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The Courage To Stay In The Middle

August 19, 2014

WORDS FROM W.W.                                                           August 18, 2014

                                  

The worst person and place to be in a two-teamed shaving cream fight is the judge in the middle. After a few moments of each team “creaming” each other the judge, invariably, gets pounced on by both teams. The judge comes out wearing more shaving cream than anybody else.

The middle of something is becoming an awkward place to be. People on both sides of you want to pull you in their direction. When you’re committed to staying middle you become the easiest target.

In shaving cream battles it’s fun and humorous, but in the growing chasm of opinion that our culture is experiencing staying in the middle takes courage.

I’m sure some- dare I say most- will disagree with me. I have Facebook friends who are conservatives and Facebook friends who are liberals…Republican and Democrat…Tea Partiers and Starbuckers. I have FB friends who are pro-life and others who are pro-choice…those who attend church every Sunday and those who consider going about once a decade. In other words, I relate to people on both sides of the tug-of-war, looking for common ground with all.

Some of my richest times in ministry- spiritually speaking, not financially (GIve me a break!)- were the years I pastored in the Lansing, Michigan area and lunched every other Wednesday with two other pastors, Chuck and Tom. Even though we’ve gone our different ways because of ministry changes I still consider them to be my two best friends in ministry. One was fairly conservative ( not “Bob Jones conservative, but still leaning a little to the right) and one was fairly liberal. We toss out those labels quite often in Christian circles, but Chuck, Tom, and I never worried about our differences nearly as much as we valued our similarities. I was “the middle man” of the three, the moderate.

That experience, lunching with two guys at Finley’s Restaurant every other Wednesday for seven years, tells me that the middle doesn’t have to be a conflicted place…if there is an unquestionable commitment to respect and value one another, and be willing to clearly listen more than the compelled to speak.

Don’t misunderstand what I’m saying! I’m not minimizing the importance of people having strong opinions, just the tendency to think that their belief, stance, or opinion is the only valid one.

Jesus had strong beliefs, but he refused to be in anyone’s camp except his father’s. That put him at odds with someone in just about every teaching he gave. If there was one group that Jesus was the most consistently identified with it was the poor, widowed, and diminished. He reacted against excluding people because of their afflictions, mistakes, gender, and ethnic group.

I’m a “middler”, and I find it increasingly uncomfortable and inconvenient to be there, but I would be uncomfortable being labeled a conservative or a liberal. If you are in the middle you may be seen by one group as being a liberal, and another group as a conservative. People’s view of who you are must not change who you REALLY are.

I can watch Fox News or CNN equally without feeling guilty. I can sit in conversational fellowship with my neighborhood pastor friends from different denominations and be enriched by the diversity. I can partner with the Mormon principal of the elementary school down the street to help make our community better with a sense of confidence that we are on the same page.

As our culture becomes more polarized I believe the gospel has opportunities to draw people together. It may take time and effort, but it is….still is…our source of hope.

Categories: Bible, Christianity, Faith, Freedom, Grace, Jesus, love, Pastor, Story, The Church, Uncategorized
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Dad Time

August 12, 2014

WORDS FROM W.W.                                                             August 12, 2014

                                               “Dad Time”

I’ve been blessed with a great father, Laurence Hubert Wolfe. Dad is now 86 and moving a little slower these days, but he was able to fly from Ohio to Colorado Springs and spend about a week and a half with us.

My mom passed away last September. Dad had been her primary caregiver for the last few years of her life…feeding her meals, sitting by her bed, sometimes having to be firm with her about taking medications and drinking fluids. Because of his energies being directed to her he hadn’t been able to visit us in Colorado. This trip was an opportunity for him to spend some uninterrupted time with his grandkids and great grandkids, and it was…great…deeply meaningful…and impacting.

Our three year old granddaughter, Reagan, came to the point where she looked forward to seeing “Papaw” each day. One day she asked her mom when they were going to see Papaw and her mom said they weren’t going to see him that day. She was not happy!

One morning she entered into our house saying “Papaw, Papaw!” She breathed in through her nose and said, “I know he’s here! I can smell him!”

Dad was amazed and amused by the conversations. The uniqueness of each of his grandchildren and “greats” was obvious to him. He often smiled in satisfied appreciation. We had three meals during the week at the restaurant that our son is chef at. Papaw loved the fish and chips. They are probably not on his diet back home, but we put diets aside for a few days. His grandson personally fixed his meal.

Our oldest daughter had us over for dinner twice during his stay. The green bean casserole reminded him of meals my mom would cook. He visited her fourth grade classroom and was pleased to see a few of the ways she effectively teaches the youngest generation.

Our youngest daughter traveled up from Albuquerque for the weekend to spend a little time with her Papaw. We took him to an air show, and we did it not so much to see the planes but just to be with him, and to see his delight in meeting one of the Tuskegee Airman who was a guest there.

We talked about this and that. He retold some stories that I had heard a few times already, and also revealed some family history that I wasn’t familiar with.

We’d drive my Civic around the area, visiting the Air Force Academy, The Classical Academy where I coach basketball, as well as simple trips to Lowe’s and Walgreen’s and Albertson’s supermarket.

A few times during his stay he wasn’t up for any adventures. He just wanted to sit a while and read. Other times he just wanted to watch CNN as the events in Gaza and Iraq unfolded. On Sunday we watched the PGA championship for a solid two hours.

He ate watermelon and cantaloupe just like our family did in my growing ups days. Watermelon was a more prized treat than ice cream!

When I picked up Dad at the airport he was being wheeled down the terminal in a wheelchair. It’s a little difficult to see your dad in a wheelchair for the first time. When we dropped him off back at the airport I watched him get in a wheelchair again. It was a harsh visible sign that Dad is in his life home stretch.

The readers of this blog don’t quite understand how deeply respected my dad is by our three children. It’s hard to read something and pick up on the underlying value that they place on their relationships with Papaw.

They will remember this visit from him not for places that we went together, but rather time spent with him…sitting on the couch beside him…hearing his chuckles…listening to his accent.

Dad time…priceless!

Categories: children, Humor, love, Parenting, Pastor, Story, Uncategorized, Youth
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Coffee With Jesus…Sixth Cup”

August 4, 2014

WORDS FROM W.W.                                                    August 4, 2014

                             

“It’s been a few days. Have you abstained from the caffeine?”

“Just been busy,” I replied to the Messiah. “Things have been…you know…crazy!” The two of us hadn’t gotten together for coffee for almost two weeks. “I’m sorry! I’ll try to get back into a regular coffee time with you.”

“You don’t need to apologize.”

“Well…I know you’re always available, and here I am taking two weeks to get together with you. I feel a little embarrassed about that.”

“Get over it!”

“Okay…so you’re saying my sin is taken care of.”ht

“Do you think it was a sin?”

“I’m assuming so. It seems that if I’m feeling a little guilty about something that there has to be sin lurking somewhere underneath it.”

“Could it be that it’s more about how you’ve been conditioned…how you were raised…what the church taught you growing up? Things like that.”

“So you’re saying that I’ve been conditioned to feel guilty?”

“In some ways. Were you told growing up that you should be at church Sunday morning, Sunday evening, and Wednesday night?”

“A few thousand times. You know the saying, Jesus…if you go to church on Sunday morning, you love the pastor…if you go on Sunday night, you love the church…but if you go on Wednesday night, you love the Lord.”

“So when you miss spending time with me you start wondering if you really love me?”

“Yes…it comes back around to that again.”

“Why do lovers of God think performance is so important? Why can’t they rest with an assurance that they are in love with the Lord, and the Lord is in love with them?”

“And when you say “they”…you’re saying “me?”

“Good catch.”

“Because we’ve…been conditioned that way. I’m operating out of a mindset that says this is what it means to be a good Christian boy. It’s hard to break out of that understanding. It’s almost like I feel I’m betraying my roots, all the people who invested in my life.”

“So, to put it bluntly, you’re more conditioned by your culture than transformed by God.”

“Wow…that was pretty blunt. And it’s dead on. To use a rough example…it’s kind of like when I eat oatmeal now. Growing up we always put graham crackers in our oatmeal. The other day I was at Starbucks around breakfast time and I decided to get a bowl of oatmeal. Do you realize that Starbucks doesn’t serve graham crackers with their oatmeal. They give you raisins and nuts to put in it. I protested…to myself…that this wasn’t oatmeal, but since I paid $2.60 for it I went ahead and ate it. Do you know something? It was pretty good! But I had to break out of that “conditioned understanding” of what oatmeal is.”

“You put graham crackers in your oatmeal?”

“Yes.”

“That is weird! And you call yourself a Christian!”

He gave me a slight grin.

TO BE CONTINUED

 

Categories: Bible, Christianity, Community, Faith, Freedom, Grace, Humor, Jesus, love, Pastor, Story, The Church, Uncategorized, Youth
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Coffee With Jesus…Third Cup

July 11, 2014

WORDS FROM W.W.                                                   July 11, 2014

 

                                       “Coffee With Jesus…Third Cup”

 

“Refill?”

“Why not? Helps the pain get swallowed.”

“Let’s talk about joy.”

The shift startles me for a moment. The look I give Jesus reveals my surprise.

“It’s okay to experience joy, you know.”

“I know…I know, it’s just that it doesn’t rise to the surface of conversation very often. There always seems to be a problem to focus on, a difficulty to voice concern about, someone’s disgruntlement.”

“Well…let’s talk about joy!”

“I don’t know where to start.”

“How do you experience joy? Let’s start with that.”

“All you can eat jumbo shrimp.”

“Come on! You can do better than that.”

“How so?”

“That’s a craving you have produced by your taste buds. Let’s get to joy.”

“Jesus, you make it so difficult.”

“…when you prefer it to be easy?”

I pause. “Yes, probably so.”

“Most of life is spent “taking it easy”, so to speak.”

“What brings me joy…my kids, my grandkids, my wife, and even a 93 year old man named Rex.”

“What about them brings you joy?”

“The things they say, the things they do.”

“Don’t other people their ages say and do the same things?”

“I’m sure they do.”

“So perhaps the things they say and do are a ripple effect of what brings you joy. The joy comes from the relationships you have with them.”

“I suppose so.”

“Could it be that the relational joy you experience with them might simply be a delightful shadow of the joy your soul experiences when it is conversing with our heavenly father?”

“I’ll have to take a sip of coffee and think about that one.”

“Understand what I’m saying. My father created you and everyone else to be relational. The delight you experience when your grandkids make you chuckle is a small expression…and experience…of the joy that echoes out of your intimacy with God.”

“Then why don’t people talk about that more? Why do most of my conversations, especially in church, deal with solving problems, budget demands, and people’s warped view on life?”

“You live in a world of pessimists who, given the choice…to use a Biblical phrase, would choose to return to Egypt rather than go forward into a promised future.”

“Because they were familiar with Egypt.”

“ For some people history looks more glorious the further away you travel from it.”

“So how do I help others focus more on joy than sorrow?”

“This isn’t another “how to” problem to add to the agenda.”

“Okay, how should I phrase the question then?”

“Ahhh…another “how to” question rephrased slightly!”

“Sorry…it comes from living in a age of manuals, and “Dummy Guides.”

“Let me encourage you to begin with you!”

“How so…I mean, explain!”

“Instead of worrying about others, which as a pastor you’re ingrained to do, what about yourself? Why would you desire a joyous soul?”

 

TO BE CONTINUED

Categories: Bible, Christianity, Community, Faith, Jesus, love, Pastor, Prayer, Story, The Church, Uncategorized
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My Blankie

June 30, 2014

WORDS FROM W.W.                                                          June 30, 2014

 

                                             

 

There are some things that stay with you even though they don’t make sense. Kind of like that old TV that is sitting in the family room. It’s been a part of the family. You don’t just take a part of the family to the dump!

My “blankie” falls even more securely into this category. My blankie is my blanket. It’s been my blanket since…about August of 1979. I say “about” because I married my wife on July 28, 1979. She brought the blanket into the marriage relationship. It was hers. You know that saying, “What’s hers is his!”  I actually don’t know if that is a saying or not, but it should be.

Soon after July 28 “the blankie” transferred partial ownership to me. That means, it crept to my side of the bed at night.

There’s gold, and then there are those few things that are more valuable than gold. My “blankie” is threaded gold.

When we go on driving vacations I take it with me. I don’t take it places if I’s flying. I don’t trust the airlines that much.

I took it on a mission trip to British Columbia…three days drive away! I took it to Park City, Utah last summer.

I took it to camp where I was being the camp pastor. I needed some form of comfort in the midst of a multitude of middle school students, many whom were discovering that there was an opposite sex that could offer them a different kind of comfort.

I took it to Arizona and South Dakota. For thirty-five years it has just felt…right!

Now it is beginning to look pitiful, like the family dog that just lays around and whimpers. My blanket has a few holes in it, frayed ends, faded patterns, and stuffing that is settling in the same spot, like a middle-aged man whose body has decided to most gather around the waist and stomach.

The other thing that makes this unique…and weird, is that my grandmother made incredible quilts. Sixty years after the fact they are in almost-mint condition. They are warm and comfortable, memories for me of my Mamaw Helton who had “settler skills.” That means that she could have survived on the frontier is she wanted. Quilt-making was just one of her gifts. She could kill a chicken, clean it, and fry it up for dinner almost as fast as my Papaw could drive to the grocery and buy a chicken from the butcher. She kept the eastern Kentucky farm going that she and my Papaw owned.

I slept with those quilts as I was growing up. Somewhere along the line after July 28, 1979 I switched over to the “blankie.”

My wife sometimes thinks I love my blanket more than her. That’s not true! Although my blankie doesn’t kick me at night when I snore. She reminds me that the blanket was hers first, but I remind her that possession is nine-tenths of the law.

When I die I hope my blankie is still around. If so I want to it to be buried with me. I don’t want to have to worry about wearing a suit as I’m all laid out in the casket. When do I ever wear a suit while I’m laying down in this lifetime? My mom would never permit such a thing. I can hear her say, “It’s going to get all wrinkled!”

So just cover me with my blankie. Throw a tee shirt on me just in case chest hair is upsetting to some, but drape my tired perishing physique in my tired perishing blanket and let me rest in comfortable.

I know I’ll be walking the streets of gold in heaven, but if I get to nap in paradise I hope I can have my threadbare gold wrapped around me. It only makes sense. It fits…comfortably!…in my picture of perfection!

Categories: children, Death, Humor, love, marriage, Story
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Lost and Found

June 24, 2014

WORDS FROM W.W.                                                          June 23, 2014

 

                               

 

My life has been filled with lost opportunities and blessed findings. Once in a while the lost comes back to be found.

Or, better yet, the lost is waiting to be found…like the lost and found box at the middle school that is filled with all kinds of coats, hats, watches, and bracelets. Each was forgotten for a while, left to sit until a stranger found it.

There are people who are a part of our lives who disappear around the margins because we forget, we become disengaged and focused on other things and people. And then, later, when we remember, they are no longer there. Neglect has a way of turning friends into acquaintances, and acquaintances into those that we lose track of.

Social media fabricates an atmosphere of connectedness. We are friends with those that we haven’t seen since high school. We comment on a one sentence post and, for some reason, think we are still connected.

In our culture of instant messaging, ironically, it is easier to be lost.

The answer may not be in how many Facebook friends or Twitter followers we have, but rather in having a few friends that we deeply invest in. we seek to find them deeply. The quality of our relationships is much more valuable than the quantity of our relationships.

I think about my life. Who is it that would be greatly effected if I lost my friendship with them? The list gets whittled down quickly, and it is in that downsized list that I find those that I must not lose.

Categories: children, love, Pastor, Story, Uncategorized, Youth
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Our Father

June 20, 2014

WORDS FROM W.W.                                                    June 19, 2014

 

   (I’m doing a month-long writing test with WordPress.Com. Each day we are given a different assignment. Today’s was to open a book to page 29 and write a blog about the first words you see. In fact, we were to write it in letter form.)

 

Pops!

I know it’s weird, but Your name came up in my reading today. Who would have thought your name would be on page 29 of the novel Divergent!

Crazy!

Actually it was “our father” in the second paragraph that got me thinking about you. Since you celebrated your eighty-sixth birthday yesterday perhaps my eyes focused more on finding those words.

I thought I lot about you. The Omaha Steaks should arrive in a couple of days. Living in Colorado so far away from your place within a stone’s throw of the Ohio River makes me a little sad. I wish I could have been there to celebrate with you. Omaha Steaks are about as fitting a tribute as I can find.

Your hamburgers are still the best IN THE WORLD! I have not found any one who can contest that claim. It’s a family memory. My kids miss them just as much as I do.

My sister and brother will always remember special things about you when we say those words: Our father!

We will always remember your tendency to think before you spoke. It was as if you were sorting the words in your head like Scrabble letters, looking for the right combination that would be clear and wise.

Let’s be honest! Mom used up most of the words that were spoken in our household each day, but, Dad, when you spoke it was listened to. Not that we didn’t listen to Mom…just maybe a little less attentively.

That’s another thing that we will always remember about you, Dad! How you honored Mom, especially in the last few years of her life when she was uncomfortable, confused, and sometimes demanding. You sat by her bedside, fed her dinner, changed her when she soiled herself, and listened carefully to the mumbled words she would speak. Your love for 65 years was evident.

Continue to know that your children and grandchildren love you deeply. I wish I was sitting on the couch with you today watching the Reds on TV, talking about Kentucky basketball, and stories that have been told and retold.

We love you, Pops! Your the best!

Fed Ex me a hamburger, would you?

 

Your Son,

Bill Wolfe

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Finding Carol

June 18, 2014

WORDS FROM W.W.                                                         June 18, 2014

 

                                         

 

In my youthful years I lost a lot of young ladies. They would disappear as a result of my cluelessness, being clumsy, and uncertain as to what it meant to court a young lady. One of my friends, who was a bit of a Casanova, gave me some “lines” to use that he was sure would work.

One night I pulled one of them out of the hat. I looked at the attractive eighteen year old brown-haired blonde and asked her, “If I told you that you have a beautiful body would you hold it against me?”

She gave me a confused look that quickly cooled the temperature. If you’re going to use a line on someone make sure they are perceptive enough to understand it.

And then my friend, Jeff Slaga, invited me to a gathering of Young Life kids from Hinsdale Central. He added, “There’s someone I want you to meet.”

The night of the gathering we gathered in the living room of Bud Bylsma’s house to meet and greet the number of high school students who showed up. As we stood around in conversational groups I noticed a young woman with long brown hair arriving, and being instantly greeted by Jeff. She looked very young, and yet I could tell she was not just another one of the high school girls.

To this day I swear that she was scanning the room trying to figure out which one I was. I know…I’m certain…that she had been briefed on the prospective male who would be there that evening.

With all my “lost romances” that night was the beginning of a found relationship as I met Carol Louise Faletti for the first time. She was funny and welcoming. We chatted for most of the evening after that, lost in the new finding.

The funny thing is that we dated for a couple of weeks, decided to date other people, became good friends, and then about a year and a half later found each other again in a new way. The second time around in our dating relationship resulted in an engagement two months after we started dating again, and marriage four months later.

Now our thirty-fifth anniversary is coming up in another month. Three children, two grandkids, and two son-in-laws have come along.

Now two sixty year olds continue to find each other each day, as we walk in the evening together and discover who each of us is, the ideas we think up, the moments of laughter.

Sometimes it is necessary that we lose some people, some young ladies who don’t pick up on our pick-up lines, in order to find the one to walk the journey with.

Categories: children, Humor, love, marriage, Story, Uncategorized, Youth
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Fruitcake

June 13, 2014

WORDS FROM W.W.                                                       June 13, 2014

 

                                            

 

I don’t know which aunt brought it, but it was always there, sitting on the counter in the kitchen just waiting to be sliced into.

I don’t know who came up with the idea of fruitcake, but it was partially good. I didn’t much care for the candied cherries and pineapple pieces that invaded its goodness. The pecans and top side crusts were my favorite parts, but I had to take the good with the bad.

One time I pilfered the exposed inners of the circle of all the pecans I could see. My sin was discovered and atoned for by having to sit in a chair for almost a lifetime before I was paroled.

Fruitcake was always a part of our Christmas. I believed it was one of the Magi gifts brought to the Baby Jesus. I didn’t know what myrrh and frankincense were, so I figure one of them was a foreign name for fruitcake presented on a platter. That’s the only reason I could come up with that it only appeared at Christmas in our house.

It was also the only time during the year that I was allowed to have cake for breakfast, not much of a treat since the pieces of pineapple made my face twitch. A glass of milk and a piece of fruitcake got the day started.

When we weren’t able to go back to my family’s roots in eastern Kentucky at Christmas my mom would whip up a fruitcake at home. I knew when it was coming. The kitchen counter would be layered with the ingredients, all ready to fulfill their purpose. It also was the indication that Christmas wasn’t going to be held in a different state. We wouldn’t be traveling up river past Pomeroy and Gallipolis heading for the crossover into West Virginia and then Kentucky. An absence of pecan bags at home was a sure sign we were going to do some piling in the car.

Fruitcake was a symbol of the mixed blessings of Christmas. It was a gift, good and bad, like opening a box filled with Matchbox cars, and then the next opened gift containg socks and underwear. I never understood why underwear had to be wrapped up…kind of like why fruitcake had to have those pineapple pieces.

I would have been fine with a “fruit-less cake!”

Categories: children, Christmas, Community, Humor, love, Parenting, Story, Uncategorized
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Park Memories

June 13, 2014

WORDS FROM W.W.                                                       June 12, 2014

 

        (Today’s writing assignment in WordPress.com’s “Writing 101” challenge for June was to write a post involving three people- a man, a woman, and an older woman knitting a sweater sitting on a park bench. The story was to offer three different perspectives of what was happening, beginning with the man and ending with the elderly lady. Tough task!)

 

He thought of things past, points of reference in a life that had taken several turns. As he walked with Sue along the park path they had journeyed several hundred times he remembered the conversation they had shared about Johnny.

“He’s no longer a boy, Sue. He’s a young man dressed up like a boy. It’s time to let him go, to let him be.” He felt her hand tighten on his in anxious disagreement. Ever since Johnny had received his high school diploma at the football stadium adjacent to the park he had become more and more determined to join the military forces. Bob understood. He had wrestled with the same decision when he turned eighteen almost three decades ago.

They walked in silence. Most of their walks these past two years had been in silence.  He often got lost in his thoughts as he viewed the white rocked cliffs to his right, thinking about when their son left home for basic training. His face was still not much of a threat to the electric shaver he had received for a graduation present, but he saluted his father as he departed that day.

Sue unconsciously clamped  down hard on Bob’s hand as they walked. She saw an elderly lady up ahead knitting something red. Red was the color of their son’s hair, but it also the color of his blood that spilled out at a roadside bombing in Afghanistan. She knew that when Bob saw the red garment he would breakdown emotionally. It was still so painful. She didn’t fault him for encouraging their son’s decision for military service, but she knew he blamed himself. No words could lessen the pain…so they walked in silence…grieved and bereaved…empty shells whose lives would never be the same.

Mrs. Jones didn’t know this as she knitted. The sweater was for her great grandson who was yet to be born, still tucked away in his mother’s womb. Her grandson was coming home on leave in a month, just about the time that the baby was due to be born. She wanted to make sure it was ready. Her grandson was her hero, fighting in harm’s way for his country’s freedom.

She noticed the couple drawing close. They looked like the walking dead, and then she noticed tears running down the cheeks of the man’s face, and she knew they had lost someone dear. The woman gave her a nod that seemed to carry a blessing with it. It was as if the passing lady who looked so sad was wishing only good things for Mrs. Jones.

Categories: Community, Death, Freedom, love, marriage, Parenting, Story, Uncategorized
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