Our Parents And Grandparents Were Green Before Green Was A Thing

An economy capable of producing far more than
 is needed is dependent on persuading consumers
to buy far more than they need.

It's heartening to see renewed interest in reusing, recycling and learning to do with less, all in an effort to avoid wasting limited resources and helping save the planet. But prior to the rise of the orgy of consumerism that has characterized the post World War II generation and those that followed, our ancestors did remarkably well in the conservation department. 

Examples:

- People bought far fewer of the over-processed, over-packaged and over-priced foods and other goods offered at our supermarkets and malls, goods that are transported from all over the world and often harvested or produced by workers living on slave wages. Pre-WW II generations raised as much of their own food and even sewed as many of their own clothes as possible. 

- Milk, soda and other beverage bottles were routinely returned to the store for recycling, where they were sent back to the plants from which they came to be washed, sterilized and refilled, over and over again. And buying drinking water in disposable plastic bottles would have been unthinkable. 

- Brown paper grocery bags were reused for such things as garbage bags, shelf liners, wrapping paper or as covers for school textbooks. 

- People walked more, limited their shopping to a weekly trip to town, and didn't rely on multi-horsepower vehicles for frequent errands or shopping trips. 

- Cloth diapers were used instead of the disposable ones now seen as a necessity. Clothes were dried on a line, utilizing wind and solar energy instead of 220-volt driers. 

- By using highly efficient wringer washers, the same water was often used for more than one load, with the dirtiest work clothes always washed last. Rinse water was often reheated to wash some of the everyday clothes, and homemade laundry soap made as a byproduct of home butchering projects was often used for a detergent.

- Children wore hand-me-down clothes from their older siblings or cousins, and often wore the same outfits to school or elsewhere until they needed to be laundered.

- Most meals were prepared from scratch with home or locally grown produce, and were served at family tables without the distraction of television or cell phones replacing family interaction. 

- Lawns were small and kept trim by push mowers that helped provide lots of exercise without a need for expensive workout equipment. 

- Even writing pens were refilled with ink, ball point pens had replaceable ink cartridges, and razors had replaceable blades.

- Socks were darned and other clothes were patched and mended as long as possible.

- People adapted to warm weather without air conditioning, and in the absence of thermostat controlled central heating systems, kept themselves warm around their cooking stoves and Warm Morning heaters. On cold nights they simply added more blankets to keep themselves comfortable.

Needless to say, not everything about the good old days was all that great. But when it comes to reducing, reusing, or recycling, they did far more to help save the planet than the generations that have followed them. They thrived on reclaiming, refurbishing, restoring what they had, along with resisting buying so many of the things we have come to see as necessities.

Remembering A Dear Friend, A Great Neighbor

Carl J. Esch 1948-1981

This week marks the 40th anniversary of the passing of Carl Esch, one of the best friends and next door neighbors one could ever have. Carl  had been scheduled for surgery to repair a heart valve but died of a blood clot in the ICU at our local hospital at age 33, leaving his beloved wife Marilyn and three young children.

Unknown to most of us, Carl had felt led to go off his blood thinner and to simply trust fully in God's ability to heal him of his heart condition. Regrettably, it was not to be so, and I was privileged to be with him when he breathed his last, his heart still beating strongly to the very end while awaiting its ultimate healing in the care of the Great Physician.

Carl was devoted to his family and dedicated to our church, and we were privileged to have the Esch family as dear friends when we lived in the Zion Mennonite parsonage directly across the road from the church. While Carl provided for his family as a first rate auto mechanic, his life mission was one of being a full time servant of God and a wonderful father to his children.

I still mourn his loss as do all of his family and his many friends. And I still remember a group of us getting together with broken hearts to dig his grave in the Zion cemetery as a final way of showing our love for him and our profound sense of loss at his passing.

Here is a part of what I shared at his funeral service May 26, 1981:

Carl J. Esch, soldier of peace

At your death we salute you

You fought hard, against all odds

And you fought well, with the weapons of the Spirit

With the Word of God, precious and powerful in you

You waged a valiant and gentle war

To win, but never to destroy

To nurture you children, never to discourage them

To love your wife and family, never to lord it over them

To serve your church, never to neglect or leave it

Carl, warrior of faith

You taught us courage

You taught us to live life for all it's worth

You taught us to give God all we have

You taught us to live simply and to care deeply

And you were willing to risk more than most of us

While we stayed behind in safer places

You were on reconnaissance, testing the outer limits of faith

Carl, brother soldier, you were too young to die

How could any life be finished at 33

(Except in the service of Christ, who was able to say "It is finished" at that same age)

O brother, and dearer than a brother

May heaven reward you with its highest medals of honor

And may God grant us a deep well for our tears

Until we meet again

A Lifelong Healthcare Hero Is Laid To Rest

 

Phyllis Lee Cullers 12/9/48-5/10/21

I was privileged to be Phyllis Cullers' pastor for many of the years we were part of the Zion Mennonite Church near Broadway. Saturday I was blessed with the opportunity to speak at her memorial service at the Grandle Funeral Home, as follows:

We are here to mourn the loss and celebrate the life of Phyllis Lee Cullers, beloved friend and sister, aunt, and a caring and loving part of the community of people whose lives she touched during her many years as a nurse and caregiver.

I was sad to hear of her sudden passing, so sorry it had to be the result of a cancer that took her life before her time. But as in the words of Ecclesiastes, there is a time to be born and a time to die, just as there is a time to grieve and also a time to celebrate the life work of someone like Phyllis. And then a time to rest, to say goodnight, to ‘lay her down to sleep’ after a tiring day, and to say, as Jesus did at the end of his life, “It is finished,” and to pray, “into your hands I commit my spirit.”

Among the Ten Commandments there is the one that says, “Six days shall you labor and do all your work, and on the seventh day you are to rest, commit everything to God’s hands and cease from your work.” The Hebrew word for sabbath, shabat, literally means rest. And we could paraphrase this and apply it to Phyllis’s life, as if God were saying, “Phyllis, six decades you shall rest and finish all your labor, and in the seventh decade you shall rest, with the simple prayer, Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep, and if I should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take.”

It was a blessing that Phyllis was able to die peacefully as in a quiet sleep, at rest after a good life’s work. She had finished what God gave her to do. And to paraphrase one of her favorite psalms, The Lord was her Shepherd, so she had no want, no lack of anything. He has taken her by the hand and led her into green, lush pastures and invited her to lie down beside still waters. And even though she walked through the valley of the shadow of death, she feared no evil, for the good Shepherd was with her, his rod and staff protected her. He anointed her head with healing oil, and prepared an abundant table for her. Surely goodness and mercy followed her all the days of her life, and she will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.

That’s the confidence we have, that Phyllis is in good hands, in the welcoming arms of the Good Shepherd. She’s spent much of her life caring for others, now it’s time for her to be cared for by God, who is welcoming us all to come home with her, to join her in that great welcome home banquet, described by the prophet Isaiah this way,

On this mountain the LORD of Hosts

will prepare a banquet for all the peoples,

a feast of aged wine, of choice meat,

of finely aged wine.

On this mountain He will swallow up

the death shroud that enfolds all peoples,

the sheet that covers all nations;

He will swallow up death forever.

The Lord GOD will wipe away the tears from every face

For the LORD has spoken.

And in that day it will be said, “Surely this is our God;

we have waited for Him, and He has saved us.

This is the LORD for whom we have waited.

If Phyllis were able to speak to us today I believe she would want to share with you the words of this song:

Come and go with me to my Father's house, to my Father's house, to my Father's house,

Come and go with me to my Father's house,

Where there's joy, joy, joy.

It's not very far to my Father's house, to my Father's house, to my Father's house,

It's not very far to my Father's house,

Where there's joy, joy, joy.

Jesus is the Way to my Father's house, to my Father's house, to my Father's house,

Jesus is the Way to my Father's house,

Where there's joy, joy, joy.

James Weldon Johnson, in one of his "Negro Sermons in Verse" has God instructing his angel of death to bring a sister Caroline home to himself who, like Phyllis, has been "tossing on her bed of pain."

“...And God said,

Go down death

And find Sister Caroline (Sister Phyllis).

She's borne the burden and heat of the day,

She's labored long in my vineyard,

And she's tired--

She's weary--

Go down, Death, and bring her to me…

And Death took her up like a baby,

…And death began to ride again--

Up beyond the evening star…

On to the Great White Throne.

And there he laid Sister Caroline (Sister Phyllis)

On the loving breast of Jesus.

And Jesus took his own hand and wiped away her tears,

And he smoothed the furrows from her face,

And the angels sang a little song,

And Jesus rocked her in his arms,

And kept a-saying: Take your rest,

Take your rest.

Weep not--weep not,

She is not dead;

She's resting in the bosom of Jesus.

After the service, Phyllis’s cremains will be taken to rest in the Cullers Run Cemetery, where her parents and her Cullers and other ancestors are buried, but our Phyllis will not really be there. She is here, alive in our hearts and in our memories, and she is resting forever in the bosom of Jesus.

Please join me in prayer, with the words of an ancient Irish blessing:

May the blessing of light be with you--

light outside and light within.

May the sunlight shine upon you and warm your heart

‘til it glows like a great peat fire,

So that the stranger may come and warm himself by it,

and also a friend.

May a blessed light shine out of the two eyes of you

like a candle set in two windows of a house,

bidding the wanderer to come in out of the storm.

May the blessing of rain--the sweet soft rain--

fall upon your spirit and wash it fair and clean.

May it leave many a shining pool where the blue of heaven shines, 

and sometimes a star.

May the blessing of earth--the good, rich earth--be with you.

May you ever have a kindly greeting for those you pass 

as you go along its roads.

May the earth be soft under you when you rest upon it,

tired at the end of the day.

May the earth rest easy over you when at the last you lie under it.

May the earth rest so lightly over you

that your spirit will be out from under it quickly,

and up, and off, and on its way to God.

Amen. Go in peace.

Pentecost Miracles Bring Heaven Down to Earth

When the Spirit of God hovers over the dark and lifeless waters in Genesis, that powerful "Ruah"/Breath/Wind of God brings glorious light and life to planet earth.

Millenia later the same gale force Spirit of God breaks in with another heaven-sent revolution of fresh light and new life.

Here are some of the God-signs we celebrate in the Pentecost story in Acts 2:

1. Language barriers are removed. Visitors in Jerusalem from all over the then known world experience a reversal of Babel, the ability to hear and understand each other on earth as in heaven. "When they heard the sound, they came on the run. Then when they heard, one after another, their own mother tongues being spoken, they were blown away. They couldn’t for the life of them figure out what was going on, and kept saying, “Aren’t these all Galileans? How come we’re hearing them talk in our various mother tongues?" (Acts 2, the Message)

2. Rich and poor, men and women, young and old alike are all blessed with an infusion of supernatural grace and power. “I will pour out my Spirit on every kind of people: Your sons will prophesy, also your daughters; your young men will see visions, your old men dream dreams. When the time comes, I’ll pour out my Spirit on those who serve me, men and women both..."  (Acts 2, the Message)

3. A joyful harmony and equity become clear signs of heaven that mark the community of believers on earth.  "And all the believers lived in a wonderful harmony, holding everything in common. They sold whatever they owned and pooled their resources so that each person’s need was met. They followed a daily discipline of worship in the Temple followed by meals at home, every meal a celebration, exuberant and joyful, as they praised God. "  (Acts 2, the Message)

4. Love, joy, peace, patience and other "fruit of the Spirit" replace selfishness, pettiness, greed and conflict among God's people. "(God) brings gifts into our lives, much the same way that fruit appears in an orchard—things like affection for others, exuberance about life, serenity. We develop a willingness to stick with things, a sense of compassion in the heart, and a conviction that a basic holiness permeates things and people. We find ourselves involved in loyal commitments, not needing to force our way in life, able to marshal and direct our energies wisely."  (Galatians 5 the Message)

Does all of this sound too good to be true? Or as those who embrace God's good news, is it too good not to be true, so good that we refuse to wait until the  next life to experience its blessing?

Becoming Whole--One Piece Of Us At A Time

All the pieces have already been provided, we just need time.
persistence, prayer and the picture on the box.

One of the first things I often encourage distressed clients or parishioners to do is to visualize themselves as the healthiest and most whole person they believe they could possibly become. Then to ask, What would it look like, feel like, be like, if I embraced everything I needed to face my challenges, defeat my fears, be healed of my griefs and achieve my goals?

So one exercise I've suggested to clients is to write a description of themselves as healthy and whole, not as a superman, superwoman or saint, but as the kind of tough and tender person they would want their own son, daughter or best friend to be, and that they could affirm as being entirely possible. I encourage them to write this in the present tense, as though it were already true, as in, "By faith I am someone who..." "I am able to..." etc. And then to ask, "What is getting in the way?" and "What do I need to consistently practice in order to become more like that more and more of the time?"

When we are in crisis, we tend to despair over all the seemingly broken or missing pieces of our lives. But could it be that all of the pieces are actually somehow valuable, and are all in the box, waiting to be discovered, turned over, and fit together into a finished whole? 

So starting with the edge pieces that define the boundaries of our lives, we fit the other pieces together so they correspond to the finished picture on the box.

This is not an easy task, and may take a lifetime to complete. But life is too short not to begin now, to start this very day to live toward the vision of wholeness and wellness our Creator has envisioned for us.

How A Brave Cross Country Move Dramatically Altered My Life

(I posted this in March, but am reposting it since it mysteriously disappeared)

This week marked the 75th anniversary of my parents Ben and Mary Yoder's move from Garnett, Kansas, to Stuarts Draft, Virginia, with their family of eight children.

I was six years old, the youngest, and my oldest sister was 19. My father accompanied a freight car packed with our furniture and other belongings--including some farm machinery, two of our horses and a few cattle--half way across the country to the Shenandoah Valley. My mother herded the rest of us on the long trip east by passenger train.

The primary reason they chose to make this major move was not to better themselves financially, though with my uncle Ed Mast's help my parents were able to build a small dairy and poultry operation on the 120 acre farm that supported their family. We always struggled financially, and times were hard, but when he and my mother sold the farm and went into semi-retirement, they found themselves amply rewarded for their hard work and many sacrifices.

But their primary reason for moving was for the sake of their children and teens. Many of the youth in the Amish church we were a part of in Kansas were a negative influence, whereas the congregation we became a part of in Virginia proved to be a big improvement.

It paid off. All but one of my seven older siblings found good marriage partners in that congregation and established stable and healthy families. My one older sister who remained single became an admired nurse and midwife who served in numerous locations both in the states and abroad. 

Partly through the influence of a Mennonite public school teacher and other teachers and mentors I decided to enroll at Eastern Mennonite College, now EMU, at age 21, and after graduation married the wonderful woman I met there who became my wife.

The rest is history. 

I've often wondered how that history would have turned out had my parents not chosen to make that brave cross country move. I owe them so more than I could ever repay.

This is the farm where I grew up, much improved from when we moved there in 1946. It's located west of Tinkling Spring Road near the Cheese Shop.

 

The Answer Really Is "Blowing In The Wind"

While getting ready to set out some tomato plants this week I ran across the following instruction in an online site, "Tomato plants need to move and sway in the breeze to develop strong stems. That happens naturally outdoors, but if you start your seedlings inside, you need to provide some type of air circulation. Create a breeze by turning a fan on them for five to 10 minutes, twice a day."

This got me thinking about how vital wind is to our existence. Without it, I'm told, humidity and temperatures would be extremely high in some places and extremely low in others, and we would not experience the kinds of vital seasonal changes that maintain life on the planet as we know it.  Also, a lot of the pollination necessary for growing fruit and other foods relies on wind.  Our survival depends on it.

Wind can be a terribly destructive force, especially as driven by global warming, but is also a source of amazing beauty and wonder, as in this reflection by Barry Lopez on the view along the Charley River in eastern Alaska:

What is stunning about the river's banks on this particular stormy afternoon is not the vegetation (the willow, alder, birch, black cottonwood, and spruce are common enough) but its presentation. The wind, like some energetic dealer in rare fabrics, folds back branches and ruffles the underside of leaves to show the pattern--the shorter willows forward, the birch taller, set farther back in the hills. The soft green furze of budding alder heightens the contrast between gray-green willow stems and white birch bark. All of it is rhythmic in the wind, each species bending as its diameter, its surface areas, the strength of its fibers dictate. Behind this, a backdrop of hills: open country recovering from an old fire, dark islands of spruce in an ocean of labrador tea, lowbrush cranberry, firewood, and wild primrose, each species of leaf the invention of a different green: lime, moss, forest, jade. This is not to mention the steel gray of clouds, the balmy arctic temperature, our clear suspension in the canoe over the stony floor of the river, the ground-in dirt of my hands, the flutelike notes of a Swainson's thrush, or anything else that informs the scene.      -from Crossing Open Ground (New York: Scribners, 1988)

In the Hebrew "hymn of creation" in Genesis 1, God's Spirit ("ruah"/wind) hovers over the water covering the earth and breathes life into the planet. And after forming a human from common clay, this same Ruach breathes life into what becomes a living soul, a full-fledged person reflecting God's image and spirit.

In the words of Job, "The Spirit (ruah) of God has made me, and the breath of the Almighty gives me life."

Christians all over the world will celebrate Pentecost Sunday next week, a day when the wind of heaven again swept over the earth.  According to Acts 2, "Without warning there was a sound like a strong wind, gale force--no one could tell where it came from. It filled the whole building. Then, like wildfire, the Holy Spirit spread through their ranks, and they started speaking in a number of different languages as the Spirit prompted them."

Thus began an inclusive, worldwide movement that brought together people of all nations, cultures, social classes and languages into a caring community in which "there was not a needy person among them."

In the words of Brian McLaren, "Before Christianity was a rich and powerful religion, before it was associated with buildings, budgets, crusades, colonialism or televangelism, it began as a revolutionary non-violent movement promoting a new kind of aliveness on the margins of society."

That kind of radical God-movement can only result from a strong, heaven-sent Wind.

A Lesson With Grandchildren About Workers

The Fourth Commandment could be thought of as as
an early example of protection for workers. 

Our grandchildren haven't been able to have their usual Sunday School classes during the pandemic, so I've occasionally had some video sessions with them. Today my "class" consisted of two from Rochester and two from nearby.

Our lesson yesterday was about how important workers around the globe are to our survival and wellbeing, and how in the Genesis "Hymn of Creation" even God "worked," transforming a planet that was empty and dark into a potential paradise. And we noted that in this unspoiled and productive Eden, humans were given the responsibility to "work the ground and to keep it in order." 

We also turned to the book of Exodus, where we are commanded not only to work throughout the week but to observe a weekly day of rest--for ourselves, for members of our family, for others who work for us, for foreign workers--and even to give our work animals a much needed break.

I then had each grandchild choose some object in the room that was not of their own making for a "show and tell" about how that object came to be at their house.

The first showed us his cello, and we talked together about how many different kinds of people have had to work tirelessly at making beautiful instruments like these available for us to play and to enjoy. 

The second chose a shoe, and we reflected on the hundreds of people needed to keep us from having to go without footwear. 

The third chose a wooden three-dimensional tic-tac-toe, and we discussed some of the varieties of people needed to make ordinary toys like this for our enjoyment.

The fourth showed us a pillow, leading to a conversation about its foam material and cotton cloth covering came to be available for our comfort when napping or resting.

Together we tried to imagine the millions of people who work every day at planting, cultivating, weeding, harvesting, mining, hauling, manufacturing, packaging, painting, building, and otherwise making everything around us possible, and how we are each to be a part of this amazing worldwide enterprise of workers throughout our lives. And how we can begin now to help make our households, schools and communities a productive and collaborative part of our common efforts to survive and thrive.

We closed with a parable Jesus told in which a generous employer rewarded each of his workers a living wage even though some had worked all day long and others had been able to find work for only a part of the day. The lesson we draw from it, I suggested, was that God is concerned that each worker be able to earn enough to live on (Matthew 20), as well all workers deserving a regular "shabat," a time for respite and rest (Exodus 20).

If You Think Tithing Is Hard, Consider the Zakat

Malachai 3 is cited by Christians and Jews in support of the tithe.

Generous giving is an important obligation in all major world religions. In the Koran, almsgiving is one of the Five Pillars of Islam, next in importance only to their practice of daily prayer. 

In addition to their regular giving, Muslims with a net worth of over a certain specified amount, the nisab, are to contribute 2.5% of the value of their possessions to needy causes each year. This is typically done during the month of Ramadan (April 12 to May 12 this year), and in some countries is collected as a tax. 

This annual percentage is based on the total value of the following:

current checking and savings accounts

shares and stocks

investments

gold and silver

money on loan to others

For most of us, 2.5% of that total would represent a significant contribution, and in my case one considerably greater than my federal income tax for 2020 and more than a tenth of my annual earnings last year. Of course being semi-retired means my income is less and my deductions are greater than during most of my working years.

The Biblical tithe was never meant to be the only guide for giving among devout Jews, many of whom would have contributed a total of 30% or more through other offerings and expected gifts outlined in the Torah. Not all Christians see tithing as being an obligation, but only that we are to give generously, "as the Lord has prospered." As a result, many Jesus followers give far less than a tithe, and much less than is expected of faithful Muslims.

Zakat means "that which purifies," and is seen as a way of purifying one's assets. Here's a link to how it is calculated: 

https://www.wikihow.com/Calculate-Your-Personal-Zakat.