Joy Over One

June 22, 2021 ~ Paul Phillips ~ 2 Comments

I think I saved a life last night. It may not seem like all that much when it’s written down in black and white, but I felt pretty good about it at the time.

Now that I think about it, it seemed like the night outside was a little brighter. Just a tiny bit.

Perhaps, I should just tell the story before I break my arm patting myself on the back. The red-headed lady who raised me used to worry about that. She said she did anyway. It could have been an exaggeration.

I don’t sleep as much at night as most folks I know. It’s a lifelong habit I’m not about to break now that I’ve entered what we once called the golden years. I’m not unhappy to have the quiet hours of the night to read and to think. Occasionally, I even put down a few rambling words to share with my friends.

Which brings me to last night. Not sleeping, at about 2:00 a.m., I wandered through the house, checking the doors and appliances one last time. Walking into the darkened family room, I was startled by a bright, momentary light shining up on the ceiling near the outside wall. I wasn’t sure what it could have come from, but I waited a few seconds to see if it reoccurred. It never did but, still curious, I found a light on my phone and aimed it at the spot.

My mind had, in the few seconds I stood waiting, settled on the light from a firefly, or lightning bug, as the probable cause, but I thought it should have reappeared somewhere in the vicinity again if that was the case. Still, it wasn’t much of a surprise when the light from the phone revealed a lightning bug as the culprit.

There at the conjunction of the ceiling and outside wall, the bug hung, swinging unnaturally just an inch below the ceiling. It didn’t take long to see that it had flown into a barely visible spider web and become ensnared.

Before things get out of hand, I should inform you that the Lovely Lady assures me it hasn’t been very long since the cobwebs were last displaced by her brush, but the tiny arachnids can be persistent, constructing new webs in a matter of minutes when the mood takes them.

Did I mention they were tiny? Indeed, I laughed when I first saw what was happening. The lightning bug was jiggling back and forth as it hung there, and right beside it was the web-building spider, hardly one-tenth the size of its captive, busily spinning more sticky silk as it sidled around the body of the comparatively gigantic-sized lightning bug.

I like lightning bugs better than I do spiders. Who doesn’t?

We—most of us—chased fireflies as children in the twilight hours of the summer evenings, catching them and tossing them at each other, perhaps keeping them captive in a mayonnaise jar to light up our bedrooms later that night. I still love looking out over the freshly mown fields at night and seeing their flickering bodies lighting up the June landscape, making me think it could as easily still be fifty years ago.

But it’s not fifty years ago. And I can no longer bear the thought of even that one little bug dying to feed the tiny spider on the ceiling.

Reaching up gently, I pulled the bug and the web, spider and all, down from the ceiling. The spider, not to be denied its trophy, dropped down a few inches on a strand of web and then, crawled up just as quickly toward the lightning bug, ready to begin weaving the web-prison around his body again.

I shook the belligerent little assailant to the floor, making sure the connecting web was broken so it couldn’t make another trip up to the lightning bug, and then I examined the poor victim.

Motionless, its head was bent down towards its thorax, pulled by the sticky, nearly invisible web that remained around it. It wasn’t moving so much as a single leg.

I was sure it was dead. In fact, I considered simply tossing it into the trash basket nearby.

Instead, I gently reached down with my fingertips and pulled at the sticky web, all the while seeing the unmoving legs and body lying in the palm of my hand. It was hopeless, but still, I pulled at the stubborn silk. Being careful not to pull a leg off as I worked, the task took longer than I anticipated, but it was probably not more than ten or fifteen seconds later when the lifeless body was free again.

Did I say it was hopeless? Lifeless?

I did, didn’t I?

We give up hope much too easily.

Where once there was light, we see darkness; where there was life, death. Even though we have experienced reprieves again and again ourselves, we give in so soon to dismay and dread.

The last of the web came away and the firefly instantly righted itself and started walking in my palm. Instantly!

Not dead, but alive!

I closed my fingers around it loosely and headed for the door (nobody wants a lightning bug flying in their house while they sleep!) to return him to his natural habitat. I stood on the concrete slab outside the back door and opened my hand, waiting to see what the little bug would do.

He got to the ends of my fingers but didn’t fly away. In my experience, they always fly when they reach the edge. Always.

Well, almost always.

This little fellow had had a bit of a shock. Death had him in its grip. The foregone conclusion had seemed inevitable. And now, life and freedom beckoned.

He needed a minute to clear his head. I would have, too.

I lowered my hand a bit and then, after raising it quickly, reversed the direction again. He took the hint, launching into the night air. A few feet out from where I stood, the light from the chemical reaction in his body showed clearly. Once—twice—I saw his light, and then he had joined the other late-night beacons in Dr. Weaver’s field, lighting up the night as they have for so many centuries going back to time immemorial.

Back from the dead.

Silly, isn’t it? All this attention and emotion wasted on a little lightning bug. Still, my heart swelled a bit as I thought about the joy of seeing one who is as good as dead joining the multitude of the living again.

It reminds me of something…

It’ll come to me. Maybe to you, too.

But I will admit to one thought that dims my joy a bit. Just a bit.

I can’t get that tiny spider and its puny, thin web out of my mind. How is it that such a minuscule thing, armed with no weapon to speak of, can take down an enemy many times its size? And so effortlessly, too.

The preacher in me wants to expound.

The grace-covered sinner I know myself to be is certain there is no need.

Today is a day to rejoice!

Where there was death, life has vanquished it altogether. Darkness threatened, but the light has not been overwhelmed.

Life. Light.

Great joy.

“‘They cannot conquer for ever!’ said Frodo. And then suddenly the brief glimpse was gone. The Sun dipped and vanished, and as if at the shuttering of a lamp, black night fell.”
(from The Two Towers ~ J.R.R. Tolkien)

“And when she finds it, she will call in her friends and neighbors and say, ‘Rejoice with me because I have found my lost coin.’ In the same way, there is joy in the presence of God’s angels when even one sinner repents.”
(Luke 15:9-10 ~ NLT)

While We Wait

February 1, 2019February 1, 2019 ~ Paul Phillips ~ 3 Comments

Anticlimactic. That’s what they call it, I think.

The bomb is going to explode. Terror grips the characters in the action movie. There is no way out! They’ll all surely be blown to bits. The camera fades to the timer counting down the seconds: 11, 10, 9, 8, 7. . . The distraught secretary screams and covers her face with her hands.

Click.

The hero flips a switch on the side of the bomb’s casing and the countdown stops. Within seconds, the plot has moved on, as if the minutes of terror and horrible certainty had never happened.

Anticlimactic.

It was. For the last several weeks, I’ve been waiting for the bomb to explode. Today, a sweet young nurse flipped the switch to stop the timer. Well, actually she clicked send on the email I received right after getting out of bed this morning.

“Your CT scan is normal.”

It’s done. Over. Time to move on.

Or, as Andy Dufresne said in the movie, Shawshank Redemption, “It all comes down to a simple choice, really. Get busy living or get busy dying.”

Wait!

Can we talk about this for a minute? I’m pretty certain I’m not the only one who’s been here—here just past the anticlimactic point, the place where we’re supposed to just pretend the last few weeks didn’t happen.

They happened. I felt them. I did the things I was supposed to do; said the things I was supposed to say. And, all the time I had my face in my hands while I screamed. Figuratively—the face in hands thing, anyway. Literally—for the screaming thing, if you count on the inside.

Did I say all the time?

That’s not quite right. It was like that for a while. Even before I heeded the signs and called the doctor, I was hunkered down, imagining the end game, wondering what I would do should the worst come to pass.

But a week ago, as I was in the middle of saying the right words to my lunch companion—the right words, mind you, a light came on. Sitting there in the Thai restaurant, with my adult son, I said the words.

“I’m not afraid to die. I’m not. I know what’s next. But, I really don’t want people to be left behind, people who need me.”

Nice, huh?

What I heard in that moment, not from my son but in my head, was the voice of my father saying the words to me several years ago. He was talking about himself at the time.

“No one is indispensable. God can have anyone do what I’m doing now.”

And, from somewhere else, in the back of my brain, I almost thought I heard God Himself laugh. Not an unkind laugh, but the kind of laugh you hear from a father when you’ve been a little foolish and naive. Gently, the words come to mind:

Before you were born—before even a day of your life had been lived—your days on earth were numbered and recorded. Not a moment will be left out. (Psalm 139:16)

I’m not that important. I’m not. And no, I’m not putting myself down, not trying to be self-deprecating. I’m simply stating a fact.

I’m not important enough to make God change the days, the hours, the minutes that have been set in my account. My times are completely in His hands.

So, I’ve decided I’m waiting for Him.

I’ve decided I’m waiting for God. Share on X

The what-ifs and the if-onlys don’t change the reality of life one whit. The brain and the mouth run on ahead of the events, sometimes with disastrous consequences to our spirit.

Fear paralyzes and turns our focus inside out.

But, if we will wait on our God, He will see us to safety.

Fear paralyzes and turns our focus inside out. But, if we will wait on our God, He will see us to safety. Share on X

Just like His people at the Red Sea, He tells us to stand still and watch His rescue take place. (Exodus 14:13)

In His time. At His place.

Waiting is hard. Not knowing is hard. But, when we run ahead, we fall at the side of the road, immobilized by weakness and fear.

I’m finally learning that in the waiting, I can trust Him. Even if the result from the tests had been different today, the real outcome would still be the same. Exactly as He planned.

When we wait on Him, our strength for the journey is renewed. Like an eagle soaring on the thermal currents above the mountains, we will gather strength as we fly. We’ll run without losing strength, and walk tirelessly. (Isaiah 40:31)

When we wait.

Waiting is hard.

Ah, but His rescue is spectacular.

Absolutely spectacular.

My voice You shall hear in the morning, O Lord;
In the morning I will direct it to You,
And I will look up.
(Psalm 5:3 ~ NKJV ~ New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.)

Found

January 29, 2019January 29, 2019 ~ Paul Phillips ~ 1 Comment

It’s possible I may have forgotten a detail or two. It was, after all, forty years ago the young man told me the tale. You’ll forgive me if I embellish the spots that have grown fuzzy, won’t you? I know the young man will.

The two men, college boys—both of them, needed a change of pace. Classes had grown tedious, the assignments overwhelming, and they just weren’t feeling it. One of them—which, it doesn’t matter—suggested a hunting trip into the Ozark National Forest, just ten miles away.

Neither of the young men was an outdoorsman. The one who told me the story had shot a twenty-two caliber rifle at camp. I remember the time he shot the maintenance man at the local nursing home in the foot with a BB gun, but I think that was the extent of his hunting experience.

I never really knew the other fellow, beyond a nodding acquaintance, so let’s just assume his capabilities were about the same as the first one.

Having borrowed a couple of rifles, the two tenderfoots headed into the forest one early-winter afternoon with the intent of bringing home a big buck. The white-tail deer are plentiful around these parts, so it didn’t seem too far-fetched an idea. That was before.

Before they lost the trail. Before it got dark.

Before it got cold.

They wandered this way and that. Kicking through brambles, up and down the rock-littered hillside the fellows plodded. They backtracked and then circled around again. Finally, after yelling awhile, they gave up and decided that, rather than risk becoming even more lost, they would have to spend the night in the woods on the side of the hill. It was dark, you know.

But, it was cold, too. They sat shivering and then, a germ of an idea hit one of them. There were fallen leaves from the maples and oaks all around. Couldn’t they heap them up and crawl under them to keep warm?

I did say it was just a germ of an idea, didn’t I?

It didn’t help much, but at least the wind wasn’t as bitter under the leaves. They settled down to await daylight, ten hours away. Not half an hour passed and they heard a sound. Startling, it was, all the way out here along the trail.

A car horn! Right next to where they lay. Twenty feet—not much more.

They were only twenty feet from the road! Twenty feet!

Hopelessly lost. When they could almost have reached out and touched the gravel road.

They got in the warm car their concerned friend was driving and, relieved and not a little embarrassed, rode back to their college dorm. Can you imagine the feeling—the joy?

Found!

What a wonderful word. Found.

A lifetime of blessing, tied up in one word, one syllable.

I sat with my love one night recently and watched—again—a movie we had seen several years ago. August Rush. It’s a retelling of the old Dickens classic, Oliver Twist, but with music. Guitar music. Violin music. Ethereal music drifting in the ether.

Unrealistic and unbelievable. Tears flowed all the way through. I mean, they did from at least one set of eyes.

The movie’s villain, a character you almost want to love, takes kids off the streets of the big city and makes them work for him. In return, they receive protection, food, and a bed.

He asks the movie’s protagonist, a musical prodigy who doesn’t know who or where his parents are, the question that has stuck in my mind since I first viewed the movie.

“What do you want to be in the world? I mean the whole world. What do you want to be? Close your eyes and think about that.”

There is no hesitation, no fumbling for a description of fantastic scenarios, no mention of fame, or wealth. One word. One syllable.

“Found.”

Found.

How sweet the sound.

On a recent Sunday, I found myself sitting in the Emergency Room of a hospital in a nearby town with a friend. The call had come just as I arrived at the church and it was only natural that I would give our dear friend a ride for the treatment she needed. It’s what we do for our friends. All she had to do was ask.

She apologized for putting me out. She wasn’t. Putting me out at all, I mean. It was my pleasure to help.

You have friends like that, don’t you? A phone call—a message—the beckoning of a single finger, and they are moving mountains to help. I know several, and love them all. With them, I always belong. Always.

But, what if? What if you knew no one who would help? What if choices you had made, paths you had taken, had left you alone?

Lost.

I left the hospital a few hours later after my friend had been admitted. Someone else had come to sit with her for a while, so I was headed home for Sunday dinner with my family.

Meatloaf. Butternut squash. Apple crisp.

The small lady carrying a big bag caught me in the parking lot, just as I stepped up onto the running board of my pickup truck.

“Please, sir. Can you help me? The people who were supposed to pick me up from the Emergency Room left me here, stranded. Can you give me a ride home?”

It was several miles away. Through traffic. The opposite direction from where I needed to go. My family was waiting. My dinner was getting cold.

I gave her a ride. Climbing in, she thanked me and gave her pronouncement on the human race, based on her missing ride.

“People are always unreliable.”

She fell asleep before she could tell me where she was going. I woke her up and got a general direction before she nodded off again. At first, I was afraid she was fainting and suggested taking her back to the hospital, which she vociferously rejected. As I drove on, it became apparent the problem was drugs. Whether they came from the Doctor at the emergency room (as she claimed) or not, I don’t know.

Annie Mae got home on Sunday. After a few tries, we found the destination. It was actually a convenience store in her neighborhood, but it was where she wanted out. She had a few dollars in her hand to buy a sandwich or, more likely, beef jerky—since that was what she said she wanted.

She had a couple of other things, too.

She had the name of Jesus in her ears. I’m not an evangelist. I didn’t explain the Four Spiritual Laws to her. I’ve tried that with folks who were impaired before. It’s not appropriate in those moments. But, she’ll remember that Jesus loves her.

And somehow, I think she knows that, for just a few moments on Sunday afternoon, she was found.

Understand. This isn’t about me. Not at all about me. I fit right in with Annie Mae’s description of humanity in general.

I am unreliable. I am.

But if we, who have been shown immeasurable kindness, will not show small kindnesses to our neighbors, be they close friends or be they street people, can we truly claim to be followers of Christ?

If we, who have been shown immeasurable kindness, will not show small kindnesses to our neighbors, can we truly claim to be followers of Christ? Share on X

We, once hopelessly lost, but now found—is it not an obligation that we help those who have strayed from the way (or perhaps never been on it) to realize that being found is as simple as asking?

I wonder. Are we the unreliable ones?

Is it time for us to ride down a country road or two and honk the horn to let people know just how close they are to being found?

The Teacher, in one of His parables, reminded His followers that they should search the main roads and the alleys, too, giving them every reason to come and sit at the table. (Luke 14:23)

I’m ready to drive around for a while. But, do you suppose I could finish my meatloaf first?

After that, who wants shotgun?

Amazing Grace, How sweet the sound
That saved a wretch like me.
I once was lost, but now am found;
Twas blind, but now I see.
(from Amazing Grace ~ John Newton ~ 1725-1807)

So Jesus told them this story: “If a man has a hundred sheep and one of them gets lost, what will he do? Won’t he leave the ninety-nine others in the wilderness and go to search for the one that is lost until he finds it? And when he has found it, he will joyfully carry it home on his shoulders. When he arrives, he will call together his friends and neighbors, saying, ‘Rejoice with me because I have found my lost sheep.’
(Luke 15:3-6 ~ NLT ~ Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.

Amazing Grace ~ David Phelps and family ~ a cappella

Soon, They’ll Fly

October 4, 2018October 4, 2018 ~ Paul Phillips ~ 2 Comments

As if all of creation is following the calendar hanging on the wall, the temperatures are dropping to suit the season. The north wind already blusters, tugging on the leaves of the trees in my yard, urging them to fly.

Soon. Soon, they’ll fly.

I sat on the porch with a warm cup of coffee a few moments past and wondered why the melancholy mood seems to be descending like a cloud. It does every year now when the seasons make the turn toward colder temperatures and bare limbs on trees.

It hasn’t always been so.

I listen absent-mindedly to the wind chimes at the back of the house and then to the ones beside me on the front porch as they take their turn to spin and shimmy in the chilly breeze. The progression of the blowing wind reminds me that the years have come and gone in just the same way. The waning year reminds me that life too, wanes.

With the years have come so many life events. Joyous and sad, they also take their turns, blowing in and then out again. I might as well try to stop the north wind as to hold back the memories.

I have seen babies born and old folks die. Before my eyes, both have happened. I didn’t turn away from either. Both have brought tears. Tears of heartache. Tears of joy.

Children have grown; friendships, too. The children left, but came back with others of their own. Friends have come and gone, and then come again, some of them. Life has had its sadness, but also, in great measure, its joy.

And yet, among my memories, especially this time of year, the melancholy shoves aside the joy.

For some reason, I see, in my mind’s eye, a scene from a Greek myth I read as a child. Most will remember it, the story of Pandora and the box she was forbidden to open.

The pain and evil she loosed on the earth changed it forever. Only a weak and ineffective hope was left behind as a salve, a bandage for the open, bleeding wound.

The Greeks and Romans offered, in their attempts at explaining humanity and deity, a weak copy of the reality of a Creator who actually gave hope, real hope to His children, His creation.

How easy it is for us, like the ancients, to let our eyes fall to man and the created world, expecting salvation, but finding only weakness and death. We begin to attempt to explain all we see and experience, framed in our human frailty and knowledge.

Weakly, we grasp at the wisps of hope the world offers, thinking it will stave off our unhappiness and certainty of what follows the coming of Autumn.

We build empires, which merely crumble and dissolve beneath our feet. We follow political leaders who make promises with their mouths, but then take action from their base, evil hearts.

Wealth bellows its virtues, only to disappoint. Youth begins to slip from our grasp and hope flees. We chase health with every gym membership and dietary supplement we can find, only to discover ourselves trapped in ever-weakening frames.

Magazines are read; books purchased. Surely someone will find the secret before it’s too late for us!

We set our sight too low. Far too low.

Did you ever stand in the dark of early morning, out in a valley, awaiting the dawn?

I remember mornings—brisk Autumn mornings, not unlike those I’m waking up to now—when I sat awaiting the sun, and the beauty that would follow its rising.

Looking out across the valley, I could see only pitch blackness. They say it’s always darkest before dawn and then, I could believe it. But perhaps, I was looking too low. I should look up—up on the rise of the surrounding hillsides. Surely, from that height, light would ascend and creation would shine.

The hillsides disappointed. Every time.

Even the hilltops themselves were of little help. Possibly, I could make them out, silhouetted against the sky as they were. But, the light didn’t emanate from them.

I had to lift my eyes even higher—up to the sky, where the sun would rise.

There! Even before the sun arrived, the light shone upward from behind the dark horizon. Above the valley—above the hillsides—towering even above the hilltops—the sun burst forth to begin its daily circuit above.

The Psalmist knew it. As he sat in the valley of despair, he lifted his eyes up to the hills, but found no help there. Where—where would his help come from? Only from God. (Psalm 121:1,2)

High above the valley—from a dizzy height above the mountains—God reaches down to aid His own.

High above the valley—from a dizzy height above the mountains—God reaches down to aid His own. Share on X

We would wander in the darkness forever, trusting a weak and futile hope. In our foolishness, we believe that the evil loosed in the world cannot ever be defeated. Or worse, we think we can unseat it with our New-Age we-are-gods-ourselves mantra.

Death will follow. As surely as winter follows Autumn, death follows evil and error.

He gives us a Hope that is far better than any we could ever fabricate or imagine.

A Savior who makes all things new.

The power of Pandora’s box is broken in Him. Our Hope has the power to give us new life.

He promises us heaven.

Soon. Soon, we’ll fly.

He promises us heaven. Soon. Soon, we'll fly. Share on X

The leaves are falling, falling as if from far up,
as if orchards were dying high in space.
Each leaf falls as if it were motioning “no.”

And tonight the heavy earth is falling
away from all other stars in the loneliness.

We’re all falling. This hand here is falling.
And look at the other one. It’s in them all.

And yet there is Someone, whose hands
infinitely calm, holding up all this falling.
(Autumn ~ Rainer Maria Rilke ~ Bohemian-Austrian poet ~ 1875-1926)

“The wind blows wherever it wants. Just as you can hear the wind but can’t tell where it comes from or where it is going, so you can’t explain how people are born of the Spirit.”
(John 3:8 ~ NLT ~ Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.)

Undressing in Public

September 1, 2017September 1, 2020 ~ Paul Phillips ~ 5 Comments

My pocket was vibrating. We were most of the way through Eternal Father, Strong to Save when the distraction began. Ignoring the momentary buzzing, I bumbled my way through the end of the piece.

I don’t use my phone during orchestra rehearsal. Usually, I don’t. But you know—my house could have been burning or an intercontinental ballistic missile might have been heading our way— so, as soon as our conductor turned her attention to the violins, helping them to find the pitch which they seemed to have lost during the last piece, I checked my messages.

One was a reminder that I had promised to go to coffee with another member of the orchestra at nine o’clock, right after we finished the rehearsal. The other was from another friend, inviting me to join him and a third friend at ten o’clock at a different coffee shop.

It was cutting it close (and there was a danger of caffeine overdose), but I snuck my phone onto the music stand and surreptitiously sent a return message saying I would try to be there.

I hope no one will squeal on me to the director.

Friends in this world are hard to come by. Friends who will take the time to invite a grumpy old guy such as I to coffee are even harder to find.

Time spent among such friends is never wasted. Never.

I met with my red-headed tuba-playing friend and we laughed, and commiserated, and laughed some more.

Then I met with the preacher and his/my guitar-playing friend and we laughed, and commiserated, and laughed some more.

All in all, the two encounters were probably the most important two hours I spent in the whole day. They were completely uneventful. By that I mean there were no important decisions made, no actions taken, not even any subjects of any great significance discussed.

Did I say they were completely uneventful? That’s not quite accurate. There were two things that happened, which have had me thinking for two days. The first occurred near the end of my time with my friend from the orchestra.

An acquaintance, who knew both of us, wandered by on his way out of the restaurant and took a moment to stop and talk with us. As we wondered aloud how he was doing, he began to unbutton his shirt.

“Let me show you something.”

My friend and I exchanged quizzical glances. I can’t speak for my friend, but people don’t normally undress in public while I’m talking with them.

We needn’t have worried.

He just wanted to show us the scar.

The scar from his open-heart surgery a few months ago went from just below his ribs up to the top of his chest. He told us (in colorful terms) about his previous symptoms and the surgery, as well as its aftermath. It was good that we had finished our coffee and buns already.

I only mention the event because the other thing that happened was very much like it.

I arrived at the second venue for coffee consumption just a few minutes after the agreed-upon time and grabbed my third cup of coffee in the morning before sitting down with my two friends.

Within minutes, the guitar player was unbuttoning his shirt. Seriously.

“Let me show you something.”

His scar was horizontal, not vertical. Just below his collarbone, the three-inch incision was not completely healed and it looked tender.

The pacemaker/defibrillator has only been in his body for a short time, but he joked and dismissed it as lightly as if it were of no consequence at all. We knew better but didn’t dwell on it.

Two men, within a quarter-hour of each other, had unbuttoned their shirts to show me something I would never have seen otherwise.

What a curious thing!

It was almost as if there was a message I needed not to miss.

There was.

I didn’t.

I couldn’t.

How many people do I see in a day? Ten? Fifty? A thousand? I suppose it depends on the day and the places to which I go.

Still, if inside of fifteen minutes, two men had shown me their scars, how many do you suppose I pass every day—every single day—who have scars they don’t show me?

How many people are walking around hiding scars? Scars too ugly, too fresh, too painful to reveal to anyone.

You know we’re not talking about physical scars, right? Well, maybe some of them.

Some physical scars work their way right down into the soul of the person wearing them.

Scars put there by hatred.

Scars dealt out by people who were supposed to show love instead.

Scars carved into their body by their own hand.

And yet, those scars are, as the red-headed lady who raised me would have said, only the tip of the iceberg.

We carry, in our bodies and souls, scars innumerable. Scars we wouldn’t dare to show to anyone.

Not to anyone.

There is not one human being who is unscathed. Not one. We all have scars.

Words said. Pain remembered. War. Old age.

Every part of our lives has its anguish. Scars come from all types of injuries.

And, we walk around with the scars hidden from sight. Walking wounded, many of them yet unhealed. Oozing, scabby things—they threaten to drain the life from us.

Tears come as I contemplate it. So much pain. So much hopelessness. All concealed and festering.

Some of it is mine. Perhaps, yours as well.

Our Savior came to bind up the broken hearts. (Isaiah 61:1)

More than that, He came to heal the scars and take away the pain. Because of His scars, healing is ours. (Isaiah 53:5)

There are some who take those words to mean physical healing. I won’t argue His power to do that. It seems clear though, that the words are intended to give us an unequivocal promise of healing for our souls.

Our scars need no longer be hidden! We need conceal our pain and our shame no more.

Thomas—the one we ridicule as the doubter—asked Him to unbutton His shirt and show him. Right in front of a houseful of His followers.

The scars of a common criminal—revealed for everyone in the room to see. The stripes upon His back, laid on by the Roman soldier. The holes in his wrists and feet, torn open by spikes hammered through (not gently).

All uncovered without embarrassment.

For us, His flesh was laid open.

My heart breaks as I consider all who walk in shame and fear—fear of the exposure of their scars and fear of carrying them to their graves.

I wonder. Maybe it’s time to show our scars to each other.

Maybe it's time to show our scars to each other. Share on X

Maybe it’s time to tell the Good News, to do a little binding up of wounded hearts ourselves.

Maybe, it’s time to undress.

In public.

Let me show you something.

It has been said, ‘time heals all wounds.’ I do not agree. The wounds remain. In time, the mind, protecting its sanity, covers them with scar tissue and the pain lessens. But it is never gone.
(Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy ~ American philanthropist ~ 1890-1995)

He heals the brokenhearted
and binds up their wounds.
(Psalm 147:3 ~ NIV ~ Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV® Copyright ©1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® All rights reserved.)

On the Mezzanine

February 14, 2017February 14, 2017 ~ Paul Phillips ~ 3 Comments

I remember that mezzanine.

Tears do that, you know. Remind you.

And they fall, unbidden. We don’t want them to; they just come.

So, with the salty liquid running down my cheeks I remember that day, now over thirty-five years ago.

Visiting my folks in my childhood home, I agreed to ride along with my old friend as he made his sales rounds one summer afternoon.

We stopped by a produce warehouse, a corrugated metal structure where they prepared vegetables for shipment to various marketplaces. The building my friend entered was the onion operation. Right outside the metal building—by the truckloads—the dirty yellowish bulbs had been hauled from the fields and were dumped onto the conveyor lines that would carry them though the process.

The process would change them dramatically. On that summer afternoon long ago, it would change me, too.

From a filthy orb with roots hanging off one end and stem jutting out of the other, to a beautiful shiny sphere just waiting to be sliced, battered, and deep fried—turning out the most delicious tasting snack you could ask for—the transformation was radical.

But, you ask, what about the mezzanine? Where are the tears?

I’m getting there. Soon, there would more than enough tears to last a man a lifetime.

I hung back in the factory while my friend talked with his contact there. In just a moment though, he was beckoning with his hand for me to follow him on into the plant. He explained that he needed to check the stock levels for the products he provided to the company.

As I prepared to follow him up a steel staircase, he gave me a hint—just a hint—about what was to come.

You’ll want to stay close. Don’t worry, I won’t walk away from you.

Stay close? Why would I need him near? I snickered. As if I needed someone to hold my hand climbing up some stairs.

As if.

That was before the tears.

The stairs led to a mezzanine made of steel beams covered by a steel grate that served as a floor surface.

Right. Above. The. Production. Line.

Let it sink in for a moment. We walked above the line where the onions were washed. Where the roots were sliced off. Where the stems were removed. The round veggies banged and battered each other as they collided all along the conveyor.

Think about the strongest onion you ever sliced into and multiply it a few thousand times.

I couldn’t see a thing. It was a good thing my friend stayed near. It was as if I had been struck blind in seconds. The terror was nearly instantaneous. There is no other word to describe what I felt.

Shaking, I held onto his shoulder all the way across the mezzanine and back down the stairs.

Did you know the chemical in onions that makes you cry is the very same component that lends the edgy flavor which livens up so many dishes?

This seems a strange thing to write about on a day when we talk about love, doesn’t it?

Be my valentine.

Roses and chocolates.

Diamonds and gold.

Love is more than the fluff.

Not less. More.

Spicy and playful. Stinking and bitter.

Laughing. Crying.

To get through it, we have to stay close.

Love is more than the fluff. To get through it, we have to stay close Share on X

Standing on the mezzanine of life, we stay close to the ones we love.

And, they are there.

He promised that, too—the One who gave His lifeblood to show us the way.

I’ll be with you always. Even though the world around you disintegrates, I’ll be there. (Matthew 28:20)

He’s a Promise-keeper.

You’ll want to stay close. He won’t walk away.

He won’t.

Life is like an onion; you peel it off one layer at a time, and sometimes you weep.
(Carl Sandburg ~ American writer/poet ~ 1878-1967)

Don’t be afraid, for I am with you.
Don’t be discouraged, for I am your God.
I will strengthen you and help you.
I will hold you up with my victorious right hand.
(Isaiah 41:10 ~ NLT)

Ancient Passage

July 19, 2016July 19, 2016 ~ Paul Phillips ~ 1 Comment

It didn’t seem the most intelligent course of action. Then again, I didn’t think there was an option.

The Lovely Lady and I had taken a lovely drive along the mountaintops in southern Oklahoma and, realizing we were near an interesting old steel bridge, made a slight detour off the highway to get a photograph or two. I assumed we would find a place to park on the near side of the structure and would walk over it, rather than driving.

The structure is, after all, nearly one hundred years old. On the day it was completed in 1920, likely the only vehicles to cross it were a few horse drawn wagons and a Ford Model T or two.

The Model T weighed just over half a ton.

The comfy big pickup truck the Lovely Lady and I were driving tops out at just over two and a half tons. I didn’t really want to test the bridge.

It was unsettling to drive up the approach to the old metal truss bridge and realize there was no place to park. We reached the first span and I thought momentarily about backing the nearly three hundred feet to the closest turn off.

But, I’m a man. Men don’t back up when they can go forward.

We went forward—over the rickety, rusty old bridge. As we drove over it, the Lovely Lady read the results from the last inspection performed by the state.

“It says the substructure is rated only 2 out of 9 points—critical. ‘Structurally deficient.’ Do you think we should be doing. . .”

Her voice trailed off, as we almost crawled across the river.

The steel and concrete span held our weight, but we held our breath until we were on solid ground again.

Almost a hundred years old, the man-made bridge has very nearly reached the end of its useful life.

Nearly done.

The thought of it makes me sad.

I’ve told you before how much I love bridges. You may already know that the walls of our den hold nothing but paintings of the wonderful structures.

In this room full of paintings depicting bridges, it is probably the least likely piece of artwork to draw the eye.

I usually gravitate to the complicated designs, preferring to consider the concepts and scientific knowledge required to construct such strong, yet beautiful, framework.

This is not one of those.

The little bridge in the old watercolor is merely a solid piece of granite, hewn, not by human hands, but by the Creator Himself. The form it retains today is largely the same form it had when it was laid over the muddy brown stream nearly five-hundred years ago.

It is a real bridge, still spanning the brook it crossed all those years ago.

A solid foundation lies under each end of the clapper stone bridge. Two flat pieces of granite, possibly quarried from the same location as the arched bridge itself, have stood, unmoved, through five centuries.

The old structure has carried carts and foot traffic of all sorts—human and otherwise—safely across the brook. In the spring floods, when the muddy brown water roared and whirled beneath it, safe passage was a guarantee. Even when the flow of the brook is reduced to a trickle, the ancient piece of stone gives assurance of certain transit from one side of the little valley to the other.

But, like the much younger, fabricated bridge we crossed the other day, this bridge will one day (many years hence, one would hope) fail. The flood may wash it off its foundation, or a crack may develop, the resulting fall of the stone into the brook bringing to an end its usefulness to mankind.

Again, the thought of it makes me sad.

All that man has established will, one day, come to nothing.

All of it.

There is one Bridge, though. One Stone, laid by the hand of God Himself.

Eons ago, the words were spoken. Today, they are still true:

Look! I am laying a stone, firm and tested. It is a priceless foundation that will never fail. Whoever trusts it will never be disappointed. (Isaiah 28:16)

A Bridge, laid across the gorge of destruction by the Creator—never to be removed—never to be inspected and declared structurally deficient.

It’s not complicated. There are no angles. No girders. No need for advanced mathematics.

Just a plain Stone and an invitation to cross.

And, all we have to do is trust it to hold us.

Go ahead. Take the first step.

You can hold your breath if you need to.

He will hold us.

Forever.

For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers,neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
(Romans 8:38-39 ~ NIV)

The time worn granite clapper bridge
Spans the peat stained moorland brook,
The Dipper bobs as it hunts the midge
People cross with no second look.

Feet from ages long, long past
Have trod across the trusted stone,
The dawn and dusk have shadows cast
The sun has shone and cruel winds blown.

Men have come with brush in hand
To paint the scene through expert eye,
People followed to this desolate land
In search of something they know not why.

The rook as it sits in the solitary tree
Looks down on all that pass below,
He knows the secrets of you and me
And silently lets us cross the moorland flow.
(The Lonely Clapper ~ Anonymous)

Fight or Flight

June 21, 2016June 21, 2016 ~ Paul Phillips ~ Leave a comment

It’s not a sight you’d expect to see, here in the foothills of the Ozarks. The lush wooded landscape, along with the numerous rivers and creeks that crisscross the valleys and hollows hereabouts, doesn’t bear much resemblance to the cactus and sand-smothered expanses of the desert.

Nonetheless, I know what I saw with my own eyes. While on a longish bicycle ride last week, I actually had to shake my head for a moment in unbelief.

Surely it was my favorite childhood cartoon come to life! Up ahead on the road as I crested a hill, a roadrunner stood, poised for flight.

Greater_Roadrunner_(Geococcyx_californianus)_(3399096675) — photo by Dominic Sherony

Well, not for flight.

The earthbound birds prefer to outrun their predators with their strong and speedy legs instead of using their wings. They can run as fast as 20 miles an hour when pursued.

The thing is, I can ride my bicycle faster than 20 miles per hour. Downhill, anyway. And, I was headed straight for the unfortunate creature as he stood downhill from me.

All Wile E. Coyote-ish, I sped right toward the sprinter.

He, knowing that danger was approaching, ran for all he was worth. I gained quickly. I don’t know if he reached his top speed, but I do know I nearly ran him down.

Zig-zagging all over the road, he gave me no clear path to pass. It was evident that every instinct told the poor bird I was a predator, intent on his destruction. Regardless of the fact I was more intent on avoiding him than running him down, he only knew the terror that being close to death can bring.

At the last second, just before my wheels caught him up, the tricky fellow did the only thing he could do—the one thing he may not have known he had the ability to do—he flew up and off the pavement into the low-hanging branches of a maple tree that hung over the fence about twenty or thirty feet away..

He flew!

The bird that I have always believed could simply avoid any pursuer by out-running it, flew.

Any lingering thought of the Warner Brothers cartoon bird from my youth disappeared from my consciousness with the suddenness of a pricked balloon exploding.

The bird didn’t push the Acme weights off the cliff onto me, didn’t draw a railroad tunnel on the side of a cliff for a train to blast out of and flatten me, didn’t light the wick on a rocket to launch me into the stratosphere.

He flew away.

Gone. Just like that. Disappeared from my sight.

One moment, certain destruction—the next, salvation from on high.

Dare I say anymore? Need I?

Perhaps a word or two.

I’m not the only one who has felt the terror of late; I’ve seen it in the eyes of others. Many see all chance of escape disappearing from their sight.

Some fear for their future, others for their children’s. Aged and hardened old men weep in the darkness for the loss of their loved ones. Young men and women despair of hope.

All run as fast as they can, hoping for escape, but pursued relentlessly by their terror. There is no escape to be found.

I’ve written recently of the wings of eagles and the ability to run without tiring. They are a gift from God and there is hope in His strength. (Isaiah 40:31)

But, what if there is another way? What if the wings and the strong, untiring muscles are not meant to be tools for retreat, but a means of facing the powers that threaten us?

Perhaps, it is time, not for flight, but to fight. (Ephesians 6:10-18)

And yet, I can’t help thinking there is one more thing to be said.

What was it, now? Let me see…

Oh yes. I’m wondering if we’re all that good at identifying our enemies.

The birdbrain that ran away from me on the road that day thought I was his. I wouldn’t have harmed a feather on his body.

I wasn’t his enemy. At all.

Sometimes, fear makes our enemies seem stronger than they are. It even manufactures enemies where there are none.

Perhaps, after all, it is time for us just to stand.

Stand and see the salvation of the Lord.

Neither fight nor flight.

Just plain faith.

Salvation is certain.

Stand still.

Still.

He that flies counts every foeman twice.
(from The Two Towers ~ J.R.R.Tolkien ~ English author ~ 1892-1973)

But you will not even need to fight. Take your positions; then stand still and watch the Lord’s victory. He is with you, O people of Judah and Jerusalem. Do not be afraid or discouraged. Go out against them tomorrow, for the Lord is with you!
(2 Chronicles 20:17 ~ NLT)

Telling Stories

May 11, 2016May 11, 2016 ~ Paul Phillips ~ 1 Comment

The storyteller sits, spinning his yarns into fabric.

That’s what they call it, isn’t it? A fabrication?

I listen anyway. Still, as the story goes on, I begin to see the ravelings poking through here and there. His tale may have started with a few facts, but somehow it doesn’t all fit in a continuous pattern.

I want to reach for the edge of his fabric and pull at one of those loose ends. I just know that, like the cartoon character with a loose thread on his sweater which gets caught in a passing car, the story will unravel and the naked truth will come out.

I have done that more than once before. I’m learning (finally) to leave the loose threads alone and let the story spin out.

Some things are more important than being right.

Do you know how hard that is for me to say?

I grew up in a home where being right was paramount. Lies were set straight and wrong attitudes corrected immediately.

It’s what you do for your children. We call it teaching, and it is the responsibility of every parent.

But, the faults of others who were not part of our family were also pointed out to us constantly. My parents didn’t want to miss the opportunity to help us make good decisions.

Examples are helpful when teaching children, so folks we knew became our cautionary examples, their faults often looming larger than life in our little eyes. Their good traits could never balance their bad ones.

Black. White.

Heads. Tails.

What should have been lessons meant to help us examine our own steps and language became cause for comparison.

Comparisons stink.

I’m not the first to say it. I won’t be the last. The real problem lies in the fact that I kind of like the odor.

Comparisons where I come out ahead make me feel good about myself—for awhile. I begin to believe that God, perhaps, loves me better. I’m one of His favorite sons because of my concern with doing things right and in order.

Surely, it’s true.

It is not.

Grace pays no attention to the design of the filthy rags it washes. It takes no notice of the tag ends hanging from the corners.

The storyteller with his lying ways is no worse—nor better—off than the listener who sits nearby and tends the kernel of pride in his soul, growing quickly into a full-grown bush of snobbery.

I know how hard the fall is when pride takes its inevitable tumble, and it is inevitable.

Sinners sin. We sin, not all in the same way, but we sin.

It has taken many years for me to understand that grace, for all its astounding power, doesn’t remove sin, but the penalty for sinning. Justification is the work of grace.

We who have been justified—through grace—are called to be sanctified. All that means is we are called to become holy, or set apart, as He is.

We have to take a walk. It’s something we do with others. Not surprisingly, we don’t all start the walk with the same baggage.

There are folks with sexual sins, addicts, liars, thieves, gluttons, drunks—the list is not short. He doesn’t require that we clean up before we become part of His family. What happens after that though, is different. (1 Corinthians 6:9-10)

This walking we do is a progressive thing. The people we walk with may not be at the same place in the process as we are.

May not isn’t the right way to put it. They will not be at the same place.

We walk with them anyway. There’s a reason for that:

We still need each other. Travelers on their own rarely reach their destinations without meeting calamities along the road. It is our lot in life to depend on help through the tough places.

I have refused—refused—to lend aid to folks in the past. Somehow I thought I might get dirty in the process. I could have nothing to do with people who sinned in that way.

Do you hear what I’m saying?

I’m not alone, am I? We are a prideful and hypocritical lot, aren’t we?

We who have been forgiven freely, refuse to believe that God could forgive that.

That! How could He? How would He?

He could. He has.

Those stinking comparisons. Still, their stench fills the air around me, like the grotesque odor of bone burning under the dentist’s drill.

But, a lifetime of making comparisons has paralyzed me. I want to walk with others, but my paralysis stops me.

And then, I remember the Great Physician, to whom the man, bed-ridden with paralysis, was brought on that day a couple thousand years ago. The Healer said only two things to him. It’s all that was necessary. (Mark 2:1-12)

Your sins are forgiven.

Get out of that bed and walk.

Even today, the paralysis of a lifetime of thought patterns is banished with those words!

Freedom! At last.

At last.

I’m walking.

There’s still room on the road beside me.

May it never be otherwise.

A brother offended is harder to win than a strong city,
And contentions are like the bars of a castle.
(Proverbs 18:19 ~ NKJV)

Odyous of olde been comparisonis, And of comparisonis engendyrd is haterede.
(John Lydgate ~ English monk/poet ~ 1370-1451)

When the Music Stops

April 12, 2016April 12, 2016 ~ Paul Phillips ~ 2 Comments

I can’t see you.

I was out on a run this evening when her message arrived. Having nearly completed the first mile of a gentle three-mile run, I was feeling pretty good.

The music in my headphones suddenly stopped and the harsh clang of the message indicator hammered my eardrums. I glanced down at my phone, held tightly in the plastic-and-velcro carrier on my arm. The Lovely Lady had words for me.

I stopped. When she talks, I listen. Well, most of the time, I listen. Sometimes, I just appear to be listening. Perhaps, we’ll leave that subject for another day.

She couldn’t see my progress along the route on which I was running. The fitness program I use not only tells me how far and fast I’ve run, it sends a GPS signal to other interested parties, showing where I am.

She’s interested. I’m only half-teasing when I say she needs to know where to send the ambulance.

But tonight, she couldn’t see me.

I made a change or two to the phone while standing alongside the road, sending a message back right before trotting on my way.

“Can you see me now?”

It took a few moments for her negative reply to arrive, but I was already back to full speed, and didn’t want to stop again. I sent a curt, almost insensitive message.

“I’m just going to keep running. Sorry.”

The problem is fixed now, so there shouldn’t be a repeat of her trepidation the next time I head out to feed the fitness bug.

She needs to see me.

I know the feeling.

There are days, a lot like today—no, just like today—when I stop in the midst of all the commotion and overpowering sense of futility, and say the words. Sometimes, I say them right out loud—sometimes I shout them in the vacuum of my spirit.

Where are you, God? In all of this—this pointless exertion—are You here?

I can’t see Him.

On top of the commotion, a longtime friend’s mother was laid to rest today; and a young lady, whose acquaintance I made a few years back when she attended the local university, sent news that her father passed away early this morning. Another friend is grieving the loss of her granddaughter, only a year old.

I can’t speak for them. I simply know it is at times like these when I want most to know that God is near. And it is, for some strange reason, at times like these when I can’t see Him.

I can’t see Him.

And the music, which is the joy of life, has stopped. Either that, or I just can’t hear the sweet melodies and harmonies in my ears like I could before. Regardless, the silence is unbearable.

Blind and deaf, I stand—wondering if I’ll ever see Him again—uncertain if the sweet music will ever begin again.

It’s funny. If you stand in darkness and silence for awhile, the senses are sharpened.

Even now, I can almost hear the whisper—if I try.

I will never leave you or forsake you. (Deuteronomy 31:6)

I won’t leave you as orphans. The world won’t see me, but you will. (John 14:18-19)

Even when you walk through the valley of the shadow of death, nothing evil will touch you. (Psalm 23:4)

The longer we listen to the whisper of His voice, the easier it is to hear. In the quiet, He speaks to our spirits.

We only have to listen.

Still. I want to see Him.

I’m remembering today that we’re not home yet. Here, we see dimly.

There? Face to face. Clearly.

On that day, with our loved ones (if they were His followers), we’ll see Him.

What a glorious thought!

We’ll see Him.

That’s funny. I think I can hear music again, too. You know, there’ll be music in that place, as well. The thought brings joy.

I want to see Him. He does give glimpses here at times. Enough to give us courage. And strength.

So, I’ll keep walking.

You too?

We could walk together.

I’d like that.

So we are always of good courage. We know that while we are at home in the body we are away from the Lord,for we walk by faith, not by sight. Yes, we are of good courage, and we would rather be away from the body and at home with the Lord. So whether we are at home or away, we make it our aim to please him.
(2 Corinthians 5:6-9 ~ ESV)

Open our eyes Lord
We want to see Jesus,
To reach out and touch Him
And say that we love Him.
(from Open Our Eyes, Lord ~ Robert Cull ~ American pastor/songwriter)

He's Taken Leave

Random wanderings with Paul Phillips

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