March 11, 2009

It's A Wonderful World

Read Isaiah 1:18-20

There is state-owned land west of New Haven with ponds, open fields, marsh, and forested swamp. This land is perfect to take a city dog who loves to run, sniff, and chase wildlife without the benefit of a leash confining the activity as it is in the city.

For Christmas, I gave my wife Susan, a pair of hunting field pants, a blaze orange vest, and blaze orange dog collar (for the dog, obviously, because he is deer-brown in color and could be mistaken for a small deer). Greater peace of mind both for her and the dog to avoid any misguided hunters.

While tromping around one January weekend, the three of us were having a wonderful time exploring the land and getting out confronting the winter weather, somewhat kinder on this particular day. Suddenly, breaking the stillness of the winter air, was the ringing of my cell phone. Who, on the phone, was none other than our son Ben, making his weekly call from his year-long contracting job in Iraq.

So, we are in the middle of nowhere running the dog, and are able to talk on the speaker function of the phone half-way around the world to our hard-working son. Just amazing to those of us old enough to think that a long-distance phone call was unusual and an especially expensive event.

To think that we, with God's grace, have been able to multi-function with such aplomb. In this instance, this ability is wonderful. The hard part, in a greater sense, is determining which of the possibilities we should actually use that our world offers in electronics, communications and other modern contrivances. Of course, now with our tough economic situation, some of those decisions are now obvious, in the sense that we just can not spend the money we do not have available.

How does this all tie together? Applying basic truths of Christianity to these complex issues is one way to bring some sense to what can be overwhelming. Also using the calming power of prayer can assist our minds to wisely re-focus and give a sense of grace to our thinking. Thanks to the Grosse Pointe United Methodist Church for helping us look at our wonderful, yet intricate, world from a Christian perspective.


Dave DeWitt