that no one else wants and making use of them too.  For behold your calling brethren, that not many wise after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble are called…1 Cor 1:26.  Jesus did not go to the “in crowd;” he did not go to the rich and powerful.  In fact, most of the time those people became his followers it was because they came seeking Him, not the other way around.  No, Jesus went to the poor, the disenfranchised, and those whose lives were filled with problems that filled others with disgust.  Fishermen may not have been the dregs of society, but they were the working class poor.  Matthew the publican was despised.  Simon the Zealot was a fanatic from whom others might have shied away.  Zacchaeus, though wealthy, was another despised tax collector.  Mary Magdalene had had seven demons.  He healed ten lepers and the only one of that shunned group that even came back to thank him was a Samaritan, the lowest of the low.

            Why did these people flock to Him so?  Because He gave them hope.  He gave them purpose.  He made something of them when everyone else had given up on them.  And He will do the same for you and for me.  It matters not how far you have fallen, nor how little anyone else values you.  God valued you enough to give His son for you.  He can pull you out of the world’s trash can and make you a vessel of honor, sanctified, meet for the Master’s use, 2 Tim 2:21.  If you think otherwise then you don’t really believe in the Almighty God.
 
Thus says the Lord, Let not the wise man boast in his wisdom, let not the mighty man boast in his might, let not the rich man boast in his riches, but let him who boasts boast in this, that he understands and knows me, that I am the Lord who practices steadfast love, justice and righteousness in the earth.  For in these things I delight, declares the Lord, Jer 9:23,24.
 
Dene Ward

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Dene Ward

Four letters, “weight allowance.”  I have seen it in crossword puzzles so many times that I automatically write in “tret,” even though I have no idea what it is talking about.  Finally I looked it up.  Tret is (or was?) the weight allowance given to buyers of certain commodities, usually four pounds per hundred, to make up for deterioration during transit and impurities like sand and dust.  So if they order one hundred pounds, they actually receive one hundred and four, the idea being that they will have at least one hundred pounds of product in that one hundred and four pounds.  

    That made me think about grace.  God supplies what we lack in perfection because of our sin.  Only the ratio is backwards—I am sure He allows at least one hundred pounds of grace for every four pounds of our faith and obedience, probably far more.

    We also make such allowances for each other.  When we know someone has been through a rough time, it is easier to take their snappy comment with equanimity.  When we love as we ought, our love covers a multitude of sins, 1 Pet 4:8.  

    However, the need to make allowances for things like that should eventually disappear as we all grow to maturity in Christ.  Shouldn’t a man who has been a Christian forty years no longer be watching and waiting for the Bible class teacher or preacher to make a comment he can raise a fuss about?  Yet how many times have I heard young preachers told, “It’s just old brother So-and-So.  That’s just the way he is.”  Why is he still that way?  Hasn’t anyone told him how much he hurts people with that behavior?  I wonder how many young preachers were expected to make so many allowances for so many things that they just gave up preaching.  Why doesn’t anyone make allowances for them?

    Is old sister So-and-So still managing to take offense at everything anyone says and jumping on them with both feet?  Hasn’t anyone told her that she is wrong to treat people that way?  Oh yes, I know what they will hear back, but we are not doing her any favors to let her keep on this way.  The Lord certainly won’t make allowances for it.

    But the larger question for me is this:  are people continually making allowances, “tret,” for me?  Am I the one causing consternation, making people walk on eggshells around me, and stealing everyone’s pleasure with my bad attitude?  God’s grace works for people who are trying their best to do right and still fail, not for those who make a career out of bitterness, criticism, and cynicism and expect everyone, including God, to just accept it..  My “tret” should become smaller and smaller as I mature as a Christian, leaving infancy behind and becoming full-grown.  

    Where do I stand today?  A 50 year old baby is no longer cute, and to take the grace of God for granted in such a way must surely be an abomination to Him.

For if we go on sinning deliberately after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a fearful expectation of judgment, and a fury of fire that will consume the adversaries.  Anyone who has set aside the law of Moses dies without mercy on the evidence of two or three witnesses. How much worse punishment, do you think, will be deserved by the one who has spurned the Son of God, and has profaned the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and has outraged the Spirit of grace?  Heb 10:26-29.

Dene Ward

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            As odd as it may seem for a native Floridian, I am not a beach person.  Maybe that is why I made the mistake I did.

            I was away to a camp retreat for women, when it suddenly dawned on me en route that I had forgotten to pack a bath towel.  Rather than delay our progress shopping, we swung by a pharmacy at an exit where we had already stopped for gas, and I picked up the only type of towel they had available--a beach towel.

            The next night as I took my turn with the shower shared by thirty other women in our cabin, I discovered that beach towels do not work like ordinary towels.   I blotted my wet skin and lifted it to discover all the water droplets sitting on my arm exactly as they had before I used the towel.  I tried again, same result.  Finally I tried pushing off the water.  Some, but very little, rolled onto the floor.  Slightly encouraged I kept wiping.  Eventually I was--well, dry is not the word--but damp instead of soaked.  I am positive, though, that most of the drying was a matter of evaporation because I worked at it for nearly 15 minutes.

            The strangest things can bring me a moment of inspiration.  So when I got home, I did a quick study on the word “wipe.”  It is an interesting word, in both Testaments. 

            In the Old Testament the Hebrew word is machah.  Jehovah said to Moses, whoever has sinned against me, him will I blot out of my book, Ex 32:33.  “Blot out” is the same word often translated “wiped.”  Yet in Psalm 51, David uses it when he asks God to “blot out” his transgressions, and in Isaiah 25, God says in a Messianic prophecy that he will “wipe away” his people’s tears.

            In the New Testament, the word is exaleipho. Peter says in Acts 3:19 that we must repent if we expect our sins to be “blotted out.”  Jesus tells John in Rev 3:5 that he will not “blot out” the names of those who repent. Then we are told that when we reach our reward God will wipe away all tears from [our] eyes, Rev 21:4, all the same Greek word in exactly the same three uses as the Hebrew.

            God’s mercy is not like a beach towel.  He will blot out my sins completely.  On the other hand, if I do not live as I should, he will blot me out completely.  You cannot use “completely” in one phrase without using it in the other.  I cannot say, “Don’t blot me out completely. Don’t wipe my name out of your book,” while expecting God to wipe away my sins as completely as an expensive, absorbent towel wipes the water from my body because his Holy Spirit chose the same word for both actions in two separate languages. 

            Justice demands that something be blotted out.  God’s grace makes it possible that it not be the sinner, but merely his sins.  Amazing grace indeed.

And in this mountain will Jehovah of hosts make unto all peoples a feast of fat things, a feast of wines on the lees, of fat things full of marrow, of wines on the lees well refined. And he will destroy in this mountain the face of the covering that covers all peoples, and the veil that is spread over all nations. He has swallowed up death for ever; and the Lord Jehovah will wipe away tears from off all faces; and the reproach of his people will he take away from off all the earth: for Jehovah has spoken it. And it shall be said in that day, Lo, this is our God; we have waited for him, and he will save us: this is Jehovah; we have waited for him, we will be glad and rejoice in his salvation. Isa 25:6-9.

Dene Ward

My brother-in-law has finished his long journey.  Maybe it was because both of us were the in-laws, but for some reason he was especially kind to me, and I felt comfortable with him.

            Mike came a long way in his life, all the way from atheism to Christianity.  Keith had a special hand in turning him around.  Unfortunately, discouragement set in and he lost his way again for awhile.  When this illness hit him, with some words from his wife and Keith, he made the determination to come home.  Unfortunately, he never had the chance to sit in a pew again and commune with his spiritual family after he made that decision.  Things progressed too quickly and he was gone far sooner than anyone expected, including the doctors.

            When I read the parable of the prodigal son in Luke 15, I notice something important.  The Father was out there looking for his lost son.  It wasn’t just a casual glance—he saw him “afar off.”  This was a Father who wanted to see his son coming home, who wanted to welcome him back.  He stood there looking long and hard for the first sign of that figure trudging down the road.

            Mike’s Father was looking for him too.  Mike had made that determination—he was well on the road home, even having mentioned it to some brethren who visited.  Who is to say that he wasn’t close enough for God to see him coming?  Who is to say that God hadn’t already started running down the road to welcome him home?

            Probably some older brother, that’s who.  I have some of those—brethren who not only expect that long march down the aisle (as if there is a verse requiring that in the New Testament) before they will even consent to forgiving, but who won’t even look down the road in the first place.  I have brethren who are not thrilled with the return of a lost brother but just as grieved as the prodigal’s older brother was.  I have brothers and sisters in Christ who actually seem to enjoy being cynical—“it’ll never last.” 

            But I praise God that He is a Father who is merciful, who wants to forgive, who actually looks for reasons to forgive, instead of reasons to condemn.

            None of us deserves God’s mercy.  Perhaps if we remembered that, we would be eagerly looking to forgive too.

Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful, Luke 6:36.

The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some count slackness; but is longsuffering to you-ward, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance, 2 Pet 3:9.

Dene Ward

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            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

         It was just a cold.  The first day I lost my voice and sneezed a lot.  The second day I started coughing, a deep cough that felt like it scraped the bottom of my lungs.  The third day I started wheezing and my temperature rose over 100.  The fourth day the headache started.  The fifth day my shoulders, neck, and back began aching and I could not get comfortable no matter how or where I lay or sat.  The sixth day it climbed into my head.  I could no longer breathe, smell, or taste.  The seventh day I lost my hearing and my ears began to ache.  Meanwhile, all the other symptoms continued.  The eighth day my temperature fell a degree below normal, but I felt a little better—very little.  Eventually it did go away, but the cough lingered for weeks.  Why in the world do we always say, “It was just a cold?”

            Maybe it’s habit. 
            “I was just ten minutes late.”
            “I was just ten miles over the speed limit.”
            “It was just a song service.”
            “It was just a little fib.”
            “I was just so tired and frustrated.”
            “It was just this once.”

            Always excusing ourselves with that little word, making every bad judgment call or “little” sin unimportant—where does it stop?  How big do they have to be before we stop using that word?

            What could God have said about us?  David knew full well when he said in the 8th Psalm, What is man that you are mindful of him, and the son of man that you care for him?  Indeed, God could have said, “They’re just people.  Why bother?” and we would have had no answer for that, especially the way we so often use that word to rationalize less than stellar behavior.

            Yet Jehovah, the Word, and the Spirit got together before they made anything else, and came up with a plan so that they could keep fellowship with men, no matter how sinful they had become.  That plan involved sacrifice on their parts, but it made men once again presentable to them.  For some reason, they thought we were worth it.
            Think about that the next time you try to excuse yourself with that word “just.” 

I give you thanks, O LORD, with my whole heart; before the gods I sing your praise.  I bow down toward your holy temple and give thanks to your name for your steadfast love and your faithfulness, for you have exalted above all things your name and your word. On the day I called, you answered me; my strength of soul you increased. All the kings of the earth shall give you thanks,  O LORD, for they have heard the words of your mouth, and they shall sing of the ways of the LORD, for great is the glory of the LORD. For though the LORD is high, he regards the lowly, but the haughty he knows from afar. Though I walk in the midst of trouble, you preserve my life; you stretch out your hand against the wrath of my enemies, and your right hand delivers me. The LORD will fulfill his purpose for me; your steadfast love, O LORD, endures forever. Do not forsake the work of your hands.  Psa 138.

Dene Ward