"Hail to Jesus our King" in high heaven they sing; all those spirits restored in GOD's image and likeness.
Christ will bring them again to a world free from sin; when this earth long corrupted with unrighteous living
is recreated, restored through His love, and at last handed up to the Father above.
Beyond time GOD's family in eternity, Father's home for souls reborn
in the Spirit t'will be.
ANGELFIRE 5-4-05
As we passed the 60th anniversary of Adolph Hitler's suicide, there was hardly any mention of it (in fact we didn't even know about it back then). On the same calendar day we've later marked the 30th year since Saigon fell to N. Viet Nam. I can recall both as a time of endings, though I was still in the navy when Hitler shot himself. Yet the feelings were in total contrast. With Hitler gone there was rejoicing when we learned it. With Saigon's surrender we knew it at once and felt bitter disappointment. In the first instance we'd won in Europe but in the second we'd lost in Asia. The main hero of WW II, General Eisenhower, had warned us during his presidency that got us out of Korea with another armistice like WW I, never to become involved in any Asian mainland war. So when we did, it became the first defeat in US history. What a sad day that was! I was a pastor in Tulsa then and all I could do in the pulpit that Sunday was weep over the calamity. It just defied imagination for America to loose a war, but we did. So the gladdest and the saddest were remembered at the same time, sixty and thirty years ago. You learn with years that life is filled with paradox. And now we watch the Iraqis forming their own government like a high up tight robe act. Also the Brits will decide if Tony Blair stays on or the Conservatives take over. It's this week and looks close.
That poem we quoted, "Little Boy Blue," compares in my mind to the church waiting for the final return of it's Lord. The church is as precious to Jesus as those toys were to their baby owner. A toy is a joy and I guess that's why I "toy" with what to call that old tower in this column. How about "The Toy Tower?" Which reminds me of our PV group band, "Squeaky Burger." Since ordinary burgers are made with beef, it must be made of mouse meat. Is that so, Kevin Stark?
With Mother's Day coming up, here's a thought for us guys. Did you know that we could become superfluous in perpetuation of the species? Yes, with all that science has provided for reproduction, especially cloning, our role could be done artificially. Now what a sobering thought that is for us males who have been dominant from Creation until now. If humanity became all one gender, would that simplify things or make them worse? Depends on who you ask. But I seriously doubt there'll be males and females in heaven; just eternal souls all conjoined as the Bride of Jesus. He is the groom in that final wedding of the Lamb.
My question about that run away bride, Jennifer, is why she headed for Los Vegus. Of all the places to find solace, that seems the worst; unless she thought the gambling would be more exciting than her huge wedding coming up. Or marriage could seem like a big gamble too. Now she's sure gained attention, if that's what she wanted. Maybe she'll make a statement today. Just hope this doesn't start a fad. So much is copy cat behavior in the news. We need instead to keep "looking unto Jesus, the pioneer and perfector of our faith." (Heb.12:2)
Can you imagine dancing on the bricks? Well that's how PV's eighth annual Brickfest begins (plus a concert) at seven oclock Friday evening with a streetdance. Then there's all day Saturday activities. This should be Main Street's biggest and best one yet with over five thousand expected to attend. Next, director Della Wilson takes over Pauls Valley's Toy Museum as a new director is found for the Main Street program. So Bricktown in OKC just has to make room for "Brickfest" in PV, I say.
ANGELFIRE 5-7-05
I just saw a Rev.Thomas Smiley from Gainsville GA speaking on behalf of that run away bride. It sure doesn't make us sympathetic listening to lawyers and pastors when she could talk if she would. And it had been a Pastor Jones who was going to perform the wedding. I'll bet he's just "had it" with her. And then this Smiley goes comes out saying that "so many prayers to the Lord Jesus for her safe return were answered." It's all a pious cover up, in my opinion. She must have thought she was going to fool even GOD, living together before marriage and planning such a big wedding in the church. Too bad it's still news right here before Mother's Day. (Maybe her next claim will be that they were being celebate there in that mobile home of his) Remember when such behavior was called "living in sin." We've cleaned up the vocabulary so that now every cohabiting couple speaks of the other as their "fiance," which just adds to the duplicity. I guess it's because common law marriage has been wiped off the books and they suppose it still exists legally.
But marriage and Mother's Day have a profound link. The Bible's first Hebrew word for man is "adam", taken from earth. Then when a companion is taken from his side, it becomes "ish" for male or husband. The adam was neither he nor she, but now becomes a male with the female as his completion. It fills out the image and likeness of GOD (Elohim), because Elohim is also a plural name. We went through all that "women and men" readjustment of our language because of female liberation, though it was always the Biblical meaning of man(adam) from the second creation story in Gn.2 where adam becomes ish. Translators begin capitalizing adam at different places, but mostly after he has become a male(ish). GOD said, "It is not good that the man (Adam) should be alone." That's when his two halves were created for company, since none of the animals could do as that finishing touch of divine handiwork. Adam, who got into the habit of giving their names to all the animals, calls her "woman(ishshah)" because she was taken out of him(ish). Then later he names her "Eve" which means mother. So we could call this Eve's Day just as every EVEning is mother of the coming day. Of course this isn't objective science, but far deeper stuff that's too often dismissed by proud minded people of this perishing world. They'd say it was the primitive notions from the childhood of human history. And maybe that's not so wrong. One of the most famous theologians of the 20th century, Karl Barth, was asked about the greatest truth he'd learned in his lifetime; to which he replied "Jesus loves me, this I know for the Bible tells me so."
Remember the three most beautiful words in English are mother, home and heaven. I get joy from going up to LARC and to the PV and WW nursing homes to sing and speak about heaven. There are two heavens in this physical universe: atmospheric and celestial. Then highest heaven (shamayim) is still beyond both of them. It can't be found by astronomers but was brought near to us by the Lord Jesus Christ(GOD incarnate), who is coming again to complete the restoration of things gone wrong and judge this sinful world in righteousness. Let us live with that blessed hope (Titus 2:13). Shalom
ANGELFIRE 5-11-5
As ANGELFIRE has sometimes said, heaven is my favorite subject. I suppose that's true for most folks past seventy, and I'm more than half way to eighty. But a whimsical thought is how fast my dad always used to drive when when we kids were small. It was right in the mid-thirties depression and we had left Oklahoma for a job he found up in Illinois as a traveling salesman over several states. The company furnished him with a new car each year, something quite special in those days. So we always went places at 70 mph, which was considered extremely fast in those days. He had to cover a large territory, so to him it seemed necessary, I suppose. And there were no speed limits that I can recall. Yet fatal wrecks were sometimes seen on the highway north of Mt.Vernon, where we lived out of own. My brother John and I began third grade at a one room country school called Pleasant Grove. We all brought our lunch pails and got our water to drink with it from an outdoor pump. We filled our personal tin cups that wer kept hung on the wall . There wasn't any play ground equipment and only separate outdoor privies for boys and girls. It was before electricity or running water anywhere out there. We walked to school or were brought by our parents. No school busses either. But going anywhere with dad was an adventure because none of the other kids got to travel so fast. No seat belts of course. "Doing sixty" was the expression for the ultimate in speed back then, so doing seventy was when I began to associate seven with heaven. It wasn't just because of the rhyme but also the possibility of sudden destruction. Whenever any classmates rode with us, their eyes got big as they'd look at the speedometer. Dad was a young man in a hurry, though he had slowed down some by the later years that PV came to know him after WW II as J.M. Hazlitt (writer of the column "Sounding Off").
We went to a country church north of Mt.Vernon named "Pleasant Grove Methodist" where the red brick building was surrounded by a cemetery. A big grove of Oak trees just across the road gave the whole community it's name. I think seeing those graves around the church, which we passed quite often, fixed in my mind the mortality constantly before us. During a month spent in England as an adult I would learn how common that was abroad to demonstrate "the communion of saints:" both the living and the dead remaining one body in Christ Jesus. We all await His return, bringing their departed spirits that have been with Him to be rejoined to glorified resurrection bodies And the bodies of us still alive will all being changed from mortal to immortal, corruptible to incorruptible, terrestrial to celestial. I was pastor of Red Rock Methodist out west of El Reno about thirty years ago and it had the cemetery around it, only such I can recall serving. Got a call from one of the members there just yesterday and it brought back many memories, especially of that cemetery link between earth and heaven. In England burials are even beneath the floor of cathedrals. That's pushing it a little, I feel. Here in WW my wife and I live on the long street named Clayton. It runs down south to the graveyard and up north to the football stadium. Now that's powerful symbolism, though not quite heaven and earth; but life and death for sure. I've spent more of my life in WW than any other place and I really like this town, though remaining a Panther at heart since I played under Peacho Thompson, for whom the PV stadium is named.
This column is decicated to my late friend and brother in Christ of Marlow OK, Pete Jones. He went to be with the Lord Jesus that first Friday of May.
ANGELFIRE 5-14-05
Praise the LORD for rain that's come at long last. It makes a lot of extra effort for carriers in bagging our news papers. Still we join everyone in being glad for showers.
Did you see where there were "end of WW II celebrations" in Europe last week (May 8) of 60 years ago? I'd always thought it lasted clear up to V-J Day in August, after both those a-bombs fell on Japan. But Europeans see history from their own situation. Makes me recall in '66 when I spent a month in England, and they kept telling us "You Americans think you won the war, but we in fact we did." I just let them feel however they liked since they had played such a major role in that victory. Yet I'd insist the Germans admit they lost it, if I ever went there. We made a blunder after WW I by letting it end with only an armistice. So early in WW II the demand was firmly set for "unconditional surrender." That cost us greater losses to win, but there was no way left for them to doubt their defeat.
From my earliest memories they were always the bag guys, rather than the Japs. Of course that was America's ethos after WW I. Germans were just war mongers who loved the battlefield. Whenever us kids built a fort to play war, "we" were always the American heros and "they" (the other guys) were the bad ones. Then in '29 America gained it's greatest national hero, Charles Lindbergh, who flew solo to Paris across the Atlantic. Subsequently in '32 his baby was stolen in "the crime of the century.". I was only four myself, but I can recall news on the radio about it. In days following, there were over a dozen ransom notes sent. And then the babie's body was found buried just a few miles from their home. Seems that kidnapping was a new kind of crime back then. Everyone urgently wanted the one that climbed up that ladder to the nursery window caught and punished. It took the FBI a couple of years. At last a German was the suspected villain, Bruno Haupmann. That name seemed more hideous to us then than even Adolph Hitler's did in years to follow. We hadn't heard of him, but learned that Hitler had already come to power in Germany by '33; (that "Tale of Two Mothers" Jeff wrote just was terrific). So Haupmann was all we were hearing in '34 as the case then drug on two more years. Finally he was electrocuted in '36, despite claims of some folks that the FBI's case wasn't solid enough. Looking back over the years I'd wondered myself if our anti-German feelings might have rushed that conviction. But the history channel #61 showed a forensic study recently completed that verified the outcome: "they got the right man." I think the doubts about Haupmann's guilt have caused much opposition to the death penalty. His execution was delayed several times, once by power failure of the electric chair and again by New Jersey's governor. Now after nearly seven decades we've seen that the guilty verdict really was correct after all, and justice finally came. Though I've wondered about divine punishment on Linbergh himself. He'd spoken favorable for the Germans. Then he and his wife moved out of the USA because of bitterness over siding with England. By the real end of WW II/V-J Day, I had acquired plenty of hate for the Japanese as I grew up with for Germans, and felt only satisfaction over Hiroshima and Nagasaki; to me they were vindication for Pearl Harbor. Yet the Lord has helped me through the years to rid my heart of lusting for revenge. Now it's 9/11 and radical Islamists all over the globe: a bomb scare abroad Tuesday where Bush was speaking, a plane just three miles from the Whitehouse Wednesday and a French airliner refused landing here on Thursday. What's next?
United Airlines has gained it's survival by cancelling pension funds for long time employees it appears. If such a tactic succeeds, other airlines may use it too. Remember how much federal support was given to rescue the industry after 9/11. And still they are squeezed. I think they just pay too much to their CEOs, who seem to be a kind of royalty now. We fought the Revolution to get rid of that stuff didn't we? Doubt that I'll be flying anywhere, but sure want it to be United if I did. But watch them run tv adds telling us how wonderful they are. The world's biggest retailer (you know who) does that all the time these days. That's why Jesus told us followers to "be wise as serpents yet innocent as doves." It can only be done by keeping our eyes on Him, the way Peter walked on the water.
ANGELFIRE 5-18-05
I read in our WW paper last week about the coach being fired. Then Saturday in this paper about the airport manager also being canned. And again Sunday of a fellow minister at Madill who'd just told his congregation that the bishop and cabinet had let him go. So it's open season on jobs nowdays. No such thing as sinecures any more. Yet I did menion at the hospital to a Pink Lady that she'd better watch out, and she replied "Oh I'm just a volunteer. They can't fire me." Now that's how it is with serving the Lord. You don't work for pay and no one can fire you. Even St.Paul was a tentmaker to provide his living costs. Yes, he accepted financial support, but not always. That way he wasn't a bought off preacher. And he certainly got run out of town more often than rewarded. But most folks have to have employment and even submit to abuse to keep their job, at least until retirement. What liberation it can bring if there's sufficient resources. For St.Paul it was only house arrest in Rome, so I guess he had to keep making tents. In fact he made a spiritual one by writing half of the New Testament. St.Paul's cathedral should really be the one in Rome, since the N.T. never mentions St.Peter being down there from Jerusalem. Paul was the missionary to the Gentiles (Roman) but Peter remained more Jewish.
Since Sunday was Pentecost, I shared with the inmates at LARC how Peter preached only to Jews on that Hebrew holiday (seven weeks and a day after Passover). His message to them was to repent for the murder of their own Messiah, Acts.2:38. Three thousand were baptized. It was an answer to Jesus' prayer on the cross "...they know not what they do." And all sold what they had and formed a believer's community of mutual help there in Jerusalem. If that was the church, it was only for Jews until Peter preached at a nearby Roman city, Caesarea. Then St.Stephen became the first martyr in Jerusalem' as Jewish leaders stoned him to death. Saul/Paul saw how he died with forgiveness and it would lead to Paul's becoming an Apostle to all the Gentiles. His message was "believe on the Lord Jesus and be saved" and he went everywhere proclaiming it. So Pentecost was to the Jews, an then the Gospel and Holy Spirit to all "the nations" (Gentiles). Pentecost had been a Hebrew "festival of first fruits" from O.T. times and those 5000 in that community were certainly first fruits for the Church (new Israel of GOD) that would spread to Athens and to the ends of the earth. We keep waiting for the King's return with our eyes on the middle east struggle, which has become global over petroleum. We are torn between holy oil and motor oil. Bush suggested that our closed military bases become refineries. Maybe that should be taken seriously. We sure are glad to have WW Refinery down here as a town base. Seems there's enough crude oil but not enough refineries since no new ones have been built the past three decades. I'll end with this song: "Give me oil in my lamp, keep me burning. Give me oil in my lamp I pray. Give me oil in my lamp, keep me burning. Keep me burning till the break of day."
ANGELFIRE 5-21-05
So the king of talk won't be allowed to say anything to aid the king of pop. Though the defense had Larry King ready to testify, the judge rejected it as only hearsay. Still they have more "royalty" lined up: Jay Leno, Liz Taylor, etc. and maybe even Elvis if available from his Graceland cemetery.. He was another king, of rock and roll, and he keeps reappearing. I wonder if that's where Michael Jackson got his notion for Neverland and if it to be his burial place. Oh no, I remember that it was from Mary Poppins as Peter Pan instead. Since I very seldom watch movies, that's sort of a guess for me. But I do listen to and watch some talk shows, even Larry King now and then. Just so much drivel and swill out there to entertain that can pollute your mind when you could be reading Scripture. This morning I read about Achan, who took some booty from that city near Jerico called Ai. Just a Babylonian robe, but it brought a curse on Israel and when Achan finally confessed, Joshua had him stoned to death and burned along with all his family. That lifted the curse and then everything in Ai could be safely taken. So the blood and fire brought about purification, just as Jerico was first made an offering in their holy war of conquest in Canaan. The Bible tells about our terrifying GOD. Even long before Joshua, Abram had been commanded to offer up his beloved son Isaac as a burnt offering on Mt.Moriah. His obedience gained him the fuller name of Abraham, "father of many nations" and Moriah later was identified with Mt.Zion in Jerusalem. Then Mt.Golgotha just outside the city was where GOD did what He had let Abram avoid, offered up His own son, a Sacrifice burnt by the fires of hate. Man's discovery of fire is supposed to be one of our most primitive accomplishments, but I find it first mentioned in Scripture when Abram took the fire in his hand, along with the knife. Blood and fire were his expectation that day until that ram was seen caught in thicket. Instead, the LORD turned it into a type of blessings to come at Calvary through all time. Such is more stirring than Hollywood's rich royalty, I say. A song I like goes "God Leads His Dear Children Along." It ends with "some through the water, some through the flood, some through the fire, but all through the blood. Some through great sorrow; but GOD gives a song in the night seasons and all the day long."
And now there's an hispanic mayor in LA? I think that's big news since hispanics outnumber blacks as the second sized ethnic group in America. He certainly has a big job to do. Just hope he can handle it. We have a number of black mayors in major cities so it's sure time now for a hispanic one. What amazing strides in this land toward "liberty and justice for all." Makes me proud to be a citizen of the USA where everbody is equally entitled in the eyes of the law. But I do hope that filibustering can be stopped in our capitol. Such a waste of time and energy, and being of long tradition is no justification. Up or down now is our need. Things are moving too fast for delay. In fact "filibusters" been a dirty word for a long time as I recall. An expression for stalling, procrastination and b.s. all combined.
That Malone guy from Duncan is on trial now for killing a patrolman down in SE Okla. last year, Nikki Green. Mrs.Green, the widow wants him to get the death penalty, though she leaves the eternal destiny to "our heavenly Father." I think that's how Joshua felt toward Achan, whom he called a troubler. Achan's grave is in the Valley o Achor (trouble). Certainly Mrs. Green and her family have endured plenty because of that confessed killer, though some still don't want the death penalty for him and he has shown remorse. Yet I think the widow should be judge since she's bore the pain of it. Let her have the final word if pity's to be shown. To murder an officer of the law is a crime against all of us the way Achan's was against Israel. And Joshua is the same name as Jesus in the New Testament, Who'll have the final say in all matters. His return is surely close at hand.
ANGELFIRE 5-25-05
Senator John McCain's the hero of compromise in our nation's legislature as a deadlock has been broken there over Federal Court nominees. I'd say that it was his own filibuster that saved our long standing legacy of talk talk talk. He may well be on the road to become our next president now. Since he's also chairman of our Senate Gaming Commission, I'd go along with a hard crack down on run away gambling in America. It could be merged with the War on Terror just like drugs. As we've seen Afghanistan return to exporting opium, we're aware of how deadly that can be. Closer to home, we still have Columbia's cocaine to cope with. And right here in Garvin county it's been meth labs. Sheriff Bill Roady explained on his TV show how much other crime is combined with making and selling that most addictive of all drugs. He told of a national sheriff's meeting where the speaker showed lack of such awareness. So he arose to ask "How many meth labs have you busted?" We'd been through the worst rash of it anywhere and he wanted them all to realize the extremes to which users/sellers will resort, which increases the risk to law enforcement officers. And gambling (artificial risk to manipulate chance for pleasure) is an addiction too. Have you noticed that just as Islamic nations have no liquor traffic, there's no gambling either. That's because the Quran bans such behaviors. Yet it doesn't mention opium, so that can be sold abroad, just not to fellow Muslims. Of course the Bible makes bans a matter of conscience, both individually and collectively. So liquor/drugs or gambling/prostitution should all be prohibited Biblically speaking.
I went to see graduation at Tabitha Winn's invitation, who often sets out my papers on the dock for me. She and her class were an inspiring sight at Thompson Field. Her first and second names are both Biblical, so I checked the whole list to find 16 guys and 9 gals with Bible names (3 Jonathans and 3 Sarahs). And several like Tabitha had both from the holy Book. Now I don't want to be like those Arabs that went crazy over a report in Newsweek later repudiated about Quran abuse. But I certainly do prize and cherish our sacred Scripture kept alive through names given to the children. Though one of the Sarahs shocked me in her class president address saying "doors will close before you, but don't stop. Break out the glass, crawl through and move ahead." That was hyperbole I know, but maybe with a touch of vandalism. Ha.
Before my Panther graduation in '44 a navy recruiter told me about their new field of "electronics." It was a new term then so I asked "What's that?" and he replied "It's going to change the world!" I did apply and enlisted for electronics training. RT had been the designation for "radio tech" but I became an "ET" which was th new title. And wow, it change the world. First I ever heard of computers were those aboard ship, which filled an entire room with all their vacuum tubes. They've become smaller and smaller as transistors replaced tubes and circuits on chip boards the racks that had held tubes the way radios were once made. Now there's another word I've recently heard that will surely impact even more than "electronics;" another industrial revolution some have called it: "nanotechnology." It will enable construction from atomic particles, the ultimate miniturization. Right now I hear on C-MSNBC that nations around the world are investing over fifty percent of the starting cost for such industry. If you look on-line you'll find amazing claims for what's ahead. The electronics of my day were kid stuff compared to nanotech. (Maybe Christ will return though electrons and quarks of the microcosm instead of the stars and galaxies of the macrocosm).
I've heard of autism through the years, but watched OETA Sunday night to see how different it from mental retardation. It's defined as "a mental state marked by disregard of external reality" and can be diagnosed from infancy. The life story of a girl in CA showed what isolation she endured until a new therapy enabled her to communicate with others. Though still unable to speak, her devoted therapist helped her use a keyboard to communicate as we heard the therapist read her words aloud. What a powerful story. Made me think of Helen Keller and how she overcame being deaf, dumb and blind. In fact, it was like Sarah said, "breaking out the glass and climbing through the closed door." Yeah and right on glass breaker Sue Rubin, and all you PV grads too!
ANGELFIRE 5-30-05
Memorial Day always brings somber thoughts as we recollect those who are gone from this earth. Though Yahweh GOD revealed to our common ancestor Adam that man's destiny is "dust to dust," He had also breathed into His earth creature some of His own breath/spirit; and it would return to Him when each of Adam's race expired. Thus, the "dust" creature was also a "living soul" with eternal destiny. He both had a soul and was one. Soul, like GOD, is supernatural and impossible to fully define. Do I have one or is that I really am. Usually I just equate my soul with an eternal destiny in heaven or hell. But I've come to see that we speak of the soul as being in the body, when the opposite is more accurate. The body is in the soul. Thus when our spirit returns to God Who gave it, our body will return to the dust until resurrection day. Then Christ comes back with all the holy angels created before this material realm plus spirits of those saved persons, to inhabit their new glorified bodies. Souls either go along with spirits to GOD or leap from the day of a person's death to over time to that final glorious morning of eternity. I think it was John Keats, an English poet, who picked up a sea shell that spiralled from it's center core outward in ever larger rings. It's called "The Chambered Nautilus." As he pondered the life journey of that tiny creature from the beginning to it's large outer shell, he wrote these lines to himself which I've long treasured: "Build thee more stately mansions oh my soul. As the swift seasons roll, let each new vaulted past shut thee from heaven with a dome more vast. 'Till at last thou art free, leaving thine outgrown shell by life's unchanging sea." After I've finished singing at the nursing homes each week, I like to end by playing my Omnicord's noise of ocean waves crashing against some beach as birds cry out from the sky. To me it's the background sound of eternity while I offer a closing prayer. All that we have to keep beyond this life is that which has been entrusted into the hands of our Lord i.e. "I know in Whom I have believed and persuaded that he is able to keep that which I've entrusted unto Him against that day" (which can also be sung as a chorus).
Monday I hope to get up OKC for the start of our Okla. Annual Conference and meet our new bishop, Robert Hayes from Houston TX, while I'm there. He's an effective journalist I can see from his articles in "Contact," our Conference bi-monthly publication. And he may be the first black UMC bishop. I'm not sure. Those who've heard him preach were quite inspired, just as WW students were Saturday afternoon when Mt.Carmel's pastor Willie Tiller brought the baccalaureate address at WHS.
The church at Joy certainly has a Bible preacher in Clay Shannon. Last Sunday night he dealt with Abaham's obedience, being ready to offer up his son Isaac. Then he tried to express the joy at seeing that ram God was willing to accept instead. Clay said "Abraham must have done some shouting and maybe even danced a little about that." He covers the text well and adds some colorful drama at those six pm services.