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Saturday, Feb. 07, 2004 - 10:56 a.m.
Not me
Not my birthday but I wanted to remember this from EE A birthday is a milestone. It's a place to pause. Look back now for a minute over the way the Lord has brought you. There has been thirst, hasn't there? You've been over some sand dunes, through some valleys, some wilderness, out on a barren heath once in a while. I have too. Sometimes it seemed that there weren't any rivers, wells, pools, or springs. Nothing but sand. No lovely acacias or wild olives, only barrenness. The trouble was I hadn't learned to find them. I was trying to travel alone. I made the same mistake when I first went to live as a missionary in the South American jungle. After one bad experience of getting lost, I learned to follow an Indian guide. He knew the trails. He could find water to drink (inside a bamboo, for example, if there wasn't a river handy), honey in a hollow tree, fruit where there seemed to be no fruit. I couldn't see them. I didn't know where to look. The Indian did. He could make a cup out of a palm leaf, build a fire in the rain, construct a shelter for the night in an hour or so. I was helpless. He was my helper. A milestone is not only a place to look back to where you've come from. It's a place to look forward to where you're going. We don't always want to do that on birthdays. If we look back it seems such a long time, the good old days are over, and (here's the hard part) so much guilt clogs the memories. If we look forward--alas. How many more birthdays? What will happen before the next one? Thoughts of the future are full of for I the Lord your God take you by the right hand; I say to you, Do not fear; It is I who held you. (Isaiah 41:13 NEB) Parties and presents won't do much for a checkered past or a frightening future. Only the God who was loving you then, loves you today on your birthday, and will keep right on loving you till you see him face-to-face, can possibly do anything about them. "It is I who help you," he says. There is help for all the guilt. Confess it in full. He'll forgive it in full. And I mean forgive. That doesn't mean he denies its reality, sweeps it under the rug, or bathes it in sentiment. There was once an old rugged cross. You know where it was--on a hill far away. And you know what it means--nothing sentimental at all, but forgiveness, freely offered to all of us, the whole price paid in blood by the Dearest and Best. There is help for your fear too. Express it in full. Let the Lord take you by your right hand and help you. I had to do that with my Indian guide. I simply could not make it across those slippery log bridges, laid high over jungle ravines, without help. I was scared to death. The Indian, who had been over them many more times than I had, held me by the hand. You've heard those bad news/good news jokes. Well, this isn't cheap birthday card humor. The bad news is that another year has gone by and we haven't done all we meant to do and it's not going to come back to give us another chance. The good news is the Gospel. We can be reconciled to God--sins forgiven, fears taken care of. That old cross, the emblem of suffering and shame, stands between us and our sins and fears, our past and future, and on its outstretched arms we see Love. The Love that would die for us is the Love that lives for us--Jesus Christ, Lord, Master, Savior of the World, wanting to give you (for your birthday if you'll take it) something that will really quench your thirst, rivers among the sand dunes and wells in the valley; wanting to hold your hand, help you, give you--not only a happy birthday, but everlasting joy. I'm not the least bit bashful about telling my age. I'm glad for every birthday that comes, because it is the Lord, my faithful Guide, who "summoned the generations from the beginning." I look in the mirror and see the increasingly (and creasingly) visible proofs of the number of years, but I'm reconciled. Christ reconciles me to God and to God's wonderful plan. My life is his life. My years are his years. To me life is Christ, and death is nothing but gain. When I remember that, I really can't think of a thing I ought to be afraid of. I can't be sorry I'm a year older and nearer to absolute bliss. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Me again. Tomorrow is 2s' 42nd birthday. He has the girls next weekend so we will have a dinner and cake then. Cindy, one of the peer advocates, is coming over this afternoon for some help setting up English essays in Word and saving them to her hard drive and disk. I can't believe I am helping her, especially since I lost my essay this week. Luckily I had already made a copy of it for class. I have to type it again when I rewrite it for the teacher. I could have just edited it if I had saved it correctly. I think what I did was delete it after I had changed all the font to a larger size and then eliminated several empty spacing lines so I could get page breaks in what I thought were better places. I am pretty sure I left everything past the first page highlighted and then it disappeared when something else was done. Will have to be careful with it. Cindy has a son who will help her with computer stuff. He is very good but gets impatient with her and does it himself. I know how she feels. We have to get ahold of the situation ourselves and then we can do it but till then-----watch out. One think I definitely do well is teach dummies how to do things. That is cuz I am such a dummy myself and know how we think. It snowed 5-7 inches since midnite and is supposed to continue to snow the rest of the day and beyond. We could be buried like we haven't been for many many years, and if it starts to blow, we will all be stranded for days. I better call 1d and tell her to prepare for a shutdown. Electricity and water shutdown too. Better prepare myself.
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