http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Josh+14%3A10-11&version=NIV1984
http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Ps%2090:10-12&version=NIV1984
Yesterday we looked at the fact that everyone gets older. Or they die. There is no third option. And how when we are young, or when our children are young, getting old is not dreaded. Rather, it is something that is looked forward to.
Somewhere in the 60's our culture’s lookout on age changed. Dramatically. I’m not exactly sure why, but it did. Previous to this (and practically to the beginning of time) old age was respected. Valued. In practically every human civilization ‘elders’ (parents, grandparents, community leaders) were looked up to. Admired. Sought out for their wisdom and experience. Entire generations longed for the day when they would become ‘old’. Then, in 1964, a student named Jack Weinberger, a free speech activist, said something to the effect - “Don’t trust anyone under 30.” That phrase soon became the rallying cry for the entire generation of boomers. Perhaps for the first time in history being ‘older’ was seen as a negative. As something to be avoided. At all costs.
Of course, I don’t think that there is any getting around the fact that becoming old has its share of disadvantages. Gray hair. Baldness. Wrinkled skin. Brown spots. Flabby muscles. Hearing loss. Diminished eye sight. Decaying or missing teeth. Loss of memory. Balance. Strength. Bad knees. Bad hips. Bad heart. Pain. In multiple places. As people in my church share with me their various issues related to aging we agree that, “Getting old isn’t for sissies!” No, it actually takes a great deal of courage, determination and grit to deal with old age.
In the past couple decades, as the boomer generation has gotten older (a lot of irony here), the fear of either looking old or being perceived as old has caused widespread panic and paranoia. Entire products lines and industries have emerged to combat this reality. Millions of women now color their gray hair. That's a given. But so do a lot of men. I noticed this recently when watching sports on TV. How is that Brent Musburger (72) and Bob Costas (60) don’t have a single gray hair? They color it, that's why! And so do male news anchors. And TV actors. Which brings us to other means of avoiding aging. Botox injections. Anti-wrinkling creams. Cosmetic surgery. Then there’s the clothes. Heaven forbid that anyone should wear anything even remotely old-fashioned! The result is that we have a lot of retirement-age Americans who are trying to look and act half their age. I don’t know about you but there is something very pathetic about that!
So old age has become the proverbial ‘boogey man’. It stalks us at every turn. We come face-to-face with it every time we look in the mirror. Every time our picture is taken. Every time we go out in public. Every time we see an advertisement for looking younger. We can’t avoid it. But is getting old all gloom and doom? Isn’t there anything good about it at all? I believe there is. More about this tomorrow.
Lord, help me not to dread or fear getting older. Help me to avoid the world’s way of dealing with it. To either deny it or to desperately struggle against it. Help me to realize that a long life is actually one of Your blessings. Help me to accept where I am in life and who You’ve made me to be. And who I am going to be someday when I stand in Your presence. In Jesus’ name, Amen.
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