Christmas Was Late This Year

Christmas was late this year. Oh, it got here, but not on the 25^th. December 25^th arrived, as expected, the day after the 24^th. We had a delightful day, with the usual opening of presents and enjoying guests around the dinner table. In the afternoon, our larger-than-usual group caroled its way around the hospital, and that was a special time. But something was missing.

I didn’t think much about it over the next couple of days, but it did cross my mind. There was one gift I had specifically requested from God, and I hadn’t received it. Oh well. My other obvious blessings and pleasures kept my mind busy, and I did not fret. But if I stopped and allowed myself to think about it, that “something” was still missing.

This morning, I was working at my desk when a soft knock came at the front door. I opened the door to find a man holding a rake and looking for work. Didn’t I need him to rake the front yard? Or was there something else he could do? His family had lost its house and was having to live in a small motel room, so he had to do whatever was necessary to earn a little money and keep things together.

The yard really didn’t look too bad, but then… I really hate raking leaves, and he needed the work, so…. I told the man he could rake the leaves. We didn’t discuss price, but I knew even then that I would be paying him more than the job was really worth. Somehow, I already knew that this situation was my Gift.

As the morning continued, I had several occasions to go outside. Each time I had opportunity for a little more conversation with the man with the rake, and each time, I learned a little more about him. Like so many in our community, he couldn’t find work, but he still had rent to pay and children to feed. And each time I looked out the window the man was raking fast and carefully.

I knew about how long it would take him to finish the front yard, so I knew I had a little time. I remembered that I had a couple of shirts, some new work socks, and a few other items that he might find useful. I also asked Patsy if she had some portable food items we could put together. By the time the raker of leaves was finished, we had a couple of nice bags filled and ready to go.

It was then that I asked the man whether he would like something to eat. I already knew he hadn’t had much this morning. He agreed that something to eat would be nice, and I invited him in. Very shortly, we sat down together for a meal of Patsy's Christmas leftovers, and you can be sure that when he pushed back from the table, there was nothing left on his plate but the fork.

During the course of the meal we talked. My new friend spoke very frankly of some of the bad choices he made in his life, and of the difficulties he now faces as he looks for work. I was able to encourage him and, perhaps, point him in some useful directions. It was during lunch, also, that he told me about letting God change his entire approach to life, and that of the doors he had knocked on this morning, only ours had opened.

Then it was time to go. I already knew that with the packages my friend would be carrying, he would need a ride, so I took him in the van to the little motel.

Yes, Christmas was late this year. The Gift I had asked for was that God would send a stranger to join us at our table. The Gift was three days late, but now I have had Christmas.

A Nation in Distress: Reflections on the 4th of July, 2013

I appreciate the 4^th of July and all it historically stands for – liberty, and the willingness of men and women to risk their lives, fortunes and sacred honor to have it. Many of the signers of the Declaration of Independence for which the day is famous actually lost those things for their ideal of liberty. Freedom isn’t free.

Freedom – liberty – is important to me. I once put my own life on the line and swore to uphold and defend the Constitution of the United States – that wonderful-though-imperfect document that our ancestors established to describe a process and parameters for maintaining our hard-won liberty. I willingly, proudly, joined the Army in wartime.

I like fireworks, and bands and celebrations, and I have always enjoyed observing the festivities of “The 4^th.” An American flag waves in front of my house as I write. Long may it wave.

But I fear for that flag, and I fear for this nation that it represents.

I have difficulty this year getting excited about the 4^th of July.

What really are we celebrating?

We are remembering what used to be –what used to exist in our ideals, in our founding principles. We are celebrating things to which we once at least aspired.

We never completely reached those ideals, but, at least, we wanted to.

We intended to.

We tried.

Now, I fear, we have, as a nation, completely given up on those aspirations. We have sold our national soul to expedience. We have surrendered our highest intentions to our lowest inclinations.

We still wave our flags, and we still trot out the patriotic blather of speeches. We hold church services and public gatherings to cheer for our troops in their unnecessary wars, and we keep sending those brave young people off to “fight for their country.”

But, in the name of “freedom,” aren’t we really mainly sending them to extend the American Empire? Aren’t we really using up these precious lives just so we can be the biggest bully in the sandpile? Aren’t we really committing internationally some of the very same evils for which we condemned the British in our classic Declaration of Independence? (http://www.archives.gov/exhibits/charters/declaration_transcript.html)

For my generation, there was Vietnam. We drank the poisonous patriotic Kool-Aid while politicians talked of dominoes falling, and we marched proudly away. Most of us had no idea then how our own government was lying to us. We thought that our greatest danger was from some peacenik burning a flag. We didn’t realize that our true hazard might be masked by a pseudo-patriotism.

At least in those days, we had the integrity to be outraged when we finally learned that our President was breaking the law.

And now? Our once-great nation has completely forgotten the heights to which it once attempted to ascend.

There is a vast difference between greatness and mere power.

We are a powerful nation. Can we honestly still claim greatness?

I think not.

Neither major political party can claim any moral high ground. The politicians of both parties continue to put personal power before principle and party one-up-manship before national good. And they sell their souls, and their votes, to the highest bidder, whether such be a Soros or a Koch.

As a nation, we are divided like a husband and wife locked in a long-moribund marriage and for whom the other party cannot possibly do anything right. Every word and action is interpreted through a haze of suspicion of motives, and every fear becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.

We are divided “left” and “right,” but there is no balance.

We are divided “have” and “have-not,” but both are alike in their greed.

We are divided “liberal” and “conservative,” but the liberals are only liberal with other people’s money and with those who agree with them, while the conservatives have forgotten whatever it was they intended to conserve – except the money and power they have or wish they had. (Giving away other people’s money is not “liberal,” and selfishness is not really “conservative.”)

Oh yes … there are also the non-aligned, the would-be “third party” folks, but most of them seem to be wrapped in the self-indulgence of either the childish arrogance of some green/reform/justice “socialism” or just wanting to be able to do “their own thing.” 

We are divided “religious” and “secular,” with both claiming the blessings and support of our national heritage. The main difference, really, seems to be that the secular folks know they do not worship the God of the Bible, while the religious folks still think they do.

Both God and Lincoln have warned us that a house divided against itself cannot long stand.

But we keep talking of patriotism, while we and most of our elected officials have forgotten what real patriotism is.

We call wiki-leakers “traitors,” but we ignore a President and Cabinet officials who flout the law and their oaths. We certainly say nothing about the treason of a Congress that trades our freedom for false security and whose primary work is to keep itself in office.

Meanwhile, the Church – liberal, moderate, conservative,  or by whatever name, and with few exceptions – works hard to rearrange the chairs on the deck of the Titanic, even after she has struck the iceberg, thinking that some fresh combination of behavior-modification and political influence will hold back the frigid flood that is so surely sinking our ship of state – keep it out at least long enough for “us” to fly away. And we wonder why the watching world rejects or ignores us.

I love this country. Particularly because I have lived much of my life overseas, I love the United States and her history, her varied and mixed cultures, her interwoven strands of heritage. I love the liberty of personhood and opportunity for which the United States used to stand. As much as I enjoyed living in other countries, I was always proud and pleased that I was an American, and I was glad I could look forward to returning to these United States. Because I love the United States, my sadness for her is the greater.

I do not believe that any other country is doing “better” than we are. In fact, most are far worse, which is why so many of their people still want to come here.

Nevertheless, we are not what we could be.

We are not even what we were.

We certainly are not what we want to think we are.

If, as Lincoln said, we are “the last best hope of earth,” then the world is in deep trouble.

(To be continued….)