I Learned a New Word Today...

I recently completed a three week training course for my new job.  It was intense, but very informative.  One of the things that I really enjoy about my new employer is their commitment to Family and Traditional Values.  At the end of the coursework for one of the days, they attached a pdf document entitled, "Good Habit Inventory."  It stated, "We really are creatures of habit.  If 80% of our productivity comes from habit, it is imperative that we monitor and change our non-productive habits."  It then proceeded to list out recommended habits - about half were work-related, but half were personal in nature.  I won't elaborate on each item as there were 29 of them.  I will, however, list a few:

• Read for pleasure two hours per week
• Read paper after the kids are in bed
• Congratulate one person each day
• Maximum of 3 cuss words per day
• Read the Bible daily
• Don't eat snacks after supper
• Do 25 sit-ups each day
• Spend 15 minutes each day in quiet time
• Hear what family members have to say
• Spend at least 20 minutes with each child each day
• Learn one new word three days each week

First observation is this: I've never worked for a company that was genuinely interested in helping their employees deepen the quality of their family time, personal time and their spiritual life.  It impressed my socks off.  In a dog-eat-dog world of modernity, where we all feel like we are cogs in a corporate wheel or 'just a number,' or merely a tool to be used to get the job done, it is refreshing to know that there is a company that is not afraid to recommend that their employees 'Read the Bible everyday' or spend time with their children!

So, along those same lines, I learned a new word today.  I like vocabulary.  I had never heard of this word before: Hiraeth.

That is my new favorite word!  Hiraeth.  If you've read the blog for any period of time, you know that I am a hopeless nostalgic.  Some of my ramblings about memories of the past read like Lamentations!  

Before I begin new ruminations about this topic, I want to preface it with the fact that I know and I'm fully aware that things in the past were not perfect.  The "good old days," in many respects, were not the good old days for everyone.  Many people were in poverty, the life expectancy wasn't what it is now, people worked HARD, and so on and so forth.  However, there are aspects of those days that I feel great hiraeth for.  The emotion, the longing for what has been lost is palpable as I look at old photos and black and white films that contain people that had next to nothing but had joy.  Their smiles and innocence and optimism despite truly hard times is inspiring.

Our nation was together.  Families stayed together.  People had dignity.  People worked hard.  They were proud of their country.  They worked with their hands.  They attended church together and prayed together.  The economy was such that the head of the household could earn a living to adequately support his family, and the wife, if she wanted to, could stay home and raise the kids.  What has happened?  

We very rarely eat out.  We grow most of our own food.  Wednesday night after church we joined some church members at Wendy's to be social.  Tricia had a salad and water.  I had a spicy chicken sandwich and a small drink.  The total was $18.95!  We had a GREAT visit with our brothers and sisters in Christ, but I left hungry and unsatisfied by the meal.  I want to be very honest with you when I say that this modern world has left me hungry and unsatisfied.  I want to retreat very far away from modernity.

There are help wanted signs at every place of business, but no one wants to work.  The churches are largely vacant.  People's heads are glued to their phones.  Manners are non-existent.  The people are entertained with Bread & Circuses while "Rome" burns.  History doesn't repeat itself, but it often rhymes.  The filth and pollution that fill the airways, television and Internet promotes culture that is bankrupt with no redeeming qualities whatsoever.

What happened?  We have been robbed.  The global elites, politicians bought and paid for have sacrificed the American people, the moral rot and decay we willingly consume have corrupted our land.  I cannot blame it on outside forces, though.  We, like the children in The Pied Piper of Hamelin, have been lured away, never to be seen again, or at least, not resembling the people we once were.

Can we go back?  Is it too late?  Is there hope?  I have good news.  There is always hope in the LORD.  Things may get better for a season, but the Bible tells us that things will get worse.  We know how the story ends.  Judgment is coming!  There is a curse on the land since the fall of Adam.  The Bible tells us that creation groans for the curse to be broken.  Jesus died on the cross to break the curse of sin and death.  Trust in Him.  Read His Word.  Walk with Him.  Grow in Him.  It is time to turn to the "author and perfecter of our faith."

In speaking of our new vocabulary word of the day: HIRAETH, a homesickness for a home to which you cannot return, I want to share some good news with you.  You CAN go to that home.  C.S. Lewis once said,

“If we find ourselves with a desire that nothing in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that we were made for another world.”

That other world is found by placing your faith in Jesus Christ.