August 31st, 2010
My grandparents - Clark and Mabel DeLoach, circa 1960.
Last weekend Aaron and I were in my car running errands and he pointed to my dashboard and said, “You just past 100.” Rest assured I was not racing the MINI down Washington Rd. at 100 miles per hour. I am doing good to break 20 mph with all of the traffic. My car has now over 100,000 miles on the odometer. Turning 100,000 miles is really not such a big deal anymore. It wasn’t too many years ago that if a car or truck ever made it to 100,000 miles it was ready for the junk yard or Ripley’s Believe it or Not. To own a vehicle that made it past 100,000 miles gave you bragging rights for the next six months and an article in the weekly paper, right beside Earl and a picture of his 20 pound mud catfish. Now we just assume a car will last well past that mile marker. My niece drives the same car she bought used when she was 16. It has well over 200,000 miles. My dad recently retired one of his pickups and his best guess is that it had over 300,000 miles - at least that is what it was before the odometer quit working.
My car is doing pretty well considering it is over 100. As with anything getting older it has its problems. The power steering has not worked in six months, which is okay because it has really strengthened my biceps. Who needs gym membership? The air conditioner smells like a wet dog is taking a nap under the hood, which doesn’t offend me, but passengers prefer to ride with the windows down.
I guess it is like age. Do you remember when you thought that fifty was old and 65 meant that you had one foot in the grave and the other on a banana peel? Some of the most active people I know are well beyond 65 while some of the most tired individuals I know are just in their thirties.
It is all on how you feel. I feel like my MINI is good for another 100,000 miles. Likewise, I am not ready to strike you off the active membership if you happen to have a little gray in your hair (assuming there is still hair to gray). Age and mileage is mostly a matter of taking good care, positive attitude and a healthy perspective.
How is your attitude? Do you feel like a 16 year old trapped in a 80 year old body? Or do you feel as though your odometer is about to pass 100,000 miles for the third time? The hope of the gospel is that we can align ourselves with the eternal God and be renewed for the journey. I hope to see you this Sunday where together we can discover the truth of the Psalmist who wrote that in the Lord, one’s “youth is renewed like the eagle’s” (Psalm 103:5). There is just something about being together that not only gives strength, it makes us feel young again.
Graying alongside you,
Greg
Yep, that is my dad, 1960. Nice car, but the pants???
August 24th, 2010
A couple of months ago I handed over a rather plain fountain pen to one of our church members, Bill Engels, and asked him if he thought he could repair it. I knew Bill had recently taken up the hobby of making ink pens and pencil sets and thought perhaps he could repair this old pen. This vintage pen has been in an equally old cup with other artifacts from the past. It belonged to my grandfather or my great-grandfather. I have never known it to write and it has been nothing more to me than a sentimental antique that reminds me of family. Bill took on this project and soon began to give me reports on its progress - yes, progress. Apparently this was not going to be a simple job. I learned from Bill that it was from 1946 and Parker discontinued this particular model the next year in favor of something more modern. Today Bill presented me with the pen, repaired and ready to write.
The pen itself is plain and unassuming. It has a black barrel with nickel plated cap and a very simple nib that has to be dipped in an ink well and filled. I am not sure what my grandfather paid for it, but I am sure it was a small yet necessary investment for a farmer. I am certain that with this pen he figured and refigured milk prices, the worth of cows, calves and other livestock, and made notes to himself. Unlike today where people give pens away, this was a pen that was kept and used for years, perhaps a couple of decades until finally it was retired for the inexpensive and easier to use ballpoints.
If a pen could talk, I wonder what stories this one would tell. My grandfather came out of World War II broken hearted over his brother Robert DeLoach, an infantryman in Germany killed in 1945. Perhaps that pen wrote thank you notes a year later to concerned family and friends. I am sure my grandmother used it to write birthday wishes to neighbors. Did the pen note the difficulties of maintaining a farm while children were growing up and leaving home? I suppose the pen made a few grocery lists and kept the checkbook balanced. If a pen could talk, I wonder what stories this one would tell.
What story will you write? All of us have stories to tell: stories of tragedy and comedy; stories that have brutal endings and stories that are not yet finished. Everyday our life is a story being written. Much of what goes on around us we have little control, still we are part of the unfolding narrative. I confess that most of the events in my life that I think at the time are “headliners” become forgettable. Either I worried too much or exaggerated its value. Those events worth writing about, however, tend to be the simple moments unplanned and unrehearsed where the Holy transcends into the ordinary. Some of you may call them “God moments” - such moments are when we pay attention to how God is present to us in a sustaining or nourishing way.
There is a beautiful story of Jacob who sleeps and dreams of angels ascending and descending. When he wakes he says, “Surely the LORD is in this place - and I did not know it!” (Genesis 28:16) He then set up a stone as a memorial and called it Bethel which means in Hebrew the “house of God.” Like the pen entrusted to me, I will write my own story. There will be sadness, but there will also be joy. Through it all, I hope to see in my waking moments the mysterious presence of God, sustaining, nourishing, leading and holding. Soon enough my time will come to hand the pen over to the next generation waiting to write their story. May they have “Bethel moments.”
Amen.
August 19th, 2010
One of the rewards of gardening is growing and eating your own food. There are few things that can compare with sitting down at the table and knowing that the peppers garnishing the peas and the slices of tomatoes alongside the bowl of spinach all were planted, nurtured and harvested out of the garden in the back yard. Of course my two little plots do not have much room for little else than tomatoes, peppers and a few varieties of herbs. Still, there are few things better tasting than a homegrown tomato. Can I get an amen?!
I figured my tomatoes averaged about forty dollars apiece, which does not include my labor in planting, staking, tending, watering, fertilizing and chasing away pests like hornworms, squirrels and other varmints. I certainly did not garden to save money. A church member reminded me that it was still cheaper than paying a therapist, which I concede is a good point.
I have had some nice surprises during this otherwise abysmal harvest season. Early in the summer I noticed a couple of vines growing volunteer (meaning I did not plant them but they came up compliments of last year’s compost). At first I thought the vines were cucumbers, but as the blooms gave way to fruit they looked gourds. Finally the shape was unmistakably that of cantaloupe. While my tomatoes ran forty dollars apiece, I have four cantaloupes for free. This is not quite a wash, but I will take it.
By next spring I will get over my failures in “the back forty” and plant again. In fact soon I will replace the summer crop with a winter one - collards and cabbage. Gardening is something one must do not merely for the end result - the harvest - but the journey or the process. There are other comparisons in life: we parent knowing there is really never a time we are finished (even though we may feel like giving up); one goes to work each day hopefully not just because retirement will come, but the satisfaction of doing a job that contributes to society if not creative; and following Jesus is not simply about getting to heaven, but believing the path here on earth will be fulfilling too.
Why do you follow the Carpenter? Is it for the end results of eternal rewards or for the assurance of immediate gratifications like protection, peace, and a better parking place? There are many reasons - explicit and implicit - that Christians give for following Jesus. Perhaps there is none better than simply trusting that the journey is its own reward. In all of our bumps, bruises, disappointments, surprises and joys along the way, God is faithful. And God is able to provide you with every blessing in abundance, so that by always having enough of everything, you may share abundantly in every good work. (2 Corinthians 9:8)
Sometimes in life you go looking for tomatoes and in up finding cantaloupe, and life is good.
Peace be with you,