"Osmosis..............................."

The flight down from Cincinnati had an nitial "minor moment" that gave me one reason to consider getting off the plane and utilize another method of transportation; but, once we took to the air, it was merely a two-hour "piece of cake" to our destination. The oldest daughter's brood arrived at the condo a few hours after us, less than a seveneen-hour drive, no incidents. The middle daughter's family experienced some trouble with their vehicle, but limped in a bit later, thus ending our worries. There are, indeed, those times when I can appreciate cellphones. The whole crew had a chance to enjoy the surf before darkness fell. Even the old man. I just didn't get wet in the procedss.....

I like the beach for many reasons. Swimming in the briny just doesn't rate anywhere near the top of the list. What draws me is the "connection". Deep calleth unto deep. So that evening, about ten-thiry, while the others were topside watching television and whatever, I went down to where the sound of the waves washing over the sand allowed me to get alone with God. There was peace in my soul about making this trip, but that didn't mean I had abandoned all concern about matters at home, and a one-on-one dialogue with the One who holds it all in the palm of His hand is never out of order.....

A few hundred yards north of our unit, the shoreline turns inward, boats passing under a causeway bridge that joins two separate townships; and the city on this side has built a small, concrete deck, there at the bend, for people to sit and soak in the view. Finding it unoccupied, I walked to the end, still in prayer, and leaned against the railing. Slowly my mind became aware of the full moon overhead projecting its image on the ocean below. The picture before me resembled a lighted path, beginning at a point just in front of me and extending ever wider unto the horizon, compsed of what seemed to be radiant impulses, glittering silver fish rapidly swimming in to meet me; and, for a while, I simply stood there, raptured into the glory of the Creator.....

"Bulletin...................."

I love you…..

Three little words that some find quite difficult to speak at all; and yet, when spoken by the rest of us, they are either voiced with no real concern for what we are saying, or with no way to express what is held in one’s heart. Years ago I wrote a song that defined such emotion as “a knot that God, Himself, has tied”, for it seems to me that, even though the bond need not be reciprocated, it is hard to sever once it has been established.....

We leave in the morning for a few days vacation. My youngest daughter, along with my next-door neighbor will be guarding the home-front. It has been a hard decision to make. Other things going on in my life right now. God, though, has given me release about the matter and a heavy load has been lifted off my mind. My laptop is going with me. More later. Perhaps…..

"The Tie That Binds............................"

"These things have I spoken unto you that ye should not be offended (or: that you may be kept from stumbling)"....John 16:1, KJ & NAS


My Pensacola vacation and a visit this past weekend to the Youth Detention Center interfered with my hearing the first two servings of a four-part sermon constructed so as to more tightly shape our assembly into a unified Body of Christ. As usual in such series, however, the pastor briefly reviewed his prior points, noting that (1) friendship is vital to any congregation; and (2) involvement “seals the deal”, and then centered on his present focus (3) protecting one another. By the latter, he simply meant ministering to those within the flock who get hurt in some way or perhaps just “being there” for a fellow believer who is struggling in their journey. It was, in all aspects, a good message; yet the verse above, upon which it rested, is situated in the middle of two chapters composed of nothing but red print, the very words of Jesus concerning the need of our knowing the Holy Ghost, not as a Biblical term, but as a Reality, as a supernatural Third Party extension connecting us with our Father, an indwelling and a source of all that He is, and therefore that which will enable us to know the fulfillment of what He speaks in this particular verse; and no mention, at all, was made of that fact Sunday morning. Maybe it was dealt with on the two prior occasions…..

It bothers me when a significant portion of teens confined to that Youth Detention Center give affirmation to having had a prior church experience, yet also feel that what they were told to be truth did not confirm itself in what life brought unto them. I hear the same confession, though, from both young adults and older people; and I’ve come to the conclusion that there’s no doubt something missing in this gospel we preach. People, of course, will always remain people. The Lord, Himself, in sending us forth, made it quite clear that the seed we sown may well be lost for a number of reasons; but all the more important, therefore, (or it seems to me) that what we share with others must come up out of our “belly” more so than from a head filled with nothing but our own perception of the matter. I agree with my pastor that what we, as believers, have is each other. Nonetheless, if, in that, all we possess is a doctrine, a denominational credo giving no evidence of His promise existing within us, what do we really have to give? Our works may be mistaken for merely an effort on our part to appear holy if faith isn’t somehow confirmed by Him. It’s never been about me convincing others of my particular view of the Volume, but that Christ “in” me might somehow emerge in all…..

"Sorting It Out..........................."

"The Christian’s Bible is a drug store. Its contents remain the same; but the medical practice changes. The world has corrected the Bible. The church never corrects it; and also never fails to drop in at the tail of the procession — and take the credit of the correction. During many ages there were witches. The Bible said so. The Bible commanded that they should not be allowed to live. Therefore the Church, after eight hundred years, gathered up its halters, thumb-screws, and firebrands, and set about its holy work in earnest. She worked hard at it night and day during nine centuries and imprisoned, tortured, hanged, and burned whole hordes and armies of witches, and washed the Christian world clean with their foul blood. Then it was discovered that there was no such thing as witches, and never had been. One does not know whether to laugh or to cry. There are no witches. The witch text remains; only the practice has changed. Hell fire is gone, but the text remains. Infant damnation is gone, but the text remains. More than two hundred death penalties are gone from the law books, but the texts that authorized them remain"…..Mark Twain

In-between running to and fro with my wife this week, my mind has been occupied with some Thomas Merton, Philip Yancey, an old Tom Clancy novel, “Red Storm Rising”, and various uncharted waters, for me, within blogdom. The initial paragraph here represents a visit this morning and is but one taken from several quotes which give some insight into what the famous author of Huckleberry Finn thought about the faith I follow. Sadly, one can’t deny the facts; but, of a truth, I’d rather sit down and discuss Christ with a man so questioning in his attitude toward the ecclesiastical institution, than with that man who has it all doctrinally wrapped and encased in cement. Then again, what feeds me is dialogue, not debate; and I long ago learned that people can be dogmatic on both sides of the fence…..

As far as the Word, it’s not the text, but a man’s attempt to decipher it with his own understanding and then require all others to agree with his view thereof. If the believer tends to enshrine the volume, then it can also be said that the atheist would dismiss it altogether; and, in both scenarios, a living, tangible God is not lost, but certainly left standing outside the door, knocking for permission to enter in. Within those literary pursuits listed above, someone suggested that, as our species gained intelligence, we lost all fear of divine authority and a judgment day to come. The Book, they said, needed no translation, it spoke for itself. What they really meant, however, was that they, alone, possessed the correct meaning of chapter and verse, another declaration of having “arrived”…..

We all are created with an inner recognition of the mystery, a thirst for meaning, purpose, and some real sense of what our existence is all about. Life-on a planet in the middle of a solar system being hurled across a seemingly unending universe, bumping elbows with all of humanity and never really being fully able to explain our own psychological make-up, let alone the guy seated next to us. What I have found Scripture brings to me is an extension of the Trinity, the “Logos” utilized by the “Rhema” (which is just another word for the Holy Ghost). It comes with a tug on the anchor-line, as well as a boot in the butt at times, and is part of the key that take me “through the veil”, a location where I don’t necessarily get all the answers, but at least can find rest and strength in Him…..

"Mirror Theology............................."

One might think that having no occupational attachment for nearly three months would leave a fellow with nothing to do but gather his thoughts and put them to press. Not so. Mostly, my days are spent realizing what I already knew but seldom appreciate: it may be summer break for me, but my wife is constantly “on the go”, busy with some task around the house or running an errand concerning either our own welfare or someone else within the family. After a thirteen hour drive home Saturday, I did manage to assist a friend with his slot in the Youth Detention Center schedule Sunday morning. Although my brain was a bit fuzzy, that inner flow from His well remained faithful and the “three” of us ministered to about fifty young adults, the gender issue almost equally balanced on this occasion. Sunday evening I visited a local assembly, but left halfway through the service, unable to locate that same witness of His Spirit…..

Years ago, a deacon in the Baptist church just down the road from our congregation often pumped me at work, fishing for information on what we Pentecostals were attempting to accomplish so close to his own ecclesiastical segment of the Body. My replies were kept friendly, unlike the one given by my wife to a woman who likewise continually so drilled her. Never at a loss for words, Beth simply asked her, in return, what her group was up to and, when told “Nothing”, suggested she should then be worried about her own members. I bring this up because yesterday, in the middle of grocery shopping, an old acquaintance so approached me, seemingly amazed to learn we were yet faithfully attending a different group. My infrequent visits to the old location had somehow assured her of our return there and, when I spoke of grandchildren being the main attraction, she immediately went to examining the morals of my present pastor…..

God knows the religious community has enough stench in its frocks to reveal humanity is yet alive within the claim of having been “born-again”; and it is only in our denial of such truth (or so it seems to me) that hypocrisy springs forth to give even more pungency to the odor. That said, however, I fail to understand how the label of “comedian” gives a man the right to publically slander another person’s dignity. I do recognize that humor in our society has always embraced a crude ethnic, sexual, whatever-attacks-the-other-guy’s-sense-of-worth form of “joking”, but since when did it get elevated to prime time on national television? Didn’t Imus, a few months back, learn the cost of insulting a few women while on the air? Then, again: we never learn, do we? At the best, it is a journey down the path, a reach through the veil, a pursuit to know His presence as it graces us in the midst of all that we are…..

"A Many Splendored Thing......................."

It is seven a.m., six here in Pensacola, not all that early in the morning, but enough so that the world around me is yet pure, for the most part, in its rising to greet the sun. My granddaughter asked us to stay at least one night with her and we leave for home either late this evening after a special church gathering or tomorrow after having invested a few hours of sleep into the journey. Seated on a small deck he’s built in their backyard, though, I’m presently enjoying a hot cup of coffee and watching all the natives who inhabit this area introduce themselves to me. A bright red cardinal, female, perched atop a wooden fence to my right, just took in my presence and checked me out before flying across to the chain-link in the rear to meet with her mate. To my left there’s a scarlet woodpecker wearing a black hood over its head and pounding out rhythm in the trunk of one of several fifty-foot tall trees whose massive limbs curve and bend at crooked angles in all directions. Across the way a huge one of a different variety has attained a height of at least two hundred feet and my thoughts tend to ask if the owner of the house sitting in the shade beneath it doesn’t worry about damage to his roof should storms or age bring down part of it. No doubt the two grey squirrels who have now ventured into my immediate existence do not concern themselves about such matters. It’s, indeed, a lovely day in the neighborhood, peaceful, that is, until someone nearby just cranked up their vehicle, the noisy engine idling a bit before groaning in its exit down the street…..

We’ve had a good week, but a long one. Normally, our visits here are no more that two or three day reunions with a twelve hour drive attached to both ends, but the grandson is proposing marriage this evening to the young lady who has captured his heart and he wanted us to stay for the big event. No one is supposed to know, yet it seems as if everyone but the girl does know, and I’m thinking even she is a bit suspicious that something is afoot. Love may be blind; but, if it’s “the real deal”, it isn’t without some inner connection that makes two one long before the altar institutes legality. The Bible says that faith “works by love” and, to me, that process is the undercurrent of relationship, whether examined vertically between a man and his Maker, or horizontally as it is nurtured between any of us. Affairs of the heart may well often take us where common sense tells us we shouldn’t go, but they are hard to maintain if trust isn’t part of the package. The contract doesn’t require mutual exchange and the statement that God “so loved the world” is the vest evidence I can offer in witness of such truth. We tend to think of “surrender” in terms of our coming unto Him, but I find His grace to be very much a manifestation of His willingness to “come low” and meet with us at our level. It doesn’t make Him any less our Creator, of course, nor take away, in any manner, from His sovereignty, but knowing His reality so extended as to dwell within us does tend to induce commitment on our part…..

"Cooking From Scratch........................"

In April, Beth and I became great-grandparents via a reciprocal adoption process that began nearly twenty years ago. A little girl, a child, won our hearts when her mother and father passed through our part of the country, visiting our church for a pastors’ seminar. With a year or so, dad would become an associate part of our staff, begin an outreach in Cincinnati after a period of time, and eventually return to Florida, although far from that area he and his wife knew as home. There was a baby brother added to the family before their departure and, for not quite a decade, we were the only tangible papaw and mamaw the kids knew. Distance would not change that. We visited frequently, phoned often, and kept up with birthdays, holidays, graduation, and weddings. With school out for summer vacation, we drove down to Pensacola this past Friday, a long stretch of road for old bones, but travelled anyhow, hearts connected to our destination…..

Sunday morning we visited the church he birthed in this area, a small, independent flavor of what most know as being Pentecostal, but (to me, at least) well-balanced in its worship. Dan isn’t some celebrity, a charismatic display of divine authority. He is a leader, a shepherd, a man of humility, someone to whom you can turn and trust with whatever, someone who is open to you concerning his own need of grace and yet giving you, within such honesty, all the more reason to follow him in Christ. His congregation is an ethnic mixture, young and old, fluctuating between two and three hundred, many solidly attached in membership, always new faces when I return, but always that few, also, who have left for one reason or another. They minister and reach out to the community around them in various ways, definitely not a “self-centered” group. If my heart wasn’t already tied to grandchildren in Kentucky, it wouldn’t be hard at all to simply drop anchor and stay…..

More and more, however, I’m convinced that each individual unit of the Body is not all that different in its identity. Doctrine may separate us. Tradition may divide us. People, nonetheless, remain people; and the reasoning behind the institution is not so much about who has determined the most precise truth, as it is about God making something out of nothing. It’s good, of course, if, in our coming together, we extend His image beyond our four walls, put the Gospel into action and help others rather than simply build bigger barns to feed our own egos; but, in reality, humanity is not an easy commodity with which to work. So do you think that maybe the whole idea of assembly is actually just an attempt to teach us brotherhood, that perhaps First Baptist, South Methodist, and St. Mary’s are merely mixing bowls, filled with a bit a this, a pinch of that, seasoned and stirred in hope of baking a cake fit for a King? I can almost see the Holy Ghost wearing an apron, spoon in hand, toiling over the batter…..

"Mysteries............................"

My fiftieth high-school reunion is scheduled for next weekend and other issues necessitated my cancelling participation in the event. When they returned that money already invested, however, one of those involved in the arrangements graciously included a nice note along with a list of a few more of our number no longer with us. The old annual, of course, came down from the shelf to be brought up to date, even as someone else will someday no doubt likewise record my own departure; but, in re-visiting those pictures of our class of ’59, the photo of one girl, in particular, gave me reason to pause. Her first husband killed himself early in their marriage, asphyxiation, and I know little of it other than that. Time would bring unto her a second spouse with whom she enjoyed many years. His death, not so long ago, though, evidently took her into depression (or it could be she had some sickness in her own life); but she, herself, then committed suicide, strangely enough, while on vacation in Mexico. It is, as it always is, a sad story; and yet I have, truthfully, wondered if maybe her history with that first experience didn’t somehow lend itself to her decision about the second…..

There’s a link on my sidebar that takes me to a journal kept by a prison chaplain. Her entries are rather infrequent; but she recently wrote of having to minister to both the inmates and the family of a man who had hung himself early one morning within the confines of his cell. Whether it was her words about the incident or the above situation which sent my mind down this present path, I do not know; but it occurred to me that man might just be the only animal (other than perhaps the lemming, who reportedly effects the act as a species, by leaping en masse off a cliff into the sea) to so volitionally dispose of himself. My thoughts are not extended in judgment. Indeed, it is just as big a mystery to me how some are so quick to label it “sin”, for I can easily understand how a person might be emotionally brought to such point and none of us can categorically state that we would never find ourselves there. Purpose, meaning, anchor-lines like a sense of being loved and needed, all help to keep our spirit and soul afloat; but that doesn’t mean it’s not possible for us to lose our way in the stumble down the path. Even in Christ, what we possess is each other and His light before us in the next step. I remember a friend from oh so long ago…..

"The Hog in Me..............................."

What hair he yet possessed was a peppered silver-gray, thin on top, but tied into a pony-tail in back, merging front-wise into a well trimmed beard, long enough, he said, for the little diddles in church daycare to have become convinced when he rides up on his motorcycle that he’s Santa Clause. He was dressed in dungarees, a denim vest over a blue tee-shirt that ended where his shoulders brought forth massive, muscular arms. No Hulk Hogan. A short, over-weight man, in his fifties I’d guess, but tattooed and clearly not your average visiting evangelist. Other than special occasions, our assembly has no Sunday evening service and, for several years now, we have allowed Biker Ministry to make use of our sanctuary, a relationship that, while remaining separate in outreach, has blended well with us in many ways. This being a special, annual day, part of a week-end event where riders come from every direction, gathering to invest in a charity benefitting children, our pulpit had been turned over to their pastor for the morning sermon…..

We were privileged to hear a short testimony from one of his recent converts and then given a brief history of how soldiers returning from WWII formed the first club. After such exposure to the horror of face-to-face combat, they were looking for meaning, some way to fill an inner void, an answer for their survival when so many others had paid the ultimate price. Viet Nam would produce more of the same, but the drug culture of the sixties had its hold on many of those veterans and it didn’t take Hollywood long to create an image blown out of proportion. To be sure, he said, he was not proud of his past. He and others just like him, though, were merely in search of truth. Yet, in finally coming to Christ, while he did not doubt having found “the answer”, he slowly observed himself evolving into “just one of the sheep”, dressed now in a suit and tie, sitting on a pew, and slowly losing that which he called the “adventure” in his life…..

I could identify with his message. No; my skin has never been permanently inked nor pierced in any manner and leather, other than a pair of shoes, has never been my choice for anything I wear. There is absolutely no way you could get me to ride a Harley. For that matter, fishing was fun when it was just me, a hook, a length of line, and a nearby creek. Hunting, when it finally dawned on me that my love of the sport had more to do with just being out in nature than it ever did with killing animals for no reason, went out the window with my shotgun. I’m thinking, however, that what this fellow was actually addressing is the “excitement”, the “joie de vie” that makes the journey more than “the same old rut” day after day. It is a “stirring of the water”, a “breeze” from whence I can not tell, a sense of His presence that meets me in the next step when I least expect it. When we lose that, all that’s left is something called “religion”…..