Words from WW Blog

I was a long-distance runner through high school and college, and continuing into my adult years. In the fall of 1978, my friend, Stan Brown, and I decided to run the Chicago Marathon. It began at 8:00 in the morning and wound through the streets of downtown Chi-town, finishing with the last few miles along the lakefront.

Several thousand runners lined up for the 26.2 mile adventure. There were so many runners that the start encompassed two different streets that merged back together a few blocks later.

Excitement filled the air as the runners awaited the starter’s signal. Whooping and hollering expressed the adrenalin in the crowd. The verbal expressions continued for the first mile or so and then most of the runners were silent.

For a number of the participants, reality hit them square in the face. Their lungs and legs were letting them know that a marathon is not a sprint. It’s an experience in perseverance that taxes a person’s mental, physical, and emotional limits.

It seems that a number of people entered this weird time of a pandemic with a sprinter’s mentality, not prepared for the long stretch of slowed pacing. A sprinter’s mentality believes the finish line is already in sight from the beginning. A marathon mentality understands that after this mile, this day, there will be another mile, another day. It’s a slow journey in what seems an endless direction.

I had a teammate on my college cross-country team who never quite understood pacing. The starter’s pistol would fire and he would sprint the first two hundred yards, always leading the pack of runners. But our race was four and five miles long. As his lungs screamed at him after two hundred yards it occurred to him that there was still 97.5% of the race to run.

In our little effort-fast results culture, there’s been little preparation for a long journey. We’re a society of sprinters, fatigued by a finish line nowhere in sight. Many of us have come to the realization that we need to be fueled by prayer, fitted with patience, and focused on the promises of God.

I finished that Chicago Marathon…not well, but I finished! The last four miles I had cramps in both legs and looked like a stick figure trying to take each step. I remember the crowd of bystanders cheering each finisher on.

And here’s the thing! I was stronger because I finished. That is, I knew that if I could do a marathon then I had the God-given strength to see other challenges to their completion.

This marathon pandemic may be able to teach us a lot about our resolve and character. Just don’t sprint!

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I’m working on a 1,500 piece puzzle right now of a lion. Spiritual-types think it is Aslan from C.S. Lewis’s The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe. Me? I think it is a huge challenge for this color-blind 66-year-old. 

Slowly, I’m putting things together. Aslan, if you will, has half a face so far. His hairy mane is a bit patchy, but it’s starting to lose its gaps. As I’m looking at the shape of each piece’s connecting tabs and pockets (Jigsaw puzzle terms), I’m making discoveries. Sometimes a piece connects into another piece, but the picture it creates doesn’t make sense. Puzzle working is a learning experience, filled with trial and error, pondering, envisioning, and adjusting.

The emphasis, however, is on learning what makes sense and what has the danger of looking like a Picasso painting. As I learn the picture becomes clearer and the confusion lessens.

It seems that such a puzzle mindset would benefit those who are navigating the pandemic puzzle. It began with an outline of the problem. All of a sudden two pieces that look like they could be linked draw attention. Learnings from Singapore and South Korea seem to fit together in a pattern. The blank number of cases in several island nations hint at another learning.

A new testing procedure and a drug that has worked on a number of infected patients who had no other options bring together some clarity in one of the corner areas. This tab seems to lock into this pocket.

The more we listen the more we learn. The more we observe and facilitate discussion and dialogue the clearer the face of the virus’s makeup.

Back to my Aslan, sometimes I call Carol in to help me see the colors or at least explain what colors are what in each piece. I am not so hung up on having to complete all 1,500 pieces with no one else’s input, that I’m resistant to asking someone who can tell the difference between red and green.

After all, it’s about completing the puzzle, not be puzzled by its confusing blend of shades.

I may be wrong, but it seems that the pandemic puzzle is more about cooperation rather than competition. It’s more about finding the solutions rather than feeling the necessity of having sole ownership of the solution.

Like Aslan, may courage be evident in the face of our resolve.

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The designs are creative, almost fashion statements. Wearing masks is the new frontier. I saw a man this week whose mask made it look like he had a baby pacifier in his mouth. And then you’ve got a young lady making me look twice at the bright pair of red lips decorating the front of her mask, and another guy who looks like he’s got a set of extra-wide choppers smiling for eternity.

Me? My mask is as plain Jane as you can get. I don’t need extra attention. I just want to get by.

What intrigues me still- mystifies me, if you will- is the number of people who still walk face-naked into the supermarket. Or Walgreen’s!!! Walgreen’s, you know that place where you go to buy medicine when you’re not feeling well, as well as pick up prescriptions. Hello!

My wife heard an interesting analogy about wearing a mask compared to not. The person compared it to two naked people urinating on each other. That’s how it is when two non-masked people are within a couple of feet of one another in a store. She went on to say that if one person had pants on and the other peed on him, at least he’d have the pants as a layer of protection. But if both people had pants on and urinary issues, no one would have the other person’s…business on him.

Disturbing visual there, but it draws the importance of wearing a mask to the forefront. At Lowe’s today, an unmasked man who looked to be about 60 was walking into the store holding hands with a lady about his age- I’m assuming his wife- and she was wearing a mask! Okay, what’s wrong with that picture?

Listen! I’m not infatuated with masks. I began running again this week, but I don’t wear a mask as I’m getting red in the face during my run. When I take my morning walk around the neighborhood at 7:30 I’m unmasked. Ain’t nobody else out at 7:30, and if I come upon someone we make room for one another.

Masks may be here to stay for a while. We may get to a point where we recognize one another by the design on their mask. I need to get a Michigan State Spartan mask. If the Spartans play bad, at least I can hide my face behind the mask. If they take it to the Wolverines I can wear it like I’m a proud papa.

I wonder if guys whose pants always seem to be sagging wear sagging masks. Or maybe they pull them further up their face for the contrast.

The only thing I don’t like about wearing a mask is that it sometimes causes my glasses to fog up. It’s kinda’ strange having to pull my eyeglasses off so I can see better.

I need to be honest. I’m starting to make judgments about people on the basis of their missing masks at King Soopers supermarket. Are they that determined to exercise their personal freedom that they feel they have the right to sniff the cantaloupes? That just doesn’t seem right. Seeing someone sniffing the shampoo with an unmasked extra-long snoot makes me want to hurl…and I’m wearing a mask as I’m gagging!

Bottom line: Be safe. Be responsible. Be anonymous!

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WORDS FROM W.W.                                          April 27, 2020

Driving by the empty movie theater parking lot is strange. It brings me back to the days of boarded-up Blockbusters. Who would have thought that would happen? And now who knows when theaters will have vehicles parked in them for the evening showings?

Maybe it’s time to bring back the drive-in theaters!

When I was growing up in Winchester, Kentucky, my parents would load my brother, sister, and me into the car and head out to Sky Vue Drive-In Theater on Lexington Road, just a few miles out of town.

We’d already have our pajamas on, complete with fitted feet. (To this day I can’t wear socks on my feet at night. Maybe it goes back to the memories of their incarcerations in those smothering pajama feet!) Because we were PJ’ed we were never allowed to play on the swing set and slide down front by the giant screen. Mom and Dad were wise people. I’m sure they thought about three sweaty kids smelling up the Ford and making the family outing seem like we were in a middle school boy’s lockerroom.

It seems that I, being the youngest, always sat in the front seat between Mom and Dad. I was the insurance that they wouldn’t start smooching and causing my brother and sister, sitting behind them, to start gagging.

Mom would have popped popcorn and Dad had gathered a few bottles of RC Cola for the trip. The images of a dancing soft drink and bucket of popcorn trying to lure people to the little white stone building that served as the concession stand didn’t work on us. Mom made good popcorn anyway. We always ate it on Sunday nights as we watched The Ed Sullivan Show. Sky Vue outings were the only other time Mom would make it.

I remember watching The Bridge Over The River Kwai at the Sky Vue. I think we may have seen an Elvis Presley movie there once or twice, as well. Presley didn’t impress me as much as the army movies. Being four years old, gyrating hips weren’t understood yet. As Elvis swayed, I never thought about what my mom was thinking about. Still don’t!

Dad would hang the speaker on the driver’s side window and, if the mosquitoes weren’t too bad, keep the windows down most of the way to allow the pleasant Bluegrass breeze to float through.

Sky Vue always had a double-feature, but I never kept my eyes open for more than the first five minutes of the second movie. I’d lean against one of my parents and drift off into a distant Dreamland, where PayDay’s and Pepsi’s were the main menu items.

And then I’d wake up the next morning in my bed, magically transported there sometime during my slumber.

Those were good days. The Sky Vue opened in 1948 and finally closed in 2014. Judging from the last Yelp reviews, its closure was probably about twenty years past when it should have. But, maybe, just maybe, it’s time for drive-ins to make a comeback. Maybe it’s time for new families to be able to Bluetooth in the sound of the main feature on the screen, and girlfriends snuggle up to their latest squeeze, who is having a hard time staying focused on the film.

I’d go. Maybe even position the grandkids in the backseat! The only problem now would be that I’d be asleep five minutes into the second feature and they’d still be wide awake.

I notice it at the four-way stops around our neighborhood. Perhaps it’s because the pandemic has lessened the amount of traffic, but my three-times-a-day walks have me seeing numerous kinda’ stops. That is, people slow down a little bit as if the stop sign is a suggestion.

That’s an indication, in my opinion, that the lessening of restrictions about to happen is also a bad sign. Our governor has emphasized that people should exercise self-control and continue to observe safe social distancing, as well as “staying safer at home.”

In our culture of entitlement, however, there will be numerous folk who will use this easing of the mandates to do what they very well please. Others be damned is the battle cry for many.

Call this optimist a skeptic, but I see it in the supermarket. A little step of courtesy and community concern like wearing a mask is ignored by so many. Here are the store employees all wearing protection gear (masks and gloves) and unmasked Johnny Cool comes waltzing in as if the world revolves around him.

That’s why I’m uneasy about reopening. Many businesses have thought through it and are ready with new procedures and safeguards. I applaud that. One restaurant owner said his establishment would go to a “no cash” system where the customer could pay, using an app. He also said the menu would be available on cell phones, instead of using paper menus. That’s thinking ahead of the best ways to run a business and keep people safe.

The problems are the Johnny Cool’s and Betty Not-So-Bright’s who feel enlightened to exercise their free will at the expense of others.

Self-control is an antiquated term and characteristic of our culture. In Scripture, it’s almost always written about as being an indicator of maturity, wisdom, and a part of someone who has a consistent spiritual journey. Conversely, the lack of self-control is a sign of depravity and stupidity.

There have been encouraging signs of how people have stepped up to help one another, contributing food, money, and creativity. It’s just all of those self-absorbed, it’s-all-about-me folk that turn his grey hair greyer.

And, let me tell ya’, I’m very careful crossing streets!

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I stood in front of a class of eighth-graders this past September 11th. The topic that day was what had happened on that day in 2001. I talked to them about how 9/11 changed things, airport security in particular. Some of them took on surprising facial expressions when I told them that people used to be able to meet their arriving family members at the gate, as well as escort them all the way to the gate for their departures.

“9/11 changed things.”

The coronavirus

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, likewise, is changing things and will change things. Despite our incredible reluctance to admit it, things will not return to what and how they were.

Hopefully, faith communities will grasp that. Churches sometimes have a difficult time accepting that things change. Even as the elephant has thrashed around in the sanctuary, some communities of faith will insist that we need to keep things as they are.

Well, like the Titanic, that vessel is no more!

Streaming worship services are here and they are not going away. When most churches are able to gather in physical worship centers again, streaming the worship service will be an additional way of being connected to the body of believers. It is not just a temporary solution. In fact, many churches will increase their audience because it is not restricted to a geographical area. Today I listened to my friend in ministry, Chuck Moore, speak to his virtual congregation of First Baptist Church of Savoy/Champaign, Illinois. I’m a healthy 16-hour drive away, but I was in the same room with him.

Most of us long for the intimate surroundings of a sanctuary, but we’ve learned, in this time of change, that we can worship online with our faith community and it’s okay. There will be those, like during the worship war battles over hymns and praise music in the 1980s, who will scoff at the new ways, and probably send nasty letters (ironically, the email type) to their pastors about how disgusted they are with all these newfangled ideas. They may even leave the church to find another that is anchored to the past.

So be it! Let them climb into another sinking boat and pretend that it’s a Viking River Cruise.

Things change, and some faith communities are feeling the chains be broken loose during this time as they have to be innovative and creative. The choir has left the building, not virtual choirs are appearing. Last Sunday I listened to a virtual choir from Nashville sing an amazing version of It Is Well With My Soul as a part of the Mason, Michigan Community Church Easter worship. Then I found the video on YouTube and played it another five times. Just think, I’m in Colorado Springs watching the service of a church in Michigan as they air a Tennessee choir connected by about 35 iPhones singing a song.

I remember when my grandparents, farmers in Eastern Kentucky, got indoor plumbing. Before that my grandmother had used a handpump and we’d go to a well in the frontyard and lower a bucket to get a nice cool drink of water. When the indoor plumbing went in my grandfather never went back to the outhouse behind the garden. Indoor plumbing was the new norm for him, and my grandmother didn’t quite know what to do with herself when she just had to turn a faucet on.

Things change, and the churches that don’t recognize that this pandemic has changed from now on how we do ministry will be left holding the bucket.

I can’t help myself and I’m getting a crick in my neck because of it!

Yesterday, ESPN’s Adam Shefter was talking about NFL draft possibilities…who could be picked early and who could be picked late…and all I could focus on was the books on the shelves behind him. There was Louie Zamperini’s story, Unbroken, that I’ve seen in the theatre and read the book. Other titles seemed harder to make out so I moved closer to the TV and leaned my head to the right, trying to read titles.

It’s my ADD indicator. Put books on shelves behind the NBC News Correspondent and I don’t even hear him saying that the sky is falling. There’s David McCullough’s 1776! And what was that? Doris Kearns Goodwin’s Team of Rivals! Classic!

I have yet to locate a James Patterson novel showing on one of those shelves. Probably located lower so the camera doesn’t pick it up. I did see a Daniel Silva on one shelf, trying to be hidden by the cookbooks on either side.

Thankfully the remote shoots don’t last too long. Otherwise, I’d be walking around with a warped view of my surroundings.

Some shelves have more literary works than others. Some are more opinions lengthened to 300 pages of print. Shefter had some classic-looking book covers whose contents I couldn’t make out. Perhaps they were classics like The Tale of Two Cities and The Last of the Mohicans. More likely, they were George Plimpton’s Paper Lion and Out of My League.

Fox News shelves tilted to the right and CNN readjusted my neck posture to the left. Al Roker had shelves of LPs.

Meanwhile, the news and commentaries resonated at background noise as I concentrated on what was in the background. I wonder…I just wonder…if I sent a copy of my book, Red Hot: New Life in Fleming, to Adam Shefter would he put it on the second shelf from the top, right between Michael Lewis’s Moneyball and Grisham’s Calico Joe? I’d even autograph it for him!

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WORDS FROM W.W.                                                  April 12, 2020

                          The Disciples socially distanced themselves on that Resurrection Sunday, but Jesus came to them and said: “Peace be with you!”

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Let’s be honest! We don’t want it to seem like we’re lacking faith, and yet we’re disturbed by those who seem dead set on gathering in mass in church buildings for a Sunday morning worship service!

We believe in the Jesus who is always with us, and we are anchored to the Jesus who rose from the dead. Part of that faith journey is believing that we can worship together, despite practicing social distance.

Should we begrudge those who seem committed to massing together in a sanctuary, as if they are the Hebrew people of Moses’s day, putting the blood of a lamb on their doorframes and having COVID-19 blow past them as it hunts for its next place to land? Is it unspiritual of us to believe they have taken that step of faith off a cliff?

There are enough issues for people of faith to disagree about, and here’s one more point of contention to add to the heap.

So what are the confusing elements that are the bones of contention?

First of all, there’s the proclamation of some that they are being a witness to their communities and cities by continuing to come together and worship in the freedom of Christ, not being prisoners of their homes. The reality, however, is that the only people impressed by their witness are those who are gathered in their sanctuaries. The opinion of others ranges from “those crazy religious fanatics” to “It figures they would do something as dumb as that!”

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Having a witness includes the elements of integrity and humility.  That leads into the second bone of contention: the attitude of many of those who are gathering together. When I say “gather together’, I’m not referring to those who have decided to do drive-in church services this Sunday. I applaud their creativity, their seeking that middle ground of gathering together, but wanting to be safe and be seen as being safe.

Unfortunately, those who are gathering in mass in church buildings are coming off as either spiritually arrogant or deliberately thumbing their noses toward the governing bodies (local, state, and national). They are taking church and state separation to the extreme. The opinion about the multitudes watching them from a distance is that they couldn’t care less about the communities they live in; that they are more enamored by how many people are still flocking to their buildings on Sunday mornings, than with the risen Christ who can speak to people in the quiet of the living room.

Those of us who are worshiping by watching a worship service being streamed onto our laptops are wondering if we’re simply spiritual vagrants or have we found a good balance between faith and that other thing God gave us…common sense?