Brainwaves

Sometimes I think I open up my big mouth on a particular subject and it’s like God immediately responds, “Now wait a minute, Jim!” My sister was in from Florida this weekend for her 45th high-school class reunion and, not being able to see her but once a year or so, Beth and I accepted her invitation to attend the affair with her. Nothing fancy; but an enjoyable evening nonetheless. It was a surprise, though, when the telephone rang late Saturday evening with a request for us to visit her son’s church this morning. We have other friends who also attend there and the nephew has been eager for us to check it out for some time now, but the description they had given me somehow had me thinking it nothing that would interest me. Birthed in an old, abandoned Home-Depot building and offering a more modern approach to the Gospel, this group was exploding, indeed growing so fast they were already pushing the limits of their facility. Those facts, however, merely produced an image in my mind of loud music and something akin to my last post. What I discovered today, however, was quite different……….

We all rode together in Mark’s vehicle and were ushered through a large parking lot by a host of fellows all waving those neon directional markers. Immediately inside the front doors there was a huge open foyer with at least three dozen coffee urns waiting to bid you welcome. Two other “island” areas provided information and tracts about their needs and endeavors. An open entrance to the right clearly indicated an area within its recess where children could find ministry at their own level of understanding. To the left, another sanctuary was equipped for the teenage crowd, complete with activities to entertain them before and after service. The adults, though, would enter what resembled, to me, to be a darkened movie theater. The stage up front held microphones and instruments. On either side, a 6 x 6 foot television screen would eventually be utilized for video clips and reproducing the whole affair taking place right before us, but at no time would there ever be any lighting other than individual focus on whatever event was transpiring. Other than being encouraged to stand and participate in worship, we were merely there to receive………..

Five musicians and a single female singer began exactly “on cue”. While their offering was, by no means, soft and out of a hymnal, neither did the volume blow my thoughts into another county. It was quite easy to worship with them. Two tunes and then a film presentation introduced us to the truth that this congregation had been walking through a series entitled “Room to Breathe”. Members had been asked to attempt fasting all forms of electrical media for a week as an exploration of whether the vacuum created would bring them closer to experiencing God in their life. The pastor, seated atop a stool and casually dressed in blue denim jeans, interviewed a young man on the other side of a small table between them about what the seven days had brought to him. That conversation, then, took us into the sermon, which was a mixture of worship, his thoughts as they came to him, and our “taking in air” as the Spirit gave it to us. I left feeling refreshed, but not so sure I hadn’t been to anything other than a live performance of something I could just as well have received in my living room via “surround sound”………...

Their literature indicated programs with Habitat for Humanity, a meal serving team at the City Gospel Mission, and several ways to reach out to kids in the community as tutors and “dinner buddies”. Their efforts left me impressed. No “super stars”. No demand to push their particular doctrinal uniform upon anyone. Indeed, the opposite seemed prevalent. They spoke of Christ while seemingly suggesting that each of us find Him in our own way as we commit ourselves to the journey. Would I return for another offering? Why not? Would I be interested in joining their flock? Only if His voice so directed; and, right now, I hear no such leading. I did figure, though, I owed a follow-up to my recent point of view……….

Tom Brokaw commandeered a special last night entitled “In God They Trust”. It dealt with conservative mega-churches that have sprung up in this country and how they are affecting politics. I’m not sure what such broadcasts accomplish other than stirring up the debate that’s already out there. People usually have their minds made up about these kind of issues long before one of the television moguls decides bringing it into our living rooms might draw a crowd. I mean: Bush could single-handedly rush into an inferno and rescue three small children from a horrible death and my mother would find some reason to pronounce a curse on him for “showboating”. Most of us are no different. Watching a media documentary only gives us fuel for the fire, depending on our own particular choice of what we consider trash………..

It is not, however, my intention here to so utilize this space. Personally, I think the “right-wing church” has as every bit as much right to espouse its views and bring them to the polls as everything else out there. I don’t know as I agree with all of them and sometimes I wonder if we haven’t started our own version of the Crusades all over again; but, then, this IS America. You ought to be able to push your agenda whether you belong to a gay activist group or Second Baptist. I find absolutely nothing wrong with cadets passing out promotional pamphlets for Gibson’s “Passion of the Christ” at a U.S. military academy as long as the same privilege is afforded others to share their faith. It isn’t like brass ordered the entire student body to attend the movie. Nor did a few religious zealots hold the mess hall at gunpoint with the tract……….

What bothers me with the recent trend in taking “the Kingdom of God” into a corporate arena big enough to house a professional football game is an image perceived, not of Jesus being Lord of the operation, but an individual whose theology sets the stage for all. Worship becomes no more than a super, star-studded, theatrical extravaganza that presents a menu for what one does or does not like in a religious service. You don’t like Christianity with hard rock? Old-time hymns are scheduled next. You can purchase a hot meal in the shopping mall while you wait. I hear no mention of ministering to the poor. No talk of reaching out into the community with anything more than an invitation to next week’s fellowship. Somehow it speaks to me as being no more than “business as usual”, religion “ala mode”, create your own flavor……….

I have no idea who George McCleod is, but found the following quote this morning and completely agree with his words. "I simply argue that the cross be raised again at the center of the market place as well as on the steeple of the church,” he boldly states to whomever. “I am recovering the claim that Jesus was not crucified in a cathedral between two candles, but on a cross between two thieves. On a town garbage heap. At a crossroad so cosmopolitan that they had to write His title in Hebrew, Greek, and Latin. At the kind of place where cynics talk smut, and thieves curse, and soldiers gamble. That’s where churchmen ought to be and what churchmen ought to be about." The Gospel is not some particular totem I’ve carved for myself out of Scripture. It is, and always has been: His Spirit, alive in “me”…………..

My own theology on prayer, like most other aspects of my faith, has evolved out of lessons learned along the way. Much of that experience includes rejecting a lot of instruction put forth by people who supposedly had “the inside scoop”. A recent approach I found on the Internet, though, really spoke to my heart. For one thing, this fellow’s initial statement suggested he thought it dangerous for anyone to consider themselves an expert on the matter. Secondly, in comparing the endeavor to sunbathing, he came close to insinuating both activities might make you a little fidgety due to feeling guilty. I like the picture that brings to me. Surely we need not fear to approach His throne, but the knowledge of His grace in permitting us that privilege ought to always accompany us in the endeavor. Of a truth, we can bring nothing but our humble gratitude to such fellowship. So, thirdly, I’m in agreement with his proposal that all we have to do is “show up” and allow the Son-light to work at its own pace. It’s not about proper positioning, spouting Scripture, or being full of faith in the sense of being able to “move mountains” via your own willpower. It’s being anchored in that which He’s already done in your life and resting in His promise that He’ll go with you, even unto the end……………

If you would have asked me thirty-three years ago if I thought I’d ever be agreeing somewhere down the line with a Catholic priest on his definition of ANYthing Biblical, my answer would no doubt have been in the negative. Not that I knew a great deal about their tenets. Only that I knew what others had told me about their tenets. You form an opinion; you create an image; then you file everybody concerned under that name tag. We do it on both sides of the fence. Television evangelism and all its theatrics have come to represent what most people consider to be Pentecost. Ritual involving papal mandates, prayer beads, and a bunch of “Hail Mary”s pretty much describes how Full Gospel sees Catholicism. My eyes were opened years ago, however, when a friend lent me a book written by Thomas Merton. Here was a bona-fide monk who, while perhaps not utilizing the “correct” terms, spoke to me of getting “lost” in the Holy Ghost! What’s more, he was making more sense describing how to approach the experience than most within my own ranks! From Merton to Nouwen. From Nouwen to wherever the Spirit would lead me. Tozer and Lewis didn’t go out the window, but my library did suddenly grow to reflect much more viewpoint than it did before…………

There are those, of course, who would deem me to be “backslid”. If you don’t buy into the total opinion of the majority, they tend to look at you a little strange and question your credentials. I’m still rooted, though, in those same basic beliefs established in the beginning. Tongue-talking, in my book, is a valid Biblical gift of the Spirit yet given unto us today, but that doesn’t make it a standard by which to condemn all those who have not discovered its reality. In truth, it has been abused and mis-used every bit as much as refused. Why should I think it any different with the other guy and his tenets? Regardless of denomination, Scripture tells us to work out our own salvation “with fear and trembling”; and that makes each of us held accountable for our own journey. I need not require my brother to conform to every detail of my walk. He need not expect the same of me. Can we not, however, rejoice together in that which we have discovered in Him? This has nothing to do with switching horses in midstream. It has everything to do with recognizing that, while we may not be in the same identical “boat”, we’re both trying to reach the same destination! The name on the bow doesn’t mean anything as long as our compass is set on Him…………..

Nearly two decades ago, a friend and I visited The Big Apple to learn about ministry within the inner city. It seemed strange to me finding a populace where invisible walls separated individual cultures from each other, but even more so to note how a man ridiculously attired in pink tights, a tutu, and an orange angora sweater could walk through that elbow-to-elbow throng on 42nd Street without anybody at all giving him a second thought. Just another face in the crowd, I suppose. It is true, of course, the area was renown at the time for seemingly “anything goes”, but not where I lived. A while back I admit it was popular in these parts to emblazon the phrase “No Fear” across the window of your vehicle. I don’t think it was meant, though, to suggest a disregard for another person’s opinion to the point of making a fool out of yourself. Then, again, after an experience at Sam’s yesterday, who knows? Maybe northern Kentucky has “arrived”?…………

He looked to be at least ten years younger than me. For that matter, he also looked to be at least a hundred and twenty pounds heavier than me. Something akin to “weebles wobble but they don’t fall down”. There was a fancy black stetson atop his head. It matched the rest of his ensemble, his shirt and trousers simply more adorned with decorative stitching. No gun; and I don’t know about the boots. I didn’t look. Hopefully, no spurs. What he did have was a microphone held up in front of him and, as the words to some country song marched across the screen of some television set, he sang as if he was oblivious to all others in the store. Luckily, his voice ascended into the upper heights of the ceiling and was lost before it reached too far, for he was also obviously unaware of the pain he was inflicting with it in that small area around him. Promotion for some new karioche machine? Possibly; but I’m more inclined to think him just a little weird…………

For two weeks now, this on-line retreat with which I’m involved has been speaking to us on the subject of “sin”. The present lesson, though, has asked us to turn to God “that we might know” such as we possess, both “completely and profoundly”. It gives a list of inquiries to put to no one but ourself, questions like: How have I been dishonest, to others, to myself? How have I let my heart become cool, to God, to others? When did I make up my own rules? The focal point presented, for the most part, appears to direct us to our lack of reaching out to someone else, seemingly suggesting that what we do is but a witness of who and what we are. Surely there is some truth in that; but then, again, works is by no means validation of the inner man. The Bible proclaims it possible to bestow all my goods to feed the poor and yet it profit me nothing. It all boils down to the heart. Do I see myself as others see me? Am I willing to see myself as God see me?.........

There were just three of us on my “evangelistic outreach team” this past Sunday. An icy rain had settled over northern Kentucky and whether that, in itself, had numbed our brains might be debatable, but it’s for sure we were not our usual talkative carload of Bible junkies during the trip over to the Detention Center. No doubt Phil was a little nervous. Though he has fed the kids a word or two on other occasions, this would be his first time to actually initiate our service and pursue a point for as long as he felt led. I once more advised him to not attempt reading his notes, however, emphasizing “success” lay in simply letting the Spirit bring it forth from his “belly”. He, then, in doing so, gave us a good foundation upon which to build. Bob followed and, once I figured out how to work the equipment, would mix a couple of songs in with his serving, When he finished, there was ten minutes left for me to close…………..

You never know what sort of reception you’ll get from these young inmates. I don’t kid myself. Most of them come to “church” only because it beats any other activity being conducted elsewhere. This particular afternoon one of the guards explained our low number of participants was due to some discipline presently being administered; and that fact, in itself, probably accounted for the bit of “humor” injected into our own gathering by a few individuals. You learn how to deal with that sort of thing, though. If you can get them to see the seriousness of the moment, or at least that YOU’RE serious about what you’re doing, if you can do that and still show them some respect for who they are and why they’re where they are, God seems to work out the details. I looked at this bunch, asked their background in church, and then inquired what it had done for them. After all, they were presently sitting in a “jail”…………..

My point, as noted, was not to belittle them for their circumstances, but to clarify that Christianity was not merely quoting Bible verses and learning how Moses parted the Red Sea. Life was full of hard knocks and bad decisions; and we needed something more than a doctrinal creed to keep us out of trouble. If that truth got their attention, however, it also hit home with a young black man up front who wanted to know: “What about Islam?” and when I told him if he was “going for God” I had no problem with his faith, there was an audible gasp in the room. While most religions want to bring it all down to heaven or hell depending upon their singular credo, I continued, judgement, as far as I’m concerned, still belongs to Him; and what Christ brings to me is NOW! He’s here NOW: to answer my questions, to minister to my hurts, to meet me in my sorrows, to give me hope about tomorrow. Now. Right now………….

As I lead them in prayer, every head was bowed. EVERY head. Allah. Jehovah. We weren’t too worried about name tags………….

A year ago, one of the associate pastors at my old assembly, disgusted with “politics” and knowing the time was “right”, moved his family to the southwestern corner of Kentucky. He bought a farm down there, being no stranger with what it takes to raise cattle; but, supposedly, it was not babysitting beef that drew him and his wife to such location. Nope. They were quite adamant about that. The voice of God was leading them to pioneer a new church in that area, the Spirit directly speaking to him one day as he drove past a small black congregation’s sanctuary. Sure enough, it was not being used Sunday evenings, was available to rent; and so rent it he did. That much came easy. Finding enough people to make it work was another matter. Divine directive, evidently, wasn’t given to the local populace and, after a few months, he found it necessary to re-examine his orders……………

Beth had relayed that last bit of information along to me quite some time ago, but when the phone rang yesterday afternoon, I was the only one in the house and he didn’t know that I knew when I inquired as to how they were doing. He had called to ask about the funeral and it was good to catch him. We talked some fifteen minutes or so. He was exuberant, full of life, and excited about what God was doing. Discouragement overwhelmed him when that initial dream failed. Questions concerning the unsuccessful beginning filled his prayers. It became mandatory for him to seek some sort of employment and he found himself working part-time for another farmer. Friendship developed as conversation with his boss bounced between feeding cows and feeding a man’s soul. Those talks turned into an invitation and Tuesday evenings became weekly Bible studies at his employer’s home…………..

“Gary,” I said, “sometimes when we’re so caught up in doing what we think is the Lord’s will, it’s hard to realize that about ninety percent of our zeal is us and not Him, isn’t it.” He was not offended. “Sometimes,” he replied, “when we think we’ve got it all figured out, Jim, He just has to stop us right dead in our tracks and completely strip us of our pride before we begin to see we’re not as big as we think we are.” I listened, then, as he told me how, although the job ended, the house meetings had only grown. The need for money, though, had him driving a truck and that venture had but opened another door of witness. He and his wife, Terri, were doing fine; God was doing great things through them; and he had discovered there was more to ministry than just occupying a pulpit. Suddenly the Word was not just doctrine to be preached, but a Force proving Itself on a day-by-day basis…………

Amen, Gary…………

Shirley Brown. Her married name was Schoonover, but she was thirty years old when that event took place and the transformation never did completely settle into my thinking. Whether because of similar phonetics, I do not know, but somehow my mind, concerning her, always went to the character in the Peanuts cartoon strip. The fact that Charlie had a girlfriend at some point with red hair only added to that mental association and I never mentioned such insignificance to her. If Schultz’s creation never seemed to find life filled with anything more than “good grief”, that was not the case with this lady. Originally from the northeast corner of West Virginia, she came all the way to Kentucky to visit our small church while attending a seminary in Pennsylvania. Something “clicked” and she would later return from teaching in a church school in North Carolina to take a position with us…………

There was little money attached to such employment and, over something like three decades, the titles she held grew to be quite a list. Secretary. Children’s Church. Vacation Bible School Leader. Sunday School Superintendent. Nursery Coordinator. Initiator of Wednesday night Royal Ranger program. It just goes on and on. The “official” typed-up sheet didn’t mention janitorial duties, but there’s hardly an area where her efforts weren’t involved along the way. Women, especially in those early days, did not have the privilege of sitting in our business meetings. “Holiness” did not permit such heresy. Male hierarchy, however, knew what a treasure they had here and even permitted her to preach a few times. Shirley knew she loved Jesus and she loved kids. That love spilled over into everything she did and everything she was. She lived in her Bible, a prayer closet, and in reaching out to others…………

Breast cancer took her from us Monday evening. I noted with mixed emotions Wednesday morning the announcement that what appears to be a cure has been found. More than anyone I’ve ever known, her life exemplified what it means to be a Christian. People came from as far away as Chicago and Florida to attend the funeral. It lasted a little over an hour and three or four different preachers gave short testimonies of her witness. This was a woman who fulfilled in every way what it means to be servant of God. As one man said: she was blind, to color, to social status, to those things with which many wrestle. She was full of compassion and a friend to whomsoever. But fifty years old, she left behind a husband and five young children ages 17-7. Her faith rested in Him and was no less at the end than at any point in her journey. The “end”? Let me rephrase that…………

No more than two hours after her passing, I was driving in the darkness to pick up some cokes for those who had gathered at the house in mourning. Alone in the car, my prayer concerning her loss was more like conversation than anything else, just He and I, one on one for a few moments, tears streaming down my face. No sobs. No noise. Just talk. And then Shirley stepped in. I could swear I heard her voice. Not audible. In my spirit. She spoke only my name. But it was her. I could see her face and it was the Shirley I’ve always known, not the woman whose body had suffered so greatly for so long. The encounter was brief, but it was more than enough to confirm unto me that this was but victory for her. From somewhere deep inside of me, the Spirit began to overflow and, for the rest of MY trip, worship mixed with song filled the Toyota…………..

When you get old, the danger is not so much a matter of merely repeating yourself as it is forgetting when you last told this story and to whom it was you told it. With apologies, then, I once more go back to a day long ago when I was but seventeen and even then pursuing answers to many things that troubled my mind. My father was passing through our living room and, seizing the opportunity for a one-on-one confrontation, I asked him if he believed in God. Never one to frequent a church, he just stood there, dead in his tracks for a few moments, before finally saying no more than “yes” and turning to leave. I wasn’t about to let it end with that, however. “Why?” I insisted and had him again searching for how to respond. Silence. “Because”, he at last ventured, “if there is none, then dying is no more than turning off the light.” End of conversation. He was gone and his explanation only left me wondering. After all, why not just put your trust in frogs or peanut butter? Indeed, why not just construct your own source of hope if there is no reality, no proof, no evidence to use for a foundation? Within six months, Dad was dead. An accident on the job………….

People think me odd for a lot of reasons. My theology is but one item on the list. To begin with, while the Bible remains a gauge by which to check my conclusions, it also, at least in my opinion, has the potential to serve as fodder for a man’s ego. Let’s face it: if it wasn’t possible to simply do no more than carve our own totem from its pages, we wouldn’t have umpteen different denominations disagreeing over its content. Tout your faith all you want, but it all really comes down to whether it’s established in some manifesto that you and your bunch have created or in He Who has proven Himself unto you again and again. Even so grace. If it is no more than a state you have defined for yourself, then you had better hope He agrees with you when you meet Him on the other side. If, though, the term is validated by the knowledge of His presence in your life, then assurance is yours already. Can people kid themselves even about that? I’m sure they can; but we each stand responsible for ourselves. Personally, I prefer taking it day by day, the dumb sheep ever in need of the Shepherd’s voice and I’d counsel anybody along those lines. Counsel; not argue…………..

In the Old Testament, Hagar, Sarah’s handmaiden, is despised by her mistress, flees into the wilderness, and there, by a fountain of water, comes face to face with an “angel of the Lord”. He commands her to return and also gives prophecy concerning the child in her womb; but it is the appellation she, herself, gives to this very location that speaks of an encounter with divinity rather than just some messenger of the Almighty. Amazed that Jehovah should know of her situation, she is even more astonished that she should see Him and survive the encounter. Beer La Hai Roi, the name of the site thereafter, literally means: “The Well Where I Looked Upon God And Lived”. If she so marveled at the meeting, however, Abraham, who would eventually kick both her AND her son out of camp, apparently had no such issues about going one-on-one with his Maker. On at least one prior occasion, he sat down to dinner with Him………..

Strange, then, that a few milleniums later it’s not all that hard to yet find the same opposing views when it comes to approaching His throne. Some determine themselves unworthy of His attention, undeserving of His affection. Others boldly march into that sanctuary, dictating their demands. They see themselves as having been somehow transformed into “keepers of the kingdom” and now possessing “blank checks”. Personally, while I do believe His door to be open “24/7”, I am also of the opinion that we build our own walls between us and our Creator and attitude is a great barrier on either side of our entrance. Humility is proper procedure, at least until it strips you of hope. Self-confidence is healthy, but, again, only when it is gained through Him and not pumped up out of our own imagination. What Christ brought unto us is a Reality Who abides within
and Who is able to span the gulf. The “door to heaven” is not ethereal, but living inside us………….

There’s a note I once penned for further consideration: The Presence of God versus faith in His being there. It fits well with a chapter I’m currently reading in “Imitation of Christ”. It’s author is uncertain, but its roots definitely lie within Catholicism; and yet I was somewhat surprised to discover the tone it set concerning the “corruption of (our) Nature and the efficacy of divine Grace”. While we usually visualize both terms as no more than that which characterizes an individual, their capitalization here tends to extend personification to their meaning. In other words, the first is actually “who” I am rather than how I act; the second is Who He is and not merely something He imparts. It is not something I pray down from heaven, establish out of my own reasoning, or acquired only if I can manage to bring my life into some sort of sinless state of existence. It is His voice, His Spirit, sharing in my journey in SPITE of who and what I am…………

I turn sixty-four today. Whether that, in itself, is responsible for the condition in which I find myself, I do not know. The on-line retreat spoken of in an earlier post has us looking at our Christianity from a different perspective this week. Rather than looking back at people and events that may have shaped who we are as individuals, this time around we have been asked to look for those who might serve as “models of freedom” unto us. That particular label, then, was applied to anyone who has learned to be indifferent to whatever life brings. Their goal is but to attain that for which they were created. Possession of such attitude was termed as "living in balance". Admitting that words are both elusive and not always trustworthy in ensuring we are understood, I dared to suggest that such moniker does not necessarily equate with “people whose behavior stands out as good examples”, at least not until we define the word “freedom”………..

Someone had stated that grace was its foundation. Agreeing that such observation might be close to being truth, I wondered if it was conclusive in capturing its essence. It would depend, it seems to me, on just who establishes it: me or Him. If all I own is no more than a handful of Scripture by which I carve out an image of who He is, then all I really have is religion. If He, on the other hand, brings Chapter and verse alive in me, shaping me with it by both His rod and staff as well as His mercy, THEN there is “balance” in my life.
Liberty becomes the knowledge that whether I stumble to the left or right of center, He is there to realign me in my walk. Faith is not something I have to create on my own in order to find Him “true to His Word”, but that which He has created in me by being faithful in His Word as we go. I can rest in Him, not in my interpretation of Him. I may not always understand; but He remains my anchor……….

The Bob Evans Beth and I frequent has a two-lane entrance that leads you back to both it and a couple of other restaurants. When Walmart purchased the land directly across from that spot and developed it into a huge industrial complex, that point on the highway suddenly became a busy 4-way intersection. Departing from Bob’s became a nightmare and making a right turn on a red light you tend to forget that vehicles now can come roaring down off that hill trying to beat a yellow light that gives them the right of way. His horn blasting his displeasure with me was my first clue that I had made somebody mad. The next hint was noting the bumper of his oversize pick-up truck about to introduce itself to the rear of my Toyota. With me already being in front, though, I figured it best to just ignore his anger and proceed toward home. My irate friend, however, wasn’t read y to call it quits. At the next stoplight, jumping out to stand behind me in the middle of the road, he mouthed obscenities enough to curse me three generations hence. Hopefully, that eventually relieved his anxieties. He didn’t follow me any farther……….

Of course, it’s not like I, myself, have never pondered the stupidity of another driver; but at least nowadays such an event is almost immediately reduced to mere mumbles and then stored on that “microchip” referred to in my last post. Just how much of my progress in this sort of thing, though, is attributed to my getting old and how much is “Christ in me” is a matter yet to be determined. In this particular scenario, I must confess to there actually being a mental video that briefly passed through my thoughts, one where I emerged from my car with a crowbar to address his remarks. But when that one was quickly followed by another scene where he then produced a gun, good sense quickly convinced me it was better to let him rant. If Christ was in him, there surely wasn’t much being displayed and it seemed more feasible, at this point, to wait until conversation could be accomplished on more peaceable terms. How soon that might occur was anybody’s guess; but I was willing to wait. Shucks. I was willing to forget the whole thing. Apologize, even. Traffic began to move again, however, and I left him there still shaking his fist and fuming………

Life happens. And just because you’ve got a chrome outline of a fish attached just above your bumper, it doesn’t mean you walk on water. People remain people; and Christians come in various assorted doctrines. Some simply excuse their humanity, leaning heavily on the fact that “God understands”. Some claim to be in-dwelt by His Spirit and thereby translated into holiness. When circumstances prove otherwise, they rest on another Gospel truth: “God forgives”. Personally, I find salvation to be a day-by-day walk to be made one step at a time and His Presence, more often than not, a well within from which I drink as opportunity permits. That’s not to say He doesn’t show up unexpected on occasion, or that I’m not always looking for any chance to swim in those waters. I only mean most of my journey is as it always was and I travel its path, not necessarily steeped in the knowledge of His identity, but resting in the assurance He has given concerning that connection along the way. My faith is not in what I have come to believe, but in a Reality Who meets me as I go. Sometimes I have questions. Sometime we just talk about my driving……….

Forty-five years ago, the Navy looked at my ability to type at least to some degree, my inability to recognize one end of a screwdriver from the other, and sent me to school to learn Morse Code. Dits and dahs. Electrical impulses systematically arranged to represent characters of the alphabet. Slow at first; but you pick up speed as you go. Matter of fact, it gets so into your brain that you begin to imagine you can hear its cadence coming from inanimate objects quite incapable of any intelligent transmission. In the beginning, several months into my indoctrination, I once sat eating dinner in the mess hall and attempted to decipher a message that turned out to be originating from a squeaky freezer sitting in the middle of the room. Worse yet, this morning, over four decades later, while waiting on a traffic light on my way to work, the cooler weather had some unknown part of my car trying to talk to me. The good news is: even though I am turning sixty-four next week, I didn’t take the bait and respond………………

How is it that the brain can seemingly retain some things forever, spitting them out almost on impulse from out of nowhere; yet just as quickly go “blank”, refusing to give you vital information as simple as where you laid your glasses five minutes ago? I’ve pondered here, before, the status of the human spirit when “command central” is somehow held prisoner in a comatose state. A buddy’s reference, however, concerning a visit once made to a home for the elderly, has me again deep in thought. What about when our gray matter apparently is still working, just not on all cylinders. Conversation comes forth, but not in character with that person we’ve known all our life. “It’s not them”, we tell each other; and, yet, maybe it is. Maybe what we’re getting is but that which was hidden, kept at bay, and buried deep inside. Thoughts and emotions that passed through the cerebral chamber for whatever reason and, even though dismissed by the spirit as improper to keep, were nonetheless filed in some dark recess to now find their way to the surface………………

Complicated creatures we are; and more a part of the animal kingdom than we usually like to admit. Some of us, of course, have never bought theology’s package and see us no more than perhaps a little smarter than the average beast. The ecclesiastical side of that statement, though, finds Biblical reason enough to believe what separates us from simians is an element other life does not possess. Spirit? Soul? Here, even as we do with a lot of other issues, we sometimes disagree as to what constitutes what. As far as I know, no one has been able to disengage that part of us for scientific examination and it all boils down to where the individual wishes to hang the label. The question for me, however, in the scenario I have set, is once again: what has happened to that segment which has always controlled our “computer storage unit”? For that matter, does the “micro-chip” containing all that information go with me to meet God? Heaven help me if it does. There’s a lot of strange stuff in there. Dit-dit-dit-dah. Dit-dit-dit-dah……………..

My middle daughter recently did a google on my name and somehow entered into the world of Genealogy. I’ve been talking about an attempt at a “family tree” for quite some time, but haven’t, as yet, taken the first step. Suddenly two distant relatives, who already seem to know my ancestry clear back to the voyage over from Germany, are bombarding me with questions trying to fill in the blanks. Not only have I learned that my great grandparents got divorced somewhere along the way, I’ve also received confirmation concerning one of my grandmother’s sisters actually being her niece. They used to handle such situations that way, so I’m told. The world was a little more “religious” back in those days. We’ve “come a long way, baby”……

That last remark isn’t meant to suggest I personally endorse either the current value system or the one we left behind. To my way of thinking, how do you lump every incident into the same category without losing the individual conditions of each? While I would hope no father could abandon his daughter over a bad choice, at the same time we appear to be living today in a society where the community at large is “footing the bill” for a moral outlook that’s gone “down the drain”. Then, again, I wonder if we really, as a nation, ever were anything more than a bunch of ecclesiastical kangaroo courts, burning witches at the stake even as we condemned any who dared disagree with our doctrinal dogma?……

The television, this morning, amidst all the hype over the President’s latest nominee to fill a Supreme Court vacancy, also introduced into their broadcast a new law in Oregon that permits physicians to now prescribe a lethal dosage of medication to terminally ill patients. If you can believe the media (right…), it’s not like you just walk in and ask for “the big one”. There’s supposedly a number of steps designed to ensure that the request is being made both “out of a sound mind” and by the person who so seeks to end his life. While I know I stand the risk of being branded a number of things here, I’m wondering what’s so wrong about it. To each their own, especially if it’s hurting no one but yourself…….

There’s a lot of things that give me reason to scratch my head and ponder. Over thirty-three years invested in this Christian journey and what I believe is what I believe. Not that it’s worth going to battle over any of it with someone else, nor that my particular view is without error. My own version of the Gospel has been forged out of a prayer closet and what life has brought to me. It gets adjusted now and then, but only in the same manner that it came to me in the first place. It works for me. It doesn’t have to work for you. And if His indwelling really be within me, then it seems to me that His grace ought to be flowing through me. Let me point others to Christ, not beat them to death with my slant on Scripture………

As “my” three kids began to sink in mathematical operations that were over their head, someone finally took notice, threw out a lifeline, and transferred them to the shallow end of the pool. For about two weeks now, I’ve sat with them in a slow learner’s class where the teacher has been drilling all her students on their multiplication tables. Memorization is out of the question for this bunch, so you shoot for whatever you can accomplish that might at least give them a fighting chance. They can’t remember two plus two equals four, but easily capture a picture of each digit with an appropriate number of dots attached to its structure. All of a sudden the basics become no more than counting up the imaginary points. It even works with subtraction. Nine times three is how much? Put your fingers (both hands) in front of you and drop the third one over. The two upright to the left of their fallen comrade represents the first part of your answer; the seven to the right will complete it. Don’t ask me why that’s so. It just is. To use it, however, you have to realize it only works with nines and, seeing as how there’s one in your present problem, this might be a good chance to give it a try. Friday, having already scribbled a sheet full of erroneous results on his quiz, my one charge seemed shocked when I suggested he might find the rules we’d been learning lately useful………..

That type of situation isn’t just common to Special Ed, though. Humanity, at large, is guilty of the same sort of behavior. We know the rules. We just don’t think they apply to us; and I’m not necessarily talking about life in the fast lane. Our habits on the expressway are merely reflective of our inner nature in other areas. We are “programmed” individuals, for the most part. More so, I think, the older we get. Safety-wise. Health-wise. And a lot of other ways-wise. Rules may be good for us, but they’re not who we “are”. Isn’t it good “news”, then, that God’s grace allows for that condition! His relationship with us isn’t based on how well we walk the chalk-line following a “black and white” gospel established by whichever ecclesiastical “authority” you might want to insert here. The Almighty isn’t waiting with a thick wooden ruler to crack our knuckles every time we forget His instructions. The truth is: ignoring His principles will, even as our seeking to obey them, produce its own fruit in your life. The only difference is in the meal you wind up having to eat; and it does little good to complain when you, yourself, both cultivated and cooked it. How much better, then, to have my weakness seasoned with His gentle voice reminding me that error doesn’t necessarily mean I’ve lost it all……….