There Will Come a Day

Lotus Blossom, Monet Exhibit, New York Botanical Gardens, Bronx, NY

Copyright 2012:  singeronthesand

 

He will wipe every tear from their eyes. 

There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, 

for the old order of things has passed away.

Revelation 21:4

 

CNN Online reported a heart-rending story this morning.  A young girl, playing in her mother's lap inside her home, is suddenly struck by a bullet out of nowhere, bursting through the frosted glass window on the family balcony, piercing the child's cheek and knocking out one of her teeth.  She cries for her mother, and then is silent, blood pouring from her mouth.

 

A neighbor grabbed the child, flagged down a passing truck, and tried to race toward the hospital. The traffic was beyond terrible, and the neighbor transfered the child from the truck to a car carrying two reporters, the girl choking and gurgling blood in the back seat.  When they finally reached the hospital, the doctors wheeled her into the emergency room and began to work on her face.  The bullet had passed cleanly through one cheek, but ripped up the other one. The little girl was breathing more easily, but she could not receive the surgery she needed at that hospital, so the decision was made to take her across the front lines to a bigger government hospital.  She was piled into a truck and disappeared into the streets.

 

Back home the parents were calm.  They believed their child was getting the best care.  The reporters returned to their business, but curiosity about the girl's condition caused them to return the next morning.  They were met with news on the street:  the little girl had died.  She had been taken to two different government hospitals where doctors tried to help her but failed.  After her death, it was discovered that the bullet had lodged inside her throat. 

 

It is difficult to understand a world where a four-year-old's life can be swept away by a sniper's bullet.  So much of our planet is inundated in violence and war of every description and size.  The value of human life does not count for much on today's scale of importance.  A day is coming, however, when tears and pain and death will be swept away - when God will make a clean sweep of sin and darkness and create all things new.  It is a day I am looking forward to.

 

 

The Cat Creator

O Lord, our Lord, how excellent in Your name in all the earth.

Psalm 8:1

All things bright and beautiful, all creatures great and small,

All things wise and wonderful - the Lord God made them all.

-Cecil F. Alexander

I love cats.  Big cats, little cats, tame cats, wild cats - there is nothing in the world quite so beautiful as a cat.  All cats have flexible bodies, quick reflexes, sharp retractable claws, and teeth for killing small (or large) prey.  Not only can cats hear sounds too faint for human ears, they can also hear sounds higher in frequency than humans can perceive.  Cats are adept at both seeing in near darkness and (almost) always landing on their feet.

My first cat as a child was an un-fixed baby machine named Susie.  I have no idea how many batches of kittens she had when I was a kid, but there were a lot of them.  I have shared a home with a giant cat named Chubbs, a female cat named George, a very large, tiger striped orange male named Boopie, and a particularly talkative Siamese who refused to stay out of the baby's cradle and had to be given to a new family.  I currently have a black and white cat named Sapphire.  She is just a run-of-the-mill mixed breed, but there has to be some Siamese in there somewhere, because she talks and talks and talks.

The cat in the photograph above is a darling tiger who lives on Tiger Mountain in the Bronx Zoo in New York.  There were six or seven tigers lazing around on the day I visited, but this fellow decided he had slept enough and between splashing/swimming/nose diving in the pond and harrassing his dozing buddies, he put on a real show for everyone on the other side of the glass.  Obviously his calm demeanor belied his ferocious nature, and I was very glad for the protective glass that kept him on his side of the pond.

God's creation always amazes me - not only for its beauty, but for its color and variety.  God could have made just one species of cat, but instead, he filled the earth with lions, tigers, cheetahs, lynx, leopards, cougars, ocelots, bobcats, and jaguars, to name a few.  I love my little house cat, but I look forward to the day when the heavens and the earth will be recreated, and I won't need a piece of safety glass protecting me from those beautiful big cats. 

Role Models

National Botanical Gardens, Washington, D.C.  Copyright 2012: singeronthesand

There is an opportune time to do things,

a right time for everything on the earth:

A right time to shut up and another to speak up... 

Ecclesiastes 3:1, 7b

It's a deeply ingrained human attribute to look for role models.

-When the Hero Falls [CNN] 

Nathan DeWall, a psychology professor at the University of Kentucky, believes that "Humans have a fundamental need to connect with other people.  We like to choose people who inspire us to become better versions of ourselves."  The problem with role models in general, however, is that they are human, and at some point, they inevitably fail.  Tiger Woods, Bernie Madoff, John Edwards, Joe Paterno - these are just a tiny handful of individuals who were enthroned on a pedestal for one reason or another, only to unexpectedly come crashing to the ground.

When you place another human being in a worshipful position, you give them a power over the way you think and the way you react.  To elevate an individual just because of their athleticism, their money, their political power or their coaching ability is to set oneself up for disappointment and discouragement when that hero is shown to be a common, flawed individual.  Living your life through the worship of someone's over-the-top experience and success deprives you of expanding your own abilities and character.

In this fall start of football season, much is being written about Penn State, who is fielding the first team since 1966 without Paterno as head coach.  Paterno's fall from the pedestal began when he found himself incapable of speaking up when faced with the knowledge of a crime perpetrated by one of his staff.  Although he himself had become a larger-than-life hero with many, many wonderful qualities, he knew that a man's status could change at the drop of a hat.  In a 1973 Penn State commencement address, Paterno warned, "Don't underestimate the world.  It can corrupt quickly and completely."  Unfortunately, he failed to listen to his own advice.

We are all in this human life experience together, and I can no more be a role model for you than you can be one for me. Perhaps it is time to teach our children to admire our heroes, and save our worship for the One who will never, ever fail us.