Winging My Way in Life's Dusk-Light

I am prompted this morning by my quiet wonderings our of yesterday's event as big expensive medical machines scanned silently for a battle report; my Provenge-trained guys in white hats against the fierce black-hatted prostate cancer thugs.  Mostly it's long-forgotten, esoteric writings that give hints of glory found at life's end.  I thought it was time for an update.  Thus, this morning's journal entry.  Long, but deep.  Don't start reading if you don't have five more minutes to grab some dusk-light.

Thoughts along the trail are more like a slide show than a You Tube video of the journey; more a head and heart report than a travelogue.  Oh, but what a journey it has been--AND IS!  There is room in my heart but no words my lips can shape to express the inexplicable glory of Grace and the presence of Jesus deep down and throughout my being.

Seems my life's light is taking on the faint glow of dusk. My reflections may be prompted by the old fashioned stinky day, now yesterday's history; too busy by half, too unfulfilling by whole.  Or, could it be the passion for Cari, Taylor, Colton, Brooke, Gracen, Charis (oh, yes, now there is The Gift that keeps on giving), and Kira.  And Matt?  Distinct because sons-in-law as best friends reflects the unique role we play in each other's lives.  Or, it may be that all of this is framed by the extraordinary love of an extraordinary woman and which makes the reading of today's Scripture so powerful with joy that I find myself--again, inexplicably--grateful, even excited, that the Journey's end is just over there around the corner shimmering in the somehow glorious glow of dusk.

Whatever the source--or, The Source--this glow from the deeps of my soul and the tear forming just above each corner of my smile encompasses a very small world.  I have no fame of worth that is not granted by these few.  And, it is enough.  And it brings cherished light to David's rejoicing in Psalm 9, spoken out of the terror of life gone wrong, "I'm thanking God from a full heart with whistling, laughing, singing, and jumping for joy."  Then my pal Apostle Paul said of a life of worship portrayed vividly in Philippians 4(v4-9) that a "sense of God's wholeness will settle you down."  To which I said, "AAAaaaaah, yes, this God I worship and walk with is worthy of more praise than I can give Him."  And I can ride around that corner on  the trail lighted only dimly at dusk but somehow bright and alluring as if I were finding Home.

Journaling Wild and Gray

Don't make too much of the "Gray" thing.  Life is bright, exciting, full--too full.  "Gray" gives mystical tone to the Wild Goose, the description of the Holy Spirit by my Celtic forefathers.  And mystical and myserious and magical and mighty are the wings I follow.  Seldom predictable are the glens and glades, the mountains and the valleys, the glistening lakes and the swamplands, He will take me to.  Wonderfully odd that He is the portion both indwelling and guiding me of the immutable God with Whom there is "no shadow of turning."  And Who awaits my presence.

The "Wild" part sure fits, though. For some--not all--"wild" and "wonderful" are twins.  I'm pensive today.  You can smile when pensive, you know. I smiled scanning my journal and pondering what a wonderful and wild life He had assigned me.  Yes, "assigned."  It's a Grace thing.

So, I wrote this morning.  Really, I WROTE.  By hand.  In my journal. That holds lots over keyboarding.  Keep in mind the frame of reference; cancer, Deep Rivers Family Ranch, the Book (Generational Fathering), and a joyful marriage that fills in the pastels of a wild and wonderful life.

One journal section reads,(After reading, again, Proverbs 19:21, "We humans keep brainstorming options and plans, but God's purpose prevails.").  "I make my plans as if the end were in sight.  Well, it is.  And I do.  It's just that the fog of God's mystery shrouds the milemarkers ahead.  I guess I'll catch a glimpse of my Father's cairns here and there. Wassat I hear? I believe it's the honk of my Friend luring me on ward into the Grand Mystery."

MYSTERIOUS AND WONDROUS

Pretty much sums it up, Mysterious and Wondrous.  That date just below, April 14, should read today, July 18.  I liked reading what I sensed in the journey back then.  The mystery is in the Sovereign Father's gracious care over me compounding the mystery of  Prostate Cancer.  Don't feel a thing.  It's the monster lurking in the shadows. But as death has no sting, Grace tames the monster. While it is still ugly and barely restrained by medication, the taming is in my sheer lack of fear. The Gray Goose comforts me; His call is slightly  muted and doesn't drive me wild as before, but there is no more assuring a chorus, than His call...I swear I hear tones of the Heavenly Host echoing in the background.

WHEN THE ONCOLOGIST CALLS AND THE LORD SAYS, "Son, ..."

Think back on it, even just a little.  Do you realized how many times from our youth onward we who know we belong to God's family through our spiritual rebirth talk about "the end"?  My most recent "end times" phrase has come allive...so to speak.  I pray the author of the ditty they call an epitaph on my tombstone will include it.  Yes, it comes from deep within my personal and spiritual DNA; "Finish well."  "Wait!...Hey, what do you mean, 'FINISH'" ?!!

 

What if, suddenly, there is a number attached? Like a date, like so many years?  Like 5x365=1826..."more or less," so to speak?  It's the material of novels, drama, and comedies. Here's how USA Today put it: "Death bites. But dying while healthy, rich and free enough to drink life to the last drop is getting great press, thanks to 'Bucket List'".  The comedy about living to the fullest before you "kick the bucket" is three years old and still people are circulating things like, "100 Things To Do Before You Die".  It's great sport.  Unless there's a time frame.   

At lunch after our oncology consult, Carolyn and I drew up a bucket list, and
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CLASS REUNION MESSAGE: LIFE IS SHORT, HARD AND ...

I never said this when I was young.  Especially in high school.  Then comes the 50+ year reunion.  Darick, our son dying at 31, my brother, Craig, in late 20's, a war hero; they didn't say it.  But I did after they passed; "Life is short, life is hard, life is unfair, and it's end is uncertain." I should add, to return the smiles to reunion bliss, maybe in bold type, too, "life can be wondrous and full."

Reunion time.  All these years, all these trails, all these adventures.  They passed so quickly.  Mike, Roger, Ronnie, Bobby, Sharon, Johnny, Coach Sisca, and all the folks I didn't remember well until the stories from back yonder came alive again.  Could they--the stories and the classmates--be this old? 

And what interesting lives.  Some not. BUT . . .

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SPOSE THEY'LL FIND HIM...THE "BAD GUY"?

Dunno.  Prolly not.  Finding the "Bad Guy," I mean.  Caps indicate proper (or, in this case, "improper") noun, a name.  The Devil? No, 'he" is really an "it". 

Confused?  So's everyone, even the Urologist and Oncologist.  They don't say "confused" because they are paid a lot--A LOT!!--to know stuff but not tell stuff.  But their eyebrows lift in response to "Where's it going?"   "How far along?"  "How long?"

The "bad guy" ain't there.  In the world of blaming Bush and almost anyone/anything else, I suppose we could pin this one on God.  Yea, the Sovereign One, Creator of Heaven and Earth.  Jesus, we are assured, is the creative agent AND the "Sustainer" of earth.  And health.  Let's blame them.  I do. 

After all, it is a mean, onery, vengeful Judge who carries out the punishment for sin just like He said He would. Blame Him, not Adam who stood by passively as the Snake cajoled his wife.  He watched her succumb and didn't even lift the Garden hoe to the Snake's head.

OK, enuf bloggish sermon.  I do blame God for the extraordinary life that has no explanation but Grace.  It's been a long one, in and out of more danger than a Tuesday evening of TV.  Seventy years worth and, they tell me, probably ten years or more to go.  At least I know what my schedule is. Sorta. 

So, other than Adam (and Obama is just as related to him as Bush), ain't no one to blame.  You take the Whole Story to account and recognize every day we have is a gift from the Source.  

Romans put it this way in 5:17(Message)  If death got the upper hand through one man's wrongdoing, can you imagine the breathtaking recovery life makes, sovereign life, in those who grasp with both hands this wildly extravagant life-gift, this grand setting-everything-right, that the one man Jesus Christ provides?

Have you visited the book site recently.  I just did.  I LOVE it.  (Which is why this is a break in my headlong effort to meet a book proposal deadline).  http://www.generationalfathering.com/  Subscribe, why don't you?


  

LOVING THE HIGH LEVEL JOURNEY

One of the great metaphors for the journey of a life along the path of faith is...is...er..ah, a "JOURNEY". I've used it often. I also like to tell of the Walk, the Walk with God. This one turns me even closer to the "Jesus bumps" my mother used to talk about; dare any of us say we are "Walking with God? Yet we can, many do. Can you grasp the ungraspable imagery, can you sense the conundrum that He, the Lord God Almighty, Creator and Sustainer of Heaven and Earth, has arranged for such a walk, hand-in-hand, as it were?

So, as I reported in broad strokes in my latest post on www.gendads.com, Matt and Taylor and I had an extraordinary journey on the four-day trek, backpacking in the wilderness for Taylor's "rite of passage." At 10,000 feet overlooking eons of His handiwork, the Journey becomes real. There we were, father, son, father's father (inlaw) walking together on The Journey mapped for us somewhere in Heaven before time began.

Walk turns to Journey, Journey become part of The Story. The Story, like the Walk and the Journey, is never alone. It's about us with Him, us with each other. How special that it is with fathers and sons.

HOUSTON, WE HAVE A TEENY WEENY PROBLEM !

Yeah, like I blew the launch countdown. July 13 came and went. It's like moving all you are and have in to a new community...in another country...time-warped to a future generation, ie., BIG.

Yes, I'm up to it. Yes, I'm working it hard. Yes, I am actually eager to get the new blog rolling. Lots and lots to understanding, design, then configure. And the results? Not that much will be noticable. Like what, your ask?

Well, podna, my full life efforts will focus on the book. Here in Utah wth the family for the summer, I'll be spending interactive time with Matt, co-author. Sorta. I write, but he knows stuff; a therapist. There will be Twitter and Facebook and LinkedIn connectivity and activity. There will be a couple of widgets inserted to make the blog more interesting and more valualbe. And we'll toss in a few short U-Tube videos out of our fathering/family/spiritual/therapy world.

So, STAND BY. Again. For a few days. We can't wait. Can you? Tell us you can't. Make us smile.

Saddling your best horse

This one's like a short ride after catching and saddling your best horse; not satisfying, but at least you saddled up.

Back up and ready to ride midst my busiest time in years (new job plus writing book and keeping family and Chapel ministry fulfilled). Am going to stay alert and active to the blog because soninlaw, Matt, and I are reading, outlining, interviewing and just now starting to write THE book. No, not the Bible, but the other one, Generational Fathering.

So, here's your chance. Short or long, let me have it. Your story, that is. It may be, and I'm hoping so, that it will be a story of the family tree from which you, the apple, didn't fall far. How you became who you are, especially how God THE Father, used the words and the model of your father and his to shape who you are.

Tell us the journey of your grand and great grand fathers, your own dads. The glory, the wounds, the recovery, the intervention of a gracious God to make of you what the best efforts of your elders could not. Tell us where you intend to go from here to assure a legacy of three more renewing generations of godliness that will glorify God and His Kingdom through the ages ahead.

www.ransomedheart.net/generationalfathering will take you in to an active group discussion.