A Letter To My Sons

Education, Family Life, Humanity & Sin, Parenting, Spiritual Health,

My Dearest Sons,

If men do not appreciate the world of today, they must look to themselves.  God set up the order of things and placed men at the helm.  If what has transpired, if what is, does not suit them, they have only themselves to blame.  Maybe it is time to live according to God’s standards? Maybe it is time to value God and His Word above personal comfort and pleasures? Maybe it is time to bring back an individual sense of moral obligation and duty, and a denial of selfish interests?

I’m sure the decision to remain single in Jesus and for the sake of the gospel, has its own very great rewards, and there are those faithful to this decision and lifestyle who may be of aid to you, should you take this path.  However, I am familiar with the sacrement of marriage.  Marriage is the most beautiful illustration of sacrifice and joy because when done with pure intention; it imitates the sacrifice of God in Christ.  It is a picture of our relationship to Christ, highlighting the sacrifice He made, loving us while we were unlovable, and the blessing and joy He received and receives continually in an everlasting flow as a result.  Christ sits at God’s right hand enjoying Him forever! If you decide on marriage and want the best insurance that your marriage will be one that glorifies God, begin by dating only a woman who professes to love Jesus Christ, the son of God, and to own Him as her Savior and Lord.

Remember:  Man brought about the fall by his abdication of duty in the garden.  He chose to honor the gift rather than the giver.  He turned away from his First Love, if only for a moment, and failed to lovingly lead.  Then, when his Creator came looking for him to talk it over, he blamed God for the whole mess.  If unhappiness, oppression, evil is abounding- return to your First Love.  Acknowledge Your Creator and turn from your wickedness- and stop blaming God and others for your sin.

Stomping your foot in the backroom will not impress anyone.  Yelling at others and demanding that they respect you “just because” will not work.  Instilling fear in others may keep them close to you for a season but it will never do for the long haul.   You must earn your place of respect in their lives, and it is their duty to respond rightly.  Women and children generally and in the absence of illness,  do answer well to genuinely loving, gentle guidance, and self-sacrificial leadership.  And though they do not, your call to righteousness remains.  When you fail, go first to God, and seek His forgiveness.  Follow this with an authentic apology to the one or more whom you have wronged and there seek forgiveness.  Endeavor always to approach your charges with humility, compassion, and a pure heart, clothed in the quiet strength and resolute confidence that is the result of a completely surrendered life; and you will meet with God’s idea of success.

Still, the success you achieve within your own family will not necessarily follow in the world outside your family circle and the circle of the true church.  The organized church will be a place of like-minded Believers and fellows in the faith for the most part, but even here you will find some imposters.  There will be some within its walls who serve darkness.  The world will certainly not be without flaw.  And the world will challenge all, including those who have grown up under your leadership.  Only each one’s personal relationship with Christ will keep him or her safe from evil.  We live within a system marred by sin and hatred for what is right and true.  Humans are broken and only God in Jesus Christ can fix them.

But in the midst of all, you can find rest knowing that keeping your own eyes on Jesus, you faithfully honored and served your God, and that you led by loving example and tender heart toward those you touched, and that while imperfect, you were an example of His servant leadership to those within your sphere of influence, ever hopeful that each one would receive Jesus Christ as his or her personal Lord and Savior.  It is the best that any man can do.

 I love you ever and always,
Mother

Copyright 2021.    L.L.  Shelton.

Don’t Let It Be Forgot

Academics & The Arts, Church Culture, Current Events, Education, Essay and Prose, Living the Word, Politics, , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Is it probable that we have so abused our liberty  that we have propelled our nation into a choice between thinly veiled fascism and slightly  obscured communism? Is it too late for any rational choice- too late for our healing? Has the time passed for our recognition of the other’s point of view and a sincere attempt to find a common moral ground? Professing Christians stand resolutely on both sides of the divide, each one sure of his perspective and of his thoughts regarding  it.  Each idealogical camp accuses the other of a lack of regard for the living.  Each group is sure that the other is a culture committed to death of one kind or another; therefore each assembly is pushing for its members to vote according to conscience.

What if each individual and morally grounded voter is honestly compelled to consider an issue that he believes is a promotion of our culture of death, and is certain that the other party is oblivious to said issue; therefore he casts his ballot in the opposite direction? In this case, are we not obliged to consider that each congregation’s view of death is different.  As our president so aptly stated during a press briefing  related to the possibility of reopening the country during the COVID Crisis, and for these words I applaud  him, “There are many ways to die.”

While good Christians are united in their belief in their need of Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord, and in their belief in His divinely appointed position as the only begotten Son Of God, good Christians are diverse in their genetic compositions as well as in their life experiences, lifestyles, and in their personal and cultural histories.  These differences allow for the development of a curious array of perspectives.  What if each of us on both sides of the aisle- that is each one who is truly sane- understands that death is the ultimate evil ushered into the world by sin and longs for life to prevail? What if our greatest need is to sit with the other at a round table and discover the other’s understanding of the nature, structure, and definition of death? What if, presently, our greatest common good would be to cultivate a true comprehension of the other Christian American’s view? (This is not to say that the table should accommodate those who do not profess Christ as Savior and Lord.  The table I imagine would seat my friends and family members who are fruit producing, baptized Believers, as well as their loved ones who are in the same position, and as the true church we would come together to discuss our opinions of God’s communication of what constitutes oppression and death, and to further our understanding of the other tribe’s dialect concerning such things.)

I find that I agree with Ayn Rand (who by her own admission, thought under the influence of Aristotle) in specifically this:  For one man to demand that another man give up his own life and personal happiness for the sake of another is the ultimate selfishness and is evil.  That said, I wholeheartedly believe that the Creator God who exists does ask this of each man for the other, and encourage the Christian education that exposes others to this Biblical Truth, and the subsequent explanation of all Scripture.  I hope for the church to continually propagate her beliefs founded in The Word of God to man, and that many will give up their own self-centeredness to the better man in Christ Jesus, to the power of His Holy Spirit, and to the will of God.

In conclusion, it is apparent that some good Christians are assured of the science evident in the natural physical world and other good Christians avow the “magic” of Aslan, and that some of us embrace both; of course both in the purest sense are True, as both in the purest sense can be known.  Come, let the church of America reason together.  Let us remember our history, and in all gravity, think on the mistakes of the past and learn from them.  Let us consider the abundant evidence of resulting corruption and reject fascism, communism, and all other terrible notions.  Let us avoid the evil of a totalitarian regime, as it is an absolute government of man in the place of God; and may He Himself have mercy on our souls!

Copyright 2020.    L.L. Shelton.

Some Grow Small

Current Events, Education, Poetry, The Arts, , , , , , , , ,

How is it that you read

Lady Chatterly’s Lover,

And come away simply aroused by a passionate affair?

That you are acquainted with

The Diary of Anne Frank,

And note only the introspections of a young girl becoming familiar with her body?

That you have knowledge of 

Are You There God, It’s Me Margaret,

And are moved merely by the description of menses?

That you read

Huckleberry Finn,

And place your focus on one foul word?

That you study Orwell and are stunned only by illustrations of suffering?

Perhaps you, as Alice, drank a vile potion?

Copyright 2020.   L.L. Shelton.

A Reckoning

Health & Dis-ease, Holistic Health, Mental Health, Physical Health, Poetry, Spiritual Health, , ,

Precariously perched,

Bright new wings unfurled,

Her wretched screaming slowed,

Still at her past Is hurled;

And round the fragile stem of life

Her feeble feet are curled,

“I cannot save you from yourself,

   I recognize the plea;

  For many years I heard the cry

  Yet I could not save me.

  Now here I stand with heart in hand,

  The child is finally free.”

Light blinds her temporarily,

She’s startled by the noise;

Walking slowly to the edge

Though in her pain is poised,

To take to flight across the sky,

Embracing future joys.

Copyright  2020.     L.L.  Shelton.

The Adventure Continues

Poetry

A few moments before six this morning, our little ebony and white Ferdinand, only five months old and once a lively but patient presence in our barn, left us.  He was so named due to his pattern being remarkably similar to that of the hulking but graceful bull of children’s picture book fame, who wished only to enjoy the flower filled meadow on sunshiny days but was, to the dismay of not only Ferdinand but to the consternation of his fans, instead made to enter the fighting arena in Spain.   Our own little Ferdinand had seemed to bear a resemblance to his namesake in pleasant disposition as well as in appearance, and as he festively frolicked through the season of being a kid, easily endeared himself to all.

It is true that  the miracle of life never ceases to completely engage me in ecstasy, and impending death never ceases to call forth a full and encompassing anguish.  Still, there is a time to stop clinging to the here and now.  It had been a long night and Ferdinand’s occasional weak and pitiful bleat as he struggled in the throes of serious illness instigated a tremendous ache in my heart.  And so I listened as my soft  but persistent cheerleader tones, the ones that I had been using for the past forty-eight hours as I  tried to encourage him to this life, turned to gentle soothing notes of assistance in letting go of his body to recover life in a different form.  Then, I heard myself whisper that I knew he was destined to a joyful reunion with his mother who had passed in similar fashion only days before.  In this event, I felt a transcending peace surrounding our beings and only a few shallow breaths later, the little fellow stretched his legs and began to run.  Though he lay on his side, anchored to the pillow by his exhausted body, unable to lift his head, his previously crippled legs moved perfectly smoothly in a running motion.  His eyes appeared focused on some distant desire that only he could perceive- then he stopped abruptly and his tail began to wag with joy.   Sensing that I was witness to  something  extraordinarily beautiful, I was rapt with attention.

Some, having little experience with farm animals, do not realize the exuberance that is often expressed in the goats frantically wiggling tail, but I am quite familiar with the wonderfulness of it, and I have seen it often when the kid whose eyes have located his mother at a distance realizes that his strong little legs will efficiently carry him through the pleasant pasture in her direction and suddenly finds himself close beside her.  Another sight common to the goatherd is that of the obvious adoration between the pair.  Their eyes shine and their countenance is visibly lifted in one another’s presence.  The young one will often skip and hop around the doe, bleating  excitedly upon their sure reunion.

Seconds following this miraculous expression of his copper deficient, partially paralyzed body, Ferdinand closed his eyes.  Then, he visibly relaxed and quietly resigned his brief existence in this life; and I realized  anew that I am blessed to have experienced his life here and to have been included in his passing on to his next adventure.

Copyright 2020.    L.L. Shelton.

Steps

Poetry

Of what I was about to do,

My brain it simply has no clue.

I wander here, I wander there,

Searching for it everywhere.

I look up, I look down.

My eyes they hasten all around,

At last remember what is due,

To travel back to what I knew.

Copyright 2020.    L.L. Shelton.

The King Pimp

Poetry

If Gloria Steinem is correct, if marriage is only legalized prostitution- then God is the king pimp.

But what if she is wrong and marriage- marriage apart from the state, marriage practiced as it was designed to be and intended to be by God, is the most beautiful gift God bestowed upon humanity, second only to Christ Himself?

What if the perversion of marriage has been purely manmade;  brought about by our self-centeredness, our sin and our unwillingness to forgive, the natural result of individual cynicism and hardheartedness?

Copyright. 2020.    L.L.  Shelton.

How Well Are We Adulting?

Education, Health, Holistic Health, Mental-Physical-Spiritual Health, ,

Adults educate themselves.

Adults seek and consider counsel.

Adults adopt their own values.

Adults make decisions.

Adults embrace responsibility for their decisions.

Adults are honest with themselves and others.

Adults accept the blame that is due them.

Adults graciously pardon weakness in others.

Adults are respectful and considerate of others.

Adults are motivated by the joy of service.

Adults cheerfully give more than they take.

Adults engage in conflict.

Adults engage in conflict resolution.

Adults demand little and freely negotiate.

Adults remember the past and learn from it.

Adults plan for the future and rest in it.

Adults  live in the present and enjoy it.

How well are you adulting, today?

Copyright 2020.     L.L. Shelton.

My Shingles And Me

Poetry

I know you by now.  You are the ordinarily pleasant sounds of life moving through the day, the  common mistakes of a moment that everyone makes, but you are disguised as something terrible.  You make me feel as though I need to cover my ears and seek shelter.  You cause me to be nearly unable to withstand these usually comforting evidences of the living.  Normal existence grates across the fabric of my being.

Next, you appear as screws puncturing and turning in one or another well chosen area of my inner space.  Most often I feel you in my upper arms, my neck and shoulders, and my lower back.  You show up violently as though you are outraged at having been suppressed.  You immediately explode and your ranting is somewhat paralyzing.

Finally, there is debris scattered sparingly across my shoulders, around my collar bone, occasionally along my spine.  Your signature in little blistery pop-ups that itch momentarily; that I unwittingly run my nails across in response to your demands, that become crusty, scab-over and pass away as mysteriously as they arrived.  Your clarifying claim of responsibility for the terrorist act.

Treacherous enemy that you are- you require absolute surrender to ease the pain.  We are, therefore, at odds.  Though I ache, though I am near exhausted, I will move, I will recover, and I will live.

Copyright 2020.    L..L. Shelton