See You On The Other Side

I felt compelled to expound on this for my GenX and Millenial brothers and sisters.

In less than two weeks the death toll personally and extraneously of people I knew or knew of that had some form of impact on who I am is now is over a dozen people. There were (13) in (14) days. I suppose there might be some PTSD going on at this point. As an adult I've always tried to be the stoic Biblical one and look at the longview of humanity and God but...what in the living hell? Its like the war generation of the 40s that had to deal with loss almost daily. Then it hits me....the war generation is essentially gone. It is now the generation after the war that is dying. Time stops for no one.

I guess as a GenXer I always knew this was going to happen. To this point we've mostly been insulated from generational die offs. No longer. The Boomers (mid 1940s to mid 1960s) were the largest generation to ever walk the earth, approx 90 million worldwide. They were the fruit of the WWII/Depression era.

Never in history did humanity have a generation with such an advantage in terms of medicine, science and longevity. Each successive generation has gotten smaller. Boomers are all now approx 60-80 years old. The twilight of life. As with anything human, there are limits. Even with the science and medicine we are beginning to reach the limitations of the Boomer's generation. It is estimated that 5000-6000 will die daily.

The statistical outliers go first if they're not suicides or accidental like Chris Cornell or Malcolm Jamal Warner. We've lost many: Bowie, Prince, Sly, Jobs, Crosby, Ozzy, Hogan. I expect that the 'die off' is only going to accelerate now. Sadly, GenXers and Millenials will be the generations to bury them.

It is a reminder that life is finite, precious, a gift. By the grace of God we breathe. 1 Corinthians 15:10~ By the grace of God I am what I am....

...and so are you. Embrace life. Embrace God. Consider it all joy. We won't be here forever. It is appointed to a man to die once and then face their Lord.

The Place In-Between

I generally was a loner most of my life. The call of God has changed that sometimes as some people call on me to perform my duty as a doulos δοῦλος (servant) or poimēn ποιμήν (shepherd, pastor). I marry people and speak over the dead. I'm comfortable there. In the spaces between sound or inside the wavelength itself….tuned to a specific divine frequency. I've known this my whole life. I've always been at peace with being seen as the rebel. All rebel means is that I refuse to follow societal norms. I shun most of them because I refuse to let the horde define me.

As I've aged solitude is becoming more frequent and at first I thought is was an issue of irrelevance or being anti-social. Yet I found this not to be true because I'm virtually always out doing physical things around other people. When I do encounter people it is in profound overreaching ways that it is clear God is orchestrating it. I don't hate people, I just value my isolation more sometimes. As I read the Bible last night I came across Luke 5, and the Spirit struck me as verse 16 hit hard.

"But Jesus often withdrew to lonely places and prayed."

God does his deepest work on me when no one is around. God quiets the noise in my life so I can hear Him more clearly or only Him. Although Jesus preached to thousands, He spent most of his time with twelve. I no longer rush to fill silence, I try more to hear God in the silence. The older we get the more God brings us into alignment with eternal things. When God separates me from people it is not merely a subtraction, it is a refining and stripping of unneeded things. Don't get me wrong I communicate through writing constantly because I believe God wants me to put ideas into the aether but it is also to get what’s in my head out to create more room. God does not waste our later years, he is more purposefully utilizing us.