SIMEON

. . .. waiting, watching, and working.

Luke 2:23-35

 

The Quiet of the Land—that’s what Simeon and a few others in Israel were called.  Simeon represents a worshipful, humble, faithful expectation that God will come in the time of his choosing to bring comfort to a troubled people.  For him, there were no dreams of a great one who would come to crush all Israel’s enemies or drive out the hated Romans.  It was enough to be “just, devout, and waiting,” not a bad job description!

What seemed like another tiring, monotonous day at the temple. . . people coming and going, some sleeping against pillars. . .smoke and incense blurring every room. . .the dull, ceaseless crowd noise with people talking and feet shuffling. . .got turned upside down with the shrill cry of a baby being circumcised, and perhaps a whisper in Simeon’s ear: ‘it’s him!”  This makes a pretty good case for always going to church, for one has no idea who might show up.  Look what Simeon would have missed had he slept in that morning (or watched online)!

Simeon had no idea whom to expect. . .a child, a youth, or an adult, but he had been given the special gift of knowing Messiah would come in his lifetime, that he would know him the minute he saw him.

Why Simeon. . .and not someone else, like Nicodemus or a priest or a famous leader?

What set Simeon apart was his “waiting.”  And not merely waiting. . .but “waiting forwardly.”  Expecting.  Waiting on his tiptoes.  Simeon looked, and he never stopped looking.  One can imagine his making eye contact with everyone who passed. . .studying every face. . .looking for a standout in the crowd. . .listening for a baby’s cry. . .because on any given day, out of nowhere, the Lord’s Christ might spring up unannounced.

Simeon was just a harmless old man no one paid much attention to, something of a daily pest, and whom temple authorities might have felt had a runaway imagination.  But Simeon had a heart for God, was precious to God, and for that reason he was told to stay on full alert.

If Simeon looked for the first coming of Christ, it is for us to look for the second coming.  It’s no secret this time; we’ve all been told plainly: “I am coming again.”  And if Christ chooses not to show up, at least in my lifetime, am I any the worse for it, if I have been found faithfully waiting, watching, and working?

 

Don M. Hull     © April 2024

 

Heaven:

What It, And We, Will Be Like

 

Heaven is about people.   You.  Me.  And countless other redeemed people living forever in a community of oneness with the living God.  It’s about relationships.

We miss that point when we ask questions about heaven; Will I be able to keep my cell phone?  Do all dogs really go to heaven?  Room service? What makes heaven heaven is people.

Years ago, John Ortberg profoundly influenced my thinking about heaven.  Many of the ideas in this article reflect his thoughts.  He said, “The best part of heaven is the sort of persons we will become.”

That’s the deal.  Who we will be with and the kind of people we will become—that’s heaven. To enter it is to enter endless life.  By comparison, our brief stay on earth seems only a trifle, but is of enormous consequence.   Life will have only begun when heaven begins.  What is of significance is the development of our character and the kind of person we become.

In heaven we will not sit around looking at each other, or at God, waiting for something to happen.  Our purpose is to join the Father as His heirs and co-regents in His never-ending creative work.  I’m baffled so many Christians seem uncomfortable or unwilling to talk about it.  As I try to engage friends and other believers, the responses range from virtual silence to polite dismissiveness.

While there seems to be bewilderment in what heaven will be like, there is unprecedented interest in end-times speculation.   A recent book series sold millions of copies and was then made into films which follow a scenario featuring Christ’s secret return to earth to rapture His church from the so-called “great tribulation.” Still another return of Christ follows, this one public, a second ‘second coming,’ to consummate history.  Many apparently do not realize or care that the series was written as fiction.  These end-time thrillers first create, then cash in on, a sense of crisis and urgency, followed by further popularizing them with vital products like coffee mugs, t-shirts, and screensavers.

So why does talking about heaven interest us so little?

• Maybe it’s a topic too close to death, one very unsettling to many. If we just ignore it, maybe it will go away.
• Our obsession is with the present moment and keeping our overcrowded, constantly connected lives from flying apart.
• Heaven to many may seem like an incredibly boring place. What will be do?  How will we occupy our time? Will there be endless singing around a campfire accompanied by ukulele?
• Much of what we claim to know about heaven is simply bogus, trivialized by tasteless jokes and inane television commercials. It is more than fluffy white clouds, fluttering wings, and a fog bank into which people disappear.

Despite all this, the return of Christ and the reality of heaven are still the blessed hope of the Christian.  And to treat either with disinterest suggests a serious shortsightedness into precious Biblical truth about our glorious future.

It wasn’t that long ago I would have responded to questions about heaven with a stifled yawn, but then I got a good dose of Biblical truth and learned about the incredible future that is the birthright of every Christ follower.  After many years of deliberate avoidance and self-inflicted poverty, I studied the Biblical book, The Revelation.  Setting aside the nonsense of sign, date, and event-setting, all being supported with obscure Bible verses, I sought the message God had for my heart from this book that has been so maligned.

I am not a trained Biblical scholar, rather an ordinary Christian with a teachable heart.  From my personal study of Revelation Chapters 21-22, here is my understanding of what heaven, and we, will be like.

Intimate, Unbroken Relationship with the Living God

From everywhere they come, the redeemed of the earth.  God’s priceless treasures—men, women, boys, and girls—each so different, and yet brought together as His family through the substitutionary death of His Son for our sins.  John saw these people, this family as he wrote Revelation:

“. . .I beheld. . .a great multitude, which no man cam number, of all nations, and

kindred, and people, and tongues, stood before the throne, and before the Lamb,

clothed with white robes, and palm in their hands. . .”   Rev. 7:9 NIV

God’s people have come home, having been scattered across the centuries, to heaven our real home.  He is with the people who bear His name, never to be separated again:

“. . .Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them. . .God himself

            will be with them and be their God.”  Rev. 21:3 NIV

This grand picture of being together, in perfect fellowship with each other and with God forever, summons up emotions too deep to express.  Nor can the scope of such an experience be imagined.  Our minds and emotions suffer hopeless overload when we think of the indescribable sweetness of what it means to be in heaven, to be home.  A joyful, song-filled homecoming like this has never happened before.  For many Christ followers it has been such an exceedingly long wait, an exhausting journey filled with suffering and sorrow.

For the very first time we can see God.  John said, “We shall see him as he is.” I John 3:2 NIV It will take all eternity to explore this One who can hold our universe in His palm, who can create more than one trillion galaxies.  Such is our God.  How can we begin to understand his limitless goodness and greatness?

The Restoration of Community

            “. . .They will be his people. . .”  Rev. 21:3 NIV

The church, founded by Christ, is to be a community of God’s people on earth to demonstrate to a skeptical world the great value of knowing Him.  It is to be a living example of what true community can someday be.

True community means oneness.  It is pure and perfect fellowship, without hindrance and tarnish.  Community originated in the oneness of the Godhead—the Father, Son, and Spirit—and extended to Adam and Eve who, before their sin and rebellion, were in perfect harmony with God.  The fall of man into sin and alienation from Him wrecked everything.

Authentic community will be reestablished for all eternity at the return of Christ.  The countless dead in Christ shall be called forth to resurrection life and joined by present believers, all of whom will be transformed and transferred into eternity as one body, a fully formed community of fully devoted followers: A New Community.

This New Community, this gathered church, is God’s centerpiece of all history, a unique people called out to be the showcase of His grace.  The church is God’s most precious possession and fulfills his dream of a community of oneness.  It is composed of all the redeemed people of the earth outfitted in resurrection bodies, rewarded for their faithfulness, and forever enjoying the presence of the living God.

Elimination of all Evil

            “And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no

            more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain:

            for the former things are passed away.” Rev, 21:4 NIV

Satan will have spent his allotted time trashing the universe and wrecking the lives of mankind.  This is the day all the carnage will be hauled off and dumped, never to be seen again.

Every heartache that mankind ever felt found its way into human experience through sin.  Life in the Garden of Eden was perfect for Adam and Eve until sin entered the story of which all mankind is still a part.  But now, sin has been erased from the universe, and all the problems associated with it vanish.

All the things that make us cry—gone forever.  All the things that make our hearts heavy, that burden our spirits and cause us unbearable sorrow—gone forever.  Suffering, sickness, disease, disability, evil, injustice, even death itself—all gone.

On this first day of eternity God wipes away many things: our tears, our most painful wound, our worst dread, our most difficult relationship, our most devastating loss, our deepest disappointment, all the hurts that would never go away, and the things that make us afraid.  On this day God makes everything right, once and for all, so that all that remains is peace, comfort, and inexpressible joy.

Perfect Personal Holiness and Godliness

            The celestial city John described in Revelation Chapter 21—the New Jerusalem, the “bride” —is the church.  It is believers, followers of Christ, from all the ages.  God knows every square inch of this city which symbolizes his people (21:9-27 NIV).  He knows everything about them, and to Him they are an absolute moral treasure.

Men crave darkness because it conceals their wicked deeds (John 3:19, NIV).  But in heaven there will be no more darkness, and no more night for people to fear:

“The city does not need the sun or the moon to shine on it, for the glory of God

            gives it light, and the Lamb is its light.  Rev. 21:23 NIV

There will be no more night. . ..”  Rev. 22:5 NIV

Think of it!  There is coming a time when what we have yearned for all our Christian lives will be reality—we will be completely free from personal sin, including the desire to sin.  Our sinful, fallen nature, against which we have struggled all our lives, will be eliminated. The human heart was included when God said,” I am making everything new!”  Believers will undergo radical spiritual transformation:

“. . .in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye . . .we will be changed.” I Cor. 15;52 NIV

In moral character and personal holiness, we will be, not similar to, but like Christ:

“. . .now we are children of God . . .we know that when he appears, we shall

            be like him . . .” I John 3:2 NIV

What is heaven if it is not when you and I will be like Christ in every sense?

You and I will be able to “walk in the light as he himself is in the light.” I John 1:7 NIV

No more moral lapses.  No more dragging ourselves back to confess the same sin we’ve committed countless times before.  No more guilt.  We will know what it feels like to be morally flawless, and free from the terrible grip of fleshly cravings.  Completely pure, and able to love God effortlessly.  You and I will have a new heart, a renewed mind, and transformed body.  We will think only good and noble thoughts, speak only gracious words, and do only worthy deeds.

Complete Personal Fulfillment

Is anyone thirsty?

“He who was seated on the throne said, ‘I am making everything new! To

            him who is thirsty I will give to drink without cost from the spring of the

            water of life’.” Rev. 21:5, 6 NIV

Is anyone afraid?  Not feeling safe?  In heaven there will be no elaborate security systems, no need to lock your doors because there is no night, and no wicked person to trouble you:

“On no day will its gates be shut, for there will be no night there. . .nothing

            impure will ever enter it, nor will anyone who does what is shameful or deceitful”

                                                                                                                        Rev. 21:25-27 NIV

Is anyone feeling unloved, unknown, forgotten, marginalized?

“. . .the city (was made) of pure gold, as pure as glass. . .” Rev. 21:18 NIV

The city, the people of God, is of incalculable value to God.  John uses the imagery of gold, precious stones, and pearls to ascribe value to every believer.  One need never feel lonely, forgotten, or worthless again.

People futilely chase after many things while seeking fulfillment:  wealth, fame, pleasure, intimacy, influence, and acquisition—always in pursuit of ‘just a little bit more.’  But enough is never enough.  Fulfillment eludes us.  In a rich country like America, men and women can spend their entire lives driven by appetites, destructive overwork, overeating, overcompensating, and over connectedness.

When we finally discover God is all we have, we learn He is all we need.

Ceaseless, Useful Service

When we die, we don’t cease to be who we are.  Our personality isn’t scrapped, our rich experience isn’t scuttled, and our Holy Spirit implanted gifts and skills we’ve spent a lifetime honing aren’t scrapped.  It all goes with us—the progress we have made as disciples, the excellence of character—all transferred to heaven because it is valuable to God and essential for our unimaginable service in the life to come.

“. . .the throne of God and of the Lamb will be in the city, and his servants

            will serve him.” Rev. 22:3 NIV

Heaven will be teeming with vital life and brimming with creative activity.  God has never ceased creating; He never will.

Consider how busy our little planet gets when it leaps to life in springtime with the coming of the sun’s warmth and gentle rains.  Nature explodes into frenzied activity.  Seeds sprout.  Flowers bloom.  Birds sing and build nests.  Animals seek mates.  Just try holding all this back when the unstoppable forces of spring break free from winter’s grip!   It is called ‘life,’ and it drives the springtime.

Eternal life, not the seasonal trappings to which we are accustomed, will be the driving force behind heaven’s activity.  Try holding that back! Eternal life will have been turned loose in a perfect environment with people whose lives are perfect and are in perfect harmony with God’s will.  God will ask a simple question, “What would you like to do”?  The result will be mind-numbing and will set into motion things to be done and services to be rendered that make busyness on our little planet look like children at play.  Dallas Willard says,

“. . .the intention of God is that we should each become the kind of person whom

He can set free in his universe, empowered to do what we want to do.  Just as we

desire and intend this, so far as possible, for our children and others we love, so

God desires and intends it for his children.  But character, the inner directedness of

the self, must develop to the point where that is possible.”

We cannot wrap our finite minds around the incalculable creative work God has for us to do in his workshop which we call our universe.

Endless Personal Development

            In heaven there will forever be room to learn and grow unless we assume we will be all-knowing and fully developed.  I don’t.  Consider Jesus who was perfect in every respect.  Sinless.  Flawless.  Yet we are told he developed personally:

“And Jesus grew in wisdom and stature and in favor with God and men.” Luke 2:52 NIV

The moment we see the face of God, experience Him, hear His voice, and feel His touch, it will be a teachable moment unlike any other.   We will have endless eternity to grow and develop as God further enables and equips us to serve Him at levels we have never imagined.

Paul suggests there will be a profound change in the new eternal order in what we know, how we know it, and how we learn it. (I Cor. 13:9-12 NIV) The way we presently speak, think, and reason is like that of a preschooler compared to the way we will react when we are face-to-face with God without all our present limitations.

We are told the virtues of faith, hope, and love will remain after everything else has ceased, that these will be transferred from the old order to the new.  Hope has its eye to the future, always anticipating that it will bring favorable change.  Hope looks for that which is not yet realized.

We have not begun to comprehend Jesus’ parable of the talents when He spoke of His coming kingdom:

“Well done, good and faithful servant!  You have been faithful with a few things,

            I will put you in charge of many things.” Matthew 25:23 NIV

Ortberg has taught us to ask bolder, more expansive questions worthy of the glories of heaven: Will there be things to do in heaven that require the utmost strength of character and willpower?  Will there be adventure beyond our wildest dreams?  Will there be opportunities that require our best thought, our best problem-solving skills, and ability to lead?  Will there be mind-numbing challenges to engage and give our best effort to?  Absolutely.

Heaven is where our real service begins.  This life will remind us of our childhood tricycle with training wheels.  All our experiences will have only been a prelude as we pass the rim of our world and engage the boundless stretches of eternity. This world as we know it will have only been a training ground for heaven when we will be unleashed in ceaseless creative, productive activity.  We ought to hone our gifts, sharpen our skills, and acquire all the useful abilities we can while we yet live.  We ought to vigorously press ahead in becoming a fully devoted follower of Jesus Christ. Our life on earth is an incredibly important dress rehearsal for the life to come.

My feeble efforts to share these thoughts about heaven seem such a trifle.  Heaven is so expansive; no one can conclude with any finality what it will be like.  We can only pause, as C. S. Lewis does in the conclusion of Narnia, and allow the story’s characters, and ourselves, to be caught up in the wonder of it all:

“But for them it was only the beginning of the real story.  All their life in this world

and all their adventures in Narnia had only been the cover and the title page; now at

last they were beginning Chapter One of the Great Story, which no one on earth has read;

which goes on forever; in which every chapter is better than the one before.”

 

Don M. Hull   © September 2021

Becoming A Christian “Minuteman”

 

The statue of the greatly admired Concord Minuteman stands at Concord,

Massachusetts, to honor a class of armed citizens who

pledged to take the field at a minute’s notice during America’s War

Of Independence.  There he stands—fearless, committed, resolute, alert,

hand having just left the plow, and musket in hand—but

more than anything else, ready!

The Minuteman is a fitting symbol of the Christian who is

spiritually awake and ready to meet the Lord at a moment’s notice

when he comes again.

For some time, I have felt the tension that comes from professing a belief that Christ will certainly come again, just as He said He would, but living as if it is never going to happen.  It’s that uneasy feeling that comes when you know in your heart what you claim to believe isn’t making any practical difference in the way you live.  Conscientious believers ask themselves, “Why?”  Line up one hundred followers of Christ and ask them, “Do you believe in the second coming of Christ?”  My belief is that almost all will respond, “Yes.”

Now ask again, “Do you believe in the second coming of Christ with sufficient passion so that it affects the way you daily live?”  And watch the eyes hit the floor!  For too long my eyes have been hitting the floor.  When was the last time you heard a sermon specifically about the Second Coming of Christ?  For many in 2021, the idea seems as far away as the moon.

Problem

The victorious return of our Lord to consummate God’s purposes and man’s history is a truth clearly taught in the Bible.  I believe it—all of it.  Yet, unintentionally, I treat it casually, as if it is of only minor importance. I may go for days and weeks without thinking about the return of Christ.  I am troubled at how easily I shrug my shoulders and treat with disdain an event I know ought to be scintillating and joyful.

Perplexities

            Several problems seem to contribute to this tendency to neglect anticipating Christ’s any-moment return:

• We tend to overcorrect too far in the opposite direction when the media exposes us to sensational views of prophecy that foist onto a trusting public its message loaded with hubris which features sign-seeking, date-setting, and event-matching between today’s headlines and carefully selected pieces of the Bible. Some call this “rapture frenzy.”  If these so-called leaders obsess with the end times, I am dispassionate.  I permit their outrageous teachings, of which they are supremely confident, to alienate me from great truths that I ought to be heeding.
• Believers do not want to be perceived as some sort of spiritual ‘wackos’ who have gone off the deep end in apocalyptic fervor when we try to share what we do know about Christ’s return. I yearn for a clearer understanding of end-time events that I can “live with” and hold in humility, respect, and tentativeness.
• Christ’s return may now seem so remote that we underemphasize it at every turn, in teachings, writings, and in conversations which present Christ as a wonderful Savior, but say little of His return to reign. In a short while, fully 2,000 years will have elapsed since men first started looking for Christ’s return.  Scorners have more reason than ever to challenge the hope of a Second Coming with the question first raised 2,000 years ago, “Where is the promise of his coming?”
• After twenty long centuries of waiting, some believers get a “disconnect” between the Biblical truth that he will eventually return, and the actual event of his return and the initiation of heaven, thus making the time of his return appear unrelated and unimportant. This leads to errors in thinking such as: “Christ can come whenever he wants to, but what’s that got to do with me if I’m going to heaven anyway?”

Promises

            Speaking for myself, there isn’t any serious question of our Lord’s return to this earth.  He often personally promised it.  For example, he said: “. . .I will come back and take you to be with me that you may also be where I am . . .I will see you again . . .” John 14:3; 16:22 NIV

Christ’s certain return was attested to by angels at His ascension: “Jesus has gone away to heaven, and some day, just as he went, he will return!” Acts 1:11 NIV

There are numerous New Testament references that urge Christians to be alert as Christ’s second coming approaches.  Paul cautioned believers that the day of the Lord would come as a “thief in the night,” and that they should “watch and be sober.” I Thessalonians 5:2, 6 NIV Peter warned his readers that scoffers would ridicule the Lord’s coming because on his long delay.  He, like Paul, assured them of the certainty of it, and that it would “come as a thief.”  Anticipating the coming of Christ, he asked: “. . .what kind of people ought you to be?  You ought to live holy and godly lives as you look forward to the day of God and speed its coming.” II Peter 3:3-12 NIV

Principles

In 2021, how exactly is a 21^st century Christian supposed to “watch” for Christ to come?  How do we do this without appearing to be a certifiable case of something abnormal?  My question is not meant to suggest doing foolish, irresponsible things like sky-gazing all the time and losing the respect and validity we have with others.  Nor do I want any of us to become so heavenly minded we are of little earthly use.  I ask to raise the level of our personal awareness of His coming and to acknowledge that proactively looking for the Lord’s return is a real part of discipleship, whether He comes before this day is over or waits another century.  In whatever way we watch, it must be done in a healthy and holy way.

What might 21^st century “looking for Christ’s return” look like? If I search the Scriptures for guidance, I find what I need to know in the teachings of Christ and in a better understanding of the word “watch” as it was originally used.  The clearest teaching about readiness and watchfulness come from the lips of Christ as He urged the followers who were with him to be watchful servants:

“Be dressed ready for service and keep your lamps burning like men WAITING

            for their master to return. . . .it will be good for those servants whose master

            finds them WATCHING when he comes. . .you must also be ready because the

            Son of Man will come at an hour when you do not expect him. . .it will be good

            for that servant whom the master finds DOING so when he returns.”

                                                                                    Luke 12:35-43 NIV

Jesus said the wise servant will be characterized by waiting. . .watching. . .and working. He also added stern words of warning to servants who grow careless:

“But suppose the servant says to himself, ‘My master is taking a long

            time in coming’ and he then begins to beat the menservants and maid-

            servants and to eat and drink and get drunk.  The master of that servant

            will come on a day when he does not expect him and at an hour he is not

            aware of.  He will cut him to pieces and assign him a place with the

            unbelievers.”                                                   Luke 12:45-46 NIV

The analogy is not about two groups of Christians—some worldly, some godly.  It is about people who profess to be Christians—true and false servants.  The punishment reveals this.  Those who did not watch are punished with the unbelievers.  The delay made no difference to the true servant.  He busied himself in service and watched continually.  The delay induced the false servant to sinful behavior.  The Lord’s delay revealed the true character of both.  Heart devotion, love for Christ, is what kept the true servant on the job.

Of the five different words for “watch” used in the New Testament, the primary one is used nine times, each of which is an exhortation to watch in view of an impending end—watch carefully because something important is about to happen.  Jesus’ emphasis is on spiritual and moral wakefulness more than watching for His actual physical return.   We simply do not know when the end time will come; the time is uncertain.  Because it is, we are to watch.  We are to be spiritually awake and not in a stupor.  If we are awake and he comes today, we will be ready.  If we awake and it is tomorrow, or some other day, we will be ready.  Whenever he comes, we will be ready.

A follower of Christ does many things.  He obeys, prays, loves, gives, worships, witnesses, studies his Bible, pursues a holy life, etc.  I want to add another essential discipline to those we normally list; proactively watching for his Lord’s return by always maintaining personal spiritual readiness and wakefulness.  For most of my adult life I have been busy and happy in the Lord’s work.  No doubt you have been too, as have most committed Christians.  It is obvious we must all wait for Christ’s return.  It’s the watching part I need to watch!

Practical Application

            How can a serious Christ-follower move to a higher level of watchfulness and readiness for an any-moment return of our coming King?  What steps might we take?  What spiritual disciplines should we undertake or strive to further develop within ourselves?  As I strive to become a Christian Minuteman, I offer these three suggestions that are presently working for me:

1. Resolve to relentlessly pursue a lifestyle characterized by godliness and holiness. The practical effect of our “blessed hope” (Titus 2:11-14) is to call the disciple to a life of holiness characterized by unselfish pursuits and sacrificial deeds of compassion.   This means embracing a lifestyle, not unlike that of Jesus, that is as free as possible from self-centered concerns, one that seeks to take up the challenge of Peter to see ourselves as a special people, called out by God, to be separate and different from the world. (I Peter 2:9-12)

It is also a life filled with the pursuit of virtues.  In his book, The Pursuit of Holiness, Jerry Bridges summarizes these virtues as threefold: (1) those that deal with our relationship with God (humility, contentment, thankfulness, and joy) (2) those that require us to deal sternly with ourselves (holiness, self-control, and faithfulness) and (3) those that enable us to deal graciously and tenderly with other people (peace, patience, gentleness, kindness, goodness, and love).

Accomplishing all these is dependent on making the next commitment.

2. Engage in an intentional effort to live much more simply. We must each of us set up reasonable boundaries in our lives by making choices that avoid the unwise, unproductive use of our time, attention, energy, influence, and money. Saying “yes” to the right things requires saying “no” to a great many more wrong or unnecessary things.  In doing this we will discover the vast power which lies in one simple word, politely spoken: no.

In our present culture, this may mean becoming expert at saying “no” to telemarketers and to the frivolous use of time-squandering social media, to the senseless buying of a vast amount of what can only be called “stuff” (which requires rental space to store) that has little or no redeeming value, and to meetings (including church) without agendas and which serve no apparent purpose.  Our obsession with cell phones which give us 24/7 instant accessibility knows no bounds, including taking them to bed with us.  We must make some sensible decisions about who, and who does not, have unlimited access to us.

My friend, Dr. John Hunter, had a wonderful mantra: “I live simply, so that others may simply live.”

3. Align my life with a self-imposed accountability that has two components:

• To include in my daily prayers and meditation a sobering acknowledgment that, “This could be the day . . .” How do I know that this very day isn’t the one when I need to be more alert and, on the job, doing than any other day of my life?  Jesus had some of his harshest words to say to bridesmaids who weren’t prepared and to napping disciples.
• To live according to a personal mission statement I prepared many years ago, to which I recently added a new commitment: “To cultivate an intentional attitude of calm attentiveness toward the certain, any-moment return of Christ, characterized by waiting, watching, and working.” A written mission statement is helping move me from vague intentions to commitments to which I hold myself accountable to better honor Christ while staying alert.

Don M.Hull ©2021

. . . .a sort of essay

Come on, admit it! You keep them. We all do.

I’m talking about objects that may be of no more value than the stuff left after you’ve taken down the signs, lowered the garage door, and sworn under your breath this was your last garage sale.

We call them “keepsakes,” which probably stands for the strange and wonderful things we keep just for the sake of it.

Why do we keep them? Why do we keep indispensable treasures in boxes for years without letting them see the light of day? It makes no practical sense. After a few years the tonnage we accumulate can become unbearable and yet we drag it with us from move to move.

I have my fair share of keepsakes. Some are worthless and some are priceless. I could part with most of them were it not for the faces, fingers, and feelings.

I watched my mother going through sacks of keepsakes as she faced the painful task of downsizing and moving to an assisted living center. An empty box on her right was for the things to be kept; the one on her left was for things to be given or thrown away.

With once supple fingers and eyes grown dim, she examined one keepsake after another, reverently caressing each prized souvenir from her ninety years of yesterdays. Her eyes filled with tears as she seemed to experience, once again, those happy moments when each article became a valued keepsake. . .like, 3:30 p.m. on a Friday, the last day of school more than sixty years ago, when a grinning second grade student named Roxie proudly gave her the inexpensive vase she now can’t part with.

After an hour I noticed the “give away” box was still empty. This sorting job was going nowhere fast.

Why can’t we let go of keepsakes? Perhaps it has something to do with faces, fingers, and feelings.

Keepsakes still have traces of faces attached to them—faces of people we cherish as much as life itself. Like the Kool-Aid stained face of our preschooler who once gave us a homemade Valentine’s Day card, the one with his misspelled name scrawled across the front. Or maybe the reverent face of a young student who gave her teacher some small trinket, thinking at the time the teacher was heroic. Larger than life. Dispose of the keepsake and you forget the face you want to remember.

Keepsakes also seem to bear the prints of fingers that linger, left by the people who once owned what we now admire. We feel reverence as we envision these keepsakes still in the hands of those who once held them.

Keepsakes act like monuments to lives well-lived. They symbolize for us, if only in our imagination, the laughter, love, and antics of one whose memory we hold dear. These are real people who have touched our lives. Like photographs, our recollections of them fade with time, but keepsakes help us laminate those memories and make them last a little while longer. Dispose of the keepsake and you’ve lost, possibly forever, the unforgettable touch of a friend.

Keepsakes also have feelings attached to them. Our emotions are recorded onto a keepsake like movies on a DVD, and they are available for replay any time we choose to pick them up. Mementos dredge up indescribable feelings. They summon from deep within us what Wordsworth described as “thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears.” The keepsake you lovingly hold isn’t impersonal like something purchased. It is dripping with emotion and value. It has behind it the full force of the one who gave it to you, and the power of your feelings in receiving it. Dispose of the keepsake and you deny the emotions you yearn to feel again.

These sometimes silly relics can embarrass us, because we can never quite put into words why we nurture memories the way we do. The reasons we offer make us feel foolish, as if we really are the hopeless sentimentalists others think us to be.

It begins in childhood—this idea of holding on to keepsakes.

With little boys, it may be a first knife or perhaps a rusty key that opens a vault full of treasure somewhere, if only we knew where. With little girls it may be tickets torn in half, or dolls that are most certainly the prototypes of the family she will someday have. Many mothers collect “first” things—baby’s first step, first word, and first drawing. Fathers may have fewer keepsakes, but look in the closet and you’re bound to find a trophy or two.

A keepsake can be anything we empower with value. I treasure a lovely Civil War locket containing a tinplate photo of my great-grandfather, and a piece of slate from a 300-year old rock fence in England’s storied Lake District where Wordsworth, Coleridge, and Tennyson took walks.

But, why do we do it?

We try to save bits and pieces of our lives, and of the people who enriched ours, as fancifully as we try to save “time in a bottle.” Little by little, we know down deep that time is taking away everything and everyone dear to us. And someday it will take us away, too. Every second that ticks is sounding the solemn reminder that life is fleeting, slipping through our fingers like sand in an hourglass.

Mementos are an attempt, if just for a little while, to extend our own mortality. To hold the relentless passage of time at bay, even though we admit we are powerless to stop it. What are photographs and home movies if not attempts to stop time in its tracks, if only for a split second, so we can relive again a scene from the passing parade we call life?

Mementos conceal this resentment we feel toward time and its heartless burglary of our lives. Time is the thief that picks our pocket clean of everything and everyone we love. Keepsakes may be a subtle disguise for our anger, our vain attempt to strike back at time, if only for a moment. We hang onto some symbol—a ring, a dried flower—of the life of someone we love or highly respect to keep their memory from fading forever. Keepsakes are our way of kicking sand in the face of time.

To talk about our deepest motivations is to dig around in the stuff that makes up the human soul: love and fear, faith and hope, life and death. Keepsakes express a primal instinct, the irrepressible nature of man to believe that life outlasts time. That the memory of life lived is made precious by the people who lived it. That every day of our too few days is pure gift.

Our family history, our genealogy, is a form of keepsake. Alex Haley touched something deep within us with his epic work, Roots, and sent thousands of us digging for answers to questions we didn’t have before: Who am I, and where did I come from? Who were the people that gave me this wonderful gift called life?

As I walked barefoot along the chilly seacoast of Ireland near where my family sailed for North Carolina in 1773, I picked up a stunning pebble worn smooth by countless waves. Almost round, it speckled while and black like the rugged cliffs that face the sea.

I sit musing by my fireplace today, holding that pebble in my hand, and I am years and thousands of miles away from Ireland. But I can revisit that memorable wind-swept day and be moved, if only for a fleeting moment, by the same feelings that I had as I shivered along that beach with my wife, Helen, and daughter, Amy. And as I do, I wonder again, with melancholy, about my courageous family who braved the Atlantic in unworthy ships to arrive in America in time for the Revolutionary War. They, and my English ancestors who came from Crewkerne to Connecticut in 1630, gave me some of their DNA that my grandchildren now carry with them into the 21st century.

How we fear being forgotten! So we pile up keepsakes, like my Irish pebble, as a fragile hedge against forgetting and being forgotten. They are our attempts to keep alive the memory of someone we love and long to see, in the secret hope that someone, someday will miss us, and realize that some of those “footprints on the sands of time” are ours.

If a man is fortunate he will, before he dies, gather up as much as he can of his civilized heritage and transmit it to his children.”                                 – Will Durant

 

Don M. Hull (Copyright 2015)