Terrible Blogger

So, apparently, it has been two full months since I was on here last.  I am quite certain that I can come up with a plethora of excuses as to why I have been neglectful of my blog.  Come to think of it, I am pretty sure I can come up with an original excuse for each of my loyal readers (and that would make both of them very happy I am sure)!

But, I felt led to finally post something on here.  I made the decision last year that I was NOT going to fill this blog just for the sake of writing.  But, I did want to fill my readers in on what has been going on in my life.

I have not been blogging, because I have become very busy writing in other areas.  I am not, by nature, a writer.  I know.  I just heard the collective GASP from all of you.  I am, however, a teacher.  I am discovering that my writing and my teaching seem to come from the same well.  When I get to do a lot of teaching, I find myself blogging less, and when the teaching dries up a little, I tend to write more.  It is almost as if I have to get things out of me or I might just explode!

But, I am very excited about the opportunities that God keeps putting in front of me.  He is constantly challenging me to grow, to learn, and to not accept the limits that I have, unknowingly, put in my life.

For example, some of you know that I am lucky enough to teach about once a month at Bluegrass IronMen.  These 45 minute lessons require about 6-8 hours of preparation as I pour over the material and prepare it for teaching.  I do love doing this, but it is a big time commitment.

Also, lately, I have been traveling around the state doing a lot of trainings for the Kentucky Center for School Safety.  So far this year, I have had the opportunity to do several student assemblies (both middle and high school) reaching several thousand kids.  I have also done several staff trainings teaching over 100 school teachers and administrators on things like bullying prevention and prescription and over the counter drug abuse.  This has been quite a blessing, and something I see myself possibly retiring into one of these days.  For those of you keeping score at home, I only have 7 years left before that is actually a possibility…thank you Hazardous Duty Retirement!

Along those lines, I am in the process of designing a website that would help me spread the word about these trainings.  The website is nowhere near ready to “go live”, but I will keep you posted.   I like partnering with the Center for School Safety on these trainings, but they are jokingly telling me that they are beginning to feel like my booking agent with all the requests that are coming in!  It may be time to look at moving out from their umbrella and doing some of these on my own.  I don’t say that to brag, because I have no illusion as to where the talent comes from.  God allows me to teach and opens the opportunities, and I teach as if my kids were in the audience.  Because, yours just might be!

All this to say, I will not take it personally if you have to take your readership elsewhere.  I still welcome your input, and you never know when I may pop in here and bang out a quick post or two.  In the meantime, I would ask that you would pray for me.  Pray that God would continue to use me as he sees fit, and that I will stay attuned to His gentle proddings.  Because I don’t know about you, but I have found that when I ignore those gentle proddings, He has other ways that are less gentle to get my attention!

If you are interested in following my continuing antics and ramblings, please follow me on twitter (@ramblinharvey), because I may not have time to crank out a blog post, but I usually can find time to generate some tweets.  Thank God for the 140 character limit!

Hard Work

As I sit here in Campbellsville, KY for the second week in a row, I am struck by the hard work I see going on around me.  You see, I have the opportunity to train police officers to teach the D.A.R.E. curriculum.  These 14 officers, provided they complete the training, will return to their communities to teach children.  This is one of the more professionally satisfying things that I get to do in a given year.  But, it is not easy.  It is two weeks of 12-14 hour days to walk these very capable police officers through the process of becoming one who can connect with and teach kids.

You see, these officers have been trained their entire careers to take emotion out of what they do.  They develop a “muscle memory” that when the uniform goes on, the emotions go away.  This could save their lives if they are confronted with someone who is trying to hurt them or someone else, but it doesn’t translate well into the classroom.  Kids need to see the heart that is hidden behind their badge.  The old saying rings true with kids, “they don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care”.

It excites me and motivates me every year to see officers come to D.A.R.E. training expecting it to just be “another police training” where they can show up, try to stay awake, and be given a certificate at the end.  They realize very quickly that this is not that kind of training, and they rise to the challenge!  I love watching them realize they are capable of more than they thought.  They are able, with hard work, to be the “Hero” that their future D.A.R.E. kids will think they are as soon as they walk through the door for lesson 1!

The really cool thing is that these officers realize about halfway through week two that they are actually capable of doing all the things that we have asked them to do.  They live UP to our very high expectations for them!  And, my prayer, is that they will set equally high expectations for their D.A.R.E. kids.

I have found, that D.A.R.E. officer candidates are a lot like the 5th and 7th grade students they will get to teach.  They all will work harder than they have ever worked to live UP to the expectations that are set for them.  Unfortunately, however, the opposite is also true…kids and adults alike, will also live DOWN to expectations if they are not set high enough.

So, what expectations have you set for the kids in your life?  Are they forcing the kids you come in contact with to push themselves to be better?  Or, can they just cruise through life and meet your expectations without really trying?  Because, I believe, if you are the HERO you are capable of being, they will strive to live up to your high expectations.  Because, in the end, they are looking for heroes!  And, I get the joy of watching heroes work HARD to positively impact your kids!

What are you capable of?

ATTACK!

As I was catching up on some tweets this morning, I saw a link to an article that talks about the “trend” of Christians being under attack in the Middle East and Africa (http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20110104/pl_afp/egyptiraqnigeriachristiansunrestus).  I read the article with the appropriate amount of dismay, tsk tsk’ing, shaking my head, and thanking God that I didn’t live in the Middle East or Africa.

But, the more I got to thinking about the article, I began to wonder who was more under “attack”.  Is it the Christians in the Middle East and Africa, or is it the Christians right here in the good ‘ol USofA (myself included)?  I got to thinking, we can SEE the attacks happening in the Middle East, and so, they get reported on.  They make for good news.  But, who wants to write the story about the “attack” of the American Christian?

I know, at this point, both of my loyal readers are sitting there thinking, “I’m not under attack”.  One of you even went so far as to make sure your door was locked to ward off any “attack”.  But, the longer I sat and thought about this article, the more convinced I became that we are under attack.  AND, WE DON’T EVEN KNOW IT!  That is the worst kind of attack.

What is attacking us?  How about apathy?  Greed?  And self-confidence?  And who is leading the charge?  Our enemy!

But, he is leading an amazing charge.  He has been walking around the ranks and whispering for centuries, and we have started to listen.  He whispers things like, “Change the channel.  You don’t live over there.  That is not your problem.”  Or, “Look at the new boat your neighbor has.  Why don’t you have a boat like that?  You work harder than he does.  You DESERVE a bigger boat than he has.”

And, possibly, the most damaging lie of all is whispered the quietest.  “You can do this on your own.  You are a self-made man.  God will just get in the way.  He didn’t work all those hours to buy this stuff.  He never worked in Corporate America.  He doesn’t understand.  You are on your own.”  Have you heard these whispers?  I have.

You see, no one wants to write the story about spiritual attacks.  But, does that mean there is no attack?  Or, has our enemy been whispering to the media as well.  If we see Christians being attacked in the Middle East and Africa, we might begin to believe that is what “attack” looks like.  And, since that is not what our lives look like (and some of us thank God at this point), then we must not be under attack.

But, what we seem to forget is that persecution ALWAYS makes the Church grow.  I heard a quote the other day from a Romanian Pastor (whose name I didn’t get) that said, “Christians are like nails.  The harder you hit them the deeper they go.”  You see, persecution and physical attacks drive the Christians in that area into a deeper relationship with God.  You can’t destroy Christianity by stomping it out of people.  But, I am beginning to wonder if you just might be able to destroy it by giving Christians everything they ever wanted including the ability to change the channel or stop reading the article when they see other Christians being physically attacked for their faith.

Can apathy kill Christianity when tyrant after tyrant has tried and failed?

Father God, break my apathetic heart.  Open my eyes so that I see people the way you see people.  I know I am not being physically hurt for my faith, but I am, nonetheless, under attack.  Father, you know my enemy better than I will ever know my enemy.  I pray that you bind him.  Keep him far from your Church, God, for I fear his whispering is beginning to greatly affect the troops.  Thank you for giving me a glimpse this morning of what you see.  Help me to use it to motivate me to change.  But, God, I realize that the only change that truly makes a difference is the change you bring.  So, change me, God!

Amen

Truth

I am right in the middle of Rob Bell’s book, Velvet Elvis.  And, I won’t say that I love the book, yet.  But, it has made me think more than most books I have read lately.  I can only read a few pages at a time before I have to put it down and finish chewing on what I just read.  I guess that makes it a good book…just not a lot of fun sometimes!

One of the points he makes in the book that I really love is when he talks about truth.  Jesus tells us in the book of John, that He is the way the truth and the life.  So anything that is true is Jesus.  You can not have truth outside of Jesus.  They are one and the same.

And, yet, we spend a lot of our time arguing truth.  We write doctrines.  We make rules.  We exclude those who don’t follow our doctrines and rules.  And, we discount other truths.

One of the examples Rob uses in the book is a trip he took to the Middle East.  He was in a Muslim country, and as he was driving around, he noticed a lot of the houses were under construction.  But, all construction looked like it had been stopped and abandoned.  Houses had partially finished additions.  Foundations were there gathering dust with no other work going on.  Construction equipment was laying around.  So, Rob asked his guide about this, and he was told that Islam forbid people from going into debt.  So, they cash-flowed all repairs and additions to their homes and businesses.  When they ran out of money, they quit working.  They would begin again when they had more money.

Friends, that’s truth.  And that’s biblical.  Proverbs 22:7 tells us, “the borrower is slave to the lender”.  So, is it possible that there is some truth in the Islam faith?  Now, I will be the first to tell you that until they know Jesus, they won’t really know truth, but isn’t that aspect of their faith more “true” than the American way of going as far into the debt as the banks will allow?  How many of us would admit that we are truly “slaves to our lenders”?  How many of us feel locked into jobs we hate because we have bills to pay?  How many of us miss out on ministry opportunities because we have a J-O-B?

Here is my point.  I think we, as Christians, need to get off our high-horse.  We don’t have Jesus all to ourselves.  For, wherever there is truth, there is Jesus.  So, we need to quit saying things like, “I am going on a mission trip to bring Jesus to such-and-such”.  Is Jesus something that you pack in your suitcase when you travel to these areas?  If we think that, than we have no idea how big Jesus really is.  And I have said similar things myself.

The Bible says, in John 1:1-4 “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. ² He was with God in the beginning. ³ Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. ⁴ In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. ⁵ The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.”

Did you catch that?  Jesus was there “in the beginning”.  He is everywhere.  Why do we act like we have exclusive rights to Him?  Wherever there is truth, He is there.  And, if I am being quite honest, sometimes I have found more truth outside the familiar walls of my church than within them.

So, we don’t need to “bring” Jesus anywhere.  He is already there, and calling us to join him so we can tell people about the source of the truth in their lives.  He is not our “Savior in a Suitcase” that we unpack for people.  He is moving and active, creating truth wherever He is, and He was there long before we were ever here.  And, that makes him WAY bigger than I ever thought!

Familiar

As I was preparing for devotions at volleyball the other night, I pulled a book off my shelf to see if there was anything I could find quickly to take to devotions.  I know, I know…I should have spent more time…I should have been better prepared…I should have…But I didn’t.  Instead, God led me to a book I read last year by Francis Chan titled Crazy Love.  Now, I will usually plow through a book fairly quickly and throw it on my shelf without remembering a lot of what I read.  Not something I am bragging about, but it happens.  Then, the books will sit on my shelf never to be read again.  They may be loaned out but only if my name is in the cover.  That way, they can be returned to me to gather dust on my shelf the way they are supposed to!

But, I really believe that in my distractedness and my hurry Monday night, God put this book back in my hand.  Because, as I opened it up, I was intrigued by the first chapter’s title, “Stop Praying”.  Now, this is an odd first chapter for a book written by a pastor.  So, I began to read again the first chapter of this book, and I was blown away by what God was showing me.

I need to quit praying…the way I have been praying.  I need to quit going to God with my prayer checklist.  My prayers, have become, “God, help me.  Help them.  Feed them.  Heal them.  Heal me.  Lead me.  Lead them.  Give me a sign.  Comfort them.  And, oh yeah, by the way, I love you.  InJesusnameamen!”  I have become the master of the speed prayer.  I mean, come on, God doesn’t want my food to get cold.  Does He?

After I read that Chapter for the second time, I went to the book’s website and watched the 2 minute video for Chapter 1.  You can watch it here:  http://crazylovebook.com/videos_chapter.html

In this video, Francis talks about people not believing that the beautiful woman they see him with is actually his wife.  He talks about looking at a picture of the himself and his wife and trying to be objective about whether or not she looked too good for him.  He came to the same conclusion that I did when I thought about this.  Like Francis’ wife, my wife is WAY to beautiful (inside and out) to be married to some schmuck like me.  But, I spend most of my life not thinking about this fact.  I mean, she’s “just my wife”, “my other half”, etc.

Why do I take her beauty, poise, and grace for granted?  Because she is familiar.  Because she is there every day.  Because she is a woman of her word, and I know she is not going anywhere (homely husband or not).  Sometimes I think familiarity brings complacency.

And, I am beginning to wonder if I am becoming too familiar with God.  I mean, I read about Him every day.  I talk to Him every day.  Notice I didn’t say talk WITH Him.  I have become too accustomed to the awesome and powerful God who created everything I see including this beautiful woman who sleeps next to me every night and puts up with me every day!  Why do I come to Him with a list of wants and not take the time to marvel at what He has already given me?  Why don’t I take the time to just stand in front of Him mouth agape in childlike awe of who He is?  Why do I think I know all about Him?  How can I be so arrogant?

God, break me of this familiarity that breeds comfort.  You are so much bigger and greater than I ever give you credit for.  And yet, I treat you like a slot machine in the sky that I can just make by request, insert a small dose of inJesusname and wait for the jackpot.  You give to me because you are a good Father not, necessarily, because I am a good son.  And, I thank you for that.  Please continue to put books and people in front of me that challenge me.  Thank you for reaching out and lovingly smacking me as I grabbed, in haste, for anything that would work for a quick volleyball devotion.  You directed me to something that is still messing with me days later.  Thanks for loving me enough to not leave me where you found me!  I love you!

Amen.

Simple Gift

I have been taking a writing sabbatical of sorts lately.  Sometimes, I felt like I was writing just for the sake of the post, and not because I had anything pressing to say.  But, that changed yesterday…

I mentor a 3rd grade student here in Jessamine County.  In the interest of his anonymity, I won’t tell you the school, and we can just call him D.  This year is the beginning of the third school year that we have spent together.  For 30 minutes each week, I go to D’s school and play with him.  Sometimes we are on the playground, sometimes the gym, sometimes playing a board game that when things start looking bad for him, he finds new rules to slant the game in his favor again.  But, all this to say, that D is my friend.

I wasn’t sure that we would hit it off at first.  Before I met him, I was told by his assistant principal that his dad was in jail for a really long time, and mom was less than involved in his life.  She popped in and out of jail.  When she was in jail, D stayed with his Nana.  So, here I stood outside his classroom in a police uniform expecting to be the bad guy.  But, when the assistant principal introduced D to me, she told him that I was going to come every week to school to hang out with him.  I was immediately wrapped up in one of the biggest embraces I have experienced from a first grader.  I’m not even certain he saw the uniform.

Now, I spent that first year being told that his daddy was faster than me, stronger than me, and could jump higher than me.  I told D that I believed him.  I was not known by any of those attributes.    But our relationship grew over the last couple years.

Fast forward to yesterday.  In general conversation on the playground, I asked D about homework in the 3rd grade.  He was telling me about it, and he said, “My mom said I don’t have to do Tuesday’s homework because we don’t have scissors at the house that aren’t for like  hair cuttin’ and stuff.  No kid scissors.  So, I don’t have to do Tuesday night’s homework because it’s usually cuttin’ stuff out.”  This struck me as odd.  But, I believe about half of what any typical 3rd grader tells me, so I asked him, “So, if you had scissors, you could do Tuesday’s homework each week?”  Without hesitation, he said, “yeah”.

So, when our time was up, I took D back to his classroom and went to the assistant principals office to tell her about our conversation.  I asked her if there were any scissors to be had so I could “take this excuse off the table”.  I really thought he was just being onry and coming up with a silly reason why he couldn’t do his homework.  She gave me a used pair of kid’s scissors and a sharpie marker.  I wrote D’s name on the handles on both sides so there would be no doubt as to whose scissors these were, and I walked them down to his classroom.  I walked over to where he was sitting, handed him the scissors, and said, “These are for you to take home.  Now you can do your homework”.  I expected an eye roll or an “oh man”, but what I got shocked me.  You would have thought that I had just handed D an award.  His mouth fell open, and all he said was “YES!” as he pumped both fists like he had just scored a goal.

Needless to say, I went back and thanked the assistant principal and shared with her the reaction that I got from D.

A fifty cent pair of scissors.  A used pair at that.  Made special by the fact that they were now D’s.  After all, they had his name on them.  And, I realized, that’s what giving is all about.  I promise you, if I would have just walked up and given D fifty cents, he would have given one of the quarters away, and probably lost the other one.  But, not to toot my own horn, I actually spent the time to get to know D before I tried to fulfill any of his needs.  I found out what his need was, and it was surprisingly simple.  I didn’t go in and fulfill what I thought was his needs.  I waited until the relationship showed me a need.  Now, I am not so simple that I believe this fifty cent pair of scissors changed his life and solved all his problems.  D probably won’t be standing at his college graduation thinking about the pair of scissors he received in the third grade, but it was a simple gift that meant something to him because it was a need.

How many of us are too quick to write a check?  How many of us are too busy to take the time to find out what is really needed, so we tell someone else, “If you need anything, let me know”.  We want to write a check and be done.  My friends, God has been showing me that is just not enough!

And, here is what bothers me the most.  School has been in session for 3 weeks or so, and no one thought to give D a pair of scissors.  As I thought about this, I realized, it’s probably because no one expected D to do his homework anyways.  So why would anyone ask him why he wasn’t doing it.  I don’t ask my wife why she didn’t mow the grass, because I don’t expect her to do that job.  I don’t know, for sure, that this is the case with D.  But I do know this.  Kids will strive to live up or down to our expectations.  If you set a bar, they will reach it.  But, will they have to reach up to get it, or will they stumble on it.  Our expectations can sometimes shape their lives.

A simple gift with a profound lesson for me.  Thanks God!

Silly

Have you ever felt God bumping you in a certain direction, and you convince yourself that it must not have been God.  It had to have been last night’s burrito, because God would never ask me to do something so silly.  Would He?

As I was reading in 2 Kings the other day at breakfast, I came across a story that I have read several times, but, for whatever reason, it jumped out at me and I can’t get it out of my mind. (how’s that for a run-on sentence…my high school english teacher just rolled her eyes)  The story I am talking about is 2 Kings 4:1-7.

The Widow’s Oil

¹ The wife of a man from the company of the prophets cried out to Elisha, “Your servant my husband is dead, and you know that he revered the LORD. But now his creditor is coming to take my two boys as his slaves.”² Elisha replied to her, “How can I help you? Tell me, what do you have in your house?”
“Your servant has nothing there at all,” she said, “except a little oil.”

³ Elisha said, “Go around and ask all your neighbors for empty jars. Don’t ask for just a few. ⁴ Then go inside and shut the door behind you and your sons. Pour oil into all the jars, and as each is filled, put it to one side.”

⁵ She left him and afterward shut the door behind her and her sons. They brought the jars to her and she kept pouring. ⁶ When all the jars were full, she said to her son, “Bring me another one.”
But he replied, “There is not a jar left.” Then the oil stopped flowing.

⁷ She went and told the man of God, and he said, “Go, sell the oil and pay your debts. You and your sons can live on what is left.”

Here is my problem with this passage.  Here is a woman who has lost her husband.  She is a widow.  And, the creditor is coming to take her boys as slaves to settle the debt that her husband left when he died.  She apparently has nothing to give other than her sons to settle accounts.  She is scared.  She is hurting.  She is destitute.  She needs help.  So, she turns to Elisha, God’s prophet.  And what does God tell her to do through Elisha?  To start a recycling business.  God tells her to go door to door collecting old jars.  Can you imagine her confusion.  If I were her, I would be saying, “Jars?  REALLY?  With all due respect here, Elisha, I don’t think you understand.  My boys, the only thing I have left in this world, are about to be taken from me.  With my boys gone, I will have no one to take care of me.  This is my life on the line here.  And you tell me to collect jars?”

Does this seem like an odd request to anyone else?  And, he tells her to not ask for just a FEW!

Then, get this, she is supposed to take all the jars she has collected, as many as she could get, and go into her house and shut the door.  I am sure shutting the door was not a problem for her.  She probably didn’t want the neighbors to see what she was up to lest they call for the men in white tunics with the padded chariot.  Then, she is supposed to pour oil into all the jars.  She knows how much oil she has.  She knows she doesn’t have enough to fill ONE jar.  Let alone the collection that she has accumulated from her neighbors.

And here is the part that amazes me:

She pours

She pours not knowing what will happen.  She pours what little she has and watches God work a miracle with it.  She pours with all her might trusting God to use all that she has left in the world and make it enough.  If there is no God, she would have poured out the last possession she had.  This is faith.  This is trust.  This is something I need to learn from.

And, this is a repeated theme in the Bible.  How many times have we read about Jesus or God taking what little someone could provide, and making it enough.  But, it only happens when that person is willing to give up all they have.

The fish and bread that the little boy gave to Jesus was not nearly enough to feed the 5,000.  It probably would have left the boy wanting more.  But he gave it anyway.  He gave it to Jesus and watched Him make it enough.  It wasn’t enough until He touched it!  The widow’s oil was not enough until God touched it.  But, those things would have gone untouched if they hadn’t been given in the first place!

What are you holding onto?  What has God been asking you to do that you dismissed as silly?  What do you feel God pushing you towards that is just too big for what little thing you can bring to it?  He can’t make it enough until you are willing to give it up.  He won’t touch it until you give it!  I don’t know about you, but it is time for me to risk looking silly in order to gather some jars!

(un)remarkable

I was thinking a lot the other day after reading something in a book by John Eldredge.  He made a comment about a very famous verse found in 1 Peter 3:15.  I know you have read/heard this verse a lot.  I included verse 16 with it as well.

Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect, ¹⁶keeping a clear conscience, so that those who speak maliciously against your good behavior in Christ may be ashamed of their slander.

Sounds good doesn’t it?  “Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have.”  Let me ask you a really honest question.  Has anyone ever asked you?  Because they haven’t asked me.  Why is that?  Are they just shy?  Ashamed?  Clueless?  Or apathetic?  Those would be easier answers than what I suspect is the actual reason they don’t ask.  I am afraid that they don’t ask because my life doesn’t look remarkably different than any of their other friends’ lives.  In other words, I don’t stand out.  We only ask about things that stand out.  Things that catch our attention.  When something blends in with everything else around it, we don’t even notice it.  In essence, too many Christians, myself included, are simply unremarkable.

Now, this doesn’t mean you have to get weird around your friends.  When they ask you where you want to eat lunch, you don’t have to say, “Let’s pray about it”.  You don’t have to start working “thee” and “thou” into your everyday speech.  You don’t have to slap a fish on the back of your car and an Annotated Study Bible in your back window that would be entirely sufficient to completely decapitate you in the event of a crash.  This is not a call to be weird.  As a matter of fact, if you are that guy, I am going to respectfully ask you to quit weirding people out in the name of Jesus!

It is not a call to be weird, but it is a call to be different!

I guess what I am saying, is what would happen if we started taking risks in our lives?  What if we quit being comfortable like everyone else?  What if we took some risks for God?  And, the biggest risk we might be able to take is living a life that looks different from everyone else.  Because one thing I have learned in my old(er) age is that no one else has it any more “together” than I do.  Studies show that around 80% of households are living paycheck to paycheck.  Which means if I don’t live that way, like maybe I have money saved in the bank, a written budget every month, and am out of debt, that makes me weird.  But, would anyone think that kind of weird is a bad thing?

How many truly happy marriages do you you know?  What if I lived my life in such a way that showed I valued marriage?  What if I spoke highly of my wife while standing around the water cooler instead of running her down like the other guys?  What if I took my wife out on dates a few times a month and we left the kids with a sitter so we could be “husband and wife” for the night instead of “mom and dad”?  How different would we look to the rest of the world?

What if I was just honest in a loving way?  What if people knew me as someone who would tell the truth instead of telling them what they wanted to hear?  Would I get more people talking to me or less?

This has turned into a big “what if” post.  I didn’t really intend it that way, but as I wrote, I felt like I was dreaming.  And dreams are a big “what if”.

All I know is this.  The Bible tells me to always be prepared to give an answer to those who ask about my life.  And no one asks.  I am not naive enough or self-centered enough to think the problem is with them.  I believe the problem is with me.  I need to do a better job of living my life in such a way that people ask.  Because when they ask, I will be able to tell them about the One who is making me into the one who stands out; who looks different than everyone else;  who isn’t afraid to be different.

I want to be that guy.  Not for me, but for Him!

Simple Prayers

So, we are sitting at the dinner table the other night and my five-year-old daughter said, “I want to pray to God that He will make me like picking up and cleaning.  Then, I will come in and ask, “Mommy, can I please clean up?”, and mommy will say, “But everything is already clean.  You cleaned it already.”"

We shared this with my family, and they wanted us to keep them posted as to how effective this was.  They were going to help their kids pray this way if we had a lot of success with it!

But, I share this for two reasons.

1. Amazing cute factor
2. Why do we complicate prayers?

In the mind of my five-year-old, it made perfect sense to ask God to help her like something that she didn’t like but she knew was necessary.  She didn’t ask to pray that her sister would clean for her or that God would wave his magic wand, and do her cleaning for her.  She prayed that He would change her heart!  Isn’t that what God is in the business of doing?  How many times have we asked for a job we disliked to be taken away from us?  How many times have we prayed that God would make someone else more helpful?  How often have we prayed for a change of our circumstances instead of a change in our hearts?

I am constantly amazed at what I learn from my kids.  And one of my favorite lessons is always their child-like faith.  And please don’t read that as me looking down on them.  It is quite the opposite.  I am jealous of their faith.  I model a lot of things as their father.  Some good…some not so good.  But, they model things for me also.  I think this is why Jesus was so fond of children.  Children were to be seen and not heard in his day.  Tolerated.  Yet, he was constantly calling kids to Him.  In Matthew 18, it says:

^“1At that time the disciples came to Jesus and asked, “Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?”

²He called a little child and had him stand among them. ³And he said: “I tell you the truth, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. ⁴Therefore, whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.

⁵“And whoever welcomes a little child like this in my name welcomes me. ⁶But if anyone causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him to have a large millstone hung around his neck and to be drowned in the depths of the sea.”

So, I think I will continue to learn from my kids, and any kids I allow to teach me.  I am thankful for these lessons.  And, I want God to change my heart and not, necessarily, my circumstances.  For, it is my heart that is forever with me while my circumstances are always temporary!

Lucky 13

WOW!!  It has been a REALLY long time since I have written.  I spent a week at the beach with my family where we had an amazing time!  And then, we spent a week in Northern Kentucky at the state D.A.R.E. conference where I learned a lot, and got to do some teaching as well.  And, then I have just been lazy.  Just haven’t gotten around to posting anything.  No excuses…just stories.

But, today, I was thinking about the number 13.  Seems odd doesn’t it (well it IS an odd number…don’t ya know).  Ba-Dum-Bum!  Wow…sorry.  Triskaidekaphobia = a really long word that means an irrational fear of the number 13.  I didn’t make this up.  It’s really a concern for some people.

For example, I was told in a history class in high school that the number 13 is considered so unlucky, that you will very rarely find a staircase with 13 steps.  Now, I wish I had never learned this, because I have counted (in my head) most staircases since.  I little OCD, I know.  But, I can tell you that I have very rarely found a set of stairs with 13 steps.  Ours here at home is a very lucky 14 steps.  My brother’s new house however is the exception.  He has 13 steps…BE CAREFUL!  (later today, when you count stairs, you can think of me…you’re welcome)

I mentioned earlier, that we went to the beach a couple of weeks ago.  While there, we had a beautiful view from our 14th floor balcony overlooking the Gulf of Mexico.  Our condo was #1410.  Which was, as I mentioned earlier, on the 14th floor which was right between the 12th and 15th floors.  That’s right, no 13th floor!  This is not the first building I have seen that lacked a 13th floor.

I don’t have any idea why this number is so despised.  I looked it up on Wikipedia, and there are many different possible origins for the dislike of this number, but no real conclusion.

So, why all this talk about the number 13?

Because, 13 years ago this past Monday, I married my best friend.  And, no matter whether you are superstitious or not, I really like the number 13.  Next year, I will be a big fan of the number 14 for those of you who are following along!  But, seriously, 15 years ago, God saw fit to set me up on a blind date through a friend of mine.  So, on a Thursday night in early April of 1995, I agreed to meet a girl named Greta and we were going to spend the evening with a bunch of mutual friends.  My friend was dating her room-mate, but I had never met this girl.  So, we spent the evening together, and I learned that Greta worked at Rite Aid while attending Eastern Kentucky University (which is also where I went).  The next day was the beginning of Lil Sibs weekend at EKU, and I was supposed to drive to Cincinnati to pick up my little brother.  So, I thought I might ask my new friend, Greta, to ride along.

I went to Rite Aid, with my speech all prepared.  Something like, “if you want, you can go.  I don’t blame you a bit if you don’t want to.  I know, you are busy.  Probably have homework, or you have to wash your hair, or you have better things to do than hang out with me, blah, blah, blah”.  But, to my surprise, she said, “If you can wait until I get off work, I’ll go”.  I was floored!  I didn’t have a speech prepared if she said yes, so I stammered something about pick you up when you get off work.

We spent over three hours in the car that night just talking.  I had known her for about 24 hours at this point, and I was able to have a three hour conversation with her.  Fast forward almost two years, and on June 21st, 1997, she married me, and made my life better than I ever thought possible.  Fast forward another 13 years, and we are still able to ride in the car (over 20 hours on the Florida trip) and have amazing conversation.  She still makes me laugh.  She still is my best friend.  And, she is responsible for the happiest 13 years of my life!

So, big, bad number 13…you don’t scare me.  In fact, this year, you are my favorite number!

Here’s to many more years spent with the one God had in mind for me when he made me 35 years ago.  Thank you doesn’t seem quite adequate enough, but it’s all I got.  So, THANK YOU, God!

And thank you, Greta, for making me a better man, and giving me our amazing daughters, and agreeing to share life with me.

“Ordinary?  No.  I really don’t think so.  Just a precious few.  Ever make it last…get as lucky as, Me and You!”

I love you.