RACHEL & MINNIE'S "LOOK ALIKE/SIDE BY SIDE" HOUSES

"...Except the LORD build the house, they labour in vain that build it... (from Psalm 127:1)

A few days ago as I walked along the small one-way street in a residential neighborhood just outside downtown Framingham, Massachusetts, I saw them:  The two "look alike/side by side" houses.  They're painted very different colors from the colors that adorned them thirty years ago.  And, they've been "fixed up" quite a bit.  They've been changed and they've been updated.  They don't even look quite their eighty-three-years of age!  There are "new" people living in those houses; well, they're relatively new people, compared to the long term residents who'd previously occupied them.

I'm no architectural or home design expert.  I couldn't tell you the name of the style of these houses.  Each is a two story house, and that doesn't include an attic at each edifice.  Each has a basement.  Each house has a very nice porch.  They're definitely "porches" and not "decks"!  What's unusual is that each has a side porch.  On each house, the porch is on the right side as you look at the house from the street.  And, the front door is really not a "front door" at either residence.  In each case, it's a side door accessed through the porch.  [Each house does have a back door.]

The house's numbers are seventy-three and sixty-seven.  I know, it seems weird that they're side by side yet there's a gap in the street numbers.  I'm not sure why that's the case.  Today, seventy-three is painted beige and sixty-seven is a very pretty yellow.  Today, each house has a nicely paved driveway.  That's possibly the most radical change to the houses.  For most of these houses' lives, they not only had no garages but they had no driveways.  I don't think either even had a "curb cut" from the sidewalk.  Today, seventy-three has a driveway with no curb cut!  I'm not even sure if it was legal to put in a driveway that way,  but whoever owns seventy-three did just that!  As I recall, sixty-seven does have a curb cut for the driveway, but there's a telephone pole awkwardly almost blocking the driveway.  Pulling into or out of that driveway has got to take a little skill!

My family and I moved to Framingham in 1987 when I accepted the pastorate position at First Assembly of God of Framingham.  The church's name always made it sound rather important, but in fact, it was always a small, struggling church.  The occupants of each house had a strong connection to the church.  "Rachel",  nearing age eighty when I moved in, lived at seventy-three.  During the years she lived there, it was not painted beige but rather gray.  "Rachel" was a retired college professor.  She co-owned the house with a dear friend I will call "Pam".  "Minnie" lived at number sixty-seven.  She was about age ninety when I moved in.  Rachel and "Pam" had purchased their home in 1958, but Minnie had lived in her brown house right from its beginning in 1932.  Rachel was not a Member of our church, but she was a regular attender.  About six weeks after I moved into Framingham, I received a phone call from Minnie.  I had a bit of a difficult time understanding her, as she spoke with a thick Irish brogue.  Minnie invited me to visit her at home and told me she had something very important to ask me.  The visit to Minnie was fascinating.  I learned she'd come to this country from Northern Ireland very early in the twentieth century.   She'd been in Framingham for many, many decades, and was a very early "Pentecostal"- from the era when Pentecostals were truly persecuted and considered "people from the other side of the tracks".  Minnie had been a Member of our church almost from its very beginning.  She'd married and raised a family.  For some reason, her family was not particularly keen about our church.  So, for many, many years, she and her family attended the Nazarene Church in town.  Ironically, Minnie had met Rachel when she'd moved in next door, and had encouraged her to visit the Assembly of God and not the Nazarene Church.   That's how Rachel had started attending.  [Rachel was open to the "things of the Spirit" but was not from a Pentecostal background and was never comfortable about becoming a Member at our church.]    The important thing that Minnie had wanted to ask me is if I would conduct her funeral service when she died.  I told her that I would do that.

During my first couple of years in Framingham, I visited Minnie at least once a month.  She was amazingly hearty, healthy, and mentally sharp for someone over age ninety.  Sadly, after a couple of years,  Minnie suffered a massive stroke.  I visited her a few times at a local nursing home.  She was pleasant but she was just not the same.   One day, I noticed Minnie's obituary in the local newspaper.  Her funeral was being conducted at a Lutheran Church- where some of her children and grandchildren attended.  I thought of my promise to Minnie that I'd conduct her funeral service.  Rachel and I had a phone conversation about this.  Rachel believed very strongly that I should kind of push myself on the family and tell them Minnie wanted me to conduct the funeral service.  I felt guilty and uncomfortable, but I just didn't feel right about doing that.  I was a young, fairly inexperienced pastor in my early thirties when I'd made that promise to Minnie.  Today, if I made a promise of that sort, I'd insist that the information all be written down, and that the person make sure he or she communicated their wishes about their funeral to their heirs.  Minnie's house sat empty for many years.  The family kept it from falling into disrepair, but it was sad to see it just sitting there, looking so lonely and empty.

Rachel was still driving a car (she bought a brand new Dodge Aries in 1988) and very active during my early years at the church.  She owned a place near Lake Winnipesaukee in New Hampshire in those days, and she went up there quite a bit each summer.  Sadly, by the late 1990s, Rachel's health had failed quite a bit.  She became legally blind, and so she had to stop driving.  She sold the summer place.  Her "house mate" Pam died.  She loved to read, and now was unable to do so.  Rachel had many happy memories of her past, but she was very unhappy in her present.  In those days (around 2000) I used to help her out by bringing her recycling bin out to the street each Thursday and bringing it back after it had been emptied.  I also once mowed her lawn.  She'd hired various people to cut the lawn, but was in-between lawn cutters and the grass was about three feet tall!  I remember I worked really hard that day, but I was glad I was helping Rachel.  She was a great student of the Bible and would sometimes talk to me on the phone for up to an hour discussing Scripture verses and passages that meant a lot to her.   Somewhere around 2003, she went into a very nice nursing home and sold the house.  Rachel died in 2007.  She was ninety-eight!  She'd had some dementia over her last couple of years.  I conducted her funeral service.  The burial was in the family plot in Lynn;  except that like "The Last of the Mochicans" she was the very last of her family.  She was an only child.  There were no living cousins.  That part was rather sad, but Rachel had touched a lot of lives during her distinguished career as a professor and many fine words of eulogy were spoken during her funeral by a number of people.  And, of course, it must be remembered again that it was Minnie who'd convinced Rachel to get involved with First Assembly of God of Framingham.  So, I did do a funeral service for one of these dear old gals, it's just that it was for Rachel and not for Minnie.

Yes, I paused and reflected as I looked at those two "look alike/side by side" houses a few days ago.  And, I thought I'd share some of my reflecting with you.

"SIGNIFICANT" OR "SUBSTANTIAL"?

"Hast thou entered into the treasures of the snow? or hast thou seen the treasures of the hail,
Which I have reserved against the time of trouble, against the day of battle and war?"  (Job 38:22-23)

Today (Sunday, February 1, 2015) is not only "Super Bowl Sunday", but for those of us living in the northeastern United States, it's another day in which we're hearing numerous weather forecasts calling for a major snowstorm to begin late tonight and last until the early morning hours of Tuesday.  One report I saw on-line is calling for a "significant snowfall".  That word "significant" makes me think of something I heard on a radio broadcast several years ago.  At that time, the weather reports were calling for a "significant snowfall".  Radio talk show host Jay Severin (who is quite a purist when it comes to English grammar) pointed out that the phrase "significant snowfall" is really not correct.  Severin stated that the correct phrase should be "substantial snowfall".  I realize this information may sound quite picky, and in a sense, it is.  Jay Severin explained that "significant snowfall" means that the snowfall would (grammatically speaking) have to signify something.  What would it signify?  That's unclear.  Honestly, I do think Severin had a valid point.  So often our common usage of the English language is actually incorrect!  The sad reality is, we regularly use incorrect terms and incorrect phrases;  in time we do that so often that the incorrect phrases catch on and become the norm!  (This has happened, for instance, with the expression:  "I could care less!".  In fact, the grammatically correct phrase is:  "I couldn't care less!".  It has also happened with the usage of the words "apology" and "apologize".   Most people think that apologizing means "saying you're sorry".  It doesn't.  An "apology" is actually a defense of something!)

I know that (ecologically speaking) winter snow is actually very important.  A winter with very little snow [such as the winter of 2011-2012 in Massachusetts] is very enjoyable for people like me who dislike snow.  Yet, a snowless winter often means a drought for the summer and harm done to plants and animals.  I'm not excited about the substantial snowfall that's expected to come our way in just a few hours!  Nor am I excited about the significant snowfall that's expected to come our way in just a few hours!  In my ideal fantasy world, the calendar would jump from November 30 to March 1 and we'd skip December, January, and February entirely!  The reality is, of course, that in New England, we're all in this "snow and cold" and "winter" thing together, whether we like it or not! 

Please be safe in this upcoming storm.  Pray for the Lord's protection.  I do!  

And, what do you think?  Was Jay Severin off base?  Are you more comfortable hearing about a "significant snowfall" or a "substantial snowfall" or does it really matter?

SUBARU

"To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven:
 A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted;"
(Ecclesiastes 3:1-2)

Much has been written and discussed over the past hundred years or so about Americans' "love affair with their automobiles".  As a committed Christian, I am well aware that this "love affair" can border on idolatry and in fact can be idolatry.   I admit that as much as I would like to own a brand-new car someday, it's possible that I never will, because I can get much too wrapped up in worrying about the slightest dent or scratch to the car's exterior, or about a stain on the upholstery.  This may be part of why the Lord has had me in very old cars for the past couple of decades!   My last two cars have been what I called my "Lt. Columbo cars".  They've been like that beat up 1959 Peugeot which was his trademark vehicle on the old "Columbo" television movies all the way from 1968 through 2003!   My cars were old and beat up, and yet sporting Massachusetts license plate #280.  It's a long story, but I inherited those specialty license plates when my parents passed away in mid-2000 (within seven weeks of each other).

I got my parents' 1989 Volkswagen Golf in 2000 and I drove that car until early 2010.  At that time, the brakes failed [totally] in downtown Framingham.  I literally drove the car right into a snowbank to stop!  It was towed to my driveway by AAA and it sat there for three months until I sold it to a young mechanic who loved fixing up old Volkswagens.  Right now, I'm without my own car, and frankly I hate it, but I easily forget that in 2010, I went for almost three months with no car of my own.  It was a little easier then because I lived withing walking distance of work, my barber, my bank, and my post office box- not twenty-one miles away like today!    

I was very blessed in May of 2010 to receive a gift of precious cargo from my daughter Amy and son-in-law David:  A 1995 Subaru Impreza sedan which they'd owned for several years.  Amy and a friend drove it all the way from Springfield, Missouri to Framingham, Massachusetts.  During the Subaru's final eighteen months, it really looked like what I call "a junk heap" but it was not too bad looking when I got it in May of 2010.  There was something very special about that car because I first drove and "experienced" the green Subaru sedan on my time of "sabbatical" there in Missouri in April and May of 2009.  The Subaru was not Amy and David's only vehicle.  They pretty much let me use the car quite a bit during that time.  I've written on the blog in the past about the "private retreat" I had at the Hermitage Spiritual Retreat Center, located about an hour and a half's drive north of the city of Springfield.  I well remember the drive up there and back, and seeing the Subaru parked there during my days of prayer and reading and reflection.  My wife joined me for part of the time in Missouri and when she was there, we did an overnight in Branson, also using the Subaru.  Thus, when I registered the Subaru as my car in May of 2010 it was already sort of an "old friend".  I deliberately never removed the Missouri inspection sticker from the car's windshield.  (In Missouri, the sticker goes on the opposite side of the windshield from where the Massachusetts stickers are displayed.)  And, I was even kind of proud of the "Reliable SuperStore" dealer's decal on the trunk of the car.  (Back when I went to Bible College, that was known as "Reliable Chevrolet"!)  

The Subaru had just over 156,000 miles on it when I got started as the owner.  Upon being junked a couple of weeks ago, there were 270,911 miles on it!  Yes, I put 114,000 miles on that car in four and a half years!   It was especially during the year and a half of living in Webster and commuting every day to Framingham that I put about half of those miles on the car.  After about a year, the Subaru started looking a little "ratty" and after two years, it frankly looked terrible.  In several places, the exterior trim fell right off!   The metal "door" over the gas cap area broke off.  In the pre-Halloween snowstorm of 2011, a tree fell on the roof of the car, leaving several large dents!  The driver's seat had a few rips and tears in it when I got the car.  By about a year ago, it was all torn up and looked horrible.  There was "stuffing" from the inside of the seat that was coming out all over the place.  The Subaru had four "hub caps" when I got the car.  They were not factory hub caps.  I think my son-in-law must have bought some look-alike ones at an auto parts store.  One of those plastic hub caps broke in pieces when I had a tire blow out on the Mass. Turnpike on Christmas Day 2011.  One broke when I whalloped a curb a few months later (note: Mary Ann, you did NOT just read that- please disregard!).  I think another just fell off.  For the past year or so, there was only one lone hub cap on the car.  The paint was not perfect in 2010 and by 2014 "looked a little rough" to use one of my son-in-law's expressions.  One day in a parking lot, somebody drove into the left rear tail light and cracked and broke the red plastic covering.   I had to order a new one of those to pass a state inspection, and I had my friend Bill install it.  In February of 2014, as I was opening the door to get out of the car, a woman in an S.U.V. smashed into the door and demolished the window glass!   I got a replacement window put in at an auto shop, but honestly, it never quite worked as well.  On the day we moved out of the Webster apartment in June of 2012, the car's nice radio died!  Following the radio's passing, I would keep a large "boom box" in the back seat and listen to it when I drove.  Can you picture me trying to change stations and work the controls while driving?!  I can't either, and yet I did it- and it was quite unpleasant!

Somewhere around late 2012, I began noticing that at times there was a strong odor of gasoline when I'd exit the Subaru.  At other times, none.  It took me a long time to discover why that was the case.  In November of 2013,   I noticed a puddle of gasoline almost the size of a dollar bill behind the car's right rear tire.  Above that stain was the gas cap and fill area.  Yup, there was a small leak somewhere in that area.  When I bought gasoline, especially when I filled it up fully, there would be a stain and that gasoline odor.  When I had less than a quarter of a tank of gas, there was almost never any gas leak.  And, I discovered I had a power steering fluid leak.  That  left a stain the size of a half dollar coin any time I'd been parked for more than a couple of hours.  So, for the final year of the car, most of the time I had to try to park it off of pavement at my residence- not always easy to do!  One of my biggest thrills of the past couple of years was being an in-studio guest on Dan Rea's "Nightside" radio program on Boston's WBZ.   The night I was on air, my brakes were almost completely gone on the Subaru!  The drive to and from the station was frankly scary.  Just two days after I was on "Nightside" I lost my brakes completely on Route 126 in Ashland near the McDonald's.  Thank God, I did not hit anyone or anything.  I steered the car off the road and had it towed to an auto shop.

Yes, I was having a real love/hate relationship with the Subaru in 2013 and 2014.  It was like a ninety-year-old man in ill health.  I knew it was going to die at any time, but I just kept wanting to think and believe the best.  I will spare you all of the gory details, but the Subaru totally died for good on Sunday morning, December 21 and it was hauled off to a junk yard a little over a week later.   Even during the "bad" times with the Subaru, I never forgot that "we" attended that retreat in Missouri together and that "we" each had a "Springfield, Missouri connection"!   I don't miss the leaking gasoline, nor the leaking power steering fluid, nor the "ratty" appearance of the car; but on another level, there was a sentimental connection to that car- especially connecting it to my daughter, that I will never forget.

Right now, I'm "carless" and it's frankly a very difficult time.  A friend (who deserves an "A" for his effort and hard work) did a great job locating a good and inexpensive Saturn for me three weeks ago, but due to some circumstances beyond his or my control, this turned out to not be a workable plan.  We had to pass on that car, and right now we're back to square one. 

I wonder- where will my next "Volkswagen" or "Subaru" come from?   The Lord provided those cars and I am frankly trusting Him to provide another.  And, will I feel as sentimental about this car when someday it's time to say good-bye to it?

PLANS FOR THE NEW YEAR

"For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future."  (Jeremiah 29:11 New International Version)

A Facebook friend of mine posted those words today [January 1, 2015] although she left out the quotes and she left off the reference to where they came from [and that's the Book of Jeremiah in the Old Testament].  Jeremiah 29:11 reads just a little bit differently in the King James Version of the Bible and in (my favorite) the New King James Version.

In the King James Version, it says:
For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, saith the Lord, thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you an expected end.

In the New King James Version, it says: 
For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the Lord, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope.  

[I don't want to turn this piece into something really boring and "dry" about Bible translating, but those words were originally written in Hebrew.  Translation can be a challenging pursuit.  Languages are so different from one another, and so many times there are a variety of ways a passage can be correctly translated.  Each of the above translations is "correct" albeit each is a little bit different.  The New International Version tends to be more of an "interpretative" and less of a literal translation, and it's no wonder many of us have most often heard Jeremiah 29:11 from the N.I.V.  For many of us, the N.I.V. is our favorite way to hear it.  Listen, I just wrote that my favorite version of Scripture is the New King James Version and even I like Jeremiah 29:11 best from the N.I.V.!]
  
I paused and read my friend L.B.'s post today [I also know the plans I have for you: plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future....]  and it just stared so much flowing in my mind and in my spirit!  For one thing, it didn't mention the Lord, and it didn't give the reference.  For me, that's really important.   Do those words apply to just anybody or to any situation?   I began to think about the context of those words- to whom were they spoken and for what purpose?  If you do a little on-line research, you'll find out that Jeremiah lived around 600 B.C.  At that time, he was called to prophesy to Israel's southern kingdom known as Judah.  It's ironic that Jeremiah wrote those words because he had one of the most difficult lives of any person who ever lived!  And, even as a "God person",  Jeremiah's life was full of loss and pain.  He was called the "Weeping Prophet".  Almost no one listened to him.  He was imprisoned by the king of Judah.  When Judah fell to the Babylonians, Jeremiah was set free by them.  He spend the final years of his life in exile in Egypt.  Those words were said to the people of Judah who were being carried off to Babylon.  [If you think about the plight of the Jews being herded into boxcars and shipped to the Nazi concentration camps, this was only a step or two better than that, but not much better!]  It certainly must have seemed to the people of Judah that God hated them!  Their Temple was desecrated.  Their city [Jerusalem] was essentially destroyed.  They were marched off to Babylon.  Yet, God's Word to them at that time was Jeremiah 29:11!

In fact, the Jewish people were not wiped out!  Many decades later, under the Persians, a huge number of Jewish people returned to the land and reestablished their homeland and their worship in the Temple.   In general, Jews have been hated because as a people they tend to be much more successful than are most other people groups.   As a group, they indeed had "a hope and a future"; even after Adolph Hitler!

Now, that brings us back to why we love that verse.  Does it have anything to do with us?  I did find an blog entry today in which the author states that Jeremiah 29:11 was strictly for the ancient people of Judah and has nothing to do with us.  My opinion about that is, I disagree.  Of course, in context, it was said to the ancient people of Judah as they were being carried off.  The fact is, however, that God does have plans for His children as a group (and the "you" in Jeremiah 29:11 is plural) and also as individuals.   I remember a question that was once asked of Dr. Anthony Palma in class at Central Bible College.  A student asked about many Old Testament references (especially in Matthew's Gospel)  that the New Testament applies to Jesus Christ which in their original context have absolutely nothing to do with Jesus Christ!  Dr. Palma said that the Holy Spirit clearly cited these verses and applied them to the Lord Jesus Christ, so even though these verses are out of context and so forth, if the Holy Spirit applied them as an application to the earthly life of Jesus Christ, that was good enough for him.  Similarly, I think a verse such as Jeremiah 29:11 can apply to us today.

Now, here's the sobering part:  Remember what I wrote about Jeremiah's life above?  Did he [personally] have a hope and a future?  Yes.  Was his life a "cake walk"?  Absolutely not.  

I'm a very reflective and a very emotional person- and these characteristics can be both good and bad.  I've faced profound loss and disappointment in my life over the past six years or so, for instance.  I will admit that this morning for about an hour, I suddenly had a very negative thought.  The thought was:  I just can't face another year.   And, you know what, "in the natural"- in my own strength and abilities, I absolutely can't!  That's a true statement.  But what did I forget?  I am ashamed to say that for a short period of time today I forgot that I am not called upon to face this year on my own in any way, shape, or form.  I am called to walk through this year trusting in God and clinging to Him all the way!  In that way, we can face this year.  So, yeah, it's a good verse to remember.  

I don't want this piece to become too long, but I'm definitely feeling impressed of the Lord to share something with you.   About nine months ago a couple from the south who are good friends of mine sent me some CDs of Christian teacher Graham Cooke.  They said they felt very strongly that they were to send them to me and that the Lord wanted me to hear them.  I was not familiar with Graham Cooke.  If you research Graham Cooke on-line you'll learn that he is a very controversial and somewhat polarizing figure in evangelical and charismatic Christianity.   Some people love him and some people can't stand him.  His ministry is definitely "outside the box".  I began listening to his teaching tapes with caution and skepticism.   I will say, Graham's sense of humor and Biblical soundness won me over by the end of the first CD!   I listened to all of those CDs- some of them two and three times, and I got so much out of them!  Those teachings truly soothed my soul.  

Cooke taught that suffering is absolutely part of the life of any person who seriously wants to get close to God.  He said he "went through Hell for many years" but that during that time he drew very close to God and he came to the point that in the midst of "going through Hell" he had genuine joy because of what happened in his relationship with God.   The most valuable thing I learned from him is that no matter how bad or how confusing our circumstances are, we are never to ask "Why?"  It's the wrong question.  Cooke (citing the response of the crowd Peter preached to on the Day of Pentecost) says that when we face really horrible stuff we need to ask God, "What does this mean?" and then "What must I do?"

I will confess that I don't always remember to ask those two questions, and I want to be more faithful to do that.  [Incidentally, when we do ask those questions, we can expect God to show us the answers, but we must be obedient to do what He asks, whether it's easy or difficult for us.]

In closing, I know this did get a bit lengthy, but I hope it helps you.  It helped me a lot to think about it and to write it.  I have my own challenges and I struggle daily with the tendency toward irritability that I inherited from my father (who wasn't always irritable!) and with the tendency toward depression that I inherited from my mother (who wasn't always depressed!).  I have to remember to lay this stuff on the altar and let the Lord be the Lord of my opinions and emotions.  Yes, that's how I want to live in 2015, and forever, for that matter!   How about you?

MY FIRST "REALLY DIFFERENT" CHRISTMAS

"And she brought forth her firstborn son, and wrapped him in swaddling clothes, and laid him in a manger; because there was no room for them in the inn."  (Luke 2:7)

I read Luke chapter two for my "Bible devotional reading" early this morning.  Yes, it's that familiar passage that Linus reads in the classic Charlie Brown Christmas special.  It's very familiar, but if you stop and think about it (and "chew" on it as my friend the late retired Framingham State Professor Rachel Bangs used to say), it's amazing what insights and reflections that will stir up.  As I read the above verse today,  I wondered if Joseph felt really lousy about the fact that there was no room in the inn for Mary and newborn Jesus.  I wondered if he felt especially lousy that Jesus was laid in a manger (an animal feeding trough) and that they were out in essentially a barn with a bunch of [dirty] animals.  You know, the Jewish religion and culture was really into everything being "clean" or kosher.  I guess that whole situation wasn't too kosher.  I know from personal experience that when you're told you have to "man up" and take charge and really make a situation good and healthy and right for your family, and then for some reason you can't do it, it feels horrible!  A line my dear friend Gene Sorbo often uses is, "It's not something I would have signed up for."  I'm sure the circumstances and experience of Jesus' birth were not what Joseph would ever have pictured or desired or "signed up for".  Yet, today, we romanticize it and we love to hear Linus' voice read that passage!  Today, we understand that as "crazy" as it may have seemed, it really was God's plan.  God was in that first Christmas [although it probably happened in June and not December]!

The family I grew up in was not rich.  I know my father made a very modest salary as a Boston Police officer and later as a Registry of Motor Vehicles officer (like the Highway Patrol in many states).  As I look back, I'm amazed at the great Christmasses my parents provided when we were very little.  In my childhood, Christmas was an absolutely magical and special time.  My parents were also each pretty serious Roman Catholics (especially my mother) and I remember each Christmas Day starting with attending an early mass at St. John's Church.

Thirty-nine years ago today, I got quite a reality slap.  I do remember that throughout my growing up years, my father would give us little lectures that we should be grateful for what we have because many people are in poverty and do not have nice Christmasses.  Today, as a sixty-year-old who spent a number of years as a Protestant pastor, I know that there's a lot of sadness and pain that people experience during the holidays.  The worst part is, that sometimes, people are victims- they suffer at Christmas thorough no fault of their own- much as Jesus, Mary, and Joseph in a sense were "victims" of the culture of their day that left them in that smelly, dirty stable following Jesus' birth.  On both Christmas and Thanksgiving we always had my grandmother (my mother's mother) and her sister Celia as our dinner guests.   Mom's parents married late and had kids late (her dad passed in 1960) so I had an "old" grandmother even as a little kid.  In 1975, my grandmother lived in the elderly housing complex at Hagan Court [near Cobb's Corner] in our hometown of Canton, Massachusetts.  Her sister Celia lived near the heart of downtown Boston but would take public transportation to Canton and spend a few days with her older sibling during holiday times.  (We also used to get a kick out of the fact that my very confident and masculine father used to get nervous when they were over for dinner.  He'd humbly ask me, "Would you pass Mrs. Richard's plate?"  I was always just about to crack up laughing!)  In '75, my father took my sister Dianne to go up to Hagan Court and get the two old ladies.  They seemed to be gone forever on that errand!  I remember that my mother (who was highly prone to depression) was getting more and more agitated.  The turkey was in the oven for a long time and was just not getting done.  And, Gene and Dianne and the old ladies were just not arriving.

"Oh, why isn't this turkey getting done?!"  and  "Oh, where are they, why don't they get here?!"  were recited by her over and over and over.  Each time, they sounded even more negative.  It just was not a good atmosphere for Christmas!

Suddenly, I heard a far worse lament out of my mother's mouth:  "Oh, here's a police car, something's happened!"

Indeed, it was a Canton Police car.   Out of that car stepped my father and Dianne and no old ladies.  My father came into the house and tried to reassure my mother, but it was pretty much a lost cause.  In fact, there had been a car accident,  and my father and the car's other occupants were the victims.  A drunk driver had plowed right into their old Dodge Dart in downtown Canton!   My grandmother was shaken up, and Celia was injured.  The old women had been taken to the Norwood Hospital by ambulance.   Honestly,  I'm not sure what my mother did with the turkey at that point.  I guess she turned the oven off!  We all hopped into another of our cars and headed to the Norwood Hospital.  I remember spending at least an hour sitting in the emergency room.  The most common patients that I saw in that e.r. were children who had been injured playing with their toys or children who had been injured somehow in the home as they celebrated Christmas.  That e.r. was a very busy and stressful place!  Celia's face had slammed into a metal ashtray which had a sharp edge.  (This was in a 1963 model car built before anybody cared about safety!)  She came out with a "decent sized" bandage on it.  This left a slight but permanent scar and she did collect some insurance money for her injury.  My grandmother was not injured but was very shaken up.  It's ironic that a drunk plowed into my father's car!  At that time, he was a Supervisor at the Registry of Motor Vehicles' old 100 Nashua Street headquarters.  If you're a drunk, you don't want to hit that guy's car!

Eventually, we all got home, and managed to have a dinner, and open presents.  We all knew it could have been so much worse.  Someone could have been killed or seriously injured had [for instance] the drunk's car been going faster.  Yeah, that was my first "really different" Christmas.  I think I surprised a friend recently by telling him that at least half of the Christmasses in my adult life have been somewhat difficult ones.  In many years, there was enormous financial stress.  In the late nineties there were my parents' serious illnesses.  I remember visiting at their Canton home on Christmas Day 1998.  My father was pretty senile at that point.  My mother had cancer and was severely depressed.  She verbally lamented how bad that Christmas was, and in fact it was a lot worse than even 1975, for instance.  Those are tough memories.  But, there are many good memories, too.  In our final years in Framingham, Rachel [my youngest child] would always make pancakes for breakfast and we'd really have a great family time opening presents.   Today, due to my car recently dying and having to work this morning at my secular job, some of you know I've been temporarily staying at my kids' apartment.  My wife is preparing what will be a very late afternoon turkey dinner for us and Jon and Rachel are at the movies.  But, you know what?  As they say, "it's all good".   If this were a "normal" Christmas, I would never be sitting here at 1:45 p.m. E.S.T. writing a blog post!

Chevy Chase [or is it Clark Griswold?] learned it in that famous Christmas movie of his, didn't he?!  He wanted the "perfect" Christmas.  He did not imagine the sewer blowing up, or the jelly of the month club, or the dog and the squirrel tearing his house apart.  But in the midst of it, he learned some things.  And, I learned some things and I continue to learn some things at Christmas, as Joseph did all the way back there in 4 B.C.!   Good and bad things happen for a reason, but God is there.

Them's some thoughts at Christmas 2014- Merry Christmas!

WHAT WOULD THOSE "CHRISTMAS SPIRITS" HAVE TO SAY TO YOU?!

"For the time is come that judgment must begin at the house of God: and if it first begin at us, what shall the end be of them that obey not the gospel of God?"  (I Peter 4:17)

"Wherefore let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall."  ( I Corinthians 10:12)

I haven't been to see any production of Charles Dickens' "A Christmas Carol" this year, nor have I read the story this year.  I have (probably like most Americans) read that story and seen it acted out in drama many times.  As a kid and as a young adult, I was a "big" Christmas person.  I confess that since I joined the ranks of the "over thirty crowd" roughly half a lifetime ago, I have not been much of a Christmas person.  I love the Lord Jesus and I do enjoy Christmas carols and the Biblical accounts of His birth and early life.  I've frankly found the whole materialistic and high pressure secular Christmas holiday to be very hard to take at times; and I must admit to owning a pair of "Grinch" stockings that I wear only on Christmas Day- no kidding!   I've got to admit, though, that I loved watching the old "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" holiday special once again this year, and I do love Charles Dickens' story of the reformation of Ebenezer Scrooge.

Sometimes it amazes me what thoughts will pop into my head seemingly "out of the blue"!  Today, I had such a thought, and it's led me to write this piece and share it with you.  My thought was, "If you (or I) had a nighttime visit by the Three Spirits of the Ebenezer Scrooge story- how well would you (or I) fare?" 

I know.  Your first thought is probably, "But I'm nothing like Ebenezer Scrooge!  I'm not a mean and cheap miser!"  We like to think well of ourselves, but could it be that we'd be in for as much of a shock as Mr. Scrooge was?  One of my favorite television shows of all time is Northern Exposure which ran on the CBS television network in the early 1990s.  The show is about Dr. Joel Fleischman, a recent medical school graduate, who spends the first few years of his career as a physician in a tiny and remote community in central Alaska.  Joel is a young New York City Jew who despises his life in Alaska.  My son Jon's favorite episode of Northern Exposure is also my favorite episode:   It's the "Yom Kippur" episode from around the show's third season.  In that episode, Dr. Fleischman takes the Jewish Day of Atonement off, but he's in for a shocking surprise of Dickensian proportions!

Mystically, miraculously, and supernaturally, his elderly rabbi from New York appears inside his simple, rustic house.  The rabbi announces that he's got a VHS tape for Joel to watch.  At first, Dr. Fleischman wants nothing to do with it, but the rabbi is insistent.  In fact, faithful viewers know the VHS tape contains clips of previous episodes of the show.  Joel Fleischman sees himself as a friendly and competent physician who contributes much good to his community.  The video clips (of "Yom Kippur past") tell a very different story.  One shows the doctor yelling insulting and cruel comments to "Ed" a simple and idealistic twenty-something guy and also similar comments to Maggie O'Connell, a local "bush pilot".   Joel has a lot of excuses for the rabbi, who is not impressed.  For "Yom Kippur" present, it's not a video clip but a vision Joel sees of Marilyn his faithful Native American secretary/receptionist struggling to make ends meet on her meager salary.  The rabbi points out that she has a number of needy relatives she financially supports, leaving little for her.  Joel Fleischman had no idea.  There are also two "future" Yom Kippur visions.  In one, a Greyhound bus is pulling away from the town's bus depot and about a dozen local citizens talk about what a jerk Dr. Fleischman was and how glad they are that he is gone.   There's also a graveside scene regarding a sick man that Dr. Fleischman had no compassion for who is now dead.  The whole "Ghosts of Yom Kippur" thing has a profound effect upon Dr. Fleischman.  This Yom Kippur was not just a token Jewish holiday for him- it was a day of serious reflection and repentance.

Now, back to us.  If you're a fellow born-again Christian reading this, you may be thinking something like, "Well, yes, LOST people need to receive Christ as their personal Savior and Lord and be born again this Christmas."  And, yes, they do!   But what about you and what about me?

Has God ever given you one of those experiences like Joel Fleischman had?   Listen, after having had the small church I pastored closed up, and then being out of the ministry for five years, I've had a lot of time "in the woodshed" with God.  One of the reasons I liked Northern Exposure so much is that I'm a lot like Dr. Joel Fleischman!  No, I'm not Jewish and I'm not from New York,  but I can be selfish and critical and independent and impatient, and yet see myself as just the nicest and most pleasant guy who ever came down the pike!  It took a few years for me to come to grips with a lot of my own failures from pastoring, and honestly, I'm still coming to grips with them.

You know, Ebenezer Scrooge hated change.  He hated it!  He also hated accountability!  He did not like those guys from the charitable agency coming and asking for a donation.  He put his focus in the wrong place- on his business and on his money.   In my own case, I put the church and its success or failure first and foremost in my life.  I don't think my motives were completely wrong, but the final outcome of it all was, well, not good.  More than anything else, Ebenezer Scrooge was in denial.   He was in deep, deep denial.   In my own life and ministry, I was in denial.  Have you read the Lord's message to the Church at Laodicea [in Revelation chapter three] lately?  You may recall that this was the church which said, "I'm rich, I'm increased with goods!  I'm in need of nothing!"  Yet, the Lord said they were "wretched, miserable, poor, blind, and naked"!  Possibly their biggest fault was that they were blind- or frankly, in denial!

Most of us [and I'm talking about most of us born-again Christians]  need a good dosage of what Ebenezer Scrooge got in "a Christmas Carol" and of what Joel Fleischman got in that Northern Exposure episode!  This would absolutely revolutionize our personal lives and it would absolutely revolutionize our churches!  I say with tears that I wish I could preach this somewhere this month.  I can't.  But I can "preach" it here!  Listen, I have not "arrived" as we evangelicals say.  I am painfully aware of my sins and shortcomings, but as much as I don't like a lot of the secular aspects of Christmas, I'm so glad for that "sweet little Jesus boy" (in the words of that old Negro spiritual) who came to be born and give His live and His love so that I could be saved.  

If you've got the guts- take some serious time alone with the Lord and His Word this month.  Ask Him about your own life- past, present, and future.  In the words of an old chorus, "Let Him have His way with thee".  It just might end up being the most meaningful and transformative December you've ever had!

I CAN SEE CLEARLY NOW!

" ...one thing I know, that, whereas I was blind, now I see."  (from John 9:25)

(First of all, a "shout out" to the Rev. Rob W. who gave me a word of encouragement about writing this blog and inquired about why I don't post as much on it as I used to.  That word of encouragement is part of why I'm posting this story today!  It was at a Christmas function that he gave me that word of encouragement.  It's a good reminder that at this season we should seek to encourage and uplift others.) 

I experienced a true adventure yesterday!  It had its highs and lows;  it was definitely "educational", but as much as some aspects of it were not "fun" the overall result of it was very positive.  For that, I thank the Lord!

Today, at age sixty, my vision is the best that it has been in over fifty years!  I think of the faith and love of people like the late Ray Charles and the late Helen Keller, and I know I've got a lot to be thankful for regarding my eyesight.  I first experienced minor nearsightedness in the autumn of 1962.  Yes, during the time of the Cuban Missile Crisis, I had my first formal eye exam and got eyeglasses to wear.  The nearsightedness gradually got worse over the years and decades.  There were many pairs of eyeglasses that I wore during those times.  In early 2012, I began having serious vision problems, even with my glasses on.   During 2012, things just got worse and worse.  By late 2012, I could hardly see to drive at night- and even driving during the day was becoming challenging.  After several eye examinations and referrals to specialists, it was determined that I needed cataract surgery in both eyes.  I was fifty-eight when I had my eye surgeries done in early 2013- about twenty years younger than most cataract surgery patients.  Today, they correct not only for cataracts, but even for nearsightedness!  So, I have remarkably good vision.  Now, one complication is that I experienced a detached retina in my right eye in the summer of 2013 and had emergency surgery in Boston to reattach it.  Had this been one hundred years ago, I'd have been left blind in that eye, but the surgery was remarkably successful!  I had to have several checkups following the retina surgery; the final one was in November of 2013.  

The above is all introductory material as to why I had an appointment with the retina specialist in Waltham, Massachusetts yesterday.  This was my "one year later" [following my last appointment] checkup.  Now, there is a critical error I made when scheduling this appointment a couple of months ago:  I was not thinking in terms of the time of day that I'd be leaving the appointment and that it would be "pitch dark" outside when I did!  I was not thinking about the fact that the pupils of my eyes would have been "dilated" for the eye exam,  and that this would badly affect my vision- especially concerning driving!   The good news is that I did very well on my eye exam.  A year ago, my vision was 20/30, it's now better-  closer to 20/20!  The doctor said my eyes are doing very well.  I don't need to see him nor an optometrist nor any eye doctor for at least a year unless any sudden problem develops.

I did know that on all of these eye appointments, your eyes are dilated.  The difference is, I've always left my appointments during the day.  The experience of driving and functioning with dilated eyes was always a little challenging, but as long as I concentrated and squinted  I could see to drive and do other things with minimal difficulty.   Yesterday, just prior to leaving the medical building which is located in the Totten Pond Road area of Waltham, just off Route 128, I realized my vision was quite cloudy.  When I got into the car and pulled out of the parking garage, all I could see were headlights that looked ten times brighter than they were supposed to, and all sorts of glaring and "halos".  Now, the glaring and "halos" are very similar to how a person with bad cataracts sees at night, but this experience including the very bright headlights and taillights was easily ten times worse than any of my bad visual experiences driving at night with cataracts!   I really wondered if I should be driving, and how I was going to get home  (well over fifteen miles away).   I pulled the car onto Route 128 (also known as Interstate 95) South and began driving.  It was very scary.  I remembered how difficult things had been when I drove at night with bad cataracts, and this was so much scarier even than that!   

I only "made it" to one exit!  I knew I had to get off of the highway!  I took the exit for Route 20 West, thinking this would be better.  It wasn't!  Now, I had headlights much closer to my field of vision!  I literally could barely see the road, let alone any Stop signs or anything else I really needed to see!  I took a few turns at intersections and after about ten minutes ended up right back at the spot where I'd first gotten onto Route 20!  All I could think of is, "I've got to find a parking lot where I can stop for awhile!"

I did see a combination Mobil gas station/convenience store/Dunkin' Donuts ahead.  I pulled into the parking lot.  I spent forty minutes in that lot, hoping my vision would get better.  After the forty minutes, my vision was a little better, but the key phrase is "a little".  I used to be terrified to drive on superhighways when I was a teenager and I'd recently gotten my driver's license.  You may laugh, but in those days when I was by myself driving on a superhighway, I'd yell just like Curly Howard of The Three Stooges as I was driving, "Woo, woo, woo, woo, woo, woo, woo, woo!"  No, I didn't "pull a Curly Howard" last night.  I was honestly too terrified to do even that!  It's only God who kept me from having an accident on Route 128 last night.  At the Route 9 interchange, the traffic on Route 128 was jammed and the speed was (no kidding) five miles an hour.  I decided to take the exit for Route 9 West, and I did.  Pretty soon, I was in Natick (which of course was the opposite direction I really wanted to be traveling in).   I got onto Route 27 South and commenced the trip through Sherborn and a bunch of towns before getting home.  (The highlight in Sherborn was a deer who was about to dart across the road but my horn blast scared him!)  


Yes, I finally got home, two hours and fifteen minutes after I'd left that medical building in Waltham!  Today, my vision is normal and fine!  I hated that experience last night, but it has made me think of a couple of things:  How thankful I am that the Lord got me home last night, and how thankful I am that [when my eyes are not dilated]  my vision is truly excellent.   Yup, I can see clearly now!