Sidled Through the Door at 74

Actually, the catchy title has only incidental reference to the matter to consider.

I am 74, and had some firewood in my arms, and a slowly closing door through which to walk. The thought flitted through my mind, "Yes, I can slip through it and do it quickly if I move somewhat sideways." It worked fine as thoughts of athleticism mentally applauded the smooth effort.

But it was the method of the move that alerted my senses, and not the actual act. It was not "my kind of a move" at all, but that of one of my dearest pastor friends. Many times, over the years of our working together, I had seen him make just such a "smooth, sideways move" through a narrowing space.

It was the thoughts that followed that quietly rocked my mind. Jim's three boys all made those same smooth, sideways moves, and they do so today though they are in their late forties and early fifties. Their body language, bearing, facial expressions, soft-spokenness and much of their conversations are "Jim all over again."

The truth is that we become like those persons with whom we spend large amounts of time - those with whom we talk a lot, and especially those whom we admire.

The conclusion here is as certain as heredity and environment: the more we spend time with Jesus and His teachings and His Word, the more we are like Him

I love the truth of two heavily-lined verses in my Bible, and long ago made them guiding stars in my own quest for my Lord.

Matthew 10:25a: "It is enough for the disciple that he be as his Master..."

and also,

John3:29: John the Baptist said, "...the friend of the Bridegroom, who stands by and listens to Him, rejoices greatly because of the Bridegroom's voice: this my joy therefore is fulfilled."

What Kind of a Rose Would You Like?

Without specific knowledge of percentages, I would guess that 75 to 80% of buyers prefer red roses. However, I just read after an author who took two dozen yellow roses to a departed friend's memorial service because she favored yellow.

When my mother, Ida, went to be with the Lord, our neighbors brought us a lovely white rose bush to plant, and their young daughter, Rebecca, asked us if she "could help us bury it," in her sweet, caring words.

There are so many varieties of roses that no person should have or buy a rose he did not like. Basically, however, roses are roses, and are appreciated and loved for their beauty and frangrance.

Uniqueness would be another quality. "A rose by any other name would still be a rose".

Debatably - with a few exceptions - a rose is usually characterized by thorns. For most varieites, their lovliness is accompanied by offensive and injurious thorns.

Relationships are a lot like roses in this regard. You have to watch the thorns! As long as you just look from a distance, the thorns pose no threat, nor do they become personal. But if you want to get close enough to touch, to embrace, to scrutinize, thorns are a part.

Rose thorns are not rational or logical. They do not intentionally choose to cause pain or injury - but they do just because their space is invaded.

To have a rose is to require carefulness, sensitivity, tenderness, and a soft touch. He who tries to brusquely grasp a rose will loose every time. They must be held carefully. Relationships are a lot like this.There are "barbs" in all of us that offend those with whom we realate, and we are unaware of most of them.

Obviously we are different from roses, though, in that we can learn what offends and hurts, and either eliminate, or at least, minimize them. Here is a crusade for us. Blunt the barbs.

Different Stars

The Bible declares that there are no two stars alike, and since nobody has ever physically and personally made an "on site" inspection to either disprove or corroborate this, Bible believing Christians accept it as fact. Here is how the Amplified Bible writes 1 Corinthians 15:41:

"...the stars are glorious in their own distinctive way; for one star differs from and surpasses another in its beauty and brilliance".

Roughly a thousand years before this inspired comment by the Apostle Paul, the psalmist wrote in Psalms147:4 that, "(God) counts the number of the stars, and calls them each one by name".

Without arguing with the scientific community that has long insisted that our sun is merely "another star", the Bible seems in both this scripture and in Genesis 1:16 to state that our sun differs from the stars: "God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night: He made the stars also".

And here in 1 Corinthians 15:41 the Bible says: "There is one glory of the sun, and another glory of the moon, and another glory of the stars...". The strong inference in both the Old and New Testaments is that the sun was specifically and uniquely created by God to provide light and warmth to the earth, and that it and the moon are the only heavenly bodies like them.

The idea here is how unique and individual each star is - and accordingly, how individualistic and unprecedented each human soul is.

Though there are probably milti-billions of stars, each one is specifically and individually Divinely created and named, so that when our human eyes see a falling star burn out, an observing angel might say, "There goes Spica", or "Look at Alcor go!", or "How beautiful is Procyon as he blazes!".

He is a God abundant in grace Who comes to each human soul and offers an eternal relationship to him or her...a union and a friendship shared with no other human being.

He gives us a lifespan to make up our minds, for every person who loves, follows and serves Him is a volunteer. Every friend of God chooses to be.

One Thing You Can Not Say

There are many things that are hard to say. Like, "I'm sorry. It's my fault. Forgive me. I spoke too quickly. I spoke too harshly. It was not just the way I represented it. I volunteer. I'll go." Lots of things like these and similar ones are hard to say.

But this is one thing you or I can not say, and it is as true for believers and unbelievers alike. We find this one thing that we can not say in 1 Corinthians 12:21. None of us can say, "I do not need you." The Bible insisted that this was true centuries before the 1940s or 1950s hit song, "No Man Is An Island." The Bible says it this way in Romans 14:7: "None of us lives to himself (alone) and no one dies to himself (alone)".

However adamantly and forcefully an individual declares his total independence from other persons, it is nothing more than empty rhetoric and illogical silliness. Those who arrogantly declare that they need nobody else starkly reveal their immaturity.

The fact is that we need each other to survive, and the Apostle Paul in the 1 Corinthian scripture alluded to above goes a step further when he overtly asserts that each of us is actually but a single part of a body - a hand, a foot, a mouth, eyes, ears, a leg, etc. None of us is a "total package" as a few boastful persons like to think they are. There are no "number tens" among us, and those few who unwisely think there are - whether themselves, or others who think someone else is - eventally realize that we all need each other, and much of what and who we all are comes from those around us.

This fact is not up for debate according to this definite statement in God's Word. We can not say, "I have no need of you". A whole person is the one who discovers that he is complete in the strengths and assistances of his friend who comes along side of him in his time of need.