I've just pulled out my "As Seen on TV", E-Z Eyes, Large Print, glow in the dark, QWERTY keyboard (that apparently I can spill an entire glass of water on without doing any damage to), which I got fifteen years ago for a "steal" of $3.00 (marked down from $11.99) because I have something more lengthy and important to say and I need to do some power typing. (How is THAT for an opening sentence?!)
My cat, MONTY is nearby, having just eaten his lunch and is just having a "kitty clean up" before (I predict) having a "power-nap". His fourth of the day ... so far. And since (my) "universe is unfolding as it should" *, let us begin.
I am reminded of a time in 1988 when I was twenty-two years old (Oops! I just accidentally out my age on the Internet again) and I worked at "Charlie's Chocolate Factory" in Port Coquitlam, BC with my friend from Vancouver Christian Secondary School, Kim. She was driving me home to Burnaby on her way to Vancouver and braving the freeways during rush hour. We got to discussing various things and landed on "reaping what you sow", which is the original, Biblical concept of "what goes around comes around". We were discussing that a life full of sin meant having to face some harsh, difficult consequences and that life would go much easier if we got as much sin out of it as possible. I ended with a statement along the lines of, "I'm glad I know these things now. It's much easier being a Christian than before when I wasn't one." Then we fell to being silent, each with our own thoughts.
As I was seated there watching the rain on the windshield (it rains four hundred days a year in Vancouver) and looking out at all the traffic I heard the Lord say to me, "And what if it isn't?" That perked me up because at the time I didn't hear the Lord so plainly.
"What if following me means a much harder life instead of an easier life? Will you still follow me then?"
I was about to answer with an immediate, "Absolutely, Lord!" but He paused me to think about it and consider what it might actually require. Suddenly all the martyrs I knew about throughout the centuries flashed through my mind. Finally I landed on a much more quiet and restrained, "Yes, Jesus. To whom shall I go? You have the words of eternal life. I have come to believe and to know that you are the Holy One of God." Which is my personalized version of John 6:68-69. Then added in my own words. "Besides Lord, I love you and I'm never going back to a life without you again."
And so I adjusted my perspective of my life and it took on a very different meaning and course from that moment on. (Do we ever see these life altering moments coming?!)
Let's jump forward thirty-three years. Has it been easy? No. Very rarely in fact. I've endured mostly valleys and pits instead of mountain tops. Would I change any of it? Never!
That brings us to the here and now. Last night I was reading from the Apostle Paul's second letter to Timothy. Timothy was a young, Christian gentile who is like a son to Paul and who was pastoring a church in Lystra at the the time. Paul was in a Roman prison and knew he would die soon. In fact, this is the last letter that Paul writes. One of the things he asks Timothy is to come and see him "before winter" and also asks him to bring with him, Mark, his coat, his books and his papers. - SEE (2 Timothy 4:11, 13, 21)
Not surprising to me (because I don't believe in coincidences) I had just taken out a book I have owned since Mom gave it to me for Christmas in 1998 and that I read every autumn called, "Come Before Winter" by Charles Swindoll. It is separated into three parts: Before Winter, MidWinter's Blast, and Winter's End.
I found an old bookmark in the Midwinter's Blast section and read the introduction to that section again. I share it with you now because it is absolutely meant for these times and what we are all enduring.
"I have never been inside a Siberian work camp. I have not sailed the North Atlantic in January. Neither have I clung to a sled behind a team of huskies barking their way across the Yukon. Nor was I part of the combat Marine outfit that braved the notorious "frozen Inchon" in Korea. But I have been cold. Frighteningly cold.
From frigid ice storms in the Rockies to bitter blizzards in Iowa and Illinois, Minnesota and Massachusetts, I have leaned hard against the wind, wondering if my face would ever regain its feeling. Those traumatic times have taught me to listen to things like weather warnings and wind-chill factors. There's a name for folks who don't: victim. That numbing, vicious blast when winter releases her fury may be given a fantasy label like "wonderland" by poet-and-artist types ... but the raw-boned realists who have survived those freezing winter winds that roar like a lion and sting like a whip have a healthy, awesome respect for blizzards.
The best place to be during midwinter's blast is inside. Away from the cold ... under a pile of thick, soft, cozy blankets ... near a fireplace of burning timber.
But I have been cold even there, frighteningly cold, when winter blew inside and refused to leave.
Feeling broken, bruised, and - worst of all - barren, like the scene outside. Asking why. Wondering when it would end. Struggling to go on. Wind-whipped within, I have honestly thought at those times of packing it in.
Such midwinter miseries, I have come to realize, are not mine alone. You've had them too, haven't you? That's one of the reasons you picked up this book, isn't it? You long to persevere through the pits, but you find yourself running shy on hope. Hope ... the midwinter mirage others talk about, but you fail to see. Believe me, I understand. It's faded from my eyes many times.
I've got some things to say especially to you in the pages [posts] that follow. Perhaps you will stumble across a statement or turn of a phrase, maybe one particular word that will light a spark and bring back the warmth you've lacked in the midst of the blast. It's possible, you know. Hope doesn't require a massive chain where heavy links of logic hold it together. A thin wire will do ... just strong enough to get us through the night until the winds die down.
If God should use something I have written to steady your course and help you cope with at least today's bitter battle, thank Him. The byproduct of hope's sudden breakthrough is called perseverance ... a rare commodity in today's shallow times. But oh, so essential! It is all you need to take the chill out of the air.
It's the stuff of which pioneers were made and other hearty types ... like those who endure Siberia, sail the North Atlantic, cross the Yukon, fight with frozen feet at Inchon ... and even those who regain enough hope to press on when only moments ago they had written out and rehearsed their resignation from the human race."
- Charles Swindoll
Thank you Reverend Swindoll for going from talking directly TO me to talking directly FOR me.
Speaking the truth, with love,
Always, Laura-Lee
"From this time many of his disciples turned back and no longer followed him.
'You do not want to leave too, do you?' Jesus asked the Twelve.
Simon Peter answered him, 'Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life. We have come to believe and to know that you are the Holy One of God.' "
(John 6:66-69)
LINK: Insight for Living Canada (teaching ministry of Charles Swindoll)
* From the Desiderata. A poem put to music we had on a (45) vinyl record when I was five years old. It gave me the "creeps" back then, I like it less now.
Here's a LINK for your own appraisal.
https://youtu.be/C9iwKW6bal8
YUP. MONTY is still at it. Zzzzzzz.
UPDATE: November 4, 2021
