Practicing Pedantics

So it's been a while, huh?

2005-12-06T12:34:00.000-08:00

I understand the phalanx of frustration that is felt by all of my adoring readers and that you feel lost and alone without my guidance, wit and foolishness as witnessed in this blog. So for all of you who read this (both of you would be my guess), if you read it, call me or email me just so I know. If I don't get an email or a call from you referencing this number 235664 then I will realize that I am speaking only to myself in this blog and it will cease to exist.

I question and I wonder about a lot of things. I have serious doubts about the whole purpose of things outside the work of God. Now, by "the work of God" I am including his work in the world and our participation in that work. I hope that all who read this recognize that I put extremely great value on these two things. In fact, they rank right up there with Laura Johnson, my three kids, Mountain Dew, and the Kentucky Wildcat basketball team (damn their scrawny hides allowing North Carolina to beat them!). But don't you just question the value of a lot of the other things that go on in the world? I mean, really, who needs a 46" plasma tv or even a 52" (or I just heard advertised today a projector that will give you the equivalent of a 92" picture)? How close do I really need to be to enjoy what little there is to enjoy in television and movies today? I wouldn't be able to actually taste the Mountain Dew on screen even if it was seven feel tall! And while there are players on the Wildcats that really are seven feet tall, I don't need them running back and forth across my wall. But I digress.

There are only a few things that really matter: love for and by God, love of family and the fulfillment that comes from following God's lead. I want to be more and more like Christ, more and more willing to live a life of sacrifice and suffering in honor of his life and sacrifice. But when God allows those things to come my way, the first thing I do is panic or get mad or get afraid. I refuse to get afraid or mad or panic anymore. I have the things that matter, the rest will just have to forget it.

Is it possible to exist outside of grace?

2005-05-30T14:50:00.000-07:00

Truly I wonder. I try so hard to be all that I should be, all that I am supposed to be, all that I have been created to be. Instead, I miserably fail. Those who count on me the most find me to be the most unreliable and those who know me not, consider themselves among the elite. So I wander and I wither and I excuse myself and I chastise myself. If only you were like this one, or like that one. If only you would...

Then God speaks...

I would not have you be anything other than totally and undeniably dependant on Me, My son. All the rest is shadow and feathers. Clouds bursting into showers of dust...the dust from which you were created and the dust to which you aspire. Nothing more and nothing less. Aside from Me. Yet with Me (I tire of all the capitals, my son, let's let it rest, shall we?), there are incomparable extensions of superiority and usefulness you will find.

By the matchless grace of God, I have had an impact on this world and in accordance with whatever grace he should continue to bless me, I will endeavor to impact some more. On this Memorial Day, I seek to honor those who have gone before and who have sacrificed for my behalf and on the behalf of my family. But, wouldn't it be better if there were no war? If men (and now women) didn't have to die in order for nations to get along?

I believe that God would prefer that we not have war. He is the one who said that life is precious and valuable and that he is watching if even so much as a sparrow falls. Mustn't he grieve for all of his children (Christian, Jew, Muslim, Buddhist, etc.) who fall in battle? Since God surely isn't for it, then it is only reasonable to assume that war is a creation of our own and as such, is subject to our setting of the boundaries and the rules and limits. If that is true, couldn't we just choose to settle our differences by, I don't know, having someone chosen out of the respective legislative bodies of the particular nations race wheelbarrows full of chilled gelatin up a mountain. First one to the top and back wins? I mean, we're getting to choose, right? Why not guerrilla gelatin battles as opposed to smart bombs and dirty bombs, WMDs and MAD?

And I would appoint the roaming gnome as referee.

Could it really be true?

2005-02-15T09:45:00.000-08:00

Could it really be true that God loves me so much that he is willing to forgive all the things that I have done? I am rereading Ragamuffin Gospel by Brennan Manning and I am reminded of the grace that is mine through Christ Jesus my Lord. Can we stretch the limits of the grace that God offers?

Let's look at a classic example: Jonah and his battle to prevent the redemption of the evil people of Nineveh. We always talk about the midafternoon snack that Jonah became and allow our minds and imaginations to go all over the place as we seek to prove or disprove that there could be a fish (or whale) large enough to swallow a man and then allow him to survive in there for three days before regurgitating him back onto shore. We think that this is a fantastic yarn that stretches our abilities to accept by faith what is written in the Bible. Our arguments and discussions take tremendous twists and turns as we debate the improbability of such a thing while routinely failing to see that which should boggle us all the more.

Jonah was a prophet. Evidently a fairly well respected prophet and a guy who heard God when he spoke to him. God called out to Jonah to take the good news (not to be confused with the Good News) to Nineveh that God was going to forgive them of their sin. This may have been good news for the Ninevites, but it wasn't for Jonah. Jonah was a Jew and the Jews were no friends of the Ninevites. You see, the Ninevites were evil people, known for cutting their enemies in half lengthwise. I don't know why that always sticks out as important to me, their cutting lengthwise, but it does and it's how I tell the story. Knowing how God works, Jonah refused to go to Nineveh, he did not desire for them to be saved. So Jonah ran from God and from the mission he had been assigned. You know the story from the boat and how eventually Jonah is willing to sacrifice himself on behalf of those on the boat with him. Yet he wouldn't even go talk to the Ninevites. Jonah hated the Ninevites, but God was calling to him to evangelize them (again the wrong use of the word but you get the picture). Then comes the encounter with the whale and Jonah relents (notice I did not say that Jonah was convinced) and goes to Nineveh. There the people repented, turned from the wickedness and accepted the God of the Jews as their God. Though he should have celebrated, Jonah was discouraged, desolate and depressed. It had worked out just like he knew that he would, God had done just as Jonah knew God would and now the great enemies of Israel were serving their God. We should take from this the realization that Jonah had his priorities all mixed up. He was interested in putting limits on God so that God was in Jonah's image instead of the other way around.

Fast forward to today. Look at us in the church. Knowing how God works we choose to work some other way. We choose programs so that we can be like Willow Creek or Saddleback. We seek charismatic preachers and expansive sanctuaries. We desire pipe organs and large choirs or rock & roll bands with praise teams. We know how God works. It is not in the magnificent and the mighty that we will always find God. Often it is in the still small voice. It is not always in the whirlwind, it is often in the silence. "What does the Lord require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God. Micah 6:8" Let us choose to accept the incomprehensible grace of God and to put off the binding and oppression that our past may have taught us. We are not slaves to the past, nor are we slave to our teachers. We have but one Lord and He is God.

Ask yourself this question

2005-01-12T13:39:00.000-08:00

Ask yourself this question: is it better to be alone knowing that you are being true to yourself or is it better to be surrounded by friends while knowing you are living a lie? Seems like a simple enough question, but let it slosh around inside your brain for a while and see how it stacks up.

Alone, but true to self If you choose this option, then your credibility is to be admired. You do not want to be untrue to who you are and who God made you to be. That is commendable. But loneliness is not what God created you to be. Speaking in reference to the man He had just created, God said, "It is not good for him to be alone." Now in this particular account, God was referring to giving Adam a partner, a life mate, in other words, Eve. But I believe that it is consistent with what we learn about God through Jesus Christ to say that it is not good for anyone to be alone (at least not all the time). Jesus spent time alone, sure. He would go off by himself in order to pray and to be silent with God. But he surrounded himself with people most of the time. They were all important to him, but their priority was figured in concentric circles (think of your typical bullseye type target). The crowds that followed him are the outside ring of the target. These include people that he loves, but people that don't always love him or have his best interest at heart. Some of them are just interested in what he's doing, but they don't want to follow. Others just came for the free food. (There are always some who are only hanging around to see what they can get out of it or you). And, some are there to collect intelligence in order to justify killing him. The next ring includes a large group of what would be called disciples, or followers. This group would include his apostles but also other people who were in his camp. They would be dedicated to his well-being and would realize that he was devoted to them. They would support what he desired to do, but were willing to question him when they didn't fully understand his actions or his reasoning. At the center of this relationship bulls-eye would be James, John, and Peter, the Big Three. They are the ones that Jesus knew he could count on and the ones that he intended to spearhead the movement after he returned to be with the Father. So, see, Jesus had friends and acquaintanes and he knew how to manage all of the relationships. You will note, however, that Jesus remained consistent in how he felt about the whole group: he loved them all. His interactions with them depended on their acceptance of him.

Life of the party, living a lie There's just something about this whole concept that speaks to frequent and endless torment. If you chose this option, there is no doubt that there will be plenty of opportunities to have fun and to laugh and carry on. The problem is that after the party, you still have to live with yourself. And your intrinsic understanding of self will not allow you to accept the lies you share with everyone else. So, you will be miserable. Jesus was stopped by a young man one day. This young man was wealthy and was a follower of the Mosaic Law. He asked Jesus, "Master, what must I do to gain eternal life?" and Jesus said, "Love God and love others as yourself (basically)." The young man replied, "Master, I have kept all the Law since I was a child." So Jesus said, "Then, sell all you have and follow me." Scripture tells us that the young man went away sad. Why was he sad? He had great wealth. He could do anything he wanted. Except that one thing that meant the most to him: he couldn't keep his wealth AND enter the kingdom for eternity. He lied to himself by thinking he had kept all the commandments, because he broke the first one most of all. "I am the Lord your God, you shall have no other gods before me."

My advice? Be true to yourself and love the Lord. All the rest will be given to you. Jesus said so.

Is Legalism the Unforgiveable Sin?

2004-12-08T10:10:00.000-08:00

I'll bet that title got your attention, didn't it?

A couple of teens and I were having a discussion concerning the statement by Jesus that blasphemy against the Holy Spirit was the unforgiveable sin. Matthew 12:31 says, "And so I tell you, every sin and blasphemy will be forgiven men, but the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven. (NIV)" So we began to discuss what this meant. I told them that essentially it meant that to claim that the work of the Holy Spirit was the work of anything else when we knew that it was the work of the Holy Spirit would be blasphemy against the Holy Spirit. Granted, that is a simplified answer, but I think it works. But this discussion got me thinking.

The work of the Holy Spirit is to comfort and to guide the believer into all truth, right? Another work of his is to convict the unrepentant of their need for repentance. Is it fair to add to that and to say that for his work to be considered his work, we need to realize that there is grace involved? Here's why I say that: If someone were to be convicted by the Spirit that they were in need of repentance and grace were not involved, I believe that would likely cause the one being convicted to want to blow their brains out. Imagine! You've come to the realization that your sins and the sin of humanity has severed your relationship with a loving, holy and wrathful God. Yet, without grace being known, you have no idea of the way that you could restore that relationship. You would only see the interminable darkness that invades your soul and would see no way out.

You could say that the newly convicted and as yet unrepentant person is like a little child. They know that there is a problem but they are not sophisticated enough to understand the solution, to even take advantage of the solution. In our faith, we believe that God provides something called prevenient grace to children and those who might be mentally incapacitated to the degree that they could not make a decision for Christ. Prevenient (that is, going before) grace is granted to them as salvation and redemption. I think this prevenient grace is also provided by the Holy Spirit to our unrepentant friend as well. As such, he then is able to, not be saved, but not be held accountable until he is informed enough to make a decision. (Now if that person were to find out what they needed to do to be saved, and then decided to resist the wooing of the Spirit, prevenience no longer applies because they have the knowledge to make the right decision and consciously choose not to.) This grace is a provision of the Holy Spirit.

God's grace administered through His Holy Spirit by virtue of the sacrificial death of Jesus, God the Son, on the cross, makes it possible for the one who does not meet the church's idea of salvation material to still be saved. In other words, God doesn't expect us to change in order to be saved, He saves us in order to change us.

The practice of legalism, whether we're talking about the Pharisees of days gone by or the saints of today, says that you must fit into our rules, our methods, our standards or else you may not enter this church or, by expansion, the kingdom of heaven. Yet it is obvious that the calling of the Holy Spirit on the unrepentant life and the work of the Holy Spirit in the newly converted life are acts of divine grace. As such, I would be comfortable in saying that the application and availability of grace are acts of the Holy Spirit. Therefore, it would follow, would it not, that to claim that because someone smokes or drinks or gambles or dresses inappropriately or curses or whatever is unfit for salvation and unworthy to participate in the activities of the church (as legalism usually does) is to deny the work of the Holy Spirit, to commit blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, as it were. If that is true (and I think that it is, but I will welcome conversation about it), then legalism is an unforgiveable sin.

The Page I'm On

2004-11-08T19:53:00.000-08:00

I'm in the middle of reading this book. It's one of your typical show-and-tell type of biographies. In it, the character, a famous man whose identity I will not divulge, looks back over his life and examines the places where shifts occurred, where the slightest little difference could have (or did!) affect his entire life. I think what he's trying to get at is that we need to recognize these shifts, these slight, seemingly inconsequential moments in time, in order to fully realize the depths of the lives we live. Should I choose to turn right at the intersection of Water and Main? Should I take my girlfriend to Cracker Barrel or Chucky Cheese? Events that seem to be of little value or importance, attitudes and stances we choose to employ, can be deal-breakers. They can send us down the road to ruin, or they can be guideposts on the highway to heaven. Words and attitudes do matter; choices of allegiance are important; sometimes life (at least as we know it) really does hang in the balance.

God has understood this about us all along. He tried to make it clear to Adam & Eve in the Garden, showing them that relationship with him was of utmost importance. Proving that even a slight deviation could have monumental consequences. Finally (after destroying all of his creation except Noah & company and after allowing his children to be taken into captivity and then redeeming and rescuing them), God gave his people ten simple little rules that were designed to help them get along in the world. (If you read the book of Genesis, you will see that there were seldom capable of accomplishing this on their own.) These ten simple little rules have a really dramatic sounding title: The Ten Commandments, or, to use the theological terminology, the Decalogue. These weren't all that difficult. Four of them deal with relationships with God and the other six deal with relationship with one another.

Let's understand this one point, it shouldn't be too hard for us to see the import of: Love God, Don't Kill, Don't steal, don't have sex with somebody you're not married to, don't seek to take something you don't have, but belongs to someone else. All of them are about relationship. Maybe it would be a good idea for us to see that and seek to keep relationships in our lives healthy.

Jesus came along and, since it is only through Him that we can truly know what God is all about, gave us the Sermon on the Mount. The Sermon is essentially the Decalogue all over again, only with some distinct refinements: for example, not only is murder condemned, so is anger. Not only is adultery condemned, so is lust. You see the point, don't you? Jesus was telling us that we couldn't be the people God desires us to be by just grabbing the big 10, pointing at them and saying, "Hey! I've never broken a single one of these!" and expect that to be enough to keep the vital relationships in our lives healthy. Doing that will, in the end, only serve to sever our relationship with God and with people. It takes more. But you may say: "I'm just a man (or woman), I can't possibly live up to what Christ is expecting of me." And I would tell you, "You're right!!"

You can't do it. At least, you can't do it without the wonderful grace of Jesus. He tells us that he will be with us, that he will forgive us, that he will love us and that there is nothing we can do to stop him from doing those things. No matter how hard we try, we cannot stop the love. In showing this grace, in witnessing to this boon to mankind, in making this kind of sacrifice; Jesus is showing us what God is like. Jesus is showing us that God, while transcendent and wrathful and vengeful and jealous, is also immanent and forgiving and redeeming and understanding. God is love!

He is the penultimate example of a father's love. But so often, we take advantage of that love, we punish that love, we deny it and we betray it and we belittle it and we ignore it. We take exception with that love and we cajol and ridicule and demean and shake our fists in the air and declare: "I am a man! I will not give in to the Father. I will not share in his grace, I do not accept his love, I choose another over him." And how his heart must break! The aching and the sorrow must be overwhelming. Were God not God, it would be enough to cause him to just give up. Fortunately he is God and not man. So, he hangs in there and he waits and he loves and he forgives and he loves. He doesn't count against us the many times he has bailed us out, the times that when everyone else failed us, he came through. He remains silent. He gently loves and remains forever open to reconciliation.

Oh, bring back the God of the Old Testament!! With his theolphanies of thunder and lightning, he would show his power as well as his grief, his love as well as his disappointment. Maybe then we would listen. But He is a God of grace. The page I'm on is this: I will always try to be like him.

It's Only A Name

2004-10-12T15:54:00.000-07:00

We have to be so careful these days with the labels we use. We are so quick to say, "It's wrong to be a Democrat," or "It's wrong to be a Republican." If we are going to use labels, shouldn't we be convinced of the label that we ourselves carry first? Labels are like names, they are used to identify us or someone else. And they carry great weight. Imagine carrying around a name like mine all your life! Yes, I've heard all the jokes, but if you think you have a new one, feel free to utilize the comments section to send it my way.

People who are anti-Jewish are more correctly called anti-Semite. That's because the Jews are a Semitic people. That label or name, Semite, comes from the Hebrew, shem. For you Bible scholars out there, that name should mean something to you.

Noah had three sons: Shem, Ham and Japheth.

Shem literally means name. So, Semites are people of a name. It is through the lineage of Shem that Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob were born (you can find this in the 11th chapter of Genesis). You will recall, I trust, that Jacob had his name changed by God: Jacob became known as Israel. Hence the nation of the same name. I could go into a long drawn out process about this (in fact I did just last Sunday in church), but I leave the rest as an exercise for the class, except to point out that Jesus the Christ came from this same lineage.

We carry the name, Christian. It literally means, "one who follows Christ." We are proud of that name, we celebrate it, we lift it high, we proclaim it. But do we live it? Living the Name of Christ means that we will look at the world and and all the stuff that happens in it and ask ourselves, "How would Jesus respond to (fill-in-the-blank)? And then we should go do that. It is imperative that we understand that Jesus left us, the Body of Christ, as the place where the world could meet God. Yet, how often do we prevent that very thing from happening?

If a pregnant teen comes into our church, do we welcome her with the love of Christ or do we whisper and stare? Or, God forbid, do we do both--->attempting to appear righteous, do we love falsely and then gossip? Or, if we see injustice in our communities or our schools or our government or our world, do we decide that these are things that others are supposed to handle or do we stand up and allow ourselves to be counted, regardless of the cost? That's what Jesus did, you know.

There is a dire world out there far beyond our personal worries and fears, far beyond our self righteous crap and our pontificating on the virtues of our other labels, that deserves our attention, our prayer and our action. Particularly I want to draw your attention to Darfur, Sudan in Africa. 1.2 million people have been displaced by Arab militia illegally supported by the Sudanese government. There are estimates of somewhere between 20 and 30 thousand who are dead, along with numerous beatings, rapes and starvation. Do you hear anyone talking about it? No, sadly, no.

We carry the Name. Will we carry the cross, too? It all goes together.

But, what the hell, It's Only A Name.

The inevitable outcome of sheep

2004-09-14T15:42:00.000-07:00

Sheep are strange animals. They are literally afraid of their own shadows. They will stay in one place and graze the available pasture to the dirt and never move if they are not so directed. When threatened, they will gather together, seeking safety in numbers, but they will not defend themselves. Frankly, it is something of a discouragement to realize that our Savior described us as sheep.

Perhaps we should consider that the emphasis (like always) should be on the Shepherd and not really on the sheep. A human shepherd (one who herds sheep, hence the name) is responsible and dependable. He will look out for the sheep, defend them when necessary, lead them to pastures that have not be overgrazed, and generally be the best thing that ever happened to them. Sheep on the other hand will not move from that which frightens them unless first led by the shepherd.

Jesus is our Great Good Shepherd. He cares for us in ways that we cannot comprehend nor interpret. He defends us (even from ourselves) and He leads us. Occassionally he leads us into places that frighten us, that take us out of our comfort zone, that challenge us in what seem to be cruel and unfriendly ways. Yet, we (the sheep of this story) must be willing to trust Him. Even when it seems that we are facing insurmountable obstacles, we just rest assured in His love and leadership. He will not allow other sheep to bite us and he will not allow raging rivers to separate us.

Do not be afraid. Sheep are always either sheared or slaughtered. Here is where the sheep analogy breaks down. If we are trusting and content to follow Him, Jesus will not allow us to be sheared or slaughtered. In order to prevent that for all eternity, He went to the slaughterhouse for us.

Do not be afraid. Instead, dance. Sheep can't do it, but you can.

Revisiting the Roaming Gnome

2004-09-06T08:20:00.000-07:00

Have you seen the latest travelogue from our friend the roaming gnome? He is at the foot of the bed in a hotel room at the end of some exotic vacation. Now, those who know me, know that I dearly love the roaming gnome, but I fear that he is being maligned for pornographic purposes. The lascivity of the American public could not be ignored and so, now even the Roaming Gnome is no longer sacrosanct. I had a feeling that this was coming when we witnessed him having a date with the Statue of Liberty, but who would have believed that a national icon such as RG would be cast as nothing more than a statuesque voyeur? Where have our morals gone?

In response to that previous rhetoric, I would direct you to examine the world around you. Never before has there been such a lack of correct and respectable moralistic behavior. I could discuss with you the ever increasing amount of skin that is shown on network (that is, over the air rather than over a cable or satellite receiver) broadcasts and the earlier and earlier times at which it is available, but no, I choose instead to look at the moralistic behavior that is being displayed by a particular presidential candidate.

I just saw it today and I need to more fully research the video before I completely wig out over it, but here's what I saw and for now, you can be the judge of whether I've slipped a cog or not. During a discussion of ABC's Good Morning, America relating to the upcoming presidential elections, video shots of both President Bush and Senator Kerry were shown. Just before this segment was a report on the upcoming trial of Saddam Hussein by an Iraqi court with the requisite picture of the deposed dictator. That picture conjured up in my mind the oft-shown picture of Hussein, standing on a balcony overlooking his "adoring" subjects and firing a shotgun from the hip. Cut to the spot on the presidential elections! When showing the videos of the two candidates, one of them was standing behind a table or podium, breaking down a shotgun! Who do you suppose was the candidate that, at least to the fertile imagination of this practicing pedantic, was doing his own Saddam impersonation? Yep, John Kerry. Hey, I just report the news, it's up to you to analyze it. All for now.

Talk about enemies

2004-07-06T15:48:00.001-07:00

Have you noticed all the talk about enemies lately? It's actually everywhere you look. Republicans say that John Kerry is the enemy. Democrats say that George Bush is the enemy. For some, the enemy is runaway inflation, for others, it is conservative family values. There are enemies everywhere you look.

Even in the church, enemy talk is rampant. If you don't think so, pay closer attention the next time you have to talk to a Christian who is going through a rough time. Or, somewhere in almost any sermon preached anywhere. It's the fault of the enemy. The enemy is fighting us. The enemy is holding us back. Sometimes it's hard to tell the sanctuary from the White House Situation Room.

Why don't we talk instead about our friends? Or, more pointedly, why don't we talk instead about our Friend? So often we talk about our enemies because we don't want to face up to our own responsibility in the friendships that we have. It is often much easier (in our minds) to have an enemy than it is to do the hard work that comes with having a friend. What's so hard about having a friend? Well, you have to talk to them all the time or else they think you don't love them. And every now and then you have to visit with them, tell them that you love them and spend time with them. But so what??? They're your friends, He's your Friend.

Why not visit with your Friend TODAY and worry less about your enemies?

Can God use ungodly people to accomplish His will?

2004-06-28T18:17:00.000-07:00

The simple answer would be "yes!" God can do anything. But the question that is being asked is actually, "Would God use ungodly people to accomplish His will?" Again, the simple answer would be, "yes!" But I know what is really being asked. God has used ungodly people in the past to accomplish that which He directed needed to be accomplished.

Consider the Old Testament. God used Pharaoh to accomplish His will. He used the Assyrians and the Babylonians. Typically these were in negative ways. God used these people to impact His people Israel because they were not behaving according to His commands. In the New Testament there is a glowing example of God making use of ungodly people. Do you know what it is?

God used the pagan Romans (along with some supposedly godly Jews, but considering what they did, who knows? That's for God to decide.) to accomplish the greatest thing that God has ever done for mankind. He used them to crucify Jesus so that we would all have the opportunity to be saved. So, yes, God can, would and does use ungodly people to accomplish His will. However...

The question is being asked today, in 2k4, and so, we have to ask again, "Would God use ungodly people in this manner?" If it were necessary to use them in this way, God could and would. I just wonder if He would find it as necessary today as He did in the past. I mean, there are millions of His followers around today and in many instances, it would seem that God would be best served using them to accomplish His will. That is one of the reasons we're here, ya know? But there may very well be situations where God would see the divine wisdom in using the ungodly for such a task. Just the same, there may be things that God wants to do (who am I to try to figure out what that might be? I can barely figure out what I'm trying to do most days) that would require an ungodly person to do it. It just might happen.

What's with the roaming gnome?

2004-06-25T07:25:00.000-07:00

Since I am a self-proclaimed observer of current social states of mind, I may be alone in recognizing what may be an imminent threat of conspiracy in our television broadcasts. However, I have noticed a subtle change and I feel obligated to bring it to the internet world's attention.

Have you noticed that the Travelocity "Roaming Gnome" has always signed off his fictitious notes back home with the statement, "Don't forget your hat."? In the latest tome from the gnome, he fails to say that. Doesn't that strike you as odd? What could be the possible explanation for such an oversight on his part? Or on the part of the advertising people responsible?

It's interesting that in this particular commercial, RG is visiting NYC and is dating a model of Lady Liberty. They travel throughout the Big Apple, they eat in the local establishments (what is the difference between a bagelle and a baguette?). But the message home fails to sign off with "Don't forget your hat." Is there some reason to believe that one doesn't really need one's hat in New York City? Or, could it be that the hat would be an easily identifiable mark on one who was seeking an illicit affair with the symbol of our nation's liberty? It's just a question!

But speaking of identity symbols, what do you think about this: If the Roaming Gnome would be recognized by his distinctive red hat (which is only differentiated from a dunce cap by its color), how is that we as followers of the Creator of the Universe, as adherents to the Son's teachings of grace, mercy and peace, should be recognized? In other words, is there some symbol that should make us easily identified? I suppose that many would offer up the little fish that some of us place on our cars or the little cross that we wear around our necks. (Someone should ask me what symbol I've been wearing around my neck lately.)

I believe that the only recognizable mark that Jesus declared that we should wear to distinguish ourselves as his followers is our obedience to his commands and our love for one another. Using these criteria, are there people that you would know were Christians even if you didn't know them personally? Are there people that you can remember being around that showed these distinctive marks that Jesus said we should have? What about the person you see in the mirror? Does that person carry those marks?

the spoon/fork evolutionary controversy

2004-06-24T09:57:00.000-07:00

The random question in my profile asked if I thought that spoons were evolved from forks (or was it the other way around?). I tried to give the following response, but you're limited to 150 characters in the profile, so I decided that you needed to be aware of my true and full answer. It follows:

As the primordial ooze gave up its cache, sporks rose up and left. As time passed, other ooze-mates tried to utilize the sporks, leading to numerous punctures in the lips and cheeks of said mates. So, through necessity and the theory of natural selection, certain genetically balanced sporks became spoons, while other genetically unbalanced sporks became forks. Left to their own devices, the spoons and the forks went their separate way, bred and multiplied until we find the unlimited divergent races we see today.

Shall we dance?

2004-06-24T09:45:00.000-07:00

I think we not only shall, but that we must. Humans are interesting creatures, filled with so many questions, dying to find answers, hitting & missing, striving & falling; but continuing to get up and try one more time.

We spend so much time, money and energy seeking to find the right way to dance, the right clothes to wear when we dance, the right music to dance to (will it be hip-hop, salsa or ballroom), the time to dance and the time to sit still. By the time that we think we got all those questions answered, someone's either changed the location of the dance floor or the party's over and it's time to go home.

Come on, friends! Just dance. Abandon yourself to whatever music God is putting in your head and heart and just dance!! Maybe today it'll be hip-hop and you're not really sure if that is the style you like and maybe tomorrow it'll be the bunny hop (and you're positive you're not into that), but it doesn't matter. It's not the style, it's not the clothes, it's not the time or the money, IT'S THE DANCE!

Just Dance!

and so it begins...

2004-06-21T06:45:00.000-07:00

and so it begins...
I now enter the world of blogging and hope to realize my own thoughts and endeavors while perhaps helping others.

I believe that the Christian world is suffering from an identity crisis. Many of us seem to have difficulty realizing who or what it is with which we should be identifying. In just the last several days, I have heard supposedly well founded Christians say things which would identify them as: Americans, white people, men or women, spouses, liberal or conservative, Republican or Democrat, union member or not. Don't we understand that ALL of those labels must take second place to the label that Jesus died to give us: follower and friend of Christ. If we fail to identify ourselves that way, if our other labels take precedence over THAT label, then we have failed as Christians. At least that's what I think...