World Wide Wrestling

#555

Traveling the world, I have had many interesting airline experiences. Not being able to see, then as now, it was a matter of hearing. In Berlin, back of me, there was quite a commotion. I asked the flight attendant, “what is wrong”. She said, “the man said he must sit next to the window although he had been assigned an aisle seat because he needs fresh air.” Again, crossing the Atlantic, an elderly lady was up and down the aisle telling everyone she wanted to get off the plane. I told the attendant, “please let her off, we have enough people in America without her”. In Hawaii, returning from across the Pacific, I was taken into a private office by the FBI, and searched. Someone had reported to them that I was an obviously rich man traveling with a lot of money on me. I told the officers, “I hope you can find the money”. The thing that stopped them, going through my wallet, was my military I.D. The officer said, “you are an Army Lieutenant Colonel?” This stopped everything and they began to apologize. I said, “I don't want to hear a word of it. You could have saved yourselves and me this type embarrassment.”

This week, a mother in Shelbyville, Tennessee put her adopted son...an orphan from Russia, on a plane with a note, sending him back to Russia. She had gone through the time and expense to travel to Russia to adopt a child but when this six year old boy did not turn out as she wished, like anything else at a store she may have purchased, she thought there was a return policy...a trial period. Like going to a pet store and picking out a dog, when you get the dog home, you can always find someone to give the dog discipline lessons...dog training. Few children...fewer animals, are perfect. Many mothers have found that their children's innate genetic qualities of the husband's family. It is a matter of dealing with the situation...the essence of motherhood. Many features go into determining the quality of a diamond.

I was in Vatican City one time, standing around in St. Peter's square listening for the midnight Mass over the loudspeaker. A priest with a Roman collar walked up and said, “I have a ticket down at the front, I don't feel well, and I would like for you to have my seat”.

A friend told me he was standing outside Radio City in New York, the Beatles were making an appearance there, and the place was jam packed, including the streets on the outside. A stranger walked up to him and said, “I have a ticket on the inside but I have just received an urgent call to go to the hospital, you can have my seat”. Hastily, he went in, so thrilled with this once in a lifetime experience. When he got in he realized he had left his keys locked in his car. The experience was ruined because throughout the performance he was trying to surmise how he was going to get into his car and return home, wrestling with the thrill of the performance and the disdain of him doing something so foolish as to lock his keys in his car.

Life is wrestling match, you wrestle against good and evil every day you live. “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)

So much of the wrestling mortals go through is completely unnecessary. Most of us are blessed with a sound mind...able to solve problems. Think of those who have died from conflict...those forever disabled and enslaved by conflict. I speak as a totally blind, 100% disabled, service connected, medical officer, veteran. Don't even try to imagine what it is like to live every moment of your life, for over 40 years, in darkness. Some days, it seems like everything I touch falls on the floor...then it is a matter of getting down and trying to find it...or I spill something...or I get turned around somewhere. Just the matter of sweeping off your front walk, I can get turned around, hard to find my way back into the house. I keep radios on all over the house to give me direction. I heard Dr. Helen Robinson, University of Chicago, totally blind say, “if only I had enough vision to get from one room to another”. I have been fortunate enough to wrestle with the world, airports, hotels, restaurants, non English speaking people, in travel, so that I could return, write and speak about the world from a blind man's point of view. I have thousands of photographs made by a blind man with cameras. (I have been on 8 trips around the world, passport stamped in 157 countries at least once, most countries several times.) I learned years ago that most people don't care. Most people don't care that 11 million were killed in WWI or 50 million were killed in WWII. Not just military combatants, but millions of innocent women and children.

We ask, why did God allow this? He is in control. You should ask, why did God allow his only begotten son to go to the cross and suffer for the sins of the world? Why does God allow the most innocent of life to be killed, 53 million abortions since 1973 (3,000 a day, 1,452 black babies)?

I will never forget two “radio talk show experiences”. One, a black woman who lived on Castle Street, Wilmington NC, called a local talk show. She said, “I'm here in my house so sick. I'm old, I have buried all of my family. I need some help. People have told me to trust in God. THE ONLY GOD I HAVE EVER KNOWN IS A WHITE MAN'S GOD”. Again, a white woman called from Brunswick County, NC. She said, “I have finally gotten off the bed and gotten to a phone. I need help. I have been here desperately ill for days, my husband has been dead for three days here in the bed with me.” She said, “evidently someone has tried to check on us. They just come and knock at the door”. She said, “I have no feeling in my arms or legs. I have not walked in years. I have rolled over to the phone. I must have some help”.

Observing cultures all over the world, there are three things important to each life, your life purpose, your relationship with God, your relationship with family, and your relationship with others. Even Princess Diana, spectacular in every way...wealth, notoriety, power, at her life's end had the three purposes that the above black woman and white woman had. With Princess Diana, there was endless servants, money and family members. With many of us, as well as human beings around the world there is no family, often unconcerned others, only a relationship with God. He has told us, that he will never leave us nor forsake us. (Hbr 13:15) This should be of great consolation, particularly to all who live alone. We are in a world, wrestling with the world, remember this, those women in distress did get to a telephone and they did get help. Perhaps, it may be a situation such as Catherine Johnson, the black woman living in a drug infested area of Atlanta. This 92 year old black woman attempting to hold on to her only possession, her house, a drug addictive culture having grown up around her. Someone cruelly informed the police that her house was a center of drug operations. The Atlanta police came up and kicked in her door. This bed ridden, aged woman, trying to protect herself, did get off one shot but these uninformed, bully, police thugs did put 39 shots into her.

The world has changed completely in my lifetime and I predict it will not get any better.

Many think our everyday existence very mundane. I watched the great Sphinx at the great Pyramid in Egypt at Giza, at one time, nearly covered with sand. Our lives can be slowly covered. “And the cares of this world, and the deceitfulness of riches, and the lusts of other things entering in, choke the word, and it becometh unfruitful.” (Mar 4:19)

Incrementally, we become unconcerned. Like a child with a supply of quarters in an arcade, we just go from one interest to another. We had rather wrestle with a game machine than the real challenges of life.