Surgery Wed. Nov. 30, 2011

The following is the email sent out by Joanne on Nov.7

Dear Family and Friends,

The date for Gary’s surgery is now booked for Wed. Nov. 30th at 9 a.m.
He is doing o.k. and keeping busy. I’m sure he will make good use of the extra week he has before his surgery.                                          


After Gary's First  Surgery (July 16, 2010)

                                                                          
Please pray that Gary will continue to remain healthy and that nothing will get in the way of his booked surgery for next week. You can also pray that we will feel at peace and trust that God has all things in His control and that we can leave the future in His loving care.

Joanne


Recently at a parent teacher meeting I met two people who asked me how I was feeling. This is not unusual- I find that the amount of concern shown and the promise of prayer for me has been very humbling.
At that time to explain how I was feeling I related an event that happened recently that sort of showed the type of thing that is difficult for me.


Ryan and Danny the Cat

My son Ryan and I were walking out of the woods when he said to me, “I am looking forward to coming back here 15 years from now to see how my little oak tree is doing.” (This is a realistic expectation for him), but tears sprang to my eyes, because barring a miracle, I will not be there to share that with him and I do not even know of any way to ensure that our family will still own this place so that he even has opportunity to go and look. It’s not that I fear the unknown or the illness- I believe that as Romans 8 so eloquently promises, nothing can separate me from the love of my Saviour.

What I regret is missing the fellowship and camaraderie of Ryan and the others of my family, especially in some of the things we have been working on so closely together.

David  in foreground working on the bridge

To answer the question I referred to Revelation 22:1&2 where it refers to the river flowing out of New Jerusalem and the tree(s). Compare with Ezekiel 47:1-12.  I think some versions refer to the tree as plural (certainly in Ezekiel).
If this is so, I hope there will be oak trees as well.


C.S.Lewis's Chronicles of Narnia are among my favourite books

C.S. Lewis, in his book The Last Battle, relayed an idea that has always held fascination for me.

When the children go into Aslan’s country (the new heaven and earth in that story) they recognize their beloved country Narnia.

"Listen, Peter. When Aslan said you could never go back to Narnia, he meant the Narnia you were thinking of. But that was not the real Narnia. That had a beginning and an end. It was only a shadow or a copy of the real Narnia, which has always been here and always will be here: just as our own world, England and all, is only a shadow or copy of something in Aslan's real world. You need not mourn over Narnia, Lucy. All of the old Narnia that mattered, all the dear creatures, have been drawn into the real Narnia through the Door. And of course it is different; as different as a real thing is from a shadow or as waking life is from a dream." 

Ancient British Oak Woods

"It was the unicorn who summed up what everyone else was feeling. He stamped his fore hoof on the ground and neighed and then cried: ”I have come home at last! This is my real country! I belong here. This is the land I have been looking for all my life, though I never knew it. The reason why we loved the old Narnia is that it sometimes looked a little like this.
Bree-Hee-Hee! Come further up, Further in!”

All this was quoted directly from C.S.Lewis's book without any permission, something I hope that I do not go to jail for at this time in my life. I hope "Jack" would understand.

I cannot say with absolute certainty that the idea portrayed in this section of Lewis’s book, the idea that any good or worthwhile thing in any place or country is only a shadow of something real in Heaven is accurate biblical truth, but I do find the idea immensely attractive, and not incompatible with what we are taught in scripture.

If this were true, I can picture some day walking with my family along The River and seeing an oak tree (or maybe even an oak woods) and saying “doesn’t that look like the place where Ryan planted his little oak in Anderson?”


Our little creek in Anderson

                                                                             
To all my children and dear wife, Joanne, my brothers and sisters, my fellow Christians in Bethel Free Reformed Church, and the dear people who have become good friends, it has been a great joy to have had fellowship with you here. I hope to have more time for this, if God spares my life for another year like He did with the last Surgery.

If that is not the case and He calls me home at this time, it has become my firm belief that we will know each other and will be able to fellowship and do things together in the new heaven and the new earth. I will look forward to meeting you along The River.

I relayed this to someone recently and he said : I think maybe it will be more like Samuel Rutherford conveyed in one of the the last stanzas of his hymn “the sands of time are sinking”:

"The Bride eyes not her garment, but her dear Bridegroom’s face;
I will not gaze at glory but on my King of grace.
Not at the crown He giveth but on His pierced hand;
The Lamb is all the glory of Immanuel’s land."

This brings me back to the very first blog I wrote about the words of this contemporary song:

“I can only imagine
what it will be like
When I walk
by your side
I can only imagine
What my eyes will see
When your face
Is before me
I can only imagine
[Chorus:]
Surrounded by Your glory, what will my heart feel
Will I dance for you Jesus or in awe of you be still
Will I stand in your presence or to my knees will I fall
Will I sing hallelujah, will I be able to speak at all
I can only imagine

I do not know whether Lewis’s vision or Rutherford’s will be the one that I will encounter.  I hope it is a combination of the two, but I firmly believe that it will be glorious.

Thanks for your prayers,
Gary