On Thursday, April 6^th, I will have a cardiac by-pass operation. Mary Earle, the lady who coached me on how to do this blog thing, told me two weeks ago that there was a way I could write my blog ahead of time and allow this website to hold it and then publish it on a prescribed date. Therefore, I wouldn’t miss sending out any blogs. This is a cool idea since, if all goes well, I will not be writing for at least ten days. However, I have not had the time to write ahead, so this blog will be the last for a while. I would ask you to go to Mary’s blog at http://mary-marysmoments.blogspot.com/ and give her blog a read. Then, when I come back, you will have two blogs to follow.

          I have been in the ministry for a long time. Literally decades. I have sat with many families as a family member went through the procedure I will be going through. The very idea of open heart surgery is frightening to people and it helps (I think, anyway) to have their pastor right there. There is tension, fear and anguish there in the waiting room. But it almost always works out well. Heart by-pass surgery is the single most common surgery performed in the United States. (Something I didn’t know until mine became necessary.) They have it down. An incredible number of people are walking around with a long scar down their chest and extending across their bellies and are living great lives. I feel confident.

          But not overly confident. Of all those many surgeries during which I have been with the families, all have turned out just fine except for two. Both were church members, both had minimal issues, both made it through the surgery, but both died from complications. Although I was friends with both, one was a really close friend. His death twelve years ago still bothers me.

          So, while I have a calm assurance that everything will be fine, I also know that it may not be. I have a wonderful church full of people praying for me. I have dear, dear friends praying for me. I have people I don’t even know praying for me. However, it may suit God’s will more for me to be one of the small percentage of people who do not survive. Believe it or not, I am fine with that, too. I think heaven will be a lot better than this place. If the Lord were to take me (after all, we all must die) He would see to the needs of Marsha, my wife. So, no matter which extreme it goes to, I am prepared.

          If you have been reading this blog over the last few weeks, you will have noticed that much of it has concerned the past years of the life of my wife and me. Funny stories, touching stories, weird stories. We have had an interesting life. I suppose it is human for me to be thinking in these terms as I face this surgery. In looking back, I have very few regrets. Most of those regrets are over the little things in life. It has been a life devoted to ministry, and it has been pretty cool.

          Honestly, though, it is not the life I envisioned back forty odd years ago. As a very young man I saw myself becoming a great, great preacher, someone who would shake the world for Christ. In my mind’s eye I saw the great river of Christianity running through history. In places along that river there were great rocks rising from the swiftly moving water. One of the rocks was the Apostle Paul, another was Charles Spurgeon. Another was Myles Coverdale and still another William Tyndale. D.L. Moody was one of those great rocks and Billy Graham was another. All great men of the faith, all gave a dynamic message to the world. In my mind, I could do that. Not for my glory. I really never wanted that, but I always wanted it for the glory of the Lord. For that I would devote my life.

          When I was a boy my father and I would start at one bridge that spanned a river or creek and walk in the water to the next bridge, fishing all along the way. My father taught me to look for rocks that protruded up from the river bed and broke the surface by no more than a foot. Those rocks broke the flow of the river and in the shelter of those rocks, fish would gather. They would feed on whatever the river brought to them while they sheltered. Eventually, they would move on and more would come and take their place. One day, as we walked a river with high shale walls, there was a small landslide. Some of the shale broke free and made a dash for the water. A mighty splash and a small tsunami washed over to the other side where we were. It made my heart race. I asked my father if big fish would gather amongst the big chunks of shale. No, he told me, the shale would wash away eventually because shale is brittle, and until then it would make the water around it to toxic for the fish.

          I guess it was the time spent on rivers and creeks as a boy that shaped the image in my mind of the river of Christianity flowing through the ages of history. Now, all these years later, I have had the pleasure of meeting some great Christian leaders whom I consider the great rocks. I have also known quite a few people who were like that shale slide. Made a big splash and thought a lot of themselves, but who washed away after a while and polluted the river for a bit. But in my mind’s eye now, knowing that my life may dramatically change shortly, I see myself as one of those smaller rocks. Firmly attached to the bedrock. Eroded some by years and years of disturbing the flow just enough to let a few shelter there with me. Nothing big, nothing flashy. Just steady, serving the needs of the fish of the river.

          I hope you didn’t expect anything profoundly theological in this edition of the blog. Today, all you get from me is this; I am profoundly grateful to the Lord God for letting me be that small disturbance in the river. I am so humbled that He has allowed me to minister as a pastor to three different churches that blessed my life in so many ways. I am awed that when He led me out of the pastorate for a period of time He allowed me to do a different kind of ministry, working with people I came to love and cherish. I tremble in His presence when I think of how He took a sixty year old man and allowed him one more opportunity with a new church to do the very thing he loves the most. And I am grateful for the woman He has put beside me to experience it all.

          I imagine I will be back with you in ten to fourteen days. But know, regardless of what happens, you have blessed me more than I have blessed you. God is a great and a mighty God, worthy of praise. So many cannot get that simple fact. He is awesome.

          God bless you all.