"see ya down the road," somewhere in Colorado, 1975

Someone wiser than me confessed once the best place to look at the future is yesterday.  Profound, but simple.  As we look back much easier than we look ahead.  The future events often seen more clearly looking back then looking ahead.  And Jesse, a fellow BMW rider, he on an R60/5, reminds me of that truth.  Jesse was what we used to refer to as “good people.”  You met, you were friends, and life went on.  You fit in with his friends, and he with yours.  With both of us meeting along the side of I-25 south of Denver at a rest stop.  I was in my 1973 Chevy van heading to California by myself, with four weeks off from work, two paid, two on me.  I was eating and looking at maps, my first long trip besides Florida, and my R90S was in my bedroom upstairs back at my parents house in Jersey.  So when a BMW pulled in, we were a much tighter group then, I went over, a bond based on BMW was formed, and we sat in my van and got high.  Jesse was one of those long haired hippies left over from the sixties, just ending his seven year quest to get a four year degree.  An anti-hero type, we all respected.  But he was finding the world a bit harsher than the free thinking and loose sex and drugs of college life, and was setting out to teach on an Indian reservation, much like the one in Easy Rider.  Or in my eyes more like the school in Billy Jack where the hippies and the establishment would clash.  He was excited about his new career, and anxious to get to Taos, where ironically Dennis Hopper of Easy Rider fame had been mayor.  A tough town where vigilante law still was evident, and racial prejudices were alive and not so well.  That was where Jesse was going, and I kind of envied him.  More for being on his bike, but of having it all together.  Such was the mindset before I was saved....

For within a few weeks I would come to know Jesus and be saved, and four months later move to Albuquerque.  Looking back at my future it was an exciting time, and I got a job selling motorcycles at Motorsport, BMW, Suzuki, and Triumph.  I did OK, and met many people from all around New Mexico, when one day in walked Jesse.  We both embraced, never thinking we would ever meet again, and particularly in Albuquerque.  We had motorcycles and BMW’s in common, and Jesse was well known at the shop.  They thought it was cool how we knew each other, both of us settling into our new life, and we went to lunch.  He shared how excited he was and how he was making a difference on the rez.  And then he wanted to get high, and I refused.  And told him why.  Less than a year later, less than a year after Jesus had changed my heart and life, my past was before me and I could share how Jesus changed me.  Somehow without being stoned our relationship was different, still friends, but the difference between dreams and reality had changed us.  While the difference between sin and salvation had changed me.  I didn’t want or need drugs any more, I found my comfort in Christ.  But Jesse listened, we parted, and every time I see a blue BMW toaster model, I think of him.  I wonder if my seeds and testimony made an impact?  Still friends, but Jesse still searching, I had found all I needed in Jesus.  And so much more I never knew I needed too. 

God knew all along how our paths would cross, and cross again.  How some would be victors, while some would be victims.  But how he still loved us while we were sinners.  How in my salvation he didn’t love me any more than when I was lost, or any more than Jesse.  We were both lost souls who needed Jesus, I had heard the spirit calling me, I hope Jesse has.  God has allowed me to look back at the future he once gave me, and see how he took me through the highs the lows, the good and bad times, and how he is still with me today.  I often get asked “would you change anything?”  and I quickly answer “no.” I am content in where I am and how God got me there.  He knew best and still knows best.  I can see how in my shameful past he saved me both physically and emotionally, how many times I could have been dead or worse, and how his had protected me. It is in looking back at my future I am secure in looking forward to my future.  You see there are no chance meetings, and too often we only see God in them afterwards.  But each time Jesse and I would say “see ya down the road,”  it was like we would meet again, we just didn’t know how.  Or when.  Or where. 

So to those who aren’t saved and I meet, I say “see ya down the road,”  which I hope is heaven.  We aren’t all there yet, and in God’s wisdom and patience he waited 21 years for me.  Some are quicker, some slower.  Some hear and obey, some hear and deny.  Some wait, which is the same as saying no.  But God is calling each of us to repent and seek his son for forgiveness.  To be saved.  Do you look forward to today, knowing Christ is with you, or are you still worrying, unsure of the future.  Are you saved but still worrying, not seeing Jesus as Lord, but safe in being saved and heaven upon death?  Are you still waiting for that chance meeting with God or has it happened yet?  If a Jesse walked back into your life, would they see a difference? 

Be encouraged you words mean something.  Jesse could see I was sincere, that I had changed.  And in more ways than words can describe.  I listened to his story because we were friends and I cared.  And he did the same.  Do you share Jesus the same way, can they see you care?  Or are you just out witnessing?  Does your testimony meet your lifestyle?  If we looked back at your future, what would it say about you?  What would it say about your tomorrow?  Some are still living the experiment they call life, are you still experimenting with your future without Jesus?  Fallen away, look back to when you first met Jesus, you will be welcomed back.  Still not sure, try him out today, it may be the day of your salvation.  Or the day of your death.  You can plan for your future now by accepting Christ as your savior, and live knowing that someday you will enjoy heaven.  Or deny him and be scared that you are facing hell.  Death is still 100% in everybody’s neighborhood.  Rider or not.

We never know who we will meet, Jesus does.  He has prepared the place and time in his love for us.  I never expected to meet Jesus on my trip, or Jesse again a year later.  But God had me ready for both, and all in between, and for tomorrow, too.  We are just messengers with a message of good news, the gospel in Jesus Christ.  Share him daily, and when needed, use words.  These things shall follow them that believe.  What did your future look like?  “See ya down the road...” knowing the best days are still ahead.  In Christ.

Oh, and by the way, Billy Jack rode a Triumph.

love with compassion,

Mike

matthew25biker.blogspot.com

life before the electric leg

If you started riding less than 35 years ago you may not recognize the lever on the right side of older motorcycles.  The kick starter as its name implies its purpose, disappeared altogether after a 100 year run, finally replaced by an electric leg, the push button starter.  And if you started riding less than 10 years ago you don’t know how to start a carbureted bike.  Old English bikes, and the Dell Ortos on my R90S had ticklers, hold them down until the gas runs on you shoe, then in my case push the button and pray the god of Varta will spin the motor.  But real men as we used to call them, per their insistence, would them try to kick start their bike to life, and if it didn’t light off in two kicks, you pushed it and hoped.  Which is why many of us still park facing downhill, just in case.  And why so many old English bike owners walk with a limp from the kick starter coming back and smacking them in the ankle, causing great pain and cussing.  A far cry from today, where you pull in the clutch, the government providing for those who try to start the bike in gear, and ride away.  Computer controlled engines and fuel injection is almost invisible, and flawless.  No more learning how to adjust a choke, waiting to ride off until the bike is warned up, and instant karma for old riders.  Life before the electric leg made you a participant in starting your bike, and helped you work up a sweat on cold days, and hot ones too.  And learning new combinations of impossible physical positions.  One push of the button and  you can ride away...if you don’t forget to put up the side stand.

For if you do, the bike will stall, and not restart until you are in neutral, and not move until the stand is up.  So much thinking for just a small task.  No wonder hipsters need an extra large latte after riding a few blocks!  But the electric leg, and side stand monitor, along with other things not seen but trusted make our riding experience more enjoyable.  Now if we can only get out of the driveway safely...and the ride goes on.  Old bikes and their riders will still be with us along time I hope,  but only one thing is eternal, and when we see that it makes it other things make sense.  And why we need an electric leg.

The second law of thermodynamics states all things are in a perpetual state of atrophy, they are getting worse, not getting better.  In Romans it is called the bondage to decay, written 2000 years before scientists proved it.  But fortunately we are new creatures in Christ, and the old is passed away, and a new heart is created within us.  We begin to live by different principals, among them love and forgiveness showed via grace in the holy spirit.  Yet we cling to the old creation, causing disputes among families, churches, and others because we will not let go and let God.  True love demands a choice, and when Jesus is the choice, we see the seeds of love, joy, and peace take root.  We can then reach out in love to others, now.  No teaching, extra study or praying will replace or hasten what the spirit has given to you already upon salvation.  The process is instantaneous, just waiting for you to begin a new life. Until then we are like a cocoon, waiting for the secular world to penetrate us and release us.  Nothing physical can replace the things of the spirit. None. 

And the mystery is revealed.  You are either part of the new or part of the old.  You cannot do both.  And like the kick starter that hung around after the electric leg, it soon went away, and we push the button in faith, with no back up if it doesn’t.  When we cross over into the new in Christ, the same faith that saved us will enable us every day.  It will give us wisdom and insight when needed.  Comfort us and guide us.  All at the push of a spiritual button.  We can break loose from bondage, and ride and live in Christ.  He provides the power, all we need to do is access it.  For years I was wary of only having the electric leg, now I trust it without reservation.  Can we trust the spirit the same way?  What proof do we need?  Is it for us or to prove to the the world about Jesus?  If only we trusted him to start our day as we do to start our bikes how different our rides would be. 

But trust is funny, either you do or you don’t.  And if you doubt, you aren’t.  But what if when the button is pushed it doesn’t start?  You will never know until you trust it to.  Same with Jesus.  Yet some still end up the old ways, claiming they are better.  And limp through life bruised and beaten.  While those in Christ ride.  Seems like a simple choice doesn’t it?  Yet still park facing downhill just in case.  None of us is getting any younger, and the sins of our youth will show more as we age.  Turn to Jesus today, experience the miracle of being born again, welcome the spirit into your life and ride knowing you are never alone.  Allow the spirit to keep your battery charged, knowing that while others try and fail, you will be enjoying life everlasting.  Old ways, old bikes, and old times have a way of creeping up on us when we least expect them.  Break the law today, experience freedom in Christ, live in the spirit and start to live again.  Let the spirit tune your life and when you hit bumps, know he is there to get you through.  There is still a prince of darkness other that Lucas electrics. 

Next week, why we need suspensions.  Dedicated to those who limp from riding hard tails.  Again why we need shock absorbers, and the one named Jesus.  See isn’t riding simple when you trust the Lord? 

love with compassion,

Mike

matthew25biker.blogspot.com

 

new cars in old garages

Growing up only the rich people had two car garages.  None in the suburban neighborhood I grew up in, just a single car unit attached to the house, shared with bicycles, lawn mowers, skate boards, and hula hoops.  A design whose size was determined by cars built 30 years earlier, and in which the sixties cars of my youth barely fit.  My Grandpa had a 1962 Cadillac Coupe DeVille, that he had to touch the front bumper to the wall, and climb out the passenger’s side door, he couldn’t open his door as it was almost against the left wall.  Then gently slide the garage door closed, as it narrowly missed the rear bumper.  A skill he mastered with great ease, but it took patience and great aim to pull it off every night.  In the dark.

Some of the newer homes where I lived had deep garages for the unesssentials of life, and they would be stacked so the longer, wider cars would fit, or almost fit again.  Add in a bicycle or two, and it was a procedure just to go to work getting in your car.  When I dared to buy my first motorcycle, many early mornings were greeted with “Michael move that ^%$&* motorcycle so I can go to work.”  So much for sleeping in....but as my Dad was never into big cars, probably based on price, the Ramblers he owned always seemed to fit, thoughtfully avoiding the garage parking blues.  And in return allowing the motorcycles he hated a place to sleep for the night.   Even then I knew that if I wanted to ride, I had to be creative.  Would you let your wife or girlfriend sleep outside while you were warm and safe inside?  Cars are for garages aren’t they?  A question that should be posed to home owners in So Cal, as some doors when opened contain anything but cars.  From boxes, to bought new and never used exercise equipment, to being converted to an extra bedroom, to storage for stuff they just can’t throw away, to an extra den for the kids, today’s garages are for anything but cars.  And yet with two car garages the standard, they still have no room to park them.  Do we see a problem here?  Was what was once a luxury, a two car garage, turned into a storage unit, while the $35,000 new car, the average price of a new car in 2015, sits out?  And what about motorcycles?  Have our priorities gone crazy or have we?  And some husbands still hear “move that #$^&&**” motorcycle out my way....”

So where do we park the cars?  Driveways fill up, narrow streets get crowded, and wider streets become just one wide lane for us to ride on, the new storage area for cars.  While the garage fills up with junk.  Except at our house, and others who ride.  No man cave here, I think that term is so stupid.  Probably thought up by some yuppie who takes the bus.  With our motorcycle population growing at one time, we made certain arrangements that Theresa’s Mustang would always have a space.  And it does.  All the junk we cannot part with, is stored on shelves.  A TV sits where we can visit with our bikes when not riding, and visit with friends, like previous generations did on their front porches.  Add the 1949, vintage Coke machine, a rack to work on bikes, and a workbench, and we still have fit as many as nine motorcycles in our two car/nine motorcycle garage.  Which now down to three looks empty.  A garage my Grandpa would have loved to hang out in, to polish his Cadillac, to bench race and tell us stories of when he was our age.  To tell of when he had his new car in his old garage, how it barely fit, and the procedure for parking it every night.  As the younger ones would try to imagine a one car garage, and a car so big it almost didn’t fit.  And tell of when Coke was 10 cents a bottle, premium gas 30 cents a gallon, and it was pumped for you.  The garage would be a place to fellowship, to visit, to work on your bike, to keep the car clean after the rain, and where history was rewritten.  What’s in your garage?  Are you missing a chance to bench race with your kids and friends?  I mean, how cool can Starbucks really be?  Here the Cokes are free, no lattes available, and the smells of Castrol and 104 octane gas fill the air.  If only my Grandpa could be here.....

We lose something when we don’t get together and fellowship and bench race.  We miss the intimacy of friends just being friends, of being comfortable, of being ourselves in an atmosphere where the memories are old but told in a way to make them sound new and exciting.  To want to relive them.  Testimonies we call them, meant for sharing.  And being shared.  Yet so many hearts are like that garage filled with stuff, with no room for its original purpose, and the car sits out.  Jesus tells us we cannot put new wine in old wine skins, they will burst because they are dried out, and have lost their strength, their ability to hold what is inside.  And soon leak, and then let go.  A look into a person’s walk with Christ, as many try to act heavenly, but inside live like hell.  Church has changed them, and Jesus may be just another item in their garage of hearts.  Among the junk, the old exercise machines, and other things they will get around to someday, they add the gospel, and after a while, when nothing changes, they go back to what they were before.  The garage still overcrowded, and Jesus among the goodies.  Not lost, but misplaced, He’s in there somewhere, and someday they will find him again.  Someday......

In trying to add Jesus to our life, we haven’t given up the old man, or as scripture tells us to let the old man die.  We are new creatures in Christ, the old is passed away, but we like to hold onto some things in our past, and gently Jesus gets squeezed out.  We forget our bodies are temporal, and soon wear out, mostly revealed when older and we with we had taken better care of ourselves.  But as we begin to miss Jesus, as the spirit calls us to repent and return, we start to remove things from our over crowed garage of life, and soon we find him, make room for him, and he takes over the spot in our heart God formed just for him to live in.  We see things his way, and the stuff we had cluttered our life with we get rid of.  Wondering how we ever hung onto it.  Sound familiar?  We come to Jesus and get excited, life overwhelms, we fall back to what is familiar and soon we are living a life not intended.  Maybe a day or two of cleaning out the garage is in order.  Not move it to another place, but throw it out.  How many times have you said “so that’s where I put it..” don’t ever have to say that about Jesus.  Or be forced to lie when you can’t find it, “Oh it may look like a mess, but I know  where everything is,” until you cannot find it.  Or him. 

So make room in your old garage for the new car or motorcycle of Jesus.  Welcome him as you would a friend, and find out when you get to know him what you have been missing.  With the SUV becoming the vehicle of choice for America, many of them are too high to fit in the garage.  Why would you buy something like that?  After your home, the car is the largest purchase you will make, unless it says HD on it.  Yet the most valuable thing in life, Jesus gets the same treatment.  Clean up the garage, and clean up your life.  Put out the welcome sign of love, and let Jesus draw others to you as he did you to him.  How many chances do we miss to be blessed because we have no place to visit?  How important is a place to hang out?  Seems a story about a couple who found no room at the inn is pertinent here.  And Jesus was born in the stable, the garage of its time.  Are we missing the most important part of our house by neglecting it?  A life is rather cold until love comes into it.  Until something is placed of value in it.  My life is filled with Jesus and the blessings from him.  Stop by, if the door is open, I’ll but the first round of Cokes, as the crowd never gets smaller.  Just like the crowd following Jesus. What happens in the garage should never stay in the garage.  Open the door and let’s ride.  You may be amazed that your neighbors never knew you had a new car, or were a Christian.  Time to take both out and brag.  What is in your garage will say a lot about what is on your heart.  But it is what’s inside that counts.

Somehow Ward Cleaver found space in his garage for his boys and time spent with them.  Imagine all the things he left to the Beaver!

love with compassion,

Mike

matthew25biker.blogspot.com

behind that locked door

 After years of watching Alfred Hitchcock movies, I am finally beginning to appreciate his work.  The little details that we over look, the fine touches that if were missing we would miss, but go unnoticed because we aren’t looking.  And one of his “Alfred Hitchcock Presents....” episodes has stuck with me for years.  See if you remember it, here we go.

A man moves into an old relative’s mansion.  The old man who lived there was wheelchair bound, and the old, but classy mansion has many personal touches to it.  Among them many doors, leading to rooms, closets, and hallways leading to other rooms.  Intriguing as well as fascinating, the new resident is told all doors are open except for one, on the third floor, which is locked and sealed.  With no key to open it, the dying man’s request was the door never be opened.  Which only made the new owner want to open it more.  But with his wife preventing him from it, “can’t you just grant the dead man his last request?”  And so for a few weeks the door remains locked and sealed, with the many times stopping and leaning on it, rubbing his hands against it, and listening,”what is behind this door I cannot open?”  And so he plots to see, when his wife goes away for a few days.  Her last warning to him, “don’t open that door.”  And of course we know what he does....

Thinking his wife is gone,he carefully unseals the door, so he can reseal it leaving no evidence of his invasion.  He finally has the door to the point he can open it, and just as he is turning the knob to enter, he hears a car door.  Thinking it is his wife returning early, he pulls open the door and rushes in to hide.  And plummets 40 feet to his death.  He has rushed into an empty elevator shaft his relative had planned on building, but lost interest.  Remember he was wheelchair bound, and wanted to access his room on the third floor.  But never completing it, had it sealed of with the warning to never open the door.  Despite all warnings, the new owner disobeyed, rushed in and fell to his death.  After calling out to his wife for hours, the soundproofing muffling his cries for help.  Which she wouldn’t hear anyway, for he had heard no car door, only his imagination warning him.  He just had to know, and the knowledge cost him his life.  And only the wife’s look of horror and despair when she returned and found the door opened.   An episode to watched with someone in the dark.  And the whole time telling the TV set, “don’t go through that door, don’t go in there...”

And so we live our lives like that.  In suspense, in the dark, something we are told not to do only haunting until we have to find out for ourselves, and then find out too late why we were told no.  Sadly too many people have the same opinion of God, he is out to ruin their fun, telling them not to do things, and creating a “thou shalt not” image of God that doesn’t exist anywhere but in religion.  But God does tell us no sometimes and for our own good.  But when we disobey, we suffer, and many times cannot look back and obtain a do over like we did when we were kids.  In one Old Testament story we are told of a king who is told to defeat all his enemies on the battle field.  But showing mercy to one he disobeys God, and years later just before that General he didn’t kill attacks him, remembers God’s word to him, “to take no prisoners, and totally defeat his enemy.”  Maybe the last words going through his mind before his enemy runs his lance through him.  God knew, God warned, he didn’t listen.  How many times have we not listened, have not obeyed and wished we had?  Leaving too soon before the end, forming our own judgments, and coming to wrong conclusions, sometimes fatal.  If only I had listened is no way to go through life,no way to reflect on what may have been. But when we listen, we get the benefits...

On one return trip from Canada we stopped to spend the night in Reno.  Seeing a sign at Circus Circus advertising “ROOMS FOR $19” we stopped and got in line, with about 200 people in front of us who had seen the same sign.  After not moving, a woman stood up on the counter and announced “NO MORE $19 ROOMS!” and the place emptied out.  And suddenly we were first in line, when she said, “BUT WE DO HAVE SUITES FOR $29!” And how sweet is was.  We got a huge suite, a corner room with a hot tub for $29.  Those who left only heard her first part of the message, and suffered for it.  Giving a new meaning to us of the scripture “and the first shall be last.”  The Lord had a room waiting for us, the others only heard the price and never got the bargain. 

Yet still deny the knocking of Jesus on their heart.  With prejudices, and listening to others who doubt, they miss out on the blessings he offers.  Yet others listen to the spirit and are saved, but give up listening after, thinking “I’m saved, what else can there be to it?”  And miss out on more blessings, impatiently waiting for heaven for their reward.  Curious about the things of God, but never willing to pen the door and look in.  They are just the opposite of Hitch’s man who opened the door he was told not to, they fear and let their fears dictate their lives.  The inability to trust and obey leaves them bitter, and soon turn on religion, blaming “that Jesus thing that doesn’t work.”  When it was them that failed, not Jesus.

When Barney Fife conducted an interview he explained “the first rule is to obey all rules.”  Simple enough, and God’s law is love.  First him, then your neighbor as yourself.  Which you cannot do if you don’t love yourself, for scripture also tells us we treat others as we feel about ourselves.  One door God knocks on wishing us to open up to is spirit, another he tells us to beware and keep closed for our own safety.  But how to know.....by trusting God, who hears and answers.  Not rushing for the door when the rooms are sold out.  Avoiding the sins that you know may not kill you, but make you miserable enough you wish you would.  And knowing when God closes one door, it may be because he is opening another.  Each no will be followed by a better yes....

Religion offers a cheap room, Jesus offers us a suite.  Just for us.  But it takes trust, and you don’t trust someone you don’t know.  Get to know Jesus, read his word, let the spirit give the words meaning, and listen to that still small voice.  And when he locks a door, leave it locked until God opens it.  Or you just may get the shaft! 

Don’t wait for years to see the little details Jesus is in your life. Don’t live a life not noticing him.

“And now for something completely different...Good evening.”  Don’t let your legacy be “if only I had listened.” 

love with compassion,

Mike

matthew25biker.blogspot.com