Reluctant Retiree

Every day first responders inspire us with their courage. They perform difficult tasks under dire circumstances, all the while they are often putting their own lives in danger. Medical personnel have put their own and their family’s safety at risk while saving others during this pandemic. Soldiers risk their lives to protect our freedom and liberty.

These and other heroic acts demonstrate courage and selflessness. Where does this courage come from? Am I able to respond with courage if the need arises?

I have not faced these types of situations before. But, like you, I have faced situations where some degree of courage was needed. Often, making the right choice takes courage. This right choice may cause us to lose something. For instance, standing by a moral choice can cause the loss of friends, a job, or a significant relationship. Standing strong in our faith can also cause the same types of losses.

How do we find the strength and courage to make the right decision in the face of potential loss? Psalms 27:14 says, “Wait for the Lord; be strong, and let your heart take courage; wait for the Lord! ” The Lord gives us strength and courage. The key is to ask him for strength before we make a choice and then wait for him to provide the courage to act.

Our minds are spectacularly awesome things. We can think the most lofty and glorious thoughts. Unfortunately we can also think about the basest and darkest things. Our minds can alternately understand the most complex issues and the simplest of ideas. We can compute sophisticated calculations internally within seconds and be dumbfounded on how to make change at the store.

I have played a lot of baseball in my seven decades of life, and I am always amazed that a baseball player can calculate the trajectory of a fly ball along with his /her own speed to be in the right place to catch the ball in flight. To me that is unbelievable physics calculations done without thinking about the details.

Our amazing minds are, to me, evidence of God’s creation. It takes more faith to believe that our minds are the result of arbitrary external circumstances. So we need to be good stewards of our minds and use these God-given abilities for His glory and to benefit others. Roman’s 8:6 says, “For to set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace.” This verse tells us how to glorify God with our minds, i.e. by setting our minds on the things of the Lord. It also describes the benefits if we do set our minds on Him, i.e. life and peace. Lastly the verse warns us that if we set our mind on fleshly appetites it leads to death. We need to be careful what we give our mind’s attention to.

I am a classic introvert. When I have taken personality tests, I have always scored at the extreme end of the introvert spectrum. Our culture doesn’t know what to do with introverts. People make all sorts of judgments when looking at my personality type. I’ve had people suggest that I must be wise because I am thinking all the time. Well, yes, I am thinking, but I would be brain dead if I wasn’t. I have also had people think that I was angry all the time. NOTE: quiet does not equal angry. Some have thought that I was aloof. Not likely. I just don’t have anything to say at the moment.

Being introverted just means that people drain energy from me. An extrovert gains energy being with people. Our culture values extroverts because of the energy they bring to social gatherings. That’s okay, and I am fine with that truth and with being an introvert in this culture.

We all make judgments about people based on appearances only. If someone could look into our minds, I believe that our judgments in these cases are most likely wrong more than 90 percent of the time. Nevertheless, we should be wise in how we present ourselves to others.

In the book of Acts, the apostles John and Peter healed a man, in the name of Jesus, at the temple. Then they began to presch about Jesus. The Jewish leadership had them arrested. The apostles were thoroughly questioned and then threatened to not speak this way again. Acts 4:13 says, “Now as they observed the confidence of Peter and John and understood that they were uneducated and untrained men, they were amazed, and began to recognize them as having been with Jesus.”

So the leaders judgment about these men, just by looking at them, was that they had been with Jesus. What do people think about you, just by looking at you. I already told you what they tend to think about me by looking at me. Oh how I would prefer that they would recognize that I have been with Jesus. I am working on that and praying about that. What about you?

Once several years ago, I was trekking in the Himalayas of Nepal. We came to one of the many suspension bridges that cross the river. Suddenly I became very afraid. Even though I was with other people and I had no other option, I couldn’t get the nerve to cross for several minutes. After sitting and praying for about 15 minutes, I got up and headed to the bridge. I wouldn’t let anyone on the bridge at the same time as me and I asked the others to pray. I made it across that bridge and several more on that trek during the next three days. It’s a good thing, because there was no other way down the mountain.

All of us have fears or phobias that can be difficult for us to overcome. It is another thing entirely to deal with the fear of other people thinking poorly about us. Most surveys say that our number one fear is public speaking. Why? Because we are afraid of what people will think about us. That same type of fear pops up in large gatherings and when we meet new people, especially prospective in-laws.

This fear also shows up when we tell others about something important to us, like our faith. We are afraid that they will reject us. God gives us comfort in these times when he promises, “The Lord is my helper, I will not be afraid. What will man do to me?” (Hebrews 13:6) God promises to protect his people from all evil. We can be comforted and feel secure in these promises.

Faithfulness is a word that has grown out of favor in our culture. We don’t expect our politicians to be faithful to their campaign promises. We don’t expect our celebrities to be faithful to their fans. We don’t expect sports teams to be faithful to their stars. Most people do expect their spouses to be faithful to them, but are not surprised when they aren’t. Children expect their parents to be faithful to their promises and are crushed when promises are not fulfilled.

Too often people have little regard for the promises that they make or the words that they have spoken. When we break our promises, we often say something like “Oh they will understand.” What they understand is that you can’t be counted on, no matter what you say.

Proverbs 20:6 says it well, “Many a man proclaims his own steadfast love, but a faithful man who can find? ” Our words and our promises do mean something to whom we are speaking. We must make every effort to be faithful to our promises, our word, our family, and our God. God is always faithful to his word, his promises, his character, and his people.

What do you look forward to with excitement? Do you get in a frenzy expecting your favorite team to win the Super Bowl? Perhaps you are anticipating a new child or grandchild and that brings a smile to your face. Maybe you are looking forward to a soldier returning home from deployment. It could be the joy of a new car or house.

All of those things are worthy of joyful anticipation. They fill our hearts with excitement . They bring positive feelings and a hopeful outlook for the future.

When the apostle Paul was working with and training Titus, he wrote a letter to his young apprentice. In this letter Paul made a statement that excites me about past, present and future things. Titus 2:11-14 says, “For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to all people, training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright, and bodly lives in the present age, waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for himself a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works.”

Wow! There is a lot of truth and many promises in those verses. Let me talk about just a few. In the PAST, God’s grace appeared bringing salvation and redemption. In the Present, God is training us to live godly and upright lives and making us zealous to do good works. In the future, our blessed hope will be fulfilled when Jesus returns and gathers us to himself.

Now those are things to be truly excited about. I shout HALLELUJAH! Glory to God!

I know people who can be called professional students. They have spent decades in the pursuit of knowledge. Many have achieved the highest levels of education, earning multiple masters degrees or doctorates. Their pursuit of knowledge has sometimes clouded their views of the real world as they ignored the realities surrounding them.

To some degree I am a learned man. I earned a bachelors degree and did some postgraduate work. Also, I have gained a lot of experience in many areas through my 70 years of life.. However, I don’t consider myself to be especially wise.

Wisdom doesn’t just come to us by gaining knowledge and experience. Wisdom is applying the knowledge and experiences we have to life in ways that make us and the people around us better.

How do we acquire wisdom? Proverbs 2:6 says, “For the Lord gives wisdom; from his mouth come knowledge and understanding.” True wisdom comes only from God. This wisdom leads us in righteousness and eternal life. We must humbly go to the Lord in search of wisdom. He will surely give us the answer to our questions. I offer one word of warning though. When God gives wisdom, He expects us to apply it.

We had snow overnight and this morning. It made everything appear so pure and clean. It was beautiful. But it doesn’t take long to reveal the real landscape and ruin the beauty. Snow plows come along scooping not only the snow but the filth of the road onto sidewalks and lawns. Cars mush the snow on the roads so that the only thing left is dirty water. It is sad, but inevitable.

People can also appear fresh and clean. We shower, shave, put on fine clothes, add touches of makeup to hide imperfections, and display perfect manners, all the while hiding, sometimes, evil thoughts and intentions. Then life’s stresses and pressures come and the things that we were hiding come to the forefront.

That doesn’t have to happen. God has a better way. James 4:8 says, “Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded.” Jesus died to take away our sins and to cleanse from our evil thoughts and intentions. We can accept these gifts of grace and stop hiding beneath outward appearances. II Timothy 2:21 says, “Therefore, if anyone cleanses himself from what is dishonorable, he will be a vessel for honorable use, set apart as holy, useful to the master of the house, ready for every good work.” Stop hiding your sins and imperfections. Let Jesus cleanse you and make you a vessel for good works.

Today, I had x-rays taken of my hip and neck. The doctor ordered them to make sure that there is no damage to the bones after my accident a week ago. The x-rays, of course, can give the doctor pictures of the bones.

Doctors use other types of internal scans to examine our inward parts. I have had ultrasounds of my heart and digestive systems. Every six months I have an MRI of my head to ensure a tumor is not growing. It’s amazing what medical science can do to check our internal health.

Despite these high tech advances, we cannot so easily evaluate our spiritual condition. Jesus said that the fruit that we bear tells us whether our spiritual heart is good or bad. If we bear fruit of anger, jealousy, hatred, fear, and anxiety, then our spiritual condition is not healthy. But if we are bearing fruit of love, joy, peace, patience and goodness, then we are abiding in Jesus and are spiritually healthy.

God is far more concerned with our spiritual condition than He is with how we look on the outside. God is seeking people who will give them their hearts so that He can use them to bring glory to His name. I Samuel 16:7 says, “But the Lord said to Samuel, ‘Do not look on his appearance or the height of his stature, because I have rejected him. For the Lord sees not as man sees; man looks on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart.'” We need to ask Him to give us a good heart. That is a request that He will honor.

It is impossible to know everything. Even if we could, would we want to? Would we want to know the secrets that friends and family members don’t tell us? Would we want to know the secrets that our elected officials don’t tell us? We may want to know the secrets that nature hides, but can we know them all? Should we want to hear the secrets that the internet discloses?

Even if we read every book ever written, we would still only know a fraction of the information available to us. If we read all the information available on the internet, besides being depressed, we would be incorrectly informed in a lot of areas.

Deuteronomy 29:29 says, “The secret things belong to the Lord our God, but the things that are revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may do all the words of this law.” So even if we gather all the information that the world can give us, we still won’t have the things that God keeps secret. But we are held responsible for the things that He has revealed. God is God and knows all things. We are not omniscient, so we can’t know it all. We must do what He shows us to do.