The Mosquito Machine

The Great Sock Caper

2014-07-05T21:43:00.000-04:00

In terms of abilities and personality, a baby enters the world as a bag of reflexes, and it seems, not much more. But it does not take long at all before the child’s interface with the world around begins to produce amazing results. A personality emerges, and skills begin to develop. Within days of birth, an infant is making rudimentary attempts at communication with his or her parents. Shortly thereafter, the child gains the ability to focus and begins to learn the art of reading others’ minds by watching their faces. Motor skills soon follow, the ability to grip objects, the ability to roll over, strength to hold up one’s head.

Each day brings with it exciting developments in the child’s progress, and when I was a young father, I took a keen interest in each stage of my son’s growth as a person. What a wonder he was to me! What a magnificent thing God crafted when he designed Caleb! A new aspect of God’s creation, which he had planned since before the world began, was taking shape right before my eyes. What a high privilege to have been selected to play the role of father to this amazing new masterpiece of our Creator!

Those first days were amazing, but the realization of just how fun fatherhood would be began when Caleb learned to crawl. Crawling vastly opens a child’s horizons, and with this skill comes the ability to have the first of what can be termed adventures. Adventures are where daddies excel!

So it was that as I was getting ready for work one morning shortly after Caleb started crawling, I detected a sound from the doorway of the bedroom and glanced over to see my son, on unsteady arms and legs, laboriously making his way into the room. Being in the early days of crawling skill development, he frequently collapsed under the burden of his own weight, and often this resulted in him rolling all the way over onto his back. No matter; he would struggle back to the crawl position and onward he would come.

I do not now recall for certain, but I suppose that on this particular morning, I was talking to him as he progressed. His mother and I generally heaped praise on him when he accomplished new skills, and making the difficult pilgrimage from one room to another was definitely cutting edge stuff for him at that age. What I do recall was that I had laid out the socks I intended to wear for the day and that at some point I turned my back on my son and the socks. When I turned back around, I discovered that Caleb had taken one of my socks and just as arduously as he had come, he was exiting the room, sock in tow behind his little balled up fist!

“Hey!” I cried out teasingly. “You’re stealing my sock!” I chased him down and scooped him up, kissing his neck and teasing him about being a little sock thief. He squealed with delight. I took my sock and went to work, thinking that the fun was all played out.

But guess what…The next morning, as I was, once more, getting ready for work, I again heard that telltale crinkling sound of an approaching diaper in the doorway. Glancing over, I discovered that the little miscreant had returned, this time with the most impish look of mischievous delight animating his features. One glance and I knew the sock thief had returned. I pretended not to notice as the little villain stealthily tumbled across my carpet, grabbed a sock and made good his escape. Only when sounds of his shuffling little diaper had reached the doorway to my bedroom did I chase him down and once more playfully chastise the little booger!

So began a game that went on for months. Each morning as I readied myself for work, my little sock thief would make an appearance, that same gleam in his eye, that same determination to relieve his father of one sock, maybe two. Although he always thought he was really sneaky, he did not realize the extent to which his any success at this game was due only to my pretended inobservance. Eventually, however, his speed and craftiness did increase enough that by the time he and I abandoned this pastime for other amusements (months later), he had been successful on a least a couple occasions at forcing me to make a second trip to my sock drawer.

(I as a father and he as a son never had any difficulties maintaining the distinction between the game we played and real theft. He knew the difference. He’s a normal human being, and as such, God designed him smart enough to know the difference. To think it would have been otherwise is just silly.)

Caleb turned twenty years old today. He still remembers stealing my socks. I am sure glad that he does remember, for that means that he, like me, remembers back to the very early days of our friendship.

Around the time Caleb was born, there was a parenting curriculum named Growing Kids God’s Way that was, shall I say, “all the rage” in Christian circles at that time. Some friends of ours gave us this curriculum with a strong admonition that if we were to be good parents, Growing… was the model to follow. I read a lot of the Growing… curriculum, and I suppose that much of what it had to say was good advice. However, there was something that bothered me very much about it. It advocated a very controlling parenting methodology, and it sought to justify this level of control by repeatedly emphasizing that children need parents, not friends.

Right on the face of things, it seemed clear to me that being a parent is more important than being a friend. I understood that much, but what I could never understand is why being a parent precluded me from also being a friend. It seemed to me that being both a parent and a friend was possible…and necessary. Growing Kids God’s Way had set the bar too low. In my estimation at the time, any parent who had been one but not the other had failed to do the whole job, and I determined that my son would have in me both a parent and a friend, right from the beginning.

A key reason in my willingness to discard the conventional wisdom was that I always felt that my own father had been my friend right from the start, and I never perceived that his having been so ever interfered with his ability to act from his position of authority as my father. I wanted the same for my relationship with my own son.

My son reached the Biblical age of majority today. He’s now an adult in every way except the ability to buy beer. From what I recall of Growing Kids God’s Way he is now at the age at which they say I can become his friend! That’s great, but there’s no need for anyone to introduce the two of us. He and I have been the best of friends dating all the way back to The Great Sock Caper of ’95!

My Father's 77th Birthday

2013-08-10T23:12:00.000-04:00

Today was my father's 77th Birthday. My mother shared with me a passage that seems particularly meaningful today as we all remember the dear man who was...and is...my father.

Isaiah 54: 4 - 14

⁴Fear not; for thou shalt not be ashamed: neither be thou confounded; for thou shalt not be put to shame: for thou shalt forget the shame of thy youth, and shalt not remember the reproach of thy widowhood any more.
⁵For thy Maker is thine husband; the Lord of hosts is his name; and thy Redeemer the Holy One of Israel; The God of the whole earth shall he be called.
⁶For the Lord hath called thee as a woman forsaken and grieved in spirit, and a wife of youth, when thou wast refused, saith thy God.
⁷For a small moment have I forsaken thee; but with great mercies will I gather thee.
⁸In a little wrath I hid my face from thee for a moment; but with everlasting kindness will I have mercy on thee, saith the Lord thy Redeemer.
⁹For this is as the waters of Noah unto me: for as I have sworn that the waters of Noah should no more go over the earth; so have I sworn that I would not be wroth with thee, nor rebuke thee.
¹⁰For the mountains shall depart, and the hills be removed; but my kindness shall not depart from thee, neither shall the covenant of my peace be removed, saith the Lord that hath mercy on thee.
¹¹O thou afflicted, tossed with tempest, and not comforted, behold, I will lay thy stones with fair colours, and lay thy foundations with sapphires.
¹²And I will make thy windows of agates, and thy gates of carbuncles, and all thy borders of pleasant stones.
¹³And all thy children shall be taught of the Lord; and great shall be the peace of thy children.
¹⁴In righteousness shalt thou be established: thou shalt be far from oppression; for thou shalt not fear: and from terror; for it shall not come near thee.

Note

2012-08-06T07:00:00.000-04:00

Note that I have not recently been posting to this blog because I am scoping out another writing project. Ultimately, I do plan to make more entries here, and in the event that I decide that I am moving forward with the other project, I will post information about it on this site.

Note Card: Leverage for Life

2012-07-05T08:10:00.000-04:00

Written on a 4x6 note card by Stan Julin.

June 14, 2001
In this world, it is sought to keep an advantage secret lest someone else steal it, thus siphoning off our leverage for life. In Christ, the more advantage we give away to others, the greater our own prosperity and joy.

Note Card: How Much is Not Visible to Him Who Thinks Truth is on the Surface?

2012-07-02T07:11:00.001-04:00

Written on a 4x6 note card by Stan Julin.

[Blog Author's Note: My father's use of left versus right is based on Matthew 25 and also on American politics.]

May 20, 2002

The Bible means what it says, and it means what it means. Viewing the surface, one will be mystified by the curiosities of it. The Bible is written to mystify the skeptic on the left hand and to disclose the mind of God to the open-hearted sinner on the right hand. The prophet is a fool to the man on the left, but to the sinner on the right, his voice is thunder and his stature as of an angel of God. To him on the left, the words are rubbish; to him on the right, each is a precious jewel to be stored away and to be brought out again and again to consider, ponder, and to amaze. For behind each word there are stories and infinite depth of thought and promises and covenants and alliances and support...where shall we stop, where could we stop. Here is truth! Here is simplicity! Here is liberty to be what one ought to be!

How much is not visible to the man who thinks it is all on the surface?

Truth

2012-06-28T19:05:00.000-04:00

Truth is ugly, unless you love it. Stan Julin

Note Card: Refuge and Strength

2012-06-24T17:37:00.001-04:00

Written on a 4x6 note card by Stan Julin.

[Blog Author's Note: "Esther" is a reference to a sister-in-law.]

Probably written in 2002
I once had a thought that meant something to Esther, who asked me after considerable time what the thought was. I like thoughts, some of them. In some ways, I live in and for my thoughts. As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he. Anyway, it was this, from Psalm 46:1: If you have no strength, you need a refuge; if you have no refuge, you need strength. But God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. I will add here that , apart from Jesus Christ, no man has either refuge or strength; in Him are both. Why be completely exposed when complete security is available?

Note Card: Psalm 105 - The Law and the Covenant

2012-06-24T15:30:00.000-04:00

Written on a 4x6 note card by Stan Julin.

May 20, 2002

...confirmed the same unto Jacob for a law and to Israel for an everlasting covenant. [This is] another interesting comparison of Jacob and Israel. Jacob, the earthly man, has God's words as law, while Israel, the same man, though the spiritual one, sees the same words of God as a covenant.

Note Card: The Value of Apologetics

2012-06-24T07:53:00.000-04:00

Written on a 4x6 note card by Stan Julin.

April, 2002
The value of apologetics does not usually accrue to the benefit of the skeptical, for they are unbelievers and that because they do not want to believe in God. The value of apologetics is recognizable to believers who are the butt of attacks from the skeptics. It is believers who want true answers regarding exactly what God says.

Caleb's Article Published in the Huffington Post

2012-06-17T14:33:00.003-04:00

Caleb's article, A Penny For Your Thoughts, A Jar of Memories, has been picked up by the Huffington Post.

Click the picture below to link up to the article.

Press Release

2012-06-11T20:58:00.002-04:00

Here is a link to AFA's press release regarding the essay contest in which Caleb placed Runner-Up.

Contemplations on the Anniversary of My Father's Passing

2012-06-03T22:44:00.003-04:00

Today is the first anniversary of my father’s passage (though this being a leap year, the one year mark was technically passed yesterday). The occasion of this anniversary gives me pause to contemplate the whole of my experiences with his illness and death and our family’s grieving process.

It should be clear from the existence of this blog that my father and I were close. Furthermore, the contents of many of the blog entries make it clear that I consider him a hero, worthy not only of emulation but also of a greater place than history will likely afford him. He was very dear to me; that is no secret.

In consideration of these things, there are some aspects of his loss which my reader may find surprising, especially those readers not as devoutly Christian as I am. I would like to mention three aspects of losing my father which run counter to our culture’s understanding of the thoughts and events that should surround the loss of a loved one.

1) There was a remarkable atmosphere at my father’s deathbed. To be sure, there were many tears shed at my father’s bedside during those last thirteen days of his life when he was a resident of the Hospice of the Comforter. Many family and friends knelt beside him, took his hand, and whispered their goodbyes. Many tears were shed.

Not knowing when he would go, those of us who visited him daily were forced to relive final goodbyes night after night. By the end, I had mine memorized. “Good night, dad,” I would say. “You were a great father to me. I’m glad you were my dad, and I love you. If you’re here tomorrow, I will be here too.” These things, the tears and goodbyes, fit our cultural stereotype of a deathbed scene.

What did not fit, however, was the festive atmosphere that sometimes lit the room. For two weeks, my dad had the “party room” at the hospice. A steady stream of people came and went and though frequently the mirth was mixed with tears, there was the sound of laughter and, indeed, even of song. The rooms being quite well sound proofed, we were not a disturbance to the other residents, but the nurses knew that of all the heavy oak doors lining the hall, my dad’s was the one through which wafted the sounds of laughter, of singing, of guitar.

On one Sunday morning, as we were singing in my father’s room, one of the nurses eased open the door. “Do you mind if we leave this door open?” she inquired. “The rest of us want to get some of the hallelujah too!”

My dad’s deathbed stands in contrast to another I saw during our time at the hospice. I remember seeing another man in a nearby room, alone in his bed, pale, gaunt, oxygen masked… watching the Wall Street financial reports.

2) I have never been to my father’s grave. By the time of the memorial service, my father’s body had already been interred. There was no casket, no hearse, no pall-bearers. There was no long line of headlight burning cars with police escort. To my knowledge, no one went to the graveside after the service.

Since then, I have not yet made it to the grave site. I would like to visit. But it lies a good distance out of town, and I simply have not found the time to drive all the way out to that part of Florida.

Some people, I suppose, would be aghast that I have not been to my father’s grave, but the part of my father that I am interested in, does not reside in the Florida National Cemetery. It resides with God. I know whom I have believed and am persuaded that He is able to keep that which I’ve committed unto him against that day.

My father’s grave stands in contrast to the Hollywood portrayal of grave sites as places where the bereaved go to talk to their lost loved ones…a place where people grieve, year after year with no hope of real restoration.

3) My grief has not been as bad as I anticipated. I suppose it helps that his passing was no surprise and that prior to his death his quality of life was greatly reduced. It helps too that he reached his life expectancy. As already stated, it helps also to know that he is with God.

However, I should like to explore, for a few sentences, another reason why my father’s death does not bring the grief one might expect. That reason is that he was a remarkably good father.

This may strike my reader as counter-intuitive. If he was an exceptionally good father, why does that fact make him less missed? Here is my answer: Had my dad been a worse father, there would be unsettled hurts from the forty-two years he and I had together on this earth. There are, in fact, no such hurts, no regrets, no unsettled issues. I guess you could say that my father raised me to do fine without him. I hope I can equip my son in the same way.

Though I do grieve his loss, my father’s relationship with me stands in contrast to that of many other people who will never settle the hurts of the past.

I guess the Apostle Paul summed it up pretty well. “O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?”

Note Card: Those That Love Are Worth Everything

2012-06-01T07:58:00.000-04:00

Written on a 4x6 note card by Stan Julin.

[Blog Author's Note: My father's reference to "Circle" is a reference to his church, Circle Community.]

June 7, 2001
Suppose I had at Circle six friends. Everyone else there either ignored me or despised me, and those who despised me despised also my friends. Would I go there to see my friends? The Lord endures this creation for the sake of His friends, hoping to gain more of them. His strategy is to put himself right in the middle of things so that people have to do something about Him. He will endure the hate to gain the love. The ones that hate do not matter. The ones that love are worth everything.

Note Card: On Battles of the Mind

2012-05-31T08:30:00.000-04:00

Written on a 4x6 note card by Stan Julin.

June, 2001
Why fight a war in my own mind? It can neither be won nor lost. It makes no difference, affects no one but me, and that I am not sure how. Sometimes I am like those holdout Japanese troops who, unaware that the war was lost, endured years of subsistence apart from all others before they were discovered and told they could resume life now.

Note Card: The Magnificence of the Cure

2012-05-06T13:22:00.001-04:00

Written on a 4x6 note card by Stan Julin.

[Blog Author's Note: The sacrifice my father refers to as the sweet savor offering can be referenced in Leviticus 1. The sin offering is found in Leviticus 4.]

April, 2002

When a man offered a sacrifice, he put his hands on to signify transferal of himself with his sins to the beast, and slew and offered it. If a sin offering, symbolizing the sins, blood and fat was put on the alter, and the beast burned outside the camp as unfit. If a sweet savor offering, all was burned on the alter. All the offerings together signify Christ's sacrifice, for both the sins are taken by Him and the man himself is accepted, as in sweet savor offerings.

What I am getting to here is the tendency of a man to wonder exactly what was cured in Jesus' sacrifice. People (at least myself for a long time) do not seem to have light within about it. Jesus is acceptable to God for us. Why? Because of both what He did and for who He was and is. It was not just that Jesus was an innocent victim in our place; it was that plus who He was. We put the hands of our hearts on Him because of what we did and because of who we are. He is a whole and complete and infinite savior - as complete as God Himself. Only that is enough for us. And it is enough. The enormity of the sin can be conquered by the magnificence of the cure, and nothing less.

Note Card: Safety Lies Not at a Distance

2012-04-30T08:07:00.000-04:00

Written on a 4x6 note card by Stan Julin.

Date Unknown
When you're at the top, as God is, it can be very lonely, especially if you're a good guy. Can't He sit in the sunshine and play with a cat too? Or watch children play? ...not to trivialize God. He did mention playing with leviathan as a man would play with a bird. [Also Psalm 104:26] What did He do on that one seventh day? Does He take pleasure in us?

I cannot help but think that the whole God thing is intimidating to man. They shy away from things too big and too strange for them. They are up against something that puts them at a severe disadvantage and against which they cannot win. The only thing they can do is avoid it altogether.

It is true: He is too big for us. But He has simplified it for us; God loves us, so He sent Jesus down to to rescue us. Jesus said at Jericho, He came "to seek and to save that which was lost." The seek part is overlooked, it seems. Jesus is looking for men.

God is not a complicated person. Men have all the complications. When Jesus was here, He was royalty walking among men. They were not afraid of Him; He was a really good guy, so to speak, very interesting, very comfortable and friendly - if you were an honest person.

It is not difficult to be on His good side if you are true, real. The safety lies not at a distance but really close to Him.

A Penny for Caleb's Thoughts

2012-04-24T08:44:00.000-04:00

I wish to congratulate my son for taking 1st Runner Up in an Alzheimer's Foundation of America scholarship essay contest with almost 1800 participants. His essay, entitled A Penny for Your Thoughts: A Jar of Memories, interweaves his favorite memory of his grandfather with his memories of the experience of losing his grandfather to Alzheimer's disease. The essay is brilliantly written and marks Caleb as a writer to follow in the years to come.

Click here to read this essay.

Other things Caleb has written about his grandfather may be found here and here.

Note Card: WWJD

2012-04-13T07:01:00.000-04:00

Written on a 4x6 note card by Stan Julin.

[Blog Author's Note: What would Jesus do? Walk on water. What would Jesus do? Drive out the money changers with a whip...doesn't mean you should try it. The note card below is reflective of my own opinion on the trite little WWJD; so I will share it. Others may think this best left unsaid. They are welcome to that opinion, but if we redesign Christianity into a pop culture paradigm, the salt has lost its savor. Christians will never do pop culture as well as the pagan world does it.]

June 14, 2001
WWJD? Give me a break! You do not know what Jesus would do, probably not what you want to convince me that he would do. You have some screwy ideas, anyone who would ask WWJD; Jesus was too unpredictable to fit your scheme or mine.

Note Card: I Look For Men Like That

2012-03-26T07:51:00.001-04:00

Written on a 4x6 note card by Stan Julin.

April, 2002
My tendency is always to estimate a man [or] an author by the estimate which he appears to have of the Bible. Is he for it or against it? Does he love the words of God? Is he jealous of God's words? Does he oppose the wicked who love to pick at it because it exposes them? I look for men like that.

It is easy to walk past a desk and throw a lit match into the documents there; it is a difficult matter to put out the fire. Many matches have been thrown; the words are still there. I love and am jealous of each word, singular or plural, past, present or future tense, for each was chosen by the greatest linguist, commentator, communicator, and deliverer of all time.

The Bridge to Moses

2012-03-18T17:22:00.014-04:00

It is in the wee hours of the morning, and I have tried and failed to achieve a state of slumber. Illumined by a single lamp, I now sit on my couch, glaring grumpily at my coffee table and listening to the ambient sounds of my sleeping household. From the neighboring kitchen, a clock’s tick, normally lost in the hubbub of life, chronicles the steady march of sleepless time. The refrigerator compressor kicks on for a few minutes, then yields to the mournful sound of a distant train, penetrating the glass of a window behind my head.

I am bored, and so I eventually rise and make my way to my empty guest bedroom where there awaits me a large bookcase filled with a wide selection of literature. Before this structure I plant myself and begin, somewhat absently, to scan the familiar, and somewhat musty rows of fact and fiction found thereupon.

It is not with a great deal of hope that I stand upon this spot, for within these shelves dwells a collection of books very much picked over by me. Many a time have I stood before these very shelves to search in vain for a gem as yet unread. Many a time have I walked away empty handed, concluding that everything housed there has either been comprehensively read or adjudicated unworthy to entertain. So it is not hope but the habitual wanderings of a sometimes insomniac that has brought me once more to gaze upon my library.

Starting with the top shelf and working my way down, I scan, one by one, the familiar titles. I finish the top shelf and move down to the second shelf, walking in front of the bookcase at the same speed as my wandering gaze. A couple times I pause, briefly considering this or that title, and on one occasion I even pull a small paperback from its place, only to quickly return it.

I am on the third shelf now, and having admonished myself for a fool’s errand, I am moving more quickly when, to my surprise, something unexpected catches my eye. Several books once belonging to my father have made their way into my house and, awaiting proper integration to my shelves, have been cast somewhat haphazardly across the tops of the vertically shelved literature. In the months since my father’s death, a number of artifacts of value or intrigue have surfaced as we work through the disposition of his worldly goods, and one such find is here amongst these books. I have seen it once before, when I was a child, but then it disappeared, not to be encountered again until now. It is my father’s yearbook from his senior year at Concord High School in Concord, Massachusetts.

I retrieve the book from the shelf and turn it over in my hands. Despite its age, it remains in excellent condition. Its cover is soft, leather-bound, maroon. The Bridge 1954 is embossed in gold on its front cover, along with an image of the famous Concord Bridge. I return with it to the couch in my living room and, in typical left-handed fashion, thumb through it from back to front.

There are the usual sorts of amusements one might expect in a time capsule like this. For instance, among the advertisements at the end of the book, I learn that if I wish Fred R. Jones to be my milkman, he can be reached at his telephone number, which is 604. I am also surprised to find a large number of advertisers with no telephones whatsoever.

A few more pages and something else catches my eye. I see my grandparents, Mr. and Mrs. Stanley G. Julin, listed on the yearbook’s patrons and patronesses page. For a brief moment, I try to reconcile my grandparents’ patronage with my father’s recollection of such poverty that his mother made peanut butter sandwiches by spreading peanut butter onto the bread, then scraping it off again. I smile at the thought and flip pages toward the front of the book.

Upon reaching the honored pages reserved for the senior class, I am surprised by how old most of the students appear. After staring at the images for a while, I realize the reason for this phenomenon is that, unlike the teenagers of future decades, my father’s generation maintained the same hairstyles throughout their whole lives[1], and as a consequence, the young faces I see here are crowned with hairdos I am accustomed to seeing atop older citizens.

Still, I am struck by the passage of time as I look upon those faces staring back at me, for I realize that those people were then the same age as my son is now. They then stood on the threshold of their adult lives, and how great the promise of the future must have seemed. In fact, it is clear that the future was then foremost in everyone’s minds. The yearbook was signed by about three quarters of the 136 students in this senior class. Many of these messages are now illegible due to faded ink, poor penmanship or both, but almost all of those still legible mention the future.

“…May your future be full of happiness.”

– Virginia Woodruff

“Best of luck and happiness for a wonderful future.”

– Virginia Wilkie

“…I seriously want to wish you all the success in the future.”

– Dean Soule

“Keep up your hard work and you will be a success.”

– Robert McWalter

“May you succeed in all you strive to do. May your future be full of happiness and may all your dreams come true.”

– Laura Larsen

I only find two handwritten notes from fellow students that do not mention the future. “Knowledge is there whether or not it is heard,” wrote Coburn Benson.

The less serious Wally Driscoll wrote only, “Remember Mr. Salter’s geometry class and the time you set the bomb off on the windowsill?” I instantly like Wally and hope that his healthy appreciation of tomfoolery served him as well as mine has me. I smile at his remembrance, for I recall my father recounting to me how, by painstaking effort, he constructed an unusually large firecracker from gunpowder carefully scraped out of cap-gun caps. With a bemused smile, my dad told me that the endeavor had been successful beyond anything he could have anticipated.

My father’s senior picture decorates the upper left corner of page twenty-two. The picture is instantly recognizable, for the seventeen-year-old Stan Julin, or “Sonny” as he was then known, did not look very different from the seventy-four-year-old who, only a few months ago was shuffling around my house. The personality too is recognizable, for the caption next to his picture begins with the words, “Sonny doesn’t say too much but he seldom misses a word that is spoken.” This quiet nature is also mentioned in a brief note fellow student John Reed wrote across the upper left corner of my father’s picture. “My silent friend. Good Luck John”

At the upper right corner, there appears the only handwritten note from someone not then a student or teacher at Concord High. It reads, “My Son Love forever Mama.”

The most striking note of all was written by a student named John Keith, whose picture appears directly below that of my father. It is striking because it alone makes mention of God. “Best of luck to a fellow Bedfordite,” he wrote. “May the good Lord Bless you in years to come.”

Thank you for writing that, John Keith of Bedford Massachusetts (if you yet survive, and if, through the miracles of our interconnected world, this message makes its way to you). I do not know how much luck my father had, but the good Lord did, indeed, bless him in the years to come…really, really blessed him.

A few weeks hence, my son will graduate high school. His childhood a memory and his entire adulthood stretched out before him, it would be easy to think of his time yet remaining upon this earth as endless, but my father’s fresh young face, smiling from the upper left corner of page twenty-two, says otherwise.

“…for it is soon cut off and we fly away.” These words come to my mind; so I put the yearbook on the coffee table, retrieve my Bible from across the room, and open it to Psalm 90. Here, in the predawn quiet of my living room, the words of Moses are clearly audible across the thousands of years that separate us. “Thou carriest them away as with a flood; they are as a sleep: in the morning they are like grass which groweth up. In the morning it flourisheth, and groweth up; in the evening it is cut down and withereth.”

Tick…tick…tick goes the clock. From outside, the 12:30 train has been replaced by the 3:30 train, which is then drowned out when my air conditioning kicks to life. Eventually, the air conditioner cedes to the distant barking of a dog; then, another dog joins the chorus. So goes the night, and as these things mark the passage of time, a prayer emerges, a prayer inspired by a yearbook but crafted with the words of Moses, a prayer for my son:

Teach my son, O Lord, to number his days, that he may apply his heart unto wisdom. O satisfy him early with your mercy, that he may rejoice and be glad all his days. Let your work and glory appear unto him, and let the beauty of his God be upon him. Establish the work of his hands. For before the mountains or earth, you are God and you have been our dwelling place in all generations.

Best of Luck, my son. May the good Lord bless you in years to come.

[1] Except for a brief and ill advised foray into beehive hairdos for women in the early 60s.

Note Card: On Secret Thoughts

2012-02-26T15:34:00.001-05:00

Written on a 4x6 note card by Stan Julin.

[Blog Author's Note: The thoughts that follow come from the book of Job, but they are not the usual lessons others have gleaned from this book.]

April 23, 2002
Lessons from Job: The really significant issues of a man's life are those that are beyond the view of other men. These are the things that God observes, and He Himself keeps them close to His own secret thoughts, all the while engaging Himself with others in other matters of heavenly business and activity. Since the secret thoughts of a man are the real measure of a man, we may, with some security, assume that God's secret thoughts are those that reveal who He is also.

If a person chooses to disclose to another the thoughts that he has to himself, that other person is in a privileged place of honor; and the more honorable the person is who tells his secret motivations, the greater the privilege of the person listing to his words...and not merely the privilege of being on the inner circle of a noble person, but one could not help but realized that he is considered to be able to appreciate and sympathize with the thoughts of that person. Who is man that God should open up His heart to him and want man to know Him as the angels never could?

So God knew Job. Does he know me? What reason have I given him to know me? What effort of my life has been engaged in ways that would catch His eyes and ears? What common interests have we? What common characteristics, He and I, sinner that I am? I see very many people most days and ignore most of them. He knows everyone; how? How many live in such a way as to have His attention?

One thing I know: All who accept His offer of salvation by the sacrifice of His Son Jesus Christ have God's attention.

Note Card: Beauty, Tranquility, Happiness

2012-02-14T22:57:00.001-05:00

[Blog Author's Note: Happy Valentine's Day, Mom.]

Written on a 4x6 note card by Stan Julin.

December, 2006
Thinking of Connie and what she has done, and of how she has fulfilled the model role of a woman in her life...

She took whatever I could get and transformed it into beauty and tranquility and happiness. She strives to do that with everything she touches for everyone. She deserves much better than anything I could get for her.

It bothers me that I have a slack time right now; that affects her. I can truthfully say that there are some things hindering me now. I would like those hindrances (related to my health) to go away. I hope I can surmount them. Connie does not seem troubled that I don't produce more economically. She is so encouraging that it does not seem to bother her.

The Lord must be delighted with her. Surely, he has a place of honor for her; I will be first to cheer her when she gets it. She can have all of mine too, and it would make me happy.

Note Card: On Understanding Women

2012-02-12T13:20:00.000-05:00

Written on a 4x6 note card by Stan Julin.

December, 2006
For a man to say he does not understand women is not true. Part of it is that he is not willing to understand them or that he has not tried to understand them.

Perhaps the reverse is true, that women do not understand men. But...women, being relational beings, try to understand men and often are successful.

Note Card: The Jig is Up

2012-02-08T21:25:00.000-05:00

Written on a 4x6 note card by Stan Julin.

[Blog Author's Note: When my father wrote this, he had 3208 days to get his house in order.]

August 21, 2002
I am beginning to understand why my mental outlook is changing in this last period of my life. Truly God has so arranged life that a man would be increasingly chuted into a pondering of who he is before the eyes of God. The whole experience often brings tears to my eyes. The jig is up, so to speak. Get thy house in order, for thou shalt die and not live. I have a lot of "getting in order" to do.

Note Card: The Last Word

2012-01-30T08:47:00.000-05:00

Written on a 4x6 note card by Stan Julin.

[Blog Author's Note: To avoid confusing readers of Catholic background, note that the word "saints" is used below as a reference to all persons who have appropriated redemption in Jesus Christ.]

May 22, 2006
Hebrews 9:28 - "...unto them that look for him shall he appear the second time without sin unto salvation." For saints, when Jesus comes (returns), no more will his purpose be for sins, as if he did not quite finish at Calvary, for never again will the issue arise as to our sins or our sinfulness, for all of that is gone.

Then why does it bother us? Because we know ourselves. If he will not mention it, why should we? If we think it, is he? Do we really assess Calvary adequately? If we entertain fear, is that unbelief? Or is it simply a residual flavor of this world and of the spirit of the age?

Looking about, we see that judgment must come. We agree that it is necessary that God must have vengeance upon arrogant defiance. We even look for it as fitting...and shudder, knowing that we once were there.

The first time he came, it was for sin. When he comes again, it will be without sin - our sins or his dealing with the matter. When he said, "It is finished", that was finished, the last word.