In Peace

If there's one thing I've learned about myself over the years, it's that I'm a city guy.  Noise.  I kinda like some white noise to make me feel secure.  I grew up in the city, lots of cities. Noisy, dirty, crowded and busy cities.  I wouldn't do well in rural America for long.
      
But, I know too, that I need some peace & quiet now and then (more so as I get older).  With summer coming I'm thinking about one thing:  a vacation in the sun, on the sand, by the surf.  I like surf and sand, that's not too far from the city.

 As much as I wish I lived near the ocean and the beach, there's something about NOT living there all year that makes you yearn for it even more, enjoy it more, and appreciate it more, when you get there.  I took this picture 12 years ago at one of my favorite beaches.  When I look at it, my blood pressure drops about 85 points (give or take).

It reminds me that we need to learn to live at peace, in peace - with a sense of calm - always (not just during summer vacations on the beach).  Believers are suppose to be role models for joy - and your joy brings peace - naturally.
 
In Eccleciates 4, it says: "Better one handful with tranquillity than two handfuls with toil."   I'm not a theologion, but I think that means we should live with less material ambition and stop trying to get more stuff, because it just creates trouble.  Strive for 'tranquility' - it's better than 'toil' anyday.
    
And in 2 Thesalonians 3, Paul says:  "May the Lord of peace himself give you peace at all times and in every way."   That's a good one, as if to say having a sense of 'peace', is what it's all about.

I'm looking for more peace.   Are you?      
     


  

Big Porches

When I build my own house, it'll have a big porch.  I mean a BIG porch - wrap around job, deep, part screened, part open.

What good is it if you don't have a respectable porch to sit on anyway, to watch the cars going by, waving at your neighbors, drinking some lemonade in the summer and hot coffee in the evening, playing cards, gazing at the sky, counting shooting stars?
  
You can chew on some straw, sleep in a rocker, play fetch with the dog - shoot squirrels - whatever.  
 
This is a porch we sat on for 2 days in Louisiana last weekend - visiting MawMaw at 103 years old.  Good times.  You could smell spring in the air.  The days were warm and the evenings were cool.  The towns people didn't know us from Adam, but they waved just the same as they drove by. 
   
When are we going to start sitting on the porch more often?  It's time to do - nothing.  As Paul instructs in 1 Thessalonians 4:11 - "Make it your goal to live a quiet life, minding your own business and working with your hands."

  

My New Boots

Well, they're not for me - they're for some little kid someday.  But I think they look cool next to mine!  He's gonna be a Texan, for sure.
  
I figure we'll go to the rodeo together in the Spring.  We'll go to the Fair in the Fall.  We'll go camping all year round.  Go dirt bik'in in the summer.
      
Maybe we'll just kick some rocks, look for girls to pester.  I'm always digin holes, he can help with that.
  
Whatever - they'll look good and clean up nice.

Grasshoppers & Spring

  I needed a break, so I walked out into the hallway area at work, to sit next to a big glass window that looks out over a beautiful garden area.  I had a piping hot cup of coffee, fresh.  The sun was filtering beautifully through the tree tops and onto a area blanketed with new springtime growth of plants and flowers.
  
It's awesome here in Plano right now.  The perfect 75 degree weather, drops to 55 at night - topdown, windows open weather.

Just fantastic.  Spring is in the air.  All things new and fresh.  The possibilities are endless. 
    
I spotted a little grasshopper feeding on the new vegetation - sitting on top of a green leaf.  I marvelled at its strange beauty - its prehistoric posture.  I envied it being out there while I was in here.  I wanted to be the grasshopper.  Nature at it's best.
      
Just as I was processing all these thoughts, a large black bird swooped down directly in front of the window, and without even touching the ground, picked up the grasshopper and disappeared into the trees above.  It all happened in the time it takes to blink an eye.
      
Ain't spring great?  :)  I'm just saying ......

 (picture taken of artwork at the Ft. Worth Arts Festival last weekend)   

A Madman in Jerusalem ?

Once, I went to Israel and made it to Jerusalem for a 6 hour tour.  I was alone except for 5 other strangers who sat in a minivan while the english speaking tour guide whipped out of Tel-Aviv, and drove 60 klics east to Jerusalem.  When we got to town, he sped around corners, pointed and shouted things like "that's where .....", and "over there to the left is .....",  "on the right at the top of the hill you can see .......".  He did this hundreds of times and I was only catching every third phrase that he spoke.  I had a map and was trying to follow it as he turned right, left, right, left.  I was sea-sick and hot and sticky and thirsty.

Then, very casually, he pointed up a hill to the left and shouted "that's where they crucified Jesus".  Never slowed down, never acknowledged much of anything, just raced on to the next site.  I turned in my seat, now just barely able to make out the hill through the rear window.  This picture is the hill he was pointing at.  (whether it really was the hill, I don't know).
   
It was a big Nothing.  A waste land of dirt and weeds, chain link fencing, electrical wires dangling, an old gas station below, trash everywhere.

I thought to myself - "no, it's impossible - surely there's more to it than that!.  Golgotha is a joke.  Don't they know I'm a tourist looking for the most sacred spot on the planet.  Can't he slow down long enough to let me focus the camera on something worth taking a picture of ...... is there anything worth taking a picture of?"

I became irate.  I'm thinking:  "The Promised Land?  This place sucks!"   And I felt guilty for thinking it.  But I can tell you, if you're looking for the land of Milk and Honey - go to Texas, or California - not Israel.  Even the beaches in Tel-Aviv are nasty - but maybe for people who don't know any better, they'll do.  What is everyone fighting for over here?  And by the way:  someone clean-up my hill!
     
Preachers use stuff like this to make a point in sermons on Sunday morning.  Like:  'it was the worst of places where Jesus came, in the worst of circumstances, for the worst of people - like you ......'  Ever heard that one before?
      
I think way back when Moses and Joshua were alive - it was an incredible place of beauty.  Then, a couple thousand years later when Jesus showed up in person - it wasn't so nice, but not too bad.  Then, a couple thousand years later when I showed up - the devil had done a lot of damage, because that's what the devil does.  He destroys beauty.  He belittles what really matters.  He takes our focus off 'The Hill' - and onto the pavement.
        
Golgotha wasn't a joke.  Jesus wasn't just some cool guy in flip-flops,  and he sure wasn't just a great teacher or philosopher.

I like how CS Lewis puts it:
"I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him:  "I'm ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don't accept His claim to be God."  That is the one thing we must not say.  A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher.  He would either be a lunatic - on a level with the man who says he is a poached egg - or else he would be the Devil of Hell.  You must make your choice.  Either this man was, and is, the Son of God:  or else a madman or something worse.  You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill Him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God.  But let us not come with any patronising nonsense about His being a great human teacher.  He has not left that open to us."   
 
We should all be 'Madmen in Jerusalem' - crazy for Jesus.  He died on a sorry little nothing of a dirty hill - for us. 
 


 
        


     

Spaghetti

 

I think I'm allergic to pasta - really.  Or, maybe it's that I eat so much of it - everytime - that my stomach just can't handle it, and my body's defense system sends messages to my brain to shut down every moving part until the problem is solved (it takes about 8 hrs to recover).  I don't know.  But I love spaghetti and when it's in the  room, I can't stay away from it until it's gone.

Just ask Candy (my sister).  Every Monday night I go to Candy's for spaghetti.  She'll tell you, I'm just a pig when it comes to her spaghetti.  I can't help it - it's that good.  We all eat, then she makes up a special dessert, and we all watch '24' together.  "Jack Bauer" gets the bad guy, blows up a lot of stuff, and saves the world. Life is very good on Monday nights.
  
A few years back I used to be lucky enough to travel to Wash D.C. to have "Tuesday Night Dinner" with my other sister Cindy.  Oh ya - it was good too.  Don't tell anyone, but there were at least 2 occasions where I 'engineered' a business trip to D.C. just to eat there on Tuesday night.  I was crashing the party of an established group of young kids - they always wondered why I was there and when I was going to leave - but it didn't bother me - I was eating large.   (thanks Cindy!).
   
So for now -  allergic or not, I'm going for it - every Monday night - as long as she'll tolerate me (and the rest of us).  It's just that good.  So Candy, please, for the love of spaghetti and the world, don't stop the insanity!
        
 

FOCUS: Insert 25 cents, Turn Knob To Right

I'm distracted easily (that's an understatement).  We all are - right?  I've learned that my best chance of accomplishing anything during the day, is to start out the morning with a pen and paper (usually a Starbucks napkin) and list the things I 'have' to do today, and maybe list a few things I'd like to do.  Then I keep that piece of paper with me, next to the laptop, or on the seat of the car.

Tomorrow, I'll do it again - start over.  It's not monthly or weekly.  It's an everyday thing, and it only takes a minute.  That napkin helps to keep me focused.  By 5 pm I throw it away - and I usually don't get it all done - but I've done more than I would have if I didn't have the napkin..
  
I have other lists:  things I need to do around the house; places I want to go; life goals.  But I only look at these lists now and then.
 
So every morning I have to drop the quarter into the slot (like buying the cup of coffee), and I have to turn the knob to the right (make my list).  Then I can focus.  It's amazing what you can see!  No matter how good you might think you are at structuring your life to accomplish the most in a given day - you're likely not good enough to pull it off - unless you drop the quarter, turn the knob and focus.
   
And let God help with your vision for the day.  This is something I have to work on myself - big time.  In today's "My Utmost for His Highest", Oswald Chambers says "If you select your own spot to be planted, you will prove yourself to be unproductive, empty.  However, if you allow God to plant you, you will 'bear much fruit'" (John 15:8).
  
FOCUS.  and produce a bunch of fruit.