We are the Dead

I decided to go to the Cenotaph for this Rememberance Day, but first I had to find out where it was. I searched online couldn't find an address or order of ceremony, but there was a map that pointed to its general location, so I used that as a start. After cruising around the area I decided that the map could have been wrong and started looking in another part of town. Giving up on that, I decided to pull into a coffee shop and look at one of their newspapers. Surely a local newspaper from the day before would provide information on where and when events would be held. 

Nope. So I decided to ask the Barista if she knew where the cenotaph was.

"The...?"

"The cenotaph"

This is awkward and she looks confused, she probably thinks the Cenotaph is some pagan temple or something... Let's try again,

"The memorial? The place where they have rememberance day stuff?"

"um... Kyla probably knows, I'll ask her..."

I wait while she gets her co-worker's attention

"This guy is looking for the..."

"The cenotaph"

"The ceno... ?"

"The place where they have the Rememberance day festivities. Well not festivities, more like a events or assembly or whatever, you know?"

"Rememberance day...?"

This is going no-where

Then a lady who looked like she was over 25, overhearing gave me directions. I thanked her (for the fact that she knew what I was talking about as well as for that she was able to help me be on my way). 

Half way there I pulled in behind the distinctive ford scored with firefighting logos that I knew belonged to the biggest war buff in school and the one person I would trust to be heading one place 10:30am on Nov 11.  I followed him the rest of the way and found He was glad that I came. He was there with his wife, brother and sister-in-law, so I wasn't suddenly so alone in my venture. 

Did you know that today was the 90th anniversary of the end of WWI? 90 years! A lifetime, that's it. Much less time spans us and WWII. The local roll call of those fallen was perhaps a dozen for WWI and some 30 or 40 for WWII. How many people lived in this cow town at the time? Not many... of which a dozen during WWI, 30 or 40 during WWII would have been a considerable percentage! There was also one fallen in Afghanistan, a silent reminder that war is far from extinction. 

The turn out wasn't much bigger than my home town which is a much smaller town, but that might be accountable to the fact that my home town has a far older populace. 

The cadets marched into the square. Usually I'm not a big fan of cadets, but today they looked in good form. The Mounties came next followed by the military. Mounties, as ridiculous as any non-Canadian may say they look are sure to always convey a sense of true Canadianism in me. These, with the military appear disciplined to a tee. They can't afford to fake it. The veterans walk in, amongst respectful clapping, bearing Flags that represent Canada, British Columbia, the United Nations, and some others I'd be slower to name: probably The RCAF and divisions like that. 

There's the anthem, the silence, the gun salute and the long recognitions as family members show their respects at the wreaths. 

"Why is it that i feel a need to go?" I asked myself as I was on my way there. It wasn't likely that many if any of my school associates would be attending.  I guess its because I've been raised to believe that it is important. And I do. I think its very important, and the day when I forget the 11th of November will be a bitter bitter irony indeed. 

LEST

WE 

Forget

thoughts (H:11:1)

Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see. Never been easy to understand. But neither is our Creator who is worthy of all trust and faith. Closed eyes open to the providence in the dark that surrounds like a blanket all lost. And a pinhold of light breathes like hope through the canvas of our closed tight eyelides. Hope rises on horizon like endlessday forboding. And I, I with squint eyes now open break day with a grin. Love has come. Love has come. Love has come. And I'm ready to go home now. 

A walk in the woods

I make it a habit to go for a walk most mornings.  With much thankfulness I can say that I most always have somewhere enjoyable to walk. In my current estate it is a short trail that finds its way up the side of a small mountain as it bends away from a quiet road and a surging stream (in which, today, I saw my first salmon this year. Two of them, each some 20 inches long.)

It was a beautiful morning today. Accented by the fact that it had been raining with opression the day before, the sun cutting colors through the golden autumn leaves left an impression that only being there could render.  I stopped at a point where I could still see the road bending away below and still hear the rushing of the stream behind the birds and the forest's hum. My feet have stopped crunching leaves beneath them and in the thick stillness I see the trees growing up the decline below set as silhouettes against the relentless morning sun- whose beams lay stripes on the path and make my shadow dance quietly in the underbrush when I walk. The air is misty and dense. For the first time I notice that steam is rising off the moss growing on the trees below me, which had accumulated much moisture the day before and was now giving it back to the demand of a new day rising. 

Amazed with the lot of it I look upward and wonder at the golden yellow leaves that pattern the sky from their limbs and motherly trunks that set themselves far below on the ground beside me. 

"Like a crown." I think to myself.

"But not a spoiled and pompous crown that we think of ( so unfortunately) when we think of kingly. No. This crown is one that is too earthy in tone to assume more than it is. This maple dons a humble crown. Up there, existing in all its splendor, this maple knows that to think of itself more than a maple would only destroy the true glory that its simple existence allowed it. Such is humanity! So creation - so our lives."

And for a moment again I realize that being quiet and enjoying the Creators work is no less than he might have me do in this moment. Enjoy, breathe, learn. 

Why not?

I continue to walk again, only in time for another traveller on the trail to mostly miss seeing me gazing off into the air. As his dog approaches the owner makes a joke. 

"There ya go Fellah!"

Talking to his dog, 

"You can have him for breakfast!"

Talking about me. 

I laugh and give the canine a rub on the head before carrying on to greet his owner and pass by. Walking away I think to myself how much I liked the dog. 

Later I see a small bird that land and skirts around my near peripheral- enough to show his colors that would have been a blur in flight. Then he flies away. 

The morning sun is burning on into day and I am almost back to the place I currently call home. 

Hope, Love, Truth hold ground in me today. 

I know God loves me. But I don't need to know. I need love.

I was just sitting here on my couch listening to Jars' new recording of "Love song for a Savior" when a simple and profound thought struck me.  

Here i am, having been raised by an incredibly loving family in a relitavely supportive social structure. I've accepted God's love in my life, at least so I say. I'm at Bible college, have a bible, and have discovered that page after page spells love, and yet... 

Yet I have such a hard time accepting God's love. I know it I know it I know it.... than why don't I receive it? Ephesians 3:19 says that the love of Christ "surpasses knowledge" (niv).... well then why can't I believe it.  Its so important I know. my emotional, physical and spiritual self all scream for it. 

The message in church today was more or less about taking the love into the world. It was about showing God to a world who is caught in a great separation from God- from Truth. 

I have every reason to do this don't I? What is the thing that would hold me back? 

If the enemy wants to hold off the attack, what is an easier way to do it, to fight back, or to make his enemies question their cause? 

This was my thought: No wonder I have a problem receiving and believing God's love! What better place for the Enemy to target all of his arrows? 

In addition, what better way to infuriate God?

Where did i put that shield of faith? 

So How do we combat the lies? I'm sure there are many ways, but on a practical note I know God's love most presently and practically and real when another of the body of Christ shows Christlike love to me. There's nothing like it. Maybe there is more to be said for encouragement and love among comrades than I thought about before. 

Simple, but in my mind, profound. 

I put off lunch to write this. 

Love ya later,

mc

What would a smart person do?

Sometimes I get to thinking about the stupid things i did when i was younger, sometimes these things are laughable, and on a bad day depressing. But in any case, I was thinking recently about how it seems every year I think I've got it together-like "now I've arrived". 

Having realized that i seem to think this all the time and i still look back on my mistakes and groan at my ignorance leads me to ask one question (which i hope proves some increase in wisdom). The question is this: What stupid thing am i doing right now?!

Ok, so I'm sortof joking... because if i thought that way all the time I'd probably hide in my closet afraid to do anythings for risk that i will fail. But I think it is worth having friends around who can check you and kick you in the rear when you need it, 'cause sometimes it takes another party to see your stupidity just as it might take another party to see your success. 

Just a thought

from yours truly

Breakfast

As I ate my pancakes this morning,

I thought

In the nineteen eighties there was a big scare about

Bombs

That maybe

One would set the world ablaze with an apocalypse

(I lived in Canada

On a farm

And i think i remember the tv being on

And having military on screen

We didn't watch much tv

It might have been cuba

As my mother folded laundry

In the farmhouse)

I had Maple syrup on my pancakes today

I remember the scares

Terror

Death

Kids stay inside

I remember the turn of the century

Bunker down

They said

Even though nothing happened

Not to say that nothing has

They say that our society is consumeristic

It's probably more so than the history of mankind put together

But then again

We have technology

Improving moving

Plastics and oil. Computers and landfills.

I don't begrudge

It's just

I had maple syrup on my pancakes.

There are men that we are told to be afraid of

Or men that we're supposed to hate

Or races that we're supposed to dissengage with

Or sects who we disregard.

I'm not proposing much

Its just,

I had maple syrup this morning

Be careful or your frail body will fall victim to danger

Stay under the shelter of your knowledge

I hear the president has an "end the world now" button

In his office

And that the Pope has a direct phone line to God

I hear that DNA has been mapped by supercomputers

and that someone cloned a sheep

But I sit back

And have to laugh

Because i have maple syrup on my pancakes.

Here

Well, one way to make a change in the, sometimes horrific, world could be this. It seems to have worked before. Its something. Oh, and if you can't go to Washington D.C. you can digitally sign what i think to be an pretty darn good petition.
Easier on paper I'm sure, but i guess that not for us to complain... right?

hmmm... it seems like if injustice isn't staring you in the face, it's easier to disagree with but harder to punch out cold...

Thought i'd throw these out to those who potentially read here.

"Peace"

Rain Falling on a Battle Field

The Blood on my brow is washed to the ground
And the blood on my spear is forgotten
By a million tears

Pools on the ground reflect our image
And no one in time can explain the scrimmage
Emotions are washed as the thunderheads roll
And lightning flash lights all our faces exposed

The heavy warm rain weighs battle gear down
And one by one, pieces all fall to the ground
And bare chested men, exposed for their worth
Care not for their colors, which lay mingled with earth

Instead all washing their nakedness clean
Are united as one. No difference seen.

And as water quenches a dry tongue
Its invigoration gives life to breath
And one lifts his arms t'ward heaven
In the thundrous quietness

And everyone, they see
That they've all become the same
And that theres only now one army
In the rain

mc Jan/08

Hope Love Life...

The fact of the matter is that I should have crashed and burned a thousand times.

It was only the Grace of God that kept me on me feet and only the knowledge of which that gave me the will to keep standing.

I remember my mom saying that rebellion was a sin. I never really understood that. I thought of the punk rockers with their antiestablishment agendas and something in me desperately related with them. I remember one of the presidents of the United States being quoted as saying that a little bit of rebellion was a good thing once in a while. Stick it to the man! Don't conform. Don't be a pawn.

I think I might finally see what was really meant by the one who said that rebellion is a sin. I don't know, but I realize now in having being saved from myself a thousand times that I don't have anything to stand against. What is there left of me? That is, the me that was defined by myself. We call it pride.

I fall and I fall again and become subject to grace and slowly become by humility- that sweet revelation of seeing myself as I really am.

God said I was worth saving.

I'm worth something. I have to throw off everything I was caught up in about myself to see what that really is because surely this self-motivated pride stuff isn't it. That becomes humility and I begin to see myself as God sees me and I begin to realize that I'm worth more than I ever knew. I stop fighting as a rebel that feels helplessly disvalued by the world. I stop acting defensively knowing my own failures and realize that to continue- knowing what I know now- is pointless, prideful and rebellious. God has called me to something more. He has valued me higher than that! To disvalue what he has called valuable (even worth dying for) - what blasphemy is that!?

So I don't stop acting. No. For surely now it's time to be pro-active.
Knowing what i know now i act out of a new entity and agenda and no-one said it would be easy (when a sinful nature, evil, and -it seems sometimes- the whole world is going the other way down the stream.)

I have a theory that a man goes crazy without something to live for. He'll get depressed, feel devalued, and may end up off the deep end. Probably most of us have experienced that feeling to some extent. Maybe you've lived alone, ate Kraft-dinner, worked at a dead-end job and watched TV in the evenings a little too long for a state of pace. We begin to lose touch of that part of us that wants to live. That's what it seems like to me. I think you might be alive if you know you could die tomorrow and know that something you did today would count.

Maybe you've seen the way a friend's demeanor changes when he gets into a job that is fulfilling to him, or when he starts back at college and feels like his life is going somewhere, or when he enters a relationship with a significant other. Suddenly there’s something real to live for!

Jesus showed me that i was worth something. I respond and accept it. I love him for it and respond accordingly (Something most definitely real to live for!)I find myself living -ideally every part of my life and being- for HIM. Purpose. Hope. Life. Love.

Alright...

I Found Profound

From a book of clever and heartwarming short stories and antidotes about life that my mom recommended, called "Front Porch Tales"( by Phillip Gulley.)
I was apprehended by the end of one of the stories called "The Kitchen Table" By the moral which I found considerably profound. Maybe you won't; maybe you will. The following is the summary from that chapter:

"A friend came for dinner not long ago. He asked me where I had bought my table, and I told him I had made it. He wanted me to make him one, but I told him no. A man has to be careful not to let his hobby become his business. He was talking about how his kitchen ta ble is forever falling apart and lamenting the shoddy nature of today's craftmanship. People slapping things together in five minutes expecting them to last a lifetime.
We got to talking about how that isn't only true about furniture, it's true about life. Folks get discouraged because God doesn't make them saints overnight. They don't understand all the years of God-work that go into making one's life a thing of beauty- a lot of shaping, a lot of smoothing, a lot of finishing. And if we rush the process, the flaws will surely show.
Once a week I rub a coat of lemon oil into my table. It reminds me that my table is never really finished. Kind of like me. "

What can I do?

I regularly read World Vision Bulletins.
World Vision is an organization which I have come to trust for relatively accurate international statistics and news. It has also proved itself to be nothing less than a respectable and effective Christian Humanitarian Organization.
So when I read their most recent Bulletin with the heading, "Sudan Crisis Continues. Dozens Die from Hunger Daily." I have reason to believe that it is more than an attention grabbing header. Its probably also nothing less than the truth.
Same goes for the other bulletins I've pulled out of the archives. One reads, "Action now will save lives! Silently, starvation stalks millions in Africa". Another "emergency bulletin" appeals that "Starvation Threatens Millions in Zimbabwe". This one includes a picture of a mere toddler sitting sadly, stomach enlarged from sickness, on the ground.

Of course these Bulletins appeal for financial support for these situations and as I read the details of the specific catastrophe I will probably be moved to give up a bit of what I suddenly realize is worth so little to me and so much to them. My heart begins to break as i begin to comprehend what I'm reading.
I've come to wonder, however, if money is really all I can give...

I know that there is desperate need left right and center. I need not look far and I need not look for the physically malnourished or sick. However, the physical need in countries like Sudan, Zimbambwe, Kenya, Ethiopia and Darfur is what I'm looking at imparticular at the moment.

In our typical western mindset we seem to assume that money will make everything all right. Everybody needs money and everything can be done through the all sufficient currency.
Can it really?
I want to know.

If money is all it would take to stop dozens from dying in Sudan daily then why does starvation continue? What is money? We've got lots of it don't we? If that's all it takes and they're not getting it then I fear that something is not right at all. Surely that can't be all there is to it... can it?

Is it a lack of educated people helping those in impoverished countries to survive, heal and rebuild? I never see much of a recruit section on the World Vision website for this. Are more people needed? If so, what kind of people? What kind of training is needed? These are things I actually want to know! Nurses? Agriculturalists? School Teachers? Economists? Engineers?

And my third question is, if it's not money and if it's not people then why do people still die?
I know that this question is very ignorant and that the answer is very involved, but If you have a possible partial answer, I'd like to hear.

mc