Grandparents

Honoring our Parents

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What is honor and what does it mean to honor our parents? One way I have come to understand it is that honor is a combination in equal parts of love and respect. Honoring our parents means we can not love without respect and we should never respect without loving.

Every week as I visit nursing homes I see the results of a culture that has often forgotten how to honor its mothers and fathers. and has abandoned it’s parents.

Yes they are professionally cared for. Yes they are clean and well fed, but they mostly spend their days alone. Though we may be honoring our own parents, God is also calling on us to hear the cry of the forgotten ones. On January 18th hundreds of thousands reminded our nation about the value of the unborn. Today we need many more among God’s people to also remember those left alone in institutions. God doesn’t forget a single sparrow. If we forget these mothers and fathers we have forgotten the heart of God.

Again I Say Rejoice

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Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say rejoice Philippians 4:4 

While Paul was writing from a Roman prison with guards chained to him on either side, my life’s problems pale in comparison. Yet Paul’s kind of rejoicing is a hard lesson for me to learn. Yes, things are not all that bad. We have moved into our comfortable small home in Florida but those we love especially the grandchildren we kissed good-bye just last week seem like a universe away. As we unpack and make phone calls to change our address with a thousand people we feel lost, lonely and joy, real load lifting and soul refreshing joy is something we long for.

But Jesus told us He was leaving us His joy – not a joy to be found anywhere on planet earth.

These things I have spoken to you, that My joy may remain in you, and that your joy may be full. John 15:11

His joy kept Jesus through the wavering loyalties, betrayals and treacheries that pressed Him towards a harsh Roman cross. His joy caused Him to wash dirty feet and skip lunch in the sweltering heat by a well to meet a woman who was thirsty for a water only He could give. The joy of Jesus Christ rises up and says, “Enough!” to waves and wind. His joy sees the way along shadowy valley paths and lights a candle of hope waiting for us at the end of the day. Maybe that is why Paul tells us, “Rejoice!” then in face of the improbable backdrop of His life and our’s He tells us again, “Rejoice!” The world may not get it. Our weary bodies may not feel like it and The devil can not understand it. But we who are God’s children are given the priceless gift of His joy. We only have to remember and believe His joy is especially deep and true when it comes in a morning light that wipes away the tears of our darkest night!

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Never too late to Leave a Legacy

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“If we knew how great the grandkids would be we’d have had them first!” some people say. For a parent exhausted and discouraged by years of struggling with just getting it right for a day, even one hour of grandparenting can feel lile the balm of Gilead! What can be more refreshing than pushing your granddaughter on a swing or holding your grandson’s hand as you crunch through Autumn leaves? But unlike the sense of never ending and overwhelming responsibility that being a parent brings; grandparenting comes wrapped in the sweet sadness of knowing it may not be for long.

I have lived enough to know that one day this time will pass and I will no longer be here with them. No amount of hugs or kisses can change the calendar or slow the pendulum of life’s clock. But what I can do today is to be sure of what legacy I leave behind. Will I leave them a list of my fears and frustrations or will I pass on to them my faith? Will they weep and say, “Grand-dad went to be with the Lord” or will they have His peace knowing that my life has been wholly His? What a great hope lies before us! We can still leave behind a great legacy…not that we lived trouble free but that through every mighty storm He has been our mighty Savior!