Neighbors are different out in the country.  First of all, they are a whole lot further away.  Instead of zero lot line houses barely five feet apart, they are 5 to 50 acres apart.  You seldom even see one another to wave, except maybe at the lineup of mailboxes out on the highway.  In the country, if you want to see your neighbors, you have to make it happen.
            In the city a good neighbor often boils down to this:  he’s quiet and doesn’t cause any trouble.  There may be a particular neighbor or two you really become friends with, taking turns having one another over for dinner, going fishing together, loaning your lawn mower and babysitting once in a while, but the rest are confined to a nod when you pass one another on the street and a quick word over the backyard fence if you both happen to be out at the same time.
            In the country, because you are so far out of town and away from help, “neighbor” takes on a much larger meaning.  The very lifestyle means you have far more need of one another.  You pull one another’s vehicles out of the mud.  You tag team generators when the power goes out for more than a couple of hours.  You feed one another’s livestock when the other one has to be out of town a few days.  You swap garden tilling for tractor mowing and tomatoes for blueberries.  You help one another shell peas and shuck corn, and then work together one hot afternoon to get it all put up.  You help load sick, but heavy, pets in the pickup for a trip to the vet.  You trade shooting lessons for help wiring the shed.  You loan cars when one is in the shop, or chauffeur a sick neighbor to the doctor if you need it yourself.  If a widow is alone, you load up her woodstove and get it set, ready to light on a cold night.  If a husband is away and there is a household emergency—like the refrigerator door falling off!—you head down the lane immediately and screw it back on.  When a storm passes through and leaves a live oak half out of the ground leaning over a house, all the neighbors drop everything and run with their tractors, chains and chainsaws to help.  There is something a little more primal about being a neighbor in the country.
            We’ve had neighbors like that and we’ve tried to be neighbors like that in return.  I think it’s the sort of thing Jesus had in mind when he told the story of the Good Samaritan.  This isn’t a matter of borrowing a cup of sugar.  It isn’t about keeping the TV low in the wee hours or not parking on someone else’s property.  It’s about real life and death matters, real trials and suffering, and aiding in whatever way you can.
           Maybe the Levite and the priest were used to city neighbors.  This guy on the side of the road certainly wasn’t being a good neighbor to them, causing them all sorts of trouble and a delay in their schedules if they had stopped to help.  But the truth is, you can be a bad neighbor anywhere, country or city, and the Lord expects a whole lot more from us than that.  He expects us to do just as that Samaritan did, helping beyond the expected—just think what a couple night’s lodging would cost today—and yes, for a perfect stranger.  Was he a good guy or a good-for-nothing?  We don’t know and that’s the point.  If someone needs our help, we help, even a stranger and even when we don’t have time to check and see if we are being good stewards of our money.
           “Love thy neighbor as thyself” was recognized by Jews as the second greatest commandment.  Yet they argued long and hard over who exactly their “neighbor” was.  It most cases it boiled down to a good practicing Jew.  We’re big on castigating those Pharisaical Jews who knew the Law but explained it away.  I think we just might have the same problem.
 
For the whole law is fulfilled in one word: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself. (Gal 5:14)
 
Dene Ward

Boundary disputes once helped win an American presidential election. 
            In 1818, we signed a treaty with Great Britain agreeing to joint ownership of the Oregon Territory.  Citizens from both countries had settled there.  They eventually agreed to a boundary between America and Canada at the 49th parallel.  Then they both got greedy.  The British claimed anything north of the 42nd parallel.  Along came American expansionists who were willing to go to war in order to claim the disputed area up to the 54th 40 parallel for America. 
            Franklin Polk ran on the expansionist platform with the slogan "Fifty-four forty or fight," referring to what is now the southern border of Oregon, fifty four degrees, forty minutes north latitude.  On Dec 4, 1844, after an election that had run since November 1, he won the presidency.  However, he abandoned the fight and left the Oregon Territory boundary at the original line of agreement, the 49th parallel, where it still is today.
            We've had some boundary issues ourselves.  When we first moved onto this land, no one else lived on the parcels anywhere around us.  Everyone else bought for the investment and planned to sell later, and with the titles unclear (except for ours) the plots remained empty for a long time.  With no fences in place, the boys literally had their own version of the Hundred Acre Woods to play in. 
            When the first hard rains showed us how the land around here drained, and that we would soon be washed away if something weren’t done, the owners to the north of us plowed a ditch along that side to help us out.  It was required by law, but they were compliant and even stopped to make sure we were satisfied before their rented equipment went back to the store.  Yes, we were.  The ditch worked fine and we stayed dry.
            We assumed the ditch ran right along the northern edge of the property and used all the land up to it for our garden, for our yard, for flower beds, even for a post to hold guywires for our antenna.  When the land around us began to sell and people moved in, we finally had to put up a fence.  Imagine our surprise when we discovered that we had been using as much as five feet more land along the north boundary than was actually ours.  But of course, the surveyors were correct.  They had sighted along the boundary markers, white posts set on all four corners of our five plus acres.  I even had to dig up half of a lily bed one morning and transplant them elsewhere so they could put the fence along the correct line.
            The Israelites were aware of boundaries and the landmarks that outlined them.  “You shall not move your neighbor's landmark, which the men of old have set, in the inheritance that you will hold in the land that the LORD your God is giving you to possess. Deut 19:14.  It was a matter of honesty and integrity.  “‘Cursed be anyone who moves his neighbor's landmark.’ And all the people shall say, ‘Amen.’ Deut 27:17.  And this is just talking about land.  Imagine if someone moved a landmark that showed something even more important than that.
            The princes of Judah have become like those who move the landmark… Hos 5:10.  The wicked kings of God’s people had blurred the lines between right and wrong, between good and evil.  The standard became which will make me wealthier or more important among my peers, rather than which is right in the eyes of God.  Which is more convenient, which is easier, which do I like the best, which appeals to my lusts?  All of these have been used to move the boundaries of right and wrong in people’s lives for thousands of years.  When the government does it too, we have an instant excuse.  After all, it’s not against the law, is it?
            Do you think it hasn’t happened to us?  What do you accept now that you would never have accepted thirty years ago because you knew that the Bible said it was wrong?  Now people come along and tell you the Bible is a book of myths or the Bible only means what you want it to mean.  They have moved the landmark, and many have accepted it.
            God does not move landmarks.  What He says goes—then and now.  He may have changed the rituals we perform in each dispensation, but basic morality—right and wrong--has not and will not change.  Even Jesus used the argument, “But from the beginning it was not so…” (Matt 19:8). 
            We can move the landmarks all we want, but we will still wind up on the Devil’s property, and God will know the difference, whether we accept it or not.
 
​Do not move an ancient landmark or enter the fields of the fatherless, for their Redeemer is strong; he will plead their cause against you. Prov 23:10-11
 
Dene Ward

Benjamin Franklin was one of the most amazing men who ever lived.  Besides being one of the founding fathers of America, he was a printer, publisher, author, inventor, scientist, and diplomat.  He began writing his own autobiography in 1771, many years before his death in 1790, and never finished it.  It exists in four parts, the final part being the shortest and not begun until a few months before he died. 
           The publication of that book has a long and complex history.  An English version was published in 1793 but that was a year after both a German and Swedish version had been published.  Also, that English version was a translation of a French translation of the original English, which means that being doubly translated, Franklin's original intention in the words was likely "lost in translation."  So how did we get that French translation?  On November 13, 1789, Franklin himself sent a copy to his friend Louis Guillaume Le Veillard.  In 1791, Franklin's grandson, William Temple Franklin, traded the final manuscript he owned for that original.  Meanwhile, Veillard had already had it translated, and that translation was purchased by the Library of Congress in 1908 (www.loc.gov).
          Today, consider a portion of that autobiography dealing with the invention of the Franklin stove, which Franklin himself considered one of his more important inventions.  In those days, most homes were heated by fireplaces.  Anyone who has tried to do that understands that most of the heat goes right up the chimney.  In addition people were dying every year due to the hazards of fireplaces, and on top of that, Pennsylvania was experiencing a wood shortage. 
           Ben Franklin tackled all those issues by creating a freestanding fireplace that burned wood efficiently, using less wood and producing more heat with less danger.  The first Franklin stove was called a Pennsylvania Fireplace, and though its original model was not perfect, it was the precursor of today's wood stoves and fireplace inserts.  Although he was offered one, he refused to patent it stating in his autobiography, "That as we enjoy great advantages from the inventions of others, we should be glad of an opportunity to serve others by an invention of ours…"
             We installed an insert in our fireplace when we lived in South Carolina for three years.  The difference in the heating value between it and a fireplace was like night and day.  Now I live in Florida but up here in North Florida we still have a little bit of winter.  Usually on cold nights, we fill up our freestanding Ashley woodstove, which burns out by morning and we don’t need any more till the next night, or maybe not for a few nights, depending upon the vagaries of cold fronts.  Sometimes, though, I have had to keep that fire burning all day, adding a log or two every couple of hours.  You see, if you let it burn down too far, it goes out.  Even adding wood will do you no good if the coals are no longer glowing.
            Sometimes we let our souls go out.  Instead of stoking the fire, adding fuel as needed, we seem to think we can start it up at will and as needed, with just a single match I suppose.  Try holding a match to a log—a real log, not a manufactured pressed log with some sort of lighter fluid soaked into it.  You will find that you cannot even get it to smoke before the match dies.  Starting a fire anew takes a whole lot more effort than just keeping the old one going.
            God has a plan that keeps the fire going.  He has made us a spiritual family.  He commands us to assemble on a weekly basis.  He has given us a regular memorial feast to partake of.  He has given us his Word to read any time we want to.  He will listen to us any time of the day.  And perhaps, knowing how he has made us, that is why those songs he has given us keep going round in our heads all week—words at the ready to help us overcome and to remind us who we are.  All of these things will keep the fire from dying.  Just as those people who actually saw and heard Jesus on a daily basis said, “Did not our hearts burn within us while he talked to us on the road, while he opened to us the Scriptures?" Luke 23:32, his voice can come to us through the Word, through the teaching in our assemblies, and through the brothers and sisters he has given us.
            Once a month attendance won’t keep the fire burning.  Seeing our spiritual family only at the meetinghouse will not stoke the fires of brotherly love.  Picking up our Bibles only when we dust the coffee table won’t blow on the embers enough to keep them glowing.  Sooner or later my heart will grow cold, and no one will be able to light a big enough match to get it warm again. 
            Our God is a consuming fire, and he expects that to be exactly what happens to us—for us to become consumed with him and his word and his purpose.  Nothing else should matter as much. 
            Take a moment today to open up that woodstove of a heart and see how the fire looks.  Throw in another log before the fire goes out. 
 
My heart became hot within me. As I mused, the fire burned; then I spoke with my tongue: "O Lord, make me know my end and what is the measure of my days; let me know how fleeting I am! Behold, you have made my days a few handbreadths, and my lifetime is as nothing before you. Surely all mankind stands as a mere breath! Selah.  Surely a man goes about as a shadow! Surely for nothing they are in turmoil; man heaps up wealth and does not know who will gather! And now, O Lord, for what do I wait? My hope is in you. Psalm 39:3-7.
 
Dene Ward

One morning as we sat with our last cup of coffee by the fire pit, we spotted a bug as he came crawling out of the wood we had just lit.  Can bugs be groggy?  It was early and he barely moved away in the bottom of the pit, not 5 inches from the flame, and then sat there as if contemplating it all.  Finally, he began crawling again with a bit more speed, not surprising since the fire was catching well now and the heat rising quickly.  He reached the reflector wall we have set up so that we get the heat instead of the entire surroundings, and slowly began his upward crawl.
            "Well, he's safe now," I thought, but thought too soon.  He never reached six inches before he turned around and headed "south" again.  As he closed in on the burning wood, he must have felt the rising heat because he suddenly turned again and headed upward.  He could have even headed sideways and gotten out of the heat, but that remedy seemed to have eluded him.  Up a bit, and back down, up a bit, and back down, again and again.  Then, as the fire really began to blaze, he began running around in circles.  He couldn't figure out which way to go, or perhaps which way was up!  And suddenly he fell into the fire—pzzzt!  A quick sizzle and he was gone.
            I have seen some Christians act like that bug.  They want to play in the fire, but then their conscience gets the best of them and they ease away, not too far, though, because, oh, it's so tempting, so there they go again.  But wait—no!  I shouldn't be here.  But maybe I can for just a little while—and then suddenly, before they know it, and maybe even because of the fire they are playing with, they are gone.
            If you have been playing around with sin, stop.  It isn't worth it.  The "fun" only lasts a nanosecond when compared to eternity, and you may wind up paying dearly for it, even if you don't actually fall into the fire.  And what is so fun about running around in circles not knowing where to go, beset by your conscience, and having to dodge those who care about you?  You will only get in deeper, becoming more and more confused, until you simply can't get out.  You no longer know the way.  And some day, pzzzt!  You will be gone too, and that will be the end of the matter.
 
For if, after they have escaped the defilements of the world through the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them and overcome, the last state has become worse for them than the first. For it would have been better for them never to have known the way of righteousness than after knowing it to turn back from the holy commandment delivered to them (2Pet 2:20-21).
 
Dene Ward

We have had some cold this winter, more than in recent years.  Over the holidays we had at least two nights in the low to mid 20s, and have had quite a few in the 30s and 40s.  If you are north of the Florida-Georgia line that may not seem too bad to you, but for us, it's noteworthy.  It means when we go out in the mornings for our third cup of coffee and to throw treats for Chloe, we head for the east fire pit rather than sit on the breezy carport.  Even with layers of shirts, sweaters and coats, and even in sunny Florida, those plastic chairs feel cold to the backside, so we pile on the firewood, usually deadwood gathered from around the property.  If the fire is more smoke than flame, a good piece of fat lighter will usually get it going hot and strong, and a handful of pine straw provides the strong, hot, and immediate blaze our bodies crave for comfort. 
            After a few minutes we are finally warming up, both outside and in.  The hardwoods will begin to coal up and suddenly, though the flames may be lower, the heat is much higher.  I often need to turn a bit to the sides to keep my pants and the legs within them from scorching.  Sometimes we even need to push our chairs back a foot or two, and Chloe suddenly prefers to sit to the side on her pile of carefully raked up pine straw rather than right next to us.  When it gets that hot, all you have to do is look up and even on a perfectly still morning, see the leaves on the branches 30 feet above our heads dancing in the heat waves.  Hot air rises, they taught us in science class, and there is the proof of it.
            The Bible uses "heat" as a metaphor for anger, particularly when referring to God's anger.  He let loose on them his burning anger, wrath, indignation, and distress…(Ps 78:49).  But the same figure is used of our anger as well.  ​A hot-tempered man stirs up strife…(Prov 15:18).  Before we go too far along with this, we would do well to remember that anger is not necessarily a sin.  Be angry and sin not, Paul says in Eph 4:26.  But too often, that becomes the excuse du jour, a little too handy and too often used.  Still, we are right to be angry about some things.  ​Hot indignation seizes me because of the wicked, who forsake your law (Ps 119:53), but I fear that too often, our anger has nothing to do with our defense of God, righteousness and justice, but simply of ourselves and what was done to us.
            If a man has a constant problem with anger, the real issue isn't what caused the anger, but the fact that he is simply an angry man.  Anything can raise his hackles at the least provocation, and just like the heat from our morning fire, it will rise to the top, causing turmoil and upset.  It is not just his problem; it affects everyone around him.  As charcoal to hot embers and wood to fire, so is a quarrelsome man for kindling strife (Prov 26:21).  And perhaps worse, Make no friendship with a man given to anger, nor go with a wrathful man, lest you learn his ways and entangle yourself in a snare (Prov 22:24-25).  An angry man is not a happy man and he had rather no one else be happy either.  It should go without saying that he is no fun to be around.
            Many angry men have the mistaken idea that their anger is a sign of strength.  God says otherwise.  A man with a quick temper is a fool (Prov 14:17; Eccl 7:9)).  He has no understanding (Prov 14:29).  He is weak (16:32), and he has no sense (19:11).  That's what God thinks of him. 
            So when you notice the hot air rising, especially within yourself, take a step backwards and reflect.  Why are you so easily angered?  (It can happen to women as well as men, you know.)  What has gotten so deep inside your heart that you can no longer control it?  No bad day or difficult circumstance can ever excuse it.  For some who are deeply damaged, it might require some professional help, but for the average person, it is a choice he makes when he decides to let anger take the controls.  Other people experience the same difficulties and manage to handle them in a righteous manner, including the Lord when he was on this earth.  With him on your side, so can you.
 
Know this, my beloved brothers: let every person be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger; for the anger of man does not produce the righteousness of God (Jas 1:19-20).
 
Dene Ward

A long time ago, a local farmer allowed Keith to milk his cow.  The farmer furnished the cow and the feed, while Keith furnished the labor, and we split the milk.  Our cut was usually a gallon a day, which was good with two boys who drank it by the quart.  I also used the cream to make our own butter.  There is nothing quite like a Southern pound cake made with homemade butter, homemade sour cream, and eggs fresh out of the chicken that morning.  Our mashed potatoes were so creamy you might as well have troweled them onto your hips, and the homemade ice cream so rich it had flecks of butter in it.
            When a dairy cow needs milking, it needs milking, period.  Keith was away overnight once, not due back till late afternoon the next day.  All I could think about was that poor cow.  Having nursed babies, I understood her pain.  Surely I could take care of this, I thought, and help both of them.
            This cow was known to be a kicker.  She had only recently gotten used to Keith, finally allowing him to milk her while she ate feed from the trough.  I knew the drill, so I got a bucket of feed and headed for the corral.  I also knew her penchant for kicking, so I put on Keith’s jacket and hat before I left the house.  I thought I would look and smell like him and she would never know the difference.
            As I headed for the stall she saw me coming, and began a slow walk in my direction.  I made my first mistake.  Keith always called her with the same phrase every day, so I did too, lowering my voice as much as possible.  The cow stopped and looked at me across the fence railing.  For a few minutes I thought she had me, but I held up the bucket so the scent of the feed reached her on the breeze, and she started walking again.
            After that I kept my mouth shut.  I simply poured the feed into the trough and waited for her to put her head down.  Then I reached out and started milking.  Instantly her head was up again, and she looked over her shoulder at me.  I stepped back, keeping a careful eye on her hind legs, ready to jump if she looked like she was even thinking about kicking. 
            For a long moment we stood there eying one another.  Finally, she gave a snort and shake of the head.  The jig was up, as they say.  For all the world it looked like she was saying, “I really need this right now, so go ahead.  But don’t think I’m not on to you.”  She put her head back in the trough, and I began milking again.  It was a compromise.  She gave me just enough to get the pressure off her aching udder, but not enough so I would think she had not seen through my disguise.  A quart later, she stepped back from the trough, and I took both the hint and the milk into the house.  When Keith got home, she gladly let him finish the job.
            Isaiah had a lot to say about this same point.  If a cow—a dumb unreasoning animal—can know its master, why can’t we so-called intelligent human beings recognize ours?  If a donkey knows where to get its sustenance, why can’t we figure out who we must depend upon? 
            Have you ever seen a cow path?  Cows learn when it is time to head for the barn, and they take the shortest route every evening at the same time, following one another down the path, until it is beaten from their hooves and so obvious anyone could follow it.  I look around our world every day and marvel at how many smart people don’t seem to have a clue where the path is, and what’s more, brag about it.  Then I look at God’s people and cry for all the ones who claim to be His children, but act the same way.
 
Hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth; for Jehovah has spoken: I have nourished and brought up children, and they have rebelled against me.  The ox knows his owner, and the ass his master's crib; but Israel does not know, my people do not consider, Isa 1:2,3.
 
Dene Ward

Every afternoon following our midday meal, we walk our property, counting new blooms on the roses, smelling the jasmine, and looking beneath those large scratchy leaves for new squash blossoms.  Usually I end up with a handful of wildflowers, blooms so tiny I cannot see them until Keith hands me one I can pull up close.
            Do you know what I see?  Blooms of all colors--red, pink, blue, white, yellow, orange, purple in all shades and combinations—and shapes—bells, tubes, bowls, cups, stars with five or six points, some flared, some rayed, some as complex as orchids.  And did you know that even the stems are different?  Some are wiry, some are leafless, some are hairy, some sprawl and others stand up straight, and some are square!  Some of these flowers are exquisite, but most of us don’t know that.  We’ve never taken the time to bend over and really look.
            A long time ago a woman who has since become a close friend, told me that looking across the pews at Keith had made her think he was stern and unapproachable, and so she had decided to make it a point to get to know him.  It wasn’t really Keith’s fault.  He has large, piercing blue eyes that look like they’re boring into you, a strong Roman nose, and a voice that, because he is profoundly deaf, is always in projection mode.  Even when he isn’t, he often sounds disapproving, and is always loud, which is often translated “angry.”  A lot of people just go with that first impression.  This woman did not, and she proclaimed that year of getting to know him “delightful.”   I wonder how many others have missed out on that delight, how many have formed an opinion, and kept it despite what others might have said.
            How many do we overlook?  The elderly because we think them dull and uninteresting?  The teenagers because we’ve branded them all shallow and naïve?  The disabled because we think they have nothing to offer?  The scholarly and intellectual because we think those dry old men can’t possibly know how to have any fun?  The ones who seem so well put-together that we think they wouldn’t possibly want anything to do with “someone like me?”  None of these judgments is fair.            
          Jesus told the Jews, “Judge not according to appearance, but judge righteous judgment,” John 7:24.  Maybe I should take the time (sacrifice) to bend over (be humble) and examine (make some effort) a few wildflowers out there, instead of passing over them (negligence) as if they weren’t worth my trouble (arrogance).  When I think of it that way, I finally understand why judging by appearance is NOT righteous.
 
But the LORD said to Samuel, “Do not look on his appearance or on the height of his stature, because I have rejected him. For the LORD sees not as man sees: man looks on the outward appearance, but the LORD looks on the heart.”  1Sam 16:7      
                          
Dene Ward

It has sat there for about a month now, an old birdseed sack that we saved for hauling all those unsolicited catalogues to the dump.  It's impossible to burn them in the burn barrel and they fill up the kitchen garbage in just a day or two, so off to the dump they go every time Keith hauls the garbage cans off.  In the country, in a poor rural county, there is no garbage pickup—you do it all yourself.
          Because it's such a laborious task, and the truck had been in the shop for about three weeks, that sack became part of the landscape.  When Keith finally loaded up the cans, he walked right past where it sat in the corner of the porch and left it there.  He didn't even noticed what he had done until the next morning.  There it was, full of seed catalogues, women's catalogues, Land's End and L L Bean, a couple of Baker's Catalogues, and half a dozen Harbor Freights and Cabela's, still sitting in the corner waiting for its trip to the dump.  And now it will wait another month, probably.
          Which all reminds me of my personal Bible study.  I have read the Bible through more than half a dozen times.  Yet it never fails that when I am studying something I find a passage that seems brand new to me.  "I have never read this before," I will tell myself, as if someone could possibly have come along one night while I slept and put it in there.  Of course I've read it, but it had never stood up and waved at me before.  Can I give you a couple of really easy study tips this morning to help you avoid this?
          1.  Read more slowly.  We all mean well when we plan to read the Bible every day.  But too often, we find ourselves saving it for last, or for the few minutes we have between other chores, and just zip right through it to get it done.  Don't.  Read for the time you have.  God didn't put those chapter divisions in there anyway, so if you have to stop in the middle of one, so what?  Far better to try to read by paragraph (subject), S-L-O-W-L-Y.
          2.  Ask yourself questions while you read.  What did that just say?  Who is he referring to?  Where was he when he said/did this?  What does that word mean?  Where have I heard this name before?  What does this have to do with what I just read in the last paragraph?  What did that command mean in that particular culture?  That will automatically slow you down, and make you think about what you are reading, which, in turn, will help you remember it.
          3.  Read from a version you are unfamiliar with.  I am always looking for large print Bibles these days.  I found a Holman with the largest print I had ever seen—Giant Print, I think they call it.  After checking with some people I trusted who said it was as reliable a version as most any other modern one, I picked it up.  When I started reading, I could hardly put it down.  "It does not say that!" I said out loud more than once.  But when I picked up my old favorite American Standard (1901) that my father had when he went to Florida College in 1946, I found that I was wrong.  It most certainly did say that, just not exactly in the words I expected.  And that small change made me notice much more than I ever had before.  I learned more in a few days than I had the entire month before.
          I hope this helps you in your study.  We all mean well when we pick up God's Word, but let's not treat it like the sack of trash in the corner, something that's always there and thus, goes unnoticed.
 
For this commandment that I command you today is not too hard for you, neither is it far off. It is not in heaven, that you should say, ‘Who will ascend to heaven for us and bring it to us, that we may hear it and do it?’ Neither is it beyond the sea, that you should say, ‘Who will go over the sea for us and bring it to us, that we may hear it and do it?’ But the word is very near you. It is in your mouth and in your heart, so that you can do it.  (Deut 30:11-14).
 
Dene Ward

We live on wooded property—spreading live oaks, pencil straight slash pines, red and silver maples, fast-growing sycamores, sweet gums with their spiky balls, wild cherry and water oaks, both of which will split and fall at the least breeze.  When I walk Chloe around the perimeter I dodge fallen limbs, both deadfall and green, every ten feet or so.  Sometimes I find larger limbs that have fallen overnight, and once one fell right in my path just seconds after I had passed. 
              Often in the night, especially a windy one in the spring or fall as fronts pass through, I hear limbs hit the roof.  They are surprisingly loud and I awake expecting to find something large and heavy only to waste Keith’s time as he climbs the ladder to discover a two foot long twig no bigger around than his thumb.  It certainly sounded bigger than that!
              A few months ago, after a particularly windy winter storm, Chloe and I came upon a fallen pine limb, three feet long maybe and about two inches in diameter.  This one, though, was not lying on the ground.  The wind had cast this one with enough force that it had stuck straight into the ground through the sod.  I pulled it out and a full six inches of it was below the surface.  Imagine if that one had come hurtling through the sky at me as I walked by.
              Words are a bit like fallen limbs.  You never know who they will hit and how.  We are often just as careless as the wind in hurtling them about.  We may think the only one who hears is the one we are addressing.  We may think that everyone knows us and understands how it is meant.  We may think that what was said was perfectly innocent and completely impossible to mistake for something bad.  We may be very wrong.
              Yes, people need to listen with as much charity as we need to speak.  The Bible, particularly the wisdom literature, is full of cautions not only about how we speak but how we listen.  Even Jesus said, “Take heed how you hear.”  Hearing involves maybe as much responsibility as speaking. Do not take to heart all the things that people say, lest you hear your servant cursing you. Your heart knows that many times you yourself have cursed others, Eccl 7:21,22.
              But just maybe we could stand to be a bit more careful in our speaking.  Words can hurt, and unlike physical wounds, may never heal.  What sounds like a twig to us may sound like a massive branch falling on the roof to the hearer.  And a multitude of the same kinds of words has an effect that is hard to erase.  What kinds of words do I use the most?  Praise or criticism?  Thanksgiving or complaining?  Encouragement or rebuke?  Tough love is necessary and is necessarily painful, but do I ever practice any other kind?  Are all my words, or even just the majority, “tough?”  And am I proud of having that sort of reputation?  Do people cringe when they see me coming?
              Those things I can control, but what about the things I say that are not meant to harm, but still manage to do so?  What about things I toss off without thought, directed at no one in particular, but that, like a fallen limb, accidentally come close to someone else’s heart?  Yes, for those who are mature, we can go back to the responsibility laid on hearers in that Ecclesiastes passage and in Jesus’ and the apostles’ words about being quick to judge, but what about the perfectly innocent babes?  What about young impressionable Christians? 
              If I shoot a gun into the air, the bullet will land somewhere, and my having shot it will make me accountable to the law of the land.  Will God’s law hold us any less accountable for the spiritually injured? 
 
I tell you, on the day of judgment people will give account for every careless word they speak, for by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned, Matt 12:36,37.
 
Dene Ward

We live in a rural county.  We have no garbage pickup.  Instead we have dumpsites at several places with recycling bins and a dumpster for household garbage.  We have to haul our own trash.  Ask yourself how much trash and garbage your family generates in a day.  How many garbage cans do you have outside and how many times can you empty the trash indoors before your outside can is full?  Now, how often would you like to drive several miles to dump your trash, and how many of those big trash cans will fit in your car?  You now know one reason most of the folks out here have a pickup truck!
              But this also explains the burn barrel.  We keep two receptacles in the house—one for wet garbage and one for burnable trash.  The more we can burn, the less often we have to cart garbage cans down the highway.  We put everything we possibly can in that box of trash—junk mail, out-of-date documents, bills, and receipts, cardboard boxes, empty plastic containers and lids, plastic bottles and bags, old rags, irreparable clothes—everything that will burn, or melt and then burn.  Don’t talk to me about recycling.  We recycle in several other ways, and this practice saves gas.
              But let me ask you this. Would you ever put anything important in a burn barrel?  Of course not.  Do you know what God thinks of this world?  He has his own burn barrel, and this world is what He plans to throw in it.
              We need to remember that.  Too often we become enamored of the very things God will ultimately destroy.  Some of our favorite things in life are sitting in God’s burn barrel.  Even when we think we have our priorities straight, we often do not.
              I remember telling my little boys that one day we would take a month long camping trip out west.  We would show them all those beautiful national parks they had only heard about.  They could look across the Grand Canyon, watch Old Faithful erupt, and stand in a place where the mountains rose peak after peak after peak with no signs of modern man—no power lines, no sounds of traffic, not even a tangled skein of contrail in the perfect blue sky--a place where a thousand years before some native had stood and enjoyed the same view.  It never happened.  We never had the money or the time.  They are grown now and can understand the pressures of life, making a living, paying the bills, meeting one’s responsibilities to others, but I have always felt bad about missing that trip.  We managed one or two other things while they were still at home, but never that one.
              But remember this, no matter how good a plan it was, how good the values we were trying to instill with an appreciation of God as the Creator of all that majestic beauty, God Himself doesn’t think that much of it.  It’s temporary.  He plans to destroy it all.  The things God meant for me to teach those boys were things I could teach any time, any place, no matter how much money we did or didn’t have. 
               The Bible is full of people who did not have the right priorities—Esau for one, who sold a birthright for one meal.  The Hebrew writer calls him “profane” (Heb 12:16).  Paul talks about having a “mind of the spirit” rather than a “mind of the flesh” (Rom 8:4).  And why?  Because Jesus’ kingdom is “not of this world” (John 18:36).  It is “not meat and drink” (Rom 14:17).  So many things we allow ourselves to become upset about simply do not matter.  Traffic jams?  Noisy neighbors?  Pet peeves?  Even the trials of life—precisely because it is this life we are becoming distracted with.
              For many walk, of whom I told you often, and now tell you even weeping, that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ: whose end is perdition, whose god is their belly, and whose glory is in their shame, who mind earthly things. For our citizenship is in heaven; whence also we wait for a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, Phil 3:18-20.  Yes, Paul says that when I let things of this life upset me to the point of distraction that my “god is my belly.”  I am not supposed to be minding those earthly things.
              So today, think about God’s burn barrel.  He has a place for the things He plans to destroy, just like I do, one that gets too full too fast.  God’s burn barrel holds things like wealth, possessions, awards, careers, opinions, irritations, Jimmy Choo shoes, stock portfolios, time shares on the beach, cabins in the mountains, camping trips out west—even this earthly tabernacle that so many try to keep looking young.  They all go in the barrel at the end of the Day.  And God will light the fire Himself.
 
But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a roar, and the heavenly bodies will be burned up and dissolved, and the earth and the works that are done on it will be exposed…Since all these things are thus to be dissolved, what sort of people ought you to be in lives of holiness and godliness, waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be set on fire and dissolved, and the heavenly bodies will melt as they burn! But according to his promise we are waiting for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells. Therefore, beloved, since you are waiting for these, be diligent to be found by him without spot or blemish, and at peace, 2Pet 3:10-14.
 
Dene Ward