This Foggy Road

 

I've been thinking alot about roads, lately.  The road I'm on, the road less traveled, the road not taken, the road ahead.  A week ago, I thought I knew where my road was going.  Everything seemed fine.  And then a bump, and my path diverged from the road I thought I was on.

Two months ago, I didn't even know that my road was going to take me over the river (actually, both the Navasota and the Trinity, along with several other creeks) and through the woods (the southern Piney Woods, to be exact), to a little town much like the one I grew up in.  It wasn't on my radar as anything but a temporary assignment to provide a church some assistance until they could find their permanent solution.  Turns out, the permanent solution was for me to quit being temporary.

As I pondered the possibilities, considered my options, weighed the pros and the cons, I also kept my ears attuned to the still small voice of the Lord.  It's a voice with which I am not unfamiliar; I have heard it often in my heart.  I've spent a lifetime training my ears to be attentive to the voice of the Lord, the leading of the Spirit of God.  My life depends on being directed by the God I serve.  He has a plan for me, a path already laid out.  All I need to do is get in the way and walk in it.

All along my path, there have been bumps in the road, twists and nauseating turns, washed out roads and what I assumed were detours.  But looking back now I can see that the road I took was the road He kept me on.  He didn't let me get lost, or spin out of control on some invisible patch of ice.  He kept me from turning this way or that to avoid a treacherous stretch of highway.  In all my life, I can't say that I have turned either to the right or the left, but rather I have kept myself on the road ahead.  Regardless of the cost, regardless of the consequences, regardless of the challenges, I am determined to stay on the road He has set before me.

A few years ago, I was driving a route (literally, now, not figuratively) I had only driven a handful of times.  I was coming home late in the night, with a dense fog lying low over the road.  I was listening to something good on the radio, and caught up in what I was hearing, I missed a turn because I missed a sign.  It's a pretty big one too, a fact I have confirmed on a number of subsequent occasions.  On that particular night, it might have been obscured by the fog, or perhaps I just blinked and missed it.  Regardless of which, I didn't even realize my mistake until I was far enough along to have reached my destination...and discovered that my destination was not where I was headed.  I was far off course, 100 miles from home, 2 hours delayed, and almost out of gas in the middle of the night in the middle of nowhere.  Fortunately, there is more than one way to get to where I was going, and there are also 24-hour gas pumps if you have a credit card.  I did eventually get home.  And I never missed my turn again.

I have been on a certain road for a while now, an interstate highway so to speak, and I was in the fast lane.  I knew where I was going, and I had the pedal all the way to the floor.  My destination was marked with a great big X.  I knew my ETA.  My speed was set, my gaze was fixed on the far end of the road.  There was no fog, and I clearly saw the sign that God had set for me, directing me off the four-lane onto this curving Farm-to-Market.  Only, the FM wasn't going to take me where I thought I was going.  I had a choice; stay with the road I was on, or follow God's direction.  So I chose to follow the Lord, just as I hope I've always done.

And everything changed.

This is not an easy road I have taken, and my destination is not as clear as it was before.  Like the picture I posted above, where I'm at is beautiful and bright and clear.  The grass is green, the weather is wonderful.  But the road ahead disappears beyond a hill and into the trees, with a low lying fog across my path.  I can't see the end now, not even the next stop along the way.  I just know I'm here now, and the Lord is right here with me.  I may not know where I'm going, but I trust the one who has guided me this far, and I know He won't let me down.

Centennial

Ask me what my favorite book is, and I'll say the Bible.  It truly is the best thing anyone could ever read, and I have read it over and over and over again since 1979--the year I learned to read.  Ask me who my favorite author is, and at any given time I might tell you Solomon, Paul or Moses, and it's true.

 

But of all the other books out there, this just might be my other favorite.  And of all earthly writers, James Michener (1907-1997) is certainly my favorite.  Maybe you've never heard of Michener or Centennial, but they have been old familiar friends of mine for a very long time.

 

The novel itself was published in 1974, an historical novel of Colorado that was representative of the Western United States.  It was a monster of a book, 909 pages in the hardback, 1086 in the paperback, about 440,000 words.  It started with geology and geography, a story that spanned from the creatures of pre-history to the citizens of today  (well, 1973). 

 

In 1978-1979, back in the day when we only had 3 channels--ABC, NBC, and CBS--one of the networks developed Centennial into a 26 hour mini-series with an all-star cast.  Most names you wouldn't recognize today, but 35 years ago they had top billing in Hollywood.  And the first year it ran on TV, it was a community event.  My parents and grandparents and some of the neighbors got together every week to watch the new 2-hour episode.  I was only 6, but I remember everyone's excitement at watching this epic story unfold on the small screen.  Through the 1980s, Centennial reappeared on TV multiple times.  In 1985, I bought our family's first VCR with my paper-route money, and we recorded the entire thing on VHS so we could watch it over and over again.  When the entire series was released on video in the 90s, we bought a set.  And in 2008, it was released on DVD--Mom and I each have one.  It really is one of our favorite entertainments ever.

 

I have always been an avid reader, and I've always been a bit precocious.  I always said and did things that were intended to set me apart from my own generation, because I wanted to be older than I was.  Now that I really am older, I find myself doing things to identify with younger people, because now I want to be younger than I really am.  Go figure...  But in 1984, when I was 12 and in the sixth grade, I finally convinced my mother to let me read Centennial.  I went down to the library and checked it out, and for six weeks I plodded through that tome.  I enjoyed it so much, I wanted to read everything else he wrote.  Mom said I could read anything except Hawaii.  So I followed Centennial with Chesapeake, and I followed that with The Covenant, and Space, and Poland.  The biggest literary thrill of my life was the long-awaited publication of Texas.  I ordered it through inter-library loan, and might have been the first person in Skellytown to read it.

 

Now ask me, did I understand what I was reading?  Did I really "get" Michener at 12?  The answer to that is, Of Course Not.  I mean, I comprehended the words on the page.  I could follow the basic storyline.  But these were works of art produced by a master, with deep, rich themes underlying the narratives.  And even when I read Centennial again, and again, and again as a teenager, I still didn't get it.  But I read.  In fact, I would estimate I have read Centennial close to a dozen times in the last 30 years.  It really is one of my favorite stories.

 

A few months ago, I dug out all my Michener paperbacks and stacked them on my bedside table.  Michener wrote 10 epic historical novels--Hawaii, The Source, Centennial, Chesapeake, The Covenant, Space, Poland, Texas, Alaska, Caribbean--several of which I have in 1st Edition Hardback, in addition to 37 other works of fiction and non-fiction.  I've read 9 of the 10 historical novels at least once; I'm still struggling to read Caribbean for the first time.  But every few years I go through a Michener phase and I read until I am absolutely sick of historical fiction.  I started with Poland six months ago--one I've read less than a handful of times.  And simultaneously, I started Centennial again. 

 

I took it slow, reading it usually at night right before bedtime, savoring each page, each character, each story as if for the first time.  I found myself enthralled with certain passages, laughing at times, crying at others, thinking, really thinking, throughout.  I didn't get it at 12.  I'm not sure I really get it at 40, but there is a great underlying theme of real conservation and environmentalism there.  Not the nutty tree-hugging kind, but the practical aspects of humanity having been given a job by our Creator to fill the earth and subdue it, to care for it and use it for its intended purposes.  And the truth is, if we don't take care of it as God intended, we will reap bitter consequences from the earth itself.  I'm sure no one is going to go to hell for chopping down too many trees, or shooting all the buffalo, or overgrazing the grass, or plowing the fields so finely that the wind blows them away.  But abusing God's creation does indeed introduce us to a kind of hell-on-earth.  I'm not becoming an activist, I'm just saying.

 

On Wednesday night, I finally finished Centennial again.  I put it down, satisfied that I had read every page and gained a better understanding of the message behind it.  Then I picked up Chesapeake for another read-through, which is a book about endless cycles...and pirates.  After that, I'm eyeing The Covenant, because of my new South African friend.  And The Source, which is about Israel.  And Hawaii, which my mother finally did let me read.  Maybe after that I'll try my hand at Texas again, or maybe Caribbean.  And there are nearly 40 books of Michener's I haven't read yet.  But as I was finishing Centennial, I happened across a page of reviews, written by current readers.  And I was surprised to find such harsh criticism of my old, dog-eared friend.  And then I realized, they only read it once.  They just don't get it.