Drawing Near

by deborawephraim@gmail.com October 26, 2021

It’s difficult to grasp the idea that we are drawing near to the end of another year.

As we were driving through our small middle of nowhere town yesterday morning on the main street there were some workers with a lift. I wondered out loud what they could be doing when Old Fuzzy said they were probably putting up Christmas lights.

At the moment he said that I thought ‘O goody, Christmas lights.’ In reconsidering the thought I believe they were just fixing something. It’s too early even for us to be putting up lights for Christmas.

My disappointment aside, it is still October and we will need to get to the first of November at least. We are being told to start purchasing our Christmas presents early or there may not be presents available this year.

My mind is wondering several things. In the last few years, stores have been doing some waffling. Some stores open their doors for business on Thanksgiving Day instead of allowing their workers time off to spend with their families and loved ones.

Not the normal ‘public service’ type stores such as gas stations and mini-mart stations, that we are used to being open, but others are expanding to a business as usual day.

Some of these are hardware stores or farm stores that generally were closed. They’ve found it can be profitable for them to be open and so they are. Then there are the stores that were open on those days and are now closing in order to give their workers time to be with their families and…

Waffling—which way is better? Is there a way that is more right? There are probably few people alive anymore who will remember the days when Sunday was a sacrosanct day of rest—An actual day when nothing was open. You had what you needed on Saturday because stores were closed on Sunday.

Old Fuzzy and I don’t make it a practice to frequent stores on Sunday, but, and of course, there is always that exception. We have become more lax in stopping at the Dollar General for cookies, or some item on the way home from Sunday worship. Sometimes we stop at the gas station—It’s easy peasy in our current culture.

I’m sitting here this morning as we experience a weather shift. Yesterday was mild, not sunny mostly cloudy. Today it’s cooled off considerably, the clouds are a steel gray. They are a beautiful background for the changing colors of leaves. A background for the reds, yellows, golden browns, and even still green of leaves clinging to the trees.

It’s a day to bundle up if you’re going outside…and as I sit inside it’s a good day to heat up my oven and bake some squash, or sweet potatoes, or maybe even cinnamon rolls. To drink hot coffee or brew some hot tea.

Often times when we are young we search for our reason or purpose in this life. When we are old we are no longer searching for that answer, our purpose was to live, to love, and to praise God.

We have no right to cruelty, ugliness, but to be ruled by the precepts of God. As the ten commandments state, to love God and keep his commandments and to love our neighbor as ourselves.

Genesis 1:

28 “And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.”

Matthew 22:37-40 KJV

“Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.”