FRIENDS

Following below is a poem I have turned to many times during my decades of ministry. I have always valued my friends and carefully collected them as valued gems, but since the departure of my beloved companion some three years ago, my passion for friends has taken a different turn. What quickly becomes obvious when you peruse my Facebook traffic, you will see many friends who look very different from this White Anglo-Saxon American Protestant. 

It all began when Olga responded to a blog I wrote a few years back; she wondered what I knew about the followers of D. S. Warner, the Patron Saint of our Faith Family. Olga grew up as part of a German settlement in Kazakhstan. In time, she became part of a Khazik colony migrating north and west seventeen hundred miles that homesteaded about three hundred miles west of Moscow, Russia, where they established a permanent Church of God Missionary Colony.

My involvement soon connected to other friends and began a slow trek that eventually took on a global shape. From the Ukraine it found its way to Northeast India and a tiny newer nation called Meghalaya,  across Asia, into the continent of Africa, and beyond. With time, it took on a global shape and the lyrics of "I'm so glad I'm a part of the Family of God ..." that Bill and Gloria Gaither had introduced at the 1980 World Conference of the Church of God meeting in Anderson, Indiana that year. What a celebration that was, attended by somewhere between thirty and forty thousand people.

Today is  Monday, the beginning of Christmas Week 2020, a year we will long remember as the year of the covid-19 pandemic; a year of tragedy and suffering and untold deaths. It was a year when Friends suddenly translated into meanings we had neglected far too long. We have experienced a full year of pandemic, during which we have reconsidered our friends and memorialized a host of deceased friends. It is with that thought in mind that I turn back to these simple poetic lines I have used so many times to celebrate the worth of friends joining together in acknowledging and sharing our humanity as a collective body in a meaningful way.

Christmas concludes 2020 by introducing 2021. For what it is worth; there may be no greater source of joy in God's scheme of things ... SO, let us join together and launch our New Year with a renewed sense of the worth of our ''FRIENDS''

The river flowing gently by,

          The rolling meadows green,

The mountains towering to the sky,

           The valleys in between,

Are all a part of God's great scheme,

           On which our joy depends,

But greatest of them all, I deem,

          Are friends.

The sunshine and blue skies are fine,

          I'm thankful for the flowers,

For they are truly gifts divine,

          To cheer this world of ours.

But flowers droop and skies turn gray

           And oft the sunshine ends,

God's  greatest blessings, so I say,

           Are friends.

When sorrow comes and grief is yours

          And hope is lost in gloom,

'Tis then that friendship comes to shine

          Within your darkened room.

'Tis then that consolation sweet

          Your bitter woe attends,

For God hath made this world complete

          With friends.

I glory in a summer's day,

          And in the morning sun,

But wh--Authen my cares are put away,

          And all my tasks are done,

When low the shades of evening fall

         And night time fast descends,

Most thankful then am I for all

          My friends. 

                                                             --Author Unknown

                                      IDEA KIT, Golden, CO (early 50s)

"LUCKY TO BE AN AMERICAN"

 "I grew up with many of these fears imprinted on me," writes Barack Obama.

"In Hawaii, I knew families who'd lost loved ones at Pearl Harbor. My grandfather, his brother, and my grandmother's brother had all fought in World War II.  I was raised believing that nuclear war was a very real possibility. In grade school, I watched coverage of Olympic athletes being slaughtered by masked men in Munich;  in college I listened to Ted Koppel marking the number of days Americans were being held hostage in Iran. Too young to have known the anguish of Vietnam firsthand, I had witnessed only the honor and restraint of our service members during the Gulf War, and like most Americans I viewed our military operations in Afghanistan after 9/11 as both necessary and just.

But another set of stories had also been etched into me--different though not contradictory--about what America meant to those living in the world beyond it, the symbolic power of a country built upon the ideals of freedom. I remember being seven or eight years old and sitting on the cool floor tiles of our house on the outskirts of Jakarta, proudly showing my friends a picture book of Honolulu with its high-rises and city lights and wide, paved roads. I would never forget the wonder in their faces as I answered their questions about life in America, explaining how everybody got to go to school with plenty of books, and there were no beggars because most everyone had a job and enough to eat. later, as a young man, I witnessed my mother's impact as a contractor with organizations like USAID, helping women in remote Asian villages get access to credit, and the lasting gratitude those women felt that Americans an ocean away actually cared about their plight. When I first visited Kenya, I sat with newfound relatives who told me how much they admired American democracy and rule of law--a contrast, they said, to the tribalism and corruption that plague their country,

Such moments taught me to see my country through the eyes of others. I was reminded how lucky I was to be an American, to take none of these blessings for granted. I saw first hand the power of our example exerted on the hearts and minds of people around the world. But with that came a corollary lesson: an awareness of what we risked when our actions failed to live up to our image and our ideals, the anger and resentment this could breed, the damage that was done. When I heard Indonesians talk about the hundreds of thousands slaughtered in a coup--widely believed to have CIA backing--that had brought a military dictatorship to power in 1967, or listened to Latin American environmental activists detailing how  U.S, companies were befouling their countryside, or commiserating with Indian American or Pakistani American friends as they chronicled the countless times that they'd been pulled aside for 'random' searches at airports since 9/11. I felt America's defenses weakening, saw chinks in the  armor that I was sure over time made our country less safe,

That dual vision, as much as my skin color, distinguished me from previous presidents. For my supporters, it was a defining foreign  policy strength ... For my detractors, it was evidence of weakness..." (409/410 A PROMISED LAND, Barack Obama  

walkingwithwarner.blogspot.com

BATTLEFIELDS

 H R McMaster is a Senior Fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institute for Peace Studies. He graduated from West Point and served thirty-four years as a career Military Officer. He retired as a four-star General with several important tours of duty as the Commanding Officer of important Battleground Commands. He holds a PhD in History from UNC and taught history at West Point. A brilliant student, McMaster studies the history of War like an Oncologist pursuing  the cure for Cancer, always in defense of his country and in the cause of lasting peace.

After thirteen months as NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISER to President Donald Trump, McMaster wrote BATTLEGROUNDS and concludes his game-changing reassessment of America's place in the world with this insightful paragraph:  "As historian Zachary Shore observed, 'the greatest source of national strength is an educated populace.'  It is my hope that this book will make a small contribution to the strength of our nation and other nations of the free world. Writing it was a continuation of my own education. I will judge it to have been worthwhile if it inspires vibrant, thoughtful, and respectful discussion of how we can best defend the free world and preserve a future of peace and opportunity for generations to come.'"

McMaster writes from an a-political position; he is neither liberal nor conservative, but liberal and conservative. He writes with three objectives in mind: (1) defend and protect constitutional law as the Rule of Law; (2) defend and protect the human rights and personal civility of our Democratic Process; (3) Provide the President with multiple options with which to successfully and safely meet diplomatic or military situations from a geo-political context that considers both the geography and the politic within the context.

This reader began with a strong personal bias for peace and pacifism that is potentially anti-military (non-violence). McMaster skillfully describes six nations, or geographic regions that America faces as potential BATTLEFIELDS. I learned much from reading McMaster and seeing our diplomatic and military resources in a new and more positive historical, geo-political perspective that remains bigger than mere politics and patriotism--issues of humanity--peace, pollution, global warming et al.

McMaster offers me a rationale - a rational view that holds my peace principles, but feels patriotic pride in an America that stands for liberty and justice for all while protectings the democratic process of all humanity, despite creed, color, or culture - and remains non-violent, yet willing to defend to the death if and when necessary.

I am walkingwithwarner,blogspot,com recommending that you real BATTLEGROUNDS for yourself, as written by General H R McMaster, a Harper-Collins publication, NY, 2020.