Archive for the ‘Community’ category
June 22, 2018
JUNE 22, 2018
Messes happen. They are a part of our fallen (or spilled!) creation! I’ve spilled my coffee several times over the years. The worst thing, however, is to pretend that there is no mess! That the spilled coffee is just part of life and to either walk around it, step over it, or walk through it. (If you’ve ever been in a school cafeteria you’d be amazed at how many students will pretend spilled milk on the floor really didn’t happen!) What is the other option? Ahhh…clean it up! Get down on your hands and knees and take care of the mess! No parent tells their child who has just dumped his morning Cheerios to just pretend it’s not a problem.
No matter what your stance is about illegal aliens I’m going out on a limb here to say that most of us are at some degree of uncomfortableness with kids being separated from their parents. Even without factoring in the “media hype”, it’s disturbing.
There’s always something troubling about intentionally separating children from their parents!
It’s a mess! A mess created by our yearning for a safe environment, our tendency to see our enemies as those who live outside our realm, and to push the powerless out of the way. The mess, in this case, has been swept to the side so not to be disruptive.
Like with my parents, however, when I made a mess I admitted it and took care of it. Perhaps the same thing needs to happen with the migrant children. We messed up. We admit it, and now we’re going to get down on our hands and knees and take care of the chaos we’ve brought into the lives of the people whose lives have been turned upside-down.
The spills of our mistakes become permanent stains if they aren’t taken care of.
Categories: Bible, children, Christianity, Community, Freedom, Grace, Jesus, Nation, Parenting, Pastor, Story, The Church, Uncategorized, Youth
Tags: cleaning up the mess, correcting mistakes, detaining kids, detention camps, illegal aliens, migrant children, pretending nothing is wrong, protecting our borders, reuniting families, reuniting migrant families
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June 12, 2018
WORDS FROM W.W. June 12, 2018
The heat is on! Not the Colorado summer heat, but the political primaries…that kind of heat!
Last night I flipped between three local TV stations at 5:30 to see the local news. Each station was airing a political advertisement at the same time, but for three different candidates!
When I went outside and got the mail out of the mailbox I had to search between all the political postcards and propaganda to find the car insurance bill. I wonder if State Farm would see that as a valid excuse for not paying my monthly premium- that I couldn’t find it in the midst of all the campaigning candidates’ mail?
But the worst so far has been the unbelievable number of calls I’m getting on my iPhone. Now, I have to admit that I’m assuming they are political calls, but why else would I be getting calls from Shoreline, Washington; Jamesburg, New Jersey; Pueblo, Colorado; Oklahoma City; East Tawas, Michigan; Newton, Massachusetts; Leota, Minnesota; Portland, Maine; and Oyster Bay, New York.
“No!” to all the questions that are being asked right now by moms! I do not answer the incoming call if I do not recognize the number.
I’m listening to Amazon Prime Music on my iPhone as I do my morning run and Mercy Me’s song I Can Only Imagine is interrupted by an incoming call from Boynton Beach, Florida!
I’m at my writing spot at the public library, deep into my book rewrite, and someone from Waltham, Massachusetts is trying to get my ear!
And so now I have this fear that an important call is going to be ignored simply because someone wants to convince me of the evils of a certain candidate for office.
Political callers are the new telemarketers! In the last week out of 27 incoming calls to my phone 3 OF THEM were from people I knew…two from Carol, my wife, and the other from Amy Teten, who we financially support with The Navigators ministry! The other 24 calls were from phone numbers I did not recognize. None of those callers left a message! Perplexing, isn’t it?
I realize the importance of electing the best officials. In fact, I’ll probably take my ballots to the drop-off box at the library today. (Colorado’s primary is June 26!) My voting decisions are based on summaries from neutral publications on the political positions of each of the candidates.
In the mean time I’ll hear my iPhone ringing in a few calls this morning as I’m running my four miles. They will come just as my pace has increased listening to the song “The Greatest Show” from The Greatest Showman. Suddenly I’ll slow down to a turtle’s pace!
Ugh!
Categories: children, Community, Freedom, Humor, Nation, Parenting, Pastor, Story, Uncategorized
Tags: candidate, Colorado political primary, iPhone, phones, political ads, political calls, political campaigns, political candidates, Politics, running for office, State Farm, telemarketers, telemarketing, voting decisions
Comments: 1 Comment
June 9, 2018
WORDS FROM W.W. June 9, 2018
Dewey Helton was my farming grandfather who lived a few miles outside the sprawling metropolis of Paintsville, Kentucky- population 4,000 and a few! Some of my best childhood memories are from my time spent on the Helton farm, jumping from the hayloft of the barn onto bales of hay, drinking the cool well water, exploring in the woods and fields, and making up games to play all by myself or with the cousins who might be around.
When my aunts and uncles came for a Sunday afternoon meal I’d sit on the front porch with the men, listening to the stories…both made-up and true…and soak up the time with them. It was back in the day of front porch smoking: Uncle Bernie with his pipe and cigars, Uncle Milliard with his chewing tobacco, and Uncle Junior, Uncle George, and my dad with their cigarettes. Chuckles filled the air as much as the smoke.
There was a hint of oneupmanship present. The next story needed to be as much of a “knee-slapper” as the previous story, or better. The common sense wisdom of my uncles was inserted into stories that featured doofuses and knuckleheads in order to elevate the appearance of Helton intellect. I still remember some of those stories fifty-five years later…like the story of the boy whose father had not been educated. He brought home his report card filled with “D’s” and “F’s” and told his papa that a D was short for “darn good” and an F meant “fantastic!”
I’d sit there with the uncles soaking in the cultural education. Uncle Junior had a tendency to pinch me on the leg if I sat next to him so I always hoped for a seat a safe distance away. I’d usually try to sit beside Uncle Bernie because I loved his soft chuckle and the smell of his cigar.
Stories had to be punctuated with statements to emphasize the tale being told. Phrases like “Lorrddd, have mercy!” and “God is my witness!” were uttered often. Inserting God into the story raised the story’s believability! The narrative might come from past military experience, county politics, or something that happened in the course of a typical afternoon.
“Let me tell you boys something!” my Papaw Helton started in. “There was a man stopped hur (here) the other day and he was selling these things called…ahhh…satellite dishes…big ole’ things! Said they get as many as thirty TV channels! Lord have mercy! And then I asked him how much a dish like that cost and he says “Nineteen-ninety-five!” Good Lord, he made it sound like a twenty dollar bill!”
“Boys, let me tell you! I’ve never worked so hard in my whole life!” my Uncle Millard exclaimed, telling about his career change from town barber to owning a Dairy Queen. Think Floyd from Mayberry and you’d get an accurate picture of him. “One night around dinner time I looked out and there was this long line of people and I just yelled out, “Doesn’t anyone eat at home any more?” Lord, have mercy! I’ve never cooked so many hot dogs!”
Sit and have a smoke. Sit and laugh. Sit and be together. Sit and be educated about the things of life that you couldn’t learn from a textbook. It was the first men’s group I was a part of…at the age of eight!
Categories: Bible, children, Community, Grandchildren, Humor, Parenting, Story, Uncategorized, Youth
Tags: chewing tobacco, Dairy Queen, Eastern Kentucky, family memories, family stories, family traditions, farm, farm adventures, farming, farms, front porch, front porches, grandparents, memories, Paintsville, satellite dish, sitting on the front porch, sitting with family, smoking, uncles
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May 31, 2018
WORDS FROM W.W. May 31, 2018
I don’t have a jet, not a single one!
“Lord, what did I do to deserve this lack of air travel, even a propjet!”
My bitterness stems from the report this week that Louisiana evangelist Jesse Duplantis is raising funds to add a fourth jet to his fleet, a three engine Dassault Falcon 7X to be exact. A new one right from the showroom goes for just 54 million, although used ones can be had for the bargain basement price of 20 million.
Jesse, with his snow white hair, heard the voice of God tell him to aim high! He needs this fourth jet that can fly 700 miles an hour to preach the gospel around the world. I’m not sure what the other three jets he already owns are to do. Having a backup is always a good thing, I guess! But a backup to the backup to the backup…seems kind of overkill!
Jesse is committed to the prosperity gospel, a twist on the words of Jesus that says God desires to bless his people with wealth…and jets (my paraphrase!).
He rationalizes his need for Jesse Jet IV with the statement that if Jesus was on earth today he wouldn’t be riding a donkey any more. Sound theology!
One young man I pastored a while back DID refer to my Honda Civic Hybrid as “the spaceship!” Other than that, however, I’ve ministered with all four wheels on the ground and two feet on the cracked sidewalks.
Perhaps I should aim higher! Maybe I’ll take the idea of “Wings for Wolfe” to the little congregation in the small Colorado town on the eastern plains I travel to speak at. It takes me 45 minutes to drive there. Perhaps I should tell them to have faith and give funds.
Tele-evangelist Creflo Dollar asked his congregation and listeners to give $300 a piece so he could buy a $65 million dollar luxury jet. Unlike Duplantis, however, Dollar needs a new jet to replace his old one that he says no longer works. (I know where he can get a Dassault Falcon 7X for 20 million!)
Here’s how my pitch to the congregation in Simla, Colorado, will sound and their obedient response!
“God has called me to fly! He wants me to spread my wings and spread His Word! And he has told me that y’all are going to have faith enough to raise the funds for me. Would you help me fly today? Can you believe in miracles?”
And they would shout “Yes! Yes, we believe!”
And then the next Sunday with tears of joy running down their faces they’d present me with a package. “We believed, pastor! We believed! We raised the money to make “Wings for Wolfe”…Wolfe Wings, if you will, possible.”
Tears would begin to stream down my face as I opened the package, expecting to see a pair of keys. Instead, however, the opened box top would reveal a red cape inside, and then they would look at me and say, “Okay, Pastor! We believed! Now…how much faith do you have that God has called you to fly?”
Categories: Bible, children, Christianity, Community, Faith, Humor, Jesus, Pastor, Prayer, Story, Teamwork, The Church, Uncategorized, Youth
Tags: believing, Creflo Dollar, Dassault Falcon 7X, fleecing others, having faith, Jesse Duplantis, jet plane, luxury jet, prosperity gospel, spreading the gospel, televangelist
Comments: 2 Comments
May 30, 2018
WORDS FROM W.W. May 30, 2018
Yes, I frequent Starbucks…like, right now! I can’t say enough about the baristas at the coffee cafe I visit six days a week. I know them by name- Steph, Rhea, Sarah, Chase, Cody, Viv, Kallie, Katherine, and Katie.
Rhea began taking online classes with Arizona State in January and I edited a couple of English Composition papers for her. Sarah and I share family pictures together. Katie always greets me with a smile, like I’m someone she’s happy to see. Cody would be friendly to a rock. His break times are spent sitting with customers and talking about life.
They are great people who frequently are called upon to serve others who are demanding, obnoxious, judgmental, and entitled.
The pace is furious. I was trying to share a story with Rhea one day about something that had happened at school and it took me another three days of visits to be able to finish it!
Starbucks closed 8,000 stores on Tuesday for a four hour employees’ training session on anti-bias. The company’s decision to conduct the training grew out of a situation in a Philadelphia Starbucks where two black men, who were waiting at the store to meet a friend, ended up being arrested. An employee had called the police about the men hanging around the store. The incident quickly gained nationwide attention.
Racial stereotyping is not something I’m comfortable with. However, I am acutely aware of how I stereotype elderly people who are behind the steering wheel of a car, how I stereotype anyone who drives a BMW, anyone who plays basketball at a certain high school close to us, any guy who is “sagging”, anyone wearing a Michigan Wolverines tee shirt, or anyone who drops “F” bombs as easily as exhaling.
This post is to come alongside my baristas and say that they have to deal the Roseanne Barrs of the world on a daily basis. My barista, Chase, who has several tattoos, told me of a woman who ordered coffee one morning and told him his tattoos were an abomination to God. She was on her way to church. I apologized to Chase for having to be subjected to someone who felt she had to be God’s mouthpiece.
Were we surprised by Roseanne Barr’s tweets? Twenty-five years ago this week she made a mockery of the national anthem that she “kinda’-sung” before a San Diego Padres baseball game. She thought it was funny! Do we think she spent the past twenty-five years getting proper and well-mannered?
Everyday my baristas deal with the Roseannes of our area with patience and hospitable spirits. Perhaps Starbucks should consider another training session, but this time offer it for all those folk on this side of the counter who feel they have a license to kill-verbally, treat the employees like dirt, and don’t think their poop stinks!
Categories: children, Christianity, Community, Freedom, Grace, Parenting, Pastor, Story, The Church, Uncategorized, Youth
Tags: anti-bias training, barista, national anthem, racism, Roseanne Barr, Starbucks, Starbucks coffee, stereotyping, tattoos, treating people with respect, tweets
Comments: 2 Comments
May 20, 2018
WORDS FROM W.W. May 20, 2018
Why am I the way I am?
Why do I always drink my coffee with cream and sugar?
Why do I always put my left leg into my pants first?
Why do I hate beer?
Questions that may intrigue no one else but myself! They are questions that hint at something from my past that caused me to think, act, or feel in a certain way in the present.
It’s my back story reemerging. For example, I drink my coffee with cream and sugar because that’s how both my mom and dad drank it. It’s a family practice. Once in a great while I’ll drink a cup of coffee black, or with only one of the additions, but it feels strange…it feels off, like I’m putting my pants on backwards and wondering where that zipper went!
“Back Story” is a term writers use to illuminate a character’s past, like telling the story of how the main character received the scar that ran down the side of his face. It’s a glimpse into why someone is the way he is.
Everyone has Back Story! It’s what we’re rooted in, for good and for bad.
When tragedy happens, something unexpectedly evil, we ask questions about the perpetrator. We search for some kind of explanation for the unexplainable. Why would Dimitrios Pagourtzis kill students that he went to school with each day? I’ve noticed that there have been several rumored reasons set forward already. What’s his Back Story? What pushed him to do something so evil that it would break the heart of a community and send more shudders throughout the nation?
That question will trouble Santa Fe High School for generations to come. “Why” will continue to rumble through the minds of the students and faculty each time they look at the building or walk down the hallways. A mass shooting will become their Back Story.
If I was pastoring a church in Santa Fe, Texas, what would I say this morning to a sanctuary of confused and troubled faces? What would I tell them on this Sunday that is also Pentecost Sunday?
It is the “Back Story” in our faith journey that I would bring forth. Pentecost is that holy moment when the Holy Spirit descended upon the disciples of Jesus. In a world that is exhausted by its unrest, Pentecost is part of our Back Story of hope. It is why we believe that good can overcome evil. It’s the reason each follower of Jesus believes that lives can be redeemed, that light can shine into darkness.
Pentecost is the Greek name for “Shavuot”, the spring harvest festival of the Israelites, which was happening at the time of the coming of the Holy Spirit. If you could find more than a couple of Christians out of a hundred who would know the spring harvest festival part of Pentecost you’d be doing good. Our Back Story is now connected to the promise of the Spirit.
We may never know, and probably, never understand why Dimitrios Pagourtzis opened fire on people he knew and had been educated with? Whatever was going on in his past may never make any kind of sense to us. Our culture minimizes the idea of “The Evil One”, until the Bible tells us he comes to deceive and destroy. It’s his M.O., his Back Story that continues in the present and on into the days ahead.
But followers of Christ know their Back Story, too, and that it leads us on to be agents of change, and lovers of all people. It’s my Back Story that causes me to fear no evil, and have the assurance of future hope!
Categories: Bible, children, Christianity, Community, Death, Faith, Freedom, Holy Spirit, Jesus, love, Nation, Parenting, Pastor, Story, The Church, Uncategorized, Youth
Tags: Back Story, Descending of the Holy Spirit, Dimitrios Pagourtzis, evil, hope, literary terms, Pentecost, Pentecost Sunday, Sanat Fe Texas, Santa Fe High School, school shootings, The deceiver, The Evil One, the unexplainable
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May 15, 2018
WORDS FROM W.W. May 15, 2018
The Estes Park Christian Writer’s Conference is one day away and I’m feeling like a jittery five year old about to hug his mom and walk with shaking knees into his kindergarten class for the first day of school. What will happen? What if I have to go to the bathroom? What if I fall on the playground and skin my knee, or tip over the building blocks accidentally? What if my teacher doesn’t like me and makes me stand in the corner?
Kindergarten questions simply get redressed into grownup worries. As I head to the conference the questions cloud my mind like the halo on top of Pike’s Peak this morning.
What if my clinic teacher tells me that my writing really sucks? What if they use literary terms that I have no clue about? What is the people there are about half a bubble off center…you know, the elevator doesn’t go to the top floor? What if I have to go to the bathroom really bad? (As you can tell, I’m a bit concerned about taking care of “my business!”) What if I get asked a question and my mind goes as blank as a stare? What if I get Gordon Ramsay for an instructor, complete with English accent and expletives?
When you have never experienced something you begin to let your mind wander to dark places.
I WAS accepted as one of six people in the Fiction Intensive Clinic. I had to send my book synopsis and first chapter to the clinic teacher about two months ago and the six of us that were accepted were notified at the end of April. Each of us now has the first chapter and synopsis of the others in the group. There will be some major critiquing and, hopefully, encouragement as we learn about writing tendencies and bad habits.
I will have appointments with a few literary agents, with hopes that someone will be interested in my book enough to express desire in getting it in front of some publishers. In the midst of this is some personal pride about the story I’ve created, the characters I’ve come to love, and the value of the message that the book brings. My stomach becomes a bit queasy thinking that I’ve written four hundred pages that might get trashed. Actually, I’ve written eight hundred plus pages, because the sequel to the first book has already had its first draft finished. The third book has already been started. Through the pages of type I’ve come to love the characters like the ninth grader, Randy Bowman, and his seventh grade neighbor and friend, Ethan Thomas. It hit me a while ago that I WAS Ethan Thomas in seventh grade and I wanted to be Randy Bowman when I was a freshman. In the course of the first two books Randy helps Ethan become more than he ever thought he could be, a kid easily unseen in the midst of his school who is mentored and befriended towards the discovery of potential and value.
And, that is also why there is anxiety about this new experience. I’m all in with the story! Like a fourteen year old who discovers his name is not on the list of players who made the basketball team, I’m trying to brace myself for the possibility of disappointment, but also hold out hope that…something just might happen!
Regardless, I believe that God has orchestrated this moment. I’m just hoping that it doesn’t sound like a harmonica in the midst of a wind ensemble!
Categories: Bible, children, Christianity, coaching, Community, Faith, Freedom, Grace, Humor, Jesus, Parenting, Pastor, Story, The Church, Uncategorized, Youth
Tags: anxiety, author, authoring a book, book publishers, characters, characters in a book, creating, Estes Park Christian Writer's Conference, failing, fiction, fiction writing, literary agent, not making the team, sequels, story creation, trying but failing, uncertainty, writing fiction
Comments: 3 Comments
May 9, 2018
WORDS FROM W.W. May, 9, 2018
It’s the card that you hold in your teaching hands that has the power to raise a student’s eyebrows, the corrector of the uncorrectable…the threat of lunch detention!
For most students it holds the same level of dread as being grounded for a day, or having to write “I will not act like a fool ever again!” fifty times on a sheet of notebook paper. Only the threat of execution or taking the student’s cell phone away holds more power.
Last week I used the trump card three times. For one student I could see the fear of God in his eyes when I hinted that the consequence was close at hand. He would have run through fire to avoid it. For the other two students, however, their intelligent responses had taken siestas and left them unprotected from momentary stupidity.
After pronouncing sentence the first convicted thirteen year old tried to convince me of my unreasonableness. Too late, my man! Since you gave me a bunch of baloney, you’ll be eating your baloney sandwich at that desk!
The second charged, tried, and convicted was like a repeat offender. When the threat of detention revealed its ugly head he acted like it was a good thing…kind of like wearing a pair of “tighty whitie” underwear that’s a size too small! That’s never a good thing! His insolence caused me to propose two days of lunch detention. He still mistook cockiness for courage.
“Would you like a whole week of lunch detention?” He gave me a thumbs up.
“Okay! You’ll have it all next week.”
He is the exception. 99% of middle school students, if given a choice, would choose taking a shower after P.E. class- a place in the locker room that collects cobwebs because of how often it gets used- rather than lunch detention.
When the consequences were rendered there were gasps throughout the classroom. It was seventh grade newsworthy! Word would spread through the other seventh grade classrooms as quickly as a spring thunderstorm cloud burst.
The young man who is serving “the five” saw me in the library yesterday. He looked at me and said, “I’m still mad at you!”
“Understandable! When you stop being mad at me and start being mad at yourself you will have taken a step towards maturity.”
One of his eyebrows raised as if he was thinking about it. If nothing else I got him to that point…thinking!
Categories: children, coaching, Community, Freedom, Humor, Parenting, Story, Teamwork, Uncategorized, Youth
Tags: baloney, consequences, discipline, intelligent response, lunch detention, middle school, middle school boys, middle school shower room, middle schoolers, penalty, punsihment, Seventh Grade, seventh grade boys, unreasonable
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May 6, 2018
WORDS FROM W.W. May 6, 2018
I’ve usually associated the number “64” with the interstate between Charleston and Huntington, West Virginia, a road that often has the feel of the Monaco Grand Prix, populated by tensed-up drivers and speeding coal trucks.
Yesterday, however, I hit 64 in birth years. My former high school classmate, Tanya Citti, hit it a day earlier. I should have called her up to get a scouting report on its impact.
I’m not sure that I’ve ever had as a wild a birthday as number 64! I’d better clarify what “wild” means in case anyone thinks I took a roll of quarters to a casino slot machine, or went to a local bar and downed a series of Woodford Reserve Kentucky bourbon shots.
“Wild” began with about eighty middle school track team members meeting to travel to the league meet at 7:30 in the morning, our final meet of the year. Being the 7th Grade Girls coach I was responsible for about twenty-five of those students, all giddy and giggly for the day ahead. I layered on the sun block because it was…wait for it!…hot! Snow had canceled our last home meet two days before!
At noon the first hint of weird and wild appeared on my cell phone screen. It was a text from my youngest daughter, Lizi. The text said, “Not a good day over here! What time are you done with the meet?”
“Huh?”
I called. “What’s up?”
“Well, Mom fell in the front yard at Kecia’s house (our oldest daughter), hurt her shoulder, and is at the doctor.”
“Ohh, how did she do that?”
“She stepped in a divot or something…and then-“
“And then?”
“Yes, and then while she was there Reagan (our seven year old granddaughter) fell off the monkey bars at the park a couple blocks away from the doctor’s office and got a gash beside her eye so I had to take her to the Emergency Room at Penrose-St. Francis Hospital.”
“What!!??”
“So she’s probably going to get some stitches and then Mom’s doctor is sending her here to have her shoulder x-rayed.”
“Her doctor is sending her to the same ER as Reagan?”
“Yes! Oh, and happy birthday, Dad!”
Middle school track meets can sometimes seem like they go on forever. Saturday’s seemed to go on forever…and ever…and ever, as the three ladies close and dear to my heart spent their afternoons populating the emergency room! Lizi and Reagan were able to leave about 3:00, but Carol was still there…waiting! When I got home at 4:30 I dropped my stuff, changed clothes, and headed to Penrose to be with her. A new Time magazine came in the mail so I threw it in the car. Murphy’s law says that if you take nothing to read with you you’ll end up being there forever, but if you take a book, the newspaper, or a magazine you’ll never get a chance to open it. Sure enough, when I checked in at the ER Security desk Carol texted me, “Ready to leave!”
The security person took me back to Room 8 and there was my wounded warrior, struggling to get her pants on. I helped her get her right foot through the correct hole, the foot that she informed me had also been sprained in her fall that morning.
A few minutes later, with a boot on her foot, I helped her hobble out to the car, got her buckled in, and headed home.
Lizi and Kecia arrived a little while later, Kecia driving Carol’s car that had still been parked at her house. She, and her husband, Kevin, had been at the Spartan Race that morning and afternoon, an eight mile run with a 100% possibility of getting muddy and dirty as the participants encountered various obstacles and challenges.
They all wished me a happy birthday, and then apologized.
“It’s all right! I’ll have another one next year!”
Next year…65! And my mind went to another highway, I-65, the interstate I traveled numerous times from Chicago to Indianapolis. A road that does not seem nearly as treacherous and intense as 64, and I thought to myself, hopefully number 65 will more resemble that road than the wild ride 64 was!
Categories: children, coaching, Community, Grandchildren, Humor, love, marriage, Parenting, Story, Uncategorized, Youth
Tags: accidents, birthday, birthday celebration, celebrating birthdays, emergency room, I-64, Kentucky bourbon, middle school, middle school sports, middle school track meet, middle schoolers, Monaco Grand Prix, the unexpected, turning 64, Woodford Reserve
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May 1, 2018
WORDS FROM W.W. May 1, 2018
“Keep us safe from ourselves and the Devil. You’re in charge!” (Matthew 6:13, The Message)
“Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the Evil One!” (Matthew 6:13, NIV)
When I pray I have a habit of praying about the “not yet” right away!
“Lord, give me strength to get through a day of teaching sixth grade language arts!”
“Lord, help me to deal with that person when I have to see him next week!”
My prayer life has been dominated by situations and events that are in my future path. I noticed, however, when Jesus taught his followers how to pray and gave them a modeling prayer to help them understand he talked about the past and the present before he got to the future.
He suggests that we pray about our present needs and our past failures. The present is about the simple and uncomplicated…”bread!”…the essential for now!
The past is about the moments that haunt us, the ill spoken words, and the inaction in those situations where a response was needed. As a Baptist I don’t enter a confessional booth and reveal my transgressions to a priest, and yet that may be a missing element of my faith journey. It becomes too easy to race blindly into the future! When we don’t deal with our past it clouds the clarity of the future.
There are wounds in our memories that haven’t received the treatment of grace and forgiveness. The peripheral vision of our faith walk is lacking because of the blurring of our past. I think Jesus is leading us to get a grip on our past in preparation for our future. Many of us “avoid” the past as if it never happened. My understanding of how God will lead me from here, however, is influenced by the trail of my steps behind me.
This is true for churches, also! If a congregation hasn’t dealt with its past- how it mistreated a staff member, how judgmental it was towards a family dealing with a relational failure, or demeaning it he’d been towards women- it will most assuredly mis-step into its future.
And so Jesus advises us to deal with our history as we pave the path in front of us.
Categories: Bible, children, Christianity, Community, Faith, Freedom, Grace, Jesus, Pastor, Prayer, Story, The Church, Uncategorized, Youth
Tags: confession, confessional booth, dealign with our past, forgiveness, future, Lead us not into temptation, Matthew 6:13, past trangressions, prayer instruction, prayer life, repentance, temptation, The Lord's Prayer
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