John Albert Thomas Solo Piano

From Angst

Angst.  It’s the word that Becky used last night to describe my state of being over the past few years.  She said it made me emotionally absent.  I had to agree.

Before I trekked to Baborigame in southwestern Mexico last week, which I will describe in later posts, I struggled night and day with angst.  The underlying cause for this was once again discontentment.  This discontentment was both divine and demonic.  (Before thinking such a statement is sacrilegious, please read Job.)  Let me explain.

For years I would go to work and sit behind a computer screen, clocking hours, counting on the next paycheck to cover our monthly expenses.  This is a good reason to go to work, but not a perfectly good reason.  For years I have had little-to-no desire to be doing what I’m doing.  I’m good at what I do, but it’s not my passion.  My passion is music and ministry.  So I lived day in and day out with a spirit of discontentment, frustrated that I wasn’t doing what I felt God created me to do.

Every month or two I would quite naturally go through brainstorming sessions whenever a “cool idea” of making money popped into my head.  It was usually something creative that would fascilitate the transition from the computer world to a life of residual income where I could be free to focus on music and ministry.  I’d bounce the ideas off of my very patient friends, who would critique the ideas.  Were they John’s ideas, or were they God’s ideas?  I could never tell.  Every idea would come and go, and the next day I’d go back to my computer work to cover my monthly expenses.  And the angst would grow each time I went through this process.

Then came Mexico.  I worked with my pastor, John Horne, on a job site and I told him of my struggles with wanting to be in music and ministry.  And he told me something that I’ll never forget.  He said that sometimes, when we are seeking God’s will, He lets us struggle.  It prepares us for the answer.  Try to see your struggle as a positive thing.

I told him how I had idea after idea and I just couldn’t do them all.  He went on to say that God could funnel those ideas such that any or every one of them contributes to the answer.

That’s when the paradigm shift began.  The rest of the day and again at 4:30 a.m. the next morning.  At 4:30, I woke up and I felt that God wanted me to go outside.  I argued a little because it was below freezing.  I did it anyway and I looked up.  The moon shone brightly and millions of stars were shining.  He reminded me of His promise to Abraham, that his descendents by faith would be as numerous as the stars.   God showed me the source of my angst.

I went back inside and warmed myself by the pot-belly stove.  I cried and prayed.  At 6:30 a.m. I said, “Father, I’m tired of trying to figure out your will.”  I turned my notebook over to a blank page and laid my pen on it.  I shoved it across the table and said, “Father, you write it.”  I went up and tried to go back to sleep.

So what was my source of angst?  Simply this, I didn’t trust God. I didn’t trust Him to show me His will in His time and His way…at the best time and in the best way.  I didn’t trust Him enough to wait patiently and peacefully, with contentment.

So I came back to Memphis a changed man.  Everywhere I am is His mission field.  My job, my neighborhood, my church and my home.  It is enough to simply “trust and obey, for there’s no other way to be happy in Jesus, but to trust and obey.”

Last night, Becky used the word angst to describe what I was like before the trip.  But now the “old John” is back.  Instead of angst, she said, I now seem to have a peaceful and hopeful expectation.  I had to agree.

In His time and in His way He will reveal all things.

“We can make our plans, but the LORD determines our steps.”  (Proverbs 16:9, NLT)

The Old Rugged Fireworks?

Last summer we went to Bellevue’s Fourth of July fireworks display.  I thought it was a blast, and Will (2 years old at the time) loved it, too.  Tonight we went back to Bellevue for the annual Singing Christmas Tree.  It, too, was a top-notch performance.

In fact, I just felt like crying for no apparent reason on several occasions.  I had happy, fulfilling memories of my theatrical experiences.  I looked at my daughters in front of me and imagined them experimenting with music and theater someday.  I was moved by the excellence with which the production clearly strove to accomplish.  It made me want to pursue excellence in my own music.

So in the midst of this evocative experience, my three year son holds up a Bellevue registration card with a picture of a cross on it and exclaims, “Fireworks!”  I smiled, but deep inside I cherished that moment and was determined to lock-in that memory.

My son associates the cross of Jesus Christ with fireworks!

Obviously, he doesn’t understand, and there was no underlying meaning to his words.  However, it got me thinking:

When’s the last time I went to the foot of the cross and saw fireworks?

Tribute To A Veteran Of WWII

by his daughter Karen K. Spooner

The following journal entry was written by Pvt. John W. Kellogg in Dec. 1944 in Belgium.

“The morning of Dec. 17th or 18th, memory fails me as to date, I found myself alone with three buddies on the east side of a swift moving stream in the Ardennes, near Clerveau. It had been an exceedingly tough night. The remnants of our battalion had fought all day in a small village east of Clervaux and we had finally been pushed out of the village into the meadow beyond where we dug in for what the morning might bring. The line such as it was had gone far beyond us and as far as we knew we were an isolated unit. We expected nothing but to fight until the end whatever that might be. The outlook was anything but heartening. The village we had just left was but a mass of flame. God knows whatever became of the villagers. The last I saw of them they were all huddled in the basement of the last house in the village. They weren’t a bad bunch. I only hope that when I can look into the face of utter ruin I can be as stoical as they.

To get back to my story : The terrain was fairly well-lighted from the flames of the village and it was possible to see our outfit digging in for quite some distance. We had dug our machine guns in on the perimeter and Johnny Zero, my buddy and I had dug a slit trench nearby and failed it with straw to lie on. We stood guard on the guns for quite some time. When we considered our duty was about up, I endeavored to find our relief. It was quite a job as the ground was covered with slit trenches and the platoons and companies pretty well intermingled. We finally found our relief and them retired to our own private slit trench. Johnny had left his coat with our jeep which was back in the burning village, as were our packs, so my overcoat had to cover the two of us. It had been two nights since I had had any sleep and now I can’t remember whether I dropped off or not, but I recall Lieutenant Mason, our platoon leader telling us to knock our gun down and load it on the jeep of H company and to round up the rest of our boys. As we were pulling out, finding the boys was a difficult job but I know all of our squad was there. The boys burrowed so in the……..”

After about 10 days avoiding the enemy behind the German lines, Pvt. Kellogg was taken prisoner and place in a POW camp. They were forced to march from camp to camp, in snow and wet. John had no overshoes as he had traded them earlier for a loaf of bread. He suffered from frost bitten feet. It was February 22, 1945 when my mother, Margery, received word from him that he was a POW. On April 5th she received a letter saying the Allies had freed him. He reported later that he had been left behind when the Germans fled the coming Allies as he was too ill to walk. He was transferred to a hospital in Liege, Belgium, where he weighed 125 pounds and had pneumonia. Unable to walk, he eventually was able to move about a little in a wheelchair. On May 13th he wrote he was able to take a few steps and on May 30, he was transferred to a hospital in Paris before being shipped to the U.S. He then spent several months in Rhodes Hospital in Utica before returning home to Adams Center.

I was only two when my dad returned home. My brother, Dave, was three. It had been a rough year for my mother and dad’s family. The winter had been terrible; food and gas were scarce. However, nothing was as bad as the winter my father had endured. He had dreamed of banana cream pie and homemade meals. He worried about his brothers and brothers-in-law who were still involved in the war. The people of Adams Center and area prayed for all their men who were serving their country. Some made it home, some didn’t. Those who came home were glad to be there as they struggled to put their lives back together.

Dad was a lawyer and eventually went back to Watertown to practice. I remember many nights when he would come home from work and make the rounds of Adams Center visiting widows, making sure they didn’t need anything. In 1974 when he passed away, we received many calls and letters and people stopping by asking what they owed Dad for legal work he had done for them. My mother would smile and say they owed nothing. Dad left no bills for many folks. He was just glad to be able to serve –first his country, then those who needed his help at home.

I never heard Dad say a bad word about anyone. He never spoke ill about the Germans. He was a proud American. On this Veterans Day, let us remember those who have served
this country and those who serve it now to protect our country and to make a better world for all the peoples of the world. God Bless America!