Pastor Stan Scripps, Graafschap CRC | "Your sons come from afar, and your daughters are carried on the arm. Then you will look and be radiant, your heart will throb and swell with joy."Isaiah 60:4,5.
A long time ago my wife, Ann, and I were newly weds, living in a little cubical on the campus of Michigan State University with 43,000 other students, none of whom could be counted as friends. It was Thanksgiving, so we decided to drive south through the Smokey Mountains to my maternal grandparents for the holiday. My dad loaned us his car. I never thought twice about leaving him and mom behind for the holiday, but that is how easily kids can leave home. It is no big deal. We'll be back.
The next day we were at the old farm in North Carolina. Grandpa and Grandma were both devout Quakers. The farm had once been used to grow tobacco, the most profitable cash crop you could grow on that red dirt. But Grandpa had turned it into a fairly unprofitable cattle ranch. Everything around there was old; the trees, the overgrown garden, the buildings, the little cement block house, the dog and, of course, the two old people who lived there quite happily. Grandpa had a dream that one day all his children and grandchildren would come back there to live. He had 100 acres to divide up and there was plenty for everyone. But aside from a couple of cousins, that never happened. The family had grown and gone like a flock of birds from last summer. The place remembers us no more.
Grandma cooked up a feast for Thanksgiving. We were their only guests. The woodstove, a few feet from the dinner table, had a workout. Afterward we sat around in the "parlor", kind of the main room where most of life happened at that time. The whole house was not any bigger than a two-stall garage, but they didn't even use all of that. We talked until they fell asleep and then Ann and I walked around the quiet old farm.
The next day we left for Michigan. A winter storm along the way made it a journey of two very long days. But my dad got his car back without any dents. We were once again "home", sort of; but not really, not yet. Today I can fly to the west coast in less time than it took to drive back from my past. I have a son living out there. Yes, it is the next generation of the dispersion. Other children live in other states and 'home' is where ever we can get together, sort of. People say that ministers are different from normal people; that they are used to moving around the country (or world). They aren't really different or used to it. Not really, but our travels do increase our circle of friends and friends, along with family, are folks for whom we thank God. This ingathering is God's work.
In the Bible, at the end of 2 Timothy, there is a passage with a whole bunch of names; strange sounding names of people we don't know. It is tempting to rush over that. It is tempting to read that and wonder if the Bible is relevant at all to contemporary life. I mean, who in the world cares about Crescens anymore? Paul did. Many of those names represented his friends. "Come quickly. Bring Mark. Come before winter. At my first trial no one stood by me, except- except Jesus. He stood by me and gave me strength." He is the heart of all my thankfulness in every season. Though sin and misery, time and miles separate us, Christ has the power to draw us close. "Above the tumult and the strife, a melody is ringing. When friends by shame are undefiled, how can I keep from singing?"
Happy Thanksgiving.
Thursday, June 2, 2011 at 01:23PM 
Stan Scripps | It is amazing what will grow from a stump. You may have thought the old tree was finished. But give it a little rain and a little sun and a little time, and look at this! Where did it come from? Did someone plant a seed? No one planted it, perhaps ever. Maybe God just planted it there once while no one was looking a long time ago. Then someone came along and cut it down and for a while it looked dead; but then this. It is kind of like Easter.