Life Matters, October 27, 2021
On Tuesday evening, a week ago, we were expecting heavy rains before morning so I thought I'd better check in at a job site to make sure the downspouts from the original building drained away from the foundation trenches that had been dug for the addition we anticipate building. "But," I thought, "I'll take the largest diameter pipe we have in the shop attic along in case I need them.”
In the shop, I went up the long flight of stairs to the landing above the mechanical room and from there up the short flight of stairs to the trap door that opens into the attic. Sure enough, I found two sections of eight inch pipe and stuck them through the trap door opening to the landing below. I very carefully backed down the stairs toward that landing, very carefully, because you see, I'm still in recovery mode from an accident in 2011 that left me in a 3-week coma. My depth perception is still not the best, but worse, if I do start to fall my reflexes don't work. Yet. As if that particular department ran out of adrenaline. So, I very carefully backed down the stairs ... until the pipes got in my way. For the purpose of handling long items, the stairs don't have railings so when the pipes got in my way I stepped off the side of the stairs to the ... landing? Did I tell you about my reflexes and lack of depth perception? The landing was too far down yet. My foot didn't reach. It swung back. I pitched forward, lost my grip on the stair and fell in a tangle onto the long flight of stairs below the landing. Then head-first and face-down, I flopped and wash-boarded down that long flight of stairs, face-planting onto the cold, hard concrete floor followed by my neck, left shoulder, and then the rest of me, all flopped into an undignified heap at the base of the stairs. For what seemed a suspended moment in time, I lay quite still ... then the pain assured me that "I ain't dead yet" and since I had no broken bones I struggled to my feet, went on and got the job done. But sore? Yeah. For days. But ... though the face-plant felt rude, I am thankful that the stair-slide didn't go on into infinity. I am thankful there is a floor there.
I am also thankful for Truth and the America I was raised in ... but "Uncle Sam" has been, it seems, on his own face-down, head-first, flopping, wash-boarding slide for decades now. To a helpless on-looker like myself, the stair-slide looked as if it could well continue into infinity and ultimate destruction. But a floor appeared. As if out of nowhere. Built by four years of our 45th President, Donald J. Trump, and by the grace of God who, I believe, desired to give the American people another chance. The face-plant onto the cold, hard facts of reality was a rude one indeed and the results painful but I/we remain thankful that there was a floor there to stop "Uncle Sam" from sliding on to his demise.
However, not all are thankful. The present POTUS (President of the United States) has been aimlessly jack-hammering away at the floor while his minions busily grease the stairway below that stretches into the destruction of infinity. The face-down, head-first, flopping, wash-boarding slide of "Uncle Sam" had become normalized with the passing of time (think "America is back") while the perversions of Marxism's, coupled with the devil's, carnal desires blind the eyes and the minds of logic in many who could make a difference, but won't. So far. Let us pray and do what we can. Pray that through the power of Christ many may get converted. We may be battered and bruised but "we ain't dead yet.” Courage is being eager to live, yet ready to die, and is still available from the out-pouring of God's grace through our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
Life Matters!