Guess We'll Always Have Football

After being a Detroit Lions fan for over 60 years I've learned one important lesson.  The world will not end after your team loses.  We always have those high draft picks to offer us hope.  But what if the world is supposed to end and then doesn't?  This time we still have those college bowl games to look forward to, ready to live or die with our strange loyalties while eating yet another piece of pizza.  

Guess We'll Always Have Football

The world didn't end

so will you be my friend?

You couldn't ask for anything more.

After twelve twenty one

still the hot Mayan sun

is there anything else now in store?

I've heard my dear friend

that the Irish will send

their best to battle the Tide.

To hold back the oceans

they'll need leprechaun potions

Vegas margins are really that wide.

But should they prevail

look for lightning and hail.

Be careful, don't fall on your bum.

If the sun doesn't shine

and your engine won't whine

I'll come running to save you dear chum.

Tidings Of Comfort And Joy

Christmas will never be the same for the many families who recently lost their loved ones.  What makes it even more difficult is that we all know that this is supposed to be a season of anxious anticipation, overflowing joy, a time when we share those experiences with the ones that are close to us.  When family we love can no longer be with us there will be pain.

I want to share with you the Christmas story from Matthew.  This is a story of great joy mixed with  tremendous sorrow, but in the end it is a story of hope.  That hope is brought about by a Father who loves us. Unfortunately His eternal plan is opposed by the father of lies, who scripture says was a murderer from the beginning.  That dear friends, is the world we still live in.  But lies cannot live in the light that is the Father.  Love will always comfort hurt.  Our hope is powerful because it is not based on imagination but rather on what is true, "the substance of things not seen".

Now the birth of Jesus Christ was as follows:

When his mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together she was found to be with child by the Holy Spirit.  And Joseph her husband, being a righteous man and not wanting to disgrace her, planned to send her away secretly.  But when he had considered this, behold an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, "Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife;  for the child in her is of the Holy Spirit.  She will bear a Son;  and you shall call His name Jesus, for He will save His people from their sins."

Now all this took place to fulfill what was spoken by the Lord through the prophet:

Behold, the virgin shall be with child and shall bear a Son, and they shall call His name Immanuel", which translated means, "God with us."

And Joseph awoke from his sleep and did as the angel of the Lord commanded him, and took Mary as his wife, but kept her a virgin until she gave birth to a Son;  and he called His name Jesus.

Now after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the king, magi from the east arrived in Jerusalem, saying, "Where is He who has been born King of the Jews?  For we have seen His star in the east and have come to worship Him."  When Herod the king heard this, he was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him.  Gathering together all the chief priests and scribes of the people, he inquired of them where the Messiah was to be born.

They said to him, "In Bethlehem of Judea;  for this is what has been written by the prophet;

'And you, Bethlehem, land of Judah, are by no means least among the leaders of Judah;  For out of you shall come shall come forth a ruler who will shepherd My people Israel.' "

Then Herod secretly called the magi and determined from them the exact time the star appeared, and he sent them to Bethlehem and said, "Go and search carefully for the Child;  and when you have found Him, report to me so that I too may come and worship Him."  After hearing the king they went their way;  and the star which they had seen in the east went on before them until it came and stood over the place where the Child was.  When they saw the star they rejoiced exceedingly with great joy.

After coming into the house they saw the Child with Mary His mother;  and they fell to the ground and worshiped Him.  Then, opening their treasures, they presented to Him gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh.  And having been warned by God in a dream not to return to Herod the magi left for their own country by another way.

Now when they had gone, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said, "Get up!  Take the Child and His mother and flee to Egypt, and remain there until I tell you;  for Herod is going to search for the Child to destroy Him.  So Joseph got up and took the Child and His mother while it was still night, and left for Egypt . . .

Then when Herod saw that he had been tricked by the magi he became very enraged, and sent and slew all the male children who were in Bethlehem and all it's vicinity, from two years old and under, according to the time he had determined from the magi.

Then what had been spoken through Jeremiah the prophet was fulfilled;

"A voice was heard in Ramah, weeping and great mourning, Rachel weeping for her children;  And she refused to be comforted, because they were no more."

But when Herod died, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared in a dream to Joseph in Egypt, and said, "Get up, take the Child and His mother and go into the land of Israel; for those who sought the Child's life are dead."  So Joseph got up, took the Child and His mother and came into the land of Israel.  (NAS)

May the Father of life give it to you in abundance this Christmas season.  May the Hold Spirit bring Jesus into your heart so that for you He will truly be, Immanuel, God with us.  May His comfort carry you through your pain.  And may His joy knock you off your feet.

The Annual Christmas Letter

We have family who live far, far away in a galaxy called Iowa. In what seems almost forever we have been receiving enclosed with their annual Christmas card (now photo page) a long letter, signed - Jon, Nancy and family - but written of course by my sister-in-law Nancy. We also have been receiving, for a long time but not forever, an annual Christmas letter from family that live a little closer in Chicago. That one is signed by Ed and Carol. In the earlier years I wasn't quite sure which one had been doing the writing but now the prose is definitely from my brother-in-law Ed.

Both letters came on the same day this year. I sat in my rocker/recliner, put on my reading glasses, and thoroughly enjoyed updates on the various family activities (Nancy's specialty) and far flung travel adventures (Ed could and maybe should write for the kind of magazine that has those beautiful color pictures of French cathedrals or Peruvian llamas).

This year after finishing the second letter a warm feeling tweaked my otherwise Christmas Grinch heart. After having read those letters for all of those years this had now become for me an enjoyable Christmas tradition. I'll admit it wasn't always so. One year I wrote a parody of a Christmas letter (would I do that?) telling exaggerated stories about one family disaster after another - “We are so proud of Carrie. She tried out for the volleyball team and although she got cut she wisely used the next three weeks alone in her room to reconsider her priorities.”

Ah, warm feelings. For the last couple of years that seems to have been the underlying theme of Ed and Carol's travels. For example, this year they went on a tour of “the Villages and the Vineyards of Eastern France” where there would always present itself a need to “sip a wee bit of wine”. Now I myself do not imbibe but wine is like a big deal on my side of the family. One of my cousins married into a family that owns a vineyard set among the redwood forests of Northern California. They are one of the pioneers of organic grown wines and you can check out their beautiful web site at www.freywines.com.

My brother Jim lived in Florence, Italy for a year and is the type of guy that while dining out will choose the year and vintage for the entire table. The wine guy will present the bottle to my brother, pour him a little, and then we all watch as Jim swirls the liquid around the glass while holding it up to the light, sniffs the contents, then takes a sip. He pulls his head back, eyes closed, and we are silent seeing that the wine must be really good because Jim is having himself a moment. Moment over Jim's eyes will pop open, a smile will cross his face and he will in true LaBarge style announce that fortunately it had been a very dry year when those grapes were grown and the wine master handled the crush expertly.

Social media has helped a lot in keeping up with far flung family. We now have access to a lot of cute pictures and precious stories and when we are fortunate enough to actually press the flesh we feel that we are already so much more up to date on what is happening and what that little nephew bugger really looks like. Maybe that has made me enjoy those letters even more.

Mayan Calendar Miscalculation

Oops! Perhaps the world is not going to end on 12/21/12 after all. Researchers at MIT Community College have uncovered a shocking new development that relates to the interpretation of Mayan glyphs that directly affects precisely how one should read the soft limestone artifacts purporting to be their universal calendar.

It seems that back in 1961 when the stone pieces were first discovered the archeology team responsible for excavating the particular calendar section of glyphs from the ruins of Building number 17 had no idea what information the pieces conveyed. Centuries of jungle growth, mold and dirt did not allow for any accurate type of photography so the ancient writings needed to be transported to a location back in Mexico City where they could be carefully cleaned, analyzed and preserved.

From his death bed last month Chas Gilligan Johnson, who at the time was a student apprentice working on the project for the Mayan Guppy project, told this story through his girl friend Mary Ann for the first time.

As the pieces were chiseled out of the base limestone and carefully placed on the wooden donkey cart he accidentally bumped the cart causing all of the stone pieces to fall off. He then tripped over the pile thus scattering and chipping most of the lot. Without informing the project's Captain he put them back together as best he could. They had found and transported hundreds of other stone pieces with this strange and then indecipherable pictorial imagery and Chas thought that overall his little mistake would not make any difference. He was going to take his secret to the grave but in the end he wanted to go out with a clear conscience.

Dr. Antiono Gesiepe-Riveria Gonzalez, the original MIT professor credited with deciphering the Mayan graphics and ferreting out the complicated code for the dating system used by the Mayan, using funding provided by a mysterious millionaire only identified as “Lovey”, had determined that pieces from Building 17 depicted what could be described as a type of dating calculator, used for establishing future advantageous times for agricultural plantings and religious ceremonies as well as a way to predict astrological signs, periods of famine, wars and catastrophes such as earthquakes, floods and even plagues. Dr. Gonzalez, who died in 2010 was the first to proclaim that this Mayan calendar ran out of time on 12/21/2012. If the calendar ran out of time it could only mean one thing - THE VERY POSSIBLE END OF THE WORLD!

The newest revelations by Chas “Little Buddy” Johnson set in motion a frantic reevaluation conducted by a top team of MIT scientists of the data first collected by the famed archeologist. They had the original limestone pieces on loan from the University of Mexico City, Cuidad Campus. Using current laser and infrared technology they were able to reassemble the pieces in the proper order and were shocked to find that these icons presented quite a different end of the world scenario than purported by Dr. Gonzalez.

At a press conference this week called by a once beautiful but now aging actress the scientists showed charts and graphs of the new findings. The calendar did not end on 12/21/12. Indeed, the images did not depict a calendar at all. It turns out that in the latest and now indisputable (by ALL the worlds scientists) analysis the following conclusion can be made.

The pieces were from a practice wall for young and upcoming stone carvers. After they had mastered chiseling the numbers 0 to 9 they would be put to work on the real parts of the massive Mayan Pyramid and Temple complex, and then when finished be sacrificed to the Jaguar god by having their still beating hearts ripped out and put on their chest. Knowing that this would be for them – THE DEFINITE END OF THE WORLD! - the young men practiced chiseling over and over – 1,2,1,2,12. One poor sucker messed up with 1,2,2,1,1,2 and the gig was up.

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The Keys, Oh Please!

I was born and raised Roman Catholic, became an agnostic while in high school, was an atheist throughout my four years at Aquinas College, asked Jesus into my heart and was baptized in the Holy Spirit 6 months after graduation, worshiped as a Catholic for the next 10 years while helping lead a charismatic prayer group that met at a Catholic church for most of that time and have spent the last 30 years worshiping outside the Roman Catholic tradition.

I know how it felt growing up as a faith minority in a largely Protestant town. I remember that leaving Catholicism was difficult for my parents to understand and almost impossible for us to talk about. I had left a faith culture handed down thru my father's family for centuries and one chosen by my mother, and had crossed over to the dark side. My parents still loved me and we got along great as long as we didn't talk theology.

I married a Catholic girl whose faith in Jesus as her Lord and Savior was solid for as long as she can remember. She was baptized in the the Holy Spirit while I was still an atheist in college but made a risky move and married me right after graduation. Jackie's parents were both Catholic the same as mine, one the continuation of generations and the other by choice. Her father, the one by choice, was my mentor in learning how to study the Bible and how to compare scripture to scripture. He readily understood our eventual decision but it was and still is difficult for her mother to accept.

I know what Catholics believe, how they look at what their church teaches and why they can feel comfortable ignoring certain church teachings and still feel themselves to be fully Catholic. I understand, probably much better than most of you reading this, what the doctrines of the Catholic Church are and the logic that ties all the parts together. I own and have studied Roman Catholic catechisms printed before and after Vatican II and have made an effort to study church history as well.

I know people still in the Catholic Church who have a personal relationship with Jesus although I believe this comes about mostly despite and not because of Catholic doctrines and practices. I use to know a lot more but it seems that most have done what Jackie and I have. If you go to almost any large non-denominational church you will find that a significant percentage of their members are ex-Catholics. Most didn't leave because they had a bad priest or inadequate religious training. Some who left were searching to fill a spiritual void in their lives. Some like Jackie and I left, first - because of the growing conflict between our interpretation of Sacred Scripture and official Catholic teaching and second - because the Holy Spirit finally said to us - Now is the time.

God will find an open heart where ever it is and will move in the life of that person, spirit, soul and body, without regard to the theological knowledge or the religious practices of that person. Every person needs new life to become acceptable to the Father and that life must come through faith alone. Faith that Jesus died for me (you) personally. Faith that His death and resurrection have taken away the punishment that we deserve for our sins. Faith that He has made us a part of his family, his church, his eternal plan for redemption. And faith that God rewards those who honestly seek Him.

Religion however seems to do an awful good job of confusing the simple truth of the gospel. It's their business after all to make sure the faithful live out their salvation. The problem though is when the living out becomes the means to.

This difference is what should make Christianity altogether unique from every other religion. Salvation, harmony or whatever else you want to call it does not come from sacred acts or good and noble intentions. There is no scale that weighs out good verses bad and tilts the scale toward Heaven. Our sinful hearts are separated from The Father and they need to be reborn to fellowship with Him. This rebirth happens through repentance and faith.

Everyone first needs to repent of their rebellion toward God. The good news of Christianity is that God loved us even before we repented. He sent His only Son at a particular point in history to suffer and die for each of us, because we all fall far short of His will no matter how much effort we put into being righteous. He wants us to come to Him in humility, not based on any thing we bring to the table except the simple faith that leads us to confess that He died for us. He wants us to proclaim Jesus as our Lord and has given us His Holy Spirit to guide us in the life that we live in Him. And He will provide us with a community of other believers to help us in our lives.

My favorite scripture verse has always been Romans 8:1-2.

“Therefore there is now no condemnation for those that are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and death.”

If I had a chance to preach only one sermon it would be based on this verse and I would call it "The freedom we have in Jesus".  Like everyone I mess up and fall short of what my Lord desires for me. This may for a time affect my fellowship with Him but it in no way condemns me or in anyway changes my relationship with Him. My relationship makes me hungry to be close to Him. I live a life secure in the knowledge that He loves me and I love Him and there is wonderful, wonderful freedom in that. The veil in the Jewish Temple that hung before the most Holy Place, that separated man from God, was torn in two at Jesus death. There is no longer any need to make continual sacrifices by a priesthood to appease for sins. Jesus, our high priest, has already done it, once, for all.

My prayer for my Catholic friends is that you can experience that same freedom. It's not enough that you believe in God if that belief hasn't led you to surrender your heart to Jesus. And if you have surrendered your heart you are being robbed of great joy in your life if you think you need to pray and do religious acts to pay for a debt you do not owe.

Pope Benedict XVI has declared the year beginning in October 2012 as “The Year of Faith”. In honor of The Year of Faith he will grant plenary indulgences (time off of Purgatory because he's got the keys man) to those who perform four different “faith-related” activities. The activities include attending a certain number of sermons or lessons on Vatican II documents, visit a papal basilica or other designated site and while there pray certain designated prayers, make a pious visit to the place one received the sacrament of baptism and while there renew one's baptismal promises, or participate in a celebration of the Mass at any designated sacred place, adding a profession of faith in any legitimate form.

If you spend the entire year doing as much of the above as possible you will, in Catholic teaching, reduce yours or Aunt Minnie's stay in Purgatory by X amount of time to take care of Y amount of punishment (unspecified of course), and you are still left with an undetermined number of days of future suffering before you would be allowed the fellowship of Heaven after death.

Or - you can find a quiet place now and take an hour to examine your heart, confess your sins, ask Jesus to forgive you, promise that from now on you will try to the best of your ability to follow His will, and then ask Jesus to come into your heart to be your Lord and Savior. Ask Him to fill you with His Holy Spirit and tell Him you are open to receiving any of His good gifts. Then tell someone about what you did.  You've now got the rest of the year free to praise Him from the overflow of His grace.

Duck Dynasty

After reading comments from a couple of my friends that the A&E show Duck Dynasty was their new favorite I found some time last Friday night to view about 4 episodes.  Cable is now chock full of reality shows showing real men doing real men stuff in the out-of-doors.  There must be almost a dozen alone set in the rugged wilderness or stormy waters of Alaska.  DD is filmed in the backwoods and bayous of Louisiana and follows the adventures of the Robertson family - bearded men, loyal women, cute kids - who made it rich by making and selling duck calls and decoys.

That night I woke up at about 4 in the morning with the jarring thought that what I had viewed was really much closer to a TV sitcom like the Beverly Hillbillys than it was to a true reality series.  My father was friends with some good old boys who were furniture manufacturers based in North Carolina.  He told me that a visit to one of their homes was just like the TV show.  After chatting for awhile inside the biggest house on the block with the Mrs. he and Wayne would walk past "the fancy eating table" and take a nice walk around the property where they would find the various alcohol stashes hidden by Wayne.  This was Bible Belt country and the women folk didn't believe in the devil's brew so the men folk would hide a jug of moonshine down a well or up in a tree.  Then my dad would say; "And do you know what their favorite TV show is?"  You guessed it. 

I had been thinking about the Duck Dynasty show where Willie, the family CEO, had a meeting with a big chain store buyer.  He is running late so he tears out of his mansion, pass the C Ment Pond, clothed in his best camouflage pants and boots, his camo shirt covered by an open white sports jacket, into a waiting helicopter which then takes off and lands in an open clearing in a swamp to pick up his father, the inventor of the Duck Commander duck call and creative genius of the whole lot of Robertsons, who was hunting and dressed in his wet and dirty camouflage outfit (without white sports jacket of course), flying then to the big city where the buyer informs the bearded boys that sales are great and he wants to increase by a factor of 10 the amount of duck calls, decoys, DVD's and clothing he is buying.  "When can you fill the order?"  "Tomorrow!" Willie assures the man (pan to shot of the father scratching his beard and rolling his eyes).  Big order in hand Willie flies back to his huge warehouse/factory to tell the laid back bearded family and bearded backwoods friends that they now need to "automate", which they do with the typical Robertson mindset - it will be silly, it will be fun, in the end everyone will be Happy, Happy, Happy.

The Robertsons are real people with real beards who are making a lot of real money selling their hunting related stuff from the Bayous of Louisiana.  Although it's my opinion that most of the situations the show films are actually scripted and edited, the Robertson philosophy of life is so strong and so genuine that everything they do seems believable.  Each episode ends with the whole family sitting around the dinner table while a blessing is given, thanking God for all He has given.  This does happen in their real life and although the producers edit out the "in Jesus name" ending of grace, mainstream America fills in the blanks and understands that this is a faith based family.  That's why I find it a little disturbing that the A&E producers feel a need to edit out the "In Jesus name" phrase at the end of grace while trying to, by creative editing, make it appear that the straight laced family will swear from time to time in their misguided effort to appeal to the part of the country that wouldn't know where in a gun you would load a shot gun shell into.

In real life the beards lasted only through duck season but when the family posted their adventures on U Tube sales of their hunting products increased.  A&E made it into a cable show and the beards stayed year round.  In real life the family finances were quite modest until sales of the Duck Commander took off, but their faith was always solid.  It turns out that most of the boys have been active for years in leading people to come to know Jesus as their personal Savior and Lord.  I bet A&E won't pick that one up unless they can edit in a money hungry, Elmer Gantry type evangelist.

So anyway, when one wakes up at 4 in the morning in shock the neural connections start firing off in one's brain making it almost impossible to lapse back into that dark oblivion.  I start thinking about the difference between believing fiction and discovering reality and, like the ghost of Christmas pass I see myself as an 8 year old talking to my mother while she is doing laundry.  I asked her if there was really an Easter Bunny and she told me the truth.  It took me about an hour before this thought occurred to me -  'If the Easter Bunny is fake then maybe I need to rethink this Santa thing'.

At least my revelation came a lot sooner than it did for a certain guy I know.  Dan was the oldest of 12 children and was defending the truth of Santa to other classmates when he was in 8th grade.  I mean, why would his parents lie about something like that?  Needless to say he was horrible embarrassed when he found out the real deal.  In 9th grade Dan entered a seminary located on a 200 acre wooded estate near the shoreline of Lake Michigan in nearby Saugatuck to train for the Catholic priesthood.  He stayed with the other seminarians at the former estate manor house for a few years until his father died and he left the priesthood training because his family needed him.

The stay did provide Dan with a great story to tell any girls he was now happy to date.  At night they would drive the back roads to the edge of the old estate.  As they got out to walk Dan would start telling them a seminary story about "The Mellon Heads".  It seems that many years ago the original owner had kept wild animals in special stone pits scattered throughout the property.  Dan assured the girls that the animals were long gone but there was a local family whose children became afflicted with water on the brain.  They eventually went "feral" and were known to roam those woods.  After sharing a beer while walking around one of the old stone pits they would inevitably hear something in the woods and would have to run as fast as they could back to the car to escape the Mellon Heads.

Reality or fiction - Sometimes it takes awhile to figure it out.  I read today that 56% of Americans under the age of 26 believe that the Bible teaches the same spiritual truths as all other religions.  The article goes on to say that "people find it increasingly acceptable to define truth by their own standards.  Right and wrong become a matter of personal conviction."  The result is something that I've heard expressed twice in the last 2 days.  A large portion of our youth that have come out of a church background have chosen to believe a  negative picture of Christianity.  The world beats hard on that drum and our kids learn the dance.

The great news is that The Holy Spirit has been finding a new generation of lost souls who have been brought back to the truth by finding a living Savior.  They understand the walk and the talk of their peers and are learning the unchanging and eternal truths of the Word of God.  These young men and women are being equipped to share the hope and joy and peace that only Jesus can provide.

Praise the Lord.  Santa Clause is just a story but Jesus Christ is my glory!     

      

The White Hanky

Maria was waiting for me when I showed up at our test site this morning to set up.  She is from the Dominican Republic and speaks very little English and I speak very little Spanish but my un po keet toe has been enough to navigate hundreds of tests without a translator over the last dozen or so years.

Our office had informed me earlier that Maria had taken the test before with another organization and she felt that she had been discriminated against.  When she asked if we had someone who spoke Spanish they remembered that I was willing and mostly able to do tests by myself in Spanish and they routed her my way.

With tears in her eyes Maria hands me a handwritten letter on white notebook paper written in English by her school age daughter which says in effect - My mother is very nice, she needs a driver's license, she gets very nervous, she really is very nice, we don't have a lot of money, she needs a license to drive to work, please pass my very nice mother.

I read the letter and hand it back to Maria and she then explains to me in Spanish what is in the letter and what most every immigrant says after they have struggles passing their driver's test.  Only bits and pieces of what she is actually saying are clear to me, but they are enough.  "Mucho Nervoso" means she is very nervous.  "No carro No tra ba ho" means she can't get to work without her car and she can't drive her car without a driver's license.  And "Mucho dinero" while rubbing her two fingers together means that all of this testing business is taking money that she really doesn't have in the first place.

In response I spread out my arms and say:  "Everyone says Mucho Nervoso.  Everyone says No carro No tra ba ho.  Everyone says No Dinero."  I put my hands on an imaginary steering wheel, turning it left and right and say:  "Bien Bien, Si.  No Bien, Mass Mass, No."  Through her tears Maria nods her head.

Before she gets into our rental car Maria has me stand next to her while she says a very long, expressive and emotional prayer in Spanish, ending with something like "In nombre Patre e Filio e Spiritu Santo.

Maria ends up passing the parking maneuvers so I get into the passenger seat to start the driving portion of the test.  Maria is still crying.  We pull out of the parking lot and turn a few streets later into a residential area.  Maria is still crying.  Being the gentleman that I am I offer her my handkerchief which she takes without hesitation.  Maria rubs her teary eyes with it and then each time we stop at a light or a stop sign Maria uses it to blow her nose, emitting a loud honk each time.  This goes on through the entire test.

It turns out that Maria does well enough to earn a passing grade.  I have her park the car and then pressing my body against the passenger side door because I suspect what might happen next I inform Maria that she has passed her test.  Her puffy red face and nose seem very happy with the news and she reaches over to hug me but I extend my arms to give her a more long distance hug.  I do this because I once was hugged by a very large African American woman and it took me several minutes to break free.

I point to the center drink holder in the rental car and tell Maria that she can put my handkerchief there.  "Oh no!" was her reply.  Holding the wet and limp hanky in the open palm of her right hand she places the palm of her left hand on top of it, then moves both hands and hanky to her heart and says that she must take it home with her.  I say OK because I know that I really have no choice in the matter.

I say goodbye and God Bless You in Spanish to Maria and once again the tears come.  I'm hoping that my hanky gets washed and finds a good home and that she's not the type that would put it as part of a little shrine in her home that honors nice people like me.  After all, she did earn the passing grade.     

You Must

YOU MUST

If I have a joy in my life that would far exceed anything else I would say it's that all of my five children came to ask Jesus into their hearts at a young age and that even now grown they know how to go to the Father in prayer for all of their concerns, praying in the name of their Lord.

I was thinking and chuckling one day about some things daughter Becky wrote after my mother's funeral and so I wrote a poem that shares some of her observations.

A young girl at nine

as she sat by my side

thought about life

and the changing tide

of promise and hope

and much more besides

while we wept cause my mother

her grandmother died.

It was Easter when Heaven

swung opened it's doors

to the woman who cancer

had sent to the floor.

And my father knew well

what had severed the cord

Twas the smoking that got her

on the way to the Lord.

While there in the church

it was hers to make sense

of vestments and flowers

and rising incense.

Of uncles who talked

and pews like a fence

from the grandmother loved

and a heart that was rent.

So she poured out her feelings

onto paper with trust

what she heard say the preacher

with words that were just:

"Ashes to ashes

and dust to dust

when it's your time to go

you must, you must."