Lake dreams
June 29, 2008
In the early eighties, when we time-shared a lake front condo near the Lodge of the Four Seasons at about the 13-mile marker, I would hop in the car early in the morning and drive a mile to the Four Seasons Village City Hall to start my morning jog. I would cover my 4 miles at a brisk ten minute mile pace. As I jogged along Cherokee Drive I dreamed of moving to the lake full time and living in a small, waterfront home with a dish on the roof for telecommuting to my office at Quintron Corporation, a company I helped found in 1969 and was sure that I would manage until I decided to retire. My dream home would look something like this.
Fast forward twenty years.
My daily walk at a not-so-brisk twenty minute mile pace now covers two miles on a good day. Its starting point is a 3rd level condo apartment in an obscene high rise on a raped hillside overlooking Sandpiper Cove at about the 2-mile marker.
What happened?
Well, such matters as an elevator to lake level and easier maintenance somehow bubbled up to the top of our priority list. So when decision time came, we signed for the condo with a wistful last thought of what-might-have-been and didn’t look back.
It was a wise decision. I have my bass boat cradled on its lift below our condo, only a few minutes from first cast. Marilyn has a lake view and her binoculars to keep track of the Blue Herons. Provisions come up in the convenient elevator. We have become comfortable with the wimpy life.
Dave, almost believing what he just said.
Bible Diary - Hebrews 5:1-10
June 29, 2008
I may struggle a bit with the idea of needing a high priest, but the first readers of this letter to the Hebrews were quite familiar with the high priestly function. Since the days of the Aaronic priesthood, they could look to the high priest to stand before God in their stead, even though they knew he was obliged to make sin offerings for himself as well.
5:1 For every high priest is taken from among the people and appointed to represent them before God, to offer both gifts and sacrifices for sins. 5:2 He is able to deal compassionately with those who are ignorant and erring, since he also is subject to weakness, 5:3 and for this reason he is obligated to make sin offerings for himself as well as for the people. 5:4 And no one assumes this honor on his own initiative, but only when called to it by God, as in fact Aaron was. 5:5 So also Christ did not glorify himself in becoming high priest, but the one who glorified him was God, who said to him, “You are my Son! Today I have fathered you,” 5:6 as also in another place God says, “You are a priest forever in the order of Melchizedek.” 5:7 During his earthly life Christ offered both requests and supplications, with loud cries and tears, to the one who was able to save him from death and he was heard because of his devotion. 5:8 Although he was a son, he learned obedience through the things he suffered. 5:9 And by being perfected in this way, he became the source of eternal salvation to all who obey him, 5:10 and he was designated by God as high priest in the order of Melchizedek.
How much better it is, then, to have a high priest who is a priest forever - knowing temptation, yet sinless? This calms my struggles. Like all humans from ancient days until now, I crave eternal verities, truths that can solidly anchor my life in eternity. The older I get the more important this becomes.
Dave
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Bible Diary - Hebrews 4:14-16
June 21, 2008
These are timeless and intensely practical verses for any Christian. All of Hebrews to this point has been about Jesus as our high priest. I suspect that many, if not all, serious Christians share my experience of becoming more and more aware of personal weaknesses. I call them my structural defects, which seems to have a nice engineering ring to it. This increasing awareness of weakness could easily lead to despair, since our standard is nothing less than the perfection of Jesus. This is where Jesus, in his role as priest, comes in, as we can see in these verses.
Jesus Our Compassionate High Priest
4:14 Therefore since we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast to our confession. 4:15 For we do not have a high priest incapable of sympathizing with our weaknesses, but one who has been tempted in every way just as we are, yet without sin. 4:16 Therefore let us confidently approach the throne of grace to receive mercy and find grace whenever we need help.
Reading these words gives me hope. Experiencing them is even better. If I ever had the idea that my weaknesses barred me from communion with God, this demolishes that idea. I can wearily haul this sin-stained soul to God’s throne and receive not the wrath that I deserve but mercy and grace. This is the help I need to return re-energized to the daily battle against the world, the flesh, and the devil. And with a smile on my face!
Dave, always needing that dose of confidence.
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Bible Diary - Hebrews 4:7-13
June 15, 2008
These words remind me of one of God’s great attributes, patience. After all these years, it is still “today” for all who have not responded to God’s inner call. God’s rest still awaits.
4:7 So God again ordains a certain day, “Today,” speaking through David after so long a time, as in the words quoted before, “O, that today you would listen as he speaks! Do not harden your hearts.” 4:8 For if Joshua had given them rest, God would not have spoken afterward about another day. 4:9 Consequently a Sabbath rest remains for the people of God. 4:10 For the one who enters God’s rest has also rested from his works, just as God did from his own works. 4:11 Thus we must make every effort to enter that rest, so that no one may fall by following the same pattern of disobedience. 4:12 For the word of God is living and active and sharper than any double-edged sword, piercing even to the point of dividing soul from spirit, and joints from marrow; it is able to judge the desires and thoughts of the heart. 4:13 And no creature is hidden from God, but everything is naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must render an account.
I have been re-reading the C.S. Lewis classic, Mere Christianity, in which he talks at length about how the busyness of modern life tends to crowd out serious thought about Jesus Christ; who he is and why it matters. Such thought and meditation starts, of course, with serious study of the Bible. I have come to deeply appreciate how, through purposeful study of the Bible, the word of God, can “judge the desires and thoughts” of my heart. They are often not what I thought they were. I can try to hide my motivations from myself, but there’s no hiding my true thoughts and desires from God. The “Sword of the Spirit” has sharp edges, indeed. I am beginning to understand what it means to stand naked and exposed before the all-knowing and all-powerful God. It’s often not a comfortable position.
Dave, squirming under the penetrating gaze of God.
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Pershing Rifles
June 13, 2008
During my college years at K-State I joined the R.O.T.C. (Reserve Officers Training Corps), affectionally/derisively pronounced “rotzee.” For paying attention to my Army training and attending the weekly classes, I was issued a uniform and received, as I recall, a $50 monthly stipend. During the summer of my Junior year, we shavetails-in-waiting attended summer camp for a month at Camp Gordon, Georgia. Upon graduation from college we were commissioned as U.S. Army Second Lieutenants.
Associated with the R.O.T.C. in college was a precision drill team called the Pershing Rifles, and I ended up as the ‘Captain’ of the platoon-sized unit and conducted drills once a week, Hup-Toop-Threep-Four! I won’t attempt to describe the intricacies of the march and counter-march stuff, but we drilled carrying (and doing tricks with) the ten-pound M1 Garand rifle.
One of the tricks was synchronized spinning of the rifles as we marched in formation. During half-time of one football game, we performed a drill with loaded (blanks) rifles. After drilling in formation for a while, we peeled off in one long file at mid-field. As the file formed, everyone went to one knee with their rifles positioned vertically behind their left shoulder. Captain Dave was front and center, facing the home stands.. Get the picture? (Oh, well.)
Anyway, Captain Dave, standing at rigid attention, slowly raised his right hand in salute. When his fingers touched his cap, the rifles were discharged, starting at one end of the file and rippling down to the other end. That accomplished two things: It woke everyone up and probably damaged the hearing in a bunch of left ears.
If you will indulge me with some comments on the M1 rifle, I confess to somewhat of a love affair with that weapon. It was the standard infantry weapon in World War II and Korea. Besides learning to do tricks with it in college, I later trained to be a Range Officer at Fort Benning, GA. I fired off many 8-round clips on the various ranges, which may account for some of my high-range hearing loss. No ear plugs in those days. I’m not sure I could field-strip, clean, and re-assemble the M1 now, but I sure could then.
For you gun-nuts, it fired a .30-06 Springfield cartridge, semi-automatic, at an effective rate of 16-24 rounds/min. It was almost as accurate as the bolt-action Springfield M1903 rifle that it replaced. The Springfield became a very accurate sniper rifle.
But enough. I mainly wanted you to know that I got rhythm.
Dave, still hupping along.
Bible Diary - Hebrews 4:1-6
June 8, 2008
I look forward to entering God’s rest. This rest, I believe, refers to my continued existence after death. The word “rest” suggests to me graduation from the life of a pilgrim in this world with its stress and pain to the joy of coming “home” to my Father.
God’s Promised Rest
4:1 Therefore we must be wary that, while the promise of entering his rest remains open, none of you may seem to have come short of it. 4:2 For we had good news proclaimed to us just as they did. But the message they heard did them no good, since they did not join in with those who heard it in faith. 4:3 For we who have believed enter that rest, as he has said, “As I swore in my anger, ‘They will never enter my rest!’” And yet God’s works were accomplished from the foundation of the world. 4:4 For he has spoken somewhere about the seventh day in this way: “And God rested on the seventh day from all his works,” 4:5 but to repeat the text cited earlier: “They will never enter my rest!” 4:6 Therefore it remains for some to enter it, yet those to whom it was previously proclaimed did not enter because of disobedience.
From this passage I learn that experiencing this rest is not necessarily certain. What am I to “be wary” of? Basically unbelief, I think. Believers will enter God’s rest. Unbelievers “will never enter my rest!” So what must I do to believe?
That is a deceptively simple question. The whole of Scripture tells me that the issue of my belief or unbelief was settled, for good or for bad, by God before I was born, so at least in one sense there is nothing that I can do to guarantee my entrance into God’s rest. The question is shrouded in mystery because for now I cannot see God. I have no choice but to work hard to, as someone has said, “work out in my life what God has worked in.” Or as the Apostle said, to “work out my salvation in fear and trembling.” Work now, rest later.
Dave
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D. Paul Ayers
June 1, 2008
The father of the three Ayers brothers was D. Paul Ayers (1907-1967). At our recent reunion, we talked about our parents and tried to re-construct a chronology of our growing up years. I was later asked by son-in-law Kerry Layton for details of Dad’s engineering career. My reply is below.
(Mom’s annotation on back of photo.)
Thank you, Kerry, for supplying this history of S&P.
Laura and Kerry,
I guess I should put some information about my Dad in the ‘Old Gent’ section of my website, shouldn’t I?
Dad was born in 1907 on a farm near Iola, KS (southeastern corner of the state). Granddad was a prosperous farmer, row crops and small dairy, and one of the early adopters of agricultural advances like crop rotation and contour plowing. The farm was one of the few at that time with electricity (windmill charger for a bank of batteries) and indoor plumbing. The outhouse remained, however, to conserve water, which had to be pumped from a well. When we visited, it was out the door to the back that we went.
Dad was interested in scientific things and constructed one of the first crystal radio sets in the area when he was a boy. He did well in High School and was able to go to college in Manhattan (Kansas State Agricultural College in those days), graduating in 1928 or 1929 with a B.S.E.E. degree. His first job was with Kansas Power and Light in Manhattan, Hutchnson, and Topeka, KS. His specialty was design of power transmission systems (the wire highlines that criss-cross the country carrying electricity hither and yon).
In 1947, Dad apparently decided it was time to move on and left KP&L for CopperWeld Steel Company in McKeesPort, Pennsylvania (Pittsburgh). We lived for one year in Mt. Lebanon, PA, all very different and eye-opening to this 10th-grader, but for reasons unknown (to me) it didn’t live up to Dad’s expectations, and we moved to Webster Groves. Dad commuted downtown to Sverdrup & Parcel every day with a few fellow-workers. He was involved with the electrical engineering aspects of various S&P projects in St. Louis and around the midwest.
I’m hazy about the particulars, Don and Tom and I couldn’t decide, but Dad left Sverdrup in the mid-1950s for two or three years to be part owner of a business in Hutchinson, KS. Marilyn and I were living in Hutchinson at the time, before and after my brief Army service, but I cannot remember what kind of a business it was. I thought it was a hardware store, but my brothers say I’m not even close, and they’re probably right. I do remember that we all went to a brand new Presbyterian church for a year or two until I left Hutchinson to work at Collins Radio in Cedar Rapids. Dad returned to Sverdrup & Parcel in St. Louis and was shortly assigned as Project Engineer for Sverdrup’s part of Bush Gardens under construction in Tampa. I am the only one of the Ayers boys who didn’t find an opportunity to visit the folks in sunny Florida.
Returning to S&P in St. Louis, Dad continued to work as an Electrical Engineer there until his premature death in 1967 at age 59.
So there you have it, Kerry. I sort of followed in Dad’s footsteps and entered the Engineering school at K-State in 1949, studying under some of the same professors as Dad did, some 20+ years earlier. But where Dad learned about dynamos and generators and transmission lines, I leaned more to electron tubes (no transistors yet) and radio transmission.
As sort of a post-script, Dad lost some pension benefits when he left S&P and returned later, so his major goal was to get their little house paid for as soon as possible. They burned the mortgage less than a year before he died.
Never ask an old man to reminisce unless you have a few minutes to spare!
Love,
Dad
Bible Diary - Hebrews 3:12-19
June 1, 2008
R.C. Sproul makes the point that no one can “decide” to have faith, but that we can to decide on our response to faith, that is, our behavior. I think Paul’s exhortation in this passage is about just such a response.
3:12 See to it, brothers and sisters, that none of you has an evil, unbelieving heart that forsakes the living God. 3:13 But exhort one another each day, as long as it is called “Today,” that none of you may become hardened by sin’s deception. 3:14 For we have become partners with Christ, if in fact we hold our initial confidence firm until the end. 3:15 As it says, “Oh, that today you would listen as he speaks! Do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion.” 3:16 For which ones heard and rebelled? Was it not all who came out of Egypt under Moses’ leadership? 3:17 And against whom was God provoked for forty years? Was it not those who sinned, whose dead bodies fell in the wilderness? 3:18 And to whom did he swear they would never enter into his rest, except those who were disobedient? 3:19 So we see that they could not enter because of unbelief.
When is “today?” I believe most would say that it is the continuum of time from the Incarnation of God to Jesus’ return. I am called to continually listen to the voice of Jesus in Scripture and heed what He says. Since nothing seems to come easy in the Christian life, I need to be aware that many in the godless society in which I live are doing everything possible to divert my attention from the source of truth, Jesus the Christ. If I succumb to cultural evils, which would be a slam dunk if it weren’t for the Spirit of God, I risk a hardened heart that might fatally provoke God.
God is faithful and has given me the desire to know Him better and to serve Him. What I do or don’t do with that desire is up to me.
Dave, experiencing a little fear and trembling.
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