“We often want things to go back to the way things used to be, before ‘work got difficult and faith got confused, and life got more confusing,’ but when we dwell on the ‘if only’ of life we forget that ‘God addresses us in the now.’” — Luis Leon
You gather a group of middle age, middle class, middle income voters who remember with longing an easier time, and you talk to them about family, and American values and character,… and you scream about patriotism. – The movie American President.
I have written a lot about my early days, my grandmother’s field of daffodils, holiday dinners, riding my bike to the local five and dime, etc. When we get older we tend to hold on a little tighter to our memories forgetting that at the time they seemed as hurried, full of trouble and anxiety, and frightening as times seem now.
We read about the apostles and think how easy it must have been to carry God’s message to the ends of the earth. After all they knew Jesus, they had the breath of God fill them during Pentecost, and they didn’t have the demands of family or making a living as we do. We forget that each and every one of the apostles were tortured, imprisoned, and had to overcome huge obstacles every day. I also suspect that they had those same day-to-day pressures that weigh us down, the writers of the gospels and the apostles themselves just thought them insignificant.
Luis hits the nail on the head – “God addresses us in the now” and we are each called this Easter to respond to the call with service, prayer, and an attitude to rid the world of injustice wherever it is found.
Believe me when I say I long for “an easier time,” but I must turn a deaf ear to the siren’s call to seek the past. My life is in the here and now. So it is for us all.
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Life is all memory, except for the one present moment that goes by you so quickly you hardly catch it going.
— Tennessee Williams
Wonderful quote. Thank you. Webb