In the winter horses accumulate a thick coat to protect them from the weather. Come spring, it falls off in huge pieces. I could stand and groom Mr. Asia who looked like he had wallpaper falling off his sides and after some work with the shedding blade, a beautiful shiny coat would emerge.
However Sunny my shepherd mutt sheds all year. I can see chunks of hair protruding from her coat. I pull them off, but if I decide to brush her, no matter how long I brush, when I stop hair always floats loose on her coat, so I'm never really done and little progress can be seen, despite the pile of hair that could stuff a pillow.
Lately God's theme for me has been dying to self. I would like to brush away my "self" like I used to a horse's coat, in large satisfying pieces that left a sheen underneath. Or better yet like a snake sheds skin in one miraculously removed piece. But instead my self clings to me like Sunny's hair, always needing daily removal, constant vigilance. Lord give me perseverance to keep shedding.
Wednesday, August 18, 2010
Saturday, July 24, 2010
The Future
Easily obsessed with change and the end of the world, Americans think little about the future past their own lifetime. We plan to be sure we have enough in the retirement account, but we rarely build anything that will last beyond our days on earth.
My friend Bud planted walnut trees when he was 60. Instead of looking for a harvest of nuts, he pruned the trees while young to provide long straight lumber someday. That day would come long after his graduation to heaven, but Bud increased the value of his property for his descendants. He was thinking past his own life span and concerns.
Too often we are short-sighted and self-focused. We don't think about our own family descendants and the legacy we are leaving them, much less how we are impacting the earth for coming generations.
Rumors swirl that the world will end in 2012, but that's not the first time that has happened. Such rumors circulated multiple times since Jesus left the earth, and the world may well last another 2000 years before its renewal in God's Kingdom. So we need to be responsible with creation, and with each other.
Bud didn't just plant trees for his family's future. He is a kind and gentle man, who has also passed on a firm foundation of spiritual nurture and health to his family. That will guide their future even more than trees.
What are you planting that will influence others?
My friend Bud planted walnut trees when he was 60. Instead of looking for a harvest of nuts, he pruned the trees while young to provide long straight lumber someday. That day would come long after his graduation to heaven, but Bud increased the value of his property for his descendants. He was thinking past his own life span and concerns.
Too often we are short-sighted and self-focused. We don't think about our own family descendants and the legacy we are leaving them, much less how we are impacting the earth for coming generations.
Rumors swirl that the world will end in 2012, but that's not the first time that has happened. Such rumors circulated multiple times since Jesus left the earth, and the world may well last another 2000 years before its renewal in God's Kingdom. So we need to be responsible with creation, and with each other.
Bud didn't just plant trees for his family's future. He is a kind and gentle man, who has also passed on a firm foundation of spiritual nurture and health to his family. That will guide their future even more than trees.
What are you planting that will influence others?
Wednesday, July 21, 2010
Summer
Summer is kids out of school. Early morning sunshine. Hot afternoons. Late evening sunsets. Time with family.
Summer is less on the schedule. More interests pulling every direction. Sweating. Swimming.
Summer is family time. Vacation. Reunions. Love.
Summer is my favorite time of year.
Summer is less on the schedule. More interests pulling every direction. Sweating. Swimming.
Summer is family time. Vacation. Reunions. Love.
Summer is my favorite time of year.
Saturday, July 3, 2010
Looking Ahead
Planning vacations is my favorite pastime. I might just prefer it to going on them. After all, when the actual time arrives, so many events can fall short of expectation, but while they are still ideas, it sounds like the most fantastic week ever!
This year we begin by driving to see Nora's graduate exhibit in Baltimore. Check it out at: http://www.mica.edu/News/MACA_Thesis_Exhibition_Explores_Issues_of_Social_Justice_July_15-31.html
Her dad hasn't been to her school yet, and he'll get to see Nora in full force, with a crowd of people admiring her unique work.
From there we crash that night at the Faulkners, friends willing to let us use their floor to save money on a motel even though we don't have time to really stay. Then it's on to Boston, where Nora will read in her college roommate Farrell's wedding.
The next evening we visit Ben's church plant, another college friend of Nora's. Then we drive to the far west corner of Massachusetts to see the MassMoCA, the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art, where they have some galleries as big as a football field to display large pieces.
That afternoon we will drive to the top of the highest peak in Massachusetts, before meandering south to camp in Connecticut so we can mark off another state visited.
Wednesday, which happens to be my birthday, we have three hours to drive with NY city in the middle, worth a stop for an urban fix. Pommes Frites and a walk across the Brooklyn Bridge.
Then on to a Doubletree in Wilmington, which I got for a great price on Priceline, warm chocolate chip cookies here we come. The next day we visit Du Pont gunpowder factory for Wesley, as well as driving to Dover to see their air command museum.
That night we sleep on Assateague Island, and the next morning visit the wild ponies I grew up loving from Marguerite Henry's book Misty. A childhood dream finally realized.
From there a stop at a NASA post, a drive by Annapolis, then back to Baltimore. Our last day will include a sport legends museum for Luke, an Orioles game, and somewhere in there some delicious gelato.
A month from now I'll be living this, and I hope it meets expectations. Typically part of it will, and part of it won't, and I only hope I can roll with it. Just being with the whole family will be the best part, especially since we don't know when that will stop being a vacation privilege.
When I consider my yearly ritual, planning a vacation, then living it, I am glad that one final "vacation" will exceed expectations. I really don't even have to plan, I already have my reservation. Just believing in Jesus means he's planning for me, he's got a deluxe room waiting. The weather will be blissful, the activities ample, and the fellowship literally divine. And my yearly stress reliever will become a never ending way of life.
May this year's vacation be a little taste of that coming reality.
This year we begin by driving to see Nora's graduate exhibit in Baltimore. Check it out at: http://www.mica.edu/News/MACA_Thesis_Exhibition_Explores_Issues_of_Social_Justice_July_15-31.html
Her dad hasn't been to her school yet, and he'll get to see Nora in full force, with a crowd of people admiring her unique work.
From there we crash that night at the Faulkners, friends willing to let us use their floor to save money on a motel even though we don't have time to really stay. Then it's on to Boston, where Nora will read in her college roommate Farrell's wedding.
The next evening we visit Ben's church plant, another college friend of Nora's. Then we drive to the far west corner of Massachusetts to see the MassMoCA, the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art, where they have some galleries as big as a football field to display large pieces.
That afternoon we will drive to the top of the highest peak in Massachusetts, before meandering south to camp in Connecticut so we can mark off another state visited.
Wednesday, which happens to be my birthday, we have three hours to drive with NY city in the middle, worth a stop for an urban fix. Pommes Frites and a walk across the Brooklyn Bridge.
Then on to a Doubletree in Wilmington, which I got for a great price on Priceline, warm chocolate chip cookies here we come. The next day we visit Du Pont gunpowder factory for Wesley, as well as driving to Dover to see their air command museum.
That night we sleep on Assateague Island, and the next morning visit the wild ponies I grew up loving from Marguerite Henry's book Misty. A childhood dream finally realized.
From there a stop at a NASA post, a drive by Annapolis, then back to Baltimore. Our last day will include a sport legends museum for Luke, an Orioles game, and somewhere in there some delicious gelato.
A month from now I'll be living this, and I hope it meets expectations. Typically part of it will, and part of it won't, and I only hope I can roll with it. Just being with the whole family will be the best part, especially since we don't know when that will stop being a vacation privilege.
When I consider my yearly ritual, planning a vacation, then living it, I am glad that one final "vacation" will exceed expectations. I really don't even have to plan, I already have my reservation. Just believing in Jesus means he's planning for me, he's got a deluxe room waiting. The weather will be blissful, the activities ample, and the fellowship literally divine. And my yearly stress reliever will become a never ending way of life.
May this year's vacation be a little taste of that coming reality.
Monday, June 7, 2010
More Haiku
June comes finally
But not yet Junia so
Can’t really be June.
Sending out children
Like bread cast on the water
To be found again?
But not yet Junia so
Can’t really be June.
Sending out children
Like bread cast on the water
To be found again?
Tuesday, May 25, 2010
Opportunities Missed
My sons are watching an action show. In action shows people burst into doors and spray the room with bullets and people die.
This happens in real life too. I’ve seen the photos, the blood splattered against the wall where the bullet hit an artery, and the body slumped open-eyed at the bottom of the stairs. Eighteen casings from a AK 47 strewn across the house.
And in the mess photographed by the police to document the crime scene, a book lying on the floor, The Purpose Driven Life. A few years back, like many others, our church participated in this book and series. Unlike many churches who followed the program, we probably had some folks reading that book that could have lived in a house like these victims, who were raising pit bulls (illegal in my city) and marijuana (illegal anywhere in our country).
Who gave these two young men that book? Did they read it? Might it have mattered?
During the trial a woman I am confident is the mother of the deceased man sat and cried as she saw her son’s photograph used for identification. She left before the gory pictures, I was glad.
I can only imagine her going through his belongings after his death, and seeing that book on the floor, and if by any chance she had given it to him, wondering, what if?
It’s so easy to not feel responsible for other people. And in the end, we can only do so much. Someone tried to reach these two guys. But if they had, if their attempt had succeeded, their lives might have been so different, the one still alive. And the survivor, what happened to him? Has he changed? Has he cleaned up his act, gotten out of the drug business? He’s currently facing charges on the drug count. Did he read the book? Would he now?
I wrote these musings after seeing that photograph. The next day, that survivor sat in the witness stand. He told the story of the events, and how he seized an opportunity and ran. He tried to call the police to help his roommate, but heard a volley of shots before help arrived.
When he reached the part of the narration where he related that his roommate was killed, he cried. Two years later. A strong, macho male, in front of a courtroom of people. The prosecutor quietly walked to a desk and placed some Kleenex in front of him. Even the defense attorney was moved by this moment of raw emotion, a young man remembering the horror of his friend's death, and reliving his own guilt, because the grow operation in the house was his own. His friend died, he survived, but the drugs were his.
We also learned that the upstairs bedroom was the survivor's. That photograph captured the book The Purpose Driven Life, also the book 1984, and a handgun. What a capsule of that young man's life. When he retrieved his belongings, did he keep the book? Has he read it since? Do I ask?
This happens in real life too. I’ve seen the photos, the blood splattered against the wall where the bullet hit an artery, and the body slumped open-eyed at the bottom of the stairs. Eighteen casings from a AK 47 strewn across the house.
And in the mess photographed by the police to document the crime scene, a book lying on the floor, The Purpose Driven Life. A few years back, like many others, our church participated in this book and series. Unlike many churches who followed the program, we probably had some folks reading that book that could have lived in a house like these victims, who were raising pit bulls (illegal in my city) and marijuana (illegal anywhere in our country).
Who gave these two young men that book? Did they read it? Might it have mattered?
During the trial a woman I am confident is the mother of the deceased man sat and cried as she saw her son’s photograph used for identification. She left before the gory pictures, I was glad.
I can only imagine her going through his belongings after his death, and seeing that book on the floor, and if by any chance she had given it to him, wondering, what if?
It’s so easy to not feel responsible for other people. And in the end, we can only do so much. Someone tried to reach these two guys. But if they had, if their attempt had succeeded, their lives might have been so different, the one still alive. And the survivor, what happened to him? Has he changed? Has he cleaned up his act, gotten out of the drug business? He’s currently facing charges on the drug count. Did he read the book? Would he now?
I wrote these musings after seeing that photograph. The next day, that survivor sat in the witness stand. He told the story of the events, and how he seized an opportunity and ran. He tried to call the police to help his roommate, but heard a volley of shots before help arrived.
When he reached the part of the narration where he related that his roommate was killed, he cried. Two years later. A strong, macho male, in front of a courtroom of people. The prosecutor quietly walked to a desk and placed some Kleenex in front of him. Even the defense attorney was moved by this moment of raw emotion, a young man remembering the horror of his friend's death, and reliving his own guilt, because the grow operation in the house was his own. His friend died, he survived, but the drugs were his.
We also learned that the upstairs bedroom was the survivor's. That photograph captured the book The Purpose Driven Life, also the book 1984, and a handgun. What a capsule of that young man's life. When he retrieved his belongings, did he keep the book? Has he read it since? Do I ask?
Courtroom Haiku
Mothers of victims
Sitting in courtrooms crying
Like Jesus’ mother.
Witnesses from jail
Spilling what they know or don’t
Hoping for freedom
Sitting in courtrooms crying
Like Jesus’ mother.
Witnesses from jail
Spilling what they know or don’t
Hoping for freedom
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