“I’m sorry. Please forgive me! I don’t mean to hold you up,” he said as he struggled to get off the escalator.

I’ll admit to it. There have been times when walking or driving behind an older person I’ve gotten impatient and upset. I’ve huffed and zoomed around them because I was in a hurry to get nowhere.

Perhaps I’m more aware of it now because I see myself there one day soon. Today I saw myself in this old man’s shoes and it caused me to slow down, stop and ask for his forgiveness.

He was about five or six people ahead of me. I was in a hurry and saw him as an obstacle. I’ve seen people get off the end of an escalator and stop dead in their tracks, gather their things and suddenly there’s a pile up of angry people behind them. You can’t stop an escalator full of people behind you. Like the Energizer bunny, they keep on goin’.

This man was well aware of the challenge. He tried desperately to step aside. Fumbling with his small packages, struggling to gain his footing, you could see how troubling this was for him. “I’m sorry. Please forgive me! I don’t mean to hold you up,” he said as he struggled to get off the escalator.

I suddenly saw this in a whole new light. It was like I was watching my future. I felt sorry for him. I felt sick to my stomach because this man was apologizing to everyone, when we should have been helping him and calming his fears.

One by one, people zipped around him. I heard a few angry comments whispered as one lady passed by him.

I saw me.

By the time I got to him he was just about steady on his feet.

“Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t know there was more,” he said.

“No, sir. No more with me,” I said. This really hit me hard. I realized right then how sad it was that the world was in such a hurry. That, of course, included me. But…no more with me. Count me out.

This wonderful man paid his dues. For whatever time he had spent on this earth, he most likely walked many rough roads and too many important miles. Now he should be apologizing for moving slower?

My heart ached as I looked into his eyes. I wished that I could see what he had seen all those years. His face weathered from life itself, was creased and wrinkled. The small soft pockets under his eyes and the gentle lines that curved up and around them told me he had many happy moments, too. Those were traces left behind from laughter and a smiling, happy man.

“My friend, can I help you with those things?” I asked.

Hesitant at first, he finally said, “Well, yes, thank you!”

I placed my hand under his left arm and walked with him a safe distance away from the rush of people.

“So what are you shopping for, sir?”

“Oh, just a little something for my neighbor. She’s a young mother raising kids on her own. She’s always so nice to me. I thought a box of candy for Mother’s Day…” he said, stopping suddenly as he searched his inside pocket of his sport coat.

“Do you need something?” I asked.

“Oh, no. Here. I think I have it right here. I always carry them with me,” he said. Then pulling out a hand full of papers he shuffled through them and handed me a business card that read:

“John A. Pomicter
Friend to all…enemy to no one!
I said a prayer today and you were the answer. Thank you!”

“That’s for you,” he said. “Thanks for stopping to help an old man.”

“My friend, you helped me. I discovered that I was unhappy with the world and I was part of the problem. Now I’ll be part of the solution. No more with me!”

“Then this was meant to be,” he said smiling.

“You know God sends me gifts every day and always at least one special person. You were my gift for today! Let’s go get some chocolates, my friend.”

- – - Written By Bob Perks

There is a parable about a wild goose shot down by a local hunter. Only wounded in one wing, he landed safely in a barnyard. Naturally the local turkeys and chickens were quite startled by this sudden visitor from the sky. As they became more comfortable with this stranger, however, it was only natural to ask about what they had seen but never experienced: “Tell us what it’s like to fly?”

“It’s wonderful!” said the Goose who told story after story of his flights. “It’s beautiful to soar out in the wild blue yonder! Why this barn looks only an inch high and all of you look like tiny specks from such a distance. First you fly high and then you can glide and enjoy the astonishing scenery.”

All the birds were quite impressed by the goose’s stories. Later they asked him to tell more stories about flying. Soon, it became a weekly event for the goose to entertain all the barnyard birds with his stories. They even provided a little box for him to stand so everyone could see him better.

But the strangest thing happened or maybe I should say… never happened. While the domestic birds very much enjoyed hearing about the glories of flight, they never tried to fly themselves. And the wild goose, even though his wing healed, continued to talk about flying but never actually flew again.

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As pastor of a church, I find this parable frightening.

Why? Because it hits too close to home. How easy it is to talk about being a Christian without acting like one. How easy it is to stand in church and say, “Jesus is Lord,” without actually turning our lives over to His direction. How easy it is to sit in our comfortable seats and ignore a world in desperate need of our witness. How easy it is as a minister to talk about ministry without actually doing it. It’s easy to talk but you must really flap those wings to fly.

Jesus spoke to his disciples about what it takes to actually fly and follow Him: “`If any of you wants to be my follower,’ he told them, `you must put aside your selfish ambition, shoulder your cross, and follow me. If you try to keep your life for yourself, you will lose it. But if you give up your life for my sake and for the sake of the Good News, you will find true life.’” (Mark 8:34-35)

“Shoulder your cross and follow me.” Other versions of the Bible quote: “Take up your cross and follow me.” I used to think the cross stood for the pain of being a Christian. In other words: “If you really want to follow me, you must be willing to endure pain and suffering.” This is not an exciting thought and also not completely true. Although pain strikes all of us, it’s not what Jesus had in mind. If this were about pain we would be keeping `pain’ diaries to see which one suffered most: `pain’ winners go to heaven.

So, what does it truly mean to `shoulder your cross and follow Christ?’

Well, you’re not going to believe this but I think Jesus is talking about flying.

Jesus is talking about being committed to your mission. Jesus accepted the suffering because that was his mission. The cross was Jesus Christ’s ultimate mission and he was committed to seeing it through to the end.

A bird’s mission is to fly but you must first be committed to the work and effort of flapping your wings over and over until you learn to fly. Our decision to take up the cross and follow God regardless of the cost is our cross and our commitment to flap our wings until we finally fly.

But flying is the best part. It may be safer to stay in the barnyard but look at what you will miss.

What would it be like to truly soar and ride the air currents? If we live always so carefully protecting and watching our own self-interests, making no effort for anyone but ourselves we’ll miss the best part of life: Knowing our mission and having the inner satisfaction of carrying it out to the best of our ability.

A song in the musical “Godspell” said it best: “Day by day, day by day: Oh, dear Lord, three things I pray: to see thee more clearly, love thee more dearly, follow thee more nearly, day by day.”

If we learn from God to see more clearly, love more dearly and follow more nearly , we will take our cross and fly.

- – - written by Larry Davies

A group of alumni, highly established in their careers, were talking at a reunion and decided to go visit their old university professor, now retired. During their visit the conversation soon turned into complaints about stress in their work and lives.

Offering his guests coffee, the professor went to the kitchen and returned with a large pot of coffee and an assortment of cups – porcelain, plastic, glass, crystal, some plain looking, some expensive, some exquisite, telling them to help themselves to the coffee.

When all the alumni had a cup of coffee in hand, the professor said: “Notice that all of the nice looking, expensive cups were taken up, leaving behind the plain and cheap ones. While it normal for you to want only the best for yourselves, that is the source of your problems and stress. Be assured that the cup itself adds no quality to the coffee. In most cases it is just more expensive and in some cases even hides what we drink.

What all of you really wanted was coffee, not the cup, but you consciously went for the best cups…and then you began eyeing each other’s cups.

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Now consider this:  Life is the coffee; your job, money, and position in society are the cups.

They are just tools to hold and contain Life. The type of cup one has does not define, nor change the quality of Life a person lives. Sometimes, by concentrating only on the cup, we fail to enjoy the coffee God has provided us.”

God makes the coffee, man chooses the cups. The happiest people don’t have the best of everything. They just make the best of everything. Live simply. Love generously. Care deeply. Speak kindly.

Enjoy your coffee!