Why we need Jesus...

"Reason and morality cannot show us a good and gracious God.  For that, we need the incarnation...The God revealed in Christ does what reason and morality cannot to...Many people today act like someone has created a peace treaty between reason and faith, after reason won the war...Special revelation, especially the incarnation, is precisely where the Christian faith breaks down the wall our culture has erected between faith and reason...The gospel creates not speculative pundits, spiritual gurus, or moralists but witnesses."

Excerpted from "The God Who Came Down" 

by Michael Horton

What a difference a day makes...

Each year, on December 28, I pause to reflect on my story.

Life moves past us at such a brisk pace that it's easy to forget what life was like 44 years ago; what life could have been like, had God not intervened that night in 1968.  It was the last Saturday night of the year; I had a plan for my evening, and it certainly did not include an up close conversation with God.  But, He had a different plan...and, as it turns out, it changed my life forever.

But the path to that evening in 1968 started many years before...when my Grandmother, who lived with us at the time, would gather me up and carry me off to Church and Sunday School--I still have my first Bible, the one mom gave me to take to church with Grandma.  I didn't know, until I was a young adult, that my grandmother faithfully prayed for me each day--that "BJ would experience the power of Christ in his life and embrace Jesus as his Lord and Savior."  She eventually moved back to her roots in Fort Scott Kansas.  But I continued to get myself to church until about the 8th grade.

I don't recall why I decided to "drop out" but I'm sure it just didn't feel very "cool" to attend church and sunday shcool any longer--and since I went by myself, it was my decision to make.  Fast forward to the fall of my Jr. year in High School.  One evening I landed at a "Campus Life" meeting at the home of a classmate (Jim Rehnberg)...it was the kickoff for the school year and as advertised, it was a "Burger Bash"--all you could eat--and a huge crowd of students.  But I got more that evening than a big meal.  The Campus Life leader, Mark Zier, gave a short talk at the end and he asked the crowd..."If you died tonight, do you know where you're going?"  I didn't; it bothered me, then I moved on.

On the evening of December 28, 1968 I was set to attend an "Afterxms" party with some buddies (Jerry McClain was driving).  Our "wires got crossed" (coincidence?) and they never showed up; stuck, I recalled something was happening at the Rec-center with Campus Life that night--they called it a "Campus Life Rally."  There was a girl I had some interest in (Colleen Rehnberg) and I knew she would probably be there (I was right);  I managed to catch Mark (Zier) before he'd left his house.  He was delighted when I called, and he swung by and picked me up.  An evening of activities, music and then a guy, Roger Cross, got up and challenged me again about my life and death.  This time I was ready and wanted to get this question resolved; Mark talked with me and then invited me to pray a short, simple prayer, and the rest...is history.

Three weeks later I went to the Ventura "Rally" because Mark asked me to share about my recent conversion experience with that half of the county we lived in. Mark mentioned a girl he thought I'd really like, a cute sophomore at Buena HS named Laura--he wanted to introduce us; he was right.  In that span of three weeks I'd had two introductions that literally changed the direction and the outcome of my life: I'd trusted Christ and met my future wife--we married 3 years, 48 weeks and 6 days later.

My home was a rather complicated place.  Lot's of love and pain.  I was carrying some emotional baggage by that time and was making some bad choices.  Christ changed all that in an instant.  The baggage was there--if fact it didn't get fully "unpacked" for years.  But His presence in my life set me in a "best direction" that just never wavered.  Laura's family became a surrogate family for me as our relationship grew; they, especially her dad (my dad died suddenly in 1970), filled a great need in my life.

In the 80's there was a popular gospel song written by Bill Gaither that describes my story, I get choked up every time I sing it; the chorus declares..."Something beautiful, something good; all my confusion He understood, all I had to offer him was brokenness and strife, but He made something, beautiful, out of my life."

December, 28, 1968.  What a difference a day makes.

2013: a "Big Ben" year...

Four big milestones in 2013. 

• Celebrate 40 years married to Laura January 5.  
• Watch the Irish make it 12 National titles on January 7.  
• Mark entrance into my 6th decade on March 14, my 60th birthday.
• Blessed to have had 45 yeas "in Christ" December 28.

It's been a good life.

#59...

Christmas #59 is in the books.  

Some random thoughts...

• Had a great celebration...but with some missing parts; family in CA, NJ, NC, CO...wish we could all be together.
• Erin hosted again on XmsEve...Laura on XmsDay. (I am keeping Christ in Christmas..."X" is the ancient symbol for Christ. Greek letter Chi "X" is the first letter of Greek "Xristos" or Christ...nuf' said.) They did such a wonderful job making us all feel at home and feeding us very well.
• One member of the family was just recovering from the flu, so glad she felt just well enough to join us...so much appreciate the effort it took.
• Grand sons are growing up too fast.
• Movie selection this year "Trouble with a Curve Ball."

But this year there was an undercurrent of sadness and concern; it was buried inside us, but it was there.  Why wouldn't it be?  Grief over the senseless murders of people in Oregon and Connecticut, an ambush/murder of two first responders in New York state, bitter division that still plagues our government, a population unwilling to celebrate our diversity and unable settle on what constitutes our "core values," uncertainty about the economy and a health-care system, a school system sabotaged by politicians which is exhausting the people charged with the task of education (4 in my family), 10+ years of war, a future for our children, grandchildren...our Nation.

These are disquieting times.  The conclusion to President Abraham Lincoln's 2nd inagural address seems so appropriate to these days we're living in...

"...With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation’s wounds; to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan—to do all which may achieve and cherish a just, and a lasting peace, among ourselves, and with all nations."

Lincoln saved the Nation once.  Perhaps his wisdom might point the way again.

God's love never fails...

We are the reason for the season...

"When we were utterly helpless, Christ came at just the right time and died for us sinners...God showed his great love for us by sending Christ to die for us..."

Christmas is joyous because God's love never fails.

Shalom L'Chaim, in Christ.

Blog, blah, blah...

Someone asked me recently "why do you blog?  Nobody reads it, what's the point?" 

It's not the "reading" that's the magic. 

For now...it's the writing; great therapy, keeps me engaged, demands rigorous thought and teaches me a great deal as I work through the process.

For later...I'm leaving a cyber "paper trail" that my friends, family...especially my kids and grandkids...can log onto and "hear" me, remember me; who I was, what my passions in life were, how I thought and what I valued. I pray it just might make a difference in their lives someday...can you spell l-e-g-a-c-y?

Grateful to live in an era that has empowered me "go on the record" and leave something of what makes me unique behind.  I can't live forever, but the words I leave behind, they can.