In my professional opinion, it's time to get over it

OK, I have to say it... It has been two weeks now. If you aren't a part of Michael Jackson's immediate family and friends - Get over it.

I'm tired of that being the headlines in all the news, constantly mentioned on talk radio, and the only thing anyone seems to be talking about. I have no patience for the cult of personality for celebrities that our culture seems to thrive on.

You didn't know him personally and, no matter how much you liked his music, there is no personal connection there. Zip. Zero. Nada. Nicht. None.

If your life is so empty that his death matters to you (or the happenings of any other famous celebrity that you don't personally know), then it's time for you to get out into the real world. Go meet some people. Make some friends. Go to church. Use your time to serve others and get to know them.

His daughter's eulogy broke my heart. I hurt for her and the rest of his immediate family, just like I hurt for anyone who has lost someone close to them.

For the rest of you - get a life of your own and get over it.

That's all I have to say about that.

P.S. this also goes for anything to do with Paris Hilton, Brittany Spears, Brad and Angelina, Brad and Jennifer, the Jonas Brothers, Miley Cyrus, Lindsey Lohan, etc. etc. etc.

Today

Today,

More than 20,000 children will die due to famine or poverty related causes

Thousands will be made orphans due to loss of parents due to HIV/AIDS

Many more will be made homeless refugees due to war

Soldiers will be injured and die in wars around the world, leaving loved ones behind

Hundreds of Americans will lose jobs and homes due to the economy

Elderly grandmothers and grandfathers will languish in loneliness

Oh yeah, and some dead famous singer guy will receive thousands of hours of media coverage.

I'm glad we focus on the important stuff.

Two Movies

This weekend, I watched two movies that are worth comment. Life just isn’t like the movies. Usually. But, sometimes, they mirror real life in a way that can be exquisitely raw.

The first movie that I saw was ‘Last Kiss.’ It was a date night movie for my wife and I. Earlier in the week, we were at Wally World, getting new shoes for my daughter. After about a half an hour looking at shoes and realizing that the girls weren’t anywhere near done, I wandered over to the $3 movie bin. (Hey, if a man can’t spend $3 on a movie for his wife, what’s this world coming to?) I found this movie that billed itself as a romantic comedy and it had the guy from ‘Scrubs’ in it, a show my wife likes. What could go wrong?

Everything.

This movie is agonizingly close to reality. It is a movie about relationships, broken ones. It was not the ‘romantic comedy’ that it billed itself as. No, this movie is about the destruction of relationships. Marriages fell apart, relationships were destroyed, parents fought over their children. There was infidelity and dysfunctional relationships right and left. I've seen far to many destroyed relationships of close friends and people I care about, to appreciate this movie.

Save your $3 and buy your wife a big chocolate candy bar.

I would recommend this movie to one group of people. I believe that I might just send it back to my old Bible college to the counseling department. It should be a class assignment: each student must take one of the characters and describe the process for counseling this person. The people in the movie are so real that the process of counseling them would be great practice.

The second movie that I saw was also on a date night. This time, it was daddy-daughter date night. I took my little girl out to see the movie of her choice and for a little gelato afterwards. She chose the movie, ‘Up’.

This movie, I would recommend. It too is about relationships. The core of the story is about a man and a woman who get married and grow old together. She dies in the first 20 minutes of the movie and the rest of the movie involves him fulfilling a promise to her while learning to find other relationships in his life.

I am not ashamed to say that I cried in this movie. The writers do such an excellent job of making you love this couple, it’s hard not to cry when you see him alone. It really strikes to the heart of my own fears. I love my wife. A lot. And, I recognize the awful truth that one day, one of us will go before the other one.

Every love story has a sad ending. There is a deep truth there that was at the heart of each of these movies. Each movie showed the pain and grieving that comes with the loss of a relationship. Unfortunately, we live in a society where the first movie is a better example of relationships than the second.

I am distressed at the state of marriage in our world. Life is short, painfully so. We have the briefest time on this earth to live and love. Why, then, would you waste it being miserable and hateful to someone.

The truth is, you can spend a lifetime growing together in a healthy relationship, facing down your problems and learning to work together OR, you can spend a lifetime dealing with the baggage from a broken relationship. Either way, you spend a lifetime with that person.

My wife and I both come from broken homes. We could have learned the lesson that relationships are disposable. They aren’t and we didn’t. Instead, we both decided that our marriage was going to last through it all. Our goal is 75 years and then we’ll renegotiate.

We’ve lasted 13 years so far, through some really tough times and through some really great times. We’ve had the 2nd Year lull and the 7 year itch. We’ve had struggles with having children and the delight of adoption. We’ve had arguments that shook the walls and we’ve laughed together, played together, cried together, and loved together.

Relationships are hard. I won't lie to you. You will never hurt another person in this world as much as the person that you truly love. To grow in love, you must be vulnerable, and when you are vulnerable, you will get hurt. Working through that hurt as a partnership, opening up to each other, and growing old together will make for an adventure that outshines any movie script.

Healthy relationships require a daily choice to grow closer to each other. They require a regular dose of humility. They require constant care and vigilance. Long lasting, loving relationships don't just happen. They require effort. Trust me; it is worth it.

Both of these movies, ‘Last Kiss’ and ‘Up’ hold the same lesson: a healthy relationship is priceless and a dysfunctional one is worthless – it’s your choice which one you will live with.

I think I need to go watch a guy movie now.

“For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh.” Genesis 2:24.

The Greatest Battle Ever Fought

It’s summer camp. Junior High Summer Camp. If you’ve never been to one, those words may not conjure up the mess of feelings and ideas that it does for those who’ve been there. It’s kind of like the old guys who went to Vietnam said, “If you weren’t there, you wouldn’t understand.” I’m pretty sure that there are Green Berets that have seen the most hellish jungle warfare that would shy away from volunteering at Junior High summer camp.

If you’ve never been there, Junior High Summer Camp is a week of crazy fun, boredom, escape from the city, hormones, first loves, first heartbreaks, daredevil antics, water balloon fights, climbing rockwalls, marshmallow roasts, prison camp accommodations, burping contests, late night conversations, surplus cafeteria food dating back to the Korean war, bugs, and Bible studies.

To really get an idea, close your eyes and try to get the sound and smell of 150 pubescent teens packed into a small room with no air conditioning, dancing around to screaming loud praise music. The sound is enough to wake the dead. The humidity from sweat make the air fetid like a Louisiana bayou and the smell is something like a large goat farm. Body odor, sweat, and hormones mix with Axe body spray and 273 types of body lotion, hair products, and perfumes. (a side note here, when middle school boys see the Axe commercials where a guy sprays himself and then a dozen girls attack him, they assume that if they triple the amount, then even more girls will attack them. I’m pretty sure God has a special punishment in mind for the makers of Axe.)

Junior High Summer Camp. Ministry here is raw and cutting edge. You have to be able to face anything and everything from an invasion of millions of ants in the cabin to arguments over who gets to ask out the cute boy from the other church. There’s the kid who seems to disappear every time we are supposed to go into worship and the other one who seems to pick a fight with every kid who crosses his path. One girl slips off of the rocks she wasn’t supposed to be on hurting herself and another finds it funny to pull pranks on the youth minister. And then, one night around church group time, one kid shares how his parents fight all the time and are getting a divorce. Another has a father who pressures him constantly. Another lost her parent last year and still doesn’t know how to cope. Another has had sex with her boyfriend and wonders if Jesus could ever accept her after that.

It is easy to think that kid’s problems are silly and childish. It’s easy to laugh off the first heart break because, as an adult, you’ve been through dozens. “Wait till you grow up Kid, then you’ll know what real life problems are.” "It's too far from your heart to kill you."

The reality is that wherever we are in life, our problems are really intense. Whatever battle you are facing is terribly real to you. It doesn't matter if you are in Junior High or you barely remember Junior High because it was so long ago. As Pastor Chip so wisely says, “All life is Junior High.”

It’s always easy to solve someone else’s problems, especially since they aren't yours. Junior High Summer Camp taught me to listen as people of any age share their problems without belittling them, but offering them an understanding friend who can support them as they fight the greatest battle of their life.

Next time you hear someone tell you about the problem they are facing, take a moment and shut out that self-absorbed little voice inside you that says, “You think you got problems, you don’t understand what I am going through.” Don’t try to solve their problems for them or tell them how little they really are. Instead, put your arm around the other person and tell them that you know what it’s like to fight a great battle too. Then pray with them. Maybe then, they will do the same for you.

I pray that you have someone to fight at your side as you fight the greatest battle of your life.

Welcome to Junior High.

Haggis, It's not just for breakfast anymore.

Because I wear kilts, the people around me sometimes send me Scottish paraphenalia. (For the record, I am of predominantly German heritage and have no Scots in me that I am aware of).

If you want to know more about kilts, you can read my archive blog: http://rodg3r.blogspot.com/2009/05/kilts.html.

Anyway, today, I came in to work and found a recipe for Haggis on my desk. Now, I've had haggis, and it isn't bad. Can't say it's that good either. It's basically a large boiled sausage that really needs some gravy or ketchup on it.

Interestingly enough, the Scottish Haggis eating champion, says that the worst thing about winning a haggis eating contest is the retching afterward.

With that said, I have included a traditional haggis recipe below, along with an American version which is actually pretty good and is a little like meatloaf. The American version uses a loaf pan instead of a sheep stomach as it tends to be a little hard to locate sheeps stomachs in the U.S.A.

Traditional Scottish Haggis Recipe

2 lbs. dry oatmeal
1 lb. chopped mutton suet (the hard fat around the kidneys)
1 venison or sheep liver, boiled and minced
sheep heart and lungs, boiled and minced
sheep kidney, boiled and minced
2 hen’s eggs
1 large chopped onion
1 cleaned sheep or lamb's stomach bag
1 ½ cup beef or lamb stock cooled
1/2 tsp. allspice
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. pepper

Toast oatmeal in iron pan slowly until crisp. Mix oatmeal, liver, heart, lungs, kidney, suet, onion and spices together in a large bowl. Add eggs and stock and mix with hands till it holds together. Ladle mixture into stomach bag until mostly full. Press down as you go to remove any air. Sew the stomach up to create a large sausage. Prick this several times with a fork to prevent it from bursting as it cooks. Place the haggis into boiling water and cook for four to five ours. Serve on a bed of boiled cabbage with a side of fried turnips and potatoes. Enjoy a glass of scotch on the side.

American Haggis

4 cups Quaker Oats
1 pound of bacon diced
1 calf liver diced
1 pound ground lamb
1 pound ground beef hamburger
1 pound spicy Italian sausage, chorizo, or other spicy pork sausage

1 large chopped onion

2-3 large eggs
½ teaspoon cayenne pepper
½ teaspoon sage
½ teaspoon allspice
½ teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon pepper

In a deep pot, fry bacon until just done, you want it loose and springy with the fat still on it and not crispy. Drain off most of the bacon grease and set it aside in reserve, leaving a little in the pan. Pour oats in pot and brown them carefully, turning often. Remove oats from pot. Return remaining bacon grease to pot and brown onions. Add calf liver ground beef, hamburger, sausage, cooked bacon and spices and cook until meat is just cooked, but not brown. Remove mixture from pan and let it cool completely.

Mix meat mixture, oatmeal, and eggs in large bowl until stiff enough to hold together. Use your hands to form into a sausage shape. Spray a loaf pan with cooking spray oil and place the sausage in loaf pan. Bake for 30 – 45 minutes until crispy on top and heated all through. Slice and serve with fried potatoes.

Thinking and Believing

What do you believe?

Why do you believe it?

Have you ever really thought about it?

Could you explain it and give any rational reasoning behind it?

Are your core beliefs based on something someone told you, something you have read, or is it based on something you have put some deep thought and energy into?

For example, I have a friend who told me, “You know, I believe that we all just keep living and dying and living again in one great circle that never really ends.” That’s nice. I read those books too. Robert Jordan’s ‘Wheel of Time’ series is a great science fiction fantasy series, but for the record, it is a fictional story with no basis in reality.

I worked with a guy who said to me, “I don’t know why you follow that Christian crap. It’s all false. They discovered the Dead Sea scrolls at Nag Hamadi and the Gospel of John Thomas proves that Leonardo Da Vinci married Mary Magdalene and they had Baby Jesus right after he painted the Sistine Chapel.” Oh. I read the Da Vinci Code. Did you look on the side and see where it says, ‘Fiction’? The book wasn’t even that good. It was a mediocre mystery. The movie was awful. Frankly, Dan Brown’s other two books, Angels and Demons and Deception Point were much better written stories. Even with the nudge, nudge, wink, wink disclaimer at the front of the Da Vinci Code, his scholarship and historical ‘facts’ leave much to be desired.

Time and time again, I meet people who say, “All religions say pretty much the same thing, I believe that all religions get you to heaven.” That’s one of my favorites. Do you know anything at all about the religions of the world? Have you read even one of their holy books? Have you read even a few words of them? Really? Buddhists get to go to heaven? Boy, won’t they be surprised, considering they don’t even believe in heaven. What about the Shinto believers who get to heaven and find out that all those trees and rocks were really just trees and rocks because all of the kamis were actually in heaven? Or, what about Jehovah’s Witnesses, they are expecting to get there and be alone, they won’t be happy to find the place so crowded. And wait a minute, which heaven? Will there be the eternal feasting and battles of Valhalla? Or the 77 virgins of Islam? How about we all get to be gods of our own Mormon world and populate it with spirit babies. Or, how about we all castrate ourselves and ride on the Hale-Bopp comet to heaven together? Hmmm.

Then there are those people who believe that there is one God who created the world. They tell these seemingly mythological stories about a flood and a rainbow, about prophecies that came true, about some guy nailed to a cross who came back to life and other crazy stuff like that. These Christians love to tell anyone who will listen all about it. Do they even know what they believe or why they should believe it?

I once knew a guy who loved to argue with Christians when he was in college. He was really good at it and often left them sputtering in frustration as he disassembled their ostensibly silly beliefs. Once, he even left a girl in tears in the middle of Ethics class as he talked her in circles about her Christian beliefs.

That guy was me, the first time in college. I’m not proud of it now, but I used to love to meet those young Christian zealots, marching their way into secular college classes, trying to introduce their faith to others. I knew some things about their Bible and beliefs better than they did and it wasn’t hard to frustrate them. I also knew the right buttons to push, the right things to say, to leave them confused and doubting. All of this was great fun at the time.

Until I met Al. Al was a pastor who actually sat down to talk to me. I was ready for him. What a fight this was going to be. I’d graduated from the featherweights and was ready for a heavyweight match. I knew that, as a pastor, he was going to be a harder nut to crack, but up till that point I was undefeated.

In the end, I was the one that sat there sputtering as he disassembled every argument that I had ever used. I lost round after round as he used logic and rational thought to slap down every silly argument that I had ever used against Christians. Ultimately, I had believed in nothing and therefore had nothing to stand on.

I have been encouraged by another Pastor, Chip Moody. He showed me the importance of education, the significance of searching for answers, and the power of truth in the face of earnest questions.

Thirteen years later, I am a Christian pastor, having gone though much struggle and long hours of study, three years of Bible college, and personal study. My studies continue as I go on to pursue my Masters Degree.

I realize these days, just how easy it would have been for any of those Christian kids to defeat me in arguments, if they only had been taught to discuss intelligently and defend their beliefs with solid apologetics. They were sent out as sheep among wolves but were never taught to be shrewd as snakes (Matthew 10:16). They were taught to love the Lord their God with all of their hearts and soul, but weren’t taught to use their minds (Matthew 22:37).

Now, as I teach each new generation of kids, I despair as I watch them go out into the secular college. Did I teach them enough? Do they know what they believe and why? I know there are people like the old-me out there waiting for them. I can only pray that for each antagonist out there, there will be an Al waiting to challenge their beliefs, to help them know the truth.

Al passed away several years ago, before I ever go to tell him thank you for all he did for me. Because of busy lives and distance, I only just found out this last year.

Thank you Al. I wait for the day when I can see you again and say thank you in person.


Father God, I thank you for men like Pastor Al and Pastor Chip. I pray, Lord, for those young men and women that go out into the world. I ask that you give them the strength to face those that would assault your word, the wisdom to defeat attacks with logic and reason, and the understanding to do this with gentle love and not with condemnation.

So, what do YOU do?

You know, It’s funny…Since I became a pastor, conversations with strangers have never been the same as they used to be. Time was, I’d meet a stranger and they’d ask, “so, what do you do?” I’d then answer, I’m a Customer Service Manager for an international electronics manufacturer. “Oh,” they’d say, “that’s interesting,” and then the conversation would move on to other topics.

Now, things are different. Today, when I meet a stranger and the question comes up, one of two things seems to happen:

Scenario # 1: “So, what do you do,” they ask. “I’m a pastor,” I answer… Uncomfortable silence. They then quickly exit the conversation as soon as they can find an excuse to go away. Maybe they think I am going to thump them with a Bible or ask them some uncomfortable question.

Scenario # 2: “So, what do you do,” they ask. “I’m a pastor,” I answer… “Well,” they continue, “you know what I think…” Uh oh. I say that because the words, "You know what I think..." are always followed by some theological or philosophical belief that they hold very strongly about the apocalypse, or the Da-Vinci Code, or what they believe about all religions leading to heaven, or some story about how someone at a church somewhere in the past offended them or about how God failed them when their dog died even though they prayed about it. This might be sound like the best scenario, because then I can talk to them about God, but, in my experience, these people already have all the answers and don’t want to be bothered by silly things like facts, rational thought, evidence, or logic. These are usually the people I would like to thump with a Bible (or a large stick) and it’s really fun to ask them uncomfortable questions, though it rarely does any good.

For the record, I don’t thump people with Bibles and generally only ask uncomfortable questions if you ask me to speak into their lives.

I think that I am going to change my answer in the future.

So, what do you do,” they’ll ask. “I’m a technical support person, I try to help people with problems by pointing them to the manual.”

So, what do you do,” they’ll ask. “I’m a janitor, I come in and try to help clean up messes that other people make.”

So, what do you do,” they’ll ask. “I’m in construction, I try to rebuild things that have been torn down”

So, what do you do,” they’ll ask. “I’m a mechanic, I work on stuff that is broken because it hasn’t been maintained.”

So, what do you do,” they’ll ask. “I’m Google ™. I don’t have all the answers myself, but I can point you to some places to find them.”

Maybe I should try something different:

So, what do you do,” they’ll ask…… THUMP (sound of me hitting them with the largest Bible I can find.)

So, what do YOU do?

Two-holer

A cowboy is sittin in the old two-holer outhouse takin care of business. In walks another cowboy to do the same. As he takes down his drawers to sit on the other hole, a $5 bill falls out of his pants pocket and down into the hole. The cowboy promptly grabs a $20 bill from his pocket and throws it down in there too.

The first cowboy exclaims, “Now, What did ya do that fer?”

The other one replies, “Cuz I ain’t gonna go down in there for just five dollars!”


(Joke told at Comedy Night held at MVCC on first Saturday evening of each month)

You can't understand this because it’s written in English.

A friend of mine recently shared her college experience with me.

She had an English Professor at the University of Arizona who enjoyed attacking Christian beliefs as a part of his class. He taught that there are no incontrovertible truths and that language could not possibly convey ideas between people due to the vagaries of our own narratives. Evidentally, he liked to pick on Christian kids taking apart their ideas, leaving them confused and unsure.

She said that she had to do a lot of debriefing with her youth minister and that the class was a real struggle because of the way he pressured students to believe like him and his regular attacks on anyone who believed differently or even questioned what he said.

I have toyed with the idea of driving to Tucson to audit one of his classes.
I don’t think that I could sit long in his class without challenging his credibility. He is either ignorant or a fraud.

I’d like to stand up in the middle of his class and ask him a few questions;

“How can you stand there, speaking to us about an idea, expecting us to understand what you are saying if you don’t believe that ideas can be conveyed by language?”

“How can you teach an English class (a language), expecting students to write papers expressing ideas in that language, that you will then grade (an idea) in the same language assuming they will be able to understand the grades that you gave them?”

“How can you grade papers for grammar or spelling based on the idea that there is a true and correct way to phrase ideas and spell words when you don’t believe that there are truths?”

Now, I’m a believer in being the devil’s advocate in arguments, challenging people to defend ideas, and asking students to think through positions that they hold. However, this professor is presenting ideas that he cannot even live by. Why, he couldn’t even drive to work in the morning, because road signs communicate ideas with the assumption that other people can understand the idea and the people who made his car assume he can learn how to operate it based on communicable truths. He couldn’t find his classroom on a campus map because it is communicating ideas from one person to another. Heck, if he was really honest, he wouldn't bother trying to cash his paycheck from the university because the value of money is an idea that is agreed upon by people.

I have to come to the conclusion that he doesn’t live by the beliefs that he professes (because it is impossible) which then makes him a fraud, teaching an idea that isn’t workable while attacking principals and ideas that are.

I wonder if it is worth four hours of driving time to drive to Tucson and back so I can attend his class.

Probably not.

If I argued with him, he probably couldn’t understand the ideas that I communicated to him anyway.

Spiderman and Jesus

A few years ago, I traveled with a group of guys to a Promise Keepers convention. There were thousands of men going into a stadium to hear about Christ and to be challenged to change their lives. Primarily due to misunderstanding of the message, there were many people protesting the conference. Because of the possible threat of violence from these groups, the stadium had hired outside security for crowd control.

As we entered the arena, I passed one of these fellows. Spiderman. No, not Peter Parker, but a 6 feet tall biker type. Shaved head. Muscular with a shirt that said Security on it, black jeans and combat boots. Both ears pierced multiple times. Oh yeah, and tattoos. Lots of them. Both arms were sleeved in tatts. But, what drew the eye was the spider web tattoo that covered his face and head. Centered on his upper lip, the spider web went down his neck around his cheeks, over his forehead and back over his shaved pate. Spiderman. If you saw him coming at you down the street, you’d be afraid. In a dark alley, you’d run for your life.

All I could think at the time was, “You’d think Promise Keepers would do a better job of vetting the people working at their events.” Why would they let a guy like that work at one of their events?

Later, while the event was going on, I got up to use the restroom. As I returned to the seating area, they had started singing, “Amazing Grace.” There, in the back of the seating area, I saw him again. Spiderman. This great big biker type, covered with tatts and piercings was stomping to the music with his hands raised to heaven and his head bowed. With tears streaming down his face, he was sweetly singing the words to Amazing Grace – “Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound, to have saved a wretch like me, I once was lost, but now I’m found, was blind but now I see…”

Jesus tells a parable of a religious man and a sinner who went to the temple. The religious man stood proudly and prayed loudly, thanking God that he wasn’t like the sinner and reminding God of all of the ways the religious man had served God this week. The sinner on the other hand stayed far off and tore his clothes and beat his breast crying out, “God, have mercy on me a sinner.”

I never met Spiderman personally, but I’m pretty sure of which one he was in this parable and which one I was. I don’t know what his story was, but his history was written all over his face and body.

Because I don’t have my sins and scars on the outside of my body, it’s easy to forget that I have a history too. It’s a lot easier to pretend that I’ve got it all together and don’t need nearly as much grace as those sinners do.

The lesson Jesus teaches me time and time again is that I am a wretch who is broken and screwed up beyond belief. And, I need His grace as much as any other tattooed sinner out there. I belong on my knees, tearing my clothes, beating my breast, and weeping at my condition. “God, have mercy on me a sinner.”

Thank you, Spiderman.