On This Sixth Day of Christmas--Pray For Children And Grandchildren

"Direct your children onto the right path, and when they are older, they will not leave it."

Proverbs 22:6 (NLT)

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Someone has said that what this oft-quoted "train up a child" text might really mean is that whatever good instruction we give our children will never leave them. At any rate, most of us parents have one wish above all others, that we successfully pass on a strong faith and a good set of values to our children and grandchildren.

But none of us is perfect, and even if we were, it would not guarantee that our children would be. Every human being has the right, indeed the God-given  responsibility, to make personal choices. And even God's very first children didn't make all wise ones.

I once heard someone say that our real success as parents has less to do with what kind of children we raise as it does with what kind of grandchildren we produce. At any rate, Alma Jean and I thank God every day for being blessed with three children and six grandchildren who are far, far better than we deserve. But we know they all face challenges and temptations greater than any of ours in previous generations.

For example, will our offsprings' constant access to screen-based entertainment rob them of good connections with the real world of nature and of other people? Will increased wealth and an ever easier and comfortable life detract from their willingness to work and serve in self-giving ways? Will they form strong bonds with supportive communities of faith in which they will be able, if so led, to grow strong families of their own? And will they be able to live by the above six "family rules" in all their relationships?

Pray with me, on this sixth day of Christmas, that our future generations of grandmen and women will do far better than we in making this a truly God-blessed world.

On This Fifth Day Of Christmas, Pray For A Livable And Well-Kept Planet

"The Lord God placed the human in the Garden of Eden as its gardener, to tend and care for it." Genesis 2:15 Living Bible

The very first mandate given us in the book of Genesis is to take care of the earth, to exercise responsible oversight of it on God's behalf. As caretakers created in God's image, we are entrusted with the wise stewardship of creation. 

Sadly, most people have chosen to exploit the planet for short term gain rather than preserve and care for it as the unique, life-giving treasure it is. Huge areas of rain forests ("the lungs of the planet") are being destroyed at an alarming rate to provide more grazing land to meet increased demands for ever more red meat in our diets. Coal burning power plants spew tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere every day due to our insatiable need for increased power, resulting in the planet warming at an alarming rate.

Good planets, like healthy bodies, require diligent care. We know we cannot expect to be able to abuse our bodies with alcohol, nicotine and other drugs, or with too many carbs, harmful fats, sugars and sodium, without paying a heavy price. In the same way the harm we do to the earth may become devastating and irreparable.

On this fifth day of Christmas pray with me that we will be responsible caretakers of our rich soil, pure water, clean air and all of the resources with which we have been blessed.

It's surely true, as someone has said, that "Good planets are hard to find."

On This Fourth Day Of Christmas--Pray For Goodwill Among People Of All Faiths (or no faith)

^"All who are wicked will be punished with trouble and suffering. It doesn’t matter if they are Jews or Gentiles. But all who do right will be rewarded with glory, honor, and peace, whether they are Jews or Gentiles. God doesn’t have any favorites."

Romans 2:9-11 (Contemporary English Version

At a time when ISIS forces are making headlines with horrific acts of violence toward Christians and members of faiths with whom they disagree, and when western-led forces representing so-called "Christian" nations are making drone and other attacks that result in untold carnage, relationships between members of major world religions are strained as never before. We forget that God loves all people, and that Muslims, Jews and Christians alike claim to serve the God of Abraham and Sarah as revealed in our sacred texts, even though their understandings of God may differ. And we Christians likewise forget that Jesus' only teaching regarding enemies who persecute and hate us is to respond by returning good for evil rather than exacting revenge.

I've never been one to promote the idea that all religions are the same, that we should just forget about our differences and blend everything religious together into one generic faith. On the contrary, I feel that whatever I or others truly believe as our "way, truth and life" we should respectfully promote and affirm without apology.

But we can't get others to even consider our own faith if we are inconsiderate of theirs, and certainly not if we are hostile toward them. Jesus never lashed out against Samaritans or called them heretics. Nor did he ridicule or insult the religion of Romans or of other Gentiles of his time. In fact, the only religious teachers or teachings he lashed out against were unloving dogmatics within his own strongly held Jewish faith.

And certainly if we are to love and pray for even our enemies we should love and respect all of our many friends around the world who follow the faith of their choice--just as we would have them respect ours. That's not heresy, it's the Golden Rule.

On This Third Day Of Christmas--Pray For The Release Of Long Held Prisoners

Some good men at Buckingham Correctional Center

"I, the Lord, have called you... to free captives from prison and to release from the dungeon those who sit in darkness."

Isaiah 42:6-7 NIV

Imagine spending half of your time every day confined to a space as small as a medium size bathroom. At meal times and some other times you live in equally crowded spaces surrounded by concrete walls and barbed wire, never able to get away from the hundreds of fellow detainees with whom you share a concentration-camp-like environment for years on end. 

Whether detained for just or for unjust reasons, decades of such confinement result in an unusually cruel form of punishment.

So pray with me on this third day of Christmas for the humane release of three people such as the following:

Mr. A. Jefferson Grissette #1143033, currently at St, Brides Correctional Center in Chesapeake was free on parole and doing well just four years ago. He had a good job, was working full time, paying off his debts and getting his life together. Unfortunately, he became a convenient suspect in a credit card theft case in Arlington because of some similar crimes for which he had been convicted earlier in his life. The only evidence against him was based on his resembling an obscure image caught on a surveillance camera. Without due process, he got another 18 years in prison after being urged to take a plea agreement rather than face a jury trial.

Also please pray for the release of men like Mr. Nat Painter #1009725, age 74, who is still incarcerated for a crime he committed 21 years ago, but who has consistently demonstrated good behavior in prison, and only wants a few remaining years of a normal life with his loved ones. He has  repeatedly been denied parole in spite of his almost certainly not being any further danger to society. His address is Coffeewood Correctional Center, 12352 Coffeewood Drive, Mitchells, VA 22792.

Virginia Public Radio

Likewise, pray for the release of Mr. Jens Soering #1161655, age 49, to his native Germany. Jens, whom I met at the Buckingham Correctional Center a couple of years ago, has just spent his 30th Christmas in a Virginia prison for a crime he says he foolishly confessed to at age 20 to save his then girl friend from being convicted of capital murder. As a son of a German diplomat he assumed he would be sent to Germany for a trial and get a lesser sentence. When she testified against him he got two life sentences here and she got 90 years. Jens has had nine books published since his incarceration. His address is BKCC, P.O. Box 430, Dillwyn, VA 23936-0430.

For an excellent Washington Post column by George Will on mandatory sentencing, check this link.

And here's a good article on the increasing numbers of aging citizens in our prisons.

On This Second Day Of Christmas--Pray That Walls Of Separation Come Down

"For he himself is our peace, who has made the two groups one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility."   

(Ephesians 2:14 NIV)

Whether it be the Berlin Wall, the barrier fence on our U.S.-Mexican border, or Israel's Separation Barrier (seen here) that scars the Holy Land around Bethlehem and the West Bank, there is something in us that "doesn't love a wall", that begs to have it removed.

On this the second of the twelve days of Christmas, join me in praying that these kinds of physical walls will become a thing of the past. Also that those invisible barriers dividing us along race, class, gender, religious and national lines may be removed by the Prince of Peace, or at least that doors may be opened in them to allow us all full access.

In the vision of the "New Jerusalem" in the Apocalypse, the visionary new city representing the peaceful Lamb's radiant " bride", God's eternal dwelling, has secure walls but eternally open gates in all directions. "The nations will walk by its light, and the kings of the earth will bring their splendor into it. On no day will its gates ever be shut, for there is no night there." (Revelation 21 NIV)

Pray with me that the world's darkness will be dispelled and all of its walls be destroyed--or to be remade with gates that are forever open and welcoming.

On This First Day Of Christmas--Pray For New Birth Everywhere

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For this first of an annual series of daily prayers and reflections for each of the twelve days of Christmas, I borrow from John of the Cross (1542-1591):


If you want

the Virgin will come walking down the road
pregnant with the holy,
and say,

“I need shelter for the night,
please take me inside your heart,
my time is so close.”

Then, under the roof of your soul
you will witness the sublime
intimacy, the divine, the Christ
taking birth
forever,
as she grasps your hand for help,
for each of us is the midwife of God, each of us.

Yet there, under the dome of your being does creation
come into existence eternally,
through your womb, dear pilgrim—
the sacred womb in your soul,
as God grasps our arms for help;
for each of us is
His beloved servant
never far.

If you want, the Virgin will come walking
down the street pregnant
with Light and sing …

–St. John of the Cross, “If You Want” in Daniel Ladinsky Love Poems from God: Twelve Sacred Voices from the East and West (New York: Penguin Group, 2002), 306-307.

May Christ truly be 'born in us' on this day.

Reflecting On A Holy Night (And A Horrific Night): Christmas Greetings From Hamlet Drive

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Dear family and friends,

This has been a difficult holiday season. While we've been blessed beyond deserving this year, we received the terrible news on December 12 that my sister Mary Beth Shifflett, 69, and her husband of 51 years, Harven, age 77, perished in a fire that destroyed their mobile home in Greene County sometime after midnight less than two weeks ago. We remain in a state of shock, and are still waiting for their bodies to be released from Richmond for burial.

Meanwhile a service of memory is being planned for friends and family on Sunday, January 3. Pray for us.

Meanwhile, Alma Jean and I, with our three children and six grandchildren, enjoyed a Christmas meal together yesterday, sang some carols, shared some gifts with the young ones, and prepared some hygiene kits for refugees to send through Mennonite Central Committee, along with an investment in Oxfam to purchase some goats ($50 each) and some efficient small cookstoves ($25 each) for needly families abroad.

This year we won't tire you with any other wonderful details of our children and grandchildren's lives, much as we celebrate them each and enjoy them all (especially this week!). And this year we're again going simple with our season's greetings, saving trees and sending our Christmas blessings via email and blog to our many wonderful friends and family members.

We celebrate the following words from "O Holy Night" by a French poet, Placide Cappeau (a nominal Jew when he wrote the original "Cantique de Noël" as a commissioned work) which in 1885 became "O Holy Night" as translated and set to music by John Sullivan Dwight:

Truly he taught us to love one another,

His law is love and his gospel is peace.

Chains shall he break for the slave is our brother

And in His name all oppression shall cease.
Sweet hymns of joy in grateful chorus raise we,
Let all within us praise His holy name!

Fall on you knees, O hear the angel voices,

O night divine, O night, O night divine!

These are words we want to take to heart and live by in 2016 and in the short remaining years of our life.

Blessings to you all!

Harvey and Alma Jean

P.S. Click here to enjoy "O Holy Night" as sung by the Indianapolis Children and Youth Choirs.  And here to hear an ensemble of members of the Pittsburgh Mennonite Church, led by our son Brad. You'll love his arrangement of "Go Tell It On The Mountain" with soloist Tony Brown!