Nah-Nah-Nah-Nah, Hey, Hey, Goodbye…

Well, Denmark has canceled all their stamps as of December 30, 2025. PostNord, the state-run postal service in Denmark has been issuing postage as we know them for 175 years. The first few issues from 1851 were, admittedly, boring royal emblem designs. Since that time, Denmark has issued stamps that are historical, colorful and purposeful. Like all postage stamps they carried letters which kept people connected.

Then along came the internet. People stopped writing letters on paper. Therefore, all the stamps of Denmark, including the love stamps – are canceled, forever.

As a small child growing up with my grandparents in Chicago, it was common for us to sit out on our front porch and wait for the postman to arrive. He went up and down the neighborhood with his roller cart stuffed with exciting mail. It was the same mail carrier, and his route was completed twice a day – with morning and late afternoon delivery!

Many decades later, the cost of mailing a one-ounce letter has rocketed northward while the ‘service’ in the Postal Service has long departed. 99% of what finally gets delivered goes from the mailbox to the recycle bin.

Denmark pushed the first domino and others will follow.

We also lost the Lincoln Head Penny. Pennies have been in circulation for 230 years. The Lincoln penny came about in 1909 as a centennial memorial of Abraham Lincoln’s birth in 1809 in Hardin County, Kentucky, on February 12. It was costing the U.S. Government (us) 2.1 pennies to produce one penny. So much for buy low and sell high.

Anyway, Lincoln pennies may become more popular to collect again but they are gone. Note that you need to find the 1909 VDB and the 1909 SVBD to complete the set. Lot’s of luck finding those.

So much loss to absorb and then comes the devastating news! The Chicago Bears are pulling up stakes and leaving Chicago. While state and city officials have been hibernating, the Bears have sought a new cave in Indiana. Iowa made a humorous effort to try and lure the Monsters of the Midway to the cornfields of ambrosia here in Iowa, but we never really had a chance.

The Bears started out in Decatur, Illinois as the Decatur Staleys in 1920. One year later they moved to Chicago and became the Chicago Staleys. In 1922 the name was changed to Chicago Bears. That makes them the oldest team in the NFL.

Despite having a fiercely loyal fan base and having been the greatest NFL team ever in 1985-86 (not to mention the incredible 2025 season) the love affair is over. They are divorcing from the Windy City.

All of which are stark reminders that there is one thing which endures. We read this truth in Isaiah chapter 40 verse 8 of the Good Book, “The grass withers, the flower fades, But the word of our God stands forever.”

The Bears are history and so now I will have more time to read the Word, something that is enduring and timeless. It is definitely a better use of my time.

Something else that is on the way out at an alarming rate is my youthfulness. In fact, it outran the Chicago Bears a long time ago. It’s happening to you also. If you don’t believe me look at the photos in your smart phone from just a few years ago. The evidence is there.

In that Word which stands forever* we are encouraged by the results of salvation for believers as written by the Apostle Paul in 1st Corinthians 4:16-18 “16 Therefore we do not lose heart, but though our outer man is decaying, yet our inner man is being renewed day by day. 17 For momentary, light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison, 18 while we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen; for the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal.”

We are to focus on the things which are not seen – our God, Our Savior, our future home in the new heaven and the new earth, and our faith. In the meantime, while the flight suit body is whittling away, our soul and spirit are being transformed by the daily work of the Holy Spirit.

As a result, as believers we are strengthened.

Going-going-gone…. what is going to disappear next in the temporal world we live in?

*This begs the question – if our stamps go away, what happens to the Forever stamps? NASB95