My wife surprised me with tickets to the Gordon Lightfoot concert last Saturday night at the Ryman Auditorium in Nashville. We were both excited. Gordon's music has been part of soundtrack for our dating years and thirty-four year marriage. We were ready for a evening of great music. So, why did it surprise us that he had gotten older? Why were we stunned to hear that his voice in not nearly as silky smooth as it once was? Why did it surprise us that he could not hit the low tones like he did when we saw him thirty-plus years ago?
There has been a wave of deaths in our community recently. Not our members of our congregation, but relatives of our members, and members of our community and fellowship. Seems I've been in funeral homes and memorial services more than anywhere else lately.
The most recent is the passing of Jim Bill McInteer. As a preacher in the Nashville area for many, many years, Brother McInteer has been a breath of fresh air and a positive role model for preachers and christian leaders all over the world.
I remember as a very young and very inexperienced Youth/Associate minister in the mid-1970s picking Jim Bill up at the airport and transporting him to our building where he would speak to a larger group of teenagers. Those few short minutes I was with him in the car proved to be invaluable in my development as he made me feel like I was the greatest minister ever to wear the title. So affirming. So encouraging.
Years later I heard him delivered the eulogy for Clarence Daily's father. I've not heard a more eloquent and touching message before or since. He had an amazing way with words. When I saw him last I was impressed at the strength of his voice, and the clarity of his mind. I was also a bit stunned that he had aged.
I plan to attend his memorial service tomorrow. Last Saturday I did the service for a 67 year old man, and this coming Friday I'll do the same for an 80-year old wife, mother, and grandmother.
Thoughts of my own mortality have been heightened. I have done even more thinking on these matters than normal and brought one reality clearly into focus: Time is precious.
I've wasted too much time. I spend too much time piddling. There are things that need to be done. People I need to talk to. Words I need to share. Feelings I need to express. Love I need to share.
We've wasted too much time. While we have been arguing over petty issues of opinion and prejudices and preferences, people have been living and dying alone and without hope. People need Jesus, not our opinion. People need our Savior, not our judgments. People need God's Word, not trivia. It's time to get busy with what God has placed us here to do: tell the world about His Son.
Yes, as difficult as it is to accept Gordon Lightfoot is 72, Jim Bill McInteer is gone, and I'm not getting any younger. And, by the way, neither are you. It's time!
Tuesday, March 9, 2010
Monday, March 8, 2010
A Norvell Note: March 8, 2010
A Simple Phone Call
By: Tom Norvell
Vol. 13 No. 10 | March 8, 2010
Turning fifty-seven recently was a pretty pleasant experience. Nothing traumatic. Nothing extraordinary. Another birthday. It was a very good day.
I received many "Happy Birthday" wishes from friends. Time well spent with my wife. Good conversations with my children. It was a good, quiet birthday. However, one thing did make it a most memorable day.
It came fairly late in the day and caught me completely by surprise. I received a note from a very dear friend asking me for my phone number. Someone wanted to call me. I sent my number and within a few minutes my phone rang (actually it didn't ring,it played a tune). The voice from miles away said, "Hang on, my Dad wants to talk to you."
His voice was slow and deliberate due to a stroke he suffered about eighteen months ago. He could not say much. But, hearing his voice was enough to transport me back through the years with tears in my eyes.
You see, we once spent a considerable amount of time together. During a very important time in my life his family became part of my extended family. His home became my home away from home. He was a mentor. He would become one of the most powerful influences in my life.
Then, stuff happened. Things changed. Our lives went in different directions. Conversations and visits became less frequent and eventually pretty much non-existent. Not because angry words were shared, not because of an argument, and not because our love for one another ceased. Just life.
With the sound of his voice all those years of no communication were erased and we were talking again. Our friendship seemed as strong as it ever. The closeness returned over a 3G network.
How is that possible? How is it that relationships that have lost connection for years can suddenly with one very brief telephone conversation be re-connected as if there had never been a break? What is it that creates a bond between two human beings that can never be broken, no matter what happens, no matter what changes, no matter what?
There's only one explanation. It is God's love. It is the love God has for us, and the love God places in our hearts that enables us to love others and to receive love from other people. John describes it:
Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.
We know that we live in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit. And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world. If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in him and he in God. And so we know and rely on the love God has for us.
God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him. In this way, love is made complete among us so that we will have confidence on the day of judgment, because in this world we are like him. There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.
We love because he first loved us. If anyone says, "I love God," yet hates his brother, he is a liar. For anyone who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen. And he has given us this command: Whoever loves God must also love his brother. (1 John 4:7-21, NIV)
Is there someone you've not talked to in a while? Are you feeling the need to reconnect? Go ahead. Make the call. It may seem like "just a phone call." Make it anyway.
I'm grateful for my call.
Tom
© Copyright 2010 Tom Norvell. All rights reserved.
By: Tom Norvell
Vol. 13 No. 10 | March 8, 2010
Turning fifty-seven recently was a pretty pleasant experience. Nothing traumatic. Nothing extraordinary. Another birthday. It was a very good day.
I received many "Happy Birthday" wishes from friends. Time well spent with my wife. Good conversations with my children. It was a good, quiet birthday. However, one thing did make it a most memorable day.
It came fairly late in the day and caught me completely by surprise. I received a note from a very dear friend asking me for my phone number. Someone wanted to call me. I sent my number and within a few minutes my phone rang (actually it didn't ring,it played a tune). The voice from miles away said, "Hang on, my Dad wants to talk to you."
His voice was slow and deliberate due to a stroke he suffered about eighteen months ago. He could not say much. But, hearing his voice was enough to transport me back through the years with tears in my eyes.
You see, we once spent a considerable amount of time together. During a very important time in my life his family became part of my extended family. His home became my home away from home. He was a mentor. He would become one of the most powerful influences in my life.
Then, stuff happened. Things changed. Our lives went in different directions. Conversations and visits became less frequent and eventually pretty much non-existent. Not because angry words were shared, not because of an argument, and not because our love for one another ceased. Just life.
With the sound of his voice all those years of no communication were erased and we were talking again. Our friendship seemed as strong as it ever. The closeness returned over a 3G network.
How is that possible? How is it that relationships that have lost connection for years can suddenly with one very brief telephone conversation be re-connected as if there had never been a break? What is it that creates a bond between two human beings that can never be broken, no matter what happens, no matter what changes, no matter what?
There's only one explanation. It is God's love. It is the love God has for us, and the love God places in our hearts that enables us to love others and to receive love from other people. John describes it:
Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.
We know that we live in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit. And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world. If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in him and he in God. And so we know and rely on the love God has for us.
God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him. In this way, love is made complete among us so that we will have confidence on the day of judgment, because in this world we are like him. There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.
We love because he first loved us. If anyone says, "I love God," yet hates his brother, he is a liar. For anyone who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen. And he has given us this command: Whoever loves God must also love his brother. (1 John 4:7-21, NIV)
Is there someone you've not talked to in a while? Are you feeling the need to reconnect? Go ahead. Make the call. It may seem like "just a phone call." Make it anyway.
I'm grateful for my call.
Tom
© Copyright 2010 Tom Norvell. All rights reserved.
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