Life's Battlefields

A veteran of the Korean and Vietnam conflict era, every day on the battlefield you think of home, and every day at home you think of the battlefield. The people of Vietnam are going through the third generation of Agent Orange mutations...still endangered by landmines planted 40 years ago.

My cousin had just come back from WWI, the war to end all wars, he had been gassed on the front lines in France. Back to home, poor beyond comprehension, it was still the best thing on Earth to him. Away for several Christmases, he decided to liven up the annual Christmas tree celebration at the country church, where people had very few reasons to smile, by putting a young rabbit in a shoe box wrapped with nice paper and ribbons addressed to his “old maid” Aunt. The gifts given out at the church at the annual Christmas party were for the children. Imagine her surprise when a gift was delivered to her. She gingerly opened the box and this young, scared rabbit jumped out, causing her to shriek. The rabbit ran all around the church to the delight of the children. He had accomplished his purpose, bringing laughter to a poverty-stricken community at the most festive season of the year.

Later, during WWII, the pastor of the church (my cousin) took over the orphanage supported by the church. He told me later in life, before he died, that he cared for 80 homeless children on a budget of $10,000 a year. Two of my Aunts worked with him at the orphanage-- large, stark buildings almost totally dependent on the generosity of people who did not want children to go hungry. My Aunt told me that at Christmas, from what was contributed by churches and interested individuals, each child received one gift. If everything went well at their Christmas meal each child received one orange and a small bag of chocolate candy. This was Christmas in the 1920s and 1930s in eastern North Carolina.

Once in London, I visited the founding church center of the Salvation Army. General William Booth, who founded the Salvation Army in London, in his lifetime saw the army facilities grow around the world. One Christmas, he wanted to let each of his quasi-military Evangelical citadels know he was thinking of them. Always careful about spending valuable army money, he sent a telegram to each with just one word: “Others”. This is that time of the year in every Christian life. If you have bought into a part of the season which the world offers--spending, spreeing, overeating, overworking, over-entertaining--it is your fault. This is the only thing the world has to celebrate. You have the blessed memory of WHY Christ was born in this world and you KNOW where to celebrate the reason, at His table.

Don't let your Christmas celebration be artificial...artificial trees, artificial greetings, and efforts at artificial entertainment. Don't let your worship of your Savior be artificial...mixing secular music with majestic Christian hymns. I heard recently that one church raises money for their church by selling Christmas tree ornaments. You buy an ornament to put on the church Christmas tree. Much like another church which sells a rusty nail to be hammered into a wooden cross. Does anyone think God appreciates this type of worship giving?

We know it is difficult to separate the truth of the season from the lies of the season. Imagine the quandary of a small child taught to be truthful... A fat man with a beard in a red suit covering the world with flying animals and a sled full of toys. Most children, more competent than their parents with a computer, know the folly of most fairy tales. Most children can well understand why their parents are so deceived by the hoax of global warming when the Earth is getting colder, the scams of socialized health care, the debauchery inherit in telling them they love them while permitting the worse education system known to man, and enslavement by unending government debt and taxation.

Eleanor Roosevelt, on a trip to North Carolina, while I was still at the University, said, “during the poverty of the 1920s and 1930s we could have easily slipped into Marxism.” It would surprise her to know that with the increasing wealth of the nation this century, we are now ready to accept this most decadent form of government... A form of government already discredited everywhere it's been tried... A form of government in direct antithesis to the Christian way of life.

A light in the window at Christmas time originated in Ireland in a time of religious persecution there when the secular humanist, godless, communist form of government had taken over. This largely Catholic country would identify Catholic homes where Christian Christmas was being observed by a candle in the window. It is time this year for every Christian home to put a candle in the window to let people know you know the real meaning of Christmas.

The Cheerios Tree

If 

BY RUDYARD KIPLING

(‘Brother Square-Toes’—Rewards and Fairies)

If you can keep your head when all about you   

    Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,   

If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,

    But make allowance for their doubting too;   

If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,

    Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,

Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,

    And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:

If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;   

    If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim;   

If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster

    And treat those two impostors just the same;   

If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken

    Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,

Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,

    And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools:

If you can make one heap of all your winnings

    And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,

And lose, and start again at your beginnings

    And never breathe a word about your loss;

If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew

    To serve your turn long after they are gone,   

And so hold on when there is nothing in you

    Except the Will which says to them: ‘Hold on!’

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,   

    Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch,

If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,

    If all men count with you, but none too much;

If you can fill the unforgiving minute

    With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,   

Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,   

    And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!

Any black person, any disabled  person, any person of a minority in America will always tell you that justice in America is always hit or miss. Those who are convinced of God's grace and mercy, those who are concerned, committed to the goodness of Jesus, have trouble at the schoolhouse, courthouse, poor house and often times even at your house, have trouble controlling the fact that others are often everything I hate in a human being. You don't get certainty in this life. This is the beauty of Christianity. God keeps us from crossing over the boundary/setting up certain guidelines, because of his willingness to sacrifice his only son, Jesus. Jesus died so that we can erase hatred from our thinking, is willing to forgive and forget every transgression against others/every word or act against Him and His blessedness. We love God because in the council chambers of eternity He chose us for life and living. Even so, we must cling to the cross of Christ for forgiveness, for healing, for direction and He is more than able to give it, we can trust Jesus. Most of us have learned, that in this life of sorrows, He is the only one we can fully trust. The atheist who wants a Saviour of his own design, actually believes that his redemption is found, not on a rugged cross but in a cheerios tree. One schoolboy, when asked where his cereal came from said, "from a cheerios tree".

The First Commandment, we should love the Lord our God with all our heart, all our soul, all our mind. God is jealous, will not forsake His glory to anyone. So many get confused in the first chapter of the Bible, that from nothingness came somethingness, came everything. I actually heard a Catholic priest say, "Millions of years before Adam and Eve there was the Neanderthal man." Where in the world did he get that? Simply because some archaeologist found some bones that they don't think measure up to the 7 days of creation. I saw Dr. Leakey in the Great Rift valley in Africa where the genus homosapiens got started and where I saw Dr. Leakey still looking for bones. He was attempting then to explain creation and as far as I know, he and his ancestors have never stopped...refusing to believe God's word about creation or anything else. If we cannot believe God's boundaries concerning creation and the creature as well as the Creator, we might as well be like the schoolboy and believe in the cheerios tree, or like the woman in my church who said that "David was the apostle who was killed by the giant, Goliath". I had one woman working for me, in her 60's, in church all of her life, who had never come to the realization that the Bible had an Old and New Testament. I said, "what do you study at church?" She said, "I go to church because that's where nice people go. I like to be around nice people".

The fastest growing religious group in America, "the none's". They do not want to be like God but rather God to be like them. They want a bellhop Christianity, you call upon God only when you need him. Most men or women only use the name of God or Jesus when cursing. I have yet to hear a believer or non-believer in profanity say, "Oh, Buddha", "Oh, Allah". In the Muslim religion, a mother is assured her son has a place in Heaven if she names her boy Muhammad. Have you ever considered how many Muslim boys are named Muhammad? Christianity is not complicated, just tough. It's beauty, genius, God putting on a tent, and dwelling among us. The inner satisfaction in my soul, that Jesus enjoyed people, that He enjoyed visiting with Mary, Martha, and Lazarus; that He enjoyed seeing the plight of people around Him, poor people, most of the population of that time were slaves. I'm so happy that Jesus probably enjoyed laughter with His disciples/food with His friends/the bubbling personality of children. When this writer stood on the shore of The Dead Sea, looking up at Harrods palace, I thought that God could have chosen for Jesus to be born in a palace, wear fancy clothing. Those who eat from gold plates in this world, whose lives are festooned by the glamour of the rich and famous have made their choice. Why should they learn the plan of salvation twice when so many people in the world have only heard it once?

Like reading the entrails of a goat we have entire professions who think they can understand mankind by studying the psychoses of those who have chosen Satan instead of Christ. There are those who have picked Marx instead of the giant forefathers of our nation. Trust in Jesus is not an emotion it is a decision, trust in the American way of life is not an emotion but a genuine fact. The Bible and the American Constitution, side by side are wonderful bookends for living and dying. I don't know which is fading faster, Christianity in America or patriotism in America. This writer is approaching 88 years of age and it is amazing the change in the church and crucial patriotic beliefs in my lifetime. The more we humanize animals the more we dehumanize human beings. The more we humanize technology the more we dehumanize the sovereignty of God. You get the feeling the person you are talking to on your cell phone is very human...so much artificial intelligence, more dependable than human intelligence. And to think that animal parts are now being transplanted into human beings. Photosynthesis by plants, eaten by animals, having a direct bearing on the human being that eats the animal that ate the plants...a whole new science...a cheerios tree. Holiness is a gift from God, not a human creation enjoyed by robots or cellphones.

In Tammy Wynette's mansion, in Nashville, there was an $8000 crystal bowl. In the crystal bowl, she had bowls of cotton. She never wanted to forget her beginnings, picking cotton. My parents, grandparents, knew what it was to pick cotton, the heat, the briars, the hedgehogs, but, the difference, they knew the Creator, able to convert plantlife into the making of fabric. They knew the planting of corn seed, often called maize, the most generous plant on the face of the earth. The 1000's of acres of corn around the world, feeding so many people, yet, the simplest, cheapest food nourishment known to man. Would you not like to have been 1 of those to sit at the table of Mary, Martha, Lazarus, and Jesus, eating the cornbread that Martha cooked? This writer would rather have his fried cornbread his mother cooked than the fanciest cake ever found in a Starbucks or any other bakery (this writer has never been in a Starbucks). The schoolboy was not far from wrong when he said his cereal was found on a cheerios tree.

Independence Day, 2018

God Bless America, land that I love; stand beside her and guide her through the night with the light from above. From the mountains, to the prairies, to the oceans white with foam, God Bless America, my Home Sweet Home.

Come Holy Spirit. Americans do not even begin to comprehend their blessings in not only being Americans but living in a nation founded by Christians. It is easy to trust when things go well but Americans and Christians have learned to trust when things DO NOT go well; the fortitude represented by their flag and the Bible.

In my lifetime our spines were tingled hearing Kate Smith sing "God Bless America"...this overweight woman with such a marvelous voice. Have you ever considered the number of people in the world who have never known 1 day of happiness? When you are in these dictator ruled, empty religion, idol worshipping countries (and I have been in most of them) you realize not only the joy of salvation but the beauty of a democratic republic. The word of God is like a diamond mine in South Africa, facets of precious stones reflecting everything good; the ultimate determination of what is genuine. The American Constitution stands out far above and beyond any other form of government the mind of man has comprehended. This is the reason that citizens will break their back to pay taxes voluntarily, raise their children to defend their nation.

Like the equator, mankind operates on either side of an imaginary line. We really cannot read the minds of many who do not agree with us about our faith or our patriotism. We must cut slack; their experiences, what baggage they carry around. In the Muslim countries, they only know what they were taught...schoolhouse/courthouse/their own house, by their own parents. Both C.S. Lewis and Friedrich Nietzsche have told us that Satan's ultimate plan, to enforce the illusion of pseudo-sophistication...that there is always someone coming up with a new plan/method/philosophy for the benefit of man. Satan always pays off in counterfeit...ask those drown by Noah's flood. Stalin or Maos, communist, philosopher, Herod/Nero/Caesars, all efforts to control the minds of men.

Americans will not purchase a pearl at a great price for such an illusion. All the pseudo-sophisticates can offer us is that illusion. The politicians have forgotten that God is in control. The progressives, the indifferent, the modernists, offer us, drink and be merry, "if it feels good, do it", but when you leave the bright lights of "happy hour" and you go home to the darkness of your bedroom the thought always comes to you "is this really all there is to it"? Truth is truth whether anyone believes it or not. In the genus homo-sapiens, the brain cannot accept non-truths whether in advertising, whether from the novelist pen or the movie makers sick mind, God has already incorporated into mankind, a soul; an entity that makes men different from the other animal or plant life. 75% of all animal life on earth is insect life, no soul, no value system. Most pseudo-sophisticates are only appreciated by other pseudo-sophisticates. The real Christian, the real patriot, understands the real values of God and country. Even Jesus, on that cruel cross, said, "they know not what they do". The people chose a robber instead of Him and till this day, many still choose a low-life instead of a Holy life.

The 126,000 of our finest defenders of our American way of life, buried on foreign soil, the millions buried in Arlington and in small family graveyards across this nation, believed in truth and justice. I don't believe you would have ever convinced most of them that a plurality of Americans would stand by and see 59 million innocent babies killed in an abortion holocaust. Those babies deserve justice too. You would never have convinced our early forefathers that the word of God and everything seen in the mind of man would allow people of the same sex marriage, allowed to adopt children; the culture of death, culture of no borders with anything, killings of one another at schoolhouses and church houses. I was in Europe for the 25th Anniversary of Normandy, saw the American cemeteries there. I stood in the Philippines in Manila and saw the graves of the 18,000 buried there. It would be hard to convince these fallen heroes or even those of us who have survived that a nation that has climbed so far up the ladder of success on every plain (education institutions, healthcare facilities, industrial might) could drop so far in our moral and religious values. 

There were 2 things my parents talked about as long as they lived. One was that powerful hurricane called Hazel which struck and destroyed the eastern coast of NC in 1954. The other as the 4th of July picnic which was held every year in the schoolyard at the wonderful 2 room schoolhouse, still standing, across the fields from my grandparent's house. My great aunt was the teacher at that school and died of the flu epidemic in 1918. Her brother, Army officer, member of Theodore Roosevelt's inner circle, died in the Spanish-American war about that time. The entire community came together at the school grounds for a big picnic. Motor vehicles were almost unheard of at that time. Another great uncle would take a team of mules and wagon into town and buy a large block of ice. The only time, during the entire year, they could have ice tea, milkshakes, ice cream. Even in my childhood, power lines were unknown. We used kerosene lamps for light in the house, gas lights for light at the church (I can still see cousin Realmon, standing on a pew, lighting those gaslights). Not only did they have a picnic but they played ball all day. Politicians would come by to this community festival. Everyone came, landowners, tenants, black, white, your status made no difference, they were all Americans...most Christian Americans. There were no police officers in the hallway of the school, no pornography in the school, no sex activity between teachers and pupils and they did not want to live under religious laws such as the Jews of the Old Testament but rather the freedom of choice; to live and learn/sink or swim/according to their own hard work, faith and belief system. They were faithers, action based on belief, sustained by confidence. They had well-placed faith in the future of this nation.

"I only regret that I have but one life to lose for my country". Nathan Hale (6 June 1755 – 22 September 1776)

Return to Remembering: Father's Day 2018

There is nothing as conceivable in the mind of man than the grandeur of the grace of God. Every study, secular or temporal, tells us that good relationships keep us happier and healthier, especially relationships with our own family, and especially relationships with our own parents. That great commandment, given by God to Moses with promise, tells us to honor our parents.

I have been amazed, in a long life, how many young men had no relationship with their own father. Oh! The words they would use about their father, even though they were the carrier of their father's DNA. I never knew a gay male to refer to his father, he always talked about his mother.

Mark Twain said life is not long enough to have hardness, we need softness--certainly softness in the appreciation of parents, no matter how "adrift" the biological father, who planted the seed for your life. There is no way we can know the reason for things working out as they do with couples, divorce, etc. But, God has his reason for bringing people together, for giving certain very definite DNA characteristics to someone like you, characteristics which can never be duplicated. If there had not been illicit sex between David and Bathsheba there would never have been a Solomon, known for the three W's: Wisdom, Wealth, Wives. More importantly, he is known for his great contribution to God's Holy Word.

Every day, we marvel at the courage of so-called "average" people. Every day, we grieve for people who squander their lives... So many suicides among young people.

We all must come to the realization that we cannot jump further than we have jumped already. We are not stuck where we start. That great preacher, Jonathan Edwards--pastor, missionary to Indian tribes--gave us the best definition for free will: God giving man the freedom of choice, the right to choose. Man without God in the mind is just a sophisticated chimpanzee.

Alice, in Alice in Wonderland, came to a fork in the road. A Cheshire cat was in a tree nearby. She asked the cat which direction she should take. The cat said, "where are you going?" and Alice replied, "I don't know." The cat replied, "Then it doesn't matter which direction you take."

The vast population of the world has always been made up of people with simple, genuine opinions. The greatest sound on this earth was the cry of a baby in Bethlehem... perhaps the greatest example of Fatherhood. God worked it all out in the council chambers of eternity. He chose to give us life and then chose to put on a tent of human flesh and live a perfect life among us...willing to die on a cruel tree to show us the very essence of giving. The father gave his son, the son gave his life.

I was amazed at how smart my own father was when I went to college. It did not take me long to have a new appreciation for him, the workingest man I have ever known, and probably the smartest. He did the best he could with what he had...intelligence, work ethic, frugal living, faith in a sovereign God. On the day of his funeral, just before the service started, a large funeral wreath was brought in to join all of those already there. The funeral director came over and handed the card to me and I put it in my pocket. Later, I had someone read the card to me. It was from the local General Assembly State Legislative Senator. "In memory of the only man who ever asked me about the welfare of my soul."

At the university, I was so impressed by men with PhD and MD degrees. They could not begin to measure up to my father, who could understand and cultivate anything. Like his ancestors before him, he prized freedom and knew the meaning of the words "Christian" and "American"...no pretending. From the "Good Earth" they had learned to live from the soil, knew how to raise livestock for survival (hogs and cows, which could be slaughtered for meat, even how to use wild animals from the forest), how to budget time, live frugally, and return to God a large part of income after paying honest debts (debts for fertilizer, seed, building supplies). He knew how to care for his farm animals and would not allow anyone to milk our beautiful cows except him.

We would have been considered peasants in Eastern North Carolina, growing "cash" crops, such as tobacco, cotton, corn, soybeans, to take to the auction market... carefully preparing everything. He and my mother were the stalwarts of our church (built in 1874 by both my mother and fathers' great-grandparents). We had the nicest church in the community, just as we had the nicest home in the community, and just as we had the nicest car/clothing/furniture. You could hear their voices at the church singing. I can still hear him singing as he was around the farm, early in the morning, feeding livestock, "nothing between my soul and the Savior," and many other hymns.

He was not ashamed of his faith. He would work on his tractor until 10 o'clock on Friday night and then stand on his feet all day on Saturday, cutting hair in town to help out the barbershop there and make extra money for us. Then he was up early on Sunday morning, heading for the church to build fires in the wintertime/open windows in the summertime. He was chairman of the school board, and the principal only had to come to him for problems, whether the problem be with a door or a student at the schoolhouse.

My father's four children all graduated from college. After I had returned from the military and had lost my eyesight, and because of the values he had taught me, I would have my driver take me up for a visit. My mother had died much too young. My driver would say, "he will be sitting on the front porch watching for you."

At the front of most churches, you will find the table from which the large supper is served. On most are these words, "In memory of me." Jesus did not tell us to remember him at Christmas, Easter, or any other time...the only time was at the Lord's table, partaking of the bread and wine. His broken body...broken for our healing, his shed blood... every drop for our redemption. Fatherhood has been a failure if you raise children who go to hell, who go to prison.

Standing at the corner Function and Dysfunction

John Piper:

But as for me, I would seek God, And I would place my cause before God; Who does great and unsearchable things, Wonders without number. He gives rain on the earth, And sends water on the fields. Job 5:8-10

If you said to someone: "My God does great and unsearchable things; He does wonders without number," and they responded, "Really? Like what?" would you say, "Rain"?

When I read these verses recently I felt like I did when I heard the lyrics to a Sonny and Cher song in 1969: "I'd live for you. I'd die for you. I'd even climb the mountain high for you." Even? I would die for you. I would even climb a high mountain for you? The song was good for a joke. Or a good illustration of bad poetry. Not much else. But Job is not joking. "God does great and unsearchable things, wonders without number." He gives rain on the earth.".  (https://www.desiringgod.org/articles/the-great-work-of-god-rain).

Most of us choke on the fumes of judgment; we so like to judge one another. Three and a half trillion dollars spent each year in America on health care, which amounts to about $10,000 per person. I don't know how long we can keep this up but we should be glad that we live in a country where its citizens have health care available and we should not easily judge those who spend our tax dollars on frivolous psychological "troubles" or run to the emergency room for just anything that comes up. It is so easy to prevent, so easy to be careful about eating/sleeping/working. I am a great believer in supplements such as vitamins, they're cheap and really do work. Of course, Western medicine, our Western medical schools teach young, health care professionals, "that as long as you eat a good diet, you do not need supplements". Who eats a good diet anymore? All the good minerals have been extracted/leeched from the soil. Surely you can look at the groceries, the counter with vegetables and see that most of them were just hanging on, "mostly alive when harvested".

My main "gripe" with harvested vegetables, the poisons that were sprayed on them in an attempt to control parasites. Needless to say, some young people do not have the intelligence to wash well, their lettuce/cucumbers/peppers/beans, etc., before using them. Not only should they be washed well but soaked in a solution of water and vinegar. I cannot imagine anyone eating a salad that has not been thoroughly washed or anything else that hasn't been thoroughly cooked. Heat still destroys most bacteria/parasites. If you want to know how clean the food that you put into your "temple"; examine it with a magnifying glass.

I must depend on someone else to prepare my food, buy it at the store, etc.; I like vegetables with boiled eggs. One of my assistants brought in a bag of salad mix. I said, "make sure you wash it well". She said, "I think it is already clean, right out of the bag. I see them put it out at buffets, right out of a bag". I said, "get a magnifier and look at all that trash and all of those bugs in that salad mix plus chemical residue". I thought she was going to "throw up" on my food. Since I graduated from the university, almost 70 years ago, 88 new chemicals and chemical compounds have been produced to put on food crops. And we wonder why people get sick...it is not just a small amount but a cumulative effect that does damage to the body.

Rat poison is mostly harmless cornmeal, it is that small amount of arsenic that kills the rat and the genome of the rat is just 5 degrees from that of the human species. Your writer was raised on a farm. My daddy used to say that something was trying to eat everything he planted from the time he put the seed in the ground until the very last. What did our ancestors do before all of these chemicals? They let the birds, chickens, etc., take care of the problem. One of my great aunts had her flock of turkeys trained to walk down the rows of any garden or crop field and rid the plants of insects. She did not spend her time watching soap operas on television, dreaming of having a relationship with one of those "he-she's" that were so good looking, so cute. Like most of the world, television actors pretending to be someone they are not; the doctors on television could not put on a band-aid. I doubt if Martha Stewart has ever seen a butter churn.

We are all living on the corner of function and dysfunction, having lost the ability to think with common sense...now too lazy to even look at a wristwatch, rather we ask Google what time it is; too lazy to even write a complimentary note to anyone about anything. It is so easy to use a cell phone. What are we doing with all of this time we are saving? Do you see anyone, anywhere, involved in God's mission, his work, his ministry? How well I remember the saints at our country church, cleaning their own church, cleaning their own churchyard...and then going to the graveyard and cleaning it. Most of today's young people have not set one foot in their ancestral graveyard, have no idea about the lives, the DNA, that they have inherited.

The greatest forfeiture of the people I know, millennials, baby boomers, even the elderly; a lack of humility. We think we are so smart, take so much pride in having all these blessings of healthcare, technical advances, just dumped in our lap. Pride is the beginning of every sin and we are so proud of what we have accomplished. I never knew my maternal grandmother to get into a car without talking about how "good it rode". You see, she had known bumps in the road, weather beating in the buggy. Even when I was young there were so few paved roads in Eastern North Carolina (highways 17 and 301 going north and south, highway 70 going east and west). Intimacy with God brings humbleness. You function better when you realize that all the power, grace, mercy, of the creator of the universe, available just as much to you as to anyone... this gets you through the difficulties of life and living.

When you consider your hardships, think of our blessed Lord's mother, nine months pregnant, riding on a donkey. Most church people today have the "Pilot's" syndrome, we know what is right but we just want to wash our hands of the entire matter.

Glad to have received word of this award today. Woodard Receives J. William Byrd Award for Staff Excellence

Lid For Every Pot

A Gift

Amy Lowell, 1874 - 1925

See! I give myself to you, Beloved!
My words are little jars
For you to take and put upon a shelf.
Their shapes are quaint and beautiful,
And they have many pleasant colours and lusters
To recommend them.
Also the scent from them fills the room
With sweetness of flowers and crushed grasses.

When I shall have given you the last one,
You will have the whole of me,
But I shall be dead.

Most of us go through life perceiving everything will go our way. It is the difference in everything that makes life interesting, a true so of individuality. 90% of all life on earth is insect life...all different...and we wonder why God actually created fire ants.

Some friends were sitting with me on the porch of my beach house, one brought my attention even though I could not see it, that an ant was crawling across the floor, carrying a stick several times its size. God often referred to the ability of the workaholic ants. One of the persons on the porch went over and stepped on the ant...thinking he was doing the world a favor instead of learning from the ant, the fact that they are always busy. There are bees the size of a grain of rice that can fly 1000's of miles to pollinate certain trees. When I was at the North Pole, some of the mountainsides were covered with small birds, turns, that fly from the North to the South Pole each year, using only their internal magnetism, supplied to them the creator, God. They are smaller than your fist. Every day of my life I think of the advances made during my lifetime; a time when there was only 1 telephone for many miles, now almost every school child has a telephone with more extravagant technology than the system that landed on the moon.

It is not easy to live the gospel but if it were easy than the rewards would not be so great. I used to think everyone had my values, NOT SO! Not even your own family members, your friends, your neighbors, but they have a right to live their life and we never know what baggage they are hauling around, what experiences have caused them to think or act as they do. Everyone has only 1 life to live, 1 time on the merry-go-round, 1 time on the ferris wheel and then, it is all over.

The greatest message to young people, your life is not all about you. The greatest message to get across is that God took the time to write a book, a book with all the answers. If there is anything I have learned in life, both believers and non-believers, no one wants to let go of the steering wheel. The new Christian, new believer is like the new student driver, holding on tight to the steering wheel. Then, we look around and see the indifference of other believers at the church house. Then, we look around and see the indifference of our fellow citizen/patriots; their crumbling affection for their country, mostly because of pretending politicians. Then, we look around and see the games people play in their professions; in their technical ability; in their financial astuteness, no matter how long it took for them to get there. How easy it is to lose basic values. I never heard my parents, my grand parents use a 4 letter curse word. They had values and yet, with God's gift of freedom comes your right to even go to hell if you wish, to be abusive, to desire trash, "there is a lid for every pot".

The single most difficult prayer to pray, "into your hands". You do not need to put a guard at the lion's cage. God knows we are in His hands. Once in Africa, in my little jeep with my driver and guide, we came upon a pride of 23 lions. They sleep with their feet sticking straight up in the air. I said to the guide, "oh my Lord, get me away from here!". He said, "those lions certainly aren't afraid of us". The swap of just one's paw would end us forever. The flotsam and jetsam of everyday life, someone texting on a cell phone at a traffic light, a piece of meat hung in your throat, any one of a 1000 circumstances that could take your life and that rare gift of life is all over.

I am so thankful that God gave me the intelligence, and more important, the opportunity to study the human body, God's greatest creation. And just to think that we live in a world where human life means so little, a culture of death, more deaths from suicide than any disease, 1000's of babies aborted every day...great doctors/musicians/geniuses of every type, and most of all, parents. And, think of it, parents willing to make the sacrifices necessary to teach and train those who have designed the great buildings of the world (or even the lowly bricklayer). Those who have been willing to burn the midnight oil when they too, could have been out at happy hour, to learn intricate surgery techniques (the nurses and technicians that assist them); those with the ability to interpret calculations as engineers to build great highways (as well as the truck drivers that haul the dirt).

Every time I have ever been on a train, and I crossed most of the world by train, once, London to Hong Kong, those rails up on a bed for so many years, before the time of machinery, I thought of the animals that had to dig the dirt that built those great railroad beds. On the London to Hong Kong Oriental Express, at the Russian border, the wheels on the train no longer fit the rails, so the wheels on the train must be changed. Guess who changed the wheels...women (they jacked up the train cars and changed the wheels) and they are still doing that until this very day. And, until a few years ago, it was mostly women who taught school (my 5th-grade teacher received $85 a month for teaching)...I know because my father was the school board chairman. What would these teachers in these states that are protesting, say to that? And, I well remember that this doctor was paid $2 to see a welfare patient, and I saw my own mother working the fields all day long to make $1. But not her only, other women, hauled from town to pick cotton in the fields all day long to make a few dollars...no bathroom facilities, no food facilities, dragging babies along on their cotton sacks. My own precious grandmother, more educated than most women of her time, raising 9 children, playing the piano, delivering the babies and laying out the dead in the community, picked cotton on my grandfather's plantation, the day following her marriage.

In the malstrum of living most people just see what they want to see in the world; they have no idea what has been handed down to them, AND, if they have no appreciation of what God has done for them; does for them every day of their life (even the very air they breathe), providing eternal separation from sins degradation, "thou wilt shew me the path of life: in thy presence is fulness of joy; at thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore" (Psalms 16:11); but, if human beings, the chief heirs of God's marvelous creation, the only animals to which He gives salvation, do not appreciate His goodness here on earth, how could they possibly appreciate His sacrifice on a cross on a hill called Calvary?

If I have learned anything with age you never know what is going on in another person's mind. Joy is the most undeniable evidence of God's presence; in Heaven, there will be nothing but joy. It is beyond my comprehension, those saved by grace through faith in Christ, do not look forward to this joy which keeps 1 from fearing death. For anyone who ever comes in my house I want them to feel the hope and joy of eternal life, lives here.

On another trip to Africa, under a tent, and my tent mate had forgotten to zip up the tent. A snake came slithering through the opening. Again, outside the tent, I could put both my hands side by side in the footprint of an animal who came sniffing around the tent at night and to think that I paid good money for this type experience; yet, free, a gift, the answer book which few people ever read; and again, to think, free, the greatest power in the world, the power of prayer, man's ability to communicate with the creator of the universe, on a one to one basis.

It has been said wisdom comes with age; sometimes age comes all by itself. I never look down on a person in order to lift them up. I can only share my faith, my experiences, my hope of redemption. I used to watch large 50-gallon trash bags filled with food hauled from a restaurant near my office. I have been told by restaurant workers how much food is ordered, never eaten, just thrown away, in most restaurants. How easy to throw away the bread of life, the spirit of life, given so graciously to us. If gold rusts, what do you expect iron to do? My message to empty pots at the church house, (country club with a steeple), courthouse, (abused lady justice), schoolhouse, (shootings and slothliness), God help us to put the lid on our pride, our sinful ways.

Dust and Decay

“Strong minds discuss ideas, average minds discuss events, weak minds discuss people.” ― Socrates

Loneliness is as accurate a predictor of early mortality as smoking cigarettes. Already, at age 87, I have explained my certain mortality from the disease of cancer. The loneliness of laying in bed gives you much time to think...I have had such an active, remarkable life...academic, military, professional, financial AND THEN, I reached down for a bottle of water by my bed and fell off my bed. My constant companion on my bedside table, Mr. Google Chrome, to whom I can ask any question, such as the population of any city anywhere, the temperature of any place on the earth; any scripture reference; any well known quotation; any telephone number and he says nothing, such as, "what are you doing trying to kill me?" Can anyone even imagine, in my lifetime, where, when I was young, a typewriter was a great invention, you can speak into a "technical marvel" on my bedside table and someone was smart enough to come up with such a development which can answer any question without even a pause. All I have to say is, "Mr. Google, what is the temperature in Perth, Australia? and he immediately replies, "the temperature is 60", no hesitation, no pause, an immediate computer answer. And so it is with anything this marvel of technology. But when I fell, however, he said nothing; my nurse came running and got me back on the bed.

The miracles of knowledge, that someone could, with the human mind, develop such technology. C.S. Lewis said you are never too old to set a new goal, dream a new dream. Modern technology for today's technology scientist is like finding 4 grains of sand on the seashore amid trillions of grains. The average person on a bar stool at a bar's "happy hour" has no comprehension of the ability involved in brain activity, such as analyzing the chemistry of microfibers, such as the physics and mathematics involved in calculating the bending of light rays entering water. This Dr., scientist, retired Army Lt. Col. must confess, here and now, first time in my life, that mentally enshrined in a world of so much knowledge, in order to pass an exam involving the world of quantum physics knowledge I was allowed to use a "tables book" in my exam so that I could look up certain mathematical determinants. I put "cheating" in the book, certain equations and formula's which I knew would come up and which I knew I had not memorized. Little does the world know of the knowledge involved when one has a doctorate such as knowing about the ability of an insect the size of a grain of rice to fly 1000's of miles to pollinate certain plants...transporting material on the insects legs...the ability to determine this DNA under the lens of a microscope. Such dust particle knowledge just keeps piling on, forever, and then, as the poet said, "you die and it all decays". As Shakespeare said "The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars / But in ourselves, that we are underlings.”

So well I remember the day we young, Army, officer, Dr's, filled an auditorium for a lecture on forensic detecting. We were told then that technology had been developed in microbe warfare, where 1 drop of a nerve gas was potent enough to kill everyone in that room. This was over 60 years ago before Russian/North Korea, started using such for their purposes.

We are stupid enough to think that everyone is born with our values, our God given sovereignty of "trust". We trust a piece of paper from the doctor, writing that no one can read and take pills we believe will help us. One of my ex-employees told me that in a restaurant where she worked, if a serviceman/policeman/fireman, anyone wearing a uniform came in, they would all spit into his food before it was delivered to them. Tutsi/Hutu warfare, 1 country, Rwanda, 300,000 killed, mostly with machetes, almost as horrible as the American Civil War where 600,000 were killed mostly with swords.

Hate, mindlessness, has not changed in spite of technology. All life is built around trust, trust that people will believe what you say or write. Trust that you will get what you order and pay for. The human experience of trust is like a holding a small bird in your hand; too tight, and you kill it; too loose, and the bird flies away. You trust others to obey traffic signs, the mechanic who works on your car; the pilot in the cockpit of the plane you are on; the surgeon standing over you in the operating room with a knife.

So, the dust of experience accumulated day after day, year after year and, when you have learned to appreciate human weaknesses as well as human strengths. All this accumulation ends in decay...no matter who you are...your status in life, your joy or challenge of living. How can anyone with good sense desire to spend eternity with the distrust and the hopelessness of decay? If anything would cause a human being to desire salvation the joys of eternal life, a free gift of the Creator of life, it is that certain sovereignty/love and kindness from the Creator of life. Thy love and kindness is better than life. KJV PSalms 63:3.

The Thrill of Easter

We should be thrilled to know there is a God much greater than the one we believe in.  The true Easter message, we can bury our own mythological ideas about God.  His Holiness/greatness are far beyond our understanding.  But, who could worship a God that we can understand?  Because He was willing to put on a tent of human flesh, dwell among us, die for us, allow us to join Him in His resurrection from the dead we might even conceive of Satan standing by the "Broad way" saying, "those are mine" and Jesus standing by the narrow way, stating with great delight, "these few saints on the narrow way are mine".  (KJV Matthew 7:13-14).  

The thrill of Easter "again, like Christmas, defaced by commercialism with rabbits laying eggs/and now like small children now, adults having egg hunts".  The consolation of leaving a saved loved one in the graveyard BECAUSE, like every other promise of God those who have believed in the saving grace and sacrifice, and resurrection of His son will also resurrect.  And, the soul which instantly goes to Heaven or Hell at death will be reunited with the body whether the body was buried in dirt, in the ocean, or cremated.  We must learn to believe in a God of grace and glory that is beyond anything that we can comprehend; not a generalized God who walks around as a police man but a God of power, grace, and mercy who has the very hairs of our head numbered; by whose stripes we are healed from any disease (KJV Isaiah 53:5) and life's greatest consolation for the believer, His promise "I will never leave thee nor forsake thee" (KJV Hebrews 13:5); a God whose tender embrace knows every one's name.  Just think, we mere weaklings, human beings entrapped/tethered to our own "smartness" think that our wisdom is greater than that of God.  We want God in our image, not ours in His.  We like chocolate rabbits laying colored eggs.  We like a "bell-hop" God, one we can call on, only in time of need.  We want a God who is happy if we show up to worship Him one hour to the week, often dragging in late, even giving him a few tips when the offertory plate is passed, having the audacity to sing with real believers "my Jesus I love thee, I know thou art mine".  We do not want to be different in language/dress/activities.  We think God was joking when He said "Whether therefore ye eat, or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God" (1 Corinthians 10:31 King James Version (KJV). 

Personally, I resent the "unsaved world" taking over our Christian Holy days making them secular holidays.  I had a member of the millennial generation doing some typing for me; I asked the question, "why are young people so unconcerned about life and living?"  She said, "We are just indifferent to it all".  I asked a black woman who works for me, "what is taught and preached in the black churches?  Don't they realize their numbers in prison, etc.", she said, "they simply don't care"...such a price Jesus paid "for it all". 

Satan has already driven the Christian message inside places of worship and very little worship goes on in the church house.  Our churches are more like civic clubs.  Look around your church and see how many crosses are on the walls.  Even the Catholics have begun to remove crucifixes from their walls.

We must get real in our belief system, in this day of casual death "abortions/euthanasia", Christianity must become real, the miles Mary walked from Nazareth to her cousin Elizabeth's house, I judge 750 miles, the millions of Jews walked along with Egyptians to take Jacob home for burial, The miles Thomas walked in crossing the Himalayas to India; there to die at Madras from a Brahma sword, Dr. Luke hanged from an olive tree in Greece, Bartholomew, skinned alive, Mark, dragged through the streets of Alexandria, Egypt, Paul beheaded, Peter crucified, the youngest disciple who joined Jesus at age 17, boiled in oil then exiled to Pat mos and there have been many others, then until now on this side of the cross, "(Of whom the world was not worthy:) they wandered in deserts, and in mountains, and in dens and caves of the earth". (Hebrews 11:38 King James Version (KJV). 

Our ancestors had little light at night, but read the Bible, the answer book.  The Jews had no light, little methods of writing or reading, could not understand that Jesus would rise on the third day.  If they had understood, they would have been at the grave yard, waiting.  So, nothing surprises God, 2000 years ago or now.  Nothing surprised Him on the other side of the cross, the beguiled children of Israel or the 7 nations they had to conquer.  Nothing surprised Him before the flood of Noah, when everyone was doing what they wanted to do but, when the rains came and the water reached their nostrils, covered the highest mountain tops, and those who were saved along with the animals He chose to save, floated away, they had reason to believe.  Our time will come.

Happy Enough

Do not allow circumstances to frighten you.

Do not allow situations to torture you.

Look beyond the appearances.

Yours will be the unmistakable happiness.

-Sri Chinmoy-

Thank you, God, for loving me more than I loved myself. No acts are greater than the action of giving. Believers are faithers, faith is a verb, action based on belief sustained by confidence. No words give God more pleasure than the attention lavished on the poor and to those socialists, "do-gooders", even Jesus said, "the poor you have with you always" (Mark 14:7). When this writer, world traveler, stood with the Cuban delegation at the May Day parade, Red Square, Moscow, and the workers marched and the same in outer Mongolia, and the same in China, I knew then, as I know now, behind all their fake happy smiles, Communism is not enough. This is my answer to anyone who finds so much fault with the Western way of life.

Most of the real poor in this world live below the 30th parallel, Africa/South America/Asia. The poorest Americans live better than most people in the world.

This writer owned a condominium on the east side of Manhattan, New York City, for many years. I would spend about 1 week a month there. It was near the UN and I was friends with UN officials. I became active in a group called Volunteer Services for Children (wealthy New Yorkers who sponsored shelters or orphanages all over the world for destitute children: victims of war). One Saturday I went to a meeting of the group held at the Hilton Hotel on the Avenue of the Americas. The taxi driver would help me get into the building and from there, I would take an escalator, I could find the meeting room. One Saturday I had to go the "men's room" during the meeting and got turned around, lost my bearings and went to a groups' meeting in another room. Of course, they greeted this blind man very warmly, at the time were having coffee and doughnuts. It was a communist workers union group. One man said, "we are going to hear Gus talk this afternoon at another meeting, we would like for you to go with us since you are a traveled, Army officer veteran". By then, I realized I had made a wrong turn but saw I had nothing to lose by meeting Gus Hall, head of the Communist party in America and Presidential candidate. So I loaded into a taxi with them and went to a meeting on the West Side. I have never heard such vitriol against my country. He described, how an entire city, any city, could be burned down overnight. He called it "cigarette lighter, draperies and bed spreads fire".The plan of action, the wind just right, enough ice picks in the tires of fire trucks, enough windows broken, draperies and bed spreads set afire, just how quickly an entire city can burn down. The opportunity/responsibility/security furnished every American citizen, does not make people happy...just not enough.

I have found that most young people have a sparkle in their eyes when they talk about technology/idealism of socialism do not have such when you talk about salvation and even eternal life. They just don't believe there is anything to it, that life here on this earth is all there is, that what they endure here is enough: that the wisdom of this world is enough: that the wealth of this world is enough: that the thrills of this brief life here on earth is enough. Those at "happy hour" in your local bars and clubs, this very day, alcohol/strange music/perverted sexual experiences are enough.

Today's university student actually believes that only those things can be believed that are found in a test tube. Steven Hawkings, who died this week,  most of his life in a wheelchair, communicating through a voice synthesizer, with all his brilliance (considered to have the greatest mind since Einstein) thought that this world was enough. NOW HE KNOWS. He could have had eternal life, joys forever, where there is no ALS; where he could have spent eternity with ascending, not descending, people; where he could have lived in brightness, not darkness, forever (people who love darkness rather than light, John 3:19) but Steven thought that the fame and notoriety that he had found here on this earth because of this great gifted mind given to him by God, was enough...NOW HE KNOWS.

In speaking of unbelievers today's advances are not enough, constantly talking and planning on what comes next...a more remarkable telephone/car/sexual pleasure, never just content with anything. Inventors do not invent just for more money. Most of the upper 3% who pay most of the tax, already have enough. The builder of a bigger/better airplane does not have the goal of having robots fly the plane into the side of a mountain, a bigger/better car/driverless cars piled up on the highway/hospital operating rooms with robots in scrub clothing.

Who are the gatekeepers? Who will finally say that the human persona cannot be removed from life; that God wanted SOULS of men whom He chose for His eternal companionship.

Not until 1914 and the entrance on the world stage of National Geographic did the world not know much about "far away places with strange sounding names and their fellow man who lived there".

You appreciate the fickleness and cynicism of old people when you get there. It was not until I was in Chin Yang, Manchuria, in a communist hospital, body parts being transferred from healthy, Chinese prisoners to sick people, that I understood the importance of old people having overcome the horrors/terrorism/disappointments, of their fellow man and they could still laugh. Hearing now, almost daily, horror stories of shootings and other calamities we know that being happy, even if only for a few minutes, hours or days, will have to be enough, while on this earth. For the believer, rejoice, the time of sublime happiness is just ahead. Whatever your problem, the nation's problem, Jesus has always been at the crossroads of life before we got there. 

Life is Tough, AND THEN, you die, AND THEN???

                                     

...the anvil and the hammer to tear my soul;
the fire and the metal to mend my holes;
the blacksmith forging straight ahead;
to create this man before you instead;
the truth is my body is strong and pure;
seems the sculptor had given the cure;
but the sculpture is still an unfinished piece;
no eyes to see and no heart to beat;
to become the masterpiece I have to become;
the sculptor is myself and my hands must be strong;
cause self isn’t made by greater powers;
it must be forged in fire with an anvil and hammer.
https://allpoetry.com/poem/11760800-The-Anvil-and-The-Hammer-by-The-Marcellian

Often when you think your life is over, you may just be getting started. The anvil wears out many hammers. God is still on his throne in spite of the world, flesh, devil. Truth is truth whether anyone believes it or not.

I have been thinking much recently about those who simply refuse to believe in God. I have recently developed a painful/aggravating hernia on my abdomen (a bulge about the size of a large egg, my oncologist tells me that no surgeon is going to use a knife on me at my age and in my cancer condition). It brought on the thoughts of a family who lived near us and my talking with the oldest son in the family who, with his wife and 2 boys, lived in a house near his father's house. He had brought his wife to me as a patient. She attended church along with the boys but he never did, like his own father. Here was his excuse for not believing in God; I grew up seeing my father drive his car down to your church to take my mother who was a devout believer and then he would go back to pick her up. In my father's house, I had a younger brother (whom this writer remembers sitting in the sun on the front porch). He died at age 14, never having spoken a word, just a biological organism who was changed and fed by this dear woman. This older brother of this unbelieving father said, "the pastor of your church never went to our house the first time and never showed any interest in my mother's plight in caring for this totally invalid child and, the so-called Christian community showed little concern when our family's house burned down. How does a God of love permit such unloving acts and can this excuse my father's unbelief and consequently my own unbelief."

This son had a very painful hernia, which, as far as I know, he lived with his whole adult life, doing hard work. The thing aggravating him constantly and he, unable to come up with the funds to have anything done about it. On a farm, working in rain/heat/cold, with the insidious pain that irritates any protrusion, such as a hernia, one can easily understand why you could easily hold God responsible for problems which people from the beginning of time have endured and, why would one child of a perfectly normal loving mother, never speak, never enjoy anything that normal children would enjoy...just a burden and more important, everyone at that church saw her faithfulness in going to church; knew about her unbelieving husband and yet, no one, not even the pastor ever showed she or her family, Christan benevolence.

Dealing with suffering is a great teacher. Only a very small percentage of the population of the world never experience suffering, often used as an excuse for unbelief. Dr. Victor Frankel, himself a Jewish doctor prisoner in a Nazi concentration camp, said it was only the inner man, the want for survival, that got you through this life. The prisoners in the concentration camp knew that all they had to do was run towards a gate and a guard from the guard tower would shoot them dead and their suffering would be over.

Once we know the 'why' of living then we can concentrate on the 'how' of living. Those who are disabled, those who understand inequities, know that God is ultimately in charge; it is just a matter of trusting Him. Blindness has been my greatest blessing because I am much closer to God now than when sighted BUT I have the mental ability to understand this. Who would have ever known Helen Keller if she had not overcome both blindness and muteness? When Hitler started his book burning her book was at the top of the list to be destroyed. The first people to be destroyed were the disabled/gypsies/hospitalized. God put the first man and woman He created in a perfect world, a perfect environment. He made only one provision in His dealing with mankind "don't touch that tree!". Man has always rebelled, and mankind has always paid the price.

How can anyone doubt God any more than you can doubt history or the world around you? We could easily use Pascal's wager instead of attempting to persuade the unsaved about the love of God. Pascal said "what do you have to lose by believing, if you believe and it is true you have inherited eternal life with God in His Glory. If it does not turn out to be true and you do not have a soul, your body just becomes fertilizer, what have you lost? You lived a life of beautiful absolutes. The absolutes of right and wrong, of loving one another, you win either way".

Christianity is not completed, just tough. Belief in God is a matter of the heart. He will draw you if He wants you and He is perfectly willing to accept you just as you are, willing to forgive every sin which you are willing to give up.

Reverend Billy Graham

Billy Graham R.I.P. (rest in peace). Your writer is from the Billy Graham generation.  He was a part of the family.  Sightless, I could not watch the funeral service on television but I listened to it and 1 of my assistance described everything to me.

Every Christian should be so profoundly appreciative that the service not only honored this great preacher but every speaker/prayer/song, so completely honored Jesus Christ.  Most of today's millennia's have never worshipped under a tent, or a brush arbor (tree limbs over a large area protecting you from the sun and rain).  Even in the wealthiest Manhattan skyscrapers Jews still use such for a type of worship, celebrating, not forgetting their time in the desert.  I worshipped under a brush arbor in Africa and went to many tent services here in eastern North Carolina.

The service was truly worthy of the man and the Lord who he served.  I was told by 1 of his assistants with the association during the many crusades, that they had to be so careful about everywhere Billy stayed making sure there was no one with satanic purposes which the media would have devoured; above his hotel room, below his hotel room or on either side attempting to get into his room to embarrass him and the Christian world.  No one ever heard 1 word about Graham's lack of integrity...perhaps his 5 children who spoke were a testimony of his influence and devotion in his own family.  Nor, was there attempt at extravagance in his burial.

The world will little remember the lives of most Christians.  So many worship services have become just big productions.  I so loved the preaching ministry of Dr. R.G. Lee, long time pastor, Bellevue Baptist, Memphis Tennessee.  In these sunset years of my life I regret that he was self-centered.  I would hear him say, "If I tell my people to jump in the river, I will hear water splash.  If I tell my people to jump in the fire I will smell clothes burning".  Humility/meekness is a grace which Christians should learn early in life and this writer/speaker had a very hard time learning it.  I've often considered this when I saw a pastor head for the foyer to shake the hands of those in the congregation and get their praise for his sermon.  If truly effective they should have been weeping and many times, a truly knowledgeable Christian should have walked out of some services where the preacher did not understand what he was talking about.  I suppose most of us were content to sit there and pray for god's mercy.

I believe more unsaved people are touched or face death and their own souls' salvation at a funeral service such as the Billy Graham service than any revival meeting...where; so many times it is just a matter of signing a card (joining the church), perhaps even baptized.  I truly believe that those watching and listening to the Billy Graham funeral service knew that the mans faith was real, that Jesus, his power/grace/mercy/salvation, are real.

My parents never kept any of the realities of life and living from me and death is a part of life.  I still remember the 1st funerals as a very small child.  Before the time of antibiotics, around 1943, there were so many deaths from even simple diseases.  My mother's best friend, Rosell, died from the flu and I remember standing with her at the grave sight.  Death, the grave, the grave yard, was such a mystery to me.  In later years, I spent much time studying grave yards, my ancestral names, the dates, that hyphen between the date of birth and death, wondering what the person was like, wondering about their problems.  I rejoice in knowing that my family, the church where we worshipped (built by my ancestors in 1874) did not hesitate to emphasize heaven and hell, that there is no neutral place just as this Billy Graham service. 

One of my funeral home friends tells me that death has been greatly sanitized, that most families no longer even go to the funeral home.  "Just put him next to 'the cheapest casket you have and cover it with the church pall', no one will see the casket anyway'.  They don't even want to look at the deceased member; they just want to get it over with".  Jesus wept when his friend Lazarus died.  Today, the saved have reason to rejoice/celebrate when believers die because "Jesus paid it all, in his death on the cross".

I was at St. Mary's Catholic cemetery in London where I had searched for Francis Thompson "love is a many splendored thing".  A simple casket covered with an American flag, pulled on a cart followed by a woman in a wheel chair, pushed by a Catholic priest was the entire funeral cortege.  I went back to the gravesite where the workmen had already started throwing dirt on the casket.  I reached down and took her gloved hand, "I am an American".  She handed me the battle flag which had covered the casket.  The priest said, "She is not very cognitive but appreciates you being here.  They met in WWII and she was in a nursing home, separate from the 1 where he died.  Soon they will be together again".