ROADSIDE REMINDER

The year was 1967, and we were traveling to Arizona where I was to preach for the annual Indian Camp Meeting at Prescott. I had preached there the previous year. The congregation was largely Navaho, Hopi, Mohave and a good company of Piute from Nevada. Altogether we had about 27 different tribes represented. We were looking forward to a good time.

For a bit of change and relaxation we pulled off the highway at a scenic spot at Walnut Canyon near Flagstaff. There on the trail was a post topped by a glass covered case that enclosed this poem by Enos Mills.

Grindstone

If you keep your nose on the grindstone rough,

and keep it down there long enough,

In time you forget there are such things:

As brooks that babble and birds that sing,

And these will all your world compose;

Yourself, the grindstone, and your poor old nose.

Grindstone ... nose - ouch! Something wrong here! One almost reached for his nose to see if it was all there! That verse speaks volumes. Too many of us have been too busy - too busy to stop and smell the flowers, to cultivate friendships, to attend to the most important things. Here's one of those things called a truism. "If you are too busy to pray, you are too busy."

I think I know what "busy" is. Now there are many folk who think that a preacher's life is one easy task - just get up and talk a couple of times a week, visit a few people and eat fried chicken. If you will feel comfortable with a short recital, I'll give you some light on the subject.

I was a pastor on one church in Kansas City for more than 38 years. Life was good, but busy. The pastor is subject to phone calls or door calls 24 hours a day, seven days a week. When the pastor was away, the wife took the calls. In the more than 64 years of our marriage, she never worked outside the home for pay one day. Our church had members in four counties, two in Missouri and two in Kansas. This meant lots of city driving. There were about a dozen major hospitals in this area and that many more in the metropolitan area. Most of our calling was in about half a dozen, but all, I think, were visited at some time. I remember two times a call came from persons I did not know asking for blood transfusions. So I took my wife along to give blood. Her blood was a type match. I called her my portable blood bank. Prior to this, I had been diagnosed with heart trouble and my blood wasn't acceptable.

In later years, after serving as president of Kansas City College and Bible School, I was asked to step up a notch in the administration. While still pastoring, I drove to the college in Overland Park every school day for two years. I was in my office before school opened, and was there when the school day closed. To do this, I cut my sleep time one hour each night. By going to school that long, I got smarter and resigned from the school.

The grindstone is a useful and necessary implement on the farm, especially in the "olden days," but nose and grindstone don't go together! We poor creatures need some time for recreation, for family and for God. The song "Take Time To Be Holy" is appropriate. Maybe it ought to be titled "Make Time." Regular grind might be all right for our coffee, but in daily life we need to be careful, lest it get us down. It's later than we think! Take time for family and for God! It's a great lesson.

Some of us learned too poorly and too late!