She was only a year old when I found her incarcerated at the police department pound. I claimed her and sometime later she claimed me. Her fur was bright red and she was a chow-retriever mix. We named her Lady. Every man past middle-age in my town has a dog and pick up to go to the dump with on Saturdays.

Thirteen years later we were taking our final truck ride together to see the vet. We both knew this was the way it had to be. The vet was very understanding and the procedure was carried out in the front seat of my Tacoma with my hand petting her.

King David made this heart-wrenching statement in:

1 Kings 2:2

I go the way of all the earth;

We can’t go through life without the experience of “the way of all the earth,” and some day we will experience it for ourselves. The question is: Are we ready for that event?

Think about it.

Gary

As kids, when we were not in school, our days were spent playing outside. One activity was sliding down the embankment and out unto the river ice. We would make a fire on the ice and take a break once in a while and stand around the fire.

On this particular trip, with me at the front of the sled and my buddy behind, we sped down to the river. Something went wrong with our trajectory, and we landed in the fire that had melted about a six-inch hole in the ice.

My ankle was sprained quite badly, and I was somewhat incapacitated and dazed; however, my faithful companion pulled me out of the hole which still had live coals. As you know by reading this, I survived.

In life, things go wrong and plans made can have snafus. It is a good thing to have a friend who will watch your back when you get in trouble.

Proverbs 17:17

A friend is always loyal, and a brother is born to help in time of need.

God provides such friends to care and protect us; however, man’s greatest friend is our Lord and Savior.

Proverbs 18:24

A man who has friends must himself be friendly, But there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother.

If your journey involves speed and ice or other hazards, don’t go it alone.

Think about it.

Gary

I can see them in my mind’s eye. They came so close to the truth but were sidetracked by something or someone. Hardness set in and now they are completely callused to the truth.

Winston Churchill said it like this, “Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing has happened.”

Paul in writing to the Galatians put it as follows:

Galatians 4:16

Have I therefore become your enemy because I tell you the truth?

Galatians 5:7

You ran well. Who hindered you from obeying the truth?

Jesus made the statement that He was the way, the truth and the life and no man could come to the Father except by Him.

Give it some thought.

Gary

I was so vain when I was in high school that I wouldn’t wear my glasses. That habit is not a good one while playing baseball. It was a hit that sent the ball into the heavens. I was right under it as it was coming down to earth. That ball just brushed the top of my mitt and hit me between the eyes. Did that event make me start wearing glasses? No, I was too proud and concerned how I looked before the girls.  That miss, however, didn’t impress the girls much.

What a warped view of life teenagers can develop on their own. They can have, like me, a very shallow understanding of what is most useful. Most believe the universe revolves around them. It’s my environment that needs fixing and not moi. (That’s me in French.) I got a C in French my sophomore year of high school, so I’m pretty good at it. Because I said that, you realize I’m still working on the vanity thing.

If only I had known what God had to say about the subject, how much easier life could have been, and maybe I could have been a good ballplayer.

Ecclesiastes 2:1

I said in my heart, “Come now, I will test you with mirth; therefore enjoy pleasure”; but surely, this also was vanity.

He had it right. How are you doing with that subject?

Think about it.

Gary

In 1854 Henry David Thoreau wrote, “Most men lead lives of quiet desperation.” (No, I wasn’t alive then).  Years later, in our time, Bob Seger described this phenomenon in “Running Against the Wind.”

These individuals both are describing life as a hard pull which doesn’t get easier with time. Bob sings, “I wish I didn’t know now what I didn’t know then.” Fortunately, we can’t forget those events that we wish never happened, because they help keep us between the shores as we journey to our destination.

The Bible describes this thought as follows:

Psalm 39:4

“Lord, make me to know my end, And what is the measure of my days, That I may know how frail I am.

Life is short and stuff does add up, but in the economy of God “all things can work together for good” Romans 8:28.

Think about it.

Gary

There’s an account of Israel’s journey out of Egypt when they were trapped between the most powerful army on earth and the Red Sea. You talk about being in a real pickle; that was one. The Germans would say they were in deep kimchi.

I’ve never experienced that kind of terror and apprehension in such an insurmountable situation, but I had many a mess where I cried out to God. Do you know that God says the same thing to me as He did to Moses?

Let me put it in the contemporary Gardner vernacular of Bible interpretation. “Get off your can, quit crying and move forward.”

Exodus 14:15

Then the Lord said to Moses, “Why are you crying out to me? Tell the Israelites to move on.”

I like a story with a good ending. You know from having read Exodus, this had a good ending.

Think about it.

Gary

“You Gave Me a Mountain” (sometimes credited as “Lord, You Gave Me a Mountain”) is a song written by country singer-songwriter Marty Robbins during the 1960’s. I only heard it sung by Johnny Cash.

It was about an individual who never had a break in life and he said as much to God. I acknowledge that God does give us mountains but never one that can’t be climbed.

Caleb was promised a mountain full of opposition by God, but that didn’t deter Caleb from asking Joshua for it when the time came.

Joshua 14:12

Now therefore, give me this mountain of which the Lord spoke in that day; for you heard in that day how the Anakim were there, and that the cities were great and fortified. It may be that the Lord will be with me, and I shall be able to drive them out as the Lord said.”

The problem is never the mountain or the opposition; it is the fact we just don’t want to climb it.

Give it some thought.

Gary