The Greybeard Chronicles| Christmas, 2011: Too Soon Past

Posted on December 26, 2011 by Gene

Seven months and counting. That is how long I have been away from home now, working in Mobile, Alabama, doing my thing— or, what passes for “my thing” until I can really do my thing.

I came in May and now it is almost January. I would ask where the time went, but a quick check of the mirror and I can see its tracks on my face.

Christmas this year was a blur. It fell on Sunday, which is always cool. What better day to celebrate the birth of our Lord than on the day the church has commonly called “the Lord’s Day?”

We all have a plane to catch in this land where we are always chasing— but never quite catching— that place we call Tomorrow.

Friday morning, early, I was on the first plane out of Mobile. By 7:30am, I was in DFW and ready to spend the day with Momma Claus doing that last-minute Christmas shopping thing. By day’s end, we had scored an iPad 2 and a puppy, which was pretty cool, since the first represented the hottest new thingamajig on the market and the second represented one of the most cliched Christmas gifts of all time.

We had all of our bases covered and still had plenty of time for a nice evening at home with the girls and Ty David, the world’s number one coolest grandboy.

The pace seemed to pick up from there. We were so busy, I hardly noticed my Dallas Cowboys spitting the bit in yet another December contest— this time on Christmas eve. The Christmas eve service went by in a blur. Then, it was Christmas morning and we were tearing into the gift-wrapped bounty under our tree, trying on our new clothes, trying out our new gadgets, getting dressed and heading out to Donya’s sister’s for just a little bit.

Ah, but the flights back to Mobile on Monday were not looking good. They were all “red,” which has nothing to do with Rudolph’s nose and everything to do with the color American Airlines turns a flight on its website when the chances of a non-revenue standby scoring a seat on a plane are slim and none.

But I had to be back to work bright and early Tuesday morning.

What to do?

Fly out Christmas night.

It was fun while it lasted. But, my friend, it never lasts quite long enough. And that is the point of my story. That is its moral. Live in the moment while you can. Savor the moment. Seize the moment. It is only a moment and then it is a memory.

We all have a plane to catch in this land where we are always chasing— but never quite catching— that place we call Tomorrow.

Hope you had a Merry Christmas and pray 2012 is for you a prosperous, healthy and happy new year.

God bless you.

Posted in (Gene)ric Ramblings, advice, Family, Greybeard Chronicles, Personal Observation | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

The Greybeard Chronicles, Thanksgiving 2011: I Have Never Journeyed Alone

Posted on November 24, 2011 by Gene

Dateline: Mobile, Alabama, Thanksgiving Day, 2011

And so it was in my fiftieth year, I spent my very first Thanksgiving Day alone.

Some of my fondest memories, both from childhood and adulthood, center on this day. The sweetest people I have ever known, the finest food I have ever eaten, the best football I have ever seen were all on Thanksgiving Day.

There have been touch football games on the street, ping pong tournaments in the church youth center, cat naps on the couch, and furious comeback victories in Texas stadium…all on Thanksgiving Day.

It is possible, they say (whomever “they” are), to be alone and not be lonely. It is also possible to be lonely and not be alone.

So today, my heart is overwhelmed with joy and my eyes so brim with tears, I can scarcely see the keyboard– Yes, I still peek at the keys when I type, but try to focus on what I’m really saying, will ya?– because today, my wife and kids will join my mom, my siblings and my siblings’ kids at my brother’s house to celebrate Thanksgiving…without me. My wife’s parents will be in Seattle, celebrating with my brother-in-law and his precious family. My sister-in-law and her bunch will all be together, celebrating my way-too-cool great nephew’s recent arrival.

And I will be here in Mobile…headed to Cracker Barrel.

But I am not sad.

I am glad my wife is so much a part of me that she can go see my family without me and not feel the least bit out of place. I am glad that there will be laughing and love and life will be at its best because the people I love are together.

It is possible, they say (whomever “they” are), to be alone and not be lonely. It is also possible to be lonely and not be alone.

I have never truly been alone and I have never really been all that lonely.

For that, I am thankful.

Posted in (Gene)ric Ramblings, Blog, Faith, Family, Greybeard Chronicles | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

The GreyBeard Chronicles: Choices and the Men Who Make Them

Posted on November 19, 2011 by Gene
I do not choose this road I take;
It chooses me by the choices I make.
~Yours Truly

This morning, I woke up thinking about my life. Where I am. What I’m doing. Where I should be.

I thought about the difficult correlation between the sovereignty of God and the free will of a man. I thought about how much we make our own destiny and how much that destiny is chosen for us.

Would I have been here, right here, no matter what? Could I have been– and done– differently? Was this preordained? Does it matter?

I hate not knowing. But I hate people so cock-sure of what they “know” even more. Why is it so hard to admit we don’t know something?

I especially hate seeing that kind of intellectual pride in a Christian. A truly intelligent person will see the ignorance in that kind of thing and find it repulsive.

I do not know how God can be absolutely sovereign, yet sin can exist and God is not the author of sin. It defies my power of reason. I do not understand how God’s sovereignty and man’s free will abide together.

Is it so hard to admit that a finite being such as yourself and such as I can find it impossible to know the mind of the Infinite One? Is it so beyond the realm of reason to reason that if I am the created and He is the Creator, He has the intellectual advantage over me? Is it so hard to understand that understanding Him is beyond my understanding?

I find myself a half-century into this journey less sure of many things than I was a quarter century ago. You might say I am regressing. Perhaps you are right.

But what do you know?

I have three grown daughters now. Each of them is facing a crossroads. Each of them has a decision to make. They look to Dad and want to know what they should do. Sometimes, I think they would like for me to say, “This is exactly what you should do.”

But I don’t.

Want to know why? Because I do not know for sure. Their choices are not between good and evil. They are not choices of righteousness versus unrighteousness. They are trying to decide which path to take, which way to go.

But I don’t know.

So, I tell them– and I hope– that whatever they do, they do their best with a pure heart. I tell them to take the information and knowledge they have, weigh it, and make the best decision they can. I tell them that whatever decision they make, I will support them. I won’t second-guess them.

But I cannot guarantee they won’t second-guess themselves. They are, after all, my progeny.

Years ago, when Donya and I were first married, Mickey Rooney starred in Bill, a movie about a mentally challenged man. Rooney’s character had but one aspiration: to learn.

When asked why he wanted to learn, Bill replied, “Because if I learn, I will be a regular, good man.”

Sometimes, I wish my greatest aspiration in life had been just that.

Posted in (Gene)ric Ramblings, (Gene)tic Rantings, advice, Christian Living, Faith, Family, Greybeard Chronicles | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Almost is the Bitterest Pill of All

Posted on October 28, 2011 by Gene

Almost is the bitterest pill of all.

Just ask the Texas Rangers.

If the Rangers fail to win game seven of the 2011 World Series tonight, they will go down in the long and storied history of Major League Baseball as the team that came the closest to turning “almost” into “we did it.” Not once, but twice the Rangers had the St. Louis Cardinals down to their last strike. Not once, but twice they took a two-run lead into what could have been the last inning.

The Texas Rangers almost ended a half-century drought.

Almost.

But they lost.

In 11 innings.

10–9.

As a lifelong Rangers fan, I went to bed disappointed and woke up with this phrase running on a loop in my brain: “Almost  is the bitterest pill of all.”

Go ahead. Test the theory. Think about all the years when you didn’t have a chance, when you had no dog in the hunt, no horse in the race. Those years would end and that was that. The postseason was for other teams; not yours. It was fun while it lasted.

“Hey, there’s always next year.”

Back then, you could watch a game like the one last night and just enjoy it for what it was: An all-time classic.

But when it is you or your team that “almost did it,” there is a whole different feel. What if you never get it done? What if it takes another 50 years or more to get that close?

I was thinking about this haunting phrase and remembered an episode from the life of Paul the Apostle. It is recorded in the book of Acts, chapter 26. Paul was on trial before King Agrippa and was allowed to speak in his own defense. Paul’s defense, as you might imagine, was the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

So moving was the eloquent preacher’s words that Agrippa said to Paul, “Almost thou persuadest me to be a Christian.”

I have often wondered whether, in the endless grip of a Christless eternity, those are the only words Agrippa can remember saying during his time on earth. Does”almost” haunt him forever?

P.P. Bliss felt the weight of those words when he penned Almost Persuaded, the timeless hymn based on Agrippa’s encounter with Paul.

I know it might sound weird, but I thought about the last verse of that hymn as I fell asleep last night:

Almost cannot avail;
Almost is but to fail
Sad, sad,  that bitter wail:
Almost, but lost.

 

Apply those words to a team that comes as close as a team can come to winning it all, only to fall just short and they are truly sad.

Apply those words to a person that considers Christ only to reject Him… and they are beyond tragic.

The moral here is this: Let the bitter pill of “almost” apply to those things that matter for awhile, but not to the one thing that matters more than every other thing in your life. Come to Christ.

(And go, Rangers.)

Posted in (Gene)ric Ramblings, Baseball, Jesus Christ | Tagged , , , , | 2 Comments