Category: Blog

Tale of the unknown Mother

A friend of mine went to the County Clerk s office to renew her driver s license. ‘Do you have a job, or are you just a…?’ the recorder asked her.

“My friend, fuming, snapped: ‘Of course I have a job. I m a mother.

“The recorder replied, ‘We don t list “mother” as an occupation. “Housewife” covers it.

“I found myself in the same situation one day when I was at our own town hall. The clerk was obviously a career woman, poised, efficient, and possessed of a high-sounding title, like ‘Official Interrogator or ‘Town Registrar.

“She asked, ‘And what is your occupation?

“The words popped out of my mouth: ‘I m a Research Associate in the field of Child Development and Human Relations.

“The clerk paused, pen frozen in midair. I repeated the title slowly. The clerk wrote my pompous title in bold, black ink on the official questionnaire.

“The clerk said, ‘Might I ask just what you do in your field?

“I replied, ‘I have a continuing program of research in the laboratory and in the field. I m working for my Masters (the whole family) and already have four credits (all daughters). Of course, the job is one of the most demanding in the humanities, and I often work 14 hours a day. But the job is more challenging than most run-of-the-mill careers and the rewards are in satisfaction rather than just money.’

“There was an increasing note of respect in the clerk s voice. She completed the form, stood up, and personally ushered me to the door.

“As I drove into our driveway buoyed by my glamorous new career, I was greeted by my lab assistants—ages 13, 7, and 3. And upstairs, I could hear our new experimental model (six months old) in the child-development program, testing out a new vocal pattern.

“I felt triumphant. I had scored a beat on bureaucracy. And I had gone down on the official records as someone more distinguished and indispensable to society than ‘just another…

“Home—what a glorious career! Especially when there s a title on the door.”

“If you find serenity and happiness, some people may be jealous. Be happy anyway —Mother Teresa
The article by an unknown mother is reprinted with permission of the newsletter From the Ranch. Copyright © The Joyful Noiseletter, May 2001, page 5, Used with permission

Former Yale chaplain and seminary president John W. Vannorsdall writes that for him “one of the meanings of Christmas is that God does not want to hurt me, or you.”

In spite of the fact that “God must watch his whales die, and our submarines increase,” God comes to us with the message of love, not wrath. “That’s why it seems so remarkable to me that when God comes to speak God’s Word to us, that Word becomes a child.

A child announced by singing, not by thunder. A child born by lamplight in silent night, rather than a Word which shakes the mountains, pouring rivers of unstoppable fire down every side. The Word becomes a child, which can be received and cannot hurt us: a Word which does not make us afraid.

I am prepared for the anger of God, and believe that God has a right to wrath. What is so amazing is that when God comes among us, whatever God’s hurt and indignation, God comes not with violence but with love, even as a child vulnerable to our further hurt.”

I hope that you enjoy this very meaningful and beautiful meditation as much as I do.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year

Thoughts from here and There…The Blessing of Thorns

I read this story with a great deal of personal emotion and gratitude. It is not a fun story. It is sort of sad, but it is a story with a happy ending. I do not know the source. Please read and find your place in the story of the Blessing of the Thorns. Pastor Shultz

Sandra felt as low as the heels of her shoes as she pushed against a November gust and the florist shop door. Her life had been easy, like a spring breeze. Then in the fourth month of her second pregnancy, a minor automobile accident stole her ease.

During this Thanksgiving week she would have delivered a son. She grieved over her loss. As if that weren’t enough, her husband’s company threatened a transfer. Then her sister, whose annual holiday visit she coveted, called saying she could not come.

What’s worse, Sandra’s friend infuriated her by suggesting her grief was a God-given path to maturity that would allow her to empathize with others who suffer. “She has no idea what I’m feeling,” thought Sandra with a shudder.

“Thanksgiving? Thankful for what?” she wondered aloud. For a careless driver whose truck was hardly scratched when he rear-ended her? For an airbag that saved her life but took that of her child?

“Good afternoon, can I help you?” The shop clerk’s approach startled her.

“I…I need an arrangement,” stammered Sandra, “for Thanksgiving?”

“Do you want beautiful but ordinary, or would you like to challenge the day with a customer favorite I call the Thanksgiving Special?” asked the shop clerk. “I’m convinced that flowers tell stories,” she continued. “Are you looking for something that conveys gratitude this Thanksgiving?

“Not exactly!” Sandra blurted out. “In the last five months, everything that could go wrong has gone wrong. ” Sandra regretted her outburst, and was surprised when the shop clerk said, “I have the perfect arrangement for you.”

Then the door’s small bell rang, and the shop clerk said, “Hi Barbara…let me get your order.” She politely excused herself and walked toward a small workroom, then quickly reappeared, carrying an arrangement of greenery, bows, and long-stemmed thorny roses.

Except the ends of the rose stems were neatly snipped…there were no flowers.

“Want this in a box?” asked the clerk.

Sandra watched for the customer’s response. Was this a joke? Who would want rose stems with no flowers!?! She waited for laughter, but neither woman laughed.

“Yes, please.” Barbara replied with an appreciative smile.

“You’d think after three years of getting the special, I wouldn’t be so moved by its significance, but I can feel it right here, all over again,” she said as she gently tapped her chest.

“Uh,” stammered Sandra, “that lady just left with, uh…she just left with no flowers!”

“Right…I cut off the flowers. That’s the Special…I call it the Thanksgiving Thorns Bouquet.

“Oh, come on, you can’t tell me someone is willing to pay for that?” exclaimed Sandra.

“Barbara came into the shop three years ago feeling very much like you feel today,” explained the clerk. “She thought she had very little to be thankful for. She had lost her father to cancer, the family business was failing, her son was into drugs, and she was facing major surgery.”

“That same year I had lost my husband, “continued the clerk,” and for the first time in my life, I had to spend the holidays alone. I had no children, no husband, no family nearby, and too great a debt to allow any travel.

“So what did you do?” asked Sandra. “I learned to be thankful for thorns,” answered the clerk quietly. “I’ve always thanked God for good things in life and never thought to ask Him why those good things happened to me, but when bad stuff hit, did I ever ask! It took time for me to learn that dark times are important. I always enjoyed the ‘flowers’ of life, but it took thorns to show me the beauty of God’s comfort. You know, the Bible says that God comforts us when we’re afflicted, and from His consolation we learn to comfort others.”

Sandra sucked in her breath as she thought about the very thing her friend had tried to tell her. “I guess the truth is I don’t want comfort. I’ve lost a baby and I’m angry with God.”

Just then someone else walked in the shop.

“Hey, Phil!” shouted the clerk to the balding, rotund man.

“My wife sent me in to get our usual Thanksgiving arrangement…twelve thorny, long-stemmed stems!” laughed Phil as the clerk handed him a tissue-wrapped arrangement from the refrigerator.

“Those are for your wife?” asked Sandra incredulously. “Do you mind me asking why she wants something that looks like that?

“No…I’m glad you asked,” Phil replied. “Four years ago my wife and I nearly divorced. After forty years, we were in a real mess, but with the Lord’s grace and guidance, we slogged through problem after problem. He rescued our marriage. Jenny here (the clerk) told me she kept a vase of rose stems to remind her of what she learned from “thorny” times, and that was good enough for me. I took home some of those stems. My wife and I decided to label each one for a specific “problem” and give thanks to Him for what that problem taught us.”

As Phil paid the clerk, he said to Sandra, “I highly recommend the Special!”

“I don’t know if I can be thankful for the thorns in my life.” Sandra said to the clerk. “It’s all too…fresh.”

“Well,” the clerk replied carefully, “my experience has shown me that thorns make roses more precious. We treasure God’s providential care more during trouble than at any other time. Remember, it was a crown of thorns that Jesus wore so we might know His love. Don’t resent the thorns.”

Tears rolled down Sandra’s cheeks. For the first time since the accident, she loosened her grip on resentment. “I’ll take those twelve long-stemmed thorns, please,” she managed to choke out.

“I hoped you would,” said the clerk gently. “I’ll have them ready in a minute.”

“Thank you. What do I owe you?” asked Sandra.

“Nothing.” said the clerk. “Nothing but a promise to allow God to heal your heart. The first year’s arrangement is always on me.” The clerk smiled and handed a card to Sandra. “I’ll attach this card to your arrangement, but maybe you’d like to read it first.”

It read: “Dear God, I have never thanked you for my thorns. I have thanked you a thousand times for my roses, but never once for my thorns. Teach me the glory of the cross I bear; teach me the value of my thorns. Show me that I have climbed closer to you along the path of pain. Show me that, through my tears, the colors of your rainbow look much more brilliant.”

Unthanked people

(Just in time for Thanksgiving, Rev. Brian Cavanaugh, TOR, of the Franciscan University in Steubenville, OH relayed the following reflection on “Unthanked people” via e-mail from Steve Goodier.)

When William Stidger taught at Boston University, he once reflected upon the great number of unthanked people in his life. People who had helped nurture him, inspire him or cared enough about him to leave a lasting impression.

“One was a schoolteacher he’d not heard of in many years. But he remembered that she had gone out of her way to put a love of poetry in him, and he had loved poetry all his life. He wrote a letter of thanks to her.

“The reply he received, written in the feeble scrawl of the aged, began, ‘My dear Willie.’ He was delighted. Now over 50, bald and a professor, he didn’t think there was a person left in the world who would call him ‘Willie.’ Here is a copy of that letter:

“‘My dear Willie, I cannot tell you how much your note meant to me. I am in my eighties, living alone in a small room, cooking my own meals, lonely and, like the last leaf of autumn, lingering behind. You will be interested to know that I taught school for 50 years and yours is the first note of appreciation I ever received. It came on a blue-cold morning and it cheered me as nothing has in many years.’

“Not prone to cry easily, Stidger wept over that note. She was one of the great unthanked people from Stidger’s past. You know them. We all do. The teacher who made a difference. That coach we’ll never forget. The music instructor or Sunday school worker who helped us to believe in ourselves. That Scout leader who cared.

“We all remember people who shaped our lives in various ways. People whose influence changed us. Will Stidger found a way to show his appreciation—he wrote them letters.

“Who are some of the unthanked people from your past? It may not be too late to say, ‘Thanks.”‘

Thoughts from here and There…Lord, Prop Us Up

Every time Mike Atkinson is asked to pray, he thinks of the old deacon who always prayed, ‘Lord, prop us up on our leanin’ side.’

“After hearing him pray that prayer many times, someone asked him why he prayed that prayer so fervently.

“He answered, ‘Well sir, you see, it’s like this…I got an old barn out back. It’s been there a long time. It’s withstood a lot of weather. It’s gone through a lot of storms, and it’s stood for many years. It’s still standing, but one day I noticed it was leaning to one side a bit. So I went and got some pine poles and propped it up on its leaning side so it wouldn’t fall.

“‘Then I got to thinking ’bout that and how much I was like that old barn. I been around a long time, I’ve withstood a lot of life’s storms, I’ve withstood a lot of bad weather in life, I’ve withstood a lot of hard times, and I’m still standing, too. But I find myself leaning to one side from time to time, so I like to ask the Lord to prop us up on our leanin’ side, ’cause I figure a lot of us get to leaning, at times.'”

If you have to lean try, as the song says, “Leaning on the Everlasting Arms.” It helps to remember that one of the great props is thanksgiving. To help you not to lean to much to one side or the other express your gratitude to God for all his blessings, and to your family and friends for all the times that they have been a help and encouragement to you.

Thoughts from here and There…Doing the Laundry of Life

I enjoy humor and am ready to laugh, sometimes in the most inopportune time. This one came from Crosswalk.com. Housework Challenged

One day my housework-challenged husband decided to wash his sweatshirt.

Seconds after he stepped into the laundry room, he shouted to me, “What setting do I use on the washing machine?”

“It depends,” I replied. “What does it say on your shirt?”

He yelled back, “University of Wisconsin.”

Now you know that the wife assumed that her husband could read the label that in on each garment providing washing instructions. The husband does not know this. So there is this humorous mis-communication.

Sometimes mis-communication may be less than humorous. God speaks. What do we know of his message? What’s involved in more than washing a sweatshirt, it is washing a life and preparing it for the family reunion.

It is important to take the time, make the effort to listen to God, apply his cleaning fluids, and never relax until we see him face to face.

Happy cleaning.

Thoughts from here and there…Reformation Day

September 10, 2000: Helga and I with some friends were in Wittenberg, Germany, the home of the Protestant Reformation. We attended a worship service, in German, at the church were Martin Luther was the pastor. After the service we went across the square to store that had souvenirs and information. Looking over the merchandise, I burst out laughing. For sale were some socks and on the soles of the socks were printed the words, “Here I stand, I can do no other.” the famous words of Luther before the Diet of Worms.

October 29 is Reformation Sunday. This is a day which commemorates a day of extraordinary changes in the religious thought and practice. It was on this day in 1517 that Martin Luther nailed his 95 Theses on the door of the Castle Church in Wittenberg. He challenged the commonly accepted theological understandings and religious practices of his day. He stood firm in the face of severe and brutal opposition. He was so completely convinced of the rightness of his position that he could not be moved from it. He could do nothing else. He wrought great change which led to the birth and development of the Protestant Church.

In this years election cycle you hear, probably more than any other, the word, the one word, “change?” Its time for a change in direction. Its time for a change in leadership. Its time for a change in policy, and so we have various reform bills that either have been signed by the President or are being passed by Congress so that they may be signed.

Change as a rallying point is as old as history. Change in itself may be meaningless. The value obtained from change depends on the rational for change and how the changes will be made effective in personal life, church or society. One of the most important points that we need to remember about change is that we usually strongly resist change until the crisis overtakes us and we are forced by personal health or economic reasons to, of course, change.

There is an illustration from the life of William Randolph Hearst that well illustrates how desire may drive us to look for that which we already possess. He wanted a painting. He wanted it so badly that he told his staff to go in search for it; to pay any price, take any tack, to acquire it. Hearst’s staff traveled the world over searching for the desired art work. One day a member of his staff sheepishly approach Mr. Hearst with the news that they had found the painting and it had not cost him anything. He was excited and happy. He wanted to know where they had found the painting and how they had tricked the person into giving it to them. It was at this point that they candidly had to admit that Mr. Hearst owned the painting and they had found it in his warehouse.

There is an old song which provokes some thoughtfulness. “I am the church! You are the church! We are the church together! All who follow Jesus, all around the world! We are the church together!” (Richard K. Avery and Donald S. Marsh, 1972) I am the church. You are the church. What kind of a church are we? We desire change and reform. We may search the world over and remain dissatisfied. We want a painting that we may already possess.

We are the Church. Our Church can be what it is that we, under the Lordship of Jesus Christ, desire it to be. It takes time, thought and work to create our vision of God for us. It is better to do this than to travel the world looking for something that we already have. Reformation Day is a day to examine, explore, evaluate, and then determine what kind of a church we are going to be. We will be the church, regardless! It is better to be constructive and helpful.

Thoughts from here and there…Influence

“In a gun factory,” writes an unknown author, “an elongated bar of steel, which weighed 500 pounds, was suspended by a chain. Beside it an average-sized cork was hanging by a silk thread. It was swung gently against the bar which remained motionless.

For 10 minutes the cork, with rhythmic regularity, continued to strike. Then the heavy piece of steel began to move slightly. At the end of an hour both objects were swinging together like the pendulum of a clock!”

You may find this hard to believe, but such is the power even of a small influence. Influence is reflected in the lives and activities of people in many large and small ways.

Terency Elwyn Johnson, of Margate Community Church (New Jersey), tells the story of Bonnee Hoy, a gifted composer, who died in the prime of life. At her memorial service, a friend told of how a mockingbird used to sing regularly outside Bonnee’s window on summer nights.

“Bonnee would stand at her bedroom window, peering into the darkness, listening intently, marveling at the beautiful songs the mockingbird sang. Then, musician that she was, Bonnee decided to sing back. So she whistled the first four notes of Beethoven’s ‘Fifth Symphony.’ With amazing quickness the mockingbird learned these four notes and sang them back to Bonnee. ‘And in perfect pitch,’ Bonnee marveled. Then, for a time the bird disappeared. But one night, toward the very end of her life, when Bonnee was so terribly sick, the bird returned and, in the midst of other songs, several times sang those first four notes of Beethoven’s ‘Fifth.'”

At that memorial service, her beloved friend, with a smile on her lips and tears in her eyes, said, “I like to think of that now. Somewhere out there (in a big, big world) is a mockingbird who sings Beethoven because of Bonnee.”

Are you living a life so full of song and joy that it brings out the music of other people’s lives? It may not be a few notes from Beethoven’s “Fifth Symphony” that is sounded by a mockingbird, it may be the simple influence of a picture hanging in your home.

Doris Forman remembers the time when she and her husband moved into a new house. Shortly after they moved in her husband asked her, “What about having a picture of Christ in our living room?”

Part of her thought it was a good idea and another part of her was unsure, but she agreed anyway. “Of course,” she said, “we were Christians and, of course we loved God–but a large picture of Christ hanging in the living room and in a spot where everyone who stepped into the room would see it–wasn’t that being a bit fanatical?”

When the decorator came out to check on lamps and pictures one day, he couldn’t help but notice the 16 x 20 inch print of “The Savior” by Coleman hanging over the piano in the most prominent place in the living room. The decorator suggested that another picture, perhaps a landscape, would look better in that spot. “We like it and that’s where it stays,” her husband replied firmly.

What would their friends think when they saw the large picture of Christ hanging in their living room? “Most of our friends were professed Christians, but they lived largely in a world of club affairs, cocktail parties and bridge luncheons,” Doris wondered. During the next two years, many interesting things happened to this family that they believe was a direct result of that picture. Total strangers, like the man who delivered their newspaper, began telling them their troubles. There were others who commented on the picture hanging in their living room. “Consciously, or maybe unconsciously, they felt that we must know Christ,” Doris said.

She concluded, “Our life today has more purpose, more meaning and more beauty” due to this decision to proclaim Christ as the Lord of their lives.

There is incredible power in influence. We may not realize just how much power we possess. It is power to change lives. It is power to change society. A small cork has the capacity to nudge into motion a 500 pound piece of steel. We are more than a cork, a lot more!

Thoughts from here and there…The Sacred

Some time ago Sylvester Stallone wrote: “If I were watching a home movie of my life, I would shake my head in despair and wonderment,” Stallone said with a laugh. “It’s a comedy of errors.” He has acknowledged that he has been arrogant, petty and selfish.

Stallone’s dramatic rise to success blinded him to what was most important. “When you’re living in the fast lane,” he said, “you tend to overlook the basic components that give your life meaning-relationships, getting to know someone really well, putting someone else first. People who are highly ambitious often don’t focus on the needs of their immediate family, especially their children….”

“Now, I understand what is sacred,” he said.

We are not actors like Sylvester Stallone or actresses like Jane Seymour who lived in the “fast lane,” and who tended to overlook the “basic components,” that give meaning to life. Yet we can be plagued with the same results as we chase or attempt to hold on to the “American Dream.”

September 11, 2001 will live on not only in memory, but also an anniversary. The sights and the sounds of this horrible terrorist attack will not soon be forgotten. We will remember not only the enemy but also the heros.

September 11 was so tragic for those who lost their lives and for those who mourn them. It can be for each of us a kind of a wake-up call. It offer us a time-out from our present concerns so that we might have time to contemplate what is truly sacred. In this let us each make room for God to reveal to us what we need and then let us rise up and with God’s help find fulfillment. In this way those who have died will not have died in vain.

Brokenness

There was a time when Step-son Hans and I were chasing a mouse that had gone behind the kitchen stove. Welding a broom we tried to dislodge the mouse from behind the stove so that we might capture and dispatch it. We did get the mouse but in the process we knocked a decorative plate from the wall. It fell to the floor and fragmented into many pieces. There was no way to save the plate. You could have glued the pieces together but many of them were so small that the plate would have had gaps where the decorations were missing. Helga was disappointed to discover the broken plate. Fortunately it was not a very expensive one.

There are times when life becomes broken. We do not think that it ought to happen, but it does. Henri Nouwen was a Priest and a psychologist. He spent 10 years of his life working with the disabled at a L’Arche community most of them at Daybreak in Toronto, Canada. It was out of this experience that he wrote, “Our life is full of brokenness – broken relationships, broken promises, broken expectations. How can we live with that brokenness without becoming bitter and resentful except by returning again and again to God’s faithful presence in our lives.” Our lives are full of brokenness. We cannot ignore the brokenness. It haunts our waking hours and our dreams. We cannot avoid the brokenness, we can only learn to live within it, using it to grow into a deeper relationship with the Healer of Broken Hearts, Jesus Christ. But there is more.

C. S. Lewis has written about the ways in which God in Christ works, “He works on us in all sorts of ways. But above all, he works on us through each other. Men are mirrors, or ‘carriers’ of Christ to other men. Usually it is those who know him that bring him to others. That is why the Church, the whole body of Christians showing him to one another, is so important. It is so easy to think that the Church has a lot of different objects – education, building, missions, holding services…the Church exists for no other purpose but to draw men into Christ, to make them little Christs. If they are not doing that, all the cathedrals, clergy, missions, sermons, even the Bible itself, are simply a waste of time. God became man for no other purpose. It is even doubtful, you know, whether the whole universe was created for any other reason.”

Showing Christ to one another. Demonstrating the love and compassion of Christ to one another. Living out in faithfulness the teachings of Christ with one another. This is the way to a life full of vitality and excitement. Helping one another to be a child of Christ. This is the way to utter fulfilment and satisfaction.

I have come to believe that there is no better way to live. I find in Christ not only a way to live with the brokenness, but also a way to use it to develop the coping skills that are needed to live within the brokenness. This is the way of ultimate purpose and meaning. This is not only something to think about, it is something to do.