It’s a trope, really–the river of time. Twain used it in the greatest, in my opinion, of American novels, about Tom and Huck and Jim. Joseph Conrad used it in his masterful narratives. I love water, creeks–especially mountain streams–but also slow-moving water in the swamps.

A lot of folks I have met in my decades have mocked the swamp, but I love it. If you’ve ever slept under a canopy of cypresses in the Okefenokee, or even pitched a shelter by slow-moving waters, it’s a spectacle. You hear frogs plop into the water and cicadas thrum. You feel the humidity. You hear the mosquitoes as they light upon your sweaty forearm and seek blood. You see their wings on the hairs of your forearms. You see the doves light upon oaks, then glide down onto sandy soil beneath. You see lonely whippoorwills walk out and call their incessant smooth whistles in the gloaming, when the sun lows and the palmetto rustles in the gathering dark.

This morning, on the way to Sunday school and corporate worship, my son and I were in the car together. My wife had gone early to rehearse with her fellow musicians. So Goob (my son’s nickname; don’t tell him I told you) and I were in the car. We came down the hills from where we live and turned onto the highway. it descended to where still more creeks run. Then we began ascending another hill and I saw them: a wake of vultures. They were feeding upon carrion. A young whitetail doe had been struck by a vehicle. She lay with her entrails exploded upon the grass adjacent to the highway.

The vultures gorged themselves, only scampering out of the way at the last moment as I drove past. Nothing wasted. The trees and briars and grasses fed the deer. The deer fed the birds. And I drove on, thinking of my Sunday school class, of the theme we’re exploring from the Scriptures: prayer.

I saw, in bloody reality, this world–birds pecking at carrion. Provision. Gross, in a sense? Yes, perhaps. But it teaches, if you have eyes to see, that life is bloody, that providence involves blood, that generations come and go.

That my son probably took no notice of the dead doe or the knobby-headed vultures, or of the way the sun was just above the hardwoods, or of the mangy dog by the black mailbox on the right at the crest of the hill, a neglected white clapboard house, a broken-down F-150 in the front yard, a dirty blanket-as-curtain covering the window–gnawed at my heart. Why? Because it was all there, displayed in red and black color, with the golden sun still rising, and the gray and black macadam, and the smell of it all in the air. It was all there–in the details. Scenes like this we pass countless times over many days, but how often do we really see? Teach us to number our days.

They are so young. These infantrymen, training to earn their Ranger tabs, assembled to hear the Scriptures explained. As their chaplain, it is one of my greatest joys to be able to be amidst fellow soldiers, but also to be able to teach the Bible to those who elect to gather with us.

Today I taught from Luke 8:25, where Jesus asked those in the boat with him that day (and us by extension), “Where is your faith?” It’s the enduring question. It’s not a matter of whether people have faith. The question is, In whom is each person’s faith? In what is a person’s faith?

Is your faith in yourself, in a “force,” in governmental and bureaucratic systems, in planets and astral signs, in a nameless, a-historical ideology/ism? Or is your faith in the One who spoke creation into existence (Psalm 33:9) and upholds it by the word of his power (Hebrews 1:3)?

In Ecclesiastes, Solomon wrote, “Cast your bread upon the waters, for you will find it after many days” (Ecclesiastes 11:1). The idea is that we are to sow seeds now, knowing that God tills the hearts of men. But we are to be faithful to work, to sow the seeds, to sweat in labor for that which is true, good, and beautiful. In due time, our work will be tested. We shall be revealed for what we did/did not do.

That is such an encouragement. Why? Because we labor, but not in vain. There is a hope laid up, a treasure, a kingdom, in fact. God sees us. And God knows. And God is just. So, should we not number our days, use them wisely, for that which endures?

We are to cast our bread upon the waters. But why? Because things come back around.

Don’t misunderstand. This is not a karmic theology. Rather, this is the theology of God’s sovereignty, and of God’s providence, and of God’s holiness. That’s vastly different from pantheistic karmic religions.

We have so many worldviews that are asking us to trust them. Do you really want to trust in the mob, in pop culture, in government shills, in media, in fortune-cookie cliches, in yourself, in your own spiritual resume? The list could continue.

Or does it not make the most sense to trust the One who is wholly good, wholly sovereign, wholly triumphant over and through evil and death and the grave?

This is why we are to cast our bread upon the waters. Because it matters. What we do now matters.

I taught the passage. We walked through it together again and again. It led to discussions afterwards. We took the Lord’s Supper. We prayed.

I was reminded of the sacred privilege I have and for which I am so grateful. Who knows, humanly speaking, what will come of it all, how it will all play out in the big picture? I don’t know the answer to every detail. But I do know where my ultimate faith is. And I long for the next generation to know, too–to know where their faith is and where it should be.

Today the weather where I was shifted and transformed with each step I took. The winds would blow. Clouds would slide across the sky. Then the clouds would be moved and the sun would appear. The air would warm. Then the winds would come again and the clouds would reappear and the sun would disappear and the temperature would drop. The field would go from being lit by the sun to being an ominous opening under a leaden sky.

I love the spring here. The hardwoods are turning green again. Tiny buds appear everywhere. I see the jakes, hens, and long beards more often, too. The thunderstorms are ramping up, right on time. You can sense the coming humidity of the summers. But spring is nigh and I love it.

I’m positioned here, looking around and up and also at the miles ahead as I jog, and theological bearings are inescapable. Who authored all of this? The secularist has a nonsensical answer to that. Bearings only make sense with reference to the permanent.

Thus, even the simplest of activities–like a jog under a spring sky–bears witness to creation and its Creator.

I exited from I-85 and slowed to a stop at the traffic light at the bottom of the exit ramp, waiting to turn left when the light would turn to green. When traffic began moving, I turned left behind a pickup truck in front of me that was pulling a white trailer. I needed to stop at the Walmart before going to my place. I needed to purchase some milk and a few other small items for the week. When the next light turned red, the cars and trucks in front of me slowed and stopped, and I did, too. Then I saw her.

I think we all saw her simultaneously. She appeared to be Hispanic. She wore black socks, sandals, psychedelic pajama pants, and a camisole beneath a baggy sweatshirt. She was by herself and was pacing up and down the concrete median dividing the highway that ran in front of the Walmart. She held a white poster board with black writing that said 

Need money Homeless Money go for food

and room Thank You God Bless

As we drivers waited for the green arrow to turn left into the Walmart, the girl came to each driver’s side window and tried to make eye contact. She waved. She smiled. She held the sign for what seemed a very long time, right in front of the car windows, so we would read it. Then she’d wave again. 

And the sadness of the whole thing, that lasted only ninety seconds or so, pierced me. Should I give her the petty cash and quarters I have in the cup holders between my front seats? Or should I not, because she may be being pimped by some scoundrel who is at this moment watching her from the nearby parking lot? Or is she completely honest—a girl standing in the middle of the highway in front of Walmart because she cannot otherwise make ends meet but by begging on a Sunday afternoon? 

What did this all say about the world? That she was here? That the other drivers and I wrestled internally about whether or not to give? That we questioned the whole world we are in? We could give and say to ourselves, “Well, it’s up to her what she does with it.” Or we could avert our eyes so as not to have to articulate our reluctance to trust, to give. What did this whole rotten situation reveal about the world?

In one moment, signs of “Hiring: $20 per hour” were visible. Yet here was a girl in pajama pants in the highway begging for money. In whom is one to trust? It seemed to me only that things are broken. When trust is followed by a question mark in our hearts, that says much—that we’re our own enemies. Yet we turn to the same demographic for help. It’s what Faulkner called the human heart in conflict with itself.

I did not see any windows roll down in order for drivers to give the girl money. We all read the sign. We watched her walk up and down beside all of our vehicles. Then the arrow turned green on the light and we drove on up to the store, paid for our goods, and pulled out of the same parking lot, and watched her again, this time holding her sign with bad grammar, before the next line of cars.  

I wanted to give, I wanted to say. But I know that my intentions did nothing for her. It is action that counts.

But I wanted to say, You will, perhaps, understand one day that things are complicated, that people can be both blessings and curses, that we feel the embarrassment and awkwardness, too. And that sometimes when we don’t know what to say, it comes out as “Thank you” and “God bless,” and we feel as empty and necessary as words. 

This morning in the woods with soldiers, I was reminded how some sermons preach themselves.

“Men, look east. Behold. Any questions?”

I’m almost through my first reading of this collection of McEwan’s short stories. They are, I admit, hard to read at times. The language is beautiful but their subject matter and the graphic nature of detail … well, it can (as I’m sure was his goal) discomfit the reader.

McEwan portrays human perversion in ways that parallel watching a Criminal Minds episode. Perhaps the scariest part, for me at least, is contemplating the likelihood that the world is actually more like what McEwan explores than we care to admit.

His characters include mentally unstable youth and adults; nude retarded Thespians; solitary murderers who want, paradoxically, and Raskolnikov-like, to be included; incestuous tykes, and more. Read McEwan, but be ready; this is not fare for the fragile.

“Down by the river, I took a little walk . . .”

Over recent days the displays of power, color, cold, sunrise, sunset, clouds, water, snow, and more gave rise to a simple question: What makes more sense, that God is the supreme, sovereign Artist or that all of these are ‘accidents’ of blind material chance that cannot account for their origins, nor I mine?

Below is from today when I was getting a walk in along the golf course.

Below is a picture from our hotel balcony in FL.

This last one is from a ridgeline I often hike near our home.

Boy, the secularists sure do have to ascribe a lot of power, imagination, artistry, design, nuance, irreducible complexity, and much, much more to . . . nothing. Seems suppression of evidence is their default position.

Seems to me creation bears witness to intelligence. Supreme and perfect intelligence. And beauty. It’s as if God has revealed Himself so much that we are without excuse by denying creation and its Author’s sovereignty.

Ever have one of those days that you could not have manufactured, a day in which you heard something that moved you deeply, or saw sights that you knew right away would remain with you for your life?

And I don’t mean a spectacle like a mountaintop experience or a cruise in Alaskan waters or sunsets on Oahu. For me, it was just a day with fellow soldiers and with a speaker who shared a message from my favorite book of the Bible: Ecclesiastes.

One of America’s great warriors, now a civilian pastor, still preaching the gospel to soldiers and civilians alike, spoke to me and my fellow soldiers. His theme was straight from Ecclesiastes: Don’t miss God for anything else. Why? Because anyone and anything else is–by design–less than. There is God, and then there is everything else. There is the Creator, and there is the created.

Solomon unpacked this fundamental theme for 12 chapters throughout Ecclesiastes. He wrote about what he called “the end of the matter” (Ecclesiastes 12:13). He wrote of ultimate things. He wrote of how he squandered much of his life “under the sun” (Ecclesiastes 5:8-7:24). He called it vanity, emptiness, vexation, roping of the wind, futility.

The speaker today, like Solomon in Ecclesiastes, spoke to younger men, trying to warn them not to lose their souls by gaining this world and forfeiting their souls. He shared his own experiences. He connected them to Solomon’s wisdom.

And who knows if the message will take root in the souls of these young men? I hope so. I had a friend years back who was a great encourager to me when I was pastoring. He said, “Jon, we sow the seeds but only God can till the heart.” He was exactly right.

We do what we can. We open the text. We proclaim it. We explain it. We teach it. We hold it forth. But unless and until God tills the soil of the human heart, it’s unheeded wisdom. If wisdom is unheeded, it remains neglected and rather a knowledge, not wisdom. The distinction is that wisdom is knowledge appropriately applied, lived out.

Hence, my love of Ecclesiastes. Solomon was a man who made a lot of blunders, but he had the humility and wisdom, inconsistently for sure, to try and reach those he loved.

As Solomon penned, again today we all saw it: “The sun rises, and the sun goes down, and hastens to the place where it rises” (Ecclesiastes 1:5). We have another shot at it, to hear wisdom and embrace it, to live it out. Or we will suppress it, mock it, scoff at truth, and to turn away.

I have a great privilege, the opportunity to hold forth the message of hope, of reconciliation, of redemption, of forgiveness, of wisdom.

May God till many hearts.

Time will tell.

May we learn, in the time allotted to us, the wisdom of Ecclesiastes, and that wisdom is much more than a cognitive and theological construct; it is, rather, a person who took on flesh, bore the sins of His people, and conquered the world’s folly, to rise three days later, as proof that the wisdom of God overcomes the pride of men.