Cobwebs Between Bookends

I participated at the funeral of a 100-year-old friend-- the first graduate of NC State University.  I said to one of the ministers at Mr. Matthew's service, "When we bury a man of his greatness, we feel we are burying a library-- the volumes of knowledge between the bookends of his life." I have met great people all over the world, saints "of whom the earth was not worthy" Heb. 11:38

Old age is not for sissies. Just keeping up with the insanity/inventions which infect and inflict the world is a full-time job.

This week, I purchased my first "smart" phone. I'm that far behind. My employees, associates-- even school children-- already own them. My old cell phone was purchased second-hand, online. It had been previously owned by a female of questionable reputation-- it took quite a while for my associates to clean out all the pornography. The so-called Razor phone-- one I could speak into-- had well paid for itself. And, like the rest of the world-- even the poor people in third-world nations-- I have learned to depend on it. I'm told by fellow world travelers that even some natives in the African bush are using cell phones. My seminary-professor son, Dr. John Morris-- many years missionary to Korea (I am a veteran of the Korean war)-- tells me that everyone in Korea is talking on a cell phone. It should be of interest to all Baptists that there are 300 Korean students at the Southwestern Baptist Seminary, Fort Worth, Texas.

I am old enough to remember the time when there was only one telephone for many miles around at my cousin's country store. There was not a telephone in my family's home until long after I graduated college. I never received a call the eight years I was away from home at college, or the many more years I was in the service. My wonderful maternal grandmother was the first in our family's community to have a telephone in her house. Like the TV, she simply could not understand it (she would wave at the people on TV, trying to talk with them). Marvelous were the last years of her life, when she could talk with her sisters by phone-- having lived through a time in history when a penny postcard was their only method of communication. I still remember my mother thrilled on receiving a postcard from a relative, saying that they would be arriving for church and dinner on a church Sunday (when I was a child, church Sunday was once a month-- the pastor had 4 churches). Even Dick Tracy and the Science Fiction magazines could not predict the marvels of the smart phone: talking to the phone to get a number, listening to scripture read by the phone-- even the phone looking up a particular passage-- one of the best cameras one could use, and, for those of us in sales, the immediate transfer of photograph and details to a world-wide audience.

Everything has changed in my lifetime and the lifetimes of the billions who died before me, all technology, everything, except human nature. It would be hard for this old man to socialize in today's society. I still believe in courting, dating -- the guy pursuing the gal. Today's young people just "hook up." It is a matter of quick sex. One girl said recently in the media, "I don't even like him. He is just a quick fix without any entanglements."

The great preacher, Ray Comfort, gave me the idea for this illustration, which so describes today's culture. Two men boarded an airliner. The hostess said, "You need to put on this parachute. If you the plane goes down, this will save you." One passenger, sitting in his seat, parachute strapped on, found himself very uncomfortable. The whole ordeal bothered him-- other people were looking at him, sneering and laughing. He took off the parachute and threw it out. The other passenger, remembering that the hostess had warned him of the possible 25,000 ft drop, sat back, comfortable in his parachute. He had the eternal security of knowing safety. The sneers, stares and laughter of parachute-less watchers did not bother him.  

And so it is with the marvelous (parachute) grace of a holy God. In his marvelous plan of salvation and redemption by his son Jesus, we have eternal security/safety. Regardless of the cobwebs between the bookends (doubts, fears, trials, and tribulations) we will have a happy landing at the bookend.

The writer C.S. Lewis' Screwtape Letters said that people are unaware of the darkness that surrounds them. "For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places." Eph. 6:12 It still bothers me that most, who know ABOUT Jesus Christ, do not have the security/safety of Jesus Christ. They are just playing games with God-- pretending-- more concerned about what people think about them, than what God knows about them.  There are two happy hours in today's world among people who live in our community, even our relatives, even our fellow church members. There is the happy hour each Friday (usually 5pm) at the clubs and bars, when working people end their work week with a time of drinking and relaxation at their local "watering hole." Then there is the other happy hour, Sundays, 11-12, when religious people, through habit-- or perhaps some conviction-- go to a house of worship-- more to see or be seen, than to understand the "worth-ship" of the grace given by God. Happy are they that understand the true worth in God's plan of salvation for those whom he has called/chosen. It is not a time of pretending, but rather a time for dealing with the cobwebs of life. The church house, whether it be a store-front meeting place or a great, ornate cathedral, was always intended-- even from the one in the wilderness/desert-- as a covering for the altar. We often forget the altar, seldom see a cross. So many infrequent rather than frequent the Lord's table.

Christianity is not complicated, just tough. It is real. In this world of technology, the only thing that remains certain. From the beginning to the end, pictured as either bookends or the hyphen on your tombstone between your date of birth and date of death. Wearing the whole armor of God protects completely. You learn not to care about the deceivers in the world, Satan or his demons, BECAUSE, "greater is He that is in you, than he that is in the world."