This is being written a few days after Father’s day, 2013. The dates of these pages seldom have anything to do with the dates they were written. Something usually happens to me, light or serious that lifts my interest so I look up an appropriate date for the theme. Today, 07/01/2013, I have had E-mails, phone calls, and visits that have touched memories, nostalgia and meaning for me. Today, a church member friend remembering a sermon from 1978, asked for the outline: I can use it for a project I am working on. Anyone carried along by a sermon of mine from 35 years ago deserves my undivided attention – and he got it. My eldest daughter came in to review some interests from the past, and bring me the book she had purchased for me for Father’s Day. I reveled in our conversation. My other daughter just spent a week with me, and had the temerity to leave for her home 2,000 miles away because her beloved family is there. Their brothers live close to me, and I commonly talk by phone with one of them, or we visit together in the car from here to there. I have prayer daily with a former student, and we pray for each other’s family members – as well as the world. I exchanged several E-mails with a dear student of mine from decades ago, who edits my stuff. (She will get this page for editing, but I will reject any attempt she may make to omit reference to her.) This last, and the book from my daughter, plus one loaned to me from her California sister gave me the inspiration for using up so much of this Page, in accounting my pleasure for language blessings.
What brings all that together for this purpose? Words do it – words in fellowship, words expressing life, knowledge, wisdom, ideals, faith and family. They include words of books, of conversations, of E-mails, and even a Page about words. The open secret of happy or unhappy life may be found in words. Words of encouragement, of humor, love, peace, appreciation, and the list grows long – proving we are not merely animals, but there can be found a way to latch on to documenting our lives in hearing and seeing others for good. Some words seem to have been born in a spiritual haven. Or, they can be abusive, ugly, vain, threatening, harsh, discouraging, and that list also grows long. They seem to have been born in some impending evil. As children we faced word bullies with the lie: Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me. Words can hurt and there are persons in our lives, who say they love us, who use them on us. I received a three-page letter yesterday – words of appreciation, a gift beyond price.
What may I say here that will make a difference? I wish I could perform a miracle that would make every person detect the importance of words. Words express our love. They express the love of God. Jesus was so inspired with words that he gave a ministry of a thousand days to the communication of words to anyone who would listen. He forced those words on no one, but did not deny them to anyone. He gave them to men high and low, to women not admitted to the public discussion, to children on his lap, even to dead Lazarus so to be an illustration that the words of Jesus carried only life, hope, relief from grief, and assurance to attentive persons that he did indeed have the words of eternal life. Even though his words were infinitely greater than mine can ever be, they comprised the same tools which brought life, hope, meaning, faith, forgiveness, and immortality to those who heard them, applied them, and lived by them. It is discovery of high order to recognize that every person can, with proper words, offer hope, courage, love, motivation, and related factors for effective and happy life through word wealth. We are informed that even in the most wretched of the Nazi prison camps, there could be heard laughter and expressions of human decency, even of the care of God, uttered by other prisoners who in their words refused to be the prisoners of tormentors. I have heard some of them tell their stories. One fellow gave hope in offering prayer over the single slice of bread received each day. They were touched with hope, and liberation came, even though many succumbed to the brutality. The fact that those most open, communicating affirmative life, were survivors led to studies on surviving miserable odds. Impossible was changed to improbable, then to probable, and then to relief. It was in the moment of serious thought that the disciples said to Jesus: To whom may we turn, you have the words of eternal life? There is nothing greater than Jesus’ promises *Mark W. Lee, Sr. — 2016, 2020