Merciful Men in a Cruel World

A merciful man does good to his own soul, but he that is cruel troubles his own flesh -- Proverbs 11:17

Yet another week in which I have far more to do than I can get done. Yesterday -- for Mother's Day -- I carried our finish mower over to my nephew's so he could weld up a broken tab on the frame. This led to a deep conversation about the nature of good and evil and what it means to live a righteous and Christian life. Naturally.

My nephew, M.L., was nipping on 100-proof Hot Damn which I think he said was some kind of schnapps. He kept it capped while the sparks were flying. For all of his flaws and faults, M.L. is the epitome of the merciful man. Yesterday, in addition to fixing my mower, he was counseling and assisting a friend of his whose wife had left him after nineteen years of marriage -- left him for an ex-con. The man had been suicidal earlier in the week. When I left, the two of them were heading out to try and locate some of the man's equipment his wife had stolen when she left. He had no objection to her taking household items and whatever she needed. But, why, he asked, did she have to take his chainsaw and all three weedeaters?

It is rare that a person can go over to M.L.'s place and not find him helping someone. He's a big dude and more than a little woolly. Sightings of him on dark Ozark nights have probably contributed to the legend of Mo-Mo -- our local version of Bigfoot. Nevertheless, little kids are all drawn to him, knowing instinctively that no harm can possibly come to them in his presence. He is very much like the character of Hoss Cartwright from "Bonanza", a man of great strength, humor and good sense, dangerous only to injustice and unrighteousness.

He and his friend are younger than I am by twenty years, but we all know we are anachronisms, dinosaurs -- men who still live by their word, who have to do what is right, carry the load, and meet the challenge, and yet we are despised by the world for exactly the reasons we are in the world.

In a way we are like Sheriff Ed Tom Bell in No Country for Old Men. The things we know are right and true seem sadly of little consequence in a world reveling in its own cool, rational insanity. Like Bell, we at times may think we are "overmatched", that there is no longer any way for us to win against this bizarre yet efficient opponent.

And there may not be. It doesn't matter. Quitting is not an option. Bell could resign from office, but we cannot resign from life -- not righteously anyway. We agree that at the end of the trail in the long cold dark, there will be a familiar face waiting for us with a warm fire and a pot of coffee. There is no way to get there except to keep going.