"A Baby Changes Everything"

The title of the first sermon of Advent this year by the pastor of our church, Chuck Jacobs, was "A Baby Changes Everything". This sermon has set the wheels spinning and I now have the theme for this blog, I  hope my writing can makes some things come back alive, on this my 82nd birthday.

December 20, 1928; Seattle, Washington - Ballard Heights Hospital(I think) Five days before Christmas and another baby is added to the Bullard household with 3 other kids and Mom and Dad. Now there are 6 mouths to feed and things are still really tough. I know this because Uncle Steve and Aunt Zady told me the story of how word from Seattle came in May, asking them to come and rescue my family.

In June of 1929 Steve and Zady and family -Leroy and Wayne - set out in their new farm truck, with a tarp over the back, straw in the back end, camping equipment, firewood, and some sense of how to get from eastern Colorado to Seattle.

On the journey back to Wray, Colorado , so Aunt Zady told me a few years ago when I asked her why I was so deeply bonded to her, "that was the first time I visited Yellowstone National Park. She also said, "The worst part of the trip was finding milk for you." as the two families (10 people) camped there way back home. Apparently, the two families lived in the same house for the next year as my Dad found a way to survive, "back home".

Does a new baby make a difference, at Christmas time, in the midst of a depression? With six mouths to feed how much humility does it take to ask a brother to drive over 2400 miles - there were no super highways, just lots of gravel roads, ruts, mountain passes, and a new 28 ford farm truck - to rescue your family, and to go back home to face the other 5 brothers and 3 sisters?

I was the new mouth to feed, and Aunt Zady told me that her home was the place where both families learned how to survive and where I learned to walk, to talk and take my place in the whole scheme of things. According to the court records, in a little over 3 years my folks had divorced, and now there were 7 mouths to feed.

Bob went to live with our grandparents, Richard stayed with Dad. Virginia, Shirley, Lois, David and I went to Denver to live with our mother. Where did the 2 younger kids come from - according to the court records the divorce was granted in 1933, Lois and David came along after that date.

A baby changes everything - really changes everything! I grew up in Wray, Co. not in Seattle. Learned to love my Aunt Zady and Uncle Steve, (we named Stephen after him) and still to this day do not feel bonded to my parents.

Forgive me if this is too personal. I wonder, how Mary and Joseph must have felt to have "a mouth to feed" in their desperate situation? Herod wanted Jesus destroyed, a trip of some hundreds of miles - no super highways, just dirt roads, mountain passes, bandits, hunger, lots of walking, shelter is needed each night, diapers must be changed, milk must be found and there is no "home" to go back to!

Jesus is unaware of all these issues, he is just relaxed with his mother. Joseph, on the other hand, thinks of all these issues. He thinks that "home" will never be seen again, that Herod will find them and ultimately destroy Jesus - Kings have ways of getting their will done - but Joseph also knows that God sent an Angel, so he is on this journey even though there are no immediate answers.

I'm home now on my 82nd, comfortable in a warm house, with a sleeping wife, with plans for this evening to celebrate with Mark, Joanna and family. There does not seem to be journey of over 2400 miles - each way - through Yellowstone. There is no king with an edict to kill me, there is only that deep inner need to allow Jesus to reign internally ..... I hope that need never goes away!

Much love,
Bill

Hebrews 1:14

In the book of Hebrews the first chapter is a comparison of Jesus to angels.  In the 14th verse the question is asked, "What then are angels?" The answer was, " Are they not all ministering spirits, sent forth to minister (serve) for those who shall be heirs of salvation."

I am not smart enough not to believe nor not to ask for Jesus to send angels to serve.  This week I have received word from three very good friends which has prompted me to write this blog.  I want you to asked  Jesus to send angels to serve these 3 brothers.  I don't know how that service will be rendered, nor do I know the means that angels will use, all I know is that Jesus will send angels to "minister" to these men and their families.

Gene Herr - Newton,KS. Gene and I have walked together for uncounted years.  He and Mary were at one time the head of the Mennonite Youth work for the whole country.  Later they started a retreat center in Three Rivers, Mi, called Te Hermitage. For over 25 years Jesus has drawn hundred of people to "quiet their spirits and to listen to Him" as they walked through the woods or spent a day in silence.

Gene and Mary have now retired and are living close to family.  In a recent note Gene told of having gone through surgery for a "golf ball" size brain tumor followed chemo treatments " etc. As a teacher, listener and spiritual director Gene has walked with many people as they have found Jesus directing their lives..

An email, just this week, from the son of John Gilman told of John's surgery for a brain tumor.  John and I were at Willamette University together for a couple of years before he went into the Air Force.  John was later a TWA pilot/instructor until he retired to Kansas City where he and his wife Jeanna have served as lay ministers/teachers in several churches. John is also an excellent teacher and mentor...

A telephone call, last week, from Wes Trucker in Minnesota was to asked if we might get together for a long talk, face to face. ( My computer went blank at this point and we have been a week changing service.  We were told by "our man in India"  that the transmitter had died.  I think that it went to Aruba because of the bitter cold weather and I also think that Wilma and I should go and try to find that transmitter - should take about a month!)

Wes was in deep discouragementdue to declining health, a recent move from close friends etc. A week later he called to say that things have "turned around" and a date has been set for the second week in February.  I share this because Wes too needs prayer.  He is one of the best Bible teacher that I know.  He has served the Log Church in Crosslakes, Mn. and has developed Discipleship Ministers, Inc.  The influence of Wes is far ranging even as his mobility is deeply diminished.  Prayer for Wes as he lives out the rest of his ministry and life.

Since starting this blog we have moved closer to Christmas and even closer to my 82nd  birthday on the 20th..but not closer to the skills required by the digital world.  By the next blog we may have found out lost AOL transmitter!

Please keep Jesus as king of your inner and outer life...

Bill 

John 11:45 - 57

While Nancy Roesler and Wilma were out to an Advent dinner last evening Ken and I went to a small Chinese restaurant in Howell, Mi.after spending a couple of hours figuring out the computer world.  Ken is the expert in that world so I just kept saying yes!

After an excellent meal the check was delivered with 2 little fortune cookie.  I was still finishing my meal so Ken got first pick and I was left with the other cookie. Why share this anyway? We have all torn open a cookie package - some sayings are fun, others are stupid, the "lucky" numbers on the back of the slips of paper have never worked with the lottery etc. But, the message of my cookie has been the stimulus for this blog - remember yesterday was Thursday 12/2/10 and today is Friday, "On Friday your creative side will shine forth with exceptional ideas."  The "lucky" numbers on the back of the slip of paper are, 2 6 13 16 35 46 in case any of you want to try your "LUCK" !

Tony Campolo's famous talk "It Friday, but Sunday is Coming" has been swimming through my head since that fortune cookie:

Its Friday - Caiaphas, the high priest that year, and the Pharisees convened a council of the Sanhedrin....they gave orders that if anyone knew where Jesus was to report it, so that they might seize Jesus and kill him.

Its Friday - Jesus, a week before the Passover takes his disciples to Ephraim and there he stayed with them.
Why Ephraim?  In modern Israel this village is called Taiyibeh.  Ephraim was a city of refuge in the Old Testament. Ephraim as a village has a whole network of underground tunnels so that a person could escape into the wilderness should there ever be a threat on their life.  Jesus takes his disciples to Ephraim to protect them from the orders of the high priest.  Taiyibeh, according to Dr. Jim Martin with whom I have studied in Israel on a number of occasions, has been used until at least the 1500 to protect people from the invading armies. (When we encounter the name of a place in Israel we should ask ourselves, "What else happen in that same location or at least near that location? The writers of the Bible assumed that people had a background of knowledge about their history. Biblical history is not the forte for we who live in the 21st century.)  

Its Friday - the disciples decide to follow Peter back to Capernaum and the Sea of Galilee to start fishing again.

Its Friday - for so many of us in our times. It is so dark on Friday --- "a darkness fell over all the land" when Jesus was crucified.  A darkness can invade our lives when it is only Friday.  Friday seems to last forever in a failed marriage, in the lose of a job, in the "run away" of a child or the death of a child or other loved one.  Fridays are truly hard to take, darkness fills all the cracks in our lives, darkness lives in palaces, or dirt floored huts."BUT SUNDAY IS COMING" as Tony Campolo used to shout when he ended his speeches and then he would say, " AND DON'T YOU EVER FORGET IT!"

A fortune cookie, and a Thursday morning group of who men who were studying John's gospel about the raising of Lazarus from the dead, the death of Jesus and then Sunday is coming!  The resurrection changes everything - first inside of us and then sweeping into every facet of our lives!!!

Merry Christmas - truly, truly, truly.

Bill