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April.06.05: Light for the Day - "Aging"

-- Psalm 92: 12-15
Those who are planted in the house of the Lord
Shall flourish in the courts of our God.
They shall still bear fruit in old age;
They shall be fresh and flourishing,
To declare that the Lord is upright;
He is my rock, and there is no unrighteousness in Him.*

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At His Age

Mischa Elman was a Russian-born violinist whose career spanned his entire life. He began performing when unusually young and continued into old age. Someone once asked him if he could tell any difference in audience reaction through the encircling years. “Not really,” he replied. “When I was a boy, audiences would exclaim, ‘Imagine playing the violin like that at his age!’ Now, they’re beginning to say the same thing again!”

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Grow old with me!
The best is yet to be,
The last of life, for which the first was made:
Our times are in His hand
Who saith, “A whole I planned,
Youth shows but half; trust God: See all,
Nor be afraid.”

-- Robert Browning

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• The time of old age, with all its infirmities, seems to me to be a time of peculiar blessedness and privilege to the Christian. 
— Charles Spurgeon

• The first half of our lives we are romantic. 
The last half we are rheumatic. 
— Vance Havner

• The older we grow, the more we become like the place we’re going.

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“I Might Not See You Again”

Vance Havner told of a ninety-year-old who decided to travel around the world. His buddy came to him in distress, saying, “You shouldn’t try a trip like this. I might not see you again.”

“Maybe not,” replied the man, suitcase in hand. “You may be dead when I get back!”

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God, Grant Me …

God, Grant me the senility
To forget the people
I never liked anyway,
     The good fortune
     To run into the ones I do,
            And the eyesight
            To tell the difference.

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Why Does God Let Us Get Old?

Robertson McQuilkin, former esteemed president of Columbia International University in Columbia, South Carolina, once drove an elderly friend on an errand. She moved slowly and painfully, being crippled with arthritis.

“Robertson,” she asked as they drove along, “why does God let us get old and weak? Why must I hurt so?”

“I’m not sure,” McQuilkin replied, “but I have a theory.”

“What is it?”

He hesitated to share it, but she insisted. This is what he said: “I think God has planned the strength and beauty of youth to be physical. But the strength and beauty of age is spiritual. We gradually lose the strength and beauty that is temporary, so we’ll be sure to concentrate on the strength and beauty which is forever.”

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You Know You’re Getting Older When …

You know you’re getting older when: Everything hurts, and what doesn’t hurt, doesn’t work. The gleam in your eyes is from the sun hitting your bifocals. You feel like the morning after, and you haven’t been anywhere. Your little black book contains only names ending in M.D. Your knees buckle, and your belt won’t.

You get winded playing cards. Your children begin to look middle-aged. You join a health club and don’t go. You decide to procrastinate, but never get around to it.

Your mind makes contracts your body can’t meet. You know all the answers, but nobody asks you the questions. You look forward to a dull evening at home. You’re turning out lights for economic rather than romantic reasons.

Your favorite part of the newspaper is “Twenty-Five Years Ago Today.”

You sit in a rocking chair and can’t get it going.

You’re 17" around the neck, 42" around the waist, and 106 around the golf course. Your pacemaker makes the garage door go up when you see a pretty girl.

The best part of your day is over when the alarm goes off. Your back goes out more than you do. A fortune-teller offers to read your face. The little gray-haired lady you help across the street is your wife. You’ve got too much room in the house and not enough room in the medicine cabinet. You sink your teeth in a steak, and they stay there.

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What Age Can Do

• Commodore Vanderbilt built most of his railroads when he was well past seventy.
• Kant wrote some of his greatest philosophical works when he was past seventy.
• Goethe wrote the second part of Faust after the age of eighty.
• Tennyson was eighty-three when he wrote “Crossing the Bar.”
• Benjamin Franklin most helped his country after his sixtieth birthday.
• Gladstone served as Prime Minister of England at age eighty-three.
• Bismarck oversaw the affairs of Germany in his mid-seventies.
• John Glenn returned to space at age seventy-five.
• Verdi wrote operas into his eighties.
• Titian painted his great work, The Battle of Lepanto at age ninety-five and his Last Supper at age ninety-nine.
• Michelangelo was still producing masterpieces at eighty-nine.
• Monet was doing the same at eighty-five

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Prayer of an Aging Woman

Lord, you know better than I know myself that I am growing older and will some day be old. Keep me from getting talkative, particularly from the fatal habit of thinking that I must say something on every subject and on every occasion.

Release me from craving to straighten out everybody’s affairs. Make me thoughtful, but not moody; helpful, but not bossy. With my vast store of wisdom it seems a pity not to use it all, but you know, Lord, that I want a few friends at the end. Keep my mind from the recital of endless details—give me wings to come to the point.

I ask for grace enough to listen to the tales of others’ pains. Seal my lips on my own aches and pains—they are increasing, and my love of rehearsing them is becoming sweeter as the years go by. Help me to endure them with patience.

I dare not ask for improved memory, but for a growing humility and a lessening cocksureness when my memory seems to clash with the memories of others. Teach me the glorious lesson that occasionally it is possible that I may be mistaken.

Keep me reasonably sweet. I do not want to be a saint—some of them are so hard to live with—but a sour old woman is one of the crowning works of the devil.

Give me the ability to see good things in unexpected places, and talents in unexpected people. And give me, O Lord, the grace to tell them so.

— Anonymous seventeenth-century nun

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-- Psalm 71:5-9
5 O Lord, You alone are my hope. I’ve trusted You, O LORD, from childhood.
6 Yes, You have been with me from birth; from my mother’s womb You have cared for me. No wonder I am always praising You!
7 My life is an example to many, because You have been my strength and protection.
8 That is why I can never stop praising You; I declare Your glory all day long.
9 And now, in my old age, don’t set me aside. Don’t abandon me when my strength is failing.