Month: March 2019

You run a sad train, mister.  You take people away when they don’t want to go and won’t bring them back when they are ready.  Charles Anderson in Shenandoah

One of my favorite movies of all time, is Shenandoah.  I love all the characters, their close family, and I especially love the scene where the Anderson family stops a Union train to look among the Confederate prisoners bound for prison for their brother and son.  They found instead their son in law/brother in law and freed all the prisoners on the train.

There are so many different trains – passenger, freight, fast, slow – I love to hear the whistle blowing as it approaches stations along the way.  When I was a little girl, my PaPa took me on a train ride from Donalsonville to Iron City, a total of 5 miles!   I still remember how excited I was to this day.  I sat on his lap and watched the scenery go by from the window of the train (it’s not like it raced by in that five mile trip).  Normally the train went without stopping to Bainbridge twenty miles down the track,  but this day, they stopped to let us off and then started again.

Now, many places have hop on, hop off, buses and trains to make it easy to get where you are going.  One ticket and you can get off and get back on to continue your journey when you are ready.  You can start the trip when you want and stop when you choose.

The train of life provides us many opportunities to start and stop.  God has provided us with the ticket for the train, the chance to ride, and the means with which to enjoy it. We can hop on the train and start a new career, start reading the Bible, start doing for others, start praying, and basically start anything at anytime on the journey.

We can also hop off, and stop doing something harmful, stop hurting our loved ones, stop being self centered, stop a bad habit, stop complaining, and stay here until we are ready to continue.

Jesus has provided us with helpful tools for our trip.  He has given us a compass in the form of our conscience.  If we listen, we innately know what is right and wrong, and we know if we need to start or stop doing it.

He has also provided us a road map for referral on our trip. The road map is the Bible.  Sometimes we need to stop listening to what the world thinks, hop off the train, and go check out the road map.  Reaffirmed, we can then hop back on and start again.

Jesus has given us a personal guide in the form of the Holy Spirit.  We have only to ask, knock, seek and the Holy Spirit will make the journey plain as we travel.

God runs a train for sinners, hypocrites, young, old, rich, poor, men, women, children, and everything in between. During this time of Lent, maybe we should consider a train ride.  All we need to do is present our ticket and start the journey!

I come to the Garden alone; while the dew is still on the roses; and the voice I hear, falling on my ear; the Son of God discloses…and He walks with me, and He talks with me, and He tells me I am His own.  And the joy we share as we tarry there; none other has ever known.   C. Austin Miles

In 2001, Houston First United Methodist Church came calling to see if Randy would be interested in coming to be their next minister.  They flew us out to look, and  our time was filled with what I call, “wining and dining.”  We met so many great folks, and it was a humbling experience.  The last night as we sat down for dinner at the country club, John said, let’s have the blessing.  Then he said, “By the way, everyone, if Randy and Diane come to be with us, you just need to know that Diane does not pray publicly!!”  Sadly, that’s true, but how’d he know that, and is that not oversharing?

There are so many folks who pray eloquently.  The fact is, I am not  eloquent with words in prayer; consequently,  I do my best praying when I am alone.  It is then that I can have a conversation with God rather than orate.  If you want to know about prayer, all you have to do is examine the life of Jesus.  It seems to me that although He prayed for others in crowds daily, when He truly had important decisions to make or when the pressures of His life increased, He went out to a mountainside, a garden or some quiet place to be alone with His Father.  The Bible says that Jesus “withdrew to lonely places and prayed.” Luke 5:16

The Garden of Gethsemane has always reminded me of how intensely Jesus prayed and how much he relied on this time alone with His Father to get him through.  Spending time alone with God is the secret to feeling His power and strength.

Jesus always knew what we as Christians are slowly learning.  When we think we don’t have time to pray is the time we need to pray the most.  We don’t mind spending months planning a vacation, a reunion, a wedding, a dinner party, etc. yet amazingly, we don’t want to spend five minutes seeking God’s guidance.  God is always open to discussing things with us, but it takes two to have a conversation.

We don’t have to pray out loud in order for God to hear, just listen for God’s voice in everything we do, and He will direct our paths.

Everyone has sinned and fallen short of God’s glorious standard.  Romans 3:23

A couple of days ago after water aerobics class, I wandered into the lady’s sauna to warm up, and I stumbled into the most interesting conversation occurring among three ladies. It was really a vent session, but I got so caught up in it, that I sat down to listen.

The first lady, Linda, was complaining about her mother.  It seems that Linda never gets the thanks and respect she deserves from her mother for all the many ways she cares for her in any and all situations.  Maria jumped in to say that her husband loves his Mother, but Maria ends up doing all the caring for her, and she resents it.  Both of these ladies painted themselves as the perfect and deserving ones in these situations.

At this moment, Pat took the floor and said, “Ladies, I have to say this.  Three years ago my husband asked me if we could take his terminally ill mother into our home.  He didn’t insist, but he rather made it our decision.  She moved in, and we cared for her.  Then, with tears in her eyes, she said, that man loved his Mama so well.  He carried her in his arms at the end when she couldn’t move by herself.  Just seeing the love in his heart, earned my husband a whole lot of places of respect and love in my heart during that time.  She finished by saying, there’s not one of us who deserves all the riches and grace God gives us.  Not one.”  Wow!  What can one say to that?  She was exactly right.  None of us are perfect.

Silence was followed by wiping of tears, nodding of heads, and an Amen from me.  When we walked out, I stopped Pat to tell her how beautiful her words were to me.  I added, “None of us are perfect.”  She added to my thoughts by saying, “I am so glad my husband isn’t perfect because if he were, he wouldn’t want me.”  God truly placed Pat in our lives that day.

Although I have never had to care for a loved one single handedly, I watched my Mom and Dad care for their parents, I’ve seen other family members care for their loved ones, and recently, I’ve seen friends deal with caring for spouses and parents.  I’m sure they felt a lot of emotions during these times, but I never heard them be resentful.  It’s not about how imperfect those for whom we care are during this time, it’s about the grace we receive to help us be the best we can be to respect and love them.

As we prepare our hearts for the experience of Lent and Easter, I pray while None of us are perfect, no not one.  Romans 3:10,  we can strive to be worthy of the grace we receive to do our best each day.

This is the very perfection of man, to find out his own imperfections.  Augustine

Never let the fire in your heart go out.  Keep it alive.  Serve the Lord.            Romans 12:11

It only takes a spark to get a fire burning, and soon all those around will warm up in its glowing;  That’s how it is with God’s love..once you’ve experienced it, you spread your love to everyone; you want to pass it on.                Kurt Kaiser

Years ago when our family served the Calhoun First Methodist Church, we had an incident occur on Ash Wednesday.  The service was wrapping up, and Randy was at the altar speaking to those who had come to kneel in prayer.  The sanctuary was dark, and the candles were providing the only light.  It was quite a moving service.  The kids and I were sitting in the balcony, and as I looked down, I saw a strange thing.  Behind Randy there seemed to be a glow much like I would imagine the Holy Spirit.  The odd thing about it was, every time Randy moved – it moved.

As the glow got brighter, I realized that the sleeve of his robe was the source of the glow.  Just as I was making my way down to tell someone, I heard Randy say to a member, “Am I on fire?”  She nodded her head, yes, and he urgently said, “Well, please put me out.”  It turns out that a spark from the candle had ignited his robe.

It’s a fact that you can’t start a fire without a spark, and that it only takes a spark to get a fire burning.  As we begin this Lenten season, my prayer is that we all receive that spark which leads to a fire and that we are filled with the Holy Spirit.

When we acquire this spirit, we will have an intercessor, a helper, and receive gifts of the Spirit.  Usually, during the forty days of Lent, we speak of “giving up” something.  Another suggestion would be to “take on” the task of praying to be ignited so that we can pass it on to others who need the Holy Spirit.

Wouldn’t that be an amazing concept that we are so excited and on fire as Christians that we have to ask others to “please, put out our fire”?  We can be the sparks that ignite the fires all around us.

The good news about his story is that those of us in that community relived that moment, and it made that Lenten season more alive in all our hearts and minds as we sought to pass it on.