Category Archives: Aging

Great Growth

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Last week the midwife who helped deliver our little Autumn Faith on Monday returned for a follow-up visit to finalize the birth certificate and check on mommy and baby. Another thing she did was paint black ink all over Autumn’s tiny feet to imprint them on a certificate, allowing us to view her precious heel-to-toe soles in a new way.

As we marveled over her perfect feet, of course we credited God for the wonder of her unique print patterns, clearly evident in the ink. But when Skylar and Micah put their bare feet next to Autumn’s prints, the resulting picture could have been entitled, “Great Growth.” The progress made between birth and ages 2 and 3 was impressive. Autumn has her work cut out for her.

Pediatricians tell us a baby usually doubles its birth weight by 5 months and triples it by a year, by far the most dramatic growth in anyone’s life, even including a year when we might eat too much. Maybe that’s why eating is a baby’s favorite pastime. Such tremendous growth is a big job.

It’s interesting that God’s growth assignment for a newborn fits a baby’s abilities. Then as the years add up, he still expects growth, but in categories other than physically. A toddler’s biggest assignment is to learn speech and increase vocabulary. A preschooler has to conquer toilet training and begin understanding the social graces, including letting others go first.

Once we reach school, the more difficult growth begins, much of it in the school of hard knocks. Important growth takes place in the emotional realm as children learn to deflect criticism and handle verbal sparring. We grow best through the tough stuff we encounter, and the growth of our feet loses importance, except at the shoe store.

Then we hit full-blown adulthood, and slowly it dawns on us we’re falling short in being able to control life and even ourselves. We experience loss, heartbreak, and failure. And we learn we need help to grow.

God is ready and waiting, patiently standing by all the while as our little feet grow into walking ones, and much later as our childish nature grows into mature character. Little feet get bigger so we can become independent; but God grows our character greater so we can one day succeed not at being independent but at dependency, which doesn’t make sense unless we realize who he wants us to depend on. And of course it’s him.

Once we become dependent on him for every step we take with our big adult feet, life becomes richly satisfying. And it isn’t as if he doesn’t still have plans for our physical soles. He wants us to walk into the lives of others in an attempt to win other souls to dependency on him. And when we’ve grown into that, God lets us know our feet have become downright beautiful, even more attractive than the precious feet of a newborn baby.

“How beautiful… are the feet of those who bring good news, who proclaim peace, who bring good tidings, who proclaim salvation, who say… ‘Your God reigns!’ ” (Isaiah 52:7)

 

How true…

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Today I spent some time with a skin doctor here in Michigan who’s gradually becoming my friend. She’s invited me to call her by her first name (Deborah), which is a good thing since she runs her hands over every square inch of me.

Today Deborah was on a meticulous hunt for sun damage and skin cancer. Although the word “cancer” floods me with negatives, the words “skin cancer” have been part of our family since Mom began having spots removed 20 years ago.

Being raised on a Lake Michigan beach had numerous advantages, but the one disadvantage was a slow, steady assault on our youthful skin at a time when sun screens hadn’t been invented. We viewed sunburns as a happy signal that summer had arrived, and our parents believed a burn would eventually morph into the “base” for a safe and healthy tan. And tans, they thought, protected our skin for the rest of the summer.

We all know better now and have sun screens galore. Skin damage, though, is permanent, and beach lovers of my generation are all dotted with it. When I arrived home after my appointment, several projects awaited, one of which was reframing a few photographs. Amazingly, God linked one of them to my skin travails. I’d just had 11 pre-cancerous spots removed and was feeling decrepit, but he encouraged me with a lovely thought.

My very favorite “last picture” of Nate from all those taken during the 42 days he had cancer, had needed a better frame. It’s been sitting atop his high boy dresser in our bedroom as a daily reminder of my good history with him. This afternoon as I set the newly framed picture back in its spot next to a plaque Mary had given me, I caught my breath. I’d seen the picture hundreds of times and the plaque, too, but not until today, after a doctor’s appointment reminded me of my decline, did I link the two.

The plaque says, “The LORD your God is with you.”

Looking at Nate and I together in the picture, it struck me that the two of us now relate to that plaque in radically different ways. Although I know God is with me, his presence isn’t literal. Nate believes the statement, too, but for him it’s literally true.

Receiving that thought from the Lord lifted my sinking spirits, which had been completely focused on the inevitability of physical deterioration. It reminded me that one day bodily wear and tear will end for me, too, just as it has for Nate.

I hope I can  hang onto that positive thought long enough not to worry about what’s going to happen 6 months from now. That’s when Deborah is expecting me to swing by for another intimate visit.

“We know that the one who raised the Lord Jesus from the dead will also raise us with Jesus. Therefore we do not lose heart.” (2 Corinthians 4:14,16)

A Man of Integrity

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Today is the 20th anniversary of my Dad’s death in 1991. He married for the first time at 42 and was privileged to hit the 50 year mark with Mom, shortly before he died. Although he didn’t have even one health issue at the ripe old age of 92, a fall that splintered his pelvis into 13 pieces proved fatal. Although a young person could have tolerated traction for so long, immobilizing an elderly man worked against his survival.

Dad was born in 1899, a fact we children flaunted on school playgrounds. Mom used to say he was a contemporary of D.L.Moody who died 3 months after Dad was born. As a kid I used to reason that older was wiser, so Dad must have been the wisest father around.

The first child of parents who’d immigrated to America as teens, Dad spoke only Swedish when he walked into 1st grade at age 6. But he was quiet and observant, quickly learning English and other American ways, like how to avoid the knuckle-smack of an angry public school teacher.

He lost a little brother to pneumonia when he was 12, and his mother to TB at 13. After helping raise two younger siblings then training with the Army during World War I, he rode a streetcar to Northwestern University and emerged with two degrees. He navigated the Great Depression as a 30-something, and worked tirelessly to preserve his dying father’s real estate business.

My sister, brother and I loved hearing stories about the early 20th century, viewing him as a walking, talking history book. As a kid he chased after horse-drawn ice wagons hoping for loose chips on a hot day, and watched donkeys drag wagons of dirt out of hand-dug tunnels, Chicago’s eventual subway system. The city was paved with mud, election results were announced with fireworks, and all of it fascinated us.

Dad was honest to a fault. If a letter arrived with the stamp uncanceled, he’d say, “You can’t reuse that stamp, you know. It did what it was bought to do, and using it again would be robbing the postal service.” Letters only cost two cents then, but his statement was more about integrity than money.

Despite a bumpy background, Dad never experienced self-pity or bemoaned his losses, accepting life as it was. Although he wasn’t demonstrative and rarely shared his emotions, we all knew he loved us and would do anything in his power to help us. We also knew he gave 50% of his income to God’s work at the peak of his business career, which spoke volumes about his faith priorities.

My siblings and I were given a gift in Dad, but also a responsibility. Scripture says, “When someone has been given much, much will be required in return; and when someone has been entrusted with much, even more will be required.” (Luke 12:48)

And then there was Dad, who had much taken, but gave more than he’d been given anyway.

“Those who have been given a trust must prove faithful.” (1 Corinthians 4:2)