HEADLINE EVENT

Yes, that's Pat Boone at the podium, me in blue, 
far right, half a century ago....

Pat Boone was coming to our small central Washington town—to sing and PREACH! He was the headline event for our valley's combined- churches spring worship service, held in the local football stadium. As the most youthful member (mid-20s) of our daily newspaper staff, I was picked to cover his visit. One problem: I didn't identify with the youth pop culture. My heroes (as a violinist) were Bach, Mozart, Beethoven and the like.  While my friends tuned in on their black-and-white televisions to Dick Clark's “American Bandstand” and watched selected teens (in modest clothing) wiggling away in a crowded dance space, I didn't. It just wasn't my style. And so, the least pop-culture-aware member of the newspaper staff found herself set up to interview the pop singer famed for his gleaming smile and white bucks—and for his Christian testimony.

I'd been so busy with my other newspaper assignments (which included obituaries and wedding writeups) that I didn't take the time to visit the library and find out more about him. (This was the early 70s—way long before the internet was just a few finger taps away.) Thankfully, the other reporter called to this press conference (a college intern for the local radio station) had a question ready as we gathered with Pat Boone and local dignitaries in a quickly-set-up interview in the girl's locker room of a local junior high. Well, he was speaking at the local town stadium, just a few hundred feet away.

The radio's reporter asked: “What is your favorite Bible verse?” Now, that made sense because, besides his fame as a pop song star who had his first “single” (best-seller record) at age 21, Boone was known as a clean-cut guy who identified as a Christian. Hollywood celebrities came to Bible studies at his home! I was surprised—through shouldn't have been—by Mr. Boone's quick answer: “Philippians 2:12: 'Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.'”

It wasn't “work FOR,” as though salvation had to be earned, but “work OUT.” Later, as I encountered that verse in my own Bible reading, I connected the dots (and understanding) to the following verse: “For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure.” In other words, the Christian life is a partnership: the Great and Awesome God of all Creation, stooping down to teach and train His human creations to live in a way that honors Him.

 When I last checked the internet (something I couldn't do back in the 1970s!) Pat Boone was still living, turning 89 on June 1. His wife Shirley, whom he married just out of high school, died just short of age 85. His biography details all his “singles” and high-charted hits. His 45 million records sold. How many were “gold.” His awards. But whenever I think back to meeting the man in white buck shoes—who not only sang but preached at the all-church Sunday worship our community held in the big football field (and I was there to photograph it)--I remember his confident answer, quickly quoted from scripture.

 One of Boone's hits was titled “Love Letters in the Sand.” I can almost picture that happening in a guy-girl date at the beach. But his higher focus was the “love letter” God wrote all of us, not in sand, but on a crude wooden cross where His son Jesus died for past-present-future sins. Pat Boone may have been the most famed singer the 50s and 60s of love songs, but I think he'd agree that the greatest love song remains this: that Jesus loves us, this we know.

NAILED IT!

My plate was full, as the saying goes. My husband was in the hospital, and I was trying hard to “hold life together.” I’d stopped at the grocery store for some essentials, pulling quickly into an empty spot. I didn’t straighten the wheels, which meant when I came out, the angled tire of the front driver’s side was exposed at just the right place to show the head of a huge nail. I was surprised the tire wasn’t flat.

Changing tires is not on my list of “know-how-to-do.” We don’t have “road service” insurance. But now, what to do was up to me. I decided to risk the mile drive to the local tire dealer, praying the whole way! Arriving safe (with a big Thank you, Lord), I was told I’d have an hour or more wait to have it fixed. It was a hot summer day and I had milk in the trunk. When I mentioned that need, they showed extraordinary customer TLC by “parking” the milk temporarily in their employee refrigerator. (Thank you, Lord!)

An hour-plus later, tire fixed, the employee who came with my keys remarked, “That nail went all the way through. It’s amazing your tire wasn’t flat.” (Another arrow “Thank you, Lord!”)

Twice we’ve been in wrecks that others caused, and which destroyed our car. Both incidents were stark reminders of our vulnerabilities in travel. Post-wreck, I often thought of Psalm 91, which speaks of God’s trustworthiness in dangerous situations. But I’ve learned I can’t apply that like an all-purpose bandage to every danger I encounter. Sometimes, in His sovereign will, God allows the frustration, the difficulties, even the life-endangerment.

And sometimes it’s obvious He intervenes when that might increase my faith. I needed such spiritual-boosting as my husband recovered in the hospital. Driving home with that fixed tire, I remembered the psalmist’s observation that “he will command his angels concerning you” (v. 11).

The truth is, that would have applied to my frustrations if I had come out with bags of groceries (and cold milk!) to a truly flat tire in a skinny parking place in a busy supermarket shopping center, and was stuck. Somehow, someone would have helped me in that inconvenient time and place. But I’m glad it turned out the way it did, and maybe God just needed to remind me that, as Psalm 33:18 says, that “the eyes of the Lord are on those who fear him” (v. 33). Whether road hazards or the health of a loved one, He can handle it.

By the way, I later expressed my thanks to the tire crew, taking in a note with a big plate of cookies. It was the least I could do.

PORTENT (Psalm 71)

Smile--an illustration of "ripe old age"! This is an 

"heirloom" tomato.

(A continuing series on the 48 psalms listed as "recommended reading" for times of depression, from pastor/counselor David Seamands in his book Healing for Damaged Emotions.)

This is often called the “old peoples’ psalm,” but one little one in verse 7 kept gnawing at me as I read the psalm in several translations.  It’s from this verse, rendered in the New International Version (also the English Standard Version) this way:

I have become a portent to many, but you are my strong refuge.

My notes next to it---perhaps from a long-ago sermon or other study—said this: "a barometer or sign; others took faith cues from him.” In other translations it’s rendered “example” (New Living), “wonder” (1611 and New King James), “marvel” (New American Standard), and “mystery” (Today’s English Version).

WHAT'S THAT WORD?

Sometimes it’s important (not related to portent) to understand specific words, and I think this is the case here. The enormous Thorndike Barnhart dictionary defines it as “a warning, usually of coming evil; sign, omen.” The original Hebrew, mopheth, denotes something conspicuous, a sign or a perhaps ominous event. Think of Moses and his “signs” or miracles before Pharaoh. So how, in old age, can we be a “portent” to many?

 I think the answer is in reconsidering the new attitude toward aging. Long ago, the aged were respected and looked up to. Today, we dread turning 55, when the mailbox begins to bulge with AARP and cremation options literature. Our culture has shifted to worshiping the youth culture. I think of that when I see a mature woman with beautiful silver hair—and an orange or purple stripe through it.

So what can the psalmist teach us about growing old well?

First, some housekeeping business.  Who wrote it?  This psalm and Psalm 43, which commentators believe was really the second half of Psalm 42, are the only ones without an author credit. As such, it’s anonymous, though some think it was written by a Levite about to retire from temple service.  In those days, such service was so aging and exhausting (think: constant slaughtering and heaving of carcasses up onto the altar) that Levites could only serve between the ages of 25 and 50. Others attribute it to an aging David, and that might be closer to the truth if it is attached to the five verses of Psalm 70, which pleads for God to help him.  It reads naturally into the beginning of Psalm 71. From the “help!” of Psalm 70 we go right to images of how God is our help in Psalm 71. From the first three verses, He:

*Is a refuge and rock of refuge.

*Never lets us be put to shame.

*Rescues us.

*Delivers us.

*Turns his ear toward us and saves us.

*Is our fortress

His enemies have no such perspective. They claim that God has forsaken him (v. 11) so it’s time to pursue and seize him.  To this, the psalmist counters that he will have hope and praise God more, declaring His mighty acts (vv. 14-16).

The psalm, I think, turns on verses 17-18:

Since my youth, O God, you have taught me, and to this day I declare your marvelous deeds.  Even when I am old and gray, do not forsake me, O Lord, till I declare your power to the next generation, your might to all who are to come.

That’s the “portent,” the example of steadfast faith even to old age. Yes, the psalmist has his godless enemies and distracters. So do we, and sometimes our “distracters” are people who claim to know God but don’t behave like it. I heard it said that “Hurting people hurt people.” I’ve experienced that. But God is bigger than their mean words and actions, which nibble at me, pushing me into the blues or even depression. To be a “portent,” a warning against such things, I need to turn back to praise.

My tongue will tell of your righteous acts all day long,

For those who wanted to harm me have been put to shame and confusion. (v. 24)

Someone once said that when we get to Heaven, God’s not going to check us out for beauty but for battle scars. Troubles and trials are inevitable. Praise turns us into “portents”—older people to lead the way in loving and honoring Jesus Christ.

Framed faith

We call it our “Faith Box,” the 7x12-inch glass-fronted display case that hangs above the piano. It’s full now of tiny things that remind us of faith-stretching times of our lives.

A small bag of broken auto glass from our wrecked family car (bottom row, second from right) represents the October night in 1997 when we came within inches of a head-on, fatal crash caused by a speeding, drinking driver. Instead, he “T-boned” us, destroying our car and leaving us injured but alive. A few years later the nightmare became my call to action. I began speaking to convicted drunk drivers.

By their body language, most reveal their disgust for being required as part of their sentencing to attend this non-profit “educational panel” featuring drunk driver victims. Yet afterwards, some come up and thank me graciously for telling our story and those of friends, like our former neighbor and babysitter, Angela. She had grown up to be an excellent violinist and music teacher. A wrong-way drunk driver near Albany, Ore., killed her at 31. She became one of an estimated 15,000 a year killed by alcohol- or drug-impaired drivers.

Other tokens in our box don’t have such sobering connections. A tiny paper scroll labeled “mortgage” represents the joyful day we paid off our home loan early. Another paper simply said “Mammo—Psalm 90” for the Bible passage that carried me through uncertainty with a cancer biopsy. A single wrapped Lifesaver ® candy represents my husband surviving a river-tubing accident-- a story our children had not heard until we assembled the Faith Box. One holds a little acorn pin, given my husband one year for an “Outstanding Teacher” award. Tiny books represent the profound privilege I’ve had to write published books. Even my daughter added to the Faith Box, slipping in a note about how money came for her to participate in a junior high class field trip to Washington, D.C.

Some friends inspired our “Faith Box” after telling how they framed the first dollar they earned after working off a large debt. Later, in reading Joshua 4, I read of how the Israelites, while miraculously crossing the river bed of the halted Jordan into Canaan, gathered river stones and restacked them as a “faith memorial” for future generations. Gathering our own tokens of faith-events, we created our current box.

It’s good to remember milestones, just as long as we don’t get stuck in the memories. That’s why I embrace this principle: “Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See, I [God] am doing a new thing!” (Isaiah 43:18-19).

God is still in the business of offering fresh starts. After an auto wreck…or a personal or business wreck. I’m a different person because of these faith-moments, and that’s a good thing.