Tuesday, August 30, 2011

You Do Count! - August 30, 2011

Good n' foggy Tuesday morning! Did you see the video of the old covered bridge going down? Kind of sad when the old things are swept away like that. Then I found out that the bridge had been rebuilt in the 80's. Some 'historic' things aren't quite as historic as we are led to assume. I would suggest we build one out here, but we get enough damage to our overpasses and bridges without putting a big shed over the top of one. A covered bridge probably wouldn't last one harvest out here. Not to mention the inevitable, "Why'd someone build their tool shed over the crick?" I try to be funny this morning, but of course all that water out in Vermont is no laughing matter. We had a little hint of that ourselves yesterday with another afternoon of big rains over the area.

Our question for the day: Have you ever had to raise your hand after someone blurted out a question about some group only to be told that you don't count? It's always kind of depressing to find out that you don't matter or that you don't meet the standards even if it is in response to some angry blurted out question. Then one day someone came up to you on the street, or met you in a bar, or came over to your cubicle at work, and said that you do matter to a certain man who lived in Judea some 2,000 years ago. At first you may have dismissed them with a bit of wit, "Meh, I've heard about this Jesus before!" Later you may have dismissed another invitation with the reason that you didn't need anymore guilt in your life from church. After all, your boss at work provides more than enough guilt every day. You may have been one of those who provided your own exclusion for years and years until something reached through that fog of doubt, guilt and other barriers to touch your heart.

I could list all of the awful events some of us have met in this life that God turned to our good. Many a story of salvation came from the bottom of some pit. "I hit bottom at that point and there was nowhere to look but up, and that is when I saw the light of Jesus!" Many of us could insert that in our own life's story. In some cases at a young age, others in middle age, and some even at death's door, but somewhere in life we came to realize that salvation lay not in the direction we had been going, but in the other way.

In a love we may never fully understand, Jesus pointed at you and me, and said, "You do count. You matter to me. I will never let you go!" The funny thing is that if a person thinks he is special and God's gift to the world, then he will probably never reach the bottom and feel the need to look up. If another person thinks she is beautiful and good, she may never see the light of Jesus. We may feel that some folks have it all too easy in this world, and we may be right. But what a tragedy to suffer no tragedy in life that would cause a person to look to the Savior! Praise God for the tragedies in my life that have brought me running to our Lord Jesus!

I pray that you feel the love of Jesus guiding you and protecting you this day,

Bucky

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