Song of the Day ~ Greater
Why We Remember
I serve as Chaplain for the Department of Massachusetts, Sons of Union Veterans of the Civil War. I had the honor of representing the Department Commander at a dedication of a new memorial in the town of Sandwich Massachusetts on Veteran’s Day 2015. Below is the text of the remarks I gave.
I bring you greetings from Department Commander Dexter Bishop and the entire membership of the Department of Massachusetts Sons of Union Veterans of the Civil War. It is indeed an honor for me to be here with you and to join with countless others on this veteran’s day as we pause to remember the service of the men and women of the armed forces of the United States past and present.
It is especially an honor to be here as you dedicate this memorial to the 298 brave men of Sandwich who answered the call to give what Abraham Lincoln called the last full measure of devotion and service to our country during a very dark moment in our history. It is sitting that we stand here today, 150 years after the end of the bloodiest war on American soil, to recall the names of these men and I congratulate the committee that work so hard to make this a reality.
Most of them fought together in Company D of the 29th Massachusetts Infantry Regiment and left Sandwich on May 18, 1861, for places they probably never heard of. Many of them would serve in the United States Navy no doubt because they grew up so close to the water here in Sandwich. They would see the battle at Bulls Bluff, Petersburg, Fishers Hill, Spotsylvania, and Bull Run just to name a few. Fifty-four of them would lose their lives in battle or because of conditions in the camp. Some were held prisoner and reunited after the war and most would come home and try and put their lives back together again.
While preparing for these remarks today I came across a list of all of the men, many of them just boys at the time, listed on this memorial. I paused when I read each name to think about what each one had given up and the families that they had left behind. Each name here represents a story of love and loss, fathers, and mothers, brothers and sisters, sons and daughters and it is our responsibility to keep that memory alive.
On the anniversary of September 11th, the names of those who died in New York, Washington DC and Shanksville Pennsylvania are read out loud. Some of those names are read by family members of those who lost their lives that day. Reading the names of those who have gone before us keeps their memory alive if even for a few moments. James P Attkins, he was thirty-two years old when he enlisted and was killed in 1864 at the Battle of Cold Harbor in Virginia. Thomas Ball, one of many Ball’s on this memorial, was 18 years old at the time of his enlistment. He was discharged in 1864. Edward Connelly a twenty-two-year-old glass maker enlisted in May of 1861, and Charles Chipman, who rose to the rank of Major, was wounded at Petersburg and died of his injuries there. These are just a few of names that we memorialize today.
On a November day in 1863, shortly after the bloodiest battle of the Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln traveled to Gettysburg Pennsylvania to dedicate a new national cemetery not far from the actual battlefield. The war raged on, and the Battle of Gettysburg was still green in the memory of those who were present on that day. In that short speech, he spoke of the dedication of that cemetery but also why it was impossible for us, the living, to dedicate it.
But, in a larger sense, we cannot dedicate, we cannot consecrate, we cannot hallow this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here.
He then went on and spoke to us, the living, those who remain and whose task it is to keep the memory of these men and women alive on not only this day but every day.
It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us—that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion—that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain…
Friends, we must never forget the devotion to duty that each of these men gave. We must never forget the devotion to duty that those veterans are joining us today gave. We must never forget the devotion to duty that those presently serving in our armed forces give and continue to give here at home and overseas. We must never forget!
So why do we remember? I turn back to the closing words of President Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address. We must never forget so
—that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.
The Wrong Kind of Religion
This past week the interwebs were filled with stories about the recent statistics from the Pew Research Forum that points out that fewer Americans are going to Church. I am not sure how expensive this survey was, but I certainly could have told them that. I am less interested in the numbers of people who do not go to church and more interested in those who chose to come. I do not think that those who decided not to go are bad people, but why would I focus on people who do not want to come when I have those do right in front of me?
It has been said that Christians are well known for what we are against rather than what we believe. We are looked upon as pompous, hypocritical, stuck in the last century, judgmental, wanting to force people by law to do what we cannot get them to do from the pulpit. We are out of touch with what is happening in the world. Just yesterday there was a story about the so-called “war on Christmas” because Starbucks has red cups with no writing on them. I am no fan of Starbucks, I am die hard Dunkin Doughnuts guy, but I could care less what some retail outlet does with their cups! Come on people there are some honest to God battles needing to be fought here and a red cup is not one of them!
So we turn our attention to the twelfth chapter of Mark’s Gospel starting with the thirty-eighth verse where we read some pretty strong words of Jesus concerning the religious leaders of his.
As he taught, he said, “Beware of the scribes, who like to walk around in long robes, and greeted with respect in the marketplaces, and to have the best seats in the synagogues and places of honor at banquets! They devour widows’ houses and for the sake of appearance say long prayers. They will receive the greater condemnation.”
Jesus is speaking of the particular group known as the Scribes. They liked to walk around in long flowing robes. A long robe that swept the ground was a symbol of notability or someone special. I think it would always be dirty and make one looked unkempt, but I digress. The robes were designed so that the wearer was not able to hurry or to work, and was a sign of the leisured man of honor. At all events, they liked to dress in this way so that it drew attention to themselves and the honor they enjoyed. They like greetings in the marketplace; they loved to be greeted with honor and respect. The very title of Rabbi means “My great one.” To be addressed as such was very agreeable to them.
They liked the front seats in the synagogue as this had the advantage that everyone would see them. They loved the high places at feasts and places of prominence in other settings. In other words, they wanted to be the center of attention wherever they went.
“They devoured widows’ houses.” This was a savage charge. An expert in the law was not supposed to take any payment for their teachings. They were expected to have a trade that their daily living was earned. But these legal experts had managed to convince the people that there was no higher duty or privilege than to support a rabbi in comfort, in fact, it was believed that such support would win them favor from God. It is a sad fact of history that women have always been the victims of religious charlatans, and it would seem here that the scribes imposed on people who could ill afford to support them.
There are three things in this passage that Jesus warns against. I think these words are as necessary today as they were when Jesus spoke them. I always like to remember that the only harsh words Jesus ever had for anyone were directed at the religious leaders. We do not lead by setting ourselves up over the people that God has entrusted to us.
- Jesus warns against the desire for prominence. There are many who will accept and office, even campaign for an office in the church because they think they have earned it rather than because of a desire to serve others. Jesus told us that he came to serve not to be served. If we wish to lead in the church, we have to become servants of those we hope to lead.
- Jesus warns against the desire for deference. Almost everyone likes to be treated with respect. However, the very fundamental fact about Christianity is that it should drive us to obliterate the self rather than exalt it. The person who enters into an office or position for the respect that will be given to them has begun in the wrong way, and cannot, unless they change, ever be in any sense the servant of Christ and his followers.
- Jesus warns against the attempt to make a traffic of religion. It is still possible to use religion and religious connections for self-gain and self-advancement. But this is a warning to all who are in the church for what they can get out of it rather than what they can put into it.
There are many reasons why people leave a church or never come to a church, and I mentioned a few at the start of this essay. However, I think that we as a church, and we as church leaders, need to take a long hard look at our behavior and our priorities. Rather than blame others and blame the world we need to look deep inside our institutions and see if we are in fact still relevant to the world around us. Jesus was a great reformer and came at a time when the church needed reform, as this passage clearly sets forth. Other reformers followed and exacted change on an institution that existed only for its survival. We had three great awakenings in our country’s history that called people back to the basic of faith, and we need one now more than ever.
The Pastor’s Aim
That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked at and our hands have touched—this we proclaim concerning the Word of life. The life appeared; we have seen it and testify to it, and we proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and has appeared to us. We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard so that you also may have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ. We write this to make our joy complete. 1 John 1:1-4
Every time we sit down to write a letter or a preacher writes a sermon; we have some object in mind. We wish to produce some effect in the hearts and minds and even the lives of those we are writing or speaking too. And here at the very beginning of his letter John sets down his objects in writing to his people.
- It is his wish to produce fellowship with people and with God (verse 3). The pastor’s aim must always be to bring others closer to each other and closer to God. Any message that causes division is a false message. The Christian message can be summed up as having two great aims, love of God and love of neighbor.
- It is his wish to bring joy to his people (verse 4). Joy is the essence of Christianity. A message that aims to depress and discouragement to those who hear it has stopped halfway. It is quite true that sometimes the objective of a sermon is to awaken sorrow but only if it leads to repentance. But after the sense of sin has been produced, people must be led to the Savior in whom all sins are forgiven. The ultimate note of the Christian message is joy.
- To that end, John’s aim is to set Jesus Christ before them. A great teacher always used to tell his students that their one aim as preachers must be “to speak a good word for Jesus Christ.”
The simple fact is that if people are ever to find fellowship with one another and fellowship with God, and if they are ever to find real joy, they must find them in Jesus Christ.
This essay comes from my Daily Meditation Email. If you would like to have a dose of daily inspiration delivered right to your inbox sign up here.
The Day the Curse was Broken
2004 was a good year, I graduated from seminary in May, I was ordained in July, and on October 27th the Boston Red Sox broke the Curse of the Bambino!
I remember that night as if it was yesterday. I was sitting on the edge of the sofa watching in disbelief as the final out was made when Keith Foulke got Edgar Renteria to ground back to the mound. What a night!
A Personal Reformation
There are many different styles of preaching in the Church. I tend to lean towards what is known as expository preaching. I start on Monday by looking at the Lectionary readings for the week and spend the week reading and praying over those readings. I consult commentaries and see what others have said about them, and I look online. By mid-week, I have an idea of where I am going and what I am going to say and spend a few days making notes and preparing the text for Sunday. Throughout the process, I pray that the Holy Spirit guides me and points me in the direction of what I should say.
Then there are times like this week. I completed the usual tasks, but I woke up this morning with a different message and had to start all over again. This is a frightening experience, more so for you than me since I do not know where I am going with this sermon this morning so sit back and relax, this might take a while.
Each year on October 31st, the Protestant world celebrates what is called Reformation Day. Here in the United States we move this celebration to the closest Sunday, which would be today. If we know our history than we know that on this date in 1517 Martin Luther nailed his 95 theses on the doors of the Cathedral Palace in Wittenberg Germany. This was a revolutionary act, and one that had not been done in the past. This action and the thesis itself, lite the fuse of what would become the Protestant Reformation in Europe. With the merger of the Congregational Christian Church with those of the Reformed tradition in 1957, the United Church of Christ inherited this reformed tradition.
I did not grow up in the Reformed tradition, in fact, I grew up in the tradition that was trying to be reformed, and so I had a much different view of these events. However, I do not believe for a moment, that Martin Luther was hostile to the Church, and by “the Church” I mean the Church of Rome. Luther loved the Church and was concerned that it had become corrupt, and he sincerely desired that there would be a return to the original message of the church. Without going into the bloody details of our history, let’s just say Luther’s suggestions of reform were not met in the way that he had intended them to be. Because of the desire to “always do it the way we have done it” a split occurred in the Church, and not always with the best intentions.
Last week I mentioned that the only people Jesus had harsh words for were the religious leaders of his day. You see they required the people to do all sorts of things that Scripture and the law, were not forcing them to do. They had a view of the faith that had come off the rails. In many ways Jesus was a reformer and one of his aims was to reform the church of the day. This is what Luther was doing. The religious leaders of his day had corrupted the Gospel for their ends, and Luther blew the whistle on them.
One of my favorite verses of Scripture is what has become known as the Great Commission and I think this is a verse that is very fitting for today; “Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.” Matthew 28:19
This is a statement from Jesus to his Apostles that was a command. He did not say if you have nothing better to do…. He did not say if you feel like it…. He did not say if you are comfortable with it… He just said go! But he also did not say go and make converts… He did not say go and make church members… He did not say go and form a committee, talk about it for 35 years… He said go and make disciples. A disciple, by definition, is a follower, and that is what we are being commanded to do go and make followers. But before we can make followers we have to be followers.
Last week I spoke about the radical transformation that must take place in our lives if we are to be faithful followers of Jesus. The reformation that Jesus started was revolutionary, and sometimes I think we forget that. Jesus came to set us free! The religious leaders of the day wanted people to remain slaves so they would retain their positions of authority over the people and Jesus came and broke that chain that held us back.
At the start of his ministry, Jesus gathered twelve to work along with him. He did not go to Harvard and Yale and find the best minds of his day. He did not go to the best seminaries and find the most enlightened thinkers, he went to the neighborhood and gathered regular people, he called fisherman, tax collectors, sinners, and yes even someone who would eventually betray him and oh yea his closest friend would deny him when the going got tough. He called them to follow him and over the next three years he trained them, by his example and by his words, how to be followers. And when they were ready he sent them out to do them same.
You see for them to go, they first had to come. They had to come and see, they had to come and learn, they had to be willing to change their way of thinking and leave behind some of their most cherished beliefs to become new creations in the kingdom. This was not easy; in fact Scripture provides several stories of people who, after they heard what was going to be required of them, rejected the message and walked away. This life is not for everyone! We have to have a personal reformation in our lives if we are going to be followers of Jesus Christ.
One of the slogans of the United Church of Christ is that God is still speaking, and the symbol of this is the semicolon. As a punctuation mark, the semicolon is to join two closely related independent thoughts or sentences, in other words, it is not the end of the story. The semicolon joins your life and my life together, the semicolon joins our lives with the lives of people that we have not even come into contact with, but we have to be ready, we have to be prepared. Before we can go, we have to come!
We have to come to the knowledge that our lives need reform. We have to come to the knowledge that God is still speaking to us as individuals and as a church and that the story is not complete we have to listen to that still small voice that continues to talk to us and direct us. But all of this requires that we are first open to the process of personal reformation.
Jesus did not teach his followers a set of rules and regulations. He did not say if you check off all of these boxes you will find eternal life. Jesus simply told them to love God and love your neighbor. The life of a Christian is not a life of judgment but a life of love and service, to God and each other.
Martin Luther lite to match that lite the fuse that started a reformation of spirituality and thought and that reformation continues today. Make the commitment today to a personal reformation, make the commitment today to become a disciple, and then make the commitment to Go and do them same for others.
3 Essentials of the Christian Life
Therefore, dear friends, since you have been forewarned, be on your guard so that you may not be carried away by the error of the lawless and fall from your secure position. But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To him be glory both now and forever! Amen. 2 Peter 3:17-18
These are the final passages of Peter’s letter and in these last passages, Peter tells us certain things about the Christian life.
- The Christian is a person who is forewarned. This is to say a Christian cannot plead ignorance. The Christian knows the right was and its rewards for following. The Christian know the wrong way and its disasters. The Christian is one who has no right to expect and easy way because we have been told that Christianity means a cross, and we have been warned that there will always ne those who are ready to attack and to pervert the faith. To be forewarned is to be forearmed; but to be forewarned is also a grave responsibility, for those who know the right and does the wrong is under a double condemnation.
- The Christian is one with a basis for life. The Christian ought to be rooted and founded in faith. There are certain things that we should be sure about. There is a certain inflexibility to the Christian life; there is an absolute basis for belief which never changes. The Christian will never cease to believe that, “Jesus Christ is Lord. (Philippians 2:11).; and the Christian will never stop to be aware that there is laid on them the duty of making their life fit their belief.
- The Christian is on with developing life. The inflexibility of the Christian life is not the rigidity that leads to death. The Christian must experience the daily wonder of God’s grace in their lives and daily grow in the gifts that this grace can bring. The Christian must enter daily deeper into the wonder of Jesus Christ. It is only when we establish a firm foundation that great building can tower into the air, and it is only because of its deep roots that a tree can reach to the sky. The Christian life is a life with a firm foundation but always growing outward and upward.
And so Peter finishes his letter by giving glory to Christ, both now and to the end of time.
A Life of Service
When reading Scripture, I always have to remind myself that we have the entire picture of what is happening but that the Apostles, and those around them, did not. For the most part, they were blissfully unaware of what was going on around them and what was going to happen to Jesus. Sometimes I think we are like that. We go through life not know, or caring in many cases, about what is going on outside of our little world. We see what we want to see, and we hear what we want to hear.
We encounter this today in the Gospel passage from Mark. We have to let our imaginations loose and sort of think about what was going through the minds of the Apostles as they walked along the dusty roads with Jesus. Even though he has told them, on many occasions, what is going to happen they seem to have either forgotten or they just do not want to remember. Three times now Jesus has told them, directly, what is going to happen, he is going to die, and each time, they react poorly, and it seems they miss the point entirely.
If we go back a little to chapter eight, we have a scene where Peter rebukes Jesus for talking about his rejection and suffering, and Jesus responds to Peter by calling him Satan. As Jesus walked along he used that time for some in-depth discussions and he one again told them of his betrayal, death, and his rising again.
The disciples responded to a lively discussion about who was going to be the greatest. And now we see that the long passion narrative in Mark’s Gospel has come to an end, and Jesus tells them one more time that he is going to Jerusalem to face his death.
There seems to be a disconnect between the words of Jesus and what happens next. So dramatic is this disconnect that we may be thinking that a verse has gone missing, but again I remind myself that the Apostles did not have the entire Gospel before them as we do now. Jesus has just told them, yet again, that he is going to die, and they are like ya ya, but who is going to be the greatest?
At first glance, it may appear that they are ambitious and seeking position but there is another way of thinking about their reaction. Perhaps they did understand what Jesus was saying, and they were acting out of fear. Perhaps the revelation of their Master’s death was too much for them to take, and they retreated to a place of security even if it meant a violation of their beliefs and what they had been taught. Humans react this way in stressful situations, and we want to make sure that our place and our safety is secure no matter what happens to us. Jesus assures them, and us that in spite of their fear, they will measure up and all will be well.
Perhaps they are speaking out of faith. The question they ask about who will be the greatest can come from ambition but what if James and John were so sure of the final victory of Christ that they wanted to sign up right away to go with him? No matter how bad things were looking their faith was so secure that they knew what was going to happen, and they wanted to be a part of it.
Be careful what you ask for
But Jesus asks them a question, and I will suggest that he is asking each of us this question as well. Are they truly able to drink from the same cup that he has to drink from? They respond right away “we are able.” This suggests that they did not understand what Jesus was asking of them.
Marcus Borg, the great Biblical commentator, explains something of the meaning of Jesus’ words. Both of these terms, he suggests, “drinking the cup” and “baptism,” were “images of death” (Jesus: A New Vision). Jesus is speaking here of his death, and we know that most of his earliest disciples are said to have been martyred (along with many other early Christians).
In our own time, there are many examples of those killed for their faith. The last time I was with you I spoke of the shooting in Oregon and how the shooter was asking the faith of his victims before he shot them. They died because of their faithfulness to Jesus. But what about the vast majority of Christians today who long to follow Jesus faithfully, but will most probably not (literally) lose their lives for doing so? Borg speaks of this dying as a metaphor with two meanings, both at the core of Christian faith: “a dying of the self as the center of its concern” and “a dying to the world as the center of security and identity.”
This kind of dying leads to transformation when we lose our self-absorbed insecurities and are reborn. Marcus Borg writes, “the radical recentering brings about a change so sharp that it can be described as dying to an old life and being born into a new life.” This happens to different people in different ways, but it needs to involve a “letting go.” And here we come to the heart of the matter, Jesus caused much trouble by challenging the religious leaders of the day, I will point out that the only people Jesus ever rebuked were the religious leaders. They found their security in what they knew, in the status quo. We run that same risk in our lives of faith if we seek legitimization of how we are already living rather than accepting the new life offered by Jesus.
We see here that the Apostles are focused on power and prestige and not on service to others. While they argue amongst themselves about who will be the greatest, Jesus is flipping over the tables and paying far more attention to those around him that are in desperate need both physically and spiritually. He tells them not to be like the religious leaders who lord over them and he tries to turn their ambition away and on to something else, service to others.
This is a challenging Gospel for us and others to hear. Jesus is asking us to transform our lives and even turn away from our ambitions to seek after others. He tells his Apostles that whoever wants to be great must be the servant and whoever wishes to be first must become a slave. This is certainly not the picture we see painted by the world. The world wants us to grab all that we can while we can no matter the outcome. As long as it is good for us it is good the world tells us.
But the path of Jesus is radically different and as we heard earlier requires a radical change in our priorities. This radical transformation requires a rethinking of many of the ideas that we hold dear. What Jesus was speaking of in 1st century Palestine was so revolutionary for those around him to hear that they killed him for it. So unsettled were the religious elite that they risked it all to keep their power.
Being a follower of Jesus requires us to walk the same road that he did. We must walk that dusty path, sometimes alone, knowing that in the end, it will cost us our lives. But by losing our lives we inherit a greater spiritual life a life of service not to ourselves, but to those around us.
Jesus needs us to flip over the tables of our lives and our thoughts and become new creations of love and service to others. The world needs this radical transformation today perhaps more than any other time in our history and as people of faith we are called to make this transformation.
Ben Franklin’s World Podcast, Well Worth a Listen
My office is the front seat of my vehicle as I travel from facility to facility visiting hospice patients. As such, I spend an enormous amount of time on the road, I logged almost 700 miles the last two weeks. As there is nothing worth listening to on the radio I turn to podcasts and one of my favorites is Ben Franklin’s World hosted by historian Liz Covart.
I mention this podcast because it has reached a milestone. The podcast is a year old this week and has produced 50 episodes. Most podcasts do not make it past eight episodes, so Liz is on to something here. What Liz is trying to do is make history accessible to the average person, and her and her guests boil down complex issues into something that we all can understand and appreciate.
The Podcast, as its title would suggest, focuses on the time period of the early Republic but can stray away from that from time to time and gives us, the listeners, some insight into the world of our forbearers. This is not the history you learned in elementary school, in fact, some episodes challenge traditional beliefs about issues and makes you think. Sometimes I agree and sometimes not but I appreciate the fact that Liz is having this conversation and making me think.
But, the conversation does not end there. Liz has created an online community on Facebook for listeners of the show where the conversation can continue. Hundreds of fellow listeners chime in on all sorts of historical topics and issues, and I have had some kind of cool discussions with folks. Liz is also very active on Twitter where she tweets about all kinds of things for history to our beloved Boston Red Sox. She even hosted a meet up this summer in Boston, and although I was not able to attend, it was a great success.
So here’s to another year of Ben Franklin’s World! Great job Liz!
The world is coming to an end, Again
This morning, while checking my feed on Facebook, I came across another article claiming the world is coming to an end. In the article, Christian group predicts the world will be ‘annihilated’ on Wednesday, the group claims that they have calculated the date and even though they had been wrong in the past, and there is a reason October 7, 2015, is the day that the world will end.
McCann believes that Camping’s 21 May 2011 prediction did have some truth, however. That day was declared to be “judgment day” because it was the day God stopped the process of selecting which churchgoers will survive Wednesday’s massacre, McCann said.
Following 21 May 2011, God turned his attention to deciding which non-churchgoers to save, according to McCann. The eBible Fellowship believes that God said he would devote 1,600 days to this task – bringing us to 7 October 2015.
My first reaction was one of laughter and just shaking my head. I started to think how can anyone take Christians serious when we have people like this out there representing us. After all even Jesus told us that he did not know the day the world was going to end. So if Jesus did not know how could we, mere mortals, figure it out. And if God could create all of well, creation, in six days why would it take him 1,600 days to figure out who he was going to save. I mean Santa Clause does all of that in one night, and he delivers toys!
Then I attended the quarterly training meeting of the Massachusetts Corps of Fire Chaplains. At the start of the meeting we always have a little devotional time and this time our, Chief Chaplain led it. He spoke of this same article I had read earlier in the day and came to some of the same conclusions. I stole that Santa Clause line from one of my fellow chaplains by the way. But then the tone of his devotion changed.
For some people, he reminded us, the world as they know it will come to an end today and tomorrow and the day after. Some will die. Some will lose loved ones. Some marriages will end. And for some of the people we serve, they will die saving others. The world ended for a group of sailors out to sea during the most recent hurricane, and some died just trying to get a better education for themselves and their families. You see the world is ending for each one of us.
I sat there for a moment and thought about those words and was mindful of the souls for whom this would be their last day, not gone in some apocalyptic end of the world but because of a drug overdose or cancer or old age or an accident of some kind and I said a little prayer for each of them.
The time we have on this earth is limited, and none of us know when it will end. How are we spending those days? Are we truly loving God and loving our neighbor or are we caught up in some nonsense and caring only for ourselves.
So it is 9:30 pm on Wednesday and, although there are still a few hours left in the day I do not think the world is coming to an end today. Maybe tomorrow…