Plumbing, real and metaphorical:

It's nice when it stays in the pipes.

I never lived in a house that lacked running water. I am old enough, though, to remember some relatives who had the kind of water you had to run and get. Much of the world has to deal with unreliable, unsafe water supplies. I am blessed to live in a place, actually places, that have safe water, available at the turn of a faucet handle. It's a great blessing, as long as it works. Curmudgeon alert: I know of few things more aggravating than plumbing that doesn't work. The drip-drip, or worse, spurt-spurt demands immediate attention. Make-shift repairs often don't work, and it seems that no matter how many spare parts one has, a trip to the plumbing supply store is unavoidable--sometimes two or three treks are needed. In its a blessing. When it gets out of its proper channel, running water is a pain in the neck.  Many good things are that way. Praise, when channeled through the discipline of truth, encourages others greatly. When it overflows and becomes flattery it can destroy character. Rebuke when controlled by love helps the person receiving it to grow. When it is polluted with bitterness it eats away a person's self-worth like acid. We need to make sure that our good is controlled so it doesn't degenerate into a curse. Keep it running in the right channels. It's STTA (Something To Think About).

Change is Coming, But from Where to Where?

It has been about two weeks since I shared anything to think about with you. The subject of this STTA is the reason. Few of us who have hung around for any length of time think that we can live our lives in stasis, "a state or condition in which things do not change, move, or progress" (Merriam-Webster). Besides that I've seen enough science fiction TV and movies to know that stasis is not a good state. Generally, though, we live with the illusion that the change in our lives will be manageable. I'm growing old, but at a rate slow enough that I can adjust day-by-day. My health changes, but with modern medicine I treat this, take a pill for that, and still muddle ahead. Children leave home, parents die, friends change jobs, but normally these changes are like tweaks--the bulk of our lives stay the same; the differences are not all encompassing. Sure we see in the news that there are people whose whole lives are disrupted--the refugees, the victims of horrible tragedies, or those who face maladies for which we, even with all our technology, have no solution. Those are other people, though, they exist in some realm that is extra-ordinary. The change that comes to we regular folk is handed out in palatable doses. It's packaged with easy hand-holds. It comes to us in such a way that at the end of the day we can say, "I've got this." No I don't, and I doubt you do either. I don't want to appear to put myself in the group of people, like those I mentioned above, who are dealing with change that comes so hard and fast, that it produces blackout G-force. Over the past month, though, I have seen and experienced change to an extent I know, not just theoretically, but experientially, that there is no throttle in my hand that I can use to control the ride. I'm like one of those early test-pilots. Strap in, Let her fly, grit my teeth, and hope for the best. There are several factors that have made the changes in my life of late register higher on the Change-force Meter than any time in recent memory. I was already involved in preparation for making a change when my change was changed. Here I was buying plane tickets, trying to get things buttoned down back home, thinking ahead about returning to a place of service several thousand miles from home, when--hard-right, accellerating all the while--my "orders" were changed. I was already involed in a life-adjustments--setting up housekeeping in another country and culture for four months, serving the Lord, being a missionary. These provided enough stretching that I was able to feel a bit noble. I mean, me being retired and everything. Then the change I was already comfortable with changed. Is that in the employee manual? The change that came barreling down on Kathy and me came for an ugly reason. It's because my friend is sick. He is one of those servants experiencing needle-pegging plan-revision. The new change threw me into a realm where I knew I didn't have control. Not only did I not know the lines for the new play, I found out rather quickly that the script was still being written, and the audience was already restless waiting for the curtain to rise. Don't get me wrong. I'm not looking for sypathy. Perhaps I'm just passing the tenth story on a twenty-story plunge, but I'm doing OK. Maybe it's the adrenalin, but this aspect of walking with the Lord seems clearer to me. Trust is pushing aside self-suffiency. Yieldedness is taking over territory once claimed by two word descriptions that begin with "my." The illusion that I'm in the driver's seat is harder to maintain. While I don't necessarily like all of that, I do know that it is as it should be, at least most of the time, some of the time, OK, I'm still working on it. If you are curious and want to find out about the changes in my life, you can find out more here and here. I'll warn you upfront, as these kinds of things go it's really pretty boring, tame stuff. I guess, though, when you compare it to the way my life has mostly been--pretty predictable--it is enough to get my attention, just like I hope this is enough to give you . . .   STTA. Find out about how the Son of God redeems our past, gives purpose in the present, and hope for the future, here.

Further Thoughts On My Out-Of-Control Life:

Something To Think About, Control, 2

A couple of weeks ago I woke up after surgery--well half of me woke up.  Because of the type of anesthesia I had received, from the waist down absolutely no one was home. "Wiggle your toes."  Nobody home. "Can you feel this?"  Feel what? If my life had depended on doing something with my lower-limbs there is no doubt I would have died.  I had no control over them. Thinking back on my 50/50 body, I ask myself, "Which end of my body best illustrates my day-to-day life?" I'd like to think it is the waist up portion.  I go where I want to go, do what I want to do.  My destiny is in my own hands.  I think, especially, we guys all felt our spines stiffen when we first heard the words of Invictus by William Ernest Henley. We want to think we are the "masters of our fates" and "captains of our souls." If we keep thinking that, though, we are simply whistling in the "night that covers" us. It doesn't take a great deal of thought to realize that my true condition is more like my waist-down post-op self.  I live in a world that is held together by God's power.  Were he to remove hissuperintending control for a nano-second, all that is, including both ends of me would fly into I-don't-even-know-what. I live in this strange matrix known as time, yet I have no ability make even a second of the stuff.   As Robert Burns mused to a rodent, "The best laid plans of mice and men aft gang agley."  Like me, you probably don't speak the Scott dialect of the poet, but you know what it means. I am out of control because that which I need to control in order to control my life is beyond my control.  To live my life thinking, "I can handle it." is to lay a foundation on the sand of falsehood.  My house won't stand.  My life is not built on the sand of my ability--so called--to maintain control.  My life is built on trust in the One Who transcends, and Who created all that is, and maintains it down to the falling sparrow.  That's as solid as it gets. It's Something To Think About. At CBC, we continue a series on prayer, this Sunday morning. In CBC Sunday Night, What would Hosea say to 21st Century Christians?   covingtonbiblechurch.com

My Life Is Out Of Control . . .

Something To Think About, Control

There are times when I simply can't deny that my life is out of control, my control, that is. At any given time, all the time, my plans, well-laid or frivolous, can be interrupted, discarded, and/or shreded, and there is nothing I can do about it. My world is full of bad news from the doctor, identity theft, car-wrecks, down-sizing, out-sourcing, discrimination, and numerous other evils that bring forth an "Oh, no!" response. One of the arrogant assumptions that came out of modernism is that given enough resources, thought, and planning, we can fix anything.  I'm wonderfully glad for the technology that shields me from many of life's unpleasant realities.  When it is cold, my house is warm, when it is hot, I remain cool.  Many of the health scourges of the past have been all but eliminated, by medicine and sanitation.  Distances are shrunk by modern transportation and communication.  I need to remember, though, that just because I exercise a measure of control in my life, that does not mean that I can always . . . and even if there are some things I can manipulate, that doesn't mean that all things come under my control.  Finally, since events are interrelated, if I can't control everything, all the time, then I really can't control anything.   WARNING! CONTROL FREAKS, breath deeply.  Really, though, the fact that my life is out of control propels me in a profitable direction.  Realizing that I can't control critical factors in my life I can be compelled to despair or follow the example of the Prodigal Son, living high until I land in the hog pen.  I chose neither.  Rather I trust the One Who does control all.   So, bottom-line:  My life is not out of control.  It's in God's hands. It's Something to Think About.  Click here to find out how you can have this kind of relationship with the Lord.