Christmas Angels

I can be a little driven at times. I’ve been on vacation this week, trying to get all the last minute Christmas rituals squared away. Monday I was dodging thoughtless drivers, saying under my breath unprintable things and rushing around like there was no tomorrow. When I stopped at the grocery, by the time I had navigated the first isle I had already mentally assassinated at least a half dozen innocent individuals. That’s when it happened. A small voice said, “Excuse me sir.” I turned to find a little old lady. Her smile would have illuminated a thousand lightless trees. She said, “ I know I’m probably missing it but could you help me find the price of this tea?” I replied, “Mam, you have the same gift I do, you can look straight at something and not see it. The price is right here.” We both laughed for the longest time. Suddenly it hit me. I had forgotten what the season is all about. It is about sharing a gift. Not a gift of fruitcakes or commercial plunder, but the gift of new life.

I usually write a poetic piece for Christmas. I certainly never imagined writing this one, but, hey, things change, don’t they? Thank God they do!

As we draw near to Christmas, look for those Christmas Angels. I’m convinced they are all around us.

Merry Christmas to you and yours.

　

　

 

 

Christmas Angel

 

　

 

 

I saw a Christmas Angel.

You would have never known.

The frame was bent and withered,

The clothes threadbare and worn.

 

Her mission was a simple thing,

For there was one close by,

Had lost the Christmas spirit

Amidst the din of life.

 

There was certain smile she had,

A simple “thank you sir.”

I was the one who found anew

The gift of God in her.

 

Like a Mule

Before I tell this story, there is something you need to know. This is not a story condoning or glorifying cruelty to animals. It is, however, a story most people who grew up before the days of modern machinery will understand.

My granddaddy was a tough man. He raised seven children during the days of The Great Depression. During that time, people, especially rural people, had to make everything count. They wasted nothing, not even the smallest scrap of tillable land.

Shortly before World War II, my granddad moved his family to a farm with a large frontage on the Cumberland River near Nashville, Tennessee. Most of that river frontage was a series of steep limestone bluffs. Of course, you can’t cultivate rock, but in between the river and the bluff itself was a small strip of fertile land. The only way it could be accessed was for the mule, plow and farm hand to navigate a treacherous path to the river below.

I’ve heard my dad tell the story so many times, I feel like I was an eye witness. It happened this way.

My granddad had hired a young man named Fred. On this particular day, it was Fred’s job to plow that specific parcel of land.

When it came time for the noontime meal, Fred had failed to return to the farmhouse, usually not a good sign when a growing boy is involved. That’s when my granddad, dad and his two brothers went to check on Fred. They found no tragic accident. They found no mechanical failures. They simply found Fred sitting by the plow, mule in harness and attached, crying. My granddad spoke first, “Fred, what in the world is wrong with you?” Fred said, “Mr.Sircy, I’ve been trying all morning to get this mule down the path to the river. But every time we start down the path, he raises up, turns around and comes back out.” My granddad, who could be a tad over confident at times, said, “You go on back to the house and eat. When you get back, he’ll be down there at the bottom ready to work.”

Well, that’s when the show began. My dad said he snapped the lines, gave the age old command, “come up” and at least four times had the same experience that had befallen Fred.

This is where you have to understand the reality of life on a farm; a farm where the only thing between you and starvation and that of your family is to scratch a living out of the earth. If you look at what happens next without that in mind, you’ll tend to misunderstand what occurs.

He calmly walked to the front of the plow and unhooked the trace chains from the singletree. Gathering the trace chains in his hand, he jumped on the back of the mule and began to use the chains as an improvisational whip. That’s when a real rodeo show developed across the top of the bluff. It continued for more than a count of “nine.” Finally, the mule stopped, stuck his feet out in front of him and my dad maintains to this day, the mule bawled like a calf.

Then, just as calmly as he began, he climbed down, patted the mule on the shoulder and re-hooked the chains. Just as he promised, the mule went down the path to the river below.

How many times are we like that mule? We know the path we are supposed to take. Sometimes, even with the Master exhorting us to stay on course, we veer off the path before us. Many times we have to be whipped about by the trace chains of life before we get back on track.

There is something else I didn’t tell you. I know it doesn’t seem like it but my granddaddy loved that mule. I’ve heard him speak of him many times in reverential tones. He knew if he was ever going to be any good for himself or the family he had to get back on course.

Could this have been done another way? Maybe. Or maybe one of the toughest lessons we’ll ever learn is that God loves us enough to be a tough guy when we belong to Him.

By the way, I’ve been taking a little blog vacation.  I was spending entirely too much time on the internet and away from the family.  Thanks for understanding.

 

Rose of Sharon

  

This is a picture of the Rose of Sharon shrub next to my driveway.  The flowers are beautiful.  They require little or no care, and attract Hummingbirds in large numbers.

I’m going to make a confession.  I cut one down just like it.  I did it before I realized what I had.  When we bought the house almost twenty years ago, I was determined to put my “clear the decks” personality on the property.  But, in doing so I eliminated a thing of joy and great beauty.

How many times do we do that in our lives?  We rush through life like a Jackrabbit.  We ignore things God has given us to cherish and nurture.  We ignore others to whom we have been given the responsibility to share our lives.  But we pass it all by because we just don’t slow down long enough to understand.

The book of Ecclesiastes holds a sobering reminder of our foolishness.  Chapter 3:11 says, “He has made everything beautiful in its time.  He has also set eternity in the hearts of men; yet they cannot fathom what God has done from beginning to end.”

You see, Solomon had tried it all and it didn’t satisfy.  The reality is this:  if you go through life grabbing for all you can and ignoring God’s gifts, you won’t necessarily come up empty handed but you’ll come up empty hearted.

The most important thing is to make sure we don’t rush by He who is the true Rose of Sharon, the Lily of the Valley, the Bright and Morning Star, the Alpha, the Omega, the Beginning and the End.

The Stage Is Set

Our pastor challenged us recently to read through the Book of Matthew and share the lessons we learned.  I started the same way I did for many years when I was teaching Sunday school, I prepared the introduction.  I was studying the period from the time of Jeremiah and Malachi until the birth of Christ.  J. Vernon McGee once said, “Station G O D went off the air for four hundred years.”  Most people mistakenly think that God took His ball and went home for four centuries.  But when we view the historical occurrences, they can only be explained by the hand of God.

While I was turning these things over in my mind, an unusual analogy came to me.

When I was a route man for the Coca Cola Company from 1972-1979, I had a friend at work named Butch.  He and I would attend almost every Vanderbilt home basketball game.  If we couldn’t get our hands on free tickets, we’d simply sneak into the game with the company employees on duty for the game.  Sales uniforms did have advantages.

In the mid-seventies Vanderbilt had a great series of teams led by three young men referred to as the F-Troop.  At the same time, Ernie Grunfeld and Bernard King were turning the conference into a circus at The University of Tennessee in Knoxville.  Butch and I, through luck and shenanigans, had accomplished the impossible.  We had acquired a pair of premium floor level tickets for the Vandy-UT game at Memorial Gym in Nashville.  The lead story in the sports page of The Tennessean stated simply, “The Ernie and Bernie Show rolls into town tonight.  The atmosphere was electric.

The morning of the game I was in the morning sales meeting, when Butch eased into the back of the room, late as usual.  He slipped in beside me, elbowed me in the ribs and whispered, “The stage is set.”

It is the strangest thing, when I was studying the introduction to The New Testament, it struck me.  I hadn’t thought of that incident for years, but that is exactly what God did for Zechariah, Joseph and Mary.  He nudged them with the breath of an angel and said, for all eternity, “The stage is set.”

A Patch of Weeds

My yard is a weed patch.  It wasn’t always this way.  After the severe drought of two years ago, everyone told me to fertilize and re-seed.  My response still reverberates in my own hollow head: “Ahh, it will grow back.”

It grew back, alright.  But this time it was full of weeds.  What happened?  The truth of the matter is lawn grasses require care.  Weeds simply come from the four winds.  They grow with no trouble at all.  They require no maintenance.

Our spiritual lives are that way, aren’t they?  We go through times of drought when we are wrung out by the circumstances of life.  If we are listening for the voice of God, if we are focused on His Word, if we are spending time with Him, these can be times of great victory in our lives.  But, if we trust these times to just work out, the Adversary will sow weeds into our lives and they will flourish.  When they do, only the Weed & Feed of God’s grace will remove them.

I should have known better.  You see, I’ve been through those times of drought in my life.  I knew how important it was and is to be on guard, to include the proper disciplines.

Now, there has to be a bag of Weed & Feed around here somewhere.  If not, there’s always Lowes.

The Master

I work for a distributor of petroleum products.  In reality, I’m a glorified dispatcher.  A few days ago, one of my drivers, James, came to me and said, “Let me tell you a funny story.”  He said, “Yesterday I was getting ready to get in my pickup to go home when I noticed Calvin sitting next to his car, on the pavement, legs crossed Indian style and his head hung low.  I asked him if he was alright.  His only response was, ‘I give up.  Nothing has gone right today.  I give up.’  As it turns out, he’d mistakenly locked his keys in his car.  I told him if he’d give me about three minutes, I’d have it unlocked.  It didn’t take but two.” 

 

You see, unbeknown to Calvin, James was a master at unlocking the locked car.  It is a funny story, but is indicative of a profound truth.  Come, journey back with me two thousand years.

 

The disciples of Jesus had walked with Him for three years.  During that time, He had tried, many times, to teach the formula for spiritual success: surrender.

 

The night Jesus was arrested they all either ran or denied Him.  Often we look at them, as if to say, what a bunch of failures.  The truth is Jesus had them exactly where He wanted them.  It is the same place He has to bring each one of us.  He can’t really teach us and use us until we give up.  We have to give up our initiatives and pre-conceived ideas.  They had them and so do we. 

 

Calvin had to give up and let a “master” car thief teach him something.  We have to give up and simply follow the Master.

 

What is Cotton Britches Winter?

It was cold on Tuesday.  My wife came home with a startling confession.  She admitted, “Today I heard the first person, outside of your family, talk about Cotton Britches Winter.”  Now, that always takes me back to my childhood.  My grandmother not only recognized Cotton Britches Winter, but adhered to a strict observance of four other “winters”, as well.

 

For those of you who aren’t familiar with the Southern tradition of naming the spring “cold snaps”, here is my grandmother’s list.  In her mind, it was not open to debate.

 

The first cold snap or winter was Redbud Winter.  It was followed, usually closely, by Dogwood Winter.  The following is the only area that was subject to interpretation:  Blackberry Winter and Locust Winter were often alternated in order, depending upon which one she saw blooming first.

 

That brings us to Cotton Britches Winter.    It was always the last chilly weather before warm weather stayed for a few months.  Her explanation of the name was priceless.  I can close my eyes and see her with a twinkle in her eye as she says, “When this little cold spell is over, you can put on your cotton britches because winter is over.”

 

I can’t wait for Cotton Britches Time.  How about you?

 

All In A Glance

It’s almost Easter.  Let me ask you a question.  Have you ever had to be slapped between the eyes with something before you understood what you should have seen all along?  The Apostle Peter had an experience just like that, and his life was never the same.  We read right by it, if we are not careful.

 

In the twenty second chapter of Luke’s Gospel, Peter has denied Jesus three times, just like The Lord told him he would.  The rooster crows and Peter remembers the words Jesus had told him.  Then, it simply says, Peter went out and wept bitterly. 

 

Was it just the memory of Jesus’ words?  I don’t think so.  You see, I believe as much as I believe anything, Peter saw three things in this glance from The Lord, three things that penetrated to the marrow of Peter’s soul, three things that are the very nature of Christ Himself.

 

“Peter, I love you.”

 

“Peter, I forgive you.”

 

“Peter, I’m doing this for you.”

 

Oh, how The Adversary tries to get us to complicate the message.  But, when we lock eyes with Jesus, the message we need to share is clear.  Jesus loves you, Jesus will forgive you, and Jesus did this for you. 

Remembering Arnold

Arnold was a tough guy.  He kept his distance.  He’d been in countless fights and encounters with motorized vehicles.  He carried the scars on a face only a mother could love.  In a way, he protected our house.  Arnold was a cat.

 

Saturday night, the same “tough streets” he had patrolled for years, took his life.

 

I learned a lot from Arnold.  I learned life isn’t always fair.  I learned much of our character is revealed by never giving up.  But, far more importantly, he taught me the most powerful thing we will ever do is to show concern for someone else.

 

Now, before you think I’ve lost my mind (learning life’s lessons from a cat) there is something you need to understand.  The first time I saw Arnold, I didn’t like him very much, but I did admire his swagger.  Arnold didn’t walk like an alley cat, he walked like a lion. 

 

As time passed by, I began to talk to him.  After awhile, he graduated to coming close enough to eat from the food we always keep out for the community cats.  Then, just the other day, a miracle occurred.  Arnold came to me and let me rub his back.

 

I don’t know whether you like cats or not, but the lesson this teaches us needs to burn deep into our hearts and souls.  Somebody has to take the first step!  If you want to be what God wants you to be, that somebody better be you.  If not, you’ll waste away in the hinterlands of self-servitude, wondering why you’ve never influenced a single soul.

 

Just a cat?  Maybe.  Or maybe it’s one of those times when God has to reach deep inside of us and find a new way to teach us a few things.

 

Thanks, Arnold.  We’re all going to miss you.

Study Nook

What does your study nook look like?  Is it filled with trendy best sellers by the latest authors?  Or are you an old “stick-in-the-mud” like me?

 

As you can see, mine is filled with resources published from the 1700’s right up till now.  Yet, these are only tools.

 

Our pastor recently asked us to read ahead and study a particular scripture for the next series.  As I did, I was reminded of a truth that is so easy to forget.  God has given us many gifted, intellectual, perceptive and intuitive people.  Their works can be a great help to our studies.  But when all is said and done, the truth is very evident; God has given us but one textbook, His Word.   It is simple enough for a child, yet deep enough to challenge the greatest theologians.

 

So, is it the main source in your study nook?  I have to constantly remind myself how important it is to lay the works of man down beside it to see how they stack up.  If I don’t, I find myself constantly blown about by opinions and conjecture.

 

How about you?