Friday, August 19, 2022
(click here to listen to or read today’s scriptures)
Anniversary stories
The hand of the Lord came upon me and led me out in the Spirit of the Lord and set me in the center of the plain.
Will wonders never cease? Central Austin is in the middle of its first thunderstorm since mid-July, the first one since we returned from Illinois. The temperatures are in the mid-70’s. The brittle blue sunburned sky has been transformed into soft gray clouds. I did not expect this to make me so happy! I walked outside, just to get a little wet. I lifted up my eyes to the hills. I opened my mouth and sang a little song. “Joy to the heavens, and the deep blue sea … joy to you and me!
But there are still countless leaves dying on the vine. Nocturnal city animals are withering in their thirst. And bones are cracking in the dust.
God made me walk among the bones in every direction. There were so many! How dry they were! Can these bones come to life, God asked me? You must speak to them.
By now Ezekiel just does what he’s told.
Dry bones, hear the word of the Lord! See, I will bring spirit into you, I will make flesh grow over you, and you will have skin again. You will come to life and know that I am the Lord.
Today (yes, today!) is our 43rd wedding anniversary. We had our bachelor party and our wedding-dress-final-fitting party on Saturday night, and on Sunday morning Margaret wore her dress to Sunday School at Mt. Pulaski Christian Church, and I wore my white suit. I forget what we were studying that day. We loved that Sunday School class. We may even have been studying Ezekiel.
Even as I prophesied I heard a noise, a rattling as the bones came together. From the four winds come, O spirit, and breathe into these that they may come to life. And they came to life, and stood upright, a vast army.
After class we went to the sanctuary for church. It was a full house. After the service Pastor Al Morehead’s invitation included anyone who wanted to get married that day, and we went forward. He excused those in the congregation who had to get home to take their pot roast off the stove, and others.
O my people! I will put my spirit in you that you may live, and I settle you upon your land, and you shall know that I am the Lord. I have promised, and I will do it.
A few minutes later, Roger and Larry began to play the wedding march, although they played something else first, something we had not approved. Al took his place up front, and so did we, and so did our wedding party, and in just a jiffy, we were married! Alice Walker made our cake, and everyone in the congregation brought a dish to pass, and we had a fabulous party in the church basement. Pictures, of course, and then we gradually vacated our local world for Peoria’s Jumer Castle Hotel.
Were we in the honeymoon suite? I don’t remember. Both of us do remember the server’s embarrassment when we told her we’d just got married. With nothing else available as a gift, she brought us two Dum-Dum suckers.
Hungry and thirsty, their life was wasting away within them. But God led them by a direct way to reach an inhabited city. Give thanks to the Lord; his love is everlasting. He satisfied our longing soul and filled us with good things.
The next morning we headed south for Eureka Springs, Arkansas and our room in the famous Crescent Hotel, morning mimosas, a little canoeing on Beaver Lake, and then a rambling reception along several spots in Kentucky, ending in Margaret’s hometown of Madisonville.
I imagine some of my memories are incomplete or just plain wrong. But I do have a picture to prove we were there.
And Jesus told them, “You shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. And you shall love your neighbor as yourself. All depends on these two commandments.”
(Ezekiel 37, Psalm 107, Psalm 25, Matthew 22)
(posted at www.davesandel.net)
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