Kindergarten Graduation / for Aunt Pat

     When I was a little boy in Kindergarten it seemed like I would be there forever. Being in Kindergarten was everything to me. It was my life. I had my teacher and my friends that made up what I was at that time. It was what defined me. I was a kindergartener.

     I remember how important it was to me to sit in a big chair. At the beginning of class we got to pick the chairs we would be sitting in for the day. It was a big deal. I didn’t want a small chair. Small chairs were for sissies.

     Now fifty years have come and gone. I don’t care if I’m sitting in a big chair anymore. I just want one that will support me. I don’t look back to the time I was in Kindergarten. I remember my teacher’s name and some of my fellow students’ names and a few things that took place during that time, but generally speaking that’s over. That’s ancient history. I will never go back. The only person from that time that I have communicated with is a former classmate that contacted me recently who I have not seen for over twenty years. He was very happy to find me and I was very happy to hear from him. Even though our lives have taken different paths we are still on the same page. We picked up from where we left off fifty years ago like no time had gone by at all. It was like we had never been apart these past fifty years.

     I was thinking about all this, this past weekend during my Uncle Junior’s funeral. I was imagining what he might be thinking about now that he was in a different place, a better place. What would he miss the most? Would it be something like me looking back at Kindergarten fifty years later?

     The things that were important in Kindergarten have lost their attraction to me except for one. My former classmate, (his name is Donny), is just as real and alive to me now as he was back then. In fact because fifty years of life’s experiences have gone by our friendship is all that much deeper. We don’t relate to one another as kindergarteners anymore but as mature adults who have lived out most of their lives.

     There are some who say when we go to Heaven we will not relate to each other in the same way. Some say we will not even recognize each other because we will be spirit beings, not earthly beings. I disagree. I believe whatever happens when we leave here we will know each other in a far superior way than we know each other now. The Bible teaches us that this earthly realm, this veil of tears, is wrapped up in spiritual darkness. We don’t see as clearly as we should. But it also teaches us that when we leave here we will enter into a realm of spiritual light, what we call Heaven. It’s my opinion we will relate to each other in a far clearer way than we do now. We will know each other much more intimately than we know each other now. When Jesus returned to see His disciples after He rose from the dead He told them He was not a spirit or a ghost. And he proved it to them. He told them to reach out their hands to touch His wounds. Then He ate lunch with them. It was if He had never left.

     I’m convinced when we leave here many things that are important to us now will lose their value. We won’t care what chair we sit in anymore. We will have something far more important. We will have each other. We will know each other. We will know each other in a much deeper and more complete way. We will pick up from where we left off like nothing had happened. We will pick up from where we left off in a much more intimate way, a fuller way, and a higher way. We will be with our Lord. We will be with our loved ones. We will be with Frank. You will be with Frank. We will be home.

     I love you Aunt Pat. It was an honor to be with you during this tough time. Love Mike

Did you read the owner's manuel?

    On this side of Heaven it appears that to seek God like He commands us to (to be holy as He is holy, to not sin like Him, to love as He loves, and to be perfect as He is perfect) is deemed by most to be certainly unattainable. But if we think it through, I think we’ll come up with a different conclusion.

     God is the one Who created us, not us. He is the designer of our heart, our spirit, our inner man. He knows what we can do and can’t do. He created us. He created us in His image ! We are designed to be like Him to begin with!

     If we buy a car don’t we look at the owner’s manual prepared by the automobile manufacturer to see how everything works? Aren’t the engineers and the technicians the ones who designed the cars we drive? Don’t we have faith in them to explain to us how to drive a car? Then why can’t we have faith in the Creator of the Universe to explain to us how we work, what we’re supposed to become and be used for?

     I believe it’s easier to live life in the way God commands and instructs us to live rather than to listen to anybody else, including ourselves. God is our creator, He is our designer. Whatever we have to go through in this life to be made perfect like Him is going to be an easier path to walk on than any other. That’s because this is what we were designed for. If we use a car in any way that is not according to the instruction manual the car won’t run properly or at best it will run poorly, less than full performance and what it is designed for. But if we follow the instructions the car makers give us the car will run at its peak performance and in the way it is designed to run.

     We think that to go through the necessary work and the sacrifice it will take to allow God to work His full will in us to arrive to that place of the fullness of God, being made perfect in His image, will be such a hard thing to accomplish that we would rather not even try. It’s too hard. It’s too much. It’s only for Bible people.

It’s certainly not for us.

     I believe exactly the opposite is true. I believe in the long run it will be harder to live life not according to God’s commands than according to God’s commands. Just as it is harder not to operate a car according to the carmaker’s instructions.

     I believe just like we think that now it is easier to coast through life and not to attain to God’s full design for us, on the other side (in Heaven) we will understand exactly the opposite. That if we had been obedient in this life and given God full place in our lives to do whatever necessary to accomplish His perfect will in our lives, we would have gotten through this life in a much easier manner and also reap the eternal rewards as well. I believe we will clearly understand this in Heaven.

     If we’re wise, we will understand this now and allow God to do His perfect work in our lives—now.

Lake Gogebic—a Real Live Time Machine

I look at the couch in the living room and see my dad teaching me how to tie my shoes for the first time.

Out the back door there’s Old Man Ketola (who was in his nineties) telling my dad (who was in his fifties) that he was just a youngster.

Suddenly I’m flying in the air, but my dad catches me. He had unexpectedly thrown me up as he was carrying me while we were taking a family walk to Sandy Beach.

There I am spilling water from the two buckets I’m carrying that I just filled from the old water pump to take down to the camp.

In the kitchen I watch in fascination as Bill Nylund rolls a cigarette while telling us in his woodsman's voice about his latest bird hunt.

Now we’re flying through the water as Mr. Bedner takes us out for a ride in a real speed boat.

I see myself sitting around the campfire at the Webers with all the kids in the neighborhood telling ghost stories. Silently my brother and his buddy Phil Wirtanen sneak up behind us letting out a scream, scaring us half to death.

I look out into the woods and see my mom and my sister and I berry picking. I hear a strange hum above my head and see a hummingbird for the first time.

Now it’s time to put out forest fires! I watch as Ralph Wirtanen and I build airplanes out of firewood and come to the rescue.

There’s Jane and I and Mark Ketola hiding on the front porch. We had just knocked on our neighbors’ door (who we didn’t like) and ran and hid. Mark was laughing so hard he gave us away. The neighbor demanded that we show ourselves and apologize for what we had done. My sister said, “Don’t get up! He won’t come get us!” I felt so guilty I got up and confessed that we had done it and that we were sorry. Now I was in trouble from both sides.

I see myself, my brother, and sister carving our names in the old wooden steps where our cousins, aunts, and uncles had been carving their names for over 20 years.

There we are rowing to Merriweather to hike up to Seabold’s gas station to buy a candy bar or some groceries for the cottage.

Ten years later I see myself looking out the window with my father at the Weber twins who were just becoming adults. I commented, “It doesn’t seem that long ago when they were just babies in their crib.”

My dad responded, “It doesn’t seem that long ago to me when their mother Janet was

a baby in her crib.”

That was over thirty years ago. Now new names are being carved in the old wooden steps.

Fast forward a couple decades and a new generation is at Lake Gogebic with their own experiences and making new memories.

There’s Aunt Leoma saving the sauna from burning down.

There’s the outhouses that were left behind for the new flushing toilets.

There’s Tom and Todd and Tim and Ted helping Grandpa Waldo pile wood and shovel gravel.

There they go swimming across the Lake.

There’s Amber angrily responding to her cousins who had just told her that Grandma Silberg was their grandma, too. Amber yelled, “She’s my grandma, not yours”.

There’s Max being slowly lowered into Lake Gogebic by Aunt Jane for the first time. Unbeknownst to his mother, who was looking away, Max was turning blue and was sucking in all the air from Ontonagon County from the impact of Lake Gogebic’s “balmy water temperature”. He was so cold he was unable to express his concern to his mother—or maybe Max was just speechless with delight.

There’s Adam in Grandpa Waldo’s arms waiting for the cuckoo clock to cuckoo.

New names are carved in the old wooden steps.

There’s grandpa taking a walk with his friends, the chickadees. 
There’s grandma making a couple of loaves of cardamom seed bread.

There’s grandpa riding in his red tractor.

But some things are timeless:

Like . . .

Rowing down the Merriweather River.

The Hoop and Holler

A trip to Sandy Beach

Climbing Alligator Eye

Climbing the Bluff

Not catching any fish.

Looking for night crawlers.

Taking a sauna.

Chopping wood.

Swedish pancake eating contests, pasties, and apple brown betty.

Lake Superior.

Smashing pennies on the railroad tracks.

Indian head signs.

Coyotes howling at night.

Trips to Bergland.
Trips to Ironwood.
St. Paul’s Lutheran church.

Suomi College.

Hot games.

Wolves howling at night.

The Keewenaw.
The Paavo Nurmi Marathon.

Grandma walking across the Mackinac Bridge on Labor Day.

Flying squirrels at twilight.

Grandma Anna’s forget-me-nots

On and on and on . . .

There’s Catherine and Kelsey posing for Aunt Leoma with their first babies to be.

Now look:

There’s Hamilton Silberg (the first of a new generation) having the first Silberg art show on Lake Gogoebic.
All of a sudden there's a yard full of new Silberg kids: Hamilton, Truman, Hawthorne, Cameron, Conner, and Cassidy all hunting for quarters.

New names are carved in the old wooden steps.
There’s Tom II’s fire works on the fourth of July.

There goes a jet ski or two or three or four whizzing by with Silberg’s at the helms.

There we go on a boat ride around the lake with Ed and Mary Lou.

Now we’re having a pancake breakfast at the Collicks.

Now we’re playing croquet at the Berndts.

There’s grandma walking across the Mackinac Bridge.

There’s Amber swimming across the lake.

There’s Todd winning at Jeopardy.

There’s Jane winning at Jeopardy.

There goes Mary Lou to Watersmeet.

There’s Ed winning at Jeopardy.

There’s Jenny winning at Jeopardy.

There’s grandma walking across the Mackinac Bridge.

There’s Amber winning at Jeopardy.

There’s Mike and Leoma and Adam biking in the Tour da Lake.Whoops Aunt Leoma got kidnapped by the Berndts half way and they’re forcing her to drink champagne.

There’s Tucker winning at Jeopardy.

Now we’re in the car taking a trip to see the Paulding Lights.

There’s Ted and Heather and Trent on Plymouth Rock.

There’s Amber biking around the lake.

Time to put new names on the old wooden steps. Let’s see, Silbergs have been carving their names on these steps for almost 80 years now.

There’s grandma walking across the Mackinac Bridge.

Now it’s nighttime. I see a bunch of us sitting around the campfire. We’re looking for shooting stars or satellites passing by or even the Northern Lights. We’re solving the problems of the world with our neighbors, aunts, uncles, cousins, and friends—just like Silbergs have been doing at Lake Gogebic for a hundred years.

Before you know it, another summer has come and gone. The leaves are falling. The geese are flying. Winter’s in the air. There goes grandma heading south. Tom and Tom II are closing up the cabins.

How quickly these days come and go. How quickly our friends and our neighbors and our families grow and move on and life changes. But somehow they stay with us. Somehow they remain in our hearts and become a part of us. The lake is always there. The cottage seems like it will always be there. Some things don’t seem to change. Some places are stuck in time. Must be a God thing.

So, if you’re visiting Lake Gogebic sometime in the future and you're awakened early on a cold morning in the old camp by some clanging around in the kitchen—go back to sleep, it’s just Grandpa Waldo putting a fire in the stove.

Head for Cover

     I happened to be watching a TV show where a judge was questioning the plaintiffs and the defendants over a dispute on family law. The judge quickly zeroed in on the plaintiffs and it became evident they were in the wrong and committed a very serious crime. You could see the judge getting more and more incensed at their actions and the pathetic arguments they were giving. I could almost feel the heat from the judge’s anger coming through the television. I felt uncomfortable.

      I remember a time I was in a grocery store with some buddies of mine when I was about ten years old. We decided to take some candy bars and stuff them in our pants just to see if we could get away with stealing them. As we were leaving the store my candy bar became loose and I was trying to keep it from falling on the floor. The manager of the store saw what was going on and he grabbed me and my friend. He made us call our mothers on the phone and he told them what we had done. I was so embarrassed I wanted to climb in a hole.

     What will it be like to stand before God in all His holiness and power and account for our lives? The Bible is clear that God will require this from everyone of us, even from us believers. It will be the most uncomfortable, embarrassing thing we will ever experience. Imagine the eyes of God piercing our hearts and bringing out every dark thought or sinful action we have ever committed. And unlike an earthly judge or a grocery store manager, God judges with perfect holiness, justice, and righteousness. His is not an earthly judgment with earthly consequences. His judgment is eternal. We will abide in His judgment forever. If it will be uncomfortable for us Christians to stand before God what will it be like for the ungodly? No wonder the reaction given by the unrighteous when Jesus appears in His glory:

              Then the kings of the earth and the great men and

              the commanders and the rich and the strong and

              every slave and free man hid themselves in the caves
              and among the rocks of the mountains; and they said

              to the mountains and to the rocks, “Fall on us and

              hide us from the presence of Him who sits on the

              throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb.”

                                                                 Revelation 6:5, 6

Maestro is Playing

Satan is the master deceiver. He is playing his fiddle. We are listening. He is playing his fiddle and putting us to sleep. He has hypnotized us. He has hypnotized us believers. We are buying his lies.What lies?

As believers we have been sucked into certain ways of thinking that are not from God, but are from Satan.

It is a commonly held belief among Christians that it is impossible to be free from sin in this earthly life.

Throughout the Bible it teaches sin is not from God.

Didn’t Jesus die for our sin?

Doesn’t God command us not to sin?

Where does the idea come from that we must sin?

That we can’t help but sin?

It doesn’t come from God.

It is a commonly held belief among Christians that we must die.

But Enoch didn’t die.

Elijah didn’t die.

They’re from the Old Testament.

We’re from the New.

Do we have to die?

Didn’t Jesus die for us?

Jesus said, “Truly, truly, I say to you, he who hears My word, and believes Him who sent Me, has eternal life, and does not come into judgment, but has passed out of death into life.” (John 5:24)

Jesus said to the Pharisees, “Truly, truly, I say to you, if anyone keeps My word he shall never see death.” (John 8:51)

Jesus said to Martha on the way to Lazuras’ tomb, “I am the resurrection and the life; he who believes in Me shall live even if he dies, and everyone who lives and believes in Me shall never die. Do you believe this? ” (John 11:25, 26)

Who do we believe?

The devil and the world say we must sin, say we must die.

Jesus said we don’t.

Who are we going to listen to?

The Bible speaks of a group of believers at the end of time that will not die in what is commonly referred to as the “rapture”.

Maybe they are those who have learned to stop listening to Satan’s fiddle.

Crybaby

But that’s not fair! Why does she (fill in the blank) get to (fill in the blank) and I don’t?

 

When we’re little one of the first lessons and one of the toughest lessons we learn is that life’s not fair. We have to learn to accept this as part of life and move on.

But why is life not fair? Isn’t God fair? Isn’t God just? Where is He in all of this?
God is fair. God is just. But He is not the ruler of this world.

Jesus calls Satan, “the ruler of this world” (John 12:31). Satan and his angels are mostly responsible for the fallen condition of the world. The whole world lies in the power of the evil one (I John 5:19). Satan is unfair. Satan is unjust. Not God.

Jesus taught us to pray that God’s will would be done on earth as it is in Heaven. Jesus is indicating that God’s will is not being done on earth as God’s will is being done in Heaven. Unfairness, unjustness do not come from God, they come from Satan.

The Bible says that God judges with equity (Psalm 98:9). I once heard a preacher speaking on that verse and especially the word, equity. He explained that God is able to come into any situation, any life, and bring it up to a level playing field of judgment. He is able to bring it into equity. This is represented by the well known image of Lady Justice who holds the balances of judgment while blindfolded indicating justice is impartial and balanced in judgment.

It doesn’t matter what kind of life someone has lived, God will judge that life with equity. God sorts out all injustice and unfairness. He does not hold us responsible for sin or for a sinful culture brought upon us that we are not responsible for. He holds us responsible only for our own sin.

God judges righteous judgment. 
God is fair.

Shifting Tides

9/11 was a pivotal event. Something in the air changed that day. It was a spiritual Pearl Harbor. A journalist specializing in international politics reacted to 9/11 by saying, "the world has entered into a very dangerous place". Tides have shifted. New spiritual powers are jockeying for position. The overriding influence of the WW II generation has been usurped by the succeeding generations after. The world is being turned upside down. The world is being turned inside out. We are being pulled into a new day, a new age. We have passed the place of no return. Nothing can stop this. We are being pulled into the revelation of Jesus Christ.

God is Big

We all know God is big. I've always looked at it in terms of His power and might. But He is big in other ways. He is big in substance and purpose and meaning. What I mean by that is I used to think after being in Heaven for a couple thousand years we would begin to get bored. We would begin to lose interest. We would get tired. Life would lose its punch.

But that's not going to happen. In Isaiah 9:7 it says, There will be no end to the increase of His government or of peace. In other words everything that has to do with God's government or peace will keep increasing. Government relates to power and might, but peace is a fruit of the Spirit. Peace relates to purpose and meaning.
We have a distorted picture of spiritual reality here on earth. Even when things are at their best sin is present. Sin clogs things up. Sin keeps God's Spirit from flowing. Things aren't what they are supposed to be. Things are a little cloudy. We look through a glass darkly. Things don't taste the way they should. The fruit is a little rotten. Things sound uncertain. The bell tolls a little flat. Fear, depression, and hopelessness are continually swirling around us. Trying to get to us. Trying to overtake us.
Imagine being free of all this. Imagine the Holy Spirit having full liberty to move in and through our lives as He can, as He should. Imagine the earth being filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord as the waters cover the sea. Imagine the clarity of purpose and depth of meaning that will fill our hearts in such a spiritual atmosphere. There will be no room for boredom or losing interest in life. All will be full of life. Abundant life. All will be interesting. All will have purpose and meaning. We will see through glass clearly. Fruit will be a delight to our taste. Bells will ring a certain sound. Everything will be spreading out and increasing. There will be no end to the increase of His government or of peace. There will be no end to the increase of purpose and meaning. There will be no end to the increase of life. It will be eternal life. It will be big and getting bigger all the time.

Temple News from Jerusalem

In this weeks' news Israel allowed groups of observant Jews to go onto the temple mount and pray in commemoration of Jerusalem Day. 

This is huge. Since 1967 Jews have been forbidden to go onto the temple mount by their own religious authority. 

Looking at the Temple Mount

Bible prophecy teaches that the seven year period associated with Christ's return will be triggered off by Israel reentering into a covenant relationship with God. This would include a proclamation to rebuild the temple in Jerusalem. 

To this day there has been no hint of Israel even suggesting they would allow religious services let alone build a temple.

Things are changing.

click here for article