Getting Here: Part 1 - Making of a Loner

This is the first of a malt-part series on how God found me and made me believe. I know it is material I've presented several times previously in different ways, but it doesn't hurt to tell the tale again for those who may be new to me. It doesn't hurt to retell for those who may have forgotten and put it out of mind, which could even include myself at times.

I thought it wise to tell how I first got lost, how I found myself in an empty black hole and how God rescued me.

Part 1: Making of a Loner
Part 2: Losing My Religion
Part 3: On the Obverse
Part 4: All-American Dream Couple
Part 5: Desolation Row
Part 6: Change is Blowin' in the Wind
Part 7: Hippie Writer
Part 8: Peep Show into my Soul
Part 9: Atheism Has No Holy Days

Part 10: God But a Heartbeat Away

And so we begin at the beginning.

Just before my parents wed, my father lost his job at a scrapyard. They couldn't begin married life together because they were too poor. Each remained living with their parents. In my father's case this meant his mother and two younger brothers. His father had died during his late teens and he had supported the family by joining Roosevelt's Civilian Conservation Corp.

My father was a high school dropout and rapscallion as a boy, not the best credentials for entering adult life. Now wishing to live with his wife, he was forced to beg a home from his grandfather and namesake, who held the sins of his parents against him. His grandparents all but disowned him and berated and insulted him through his youth. But his grandfather, who owned most property about the town of Modena, did allow him to rent a bug-infested apartment next to the train tracks. This became my first home.

It didn't remain so for long because of that bug infestation. My parents rescued me from the insects nightly dinner plate (my crib) to the country climes of Whitford, moving in with my maternal grandparents, who rented an old house (pictured left) on the estate of George Thomas III, a prominent member of Chester County's founding families. This had been my mother's childhood home. It was not to become mine.

In December of 1941, for reasons I have never learned and probably never will, we moved again,   grandparents, parents, Nellie my mother's dog and me, to Downingtown. The picture atop this page is me, age 3, sitting on the front steps of the new home my grandfather rented for us. My grandfather was a carpenter and eventually repaired that floor. By the time of this picture my father was in the South Pacific fighting the Japanese.

From all accounts, I was a happy, outgoing, friendly, trusting lad then. I always looked so in my earliest photographs prior to 1947.

An event occurred at the beginning of that year that was to change the child I was into something different. After 1947 I would become an often unhappy, withdrawn, socially awkward, suspicious, but self-dependent boy. In the prior year my dad returned from the war and eventually got a job as a long-distant truck driver. He had been away for two years and now he was seldom home during the week. Our relationship grew as distant as his weekly delivery destinations. But even more affecting upon me was he moved us into the swamp house (pictured right).

He got it rent free from his employer and because he was a returning vet. It was in the country, removed from nearly everything and everybody I knew. It sat down a long lane partially surrounded by a marsh. Behind was a cornfield and to the other side a cow meadow. The nearest neighbors were a mile up the highway and none had children near my age. My father was on the road all week and my mother didn't drive. It was desolate isolation.

It is not completely true there were no children my age. There were three boys, brothers, one a year older, one a year younger and one just right. But I only knew them the one summer. Their father was killed in the war and they attended the boarding school in Hershey three-quarters of the year. In that summer we became "best" friends, playing cowboys at each other's place. They had a sister. She was the youngest, about four. I witnessed her death on the highway, going with her brothers from my place to hers on the last day of summer. The boys went back to Hershey and I never saw them again.

We lived in the swamp for two years, until my dad changed jobs again and we lost the house. I wasn't unhappy living there. For a child with my imagination and curiosity it was almost a Garden of Eden. There was so much to explore and the close changes of environment, swamp here, open meadow there, a sledding field behind, a woods in walking distance, made for great adventure in my imagination.

And I was free from many restrictions other kids had. Traffic was no concern as long as I stayed away from the highway. There were few rules imposed upon me. I explored at will. I was generally left to my own devices, entertaining myself by inventing games and stories. I grew very self-sufficient.

I wasn't completely cutoff from civilization. I went to school, of course, to a school I remember nothing about as an adult. It has been erased from my memory for some reason. School apparently was not the center of my life at the time. I also was shucked off to my grandparents on weekends when my dad came home. I would be dropped off Friday night and taken home Sunday evening after dinner. Obviously an arrangement that did little to bring me and my father together.

I spend many of those weekends in the company of my grandfather (pictured left), who I loved dearly. He was the father and man figure in my life. He was a gruff man, well-known about the town and well-liked. His delights were cigars, whiskey, chewing tobacco, fox hunting, boxing matches and telling the occasional dirty joke. He had an admirable vocabulary of cusses as well. He took me on many a fox hunt and to the dives and dingy bars that dotted the county. Probably if I actually didn't spend most of my youngster days in the company of the womenfolk I would have glommed onto his habits, but despite my affection for the man, his delights did not become my own. He died from the ravages of alcoholism with I was sixteen.

At the beginning of 1950 we moved back to Downingtown, back in with my grandparents at first. I was back on the old block and in the school where I had begun first grade. I was now in third grade with the same children I knew then, some of whom lived on that same block and were once my closest friends. Everything seemed the same, but that was an illusion. I was different.

Living in the swamp I had learned to be alone. Back in town it didn't take my contemporaries long to show as far as they were concerned that was all I was and should be, a Loner.

Whose Birthday?

I read today that Christmas sales were down this year. The alleged reason was people were holding back in fear of the fiscal cliff. If this is true, I do not know, but I know this is what Christmas has been reduced to in my country - how profitable stores are in December.

How sad and how did we end up down this road of Christmas shopping being our most worshipped seasonal god?

As far as I know it began with the Magi, better known in pop culture as the the Three Wise Men, although it may have been three hundred wise men in that caravan to Bethlehem. Scripture never places a number on them.

After Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea, during the time of King Herod, Magi from the east came to Jerusalem and asked, “Where is the one who has been born king of the Jews? We saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him.”

When King Herod heard this he was disturbed, and all Jerusalem with him. When he had called together all the people’s chief priests and teachers of the law, he asked them where the Messiah was to be born.

“In Bethlehem in Judea,” they replied, “for this is what the prophet has written: “‘But you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, 
are by no means least among the rulers of Judah;
 for out of you will come a ruler
 who will shepherd my people Israel.’”

Then Herod called the Magi secretly and found out from them the exact time the star had appeared. He sent them to Bethlehem and said, “Go and search carefully for the child. As soon as you find him, report to me, so that I too may go and worship him.”

After they had heard the king, they went on their way, and the star they had seen when it rose went ahead of them until it stopped over the place where the child was. When they saw the star, they were overjoyed. On coming to the house, they saw the child with his mother Mary, and they bowed down and worshiped him.

Then they opened their treasures and presented him with gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh.  Matthew 2: 1-11 NIV

Out of that rather odd assortments to a baby out modern tradition of gift-giving evolved. Now buying and giving gifts has eclipse most everything associated with Christmas. We got to have a good gift, too. Look at that poor shepherd boy fretting over not having a gift worthy to give a king. Actually, other than the wise men, I don't recall anyone else heading down to the stable with gifts in hand. And when the Magi arrived, perhaps two years after the birth, they didn't take their gifts to a stable either. Joseph and mary were living in a house when they showed up.

The gifts of frankincense and myrrh were hardly what you or I would present a child, ointments for burial. But this was a gift pointing to the future. The gold probably financed Joseph and Mary's flight into Egypt to keep the child safe from Herod. I don't know what they would have done with a Chia Pet, Snuggie or what-ever the gimmicky gift of 2012 might be. At any rate, they didn't give presents to each other, they gave them to Christ.

Last week as we drove up to Toms River to do hurricane relief we passed a church. Its sign read, "Christmas is not your birthday!"

But you know what? It could be.

Why has Christmas been celebrated with such joy all these centuries? It hasn't been because of the gifts we hand each other every December 25, it hasn't been the visit from Jolly Ol' St. Nick or the singing of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. 

It's been because of the gift given, not by the Magi, but by God. It is the gift of the babe in the manger, a child given to die horribly so we could live eternally.

I have nothing against the exchanging of gifts if given out of love for those we give to and not with expectations we will be glorified for what we gave. Nor should we give with any expectation to be given in return. But after we have unwrapped all these worldly treasures that by next year will be lost, broken or forgotten we should seek the gift that all of this should represent. That gift of salvation given to the world on that first Christmas Day. 


There is nothing else of such value.

Have a blessed, merry, happy, peaceful Christmas!


                                 Larry

Top Illustration: Adoration of the Magi by Mattias Stomer

A Lost Year; A Year of Losses

When I was a child a Billy Wilder film won the Academy Award. It was "The Lost Weekend". I didn't see it during the first screenings. I was only four years old. I saw it years later, probably on TV and it became a favorite that I viewed several times over. I even read the novel it was based upon. The autobiographical novel was written by Charles R. Jackson.

For those not familiar with the story it concerns a young alcoholic writer's five-day drinking binge. During this period he descends lower and lower into the gutter, hocking his typewriter for booze money and ending up in the DT ward of Bellevue.

My lost year was nothing quite like that and certainly had nothing to do with alcohol. It mostly came about by events beyond my control.

'Twenty-twelve was bad from the get-go. I had become dissatisfied with the direction my church was going and left it a few months earlier and the job I had at the end of 2011 left me. Thus I began the year unemployed and somewhat adrift spiritually. I am a Christian, a true believer in the salvation of Jesus and the truth of the Bible, but when disconnected from a body of brothers and sisters in Christ tends to drift backward into my sins. I began the year already with a sense of lost...and with a feeling of nausea.

I was sick most of January. I hadn't been really ill in years, couldn't remember the last time. It must have been back in the days I worked at Wilmington Trust, back in the last millennium. But I began 2012 sick.  It went away after a week, took a little Carrabean cruise or something, then by late February returned to make me sick again twice over.

Not long into the first month of the year I also lost my ability to take the long walks that generally began my days. These are times of reflection as well as physical exercise. I can get away into the quite of our many parks and clear my mind. But one morning early on I awoke with a grapefruit in my left knee or what appeared to be some sort of bulbous melon.

It really hurt with one of those pains that doesn't go away no matter what you do. Lying down, standing up or sitting, the knee throbbed away. I could barely hobble about the house upon it and driving a car was pure agony. I couldn't ben tie my own shoes.  I certainly wasn't going to be hiking up any rocky trails in the Piedmont.

As we shuffled moaning into the drear days of February the grapefruit began to deflate. Healing came slowly, but came. My knees began to match each other, ugly twins indeed, but neither bloated or painful. But my ankle was.

As if he had been displaced by bursitis, angry man Author Itis returned taking vengeance upon my ankles. I still could not walk. I had to bear a few more weeks of agony, but by the Ides of March I too was marching forth with something of my normal gate. It seemed I was about to resume the life I had become use to living.

Then on the first Wednesday of April the phone rang at about 9:00 AM and my way of life simply disappeared. Caller ID id'd my parents number. They never called me this early in the day. My first thought was, "dad died". It was going to be the call I had anticipated for the last couple of years, but when I answered it was my dad's gravelly voice that answered back.

"Your mother's had a stroke. I want you ta come up here." (Pictured left, my dad and mom on one of the last days of their lives.)

Thus began a seven month period where I disappeared into handling my parent's affairs, seeking a nursing home that could care for them both, dealing with the slow moving government agencies and then with the deaths of first my mother and then my dad with a two week period.

By that point my wife's own health was a concern, our financial situation was deteriorating and two of my favorite cats also died. I also lost my Blog domain names.

I lost the Blog domains because Wilmington Trust had been taken over by another bank, which issued all new cards. My old Wilmington Trust MasterCard became this bank's Visa. My domain names meanwhile came up for renewal in mid-summer and dealing as I was as my parents now, I forgot to revise my automatic payment info. The Domain licenser's payment request was denied against my old now invalid card.

I did not find this out until months later, of course, because I had stopped writing. I am hoping I have reached a point I can write again.

This has become a lost year in a way and a year of many losses. But in the midst of all this pain and turmoil I found prayers answered and assurance that God was always nearby. I found a new church and a new spirit. I learned that what we cling to so tightly in this world can very daily slip away. I saw how material possessions disappear in the wink of an eye as I had to dispose of my parents belonging to meet the requirements of Medicaid. When the died all that was left were a few boxes of clothing, which I donated to Goodwill.

I saw this lesson again this December as I joined the Disaster Relief Team at my new church and spent weekends doing mud-outs in homes flooded during Hurricane Sandy. All the possessions of the owners ruined and stacked haphazardly on the sidewalk for trash pickup. The houses empty shells.

You sometimes suffer in this world and you can easily slip into self-pity, then you step out into the places where others have suffered even more and you understand why we must lend a hand to our neighbor.

This was a lost year and a year of losses for many, but as for me, I know even more that God has my back and God can lift me up.



PSALM 116: VERSES 1-8 (KJV) 

I love the Lord, because He has heard
My voice and my supplications.

Because He has inclined His ear to me,
Therefore I will call upon Him as long as I live.

The pains of death surrounded me,
And the pangs of Sheol laid hold of me;
I found trouble and sorrow.
 Then I called upon the name of the Lord:
“O Lord, I implore You, deliver my soul!”

 Gracious is the Lord, and righteous;
Yes, our God is merciful.
 The Lord preserves the simple;
I was brought low, and He saved me.
 Return to your rest, O my soul,
For the Lord has dealt bountifully with you.

 For You have delivered my soul from death,
My eyes from tears,
And my feet from falling.

                    

Iron Faith Fellowship and Hurricane Sandy Relief

A couple weeks back a call for volunteers was made at church. I considered saying I'd go, but then thought that was not a good idea. I feared I'd be more a detriment than a help. This body isn't what it once was, not that it was ever all together great. But back a few years Arthur Itis wasn't hanging around my joints. I can't even squat down anymore, and if I kneel or sit upon the floor it pains me and it is difficult to get back up.

I've lost a lot of strength as well. I was able to press at least a hundred and twenty pounds straight overhead, but these days I struggle to carry a 40-pound bag of kitty litter. So, no, I better not go.

I brought this subject up at the dinner table that evening. My eldest daughter, Laurel, said, "Oh, I'd like to do that. I'll go." Since she was going to go I decided I would as well, but not without trepidation.

I went. I found I was right about my loss of strength when I couldn't lift one end of a table to help move it, but I could pull nails and sweep and pick up debris. Age caught up with me in mid-afternoon when my hands began to cramp, freezing my thumbs solid against the last knuckle of my index finger, but at least I didn't collapse.
.

The devastation is startling. We drove down street after street with the curbs on both sides lined with the ruined discards of these people's lives. This junk was their furniture, appliances, walls, floors, and personal belongings, and irreplaceable memorabilia of their lives. The houses often looked fine standing behind these heaps, but they were like movie sets, empty shells, stripped to the bone inside.

Where do you begin?

You begin with prayer and then you bend your back and you do as much as you can.

Some ask, "Why did this happen to these people? What did they do to deserve this?"

One day Jesus stepped outside after having his supper. Some who where around mentioned a recent atrocity that befell some Galileans at the hands of Pilate, the Roman Pocurator of Judea. Pilate had them killed and their blood mixed with that of the sacrifices. These people apparently though the Galileans had sinned in some way to have come to this end.

Jesus said: "Do you think that these Galileans were worse sinners that all the other Galileans because they suffered this way?  I tell you, no! But unless you repent, you too will all perish. Or those eighteen who died when the tower in Siloam fell on them - do you think they were more guilty than all the others living in Jerusalem?  I tell you, no! But unless you repent, you too will all perish." (Luke 13: 1-5)

We live in a cursed world since man fell. There are events that randomly overtake us, destroy our property and sometimes our lives, not because we are greater sinners that someone down the road, but just because murders and towers falling and hurricanes happen. These things happen to good people and bad, to the unrepentant and the saved.

Jesus was not warning these people that if they did not repent that a tower was going to fall on them or an earthquake would swallow them up. He was warning them they lived in a dangerous world and such things could befall them. And if such things did not happen to them, they would still die same day, but they could not know if that might be sooner than later. If they had not repented and found salvation with God they would not only die, but perish in Hell afterward.

We must not only help these people rebuild their property and lives, but also rebuild their faith or find a faith they may never have had. You don't just do this with a prayer and a God bless you. These people do not feel very blessed right now. You do it by putting deeds behind the words, by getting your hands dirty and standing beside them to do what little you can to make their recovery quicker.

And you realize how this could have been you and next time may be.


The video is what I pieced together from that Saturday.  All the photos are mine, except of the Church of Grace and Peace", which I called "Peace and Grace" in my narration.