And I just began to think a bit about some of the wisdom that could be hidden in their eyes.

I’m not naive enough to believe that age equals wisdom. But some age does equal wisdom. And I began to wonder when we as a society began not to respect that wisdom.

Now in days the common thought is that the elderly in our communities are too old for ____ and really anything can be filled into the blank. Driving, taking care of themselves, etc. But at what point in society did we make that conclusion. I’m sure it was near the time that we as a society decided that parents are no longer sources of apprenticeship, but aliens who never experienced the struggles that “we kids” go through. And now we call that rebellion “the teenage years”. Only that theory is no longer holding to merely teenage years as “pre-teens” have begun to adopt the same level of disrespect. But that’s a whole other topic, though tied in some way.

I just was thinking this morning in the quiet of our apartment. I wondered what wisdom lies behind elderly eyes. Wars, they have seen. Hurt. Destruction. Famine. Deprivation. They have survived it all. Yes, some are cynical and have resorted to hating every day of existence. But I wonder what is behind the smiling eyes of the elderly who have experienced all this change in our country, from the introduction of cars to the Internet. What do they think as they look into public schools? What do they think as they view our dealings with Iraq and now the talk of Iran? What do they think as homosexual laws are spoken of? Or what do they think of the growing pornography industry?

Do they miss home? When they look at the amount of children in foster care, do they miss home? Or when they watch our generation devalue their worth and their wisdom, do they just want to go home?

I’m not saying that all the people in our generation hate the elderly. This is not a political or psychological stance that I am ever planning on taking. But when it comes to the elderly, are we really seeing those rightly who have overcome so much in their lives and still cling to the cross? We, on Christ’s side of the cross, are we seeking out and respecting their wisdom? Or is the assumption of Alzheimer’s our default?

I was just thinking…

I was just wondering…