By Johnnie Godwin
Contributing Columnist, B&R
A margin is a boundary, a border, or an edge. To be in the margin in printing or in life means to be close to the limit of value or usefulness — to be of minor effect or importance. In society — since 1970 — to be marginalized refers to a person, group, or thing treated as unimportant, powerless, less desirable, insignificant, or peripheral. To marginalize people may mean to exclude or ignore them by isolating them or leaving them on the fringes of society.
The tendency to marginalize the elderly. Dad was only 75 when he was visiting us and overheard a neighbor tell Phyllis her 93-year-old dad was going to have surgery (to extend his life). Dad always said just what he thought. Privately to me, Dad said, “That seems like a waste.” When people have lived to Medicare age (65) or three-score-and-ten (70), or even AARP card age (50), society tends to treat them differently. Older people may get marginalized: they become mere footnotes in society, living in the margins, and not making a difference. But older people may marginalize themselves. And that’s bad.
Johnnie Godwin
When people marginalize themselves by age, you can tell it in different ways. They tend to give up on becoming caregivers and expect only to be care-receivers. Older people can get stereotyped. Think what comes to your mind when you think of the elderly: e.g. handicap parking spots closest to the action, discounts younger people don’t get, being a pain to others, giving up on mainstream living, and shuffling along or riding in a motorized cart that takes up half a grocery store aisle. Old people may get crusty, negative, and feel they’re cheated in life and don’t make any difference. I’m only 80, but I refused to get marginalized by others or to marginalize myself. I try to treat myself as if I were Methuselah and that God is still calling me every day. So I wake up asking God what He wants me to do; and my answer is already, “Yes!”
The elderly may be a gold mine of wisdom, knowledge, and experience. My youngest son teaches a Bible class that is made up of the oldest men of his South Carolina church. Besides the great study and stuff he brings to the class, he asks questions. And he tells me what the old guys answer and the viewpoints they share. He learns from them! And, really, my son has been doing this ever since he got over being young. Half-jokingly, I often tell people this: “I’m older, wiser, and know more than I ever have; and people care less about that than they ever have.” No, not really; I make a difference; and I will not go into the darkness quietly. Rather, I’ll go on into God’s full light with brightness in my eyes and knowing that my works will follow me (Revelation 14:13).
Now, to generalize, I realize that elderly people can be a royal pain! But that ought to be the exception. My mother died at the age of 89. For at least the last two decades of her life, one of her favorite sayings about almost any experience she had was this: “I believe this is the best it has ever been.” And that philosophy and lifestyle made its way to us siblings, to Mother’s grandchildren, and is “osmosisizing” into the lives of her great-grandchildren. Don’t miss this!
Don’t miss what the elderly have to contribute to you, your church, and all society. Don’t let the elderly you come in contact with marginalize themselves or let others do it to them. I believe it’s a sin to quit living before you quit breathing. Yet, we live in an indulgent society that focuses on retirement and money in retirement to indulge self. Such egoism and egotism is unbiblical. God doesn’t expect our successful surgery and extended life to be a gift of indulgence. Rather, He expects the extra time to be a gift of stewardship for us to keep discovering His will, saying yes, and living out His will every day we occupy space on this earth.
Avoid letting the calendar marginalize your life! Some people are so fatalistic that they default to the belief that everybody has a number; and when your number is up, you’re finished — you’re through. Only God knows that number He has assigned. And it is absolutely wrong for us to live life by the calendar and give up on life before God calls us home.
Read all of II Kings 20. King Hezekiah was sick unto death. The prophet Isaiah told him, “The Lord said, ‘Set thine house in order; for thou shalt die, and not live’ ” (II Kings 20:1). Hezekiah was devastated and wept and prayed. Then before Isaiah had gotten into the middle court, God told Isaiah to turn around with a reverse message. God told Isaiah to tell Hezekiah he had heard his prayers and was going to give him and the city 15 more years (II Kings 20:5-6). Do you understand what the Bible teaches here? It teaches that God hears prayers and may change His intentions because of the prayers — though God eternally remains the same. Your number is not up until God decides it is up and time for you to go home.
Dealing with reality in aging. My message basically is the Bible teaching that we are to live all life as long as God gives it to us. We do not have His permission to give up on life. Nevertheless, aging has its effect on all who grow older. In time, time takes its toll upon us. Our doctors know the symptoms of “groans and stones” all too well. And they try to treat us so we can live quality lives as we grow older. There is a specialty for just about everything that can go wrong with the body — even though the body and mind are wondrously made to serve our earthly purposes (until we get our eternal body (II Corinthians 4-5). But no doctor or guru can totally keep us from getting decrepit and needing attention to body, mind, and soul. Mainly, don’t give up before you have to.
This week at breakfast, a pastor asked me this question as a philosophical question —“Johnnie, if you had to completely lose your mental faculties or all of the use of your body, which would you choose?” I answered immediately by saying, “You know the answer to that.” My own mother-in-law and the questioner’s mother both suffered Alzheimer’s or dementia or “old-timers” — as some call it. My primary care physician told me years ago as we discussed this horrible condition, “It would be good if the mind and body died at the same time.” But increasingly that doesn’t seem to be what happens. Now, I’ve studied options and ways of dealing with loved ones and others in such a condition. Euthanasia literally means “good death.” We all want a good death. In the meantime, God doesn’t give us the choice; it’s His. But give me my mind even if I lose everything else. And I will not be marginalized. I will live and breathe with fire in my bones expressed for God even if it’s through a minimal means to make my spirit — God’s Spirit in me — known. Enough! Don’t be a “face receiver” (literal meaning of partial in the Bible), and don’t let anyone else marginalize you and put you beyond life’s active borders. Count for God until the last breath of life is lived — when you breathe out your last breath and never breathe in again. Amen!
— Copyright 2017 by Johnnie C. Godwin Write him: johnniegodwin@aol.com.
