We're well into the new school year but I would like to share this terrifically applicable graduation message that I heard last May to close the '08-09 school year:

Be a light for freedom

It was a great privilege to be able to serve as the Sunday school teacher to many of you, so I thank you for granting me the opportunity and honor to address you once again. In all honesty, I was shocked you really wanted to hear me again.
To those who are graduating today, I offer my congratulations for all that you have achieved, and best wishes as you seize the opportunities, and confront the challenges, before you.
I also want to congratulate the parents because they have played an instrumental role in guiding these young men and women to this point in their lives. Their commitment and dedication to the training of their children is a picture of Deuteronomy 6:7, which instructs parents to teach God’s commandments to their children diligently and constantly. With that thought in mind please join me in honoring the parents of these graduates for their obedience to God in living out this verse for His glory and our graduates’ benefit.
The blessing of the Home School education you have received has literally prepared you to take on the world. And ours is most assuredly a world in need of being taken on, by men and women who possess the intellectual treasures of understanding, knowledge and Biblical wisdom. I pray, and trust, that these gifts, given to you by God and your parents,
will in your hands become powerful instruments of reform and renewal in those many domains of endeavor to which you, the members of the Class of 2009, will dedicate yourselves.
When Jared invited me to speak, he gave me an array of topics to choose from including: politics, sports and even the weather. I will do my best to touch on at least one of these topics, and along the way hopefully impart to you some thoughts worthy of your consideration.
Since we are in a church my challenge for you today consists of three parts, because, as you know, anyone who speaks in a church must have three points or the roof caves in or something like that.
There was a time when our Country was a beacon of light for Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness. The Founding Fathers even claimed that these “inalienable rights” were endowed by our Creator. Regrettably, that light appears to be dimming.
In Matthew 5:14 Jesus tells us that “You are the light of the world. A city that is set on a hill cannot be hidden.” It’s true you can’t hide a city on a hill. Its light can be seen for miles.
Graduates, like a bright city on a hill we need torchbearers for Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness. My challenge to you today is be such a beacon of light.
America is a great nation. However, she and her people are not great enough to survive the darkness that is moving across our land. Secularism, immorality and decadence are the outward signs of a heart that has grown callous to God. Beyond the safety of your parent’s home the world grows darker.
President Ronald Reagan warned us that “If we ever forget we are One Nation Under God, then we will be a nation gone under.”
Even Thomas Jefferson confessed that “Indeed, I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just.” If he was concerned then, I wonder how he would feel about America today.
Life is the first of the three inalienable rights mentioned and we need to look no farther than how our society approaches it to know that we have turned our back on the warnings of Presidents Reagan and Jefferson.
Our government passes an Endangered Species act that protects animals, born and unborn, but refuses to protect human beings from abortion and euthanasia. Over forty-six million unborn children have died since abortion was legalized by nine men in black robes in 1973 and today a number of states have grown very close to openly endorsing euthanasia.
Scripture clearly tells us that God is the giver of life and that life begins at conception. “And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living being.” Our Founding Fathers understood this passage from Genesis chapter two, as well as the 139th Psalm, where God reminds us that He has know us from our conception. “For You formed my inward parts; You covered me in my mother’s womb.”
America, perhaps the most blessed nation on earth, needs people to shine a light and lead it in repentance, and in a restoration of life! Graduates I encourage you to be that beacon of light and expose the works of darkness in the hope that the exposed will become light. Ephesians 5:11, 13 and 14. tells us to “…have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather expose them…But all things that are exposed are made visible by the light…Awake, you who sleep, Arise from the dead, And Christ will give you light.”
Graduates, be a light for the life of those that cannot speak for themselves, but don’t stop there because the battle for life doesn’t end there.
When we lived in Mount Pleasant, I had the honor to serve as a Deacon here at Calvary Baptist Church. One of our duties was to meet with prospective members. As part of the interview process we had the pleasure of hearing people’s testimonies and on many occasions they
would share a verse that was instrumental in their coming to Christ as their Savior. John 3:16 and its guidance on how one may have everlasting life was a verse often shared. With its instruction to believe on God’s only begotten Son, the path to everlasting life is a simple one. But, it is also a narrow path.
And advocating a narrow path to eternal life is not popular in today’s world, but it is the one true path. The world needs those who will shine the light of truth thus illuminating the way to everlasting life.
In summary, Graduates be both a light for life here on earth and a light for everlasting life.
My second challenge is to be a beacon for liberty, just like the lady in the harbor of New York City.
On May 29th, 2004, a four-day “grand reunion” of veterans was held on the National Mall in Washington DC. The event culminated in the dedication of a memorial to “The Greatest Generation”. The World War II memorial honors the sixteen million members of the Armed Forces of the United States. While in Washington DC I had the opportunity to visit the memorial. The Freedom Wall was the one aspect that really caught my attention. With its four-thousand forty-eight gold stars, each representing one-hundred American service personnel who died or remain missing in the war, it is a somber reminder of the price of liberty.
The over four-hundred thousand American dead and missing from the Second World War are second only to the loss of more than six hundred twenty thousand Americans during another fight for freedom, the Civil War.
So many lives have been given in the defense of freedom and liberty, but in addition to this price, William Barclay reminds us that liberty has another cost, vigilance.
Today, our government is ever encroaching into our daily lives. It’s on the verge of taking over the banking system and regulating speech. It’s already taken over a large portion of the auto industry and now our government’s sights are set on the energy and health care industries.
And the way Washington keeps spending, a few trillion here and few trillion there, it’s getting harder and harder for us taxpayers to support the government in the lifestyle it has become accustomed. It’s my understanding that some brokerage firms are now encouraging people to invest their 401k money directly into taxes, because taxes are sure to go up.
Unfortunately the citizens of our country are eagerly swapping liberty for a false hope, peddled by a silver tongue reading lines off a teleprompter, in a government supplied security blanket. Don’t be
deceived by this ploy, because less freedom and liberty always equal less opportunity.
John F. Kennedy recognized the importance of the freedom to succeed and develop our talents when he said that “All of us do not have equal talent, but all of us should have an equal opportunity to develop our talents.”
The people of the United States have lost their love of liberty. Graduates, be the spark that rekindles the love of liberty our nation’s Founding Fathers fought and died for.
Like life though, the battle doesn’t end there because the source of liberty didn’t begin with the United States or the Declaration of Independence. Liberty began with the freeing of man from the shackles of sin. Thus it was that just over two-thousand years ago the greatest sacrifice for liberty was made as Christ died on the cross to liberate us from sin and a long list of laws.
As John 8:32 tells us, His sacrifice liberates us from the penalty of sin and as we seek to serve God, Jesus’ perfect truth frees us to be all God wants us to be. Although we are no longer under the Law, we don’t have the freedom to sin because that merely enslaves us to Satan, others or even ourselves, all over again. Instead, as Paul instructs in Galatians 5:13, our liberty in Christ frees us to do what is right and to glorify God.
Graduates, be a light for Christian liberty, be a light for freedom and to borrow an old tag line from the Army, the opportunity to be all you can be.
In many ways pursuing happiness is dependent upon having the liberty to being all you can be, so on to the third of the three inalienable rights. Just for the record, please note that the Declaration says “Pursuit” of Happiness NOT “Guarantee” of Happiness.
My comments on happiness do include a number of observations from John Piper. The first being that all men have this in common: they want to be happy. They don’t all agree on what brings the greatest happiness, but they do all long to have it. And this longing isn’t bad. It’s good.
So who are the happy people? Well according to a Pew Research poll conducted this spring on just that subject: Republicans tend to be happier than Democrats. Seniors are generally happier than Baby Boomers, and senior men tend to be happier than senior women, but that’s probably because the senior women have to live with the senior men.
So how do you get real happiness? If you can answer that question, then it stands to reason that you can pursue happiness correctly.
Mr. Piper notes that if you want to be happy, then get wisdom. Proverbs
3:13 says, "Happy is the man who finds wisdom and the man who gets understanding." Proverbs 24:13-14 says, "My son, eat honey, for it is good, and the drippings of the honeycomb are sweet to your taste. Know that wisdom is such to your soul; if you find it, there will be a future, and your hope will not be cut off." Proverbs 19:8 says, "He who gets wisdom loves himself."1 So in summary, if you want true, lasting happiness, get wisdom.
But how do you get wisdom you ask?
"The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and the knowledge of the Holy One is insight" (Proverbs 9:10). The wisdom that leads to life and true happiness, or joy, begins with knowing and fearing God. The fear of the Lord is, therefore, the beginning of wisdom not only in the sense that it is the first step in a wise way to live, but also in the sense that all the later characteristics of wisdom flow from the fear of the Lord like a river flows from a spring. 1
The wise person is characterized by humility. Proverbs 11:2 says, "When pride comes, then comes disgrace; but with the humble is wisdom." The person who is proud does not fear the Lord. But the person who fears the Lord is humble, because he depends on God for everything and fears to take credit himself for what God does.1
When the Bible says, "Get wisdom," it is referring to that practical knowledge of how to attain true and lasting happiness. It begins with the fear of the Lord and consists in humbly hearing and doing God's will. Therefore, be a light for real happiness by pursuing and displaying Biblical wisdom in your life. 1
On occasion the topic of the Lord of the Rings movies would come up during our Sunday morning discussions, so I felt that in keeping with tradition the movies needed to somehow be included today. Thus, I would like to close by relating a scene from the first of the three movies.
In the first Lord of the Rings movie, a small band of hero’s, known as The Fellowship of the Ring, led by the wizard Gandalf is making their way through the Mines of Moria, the former underground realm of the Dwarves. The Mines, now overrun by orcs and a collection of other nasty creatures, are completely dark making the group’s passage both dangerous and difficult. The only light comes from the groups few torches and Gandalf’s staff. The darkness held complete sway over the mines; until the arrival of the Fellowship, because the darkness was no match for light of the torches and the staff. Wherever the light was cast the darkness was driven back enabling the group to find their way.
Just as the torches and Gandalf’s staff illuminated the path for the Fellowship, allow God’s Word to be a lamp to your feet and a light to
your path, so that you may be a light for life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
Thank you and may God bless you and guide your journey.
1: Get Wisdom, May 24, 1981, By John Piper. © Desiring God. Website: desiringGod.org

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P.U.P.

. (People Under Pressure) . . .still “dukin” it out with the cancerJ. . .Tuesday I received the 6th of 18 possible doses of Gemsar. Dr. Moe indicated that this regimen of chemo is cumulative in its work on the body. This I have found is true but at this point is still manageable with over the counter drugs. I actually dread taking the vitamins and pills that help me each day because there are so many of them and they are made for lions and tigers and bears, oh my!!! I need an attitude adjustment at that point and with that I thank God that so much is available!!!

I am writing this on our way to Canada to visit with our daughter Deb and friend Mary Ann. I know people are praying that our time together be all that He wants it to be and that the chemo won’t be too tough on me. It will be a delight whatever the situation because we’re with family, we’re celebrating Canada’s Thanksgiving and especially because we are in His presence. He has said, “In My presence is fullness of joy. . .” That’s been His promise throughout life and cancer can’t rob that from anyone no matter how they feel physically. I cannot encourage anyone who has not put their trust in the Lord Jesus to humble yourself and know that He is the God Who loves you so much that He gave His only begotten Son that whosoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. Believe means to trust in Him for Who He says He is. He manifested only what God could do and say. No one but God could fulfill all the prophecies He did as well as perform all the miracles and declare and demonstrate His amazing statements of authority.

I’m eager to share pictures of Canada on our next blog! So far we’ve seen a wind generator farm, a humongous plastic chicken on top of a van with the caption of Gold N Plump on the door, a truck full of beets for the market and the interesting customs stop at the border! How fun is all of that-not the typical day!!!