What is ‘kairos?’

          A fair number of people read this blog (which actually amazes me) and some of them are members of the church I pastor or members of other churches that participate in Kairos of Indiana. The word ‘kairos’ means ‘prison ministry’ to them. Others who read this are familiar with the word in another form of spelling. ‘Chi Rho,’ which was my understanding when I moved here to Indiana. But ‘Chi Rho’ isn’t the same as ‘kairos,’ although they are pronounced the same. The ‘Chi Rho’ is the earliest symbol in Christianity. The word is the abbreviation of two Greek words. The symbol is basically an X with another line in it running straight up and down through the middle of the X. The center line runs a little higher than the two slanted lines of the X and has what looks like the English letter P at the top. The purpose of these early symbols was to show other believers where their brother and sister believers met. Christians were often killed for their faith, so a Chi Rho would be written on a building so that Christians could gather in that building in secret, since the authorities didn’t know the meaning of the symbol. Still others who read this blog have no recognition or understanding of either word. But starting this Thursday, six men from our church and several women in a support effort will be involved with Kairos, the prison ministry. I thought I would just share what the word actually means and what the ministry is, and then I am going to ask you folks to keep all of us in prayer.

          First, I have to say that it has always bothered me when people adopt Biblical words from the original languages to name their ministries or to pepper their speech. First, if you say it wrong, or mispronounce it, you might be saying something completely different than what you intend, especially when using Hebrew words. For instance, the word ‘Hallelujah’ is a common word used all the times in churches. The problem is, if it is pronounced with the ‘H’ sound it is a word you would wash your child’s mouth out with soap if you heard him say it in English. The ‘H’ is silent. Yet, most Christians pronounce it with the ‘H’. “Well,” you say with your American English pride, “that’s how we say it here!” And it is wrong. Along with that, most people who use the word do not know what it means. It means ‘Praise to the Lord.’ Pretty simple, so why not just say it in English so it can be understood? There are many churches in the country that are called ‘Maranatha.’ A perfectly good word, occurring only once in the Bible, it is an Aramaic word meaning ‘Lord, come!’ To people looking for a church, ‘Maranatha Church’ is confusing, but I suppose it sounds better than ‘Come, Lord! Church.’

          Which brings me back to ‘kairos.’ This is a rare occasion that I think using the Greek word is better than using the English. The word literally means "a passing instant when an opening appears which must be driven through with force if success is to be achieved."  Huh? How do you break that down to an English word or two? We might say that we have the perfect time in which to accomplish a task, one that may never come again. But you cannot say that as the name for a ministry. ‘The Perfect Moment for the Perfect Task Prison Ministry.” Better to just say ‘Kairos Prison Ministry.’ And then, if asked, explain it.

          And it is the perfect name! In the prison there are men who are going to be there a long time. They have done wrong things. Some of those things weigh heavy on their minds. Their lives have been violent, in some cases, they feel as though they have lost and are lost, they are in an environment that is alien. It doesn’t matter if the punishment is justified, it hurts and it stifles. Some have been there a long time, some will be there for a long time to come. I had a cousin, Steve. We were the same age. As a kid my family would come to Indiana every summer for a week and Steve would always get me in trouble. We had great fun! He died at IU in Indianapolis this last spring. He was a prisoner at Indiana Correctional. He died of cancer, heavily medicated, unable to communicate with his family because of the morphine. He was handcuffed to his bed. Where was he going to go? Still, the rules say……. Prison is a hopeless place, a mean place. You cannot get around it. That is what these men deal with. Hopelessness.

          Then the prison chaplain selects forty men to participate in a program that is done twice a year. No one ever repeats in this program. The draw is that, for four days, they will have homemade food and cookies and coffee with real cream. (This is where the ladies come in. They are not at the prison, but they are working hard off site and the food and goodies are rushed into the prison.) Everyone wants to be involved with this program. It is a huge break from prison routine. Muslims, Jews, Buddhists, whatever. This year we have a Satanist. Food is a powerful motivator. And all they have to put up with during those four days is to welcome forty Christian men into their realm. These forty Christians who have their agenda, they have their program. The prisoners have dealt with agendas and programs before. For homemade goods, yeah, they can put up with it. But what they don’t really know is that the 40 guys coming in for those four days are coming in with a weapon these prisoners know little about. They are coming in with the love of Jesus Christ. We don’t care if they are pedophiles, rapists, if they have killed someone or whatever it is they have done to get there. We are there to share the saving power of Christ and the sustaining love it brings. So, yes, "a passing instant when an opening appears which must be driven through with force if success is to be achieved." Kairos.

          My primary worry is that something will happen at the church that I need to attend to while I am in there. I am also worried about my health. I have done a lot of things since my surgery in April that I was supposed to wait on and my recovery has been slowed some. Our days will start at 6 AM and end around 9 PM. Can I hold out? The team, made up of men from many churches, are people I have come to know during our training sessions. Many of them are facing medical issues worse than mine. At least I am recovering. Some can recover no further. This is going to be a physical grind. But, right now, we have a passing instant when an opening appears which must be driven through with force if success is to be achieved. The Lord will prevail.

          Also, this is the first team that Brian Chamberlain has led into the prison. He has his own anxieties. As far as I can see, he has done a great job, but there are worries. It is, however, all good.

          Here is the challenge. Pray for the men going in and pray for the men who are already there and needing Christ. Pray for the ladies preparing the food. Their days will start around 3 in the morning and end around 8 in the evening, and it is all physical work. Pray that the Spirit of God moves.

          And we all know, Victory is His!

          I had a conversation the other day with one of the men in our church about memory. It seems as we get older our memory grows fuzzy. This was brought about by the fact that I couldn’t remember who had told me something just a few days before. Of course, that happens all through our lives. But as we age it happens with more frequency. We cover it up by saying it is a ‘senior moment’ and chuckling a little, but it is distracting. Fortunately, it doesn’t happen to me often, at least not that I can remember. (Yes, that is a joke.)

          But there is another side of that coin. There are some things we would rather forget. They could be things we have done or things we have seen or maybe something we read. The phrase is somewhat popular now; “AGH! I can’t unsee that!” There are just things we wish we could forget.

          For me, if it was something that caught my full attention, it is there in my mind. (Not so much recent things. If the mind is like a computer, then mine is having trouble downloading.) I remember whole conversations. I remember what the weather was on certain days. I remember emotions and what I was thinking. There are some very good things about a good memory. We farmed until I was a freshman in high school, then the farm went under. Now, out here in farm country, Marsha can ask me any question about what she sees going on and I can answer her. Brothers and sisters, it has been a long time since I was a freshman and I have done a lot of things since, but it comes right back.

          But there is a downside, too. 1988, October. I was pastoring a church in Warren, Ohio. One of our ladies, Nancy, called in a panic. Her little girl, Shelly, was dying. She wanted me to come and baptize her before she died. The thing was, the child had been born a number of years before. She should have been in third grade. But she was born with a disability. She never grew much past babyhood. Her mind, as far as anyone knew, never advanced. As she grew older, her body stiffened some. She wasn’t in pain, it seemed, and she always had a bright and clear smile for you. It was sad, but on those occasions when I went to see her she always lifted my spirits. Eventually, her parents had to place her in an institution. The facility they chose was the Haddie Larlham Foundation in Northeast Ohio. This was, and still is, an awesome place, dedicated to the care and comfort of children with special needs. After I had gone out to see this little girl, the lady who ran the Larlham facility asked me if I could spend some time with other children, as well. So, in spite of the fact that it was a long drive, I was there at least three times a month. I saw other kids and spoke with their parents, but my favorite was this little girl with the big smile.

          On this particular day, her mother was hysterical. This had happened before. She had taken a job out that way so she could go and spent her lunch hour with her daughter. Mom was very emotional and whenever the little one was in any kind of distress she would freak out. She would call her husband first then call me. The girl was dying. By the time we got there she would be fine and Mom would be embarrassed, but she was momma. Brad, the Dad, was getting more and more irritated with this and he and Nancy would fight over it. It was getting old to me, too, but I kept that to myself. Nancy was not fooling around when she would call. She was just scared.

          However, she had asked me to come and baptize the child. That was different. Nancy had grown up a Catholic and left that faith when she got married. She did not believe for a second that a child’s baptism secured their salvation. But in her fear on this day, she reverted to her earlier beliefs. When I jumped into the cart to go, I was much more worried about Mom than daughter.

          I got there and entered a back door that I had access to. I hurriedly walked to the room, wondering what state I would find Nancy in. I was still well down the hall when I began to hear Nancy crying uncontrollably. When I walked in, Nancy was holding Shelly, the little one, and was pacing. Two workers were standing helplessly to one side. Nancy would not give her little on up. When I walked in Nancy looked up, rushed up to me and, without a word, handed Shelly to me. I took her and looked into her face. She looked back at me, eyes wide, took a deep breath, and died in my arms.

          Nothing had ever prepared me for something like this. I can’t tell you how I knew she had died rather than passed out. I just did. I looked up at Nancy, and she knew, too. She dropped straight to the floor. I looked back down into the face of the little one, and handed her to a worker. Then I sat down in the floor with Nancy and held her for a long while. Strictly speaking, that was probably not the right thing to do, but, as I say, this was never covered during my educational years.

          From a personal point of view, I would like to forget that day. But it is there and, I suppose, and will always be there. However, there is a positive.

          I think of Nancy and Shelly and Brad (this was the one time he didn’t come when summoned) and I am reminded just how precious life is, in reality. The politicians and others will take an event like the killings in Las Vegas and make it about their agenda. The world of medicine will take an unwanted pregnancy and turn it into profit. The military talks about ‘acceptable losses’ when they talk battlefield casualties. A person might go through many injuries and surgeries and diseases and emerge triumphant, and then be taken down by an infection. Life is fragile and transitory. More than we realize.

          The leaves in Northeast Ohio are an incredible show in October. Here, in this part of Indiana, the leaves fade and fall, but the woods in Ohio are made up with lots and lots of maples. The colors are bright and breath taking. Come over one hill, and you are awed. Go over the next hill and it is more amazing. So it was on that October day in 1988. All the way to Haddie Larlham I was treated to a show. I enjoyed it. I didn’t realize that I was going to be holding someone as they died that day. As I walked to the car later the leaves were still incredible. But I didn’t see them then. A sweet, precious little life had just ended. If anything, the changing leaves just reminded me that winter was on the way.

          Death is a part of life, but that doesn’t mean we grow hard. Each death takes someone away who was precious to someone. The pain is as real as if someone was actually injured.

          But death is also a part of everlasting life. I have no doubt that one day I will be walking down a golden street in Heaven and a young lady will walk up to me and say something like, “Well, I held on till you came that October day. I knew Mom needed you.” And I’ll get the hug she couldn’t give in life, except when she smiled. I know I will see another young lady who I will recognize as Sally, my beloved grandmother. She’ll be happy to see me and will walk with me for a while. And I will see so many others who were dear in life and who are now dear in memory. For the believer, death is not to feared. It is a door.

          Our time here is short. Make the best of it. Life here is so dear. In the afterlife, for those who have accepted Christ as Savior, it is dearer still. Never take it for granted.

Blessings.

Marsha and I have just finished a week’s vacation. As is pretty common (for us, anyway) we didn’t really go away. We had people in the hospital who were in a hard way, and it is really hard to go away when we have people in the hospital, and we had a couple of things going on here that, if we had taken off for Ohio as was planned, we would have been hard pressed to have gotten back in time. Still, we got away for two days to Michigan, which was fun. We had never been to Kalamazoo, but we are going to go back. I really appreciate Kitty taking care of leading the music, Jeff taking the role of lay leader and Tanner preaching his first ever sermon. I received good reviews all across the board. Meanwhile, only Baby Bo is still in the hospital, Marsha’s Second Saturday Craft went very well, we had our last KAIROS training and Marsha and I had a really great time in church at Walton Christian Church in Walton, Indiana.

This past Saturday, Brian Chamberlain gave me a great honor. He asked me to speak at the last KAIROS training session before we go into the prison for our weekend October 26-29. Forty men going into a prison to bring the Word of God and the blessed Good News of salvation to men who have tried everything else and now need some reality. We will let you know how that goes after the weekend, but for now I wanted to share something else.

Sharing with our KAIROS brothers, I spoke of the attitude we need going in. If we are Spiritually prepared, the Lord will give us a great victory. At the close of the talk we had a brief commissioning ceremony and then I asked the men to sing just the first verse of, what is to me, the greatest of the victory songs. “Victory in Jesus.”

To me, this hymn is an old, old friend. When I surrendered my life to the ministry, it was the song that closed the service. When I was ordained, the song highlighted the service. Back in September 2001, when our country was attacked,  in the small Ohio city I was pastoring in, when all the churches in our community were drawn to our church and, as a community of faith, we prayed and we sang and the various pastors spoke, we ended that service with “Victory in Jesus.” I had just come to believe that Christians everywhere knew and loved the hymn, just like I do.

Not so. After Communion one Sunday I asked everyone to sing this great victory song because the original Lord’s supper was the prelude to the greatest victory ever. To my surprise, not very many in our congregation knew the song. Turns out, it isn’t even in our hymnbook. The words to a hymn are everything to me and I just couldn’t understand how this great hymn and its amazing words could be passed by.

So, at the close of the KAIROS meeting I asked the men to sing “Victory in Jesus.” I suppose I just assumed that our church was an anomaly. To my surprise, only a handful of men knew the song. The meeting was in a church, so I asked them to take the hymnals and turn to the page. Going through the hymnal, I was again surprised. It wasn’t in that church hymnal, either. My thought was, “Why do we even have hymnals if “Victory in Jesus” is not included?” So, I led it and those that knew it sang it and the service ended.

But, this is a mighty song and it has a great background.

Eugene Monroe Bartlett was born on Christmas Eve in 1885 near Waynes­ville, Mis­sou­ri.  Not long after, the family moved to Sebastian County, Arkansas. Eugene grew and at a young age, accepted Christ as Savior. As a young man he at­tend­ed the Hall-Moody In­sti­tute in Mar­tin, Ten­nes­see for his religious training and William Jewell College in Li­ber­ty, Mis­sou­ri for a business education. At the tender age of thirty seven, with his life moving along well and making a great deal of money, Eugene met and married Joan Tatum and, in relatively short order, they were parents to two sons, Eugene Bartlett, Jr. and Charles Bartlett.
          All along his life’s journey, he had written wonderful and popular hymns. A young man who loved the Lord, Eugene gave of himself selflessly to the Lord’s service in the church of which he was a member. His marriage to Joan, however, spurred him a new life. In 1918, at the age of 38 Eugene quit his extremely successful secular business and created Hartford Music Company in Hartford, Arkansas. This was a company dedicated to Gospel music. Eugene, himself, wrote over 800 hymns, but through his music company he began to reach out to young men and women who wanted to learn music, who wanted to learn how to write music and who maybe had a song they wanted to share. Hartford became the jumping off point for many of the song writers we know today. He took a huge gamble as far as his livelihood was concerned. He started the company with his own money. He hired instructors to teach voice, piano, piano tuning, rudiments, harmony and stringed instruments.  He also was editor of the music magazine, Her­ald of Song. Many thought he was foolish, but that music company still exists and still puts out great music.

But then, in 1939 at the age of 54, as war raged in Europe and it became more and more apparent the US would be dragged into the conflict, this great mass of energy and joy had a stroke. His wife felt that it was because of his worry that his sons would be called away to fight in the war, but Eugene would just shake his head. Completely bedridden, barely able to talk, Eugene struggled just to stay alive. Lying alone in his bedroom, dependent on others even for his most basic needs, Eugene turned to that one thing he had always been able to turn to when he had been faced with obstacles and trials. He read from his old, battered Bible. As he got worse and worse, he one day asked for pencil and paper. There, propped up in his bed, the man made old before his time, began to write the words and music to the song that would usher him into eternity.

Victory in Jesus

I heard an old, old story, how a Savior came from glory,
How He gave His life on Calvary to save a wretch like me;
I heard about His groaning, of His precious blood's atoning,
Then I repented of my sins and won the victory.
Chorus
O victory in Jesus, my Savior, forever.
He sought me and bought me with His redeeming blood;
He loved me ere I knew Him, and all my love is due Him,
He plunged me to victory, beneath the cleansing flood.

I heard about His healing, of His cleansing pow'r revealing.
How He made the lame to walk again and caused the blind to see;
And then I cried, "Dear Jesus, come and heal my broken spirit,"
And somehow Jesus came and bro't to me the victory.
Chorus

I heard about a mansion, He has built for me in glory.
And I heard about the streets of gold, beyond the crystal sea;
About the angels singing, and the old redemption story,
And some sweet day I'll sing up there the song of victory!  

Chorus

I think that the thing that moves me the most in this song is in the second verse. He has heard about the healings, how the Lord made the lame to walk again and all. But when he prayed, he asked for his broken spirit to be healed, not his broken body.

Less than two years after his stroke, Eugene Bartlett died on January 25, 1941. He never got to see his sons follow him into lives of full time music ministry. He never got to grow old with Joan. He never got to see his finest work in print. But he got to see his Savior. He had his victory in Jesus.

Blessings.

GREETINGS! ON VACATION! CHECK BACK MONDAY AT NOON!

          You all thought the elections would end all the ugly politicking, didn’t you? Most of us got to the point that it didn’t matter if our candidate got elected or not; we just wanted it over. That first Tuesday in November couldn’t come early enough! I even considered not voting at all, I was so disgusted with it all. But as Marsha and I left the poll that morning and headed to Indianapolis for the surgery of a church member, I was pleased. At least for a little while it was over.

          Except that it wasn’t over.

          Things have flipped flopped now with the Russians. Before the election, Mr. Trump was calling for an investigation on Russian meddling on Mrs. Clinton’s behalf. Mr. Trump said the Russians would rather have her as president because she would be easier to manipulate. Mrs. Clinton’s camp told Mr.Trump he was being stupid. No foreign power could interfere with US elections. (Those were president Obama’s words.) When Mr. Trump won, Mrs. Clinton immediately said it was Russian interference. 

          They have been at it constantly ever since. This morning I read a headline on Yahoo News, ‘Jobs Report; 32,000 Jobs Lost, Employment Rate at 4.2 Percent.’ Just the headline, no article. Most people just read the headlines. That makes the economy look bad. If there had been an article it would have been disclosed that 4.2 percent unemployment rate was a drop, which is very good and that the 32,000 jobs lost were largely due to the hurricanes and are mostly temporary. On the other hand, early the next morning after the Las Vegas shooting, Fox News was trying to make it sound as though the shooter had converted to Islam and ISIS was to blame. Those of a liberal political persuasion were calling for gun control. And when Mrs. Trump wore high heels on her walked from the White House to the helicopter to take her and her husband to the airport to fly to Texas after hurricane Harvey, you would have thought the free world was about to die. Members of Congress have openly said it would be a good thing if the president died. A hack comedian had her picture taken holding the severed head of the president, saying later it was meant to be funny. The president, for his part, is embarrassing the office with his behavior and his social media rants. This was the 15^th presidential campaign and administration I can remember and I have never seen anything so altogether silly.

On a hill far away stood an old rugged cross,
The emblem of suffering and shame;
And I love that old cross where the dearest and best,
For a world of lost sinners was slain.
Chorus: So I'll cherish the old rugged cross,
Till my trophies at last I lay down,
I will cling to the old rugged cross,
And exchange it someday for a crown.

Oh, that old rugged cross, so despised by the world,
Has a wondrous attraction for me;
For the dear Lamb of God left His glory above,
To bear it to dark Calvary.
Chorus

In the old rugged cross, stained with blood so divine
Such a wonderful beauty I see
For 'twas on that old cross Jesus suffered and died
To pardon and sanctify me.
Chorus

To the old rugged cross, I will ever be true,
Its shame and reproach gladly bear;
Then He'll call me someday to my home far away,
Where His glory forever I'll share.
Chorus

          We think we are in control. We think we have a handle on it all. We think old ideas and old understandings are quaint and no longer valid. Read the words of the old hymn. If they are quaint and out of date, if they are no longer valid, if the event those words tell about and the feeling that event gives us now is foolish, then I am quaint. I am out of date. My message is no longer valid. I am foolish. But, I can sleep at night. I can mourn not only for the victims and families for those shot in Las Vegas but I can also mourn the shooter and his family. I can marvel at the courage of those police officers who ran into gunfire to help. I am not driven by the news media. I am not told by political hacks what to believe. I am not impressed with the foolishness of man.   

          I will cherish the old rugged cross and I will cling to the truth and hope it represents. Unlike the author of the song, I have no trophies to lay down, but I do have a heart devoted to the Savior. The rest doesn’t matter.

          Blessings.

          As of this writing, the death toll in Las Vegas stands at ‘over 50’ and the wounded toll is ‘over 400.’ We know what this means. All the bodies haven’t been sorted out yet and all the wounded haven’t all been accounted for. And some of those wounded will die. All the numbers will go up. The worse mass shooting in American history, perpetrated by a 64-year-old former accountant. They are saying right now that he had at least 10 rifles in his hotel room. Some will say that there needs to be more gun laws, but in the end, we will find that he broke a dozen existing laws anyway. How on earth do you get 10 high powered rifles, automatics at that, into a hotel room without attracting someone’s attention? Some will say that this shows we need prayer in school, but this fellow had prayer in school until he was at least in fifth grade. Some will say that abortion has so cheapened life that taking a life means nothing. But the shooter was an adult, probably in college, when abortions became legal. Some will say that it was politically motivated. Maybe it was, but the shooter was an accountant. Hard to imagine what the political motivation could be. Some will say that he just snapped. But it takes some forethought to get 10 rifles together, then get them into the right hotel room over-looking the venue you wish to attack and then sneak in all that ammunition. He didn’t just snap.

          So, what happened, what was the cause?

          We will never really know. He killed himself. My own thought is that he had spent a life time counting. Long hours with long lists of numbers. Probably made a pretty fair living, but life probably got to where it wasn’t worth living. At some point he likely came to the realization he was not going to leave anything behind to be remembered by. If you live out your life in frustration that begins to turn into anger, the logical conclusion if you decide to leave something behind is to make everyone pay for your misery. It wouldn’t be the first time such a thing has happened.

          But, that is just me talking. It may be discovered that he was a closet Muslim or that voices told him to do it or that he had a weird political motive. I don’t know. But, just looking at it on the surface right now, it is what I think. His family is shocked beyond words. No idea this was in the air. The police, as of this writing, are dismissing his lady friend as an accomplice. If she just knew about it before hand she would be an accomplice. But she is not. As I think on it now, the shooter was reaching for notoriety.    

          Yet, almost everyone is in that boat to some degree. Nationally, on average, once a person has been dead for five years, their grave site is visited by family two times a year. How many times have you gone to a funeral for someone in the same cemetery your grandparents are buried in and you have trouble locating their grave? It isn’t a lack of love, it is just that your lives continue on and life, as we all know, is a scramble. The death of someone is only really important for a generation. After that, it is forgotten. I loved my grandmother and I would enjoy going back to Grace Baptist Church’s cemetery in Russell Springs, Kentucky and finding her grave, but I would have no idea where her parents are. I never knew them and I have no reason to tramp through an old cemetery to find the grave. It is just not that important to me. In the overall span of time, none of us has great importance.

          In the end, what is it that gives us a reason for living? What is it that makes us important? Where is our legacy? Why don’t we all go out in a blaze of glory, or evil, as the case may be?   

          I was so important to God that He sent Jesus, His own Son, to be sacrificed in my place. Wow! I must really be loved! I was so important to Jesus that He willingly took my place on that cross. Man! I must be really special! How could I consider taking an innocent life when God loves me so much? But, what about my legacy? Well, there are a lot of people to whom I have shown the way of eternal life. Not all have accepted the love of the Lord, but many have. They have passed it on to their children, family and friends. That means that someday in heaven I will meet many people who are there, whom I had a hand in them knowing Christ as Savior. That is an important job! There will never be a statue built of me, there will never be books written about the life and times of Larry Wade and I know I will not be remembered very long after my funeral. But, I know my Savior thinks I am pretty important, I know that He has prepared for me a mansion in heaven and I know that I have made a long lasting, even eternal, impact here.

          We can pray for the wounded and we can pray for the families of all those affected. It seems like we do a lot of that now. We can wonder why such a thing happens. We can say, as John did at the end of the Book of the Revelation, ‘even so, Lord Jesus, come.’ But, we can also make our lives count for something. We can share the good news. We can work to make sure heaven will be a little more populated. If you do this, you need never think your life was a waste.

          Blessings.