Father Corn

In my adult life I have had many titles.  To use the common expression, I’ve worn a lot of hats.  As is true of most ministers in the Baptist tradition, I have had many church members who called me Preacher.  I don’t really object to that, but I have always preferred the title of Pastor.  It is a more comprehensive term.  You can be a Preacher without being a Pastor, but you can’t be a Pastor without also being a Preacher.  A few folks have, tongue in cheek, referred to me as Reverend Corn.  Once again, I don’t object to the title, but it does have an air of formality about it that just isn’t me.

Still, those are not the only titles I have answered to.  Early on in my ministry I was Chaplain Corn, serving in the USAF.  I always liked that title, but in the plan of God I was not destined to make a career of the chaplaincy.  Of course, the most familiar term has been Brother Randy. All of the terms for clergy carry some theological meaning, and I like what Brother Randy communicates.  I am a brother in Christ.  Not their superior or subordinate, just another member of the family of God with a calling to serve God through vocational ministry.  Some change that slightly to Brother Corn, but I have noticed that those I have a significant bond with will typically call me Brother Randy.  You might say we are on a first name basis.

There are other titles that my fellow clergy have used.  One friend upon coming to a new church was asked what he would prefer to be called. He thought for a moment and said, “Well, my life verse is 2 Corinthians 5:20 which says we are ambassadors for Christ, so you can call me ‘Mr. Ambassador’!”  Safe to say, no one took him up on that!  At the other end of the seriousness spectrum I have been told of ministers who insist on being called “the man of God,” or “the prophet.” While there is some biblical precedent for these phrases, to me they picture someone coming down from the mount with a message of judgment.  Pastors have to do some of that, but they also have to come along side the sheep and, like the old hymn says, “rescue the perishing, care for the dying, snatch them in pity from sin and the grave, weep for the erring one, lift up the fallen, tell them of Jesus the mighty to save!”  It seems to me the title that fits those duties best is Pastor, and for those in my fellowship I think Brother Randy captures the relationship.

There is one more title that I have heard applied to me only twice—the term ‘Father.’  Both of those occasions were from respectful folks who were nominal Catholics and simply didn’t know how to address me.  It is understandable why people from a hierarchical church would like that term and why those of us from a congregational church would not.  Still, I have to admit that in 1 Thessalonians 2:11, 12 the Apostle Paul speaks of himself as a caring, concerned father to the Thessalonian church. It was with that background in mind that I recently spoke of myself as a father of a church that I love.

I had been invited to be the Homecoming speaker at Bethlehem, the church I served for the last two decades of my pastoral career.  The service could not have gone better.  Though I was not in good voice, and had to be seated behind the pulpit, the congregation seemed eager to hear me.  My text was Philippians 1:3-11, the great passage where the Apostle begins, “I thank my God upon every remembrance of you.”  I spoke of their past (vs. 3-5), present (vs. 6-8), and future (vs. 9-11), noting that these verse divisions speak to our head, our heart, and our hands in turn. I was able to weave in a good number of stories about my time as their pastor and had their attention, as well as laughter, and a few tears through the whole sermon.  

Long ago I learned the importance of conclusions.  A good conclusion can drive home the main idea of a sermon and a bad one can obscure it. During my preparation my wife Joy made a suggestion.  She said, “Why not include 3 John 4?”  I was resistant at first because it made me sound like I saw myself as their spiritual father, but I had to admit it did capture my emotions.  The verse says, “I have no greater joy than to hear that my children walk in truth.”  I finally came up with a way to work it in.

I said, “When the Apostle John was an old man, he wrote the brief letter we call 3 John.  He may well have been older than anyone who would be reading his letter, and so it was completely appropriate for him to speak of them as his children.  I am not the oldest person in this sanctuary, but I think it is safe to say that, due to my illness, I am aging faster than anybody else here.  Grant me this one indulgence and let me call you my children. I greatly desire for you to walk in the truth, the truth that I have tried to expound today.  Believe me when I say, nothing would give me greater joy.”

Thanks for Reading!

Thanks for Reading!

I have been writing a blog since 2009.  My original idea was that it would be a creative outlet and help me articulate some of my thoughts and feelings about being a pastor.  I wrote about all sorts of thing.  Topics might have been something serious like how it feels when church folks tell you they are “going to try out the church down the road,” or something as mundane as my filing system or library organization.  I wasn’t really expecting internet notoriety, and, sure enough, I didn’t get it.  

That changed in 2016. I had been diagnosed with Corticobasal Degeneration (CBD) in 2015 and wanted to do something different with my blog. I started writing about my experiences with CBD.  This was to give my friends all the information they might want to hear about my condition.  I also found it therapeutic to just put down in words how I was feeling.  

I have been a pastor all of my adult life.  That has meant that a good deal of time has been spent communicating.  I typically preached three times a week and also taught an adult Sunday School class.  Anyone who knows what pastors do will also think about the amount of one-on-one conversation a faithful pastor has with his flock.  Now, with CBD to contend with, there has been a radical shift.  I had to resign from the church I had served for 21 years because I could no longer fulfill my responsibilities.  It was just too much.  As my symptoms progressed it became unsafe to drive, and so I became dependent on others to go anywhere, assuming I had the energy to do so.  At about the same time that I gave up driving, it seemed like my voice became markedly worse.  The speech pathologist at Mayo Clinic had diagnosed me with “mild to moderate dysarthria” in the Fall of 2015.  I am confident that the word “mild” and possibly even “moderate” would have been dropped by 2017.  I was able to fill the pulpit of a number of churches after my resignation, but as my voice began to fail me, I preached less and less.  I often did not feel equal to the task and feared my voice would fail mid-sermon.  More importantly, I have always felt that preaching is supposed to be about God, not about His messenger.  Ever since I broke my hip in 2017, I have had to sit on a stool to preach.  Combine that with an unpredictable, sometimes hard to understand voice and I felt as though I was drawing too much attention to myself when preaching.  The bottom line for me is that my “communicating,” whether through preaching or personal interaction, has definitely diminished.

All of this has made me turn, with renewed interest, to my blog.  It is a way to speak.  As I noted earlier, I did not begin to blog anticipating there would be much of an audience, but that has begun to change with my entries about my CBD journey. No, I am still not an internet sensation, and never will be, but I do see how many times my page has been viewed, and that number has grown.  I advertise my blog posts on Facebook, and I often get positive feedback.  I am particularly glad when other members of the CBD Facebook group say they are helped by something I have written.

Now, you would think that someone who feels he has a message to share and a means to do it would end up writing some really great blog posts.  I wish I could say that is true of me, but I can’t.  I’m not saying that I don’t feel like all of my blogs have been worth reading, I just can’t predict which ones will grab a reading audience and which ones won’t!  I have written some that I could not read through without crying, and they got 60 or 70 page-views.  Others, which in my humble estimation were not as good, got over 1000 page-views.  It’s a mystery to me.

For 20 years, while I was serving Bethlehem Church, I had a Monday morning radio broadcast called “The Shepherd’s Hour.”  When it was first offered, I was really excited about having a “media ministry.” I knew the station wasn’t exactly a powerhouse, but it did cover the county and large parts of the surrounding counties, so there was a large potential audience.  I anticipated that before too awfully long random strangers would hear me talking somewhere and ask, “Aren’t you that preacher on the radio?”  If you are thinking, “I bet that never happened!” you would be wrong.  In 20 years it happened exactly once!  In spite of reminding friends and neighbors that I was “on the air,” they seemed surprised if the fact got inserted in a later conversation.  In fact, after about three months on the radio I was convinced that no one, other than my mother-in-law, was listening!  Then someone mentioned hearing my Monday morning message and said they appreciated it.  A few others even called the station to express gratitude.  More importantly, there were a few “hard cases” that wouldn’t darken the door of a church on a dare, who told me they were listening!

I guess what I’m saying is that just as I learned there were people listening to my radio program, there are folks reading my blog.  I hope it is doing them good, and just about the time I am convinced no one is reading, I get some appreciative comment or “like.” It seems my “communicating days” are not quite over.  Thanks for reading, I hope it is doing you good.

Memento Mori

Memento Mori

Recently, while reading Walter Isaacson’s biography of Steve Jobs, I came across the Latin expression memento mori.  Isaacson explains that when a Roman general returned victorious from battle he was given a Triumph, a grand parade, where many gifts and honors were bestowed upon him. Throughout all of this, a servant would follow the general repeating, “Memento mori,” which loosely translates into “Remember that you have to die.” This is from the chapter in Isaacson’s book where the cancer diagnosis, which would eventually take Jobs’s life, is first mentioned.

The writer of Hebrews reminds us, “It is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment.”  We all observe the fact that people die, and yet in spite of scripture and experience most of us fail to consider our own mortality, that is until a doctor brings us a life threatening diagnosis.  About two years ago that happened to me.  It put me on an unfamiliar path.  I had been the care-giver throughout my pastoral career; now I was the one being cared for.  Not the one praying, but the one being prayed for.  As is typical for me, I began to look around for books to help me on this journey.  I found some that have been particularly helpful, and I believe would be a resource for both the suffering and those who want to understand and minister comfort. Most of these are not Christian books, but they are honest in picturing the struggle of men and women wrestling with their own mortality.

1.  When Breath Becomes Airby Paul Kalinithi, Random House, 2016

This book was recommended to me by my neurologist and is one of the best written books I have come across.  The author, who was a neurosurgeon in training, tells of being diagnosed with terminal cancer and how he spent the 22 months until his death.  As a doctor he had a clinical view of death, but when it was his life ebbing away his perspective slowly changed.  The readers can find themselves somewhere on that learning curve.

2.  Tuesdays with Morrieby Mitch Albom, Broadway Books, 1997

This book details the story of a college professor who is dying of ALS.  He reconnects with one of his favorite students from years earlier who had gone on to be a successful sports writer.  The two get together each Tuesday for the professor to talk about life, and death.  The reader feels as though he has taken a seat beside the bed of a wise man who wants to impart that wisdom before it is too late.

3.  The Last Lectureby Randy Pausch, Hatchette Books, 2008

Pausch was a computer science professor at Carnegie Mellon University.  He developed cancer, and, while he tried to beat it with a radical procedure, he did not.  He knew from about six months out that his death was imminent.  This led to what the university called his “last lecture.” It is a tradition at many schools for a retiring professor to give such a talk.  Pausch was extended this opportunity and took it.  The result was a memoir of sorts, packed with common sense rules for life.  If there is such a thing as an upbeat book about death, this is it.

4.  The View From A Hearseby Joe Bayly, Clearnote Press, 1969

This book is one of the many recommendations made by Warren Wiersbe from his book, Walking With The Giants.  It is from his chapter on the Minister as Comforter.  I can see why he recommended this book.  Bayly is a Christian minister who has served in both local church and Christian college settings, but his understanding of this subject is not merely theoretical. Beyond ministering to the dying and their families, he has lost three of his own children.  He discusses such subjects as praying for healing and gives some very practical advice about counseling the dying and those who love them.

There are many more books on this subject, some of which I have read, but these are the ones that I feel have the most potential benefit both for the dying and for those who minister to them.  Only Bayly’s book has a clear Christian perspective on death, but the others are what might be called examples of common grace.  They have wisdom and even inspiration to share with us.

An Unexpected Fall

An Unexpected Fall

I don’t really think I could count all the times I have fallen down since my brain was invaded by corticobasal degeneration (CBD).  Of course, all of them were unexpected, but one, as of this writing my last one, was unexpected in a different way.

It was a typical afternoon, and I was working away in my study when I began to cough.  When you have a problem with aspiration, coughing can get intense and this spell was worse than usual.  Finally, things stilled, and I knew a glass of water would be helpful. I stood up, took one or two steps away from my desk and began to cough again!  I did have both hands on my walker, but that wasn’t enough.  I found myself falling backward first hitting my desk and then my chair on the way to the tile floor.  Ever since I broke my hip, I have had a healthy fear of falling. As I lay there on the floor for a moment, I did a quick inventory of myself, looking for the pain of a broken or cracked bone.  Thankfully, nothing registered.  The next order of business was to get up.  Getting up proved to be more of a challenge than you might think.  They tell us that CBD is typically not a “wasting disease,” that is you don’t lose muscle from it.  However, what I have found is that the coordinated use of those muscles has become a problem.  I struggled for half an hour to get up and just couldn’t do it.  At one point I was thinking that if I could just push myself up to my hands and knees, I would be able to grab something and get vertical. I put everything I had into doing the equivalent of one push-up and failed.  As I lay on the floor, I remembered passing an Army commissioning physical where I had to do 25 push ups in two minutes; now I couldn’t do one! Well, what was I to do now?  I had my cell phone in my pocket so I could call for help.  As much as I didn’t want to become the elderly lady in the TV commercial, I needed to call my wife at school and tell her, “I’ve fallen, and I can’t get up!” Joy was coming through the door as quickly as the speed limit would let her, and together we figured out a way to get me up.  I have never been so tired in my life.

Fast forward a little more than a week, and the bruises from my fall were fading.  My two brothers have been good about coming to take me out to lunch every couple of weeks, and on a cold, overcast day we headed out to a restaurant.  Everything went great until we exited to get in my younger brother’s truck.  I had a “to-go” cup of tea and my older brother took it to put in the truck.  I was on the sidewalk and there was a step down to the parking area.  I have made that sort of step many times before without incident, but not this day.  I suppose it was pride that made me not want to wait for one of my brothers to come back and give me a hand.  You can probably guess where this story is going!  I took the one step, the walker flew out in front of me, and I went face first into the asphalt.  In a flash my older brother was pulling me up and then my younger brother was holding me upright.  I can honestly say it is the fastest I have ever gotten to my feet since I began dealing with CBD!  By the time we got home my right eye was beginning to swell.  Initially, I didn’t feel all that bad, but within an hour I knew I had bounced off the pavement.  I texted Joy, and, once again, she came home early.  Upon seeing me she felt like I ought to go to see our doctor. He took a look at things and decided that given the placement of the blow to my head, a CT Scan was called for. We did that as well as an x-ray of my knee, which was really beginning to hurt.  Thankfully no brain bleeds or broken bones.  On the way home Joy said, “I knew that CT Scan wouldn’t find anything.” Imagine that, scanning my head and finding nothing!  Of course, she didn’t mean itthat way, but I repeated her saying for a week!

They say bad things come in threes.  A week or so later I was checking my email and noticed one from the UCSF Aging and Memory Center.  They are doing a clinical trial of a new drug which may slow the progress of CBD.  About six weeks prior, I had put my name in for every clinical trial the government web site listed.  This email wasn’t entirely unexpected, but I had pretty much given up hope of being a lab rat in anyone’s study.  When you are told that there is no treatment for your illness, even a long shot can give you hope.  The message asked if I would be willing to talk on the phone for about 20 minutes to see if I met their criteria, and within an hour I was talking to a pleasant woman named Vivian.  Everything went along fine, and I began to feel better and better about the prospect of getting this drug, that is right up until the end.  “Do you have a pace maker?”  Well, yes I do, but I had asked if an MRI were possible with one and authorities assured me it was.  “Randy, I think that is exclusionary.  Let me check around to make sure and call you back.”  About 20 minutes later Vivian called back.  My pace maker would exclude me from the clinical trial.  I suppose Vivian had dealt with disappointing potential patients before.  She was very empathetic and hoped I wouldn’t be too disappointed.  I said I wasn’t, that I had suspected something would keep me out, and I had tried not to get my hopes up. 

I am not sure how convincing my lie was to Vivian.  For about an hour that afternoon I began to think about possibilities I had only dreamed of.  Things like walking without a walker, being able to drive again, and living without the dread of what I wouldn’t be able to do tomorrow that I could do yesterday.  This was the unexpected fall.  Hope is a funny thing.  It can rapidly lift you up, but if hope is dashed just as suddenly you drop, and you will end up lower than you were before hope came along.  That evening I was hip deep in the “slough of despond.”  I made the mistake of estimating how long it would take a drug to move from a phase 2 clinical trial to being commercially available. There are a lot of variables in that, but the answer to how long was, too long.  I slept fitfully and finally got up about 4 a.m. to read my Bible.  I wish I could say a verse just jumped out at me and gave me an overwhelming sense of peace, but that didn’t happen. Instead I began to think of my situation in comparison to that of others.  Being a pastor all of my adult life has meant I have seen others suffer. I have seen cancer patients whose bodies dwindled away and dementia patients who minds did the same.  I remembered the funerals where I had buried someone younger than myself.  I began to think of all the pictures I had seen on the CBD Facebook page, especially the before-and-after pictures.  Then I slowly came to a conclusion: What right did I have to feel sorry for myself? As someone much smarter than I put it, perspective can be a blessing.  It was to me that morning.  I glanced at my watch and saw it was 6 a.m.  I wasn’t entirely out of the slough of despond, but neither was I as deep as I had been.  I went back to bed and thought of a verse from Proverbs which has come to mean a lot to me.  The context speaks of the value of godly wisdom and then promises, “When you lie down, you will not be afraid; Yes, you will lie down, and your sleep will be sweet.” Mine was.

Finding the Light in a Dark Place

*This blog post was originally a sermon that I preached at Welch College chapel on February 1, 2019

Anyone familiar with the book of Psalms knows that you often hear the heart cry of suffering saints within it. It is not unusual to read of the Psalmist questioning God and asking that simple and yet profound question, “Why? Why am I suffering?”  I was a pastor for 33 years, and in that time, I saw many different types of suffering.  I am sure there are many in this room today who are dealing with hurt of one kind or another.  As a wise old preacher, Joseph Parker, once advised a group of ministry students, “Preach to broken hearts, there is one on every pew.  You will never want for a congregation.”

I think Psalm 43 gives us a way to find the light when we are in a dark place.

To me, the metaphor of darkness captures the mood of what it is like when we suffer.  I think this is underlying the wording of verse 3 where the Psalmist pleads with God, “Oh send out Your light and Your truth!”  Just what do you do when everything in your life is overshadowed by some problem, a problem that seemingly will not go away? 

Before I launch into the Psalm, let me assure you that I have dealt with and am currently dealing with my share of suffering.  Beginning in November, 2014, I began to fall down.  I fell about once a month until I found myself seeing my doctor.  He sent me to a neurologist who did a whole battery of tests with the outcome that I was diagnosed with a rare neurological condition called Corticobasal Degeneration (CBD).  You have probably never heard of it because it is about three times rarer than Lou Gehrig’s Disease, or ALS.  The simplest way to put it is that small areas of my brain are dying, and I will probably lose the ability to walk, to talk, and perhaps to reason.  There is no treatment.  It is a degenerative disease which means it will steadily get worse over time and averages 6 to 8 years from onset to death.

This news put me in a very dark place.  I began to look for some flicker of light, and at least part of that is what I want to share with you this morning.  Just how do you find light in a dark place?  From Psalm 43 I find three principles which have helped me, and I am confident can help anyone who finds himself in the shadowland of suffering.

First, you must talk to God, even though it seems He is not listening.  This comes from verses 1 and 2.  Vindicate me, O God, and plead my cause against an ungodly nation; Oh, deliver me from the deceitful and unjust man!²For You arethe God of my strength; Why do You cast me off?Why do I go mourning because of the oppression of the enemy?”  Note two things here.  When you talk to God, get right to the point and be honest with God about how you feel.  The Psalmist puts his appeal in the emphatic position by saying first and forcefully, “Vindicate me.” 

What the Psalmist wants is for God to act as his advocate.  Eugene Peterson paraphrases this, “Clear my name!”  Why?  What was the Psalmist’s particular problem?  There were deceitful and unjust men causing him grief.  

Let’s face it, people problems have been with us ever since Cain and Abel!  As Matthew Henry puts it, “As long as there are such bad men out of hell, and nations of them, it is not strange that good men, who are yet out of heaven, meet with hard and base treatment.”  The Psalmist though is honest enough to say that it seems like God is not listening. This is what verse 2 is all about. He had called God his “strength.” The Hebrew behind that word could be translated “strong hold,” a reference to the most secure place within a fortified city, and yet he is “mourning because of the oppression of the enemy.”  Once again, the Hebrew rendered “oppression” in this verse is elsewhere “meager rations.” What is meant by this contrast?  I think the Psalmist is saying he expected more from God!  Now, I don’t suppose there is anyone present today that would say you believe in the “prosperity gospel,” the idea that God guarantees his children health, wealth, and happiness, but most of us do wonder why the Lord doesn’t immediately put an end to our suffering when we ask Him to.  I’ll be honest enough to say I have wondered that myself.  I have certainly prayed for healing, and a friend told me that I am probably on more church prayer lists than anyone in Cheatham County!

I fear too many of us have what might be called a “vending machine” concept of God.  We have put our “money” (church attendance, Bible reading, prayer, service, and, yes, tithes) in the slot, and God is refusing to give us what we have punched into the key pad!  When that happens with a real vending machine, I tend to bang on the side of it and mutter under my breath.  Are we guilty of doing the same thing with God?  Perhaps this is why the Psalmist says he feels “cast off” and goes about “mourning.”  Yes, it can seem like God is not listening, but like the writer of this Psalm we must have enough faith to talk to God anyway.

Second, you must follow God, even though you don’t know where He will take you.  This is based on verse 3, “Oh, send out Your light and Your truth! Let them lead me; Let them bring me to Your holy hill and to Your tabernacle.”  This is a prayer for divine guidance.  Once again to quote Peterson’s paraphrase, “Give me your lantern and compass; give me a map so I can find my way to the sacred mountain, to the place of your presence.” We need the Lord to point the way, or better yet, to take us by the hand and lead us.  This will deal with the sense of alienation from God that we feel when we suffer.  As one of the ancient commentators wrote, “Send your light and overcome my shadows.  Send your truth and conquer the lies that surround me!”  

And just what does God’s light and truth look like? It looks like Jesus!  He is the light of the world and the very personification of truth.  When we follow His example, study His Word, and allow the Holy Spirit to apply it to our hearts, we will indeed have divine guidance.  

Beyond this truth is the fact that as God’s children we have a responsibility to take God’s light and truth to a dark and confused world.  I am confident that this is why the founders of Welch College made “Oh, send out Your light and Your truth” the school motto.  You will find those word inscribed in English, Hebrew, and Latin on Coffman Hall.  Let’s make it more than just an inscription!  Let’s make it our mission!

I qualified this point with “even though you don’t know where He will take you.”  Yet the text seems to answer that He will take us “to Your holy hill and to Your tabernacle.”  This is the ultimate destination, but the route God uses to get us there is not stated.  The truth is that the Lord may have to take us over some rough terrain to get to where we should be.  It will take courage to make the trip.  

Finally, you must worship God, even though you don’t feel like it.  These truths are found in verses 4 and 5: “Then I will go to the altar of God, To God my exceeding joy; And on the harp I will praise You, O God, my God. ⁵Why are you cast down, O my soul? And why are you disquieted within me? Hope in God; For I shall yet praise Him, the help of my countenance and my God.”  The Psalmist rejoices in God, declaring the Lord to be “my exceeding joy.”  Note also that he refers to the Lord as “my God.” It is not simply “God” but rather the God whom he had a personal relationship with, “my God.” 

Still, as I said we must worship even though we don’t feel like it.  The Psalmist is quite frank, admitting his soul is “cast down” and “disquieted.” That would be enough to keep most people from worship.  I am not sure that I know all the reasons for this resistance to worship when suffering.  Perhaps it is because we associate only positive, uplifting emotions with worship. Whatever the reason, like the Psalmist we must get a hold on ourselves and come to the altar.

Talk to God, follow God, worship God; that is the way to find the light in the midst of your darkness.  All of us will be broken hearted from time to time, but God is saying through this Psalm that He can and will send light and truth into your life.  I think with most of us that means the clouds will part and light will come back into our lives in the here and now, but for some it won’t.  Oh, those will still see the light and glory in the truth, just not in this life.  One of the lies that the Devil sells, and the world buys, is that death is always defeat. Don’t you believe it!  Death, for the child of God is a time where he or she will be able to talk to God face to face, follow God down the streets of heaven, and worship God for all eternity.  This is part of what Paul meant when he wrote, “For me to live is Christ, and to die is gain.”

Now, I would prefer in my case for some sort of divine intervention, a medical miracle that would extend my life.  I am confident that God could do that, if it were His will.  But what if it isn’t?  To use the biblical phrase, I have “set my house in order.”  All of us are going to die.  I may just have a hint about the particulars of my departure more than you do about yours, and I am ready to go.  Not because of any merit on my part but because of the amazing grace of God.  I wonder, could you say the same?

When Life Gets Hard

“Man is born unto trouble, as the sparks fly upwards”—Job 5:3.  This was part of the argument of Eliphaz the Temanite, one of Job’s comforters.  His ultimate conclusion would be that Job’s calamities were the necessary consequence of his sin.  Anyone familiar with the book of Job knows that is not the point God is making, but consider what Eliphaz was saying for just a moment. Just as surely as the sparks from a fire fly upward, trouble comes to us all.  The Bible scholars tell us that the Hebrew word behind “trouble” could be rendered “hardship, affliction, anguish, or sorrow.”  Eliphaz’s conclusion may have been wrong, but this step in his logic is unassailable: All of us are born unto trouble.  

I know something about trouble, or I should say, the Lord is teaching me some lessons about dealing with difficulty.  In my 32^nd year of pastoral ministry I began to fall down.  Long story short, I was diagnosed with a rare neurological condition (70 people out of every million) and told I would slowly lose the ability to walk, to talk, and eventually to reason.  I retired from the pastorate and began looking for a path through this particular hard patch.  Doing so has supplied me with some resources that can help anyone, no matter what sort of trouble you are dealing with.

First, it’s okay to grieve.  You may not be dealing with a life-altering medical diagnosis, but I have found it is downright therapeutic to grieve over loss.  If your marriage falls apart, or you lose the dream job, or your son ends up in prison, it is okay to grieve.  To determine to “keep a firm upper lip” and forge ahead, thereby burying your trouble, simply will not work, nor is it emotionally healthy.  Those buried feelings will come out of the grave at the worst imaginable times.  It is far healthier to deal with them--perhaps through the help of a professional counselor, a pastor, or maybe even a trusted friend.  We are not all wired the same way, but some of us have found keeping a journal to be a way to get all of our feelings out.  I have kept a journal off and on since college, and looking back I can see my entries are always longer whenever there is some problem.  Of course, the length and depth of your grieving will depend on the nature of your trouble and even on your personality. You don’t want to allow your trouble to define you.  Grieve, and maybe continue to do so privately, but at some point move on.

What do you move on to?  I have found great comfort in God’s Word.  It is interesting how significant trouble will change the way you look at the Bible.  As a spiritual discipline I had read through the Scriptures at least once a year since my days in Bible College.  I had preached just about every Sunday since the fall of 1982.  I don’t say that to brag but to point out I was pretty familiar with the Bible.  Still, I have been amazed how many times I have seen things which I just had missed all of those other times I had read the same passages.  I suppose it would be more accurate to say I now see an application from a verse not to my congregation, or as a buttress for a doctrine, but as something that seems to be there for me.  One day I came to Psalm 37 and noted how the verbs in the first seven verses just spoke to my heart.  It begins “Do not fret,” continues with “Trust in the Lord,” and admonishes me to “Delight yourself in the Lord.”  What’s more the passage says “Commit your way to the Lord,” and finally “Rest in the Lord.” It was just what I needed to hear. I am not a mystic, but I believe the Lord led me to that passage on that day to minister to my need.  I fully believe God will do that for you as well.

Some may wonder why I would mention turning to the Bible before talking about prayer. Obviously, one of the first responses we all have to trouble is prayer, but I put it after devotional reading of God’s Word because of the guidance the Bible can give to our prayers.  I am not sure where I first encountered it, but several Christian leaders have advocated “praying the Bible.”  In brief, this is looking at a passage and applying it to yourself in prayer.  Take the first verse of the 23^rdPsalm, “The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.”  I have prayed, “Lord I thank you for being my shepherd.  I know that shepherds do so many things for their flocks, and I can see those things in my life.  I rejoice in the fact that I have a vital relationship with You.  You are not just a shepherd or the shepherd but my shepherd.”  This approach to prayer is nothing new.  The earliest reference I can find to it is in the writings of Augustine. In his letter (#130) to a woman named Anicia Faltonia Proba, who lost everything when Rome was sacked in 410 A.D., the great theologian outlines this approach.  You will find similar advice about prayer from Martin Luther and John Calvin.  Timothy Keller has brought together much of this ancient approach to prayer in his book simply entitled Prayer. Other writers like Donald Whitney and Stormie Omartian have book-length presentations of this approach.  Speaking of prayer, it is a good thing to ask people to pray for you.  Sure, it will call for a degree of humility, but don’t let your pride stand in the way of God’s blessing.

Look for support from fellow travelers.  If your trouble is with some sort of addiction, there are all sorts of 12-step programs employing forms of the approach made famous by Alcoholics Anonymous. The folks at Saddleback Community Church saw the power of this and developed Celebrate Recovery, which has been helpful especially in the area of marital problems.  While actual personal interaction is better than social networking over the internet, I have found a group on Facebook that is made up of people dealing with my particular medical problem and their care givers.  I have traded information about the latest medical developments with people around the world.  If you can find people who are dealing with a similar sort of trouble you can both receive and give support.

Finally, remember that many of God’s most used people have been well acquainted with trouble. The “prince of preachers” Charles Spurgeon battled depression through most of his very successful ministry.  You can see this reflected in his very popular devotional book Morning and Eveningwhere he gives sound advice to those of us in trouble.  One of my favorite passages is the entry for the evening of November 11^th. “Be content with such things as you have, since the Lord has ordered all things for your good.  Take up your own daily cross; it is the burden best suited for your shoulder, and will prove most effective to make you perfect in every good word and work to the glory of God.”

*This blog post was originally written for the Fall 2018 issue of Fusionext, a magazine produced by Randall House Publications for their D6 Sunday School curriculum.  It was titled The Burden Best Suited to Your Shoulder.

A Better Place

It had not been a good day.  My legs were tighter than usual, walking was precarious,  and I just couldn’t seem to rally over the fatigue.  I decided that it might be a good thing to listen to some music.  I pulled up a playlist that I call “Driving Music 2” which is heavy on Jim Croce songs, one of my favorite artists.  It’s hard to feel blue when you are listening to “Don’t Mess Around with Jim,” “Bad, Bad Leroy Brown,” or my pick of the Croce litter, “Roller Derby Queen”!  The music was having the desired effect of getting my mind off my problems when I found myself listening to one of Glen Campbell’s last songs, “A Better Place.” I had forgotten it was on this playlist.   I have history with that song. 

Back in 2011 my friend Glen Poston asked me if I would want to hear Glen Campbell in person! Poston explained that Sirius XM was running a promotion that he qualified for and that he ended up with two tickets to hear Campbell in a relatively small room at the Bridgestone Arena. Of course, I went.  I estimated there were less than a hundred people in the crowd.  This was after Campbell had gone public with his diagnosis of Alzheimer’s Disease.  The concert was not all that long, but we did get to hear most of the songs that made Campbell famous.  I don’t recall the exact way Campbell introduced the song that made my day, but I do recall him using the word “new.”  Before the band started playing I thought to myself “New?  This guy is suffering from dementia, and he is going to sing a new song?”  It was called “A Better Place.” The song goes, 

I’ve tried, and I have failed, Lord

I’ve won, and I have lost

I’ve lived, and I have loved, Lord

Sometimes at such a cost

One thing I know

The world’s been good to me

A better place -- awaits you’ll see

Some days I’m so confused, Lord

My past gets in my way

I need the ones I love, Lord

More and more each day

One thing I know

The world’s been good to me

A better place -- awaits you’ll see

It was hard to fight back the tears as I thought about how that song applied to a man who was slowly but steadily losing his memory.  He was reflective enough to admit his failures in spite of his success as a singer.  He sang of love and its cost.  Could this be a reference to his failed marriages or just the hurt all of us both give and receive going through life?  In spite of that negative note, he says in the chorus, “The world’s been good to me,” and he was looking forward to “a better place.”  The second verse in a brief but poignant way captures the truth of how much he would need the love and support of family and friends.  I thought of elderly members of my church who were over wrought with anxiety as the darkness closed in on them.  It was a very moving song.  I recall telling my friend Glen that I was sure we would be hearing that song played at funerals in the very near future.  I was wrong.

Maybe the song wasn’t popular enough, maybe it was too short, maybe the first line’s mention of failure was just too negative, but I have not heard it anywhere but on my iPhone. I have told my wife I want it played at my funeral.  Why? Well, like Glen Campbell, I have failed. I don’t think of myself as a failure, but I have failed at quite a few things in my 62 years.  I may be unique in this, but I can recall the major failures of my life in vivid detail.  There were so many things I shouldn’t have done that I did, and so many things that I should have done that I didn’t.  I am sure there were times that I disappointed those closest to me, and I am certain I disappointed my Lord.  It is the first step in redemption to realize you need to be redeemed.  Well, this song served as a catalyst for me to once again own up to my failures and to do what I could to make things right.  I am hoping the song will say to those who assemble for my funeral, he was honest about his shortcomings, and, more importantly, he served a gracious God.

The second verse of “A Better Place”says, “I need the ones I love Lord, more and more each day.”  I can identify with that as well.  Recently my wife celebrated a birthday, and I wrote in her card, “I don’t know what I would do without you.”  That is not romantic hyperbole--I really mean it!  Though I am fighting it every day, I am growing ever more dependent on Joy. Though she has been more than gracious about all the things she does for me, I just hate being a steadily increasing burden.  

If all you had were the verses of this song, it would be a cry of desperation, but then there is the chorus.  Campbell asserts “the world’s been good to me.”  I may be reading too much into it, but I think this is a way of saying that though the darkness was surrounding him he hadn’t forgotten the times of bright sunshine.  That is what I have learned to do as my world has gotten smaller and smaller.  Earlier I said that I knew I had failed, but I didn’t feel like a failure.  That is due to the extraordinary grace of God I can see in the rear-view mirror.  A major manifestation of that grace is seen in the people I have been privileged to know, the calling of God on my life, and the opportunities I have had to try to minister to others.  Yes, the world’s been good to me.

Campbell also sings of “a better place.”  Obviously, he is talking about heaven, but think for a moment why he uses the adjective “better.”  A place beyond the hurts and heartaches of this life, beyond the debilitating illnesses that wring the joy out of life.  I have come to deeply value the promise of Isaiah 25:8a, “He will swallow up death in victory; and the Lord God will wipe away tears from off all faces…” That “place” will indeed be “better.”

I couldn’t tell you how many times I have listened to “A Better Place”in the past couple of years.  If indeed it is played at my funeral (there is some debate at the Corn household), I suppose some will think it is not overtly evangelical enough. There is no mention of salvation, and some might wonder why a man who spent his whole life as a pastor would want such a song.  I want it because of its honesty and how strongly I identify with it.  To counterbalance any concern about my theological credentials, I have requested that “Give Me Jesus” be played at the close of the funeral.  Campbell’s song is to me a statement of faith, his faith and mine, that God has prepared a better place for His children.  Yes, a better place awaits.  You’ll see.