Another birthday this makes 8!

Sunday Crossroads Church we will celebrate another birthday. It has been 8 years since our first weekly worship service September 11, 2004! This Sunday a church is restarting in Knoxville, KY and others will do the same all around the country. In light of this celebration I have been thinking about birthdays and what we are celebrating!

Birthdays are so important when you are young. Cake, ice cream, presents what’s not to look forward to really. But as we get older birthdays are not so important. I surmise it is because we recognize there are fewer ahead than behind us. When you’re young you look forward to your next birthday because you can do more as you get older. Ask a child how old they are and even if their 7^th birthday was yesterday they will say they are almost 8! Try it. Don’t try that with a 49 year old. They are 49 until the exact moment they were born on their birthday. As we age we realize how much less we can do as we get older.  The other evening Barbara and I were talking about out next wedding anniversary in January. It will be 30 years she has put up with me. I told her it would be my “not 30 year anniversary” because I am not that old! She rolled her eyes and laughed, probably just like you did. When we get older we don’t look forward as much. There is just too much behind us (yes and too much behind with that middle aged spread). So what do we celebrate in a birthday?

Life is what we celebrate. Consider birthdays after our death, no parties no cake, no presents (of course not for us we are dead) but our friends and family don’t celebrate either. Birthdays celebrate life lived and the promise of tomorrow. We celebrate the events that have shaped us and in spite of the hardship and heartache we have survived and thrived. That’s life and living. Birthdays celebrate the providence of God to care for us in another year and into the future of eternity as we claim Christ as our Savior. Birthdays celebrate the honor of getting older. Birthdays celebrate the experience gained. 

Experience is the difference between the young and the old. I read several months ago of a speech given to a group of college graduates by an alum in his 50’s. The heart of the idea was that the young man like the old already knows all of the basic information of life. The difference between the mature and the young is experience. Experience is the time living through it, the time living in it and the time overcoming it. Birthdays celebrate that experience. Each year there is more. More experiences of God being our Savior, more of God being sustainer, redeemer, forgiver, equipper, friend, partner, lover, judge, jury and life giver. Birthdays celebrate all of the above. Birthdays have a dark side. If we are not careful we can focus on the aspects of life where failure has reigned.




Your failures and faults do not define you unless you define yourself by them. To do that is then to make a lie of your life because in God's plan for his children you are defined by God and God is love. That is the ultimate act of redemption love in the face of unlovable, hope for the hopeless and life for the dead.
In the end birthdays are worthwhile. It’s good to celebrate life as often as possible. It is fleeting. In the same moment 8 years can seem like forever and just yesterday. “It was just yesterday that we…” is on my lips and yet it was x years ago. On Kingdom time 8 years is nothing, I am glad for that. I look forward to the time when time is of no consequence and Birthdays are no more.

In HIS Service and Yours,

The Rev