Something about that name, always

What a week of dramatic reversals. Loads of life ...and the terrors and sorrows of an untimely death. Moments of real joy ... followed by sadness deep and complete. Life lived in the middle, though the swings would cause one's neck to whiplash if one allowed it.

Wait! That describes life, doesn't it? Life lived in the way, lived with the truth.

I think most of us want to be on that hill top, forever and a day. Barring that, and it must be barred because life simply isn't lived up there, continually, we would all settle for life somewhere in the middle, wouldn't we?  You know the type of day I'm writing of. The kind of day where you get up and nothing serious or painful or sad happens. Of course, nothing terrific, nothing surprising, nothing eventful, nothing special and new happens, either.

The awful mood swings that come with life lived in the middle of Route 66, come with the territory, I'm afraid. If we could do any one thing about those ups and stomach-surrendering downs, we probably would. I, I'm pretty sure, would love to live a straight-line peace-keeping and peace-giving way. Instead, once I was a criminal, now I'm a prodigal.

My God loves me so much He would gather me like a spilled purse and take me home with Him. That's simply the way of our God. He wants to lift and cherish. He wants the spills on God-aisle No. 4 done away with. He wants us to gently pour the cleaner, the blood of the lamb, onto us and be done with it. He wants it that way, and we wouldn't at all mind it either. But it doesn't happen that manner, does it?

Wisdom literature (primarily Proverbs) tells me this:

"Mark well that God doesn’t miss a move you make;
he’s aware of every step you take.
The shadow of your sin will overtake you;
you’ll find yourself stumbling all over yourself in the dark.
Death is the reward of an undisciplined life;
your foolish decisions trap you in a dead end."

Don't you love it when football teams explain why they lost a game? They give every reason imaginable (and they imagine it in many very different ways), and invariably those reasons don't include, oh, "we actually stunk the place up last night," or "we were very clearly the worst team," or even "Did you see the game? They played dramatically better than we are even capable of." Does the losing team ever simply admit they weren't close to being good enough? Seldom, if ever, would be my acknowledgment.

Lt life dictates that sometimes we simply aren't as good, aren't as educated, aren't as disciplined, aren't as worthy as our opponent, our friend, our competition ... for jobs, for grades, for whatever comes next. But we tell ourselves that life has just plain run over us, that we're not to blame, that our parents or our professors, or our competitors or someone out there in a tough, tough word is responsible.
Not us.
Never us.

We've stumbled in the dark because someone stole the light. We can't be blamed for the darkness if someone stole the light, can we?

We've fallen because others have caused us to fall. Others have done to us; we've never done it to ourselves. It's their fault, not mine. Heck, blame God, he made me this way, we tell ourselves. And the ridiculousness of that argument is that we actually believe it.

In the debate about government and its role as benefactor, I never read that some simply didn't earn their way, didn't try hard enough, didn't confront the evidence that speaks of failure not as a fault but as a character builder.

Life is lived in gray areas, out beyond the gifts of government and out beyond the gifts of benefits not earned.

What one does in the gray is dictated by many factors, but one of those factors certainly is how our decisions leave us. I'll tell you this: My foolish decisions have almost always trapped me, my spouse, our children. My mistakes have almost always stopped the momentum of life, love, joy and happiness. God forgives, but consequences that come from the mistakes in judgment and errors in effort are bone crushers.

It doesn't mean I can't get back up after I fall. It simply means that if I don't try, I'll remain there on my back and the world can't or won't help. I need to remember, as someone once said, the only difference between Christians and those of the world is that Christians get back up when they fall. I believe that.

There is only one way, one truth, and one life when that happens. At the risk of becoming cliched, that way, truth and life is this man named by a Jewish teen mother and step-father. They called him Jesus.

As we head into still another weekend, remember Him. Remember the smiles of his youth, the lessons of his teaching, the memories of Jesus blessing and keeping close to his mentor, his rabbi, his God.

Jesus. There's just something about that name.