Brainwaves

The room emptied other than the school nurse, me, and my young autistic charge. We were there for his daily medication and had interrupted a previous conversation reduced to whispers between her and another lady. Now she stood there looking at me with tears in her eyes and tried to explain. “Jim, my husband, after twenty-seven years, just left me.” No real explanations it seems. Merely a note with a request for a divorce. Other discoveries since that would indicate she’s never known the man inside the man. In a world gone mad, where fathers exploit their own infant daughters and then record their conquest on the internet, where mothers not only abandon their children, but go to such extremes as to drown them in a bathtub or automobile them into a deep lake, how well do any of us actually know the other person? I sat at my grandson’s basketball game last night and pondered the short, stocky referee. Possibly fifty. Bald head except for a comb-over. Black hair other than where his moustache had been allowed to let its silver drop to his chin on either side of his mouth. Stuffed into a pair of black shorts either three sizes too small or just not manufactured to accommodate such an overflow of belly. Nice guy. Likeable. We all were laughing at his antics on the court. The events of my days, however, had me wondering who he was when he went home at night………

Earlier that day, I had sat in a health class where the teacher reviewed the body’s respiratory system. In hearing how the little sacs of alveoli within our lungs conduct an oxygen and carbon-dioxide swap with the capillaries attached to their outer coverings, one lad was flabbergasted. “How “, he wanted to know, “did the doctors figure all that out?” Never mind the higher Power Who designed the whole kit and caboodle. I had spoken to her a few minutes later in the hallway of where my mind tends to go in seeing such blueprint. Yet, if the physical aspect of life leaves one in total awe of its creation, it’s just as true the electrical wiring that seemingly runs the show has to be an even greater mystery. While I’m well aware that humanity is not immune to birth defects (the package is not perfect in that sense), our identity, as defined by “intelligence”, is a whole ‘nuther matter. Who knows what’s buried within the depths of who we are as individuals? Like snowflakes, are there any two of us who completely think alike? Walk a hundred through the same circumstances, teach them out of the very same book, and at any point in the journey you’ll still get distinct personal reflections from each and every one. What’s more, what you do get is never the full story. We are too good at hiding that which we do not wish to tell and not good enough at transferring that which we might share………..

Truth. What is complete truth? How can we ever hope to completely conquer it when we aren’t even capable of ever completely understanding ourselves? “Say it loud, say it clear” advises the lyrics to an old song; for “you can miss it as well as you hear”. This evening I listened as a young boy, at the very end of “Into the West”, was told how “the only history a man knows for certain is that small part he holds for himself”. Surely, even in that possession there is yet at least some darkness. When all that’s really gained is a personal perception of events as they come to us, how can we label that the whole story? How can complete truth ever be conquered, for that matter, when we, for the most part, are not capable of completely understanding ourselves? The best we can hope to accomplish is, like the magi of old, to catch the light as it shines upon us. To pitch our tents again and again, following the Star as it goes before us. To realize that all we actually have is the moment and His promise that He will draw nigh unto us as we draw nigh unto Him. It is not necessary that we agree; only that the reality of His presence remain that which connects us to each other and unto Him. In that, alone, there is peace. In that, alone, there is hope. I pray for my friend. God forgive me my musings about a comical fellow who works with kids. And let me never think myself more than I am…………

“Community” is a weekly event for two units of our Special-Ed classes where I work. Every Thursday or Friday, somewhere in the neighborhood of six adults and fifteen kids take a trip to WalMart or go bowling or just visit someplace of interest. Last time out we were given a guided tour through the local county police station where all one little girl kept asking was “How do you catch the bad guys?” Today we explored a museum in downtown Cincinnati that originally was an actual fire department there when the city was little more than a burg in the early 1900’s. The place was filled with authentic equipment and a rich history of what such occupation is all about. Our children, if nothing else, were dunked in some good safety rules and then were absolutely thrilled to be treated to sitting in the front seat of a mock fire engine. As they threw switches to make the lights spin and the siren wail, I walked over to investigate a sign announcing a vehicle over on the other side of the room as being an “antique” fire-engine. It’s vintage? 1958. Having graduated from high school in 1959, I’m wondering what my own classification might be……...

One of the benefits of finding myself once more in a Fifth Grade learning center is discovering just how much my knowledge of this great nation’s beginning got distorted somehow during the initial trip through elementary education. Religious freedom. That’s why the Pilgrims said ta-ta to jolly, old England. Right? How did I forget that when they got here, they didn’t want to extend the privilege to anybody else? Patrick Henry. The guy who proclaimed “Give me liberty, or give me death!” Eleven years down the road, he fought just as vehemently against creating a national government. And not that I blame him. What’s a fellow to think about a handful of “delegates” getting together behind closed doors all “hush-hush”-like as if only they knew what was best for all? Reminds me of a few deacons’ meetings that have taken place in my back yard. No. More and more, I’m afraid I’m of the opinion that the past as we understand it is merely a matter of the author’s personal slant on things. In the long run, humanity is humanity, money talks, and the guy who penned Ecclesiastes is pretty well dead on it. Nothing new under the sun………

That said, however, my thoughts now go to a request put to me last night in a “Father’s Heritage” journal I’m trying to complete for each of my girls. “Name five lessens that life has taught you”, it requested. Now there’s a challenge. After much consideration, my list concluded as follows: (1) Lies get you nowhere; (2) Women think for themselves; (3) Money isn’t everything; (4) Tomorrow is a figment of our imagination; and (5) God loves me anyhow. No great revelations there. I suppose any one of them could spark a post and some conversation. For whatever reason, though, number four has been rolling around in my brain. When you get right down to it, all we really have before us is our next breath; and even it is debatable. What’s more, the second it gets here, it immediately passes through our lungs and is gone. Yet we go through nearly our entire existence walking by the past as we conceive it to have been and daring to believe the future can be something better. While there may be some good things to be said about that plan of attack, I’m just glad that, a little over three decades ago, I found the Creator in the “now”………..

"What would you say if you were asked why someone should benefit from
participating in your particular congregation?"...

There’s a couple of new inner city mega-churches that are growing by leaps and bounds in this area. A whole new style of ecclesiastics. Good? Bad? Who am I to say? Is Christ being preached? Is the Gospel going forth? It seems to me those things will prove themselves and judgment is not mine to render. All the same, I do watch; I do listen; and I ponder religion as it evolves around me. The “Emergent Church”, then, is a subject frequently encountered anymore in my internet travels, a Canadian explosion, to say the least; and Ron is a good friend who graciously fields my questions whenever something gives me reason to scratch my head and pause for thought. Misunderstanding my recent inquiry concerning the opening words above, however, he e-mailed me the following excerpts:………………

“First benefit: Smaller congregations seem more effective. Not just another home cell group. Much more intentional; and, hopefully, going much deeper. In the unity of His Spirit, we begin to share a common like. We constantly are looking out for one another through the week in prayer, coffee, lunch, and conversations. There is a greater sense of accountability in our lives. There is a greater sense of communal life. We are becoming more real, more intimate, more authentic. With each other and with Jesus.”

“Second benefit: An accumulation of knowledge. Preaching doesn’t work. Not much transformative power there. Not much transformative power there. I did it for years and I can tell you it’s not cost effective. In that setting, it is difficult to engage people. We hold the individual spiritually captive, in the formation of their lives as followers. Now I don’t preach. I reflect, and leave them with questions in which we wrestle (both) individually and as a community with the spirit of God. I’m trying to be more obedient and more faithful that the Spirit of God will provide the answer, rather than be the Bible answer man.”

“Third benefit: A greater understanding of what it is to be a missionary. In congregational settings the individual gives money to the church and it goes into the general revenue to pay the pastor, etc. Certain people are involved in outreach, but most do not have to get their hands dirty. In this setting (emergent), there is no collection, no offering taking, no paid staff of any kind, no overhead, no money needed to support and maintain the structure. We try to get people to develop a missional conscience in their daily walk, to be good Samaratins, to develop the compassionate eyes of Jesus and respond to the need.”

When he adds to these, the “freedom to fail, without making failure the goal of the community, in our weakness we discover His strength” and “freedom in expression of worship”, when he speaks of looking for people to “enter deep into the journey of what it is to be a follower, a disciple”, while not “rejecting truth nor the faith that has been passed on from generation to generation”, he has my heart, I’m wondering if the name shouldn’t be changed from emergent “church” to emergent “Spirit”. Actually, in these parts the term originally was “revival”. Somewhere along the way, we just turned it into a three-day meeting where you fellowship and have dinner afterwards……..

We live on about a three-mile section of the old state route that connects on either end with the four-lane highway built to accommodate the mass move to suburbia. Traffic lights were never provided for us to exit into the flow and with every month that passes the junctions are turning more and more into a death trap waiting to claim its victims. During rush hour, unless you’re merging into the same direction as the oncoming tide, the only method for gaining access is to risk the first opportunity presented and pray the on-bound missiles have mercy upon you. In attempting such a move yesterday morning, I found myself suddenly trapped by the next truck in the line of pursuit. Instead of continuing forward, it slowed to turn into the road I had just left, but rather than pass behind me, the driver insisted on crossing in front of me. Never mind there was now no place for him to accomplish such maneuver. He honked. I braked. He honked again. I inched forward. He honked but once more. I blindly pulled into whatever awaited me as he continued to vent his anger via his horn. Right? Wrong? Does it matter? Welcome to life as it is………..

In my last post, I suggested that a man’s religious framework might be forged as much out of his environment as anything else. That, in no way, was meant to infer Scripture played no part in our theology. It’s a given, however, if you were born in Salt Lake City, you probably view chapter and verse differently than the fellow whose roots can be traced back to New York Irish Catholic beginnings. That being true, then, is it just as possible that time, itself, plays a part in what we hold to be true? Humanity, of course, remains humanity. I’m of the opinion that if, a hundred years or so ago, you double-parked your horse in front of the general store or failed to signal when your covered wagons were about to circle-up, people no doubt got just as mad. And some of them carried guns. Too. For that matter, I’d be willing to bet the first thing Eve might have said to Adam had something to do with questioning his reasons for living in a garden. After all: No Wal-Mart. No indoor plumbing. Nothing to do for excitement. Yep. Life as it is, or so it seems to me, is much as it always was. People are people. Our surroundings, however, evolve…………

Male. Female. Young. Old. We all meet Christianity from our individual perspectives. Christ meets us where we are. It’s not about where you start in this. It’s where you cross the finish line. It’s not about how many times you stumble. It’s whether you recognize your need of Him in all you do. When I read, therefore, of those who bid goodbye to the organized Church only to “deconstruct” and then “reconstruct” that which they left, I find myself sitting there at the intersection, scratching my head, and wondering where in the world they think they’re going? Can they not realize a few miles down the highway their own motoring will come into question? I fully recognize the mess. Surely there is need of something better. The best solution I’ve encountered is akin to an old bumper sticker; but, in my version, the co-pilot doesn’t sit in the passenger seat. Asking yourself “How would Jesus drive?”, as far as I’m concerned, just doesn’t quite equate with simply giving Him the roadmap and the controls. It gives you much more patience for the other guy, rids you of stress, and makes the ride a much more pleasant experience…………

Whether “Narnia” has walked my mind into pondering the depths of Christianity, or just met me in that mysterious realm wherein it usually wanders, is debatable. Rain turned into snow last night and icy roads have granted the kids a day off from school. Good thing, for at three-thirty this morning my eyes opened and my brain kicked into second gear. When the phone rang at five, I was already awake. Now, with the wife yet in bed, I sit, kicked back in the recliner as the flames dance around the gas logs in the fireplace, and attempt to put my thoughts to paper…….

The Internet Monk recently did a series on Appalachian culture and its view of the Gospel. The area where he now lives and works is not unfamiliar to me. Beth was raised in the hills of southern Kentucky and we’ve visited a church down in Cumberland. When the preacher writes of a people who perceive education to be a stigma to one’s “roots”, I know well of such fact. It’s almost like entering another country. Faith is reduced to a fire-and-brimstone message of repentance, either a walk of “holiness” or an eternity in hell. No in-between. A lot of death-bed conversions……..

Personally, I find the whole scenario not so far-fetched, it being but one more facet of all that’s out there. We all may not be “mountain folk”, but what we believe and hold to be true Scripturally often has more to do with our environment than “thus sayeth the Lord”. The tenets of our commitment are entangled in our upbringing, the community around us, and, often as not, the individual well we fell into. Our journey began at birth and God has been with us all the way. It just often takes a religious epiphany of some sort to recognize that fact; and, by then, there are a lot of wrinkles to iron out………

I fully understand, therefore, why some look at me strangely when I speak of knowing a reality in Him. My experience is not their experience. Nor does it need to be. Salvation isn’t about different levels of achievement. We don’t get merit badges based on a point system. The ground remains level at Calvary. It’s the “connection” between Heaven and earth that is important; and whether the man, himself, keeps it in working condition. Do we hunger for Him? Do we seek His voice? Granted, we can go off on a lot of tangents, but if the heart is right, His grace goes a long way……….

There’s this “vision” lately, just a mental picture that keeps popping into my brain. It’s like everything is black and somewhere in the darkness something or someone has moved a covering of some sort at the bottom of the well. Pouring through that created opening is a light so bright it blinds; and I keep thinking to myself: “Burn me, Lord. Let the fire of Who You are engulf me and make me one with You”. I knew such an encounter years ago, a Holy Ghost flow of tongues that released my spirit beyond my body in a way I’ve not known since. Yet I believe. I do not worship the event, but the Giver of it. And I believe………

The wife and I went to see “Narnia” last night. Surprisingly, she enjoyed it. I was disappointed. Too many pre-conceived, erroneous expectations, I suppose; but, even beyond my personal let-down, it came nowhere close to “Lord of the Rings” with its technological accomplishments. There’s a major battle that takes place between supernatural forces of good and evil. Righteous centaurs, hideous ogres, buffalo-headed trolls, and faithful fauns. A couple of beavers with a bit of a cockney accent. Most certainly there’s fantasy enough for the younger generation. It is for exactly that reason, though, that I thought it lacking. Having never read the book, I hesitate to blame Lewis. Indeed, Disney would be my first suspect as to there being no real plausible explanation given to what serves as a plot. Riddled with various Biblical overtones (a lion who gives his life for a “son of Adam”, a lad named Peter who, after the lion’s resurrection, is enthroned over the kingdom), the story is no more than the gospel turned into a fairytale……………

When Mel Gibson produced “The Passion” a few years back, a lot of people thought it too “bloody”. While everyone’s entitled to their own opinion, I never understood the uproar. We live in a day and age where the movie industry has nearly dulled our senses to the reality of what it’s possible to do to the human body if a man be so demonically inspired to kill his own kind. The more gore, the bigger the box-office. It sells. Let Calvary be portrayed in the fullness of what it cost to reconnect humanity with its Maker, however, and the religious crowd gets offended. Then, again, just who is the “religious” crowd? Considering the fact that no matter how you tell it, somebody out there is going to find fault with it, maybe we all ought to forget what Hollywood does with it, and just concentrate on being a vessel for Him. If the reality of that which Christ provides for us seems to me somehow lost in this latest cinematic dramatization of Golgotha, perhaps it’s better I abandon my critique of it and simply let you decide for yourself…………..

Besides, the wife has just invited me to join her in a new episode of NCIS. It’s a wet, dreary January eve here in northern Kentucky. The recliner, the gas logs in the fireplace, and a hot cup of coffee sounds pretty good right now………….

With five grandsons, it’s certainly not strange that I should find myself at this stage of life now attending sports events in which they participate. The oldest, now a teen-ager, has never been as beefy as others in his class and prefers other interests than sitting on the bench. The youngest is still in diapers, his enthusiasm falling more along the lines of exploring anything and everything his hands reach. A third is at the entry level of basketball. I get to evaluate his skills for the first time next week. The other two are Fifth Graders who find themselves on teams that have yet to win a game; and this weekend, after putting heart and soul into their efforts, all they gained was one more defeat. There are some good reasons for that, to be sure; but, from their point of view, none that gave much comfort. While victory, as far as I’m concerned, anyway, is defined by a whole lot more than just a scoreboard, how does one get that across to a couple of eleven-year olds already indoctrinated by a world that tells them otherwise?...........

My pastor, this morning, gave us a short sermon designed to encourage people to attend a two week series he and his wife will be leading on marriage. No Bob Dylan song this time out. Just a clip from “The Princess Bride” where the priest is about to conduct the wedding ceremony. It never gets old. The message, itself, however, dealt with myths and the first one introduced was the fact that we all seem to have pre-conceived fantasies about such union that set the stage for failure. He admitted we tend to approach a lot of things in life that way; and, indeed, I recalled, at that point, a few plumbing difficulties imagined to take but a few minutes to fix. It was when he went on, though, to express the idea that church often produces in us false images of what to expect down the road, I sat up and began to applaud, if only in my mind. Christ “in” me didn’t eliminate “me”, in any form or fashion; and life “in” Christ is both a commitment and a journey wherein we learn, as we go, everything reported as “gospel” t’aint necessarily so………

Whether the fault lies with the preacher or with the individual is debatable. It’s more like, in my opinion, just part of who and what we are. Even though the apostle Paul declared in Corinthians that “we know in part, and we prophesy in part”, there’s not too many of us who’ll admit to that. Nonetheless, in the long run, it is experience that teaches us the truth. Hopefully, the Holy Ghost is in there with us, always the Good Samaritan, eternally grounded in the Word, and ready to see us through. In “filling the void”, He does not shut out the world, but goes with us to face it. If it seems there is yet emptiness within us, maybe sometimes there is just need to do as Isaac of old and re-dig the well our Father established within us. Never is it a matter of perfection. Answer to prayer isn’t a yardstick by which we measure our faith. No MVPs in this league, no competition, and no penalty for error other than “learning the hard way”…………

The apostle Paul, in declaring all Scripture “profitable for doctrine”, did not designate that particular item, to my knowledge anyway, as the only source for forming secular structure. If it indeed BE the singular place to whereby one might obtain ecclesiastical building blocks, however, there’s still good reason to think the Church, at large, is quite guilty of interpreting chapter and verse to its own understanding. What’s more: it’s been that way right from the beginning. The assembly at Corinth is described as a group where everybody continually came to the meeting with their own psalm, tongue, and individual point of view. Ephesus was warned, as well, to not be “tossed to and fro”, carried about by every thing that came down the pike. Can it hurt, though, at this point, if I add a few lines to everything else out there, regardless of denomination? Can I just skip the deep stuff and immediately proceed to a personal statement of faith?...............

In nearly thirty-four years of association with the Pentecostal community, here’s a few things I’ve picked up along the way: (1) Arriving late for service doesn’t entitle you to handicap parking. Being one of those who help lead the worship carries with it no free pass to abandon your vehicle at the front entrance. (2) The “anointing”, in reality, is an overflowing of the Anointed. If it happens during your song or your sermon, there ought to be enough left over when you’re through to refrain from bad-mouthing whoever’s running the sound system. (3) Commitment is never a lazy-susan proposition. You don’t just forget your Sunday school class because somebody invited you to preach. (4) A lie, by any other name, is yet a lie. Call it what you want: a half truth; a bit of exaggeration; beating around the bush. Whether from the pew or the pulpit, what it creates is politics; and what’s lost, thereby, is integrity. It’s hard to maintain a witness when you’ve nothing with which to secure your pants…………..

I’ll stop there. Enough said. By me, anyhow.

Sunday marked the twentieth anniversary of our present assembly’s birthing. This coming Wednesday will be the pastor’s forty-ninth birthday and thirty-one years ago Thursday he came forward to accept Christ at our old place of worship. Reflecting on such events during this morning’s service, he first quoted Baltimore’s coach, Tony Dungee, as only being able to survive his recent tragedy through the help of “faith, family, and friends”. Then he shared with us Bob Dylan’s musical rendition of “You Got To Serve Somebody” and somewhere in the middle spoke of three things every believer learns along the way: (a) God is trustworthy; (b) Storms come to all of us; and (c) Life has a purpose. Though I’ve yet, after fourteen months of sitting on his back pew, made no commitment to taking membership with this group of people, I freely admit his words managed to span that gulf and connect with my heart. My name may not be on a blue card somewhere in their files, but being one in Christ has nothing to do with one’s signature on a dotted line……………

In one of her books, Annie Dillard writes that nothing could convince her more of “God’s unending mercy than the continued existence on earth of the Church”. While I fully comprehend her statement, at the same time it is also true that it’s within the fellowship of that institution that I’ve so often experienced His presence in such a way as to unite the Body in its flow. Prayer closets and one-on-One encounters hold their own testimony, to be sure, but take nothing away from corporate fusing with the Holy Ghost. There is a Robert Frost quote recently introduced to me that suggests there are no such things as beginnings and ends, only middles. Such thought left me wondering if he had never held his own newborn child for the first time or experienced the death of a loved one. Of course, it could be he simply viewed events like these as “mere” milestones within the journey; and, if so, then I can relate. Especially in terms of ecclesiastical community. What over three decades have taught me, as much as anything else, is the need of “Christ in me” in the commitment……………

While recognition of His divinity may yet remain the foundation of the edifice, surely we can agree that what man has since erected upon it differs greatly in both structure and form. Indeed, it makes one wonder just how much Spirit, compared to flesh, was in the blueprint. Too often, I’m afraid, we’ve equated “the kingdom” with our own particular cause, elected ourselves “keeper” of it, and forgotten that He Who has occupied the throne from the beginning has never abdicated it. Thus we stumble. We hurt one another; miss the mark and go on. It is, though, in the weathering of our humanity that relationship is forged, with each other as well as with Him. You love God because He first loved you; and because He has continued to prove Himself faithful to that truth along the way. You love the Church because you see in it yourself. Imperfection, swimming in the knowledge of His grace, believing in that faith He brings unto you. It is in looking back that you see how far you’ve come; and, in Him, little else matters. His voice, friends, and the next step……………

One of the reasons I seldom watch television has to do with the fact that I am easily mentally snared. It doesn’t take much to hook my thoughts and then lead me on a chase down the garden path. Hang any old spiritual carrot in front of my nose and you’ve sparked my curiosity. There are probably those within my old assembly who think this to be the reason for my departure from their premises and they might, at least to some degree, be right. Better, though, in my opinion, to seek truth in all things than to think somehow you possess a patent on that commodity. In that sense, I’m as interested in what it is I don’t believe, as well as that on which I stand. My foundation is in Christ. My perspective is always flexible, trusting in the security of His hand upon the reins of my heart………

That said, in picking up a discarded newspaper at a local restaurant last night, I noted a full-page advertisement boldly displaying in big, black print the title of someone’s new book. “The End of Faith” it announced and had me reaching for my felt-tip. Once home, I went to the author’s site, discovered it was possible to peruse the first bit of his literary proclamation, and quickly realized him to be no “man of the cloth”. His words, however, dealt with the vernacular of such calling. Defining a belief as “a lever that, once pulled, moves almost everything else in a person’s life”, he continued to observe that “If our species ever eradicates itself through war, it will not be because it was written in the stars, but because it was written in our books”. Religion, he says, is a killer……..

The argument is not new. In Christianity, you can take it all the way back to Cain and Abel. It’s when the event escalates from a matter of whose sacrifice was accepted, to the senseless slaughter of innocent men, women, and children that we begin to look at it in terms of genocide and insanity. Whether the Twin Towers, Oklahoma City, or a bus in the Middle East, whether the Crusades, the Holocaust, or Rhuwanda, who can deny the darkness in a man’s soul. In that sense, then, at the core of this whole subject is not what we choose to erect in our minds, but what force we invite to live in the depths of all that we are. When my walk is determined, not by some doctrinal creed formed out of my perception of scripture, but by an overflow of Who resides within, what should manifest itself is life……….

Another pleasant experience last night with the cable company. No; really. By now they’ve probably got a file on me that informs them of general colloquialisms I utilize in conversation and it’s for sure we’ve had enough tete-a-tetes lately for me analyze their end of the situation. Like many other aspects of modern-day life in the colonies, it all depends on who picks up the phone as to what kind of service you get. My opinion of their business ethics took a nosedive when I learned they signed me up, took my money, and simply neglected to tell me the USB hook-up would give me problems down the road. Nonetheless, I’m hanging in there. It cost me over forty dollars tonight for the necessary equipment and a young friend (for a sum yet to be determined) should be converting my system sometime this weekend. “Ethereally” speaking, I’ll be up and running. Rather, my modem will be. Getting the old man out of his present mood and back into the “heavenly” requires a prayer-closet, not a computer mechanic…….

I was reading this morning how people can be subconsciously programmed. Supposedly, we are what we read; and the literature digested doesn’t have to be in any particular order. Pick up a list of words and, if it so happens that scattered among them should be such terms like “Florida, gray, and cardio-vascular”, you’ll walk away from the perusal thereof feeling much as if you had somehow aged several years in the process. So say the scientists, anyway. It doesn’t surprise me. Personally, I think we absorb a lot of things out of our environment and with no real recognition of doing so at the time. The Fifth Grade discussed today how dreams are manifested out of the depths of who we are. Items sucked in, lost in the shadows, only to reappear out of nowhere and disturb our slumber. What scares me, though, much more than the giant green space turtle that once chased me through the southern swamp, is the idea that we might not be held legally responsible for our actions via such theory……..

Lastly, this being my fourth year working in public school with elementary kids, it’s just now beginning to give me that same pleasure enjoyed through over thirty years of ministering in the same church. Youngsters I got to know as early as kindergarten are now in Third Grade. I’ve been privileged to watch their character develop, to note how their individual personalities deal with the challenges that society brings unto them. The details that bring such things to pass are quite unknown to me. There’s no way I can predict how people and events might shape their future. I can only pray my own interaction with them leaves a favorable impression. To accomplish that, it seems to me, however, best to simply put the whole affair into God’s hands. I’m too prone to error. The Almighty is great at ironing out the wrinkles. Now. Later. Whenever. In Him I trust. Hopefully, these children will also discover that truth; and long before they venture into a relationship with Cable Internet………….

***This one's at least a day old. Cable neglected to inform me of such vital necessities as ethernet hook-ups and I've been wrestling with their technical department for three days. After hang-ups and hold-ups and three fellows who all informed me my computer had bought the farm, the fourth guy told me he was pretty sure it had not and the problem was on their end. Voila! I'm up. At least for the time being.....

My present pastor is not one who gets emotionally charged in his sermons. In old-time holiness jargon, that makes him “a teacher, not a preacher”. I’ve learned along the way, however, that “passion in the pulpit” does not always equate to the voice of God. When charisma spreads from the message to those in the pew, usually all it indicates is the congregation agrees with the opinion being expressed. More excitement in the sanctuary may indeed assist in keeping people from falling asleep, but it doesn’t guarantee the voice of God addressing the Body. Quote Scripture as much as you want, as loud as you wish; enlightenment still remains a personal matter. Though a multitude sits down at your table to eat, the digestive process is yet between each individual and their Maker. Let’s face it, Christianity: even the apostle Paul confessed to such manner of bringing forth the Word being “foolishness”. I’ve no quarrel, then, with a bit less charisma and the use of analogy, but I am unable to explain how chapter and verse yesterday was punctuated beforehand in the foyer………..

The church is currently experiencing “growing pains”. The grounds right now are a muddy mess and pastor’s theme, “Building on Messy Foundations”, would reflect that fact, holding much truth in its overall content. It was his earlier remarks that struck home with me, though, probably because just inside the front entrance the lesson had already been illustrated unto me in most humorous fashion. There is always placed at that location a generous offering of donuts and two coffee urns allowing everyone the option of high octane or de-caf; and while the pastry is hit and miss, depending on my willpower, the brew is a must. Attempting to place a small cup beneath one of the spigots, I discovered walking across the carpet must have put an electrical charge into my body, for no matter how hard I tried, the vessel wouldn’t cooperate. Each time I’d release it and reach for the handle, it insisted on following my hand across the table. Pastor’s first words unto us, then, referred to us leaving “those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before”…………

I recently visited another site where membership in the Church was compared to cartons of eggs. What it amounted to, for the most part, was some fun tossing around the idea of broken-ness versus an un-cracked, nice, neat dozen on your membership roster. They spoke of “individualism” and “right to spiritual privacy”. They suggested broken-ness was a priority. Then they feared the possibility of “not moving into wholeness”. When they got through, I’m not sure they scrambled anything other than my brain. Good discussion, but the omelet just tasted flat. If, indeed, we can be so compared to a carton of hen fruit, I’m thinking it makes more sense seeing us as embryos within a breakable shell. It’s not the outer layer God’s concerned with, but that life on the inside. As someone else recently put it, try as I might, I cannot shed my humanity. It follows me like static cling. Nonetheless, I’m not what I was, nor what I yet shall be; and contriteness is but a matter of the spirit guaranteeing His continued success with me as we go. And that’s no yolk…………