You have to look forward to something in February. Such a bleak month. There really isn’t much to anticipate in February, unless you have a birthday or maybe a wedding anniversary. And whoever actually gets married in February? I have been doing this a long time and I have only done one February wedding. No, to get through February, you have to look forward.

And I always looked forward to baseball. Spring Training is going on for the pros and high schools and colleges are letting players throw in the gym. But even Little League coaches are looking at their rosters, trying to imagine who will play where. I know that to many of you, baseball is a slow moving game, but I love it. I have played it, coached it (“Somebody tell me why William is picking daises out in right field!” “Uh, Coach, it’s better than last week when he was picking his nose.”) and umpired it. And I have watched it. Where I come from, baseball is big. Most churches had softball teams and they all played in leagues. Each denomination had league. If you were an independent church, you played in the league that most closely fit your own beliefs.

Eleven years. I played church softball for eleven years. It was huge fun. My son and I got to play together, which meant a lot more to me than it did him. If you swore you would be kicked out of the game. If you swore in the next game, or anytime the rest of the season, you were kicked out for the remainder of the year. (Except for the Catholic leagues. Swearing was just a part of it.) However, if you ran over the catcher to score, you would be congratulated. You played all out. And our league had a rule that each team was expected to enforce; Each player had to attend at least one service a week to play.

 First year at an elderly church. One of our men had played minor league ball until WWII had changed things. He had coached since 1947. Always limped from a German bullet that had torn through his leg, but Lou was awesome. He was a baseball encyclopedia. He and I went to a lot of games over many years. Didn’t matter if it was Little League or the majors, you didn’t talk to Lou about anything except what was happening on the field. Between innings you could talk about anything, so long as it was baseball related. He was an intense old guy. But that first year at the new church, he was no longer going to coach. Finally hanging it up. And in February, he was pretty bummed.

“Hey, Lou, how about we have a church softball team this year? You can coach it and make it just as you want it!” I had been called to the church the previous August and I had learned that I could joke around a little bit with Lou. But Lou didn’t find this amusing. “Pastor, we have no Youth. You are the youngest man in the church, then David (three years older than me) and then everyone else is at least over 60. How can we ever have a team?” “I don’t know, Lou. Let’s just announce it and see what happens.”

 Turned out that the older folks who were past their playing years had sons and sons-in-law and grand kids and we had a blast that first year. We went 2-20. We won one game 25-23 and we lost one game 64-2. We weren’t very big on playing defense and we really weren’t very good hitters. Lou tried his best coaching techniques, but we were one sad team. Sometimes he would just stand and stare and sometimes he would have to sit down because he was laughing so hard. At the end of the season we gave him a plaque inscribed, We Can’t Win and You can’t Make Us! He had a room in his house for trophies and all sorts of memorabilia from his coaching days, but that plaque went into the living room. He told me it was the most fun he ever had coaching.

It took us a while, but we improved every year. Eventually, I got to present to him the league championship trophy. By this time he really was an old man. He broke down and wept.

            Our last game together. We didn’t know he would pass the coming winter. We sat in the empty dugout watching the team warm up. “You know, Pastor, we done good.” “No, Lou. You done good. I am just along for the ride.” “I don’t just mean the team. Look out there. All those people come to church all the time. Not just so they can play ball, either. The team might have started it, but this church has grown. No, Pastor, we done good.”

            You have special people in your life. I had Lou and I had Dennis. Dennis loved to sing in the choir, but Dennis was blind, so I worked with him on the music every week. When he could still see I would write the music out for him by hand in very large print. We became close. And Dennis was really good. People would come just so they could hear him sing. It was his service to the Lord. Dennis died on Tuesday and Lou died the next day. It was January. Dennis had sung for Christmas and Lou was starting to get ready for coming season. Appropriately, the weather was awful. It matched my mood. I walked up to the casket at the visitation for Dennis and looked at my friend. Rolled up in his hand was one of the songs I had enlarged by hand for him. My mood began to change. He had touched so many hearts with his song, and now he touched mine. When I went to Lou’s visitation that evening, his wife walked with me to the casket. This wonderful man who had molded so many young lives over so many decades, had a plaque on his chest. We Can’t Win and You can’t Make Us! “And, he wanted you to have this.” At the end of each season we all would sign a ball and give it to Lou. The ball his wife handed me was the ball from the first season. 2-20. “I think he didn’t want to have to explain that one in heaven.” And then the dear lady hugged me.

            You have special people in your life. The day after the funerals, one of our ladies, Mari, came into my office. She sat down and pulled out her knitting. “Mari, is there something I can do for you?” “Nope. Just don’t want you to be alone.” And she quietly began to knit.

            A white man, a black man and an Asian lady. Each one serving the Lord in their own way. I have been richly blessed by having His servants around me. How have you blessed the people around you?  

        Is anyone listening to me?

        When you are talking to someone, are they really listening or are they hearing what they think you are saying?

        For instance, I went into the hospital in July of 2021 with an infection I didn't know I had. The infection was causing external issues as well as internal. I was really sick. One of the doctors told me later that they thought I might die. One day in the hospital I told a doctor that my back had been hurting for a while in a different way than before. I have had chronic back pain since 1978, but this pain was different. The doctor told me the infection was likely causing the pain. I told him again that it was different than before. This young, thirty something doctor, put his hand on my shoulder and said, "Well, as we get older, there are things we could shrug off when we were younger." And I got it. Young doctor who knows nothing about aging, assuring this old coot that he is fine. You just have to endure it.

        Next visit is with my nurse practitioner. Very nice young lady (maybe 40?), seems knowledgeable, very professional. I tell her about the back problem. "Well, Mr. Wade, as we get older, the things we could handle when we were younger become more pronounced.

        So, the back gets worse. I can't walk right. I hobble, I can't make visits, I miss some funerals. The walk from the office to the restrooms is agonizing. I am so unsteady that Brian Chamberlain is on the edge of his seat as lay leader in case I should start falling. Life is miserable. And when I tell a heath professional it is chalked up to aging.

        Then on December 29 of 2022, a pain hits me that I have never experienced before. I am at the church, and I yell so loud I think the neighbors will come running. Lights are exploding and there are strange sounds and I can't take a deep breath. I manage to get my phone and call 911. To Wabash ER, then to Huntington ER, then to Parview, Regional in Ft. Wayne. Even with pain injections I am trembling. Steve and Cindy Runkel come in to see me and I am feeling better, at least until I move. I get an MRI and am admitted. Being a holiday weekend, there is no one to read the MRI, but the hospitalist puts me on steroids and in a couple of days I am feeling better. 

        I am discharged and in a week I get in to see a specialist. She examines the MRI (and the CAT scan and X-ray) and she shows me the arthritis spurs on the outside of my spine and on the inside of my spine. The spurs on the outside have been causing the years of chronic pain and the spurs on the inside have irritated the spinal cord and have caused it to gradually swell until the pain is overwhelming. The specialist gives me a stern look and says, "Mr. Wade, this did not happen overnight. Why didn't you ever tell your doctor?"

        ARE YOU LISTENING TO ME? I am not just an old guy who has nothing better to do than gripe!

        Many of you have been through the same thing. Trying to explain what is going on and the person you are talking to is thinking right past you and you wonder (or perhaps you yell) ARE YOU LSTENING TO ME?

        In Isaiah 30, the Lord, speaking through Moses, is talking to the people about their rebellious spirit. In verse 21 He speaks to the leading of the Lord. And your ears shall hear a word behind you, saying, "This is the way, walk in it," when you turn to the right, or turn to the left. We have a choice; listen to the Lord, or don't listen to the Lord. He has set a path before us, He shows us the way, but we make the decision which path to follow. 

        We do that, don't we? Just like that doctor or our children or our spouse or whoever, we don't listen to the Lord. 

        ARE YOU LISTENING? I'll have to get back to You, Lord.

        Be aware of that still, small voice in the wilderness.

        

 

    Allow me to get somewhat personal. I would greatly appreciate it if you folks would make this situation a matter of prayer.

    My son, Adam, and his wife, Kim, are getting a divorce. Most of you know that neither wanted children to begin with. The pregnancy was completely unplanned. So, when they found out that Kim was pregnant, they planned on putting the baby up for adoption. However, when Kim got that first ultrasound, it became real. Studies have shown that when an expectant mother has that ultrasound, 80% of the women who were planning to abort or adopt out will decide they want to keep the baby. Kim was not different, and I could not blame her. Adam, however, was furious. He felt like Kim had betrayed him. He called me and was shocked that I took Kim's side on the issue. In the end, we had words, and our relationship is strained. Adam came around, to a point, and seemed to be accepting the new situation. However, it must not have been enough for Kim, and she is the one who filed.

    They saw the lawyer and Adam called me to go over what the lawyer had told them. I asked him about how visitation was going to be set up, and my son told me he was not going to seek visitation rights. Later, Marsha called me and told me I needed to retire and come home and sit them down and talk sense into them and then be there for when I am needed to talk more sense into them. She also told me that if I had retired two years ago, then there would not be a problem now. Way too much confidence in my abilities. 

    Here is where many of you will disagree with me. If they divorce, Adam will still support the baby and Kim, as well. He would never shirk his responsibilities, but he would still pass on visitation. At some point, Kim will probably remarry. Kiri (my granddaughter) will naturally call him Daddy. Adam will be fine with that, and so will I. Every little girl needs a Daddy. If he has parents, they will become her grandparents. Every little girl needs grandparent. She already has Kim's parents, and she has Adam's parents. However, we are intermittent. Marsha, I assume, will fight to see her, but I feel it will be more of a confusion to Kiri. I told Marsha the other day that I am going to put Kiri's needs above mine. I will continue to put money away toward her education (for as long as I can) but I will not fight to see her once or twice a year.

    I have said for years that people do not disappoint me. People are people and are very prone to making mistakes. However, I am disappointed in Adam and Kim. Adam, because he really didn't work at it enough. Kim, because she didn't give it enough time. But I am grateful to both of them that abortion never came into the conversation. 

    I was thrilled to be a grandpa. I still am and will be until I die. But it is, of course, different now. I have prayed about this and have made the decision. So, you will not be able to talk to me about visitation. In time, the divide between Adam and I will go away. Marsha, well, that is another story. And for me, I put Kiri in God's hands and that will be enough.