Walter Rambling

Forgiveness sets us free from bondage to the past

2012-02-05T21:19:00.000-06:00

Cut loose from your past and enjoy being forgiven

A backward look can be helpful or it can be depressing. It depends on how you view the past. You can recall that in the “good old days” life was lived at a slower pace. People were seldom stressed out from living in “the fast lane.” How nice life was back then.

The danger is that we tend to romanticize the past and paint too rosy a picture of the days of yore. Was life really better in the days of our parents? In many ways life was worse not better for past generations. Some of our parents, for example, used an “outhouse” because there was no toilet in their home. Many of our relatives did not even know a family that had an indoor toilet.

When it comes to our mistakes, a look at our past sometimes can be paralyzing. Some of us feel much guilt about wrong things we did when we were younger. We are ashamed to admit how foolish we once were. A just God will surely not forgive us. What we did was too bad for God to forgive.

To think like this puts us in bondage to the past. This bondage binds us to our mistakes or what the church calls our “sin.” So we are not free to enjoy life today. Guilt blocks us from inhaling the pure joy of knowing that we are alive by the pleasure of the God who not only made us but also loves us.

Christians have the unique privilege of helping people find forgiveness for the past. Forgiveness frees us from the past and helps us overcome guilt. It puts a song in our hearts and when we start singing we begin to soar, like a kite free to enjoy the wind.

The church calls this forgiveness “good news.” It is indeed good news to discover that your sins are forgiven whether by God or by another person with whom you have been estranged. “I forgive you” are three of the sweetest words any of us can ever hear.

That is the message the church has for the world: God forgives you. Such news is not only good news; it is the best news the human mind can ever embrace. It is so wonderful that people often find it impossible to believe that God has forgiven them. So it helps to hear the amazing words, “Your sins are forgiven,” spoken by a caring friend who has personally experienced this forgiveness. Then hearing and believing that good news can become a liberating moment for the person who accepts it.

You may be wondering how the Bible fits into all this. Well, the Bible in one sense is the “good news” Book. From Genesis to Revelation there are people much like us who are warning people to stop doing wrong and turn to God. Why? Because God loves them and has forgiven them. The world says, “What is the proof that this is true?” The Bible says, “The proof is God’s gift of his son to die on the cross for our sins.”

The people in the Bible were ordinary people God used in extraordinary ways. Today he wants to use ordinary people like us to help guilt-ridden people understand they are forgiven. We have good news for people in bondage. If they believe they are forgiven, they can be cut loose from the past and enjoy the sheer thrill of being loved and forgiven.

I will bet my last dollar that you know some troubled person who needs to hear this good news. And it might make your day if they heard it from your lips. Sharing it could be like offering a cook drink of water to someone dying of thirst.

After all, Ezekiel, Jeremiah, and Zechariah – all those guys are gone. They had their turn. Now you and I are up to bat. + + +

Keep Christmas!

2011-12-25T23:02:00.000-06:00

Keep Christmas!

Message for Christmas Day, Saint James UM Church, 2011

When l look back in history I think of people I wish I could have known. I wish I had known Walter the Shepherd. One of those shepherds had to be named Walter. Walter is an ordinary name and the shepherds were ordinary, common people like me and you. I would have asked him to tell me again what it was like when that angel suddenly appeared and scared the daylights out of him.

I wish I had known Luke, the good doctor. It was Luke who took his pen and wrote down the immortal story of those shepherds in the fields near Bethlehem. I would have asked Luke if knew Walter the Shepherd. I bet it was Walter who told Luke about that night when the angels inspired them to go to Bethlehem and find the baby boy born in a manger.

I wish I had known John, the beloved disciple. I would have asked him what it was like to stand near the cross upon which Jesus died and hear him cry, “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.” I think he would have said, “Walter, I still cannot talk about that moment.” And I would have thanked John for penning what may be the most magnificent 28 words in the New Testament: “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth; we have beheld his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father” (John 1:14).

In more recent times I wish I had known Henry Van Dyke, the Presbyterian minister born in Germantown, PA in 1852. You may have read some of Van Dyke’s stories. He wrote The Other Wise Man and The First Christmas Tree. He also wrote my wife’s favorite hymn that we sing to the tune of Beethoven’s Ode to Joy. You remember it goes like this, “Joyful, joyful, we adore thee, God of glory, Lord of love; hearts unfold like flowers before thee, opening to the sun above. Melt the clouds of sin and sadness; drive the dark of doubt away. Giver of immortal gladness, fill us with the light of day!” What beautiful words! What a beautiful song!

But what I would really like to thank Henry for is the wonderful piece he wrote titled “Keeping Christmas.” It is only about 100 years old but it has become a Christmas classic. I try to read it every Christmas because it speaks to my heart. You remember he says that keeping Christmas is more important than the observance of Christmas. He says if you can forget what you have done for others and give thanks for what others have done for you, then you can keep Christmas. He says if are willing to stoop down and care about the needs and desires of little children, then you can keep Christmas. And I like this part: if you can remember the loneliness of the people who are growing old, then you can keep Christmas.

I am especially touched by Van Dyke’s idea that we need to make a grave for our ugly thoughts and a garden for our kindly feelings. I need to do that. We all need to do that. And if we do it, then we will be keeping Christmas all year long.

Well, the truth is I have no way of getting to know Walter the Shepherd, or Luke the Doctor, or John the beloved Disciple, or Henry van Dyke the writer. But the good news is I can get to know Jesus! He is alive! He is here! He is Emmanuel, our God who is with us! I know he is here because just this morning I heard him say to me, “Walter, come to me and I will give you rest.” I went to him on bended knees and confessed my sins to him. I heard him say, “Your sins are forgiven, Walter; now rise, and follow me!” That is what I intend to do for the rest of my life. Will you go with me? We can follow Him as a church. We can follow him as families. We can follow him as individuals. And we can enjoy the journey together! Hallelujah! Glory! Amen. + + +

Can you imagine how proud I am? Hannah's Dad is my son!

2011-09-19T21:59:00.002-05:00

Our son Tim turned 50 last Sunday. As a son he has been a joy to our hearts. His Mom and I are so proud of him. Tears spilled down my cheeks when I read what his daughter Hannah wrote about her Dad in her blog. I had to share it so here it is. May it inspire some reader to pay the price of becoming the kind of Dad his children can love and admire.

My Dad

By Hannah Albritton

There are so many things I could write about my dad, I don’t even know where to start! My dad and I have always had a very special relationship. Growing up, my dad and I did many things together. But dad made sure it wasn’t just things he wanted to do. He has always made an effort to show interest in and support the things I love. I have tried to do the same with the things he loves, one of those things being hunting. I remember the first time my dad took me hunting. My mom, being the “worry wart” that she is, did not want me to freeze out in the cold and, in turn, piled on the clothes. I had on more layers than Aunt Sherri’s 7 layer salad! It was all I could do to breathe, much less walk. I couldn’t even talk because of the scarves and hats. Dad walked in the room, ready to go, and I just stood there with tears streaming down my face. Then, mom decided to peel a few layers off so I didn’t look so much like the Michelin man. So, hunting isn’t exactly my thing, but I had, and still have, a great time just being with my dad. The most recent hunting trip my dad and I took last season was also a memorable one. Not because we got a big buck, but rather, a big laugh. It was just dad and me on this occasion. I tried to convince my sister, Sarah, to go but she had already gotten a deer and insisted that it was my turn. So off we went into the woods. Dad and I had been sitting in the shooting house for about an hour. Just sitting, waiting and watching. The sun was setting and it was starting to get a little darker. Everything was quiet when, all of a sudden, this bird flew into the shooting house through the small opening right behind my head. Well, of course, I screamed and commenced to flailing and flapping my arms all around until the bird flew back out. Dad looked over at me like I’d lost my mind, and with an alarmed expression, I replied, “A bird just flew in here!” Well, I didn’t really know if he was going to be mad or not, but when he burst out in laughter, we both just sat there and laughed. Needless to say, after all the commotion, we didn’t see very much wildlife, but Dad didn’t seem to mind.

One example of Dad making an effort to do things that I enjoy would be our annual trip to the Holiday Market. I can remember Dad checking me out of kindergarten early to take me to the Holiday Market in Montgomery. I thought it was the coolest thing to get out of nap time to go shopping with Dad. My dad is NOT a shopper and isn’t the type to go shopping with mom for clothes or groceries or anything! But when dad took me to the Holiday Market, just us two, it made me feel more special than I’m sure he ever imaged. We have gone to the Holiday Market every year since, and I feel so proud and special walking around a civic center full of ladies with my dad.

Another example is when I started to bake and sell “Hannah Banana Bread.” I was about eleven or twelve years old when I began baking banana bread. My dad helped me print labels to put on them that said, “Hannah Banana Bread” and helped me by selling them to the secretaries at his office. He encouraged my hard work and one time asked me to bake banana bread at church for one of the meetings he was chairing. I brought all my ingredients to the church, mixed everything up and put it in the oven to bake during the first half of the meeting. When I took the bread out, it looked perfect, but I cut into it and it was runny mush. The ovens at the church were much different than mine and it cooked the bread too fast. I was so upset and began crying when dad came into the kitchen to see if the bread was ready (I really don’t cry that often!). He was nothing but compassionate and understanding. I was afraid he would be frustrated that he didn’t have anything to serve at the meeting, but he assured me that it was no big deal. After the meeting, he took me to the mall to a music store and we each bought a CD. I remember buying an Alan Jackson CD. Dad and I deemed “Living on Love” by Alan Jackson our song a long time ago. I’m not sure exactly why or when we decided it would be our song, but every time I hear it, I think of my Dad.

I could go on and on with stories about my dad and me, but there simply isn’t enough room to do so. It’s so cliché, but it really is the little things that mean the most. The little things that my dad has done, and continues to do, make him a great father and role model. When he shows up at my work to bring me lunch or just to say “hey,” or the little notes he leaves for me, or when he sends me a postcard, even though I live with him, or when he takes the time to talk to me or listen when I need to talk, or when he comes to a midget ballgame to see me coach a bunch of little cheerleaders for twenty minutes, or when he calls me sugar and tells me he loves me every night and I know that he really means it with all of his heart.

Two of my dad’s favorite heroes, I guess you would say, are John Wayne and Robert E. Lee. My dad reminds me of both of these men. Like Robert E. Lee, my dad is wise, courageous, loyal and a true gentleman. Like John Wayne, he is strong, blunt, stern, and he definitely has grit! But the most important trait found in my dad will outlast all the good times, memories and other honorable attributes. He is the godliest man I know. I don’t know many people who can say that about their father, but my dad lives the life of a true follower of Jesus Christ. When someone talks about seeing Jesus lived out in someone’s life, that’s my dad. Of course he has flaws, as does everyone, but in everything he does, he genuinely seeks to follow the Lord. He aims to honor the Lord in everything he says and does. Every morning, when I see his pen, journal and Bible on the table where he had his devotions a few hours before, I am reminded of the great man that I am so privileged to be able to call my dad. - @

God wants us to live like Christ

2011-09-10T11:00:00.001-05:00

My good friend Ed Williams, longtime professor of journalism at Auburn University, shared this excellent thought with me:

God has made us what we are. In Christ Jesus, God made us to do good works, which God planned in advance for us to live our lives doing. (Ephesians 2:10 NCV)

There are three things you can do with your life: You can waste it, you can spend it, or you can invest it. The best use of your life is to invest it in something that will last longer than your time on earth.

The worst thing you can do is to live simply for today and to live for yourself. God did not put you on earth to live for yourself. He created you to be like Christ.

Yes, Ed, I believe you are right! Today I resolve again to invest my life in the work of Christ so that I may not live for myself, but for Him! Lord, give me the grace so to live!!

-- Walter Albritton, sjc

A Voice Like Thunder Brought Peace to My Soul

2011-08-25T21:13:00.000-05:00

A voice like thunder brought peace to my soul

Life is filled with abrupt changes. Boredom is not a permanent condition. The humdrum can be swiftly overturned by the unexpected. For months we wondered if the suffering of our young son would ever end. It did one day in May.

We buried our boy. I lost my job. Two weeks later we moved from Tennessee back to Alabama. Like so many Alabama summers the heat made us seek refuge in the coolness of the mountains. We made our way to Lake Junaluska, North Carolina, a favorite Methodist vacation site. The popular evangelist Billy Graham was preaching that week.

Though our hearts were broken over the death of our son we had not lost our faith. But it had, honestly, been wounded. Hopefully the preaching of Graham would comfort us in our grief. Our young souls needed a time of healing.

Graham was as stirring as we had expected. The huge auditorium was packed morning and night as hundreds of people flocked to hear him. We stood in a long line one day and finally got to shake his hand. Like others we were awed by Graham’s persuasive preaching.

However, Graham shared the pulpit with another preacher, W. E. Sangster from England. And it was Sangster whom God used that week to bring healing to my wounded heart. The man floored me from the moment he began to speak. He spoke with unusual authority, intensity, and conviction.

Every word he spoke had the ring of truth about it. It was as if God was speaking directly to me and answering questions I had not even asked. Never had I been more convinced that God himself was speaking to me. And I listened intently, eager to drink in what sounded to me like eternal truth.

I had many questions. Why had God, if he is love, allowed our son to die? Why had he not healed him in answer to our prayers? Why should a little child have to suffer when he had done no wrong? Why had God given him to us if he was going to take him from us before he could grow up? Was his death punishment for my own sins? Is God really “out there” and if he is, why doesn’t he say something when I beg him for help? Why won’t he tell me why the innocent must suffer?

Finally God did reply. He was silent when David was suffering. Now, two months after our son’s burial, God spoke. He spoke through Sangster. How do I know? I know. I was there. Though it happened 55 years ago, I remember it like it was yesterday. God answered me through the voice of his servant, W. E. Sangster.

At first I felt pity for Sangster. He would be no match for Billy Graham as a presence in the pulpit. But I was wrong. Sangster was older and wiser than Graham. And though his style was quite different, the man could preach. As the week went on, many of us realized we were listening to two of the world’s greatest preachers.

What did I hear from God? Not what I wanted to hear, believe me. I wanted something soothing; what I got was shocking.

Sangster said, “You must stop dealing with your problems. You must deal with God! You get nowhere by grappling with cancer or some tragedy. You must wrestle with God for God is the sovereign God of the universe and he allows whatever happens to you. He does not will evil but he allows it. The world is not out of control; God is in control and he allows bad things to happen.”

He went on to insist that God has a purpose in allowing tragedy even though we may never understand why he allows it. We can find peace only by accepting God’s sovereignty in our lives and believing that in all things he is always working for our good. God is not accountable to us for his actions; on the contrary, we are accountable to God for our actions and reactions. And God loves us even when he allows bad things to happen in our lives.

As much as I was able I surrendered my stubborn, agnostic questioning to God that week. I began to rethink our son’s death in a new way, a way that helped me see suffering in a new light. Slowly I tried to embrace the message God gave me through an English preacher I would never hear again. After 55 years I am still embracing his message for it is strong medicine.

A few years later word came from England that Sangster was dying, having lost his voice to a muscular disease that was paralyzing his nervous system. The great pulpit voice would soon be silent in the grave. But before his death, he wrote a simple message to his new friend Billy Graham: “Tell people that the gospel works when a man is dying.”

Since that memorable summer I have journeyed to Lake Junaluska many times, heard many inspiring speakers, and enjoyed the beauty of those North Carolina hills. But seldom have I been as deeply moved by the words of a preacher.

On a clear day I can close my eyes and still hear the thundering voice of Sangster reverberating within the walls of Stuart Auditorium bringing peace to my troubled soul. God spoke through the voice of a man and I heard him. I have never been the same. + + +

You decide: Has this young man lost his mind?

2011-08-05T11:11:00.000-05:00

Would you invest in this young man's vision?

The deadline nears. A small group of friends and I are trying to raise thirty thousand dollars to help a young man spend a year in Africa. You may wonder if the poor fellow has lost his mind.

He has quit a good job with a television station in Montgomery. Why? He says God has given him a vision. To fulfill that vision he must use his skill as a videographer to link 50 churches to 50 villages in Zambia that have no source of clean water. Each church would have its own village and assume responsibility for drilling a well in their village. Each well costs about $7,500.

Ambitious? Yes, and truthfully quite overwhelming. So far he has two pastors and two churches committed to help. He needs only 48 more churches to reach his goal.

Had the young man saved up enough money to pay his way to Africa? No, he is like most of us; he has very little money in savings. But our little group of his friends decided to help him anyway. A month or so ago we set out to raise thirty thousand dollars to fund the cost of cameras, video equipment, airline tickets and living expenses.

How are we doing? So far we have raised about $19,000, so we need only $11,000 more. We don’t have much time left. The young man has secured airline reservations to fly out of Atlanta on September 21.

So how do you raise $11,000 in a month? You trust God and pray hard. And you ask your friends to consider helping. That is what I am doing by writing this piece. Fortunately our church has agreed to accept donations to fund this ministry. The address of Saint James UMC is 9045 Vaughn Road, Montgomery, AL 36117.

I see it as a once in a lifetime opportunity to partner with a young man who has a remarkable vision. I will understand if by now you decide to stop reading. You may be thinking, “The last thing I need is one more bleeding-heart appeal for charitable giving!” If so, move on and have a great day.

If you are still interested, you could check out the young man’s website. It is water@water282.org. His name is Jacob Eubanks. Jacob describes his mission very simply:

Water282 is tackling the world's leading health problem one well at a time, by connecting a local church to an African village in extreme poverty to supply clean drinking water and overflowing joy from the living water of the Gospel.

Jacob gets the “282” from the Bible – 2 Corinthians 8:2 – “Out of the most severe trial, their overflowing joy and their extreme poverty welled up in rich generosity.”

Jacob has been to Zambia once, journeying their last fall with his pastor and others. This is how he describes what happened:

“In November 2010 a small team from our church (Saint James United Methodist in Montgomery) went to Zambia to do some scouting to see what our church could do to help the church there. Little did we know that what we saw would change our lives forever.

“We knew that there was a need for clean, safe water wells, but we had no clue what the scope of the need was. We saw people getting water from the most unimaginable sources, from the filthiest, opaque water from hand dug wells, to crocodile-infested rivers or holes beside a Black Mamba den where every bucket is a gamble, to water sources miles away from people’s huts that they retrieved 5 gallons at a time. And we knew that this was just the start of the problem, as the water they spent so much time getting and often risked their lives to get, was full of bacteria, parasites, and diseases. You can hear about it all day, but when you see it first-hand, it messes with your world.

“On the plane ride back from Zambia, I heard God’s call more clearly than I ever have and probably ever will, telling me that He had placed everything I needed to do something about this problem in my hands already, and all I would have to do to make it happen is sell everything I own and pack up and move to Zambia. Well, since you put it like that….. I’ll go.”

Well, there you have it. Has the young man lost his mind? I don’t think so. Every time I turn on the water in my home I think about the children in Zambia who are dying from waterborn diseases. That’s why I am doing what I can to help a young man with a vision provide clean water for thousands of poor people in those African villages. Thank you for listening to an old man’s appeal. + + +

Grandson Josh Albritton at Auburn Baseball Camp this week

2011-07-20T08:56:00.000-05:00

Our grandson Josh Albritton is 16 and hopes to play college baseball. He is attending the Auburn University Elite Baseball Camp this week on the Plains. The campus has changed quite a bit since I walked those trails during 1950-54. I love that place! So many precious memories! Josh is a good left-handed pitcher and can play first base and the outfield, usually right field. He is a good athlete but even more he is a splendid young man with a good head on his shoulders. We delight in seeing him succeed! Josh will be in the 11th grade this fall at Macon East Montgomery Academy and attends Saint James United Methodist Church with us. Grandchildren like Josh make old age so enjoyable!

Exciting Renewal of Baptism Vows

2011-07-19T07:40:00.000-05:00

Last Sunday I experienced a truly exciting moment in worship. Klaus and Brigitte Gunzel, and their daughter Katharina, come to the altar to renew their baptismal vows. They had all been baptized earlier. They had entered the Church through the Baptism Door. They had begun their journey with Christ. But like many of us, along the way they felt a deep inward need to renew the vows made when God gave them new life through the water and the Spirit. So, with loving friends surrounding them, and with tears wetting faces and the altar, they knelt to confess their sins and seek a fresh anointing of the Spirit's power. They asked our dear Savior to give them the grace to continue to grow spiritually and to help them witness to others about the transforming power of Jesus Christ. I sprinkled water on their heads to remind them and our church family of the power of the blood of Jesus to wash away our sins and cleanse us of all unrighteousness. God made His Presence known in a powerful way. I renewed my own vows. I am sure many others did also. It was a moment in worship that I shall not soon forget! Glory to God forever and ever!

2011-06-27T10:57:00.000-05:00

The Remarkable Story of a Young Man Who Heard God Calling!

Jacob Eubanks is packing to return to Africa! The folks in his church, Saint James UMC, are working hard to raise the funds to support Jacob in his mission to provide clean water for 50 villages in Zambia. Here is Jacob's account of his call and his mission:

In November 2010, a small team from our church went to Zambia to do some scouting to see what our church could do to help the church there. Little did we know that what we saw would change our lives forever. We knew that there was a need for clean, safe water wells, but we had no clue what the scope of the need was. We saw people getting water from the most unimaginable sources, from the filthiest, opaque water from hand dug wells, to crocodile-infested rivers or holes beside a Black Mamba den where every bucket is a gamble, to water sources miles away from people’s huts that they retrieved 5 gallons at a time. And we knew that this was just the start of the problem, as the water they spent so much time getting and often risked their lives to get, was full of bacteria, parasites, and diseases. You can hear about it all day, but when you see it first-hand, it messes with your world.
On the plane ride back from Zambia, I heard God’s call more clearly than I ever have and probably ever will, telling me that He had placed everything I needed to do something about this problem in my hands already, and all I would have to do to make it happen is sell everything I own and pack up and move to Zambia. Well, since you put it like that….. I’ll go.
Through the prayerful guidance of an awesome advisory board, the ministry that is Water282 was formed. A ministry that is poised to continue long after my initial trip to Zambia.

To learn more about how you can support Jacob with prayer and donations, go online to www.water282.org

Encourage Jacob by sending him a message that you will pray for him! I have the joy of being one of his pastors!

Walter Albritton, sjc

Easter!

2011-04-28T18:02:00.000-05:00

Why is Easter such a powerful experience for Christians? Because it gives us the opportunity to celebrate the Resurrection of our Lord Jesus! In the first Century a small group of Jews spent time with another Jew named Jesus. They chose to become his disciples, to learn from him. They followed him from one town to another, watching as he taught, healed, and delivered people from the power of the Evil One, Satan. Then they watched him be taken prisoner, beaten, and finally crucified between two common criminals. They saw him die. They saw his body buried in a borrowed tomb. Then they heard he had been raised from the dead, and they saw him in his resurrected body. They were convinced that he had been resurrected from the dead by God. They were so convinced that they began preaching the Resurrection; that is what they preached -- the Resurrection of Jesus! They were not trying to persuade people to accept the beliefs he had taught them; they were trying to persuade that he had been resurrected. The Resurrection was the chief theme of their preaching. They were persecuted for their preaching and each of them, except for John, died a violent death. But they were willing to suffer and die rather than renounce their conviction that Jesus had been raised from the dead. Belief in the Resurrection was the lynchpin of the Christian faith. If Jesus had not been raised from the dead, there would have been no stories of Jesus, no Christian Church, no New Testament, no mighty Christian movement. Had there been no resurrection we would never have heard of Jesus. But because the Resurrection actually happened, millions have come to God through faith in the shed blood of Jesus. Easter Sunday gives us a chance once a year to celebrate the truth of the Resurrection! And because He lives, we can face tomorrow and anything else we must face! Glory!

Peace through Superior Fire Power

2011-02-21T07:24:00.001-06:00

The Amazing Story of a Rifle
One of the best books ever written was Undaunted Courage, the story of the Lewis and Clark Expedition by historian Stephen Ambrose. Recently I came across a video which explains how Lewis and Clark made it through to the Pacific despite encountering many Indian tribes that greatly outnumbered their small group of 38 people. This is a truly remarkable story about a truly remarkable rifle. Enjoy!

"Ever wonder how Lewis and Clarks 36-38 man force spent 3 years safely among the savages? Here is how. Peace through superior fire power."

Subject: Fw: Lewis And Clark Air Rifle

http://www.network54.com/Forum/451309/thread/1296928404/This+is+just+to+cool+not+to+spread+around

The Scandal of Preaching in a Digital Age

2011-01-29T09:03:00.000-06:00

My good friend Matt O'Reilly is becoming a good writer. His stuff is worth reading for all who take the Christian faith seriously. The new issue of The Princeton Theological Review is now available online and contains an article by Matt titled "Faith Comes from Hearing: The Scandal of Preaching in a Digital Age." The article considers whether contemporary proposals for new homiletic forms is faithful to a biblical understanding of preaching. With young men like Matt coming along, the United Methodist Church will be in good hands. Here's an excerpt to whet your appetite:

Not only is Christian preaching to be content specific, it is also often counter-intuitive. Our discussion of the factions in Corinth demonstrated just this point. The gospel itself is counter-intuitive because it is powerful despite its lack of adornment with worldly wisdom and eloquence. The division of the Corinthian church into a Paul party and an Apollos party was, for Paul, a great source of discontent. It is most likely the case that Apollos gained a following because of his eloquence and education. He was a leader whose skill in oratory would provide a source of boasting for the Corinthian Christians. This is what bothered Paul so deeply. The Corinthians were following their culture. The assurance that came through the gospel came paired with the fact that it was foolishness when considered in light of the wisdom of the day. Convention required that orations be adorned with special techniques, and the most successful orators were masters of these techniques. Paul did not want his missionary success to depend on his own skill or eloquence but on the power of God at work in the gospel alone. This was clearly counter-intuitive, but Paul insisted on it regardless.

Why Jesus is Rejected

2011-01-26T09:22:00.002-06:00

My friend Robert Powell of Dothan shared a stirring devotional with me this week. Unless you are ready to be jarred to the depths, I suggest you not read this:

Tuesday, January 25, 2011
Loving the Dark
And this is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. —John 3:19

The Pharisees did not doubt Jesus because they merely disagreed with Him. They doubted Jesus because they were hardened against him.
Doubt is a matter of the mind. Even Christians have moments of doubt. We don't always understand what God is doing or why He is doing it. Unbelief, in contrast, is a matter of the will. It is a choice we make.
The Pharisees were full of unbelief. They did not reject Jesus for lack of evidence or because He was not consistent with what He said. The fact is that Jesus was the perfect example. Even Pontius Pilate, who had examined countless people, said, "I find no fault in this Man" (Luke 23:4), and "I am innocent of the blood of this just Person" (Matthew 27:24). Judas Iscariot, who spent three, concentrated years with Jesus and even betrayed Him said, "I have sinned by betraying innocent blood" (Matthew 27:4). So Jesus clearly was a model of everything that He said.
The Pharisees rejected Jesus because it interfered with the way they wanted to live. And that is why people reject Him today. Jesus said, "And this is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. For everyone practicing evil hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed" (John 3:19-20).
People don't reject Jesus because they have carefully examined the evidence and have determined that it is not convincing enough. They don't reject Him because they have read through the Scriptures and have found some apparent contradiction. They don't reject Him because of the so-called hypocrisy of some in the church. They reject Him because He interferes with the way they want to live.
Copyright © 2011 by Harvest Ministries. All rights reserved.

Earl J. LaLone
Upper NY UMM
Prayer Advocate
110 E Church St.
Adams NY 13605

Still thankful for God's mercy 30 years later

2011-01-13T11:23:00.001-06:00

On a cold day in January in 1981 the phone ringing woke me up. When I said hello I heard the shocking voice of our son Tim blurting out the words, "Dad, my apartment burned up; my car burned up. I lost everything but my shorts! I am lucky to be alive!" My wife and I jumped in our car and drove as fast as possible to Monroeville, Alabama. Numb and blinded by tears of gratitude we soon witnessed the remains of Tim's apartment and his beloved Mustang. He had indeed nothing left but the shorts he had been sleeping in. He told us what happened. He was awakened by a hissing sound. Looking around he figured the sound was coming from the gas space heater in the room. Afraid something was wrong, he turned toward the door just as the room exploded, blowing the door out into the yard where it quickly set his car on fire. He managed to crawl out the door. The hair on the back of his head was burned by the fire but miraculously he was not injured. We thought of John Wesley; our son Tim was another "brand plucked from the burning," a phrase Susannah Wesley used to describe John's rescue from the burning parsonage.
We quickly bought Tim a supply of new clothes and basic supplies at Wal-Mart and found him another apartment. Without a car, and without any of his prized possessions, he continued his forestry studies at the Junior College. We drove back home to Montgomery, my wife in shock that I would leave our son there instead of taking him back home with us. Years later Tim would say that losing everything was one of the best things that ever happened to him; in a moment of time he discovered what really matters in life.
A few days ago Tim send me this email:
"Yep, 30 years have passed. I was thinking again this morning about the words I spoke to you “Dad, I’m lucky to be alive”. Over the years I have realized a better way to state that would be “I’m blessed to be alive”. I was saved for a purpose and I need to listen to his voice to make sure I know what the purpose is and fulfill it."
Mom and I are so thankful to God for sparing Tim's life, but even more thankful that this rescue inspired Tim to realize that he was "saved for a purpose." He has become a respected forester who serves the Lord daily as he works with people and trees. We admire the man, the husband and the father that he has become.
Each of us is alive for a purpose. Like Tim we need to "listen" to God's voice and do our best to fulfill the purpose for which we are alive. We don't have to lose everything to become aware that God has a purpose for each of our lives. But we must be willing to listen and obey to fulfill God's destiny for our lives.

They got him out of the grave just in time for the funeral

2011-01-07T17:21:00.000-06:00

My friend Bruce Mitchell needs to write a book about his funny experiences as a pastor. In a recent blog Bruce tells what happened shortly after the bishop had appointed him to his first church. I will let Bruce tell it:

"Within a day or so someone in the church passed away and I had never conducted a funeral. I told the funeral director I didn't have any experience in funerals and he replied, "Don't worry, we've trained a lot of pastors and haven't lost one yet." With the Pastor's handy dandy funeral guide - and smiles from the funeral director - it worked out fine - the first of many. Another funeral went well until the interment at a small country cemetery. It was on a hillside and there had been rain. As the casket was moved into place a voice came out of the grave, "Don't worry, I'm fine." One of the attendants had slipped on mud and had fallen into the hole. We retrieved him just before the family and friends arrived."

Funny things happen to preachers

2011-01-03T22:13:00.001-06:00

My longtime and dear friend Bruce Mitchell tells some funny stories from his days as a United Methodist pastor. I love this one and just have to share it. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.

"There was another surprising event early on in the pastorate.I was deep into an early part of a sermon when a cat came in through an open window behind the choir, and scooted over choir member shoulders, across the chancel, and down a flight of stairs. The choir was unnerved, and the congregation was amused. And there was a time when I offered a spirited altar call hoping for some seeking soul to come forward to accept Christ. I knew I was in trouble when I saw a tail wagging in back of a pew and our collie came down the center aisle, sat down at the communion rail,
and smiled. Yes, I can assure you, dogs do smile! And there was the day I offered a profound prayer aand asked the congregation to join in the Lord's Prayer (the Our Father in a Catholic Church). Just as we concluded this prayer, the public address system sounded out: "That's a big 10-4, good buddy!" A neigbor of the church was a hardline CB'er and his strong signal somehow was received through the PA system."

2011-01-03T11:58:00.001-06:00

Eleven Ways Leaders Can Serve the People They Work With

Recently Scooter Leonard, a great servant leader and the Business Manager of our church, Saint James UMC in Montgomery, shared the following excellent ways that a leader can serve the people he or she works with. I felt this list would be helpful to us all as we began a new year. You may want to share them with your friends.

11 Ways A Leader Can Serve The People He/She Works With December 16, 2010
I read Mark 10:35-45 the other morning and made a list of eleven ways that a leader can serve people (after all, Jesus said that is how to be a great leader.)

#1 – Adopt the mindset that these people work with me and not for me.

#2 – Provide enough margin for the people who serve with you to be creative and brainstorm ahead. (The pastor that works “week of” in regards to his message really does a great disservice to those who support him in regards to creative elements.)

#3 – Make sure that the people you serve with have the resources they need to do the job they are expected to do.

#4 – Say “thank you” and “great job” A LOT instead of just pointing out all of the areas where a person came up short.

#5 – Try your best to make sure that if an area of the church is going to be impacted by a certain decision that someone from that area had input in the decision making process. (Learned this one from Andy Stanley.)

#6 – Make sure the expectations for the people you lead are both spoken and realistic. (We cannot hold people accountable for unspoken, unrealistic expectations.)

#7 – Don’t confuse personal preferences with conviction from the Holy Spirit…if you tell the people you serve with that “God told me” then you had better be willing to bet your last Bible than you heard from the Lord!

#8 – Model what you consider to be important…in other words, when you are walking into the building and see a piece of trash on the ground…pick it up.

#9 – Listen to them!!!

#10 – Understand that your words weight 1,000 pounds…choose them carefully!

#11 – Understand that WHAT you say and HOW you say it matter…the people you serve with are human beings with hearts, minds and souls…they deserve to be treated as such.

Sharing gracious comments by my friend Matt O'Reilly

2010-12-27T11:34:00.000-06:00

Matt O'Reilly is a dear friend and fellow United Methodist pastor serving at Jay, Florida. In his stimulating and excellent blog, Incarnatio, Matt recently wrote these kind words which I am taking the liberty to share with my readers:

NEW BOOKS WORTH A LOOK

I wanted to point to a couple of books that I was pleased to see published as of late. The first is Commentary on Selected Passages in the Four Gospels: Searching the Scriptures for Grace and Guidance; the second is Commentary on Selected Passages in Paul's Letters: Searching the Scriptures for Grace and Guidance; both are authored by Walter Albritton and will certainly be worth a look. I'm pleased to see these books come out because Walter is to me not only a mentor, pastor, teacher, and colleague but a very dear friend. I was privileged to sit under his preaching for 13 years, and to this day he is at the top of my call list when I'm in need of wise counsel. In fact, I actually started this blog after some advice he gave me on becoming a better writer. I'm excited about these books because I know that so much of his wisdom will fill their pages. Indeed, these two books (available from Amazon.com or from the author) are the product of nearly 60 years of pastoral ministry and reflection. Walter has always been able to draw insights from the scriptures and apply them to the life of the people of God in accessible and encouraging yet challenging and edifying ways. All who read will benefit from these books. I'm looking forward to reading them myself. Keep an eye out for a review or two sometime in future. If you'd like to get to know Walter a little better, you can check out his blog.

Lessons in Hope

2010-12-16T07:03:00.001-06:00

Nothing less than the kindness of God has enabled me to prepare for publication my commentaries on the books of the New Testament this fall. The third and final volume is titled Commentary on Selected New Testament Passages Offering Lessons of Hope. Amazon.com will release this book for sale shortly after Christmas. The first commentary published earlier this fall is titled Commentary on Selected Passages in the Four Gospels. The second volume is titled Commentary on Selected Passages in Paul's Letters. Lessons in Hope will contain lessons drawn from the Acts of the Apostles, the Epistle to the Hebrews, the Letters of James, Peter, John and Jude, and the Revelation of John. What is my audience in these books? My audience has always been ordinary disciples of Jesus Christ, the good people who are the strength of the local church. In my writing and my preaching I have sought to motivate people to fall in love with Jesus and to realize that the entire Bible is about Jesus Christ. The Old Testament says, "Someone is coming!" The New Testament says, "That Someone is here and his Name is Jesus!" My fervent prayer is that readers of these commentaries will be encouraged to dig more diligently in the Holy Scriptures and find joy in meeting the Christ who is "cradled" on every page. The books are available from Amazon.com or an autographed copy may be obtained by contacting me at walbritton@elmore.rr.com.

AUBURN WINS SEC CHAMPIONSHIP GAME!!

2010-12-04T20:41:00.000-06:00

Auburn finished strong and beat South Carolina 56-17 to become the SEC Champion! Already ranked number one in the BCS standing, the Tigers now should face off against the Oregon Ducks in Glendale, Arizona on January 10! Cam Newton is the most awesome football player I have ever seen in a football uniform! What a season to be an Auburn die-hard fan who bleeds orange and blue!!! Now the Tigers have a chance to become the national champion team in college football. Wow! It is hard to believe. I had predicted a record this fall of 10-2 but I am happy to have been wrong! Go Auburn!!!!!

So far, so good!

2010-12-04T17:18:00.000-06:00

Well, it is halftime in the SEC Championship game in Atlanta and Auburn is leading 28-14. The Tigers are doing well and I hope this will not be another nail-biter like so many have been. If Cam and the boys win this, they will play in the national championship game in Glendale, Arizona on January 10. WOW! War Eagle!!

The Big Test is coming Saturday in Atlanta

2010-12-02T16:21:00.000-06:00

My Auburn Tigers have earned the right to play the South Carolina Gamecocks again this season, this time in the SEC Championship Game. The Tigers won 35-27 in a close contest earlier this year. I had predicted Auburn would go 10-2 this year but I was wrong. They are 12-0, and am I glad to be wrong! If they can win again, the door is open for Auburn to play in the national championship game in Glendale, Arizona in January. I am nervous but hopeful -- I am just praying that Cam will be able to put all the ugly speculation behind him and play his best game ever against South Carolina. Go Auburn! WAR EAGLE!!!

Two new books published this month

2010-12-02T16:16:00.000-06:00

After much editing, and eye strain, I have managed to get two more books published by Amazon.com. The first is titled Commentary on Selected Passages in the Four Gospels.
The second is titled Commentary on Selected Passages in Paul's Letters.
Both are now available from Amazon.com.
These commentaries are a compilation of lessons I prepared over the past 20 years while writing a commentary to supplement the International Sunday School lessons for adults. I revised and updated each one, hoping that the lessons could provide helpful insights about how the Bible speaks to us today.
My prayer is that these commentaries will inspire my readers to discover anew biblical truth that should guide our living in these days.

New Book Published this week

2010-10-16T22:43:00.000-05:00

Amazon.com now has made available another of my books. The latest one is titled Leaning Over the Banisters of Heaven. Subtitle: Balcony People Make the Difference. This is the book that was inspired by the book, Balcony People written by Joyce Landorf Heatherley several years ago. Joyce's book was a gift to me from my longtime friends Grady and Celestra Rowell. The book introduced me to the concept of balcony people and basement people, and triggered a new understanding of human relationships. For ten years I have been encouraging people to get in the balcony of their family and friends, and thus make a beautiful difference in their lives. At the same time I have reminded people that they do not have to give their basement people the privilege of ruining their lives. I hope all my friends will check out this concept and decide to live the rest of their lives as balcony people. Since publishing four books this year, I am now working hard on my commentaries on the Scriptures. I hope to get them published before the end of the year. My first volume will be titled Commentary on the Four Gospels. The second will be titled Commentary on Paul's Letters. I am so thankful that the good Lord has given me grace and strength to put together these writings and my prayer is that at least a few people will find helpful. In my spare time I have been reading Truman by David McCollough and this week began reading also the book by Douglas MacArthur, Reminiscences. Both men were giants in the leadership arena. As a devotional I am also reading again My Utmost for His Highest by Oswald Chambers; this book has impacted my life second only to the Bible.

Three New Books Out this Month

2010-08-27T21:22:00.001-05:00

God has blessed us this summer! He has given me the energy to prepare and publish three new books that are now available from Amazon.com. Several of you had encouraged me to do this so the books are now available, along with Dean's book, The Yellow Butterfly. My three titles are as follows:

Life is Short So Laugh Often, Live Fully and Love Deeply (178 pages)
Just Get Over It And Move On! The Best Way to Handle Disappointment (188 pages)
Don't Let Go of the Rope! We Need Each Other (168)

Our books are available from Amazon.com for $14.00 plus postage and shipping. Many of you have asked us for an autographed copy so we want to make those available. We can sell them for a little less if you would like to have autographed copies. Our prices are 1 book - $15; 2 books - $25; 3 books - $35; and all 4 books - $45. These prices include postage and shipping. If you order one or more, please make your check out to me, Walter Albritton, and send to me at this address: 289 Leigh Lane, Wetumpka, AL 36093.

If you wish to purchase any for gifts to others, please tell us to whom the books should be autographed and where to ship them.

Thank you for sharing our joy in the publication of these books in which we express our love for Christ and our gratitude for all He has done for us!

This has been an incredible summer. Dean had surgery -- replacement of her right knee. We were rather concerned for her to have major surgery at our age but she felt the Lord assuring her she would be alright. She has done remarkably well in recovery and her rehab, though painful, has been superb. She is walking well for the first time in several years, and we are so thankful.

We hope our friends will enjoy our books and celebrate with us their publication. When you are praying, ask the Lord to tell you someone who might be blessed by one of our books!

2010-07-25T19:47:00.002-05:00

Life is Short So Laugh Often, Live Fully, and Love Deeply

This month I published a new book by the above title that is now available from Amazon.com
Though it is available, the world does not know it yet. I am trying to come up with ideas to publicize the book and stimulate some sales.

This month my wife Dean also published a book titled THE YELLOW BUTTERFLY, and it too is available from Amazon.com Her book is a collection of poems and several pieces in prose.

We are both very pleased that we can share in print our ideas, thoughts, and convictions -- and we look forward to receiving reviews and comments.

2010-07-25T19:20:00.000-05:00

Never feel sorry for a preacher

Never feel sorry for a preacher. Preachers have more fun than anybody. There is never a dull day in the life of a preacher. One reason is that those of us who are “clergy” never know what we will be doing next.
One day we share the joy of parents celebrating the birth of a baby. The proud daddy wants us to agree that the handsome boy looks just like him. We smile and say, “Why sure he does; he is the spitting image of his daddy.” But we never risk saying what we are thinking -- that this baby looks about like the last fifty newborns we have seen. No matter, it is fun to share with young parents the thrill of holding a healthy new son or daughter.
That same day we may visit a person who is dying. Beside the bed is a beloved spouse whose wrinkled brow betrays the fear that death is knocking on the door. We speak softly and listen mostly. A family member whispers, “The doctor told us this morning that it is only a matter of hours now.” No one speaks the word “die,” but everyone understands that the sick one has only a few hours to live.
Where is the fun in a moment like that? Fun is probably not the right word. It is more like meaningful joy, the incredible feeling that somehow by being there you are making a difference. Despite the hurt and the sorrow you share with those who are grieving, your own little life is dignified by the awareness that in the hour of death, when you were needed, you were there. There are few things in life more wonderful.
Most of us preachers don’t know quite what to say at such times. The seminaries provide us little training for that. But eventually we learn that we don’t really have to say anything. Our words are seldom remembered. It is our presence that counts.
When my father was dying, a dear pastor and colleague was by my side. I don’t remember a word he said. I do remember that he put his arm around me. That I will never forget. I can only hope that somehow my arm, and my presence, has made that same difference for some of my own people.
Most preachers have a daily “to do” list. But there are days when we never get time to do anything on the list. Without warning our day may be interrupted by a phone call that makes the needs of others a higher priority. We may find ourselves sitting for hours in a courtroom, hoping to comfort parents who are waiting for a judge to drop the hammer on a wayward teenager. Or we may shuffle our plans around so we can meet with a couple whose marriage is on the rocks.
Hours later we may be meeting with a young man and a young woman who have fallen in love. They have honored us by inviting us to counsel them and perform the wedding. Planning a wedding, of course, is always more fun when the couple allows plenty of time for the counseling so important for a lasting marriage. It is sad but true that some people spend more time studying for a driver’s license than they do preparing for their marriage. So it is little wonder that many marriages fail.
I do not consider the hours spent in counseling with a couple as drudgery. It is actually fun to believe that you are helping a man and a woman prepare well, not simply for a lovely wedding, but for a solid marriage that lasts a lifetime.
Some years ago I did learn something helpful from another pastor. I was in the habit of meeting at night to offer premarital counseling for couples. That meant many nights at the office, especially when counseling with three or four couples during the same time period. My friend asked me, “Why don’t you ask each couple to meet you during the day?”
My answer was that both the man and woman worked and did not get off until 5 or 6 o’clock. He asked me two rather penetrating questions: “Because they work, does their doctor meet with them at night?” The answer was obvious. No, they get off work to go to the doctor.
The second question was this: “Is the counseling you are doing as important as what their doctor does for them?” Again the answer was obvious. The counseling is at least equally as important as the doctor’s counsel for their physical needs. So for many years I have had fun explaining that to couples who came to me for counseling. Most of the time they find a way to get off work to see me.
Preaching is fun and never a chore. If it ever becomes a chore, I will quit. But preaching is such a great privilege. People are discouraged and many are without hope. Many are whipped down by the hardships of life. And Sunday after Sunday I have the honor of reminding them that God loves them and that when they turn to him he will put his arms around them and give them hope and healing.
Now and then someone will tell me, “God spoke to me today and met my need.” Someone who had little hope now feels loved by God. That is when fun turns into pure joy! Preachers do not want to hear that they preached a “sweet” sermon but that while they were preaching someone listening heard from God. It really does not get much better than that.
So if you want to have some fun, let the Lord know you are willing to be called to the ministry. Preachers have more fun than anybody. I should know. I have been doing it for almost 60 years, and it keeps getting funnier by the day! +

2010-07-25T19:18:00.000-05:00

Dog stories are as welcome as a hot dog at a baseball game

Hearing a good dog story is like a gentle breeze on a sultry day or as welcome as a hot dog at a baseball game. I will walk a mile to hear a good story about a dog. Actually I am suspicious of people who do not enjoy dog stories. A good sign of normal intelligence is a love of dog stories because a good one can make your day.
A dear friend sent me a story about a talking dog. At first I could not believe it either but wait till you hear about that dog.
Near Washington, D.C., a man spotted a sign in front of a home. The sign read, “Talking Dog for Sale.” Intrigued, the man stops and inquires about the dog. The owner tells him the dog, a black mutt that is not very impressive looking, is in the backyard.
“Do you talk?” the man asks the dog.
“Sure do,” the dog replies.
“So, what is your story?”
The dog looks up and says, “Well, I discovered my gift of talking when I was very young. I wanted to help the government, so I told the CIA about my gift. In no time they had me jetting from country to country, sitting in rooms with spies and world leaders. No one figured a dog would be eavesdropping. I was one of their most valuable spies for eight years.
“So you quit the CIA?” the man asked.
“Yes,” the dog replied. “Jetting around the world tired me out. I was not getting any younger and I wanted to settle down. So I signed up for a job at the airport to do undercover security work, mostly wandering near suspicious characters and listening in. I uncovered some incredible dealings there and was awarded a batch of medals.”
The dog continued, “To make a long story short, I found a sweet wife, had a mess of puppies, and retired a few months ago.”
The man listening to the dog is very amazed. He cannot believe what he has heard. He goes back to the front porch and asks the owner what he wants for the dog.
The owner says, “Ten dollars.”
“Ten dollars! Man, your dog is amazing. Why on earth are you willing to sell him so cheap?”
“Because he is a liar,” the owner says. “He didn’t do any of that stuff he told you about.”
Another story shared with me is about a Baptist dog. It seems that this Baptist preacher and his wife decided to get a new dog. Ever mindful of the congregation, they knew the dog must also be a Baptist. They visited kennel after kennel in search of the right dog. Finally they found a kennel whose owner assured them he had just the dog they wanted. The owner brought the dog in to meet the pastor and his wife.
“Fetch the Bible,” he commanded. The dog leaped to the bookshelf, scrutinized the books, located the Bible, and brought it to the owner.
“Now find Psalm 23,” he commanded. The dog dropped the Bible to the floor and, showing marvelous dexterity with his paws, leafed through the Bible, and soon pointed to Psalm 23 with his paw.
The pastor and his wife were so impressed that they purchased the dog and took him home. That evening a group of church members dropped by for a visit. The pastor and his wife began to show off the dog, having him locate several Bible verses.
The visitors were amazed. One man asked, “Can he do regular dog tricks too?”
“I have not tried any of those yet,” the pastor replied, “but I will now.”
“Heel,” the pastor commanded. The dog immediately jumped on a chair, placed one paw on the pastor’s forehead and began to howl.
The pastor looked at his wife in shock and gasped, “Good Lord! This is a Pentecostal dog!”
While visiting a church member one day our conversation was interrupted by her dog barking loudly in an adjoining room. When my hostess had to answer her phone, I began barking back at the dog. He took up the challenge after a brief pause and barked even louder.
The sweet lady was too kind to chastise me for barking at her dog but I doubt she will want me to come back. That suits me fine because it is difficult to have a conversation when a barking dog is in the next room. Dogs have a way of destroying pastoral calls.
It is actually fun to bark with a dog. Next time the moon is full, have some fun. Go outside and howl at the moon a few times and let your dog wonder what on earth you are doing. If your dog starts howling with you, then you will know you have a regular old dog, a good dog. If the dog shakes his head and walks away mumbling, you know you have a dog that could get a job with the CIA. +

2010-04-26T07:59:00.001-05:00

The night my father sent his son to rescue me

Nearly 40 years have passed but I remember that night in July as though it was yesterday. It was the night our car broke down on the highway near Greenville, Alabama.
I was 40 years old at the time, the father of five sons but still young enough to call my own father to bail me out of a problem. Though my father never graduated from high school he was one of the smartest men I have ever known. I grew up knowing that I could count on him in a crisis. He was strong and steady.
Daddy was a “Jack of all trades.” He had worked as a plumber’s assistant and along the way picked up basic skills in carpentry. He became a decent mechanic by maintaining his own farming equipment. He used what he had and found ingenious ways to fix things that were broken.
Dean and I married when we were 20. I was wet behind the ears with little experience in dealing with the unexpected. When there was a problem I was not ashamed to call Daddy for advice. He would know what to do when no one else did.
Calling on Daddy for advice gradually began to bother me. I thought it made me seem inadequate in my wife’s eyes. I wanted her to think that I could handle anything. Her father died when she was very young. She had not grown up depending on her dad as I had mine. I sensed that she wanted me to “grow up,” be a man, take charge, and stop calling my dad about every crisis.
I wanted that identity for myself too. I wanted my sons to think of me as I thought of my dad – a strong man who could fix anything. Gradually I began breaking the habit of calling Daddy for counsel. I felt like a real man at last.
So on that July night when our car broke down I was determined to fix the problem myself. We were returning to Mobile from a family vacation in Minnesota. With the help of a kind man who stopped to help us we pushed the car into a gas station just off the interstate.
I soon discovered that since it was Saturday no car repair center was open. No one knew of a mechanic who would be available until Monday. But I was desperate. I had to preach the next morning in my church. My family was dog tired.
I kept trying to locate a mechanic but searched in vain. And I did not have a clue what to do. I was exhausted. My wife was frustrated. Our sons were simply being little boys – and driving us crazy. My whole family was beginning to doubt my manhood. I could hear their silent demand: “You are the daddy. You are in charge. Why don’t you figure out what to do?”
Finally I thought about my favorite solution --call my daddy. But I was too proud to do that. After all, what could he do that I could not do? And I could hear my wife saying with a smirk, “So you called your Daddy did you? That is all you know how to do – call your Daddy!” I did not want to hear that so in desperation I went back to the drawing board. Still no answer came to mind.
Finally I caved in and called Daddy. Why not? He always knew what to do. By then I had learned that my car needed a new starter. Resourceful as ever, Daddy called a friend who ran an auto parts store. Though his store had been closed since noon, he agreed to meet Daddy at the store and sell him the starter. My brother Seth would be driving down to bring me the starter.
It was ten o’clock and help was on the way. My brother, sixty miles away, would arrive shortly after eleven o’clock. In the meantime fortune had smiled on me again; a local mechanic, home from an afternoon of fishing, had agreed to come to the service station and install the starter.
Once Seth arrived, the grumbling mechanic quickly replaced the starter. It was after midnight but we were on the road again. Yet before I had driven five miles suddenly I had to pull off the highway and stop the car. I was blinded by the tears that filled my eyes.
What triggered my crying was the sudden realization that this little Saturday night crisis was the gospel – fleshed out in this strange breakdown of our car. It was simple yet profound – I had called my father and he had sent his son to rescue us.
That is the essence of salvation – when our problems overwhelm us, we can call our heavenly Father and he will send His Son to save us. I could not imagine a more beautiful illustration of the gospel message. It is the message around which my whole life has been focused.
I sat on the side of the road for awhile regaining my composure. The boys were asleep, completely unaware of the exhilaration within my heart. My wife, half asleep, said, “What is wrong; why did you stop?” I told her I would explain later and urged her to go back to sleep. When my tears subsided I drove home, my weariness replaced by a joyous sense of the presence of God.
The next morning I told this story to my congregation and God blessed the telling of it. I reckon you can understand why I will never forget the night my father send his son to rescue me, and why I keep telling this story to anyone who will listen. @

2010-04-17T17:47:00.002-05:00

April 18, 2010

Today has been a special day to us for 57 years

April 18 has come again. It is not a holiday. It is not the birthday of a president or a Civil War general. For most people it is just another day on the calendar. But for me and my bride it has been a special day for 57 years. Our first son was born on this day in 1953.
Today being Sunday we will worship as usual where I preach every Lord’s Day, Saint James United Methodist Church in Montgomery. My sermon today will be about lessons we learned through the death of our son. Old folks simply have to reminisce. And we never cease to be thankful for those who will listen for a little while.
Many Lee County residents will remember April 18, 1953 for a different reason. A vicious tornado ripped through east Alabama that day, destroying several homes and damaging many others.
Dean and I began married life in an upstairs apartment on College Street across from Auburn United Methodist Church. But Dean was soon pregnant. After she fell down the stairs leading to our apartment we rented a house at 818 Lakeview Drive in Auburn. The rent was a whopping $75 per month. I was in my third year at API, the land-grant college would soon become known as Auburn University.
Early in the morning of April 18 we hurried off to the small hospital that is now called East Alabama Medical Center. Dean’s sharp and increasingly rapid labor pains convinced her that today she would deliver her firstborn.
Dark clouds and the forecast of bad weather made us a little uneasy. But it was the turbulence of childbirth, not the weather that got our attention that day.
The raging storm forced the hospital to switch to emergency power when nearby power lines went down. Rain was hitting the windows in torrents. Water even poured into the hospital through the air-conditioning ducts. But several hours would pass before we heard that a tornado had ripped through the community.
Our kind physician, Dr. Ben Thomas, had to drive through a torrential rain from Auburn get to the hospital. Shortly after his arrival, debris from the storm made driving in the area quite hazardous.
When I returned home that night, elated by the safe delivery of our first son, I found our house had been damaged by the storm. The roof had been ripped off above the front door, allowing the rain to soak some of our furniture. But the damage seemed incidental compared to the total destruction of several nearby homes.
Weighing nine pounds and two ounces, our baby boy was beautiful and healthy. His blond hair and blue eyes made him even more special to us. We were thrilled to have started our family. Though we had little money, we enjoyed life. The future was bright. We had the world by the tail. I finished Auburn and we moved to Nashville where I enrolled in seminary at Vanderbilt University.
But soon another storm descended upon us just as swiftly as the tornado had come. Tests brought bad news. Our doctor’s voice was breaking as he fought back tears and gave us the dreadful news, “Your son has leukemia.”
He explained that there was no known cure. The best he could do would be to keep David comfortable until he died. “Perhaps,” he said, “a cure will be discovered soon; a lot of research is being done.”
I asked how long David might live. His answer sent a chill up and down my spine. “My best guess is somewhere between two months and two years,” he said. It was the worst moment of my life – hearing that death sentence for our precious little boy. David was two years old, five months into his third year.
That diagnosis shattered our world on a day in September. David suffered. We struggled with the burden. We prayed. We cried. We stifled our anger and wrestled with our fear. Underneath all our frustration was the maddening question: Why would a loving God let a beautiful little boy die like this?
Finally David’s suffering came to an end on a day in May the next year. His death wounded us but it did not destroy us. Though tested sorely by the loss of our only child, our marriage lasted and became stronger. God met us in the hallways of hell and showed us the way out. We refused to become bitter and asked God to make us better. We tried to let him use our pain.
Over these 57 years our sadness has given way to the overwhelming joy that is God’s gift to those who keep on holding his hand through tough times.
And each time April 18 rolls around, we pause to give thanks for the privilege of having David for three short years. We also give thanks that in his kindness, God gave us four other sons, each of whom is very precious to us in these days.
This time, the 57th celebration of David’s birth, we offer thanks that we are still together, still able to remember his beautiful smile, and still thankful for the joy that was ours on the turbulent day our first child was born.
I hope you understand why the 18th day of April remains a very special day to us. It will always be so, as long as we live. @

2009-12-25T11:45:00.001-06:00

Year’s end a good time to bring closure to unresolved conflict

Most of us struggle with unresolved conflict with other persons. Truth be told, some of our disagreements are unsolvable. There are some problems we simply cannot fix. However it is possible to bring closure, at least in our own minds, to some of the conflicts that create inner turmoil. The ending of the year is a good time to mull this over.
Take anger for example. Sometimes we “permit” minor things to push our anger button. A driver cuts in front of us. A friend’s subtle criticism hurts our feelings. Some idiot makes us wait forever in line at the super market. Anger is kindled within us. How do we put out this fire that rages within?
The solution involves using your brain. Back away and think about what is happening. Then admit three things to yourself. First, anger hurts you, not the person who is the object of your rage. Second, no one can make you angry unless you give that person permission to do so. Third, you can choose to give up your anger and let it go. You can spit it out like a plum seed.
It is clinically true that anger disrupts the normal functions of the human body’s organs. That being true, why allow your own attitude to injure your liver or your kidneys? Common sense tells me it is stupid to hurt myself with my own thoughts.
As this calendar year ends, we have a choice. We can choose to dispose of any lingering anger within us just as we do the garbage – throw it out! That is what anger is anyway – garbage. And the longer we let it hang around, the worse it stinks.
Bitterness and resentment are kissing cousins of anger. They are like demons lurking in the darkness, waiting to hurt us. If we allow them lodging in our hearts, they can rob us of our joy and eventually destroy us. No one is immune to these villains. Like the flu, they can attack us and wound us.
So we need to guard carefully the door of our hearts. If a friend gets a promotion we thought we deserved, we must deal sternly with the resentment that pops up. We can tell ourselves that our turn will come later – or we can embrace the face that it may never come. But we can overcome our resentment by choosing to congratulate our friend for the promotion. It is living out that “Do unto others” thing that Jesus talked about.
Tension with others sometimes develops when we insist that people live by the standards we have chosen. But our society is highly diverse, and more so every day. So it is necessary to allow others freedom to make a myriad of personal choices, many of which may be different from our own.
None of us can make choices for others. We must make our own and learn to be comfortable with the “strange” decisions some people make in a free society. It helps to remember that we are not all alike.
Some people like chicken; others like fish. Some folks like country music; others like opera. We can make ourselves miserable if we constantly insist that everybody eat chicken and like country music.
People are different. The art is to learn to enjoy our own personal uniqueness rather than focus on the weirdness of others. When we do, we find our stomachs will digest either chicken or fish without the need for Tums or Alka- Seltzer.
Hairstyles pose a dilemma for some people. Parents can become embroiled with their teen-agers about the length of hair. Some young people challenge the authority of their parents by demanding the freedom to make their own decisions about issues like music and hair style. To survive, parents have to learn to give and take rather than trying to exercise total control of a teenager’s behavior.
This brings up an important principle for life. There are some ditches not worth dying in. Both sanity and peace are soon lost if we choose to fight about every issue that comes up. We must, then, learn to choose wisely those ditches we are willing to die in. Obviously the length of a person’s hair is not worth a fight. We can save our energy for moral issues that demand a fight to the finish.
An automobile runs better if the radiator is flushed now and then. The human mind can benefit from a good flushing too. There are attitudes, ideas, and dispositions that, like rust, can be detrimental to our mental health. So flush them out.
If we are willing we can bring closure to some of the conflicts that keep our stomachs tied in knots. How? Well, stop insisting on having your way about everything. Embrace the fact that you are not always right. Stop trying to change other people. Forgive people you are holding a grudge against. Give people the freedom to disagree with your opinions. Choose to enjoy yourself – and be thankful for the people who genuinely like you. Such choices can give you a jump-start on making 2010 a happy New Year!@

Growth through Study

2009-12-12T10:51:00.003-06:00

Recently a dear friend and brother in Christ asked me for suggestions for a talk he had been asked to give on "Growth through Study." These are the rambling ideas that came to mind and which I shared with my friend. I thought these ideas might also stimulate the thinking of others so I am sharing them for the larger audience. I shall be blessed again if you dear reader should find any of these ideas helpful in your own Christian walk:

1. Take a look at the life of Harry Denman. Harold Rogers wrote a good book about him. He never married and was Mr. Evangelism of the Methodist Church for many years. He was a remarkable witness for Jesus. His style was simple, direct, transparent, and compassionate. He was a friend of mine, a mentor actually, being much older. He took an interest in me. He died at 83 in the Methodist Retirement Home in Birmingham. I went to see him there when he was about 80. I asked him to suggest how I might become a better preacher and witness for Jesus. He told me to pray more, and to write out in long hand the scriptures. He told me he was writing out the New Testament daily even then, and was at the time writing out the New Testament for the sixth time. He said writing it out by hand helps you get the Word into your whole being. I have done some myself but nothing quite like he did. What a tremendous "study habit"! He talked to ordinary people about "my friend Jesus" with the same ease that most of us talk about the weather or football. His witness was contagious and challenging.I admired him and learned from him. When it comes to study, I think it helps us grow to "study" the style and holy habits of Christians we admire.
2. As you prepare your talk, let the Spirit guide you to be transparent about your own life -- especially your weaknesses and mistakes. People can identify with these because we are all so much alike. But go on to share how grace has changed you, and how you have learned to let the Lord use and develop further your strengths. Be unafraid to share your uniqueness, especially the road you traveled that led you one day to embrace the living Christ, and how you came to surrender your whole life to him. Many people are surrendered to Jesus, but only partially and with great reservations. Fullness of joy only comes when we begin to serve Jesus with no reservations, holding nothing back. Surrender is the great key to becoming a child of God with a childlike spirit. Tell about your reservations, fears, and your stumbling, but also how like C. S. Lewis you have been constantly "surprised by joy."
3. When I read Thomas a Kempis' The Imitation of Christ, one of the all-time great classics, I discovered that it was almost impossible to tell when the author was writing his own words or quoting scripture. It dawned on me that Thomas had so absorbed the scriptures, "inwardly digesting them," (a phrase from one the great prayers from The Book of Common Prayer), that the holy scriptures were immersed in his own vocabulary. This book touched me deeply because it revealed how one's life and thoughts can be marvelously influenced by not merely reading but absorbing the Bible. Harry Denman was a 20th Century example of how loving Jesus and absorbing the scriptures can cause a man to become beautifully Christlike.
4. Dr. Tom Carruth taught prayer for many years at Asbury Theological Seminary. He was a dear friend. One day I heard him say that he had read the letters of John more than 3,000 times -- and he learned something new every time he read them! Interestingly, Tom was one of the most loving, Christlike men I ever met.
5. And what did dear brother John Wesley say: "I am a man of one Book - the Bible!" Too many Christians are running from John Grisham's novels to the latest popular Christian book (example: The Shack) and missing the life-changing power that comes from "absorbing" the holy scriptures.
6. The above reminds me of Eugene Peterson and The Message, and how the Book of Psalms are more "prayers to be prayed" than scripture to be read. It was Peterson who put me on to the grand idea of "praying the Psalms."

As you can tell, I have been rambling but praying that some of these ideas might stimulate the juices of your own thinking -- and at least prod you in some helpful direction. I know the Lord will prepare you with a message that will inspire those who will hear you gladly. -- Walter, sjc

2009-12-11T08:45:00.001-06:00

Why Christmas is such a special time of the year

Ponder with me why Christmas is so special. The very word “Christmas” makes my heart sing. Since I was a small boy writing letters to Santa Claus I have loved this wonderful time of the year. But what makes it special?
Is it not the thrill of anticipation -- expecting something wonderful to happen? Anticipation adds zest to life. As we celebrate Thanksgiving we begin to anticipate Christmas. Most of us do so with wonder and joy. We have learned from past experience that good things happen at Christmas. As the 25th day of December nears, most of us are like children -- eager for the day to come! Life without the thrill of anticipation would be misery compounded.
The music of Christmas makes it special. We never sing "Silent Night" or "Joy to the World" in April or May; but who would want to live through December without the warm glow that comes from singing these songs with others who love them! And no December is complete without listening again to the majestic sound of Handel’s Messiah. Few things can set my heart on fire quite like The Hallelujah Chorus.
Of course the secular songs of Christmas are also delightful. Only Ebenezer Scrooge and his kin do not enjoy singing "Jingle Bells" or "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" or "Frosty the Snowman." An old favorite of mine is “I saw Mama kissing Santa Claus underneath the mistletoe last night.” But perhaps the most delightful of all is “Winter Wonderland.” The music and the lyrics make me want to go on a sleigh ride with my sweetie. Ah, Christmas music! It puts a spring in my step and a smile on my lips.
Colorful decorations make Christmas special. Most of us delight in decorating not only our homes but our stores, streets and public places. At no other time of the year do we hang lights and wreaths everywhere, or go to such an extent to add bright colors to the bleakness of life. Beautiful red and green ribbons, and clothes, cheer us up in the home, the school, and the work place. .
Then there is the food of Christmas! Our kitchens come alive with the sweet aroma of foods that make us merry – and overweight. Mama bakes delicious cakes and pies, and even old Bubba will toast some pecans and try his hand at baking a turkey. While the food of Christmastime is delicious to the palate, there is also the thrill of sitting down at a large table to eat with family members we may not have seen for many months.
Snow makes Christmas special too. I prefer the kind that comes out of a can, or the snow we see on television when we watch children laughing and playing on three feet of snow in upper New York State. When sometimes it snows in Alabama we chuckle to see how one inch of snow can paralyze the traffic in our area. If it snows this year, you can be sure we will all rush out to take pictures of the children throwing snowballs or building snowmen.
Trees loaded with tinsel, lights, and angels make Christmas fun for us. Chop down a tree and drag it into the house in July and your family would sign you up for the funny farm. But in December you are a killjoy if you balk at putting up a tree. Admittedly the tree, if a live one, may run up the water bill. But Christmas morning would not be the same without a tree, with gift surprises underneath it, and little children eager to find out what Santa brought them.
For some of us Christmas is special because it is a spiritual experience, a kind of journey to Bethlehem to celebrate once again the birth of the Savior named Jesus. Amidst all the wrapping paper, the tinsel, the music, the smell of food, and the tension of this busy season, we are wise to remember that it is more important for Jesus to come into our hearts than it is for Santa to come down the chimney. @

2009-12-05T07:54:00.003-06:00

More thoughts to ponder about the Manhattan Declaration

When you sign on, you will receive this encouraging response!

To all signers of the Manhattan Declaration:

Thank you for signing. We are now over 200,000 strong-and counting, for which we give thanks to God.

We have received thousands of e-mails asking what's next - a good question. The goal of those of us who drafted and signed the document is not just to get a lot of names on a manifesto, gratifying though that is. We are seeking to build a movement - hundreds of thousands, perhaps millions, of Catholic, Evangelical, and Eastern Orthodox Christians who will stand together alongside other men and women of goodwill in defense of foundational principles of justice and the common good. These are people who could expose the lie which so many in our culture have embraced about self being the center of life; and then winsomely present, in the words of St. Paul, "a more excellent way."

We are looking for people who will work in every possible arena to advance the sanctity of life, rebuild and revitalize the marriage culture, and protect religious liberty.

So what's next for you? Let us offer some specific suggestions. More will undoubtedly follow in the weeks ahead.

Pray. We can do nothing apart from God. So lay this before the Lord every chance you have, and ask your friends and prayer chains to do the same thing.

Study and learn about these issues. We see the Manhattan Declaration as a great teaching and reference source. Share it with others. Only after you have tried to teach it to someone else will you have really learned it. And go deeper in your own study. There are many organizations that offer excellent resources in support of these foundational truths. If you can't find resources, the Worldview Resource Directory we've assembled might be helpful.

Come back to www.manhattandeclaration.org if you want help in answering questions others pose to you. We've posted a FAQ (frequently asked questions) tab on the home page, but most people signed the statement before this was added. So revisit www.manhattandeclaration.org - and watch for other resources we will be posting.

Invite all of the friends on your e-mail lists to go to www.manhattandeclaration.org, read the Declaration (that's most important) and sign it.

Talk to your pastor or small group leader in church. We have heard from a number of pastors who are already referring to this document in their sermons and using it in their teaching. We've also heard from bishops and other church leaders who are planning ecumenical gatherings in their areas of responsibility. Some are talking about campaigns to equip the faithful. Other pastors are asking their congregations to sign the document, and become informed. Go to your pastor; urge him to do this. You can really help in this area. Suggest it, and then volunteer to be a part of it. Step forward as a leader.

If you belong to a civic group like Kiwanis or Rotary, and you have regular meetings, that's a great forum in which to share information about the Manhattan Declaration. Explain to people what you've signed and why you've signed it. A lot of people are asking about this statement, its meaning and purpose. Educate them.

Letters to the Editor can be a very effective way to spread information about important issues. According to some sources, more people read the Letters to the Editor columns than the editorials.

Watch the issues being debated in the public arena, particularly as the health reform bill is moving through Congress. As a citizen you have a duty to let your representatives know what you think about the issues, particularly on profoundly important moral questions like those being raised now.

Get on Facebook or any other chat rooms or blogs that you have access to. Social networking, as we are learning, can have a powerful impact.

Finally, talk to your neighbors. Robert Naisbitt wrote that fads begin from the top down, movements from the bottom up. We are convinced that societies are changed over the backyard fence, standing around the barbeque grill, and sitting in the barber shop or hair salon. Learn to be an advocate in any environment.
In conclusion, in asking you to sign we were not just asking you to raise your hand, but to raise your voice. Great changes in society have often come about when Christian people unite in this way - think of the Wesley awakening, the Celtic revival, or movements for social justice and civil rights in our own country. We believe God is looking for good men and women who will pledge (as you have done in signing the Manhattan Declaration), never to compromise the gospel, and to become well-informed, effective advocates true and godly principles.

This is a message of hope for every area of human life and endeavor, and a call to discipleship for every believer.

God bless you.

Dr. Robert George
Dr. Timothy George
Chuck Colson

2009-12-05T07:28:00.004-06:00

I agree with the Manhattan Declaration

Even though the media has not given much attention to it, I believe the Manhattan Declaration can make a difference. As of this day, December 5, 2009, more than 250,000 people have endorsed it and signed on. I added my name to the list two weeks ago. I encourage other Christians to endorse it, but even more to PRACTICE this declaration in daily life. Together we can make a difference. In case you have not seen it, I am printing it below. You can go to www.manhattandeclaration.org and sign on as a sponsor. I hope you will.

The Manhattan Declaration
A Call of Christian Conscience

Christians, when they have lived up to the highest ideals of their faith, have defended the weak and vulnerable and worked tirelessly to protect and strengthen vital institutions of civil society, beginning with the family.

We are Orthodox, Catholic, and evangelical Christians who have united at this hour to reaffirm fundamental truths about justice and the common good, and to call upon our fellow citizens, believers and non-believers alike, to join us in defending them. These truths are:

1.the sanctity of human life
2.the dignity of marriage as the conjugal union of husband and wife
3.the rights of conscience and religious liberty.

Inasmuch as these truths are foundational to human dignity and the well-being of society, they are inviolable and non-negotiable. Because they are increasingly under assault from powerful forces in our culture, we are compelled today to speak out forcefully in their defense, and to commit ourselves to honoring them fully no matter what pressures are brought upon us and our institutions to abandon or compromise them. We make this commitment not as partisans of any political group but as followers of Jesus Christ, the crucified and risen Lord, who is the Way, the Truth, and the Life.

.255498 signatures in support
...and growing!
Sign the Declaration »
www.manhattandeclaration.org

2009-11-22T20:40:00.003-06:00

Take good care of your memory while you have it

Memory is an amazing and mysterious gift. At age 77 my memory amazes me. Though I perceive that it is gradually failing, I still remember things that surprise me. But often the things I remember, like telephone numbers, are of little value.

Like most people there are times when my memory is suddenly out to lunch when I need it the most. In Wal-Mart I chance to meet an old friend. He warmly calls my name. I smile and chat as though I remember him well. I do remember him, but my memory will not cough up his name. Moments like that are dreadful and embarrassing. Three days later I will recall my old friend’s name.

Some of us senior citizens can recall vivid details of childhood experiences but cannot remember at noon what we ate for breakfast. This bothers us because we know that loss of short-term memory is one of the early signs of Alzheimer’s disease.

Memory seems to work better with negative experiences than with positive. Someone can remember for 50 years the circumstances of being hurt deeply by another person. Resentment or hatred can fuel the memory so that some hurts are etched forever in our minds.

Faith often plays a defining role in our memory. Through faith we may find the grace to let bitter memories go. When this happens hurtful memories are erased and a healthy attitude replaces the resentment that once dogged us. Abraham Lincoln was once reminded that a certain man, whom he had recommended for a government position, had been publicly critical of the president. Asked if he did not remember the man’s criticism, Lincoln replied, “No, I distinctly remember choosing to forget his remarks.”

Clearly some people have better memories than others. There is no obvious explanation why this is true. One principle of life that may explain it is the familiar adage, “Use it or lose it.” Evidently this is true of our memory. If we do not use it, we tend to lose it. So it seems wise to keep the brain in gear – by working crossword puzzles daily or memorizing Bible verses. Anything that is good exercise for the brain.

Caroline, my mother, had a remarkable memory. She could rattle off the birthdays of 75 or more family members – even the year of each person’s birth. My wife Dean can recall the color of a dress she wore when she was six. These days she constantly recalls wise sayings her mother taught her when she was growing up.

Since my sister Laurida died at age 56, some 15 years ago, I have recalled many experiences we shared growing up. Nobody ever laughed like my sister. She laughed all over, and whenever she laughed, she made the most of it. Sometimes when I hear a woman laughing as Laurida did, I am plugged into joy. I recall how much she enjoyed life, and how our family still enjoys remembering her special kind of laughter.

Laurida was a good cook, a devoted homemaker. One of her favorite things was to bake cinnamon rolls. They were out of this world. Everybody wanted a pan of Laurida’s rolls. Nobody could make them like she did. Once her reputation was made, she frequently surprised different family members by baking their own special batch of cinnamon rolls. None of her rolls ever made it to the second day.

When Laurida was dying with cancer, and she knew she did not have long to live, a wedding for one of her daughters was arranged – at the foot of her bed in her home. I don’t think I will ever forget that occasion. We all felt the wedding was performed on “holy ground.” It remains a sacred memory in my heart. Surely her daughter and her husband will never forget their special wedding even though it was not a “church wedding.”

One day an older couple walked into my study and asked, “Do you remember us?” I drew a blank. I knew I had never seen these two people before in my whole life. After enjoying my embarrassment for a few minutes, the man told me their names and said, “You married us 38 years ago.”

Now armed with their names, and the reminder that I had married them, I still could not remember what they looked like almost 40 years before. I took their word for it, and enjoyed a chat with them. Their names I did recall, but that was all.

Occasionally someone will walk up to me and say, “Do you remember me?” Half the time I cannot remember their name. But I have a standard reply to this question: “I could never forget a face like yours.” Usually that produces a laugh, which gives me a few minutes to work overtime trying to recall their name.

Frankly I refuse to be terribly embarrassed when someone challenges me to remember his or her name. I simply say, “No, I know I should remember your name, but I don’t. Please help me.” If someone is ticked off by my memory lapse, I am sorry, but I choose not to punish myself with another guilt trip. I have been on enough guilt trips.

We should all be wise to exercise our minds daily and maintain a positive attitude toward our own capacity to remember. Never say, “I have trouble remembering names.” Instead say, “Your name is important to me; tell me your name again so I can write it down. I want to remember it.”

One favor I must ask of the young. Be kind to us old codgers. If you hear one of us telling you a story we have already told you, just indulge us please. It is embarrassing to have someone say, “You must be getting old; you keep telling the same old stories.”

If it is a good story, be thankful for it. And remember, you may be old one day. Enjoy your memory while you can; it may not last all your life! @

2009-11-04T14:07:00.003-06:00

Many scenes on life's journey were the occasions of stirring moments

Memory affords me a long string of significant sights I have witnessed with my own eyes. So many I hardly know where to begin.

I first saw the snow-capped Alps from the window of an airliner. That was an incredible scene and it remains etched in my mind.

Our family visited the Grand Canyon when our boys were small. Like most people we could hardly believe the size and beauty of that place.

On a missions trip around the world, my wife and I stood before the Taj Mahal in India, so beautiful we wanted to gaze at it for more than a few minutes. We stood in the ruins of the Coliseum in Rome. We stood in the courtyard outside the Vatican, wondering why the Pope did not step out on the balcony to greet us.

We spent a week in Japan, another in Korea, and two nights in the intriguing city of Kathmandu, Nepal. The sight of “untouchable” children there and in India still troubles my soul. We saw the dead being loaded up on wagons on the streets of Calcutta and understood better why Mother Teresa devoted her life to helping the poor and the dying.

Greece came alive for us when we saw the ruins of the Parthenon on the Acropolis. The worldwide influence of Greek architecture is well known but we appreciated it more after visiting Athens and Corinth. There, of course, we kept wondering if we were walking where once the Apostle Paul had walked.

I admired the Tower of London and wished I could have stayed a week to learn more at Westminster Chapel. Visiting the places where John Wesley once preached stirred my soul.

History never meant more than when we visited ancient Bethlehem or walked amid the ruins of the synagogues where Jesus once worshiped near the Sea of Galilee.

My friend Al Krinke took me for a midnight ride on a dogsled in Alaska when I visited him in Nome. A friend took me up in small plane to fly over a nearby mountain range and see the frightened Caribou running for safety. I think Al called those the Saw-Toothed Mountains.

Having traveled in every state in the union, including Hawaii, I have seen so many unforgettable places that are important in the history of America. My mind is filled with memories of times spent gazing at sights that millions have seen only in pictures or history books.

Along the journey I have met few of the world’s dignitaries. No president ever invited us to tea in the White House. No governor ever called on me to come pray for him.

Yet on many occasions I have had a personal audience with the most important person in the universe. I met him in a holy place called the sanctuary of that sacred building called a church.

I met him there when my sins overwhelmed me and drove me to my knees. There he gave me the precious gift of forgiveness and boosted my hope for the future.

I met him there when I began to question the purpose of my life, and I felt him call me to preach. I met him there when I pledged my life to my sweetheart Dean in holy matrimony.

I met him there when our first child died. There I found comfort and healing for my sorrow. I met him there when in brokenness, I confessed my need for the Holy Spirit to take over my life, and he graciously filled me with the presence of his Spirit.

I met him there when my children, and grandchildren, were baptized and consecrated to him. I met him there when my sister Laurida died, and when my father and mother slipped away from us. Every time he touched me and met my need, despite my unworthiness.

I have met him there hundreds of times when praying for persons who were weary of emptiness and ready for God to cleanse and change their hearts.

All of this to say, of all the places I have seen, none has meant more to me than the sanctuary where I met the Master, and where I continue to go to find the peace that he alone offers thirsty souls. @

2009-11-02T12:44:00.002-06:00

Do your best not to give up until you cross the finish line

One of the greatest privileges of a pastor is to encourage people not to give up. Pastors do their best work not by chastising people for their sins but by inspiring them to overcome their failures.
When ministry is based on encouragement, rather than judgment, there is always plenty to do. All around us are people who are struggling with defeat. A business or a marriage has failed. Debts seem insurmountable. Alcohol and drug use is out of control. Dreams have been shattered. The ox is in the ditch and there seems no way to get him out.
When the bottom falls out people do not need a lecture; they need compassion. Not pity. Compassion is that rare gift that inspires people to believe in themselves because someone else believes in them. Compassion is staying with someone that everyone else has given up on. Compassion is snatching a friend from the jaws of despair and convincing him that he has what it takes to get out of the mess he has made.
A man praised his pastor for helping him recover from alcoholism. He said, “My drinking had put me in a deep hole. Nobody wanted anything to do with me. But my preacher got down in that hole with me and helped me to crawl out. His love helped me believe in the love of God.”
Compassionate caring can help people set goals for themselves and refuse to quit until they succeed. Such caring can call forth in others the willingness to persevere. Few human qualities are more important than perseverance. That is why most of our heroes are people who refused to allow adversity to deter them from their goals.
Winston Churchill, for example, is one of the great heroes of the 20th Century. He will always be remembered for his tenacious spirit, and that which he inspired in the people of England during World War II. When it appeared that Hitler was about to bring England to its knees, Prime Minister Churchill kept hope alive with his defiant words, "We will be victorious!"
Churchill traveled all over England motivating the people. He inspired workers in the factories and on the farms to work tirelessly for their country. He visited the troops and instilled in them the conviction that England would prevail.
Few stories are more captivating than that of Churchill's visit with the coal miners. Hearing that the miners were discouraged about their contribution to the war effort, Sir Winston surprised them by showing up in the dangerous underground tunnels where they worked.
They were astonished that Churchill would risk coming into the mines and stared in trembling disbelief as his words rang in their ears:
"We will be victorious! We will preserve our freedom. And years from now when our freedom is secure and peace reigns, your children and your children's children will come and they will say to you, 'What did you do to win our freedom in that great war?' And one will say, 'I marched with the Eighth Army!' Someone else will proudly say, 'I manned a submarine.' And another will say, 'I guided the ships that moved the troops and the supplies.' And still another will say, 'I doctored the wounds!'" Then, with persuasive power Churchill shouted, "They will come to you, and you will say with equal right and equal pride, 'I cut the coal! I cut the coal that fueled the ships that moved the supplies! That's what I did. I cut the coal!"
From that hour no coal miners ever worked with greater courage than the men who heard Churchill that day. They refused to quit. They endured, and helped England preserve its precious freedom. Though the German bombs continued to fall upon English cities, the coal miners were never discouraged again.
Many admire Churchill for his wit. And he desires our admiration. On one occasion Lady Astor said to Winston, “If I were married to you, I would put poison in your tea.” He replied, “If I were married to you, I’d drink it.” When someone criticized him for ending a sentence with a preposition, he responded, “This is the kind of tedious nonsense up with which I will not put.”
Though Churchill’s gifts and achievements are extraordinary, I am thankful most of all for his personal example of perseverance. Voted out of office he refused to quit and was later re-elected Prime Minister. He earned the right to encourage others never to give up.
One of his most memorable speeches is a brief one given to the boys at old Harrow School, which he had attended as a boy. Imagine how these words must have inspired the young lads at the school:
"This is the lesson: never give in, never give in, never, never, never, never—in nothing, great or small, large or petty—never give in except to convictions of honor and good sense. Never yield to force; never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy."
So if today you find yourself struggling to carry on, allow me to encourage you to get up out of the ashes of your hardship and stay the course. Stay with it. Tie a knot in the end of your rope and hold on. Refuse to quit. Never give up. The finish line may be just ahead. Do the best you can until you cross it. @

2009-10-27T21:34:00.004-05:00

People who fill the air with their opinions can become nauseating

A great lesson life has taught me is that people are blessed more by our caring than by our opinions. Yet many people seem oblivious to this truth.

If we are at all teachable most of us learn this basic truth in a hundred different ways. We learn it early as children. Wise parents do not insist that their children agree with them in all things; they recognize that people are different and even encourage individuality in their children.

Some children, for example, will not like spinach but may enjoy green beans. What is important is that children eat green vegetables, not that they are forced to eat spinach. Since green beans will do the trick, there is no need to blow a gasket because a child refuses to eat spinach.

The use of such wisdom by loving parents helps us to grasp this truth: Love is essential even though opinions may be different. So what matters is that a child feel loved, not that the child shares all the opinions of the parents.

My parents had strong feelings about many things. When I was growing up, they refused to work on Sundays unless the ox was in the ditch. They would not allow me or my siblings to go to a movie on Sunday. These and other principles they instilled in us when we were young. But they did not disown us when, as adults, we began to disagree with some of their opinions.

What I finally realized after many years as an adult is that my parents modeled this truth in our home for their children – caring is vastly more important than opinions. Opinions are really a dime a dozen. Love, however, is a fundamental need of the human spirit. Without genuine caring, all the opinions in the world are worthless.

I learned this concept also as a pastor. People are not sitting in their homes waiting for the pastor to come by and share his opinions about everything under the sun. Actually this is so true that nobody really gives a hoot about what the pastor thinks – until they know his heart, and that he truly cares about people.

This has given birth to the dictum that most pastors have embraced: people do not care what you know until they know that you care. Some pastors have learned the hard way that people will not even listen to their opinions, much less really hear them, until they know deep down that their pastor cares about them.

As a brash young pastor I had opinions about everything – from the evil of drinking alcohol to the healing services of television evangelist Oral Roberts. I learned fairly quickly that people were not waiting with baited breath to hear what I thought; they were watching and wondering if I had any compassion to share with them.

The real bore for me today is the person who pretends to know something about every subject and chomps at the bit to spray the air with his inflexible views. You can never have a decent conversation with the person; all you can do is listen or walk away in disgust.

Everywhere you turn in our culture you are bombarded with opinions – about health care, Iraq, Afghanistan, abortion, the President, illegal immigrants, medicine, fraud, crime, global warming, and a thousand other things. There are so many opinions you hardly know whose you can trust.

The bottom line for me is simply this: Opinions become useful only within the context of love, and nobody wants to know what you think until they know you care about them. Are we not all fed up with opinions – but still hungry for love?

Care about me and I may listen to your opinions but please, keep them to yourself until I ask you what you think. And do remember to shut up now and then – so you can hear what I think.

There is a good chance we may disagree, but that will be alright as long as I know you care about me and you know that I care about you. @

2009-10-17T10:06:00.001-05:00

Reflections on Zambia and some of the people we met

Adam was lonely so God made Eve for him. Walter was lonely and God made Dean for me. Together we have traveled to five of the world’s continents. We have met wonderful people everywhere we have visited, but none more charming than the gracious people of Zambia.
Dean has a vivid imagination. She sees things other people miss. She expresses her feelings well in poetry and prose. I hope you will enjoy reading a few of her observations about our recent journey to the African nation of Zambia. Here are her reflections:
It would be redundant to repeat what has already been said about Zambia. Yes, it is halfway around the world; it is a poor country. AIDS is a very serious disease that is killing more and more people every day. Dust and wind choke your breathing passages to the limit, but all these facts fade away when I think of some of the people who made an impact on my life while in Zambia.
Catherine is Alfred Kalembo’s sister. I was made aware of her existence a few years ago when Alfred shared a little about her life with me. She is a single mom with one daughter, Linda. I didn’t ask a lot of questions about why she was single, but I felt a strong desire to help her. Several times I sent her boxes of clothes and later I sent her some money through Alfred.
When our team arrived at Alfred’s home on the outskirts of Lusaka, the first person who greeted me was Catherine. We both held each other for a long time. There were no words because she does not speak English. Over the nine days I was in Zambia Catherine became more precious to me. Linda is a shy seven year old whose education is limited. She cannot read and is not on a par with Alfred’s seven year old twin girls.
Why was my heart so touched by Catherine’s plight? I discovered that she had birthed seven babies over seven years. Yes, she had a husband, but when she could not produce a child that lived, he deserted her and got a divorce.
She was left to care for herself as best she could. With no education there was little she could do. Alfred helped her open a little restaurant in Lusaka. Soon it was clear that she was in deep depression and someone had taken advantage of her. She was pregnant with Linda.
When she gave birth to Linda she needed to be with Alfred and Muumbe. He and Muumbe took her into their home, where she has been since that time. She needs a home of her own and she may soon have one thanks to the Frazer Sunday School Class at Saint James. The class has sent her a little money for several months. With that money she bought a small lot and has built a concrete foundation for what will be her first home other than a village hut.
I stood on this foundation with Catherine, Alfred, and one of her friends and prayed over this land. I had a vision of this house being completed. A well was dug by hand and it furnishes water to the people around Catherine’s lot. Where water gushes from the rock, I believe God is there.
Catherine held on to me for as long as she could. When it was time for us to go to the airport, she got into Alfred’s car and sat beside me. She walked as far as she could with me and when I looked back she was wiping tears from her eyes and so was I. I will not forget Catherine. I plan to continue helping her until I know that she has a home.
Alfred’s life began in a rural village named Siansowa. His mother, Maria, and sister, Catherine, gave up everything for Alfred to get an education. It is no wonder that he is trying to help them in every way he can. Maria does not speak English so I had someone say to her that whenever Alfred is in America I treat him like a son. Like Catherine, Maria bonded with me instantly.
She loved our son Matt when he came to her village five years ago. There were those times when Maria and I could say nothing but love each other with our eyes. There was a knowing look that was like looking into eternity. We stood side by side when the well was dedicated. The overflowing well that we prayed would never run dry is a great blessing to this village. The well was installed with funds donated this spring by the Frazer Class.
When we got on the bus to depart, Maria got on board to hug me once again. We both knew that we would never see each other again on this side of heaven, but Maria is a survivor and I know she will be all right even in that impoverished village.
Who would ever think that you would meet a boy named Anxious? We met him at the school where he is in the 11th grade. Walter gave him a new name -- Perfect Peace. Anxious is one of the orphans being supported by the Frazer Class. AIDS robbed him of both his parents. We were delighted to see him and learn that he is very bright. He has dreams of being an engineer and I have no doubt that he can achieve what wants to do. His teachers gave us a good report on him. I plan to stay in touch with this young man and encourage him in every way I can.
Hannah became my interpreter during the time I shared with the women in a three-day conference. She had such wit and wisdom. It was a great blessing to meet a lady who lives among the poorest of the poor and still continues to give her time and energy to the church. She was the pastor’s aide.
She copied my poem, “I’ve Done my Share,” for all the women and made me feel very special. On Tuesday night when we had our last service, she gave me a gift – a piece of crochet. The note read, “Whenever you look at this crochet, please remember me.” That will be an easy task, for Hannah,
like several others, will be in my heart as long as I live. @

2009-10-17T10:02:00.001-05:00

Sharing a fire with a good friend on a cold winter day

My wife and I enjoy her fireplace. We have two in our home. Mine has gas logs. She lets me fire them up sometimes. Most of the time we just build a nice log fire in her fireplace.
When we remodeled our cabin, now our retirement home, I insisted that we put gas logs in the original fireplace. I insisted but she prevailed. “Absolutely not,” she declared; “Gas logs are nice, but I prefer building my own fire in an open fireplace.”
As I always do, I yielded to her wish, provided she would bring the firewood into the house. I had to cut and bring in wood when I was a boy. Now I am too old to bring in firewood. “If you want a fireplace, you will have to bring in the wood,” I said. Without flinching, she readily agreed. She would bring in the wood.
(I should have cut a deal also about the kindling but I forgot. Now it is my job to cut kindling and haul it in so she can get a fire started. I could buy some, but I am too stingy to waste money on a bundle of kindling no bigger than a handful of peppermint candy.)
When we added a great room, the focal point had to be a mantle, a hearth, and yes, gas logs. They should last 50 years since we use them so seldom. The gas logs are little more than our backup heating source. If we run out of wood, and the heat pump fails, we can turn on the gas logs to stay warm.
My wife has kept her word. She brings in the wood and never complains about it. And being the sweet soul that I am, I even help her now and then. I hold the door open for her when she brings in an armful. After all, I remind myself, we are “one flesh.”
The little woman can build a mean fire. Then we relax and watch all that heat going up the chimney. I like it so much I will even throw on a fresh log when needed. A small log, that is. I leave the big ones for her. That keeps her strong and healthy. Exercise is good for the body and the soul.
Watching a good fire on a cold day is mesmerizing, like a rubdown for the mind. We solve a few of the world’s problems, relax, and sometimes drop off to sleep. I would not want her to know how much I enjoy her fires. She might want me to start bringing in the logs. For the time being, kindling is enough for me. I do not want to get down in the back. My back got out of sorts thirty years ago, and I do not want to risk re-injuring it.
Last Thursday we shared our fire with a good friend, Grady Rowell. He drives down from the lake for a visit occasionally. I pretend there is something wrong with my computer so he will have an excuse to come see us. He gives my computer an adjustment; then we sit and talk a spell.
We go back a long way. We were in high school with Grady. After we grew up and went off to college, we went our separate ways. After retirement, we came home to Elmore County, God’s country. We renewed our friendship and it is stronger now than ever.
Around the fireplace we talk about life. That means we talk about suffering, dying, love, forgiveness, and lesser subjects. As we talk, I am participating in the conversation but also pondering it, musing over it almost as though I am observing the scene. In a strange way, it seems like an “out of body” experience.
We bounce from serious themes to frivolous ones. One minute we are talking about love being the key to authentic living; the next about how sick we were last week with a stomach virus.
Then, for no rhyme or reason, the conversation shifts to a time when my wife’s mother was cleaning her oven. “My sister walked into the kitchen just in time to see Mother passing out,” my wife said. Frantic for the moment, she would soon be laughing about why her mother had fainted.
She had mixed Clorox and Pine Oil together and was using it to remove grease from the oven. On her knees, she stuck her head into the oven while scrubbing. Quickly overcome by the fumes, she passed out and fell to the floor. She recovered and lived to the ripe old age of 99.
What relevance did that story have to our fireside chat? I do not have the slightest idea. That is not important. What matters, when friends are enjoying a fire together, is that life is being shared, and enriched by the sharing.
Grady is a good fireside companion. He likes to talk. He likes to listen, and even more important, he likes to laugh. He will even bring in firewood. We keep it by the front door so our friends can share the fun of bringing in another log.
Sharing a fire with a good friend on a winter day makes one glad to be alive. Saves gas too, and that’s good.@

2009-10-07T22:13:00.001-05:00

The preacher’s chest waders and 150 gallons of hot water

I will never forget the day I baptized Mike and Anna. They came to Christ, fell in love, and decided to get married. But before the wedding they wanted to be baptized. They were serious about having a Christian home.

There was only one small problem. They wanted to be baptized by immersion and most Methodist churches do not have a baptistry.

Methodists believe in baptism by immersion; we just don’t believe in it enough to install a baptistry in our churches.

We do, however, allow candidates for baptism to choose one of the three historic modes of baptism: sprinkling, pouring, or immersion. While I have baptized hundreds of people, I have never baptized anyone by pouring. Methodists prefer sprinkling or immersion.

Many Methodists agree with our Baptist friends that baptism should be done by immersion. They believe that you are not baptized until you have been “all the way under.” Frankly, I have never felt that the amount of water had a whole lot to do with it so I don’t quibble about the mode.

Lacking a baptistry in my own church, I have immersed people in swimming pools, lakes, ponds, the ocean, and rivers. In Pensacola I had one strange baptism on the sound side of the bay. The water was so shallow that the candidate and I had to wade out a hundred yards before the water was deep enough for an immersion. The family on the shore could not even hear my prayer.

For Mike and Anna a nearby Baptist church was chosen. The pastor was a good friend and always willing for me to use his baptistry on a Saturday without any charge. I had too much pride to tell him I had never baptized anyone in a baptistry before and that was a mistake I would pay for dearly.

When the pastor offered to let me use his chest waders I thought that would be neat. He told me he would be out of town attending a football game but the custodian would have everything ready for me.

What he failed to tell me was that the custodian was new on the job. He had never prepared the baptistry before and heated the water twice as long as necessary. Not only that, he had also put too much water in the baptistry.

As I slipped into the chest waders that Saturday morning, I felt alone and uncomfortable. I was uncertain about my underwear but assumed I should leave it on. I did. Pulling a white robe over me, I walked uneasily out to the baptistry.

I had noticed the water was steaming but thought nothing about it. If you cannot trust a Baptist, whom can you trust? But as I walked to the center of the baptistry, I suddenly realized the water was not only warm, it was hot. And it was only three or four inches below the top of the waders.

I invited Anna to come in first. Barely five feet tall, she frowned as she realized how hot the water was. The water was up to her shoulders. Quickly I offered a prayer and leaned her head backward and under the water. Immediately I lost her; she had lifted her feet off the bottom and was sliding to my left, at least a foot under the water.

No one had told me to tell Anna to plant her feet firmly on the bottom and bend her knees as I put her head under the water!

Instantly I realized the only way to retrieve Anna was to bend my knees and get my hands under her back so I could raise her up before she drowned. When I came up, I had Anna back under control but I also had about 150 gallons of that hot water inside those chest waders.

Mike was much taller than Anna and much easier to immerse. In record time I baptized him, offered a quick benediction, and somehow managed to stagger to the dressing room with all that water still in my waders.

I soon learned that it is not easy to get out of chest waders when they are filled with water. Exhausted I sat in a chair looking at my wet underwear and thinking how dumb I had been not to bring an extra pair of shorts. I could not even find a plastic bag to use to take my wet stuff home.

Mike and Anna may one day forget their “hot water” baptism and the green horn Methodist preacher who immersed them. But I am pretty sure I never will. It was the last time I ever used chest waders. @

2009-10-07T22:08:00.002-05:00

Ambrose makes journey of Lewis and Clark come alive

Strange it is the discoveries we make as we grow older. In my 70th year by chance I picked up a book by Stephen Ambrose. The book was titled To America: Personal Reflections of an Historian, published ironically the year Ambrose died, 2002.

I was immediately attracted to the man and his writing. The more I read, the more embarrassed I felt for having been ignorant of his books for the past 35 years. The reason for my ignorance was no mystery. As a pastor my reading had focused almost entirely on theology. Now I am the poorer for my tunnel vision.

I never met Stephen Ambrose but I wish I had. He made history come alive for me like no other writer. For that I am in his debt.

Last week I finished Ambrose’s excellent account of the Lewis and Clark expedition, Undaunted Courage. Since I am not a fast reader, I was on the journey with Lewis and Clark for many weeks. My ritual was to read a few pages every night.

Earlier I had enjoyed reading Wild Blue: The B24s Over Germany, 1944-45. I had hoped Ambrose might have mentioned my Uncle Luke Johnson who served as a B-24 pilot, but his was not among the names included. Still the book is a fascinating account of those unsung American heroes.

Ambrose is best known for his histories of World War II, especially

Band of Brothers: E Company, 506th Regiment, 101st Airborne, from Normandy to Hitler’s Eagle’s Nest, and D-Day, June 6, 1944: The Climactic Battle of World War II. He wrote several volumes on Eisenhower and Nixon that were well received. I plan to read them after I finish my next selection: Nothing Like It in the World: The Men Who Built the Transcontinental Railroad, 1863-1869.
Another title that interests me is Crazy Horse and Custer: The Parallel Lives of Two American Warriors. That has to be a good one.

Every American owes it to himself to read about the courageous journey of Meriwether Lewis and William Clark. It is truly a remarkable story that tells of the expansion of the United States from “sea to shining sea.”

The author gives us a fresh appreciation for Thomas Jefferson, the man responsible for the Louisiana Purchase. Ambrose says this was “surely the best thing Jefferson ever did as president.”

If I were a younger man I would try to follow the trail of Lewis and Clark, sit by some campfires in Montana and Oregon, and read again the account of their adventures.

Lewis and Clark enjoyed a marvelous friendship and an undying respect for each other. They complimented each other and worked as one in every major decision. Clark, however, never managed to share Lewis’ love of barbecued dog. Lewis admitted liking dog more than venison.

Through the eyes of the two men we see the west as it was only 200 years ago when it was the home of thousands of Indians, buffaloes, beavers, deer, and elk. Startling for me was learning how many different tribes of Indians possessed the land until they were pushed aside by the frontiersmen.

Lewis was the greatest of all American explorers, a splendid company commander, and a truly gifted leader of men. He was gifted at identifying and describing plants, trees, and animals. Both he and Clark were good at mapping the rivers and streams.

Unfortunately, Lewis was done at 33. He failed as a politician, unable to handle the honor Jefferson gave him of serving as governor of the Territory of Louisiana. Heavy drinking may have influenced his decision to end his life by his own hand.

Only once in the story is God mentioned. If Lewis and Clark loved God, they forgot to speak of it. The only reference to God in 484 pages comes at the end when Lewis commits suicide. A woman hears him cry out, “O Lord!” after shooting himself in the head.

Undaunted Courage is a book every American should read. We have a great heritage and we owe a lot to Lewis, Clark, and Jefferson. @

2009-10-03T23:24:00.001-05:00

Mysterious strangers shows up in some of our old color slides

Somebody has been messing with our old color slides. Mysteriously, two strangers appear in some of them. One is a lovely brunette with a slim waistline and a winsome smile. The other is a young man with Elvis-like sideburns, long and dark.
I puzzled over the identity of these two people during a slide-show on a bedroom wall the other night. We have ignored these slides for 40 years. The pace of our lives allowed no time for viewing old slides. That changed recently when the CEO of our family decided to buy a slide projector and go through several boxes of slides.
For several days I walked by quietly “on the other side,” like the Priest and the Levite passing by the wounded man, as my wife watched one picture after another. I was thankful that she ignored me. The slide project was her pet project and I was glad. I should have guessed that judgment day was coming.
“Would you like to sit down and look at these slides with me?” she asked sweetly. By “sweetly” I mean that she invited me, graciously, to watch the slides. However, after 52 years of marriage, I know how to tell when there is a hidden meaning in her invitations. I knew she really meant, “If you have half a gnat’s brain, you will sit down right now and watch these slides.”
So I took a seat.
She had arranged many of the slides based on trips we had taken. First, she said, “These are pictures from your trip to Alaska.” Right off, she had me hooked. I saw pictures of majestic snow-capped mountains, Eskimos in Nome where I preached for 10 days, and the dog sled I rode on a moonlit night. There were a few shots of unforgettable scenery I had taken when a local pilot flew me over a nearby mountain range called the Saw Tooth Mountains.
Al and Shirley Krinke were my hosts in Nome. Al was a school administrator there. I had met the Krinkes when they lived in Minnesota. After teaching and serving as a principal for years, Al and Shirley had answered the call of the wild and moved to Alaska. They loved it and stayed on even after Al retired. Our hearts still ache from sharing Al’s loss of his dear Shirley who slipped away to the Father’s House last year.
Next we looked at the pictures taken when we traveled in India and Nepal during the sixties. Despite their age, the slides remain remarkably good, depicting memorable scenes of Hindu temples, untouchable children begging for coins, and people bathing in the Ganges River.
We saw dead bodies on the sidewalks in Calcutta. Everywhere there were poor people whose only possessions could be carried in a sack. Everywhere there was poverty unlike anything we had ever seen in the United States. Yet in every place we met beautiful people whose faith had made them strong and caring. Our journey there was so long ago that we sat wondering, “Were we really there?”
Then the big surprise. The boss showed me some slides of small boys. Handsome devils they were. There was one of our son Tim (now 48) taking his first step at the age of nine months. What startled me was the stranger who was holding his hands, helping him to walk. She was a slender brunette with a sweet smile. Suddenly she was no longer a stranger but the beautiful young woman I had fallen in love with so many years ago. I said nothing but silently asked myself, “How was I so lucky?”
Finally there was an even bigger surprise. Yep, there was another stranger – a young man with black hair and those long Elvis-like sideburns. I laughed out loud as I realized, “That is me!” Was I ever that slim, that young, and that bright-eyed? Wow! How the old boy has changed!
If you have some old, fading, color slides around the house, let me offer some sage advice. Get them out at your own risk. The shock may be quite a test for your aging heart. It surely was for mine. @

2009-10-03T23:23:00.001-05:00

Forgive an old man for cherishing memories of boyhood days on the farm

Younger folks can skip this column today. I don’t want to bore the young with talk of my childhood. But maybe the older generation will understand why it is important to look back now and then. Yes, I know, we must not live in the past. We need to look to the future. But there are some things about the good old days that we must not forget.

Family reunions were always fun. My mother was the oldest child of the Seth Johnson clan and I was the oldest grandchild. By the time I was eight or nine, there was quite a crowd at the annual gathering. The occasion was usually the Saturday nearest the fourth of July.

The old home place was a beautiful country home just off the Atlanta Highway west of Montgomery. To the great sorrow of many in the family, the stately home was torn down years ago to make way for what is now the Carol Villa subdivision.

Few families can afford to maintain a home big enough to raise 13 children. The house served its purpose and was gone in less than a hundred years. Life goes on. Change takes its toll.

His friends may have called him Seth, but the only name I ever heard my grandfather called was “Papa.” He and my grandmother, for whom my sister Neva was named, raised 13 children on their farm, along with cotton, corn, and cattle. My mother, who was born in 1902, had seven brothers and five sisters.

The pump house was one of my favorite spots. It was in the back yard, not far from the steps leading up to the kitchen. I loved to go inside the pump house and listen to the old water pump wheezing, coughing, and sputtering as it struggled to pull cold water out of a deep well. I believe the old pump was powered by a gasoline engine. .

My cousins and I shared many adventures during those daylong reunions. One of our favorite sports was to find a yellow jacket nest, disturb those stinging devils, and run for our lives. The slowest ones sometimes got stung. I remember being stung a time or two.

Our uncles would lecture us about messing with wasps and yellow jackets, then treat our stings with wet tobacco from a cigarette. We were proud of those stings. They were our badges of courage. I guess we thought our bravery impressed the girls.

No reunion passed was complete a good time playing in the hay barn. It gave us boys a good place to hide and smoke rabbit tobacco. That was exciting for a few years, but we gave that adventure up after burning down one of the barns.

None of us ever owned up to being the guilty party. I guess the truth is we were all guilty. Our parents must have thought so because we all got a whipping, one of the worst ones my rear end ever suffered. My dad said I was more responsible than anyone because I was the oldest. Makes sense I guess.

One aspect of growing up in a big family was the teasing we endured from our uncles. To survive we had to learn how to deal with friendly ridicule and sarcasm. They taught us many lessons, often through the art of embarrassment. If we were too loud, or impolite, or unwilling to wait our turn, we were sure to get a stern reprimand. No sin was left unnoticed.

In my late teens I brought my girl friend to the reunions. Having been raised in a small, quiet family with no boys, Dean was shocked by my boisterous family. She blushed with embarrassment when one of my uncles said, “Walter Junior, is that your girl friend? She’s cute. Where did a country boy like you find her? Has she let you kiss her yet, Walter Junior?” Both of us wanted to die.

My grandmother saved the day. She liked Dean and made her feel welcome in her home. The two of them developed a special relationship that lasted until grandmother died of cancer in the early fifties. Dean admired the inner strength and strong faith of this courageous woman who faced her impending death without whimpering. As much as anyone we have ever known she showed us how to face the harshness of life without losing faith in the love of God.

At each reunion every family brought loads of food. The only tables I have ever seen to compare with those meals were dinners on the grounds at country churches. Sumptuous meals they were.

Desserts were as plentiful as meats and vegetables. There were chocolate cakes and apple pies and banana pudding and always a juicy German chocolate cake. But the main dessert was freshly frozen, homemade ice cream.

When my cousins and I were old enough, it was our job to turn the cranks on the ice cream freezers. It was hard work but our uncles saw to it that we turned those cranks as long as we could. Then one of them would take over and give the crank a few more turns to show us how weak we were.

Those were the good old days. I would not want to go back to the way things were then, but looking back is good for the soul. Nostalgia has its value. We just need to be careful not to reminisce too much and neglect the greater value of looking ahead. @

2009-09-28T19:33:00.001-05:00

Valuable lessons learned from Robert E. Lee

My son Tim, an experienced forester, is an admirer of Robert E. Lee. When he learned how much I liked the new book on character by Alabama Chief Justice Drayton Nabers Jr., he suggested we swap books.

He wanted me to read one of his favorite books – Robert E. Lee On Leadership by H. W. Crocker III. I found it a delightful book, full of Lee’s “secrets” for successful leaders and fascinating stories of his courageous leadership during the cruel war between the South and the North.

It has been fun to note the passages highlighted by Tim and to celebrate his desire to be a good leader and a man of exemplary character like his mentor Lee. Tim will never lead an army but he has become a man whose strength of character is worthy of imitation.

General Lee was known as “the Grey Fox.” The blue-coated “hounds” of General Ulysses S. Grant failed repeatedly in their attempts to trap Lee. Though usually outnumbered two to one, Lee inspired his troops to stymie the Union Army throughout the war. Even though his men were tattered and hungry, their stinging assaults inflicted 50,000 casualties on the Federals in a single month – May, 1864.

Still, in the end the North’s superiority led at last to Lee’s surrender at Appomattox Court House. Crocker describes in his book the incredible cost of the war to General Lee:

“A successful soldier, he was not used to defeat. Now he had lost his home, his career, and virtually all his worldly goods – including his carefully harbored savings and investments. Worse, he had suffered the premature death of a daughter, a daughter-in-law, two grandchildren, and countless colleagues and friends.

“A patriot who had devoted his life to the service of his country, who venerated George Washington, who was the son of a Revolutionary War hero (‘Light Horse Harry’ Lee), and who had married Martha Washington’s great-granddaughter, was now deprived of his citizenship and liable to be tried for treason. His home state of Virginia was under occupation, its citizens deprived of their rights, its fields, towns, and cities devastated by the Union’s policy of total war.

“And yet . . . and yet, Lee was not defeated. Soon after the war’s end, he was increasingly regarded not merely as a military genius but as someone to be venerated by the South and by the North, to be venerated, indeed, throughout the Western world as a great man.”

I hope this lengthy quote will whet your appetite enough that you will want to read this good book. Crocker generated my profound admiration for the man Winston Churchill called “one of the noblest Americans who ever lived, and one of the greatest captains known to the annals of war.”

The author provides many examples to support his claim that Lee’s greatness sprang not from what he did but from what he was, and the way he lived. Lee was not merely a military genius; he was a gentleman, so much so that even his enemies admired him.

Douglas Southall Freeman, who wrote a four-volume biography of General Lee, wrote this concluding remark, “I have been fully repaid by being privileged to live, as it were, for more than a decade in the company of a great gentleman.”

One of Crocker’s conclusions is worth noting: “In our own materialistic age, we can especially benefit from Lee’s example of leadership, which reminds us that ultimately what matters is not how much money we have made, how many businesses we have led or acquired, how many jobs we have created, or how many ‘toys’ we have accumulated, but who we are.”

Lee, Crocker observes, “is an ever-present reminder that we can be much more.”

There are indeed many valuable lessons that Robert E. Lee can teach us about how to live a noble life! I commend Crocker’s book to anyone wishing to live a truly successful life. @

2009-09-28T09:20:00.001-05:00

When your feelings are hurt you can process the pain and move on

If someone hurts your feelings now and then, relax. No need to panic. It is simply a reminder that you are a human being. You are not alone. It happens to everybody. Chances are it will happen again. That’s life.

The only way to avoid such pain is to live in a cocoon, shut off from people. But that is impossible. None of us can live alone on an island. And even if we could the pain of loneliness would be worse than that of having our feelings hurt. To relate to people is to run the risk of being offended.

What can we do to heal the wounds caused by the behavior or comments of other people? Let me offer some suggestions out of my own experience.

First, give the other person the benefit of the doubt. There is always a chance that the offender was not attacking you but someone else. The offensive comment may not have been aimed at you. If you can believe that the person’s barb was not meant for you, it will help you to cope with the sting.

Second, if you are certain that the hurtful words were directed at you, then try to excuse the offender for some sensible reason. Perhaps the person had hemorrhoids or was stressed out by marital problems. Maybe the person’s friends at work have been giving him a bad time and he was just passing on the pain.

Third, remain calm. Do not overreact. Try to understand what motivated the attack upon you. Had you made remarks that triggered the offender’s anger? Before you put all the blame on the other person, make an honest effort to determine if you helped to create the problem.

Fourth, try not to nurse your hurt feelings and make a mountain out of a molehill. So your feelings were hurt; get over it. Grab yourself by the nap of the neck and put the problem behind you. Bounce back. Refuse to let the acid tongue of another person ruin your day.

Fifth, examine your shirt sleeves. You may be wearing your feelings on your sleeves. If you decide that is true, then ask the good Lord to give you a tougher skin, like the hide of an elephant. Decide that you will not be so easily offended next time.

Sixth, forgive the person who hurt you. Do it in your heart first. Then, as soon as you have cooled down, share how you feel with the person who hurt your feelings. Say something like, "What you said really hurt me, but I value our friendship. If I have done or said something that was offensive to you, I want to ask you to forgive me."

Seventh, resist the temptation to begin sending cryptic messages to the offender. Life is too short to waste time sending hidden messages in the hope that people can read your mind. If you have something to say, say it, and if possible, say it graciously. Leave the barbs for the fence. Speak truthfully but speak in love. Otherwise you may make an enemy.

Eighth, if offering forgiveness is difficult for you, then be sure you never sin. You may be sitting in the holier-than-thou seat. Be careful not to assume that you are the innocent one who has been injured by the hateful offender. There is a good chance you are not innocent. You offend people too. You are capable of speaking carelessly or sharply when you are suffering from heartburn or some other agitation. Because you also can be offensive, you can forgive those who offend you.

Ninth, seal your lips about the incident. It only gets worse when you start telling your friends about the terrible thing someone has done to hurt your precious feelings. Much talk will hinder repair and recovery.

If you keep the matter to yourself, you will not drag your friends into a problem which none of them need, and which none of them can solve for you. Give your friends a break; don’t burden them what may be a minor problem for you.

Tenth, move on with your life. Focus on beautiful things. Your life is too short to spend a lot of time wrestling with issues that have no eternal value.

Choose to enjoy yourself. Enjoy your friends. Enjoy life. Live. Laugh. Love. Forgive. Reconcile. Leave your hurt feelings choking in a cloud of dust! And one final thing: remember to ask forgiveness from the people whose feelings you have hurt! @

2009-09-19T08:17:00.000-05:00

A new phrase that afflicts our daily conversations

I am amazed at how commonplace the phrase, “No problem,” has suddenly become in daily conversations. If you haven’t heard it more than ten times this week, then you must have been vacationing on the moon.
Everywhere I turn someone responds to me by saying, “No problem.” For the life of me, I cannot explain the widespread usage of these two words.
Did I miss an act of Congress requiring the public to start using this phrase? Did Lucy popularize it by saying it to Charlie Brown? Did the Pope mandate its use? Did Billy Graham get it started in his crusades?
Was it in a song by Hank Williams or Elvis Presley? Whatever its source, I missed it.
I wonder if our Hispanic friends gave us this phrase. In Costa Rica my friends there responded to almost every need by saying, “Small problem.” But what they meant was, “We have a solution to the problem.” So it seems unlikely that we have changed “Small problem” to “No problem.”
No matter where the phrase came from, it is apparently here to stay, like it or not. Actually I like it sometimes.
If I ask a clerk in a store to direct me to the electronics department, it seems appropriate for the clerk to say, “No problem,” and then give me directions.
If I return an item I purchased to exchange it for something else, it seems alright to have the clerk say, “No problem,” and assist me with the matter.
In another setting I may interrupt a colleague at work and say, “Do you have a minute?” More often than not he or she will reply by saying, “No problem,” and I find no fault with that.
In the context of these examples, the phrase seems to be a shortened version of “I have no problem assisting you with your concern or your need.”
What bothers me is that its usage has gone wild. People are using this phrase in settings where it simply makes no sense.
Here is an example. In a restaurant the waitress asks what I would like to drink. I reply, “Sweet tea please.” And she says, “No problem,” and walks away.
Soon the waitress returns with the tea. As she puts it down on the table, I say, “Thank you.” Again she says, “No problem.”
When I tell the waitress what I want to eat, she says it again, “No problem.”
A few minutes later she brings my food and I say, “Thank you.” And believe it or not, once again she says, “No problem.”
By this time I am so tired of hearing the phrase that I am on the verge of trying to create a problem!
I have tried to analyze what people mean by this phrase, and what words were used before the phrase was coined.
Some people must mean, “I am happy to be of assistance to you.” Or perhaps, “Even though I have other things to do, I am willing to stop and gladly help you.”
Such usage seem perfectly reasonable to me.
But I have a problem with the phrase being used as a substitute for “You are welcome,” the traditional response to “Thank you.” In that context, “No problem” makes no sense.
The good news about this new phrase that has wormed its way into a thousand daily conversations is that no one seems to use it to be offensive. Nor does its use stir any feelings except possibly mild appreciation for the service rendered.
In time I suppose I can get used to it. After all I have learned not to be bothered by other meaningless phrases such as “How you doing?” or “Stop by sometime.”
We do sometimes afflict our conversations with a lot of hollow and insincere phrases in an effort to be “nice” to others, when what we really mean is, “I am so busy that I really don’t have time to squeeze you into my schedule.”
I guess the best thing for me to do is to stop fretting about how many times a day I hear the phrase and simply say to myself, “No problem.”
I hope you don’t have a problem with that solution. If you do, then all I can say is, “No problem.” @

2009-09-06T22:07:00.000-05:00

Our Mission Team was exhausted upon our arrival in Lusaka, Zambia, in July, 2006. But we soon forgot about being tired as we began our ten days of working with Alfred and Muumbe Kalemba. Those days of service and discovery were among the most rewarding of our lives. We still thank God for allowing us to make the journey and team up with our Zambian family in the service of Christ. Now we often given thanks for the privilege of being partners in the gospel with the Kalembo family as they minister to orphans there and strive to help their people find grace, health and strength for a better life.

2009-09-06T21:37:00.000-05:00

The freedom we enjoy as Americans must not be taken for granted

Wars stain the pages of all recorded history. The human race has never found a way to live in peace. Twice America has fought in “the war to end all wars,” but wars continue to the present hour.
The issue in most wars has been land. Japan is a good example. The Japanese felt they needed to expand their territory. Germany is another example; Hitler wanted to rule the world, not just his homeland.
When one nation attempts to conquer another, people rise up in anger to protect their freedom. Some wars last for years, resulting in unbelievable bloodshed. Most people feel their freedom is precious and worth dying for if necessary.
People with power and money have always wanted servants or slaves. We all know the sad story of slavery in America. That story illustrates the truth that slavery has never been popular among the slaves. The Jews hated their enslavement to the Egyptians and later to the Babylonians. Slavery in America was insufferable to the blacks who were shipped over like cattle from Africa.
Sooner or later oppressed people will rebel against their oppressors. The simple truth is that people have an innate desire to be free. People of my persuasion believe that inherent desire for freedom springs from the fact that all people are created in the image of God. Our Maker has planted within the human heart the longing for self-determination, or to put it more simply, liberty.
When Jesus announced to a stunned synagogue crowd his mission in life, he said he had come to proclaim freedom for captives. He spoke to Jews who longed to be free of the harsh heel of the Roman Empire.
Across the centuries men and women have fought and died for freedom. In the 14th Century William Wallace of Scotland fought against injustice and died trying to free his people from the English tyrants. Who can ever forget the breathtaking moment when Wallace (Mel Gibson in Braveheart) raised his sword and screamed the word “Freedom!”? Wallace’s fellow patriots went on after Wallace’s death to win Scottish freedom, but at the cost of thousands of lives.
In churches across the land the men and women who fought and died for our country are often remembered in prayer. Prayers are offered for our troops who are in harm’s way. These brave men and women deserve our support and prayers regardless of our position on the present wars.
Like many Americans I have relatives and friends serving in the military forces in Iraq and Afghanistan. I want our troops to come home as soon as possible. I have questions about the war now raging in Afghanistan. . However, I do believe we are engaged in a global war against terrorists who want to destroy, and eventually control, our land.
The conflict in which we are engaged is much bigger than most people imagine. As the most powerful nation in the world, America cannot turn a deaf ear to the millions of oppressed people in the world who long to experience the freedoms we enjoy in the United States. We stand to lose our own freedom if we refuse to help other nations defend their own freedom. And we shall surely face the wrath of God if we turn our back on Israel, the nation that remains precious to our Sovereign God.
In our church we sing songs about freedom, songs like “God Bless America,” “America the Beautiful,” and “Proud to be an American.” We will sing with gratitude to God about our “sweet land of liberty,” the land precious to us because it is the “land where our fathers died.”
We sometimes sing a prayer to God, pleading for his help with this sincere request: “long may our land be bright with freedom’s holy light; protect us by thy might, great God, our King.” Surely no nation can long enjoy freedom without the help of almighty God who makes freedom possible. @

2009-09-06T21:25:00.000-05:00

Must I explain all my secrets until no mystery remains?

Basically I prefer openness to secrecy. I like honesty. It wears well on the people who will tell you, without rancor, what they really think. I like them more than the folks who simply smile and leave you wondering what they think.
The impersonal nature of our culture troubles me. The “super” stores sell us stuff for less money but they have robbed us of something valuable. In the Mom and Pop stores we could ask Pop how a certain gadget might work. We knew Pop and Pop knew us. But no more. The “super” store clerks have no desire to know who you are; they just want your money. If what you bought does not work, do not come back crying about it to us; contact the manufacturer in Hong Kong.
I gave up on the big chain drug stores for that reason. I pay a little more for my medicine at a small independent store but I am willing to do that because Barney knows my name. I want the person who sells me drugs that can kill me to know who I am. I want to be more than a customer. I want to be on a first-name basis with my druggist.
But I must admit I do like a little anonymity. There are times when I rather enjoy being just another man in the crowd. Obscurity is not all bad. Obviously no one wishes to be “known” all the time. Famous people must cherish moments of solitude when they are free from public scrutiny.
This raises the question in my own mind: just how personal am I willing to become? An old story comes to mind. One Sunday only one man showed up for church. The pastor preached his full sermon, all 30 minutes of it. Afterward he asked the one man in the audience what he thought about his message. The man replied, “Well, it was not bad, preacher, but it did seem a bit personal.”
Any preacher worth his salt wants his hearers to feel he is talking directly to them. A pastor knows he was on target when a parishioner says to him after church, “Preacher, you have been reading my mail.” One man said to me recently, “How about preaching about somebody else’s sins one Sunday? You have been stepping on my toes for three weeks now!”
Actually secrecy is less and less possible in our society. There is a website now that has collected a lot of information about many of us. I entered my name and was surprised to see how accurately the site listed the addresses of places I lived years ago. I understand you can request that they remove information about you from the site. I chose to ignore doing that out of indifference. Who cares?
After all, Big Brother in Washington knows almost everything there is to know about most of us. Few people are able to fly under the government’s radar. Then there are at least three credit bureaus that are ready and willing to reveal your credit history to banks and businesses. And you never know, unless you ask, that they have done it.
All of us have secrets and there is a certain freedom gained from exposing our secrets to the light of day. I found as a pastor that it helps people identify with you if you will admit your own sins. Some preachers are reluctant to admit their humanity. They want people to think that clergy are above sin.
On my last Sunday in a church I was leaving, a woman said to me, “I am going to miss you. You are the only preacher I have ever known who was a sinner.” That may have been so, but I think she meant that I was the only preacher she had ever heard admit being a sinner.
To become a truly authentic person, must I share all my secrets? To be honest, I would rather not. I am not sure I am ready for total exposure. I want to cling to a little mystery a while longer.
But I reckon it is a losing battle. Finally mystery will yield to openness and truth. I might as well accept it. That is the only way I can explain what Jesus meant when he said, “What you have said in the dark will be heard in the daylight.” That means, in the end daylight wins. + + +

2009-08-22T17:37:00.000-05:00

Do your best to not give up until you cross the finish line

One of the greatest privileges of a pastor is to encourage people not to give up. Pastors do their best work not by chastising people for their sins but by inspiring them to overcome their failures.
When ministry is based on encouragement, rather than judgment, there is always plenty to do. All around us are people who are struggling with defeat. A business or a marriage has failed. Debts seem insurmountable. Alcohol and drug use is out of control. Dreams have been shattered. The ox is in the ditch and there seems no way to get him out.
When the bottom falls out people do not need a lecture; they need compassion. Not pity. Compassion is that rare gift that inspires people to believe in themselves because someone else believes in them. Compassion is staying with someone that everyone else has given up on. Compassion is snatching a friend from the jaws of despair and convincing him that he has what it takes to get out of the mess he has made.
A man praised his pastor for helping him recover from alcoholism. He said, “My drinking had put me in a deep hole. Nobody wanted anything to do with me. But my preacher got down in that hole with me and helped me to crawl out. His love helped me believe in the love of God.”
Compassionate caring can help people set goals for themselves and refuse to quit until they succeed. Such caring can call forth in others the willingness to persevere. Few human qualities are more important than perseverance. That is why most of our heroes are people who refused to allow adversity to deter them from their goals.
Winston Churchill, for example, is one of the great heroes of the 20th Century. He will always be remembered for his tenacious spirit, and that which he inspired in the people of England during World War II. When it appeared that Hitler was about to bring England to its knees, Prime Minister Churchill kept hope alive with his defiant words, "We will be victorious!"
Churchill traveled all over England motivating the people. He inspired workers in the factories and on the farms to work tirelessly for their country. He visited the troops and instilled in them the conviction that England would prevail.
Few stories are more captivating than that of Churchill's visit with the coal miners. Hearing that the miners were discouraged about their contribution to the war effort, Sir Winston surprised them by showing up in the dangerous underground tunnels where they worked.
They were astonished that Churchill would risk coming into the mines and stared in trembling disbelief as his words rang in their ears:
"We will be victorious! We will preserve our freedom. And years from now when our freedom is secure and peace reigns, your children and your children's children will come and they will say to you, 'What did you do to win our freedom in that great war?' And one will say, 'I marched with the Eighth Army!' Someone else will proudly say, 'I manned a submarine.' And another will say, 'I guided the ships that moved the troops and the supplies.' And still another will say, 'I doctored the wounds!'" Then, with persuasive power Churchill shouted, "They will come to you, and you will say with equal right and equal pride, 'I cut the coal! I cut the coal that fueled the ships that moved the supplies! That's what I did. I cut the coal!"
From that hour no coal miners ever worked with greater courage than the men who heard Churchill that day. They refused to quit. They endured, and helped England preserve its precious freedom. Though the German bombs continued to fall upon English cities, the coal miners were never discouraged again.
Many admire Churchill for his wit. And he desires our admiration. On one occasion Lady Astor said to Winston, “If I were married to you, I would put poison in your tea.” He replied, “If I were married to you, I’d drink it.” When someone criticized him for ending a sentence with a preposition, he responded, “This is the kind of tedious nonsense up with which I will not put.”
Though Churchill’s gifts and achievements are extraordinary, I am thankful most of all for his personal example of perseverance. Voted out of office he refused to quit and was later re-elected Prime Minister. He earned the right to encourage others never to give up.
One of his most memorable speeches is a brief one given to the boys at old Harrow School, which he had attended as a boy. Imagine how these words must have inspired the young lads at the school:
"This is the lesson: never give in, never give in, never, never, never, never—in nothing, great or small, large or petty—never give in except to convictions of honor and good sense. Never yield to force; never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy."
So if today you find yourself struggling to carry on, allow me to encourage you to get up out of the ashes of your hardship and stay the course. Stay with it. Tie a knot in the end of your rope and hold on. Refuse to quit. Never give up. The finish line may be just ahead. Do the best you can until you cross it. + + +

2009-08-22T17:34:00.000-05:00

When times are hard you can sometimes
smell the fragrance of the broken

Recently I read again about the accidental death of Maria Sue, the five-year-old daughter of Steven Curtis and Mary Beth Chapman. That tragedy reminded me of a profound idea I had gleaned from an earlier story about this popular Christian singer.
The idea was capsulated in the phrase, “The fragrance of the broken.” The words came to Chapman during a walk in the woods. He had gone into the woods to pray, desperate for release from a drought in his soul. Pleading with God for a breakthrough, he gathered some rocks, stacked them into a makeshift altar, and began to pray.
While praying he began to smell cedar, so strongly that it distracted him from praying. Opening his eyes he soon spotted a little cedar tree that he had snapped in half by stepping on it. The broken tree was the source of the smell that Chapman felt was a sign from God. Quickly he wrote down the words, "The fragrance of the broken."
God does provide a "fragrance" that we may learn to cherish as we wrestle with our brokenness and that of our loved ones. Like the little cedar tree, it may not be easily recognizable. We have to look for it as Chapman did. Finding it, we begin to enjoy what may be called the "aroma of grace."
Each of us must learn to handle brokenness of one kind or another. How we deal with it determines whether we live well or merely endure life until it ends. Misfortune can make us better or bitter. The good thing is that we have a choice.
My friend "Miss Jimmy" was a poet. In retirement she became legally blind. But she declined to complain. Instead she chose to think of her blindness as a blessing. “There is so much I would have missed had my sight not failed,” she said.
“I had not bothered to read the Bible very much," she told me, "but when I became blind, I began to listen to the Bible on cassette tapes. Only then did I understand why it really is the greatest book every written." My wife and I enjoyed tea with Miss Jimmy many times. While we admired her poetry we admired her spirit even more. She was not a whiner.
Fanny Crosby and George Matheson were blind hymn writers but refused to complain about their blindness. Both composed beautiful songs which millions still enjoy singing. They refused to let their brokenness "blind" them to their opportunity to live useful lives.
Alabama’s famous Helen Keller became blind and deaf as a young child. Her attitude was profoundly inspiring. She regarded her handicaps as “mere impertinences of fate.” She said, “I resolved that they should not crush or dwarf my soul, but rather be made to blossom, like Aaron's rod, with flowers.” Can you say “Wow”?
A good friend made a trip out west one summer. He and his wife drove their motor home through Montana, Wyoming, Arizona, and California to see the sights. He explained why, "I had been diagnosed with an eye disease which could result in blindness in a few years. I wanted to see all that I could see while my vision was still good."
He could have stayed home fretting about the question, "Why is this happeningto me?" Without complaining he began to adjust to the possibility of brokenness. Instead of whining he used his time to design a plan to cope with blindness if it happened.
Brokenness comes soon or late to us all. Whining about it, or asking "Why me?" gets us nowhere. Pain is inevitable but misery is a choice. As we face the pain with honesty and hope, something wonderful can occur. Character can happen. We can become finer people because we have faced our troubles with courage. Courage is contagious. Deal with your brokenness bravely, with a positive spirit, and your example is bound to encourage someone else.
Thankfully you have a choice. You can refuse to whine. You can find a way to smell the "aroma of grace" in your pain. Then the fragrance of your brokenness becomes a sweet perfume to all who savor the essence of your life. + + +

2009-08-22T17:33:00.000-05:00

A cluttered desk is a beautiful thing

I hate an organized desk. On rare occasions I had one. It was my first day in a new office. But it never lasted. After two days my papers, folders, and books were everywhere. And I dared anybody to straighten up my desk.
People with an organized desk are disgustingly proud of the accomplishment. They are apt to say piously, “A messy desk indicates a cluttered mind. A neat desk suggests an organized person.” That is nonsense and I can prove it.
My philosophy is that a messy desk is a sign of a hard-working person who is good at multi-tasking. Why settle for mono-tasking when you can do several things at once? Doing one task at a time requires much less creativity.
I know the argument against multi-tasking. If you focus on one project at a time, you can get your work done more quickly. You will be much more efficient if you will concentrate only on one task – the one in front of you.
But that approach can make work rather dull. It removes the challenge of trying to do three things at once. We all know that the truly brilliant person is the one who while talking to you on the desk phone can put you on hold, talk to someone else on their cell phone, and at the same time carry on a conversation with a visitor in his office.
Now that impresses people, just as a cluttered desk convinces people that you are capable of working on five projects at a time. The clutter convinces people not that you are disorganized but that you have amazing creativity.
It takes a lot of skill to find something on my desk. I have piles everywhere but I know what pile to look in when I need to find something. Only a person with my kind of competence could find a lost document as quickly as I can. With me, hope springs eternal; nothing is ever lost. It is here somewhere so I keep rambling until it shows up. Sooner or later it will turn up. The lost will be found.
The best way for me to lose something is to file it. If I file it, I forget where it is filed. The other day I searched for the manual for my riding lawn mower. Since it is a John Deere, I looked under “J.” It was not there. I looked under “M” but no luck. Well, maybe I filed it under “G” for grass. Wrong again. Finally I looked under “L,” and there it was.
I gave up on filing cabinets. I prefer now to stack folders on the floor around my office. You can lose stuff in a filing cabinet. I came across some stuff the other day I had not seen in 44 years.
I am glad I am not looking for a pay raise. At my age pay raises are a joke. When my pay changes it goes down not up. A recent study reveals that most employers factor in an employee’s level of organization when considering annual reviews and pay increases.
One company even dispatches workers to look in the car window of an applicant’s car to see if it is clean while the interview is being held. If there is clutter on the car floor, this indicates the applicant does not have organizational skills.
That company would never hire me. My car is cluttered with papers I may need while I am away from the office. Ride somewhere with me and you will have to wait five minutes while I move my stuff to the trunk or the back seat.
Any fool knows that if you want to find a highly skilled, competent, hard-working person, you look for a messy car and a messy desk. The reason is obvious. The person with a neat desk does not really want to work. And inside the drawers of that neat desk are piles of paper that need attention. The person who thrives in clutter is the one who can get the job done.
Somewhere on my desk is a new book written by Dave Crenshaw. It is titled The Myth of Multitasking: How “Doing it all” Gets Nothing Done. I hid it under a pile of papers. I don’t plan to read it. He is entitled to his opinion. I am content with mine. A cluttered desk is a beautiful thing and brilliant people can do three things at the same time. That’s my story and I am sticking to it. + + +

2009-08-22T17:31:00.000-05:00

Best way to handle a disappointment: just get over it

No one gets through life without having to endure bitter disappointments. We all stumble. We all fall. We all get our feelings hurt. We all have friends who let us down. And we all sometimes shoot ourselves in the foot.
In such miserable moments we experience anger, frustration with others, and even disappointment in ourselves. We want to kick ourselves. We should have done better. We may even wish we could die. Glum envelopes us like a cloud. Sometimes we have an overwhelming sense of embarrassment. We want to run and hide and never have to look another person in the face.
Since there is no way to undo the past, we have to find a way to handle the wretched feelings that come with our disappointments. We have to find a way to move on and regain some degree of normalcy.
The best solution is this: Get over it! Worry will not change anything; it actually makes matters worse. Bitterness will sour our spirit. Regret is useful only if it shows us ways we need to change.
To get over a bitter disappointment, whether in myself or someone else, it helps me to face reality. I must admit it if I have done wrong. I must ask forgiveness if I have offended someone. I must take responsibility for my own actions.
If I am embarrassed, it helps me to admit that I am a human being and thus capable of doing and saying stupid things. I can make amends. I can try again. I can improve my people skills and try to become a more sensitive, caring person. I can try to offer to others the kind of support and encouragement I wish they would offer me.
The death of a loved one brings on profound disappointment. We experience not only sorrow but remorse about what we failed to do before the person died. Such remorse can result in serious depression.
While grief is a normal and understandable occurrence, we must eventually get over it. Life does not stand still; it moves on. Sadness must give way to joy if we are to move on in a meaningful way with the flow of life.
In dark days we can learn to look for light where we can find it. The words of Thomas Carlyle are helpful: “The eternal stars shine out as soon as it is dark enough.” If we will gaze up into the dark sky long enough, most of the time we will soon see the stars shining. They are there, waiting to be seen, but it is hard to see them through our tears.
Realism demands that we admit that life is not all sunshine and sweetness. There will be sad and lonely days, but we have a choice; we can choose to overcome and get beyond our misery. The great American poet, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow understood this reality:
Be still, sad heart, and cease repining,
Behind the clouds the sun is shining;
Thy fate is the common fate of all;
Into each life some rain must fall, --
Some days must be dark and dreary.
Adversity is a great teacher. We learn more from our failure than our success. Success often leads to pride, and pride causes us to stumble. “Pride and weakness,” Lowell said, “are Siamese twins.”
When we fall, we need to ask what caused us to fall, and resolve to improve wherever improvement is possible. Only a fool continues to make the same mistake repeatedly. We can learn not to do certain things again. Unless we do, we will never be able to “get over it.”
Some people get ahead by stepping on others on the way to the top. It hurts when someone else gets the promotion you thought you deserved. When that happens, you have a choice. You can stew over it and complain bitterly. You can scream and cry that you were wronged. None of that will help. It succeeds only in making you miserable. The best response you can make? Just grab yourself by the nap of the neck and get over it.
To get over a disappointment is to rise above it. Washington Irving said it well: “Little minds are tamed and subdued by misfortune; but great minds rise above it.” He was right. We can refuse to be subdued by our defeats and become better people because of them.
Anger is a dead end street. Problems are never solved by tearing our hair out, though some people try it. Baldness will not soothe our sorrows. Though it is normal to become angry with those who hurt us, we must learn to calm down and get over the hurt.
When someone hurts us, we can never get over it until we are willing to forgive the person who has wronged us. Years are sometimes lost by holding on to hatred and in doing so we only hurt ourselves. Hatred is a chain that ties you to the person you hate. The only way ever to be free is to forgive. Forgiveness breaks the chain and sets you free.
If you are nursing a sorrow, hurt, disappointment, or failure, admit that you need to get over it. If you will get over it, you can move on with your life. Life will not be perfect, but it will be sweeter, and you will be able to share with your friends: “I’m over it!”
Remember too, the next time life falls apart for you, say to yourself, “Get over it!” Then, take a deep breath, two aspirins, and get over it! Until you do, you can never move on with your life. + + + +

2009-08-22T17:29:00.000-05:00

It is best not to fret about things that are out of our control

Stress can kill you. It almost killed me in my mid-forties. One morning I passed out from loss of blood. An ulcer had caused internal bleeding. But the frightening ride to the hospital in an ambulance was not as shocking as the doctor’s diagnosis.
After explaining that my problem was a tiny stomach ulcer, the doctor said compassionately, “Surgery will not be necessary. We can stop the bleeding with medication.” Relieved and thankful, I asked what causes ulcers.
I wished I had not asked. The doctor replied, “We are pretty sure that ulcers can be caused by stress. Ulcers may develop when we do not handle our stress very well. So I have asked one of our counselors to talk with you about this.”
That was the day I learned that anxiety can kill you. It was also the day I began asking God to help me learn to trust him more. Confession was necessary. Tearfully I confessed that all my life I had been trusting far too much in myself and not enough in the God I preached about. My confession led to new understanding and a renewal of my health.
After a week’s stay in the hospital, and two weeks out of my pulpit, I chose as the text for my next sermon these words of Jesus: “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat, or about your body, what you will wear.” I admitted that I needed to learn how to stop fretting about things over which I had no control. I realized later how much it helped me simply to tell the truth about the poor way I had been handling stress. Becoming transparent about the condition of your soul can facilitate healing.
Since then I have made progress though I still have a way to go. Trusting God in all things is not easy. Like the common cold, anxiety keeps hanging around, waiting for an opening into the mind. To avoid catching the flu, we are reminded constantly to wash our hands. We should be just as concerned to prevent anxiety from gaining control of our minds. Like the flu, worry is also a killer. We are warned not to worry for a very good reason. When we worry excessively life gets out of balance and we can become dangerously ill.
Jesus told a story about a rich man and his barns. The rich man’s problem was not worry but greed. He wanted more and more to store in bigger and bigger barns. But abruptly his life ended just as he realized he had been a fool.
Jesus used the man’s covetousness to teach the disciples not to worry about food and clothing. The meaning of life is not found in these material things. As the rich man was a fool to wish for bigger barns, so are we foolish to spend time worrying about food, drink, or clothing.
Instead we should learn from the birds, the bees, and the flowers to trust God rather than worry. God feeds the birds and without worrying they enjoy his gracious provision. Flowers do not “strive” for beauty but simply enjoy doing what they were made to do.
The Bible teaches that God knows what we need and delights in meeting our needs. He provides for us because he loves us and he wants us live to please him instead of living to acquire material things. As we learn to trust him as our source of all things needful, we are able to relax and enjoy the world as a gift made for our enjoyment.
It is refreshing to stop our wheels from turning and sit for a spell outdoors. There we can enjoy birds and flowers – and even the pesky squirrels. Whenever I do this, I remember that I am not the center of the world. I become thankful just to be alive. In such quiet moments I laugh with the realization that God does not need my help to manage the universe. He is in control. Such reflection clears my mind. And one wonderful result is that I fret less over situations I can do nothing about.
Healthy living is the result of many wise decisions. One decision that is certain to help us is to stop worrying about things we cannot control. Only then can we relax and enjoy draining the sweetness from the cup that is in our hands. + + +

2009-08-08T07:38:00.001-05:00

Into every life some rain will surely fall

Every Sunday somebody tells me "a good one." A good story, a good joke, or an encouraging quote. So I go to church expecting to hear at least one or two good ones.

Last Sunday was no exception. One man asked me if I knew how severe the drought in Alabama had been. So I asked him how bad has it been. He said, "This bad: the other day I saw two grown bull frogs in a ditch and neither one of them had ever learned to swim!"

Not bad. It was good for a laugh. Laughter is always helpful in church, for strange things happen in church. People get angry with each other sometimes over the least little thing. One woman asked another woman to stop wearing a certain perfume; it made her sneeze in church.

A woman came storming up to me one day to insist that I tell a certain mother to stop disturbing church by taking her little girl to the bathroom. I resorted to my "grin and bear it" attitude by saying, "I’ll ask the Lord to help me figure out what I can do about it."

That means, "I don’t plan to die in that ditch." And usually the Lord passes on such stuff also.

My wife did have a solution for this problem when our boys were small. She told our sons to go to the bathroom just before worship. Then she reminded them that they would not be permitted to leave the church service. I think she didn't want our boys to disturb the folks who were sleeping while I was preaching.

If during church one of our sons said, "Mom, I’ve got to go," she simply said, "No, you don’t; go ahead and wet the pew. After church I will wipe it up with this towel in my purse." None of our boys ever wet a pew.

Troubles do develop in churches because they are made up of people, and people have problems. Sometimes they disagree about things. Now and then people can take up sides and manage to split a church wide open. That is always sad when it happens.

I hear about a church in Tennessee that split up over the issue of which foot should be washed first in the foot-washing service. Now I have heard there is a church in the Volunteer State called "The Left Foot Baptist Church." I guess they are the folks who quit wanting to worship with the folks who wanted to wash the right foot first.

Honest, I am not making this up -- and the story did say that it was a Baptist Church. I suppose it could have been a Methodist Church, but my guess is that the Methodists heard about this dispute and decided against the practice of foot-washing in church. If so, they were wise. It is just not smart to fight about some things.

Trouble in church reminds me of that old saying, "Into every life some rain will fall." How true that is. Life is not always sunshine and roses. Sometimes we all have to deal with storms and thorns. Life is not easy and my guess is that God did not mean for it to be easy.

Troubles do come, and troubles do go. Like the storms, they don’t last forever. In the midst of them our faith is tested. And somehow we become stronger through the testing. We learn to decide what is truly important. We often learn that none of us is always right, and at times we find that we must admit that we have been wrong. It usually takes that for a breach in friendship to be resolved.

The Japanese talk about an attitude they call the "bamboo perspective." They see the need to learn to bend, but not break, under the pressures of life. Unity with other people is usually not possible unless we are all willing to bend a little in our attitudes. Divisiveness thrives when no one is willing to bend.

We might learn a lesson from a story I heard about a brand new fifty dollar bill. The preacher held it up in church and asked if anyone wanted it. Every hand went up. Then he crushed the new bill in his hand as if he were wadding up a piece of paper. Again he asked if anyone wanted it. Once more every hand was raised. Next he dropped the $50 bill and ground it into the floor with his shoe. Now the bill was dirty and wrinkled. Does anyone still want it, he asked. As every hand went up again, the people realized his point. The bill was not worth any less because of the dirt or its wrinkled condition. It was still worth the same as a brand new bill.

What is the point? If people throw dirt on us, or damage our reputation, our worth is still the same to God. If we stumble into mistakes, or make decisions of poor judgment, our value remains the same to God.

The lesson? Surely God wants us all to learn to think as he thinks, to love as he loves, and to forgive as he forgives. When we are willing to do that, even imperfectly, we may save God the grief of seeing his churches divided.

In the meantime, a little laughter over a few "good ones" will help us all.@

________________________________________

2009-08-08T07:34:00.000-05:00

Now is a good time to let our friends know we care

Friends are as important as breathing. Healthy living is impossible without good friends. So it behooves us to take the time to deepen friendships that make a difference in our lives.
Two brothers lived nearby us in a dilapidated old house. I heard they had no friends and did not want any. When a neighbor told me they were both very sick, I went to see them on a cold winter day.
One of the men answered my knock on the door. He did not seem happy to see me. I said, “I understand you and your brother have been sick. I brought you some vegetable soup and cornbread. My wife prepared it for you.”
Instead of a rebuff, he softened and replied, “Come on in; my brother is in the kitchen.” To my amazement, debris covered the hallway. The path through trash was hardly a foot wide. Empty cans, bottles, boxes, and paper seemed a foot deep all the way into the kitchen.
After placing the soup and cornbread on the dirty kitchen table I asked how they were feeling. “We are better,” one said, “just a bad cold or maybe the flu.” Beyond that they had very little to say. I sensed there were as uncomfortable as I was. So I excused myself, inviting them to call me if I could help in any other way.
I never heard from them again. Apparently, long before I met them, they had decided they did not need other people in their lives.
Most of us realize we need people, especially a few with whom we can become good friends. There is a great truth in the words of a popular song, “People who need people are the luckiest people in the world.” Most of us gladly affirm that thought. I know I do. I could have written that song.
I treasure a little plaque my wife gave me for an anniversary years ago. It did not cost much, but to me it is priceless. On it are two rabbits embracing. Beside them are the words, “We Need Each Other.” It meant so much for my wife to say with her simple gift, “I need you.”
Sometimes, when we are hurt by a friend or family member, we become angry. That anger can lead to depression. Then, nursing our hurt feelings, we may retreat into a shell of indifference, vowing that we do not need other people.
In so doing, we hurt ourselves more than others, allowing apathy to suppress our love. This goes against the grain of our nature, for we were made for love. When we refuse to love, we are resisting the very purpose for which we were created. To love is to live.
Loving others is impossible, of course, unless we are willing to forgive, and not once, but repeatedly. The fact that there are no perfect people makes forgiveness an absolute necessity in healthy living. Our family members, and our friends, will disappoint us, but we can forgive, and friendships can be restored.
During this journey called life I have had many wonderful friends. As I reflect on this, two strong feelings emerge. One, I feel such deep gratitude that most of my friends have not given up on me. Two, I feel much anguish of soul for having failed to express to my friends what they have meant to me.
One of my best friends was my roommate at Auburn. He was the best man at my wedding. We stayed in touch for a few years after college but eventually lost contact with each other. Then one day I got word that he had died following a pulmonary embolism. For some time I grieved over my failure to keep our friendship alive.
Perhaps in heaven we will have the opportunity to tell some of our friends what we neglected to tell them down here. In the meantime we shall be wise to find the time to let our friends know how much they mean to us. The opportunity to do so can vanish in the twinkling of an eye. + + +

2009-08-04T07:36:00.000-05:00

I Sat Alone

I watched the ageless sea,
With waves bursting on shore,
Their timeless constancy
Going on forevermore.

Once my children were here,
My laughing young boys.
Those days were so dear
Watching them play with toys.

For years I have come here,
Again and again I come,
Seeking release from fear,
And daily tedium.

Those happy days were to me
A very precious few,
But this day beside the sea
Is just as precious too.

Today I hear children,
The parade goes on by,
And I am left to dream,
And watch the sea and sky.

Dean Albritton

Copyright ©2000 Dean Albritton

2009-08-01T14:00:00.000-05:00

I Have Done My Share
Could an evening star say to the moon,"I'm tired of shining so bright,I'd rather sail in darkness and gloom.Let another shine for my light."

Could a man say to God above,"I've come to the end of the road. I have given all my love. Let someone else carry my load."

Could a river say to the shore, "I'm tired of running to the sea, I don't want to run anymore. Let another run for me."

Could a man say to God above, "I've come to the end of the road. I have given all my love. Let someone else carry my load."

Could a tree say to a bird, "I'm tired of being your nest, Go where you cannot be heard. I need a little more rest."

As long as stars shine and rivers run, And trees give birds a nest, Man's work is not done, Nor can he cease doing his best!

Dean Albritton
Copyright ©2000 Dean Albritton

2009-08-01T13:55:00.001-05:00

The kids say grandma can tell some mighty tall tales

My grandchildren roll their eyes toward heaven when my sweet wife starts telling stories about how some of her people used to live. Grandma Dean can reel off story after story about her mother’s mother and her stories are very interesting.
Grandma Emma raised nine children in the backwoods of Tallapoosa County, Alabama. All of them lived into their nineties until all that lard Emma fed them finally put them in the ground. Too much fat will kill you eventually.
Cool water in a creek near the house served as their refrigerator. After all, the only running water they had was the water that ran by in that creek. Indoor plumbing was only a dream. Like most families they had a well worn path to the outhouse. Pouring in a sack of lime occasionally helped only a little with the nauseating stench.
When the cows were milked, the milk was poured into earthenware jugs and carefully placed in a shaded, shallow place in the creek where it stayed until mealtime. Other items, like bottles of “soda water” and other perishables were also cooled in the creek. The water was clean and safe enough to drink. At least they believed it was safe.
Butter and buttermilk were obtained not with money but with muscles – churning the milk in those old churns that are now on sale in every flea market. Churning was one of the chores assigned to Emma’s girls. The older boys were spared from churning; it was their job to care for and feed the livestock. Younger lads would sometimes take their turn at the churn but they always grumbled that it was “women’s work.”
Grampa finally grubbed enough off the land to buy Emma an icebox. What a blessing it was not to have to walk back and forth to the creek. The only trouble was, the ice soon melted. Now, instead of trips to the creek, they had to make frequent visits to the Ice House in town to purchase blocks of ice. Naturally Grampa complained about how expensive it was to own that icebox.
Years later, not long before she died, Emma swapped her icebox for a fancy refrigerator. Her wood-burning stove was another matter. She continued cooking on it until they put her in a nursing home. She simply did not trust those electric stoves.
Emma had her doubts too about the refrigerator. She and Grampa had used a smokehouse for years. They were sure it tasted better than that “store-bought” meat. When the men killed a hog, they took the meat to the smokehouse while it was still warm. There it was salted and stored away for the curing. My wife remembers some of Emma’s children said they used black pepper, red pepper, and molasses, along with plenty of salt, to cure the meat. Of course the smoke also helped.
Emma never bought three pair of socks for five dollars at Wal-Mart. Instead she knitted socks for the whole family with her own knitting needle. When a hole was worn in the socks, Emma patched the hole with her busy needle.
Flour was sold in large sacks in the old days. The sacks sometimes had a pretty design on them, pretty enough for the sacks to be made into colorful dresses for the girls. That custom lingered on for many years; my wife can remember that she and her sister also wore flour-sack dresses.
Grandma Dean feels a strange kinship with Grandma Emma. She can imagine her sitting by a winter fire, cooking and sewing for her large family, and telling stories since there was no television to watch. Dean enjoys her fireplace in our home. She has refused to let me put in gas logs. She likes to sit like Emma once sat, pondering life before burning logs. A fire mesmerizes her soul, inspiring thoughts like these:
“I sit by the fire and think of people long ago, and people who will see a world that I shall never know. But all the while I sit and think of times that were before. I listen for returning feet and voices at the door.”
Most of us would like to make the world a better place. We can, but only if we recognize that our legacy reaches back thousands of centuries, all the way to the folks who made the first wheel.
Countless generations have come and gone, each leaving a precious deposit of memories and achievements. The progress of civilization depends upon each of us doing what we can to make life better for our heirs. We are stewards of the past with the opportunity to add to our rich heritage.
One day I hope to meet Grandma Emma and sit on a cloud for a hundred years listening to her stories about churns and ice boxes. I am indebted to Emma because my wife inherited some of her genes. Dean’s strengths make me think that she and Emma would have been good friends, and goodness knows the stories they might have shared around a roaring fire. + + +

2009-07-31T22:00:00.001-05:00

A cluttered desk is a beautiful thing

I hate an organized desk. On rare occasions I had one. It was my first day in a new office. But it never lasted. After two days my papers, folders, and books were everywhere. And I dared anybody to straighten up my desk.
People with an organized desk are disgustingly proud of the accomplishment. They are apt to say piously, “A messy desk indicates a cluttered mind. A neat desk suggests an organized person.” That is nonsense and I can prove it.
My philosophy is that a messy desk is a sign of a hard-working person who is good at multi-tasking. Why settle for mono-tasking when you can do several things at once? Doing one task at a time requires much less creativity.
I know the argument against multi-tasking. If you focus on one project at a time, you can get your work done more quickly. You will be much more efficient if you will concentrate only on one task – the one in front of you.
But that approach can make work rather dull. It removes the challenge of trying to do three things at once. We all know that the truly brilliant person is the one who while talking to you on the desk phone can put you on hold, talk to someone else on their cell phone, and at the same time carry on a conversation with a visitor in his office.
Now that impresses people, just as a cluttered desk convinces people that you are capable of working on five projects at a time. The clutter convinces people not that you are disorganized but that you have amazing creativity.
It takes a lot of skill to find something on my desk. I have piles everywhere but I know what pile to look in when I need to find something. Only a person with my kind of competence could find a lost document as quickly as I can. With me, hope springs eternal; nothing is ever lost. It is here somewhere so I keep rambling until it shows up. Sooner or later it will turn up. The lost will be found.
The best way for me to lose something is to file it. If I file it, I forget where it is filed. The other day I searched for the manual for my riding lawn mower. Since it is a John Deere, I looked under “J.” It was not there. I looked under “M” but no luck. Well, maybe I filed it under “G” for grass. Wrong again. Finally I looked under “L,” and there it was.
I gave up on filing cabinets. I prefer now to stack folders on the floor around my office. You can lose stuff in a filing cabinet. I came across some stuff the other day I had not seen in 44 years.
I am glad I am not looking for a pay raise. At my age pay raises are a joke. When my pay changes it goes down not up. A recent study reveals that most employers factor in an employee’s level of organization when considering annual reviews and pay increases.
One company even dispatches workers to look in the car window of an applicant’s car to see if it is clean while the interview is being held. If there is clutter on the car floor, this indicates the applicant does not have organizational skills.
That company would never hire me. My car is cluttered with papers I may need while I am away from the office. Ride somewhere with me and you will have to wait five minutes while I move my stuff to the trunk or the back seat.
Any fool knows that if you want to find a highly skilled, competent, hard-working person, you look for a messy car and a messy desk. The reason is obvious. The person with a neat desk does not really want to work. And inside the drawers of that neat desk are piles of paper that need attention. The person who thrives in clutter is the one who can get the job done.
Somewhere on my desk is a new book written by Dave Crenshaw. It is titled The Myth of Multitasking: How “Doing it all” Gets Nothing Done. I hid it under a pile of papers. I don’t plan to read it. He is entitled to his opinion. I am content with mine. A cluttered desk is a beautiful thing and brilliant people can do three things at the same time. That’s my story and I am sticking to it. + + +

2009-07-26T22:37:00.000-05:00

If I Never Saw the Sea Again

What if I never saw the sea again?
What if I never heard the waves hit the shore?
What if I never felt my feet upon the sand?
What if I could never come here anymore?
Yet life is filled with moments like these,
When I see the boats racing by
And feel the gentle breeze
And watch the seagulls fly.
May your presence fill me with a thankful heart, I pray.
Even if I never come again to the sea
At least I have today.

Dean Albritton
(Written by the sea, February 24, 2009)

2009-07-24T15:22:00.000-05:00

Family Enjoys Sharing Memories

On the 4th of July the family of Seth and Neva Johnson gathered once again for a meal and sharing time. The usual crowd of about 150 people showed up. My Uncle Wylie P. Johnson passed out copies of a book he had published titled Memories of Carol Villa, the Land, People, and Home of Seth and Neva Kate Johnson. Several of my cousins and other family members shared in the book their memories of Carol Villa. What follows is what I shared from my own rich memories of my grandparents, their grand home, and family experiences:
Family gatherings at Carol Villa were exciting when I was growing up. Caroline, my mother, was the oldest child of Seth and Neva Johnson. Born in Newnan, Georgia, in 1902, she grew up in Montgomery. The family lived in that large, majestic home south of the Atlanta Highway that became know affectionately as Carol Villa. Mother had nine brothers and four sisters. They all called her “Sister.”
Our modest home in Elmore County was comfortable but nothing compared to the stately home of my grandparents. Its massive front porch with white columns offered an impressive view of the large cotton fields on both sides of the dirt road leading to the house from the Atlanta Highway.
The grand old home had quite a history. Built in 1838, and expanded in 1860, it sat proudly amidst towering Oak trees for 128 years. Having served its purpose the splendid structure was finally torn down in the mid-1960s, giving way to the homes now called the Carol Villa subdivision.
The large Johnson plantation enabled my grandparents to raise a large family and have a good if not affluent life. Thirteen children grew to adulthood. They produced more than 50 grandchildren of whom I was the oldest. The number attending reunions grew dramatically every year.
The most important annual gathering was usually the Saturday nearest the fourth of July. Hot weather was no problem since we had never heard about air conditioning. High ceilings in the old home place did assuage the effect of the heat, as did several big ceiling fans. When the temperature seemed unbearable we could stir the air with the old funeral home fans.
I never knew my paternal grandfather. He died years before I was born. Since my mother’s family was close-knit I did get to know her parents well. Her mother was “Grandmama.” Her father was “Papa.” Grandmama took care of the home; Papa handled the farm. Like many cattlemen he grew a lot of cotton and corn as well as the hay needed for the cattle.
Papa taught me one lesson I have never forgotten. When we were walking in the cow pasture one day he pointed to a fresh pile of cow manure and said, “Walter Junior, don’t cut your foot.” He meant not to step in it. That became later a principle of life for me. It is important to be careful not to step in the manure that we often find on life’s journey. Some of it is not created by cows.
Papa’s pump house was one of my favorite spots. It was in the back yard, not far from the steps leading up to the kitchen. I loved to go inside the pump house and listen to the old water pump wheezing, coughing, and sputtering as it struggled to pull cold water out of a deep well. I think it was powered by a gasoline engine.
It was always fun to play with my cousins, especially Mickey, Buddy, Buck, Randall, and Seth Arthur. We shared many adventures during those daylong reunions. One of our favorite sports was to find a yellow jacket nest, disturb those stinging devils, and run for our lives. The slowest ones occasionally got stung. Our uncles, older and wiser, always lectured us about upsetting wasps and yellow jackets. Then they would treat our stings with wet tobacco from a cigarette or a cigar. We were proud of those stings. They were our badges of courage. We figured our bravery impressed the girls.
Every reunion was an occasion to romp and play in the hay barn. Behind one barn we found a good place to hide and smoke rabbit tobacco. That was exciting until that sad July day when carelessly we burned down the barn. I say “we” but evidently it was I who burned down the barn, since none of my cousins remembers helping me. I keep hoping that one day one of them will admit smoking with me that day. As always, hope springs eternal. I remember my dad gave me a good whipping with his mean, black belt. Dad blamed me more than anyone else since I was the oldest. I was never as sure about that as he was. But it taught me a good lesson. That was the last day I ever smoked rabbit tobacco.
One of my uncles (whose identity I will not reveal) taught me and one of my cousins something else at one reunion when I was about 12 or 13. He had several bottles of whiskey in the trunk of his car and offered us a drink. Since my dad was a teetotaler I had no idea how strong a drink of Four Roses straight bourbon whiskey would be. It took my breath away and convinced me my dad had the right idea about alcohol. I had no trouble following his example of abstinence. My uncle did me a favor.
One of the problems of growing up in a big family like ours was the teasing our uncles imposed on us. Like it or not we had to learn how to deal with friendly ridicule and sarcasm. They taught us many lessons, sometimes by embarrassing us. If we were too loud, or impolite, or unwilling to wait our turn, we got a stern reprimand. No sin was left unnoticed or unpunished.
In my late teens I brought my girl friend to the family gatherings. Having grown up in a small, quiet family with one sister and no brothers, Dean was shocked by my loud, boisterous family. She blushed in utter humiliation when Uncle Philip said, “Walter Junior, your girl friend is cute. Where did a country boy like you find her? Has she let you kiss her yet?” Both of us blushed as everyone laughed.
Grandmama more than made up for the teasing we endured. She made Dean feel welcome in her home. The two of them developed a special relationship that lasted until Grandmama died of cancer not long before we were married. Dean admired the quiet strength and strong faith of this courageous woman who faced her impending death without whimpering. Grandmama showed us how to face the harshness of life without losing faith in the love of God. I still remember how scared I was when she asked me to pray at her bedside not long before she died.
Every family brought lots of food to each gathering. It was like dinner on the grounds at a country church. Desserts were plentiful but the main dessert was homemade ice cream. Even warm banana pudding was no match for the ice cream. When my cousins and I were old enough, it was our job to turn the cranks on the ice cream freezers. Our uncles saw to it that we turned those cranks as long as we could. Then one of them would turn the crank a few more times to show us how weak we were.
Many of us remember how scared we were of Fling Down, the ghost that lived in the attic. Such memories are fun to remember and share. One thing we can all agree on is that reminiscing about Carol Villa is truly good for the soul. @

Good Friends

2009-07-21T09:39:00.000-05:00

Good friends are one of life’s most precious treasures

Many of the world’s animals hang out together. On the farm growing up I saw cows, horses, hogs, sheep, goats and chickens socializing in groups, large and small.
What I never saw were two animals that seemed to be best friends. No cow or horse ever nudged me on the arm and said, “This (cow or horse) is my good friend.”
Bring dogs into the picture and I reckon you could make a case, though a flimsy one, for the idea that two dogs sometimes appear to be friends. But mostly they just run and play together.
The concept of friendship, especially loving friendship, is reserved for human relationships. Human beings can develop friendships that the so-called lower animals can never enjoy.
Lovers of cats and dogs sometimes press me to believe that a human being and an animal can have a strong, loving friendship. That I cannot embrace. A strong attachment, but not one that is deserving of the word “friendship.” People can be friends. People can love their friends.
When a person tells me, “I love my dog,” I understand that to be a misuse of the word “love.” People may indeed love an animal, but they would be wiser if they “liked” animals and loved people.
“But,” someone will object, “My dog is my best friend!”
No, dear, I must point out, your dog cannot be your friend. Dogs are incapable of friendship. Your dog cannot love you. Your horse cannot love you. Your cat cannot love you. People can love. Animals cannot.
Still another protest is made: “My dog would die for me!” Perhaps. But it will not be because your dog loves you. Call it instinct. Call it loyalty. Call it whatever you wish, but do not call it love.
Your dog may lick your hand, sit in your lap, eat food off your dinner plate, but your dog is unable to love you. Your dog may defend you and risk death trying to protect you, but love will not be its motivation.
Your dog may be “like” a companion and go with you wherever you go. You may be so attached to your dog that you consider the two of you inseparable. You may talk to your dog as though the dog is a person, but that will never cause the dog to have human capabilities.
When I was a boy I had a Shetland pony. I named her Josephine. If you had asked me back then, I would have told you that I loved Josephine. We were inseparable. I rode her every day. I fed her, rubbed her, and even talked to her.
I also had a beautiful Bulldog. With little imagination I named him “Bull.” For several years Bull was my buddy, my constant companion. We romped and played together. He licked my face. I fed him and talked to him. Bull growled at strangers, but he recognized me even in the dark and played the role of my protector.
Then I grew up. I met a woman named Dean and fell in love with her. I formed strong friendships with people who became, and remain, dear to me. Finally, I realized my affection for a horse and a dog was in a different category from the love I felt for my family, my wife, my children, and my friends.
Roy Rogers liked Trigger. He liked Trigger a lot. But he loved Dale Evans. Dale returned Roy’s love in ways Trigger never could. Roy and Dale were friends and lovers in a dimension beyond anything Trigger could ever comprehend.
Now I am an old man. A lot of things have changed, and my life keeps changing every day. I am glad I once had a horse and a dog. I liked them; they were important to me. I enjoyed a strong attachment to Josephine and Bull, but they were animals, nothing more.
In the twilight of my life I think sometimes of an old poem that went like this:
“False friends are like autumn leaves, found everywhere. True friends are like diamonds, precious but rare.”
I realize now that my friends are more precious than diamonds. And I would not trade one of them for a thousand show dogs or all the grand walking horses in Tennessee.
Who can estimate the value of one good friend? A good friend will never lick your face, but when the chips are down, the love of a good friend will be worth more to you than all the gold in Fort Knox (if there is any left!).
Now go walk your dog. Enjoy your dog. Ride your horse. Milk your cow. Slop the hogs. Feed the chickens. Like animals to your heart’s content.
But love your friends and thank God for them. They are one of your greatest treasures. + + +

2009-07-20T14:15:00.000-05:00

The journey may be hard but encouragement helps us endure

THE recent serious illness of my wife caused me to take a fresh look at my priorities. Such wake-up calls are always helpful. Human nature being what it is we all tend to lose focus on what really matters. The jarring prospect of losing someone you love dearly can clear the cobwebs from your brain.
Putting first things first is never easy. But it is possible. And it is necessary if we are to live well. Now and then we must stop the merry-go-round, look in the mirror, and take an honest look at how we are living. Are the choices we are making everyday helping us to make the most of our brief span of life?
Trouble reminds us that the journey of life can be long and hard. None of us is immune from suffering. Our personal problems may be difficult but we quickly discover that others are hurting too. To be human is to suffer.
Life is hard. But it is also a mixture of good and bad. There is pain and there is pleasure. We may be laughing one day and crying the next. As we grow up we learn to accept the bitter with the sweet, the rain with the sunshine. Reasonably mature people find a way to handle this mixture. Otherwise they become cynical, allowing the bad stuff to rob them of their joy.
Maturity does not come easily. It comes gradually, usually the result of a lifelong search. None of us reaches it without help. The help we all need is that strange thing we call encouragement. It is hard to describe but when you receive it, you know you have been given something more valuable than money.
Oddly, the only people who can offer us encouragement are fellow strugglers, friends who step outside their own troubles long enough to come alongside us and cheer us up. So often the people who come to comfort us when we are hurting are themselves in pain. The fact that they do not speak of their own pain makes their comfort all the more wonderful.
Encouragement is like oxygen; we will die without it. People do not die from loneliness; they die from the lack of encouragement. Everybody needs somebody who will encourage them to persevere and not give up. But we soon learn that it is foolish to expect encouragement from everyone. Those who become cynical are simply unable to encourage others.
All of us have some people in our lives who are examiners rather than encouragers. Examiners constantly evaluate us. They enjoy pointing out what is wrong with us. Examiners try to convince us we are inadequate and that we will never make it no matter how hard we try.
Encouragers offer us affirmation instead of criticism. They are our cheerleaders. They give us hope that “we can do it.” Their praise inspires us to believe in ourselves and to reach for the best that we can be. And it is good news that every person has the potential to be an encourager to some fellow struggler. Each of us can choose to live as an examiner or an encourager.
During recent days of soul-searching many of my encouragers have come alongside us with hope and comfort. They have laughed with us, hugged us, prayed for us, and made us feel loved. They have generously blessed us with food and flowers. They have put their own pain aside long enough to care for us. And they have made a profound difference. We have been cheered far beyond our deserving. Love does indeed ease one’s pain.
Once more Dean and I have been reminded that though the journey home is sometimes long and hard, the loving encouragement of friends helps us endure. And what is true for us is true for others. As strength returns, we must be up and doing the things that matter most. As long as we have breath, we too can make the hard journey of others more bearable by offering the precious gift of encouragement. Doing so will help us to put first things first. + + +

In the Beginning. . .

2009-07-18T15:55:00.000-05:00

Everything has a beginning. This is mine.