Loss? Or Exchange?
The past couple of Tuesdays there have been no newsletters from me as I have been on a bike tour in Montana with 3 friends. We started just south of Missoula, up the snowy Lost Trail and Chief Joseph passes and into the Big Hole valley. From there we rode on to Dillon, then wandered up to Ennis and Bozeman and their amazing hot springs. Then it was off toward Helena by way of Three Forks and Townsend to meet up with old friends. Out of Helena we biked into a windy wall of rain and cold. Following Lincoln and Ovando, we stayed a night at Camp Utmost with dear friends and then on to Missoula and Frenchtown, where we camped in the basement of the church I pastored so long ago. We intended to drive to Idaho and ride the Trail of the Coeur d' Alenes on the last day, but we got really washed out and chose to head toward home a day early.
This was a great and challenging trip with fine companions, but after my dance with cancer and surgery last fall, I was clearly "less than" I have been on previous tours. I rode through beautiful countrysides and over stunning mountain passes, often reminded of some new limitations. Part way in, my partners agreed that I should catch a ride back to Hamilton to grab my truck and meet back up with them. We sagged our luggage and took turns driving while the others rode. This made the trip a different experience from past tours when all we relied on was hanging on the bike. Honestly, I struggled some with what seems to be a season of loss. This is normal and natural with aging, but it still nags at my heart. One's field of play shrinks. Vitality slowly wanes. Mental acuity dulls (no matter how much Wordle I play).
The writer of Ecclesiastes, probably Solomon, writes at the end of the book about his season of loss with a series of word pictures which illustrate the ageing process. Listen to a bit of it:
Remember your Creator in the days of your youth, before the days of trouble come and the years approach when you may say, "I find no pleasure in them" - before the sun and the light and the moon and the stars grow dark, and the clouds return after the rain; when the keepers of the house tremble, and the strong men stoop, when the grinders cease because they are few, and those looking through the windows grow dim....
Solomon bemoans the inevitable decay of his old man body (which a few of us are reminded of every time we get out of the shower and look in the mirror!), that seems to slow a step and break down too often with each year lived. He is living a season of loss. Take a few moments and read the whole last chapter of his musings and wonder how you line up.
But, as followers of Jesus, these years can better be seen as a season of exchange. Behind us lie the days when we charged hard at every challenge and when we were busily engaged in our version of empire-building: family, career, acquisitions, and all the rest. Freed up from that era of life, new opportunities open up. We exchange the busyness of past years with the richness of life as an elder. One of my riding companions is a tad older than me and can still ride the wheels off of most others. His career carried impact on thousands of students who filed through his classes and were part of his athletic teams. That's all behind him, and he has quietly exchanged that role for the one who is called on for advice as well as friendship. He is an elder while still learning and under full sail. I sensed no scrambling and grasping to hold on to the past, but an awareness that his window will not be open forever and so is determined to help as much as he can.
That is a good model for any of us: Let go of stuff we can no longer do so easily, with thankfulness for those times, and reach for the new, powerful, surprising things we can do at our stage of life. Forget about clinging to beauty (because gravity wins), or strength (since we don't want to embarrass ourselves), or social status (it just doesn't matter). And...if you are a youngster reading this, look forward to when you are older. It's a different time, for sure, but a good time to be alive.
On our return trip we got some watered gas in Coeur d'Alene and spent 5 hours in a repair shop draining the tank and getting the truck running again. More than a little frustrating given that the station knew they had bad gas and let us pump anyway. In the midst of driving rain and waiting to see if the mechanics would be successful, I talked with a good friend in Bend. He reminded me to "control the controllables" and trust the rest to God to oversee. What a good reminder. What I can control is my response to whatever comes next. I can control my grip on the truth I claim. I control my heart and can rein it in when it wants to wander.
Maybe it’s because I notice some physical decline that I think of the losses of life, but this is really true in each phase of our lives. Loss is part of a world not yet redeemed as it will be. People can get trapped focused on the loss and not see what stands ready to fill the void and be exchanged for what came before. Look ahead. Jesus is not finished with you regardless of your hurt and loss and disappointments. Paul reminded his readers of this in Romans 13:
May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.
Hope is our anchor. Not wishful thinking, but firm expectation of the goodness of God will always lead us on. Like Isaiah says:
Your light shall rise in the darkness and your gloom be like the noonday. The Lord will guide you continually, and satisfy your needs in parched places, and make your bones strong; and you shall be like a watered garden, like a spring of water, whose waters never fail.
As for me, I plan to keep on riding, but just a bit slower. What I gain is a chance to see things I probably zoomed by before. Life behind handlebars at 10 miles an hour is not a bad way to go. I need to quit focusing on what I can no longer do and exchange that for the firm expectation of the "what's next?". Ready? Let's go!
How about some music?
And a funny for the road
I was out walking with my then 4-year-old daughter. She picked up something off the ground and started to put it in her mouth. I asked her not to do that.
"Why?"
"Because it's been laying outside and is dirty and probably has germs."
At this point, she looked at me with total admiration and asked, "Wow! How do you know all this stuff?"
"Uh," I was thinking quickly, everyone knows this stuff, "Um, it's on the Mommy test. You have to know it, or they don't let you be a Mommy."
"Oh."
We walked along in silence for 2 or 3 minutes, but she was evidently pondering this new information.
"I get it!" she beamed. "Then if you flunk, you have to be the Daddy."