When was the last time that you felt that feeling. You know the one where you felt you were on top of the world. I t seemed that it had been a very long time for me. I have been like a bumper car the last twenty years. I tried to be in control but someone or something would rear-end me. I would climb to a top position just about to make it when I would be side swiped. I am not complaining because that was a part of life so far as I could see. I do remember the times when I was close to making it. I remember what it was like when I felt like I was on top of the world. I recall the feeling of invincibility. I remember that I could walk with my head held high and I really felt good about myself. I knew that this time I had made it. Then life would happen and a rear-ending of my bumper car would change my direction even my course in life. When Moses got to the top of the mountain and God told him he would not be in the promise land he must have hated it. He could have felt like a failure. He may have wept to learn that he was not going to get into the promise land after obeying God and leading this group of thousands of people around in the wilderness for years. I was beginning to hate that I wouldn’t even get to see the promise land. I was looking for the promise land and that feeling in the wrong places. I am the one that always preached that the family and relationships was where one should spend their time even though I may not have been the best example. I had begun looking to the world for my affirmation. I had begun to look in all the wrong places for this elusive and much wanted affirmation. When I felt that I would die before achieving this I was blindsided with it. I have received it from the most unusual source.
A few years ago I was still a smoker. I was not a regular smoker. I was excellent at it. I could be good at some things but I was a great smoker. I could smoke three packs of cigarettes a day and be proud of it. I have had three cigarettes burning at one time and was very happy when the patrolman past by me because he was speeding forty miles an hour faster than me and I was thirty miles over the limit. I could make you think that smoking was a good thing for me. I could convince you that it was not hurting me but I knew it was a lie every morning in the bathroom when I tried to cough up my guts. I needed to quit and nothing was helping me. My family would have taken bets that I would not quit. My children believed in me and knew I could do it. Actually I know they had no hope that I would quit. You could hear in their voices that they wished I would but had no assurance that I could do it. I was offered a gift if I could quit. I was told that they meaning my daughter and daughter in law would give me grandchildren if I quit. I have wanted many things in life but I really, really wanted grandchildren. I knew that both were planning to have children and that they were just using this to persuade me to quit. I also knew that before I could hold my grandchildren I would have to wash my hands to get rid of the smell of nicotine. I also knew that if I were to hold my grandchildren that the smell on my clothes would be transfered to them. I love the smell of a baby and a small child and I did not want this on my grandchildren. For some reason things began to click and soon I was able to finally quit that nasty habit. Now I have grandchildren and I am happy.
Not long ago my children and grandchildren were at my smokeless house for a visit. I was having the time of my life playing with and trying to spoil them when I could. I loved the patter of their feet on the floor even if I had to hold a little hand to keep them from falling. I loved the smell of the house that comes with having small children in it. I loved the sounds they make and I loved watching their parents be parents because it seemed like it was yesterday they were my little babies. I loved holding my grandchildren and searching in their eyes for the wonder the world brings to them. During this visit I wasn’t on bumper cars but I was the leader in a NASCAR race. I was out front and no one could catch me much less change my course by rear-ending me. My granddaughter walked across the room at 14 months old and touched me on my knee. I looked down at her and she wanted a kiss. I gave her what she was looking for but for some reason I think she did it because I needed a kiss even more that she did. I needed her to love me and know me and accept me. At that moment I felt she did all of these and I started my climb back to the top of that mountain. My grandson has been to visit three times this summer and I am proud to say he loves it at Grandpas house. He has slept better here and has been a joy to play with. I have been a part of his life as when he is here I seem to be one of his favorite buddies. He climbs in my lap and chooses me to be his buddy. We laugh and play and I am at the top of the mountain. In the presence of these two children, I have reached the top of the mountain and have seen part of the promise land. The promise land is the future and I only have a few years left to make that future better for them. The promise land is our hope that the world will be a better place for them. The land of promise is in our smallest children and their ability to make the world better than we did. I’ve seen the promise land and one of its leaders left my house today to go to his own home with his wonderful parents and I wept. I wept not out of sadness but out of happiness. I wept because I miss both of them so much already. I know it is because I need them much more than they need me but still I wept. When Moses saw the promise land I know now, he was happy and he must have wept.
