As you can see from the date of my last posting, I haven't blogged for awhile. The reason is that I was on vacation with my family. Over the course of ten days we traveled nearly 3500 miles to visit family (on both sides) in Pensacola, Florida, and Memphis, Tennessee.
We had a lot of fun. While in Pensacola, we took a tour of the Naval Air Station. The kids had a blast sitting in various Blue Angels' planes, watching videos, walking through the fuselage of an aircraft (set up with the original military equipment, bedding, supplies, etc.), and looking at the many black-and-white pictures of a bygone era.
During our visit, we saw individuals and families of all ages. The ones we really noticed were the elderly veterans wearing their uniforms. At one point, my wife Ruthie turned to me and said something like, "Nobody can appreciate these things like these war veterans who fought in these wars and flew these planes." That is so true. They seemed to take their tour a little more seriously. They watched the films a little more intently. As they walked around, they said little, if anything. No doubt they were reliving many a moment in their memories.
Our kids pretended to fly the planes; these men did fly the planes. They lived through events caught on film before we were even born. Their service to our country, coupled with the sacrifice of so many of their comrades, garnered our respect.
I think the same principle applies - or should apply - in the spiritual arena. I recall Paul's words in his letter to Philemon: "Yet for love's sake I rather appeal to you - since I am such a person as Paul, the aged, and now also a prisoner of Christ Jesus" (vs. 9). Paul was old and had suffered much as a devoted follower of Jesus Christ. That meant something, and it no doubt elicited respect on the part of Philemon, considering that Paul used it as a basis for his appeal.
I pray that we will always show a proper respect for our elderly brothers and sisters in Christ, particularly those who have "fought the good fight" and have been "a good soldier of Jesus Christ."
In one of his most famous speeches, often referred to as The Man in the Arena, Teddy Roosevelt said some important things that we should take to heart not only as Americans, but even more so as Christians, as we seek to serve the purposes of God in our generation:
It is not the critic who counts: not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes up short again and again, because there is no effort without error or shortcoming, but who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, who spends himself for a worthy cause; who, at the best, knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement, and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who knew neither victory nor defeat.