One for me, One for you

It was a busy weekend.  I had spent most of Saturday following up what part of my mind told me was a crazy idea.  I decided that, with my subscription to a renowned family history database, it ought to be possible to compile a fairly comprehensive history of the family we’d stayed with for our summer holidays year after year in my childhood.  Yes, it was possible, but one thing led to another, and it took far longer than I’d expected.

I went to bed on Saturday evening, didn’t sleep too well, and woke up with a little couplet going through my mind.  I don’t think it’s Biblical, but I’ve no idea where it does come from. “We can’t have all we want ... and we can’t keep all we have!”  Some complementary thoughts as I carried on with the task the following afternoon led to this article.

At the beginning of the last century concern was being felt in high places about the growth of our population, and a question was included in the 1911 census that caused quite a bit of consternation.  Its aim was to provide an idea of female fertility, but a century later it’s proved a boon to the family historian.  Every married woman was asked to provide four numbers.  How many years had she been married; how many children had she borne in her present marriage; how many of these were still alive, and how many had died?  (Even more useful to people like me, some widowers provided the same information!)

One of the ladies in my research had answered this question, “9:4:2:2”; in nine years of marriage, she had lost half of her children.  The two daughters still living were now aged eight and seven, but when I compared the birth and death indexes, I found four possibilities for the others, the oldest of which lived only to two years of age.  How life has improved now.  As I wondered just what she must have thought at the deaths of children so young, I realised that this was par for the course.  Maybe the percentage in this example was a mite high, but it was quite common for families to lose a proportion of their children at an early age.  It was as if they were called upon to share their children with God, or death, or the ‘grim reaper’, depending on the depth of their faith.

While these families might have wanted more children, in many cases it was an economic certainty that they couldn’t keep all those they had been blessed with.  I broadened out this thought, and considered how it might have applied to me.  As an only child, I have always struggled with the idea of sharing.  The son of a farm worker, I may not have had all I wanted, but I grew up safe in the knowledge that anything I did have, I would keep!  I now reflected upon Jesus’ story of a rich man (Luke 12:16-21,) and thought of a line from a hymn that I quoted in a recent article, “here for a season, then above ...”; I also recalled one of the many beautiful prayers from the Book of Common Prayer, “... comfort and succour all them, who in this transitory life are in trouble, sorrow, need, sickness, or any other adversity.”

Not for the first time, something had prompted me to look with a wider perspective at my transitory life, and the need to grade what concerns me into the comfortable, the convenient, the important, and the essential; and to realise just how little around me actually originates in the last of those categories!

Systematic

I’ve never been sure whether the skills of my friend the Systems Consultant are with administrative or computer systems.  He certainly demonstrates great facility with computers, whatever his professional engagement.  For my part, I’ve always found great satisfaction in seeing either sort of system fulfil its intended purposes smoothly and efficiently just the way it was designed.

The life of mankind is a system.  Created in purity and perfection as we read in Genesis, the system has been marred, biffed and battered down the centuries as man has exercised the freedom God provided, but it’s still a functioning system for all that.  The same is true of our individual lives: born, for the most part, in wholeness, but as the years pass, sickness or injury can take their toll on our physical efficiency, as also abuse or mental illness can impair our emotional systems.

God’s church is a system, too.  It was designed to be His body on earth, to spread the Gospel, the good news of God’s love for all mankind, and His provision for our redemption.  In that remarkable book that ends our Bible, the Revelation to John, we can find letters to seven early churches.  Though broadly similar in structure, each letter is tailored to the particular needs of the church to which it is addressed, highlighting their strengths and weaknesses in God’s service.  As we read these letters (Rev. 2:1-3:22), it is worth comparing the characteristics of those early churches to our own.

There are many parallels between the church of the first century and that of the twenty-first.  From time to time we find ourselves fighting opposition from authorities or from the community around us.  We have to test the validity of religious leaders who may be misguided in their revolutionary ideas, or may in fact be wisely challenging our own ill-founded practices.  We can see, for example, that the people of Sardis were only going through the motions of being church.  Beneath the surface they were really half asleep (Rev. 3:1-2): their system was in ‘idle mode’.  Or look at the Laodiceans, whose riches made them blind to their real needs.  Their church system was like an engine with too much lubrication: it was clogged up and, try as it might, it couldn’t run properly.

The church, though, is composed of individuals.  We can blame ‘the system’, and it’s all too easy for us to claim that any inefficiency is down to others or the fault of someone else in particular.  We have to remember, though, that we are all cogs in the same engine.  As individuals within the body of the church, we have responsibilities to each other and to the whole (Rom. 12:5).  We are part of the system: it cannot function as perfectly without us as it can with us.  Let’s pray for guidance in the use of those gifts with which we have been blessed for the good of the whole (I Peter 4:10).

Signs of Life

It rather stuck in my mind.  As I was waiting to collect some goods for delivery one day a few weeks ago, drinking in the unusual warmth in the air, and thinking summer might have arrived at last, I spotted a sign on a unit across the industrial estate.  “A business with no sign is a sign of no business!”  It was crisp, neat and concisely explained the nature of their product. 

Slogans are catchy, occasionally amusing and, above all, they do have this habit of sticking in the mind.  I’m sure many of us can recall advertising slogans that were on TV decades ago – perhaps even selling products that are no longer in existence!  They make use of one key characteristic of the article – something it does, some need that it alone can fulfil. 

At a personal level, most of us have particular sayings that we habitually use.  Who of a certain age can forget the detective who said, in almost every episode, “By Timothy!”?  He was too much of a gentleman to swear with any stronger oath.  Or maybe you remember Jo March in Louisa Alcott’s ‘Little Women’, who would exclaim, “Christopher Columbus!”  Fiction apart, our customary sayings, like advertising slogans, can reveal much about us: what we think, what we believe, the way we conduct our lives. 

Last year, a key member of the Family History Society to which I belong, died.  In a tribute to her in the magazine, reference was made to Jean’s frequent habit of calling her friends and colleagues back to the matter in hand with the words, “Right, let’s get on with it; work to do.” 

Signs, sayings and catch phrases are all around us; and our faith provides us with signs, too.  The Easter story provides us with a special symbol, probably the sign that, in one form or another, appears most often across the whole world: the Cross.  I once had a little bronze, medallion that had belonged to my father (though where he got it from I have no idea!)  Sadly I lost it many years ago, but I remember it fondly; its design and inscription are still clear to me now.  Around the edge were the words, “In hoc signo vinces”, and in the middle of these was a big, plain cross.  Its presence is echoed by the plain wooden cross I now wear every day. 

I recently found out the meaning of those words, and perhaps they can be taken as an indicator of hope for us all in these difficult times, “In this sign you will conquer!”

Up the Pole

The other day I was reminded – by a post at the side of the road – that this summer would have seen my ruby wedding!  The story is a simple one, but it also leads on to a Biblical link as well.

I’d been working late; although it was a main road there was no other traffic.  I was driving in thick fog.  At one point I was following a white line alongside the car ... but on its left hand side!  With a feeling of panic I realised I was going down the wrong side of the road, and started a correcting drift to my left.  Suddenly, crash!  The car came to an abrupt halt, and my near-side headlamp went out.  When I looked at the damage, I found that the lamp had taken the impact from a metal post that was now leaning at about 45 degrees away from the car.  At its far end was a sign saying ‘lay by’.  I had not only been on the wrong side of the road, but had been driving down a lay-by on the far side!

That incident must have taken place over forty years ago, because I sold that car soon after getting engaged.  What brought it to mind was the observation of some roadside posts coated with reflective paint – silver on one side and red on the other – and I thought how useful these are compared to the one I’d hit all those years ago.  If that one had been painted thus, I should have seen it, even in fog!  At the time, these thoughts offered a convenient illustration to the sermon I was (half-) listening to on my mp3-player.  The preacher’s text was Romans chapter 7, where Paul speaks of sin having no power were it not for the law, and asks rhetorically whether the law is sin (vv.7-8.) 

The next day I heard the story of Jim Thorpe, which provided another illustration for the same point.  Jim was a Native American who won gold medals for both the pentathlon and decathlon at the 1912 Olympic Games.  When, early in 1913, it was revealed that, in 1909-10 he had received payment (although only a few dollars) for playing baseball, his medals were taken from him.  In his letter of apology he pointed out that he “did not know all about such things.”  It wasn’t just that he was unaware of the rule about professionals taking part in the Games; he didn’t know that there were rules!

Whether painted or not, the roadside posts are there to mark the edge of the carriageway.  They don’t protect the carriageway from the invasion of the vegetation on the other side of that edge, nor from the cars that drive on it.  Whether known or not, the Olympic rules are there, not to protect the reputation of Games, but to define each competitor’s rights and entitlements.  In the same way, God’s Law isn’t there to protect Him – He has no need of protection!  It’s there to show us the limits beyond which our behaviour is unacceptable to Him.  If there’s any need for protection, it’s for us, against the wrath of God should we cross that boundary!

At the end of the previous chapter, Paul explained that “The wages of sin (one translation calls it the ‘pay-off’ of sin, because the original Greek word refers to the payment that would be made to a soldier at the end of his time of service; here it’s the end-result of our sin) is death, but,” he went on to explain the very Good News that is the basis of our Christian Faith, “the gift of God is eternal life in (or as a result of the sacrifice of) Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Rom. 6:23.)

Hang in there!

Do you remember cassette tapes?  Over a period of some thirty or so years, I accumulated a collection of over 100 of them ... and that’s after giving some away!  In time, I changed to CDs for my personal selection of recorded music that I can play to myself any time I like.  Long ago I bought two matching sets of drawers, some fitted out for tapes and some for CDs, to house these next to my stereo.  More recently I realised that the drawers were no longer fashionable, and anyway, they no longer housed a currently supportable means of providing a musical background to domestic life.  I obtained a cupboard to replace the drawers for the CDs.  

But I was still left with those tapes!  I didn’t want to lose them for, despite their low intrinsic value, many would be difficult or even impossible to replace.  I decided that they would have to be transferred to my computer.  I bought a unit from one of those catalogues that fall out of magazine deliveries, and set to work.  It was a tedious business.  Once the software had been installed, each tape had to be listened to in real playback time, and the extent of each track noted.  Then the tracks had to be isolated and labelled on the screen before they could be finally saved.  After completing only six tapes, I gave up, and the unit lay unused at the back of a cupboard.  When I changed my computer’s hard disk, I didn’t bother about re-installing that particular program.

What I really wanted was something that would just soak up the data, rather like a scanner soaks up a photograph, and - plop! - there it is on the computer with no more effort than the click of a mouse.  Last summer, I saw something that looked just right, and at little more than half the cost of the redundant unit in my cupboard.  It arrived bright, shiny and smart, and full of promise.  I set to unpacking it and setting it up beside the computer.  Then I installed the software.   Oh, no!  It was the same program I'd had before!  I should still have to go through that same painstaking process if I wanted to preserve those treasured recordings!

It was about then that news broke of the inner city riots and, like many people, I marvelled at the looting, the greed, and the something-for-nothing culture that seemed to be motivating at least some of the young people involved.  Instant gratification has become part of normal life today, whether it is the acquisition of goods, or seeing a whole project completed in ‘the click of a mouse’.  My prayer notes directed me that morning to James’s letter:  “Be patient, then, brothers, until the Lord’s coming.  See how the farmer waits for the land to yield its valuable crop and how patient he is for the autumn and spring rains.  You too, be patient and stand firm ... As you know, we consider blessed those who have persevered.  You have heard of Job’s perseverance and have seen what the Lord finally brought about.  The Lord is full of compassion and mercy.”  (James 5:7-8a,11.)

So, it will be worth it after all!

Cures and Remedies

What’s your reaction when something breaks, or no longer works properly?  It might be big or small, but nothing lasts for ever, they say, and at times like that decisions have to be made.  Inevitably these will be broadly either a) ‘find the remedy/repair/spare part and fix it: it could be as good as new in a few minutes/days/months,’ or b) ‘throw it away and get another one/start again.’

Some years ago, when my first wife told me she was seeing someone else – and why – a friend made us a very generous offer: he and his wife would look after our children while we went off for a week to his holiday home on the Suffolk coast, to spend some quality time getting to know each other properly again, hopefully enabling us to sort out our problems.  At the time we both felt things had gone too far for that: we turned down the offer, and rejected the possibility of saving our marriage.  Our decision was firmly in the ‘throw away and get a new one’ category.  Sadly her new relationship lasted only a few months, and each of us then passed through several lonely years.

I was reminded of this a few months ago when I confronted the fact that my new mobile phone appeared not to be working properly.  I won’t bore you with the symptoms, but the upshot was that it had become unreliable.  I rang the phone company, and spoke to a technician who guided me through the necessary steps to return the phone to its original settings.  Despite many misgivings, and my certainty that what I really needed was a replacement phone, I persevered and tried to use it normally over the next week or so, to see whether the reset had done the trick.

As the days passed, and the phone did indeed seem to be working properly, I found my misgivings diminished.  It was a slow process, however; only gradually did I learn to accept that the remedy had worked.  This experience was the opposite of the marital situation to which I have compared it.  As I reflected on these ‘reject or repair’ decisions my thoughts touched on the Old Testament story of Jonah.  You will recall how, after first rejecting God’s instructions, the prophet eventually went to Nineveh and was so successful in his mission that the people turned to God in shame and repentance.  Jonah couldn’t really believe this, and found it difficult to accept the result.

So, what can I – indeed all of us, now I’ve shared the matter – take from this?  Well, we can resolve to turn to God in the first instance when trouble strikes, and not to leave it until other avenues have been exhausted; having done that, we ought to feel secure in the knowledge that He CAN change things – even people!

Eavesdropping

The other week, I witnessed an odd exchange on the supermarket car park.  The wife was overtaken by her husband at a gentle trot.  As he passed her she must have asked why he was running.  I caught just part of his response: that he was going to tell …. “I’ve already told her,” she protested, walking briskly to keep up with him.  Her husband didn’t ease his pace, “But I need to explain,” he announced, and jogged off to the far side of the car park.  The defeated wife turned back, presumably towards their own vehicle.

Now, what was going on here?  Several questions came to mind.  The wife was clearly puzzled.   She had already imparted the necessary information to the third party; what additional explanation ought she to have provided?   What had prompted the husband’s hasty mission?  Didn’t he trust his wife to inform whoever of the complete situation, or was he concerned that she might have misrepresented his part in whatever had made this message necessary?  Was some subterfuge involved?  Did he need to impart to this unknown and unseen female some detail of which his wife was unaware?  (Can you see the mind of the wannabe novelist at work here?)

Another completely different interpretation might apply, of course.  These two were of an age that they might have had a teenage daughter.  Maybe she had travelled with them to the town centre, and was meeting friends there.  Mother had told her that they would expect her home at teatime; father, however, wanted to dot i’s and cross t’s.  Maybe he wanted to issue strict instructions as to her behaviour, or tell her where they would be during the afternoon, should she need to call them.

When it comes to the variety of stories that have grown up around a definite set of facts, little can be more prolific than religion.  The number of so-called ‘Christian’ sects is scarcely measurable.  When we are faced with unfamiliar rituals or cults, or with another mainstream religion such as Islam or Judaism, it is all too easy for traditional Christians to reject them out of hand, and have nothing to do with them.  While this might be the right response, I feel we ought always to examine these differing beliefs, and discover on what they are based.  What are the basic facts behind them?  Do they coincide with those of true Christianity: Jesus the only Son of God, incarnate, sacrificed for the sins of mankind, resurrected, and returned to Heaven where He intercedes on behalf of believers?  Are some of these elements twisted or missing, or subject to inappropriate additions, further conditions and so on?  We are warned (Rev. 22:18-19) about adding to or subtracting from God’s Word, and surely the same applies to the teaching of His Church.

That supermarket incident is now some weeks ago; the couple were totally unknown.  And, even if they could be located, would they recall a minor exchange that, to them, was part the cut and thrust of normal life?  One thing is virtually certain, however.  They had no idea that their words would become a subject of Christian teaching!