Ode to Christmas 2010

Christmas Day, 2010. I am in a plane flying to Dallas to attend the funeral of my sixteen year old grandson. He was killed two days ago when the Mazda 6 that he was driving crossed the median and sideswiped a semi. Nick had his driver's license for three weeks. By the time the helicopter got him to the hospital, he had gone to be with Jesus.

I look down from the plane window and see the neatly blocked streets of Milwaukee far below. They are covered with snow like a Christmas card picture. I think about all the people in the houses celebrating Christmas. I picture them opening packages, laughing at funny gifts, and watching their childrens' delight as they unwrap their special presents.

Some of the houses have cars parked in front of them and in their driveways - evidence of happy gatherings inside. I imagine the smells of platters filled with turkey and ham wafting through the rooms. Every year I cook too - pies, brownie bars, whatever my family likes. It gives me great joy. But not this year. That has been suddenly snatched away.

As I stare down, I wonder how the families in each house celebrate Christmas Eve? We always dim the lights and read the Christmas story. Everytime the word angel appears, the grandchildren take turns lighting candles symbolizing the verse, "The people who sat in darkness have seen a great light." Pretty soon the dark room is aflame with light. But not this year.

Charlie and I didn't open any presents this morning. We were packing hastily - rushing to catch the 12:30 pm flight to Dallas. Our one thought - get to our family whose loss is so great! As we hurried out the door, I glanced back at our darkened kitchen. No good smells, no Christmas dishes, no decorated table waiting for friends. This year our house was a way station on Christmas Eve. We thought we were going to celebrate two weeks with our Alaska family. That's what we thought until Thursday, December 23rd at 5:30 pm when we got the telephone call that said - not this year.

My thoughts go back to that evening - grieving and phoning - grieving and phoning. Family to call, loved ones calling back. "My son, my son, how can we be so far away at such a time?" Hearing the grief and pain in his voice and my Texas daughter-in-love's sobs, intensifies the already indescribable pain in my heart.

Miraculously we are booked on a 6 am flight Christmas Eve day from Anchorage to Minneapolis. Two hours sleep and it is 1:30 am. Time to dress and have our son drive us to the airport. For an hour and a half we talk - we share rambling thoughts. We watch four moose passing us in the cold Alaskan night. I remember that seeing them used to excite me. But not this year. I am too numb to register more emotion.

At 3:45 we arrive at the airport and are told that we can have seats together if we sit in the very last row. We don't care, we don't want to be separated at such a time. We both search our bibles for the comfort of the Scriptures. Lord, give us strength - special verses for Nick-anything that will help us get through this agony. As we read, the peace that passes all understanding begins to descend. We write the verses down. I look up to see the man in the window seat next to Charlie watching us. Charlie and he start talking. He is a ship's captain in charge of huge boats that carry cargo from Alaska to Japan. He tells us that he was at sea when he got a telephone call that his sister had died. He said, "What do you do when you are in the middle of the ocean and you get such a call?" We told him that the telephone also rang for us and that's why we were leaving Alaska the day before Christmas. After we had talked, we gave him the Four Spiritual Laws. He took it and read it from cover to cover then carefully zipped it into his leather seaman's jacket pocket. He wasn't supposed to be in that seat - someone had asked him to trade. We weren't supposed to be in our seats. Or were we all three supposed to be there? Was his possible conversion a good fruit from Nick's physical death? Maybe this year he will come to know Jesus. I wonder at God's grace shining in the midst of our darkness.

We arrive in Minneapolis at 2:30 pm. The van from the Country Suites picks us up. "Why are you traveling so late on Christmas Eve Day?" the driver askes us. We tell him and he shares that his son has cancer. He says, "You told me your trouble, I tell you mine." We knew what he was saying. The glitter of Christmas was all around us, but each of our hearts had great needs that tinsel could never fill. Not this year.

We drive the five hours from Minneapolis to home. Christmas Eve - snow falling, slippery roads, wrecker trucks pulling people out of the ditches, but my mind sees one wrecker truck pulling a black Mazda off of a Texas highway. We stop at McD's for a bite. Who are all these people standing in line for fast food on Christmas Eve? Are they traveling for dreadful reasons too? My mind is frozen like the landscape around us. I cannot smile at them - certainly not ask a personal question.

We get home and unpack our Alaska suitcases and make flight arrangements to Dallas for the next day, Christmas Day. Sleeping in my own bed for one night, my last thought is "No candles being lit tonight. No Nick laughing and striking a match as he hears the word 'angel.' But wait! Isn't he seeing the angels as he spends his first Christmas in heaven? Are they the angels who appeared to the shepherds when the Savior was born in Bethlehem? Is he asking them? Ah, Nick, Nick, what are you doing right now?"

My mind returns to the present. Soon I will see the neighborhoods of Dallas-Fort Worth - not snow covered and cold like in Milwaukee - but each house will be celebrating Christmas. My eyes will search for only one - a home where they opened gifts this morning and tried to continue on. A home with unopened presents under the tree labeled "To Nick." A home that now has three teenagers instead of four. How sad can life get?

The plane flies on to our destination. We are nearly there but I can't see the activity below. We are above the clouds and the sun is shining blindingly bright all around us. "Is this how bright the Shekinah Glory shines in heaven, Nick?" I wonder. "Jesus, the angels, God on His great throne. You are seeing and experiencing it all this year."

For an instant, looking out at the brilliant sun, I am there with him. The wonder of eternal life surrounds me. Then I hear the sound of the wheels going down and our plane descends to land. The clouds swirl around us and all is grey again. The trials and afflictions of this present world encumber us as before. But I have seen the upperside and God has reminded me that my grandson is truly alive. "He is not dead for He has risen!" Nick is above the clouds looking down at God's great canvas of eternity. He has fought the good fight, he has finished the race - this year.

We rent our car and drive toward Crowley. Our family is there.

Other Christmases may come and go with new joys and sorrows but we wont forget this year of our Lord 2010. We do not know what future Christmases will bring but we do know that we shall never be the same - not after this year.

Peace, Good Will Toward Men!

My dear friend, Janey, who lives in Birmingham, sent this wonderful writing in her Christmas letter this year. I loved the thought and so, dear blog friends and family, I'm passing it on to you.

Janey wrote: "In Psalm 23:5 David says God's flock is fed in the presence of our enemies. God asks us to pray for our enemies - those who for some reason do not agree with our loyalties to faith and family or country. For this reason, I am including a writing of Mother Teresa that has been a reminder to me this year of what the angels sang at Jesus' birth, "Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace, good will toward men." Luke 2:14. May we all use the love given us to practice this in the coming year to those who do not know the luxury of God's approval because of the personal acceptance of His Son as Savior."

People are often unreasonable and self-centered. Forgive them anyway.

If you are kind, people may accuse you of ulterior motives. Be kind anyway.

If you are honest, people may cheat you. Be honest anyway.

If you find happiness, people may be jealous. Be happy anyway.

The good you do today may be forgotten tomorrow. Do good anyway.

Give the world the best you have, and it may never be enough.

Give your best anyway.

For you see, in the end it is between you and God. It never was between you and them anyway.

Thanks, Janey, for sharing how God wants us to behave "toward men" (toward everyone) as we travel life's joyful journey.

Life Is A Dash!

Reading Through the Bible in 2010 (Eccles. 10-12)

"Remember now your Creator in the days of your youth..." Eccles. 12:1-5

They all seemed so young and happy. The line of animated young women talking enthusiastically, to each other, stretched down the long white baby shower table. Somehow, on each side, there was a gap between them and me. My green sherbet punch and I seemed to be on our own little island. But, my island was inhabited. A pleasant looking girl in her thirties sat across from me.

"Hello," I said, "I'm Betsy."

"And I'm Jessica," she responded.

Before long, I found myself in the midst of a very interesting conversation with my fellow inhabitant. She was married with two young boys, she had gone to mortuary school, and she now works in a funeral home. "I'm always on call," she remarked, "because you never know when somebody will die."

"Oh, do you go pick up the, uh er, bodies?" I asked.

"Yes," she replied quite cheerfully, "that's one of my jobs."

There we sat, a rather isolated little pair, talking about death in the midst of a baby shower celebrating life. Life and death. Two very significant words. In fact I've heard it said that the two most important dates in life are the birth date and the death date - with a dash in between. The meaning of that statement is clear: the dash is short and we need to make our swift earthly tenures count.

That's Solomon's point in today's scriptures. Do it now!

"Remember now your Creator in the days of your youth, Before the difficult days come, And the years draw near when you say, "I have no pleasure in them":

Eccles.12:1

It will never be easier to give our days to the Lord, it will only become harder. We need to remember our Creator now, while we can.

The wisest man who ever lived, goes on to tell us what is going to happen in our futures.

"While the sun and the light, The moon and the stars, Are not darkened, And the clouds do not return after the rain;" 12:2

He warns that as we age we are more and more prone to depression. It's been proven that older bodies do not produce the serotonin that young bodies do. Anyone who has suffered depression knows about the dark clouds that hover and can return so easily.

"In the day when the keepers of the house tremble, And the strong men bow down;" 12:3a

The "keepers of the house" that tremble are the limbs and the strong men bowing down is a reference to the legs. After having a knee replacement, I can relate. Strength wanes as we add years. Parts start to wear out. Charlie told me that if a machine worked perfectly in a mill for fifty years the operators would cheer. We expect our "fearfully and wonderfully made" bodies to run smoothly much longer than that.

"When the grinders cease because they are few, And those that look through the windows grow dim;" 12:3b

In America we get our teeth crowned, but lots of people in other countries don't have this privilege and their teeth become few. We buy attractive reading glasses when we turn forty, but after while they don't seem to work right, and we consult our ophthamoligists more and more frequently.

"When the doors are shut in the streets, And the sound of grinding is low;" 12:4a

As I tried to hear my interesting new friend's voice, I thought, "I wish my hearing aids were working better! Her voice sounds awfully quiet." The older we get, the more we have to strain to listen. We have to really concentrate. Maybe that isn't all bad.

"When one rises up at the sound of a bird, And all the daughters of music are brought low;" 12:5

There is a reason for the term "sleeps like a baby." The older we get, the lighter we sleep and the earlier we wake up.

"Also, when they are afraid of height, And of terrors in the way;" 12:5a

This speaks of the fear of falling and breaking something - like a hip - necessitating a hip replacement. The older person has a constant battle with fear. It is more difficult to control imaginations.

"When the almond tree blossoms, 12:5b

The white hair of old age is described.

"The grasshopper is a burden," 12:5c

Have you ever watched the slow shaking gait of a very elderly person?

"And desire fails." 12:5d

Most of the ads on TV refer to this.

"for man goes to his eternal home, And the mourners go about the streets." 12:5e

And my new friend and her coworkers go to their funeral homes and take care of our bodies.

It was time to open presents. As we turned to watch, Jessica's final words were, "You know, most people are so unprepared for death to enter their lives. It's like, here in America, we don't expect to die. We live our lives forgetting that they will end. When death comes, we don't know how to deal with it!"

So we left our little island and joined the group oohing and ahhing over the beautiful presents bought especially for this new baby - that no one knows yet. We don't know this little child but God does. And we can pray - that he will remember his Creator in the days of his youth. We can lift him to the Throne of Grace and interceed for him to live for Jesus during the dash that will be his life. And, if he does that, when he leaves this earth, he will be prepared - for his Coronation Day.

A Lesson From A Jar of Pickles

Reading Through the Bible in 2010 (Eccles. 3-6)

"To everything there is a season, A time for every purpose under heaven:

A time to break down, And a time to build up; Eccles. 3:1, 3:3

"You Dummy. What a klutz you are." These words came flying out of my mouth as I surveyed the damage. The kitchen floor glistened with sugary syrup. Pickles, looking like little frogs scattered from their messy perches atop the broken glass, seemed to leer mockingly at me. They were everywhere! Pickles, glass, sticky....aghh!!

"What a mess to clean up. That was so stupid!" Who was I berating? My child, my grandchild, my husband? Nope! I would never talk to them like that. The disparaging words of condemnation were directed at myself. I was the one who reached into the frig and -ker bang - dropped the whole pickle jar. As it crashed to the floor and shattered into a bazillion pieces, I wailed those words about - myself, "You dummy, Betsy. What a klutz you are!"

Later, as I stood with my mop and surveyed the clean kitchen floor, I thought, "Well it really looks quite nice now. It actually needed a good mopping anyway." Then I reached into the pantry and brought out a fresh jar of pickles and reflected, "That other jar was pretty old anyway. It was probably time to replace it."

As I looked at the shining laminate, my friend the Holy Spirit came alongside and surveyed the kitchen with me. He smiled pleasantly and said, "It looks nice, doesn't it?" Then He asked me a question. "Betsy, why were you so hard on yourself? What would you have said to your friend if she had let the pickles slip through her fingers? Would you have called her a dummy and a klutz?"

"Uh,"I paused and reflected on His question. A light was going on in my brain called the illumination of the Holy Spirit. "Why," I answered, "I would have said, "Don't worry, everybody drops things. I'll help you clean it up. And then......well, we probably would have had a good laugh as we gingerly picked up pieces of glass."

He had made His point. There was no need for me to engage in destructive deprecatory self talk. I began to think, "Why am I so careless about the way that I talk to myself?"

My Wise Counselor went on. "Here is a scripture for you to think about. "There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit." (Rom. 8:1) No condemnation, I reflected. Then why do I condemn myself? Why am I harder on myself than I am on other people?

I thought about it and thought about it. Then a long buried memory came to my mind. I remembered my mother stirring lemon pie filling on the stove. Suddenly it started to burn and the pleasant smell turned acrid. As I watched and listened, she began berating herself and berating herself over and over. How had she learned the art of destructive deprecatory self talk so well.? From her father? I'd never heard him say much positive to her. But then, he had run away from home at age 15. Why did he feel the need to do that? What was said to him that his home was not a place of refuge but a non safe place that he fled at an early age? Like an old tattered recipe, this kind of self deprecation had been passed down in our family from generation to generation.

When we come into a relationship with Jesus Christ, we enter into a new way of looking at life. "He has born our griefs and carried our sorrows. We esteemed Him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; The chastisement for our peace was upon Him, And by His stripes we are healed." (Isaiah 53: 4-5) God sent His Son to make atonement - to do a switch out for our sins. Jesus took away the condemnation that we were all under because of sin. He replaced it with love and no condemnation. But, as Christians, we have to learn to believe how worthwhile we are in His sight.

Old habits and weavings in families are often passed down from generation to generation. It is important to allow the Comforter, the Divine Paraclete, to come along side and "lead us into all truth." (John 14:26. He will help us sort through our behavior recipes carefully like we gently play a game of Pick Up Sticks. For me, a jar of broken pickles revealed a behavior pattern that needed to be removed and replaced with the biblical truth, "There is therefore no condemnation!"

How do you talk to yourself? What kinds of conversations do you have in your mind? Do you engage in destructive deprecating self talk over life's incidents or do you listen to the kind tender voice of the Holy Spirit as He reminds you that Jesus loves you and gave Himself for you?

I am not a dummy. I am not a klutz! I am a lady with a very clean kitchen floor.

"Sorry, Betsy" I said. "You are not a dummy. You are not a klutz. I'll try not to speak to you like that again." I accepted my apology and forgave myself with constructive self talk - this time.

"There is a time for every purpose under heaven..A time to break down, and a time to build up!"

You pray for me and I'll pray for you that we can break down the patterns of destructive deprecating self talk. Through the enabling power of the Holy Spirit, let's build up the truths of how much our Savior loves us. Maybe we will learn to consistently speak to ourselves with constructive self talk - just like we try to do to our families and friends.

The Shining "Son"

Reading Through the Bible in 2010 (Proverbs 4-7)

"But the path of the just is like the shining sun, that shines ever brighter until the perfect day." Prov. 4:18

The nurse must have had a bad night's sleep. She flipped through my chart and said rather irritably: "Didn't you know you weren't supposed to get pregnant right after your last miscarriage? You should have waited!"

I wasn't a Christian then, but I knew in my heart that this new little life growing inside of me was a gift of God...no matter what the grumpy nurse thought. Taking a deep breath, I smiled at her and said, "It will be all right."

And "it" was. God took care of my baby as we moved from Wisconsin to South Carolina and then to a new home twenty days before he entered the world. He was born on a scorching hot July day, but it was air conditioned and peaceful in the room where I labored - with a good nurse attending me. Later, as I held him in my arms, Charlie and I beamed at this amazing new creation and named him Theodore, a name that means "gift of God."

The years have flown. He is a man now about to send his firstborn off to college. I was watching him at our recent family reunion. He was organizing, encouraging, helping, and keeping us all laughing. As I watched two year old Joseph reach up his hands and call "Uncle Ted, Uncle Ted, pick me up!" I realized again that I had had no idea back in that first doctor's visit, how "all right" this new life would be. The joy and love and comfort our second son has brought to our lives and to the lives of so many is without limit.

Six years years after Ted was born, Charlie and I became Christians. We were drawn by God into a relationship with the true Son of Righteousness, Jesus Christ. As baby Christians, we had no idea of all the things the Son of God would become to us. But as the years have passed, Jesus has been all that His Word promised and so much more. Jesus has proved to be a very fine Savior.

My heart is filled with praise and thanksgiving as I write this morning. Praise for a wonderful Savior and thankfulness for another great son. Happy Birthday, Ted. May this verse bring you hope and direction for your new year of life, "The path of the just is like the shining sun, That shines ever brighter until the perfect day. May the true Son of God keep shining through you until we reach that perfect day.

In my very prejudiced opinion, forty plus years ago I spoke rightly when I said thusly, "It will be all right!"

A Lot to Leviticus!

“For I am the Lord who brings you up out of the land of Egypt, to be your God. You shall therefore be holy, for I am holy.” Lev. 11:45

Reading Through the Bible in 2010 Lev. 10-13

Where were you when you learned about the blood?

There are events in life that shape us – things that happen and we are changed - never to go back to life as we lived it before. Usually they surprise us, we don’t have a clue that they are about to happen.

I remember the first time that I met Charlie. It was the summer after eighth grade and two guys and two girls met at the park to play tennis. One of the guys was Charlie and one of the girls was me. As I returned a ball that the young man in the red plaid bermuda shorts slammed at me, I never dreamed that he would become the love of my life. Years passed. We started “going out” as juniors in high school. We married after I finished nursing. Things had changed forever because of a tennis match.

My life had turned a corner. Charlie had entered. We've been married for forty-five years. But when I first met him, I had no idea how much influence his interests, family, friends, ideas, and values would have on me in the years to come…. all because my friend and I decided to go play tennis.

When our first child was born, we brought little Ethan home in a blue receiving blanket. We laid our angelically sleeping baby down on the bed. Charlie and I and my mom all stood over him gazing down adoringly. Charlie broke the beatific silence,

“I wonder what we do with him for the next eighteen years?” he questioned.

My mother looked at him, as incredulous as most mother in laws are at young son-in-laws, and said, “Oh, you’ll learn. Children can take up a lot of time.”

We did learn. His life, and the lives of the three children that followed, have indeed “taken up a lot of our time.” They have filled our thoughts and consumed our days and brought us measures of joy that we never could have dreamed about before we set that little baby on the bed.

Events happen and they change our lives. Can’t we all picture exactly where we were when we watched the images of 9 – 11? Charlie and I were living at the farm in Fall Creek when my brother called. He said, “Turn on your TV right now!” The images of the planes, the fire, the ash, the people jumping to the ground, the firemen running in…, we had no concept of the impact these images would have on our lives. As we watched the collapse of the Twin Towers, we didn't know that this would affect America forever.

Where were you when you first heard about the blood?

I was at a Christian Women’s Club luncheon in Augusta, Georgia. I was thirty- one years old and I thought I was a Christian. After all, I believed in God!

We ate our lunch and afterwards an “inspirational speaker” spoke to us. She said, “If you were the only person in the world, Jesus Christ would have come. The sinless spotless Son of God, the Creator of the universe, would have bled and died on that cross just for you and your sins.”

“Huh”? I thought. “Just for me?”

As I listened to her speak, conviction rolled over me like the waves of the sea. I suddenly knew that I was a sinner and that I needed my sins to be forgiven.

The speaker continued: "Only the blood of Jesus can wash away our sins and make us holy. There is nothing that we can do about our sin by trying to be good. Sin will never disappear through our own human efforts."

I didn't see it coming, but all of a sudden, I had run smack dab into the blood of Jesus - at a luncheon!

As she spoke, I knew that I had never personally asked Jesus to come into my life and take away my sins. I had never spoken one word to Him about my sins! God revealed so much to me as I listened to that speaker - all of a sudden, there it was – confronted by the blood!

Where were you when you heard about the blood of Jesus Christ?

When I got home, it was very quiet. I sat down at my desk and asked Jesus to come into my heart. I asked Him to cleanse me with the blood that He had shed for my sins. I asked Him to be my Lord forever.

Will I ever forget that precious day? Never! I can remember the light coming in the window and the blue flowered curtains that suddenly had a brighter hue. I felt the sin of thirty years slide off of my back – “as far as the east is from the west,” the Bible says. I stood up, amazed, and said, "The blood of Jesus – it has made me clean. I'm free!”

I knew that so positively that I even wrote a poem about being free. Granted, it was a short poem because it came to an abrupt end when my friend, Sally, returned with my four young children. Each one needed something from “Mom.” After a few minutes, I thought, “Did this really happen?” My life had quickly returned to pouring juice, finding shoes, changing diapers, and answering questions.

But it had happened. I had been forever impacted by a luncheon that I had approached with absolutely no clue. The blood of Jesus had freed and changed me like no other event in my life.

Did I have any idea of how my journey with Him would look? I didn’t even think about it as I talked to my friend and tended my children’s needs. But that day I had started on a joy filled journey with the King of the universe. It still gives me goose bumps to write about it.

The book of Leviticus gives the people of Israel intricate instructions about living in the presence of a holy God. All the sacrifices of all the animals that we’ve been reading about pointed to the sinless Jesus – the true lamb of God that would take away the sins of the world. When the Israelites put their hands on the animal that was being killed for their sins, they felt its life being sapped for them. As they watched its innocent blood being sprinkled on the altar, it was a graphic picture of the atoning blood that needed to be shed for the forgiveness of their sins. All the sacrifices, the Altar, and the Officiating Priest illustrated the Sinless Savior, Jesus Christ, who would die for their sins. The bloody sacrifices carried out by Aaron and his sons were a picture of how Jesus Christ was both the Lamb of God, Who takes away our sins and our High Priest. Whew! There’s a lot to Levitcus.

“But Christ came as High Priest of the good things to come, with the greater and more perfect tabernacle not made with hands, that is, not of this creation.

Not with the blood of goats and calves, but with His own blood He entered the Most Holy Place once for all, having obtained eternal redemption.

For if the blood of bulls and goats and the ashes of a heifer, sprinkling the unclean, sanctifies for the purifying of the flesh,

How much more shall the blood of Christ who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without spot to God, purge your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?” Heb. 9:11-14

I was in Augusta, Georgia – a long way from Wisconsin. That's where I learned about the blood. That’s where my joyful journey with Jesus truly began?

Where were you when you learned about the blood?