Help Us...You're Our Only Hope

...if my people who are called by my name humble themselves, and pray and seek my face....-2 Chronicles 7:14a

 

Do you pray for this country? Do you know others who do? 

 What about your church? Does your congregation pray for our nation? 

There seem to be something like 350,000 church congregations in the U.S., most of them Christian.

 I wonder how many of them lift up the U.S.A. regularly during their worship?

 I want you to think about what you perceive as being this country's problems and how you (privately) and your church (corporately) bring these issues before God in prayer. 

You know what I think? I believe the Church has failed this nation.

You know what's worse? We have failed because we are asleep. 

In fact, if you believe that the Christian Church is the most important component in our society, why aren't you praying for the Church, for God to awaken her, to pour out his Spirit upon her, and that God's people begin to cry out, "Bow your heavens, O LORD, and come down!"

Or you may already be praying for that awakening. I sincerely hope so.

If not, search the phrase "Great Awakening" and see what God has done in the history of the our country.

And I wonder, if the prayer of a "righteous" individual (that's you if you have been saved by God's grace, and set aside for his service) "availeth much", how much more so will the prayers of God's saints, gathered together in prayer, avail with our Heavenly Father who promises to hear the prayers of his people?

 

Pray for the nation, yes.

But much more pray for the Church, that she become once more the leavening agent and source of light that this country so desperately needs.

 

  

The Haunted Pillow of East Vine Extended

There are stranger things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in your philosophy. (apologies to Will)

Conversation:

Hey, can I have this pillow?

Don't you have any pillows at your place?

Not really.

What do you mean not really?

What do you mean what do I mean?

You either have a pillow or you don't.

Not really, I don't.

So what you are saying is that what pillows you might have are worn out and flat and all ratchety looking?

Yes.

But isn't that your mom's pillow?

No.

Well what happened to her pillow then?

I don't know!

I think it is her pillow and in that case, no, you can't have it.

Why not?

Because it is special. It's where she laid her precious little head and breathed out her last breath.

Ewww.

Which means that it's haunted!

laughs at the idiocy of this statement and the fact that we are even having this conversation

Don't say that!

Yes and you will hear a voice saying, "Whoo stole my pillow???"

makes creepy fingers gestures, moving toward her

She laughing runs toward the kitchen

No!

Now I'm laughing and chasing her with creepy fingers, The chase continues through the kitchen, into the entrance hall and back into the living room. After several rounds of the course, we finally collapse laughing.

Now I don't want the damn thing.

What? Are you scared?

Shut up.



And how are things at your house today?

It Is Well

It is well that war is so terrible, otherwise we should grow too fond of it.-Robert E. Lee

So you probably thought I would open this with a nod to the beloved hymn, "It Is Well With My Soul."

But since conflict seems to be the order of the day recently, the quote from General Lee seemed more apt.

To remember, in other words, that xenophobia is the natural state of humanity since the Fall.



I offer this book as my only example; at 1524 pages, it is a mere survey of human conflict.

So, it is well to remember that we are ruled, in our natural state, by fear of the other.

It is well to remember as we encounter the behavior prompted by fear that fear is a powerful emotion, able to completely control the hearts of those afflicted by it.
 It is well to remember that in the words of our Savior and in other places in Scripture, we are counseled to "fear not."

It is well to remember that the struggle with fear is real and more difficult with some, even Christians, than others.

It is well to remember that we are counseled also in Scripture to "love our enemies and pray for those who spitefully use us."

It is well to remember that Christ met fear with love.

It is well to remember that "perfect love casts out fear" and that this refers to Jesus' perfect love not my own, though I am surely called to imitate Christ.

It is well, finally, to remember that we are redeemed in Christ, and, in spite of troubles and trials, there is a glorious future awaiting us.

What have I to fear?

It is well with my soul.

Faith of Our Fathers

Hear O sons, a father's instruction, and be attentive, that you may gain insight. -Proverbs 4:1

When he was 13 days old, my daddy's mother died.

Her father took on the task of raising him.

When my father was 10 years old, this man who had been the only father he had ever known passed away.

He told me, years later, that it felt like his world had ended.

My dad had been taught during those ten years to know who God was and that Jesus loved him and that there are such things as right and wrong. 

But I guess if you are ten years old and your world has ended that it might seem hard to believe that Jesus loves you or that right or wrong matter.

Blessedly that all changed when my father met my mother and at about the same met and came to know Jesus.

And so he spent the rest of his life teaching us what his grandfather had taught  him and what he read in the Bible.

And praying for us when we wandered down a wrong path and that we might come to know and love Jesus as he truly had.

You ever wonder what wonderful sights you will behold when you open your eyes in heaven?

I had a Christian acquaintance once tell me that he doubted that we would know one another in heaven.

What a load of baloney!

For I am very sure that my dad, upon entering the streets of heaven, met his mother for the first time.

And was reunited with his granddad.

Yankee Uncles and Other Stuff.

That's me right there in the middle. That drunk-looking little guy in the dark jacket all slouched back in his chair.

You see my cousin Jaybock peering innocently over my right shoulder? He was poking me in the back.

Ah, Frankie (that was his nickname), you were such a joker.

That's my dad over on the right in a white shirt holding Rod, so this would have been about 1961 or 2.

This was a rowdy crew and I can't believe they were all able to hold still long enough for this photo to be taken.

The Yankee uncles were loudest though the Southern guys were pretty raucous in their own right.

In fact, I cannot recall a single gathering of Tolars or Rohrscheibs (no matter the size of the gathering) where you could not hear howls of  laughter or a dull roar of conversation.

Joie de vivre, I guess you might call it.

Even funerals, though they were attended with the proper solemnity, tended to become more of a celebration of sorts after all the formalities had been attended to.

Celebration seems an odd word, doesn't it?

But you know: of family, with all the strength and comfort that brings even in the hardest of times.
Of life its own self cause dying is part of living and though our hearts are broken, we carry on.

Sort of like an Irish wake you might say but without the heavy drinking.

These thoughts come to mind because the next three summers in a row, we would gather to say goodbye to some of the young people in this picture.

And finally, on a blistering August day, Grandma Rohrscheib ( the little old lady seated at the end of the table on the left).

And that was the last of it for a while, like some weird family curse or something.

Maudlin stuff, you might say, but as I said, dying is part of living.

So celebrate, y'all. Never neglect any opportunity to gather together to love and enjoy those precious ones.

They might not be here tomorrow and we can't let fear rob us of these precious, fleeting moments.

The Strangest Things

By the waters of Babylon, there we sat down and wept.... Psalm 137:1a

Nearly all the churches around here have suspended Sunday worship services.

The session of GPC meets Friday night to discuss whether or not to re-commence Sunday worship.

I don't think it is sound practice to transfer biblical events whole-cloth to our own era and our own situation.

We tend to do it anyway, don't we?

The OT church had the privilege of corporate worship taken from them.

And we know why. It's spelled out for us in the text.

So I wonder: is this us?

And I wonder some more: is this me?

Not just individual me but me as a representative sample of us all.

Have I appreciated the blessing of being able to assemble in freedom with my brothers and sisters to pray and sing and hear the Word taught?

What about those Sundays when my head has drooped and my eyelids have grown heavy?

Or those times when my thoughts have wandered, say to what I might have for lunch?

Or thinking about that nap I'm going to take?

No, I prefer to think that we are undergoing a trial at the moment, a testing of our faith and we will come out stronger on the other side of this.

Scripture tells me to worship the Lord my God with all my heart, all my soul, all my mind.

Search me, O God, and know my heart! Try me and know my thoughts! And see if there be any grievous way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting, -Psalm 139:23-24

Down to the Ground

Opal stood at the edge of the cotton field and watched the house burn.

Her younger sisters were crying as they all huddled together. Glancing at Mama she saw that expression of grimness and maybe underlying anger that seemed to be Mama's reaction to all of life.

Or maybe just life the way we live it.

Poor sweet Daddy was sitting on a stump with his head buried in his hands.

The neighbors had gathered in the middle on the bleak December night. There was a current of relief as they gathered around the burned-out family. When one of these shotgun shacks began to burn there was a good a chance as not of the folks inside burning with it.

Opal's best friend Wiiladean hugged her.

"I'm so glad you all are okay."

Opal merely nodded, too numb to cry or acknowledge her friend or anything else. She could remember Mama crying out, "The house is on fire!" and Daddy rushing into the front room where they slept to grab baby Alice out of her crib.

Mama and Daddy slept in the middle room. Blessedly the fire had started in the back room, in the kitchen. The smoke burned her nostrils as she helped herd her sisters out the front door.

The small Christmas tree stood in in the corner with its meager decorations and the few presents.

No time to save any of that. She could hear the crackling blaze begin to roar as it grew in intensity and burned its way toward the front of the house.

"You'll stay with me," said Willadean. Indeed each of the children would be shared out among the neighbors until Daddy found them another house.

Though times were hard and money scarce as hen's teeth every family scattered on the nearby farms would pitch in somehow. Even those who sharecropped like Daddy did would pitch in a can of beans.

It was what neighbors did. You picked up the pieces and did the best you could.

Fear Itself

I am amazed.

Shakespeare once wrote, "Whom the gods would destroy, they first make mad."

A woman in the local Walmart smacked another up side the head with a package of bacon as they fought over it.

Early on in "The Stand," Stephen King describes the chaos of abandoned vehicles and dead bodies blocking the entrance to the Holland Tunnel out of New York City as the super flu wiped out 90% of the population.

There is a city in Germany, Oberammergau, where the yearly performance of a Passion Play is credited for averting the Black Plague during medieval times.

"The wicked flee when no one pursues...."

Is this that?

I hear there was great fear over possible nuclear annihilation in the fifties when bomb shelters were being built faster than storm cellars in Tornado Alley.

Even many of the local churches are cancelling services over fear of infection.

We err on the side of caution, it is said.

What exactly is wise and cautious and when  (if ever) does caution become fear?

"May you live in interesting times," goes the ancient Chinese curse.

Odd, isn't it, that our main source of interest these days comes out of China?

I guess that's what you would call "irony."

"...but the righteous are bold as a lion" goes the second half of the verse quoted above.

I could use some of that righteousness now.

Not the "self" kind, but the kind that I can't come up with on my own.

Where would we get that, do you think?

Comfort and Joy

When you think "comfort", do you think "food"?

Me too.

Simple but filling and tasty. You know, beans, taters and cornbread. You can make your own list.

But a good way to begin to think about the other ways we experience the sensation of comfort.

For example, there's this older (I can't think of them as "elderly") couple I know. They've been married for many, many years.

They have been through the struggles, weathered the storms, raised their children and are enjoying their grandchildren and their retirement.

That's some comfortable stuff.

What about those younger married couples that I know?

I have a friend who is fond of saying, "There's nothing like being married!"

And I think of the several families for whom I pray daily.

And it has occurred to me that comfort is one of the things I should be asking for on their behalf.

Because sometimes we forget to recognize the sheer comfort we get from the blessing of a hard-working, dedicated husband or wife.

Because it's just so comfortable, I suppose, it is perhaps so easy not to appreciate.

I am grateful for the chance to have recognized that comfort, to have been appreciative of it and been made joyful in it.

Here's to you and yours this day and every day.

Peace, comfort and joy be unto you!