How a Stray Bull Taught me about Memorial Day

I remember feeling a sense of excitement as my father and I saddled up our horses.  I was finally old enough to go on one of these special "working cattle" moments.  Our new, young bull had decided to go check out greener pastures.  He had broken through the fence and gotten on to my uncle's land that bordered ours.  Retrieving a stray bull could be a dangerous enterprise. Most of the time if a bull has broken through a fence, he don't want to go home.  Growing up on a dairy farm and ranch operation afforded me some unique opportunities, this was to be an unexpected one.

As we rode onto my uncle's ranch, we came through some thick brush and into a clearing.  The ground in that clearing had an odd bowl shaped depression in it and in the middle of that depression was a granite tombstone type marker.  As we got closer, I could see it had some military markings on it and there was a short list of names.  I had never seen such a marker and inquired about it.  My dad told me the story, one he had never shared with me.

During World War II, just a few days before my father shipped off to serve in the Navy, a German submarine had been supposedly sighted in the Gulf of Mexico.  A bomber had been dispatched out of a base in San Antonio to go check it out.  It was after dark that night that the plane had mechanical problems and crashed into the ground there on my uncle's land on its way to the Gulf.  The plane caught fire as it crashed, the bombs exploded and all the men on board died.

My father told me that he was visiting his sister and brother in law that night, they heard the plane go down and explode.  They rushed to the scene and started to call out to see if there were any survivors.  They heard others shouting from the other side of the crash site and were in hopes that maybe someone had bailed out and survived.  But after some time of investigation and wandering around in the dark, they found that it was another group of people who saw the explosion and drove to the site.

It did not seem easy for my father to tell this story, that was part of the reason I had never heard it before. He was days away from leaving for the war and here a group of men had just died in a that war, almost literally in his back yard.  He probably never told me all that he saw that night.  It was a sobering event; the war, in a sense, had come home to him.

It was a story and a sight, that I have never forgotten.  It would be some time later that it would dawn on me - a group of men died for our country just a few miles from where I grew up, not in some distant land but right here.  There is a sense that it came home to me that these men died for me, they died for us.  They would never get the story or the honor of those who died in the act of combat overseas.  Yet they had still laid down their lives.  Their families suffered the same sense of loss, cried the same type of tears and endured the same years of living with out a loved one. 

My father went off to that war and came home.  I was born as a result.  Those men never came home and never had children.  They still gave their lives along with the 1.3 million men and women who have given their lives defending our country since the Revolutionary war.  We have cause to be grateful.  This weekend, I pray that no one dies on a military operation and I also pray that we would become more grateful because of those who have.  Let's let their sacrifice come home to us.

for the journey...

Tim

Bergdahl, Redemption and Me

Disclaimer:  In this post, I will be talking about a controversial figure in the news and decisions that were made regarding him that are equally controversial.  There are many others who will debate these topics much better than I will.  My goal is not to make any kind of point about the rightness or wrongness of actions taken by and for Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl - though those are important discussions worthy of debate.  I simply want to share some analogies to my (our) spiritual life from what we are seeing in the news.

A few months ago, I could have told you that there was an American soldier being held by the Taliban but I could not have told you anything more than that.  Now we all know the name of Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl, we wish we knew more of why he left his post and what his intentions were.  There is still a lot of controversy and will continue to be.  It has caused me to do some reflection on my own spiritual life though, that is what I want to share in this post.

The redeeming of someone's life is never simple, clear, easy or cheap.  It is costly, controversial, difficult and messy.  So was my redemption from sin.  And always there is the question, "Was it really worth the costs?"  Was what was given up worth what was gained?  What will be the future repercussions?

I must admit that I, and every human being since Adam and Eve spoke to the serpent in the garden, have had questionable, unfathomable and totally illogical dalliances with an enemy whose sole purpose is to steal, kill and destroy.

The very reason I needed redemption was because I had, in a sense, wandered away from my post - of what I knew to be right and what I professed to believe.  In so doing, I was taken captive by an enemy who used me to do his will.  I was lost and powerless to free myself.

My King, determined that I was worth redeeming, though the cost for that redemption was high.  It is said that six soldiers died in the search for Sgt. Bergdahl and they were not able to find him or secure his release, despite their best efforts and their supreme sacrifice.

My redeemer, sent to deliver me, did find me and secure my release at a great personal price.  Then there was the dealing with my wandering.  I was found guilty of my desertion that got me into trouble in the first place. 

Then here is the amazing thing - my redeemer then took my punishment for my failings upon himself. He took my sentence and died so that I could be set free.  Was I really worth it?  What could I give back in payment even if I devoted the rest of my life to fulfilling my duty that I had forsaken?  Nothing could ever be enough.  Yet my redeemer did all this lovingly and willingly.

This whole case shows me in a way I had not seen before the costliness of my own sin - it always costs me and it always costs others and it always causes a mess that I cannot clean up.  It also shows me the great love and sacrifice of my redeemer, who set me free.

This Lord's Day, we will come to the table to examine ourselves.  I have some new gratitude for my savior.  Will join me?

for the journey...

Tim

The Deicer

A couple of years ago this month when my daughter Kelley and I flew to Denver to see our friend Caleb Jentsch after his skiing accident, I encountered a part of air travel I had never experienced before - the air plane deicer.  This is a picture of the one who did our plane before we came home.  I realized this was not a job I would ever want, being held up in the air in an open basket in sub-freezing temperatures spraying liquid onto an airplane as north winds howled around shaking the basket and blowing the wet spray back on you.  I watched this guy in admiration and prayed he did not get too cold to be careless and call our plane "good enough" when it might be packing a little too much ice weight.  Fortunately he took no shortcuts; he did his job well and we came home uneventfully.

These cold temperatures and ice that we have experienced reminded me of this man and his sacrifice.  I also thought about how to really help people get free from the baggage that accumulates in life that weighs us down and causes us to crash, it takes a sacrifice.  It is not easy work and there are never easy conditions for it.

When Jesus hung on the cross with the weight of our sin upon himself along with all the scorn and ridicule of those there blowing back in his face, it took a huge sacrifice.  He took no shortcuts.  He did a job that we could not do for ourselves and enabled us to get to our destination.  We are indebted to him.  The deicer did it for pay; Jesus did it out of love.  I now understand a little more about how much love based on how much the sacrifice was.

That is the core of what we believe and live by in Christ, he died to set us free.  May that always be our core.  We will talk more about this Sunday.

for the journey...

Tim

The Barabas Experience

As I read through the New Testament, I had the amazing experience of reading John 18 on the day that I experienced many of the places mentioned in that chapter while on my trip to Israel.  In that chapter of John's account of a day, Jesus crosses the Kidron Valley - I crossed it that day.  He climbed the Mount of Olives, I climbed it that day.  He was arrested, beaten and taken before Pilate.  I stood on first century stones near where Jesus could have stood when he went before Pilate.

In all of it, it hit me anew, that he took my place.  I also stood where Barabas stood, as the guilty one who was let go for Jesus to pay the price and take my place.  I cannot express in words the experience of that day or the new way the truth of his substitutionary death came to me.  I went from knowing about it to knowing it.

That evening, our group went into a stone church built by the crusaders - St. Ann's Church in Jerusalem.  We sang together and one of the hymn's words rang out, "Love so amazing so divine, demands my soul, my life, my heart, my all."

Amen, and amen.

For the journey...

Tim