Spreading Hope

Well it sure has been a long while since I have sat down to write something.

First, I will catch you up on the recent events in my life and then write something of more depth and meaning in another post.

I have been at home on vacation/holiday since a few days before Christmas. I had a great time at home with my family and a few friends. For Christmas, all of my dad’s family spent about 4 days in some cabins in East Texas. It was great to see everybody and get to visit and share stories about our lives. There are 10 cousins between the age of 15-24, so we are at an age in which we enjoy being around each other, but also can have some depth to our relationships. The time spent at Deer Lake with the entire Smith family was wonderful.

We had our first cousin become engaged recently, so her fiancé was able to come join us for a day or so. It takes a real man to withstand the test that is our family. I respect him immensely for sticking it out and making it enjoyable. It will be quite interesting to bring somebody to one of our family get-togethers. I am praying for her even now.

I created a new love-hate relationship with a game called Settlers of Catan. Some of the men on the trip battled many times to settle the lonely island of Catan first; however, I was not the best settler. I knew Jordan would be good at the game, but I never expected him to be that good.

I might have jumped into the Deer Lake off of a paddle boat with my brother and cousin.  I wish I could express in words the joy that brought, but I cannot share the words spoken, sights seen or jokes made. And that’s the way it should be.

I continued my love-hate relationship with the game of golf. I shot the best 9 holes that I have ever shot (a modest 44), then followed that with one of the worst round of 18 that I have ever played (I won’t mention my score). I hit a few shots though that will continue to bring me back to the game, even though I hit hundreds of others that make me want to break my clubs.

I was able to catch a good number of fish and spend some time with two guys that I really enjoy being around. I have loved their generosity and friendship over the years.

Overall, it was a great get-a-way from work and real life. Most of the time was spent pretty selfishly and non-productively, but I was able to grow relationships with family and other close friends. I pray that God would open my mouth more to talk about Him.

I currently am back in Midland, but I am not looking forward to getting back to work on Monday. It will be a short week though, because I get to go to the Cotton Bowl on Friday with my family. Whoop!

I did not get to write any kind of Christmas post, but here’s a good quote from Knowing God by J.I. Packer (one of the few books that I just can’t finish) about Christmas. I think it sums up one of the many messages of Christmas well.

            The Christmas message is that there is hope for a ruined humanity—hope of pardon, hope of peace with God, hope of glory—because at the Father’s will Jesus Christ became poor and was born in a stable so that thirty years later He might hang on a cross. It is the most wonderful message that the world has ever heard, or will hear.

            It is our shame and disgrace today that so many Christians—I will be more specific: so many of the soundest and most orthodox Christians—go through this world in the spirit of the priest and the Levite in our Lord’s parable, seeing human needs all around them, but (after a pious wish, and perhaps a prayer, that God might meet those needs) averting their eyes and passing by on the other side. That is not the Christmas spirit. Nor is it the spirit of those Christians—alas, they are many—whose ambition in life seems limited to building a nice middle-class Christian home, and making nice middle-class Christian friends, and bringing up their children in nice middle-class ways, and who leave the submiddle-class sections of the community, Christian and non-Christian, to get on by themselves.

            For the Christmas spirit is the spirit of those who, like their Master, live their whole lives on the principle of making themselves poor—spending and being spent—to enrich their fellow humans, giving time, trouble, care and concern, to do good to others—and not just their own friends—in whatever way there seems need.

I want to spend my life spending and being spent for others. This is my desire. Not being middle-class, middle-of-the-pack, in the middle of nothingness, but to being about spreading hope, that is, Jesus Christ.