by Dennis Gladden, By Green Pastures, ©2024
(Oct. 9, 2024) — Well, here we are ten months into 2024, two years into writing on Substack, and 72 years into my life on this earth.
I’ve been blessed in all three of these time zones. In this anniversary post, I want more than to thank my readers. I want to bless you and the Lord.
Bless is a wonderful biblical word. The Apostle Paul invites us to bless God “who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ” (Ephesians 1:3).
Here, blessed means to speak well of and blessing means fine speaking. Think elegance. The Greek gives us our word eulogy.
What an amazing picture: Paul sees Jesus before our Father in heaven speaking well of us, and a fine speech it is!
I grew up convinced people wouldn’t like me if they knew me because I didn’t like me; so, I walled myself behind quietness and aloofness.
I marvel to think Jesus has anything good to say. What would it be like to hear His eulogy?
Such love, such wondrous love,
That God should love a sinner such as I,
How wonderful is love like this! 1
Bless you
It is in this context of speaking well of others that I want to bless my Substack audience. Whether a subscriber or follower, you are to me as Barnabas was to Paul and the early church: an encourager. Few endorsed Paul in the beginning, but Barnabas welcomed him and eventually they traveled together.
You have welcomed me into your reading world. Thanks for joining me on the journey.
The trip has taken turns this year I didn’t envision. I wrote last October that I would like to develop a series about faith and The Exodus. That didn’t happen (although I’d still like to). Other topics seemed more pressing, including a trilogy about Noah, of which I have published two of the three parts.
The trip this year has also taken me places I never imagined.
A friend and subscriber, Jim Hoover, introduced me to Sharon Rondeau, publisher of The Post & Email. Sharon is in our home state of Connecticut and has been reposting my pieces on her site. The extended outreach has been a boost and I am grateful. I am glad to give a shout out to Sharon.
I also want to recognize the kindness and encouragement of Dr. Stephen Phinney, who inaugurated me to the IM Writers Association as a frequent contributor. The Association is a collection of Christian writers dedicated to publishing sound biblical doctrine. I encourage you to check out its site.
This year also introduced my first guest writer, Lonnie Orfitelli. We have a special connection—Lonnie is my brother-in-law—but Lonnie’s teaching in Sunday School classes and in Bible studies in his home and at work has blessed me through the years. His first piece is a unique overview that compares how God has worked throughout history with how we mature. (You can read it here.) I look forward to sharing more from Lonnie with you.
Bless the Lord
The dead do not praise the LORD, nor any who go down into silence.
But we will bless the LORD from this time forth and forevermore. Praise the LORD! —Psalm 115:17-18
This psalm exhorts us to bless the Lord as long as we have breath, and I have good reason to.
Through the 1990s, I led bi-weekly worship services at a housing complex for senior citizens in our Connecticut hometown. I was 30 years or so their junior and surprised them one Sunday afternoon when I said I looked forward to getting older.
They scoffed. Most had ailments of one sort or another, many serious. Aging is not fun, they said.
I used the story of Jacob to explain my optimism.
In Genesis 33, Jacob had been in the land of his mother’s family for 20 years and was heading home. An angry father-in-law tracked him and a hostile brother approached from the front. Jacob did not expect a happy reunion, which makes his testimony all the more amazing.
“God has dealt graciously with me,” he said upon engaging Esau, urging his brother to accept his gifts.
In six words, Jacob affirmed that God answers prayer.
Twenty years earlier, Jacob had prayed the night he fled home, “If God will be with me and keep me in this way that I am going, and give me bread to eat and clothing to put on, so that I come back to my father’s house in peace, then the LORD shall be my God” (Genesis 28:20-21).
It took two decades for Abraham’s grandson to see how God answered his prayer.
It took getting older to watch and learn God’s ways.
This, I explained to my small group of seniors, was the reason I was optimistic about the advancing years. Only as you age can you look back and see how God has been with you along the way. Youth has the anxiety of Jacob on the run.
Now, in 2024, I am the age of those faithful seniors, and I would say to them, “See? God has dealt graciously with me.”
This is not to say dark days like Job’s haven’t descended or there haven’t been worrisome times like Jacob endured, but I am here today because of the Lord’s faithfulness. Surely, goodness and mercy have followed me all the days of my life.
And I wouldn’t know this without getting older.
What can I do but speak well of the Lord?
Bless the LORD, O my soul; and all that is within me, bless His holy name!
Will you join me in blessing the Lord? I hope I have jogged your memory about how God has been gracious to you. Speaking well of Him in a comment below would be a blessing.
Thanks for reading.
Lyrics from Such Love, found at https://lyricshymn.com/library/golden-bells/such-love-.
AMEN@