Oh, I hate to admit it, but the years are beginning to add up. I get reminded of this on anniversaries of major events in history that I’ve experienced. The news media will remind us of an event that seems like it happened only a few years ago, but we’re given the factual date of decades making one wonder where the time has gone. Well anyway, isn’t it weird how some world events can be so rooted in our memory and even bringing about great emotion when contemplated? One such event surfaced just this past week that still impacts the generation of “baby boomers” like no other. Up front I want you to know, that I know, Elvis is dead. I kind of fell in the years when Elvis and “rock ‘n roll” didn’t mean anything to me. If it didn’t have a big engine, chrome and wheels, it didn’t turn my head. So, the day Elvis died, I was busy working, customizing a ’68 Vette, when my boss, a few years older than me, announced with tears, Elvis had died. Sorry, but I didn’t shed a tear. Now, thirty years later, thousands of people stood in line outside “Graceland”, the Presley estate, for upwards to fifteen hours, just to walk past the burial place of Elvis Presley. There are hundreds of impersonators around the globe entertaining millions of people, keeping the memory of ‘Elvis’ alive for as many years as possible. Elvis literally changed the world with his life, even as short as it was.
[1 Thessalonians 1] I’m reminded that school starts again very soon, yeh, that’s been many years ago too, and I can’t help but think, and maybe worry a little, about who and what is influencing our children, filling their memory banks and shaping their future. Our children are like computers, starting out with the basics, allowing them to function, but unable to produce anything due to the lack of input, or knowledge. I can’t help but to repeat what every computer expert agrees on, “garbage in – garbage out”. I’ve got to express this. School is opening the eyes of our children to the world. Who is opening their hearts to the truth? Youth is a precious period of life and is the time when our habits of life are made. It seems in too many cases, parents tend to drift away from their children after they start school. Too many parents follow the ideology of allowing children to sow their wild oats, believing that when they get older, they will get better. All children are out to please someone in their life. Throughout life we’re all looking for praise for our accomplishments, that’s what motivates us to press on to higher ground. Who will your children most want to be like while growing in the truth they are being taught? Who would you most like to see your children imitate in life? Now is the time to instill the great values and principles of truth and righteousness. Now is the time to teach them Jesus and the truths taught by Him and the Apostles found in the New Testament of the Bible. When children are taught of authority and of God when they are young, they will have a foundation upon which they can stand when they get older. They must learn honesty, above all. Honesty will allow them to see the truth, when otherwise they might be blinded by the prejudices of the world. Just what is being input to the memory of your child? How will your child function on his own when it comes time to compute a right or wrong decision? Jesus, as short as His life was, changed the world. Are you willing to hold your child’s hand and show him the cross of Jesus, the one who died for our sins? Can you imitate Jesus in order to open his heart to the truth and love of life?
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