Robert Lowery

My age is a metaphor.
It only speaks of everything before.
“War is Kind” Song by Jakob Dylan

Robert Allen Lowery was born at Methodist Hospital in Indianapolis, the firstborn son of Ercel and Adrene Lowery. My paternal grandfather’s middle name was Allen and my first name was given to me in honor of an uncle of mine, an uncle who became very dear to me and one whom I miss to this very day. I still remember his love and gentle spirit. Uncle Bob was always a gentleman, always dressed like one (I never saw him out of a suit, even when fishing or working in his garden, a pin-stripped brown suit with matching Fedora), always spoke like one, and always smoked cigars like one. I loved him and still love him.

LX. Sixty. 60. Of course, I am not alone: Samuel L. Jackson, Jackson Browne, Al Gore, Sally Struthers, Phylicia Rashad, Cat Stevens, Robert Plant, Olivia Newton-John, Brian Eno, Richard Simmons, James Taylor, Alice Cooper, Stevie Nicks, Prince Charles, et al. Yet in rereading the list I don’t know that I would want to spend any significant amount of time, if any, with any of those individuals.

Frankly, in the weeks leading up to this milestone, I have faced a bit of anxiety. Not that I think I am immortal, but the notion of only five years until sixty five years is disconcerting. I keep reminding myself that our culture gives significance to 65, not God! The only thing I can do now is get really old, I am tempted to think. I do not want to retire unless I have to; I love my ministry at Lincoln Christian Seminary. And yet I know the day is coming, but I keep praying to God to give me another decade as each new decade begins. Rather arrogant, isn’t it, since I am not guaranteed another second?

I have picked up the annoying habit of looking at the daily obituaries. As I scan the announcements, I look at the ages and I am often on the verge of hyperventilating when I see people who have died in their 40s, 50s, and 60s. The first thing I do is look at a connection with a church and if I see one (You know, the kind that reads “was a member of . . . ), and I pray that the individuals truly knew Grace and Truth and then I look at the memorial designation. If it is to an organization for some disease or illness, I breathe a sigh of relief. That means something untoward happened, and the reason for death wasn’t just wearing out because of old age!

I praise God for the days he has given me. I have spent more than half my life married to Marilyn and more than half my life loving my daughter, Rachel, and my son, Brian. And now I have a wonderful son-in-law and daughter-in-law and two marvelous granddaughters to occupy pieces of my heart. I have spent more than half my life ministering in a marvelous setting that has brought me untold opportunities to teach, preach, write as well as be the setting where some of my most precious friendships have been born. I have spent more than half my life reading through the New Testament once a month and the Old Testament twice a year. I have spent more than half my life reading countless research papers and theses and loving every minute, well, almost every minute. I have spent more than half my life discipling men and women who want to be servant-leaders. I have spent more than half my life going to Bob Dylan concerts (over a hundred and still counting).

In recent days, I have had to correct myself when I have said that I don’t “feel” 60. What does that mean, for goodness sake? We have no idea about what it “feels” like to be a number any more than we know what it feels like to be dead.

I do not know who wrote the following words, but I resonate with them: “Life becomes more right the longer we live and the reason of everything appears more clear; what has puzzled us before seems less mysterious and the crooked paths look straighter as we approach the end.” Regardless of who wrote these words and why, I am able to affirm them because I try to focus my eyes–even while wearing progressive tri-focal lenses!–on the Ancient of Days.

And so the journey in growing in Grace and Truth continues. But I know that above all, I travel Under the Mercy. Praise God!

But before I sign off, let me share some Dylan lyrics one more time. In fact, they are from my favorite song penned by the man, “Every Grain of Sand” (listen on YouTube).  The poetry is like a mirror in which I see my own reflection as I begin a new decade of life:

In the time of my confession, in the hour of my deepest need
When the pool of tears beneath my feet flood every newborn seed
There’s a dyin’ voice within me reaching out somewhere,
Toiling in the danger and in the morals of despair.

Don’t have any inclination to look back on any mistake,
Like Cain, I know behold this chain of events that I must break.
In the fury of the moment I can see the Master’s hand
In every leaf that trembles, in every grain of sand.

Oh, the flowers of indulgence and the weeds of yesteryear,
Like criminals,they have choked the breath of conscience and good cheer.
The sun beat down upon the steps of time to light the way
To ease the pain of idleness and the memory of decay.

I gaze into the doorway of temptation’s angry flame
And every time I pass that way I always hear my name.
Then onward in my journey I come to understand
That every hair is numbered like every grain of sand.

I have gone from rags to riches in the sorrow of the night
In the violence of a summer’s dream, in the chill of a wintry light,
In the bitter dance of loneliness fading into space
In the broken mirror of innocence, on each forgotten face.

I hear the ancient footsteps like the motion of the sea
Sometimes I turn, there’s someone there, other times it’s only me.
I am hanging in the balance of the reality of man
Like every sparrow falling, like every grain of sand.