Looking Back…Skipping Stones

A short walk from my childhood home was a pond where I learned to skip stones.  Ricocheting one to the other side was possible as the pond was narrow.  The skills needed were a precise blend of momentum and trajectory. I mastered it after many tries. Swish…………splat….……..splat…splat…splat…thud.  That was the sound of a successful toss. 

Life is like a skipping stone.  At least mine has been. Memories float as I reflect on moments when time and place held hands with some person or event, thrusting me onward across the pond.  There have been lots of skips in fifty-seven years. 

I didn’t see who tossed and sustained me until I reflected from a properly aged theological perspective (Isaiah 46:9-10).  Then I discovered the primary momentum and ultimate trajectory of my life was from the thrust of an unseen hand.  Providence was not acknowledged by me for years.  I foolishly believed my life had a point of its own (Proverbs 12:15).  I understand now that it was grace that kept me from sinking in my own arrogant ignorance.

Looking back is a vital part of going on.  God has a way of redeeming the skips of life.  Recognizing God’s faithfulness in the past builds confidence for the future.  My pond is not as wide as it was.  I have no way of knowing how long before my thud is heard. However, I don’t worry about that.  I’ve learned that life is not a series of unrelated and pointless events.

God is working (Romans 8:28). 

Here I go again!  

Singing and laughing I fly - crying and groaning I dive - awkward and frantic I sink  – only to suddenly skip and fly again.   I can even look forward to the thud because of the one who is waiting for me on the other side.

Barry

http://www.kairosjournal.org/Document.aspx?QuadrantID=4&CategoryID=7&TopicID=13&DocumentID=5824&L=1

However, as C. S. Lewis said, it is also important to know what is fit for  Christians to read: Even in peacetime I think those are very wrong who say that schoolboys should be encouraged to read the newspapers. Nearly all that a boy reads there in his teens will be known before he is twenty to have been false in emphasis and interpretation, if not in fact as well, and most of it will have lost all importance. Most of what he remembers he will therefore have to unlearn; and he will probably have acquired an incurable taste for vulgarity and sensationalism and the fatal habit of fluttering from paragraph to paragraph to learn how an actress has been divorced in California, a train derailed in France, and quadruplets born in New Zealand (Surprised by Joy).

It’s been more difficult for Joy than for me as we make our final approach (I’ve been on too many airplanes lately) into Thanksgiving.  I enjoy the simplicity of eating from microwavable plates and bowls.  I take the trash out more, or should, but the water bill is less. However, when it comes to Joy and a mother’s need for a kitchen, my love of simplicity must take a back seat to sensitivity. We’ve been without a kitchen going on ten months. The contractor who abandoned us (I hope it isn’t a sin to write that) has tempted me into selective Scripture reading.  I haven’t treasured 1 Thessalonians 5:18 for months. 

However, the Holy Spirit gave me a whipping this morning as I read Matthew 14: 13-21. After He was done whipping, He filled my heart with gratitude.  As I write this, my soul rises with praise to our Lord Jesus Christ.  I’ve discovered anew that I am not hungry.  Oh, I will certainly be ready to eat the turkey and dressing and the rest of the fixings overwhelming the dining room table come Thursday.  I’ll make sure I am hungry for that.  But when it comes to the most important way of being full, I’m already stuffed.  I ate this meal on my knees twenty-eight years ago and washed it down with tears of repentance and joy. 

I was surprised when room service invaded my hotel room.  I didn’t order the meal but the sovereign God sent it anyway.  Mercy and grace captured me when the feast of the finished work of Christ was laid before me.  When I saw Him, I was no longer free to deny the hunger within and I could not resist tasting and finding that He is good (Psalm 34:8).

I lost my spiritual hunger that day when the irresistible grace of God turned a hotel bed into an eternal banquet table.  While the beauty of the Christian life involves continuous feasting on Christ by faith, in terms of growing in His love, it’s also true that the initial feast satisfies and guarantees an eternal place at His banquet table.

I’m thinking about a father who, for the first time, will not be at our dining room table this year.  However, when he was just a little boy his eternal hunger was satisfied with the same bread that would later fill his rebellious son.  This is why that cold plot at the cemetery across town “ain’t ‘bout nothing.”  One day I’ll join him at the greatest thanksgiving feast of all.

My mind is racing with the implications of no longer being hungry.  I’m going to make a list of all the reasons I should dust off 1 Thessalonians 5:18 and treasure it again.   If you decide to do the same perhaps we can compare notes sometime.  Those of us who are not hungry should talk to each other about why. 

Being fed this Thanksgiving,

Barry

The following poem was penned after God’s amazing grace rescued

me yet again from the power of remaining sin, giving me

a renewed respect for the deceitfulness of sin,

directing my eyes to the sufficiency of

 the Cross, deepening my love for

and freedom in Jesus Christ. 

The ministering Psalm 

of this sanctifying

grace was

107

OUT OF THERE BY GRACE

(Inspired from Psalm 107)

Will it be different this time?

This sin, this crouching mental mime

Lures me to ponder yet again

That in the mist there is a friend

The price, yet paid, has far outreached

The promise of Hell’s sticky leech

But with the aid of serpent hiss

Right thinking yields to cold caress

The wasteland once again surrounds

As horror everywhere abounds

And wonder, I, yet once again

Why in the mist I sought a friend

The lessons of this lonely place

Are always seen when face to face

With unmasked evil in wasteland

As, out of there, I search for hand

Out of there, is not as fast

As it once was back in the past

When echoes of forgiving land

Did clearly show me mercy’s hand

Erosion and corrosion grows

Not recognized back then as foes

As sin’s relentless tide is bold

By roaring sound its victim holds

The sensitivity is weak

To hear the hope of Zion’s peak

Yet, there a soft voice calls to me

That I might once again be free

The voice gives gracious strength to me

As I admit depravity

And look to see on bloody tree

The awful price ‘twas paid for me

It is not right, nor is it fair

That I, again, am out of there

For out of there I should not be

For anything found good in me

It is by steadfast love of God

That I now stand on Holy sod

And find the strength to pray again

And thank the close and staying friend

Into this doomed wasteland He came

To rescue, this, my wicked frame

From my deserved eternal mess

And love me to his home of bliss

Barry Bruce (1997)

ALBERT

ALBERT ONCE SANG PROFESSIONALLY

Sponsored by the Russian government, his career was promising.  By age 25 he was entertaining official soviet dignitaries and wealthy citizens at ballrooms and theaters in major Russian cities.

Albert’s love of music lead him to join in singing with people he didn’t know as he would walk down the streets of towns and villages. 

During an evening walk he heard singing coming from a church building.  He couldn’t resist the urge to enter.  He asked to participate in choir practice.  The choir asked if he was a follower of Christ.  Albert said he was not.  They told him that unbelievers were not allowed to sing with believers.  He said he just wanted to sing for a few minutes. They said, “While you sing with us we will be praying for you to repent”. 

As Albert sang the lyrics spoke to him.  In singing about the Gospel of Jesus Christ he was convicted of his sins.  When tears flooded his eyes he dropped to his knees asking God to forgive him.  He repented and trusted in Jesus Christ for salvation.

When the Russian officials learned of Albert’s conversion they tried talking him into renouncing Christ.  After he would not deny the Lord they tried to recruit him as an entry level KGB agent in order to spy on the churches.  When he refused they told him he would never be allowed to sing again professionally.

Albert chose singing with the people of God over a promising career.  He is still singing for Christ in Kirovograd, Ukraine.  Pray for him as his health is failing him in old age. Thank God for His great salvation in bringing Albert out spiritual darkness and into the eternal light of His Son. What a merciful and gracious God we serve in ordaining that one of his chosen ones sing himself out of darkness into Light.

Barry