Nazis At The Door

I have a friend whose father (now deceased) was a teenager during the holocaust.  Somehow, he avoided being sent to the gas chamber and was freed by the Allies.  He made his way to America where he found Christ, married a lovely girl and became a missionary to Japan.  His daughter, my friend, grew up in Japan, married another missionary kid and they were great missionaries, and still are.

For some reason known only to God, besides having healthy children, this couple had one boy who had some sort of extremely rare syndrome and spent almost all of his 40+ years as a 6-month-old child. It was obvious that he felt love, could be happy or upset, laughing, crying, responding and generally living his life in his reality.  But make no mistake, it was never easy.  

I can never forget my friend sharing this tidbit of wisdom one day as we worked together, "My dad taught us kids that if the Nazi's are not at your door, you are NOT having a bad day."

I had to think about that a few times this week. Nothing serious, just a lot of humbug. 

Tony sprained his knee before we went off to Thailand, and the doctors told us it was a 'sprained ligament' but after two months, he still hadn't bounced back, so we went back to the doctor. After an MRI, it was discovered that he had a torn meniscus, stretched ligaments and some age-related bone deterioration. Showing us the MRI picture, the doctor pointed to some dark areas on the screen and said, “Now THAT, that’s unhappiness.” But the good news is that Tony won’t be needing surgery any time soon. Instead, he was told to get a good cane and try to stay off the leg for a few months.....................Face it, we're getting old.

Then there's my mind.  While doing and thinking about a bunch of different things, I was at the store where I tried on 4 pairs of jeans. It's getting cooler here and I need to cover up a bit.  As you may remember, most of our 'stuff' is in storage while we figure out what we're doing with our lives for the next little while.

Anyway, somehow in the transverse from the dressing room to the cash register, I forgot which ones fit and which ones didn't. I finally decided to buy them all, knowing I could bring back the ones that didn’t fit. Two did, two didn’t. 

Back home, I noticed a big package of cheese in the fridge, and thought, "I need to freeze that since we're not going to use it soon and it might mould.  So I moved it (I thought), to the freezer, which is down to the right. I found it days later in the crisper, which was down, but instead of 'to the right,' it was  'to the wrong'.....side.........and beginning to mould.

To top it off, you may remember that I mentioned a dear friend who died a few weeks ago. Now this week it was a dearer friend, sick only months and gone.  She was our age.  In fact, she had worked hand in hand with our friends who I mentioned at the beginning.

And then from bad to worse, our electrician, who was the best lay-preacher and worship leader that we've ever known, went to sleep on Mother's Day evening, planning to lead the worship the next day. Instead, he woke up in the arms of Jesus. He was 42.

I had to remind myself this morning that "The. Nazis are not at our door", and more importantly, we’re all still here.  We can take 5 minutes out of our otherwise busy day to read this and still have a rational thought.  God hasn't called us home and sees fit to keep us in our right minds a little longer.

Our goings may not be easy, but let's think about what we can do to make our very existence worth the time we have left. Tony and I were remembering a popular song of many years ago.  In fact, we remembered another missionary friend and his cute little daughter singing this as a duet. You probably know it:

"He who began a good work in you". By Steve Green

And the friends we've lost this week?  God spoke the truth: He was faithful to see it all to completion, accomplishing every purpose for which they were created before calling them home. The words of Philippians 1:6 have taken on a more precious meaning for me. "Being confidant of this very thing, that He which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ"

Talk again soon (at the place of His choosing), 

Marsha