By the time I arrive home on Saturday, I will have traveled somewhere around 1,260 miles in the last week. Now, for people who travel for a living, that’s probably not a big deal, but for an ol’ home-body like me, it certainly is.
In this time, I have officiated at two weddings, and, attended one funeral. The happy and the sorrowful; the glad and the sad. And yet, somehow, these two poles are so connected when I look at them from the point of faith. No matter how far one travels, great or small, life and death are so deeply connected—and, as we learn all too well sometimes—not far away from each other at all.
In these travels, I have gone from one end of the great spectrum of emotion to the other. The joy our family felt when David and Ashley were married last weekend is such that I cannot adequately put it into words! It rivals the feeling people have when children are born—children, grandchildren, nieces, nephews, God-children (those for whom we might have been asked to be God-parents)—there are no human terms that can come close to the feeling one has in those experiences. To try and do so is to somehow minimize the whole event!
In the middle of these two weddings, as many of you know, I was privileged to attend the Celebration of Life and Resurrection for Becky Whitlock. No doubt, she left us far too soon as her service was celebrated on what would have been her 50th birthday. Many of us at OSLC were very proud and thankful to have known her, worked with her, and seen her faith up front. Her kindness and witness was as overpowering as much as it was down-to-earth and caring with no fan-fair. Some say she would have made a wonderful pastor; I say she served as pastor very well for many years, better than I could ever have.
As I prepare at this writing to put some words down for a homily for friends of our extended family, I am mindful of God’s gracious gifts of life and love that He showers upon us in various and sundry ways. Most of those ways we have no clue that they are happening around us when they do. I’ve come to believe that in my older age I do not wait for God’s miraculous ways like I once did; it is because they happen every second of our lives—but, because of a number of things going on around us—we’re blinded to them. I suppose I could say – in some ways – because of God’s continuing grace, I no longer expect His miracles, but I admit that I do live them every time I take a breath, every morning I’m able to open my eyes and see with my own feeble eyesight the gifts that surround me every day. Every time I take one step I’ve learned to thank the Lord for the simple things, which, as I have tried to say, is where true miracles happen.
As I travel around this beautiful country side, I have seen the coastal plains and catch a hint of the sea air that accompanies them. My mind’s eye takes me back only a few months to the time Mary Alice and I walked the beach and enjoyed the wind, the tide, the sun. As I drive I most certainly have gotten my fill of mountains and hills of my homeland, the many places where I spent my youth and early life with our family and children. The ribbon of highway is truly a connector with life’s ways as I travel and seen the different exit signs that remind me of many great experiences in my life: college…my parents’ home…my brother’s homeplace…seminary…our first home…God’s various calls…friends remembered and friends lost…family come and gone.
The Psalmist’s words from Psalm 121 remind me that no matter where I go (of course around our home it’s hills, as the psalmist suggests), I know I’m never alone; He goes with me. I have grown to appreciate that miracle more as well.
As you travel this very day, long or short, remember this blessing of God, this miracle of His presence, in other words of David, the psalm writer:
“Your word is a lamp to my feet and light to my path.” (Psalm 119;102)
He truly will guide our paths. Enjoy His leadership and His unmerited love today.
Remember, God loves you and so do we!
Pastor Jim