Tribute

Rosenfelder Family:

The other day I was driving in my jeep. I got to thinking, the first time I ever road in a jeep was with Jack Rosenfelder. So I thought about that. Funny, the first time I ever went in a canoe was with Jack Rosenfelder. I really like canoes. In fact, that was the first time I ever went to the canal at Wyanet. There was Jack Rosenfelder's Jeep and his canoe. The first time I ever went to Lock 3 or 4 or was it 5?, we went with Jack Rosenfelder. I think the first time I ever went for catfish we were with Jack Rosenfelder. Shoot, the first time I went ice fishing Jack Rosenfelder came along. We went on our first fishing trip to Minnesota. Jack Rosenfelder was already there waiting.

I asked my Dad, "Where ya going?"

He answered,

"Crazy, wanna come along?"

I wasn't sure yet.

I said,

"Who ya going with?"

He said,

"Joe Sha-bot-nik."

I wondered why they needed worms.

Turned out going crazy was probably going fishing and Joe Shabotnik was usually Jack Rosenfelder.

Years ago I heard this lady speak about having a vision of heaven. My mom told me a similar story. Mom was on the operating table and had a vision of going through the tunnel of light but didn't want to leave the kids behind. This lady talked about Jesus showing her this room in heaven. There were shelves to the ceiling filled with books. The angels were sitting at a desk with little bottles. recording all our tears. I had never heard of that, but a few years later I found the scripture.

Psalm 56:8 You number and record my wanderings; put my tears into your bottle - are they not in your book?

Our sympathy,

Dave & Cindy & Family

My dad, Jack Rosenfelder, passed away July 18, 2008. We received this note from the son of one of dad's closest friends.

Hope

Yesterday I saw a man, a prominent person in our community with great talent and equally great humility. He was just diagnosed with a serious illness. I wanted to tell him, "You're going to be alright." I didn't. I quietly prayed for him and continued knitting with my friends. I was aware of the acute suffering he and his family will endure as they walk this path. The community at large is also affected, expressing compassion and concern. But I sensed a spirit of peace in his presence.

Today someone spoke to me about an offense and as we shared, the hidden purpose of darkness became clearer. Like the body is shaped in the womb, void of light, the soul is also shaped in the darkness of circumstances. Events mesh and fuse, exposing us to principles and spiritual truth, just like the DNA in the cells mesh and fuse to form a new life. All this is happening in creation, both physical and spiritual life. This dance of darkness and light bubbles with joy in my heart because I realize I am not intimidated in the same ways I once was by the darkness.

In no way do I intend to marginalize anyone's suffering and when I am suffering, I surely do not see as objectively. But I am aware of a separation of attachment to circumstances.

In light of these events, I thought about the Promised Land and how surprised the disciples may have been when they found themselves humbled at the foot of the cross witnessing death as opposed to glory and honor on a throne. Jesus knew the darkness he would endure and went willingly - despising death, but enduring it nevertheless. He experienced humiliation of a most cruel and demeaning form.

But on the other side of that suffering, eternal life and glory was revealed.

The darkness is of no consequence to the light, but it serves in creating new life. The darkness we endure and suffer in creation is part of the perfect means for shaping us into God's likeness. I am in awe at how He bends and molds us while He remains hidden in the darkness.

My hope is renewed today.

Oh Baby

I watch our newest granddaughter with her momma and smile, thinking of all the things Maya will teach her parents and those around her, things like unconditional love and selflessness. Ordinary daily events aren't so insignificant after all.

Galations 5:22But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23gentleness and self-control.

Babies are great teachers of spiritual fruit.

Makes me think of man's relationship with God. Like children, our vulnerability perfects His love, a circle of life really. Do you suppose He planned it that way?

I Doubt It

Lately, I have struggled with doubt in God. Does He even exist? Have I been deceived and spent years of my life seeking something that isn't there? Is there an after-life?

I have no desire for prayer or faith. All seems like fairy tales. I doubt the scriptures, the intentions of those who wrote them, and the intentions of those who decided which writings would be included in the Bible.

I imagine humans creating the idea of God in order to give life purpose and meaning, to have something to hope for beyond inevitable death. I think about generations of people clinging to the unseen and how society has been shaped by religious traditions. I wonder if we create our own realities.

I have stopped praying and am questioning everything I have held as truth for most of my life. Strangely enough, I am okay with being in that place of doubt. I don't care for it, but I don't judge or resist it. I let it come to me, trusting that even doubt has purpose in shaping me. The irony of my response, faith in the midst of doubt, hasn't escaped me.

Fast forward one month. Nothing spectacular has happened to change my attitude from one of doubt to one of faith. One day, I simply found myself praying again, trusting. Joy has returned. It was a season of doubt that now has passed.

And in the words of Forrest Gump, that's all I have to say about that.

Stain Free

Scrubbing a television set to get it clean, I see firsthand the sticky, nicotine-stained residue of cigarette smoke. It is dark brown against the whiteness of the paper towel in my hand and doesn't release its grip easily. I picture the accumulation of years of smoking on a set of lungs, how it would turn them from healthy pink to brown, tarry-coated, inefficient machines that no longer function at capacity. But this vision I can only imagine as the lungs are hidden from view.

Like cigarette residue, the impact of judging or despising each other is not always seen. The results of hatred also remain hidden on my pock-marked soul, compromising the efficiency with which I function in a day. Oh, I try to pretty up the language to justify my actions, but the fact remains that everyday I am either choosing to function in hatred or in love, in judgment or in mercy, in unkindness or in grace. Either I indulge selfish desires, pick up the cigarette/judgment and smoke it/indulge it, or I don't. Strong language, hatred and love, judgment and mercy, but strong impact of daily habits, nevertheless, that leave their sticky, repulsive residue on the soul.

Every day presents equal opportunities for me to exercise hatred or love, judgment or mercy, unkindness or grace, faith or doubt, His way or my way. Like inhaling cigarette smoke launches a blackened deposit and diminishes the lungs, each time I indulge my ego and pass judgment in thought or word against another person, a compromising deposit is made on my soul. I have chosen the impure over the pure.

But, and this is a big but, the good news, the big news, is that the hidden stains of my indulgences have been removed. God swiped my soul with the cloth of Jesus's sacrifice and forever removed the repugnant stains of my selfishness with His selflessness. The sacrifice of His death cost Him more than I will ever know, more than the elbow grease required to clean the nicotine stains from a television set. The release of my soul from the stain of my sins came at great personal cost to God. That personal cost is the measure, the standard, of His love for us all. He forgives. He loves, more completely than I can even begin to imagine.

My love is often conditional. His love is always without condition. That is who He is, Perfect Love. He sacrificed for us while we were still sinning. You wouldn't want to depend on me for that kind of perfect love. But you can depend on Him.

Infidels

Even in the most unlikely and conservative of places, you can find sometimes this glimmering idea that God might be bigger than our limited religious doctrines have taught us. In 1954, Pope Pius XI, of all people, sent some Vatican delegates on a trip to Libya with these written instructions: "Do NOT think that you are going among Infidels. Muslims attain salvation, too. The ways of Providence are infinite." (from Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert)

I tend to agree with Pope Pius XI.

God Speak

So, my husband and I decide the main floor bathroom needs remodeling. He did the work, stripping the wallpaper, washing the remaining glue from the walls, dismantling the sink and stool then reattaching them after rolling two coats of paint on the ceiling and walls. He wants me to pick out a linoleum remnant for the floor. I lug home an armload of samples because the remnants aren't that interesting or they're not the right size. Nothing appealing.

Before I started the search for flooring, I found a sink at a local home improvement store and brought it home, a cute European style bowl with a dark chocolate base cabinet. I try each sample in front of the sink, imagining the flooring expanded to the walls. Eh, a couple are okay but nothing outstanding.

I'm excited about the sink as the vision of a remodeled room begins to form in my thoughts. I found some nice picture frames to match the new wall sconces and a cool luggage rack shelf to hang over the stool. The image begins to materialize as I gather pieces from here and there waiting for the moment they can be set into place.

There is still the problem of the right flooring. I decide to look at some tile and find a few samples. Hmm, tile or linoleum? The thought of new sub-flooring to support and level the tile, resetting the stool to accommodate the additional height, man, that's a lot more work. But the results will be so much nicer. I mull the idea for a few more days then back to the store and happen across a "floating" tile floor that snaps together over the existing flooring and is then finished with a flexible grout. Easy-peasy complete it in a day. That's it!

Nine heavy cartons of 12" tile are loaded into the shopping carts by me and my sister, along with the grout. Getting closer to completion and I like the way the room is coming together. It's going to be beautiful. Back to the Ponderosa, where dear husband awaits.

"I don't want tile. I want linoleum. I'm not messing with the stool plumbing,” his response.

One box of tile makes it into the house, then out again. The other eight are unloaded from the trunk to the garage floor, then right into the van where he summarily heads back over the sixteen miles just traveled and takes them all, along with the grout, to be restocked. “I’ll get the linoleum I want,” his departing announcement. Huh.

I retreat. A few days later he invites me to join him to look for a sink and the elusive flooring.

“A sink? For what?” I inquire.

“In there.”

“Where?”

“The bathroom.”

“I already bought the sink.”

“I took it back.” Poof, and another one bites the dust.

Now I’m finished and ticked. I get in the car and drive away. But this time, instead of indulging my frustration and anger, I literally ask, “What are you saying to me, Lord?” I recall past confrontational moments like this. But instead of indulging that line of thinking, I consider that God may have something to say and that He is using this very situation in which to speak to me.

How do I respond? It’s a freefall once again, and this time willingly, into His arms.

John brought home a top to fit the base we already have, the flooring still hasn’t been selected, and I have recused myself from the bathroom remodel. But more importantly, I am aware of God’s presence and what He has to say in the midst of conflict. Though peaceful isn’t how I would describe my entire demeanor, inside I am aware of something greater than my desire. Something more important than, “to tile or not to tile, this sink or that one.”

A cycle has been broken for me as a new awareness presents itself. Though I may not care for the language or the method, I concede that the Spirit may be speaking through this confrontation. God has something to teach me. Am I willing to yield to His lead? It seems so.