It was 4AM on a 1972 summer day and the car was all packed when we nudged our 6-year-old son and 3-year-old daughter awake and half carried them to the car. We were heading out on our long anticipated first trip west in our trusty Ford Galaxie 500 with the black vinyl roof, no power steering, and no air-conditioning. My husband and I had wanted to see the Rocky Mountains and we had only a short week to make the trek from Ohio to Colorado so we needed to start early and keep moving. First night was to be Lincoln, Nebraska.

 

That year became legendary for many reasons and it also started a tradition that family vacations in the car would always begin at 4AM with a promise that when the sun came up and we came to a great rest area we would stop and break out the orange juice and doughnuts from our favorite doughnut shop. We all would stand shivering around the car swilling the orange juice and savoring the doughnuts. I can see it all as if it were yesterday.

 

We had this first trip mapped out to travel west on I-80 and return by I-70. There were no DVD’s or video games to play. I made up boxes for each child with new crayons, coloring books, and small toys they had never seen to help keep them occupied. We also talked a bit more than some families today might. We used the trip as a history/geography lesson as we crossed each state line.

 

My bachelor’s degree was in education so I was pointing out things like the kinds of trees, the sorts of crops, and any historical landmarks we passed along the way. That would become a pattern as well for future trips as we went west more than a few times when our children were growing up.

 

Invariably the question would come from one or the other of the children: “How long till we get there, Dad?” Since they had no concept of that distance or time, my husband came up with some pretty amazing numbers to astound them.

 

It would be hard to say what all they recalled from that first trip west, but the trip and the conversation was so rich that family vacations exploring new places and things became a part of our lives that we sacrificed to do every summer until each graduated from college. And we didn’t always head west (even though that was a favorite). There were trips to Maine, New York, Massachusetts, the Outer Banks of North Carolina, Florida, South Dakota, and more.

 

We never had a great deal of money for these trips and used the credit card for many of the stops, but year-by-year these trips became more precious as each of our lives got busier. By the time our children were teens it was easy for each of the four of us to be going in a different direction, focused more on ourselves than each other. By 1978 when the big Chevrolet station wagon became a part of our family, we were filling the car to the brim and it would take several days of getting used to thinking of others to get our family back on track.

 

One of the challenges was always where each of our two kids sat and who got to lay on the seat for a bit and who had to lay on the floor with the hump in the middle. There were smelly shoes and feet to contend with as well, but while we were all adjusting to one another in the confines of a station wagon the Lord honed our characters and brought us more into alignment as a family.

 

Looking back, I am so glad we didn’t wait until they were old enough to remember everything about a trip or old enough to complain and not think it was a grand adventure. After all, when you are 7 or 8 it can be fun to think what it would have been like to travel across the prairie in a covered wagon and try to figure out how to keep tree saplings alive until the end of the trip.

 

I wonder sometimes now if children ever see the land they are passing through or make note of its grandeur and beauty. I hope they sometimes put down the video game or headset and take in the vastness and beauty of what they are traveling through. In the midst of that, perhaps they will even share a thought or two with a sibling or parent about what they observe and the family will become more of a family again rather than a collection of individuals who happen to live under the same roof.

 

That time together (despite complaints or inconvenience) provides the stuff of precious memories and also gives God the opportunity to smooth off some of the rough edges of our interactions with each other.

 

In 1972, we didn’t get to Lincoln, Nebraska the first night because we discovered half of our clothes were hanging in the closet at home after we had driven a couple of hundred miles and we turned back and got them. Newton, Iowa, became the first stop instead, but we sang songs, enjoyed snacks, and kept looking west.

 

We were hot more than a few times and the crayons melted in the box when we were taking the cog train up to Pikes Peak, but ice cream cones were a big help and we were together and everyone agreed we needed them often.

 

Family time doesn’t often just happen. It needs to be planned for on purpose.

 

I think that is true of those of us who are in God’s family too. It might not always be comfortable, but we need to spend time getting to know one another in small settings and I am sure God shows up to help His kids grow and smooth off the rough edges.

 

 

 

In the United States and so many other places where Americans are located, we just celebrated her 241^st birthday yesterday. For many it was a day of boating, picnics, family, and fireworks. It was also a day of reminiscing about other times the holiday was celebrated. Some may have given a brief thought of the Founding Fathers who had sat for days in Philadelphia’s sweltering heat debating the step they ultimately took. They were overall quite a group of men. Most were classically educated and had read the great histories of nations long since gone. They knew what had failed. Now they were learning from one another and hoping they would succeed in a great triumph at risk to their very lives.

 

So many in 1776 learned by working with, alongside, or under someone else. Apprenticeships were sought after and an excellent way to start to gain a footing into adulthood.

 

Certainly there are some apprenticeships today, but they are certainly not the norm. In an earlier era, they were common for any and all adult skills and future work and life.

 

Internships are a little more common today with certain professions and they serve a great value. I experienced one on the way to becoming a professional clinical counselor. It was the very best way to learn before I had to prove to the rest of the world that I could do what the diploma and certificates on the wall said that I could do.

 

I wonder if we have left this key learning tool behind. Now we count on books, the Internet, and You Tube to learn something new or advance our skill in some area. They are all great tools. We even rarely head off to a library as we once did, but there is a  piece we lose that may be more significant than we realize.

 

An apprenticeship (or internship) doesn’t just teach us facts or tell us how to do something. We gain the relationship with a master in the area we are seeking to learn or become proficient at. We also pick up other things as well (a rather lengthy list I can’t fully include). We develop character, consistency, and an ability to work for and submit to someone else. We also learn more about how to communicate and develop connections with others in the area we are learning that sets up a network that may help us grow more and offer opportunities for other work.

 

In our faith area, apprenticeship was common at one time but we called it discipleship. It was that key piece where we learned to live like Jesus by spending time with a seasoned believer who had been tested and lived out his or her faith in the practical, daily nitty-gritty areas of life.

 

When Jesus walked the earth, His disciples learned by spending time with Him. They were not only being taught, but also watching how He did what He did. Certainly they missed a lot in those three years with Him, but yet it was enough to allow them to be used to turn the world upside down.

 

I read a book a number of years ago entitled Apprenticeship with Jesus (Learning to Live Like the Master) by Gary W. Moon that framed a 30 day experience with practices of things to help a believer to develop more of what it means to look like Jesus in daily life.

 

Many of us have not had any formal discipleship program in any area of our lives, but I think we need to consider the many informal ways we learn such things if those ahead of us on the journey are to live out His ways on purpose. I actually think we would be surprised how much of a living letter we may be without paying attention and doing so on purpose. Whether we pay attention or not, others are catching a message.

 

Have our lives truly been transformed since we came to know the Lord? Sometimes we can be lost in our intellectual study of Him without really being transformed in every area of our lives to look like Him.

 

I love what Gary Moon says in Apprenticeship with Jesus:

 

“If we are going to deal with the breakdown of ‘good enough Christianity,’ that is, Christianity without transformation, we must also step into and experience the solution, an apprenticeship with Jesus.”

 

 

 

The admonition, “Don’t Wait Till The Last Minute”, is one we all hear and have heard many times. Those words have come from teachers, parents, friends, spouses, ministry leaders, and so many others along the way including us. It is always sound advice and certainly intended to encourage us to accomplish a task, do well on an assignment, meet a project deadline, think through what we need to pack, and if we heed it, to avoid stress and disappointment in our performance.

 

Somehow those words often can result in feelings of frustration as well. We may not admit that, but it shows up in the tone of our voice when we respond to it. We do not like to be reminded of things we need to do much of the time. Perhaps it is our pride that anyone would suggest we didn’t have an awareness of the deadline we are facing. Perhaps it is our reluctance to dig into it and set aside the excuses and procrastination that triggers the feelings. Perhaps it is our regret at our commitment to complete it from the beginning. It is a reminder that our time is not our own.

 

Nevertheless, duties, assignments, projects, and the like are a part of our daily lives and something we cannot avoid. Time. We complain when we are older that we do not have enough of it. We grumble when we are younger that we have too much time on our hands and are bored.

 

Time is a gift. We spend some of it every day while never knowing what our allotment of time is.

 

We can feel we have no choice in how we spend it, but that is an illusion. There are duties for each of us, but the things we have committed to whether it is a job, a class, our family, a ministry, or anything else are choices we have made.

 

Perhaps the greater challenges, however, are the truly important things for which we never receive such an admonition and yet we should remember daily.

 

What kinds of things should we not wait to do lest we miss an opportunity? Here might be a short list that you can add to:

 

• Tell those we love that we love them and why (Don’t wait until they are dying.)

 

• Kiss our children and tell them something positive we noticed about them (Don’t wait! They are growing up so fast and they will hear so many negative things from others in their lives.)

 

• Notice the world around you and become a good observer so you experience the wonder of creation and places where you may be needed. (Don’t wait to look up at the star-studded sky, smell the flowers you planted weeks ago, notice the neighbor whose steps are slowing.)

 

• Take time to read and reflect on God’s Word (Don’t wait to discover the words the Lord wants you to hear from Him for that very day.)

 

Don’t simply add these to your “to do” list, but ask the Lord to help you keep the important ahead of the urgent in each day. It is usually the small things that are remembered by those around us long after we have been with them.

 

In God’s Word there are many reminders about time and our responsibility to be good stewards of that time. I was reminded of that again as I was reading in Mt. 25:1-13 about the wise and foolish virgins and the return of the Bridegroom. When we see the reminders we can be tempted to chafe again and add to our “to do” list, but I don’t think the Lord is as interested in our “doing” as in our relating to Him, loving Him, and loving one another.

 

Perhaps the truly important admonition is this: “Don’t wait till the last minute to receive Him, love Him, to love those He has brought into your life.”