With June coming to a close, another birthday has come and gone. For some reason, birthdays these days just aren't as exciting as they were earlier in my life. I used to look forward to being the center of attention, the object of celebration for a day. I was always excited about getting presents, and that still is one of the nice things about birthdays, even though my fascination with things isn't what it once was.
But one thing I loved about my birthday back then, about growing older, was that being older meant doing more things, having more privileges. It meant getting to go to school, being old enough to babysit, joining the high school youth group, getting a driver's license, graduating from high school, going to college. I don't think I'm unique in this.You felt that way about getting older at one time too. I guess my question these days is when do we start associating more birthdays with things we can't do? Why do we lose that sense that being older means doing more things, having more to contribute? Why do we start to think that being older means doing fewer things, contributing less, having fewer responsibilities? Do we start going backwards at some point?
The older I get, the more I understand what the psalmist meant when he said that our days are like grass, like flowers that flourish briefly, until the wind blows them down. Life happens fast, and it doesn't last very long. I used to look at my parents or other people when they were the age that I am now and think how old they were. At that age now, I feel like I'm just getting started, and I certainly don't feel old. There's definitely been a physical decline--it's much harder to lose weight now than it was in the past, and there's more that needs to be lost. I just got my first pair of progressive lens glasses because I'm finding it difficult to see things far away and close up. But mentally and emotionally, I feel like I'm better than I've ever been. I have knowledge, work experience, parenting experience--just plain life experience--that makes me a better, more productive, more useful, more confident person than I was back in my twenties. I have more to contribute to family, church, and work.
And that makes it all the more difficult for me to understand why people quit at sixty-five, when they still have so much to offer and so little time to waste. Social security allows them to retire from their jobs, but so many seem to quit everything at that point. And there are still so many needs, so much to do. My parents "retired," but they moved from Ohio up to Michigan to help me raise Katie and Jonathan when I was a young widow. Henry's eighty-something mom, who still drives and serves as meal coordinator at her church, often goes to nursing homes to visit the old people.
Friends of ours recently told us they've bought a condo in Florida, and they'll be going there this winter, like so many of the other mature couples in our church. They've raised their children, their grandchildren are now grown, and, she told us, they don't feel like they have anything to do. And while we're having this conversation, our VBS coordinators are running around, begging people to sign up to help. The average age of our elders is getting lower and lower because the men with maturity who have finished raising their families and actually now have the time to take up such a demanding office are in Florida six months of the year, not long enough to serve here, and not long enough to serve there. These are the people who, because they aren't working regular jobs, should have time to teach Sunday school, lead Bible studies, visit sick people, and take up any number of services in the church.
On the positive side, though, it's wonderful to see the retired school teacher, now in her eighties, teaching VBS faithfully. I've also been told that, as an "experienced" widow, she shepherds the new widows through dark days, encouraging and sharing with them in their sorrow. She may not be putting in forty-plus hours a week anymore, but she's using her time well.
And that's what God calls us to do, as author David Roper (a mature person who has not retired his wisdom and abilities) reminds us: "As long as we have the light of day, we must work--not to conquer, acquire, accumulate, and retire, but to make visible the invisible Christ, and to touch men and women, boys and girls with His love. If we have done all these things, we will have done all we can do, and we can rest easy" (Teach Us to Number Our Days, Discovery House Publishers).
