The following is one of those reflective posts that I write and
keep here for only a day at the most before relegating it to obscurity
in my 'humor and short story' link:
Maybe the best thing about going out to eat is observing the fellow diners and praying for them. I guess the same thing goes for automobile trips. It's been many years since I had to hitchhike or take public transportation because we or I did not have an automobile but not long enough to forget the difficulties involved in trying to get somewhere without one. Thus I see someone, anyone, walking along the side of the road and offer up a prayer.
Back to the restaurant, it has always amazed me how there are over 300 million people in America yet aside from twins, no two look exactly alike. I mean... how many different shapes can you have for a nose or a chin and how many different settings can there be for eyes? How wonderful was God's plan and design!
Take tonight for instance.....and two different tables at the Middle Eastern restaurant that we ate at. At one was a mother and father, presumably, and their son. The father was quiet while the mother did most of the talking, and the son, of about thirteen or fourteen, was demonstrative with his hands, often adjusting his ball cap and occasionally pulling out an electronic tablet of some kind to play with, with his face about a foot from the screen. It was a pleasant scene but my thoughts always wonder if their home life is a pleasant as it looked. Maybe the father grudgingly took them out to dinner. Maybe the mother nagged him into it.
One certainly could not tell in a restaurant of our home life when I was eight or nine years old. My father was a wonderful man but his life with us was shared with the local bar. Now it was a wonderful bar, I remember it well. The owners were elderly and everyone laughed while I played the bowling game while eating potato chips and drinking Cokes. When we went out as a family I'm sure it looked much like that family tonight but when at home there was often tension. I thoroughly felt blessed in praying for that family tonight.
The other table in question was a man and what looked to be his two teenage daughters. They smiled and talked a lot more. Where was the mother? Perhaps there wasn't one or maybe she had a lot of holiday cleaning to do and told the family to help her out and go out for supper. I didn't feel as compelled to pray for them as the first table but I did.
What else are we here for other than to pray for others in this world? I'm sure that's way too exclusive but at such times it feels to be the case. Of particular concern are those folks who might dress as if they don't have much money, or maybe their car looks to be well past its time, or maybe their expressions are just sad or forlorn? I want to tell them to take heart, that this world is passing, that true joy and even happiness is in Jesus Christ, that money means little to nothing in comparison, that Jesus said that with God it can be done but that...."...it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God." But how to tell them this...how even to help them?
What is a man's life on average. The statistics may show it to be higher but I always refer to it as seventy years.....seventy short...yet in looking back on them....seemingly long and almost endless years. So many questions to be answered. So many wonderful answers ahead when we meet our Savior! And so many wonderful faces to look at at that banquet!
Maybe the best thing about going out to eat is observing the fellow diners and praying for them. I guess the same thing goes for automobile trips. It's been many years since I had to hitchhike or take public transportation because we or I did not have an automobile but not long enough to forget the difficulties involved in trying to get somewhere without one. Thus I see someone, anyone, walking along the side of the road and offer up a prayer.
Back to the restaurant, it has always amazed me how there are over 300 million people in America yet aside from twins, no two look exactly alike. I mean... how many different shapes can you have for a nose or a chin and how many different settings can there be for eyes? How wonderful was God's plan and design!
Take tonight for instance.....and two different tables at the Middle Eastern restaurant that we ate at. At one was a mother and father, presumably, and their son. The father was quiet while the mother did most of the talking, and the son, of about thirteen or fourteen, was demonstrative with his hands, often adjusting his ball cap and occasionally pulling out an electronic tablet of some kind to play with, with his face about a foot from the screen. It was a pleasant scene but my thoughts always wonder if their home life is a pleasant as it looked. Maybe the father grudgingly took them out to dinner. Maybe the mother nagged him into it.
One certainly could not tell in a restaurant of our home life when I was eight or nine years old. My father was a wonderful man but his life with us was shared with the local bar. Now it was a wonderful bar, I remember it well. The owners were elderly and everyone laughed while I played the bowling game while eating potato chips and drinking Cokes. When we went out as a family I'm sure it looked much like that family tonight but when at home there was often tension. I thoroughly felt blessed in praying for that family tonight.
The other table in question was a man and what looked to be his two teenage daughters. They smiled and talked a lot more. Where was the mother? Perhaps there wasn't one or maybe she had a lot of holiday cleaning to do and told the family to help her out and go out for supper. I didn't feel as compelled to pray for them as the first table but I did.
What else are we here for other than to pray for others in this world? I'm sure that's way too exclusive but at such times it feels to be the case. Of particular concern are those folks who might dress as if they don't have much money, or maybe their car looks to be well past its time, or maybe their expressions are just sad or forlorn? I want to tell them to take heart, that this world is passing, that true joy and even happiness is in Jesus Christ, that money means little to nothing in comparison, that Jesus said that with God it can be done but that...."...it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God." But how to tell them this...how even to help them?
What is a man's life on average. The statistics may show it to be higher but I always refer to it as seventy years.....seventy short...yet in looking back on them....seemingly long and almost endless years. So many questions to be answered. So many wonderful answers ahead when we meet our Savior! And so many wonderful faces to look at at that banquet!
