It's that time again.  Next Sunday, April 2nd, at 1pm in Tampa, Florida, the New York Yankees and the Tampa Bay Rays will open the 2017 Major League Baseball season.  Neither team is expected to win the World Series.  On Opening Day the Chicago Cubs are 3-1 favorites to repeat as Champs; with the Boston Red Sox, Los Angeles Dodgers, and Washington Nationals behind at 10-1.  After that, teams fall off pretty fast and stand no chance of taking the Series.  But that is 162 games away and despite the odds, hope springs eternal.  My Houston Astros are listed at 12-1 and they seem to be in the mix.  I'm not planning any vacation for mid-October, but you never know.  And that's why we play the games.  No one can read the future.  No one can say for sure what teams will make it to the pennant races or the Series.  We have to get there.  We're still in the season of Lent.  We still await the drama God sets in motion for our salvation.  All our sacrificial living and prayer and repentance stand in wait for God to act.  This waiting intensifies as Good Friday and Holy Saturday draw near.  We have to get there to recognize the fidelity of God.  However, while in Major League Baseball, anticipating the last team standing makes for all kinds of excitement; for the Church, waiting in hope, the Resurrection of Jesus surpasses all else.  You see, there will be a World Series winner in 2017 and again in 2018 and again in 2019 and again...until Jesus comes and puts an end to baseball and history and that is why the resurrection has no comparison. Praise God for that. 

March 14th.  On this day in 1879, Albert Einstein was born.  That's 138 years ago.   He died in 1955 at 76 years of age.  That was sixty-two years ago.  I can't remember that far back in the past.  I'm not really sure what my earliest memory really is.  I've been shown home movies and seen pictures and been told stories about my past.  However, I cannot separate what I remember from what I was told.  Research on memory has been going on for quite some time.  Today, we know the memory center of the brain really doesn't start to develop until we're almost three and a half years old.  Memories before that age are most likely remembrances of what we've been told or shown.  And then we go through what is known as childhood amnesia that isn't really complete until we're almost seven.  No one knows why the human brain forgets the early years and then picks up three or four years later and continues for the rest of our lives.  It may be some long developed evolutionary process, the purpose to which we have no clue.  In any case, I know exactly where I was on this date in 1981.  Our first born son came into the world in Dallas, Texas.  Life and time has not been the same.  The joys and delights of life took on dimensions I couldn't dream possible.  Happy Birthday Keith Eugene Henry, III.  Now that you are beyond the mid-point of three score and ten, relish your life and your marriage and your daughter.  It's gets better as the years roll on and the memories build one upon another.

I found myself sitting at a railroad crossing a couple of weeks ago.  The crossing bars were down and I knew I needed to stop.  So I did.  But, the last car of the train was just beyond the crossing and was at a complete stop.  It was headed east and would not cross my path unless it backed up.  My dilemma?  I didn't have one.  The lights were flashing and the crossing bars were down.  I never go around those bars.  It's illegal.  I'm not sure what the penalty for violating that law, and I don't want to find out.  However, there were many drivers behind me who apparently indifferent to the law or are fabulously wealthy.  Seven drivers moved past me and zig-zagged through those flashing bars to cross the tracks and be on their merry way.  I was astonished!  I have no doubt they made the decision to proceed only because they could and they wouldn't be caught.  If a police officer or county deputy was at that crossing not a single one of those drivers would have driven past me.  Is it the case we only do what is right when the authorities are watching?  If we could get away with some infraction, would we, if no one would catch us?  Remember, it's Lent.  The God who sees in secret will reward in secret. (Matthew 6:1ff)  Maybe even punish.  Why take a chance?

Ash Wednesday invites the Church to look purposefully at it’s interior life.  By that, I mean, the spiritual life which is ours to nourish and order, by incorporating into them three specific disciplines: fasting, prayer, and alms giving.  We practice these three as they are commended to us by Jesus as specific and minimal disciplines.  They are the least we can do and we CAN do them.  They are not extras we can address only as we so choose.  They are, according to Jesus, mainstays to our very identity as his disciples.  How can we call ourselves Christian if we do not fast, pray, and give alms?  We lift them up in Lent and practice them anew with deliberation as a reminder to ourselves we follow the one who suffered, died, and was raised to life for us.  And for those to whom we bear witness by the spiritually disciplined life we lead.  We are dust.  We are sinners.  We are in need of God's grace.  We will die.  We will, again be dust.  And we will again be living creatures of the living God who has become the Resurrection and the Life for us in Jesus Christ.  Remember this in Lent.  And give thanks.