Ray Riemen’s Harvest Memories October 30, 2006
Last week Michael Powers published an autumn story I authored, called “Harvest Moon.” It was published in the Chicken Soup for the Soul series a few years ago. When Ray Reiman read it he began to reminisce and sent me a delightful note. As you can tell Ray does some writing, too and has something to say from his rich life.
LETTER FROM RAY RIEMEN:
Hi Ken!
Great “Heart Touchers” story about your granddad harvesting corn! He was much like my dad–a hard working, very honest farmer who died some years ago at age 89. Dad also was a fantastic corn “picker” by hand—not necessarily before one-row pickers were used but before he had money to buy such a fancy machine.
Even though Dad was much older than we high school sons on our Northwest Iowa farm, he could outpick any two of us! And he did! As my oldest brother and I were picking corn at one wagon behind him, we had a heck of a time keeping up with him!
Of course, our wagons were each “powered” by a team of horses that we harnessed in the dark (after first feeding the hogs, milking the cows and eating breakfast!) and drove to the field before daylight. I remember having to first “find” the ears of corn in the darkness to pitch into the wagon.
After each filling our wagons by throwing the ears against the “bang boards” by noon, we’d head home to unload the corn at the elevator at the corn crib, feed the horses, eat a quick lunch (”dinner” in those days), and head back to the field to start the whole business once again.
By the time it got too dark to pick any more, we’d drive back home to unload the corn into the corn crib, unharness and feed the horses, cattle and hogs, eat supper, drag our tired bodies into bed for a night’s sleep to start all over again before daylight the next day!!!
Oh, by the way, when we were younger, this all started with a two-week “vacation” (yeah, right!) from GRADE school that was declared every fall so that we kids could help pick corn!!!
Then, as we got into high school and beyond, Dad would let us use his horses and wagons to pick corn for larger-farm neighbors so we could go out and make big bucks! Hey, as much as 3c-5c a bushel at first and then later as awesome as 10c a bushel! And if we were good, we could make as much as $10 a day!
Wow! And kids think they have it tough these days! I don’t think we ever complained. We certainly never even thought of not going out to pick corn every day!…
…It’s been fun reminiscing, Ken! Thanks for listening! –Ray
You can write Ray at: eagleover50@juno.com
A Father’s Dreams
On a late-October night in western Ohio, twenty-five years ago, a young couple checked into a hospital in the little village of Coldwater, Ohio. The young woman labored through the jaws of death into life. At about quarter of ten in the morning, I became a father. The baby was a boy, a fine, first-born son.
We named him Kyle Dale. His first name means integrity, his middle name was taken from a man who had died a year before in October, my grandfather, who had modeled a lifetime of integrity.
There is no way to describe the joy that flooded into my soul in those days. I would turn twenty-three a few days later. That night I left my young, happy wife with a tiny child nestled at her breast and went home euphoric with joy that has not dimmed in a quarter of a century.
The next day was a Saturday. That afternoon Kyle and I watched our first college football game together. Ohio State beat Purdue 45-33 and all was right with the world. I let him nurse on commercials and at the half.
My most vivid memory was that morning, when I came into the hospital and bounded up the stairs to see my wife and our baby. I peered through the nursery window at my son. He was such a tiny human being, just a little under eight pounds. I thought my heart would burst with happiness. I stood, looking at him through the window. Then and there I determined that we would be as close as any father and son could ever be.
Plans formed in my heart of things we would do together. I would teach him to ride a bike, catch a baseball, throw a spiral, and mow the lawn. We would camp and hike and fish together. We would raise a dog, his very own dog, a dog that would follow him wherever he went. We would seek the Lord together and I would teach him to love Jesus and savor his creation. Maybe he would be a pastor, too. That would make four generations of pastors in our family. My mind raced with plans that morning and it seemed that I had years and years to fulfill them together.
Twenty-five of those years are passed already in a whirl I can’t believe. He no longer lives under our roof– a little boy with a shock of bangs jutting from the front of his ball cap set back on his head. He no longer sleeps in the next room with a little stuffed dog named “Scruffy.” He has made his way out into the world. He has a wife of his own and they will have their own child by spring.
I have often thought of that morning looking through the nursery window and the plans, even vows, that formed deep in my soul to do things with my son. If a flawed, sinful, selfish, earthly father has plans in his heart for his child, how much more must our perfect heavenly father long for fellowship with each of his children? What must his plans for each of us be? Think of it. He has good plans for you beating in his father-heart.
That is what Jesus said; “If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him!” (Mat 7:11 ESV)
Ken Pierpont
Brook Place
Hinsdale, Illinois
October 30, 2006
October Weekend October 23, 2006
It’s been blustery in the Western Suburbs of Chicago lately. Saturday we enjoyed a drive in the county and a visit to a fall festival complete with pumpkins, and Indian corn, a hayride, music, and a huge craft barn. We may only have a little over a week of autumn color left to enjoy.
Sunday morning we drove south again to First Baptist Church in Momence. I preached on “America in Scripture” from Romans 1:18-32. Why America is under the judgment of God, what happens when a nation in under God’s judgment, and what to do about it. A significant number of the men of the church came forward at the end of the service with little prompting to say; “That’s the kind of man I want to be…” It looks like I may preach regularly at First Baptist for a while.
Sunday night I preached here at the IBLP Staff Center again. I gave a quick overview of the book of Romans to emphasize the list of virtues that should be present in a consecrated community of believers found in Romans 12:9-21. I called it, “The House Rules for Christian Community.” I think we all long for the kind of experience in Christian community described there. We stayed late at the Staff Center over diner talking about the things of the Lord.
Wanna’ Start Something?
Saturday evening I was out redeeming my Sweetest Day. I was preoccupied in my thoughts weighing weather I should buy candy, flowers, or a cookbook for my Sweetest. I should have been paying more attention to my driving. I paused at a corner in a shopping center parking lot and without realizing it I rolled through a four-way stop. I pulled away from the stop sign before the fellow who had the right-of-way. He laid on his horn and his car lunged forward as if he was going to slam into me broadside.
I thought; “Wow, if I had a Beemer that nice I don’t think I would play bumper cars with it.” I glanced over just in time to see his distorted, angry, homicidal face. I looked at him as if to say, “oops–sorry,” but I don’t think I was able to communicate my contrition.
Such a fuss, I thought, about being about three seconds later wherever he was going. I’m just a village parson at heart. I’m used to people being a little nicer. I love the western suburbs of Chicago, but I’m having a little trouble adjusting. You should see what happens if you slow down to enjoy an autumn drive through the neighborhood. People here are all in a big hurry and they are often just plain not nice.
I am thinking of starting a “be nice” campaign. We could have hats and tee shirts that say “BE NICE.” We could have “be nice” meetings, and maybe even write some “be nice” songs. We could have a membership of nice people. Maybe we could get a “NICE” movement started.
There are exceptions, like our neighbor, Trudy, who invited us to her fall gathering Saturday and made sure we all had a piece of her special home-made bread and cocoa. There aren’t enough exceptions though. I think we should go on a mission to make more. I guess, when you get right down to it that should be one of the primary effects of getting the gospel to people.
If your sins are forgiven, you know you are on your way to heaven, and you have the Holy Spirit living in you, you would have good reason to be nice.
I’m thinking of a thick coffee mug with bold letters; BE NICE. Underneath in smaller letters; “You don’t look so scary that way.”
Ken Pierpont
Brook Place
Hinsdale, IL
October 23, 2006
Learning to Listen October 17, 2006
I went to refill my coffee cup at Panera this morning. A woman was there rooting through her large bag, which she had set on the counter along with her pastries and enough coffees for what appeared to be a small office staff. She was talking on her cell phone. Waiting to refill my mug, I was a captive audience.
“I don’t have them…. I’m sure I don’t have them,” she was saying. “Are you sure you didn’t use them last?” “Wait, I remember. They’re in the zipper pocket of my pink jacket. It’s hanging in the hall closet. If they’re not there call me back.”
I saw a brief opening and slipped my mug under the spout and filled it with black coffee. I made my way back to my computer to write, imagining her husband late for work, looking for the car keys, rooting through the hall closet for the pink jacket with the zipper pocket.
Steam spiraled up from my mug and I got to thinking. To make life work is a combination of a lot of little stuff. Find the keys, take out the trash, pay the bills, pay the bills some more, find the stuff you lost, wash it, clean it, put it away, get it out, use it again, fix it, insure it, store it, well… you know.
Days become weeks, weeks become months. Seasons and pass into seasons and years into years and you can stay so busy with all that little stuff that you just don’t take time for things that are really important, like listening. Maybe there is no better way to show someone that you love them than to listen to them. That is one of my goals in life. I want to learn to be a better listener.
Listen with my ears.
Listen with my eyes.
Listen with my posture.
Listen with my heart.
So far I’ve mostly been working on talking. When I’m not talking I like to write. I’m closing in on forty-eight years of talking, my kids would day pretty much non-stop. I want to spend the next half-century learning to be a really good listener. That way the people I love will know it and I will know them.
I want them to have memories of me listening with my ears and my eyes and my heart not just tossing the keys to them while I am on the way in and they are on the way out.
Ken Pierpont
Brook Place
Hinsdale, Illinois
October 17, 2006
Long Thoughts on a Short Autumn Day October 9, 2006
It’s October. Locust leaves fell like snow from the trees yesterday. The furnace kicked on last night. Just before drifting into sleep I meditated on one of the beautiful “harvest passages” of the Bible:
“In past generations he allowed all the nations to walk in their own ways. Yet he did not leave himself without witness, for he did good by giving you rains from heaven and fruitful seasons, satisfying your hearts with food and gladness.” (Act 14:16-17 ESV)
It’s that time of the year again.
I often write on the brevity of autumn as an analogy of life. Our lives are swift as a sunset, brief as an autumn day and it is a good idea to keep that in mind. Good things happen when we pray what I like to call the “Prayer of Moses” “Teach us to number our days that we may apply our hearts to wisdom.” (Psalm 90:12)
This time of the year is time for reflection. One of the things to think about is the swift-passing of the years. When I think of that I realize that I cannot afford waste time.
Your life is too short to wait to live. How rude and thoughtless to squander the Father’s good gifts.
Your life is too short to wait to love. Love you wife, your husband, you children, your parents, your grandparents, your neighbor, your enemy while you can. It will only be a few days and we won’t have them to love anymore. (Hebrews 12:7)
Your life is too short to nurse your hurts or curse your circumstances. Life is to short to withhold forgiveness. Life is too short, don’t waste it in bitterness. “.. forgiving one another, even as God for Christ’s sake…” (Ephesians 4:32)
Your life is too short for to carry the burden of past sin. Allow evil to be unrestrained in your life will destroy you, cripple you, deform you and damage relationships that are dear to you.
Your life is too short for empty things. Satan will be happy to ruin your life with things that seem innocent but are not your best use of time.
Your life is too short to keep the gospel to yourself… Love people, tell people, invite people to Jesus. You don’t know how long you have. Who are you loving right now? Who are you telling right now? Who are you praying for right now?
When the furnace kicks on in the night this week…
When you see the birds forming and going south…
When you see the farmers hurrying to the grain elevator like squirrels to their tree…
When you see the leaves blowing down and the trees becoming bare…
…Remember one of the most powerful and oft repeated lessons in the Bible…
Life is short. Sun is setting, leaves are falling…. Do it now. Our lives are as swift as a sunset and brief as an autumn day.
For a thousand years in your sight are but as yesterday when it is past, or as a watch in the night. You sweep them away as with a flood; they are like a dream, like grass that is renewed in the morning: in the morning it flourishes and is renewed; in the evening it fades and withers. (Psa 90:4-6 ESV)
O LORD, make me know my end and what is the measure of my days; let me know how fleeting I am! Behold, you have made my days a few handbreadths, and my lifetime is as nothing before you. Surely all mankind stands as a mere breath! Selah. Surely a man goes about as a shadow! Surely for nothing they are in turmoil; man heaps up wealth and does not know who will gather! “And now, O Lord, for what do I wait? My hope is in you. (Psa 39:4-7 ESV)
Ken Pierpont
Brook Place
Hinsdale, Illinois
October 9, 2006
Aurora Borealis October 3, 2006
On November 8th, 1991 there was a rare display of the aurora borealis in the cold, clear sky over our farmhouse in south central Ohio. I missed it because at that very moment our sixth child, a boy we named Daniel, was coming into the world. I will always consider that phenomenon a special sign from the Lord for good in Daniel’s life. The rare beauty of God’s magnificent creation exploded in the sky the very moment that our son Daniel was born.
When the last of autumn’s glory blows along the ground and bare branches jut into the gray November sky we will celebrate Daniel’s fifteenth birthday. About five years after his birth we moved further north from Ohio to Michigan. I have spoken in the Upper Peninsula and in northern Michigan and lived in Michigan for years but I have still managed to miss the rare and beautiful heavenly lights.
Ken's new book - Sunset On Summer, now available for order, $13.95 each.