Nightfall

 Under the glaring light of day we may fool ourselves into thinking that we are center stage, that everything revolves around us. But the night gently reminds us that we are, in fact, a small speck in the galaxies of creation.

 The wind, whipped into a hot fury during the day, loses its strength, grows silent and lies down for the night.  Darkness dissipates the day’s heat. Tires that whined on pavement during the day grow silent along with the roar of the engines that drove them.  Crickets tune their instruments and fireflies flit about in the dark. As the sun fades in the west, the lesser lights gradually take their place in the night sky.  The world sleeps.

 Perhaps previous generations were more in tune with God’s creation because they spent more time under the night sky.  Too often, we crawl into our houses and fill the evening hours with noise from our televisions without witnessing the nighttime reminders that were designed to renew the spirit and place each day’s work in perspective.

 Genesis says: “Then God said, ‘Let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens to separate the day from the night, and let them be for signs and for seasons and for days and years; and let them be for lights in the expanse of the heavens to give light on the earth;’ and it was so. God made the two great lights, the greater light to govern the day, and the lesser light to govern the night; He made the stars also. God placed them in the expanse of the heavens to give light on the earth, and to govern the day and the night, and to separate the light from the darkness; and God saw that it was good. There was evening and there was morning.”

 David grew up under the stars guarding his father’s flocks.  He wrote, “When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place, what is man that you are mindful of him, and the son of man that you care for him?  Yet you have made him a little lower than God and you crown him with glory and majesty. … How majestic is your name in all the earth,” (Psalm 8). … “Give thanks to Him … who made the moon and stars to rule by night, for his loving kindness is everlasting,” (Psalm 136:9)

 “Praise the Lord! Praise the Lord from the heavens; Praise Him in the heights! Praise Him, all His angels; Praise Him, all His hosts! Praise Him, sun and moon; Praise Him, all stars of light!  Praise Him, highest heavens, and the waters that are above the heavens!

Let them praise the name of the Lord, For He commanded and they were created,” (Psalm 148:1-6).

 When the night falls, we sense that God is near.

A Matter of Perspective

 Our nine-year-old granddaughter went on a trip with her family and left in our charge her prized pet, a hamster she has nurtured into a fat little rodent.  She wrote out a long list of instructions of how we are to take care of the hamster.

  The little critter reminds my wife of a rat. She is deathly afraid of rats. So, it has fallen to me to take care of the hamster, lovingly named Aspen.  I studied the instructions, did my best to assemble the cages, including the tubes through which the hamster can crawl to his delight. I turned off the light and went to bed.

 During the night, I dreamed that my assembly of the cages was faulty, that somehow the tubing came apart and the little creature escaped, running on the loose in our house.  Worse still, I dreamed that our dog tracked it down and ate it.  It was a nightmare.  How would I explain this to my granddaughter upon her return?

 Before I climbed out of bed, I had already decided that if what I dreamed actually happened, I would make a dash to the local pet store and buy another hamster to replace Aspen.  I told this to my wife.  She said our granddaughter would notice, since Aspen is fat.

 When I looked in, all was well.  Aspen was quietly sitting in his little burrow staring at me with his beady little eyes.  I fed him and watered him, just the way my granddaughter instructed me to do.  I checked the cage. Everything was secure.  So, I relaxed in my recliner beside the window that looks out on our back deck.  That is when I spied Freddie, another rodent much larger than the little vermin I am guarding for my granddaughter, a local squirrel.

 A few weeks ago my wife bought a bird feeder and hung it from a branch of the aspen in our back yard.  Freddie learned to hang by his hind legs and eat all the bird seed from the feeder, scaring away the birds in the process. 

 In a previous house we had squirrels in the attic.  Someone told me they were afraid of owls, so I bought a Styrofoam owl and placed it in the attic. They ignored the owl.  Maybe they couldn’t see the owl, I thought, so I added lights. They still came.  Someone suggested noise.  I added a boom box.  They invited their friends and had a party.  

 Aspen is a pet. Freddie and his friends are pests. So, what makes the difference?  The difference, I guess, is not in the hamster or the squirrel. The difference is in how we choose to view them.  Maybe the same thing is true about people.  Some we see as “pets.”  We treasure them and want to be around them.  Others we view as “pests.”  We find them a nuisance and try to avoid them. How do I view my neighbors?  Are they “pets” or “pests.” 

 When Jesus was asked to define the term “neighbor” he told the story of the Good Samaritan. When he chose the Samaritan to illustrate the definition of a neighbor, he chose someone the Jews considered a “pest.”  That is how he defined the commandment, “Love your neighbor as yourself.”

Forever Friends

 Last week we went on an “almost post-Covid” cruise to Alaska. There were still testings and protocols to pass, but the cruise business is back.  What made the week truly spectacular was going with our best friends from college. We had a great time exploring new places and reflecting.  We were young when we first met.  My wife and our friends were fresh from high school graduations in Texas and Kentucky.  I was older and wiser by a year or two. 

 After we married, we gathered in each other’s apartments as penniless newly-weds and played games, affordable and unforgettable entertainment. Our paths parted when we started our families. Identical twin girls for them, three children stretched over 13 years for us.  We stayed in touch at a distance.

 Fifty years later, our children are grown.  They are advancing in their careers and raising our grandchildren.  We have completed most of our journey, in good health and full of memories, hoping to remain useful and finish well.

 We are thrilled to make new friends for whom we are grateful, but we shared our youth with these friends when we were trying to figure out our own identity and had little idea of the direction our paths would take. We have other friends from our childhoods and our careers whom we love.  Some drifted away.  Some died. But this couple stuck.  Nothing can reproduce the treasure we have found. 

.And now that we have re-converged in the late years of our journey we are overwhelmed with gratitude for God’s goodness and grace.  We are more content than we were in our youth. We are still ambitious to do good and to bless others, but we know we are blessed beyond measure in ways we could have never imagined. Only God could do such a thing.

 Friendship gives us a glimpse of the relationship God desires for each of us.  As Proverbs says, “There is a friend that stays closer than a brother.”  (Proverbs 18:24).

 After three years walking the hills of Galilee and Judea, Jesus explained his relationship with the twelve in these terms:   “Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. You are my friends if you do what I command.  I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you.” (John 15:13-15).

 No matter who we are or where we came from; no matter our race, gender or age, God desires to be our friend. He desires to lead us on our journey, from beginning to end.  An old hymn perhaps expresses it best, “I’ve found a Friend, oh, such a Friend!   He loved me ere I knew Him; He drew me with the cords of love,   and thus He bound me to Him. And round my heart still closely twine, those ties which naught can sever. For I am His, and He is mine, forever and forever.”

The Fourth

 Next Monday we will celebrate the Fourth of July, a uniquely American experience.  When our founding fathers signed the Declaration of Independence in 1776, John Adams envisioned celebrations in every city with parades, fireworks and political speeches “from one end of this continent to the other.”  More than two centuries later, Adams’s dream is a reality.  Next Monday skyrockets and exploding bombs  will illuminate the night skies over cities, parks, and lakes.  Bands will march in the streets followed by decorated floats and mounted horses.  Politicians will address crowds from platforms decorated with red, white, and blue bunting.

 The Declaration of Independence adopted on the fourth of July in 1776 provides the focus for our American ideals: “We hold these truths to be self evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain inalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”  When the Declaration was signed our nation was far from the ideals it embraced. Slavery was widespread. Most states limited voting rights to white men who owned land.  Two and a half centuries later we have made progress, but the struggle continues to implement the ideals of equality.

 Robert Kaplan’s Empire Wilderness sought a re-examination of America in 1998.  Visiting a Mexican church in Tucson, Kaplan wrote, “The church conjured up tradition, sensuality, nostalgia.  If only this church were more relevant to the social forces roiling the southern half of Tucson.”  In The Next One Hundred Million, Joel Kotkin painted an optimistic future for America in 2050 based largely on our unique faith. He wrote, “a ‘spiritual’ tradition that extends beyond regular church attendance … persists as a vital force.” 

 We strive toward equality because that is the way God made us.  We are each made in His image and “endowed” every person with infinite worth. We best achieve equality when we seek to defend and achieve the rights of others.  We are taught, through faith, to “love our neighbor as ourselves,” to “do unto others as we would have them do unto us,” that we are greatest when we are servant to others and that service to God is measured by our actions toward the “least of these.” 

 The pursuit of happiness can degenerate into the self-absorbed and destructive pursuit of pleasure.  Without faith in Christ we are prone to become captive to addictions and sins that easily beset us.  Jesus said, “Everyone who commits sin is the slave of sin … if the Son makes you free you shall be free indeed.” (John 8:34-36).  For every individual and nation, real freedom comes when God sets us free from greed, corruption, lust and addiction.  Real freedom is won when we seek the welfare and opportunity for others, especially for those who are "not like us."

A Place To Turn In Time Of Need

 Like many Americans I have long been fascinated with Abraham Lincoln.  He stands out among all the men who have occupied the White House for his genius, his eloquence, his honesty, strength of character, and his determination to hold the nation together in its most perilous time. Books about Lincoln often occupy an entire section at the library.

 Recently I stumbled across a volume I had overlooked, Behind the Scenes, or Thirty Years a Slave and  Four Years in the White House by Elizabeth Keckley.  Written in 1868, the book contains the memoirs of the woman who served as Mary Todd Lincoln’s personal seamstress.  She personally designed, sewed and fitted the many dresses Mary required as First Lady and became Mrs. Lincoln’s closest friend and confidant. Elizabeth was born a slave, but at age 30, having become an accomplished seamstress, was able to purchase her freedom. She relocated to Washington, D.C.  When the Lincolns arrived, she went to work for Mrs. Lincoln. Her memoirs offer a unique glimpse into unguarded moments in the Lincoln home. I was especially struck by this candid description of Lincoln during one of the low moments of the War. 

 “One day he came into the room where I was fitting a dress on Mrs. Lincoln. His step was slow and heavy, and his face sad.  Like a tired child he threw himself upon a sofa, and shaded his eyes with his hands.  He was a complete picture of dejection. … He reached forth one of his long arms, and took a small Bible from a stand near the head of the sofa, opened the pages of the holy book, and soon was absorbed in reading them. A quarter of an hour passed, and on glancing at the sofa the face of the President seemed more cheerful.  The dejected look was gone, and the countenance was lighted up with new resolution and hope. The change was so marked that I could not but wonder at it. … He read with Christian eagerness, and the courage and hope that he derived from the inspired pages made him a new man.  … What a sublime picture was this! A ruler of a mighty nation going to the pages of the Bible with simple Christian earnestness for comfort and courage, and finding both in the darkest hours of a nation’s calamity.” 

 It is well known that President Lincoln never joined a church.  But it is abundantly clear from what he said and what he wrote that he was a man of deep faith. This surprisingly candid witness from Mary Lincoln’s seamstress is revealing.  In the privacy of his home we find this remarkable insight into the faith that sustained him. 

 The opening lines of Proverbs capture the essence of the Bible’s impact:  “To know wisdom and instruction. To perceive the words of understanding. To receive the instruction of wisdom, justice, judgement and equity. To give prudence to the simple, to the young man knowledge and discretion,” (Proverbs 1:1-4).  If we would find our way forward as individuals, families and as a nation, we can turn to that source to which Lincoln turned.

Trusting God in Challenging Times

 

We have entered a financial intersection of inflation and, perhaps, stagflation. Even my 9-year-old granddaughter has opinions about why the price of gasoline has soared. We all must go through challenges that raise the level of risk, and anxiety.

 Some of us have been through similar crises to the one we face now.  A few of us were around when the oil embargo hit in the early 1970s.  Richard Nixon was President.  Overnight the price of gasoline doubled, followed by the price of everything else. Speed limits on Interstate highways were lowered to 55 mph to conserve gas. Gasoline was rationed and cars lined up down the street and around the block to buy a few gallons.  Inflation and high interest continued through the 1980s. Some of us bought houses with 14% mortgage rates.  The Fed raised interest rates to 12% to curb rampant inflation, and then came the Savings and Loan crisis, followed by the2000-2002 dot-com bust. and, in 2008, the housing crash.  For the last fourteen years, at least until Covid in 2020, the economy has been cruising along on something of an open freeway.  The trillions of dollars pumped into the economy to offset Covid bought us a couple of years, perhaps, but eventually, we have entered another economic intersection littered with casualties.

 We encounter other challenging intersections when we choose a career, find a partner for life and give birth to our children.  We encounter them when our preschoolers start first grade, when they reach puberty and struggle to grow up.  Promotions, layoffs, career changes, moves to a new house in a new city, aging and old age.  Life is filled with intersections.

 We do best at these moments when we trust in God.  He knows the “traffic patterns.”  He has been there.  He knows the outcome.  He is willing to take us by the hand or “take the wheel” and guide us through to the other side.

 He led Abraham to a foreign land he had never seen and multiplied his descendants like the sands of the sea.  He guided Isaac in search of a wife and blessed Jacob in a similar quest. He led Moses through the wilderness. He guided Mary and Joseph to Egypt and back after the birth of Jesus.  In every generation, God has been a comfort and a guide to those who trust Him.

 “In your loving kindness you have led the people whom you have redeemed; in your strength you have guided them to your Holy habitation.” (Exodus 15:13).  “For you are my rock and my fortress; for your name’s sake you will lead me and guide me.” (Psalm 31:3).  “And the Lord will continually guide you, and satisfy your desire in scorched places; and you will be like a watered garden, and like a spring of water whose waters do not fail.” (Isaiah 58:11). 

While You Were Sleeping

 I typically don’t think much about sleep. But when you fly through seven or more time zones in a single day, as I have done on more than one occasion, you think about it.  When everyone else is getting up, your body is begging to go to bed. When everyone else is settling down for a good night’s sleep, your body is wide awake and looking for something to do. It takes a few days, at least, to “reset the body clock.”

Sleep is an amazing thing.  We all require it, including the animals.  Even my dog sleeps.  I know, I have spent the night camping in a tent with him.  He snores. Sleep appears to be a requirement for all animal life, though it may vary in intensity and method.

 Something mysterious and magical happens when we sleep.

 Kenneth Cooper, the world-famous physician who set us on the path for aerobic health more than forty years ago, maintains that adequate sleep, like adequate exercise and diet, are essential to balanced health.  He states, “Most studies indicate that the average person needs somewhere between the traditional 7 and 8 hours a night. If you get much more sleep than that … you feel sluggish and fuzzy-headed during the day.  … if you get too little sleep .. you tend to feel like death warmed over.”

 Sleep deprivation has been used as a means of interrogation and even torture.  In some cases, the inability to sleep has had catastrophic consequences.  Many think the popular actor, Heath Ledger’s  tragic death from a prescription drug overdose may have been caused by his ongoing battle with chronic insomnia.

 Scientists have a pretty good idea of what goes on during sleep, but no one seems to know exactly how it happens. According to the Sleep Foundation, the body and the brain are repaired and nourished during the phases of non-rapid eye movement (NREM)  and rapid-eye-movement (REM). Somehow the body repairs its muscles, consolidates memory and releases hormones that regulate growth and appetite.

 Even Jesus slept.  His twelve disciples found it incredible that he could sleep in the bow of the boat during a raging storm. Frantic with fear, they woke him.   Awakened from his sleep, Jesus asked, “Why are you afraid, you men of little faith?”  He then rebuked the winds and the waves, and the place where they were became perfectly calm. His disciples were astonished and looking at one another asked, “What manner of man is this, that even the wind and the waves obey him?” (Matthew 8:23-27).

 The need to sleep recognizes our mortality.  For seven to eight hours of every day, between a fourth and a third of every twenty-four hours, the world continues without us.  During that time, we are totally and completely dependent upon others and upon God for our existence and our well-being.  We are not the masters of our fate.

 The Scripture states, “In vain you rise early and stay up late, toiling for food to eat — for he grants sleep to those he loves.” (Psalm 127:2)