Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. "Honor your father and mother" (this is the first commandment with a promise), "that it may be well with you and that you may live long on the earth." Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.

Ephesians 6:1-4, RSV

 

In The University of Hard Knocks, Ralph Parlette tells a story of his mother that probably would have gotten her investigated today. It happened when he was sitting at the highest seat at the table when he was but three years old. He recalls that he had spotted a coffee pot, a bright and gleaming and beautiful coffee pot, and decided that he just had to have it. But his mother said, "Don't touch it!"

 

In Ralph's memory of this event he said that this woman was a meddler. He said that there was not one thing that this woman had not interfered with in his entire three years of life and it was time to stop this "petticoat tyranny".

 

And he did!

 

He said that he dumped about a gallon of the reddest, hottest coffee that a bad boy had ever spilled in his lap. For weeks after that he was upholstered in everything from chicken fat to coal oil as he was being treated for his burns. The ladies aid society agreed that allowing her son to be burned was no way to treat this angel child, but his mother knew.

 

Did you have a mother that did not fully appreciate the "angel child" that she was raising in you? I did. I remember when I was just a bit older than Ralph in his coffee pot incident when I, too, had decided that my mother had interfered a bit too often in my life. I had heard a phrase from the other kids in the neighborhood that I had been dying to try out, when the day came that I had the opportunity to do so.

 

Mom was vacuuming and I had hopped up on a chair to get away from the vacuum, only to have Mom tell me to stop standing on the furniture. However, I was prepared this time to end her interfering in my life with the magic phrase I had heard from my associates down the block. I stood up and said defiantly, "I don't have to if I don't want to."

 

Some people after a traumatic incident will say something along the lines of "I didn't even knew what hit me". I did... it was mother! She slapped this fresh little four year old on his fresh big mouth and put an end once and for all to that type of behavior.

 

Now, there will be some in our modern day equivalents to the ladies aid societies of old who will agree that this was no way to treat an angel child, but my mom didn't care a whit about what they would have thought. She was training a naughty boy to grow up to be a good man, and she taught me a lesson in the only way that seemed appropriate for the time.  And, I can honestly say that I do not remember talking back to my mother or father, even through my teen years, ever again.

 

My mom and dad are gone now, but I will always love them for raising me by godly standards. They knew that I would stand before God in Judgment someday and either by His grace and the sacrifice of His Son be granted entrance to the one place I do not deserve - Heaven, or by my own stubbornness and sin be thrown into the place that no one wants to go no matter how much they deserve it - Hell.

 

My Mom and Dad taught me to honor them, and to so honor God. And I will never be able to thank them enough! How about you?

To the choirmaster. A Psalm of David.

I waited patiently for the LORD; He inclined to me and heard my cry.

He drew me up from the pit of destruction, out of the miry bog,

and set my feet upon a rock, making my steps secure.

He put a new song in my mouth, a song of praise to our God.

Many will see and fear, and put their trust in the LORD.

Blessed is the man who makes the LORD his trust...

Psalms 40:1-4, ESV

 

This is fast becoming one of my favorite passages in all of Scripture. The last four years have been particularly trying for Carolyn and I, having lost all four of our parents and then going through one of the most confusing periods of our times.

 

I think a lot of people can relate as they also have been through times that many thought they would never see. We have watched as a disease ravaged the entire world, only to be followed by the often incompetence of world leaders whose solution to the problem was often harsher than the disease itself. We have seen people willingly give up their freedoms in an effort to save their physical lives. Each person can judge for themselves whether their efforts have been worth the sacrifices, but one thing is for sure:

 

We have all been in a pit!

 

Some still find themselves in that pit - we all do from time to time, so what do we do? This is where David's Psalm provides so much comfort. David said that he waited patiently for the LORD, and that the Lord actually inclined towards him and heard his cry. God not only proceeded to remove David from that pit of destruction, but then he set his feet on solid ground so that he wouldn't slip back into the pit.

 

It's no wonder that David said God put a new song of praise in his mouth, and that those who witnessed all that God had done for David not only feared God, but they put their trust in Him. And whenever men put their trust in God, they are blessed.

 

Do you find yourself in a pit? Would the help that God gave David help you as well? Isn't at least worth a try... or would you rather continue on as you have been going, digging deeper and deeper into your personal pit of destruction while relying on often godless men to come to your rescue?

 

God is great! All we have to do is wait patiently for Him, cry out to Him, trust in Him and Christ, and then wait for them to help us out of even the darkest pit.

And at the end of seven days, the word of the LORD came to me: If I say to the wicked, ‘You shall surely die,’ and you give him no warning, nor speak to warn the wicked from his wicked way, in order to save his life, that wicked person shall die for his iniquity, but his blood I will require at your hand. But if you warn the wicked, and he does not turn from his wickedness, or from his wicked way, he shall die for his iniquity, but you will have delivered your soul. Again, if a righteous person turns from his righteousness and commits injustice, and I lay a stumbling block before him, he shall die. Because you have not warned him, he shall die for his sin, and his righteous deeds that he has done shall not be remembered, but his blood I will require at your hand.

But if you warn the righteous person not to sin, and he does not sin, he shall surely live, because he took warning, and you will have delivered your soul.”

 

Ezekiel 3:16-21, ESV

 

Happy, Texas, the place that I have called home for the past 26 years, just lost one of her greatest watchman. His name was Joe Bill, and he was the epitome of what a police officer should be. I was greatly blessed to have Joe Bill as my friend. 

 

Joe Bill was 6'3" tall, had a bass voice that could nearly split concrete, and served in just about every type of law enforcement that you could imagine. From a city police officer (patrol and motor cycle), to Sheriff's deputy, to University Campus Police, to Child Protective Services and, finally, to a volunteer Chief of Police for Happy, where he refused to take any pay, Joe Bill did it all.

 

And he did it well.

 

I heard story after story from first hand accounts how Joe Bill served with compassion. When he caught someone who should not have had alcohol with alcohol, he would make them pour it out. Then he would give them a talk about safety, and then he would tell them something along the lines that there better not be a second time. And there rarely was. I heard people talk about how Joe Bill had pulled them over with just a warning. To my knowledge, in all the years he served in Happy, he never gave a ticket. It's not that they didn't deserve one, and it's not that Happy couldn't have used the revenue. It was simply that he did not want to ruin somebody's day, or raise their insurance unnecessarily.

 

Most of all, he just wanted people to be safe.

 

I remember visiting with him about his work with Child Protective Services. Knowing how he felt about those who would abuse children, combined with his size and strength, and the fact that no one would have blamed him had he broken every bone in the body of the one who had abused the child, I wondered how he could show the restraint that he did. Make no mistake, this was one area where he did not feel that someone deserved a second chance to repeat the crime that brought Joe Bill into their life. It was just that he did not want to risk the health of that child by doing anything that would allow a criminal of that magnitude of evil to go free.

 

As in everything he did, Joe Bill just wanted everyone to be kept safe, especially children.

 

His oldest grand daughter graduated from police academy recently. Joe Bill pinned the badge on her at her induction ceremony. He told her that she needed to conduct her public service by the book... and then he gave her the book that she was to go by and to serve by... the Bible! And he told her the verse in the Bible that meant so much to him. It is found in Matthew 5:9. In it, Jesus simply states, "Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God."

 

Joe Bill Dempsey recently had two occasions where the people of our town were able to express in a small way the appreciation they had for he and his wife Glinda As every law enforcement person knows, they could not do half of what they do without the support of their families, and especially their spouses. Joe Bill had the best in that category (family and wife). After being so honored - first at the school and then at the church -, against his will I should add, he wrote a thank you note to the church and to the community. He ended it by saying that he hoped someday to be a watchman over those streets of gold.

 

Joe Bill, lived his life as a watchman. He lived to warn the righteous and the wicked in hopes that they might repent and thereby be kept safe. In the end, Joe Bill did his job as well as any man I have ever known. I wonder who will now step up and take over the work that he devoted his life to so beautifully...

 

 

And behold, there arose a great storm on the sea, so that the boat was being swamped by the waves; but he was asleep. And they went and woke him, saying, “Save us, Lord; we are perishing.” And he said to them, “Why are you afraid, O you of little faith?” Then he rose and rebuked the winds and the sea, and there was a great calm.

Matthew 8:24-26, ESV

 

It seems that the whole world has been in a storm over the past two years. We have had a very real problem that has had very real consequences - there is no denying that.

 

There is also no denying that many people, as a result of this storm, have become very, very afraid. In fact, it seems that many people have become so afraid of dying that they have stopped living. The simple message of this article is that we cannot become so afraid of dying that we stop living for the Lord.

 

I like the Bible. Most things that we struggle with are addressed within the Word of God. And every time we see such problems addressed, we see that God has the solution to the problems. Take the apostles in the passage above. Even though they were experienced fishermen with countless storms behind them, the storm they were going through was particularly violent. So violent, in fact, that these seasoned veterans of the sea were in fear for their lives. So they turned to Jesus.

 

And He calmed the storm.

 

Would such power help you today? Maybe, instead of being so afraid of dying we should start becoming bold enough to live for God. I think that we will find that such a change will make all the difference. Perhaps all we really need... is a little faith. I think that you will agree that it is time to start living again.