Retiring moments

I've been tring for the past six months to kill the beast that grew for 30 years.

I let the beast grow. I watered and fed the beast all those years. I watched the beast change from a small bit of my life to a daily large entity.

The beast?

My expectations.

I read this early this morning: For the past 40 or 50 years, Americans have lived by a series of unofficial tenets: A good education guarantees a good job, hard work will bring prosperity, and 40 years of 40-hour-a-week work earns a comfortable retirement. Then, maybe; now, not so much. Workers who believe that somebody owes them a comfortable life just because they try hard are risking bitter disappointment in a Darwinian economy, where there are likely to be more losers and fewer winners than we're used to. The winners will be those who learn how to adapt, expect nobody to give them anything, and are prepared to work harder in the future than they did in the past. That's how it was in America before anybody ever heard of the middle class, and it may be that way for a while again. The real middle class--the true bedrock of the nation--will be able to handle it.


I thought I had earned a wonderful retirement. I thought the figures I would occasionally glance at when they passed them out at work would be enough to live off when it came time to retire. I even thought I would work long enough to pay off my house so that, again, I would have enough to live off.

I was wrong. The beast of my expectations exceeded the food pan, drank all the water and left me with little.

In other words, there will come a day not too far away when I can't pay for my house and I can't pay for my health care and I will be overcome by my bills. That's one reality.

The other reality, however, is that I have finally, finally placed my future, my planning, my expectations in the hand of the Lord. Finally. Did I say finally?

I've had to, or will, have to look at what I buy and when I buy it and what aches and pains I go to the doctor for and which ones I don't. I will have to budget according to what the Lord tells me instead of me knocking around the world of purchases with abandon.

I will have to, er, be mindful of what I do.

Ain't the beast a terror?

The Bible tells me this:

3-8"Listen. What do you make of this? A farmer planted seed. As he scattered the seed, some of it fell on the road and birds ate it. Some fell in the gravel; it sprouted quickly but didn't put down roots, so when the sun came up it withered just as quickly. Some fell in the weeds; as it came up, it was strangled among the weeds and nothing came of it. Some fell on good earth and came up with a flourish, producing a harvest exceeding his wildest dreams.

9"Are you listening to this? Really listening?"

10-12When they were off by themselves, those who were close to him, along with the Twelve, asked about the stories. He told them, "You've been given insight into God's kingdom—you know how it works. But to those who can't see it yet, everything comes in stories, creating readiness, nudging them toward receptive insight. These are people—

Whose eyes are open but don't see a thing,
Whose ears are open but don't understand a word,
Who avoid making an about-face and getting forgiven."

13He continued, "Do you see how this story works? All my stories work this way.

14-15"The farmer plants the Word. Some people are like the seed that falls on the hardened soil of the road. No sooner do they hear the Word than Satan snatches away what has been planted in them.

16-17"And some are like the seed that lands in the gravel. When they first hear the Word, they respond with great enthusiasm. But there is such shallow soil of character that when the emotions wear off and some difficulty arrives, there is nothing to show for it.

18-19"The seed cast in the weeds represents the ones who hear the kingdom news but are overwhelmed with worries about all the things they have to do and all the things they want to get. The stress strangles what they heard, and nothing comes of it.

20"But the seed planted in the good earth represents those who hear the Word, embrace it, and produce a harvest beyond their wildest dreams."

Did you get that? The stress stangles what they heard and nothing comes of it. Worries about what the bills are, where the savings went, what we will wear in five years when the clothes get old and we can't afford new ones, what the old car will look like because we've ruined our credit. Stress like spring flood waters bubbles up.

The point of all this is that we all must reach an emotional and spiritual bottom someday that will allow us to completely give our lives over to our Lord.

It's either that or we quit calling him Lord, wrongly. For someone who is Lord is Lord of all, not a piddling penny.

Even our retirement. Or maybe especially our retirement.