Life Matters - July 19, 2023
Fascinated, I stood on the shaded footbridge at Hartford Beach State Park, gazing at the sun-dappled, crystal clear, spring-fed brook as it rippled across its rocky bottom to disappear under the bridge as I leaned over the railing. My gaze followed the brook upstream to where it came bubbling around the wooded bend then rippled downstream toward me. It was a balmy, sunny, nearing-summer day as I stood awhile absorbing the God-given beauty of nature, then reflecting on the source of this beautiful brook. The source of this fascinating brook is springs of water bubbling out of yonder hills, formed by the waters of many droplets seeping through the ground, gravel, among rocks, and maybe sandy places, purified in the process, forming trickles, then rivulets, becoming little streams converging to become steady flows eventually bubbling out of their dark confines blending into this brook now rippling toward me with a sound as of the merry laughter of youth. “How like the excitement of being young,” I thought, “when the confining limitations of childhood are being left behind and most of life is yet to be discovered with almost boundless energy and ambition that could come quite close at times to feelings of being invincible.”
Then I turned to the downstream side and spread my hands on its railing. The view from this side was also beautiful but some things were now changed. The brook was no longer coming toward me, it was now ebbing away. It felt in a hurry as it rippled away from me, glittering in the full sun of a sunny day, then disappearing around a grassy bend as it neared its final destination, losing its present identity in the glittering-in-the-sun blueness of the lake my eyes now rested upon. From where I stood I couldn’t see where the brook emptied into the lake, but I know it does. I’ve seen it. The grassy banks become sand as the brook has cut a channel through the sandy lakeshore. The water is refreshing, but breathtakingly cold, as excited children at times discover, when they leave the relative warmth of the lake to daringly play in this sandy section of brook. Or, as full-grown children do when they push each other in!
Now, as I stood on the footbridge gazing downstream it seemed as if I was seeing my life ebbing away. My stamina, my ambition, my agility are no longer what they used to be. I think I’m on the home stretch. I still have a lot I want to get done, I see a lot that needs done, but at times I feel like my get up and go has done got up and left. But don’t get me wrong, I ain’t old yet! Dear Uncle Abner gave us the definition of “old” years ago when he said, “You know you’re getting old when you painstakingly bend over to pick up an item on the floor and then you wonder ‘what else should I be doing while I’m down here?’ ” Oh. Maybe I do know what that’s like!
But whether old, young, or in between, we know for certain that life on this spinning orb only goes in one direction, downstream, where all of us will lose our temporal identity in the realm of eternity upon our arrival there.
Then, our temporal identity, whether rich or poor, old or young, king or slave, will no longer be distinguishable, “For we brought nothing into this world and it is certain we can carry nothing out.” (I Timothy 6:7) What will matter is how we lived our life here, whether we lived for and obeyed God, which takes being born again, (John 3) or, God forbid, we lived for and obeyed idols. May our identity be found in the Book of Life.
Secular humanism is becoming/has become the controversial state religion in the U.S. of America and nowhere is that more evident than its left-wing government, its public schools, the colleges and the universities. There are exceptions to the rule of course, and many Christians are becoming “Awoke” but the Biden Administration seems determined, above all else, to ensure that government, and the public, worship the many gods of this world, excluding Bible Christianity with its so-called “intolerance,” which we call the Truth of God’s Word. Eternity will have no tolerance for idol worship, but nowhere in America do I find a people more tolerant of those with whom they disagree than Christians who know where they stand. Tolerance for the person, only intolerant of sin, of the lie. Loving the sinner while hating the sin. Purifying, from the inside out, is the Christian way.
Life Matters!