70 years (or so)…
In the sweat of your face you shall eat bread
Till you return to the ground,
For out of it you were taken;
For dust you are,
And to dust you shall return.”
Genesis 3:19 NKJV
Remember… you are dust
We’ve all heard it:
“Remember, you are dust” or some graveside equivalent from the Law of Moses or another ‘humble thyself before the Lord thy God’ quote from the Bible.
In the days of his trouble Job pleads to the LORD:
Remember, I pray, that You have made me like clay.
Job 10:9 NKJV
And will You turn me into dust again?
‘Lord HELP ME,’ some of us have prayed;
‘God help me,’ ‘Help me Jesus!”
And we hear the executioner proclaim to the condemned man and all witnesses: “May God have mercy on your soul.”
You and I know deep down and ALL flesh knows in our heart of hearts — our days will end!
But the LORD abides forever;
He has established His throne for judgment,And He will judge the world in righteousness;
Psalm 9:7-8
He will execute judgment for the peoples with equity.
Why all this talk about the judgment?
… it is appointed for men to die once and after this comes judgment…
Hebrews 9:27b NASB
NOTE: Roger turned 70
Although my thoughts now gather more urgency, they tend to come to the page just a bit slower.
Change ahead in my Christian Social Witness to you and the world.
Yet as always, my thoughts will remain well-considered in light of scripture before you read it here. (Bear with me and help me by your comments, please.)
I do have a reflection or two on my three score and ten, which I will share with you more gradually than before.
Roger Harned – reflection on continued writing at 70 years old
How many score remain?
Those accustomed to the language of King James Bible may take account of their days by the same measure of years used by Lincoln.
“For score and seven years ago,” Lincoln began on November 19, 1863. He looked back to the year of our Lord 1776 (as they used to say) just 87 years before.
You may also recall from Lincoln’s memorial to those killed:
… that these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.
Abraham Lincoln – Gettysburg Address
Lincoln could not have known then that an assassin’s bullet would soon end his own life five years short of just three score years, at age 54.
All flesh shall perish together, and man shall turn again unto dust.
Job 34:18
Abraham Lincoln and Job were both highly successful men of integrity in life who encountered tragedy. Lincoln no doubt had read in his own King James Bible of Job’s struggles.
If you’re keeping score
Only a few of you will know what I once chose as a ‘life verse’ and that it comes from Job.
{IF you want to know my life verse, just click the link to it above and it will open in a new tab or window.} It may help you to understand more about my purpose and gifts.
It just so happens that in this year of our Lord {Anno Domini} A.D. 2020, I have, by God’s grace, lived three score and ten years.
a bit of biography
- My mother, Marie Hall Harned, lived more than four score years, though her father lived only to three score and five and her mother, Vera Tyler Hall not even to three score.
- My father William E. Harned, his siblings and father William Alba all lived past four score years.
Praise God from whom all blessings flow!
I praise God for good health of this aging flesh and might easily boast (and speculate) of more years to come.
Yet I remember well so many struggles of the lives of loved ones, their end which came upon us sooner or suddenly.
Therefore like Job I consider that my end will be dust and strive to live for the life of my saved soul — in worship and love of Christ Jesus, One with God our Father.
Take to heart your own possible suffering to come from Psalm 22. It precedes one we know so well about ‘the valley of the shadow of death‘:
Be not far from me,
for trouble is near,
and there is none to help…… you lay me in the dust of death.
But you, O Lord, do not be far off!
excerpt Psalm 22 ESV listen
Psalm 22 was part of our celebration of the wife of my youth, Becky Rice Harned. We considered our end — knowing how she had suffered to survive just her fiftieth birthday.
She went to the Lord in spirit in that same year of our Lord, 1999, on the 10th of February, her disintegrating frame now returned to dust.
Other beloved ones suffer in the flesh even now. Some endure pain known to us, while others, like Becky, suffer in silence.
This frail frame will fail. So will yours, yet be encouraged in the Lord.
Though our aging flesh contains the image and essence of our Holy God, our dust is not our living soul.
A few family and long-time friends know a partial history of my life in this world. And I suspect a handful know yours as well.
Most of you know my own failures and disappointments, as we all have in varying degrees at different times. Yet I do not expect to receive Job’s double blessing before I draw my last breath.
Job suffered much, as some we know — even as Jesus Christ suffered severely for our sins.
I am no righteous man – only in Christ’s righteousness – but like Job I have sought to live my life in integrity. I could not have lived through it all without the encouragement of the Holy Spirit through Christ Jesus, when finally I relented from my sins and sought the Lord for help for this helpless flesh.
Looking back & ahead
Reflecting back on my three-score and ten, as well as looking forward into the light of life given to my own spirit of hope, I continue in God’s grace.
I continue in purpose, perhaps more directed toward that which lives within reach of my limited mortal touch.
Leaving behind each dream and soul beyond my reach, I press on to preach to Gospel exclusively to those whom the Lord has chosen. (You may not be one of these.)
Those not saved by the grace of God have most likely scrolled past the Light of their salvation already.
Roger Harned – reflection on why most will never talk of Jesus Christ
Social Media is not the world
Based on technical data, talkofJesus.com has reached readers in many countries on at least four continents so far. My Christian Social Witness may yet by God’s grace reach some soul who has doubted the only Son of God as the Way and Truth of Scripture.
So often Jesus taught His followers, that is, believers who loved the Lord God and one another, and also preached to multitudes which included many who failed to have ears to hear or eyes to see.
Though in Christ, I am certainly not Christ Jesus. I can no longer preach the Gospel to those who refuse the Good News of Christ Jesus. They have no interest in a relationship with the God of love and life!
Therefore, Christ’s purpose for my witness of the Gospel to a 21st century church, wrought with ‘christians‘ who witness something other than Christ, pales by comparison. Never-the-less:
No soul has more need for the true Gospel of Christ Jesus than the 21st century christian.
Roger Harned – talkofJesus.com
Although we will soon return to my 2020 series on the Gospel of John, you, beloved reader, will be in for a new and more pointed relational look at scripture as we speak exclusively to the church.
To be continued... Lord willing...
