KEEPING THE ZING IN LIFE
ZEST
Joshua 14:6-15
Romans 12:11 “Do not lag in zeal, be ardent in spirit, serve the Lord with enthusiasm.”
When I think of ZEST I think of Caleb said to Joshua, “Give me this hill country- Anakites the giants live there – The Lord helping me I will drive them out.” Then a commentary is given of Caleb: “He followed the Lord God of Israel wholeheartedly.”
I pray that all of us will keep the zing and zest in our life and when we come to retirement years or are in retirement years we will live in the spirit and lifestyle of Caleb. “The Lord helping me I will live in victory.” “I will serve the Lord wholeheartedly.” “Until I take my last breath I will give of my best to the Master.”
At 85 Caleb was open to a new challenge. He had been faithful to the Lord during the 40 years of wondering. He must have been 45 years old when he started the 40 years of desert living. He didn’t become bitter when the minority report he and Joshua gave was rejected. For 40 years he looked forward to completing the mission God had given him.
#Ray Crist, a retired scientist started teaching at Messiah College near Harrisburg in 1970. He put down his pointer in the class room at age 104. He started at Messiah at the age of 70 after a career in science and a decade of teaching at Dickinson University. When he left Messiah College at 104 he planned to work on his latest research project “To explain how plants absorb toxic metals and thereby clean the soil.”
When I served as Superintendent in Florida for 8 years Carollyn and I attended an adult Christmas party at the St. Petersburg FMC and were awarded the prize for the youngest couple. The next oldest couple was Rev. Lucien and Molly Behar the pastor and spouse of the church.
When we moved to Florida we were told there were two types of people in Florida – the newly wed and the nearly dead. I noted at that time the average age in Bradenton, Fl was 55.
I met with one of the local churches to assist the pastor in doing some planning. I sat around the table with the church board – mostly retires – snow birds from the North. We talked about possible strategies for growth. They were complaining they had no young families with small children.
I asked them if they had a church nursery. They said that they didn’t need a Nursery area because they didn’t have any babies. I suggested they look all the ways they could get ready for company. One way was to get a nursery ready with nursery helpers.
One of the members on the church board from Michigan said. The plans sounded great and he would have jumped at the chance to help out twenty years ago. But now in his retirement years he was only in the church six months out of the year and wouldn’t be that much help.
When you have the spirit of Caleb you are willing to give of your best. You become a mover rather than a blocker.
The story is told of a man who rode in his car as it was being towed to be repaired. When they arrived at the repair shop, the tow truck driver told him, “I didn’t think I was going to make it up that big hill.” The man replied, “I didn’t either, that’s why I kept the break on so we wouldn’t roll backwards.”
God is looking for retirees who will step on the accelerator rather than the brake in stepping out in faith. “The Lord helping us we will have victory.”
In his book “One Crowded Hour,” Tim Bowden describes an incident in Borneo in 1964. Nepalese fighters known as Gurkhas were asked if they would be willing to jump from airplanes into combat against the Indonesians. The Gurkhas didn’t clearly understand what was involved, but they bravely said they would do it, asking only that the planes fly slowly over a swampy area no higher than 100 feet. When they were told that the parachutes would not have time to open at that heights, the Gurkhas replied, “Oh, you didn’t mention parachutes before!”
That the kind of adventurous spirit that Caleb possessed.
Caleb was a dreamer. Joel prophesied that “old men will dream dreams, your young men will see visions.” (Joel 2:28b)
At 85 Caleb could still dream. From the life of Caleb we learn that:
You are never too old to dream.
Joshua 14:10-12
At 85 most people aren’t thinking about starting out on a new venture. At 85 many people have pulled over and parked. Theiy are thinking more about dying than living.
Zig Zigler was asked about if ageing had affected his career now that he is 78 years old. He said, “Never. I’m a perennial optimist. I’d take my last two dollars and buy a money belt. I don’t spend time worrying about things I can’t control.
George Foreman, the former heavyweight boxing champion retired from boxing and became a preacher. A few years ago, at age 42, he came out of retirement to box once again in order to support his ministry. Foreman said, "I decided to go back & challenge the heavyweight champion because I needed the money to build more recreation centers for young boys & get them off the streets & out of trouble."
Evander Holyfield, the heavyweight champion, was 28 years old & 215 pounds of solid muscle. George Foreman was 42 & weighed 257 pounds, & not all of that was solid muscle. But that was a whole lot better than the 350 lbs. he weighed just before going into training for his comeback. Boxing experts said that he didn’t stand a chance. No way that the old & slow Foreman could last more than 2 or 3 rounds against Evander Holyfield.
But on that Friday night Foreman stepped into the ring. And when the bell rang at the end of the 12th round, he was still on his feet - 42 years old. No, George Foreman didn’t win the fight. But as the 2 fighters embraced in the center of the ring at the end of the fight, the entire crowd in the arena stood up & gave them a standing ovation in appreciation of both boxers & the battle they had waged.
I like what Foreman said afterwards when he was being interviewed. He said, "I lost the fight, but...as long as you’re alive you can dream." "You’re never too old to dream."
Caleb had a dream of conquering the mountain God had promised 40 years earlier. He knew taking the mountain area populated with giants wouldn’t be easy, but he said, “The Lord helping me, I will drive them out just as He said.”
When God is in your dream and you take the initiative even through you are weaker than the giants, God specializes in killing giants.
• God helped a stuttering Moses to become a deliverer of the people of Israel.
• God enabled Gideon with only 300 soldiers armed with pitchers and trumpets to defeat the army of the Midianites.
• God enabled young shepherd boy with only a piece of rawhide and a smooth stone to defeat Goliath.
• God empowered the apostles armed only with the good news of the Gospel to overcome the Empire and turn the world right side up.
In retirement years you can keep the ZING in your life and ZEST in your activities.
In my second year as Conf. Supt. I received a call from Sandy McDonald. He had effectively served several churches in Michigan. He told me he had turned 64 and wanted to give his retirement years to planting a new church in Bradenton, FL. He owned a mobile home there and all he needed help with was his Medicare hospital insurance. I was excited about the prospect of having a new church planted in Bradenton where we had no FM church.
After six years he left a strong congregation in a small church on several acres of property in a growing part of Bradenton.
In Dr. Paul Brand’s book, "In His Image," he writes about his mother. She was seventy-five years old and still walking miles every day, visiting the villages in the southern part of India, teaching the people about Jesus. At seventy-five, she fell & broke her hip. After two days of just lying there in pain, some workers found her & put her on a makeshift cot & loaded her into their jeep & drove one hundred and fifty miles over deep rutted roads to find a doctor who could set the broken bones. But the very bumpy ride damaged her bones so badly that her hip never completely healed. He said, "I visited my mother in her mud-covered hut. At age seventy-five, with a broken hip, unable to stand on her own two legs, I suggested that she retire … She turned around & looked at me & said, `What value is that? If we try to preserve this body just a few more years & it is not being used for God, of what value is that?’" So she kept on working. She kept on riding her donkey to villages until she was ninety-three years old. At age ninety-three she couldn’t stay on her donkey anymore. She kept falling off. But she didn’t stop preaching. Indian men would carry her in hammocks from one village to another. And she continued to tell people about Jesus Christ until she died at age ninety-five.
Let’s face the future with zing and make zest our daily lifestyle. Ask God what mission and mountain He has for you to conquer.
