There will come a time in life when we will go it alone. No one to stand for us, bear us up, rise us up or raise us up. Though we may lean the post will soon give way. Leaving us to once again, go it alone. Each one for himself. Each one with himself, only. Certainly, in the end.

We all have chosen how we live our lives. Many for self only, and a few for many others.
When the posts are finally removed, and they will eventually be removed one day, what else is there for us to lean upon? What do you lean upon now?

The culmination of life in the strength of its vortex catapults us to the next moment in our lives and meant to shift us beyond what could ever be imagined. I try to imagine the possibility of the impossible and yet the impossible is more than what I can imagine. Life goes on.

My father was orphaned as an eleven year old boy. Posts were temporary as they could hardly stand the pressure and tension of a young boy growing against the grain. Life was realized on June 15, 1942.

“The scene before my eyes was like a horrible nightmare. An eleven-year-old boy
at the time, I stood petrified and unable to comprehend the terrifying sight. It must
have been true, though, for the seven caskets arranged in a semicircle contained the remains of my father, Guillermo Rubio; my mother, Estefanita Lopez Garcia; three sisters, Sofia, Elena, and Teresita; and two of my brothers, Rosendo and two-year-old Ramon, whose little coffin lay between those of my father and mother.”

(quote from author Abel G. Rubio, Stolen Heritage, revised edition (Austin: Eakin Press, 1986), p.1.

The posts no longer remained. Gone instantly. The strength of the vortex shifted beyond what my father could imagine. Despite an insurmountable tragedy, my father had faith.
My father’s faith drove him in a direction that became something better than the former things in life. His service in the Marine Corps became the foundation which gave his family and him a life of blessing. He lived for others. He wasn’t a man for himself. He was a man for others. As the Marine Corps motto goes, “Semper Fidelis.” Through his faith I have faith. Not because his faith was mine, but because through his faith I was given life to come to faith on my own. He was faithful to his family and to His God. I never knew my father to be anything else but faithful. His faith in God. My faith in God. My father’s life embodied that of the most faithful. Together we share our faith in our God. The legacy of faith has been passed on to the coming generations.

In Hebrews 11: 1 – 40 we are given a summarization of the Old Testament and New Testament saints whose faith girded their lives to live according to what they believed about God and to achieve the very thing they knew was God’s intended purpose for them and for others. Crossing deserts, childbirth beyond the age of conception, an unconditional promise to be realized beyond life ever after, building an ark for the salvation remnant, leading stubborn thousands across the sea as though dry land, quenching the power of fire, escaping the edge of the sword, imprisonment, stonings, mockings, being destitute, afflicted, ill-treated, wandering in mountains, caves, and holes in the ground. So many more beyond what was written. In each mention these saints experienced the strength of the vortex that shifted their lives in ways beyond what could be imagined. The posts they had known that once securely held their lives to the ground had been shaken and removed. The time in life came to go it alone. There was no one to stand up for them, rise them up or raise them up…but God.

God brought them through their insurmountable circumstances for His glory and beyond what they could have imagined. Their journey, though for God, was for all of us. We bear the reward for their faithfulness in God. The legacy of their faith was passed down to all believers. The reward is the something better that we can look to as having happened, that is, the words and works of our Lord Jesus Christ. We live in the era of the fulfillment of Christ. We have that something better in Him.

Our faithfulness are personal demonstrations of our belief in the faithfulness of our Lord God. For what reason would we give our lives over but for God in Christ? What else could explain the martyr-ship of the faithful but the One who is faithful? Why else be faithful to the end yet not having received the promises of God except to follow Him? Faith. It is a gift from God. Through it all, faith is about God. It says most of Him than it can mean about us. We can be faithful and faithless. Yet God is the one who overcomes our faith no matter where the strength of the vortex takes our lives. He perfects our faith. Where there is faith, there is something better, “semper fidelis,” always faithful, Christ our Lord and Savior forever and ever.

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Photo credit by the author. Location: Lake Geneva (“Lac Leman”) in Geneva, Switzerland

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