‘VIEW from the POINT’ was the name I gave to articles that I wrote each month for the ‘Wesley Chapel UMC’ newsletter, ‘The Circuit Rider’… THIS explains where that name came from!

It was first published in the February 2000 edition, and again in the January 2005 edition… The ONLY article of mine to appear Twice in the Same publication!!

 

Considering all of the cities and states that this newsletter is sent to, some of you may not know that the ‘generic’ name for Wesley Chapel is ‘Point Church’, due, in some part at least, to the fact that it is in the middle of the intersection of Old 36 & Merritt Road. Since [my then wife] and I Live next door, ‘Point Church’ is the main thing I see out of my window as I sit and write this. Hence, the title of these articles.

Fewer still may realize that the collection of 8-10 houses some miles to our west is called Merritt. Hence, the name of our road.

Merritt was never very big, but sometime during the last one hundred years it did have a railroad. One morning recently, as the sun once again began its morning climb ever earlier, the light was just right as I drove through to highlight the old roadbed. The only thing left, actually, is a field road that runs diagonally to the road, and the remains of an old elevator, but on this morning the sun hit both just enough to remind one of what once was. Now, to the best of my memory, I have never seen any picture of Merritt, let alone a picture of the railroad, or of a locomotive in Merritt. But I had no trouble at all picturing in my mind a small, puffing steam engine working it’s way through town pulling a short freight, or maybe even a mixed train. After all, I know what a train looks like, and on this morning I could envision what the rail looked like. Only a small amount of imagination was required to ‘combine’ the two.

It usually isn’t hard to think about or picture in your mind things that have happened or been built, or people that have been a part of the last 1-2 hundred years or so. We have historical records, paintings, pictures, and accounts of many things. Sometimes we even have the actual physical evidence. An old barn and foundation may remain, or entire villages, such as New Salem, may be reconstructed. Complete battles and battlefields, such as Gettysburg, may be preserved and mapped out, while cities like Chicago and St. Louis have museums to show how they have grown and evolved. We can see pictures of the people, walk the streets and touch and study the buildings and tools of the people who built this country. It is not difficult to ‘see’ and believe how it was then! I don’t have to have seen a train in the town of Merritt to believe that there once was one!

However, if we go back, say, two thousand years, things become more difficult. Yes, some traces of buildings and cities remain, some artifacts can be studied and learned from, but for the most part we rely on any written records from that time to tell us what is was like. These can be few and far between, and may not always be complete. What we sometimes wind up with is only a very small window into that time.

We read and reread the Gospels and other books in our Bible and sometimes wonder why those people couldn’t recognize what was going on around them. What we sometimes forget is that, while these books focus on God and Jesus, Life was still going on all around the world, just as it was 200 years ago, and as it is today. These people were real people, living, working, providing for their families and their old age, doing all of the everyday things that we do today. Only the ‘how’ is different! “Who has time to pay attention to a wild man in the wilderness? And what was that about the Messiah? Well, the priests will sort it all out and let us know!” And, except for those who listened and understood, life went on as always.

We have the advantage, and disadvantage, of two thousand years. True, we have only written records of that time and place, but Oh… what records! The beauty and wisdom contained in all of the Bible but especially poignant in the New Testament books, is alone worth the study. But more than that, it tells us the story of God, and the love that He has for His people. And how those same people failed Him time after time. How Jesus became a Son-of-man for all of us, and how He was so much more! His wisdom and love flows from the pages. He is real!

Yes, the fact that I have actually seen a steam engine helps me to picture one in Merritt. But I do not have to have been in Jerusalem two thousand years ago to ‘see’ how it was. And I do not have to have met ‘Jesus-the-man’ to believe that He was real. He is real to me today. And though I try to imagine what God is, or might look like, and am incapable of it, I still know that He is very much real. I can see and feel His handiwork around me everyday.

Faith? Some might call it that. But I KNOW that steam engines once huffed through Merritt. And I KNOW that Jesus once walked the streets of Jerusalem. And I KNOW that God works in my life every day. How about you?