Tag: should have stayed home today

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Bad Ideas Just Come to Me; No Extra Thought Required

Have you ever had a lapse in judgment?

When I was a young teenager, probably 14 or 15, my church’s youth leader (Todd) dropped a couple of us off at the entrance to our development. It was December, so it got dark pretty early. I’d guess it was around 5:30 pm; we were coming back from weightlifting (gotta get huge, right?), and since our housing development was on the way back to where Todd was returning the van, he dropped two of us off.

I’m not really sure what I was thinking, but I guess I decided I’d be a bit of a clown, and after I exited the side door and started walking around the back of the van, a dumb thought entered my mind. “Wouldn’t it be funny if I jumped onto the back bumper when Todd started driving away?” I just assumed Todd would somehow know I was there, stop the van, and say “har har, wise guy…off.” Then I’d give one of those dopey teenage “shucks” laughs, and comply, then we’d both be on our way.

Well, I jumped up onto the bumper and held onto the back door’s handle (the handles were more solid back then than today’s handles).

He didn’t notice, though. He started driving away and didn’t slow down. Well, like any joke gone wrong, you just kind of want to make an exit with as little fanfare as possible. Since we weren’t going real fast just yet, I figured I’d just hop off. It was dark though, and I couldn’t see how fast we were going. In one of those “this probably isn’t a good idea but I’m going for it anyway” moments, I hopped off the bumper. As proof I was less than fully committed, I hung onto the handle, just in case.

Yes, the van was moving too fast for me to safely hop off. Once my feet hit the ground it became crystal clear that I wouldn’t be able to stay on my feet. They got pulled out from under me and I started being dragged behind the van, hanging onto the rear door’s handle with one hand.

The ratty old shoes I was wearing at the time were a little too big for my feet, and I distinctly remember one of them starting to come off. If I lost a shoe, that foot could have been subjected to some very nasty road rash, and I probably would have let go of the handle. By the good Lord’s providence, it slipped right back on when I turned my foot a different way. Truth be told, I don’t remember whether or not I started yelling for Todd to stop. My other hand held the jacket I’d brought with me, so I started whipping the van’s back door with it to try to attract Todd’s attention and get him to stop.

Right around that time, a car rounded the bend and started coming up behind us, and illuminated the situation with its headlights. I can’t imagine what that driver must’ve thought when he/she witnessed the scene.

Now, sometimes you do something dumb and you’re fortunate enough that nobody really finds out about it. At the time this happened, we lived in one of the corner houses in this development. When Todd dropped us off, all I had to do was cross the street and I would have been in my yard. The way events unfolded, if you had been on our house’s back deck, you would’ve had a great vantage point to seeing a van driving away with a kid hanging off the back, flailing his coat, illuminated by the headlights of a car following behind. Well, for some reason, my mother was back there and had a great view to all of this. That was probably a pretty horrific sight. Sorry Mom.

Well we probably only went 50 yards or so, and what felt like 50 mph in the dark was probably more like 20-25. A pretty confused Todd stopped the van, and as soon as it was safe, I let go of the handle and left the road for the safety of the grass. My shoes were noticeably more worn than they were 60 seconds ago, and were still warm from being dragged across asphalt. I don’t even remember if I gave Todd any explanation, or if I just waved a “thanks for stopping” and walked away. It was an incredible act of divine protection; my shoes took the only lumps of the evening and I walked away without a scratch.

I’m sure this was one of those moments where Mom wanted to both hug and strangle me. I don’t really remember walking in the front door or what Mom said, but I know she somehow saw things play out, because she’s brought up this event several times in the past. At the time, I probably just mumbled an “I’m fine, what’s the big deal?” in typical teenage boy fashion.

To the teenagers out there: you’re gonna do dumb stuff. Don’t do it on purpose, you’ll do plenty of dumb stuff accidentally. Your parents are going to worry about you, and they’re going to lose sleep over you. Sometimes when they just give you random hugs or tell you they love you, they’re not overreacting, they’re just thinking about all the ways things could have gone wrong and are simply glad you’re okay.

To the parents of teenagers out there: God bless you. Being the parents of littles is physically exhausting, while being the parents of teenagers is emotionally exhausting. I see why hair turns gray or falls out in this stage of life. Don’t let eye rolls stop you from telling those kids you love them and giving them extra hugs. Pray for them like crazy, and foster their spiritual development as they barrel toward adulthood.

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This is not a Situation Where you Want to Panic

I used to go skydiving out of this tiny little drop zone outside a tiny little town in Texas. This place was out in the sticks. The airport also served as the base for at least one cropduster. There weren’t many drop zones nearby; this one took about 90 minutes for me to drive to. The little single-engine Cessna we used seemed to groan each time it lifted off the ground. The people were nice, and I just really wanted to go jumping, so I couldn’t be terribly choosy. I began showing up consistently and started getting to know some of the regulars.

One weekend something a little different happened. I’m not sure of the reason, but the regular pilot wasn’t available, and we had a younger, much less experienced pilot flying loads that day. I didn’t really think anything of it. Nobody seemed to have a problem with it. We had a very experienced jumper at this drop zone, Chad, who seemed to know a lot about not only skydiving, but also flight operations, so he was good to have around. (Incidentally, he probably saved my life one time.) Thankfully, he was on the same load as I was that day.

A bunch of us got in the plane and began our ride to altitude. Normally when people get on a plane, they’re actually headed to a destination on the ground somewhere. When you’re skydiving, your destination is “up high.” You pretty much just want to gain a bunch of altitude so you can hop out. That ride to altitude can look very different depending on how busy the local airspace is, what the winds are doing at different altitudes, and the aircraft’s capabilities. The pilot might fly a corkscrew pattern, a box pattern, or some kind of racetrack pattern, just for a few examples. These are methods used to gain altitude without venturing too far away from the drop zone.

On this particular occasion, whatever pattern our pilot chose involved a bad call. I’m not sure if maybe he didn’t do his homework, or if this is something that could have happened to anyone, but we ended up getting downwind of the drop zone, fighting against a pretty strong headwind. The climb to altitude took about the same amount of time, but we spent longer in the aircraft because it took longer for us to claw back lost ground distance.

It wasn’t really a big deal to me at the time, but the pilot started getting agitated. It turns out we were pretty low on fuel. The strong headwind meant we needed to burn fuel faster to reclaim ground, and the analog fuel gauges didn’t give very descriptive readings when they were very low, especially as fuel sloshed around in the wing tanks. You can imagine how this all added to the anxiety level of a young, inexperienced pilot.

Chad noticed what was happening, and that the pilot kept switching the fuel feed back and forth between the left and right fuel tanks. With a cool head, he advised the pilot to relax and to stop switching; use up one tank until it’s dry, then switch to the other one. That way you’ll know for sure what you’ve got in that tank. If the second one runs out, it runs out, no amount of switching between the two would prevent it. Getting a little higher should help get us above the air current, so let’s press on before considering more drastic measures.

It started dawning on the rest of us what was happening. We weren’t real nervous; after all, we were all wearing parachutes and planned to get out of the plane before landing anyway. If that happened, our biggest problem would be figuring out where we landed and how to get back to the drop zone from the middle of what seemed like a thousand-square-mile field. The pilot, on the other hand, had an obligation to get the plane safely on the ground. Chad would probably stay with the pilot in the plane, and dropping several hundred pounds of skydivers should help improve the plane’s fuel efficiency, increasing the likelihood of safely getting back on the ground.

This is a little anticlimactic, I know, but thankfully we didn’t have to bail out early. We did end up jumping from a little lower than planned, but otherwise we made it to where we were supposed to go. The plane had enough gas to make it back to the airport safely. I’m not sure exactly how close the pilot (and us) came to disaster that day, but I imagine those wing tanks were much more full the next time the aircraft took off.

Sometimes in the midst of a crisis, all it takes is a steady hand and a calm demeanor to avoid catastrophe. Being present and just listening to someone who’s coming a little unglued, or offering insights that might be helpful can really walk someone back from panicking. While there are occasions where you kind of need to push somebody out of the way and seize control of the situation, as long as safety or time aren’t major issues, why not just offer support (and maybe guidance if they need it) as they work through the problem? Common sense and problem-solving seem like they’re becoming a little too rare these days, and helping someone walk through an issue can help pass along some lessons on good judgment, keeping calm, and solving problems. You might just find yourself in a position to make those rare qualities a little more common.

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Cheech and Chong Dodge Tornadoes

This time of year all the thunderstorms and tornado warnings remind me of a weather event I was happy to survive in my younger days.

After college I worked in the field of residential construction for about a year and a half. The company I worked for had a large free-standing garage/shed where it stored its work vehicles, extra equipment, etc. I’d usually drive my car to this place in the mornings and switch vehicles, trading my car for the company vehicle. It was this beat-up white van with a roof rack. It was the kind that only had windows in the driver and passenger doors, along with the windshield and windows in the back doors. The interior of the van had a whole bunch of shelves and hooks installed, with all kinds of equipment rolling or swinging around as we drove. There were only two actual seats inside, and whenever we had a third guy, he’d sit in the back on an upside-down 5-gallon bucket (affectionately called “the bucket seat”). The van kind of looked like something a stoner would drive in a Cheech and Chong movie, so one of the guys started calling it the “Cheeba Van” and the name stuck.

One time we wrapped up work at the jobsite for the day and started heading our separate ways. As I drove back to the garage the sky started turning pretty ominous, and got dark very quickly. Before I traveled very far, rain started pouring down in sheets. Traffic on the road slowed way down, and that familiar tone from the emergency broadcast system came on the radio. “Severe storms in the area, with the potential for tornadic activity.”

I kept driving, turning onto a smaller road I usually took to get back to the garage. It was still windy and pouring rain as I drove along, and I came across a tree that had fallen and blocked the road. Not really knowing what else to do, I backed up and turned around, then started using an alternate route to get where I wanted to go. Before long I came upon another tree blocking the road. It’s like these things were coming down so frequently, emergency services crews didn’t even know about them (and this was in the good old days before I had a cell phone to report them).

Running out of passable roads, I tried yet another route. I was driving very cautiously now, half expecting to encounter a third road-blocking obstacle. Happily, this road allowed me to get to the garage, and even though it was still raining pretty hard, I breathed a sigh of relief as I turned onto the gravel driveway to swap vehicles. I was thankful the garage was large enough for both vehicles to fit inside without having to come out in the rain. I got close to the building and hit the garage door opener…but nothing happened. Trying again, then again, it became obvious the power was out, and the door wouldn’t be opening anytime soon. Sitting there with pursed lips and the windshield wipers still on high, I pondered my next move. Looks like I was driving the Cheeba van home tonight. It didn’t look real great parked in the driveway.

I found out later a weak tornado had touched down in the area early in my route back to the garage. I missed the worst of it by a few minutes, but I dealt with some of the carnage on roads in nearby areas.

We don’t often think about it, but it’s kind of fun to see just how easily the Lord can funnel you in the direction He wants you to go. I was very familiar with the area; these were roads I traveled while riding a school bus, and I first learned how to drive on them. There were at least half a dozen ways to get to where I was trying to go. I don’t know that the Lord had a purpose for pushing me in certain directions (other than for this illustration, perhaps), but He said “Nope, I don’t want you to go that way.” “Now I want you over here.”

As God steers your life along and diverts you from your planned route in the process, it can be easy to focus on the inconvenience of having to be flexible. Sometimes the derailment is relatively minor and it’s not a big deal even an hour later; other times you have to mourn the loss of what you imagined the future would be like, and that’s an incredibly difficult thing. Though it might take a long time to accept, God always has been, and always will be, in control of the situation. He’s steering you toward His desired outcome, using your story for the eventuality He wants.

Lord, it can be a hard thing to accept that when Your will differs from mine, Yours always wins. Sometimes these differences aren’t a big deal, but others can feel soul-crushing. Help me have the right attitude through it all. Please give me patience, mental strength, and a humble heart as I work on accepting that You don’t need my permission to guide the events and circumstances of my life. Amen.

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It’s A Thick Blackness You Can Feel

November in northern Virginia can be a little unpredictable. Some days it’s very cold, other days it’s very mild. The 10-day forecast can vary quite a bit, so it’s a good idea to check in on it frequently.

One morning the temperature got pretty warm and a heavy fog settled over the area. When I say ‘heavy fog,” it’s hard to oversell how thick it was. On this particular morning, I headed into work well before dawn. Between the darkness and the fog, it was a unique experience. I don’t ever recall having been inside a black fog prior to that. It was a little freaky, to be honest with you. The darkness felt oppressive, and almost tangible. I imagine it’s kind of what it felt like during the plague of darkness the Egyptians encountered in Exodus chapter 10.

Well anyway, the usual commute moved a little slower than normal, and it was odd to see tail lights so close, yet still fading into the inky blackness. The route I took that morning involved a descent down a long hill, toward a traffic light at the bottom. I’d done this trip numerous times in the past, and always wanted to be at a certain point down the hill by the time the light turned yellow. That way I knew I had enough time for the next group of cars to get a green light and get through the intersection and still get there in time to take advantage of the left-hand turn arrow that came after that.

It was a strange and unsettling thing to be driving at normal speed, see numerous tail lights in front of me, many (dimmer) headlights in my mirrors, but not be able to see the faithful traffic light at the bottom of the hill.

Here we were, racing headlong into oblivion, and we couldn’t see far enough in front of us to stop if we came upon an unexpected hazard. We all gained a false sense of security in seeing others around us moving at the same speed, doing the same thing we were doing, and we all just kind of figured that since other people were doing it, it’s probably okay.

Well, thankfully I didn’t encounter any sort of hazard that morning, but if a deer had decided to venture across the road at an unfortunate time, I wouldn’t have had the time or space to do much about it.

This is where most non-believers find themselves today. They’re rushing headlong into oblivion, thinking that everything’s going to be okay because they’re in the same boat as a lot of other people. Things worked out fine for me that day, but others aren’t going to fare nearly as well for these people when they stand before the Almighty.

It’s our job to sound the alarm for them. We (Christ followers) formerly stood where they stood, and have escaped the fate they’re still rushing so quickly into: an eternity separated from fellowship with God.

People fill their time with busyness, equating being busy with doing meaningful things, thinking they’ve got plenty of time to think about the more spiritual side of things later, but in reality having no idea how much time they’ve got left to consider such things. The unimportant things of life distract from the central issue of humanity’s existence.

Christians are called to spread the reality of the situation. It’s our job to help wake them up. For their sake, I implore you to use the spiritual gifts you’ve been entrusted with. I’ve heard it said that the Creator of the universe preferred to die than to live without you. The reality is that the same holds true for all the other people out there, too. It’s up to us to let them know, so they can make their own decision.

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Some People Burn Rubber; This Family Flung it

When I was in my early teens I had a buddy named Cameron. If Cameron had a super power, it was anything that had to do with rubber bands. That dude had rubber bands stashed all over the house, and he was a crack shot with them.

The house where he lived had a skylight in the kitchen, and every once in awhile a fly would buzz around in there, looking for a way out. It seemed like he could always take those guys out on the first try. He also used rubber bands to make slingshots out of branches he found that were the right size/shape. If we had Instagram back then, we’d have been on it doing rubber band madness.

I’m not sure how it started, but at one point Cameron and I ignited some kind of playful feud with his dad. I was at their house like, all the time, so he was probably looking for a way to encourage me to spend less time there. I wasn’t quite “Steve Urkel” bad, but Cameron’s dad often referred to me as “the infestation.” He wasn’t too shabby with rubber bands, either, and on more than one occasion I had to dive for cover to try to escape the onslaught of flying rubber.

Again, the details are fuzzy, but one evening we anticipated that his dad was on the prowl and looking to light us up somehow. I’m pretty sure the “Home Alone” movies were fresh in our minds, and our heads were filled with ideas whose effectiveness was portrayed maybe a little too generously in the movies.

The way his house was set up, Cameron and his sister had the only rooms on the second floor, and the only other thing up there was a bathroom. He had sort of a cool setup in his room; the ceilings slanted down to the walls, so the room got shorter as you went away from the middle, but on the other side of the walls there was some storage space where the ceiling got uncomfortably short. It was a pain to get in there if you were the size of an adult, but it was great for us as kids. Our plan was to set up a bunch of alarms and traps out in Cameron’s room, and then let them stand guard while we set up a fort in one of the storage spaces so we could defend ourselves.

I don’t remember everything we set up, but I remember I brought some stuff from my house to help us out. I brought a tape player with a cassette tape cued up to a loud spot in a Michael W. Smith song, and I made a trigger out of a motorized Construx creation. I also know I brought a small chain and a bunch of metal jax. Cameron probably set up some kind of auto-rubber band crossbows aimed at the door. We strung a bunch of rubber bands together (I don’t think I can properly explain just how many rubber bands were in this house; it’s like Cameron asked for bags of rubber bands for his birthday and Christmas, and he got them) but we’d take these strings of rubber bands and pull them tight all across the room, fastening them to different things and making a sort of web. From one of them I hung the little chain, and I put the pile of metal jacks right under it, so if something disturbed the rubber band string that held the chain, it would fall onto the jacks and make a distinctive noise. The chain was barely hanging on to the string, so a false alarm wasn’t out of the question.

That wasn’t the big alarm, though. The big one was the tape player I mentioned. It was connected to a tripline that an intruder would set off, and everyone in the house would the loud guitar from the start of “Goin’ Through the Motions” if tripped. I don’t know what else we set up, but I’m sure there were other traps. Once we finished that, we shut off the lights and went to work in the storage space, rearranging boxes, garbage bags full of stuff, and strategically storing rubber band ammunition in various locations. If Cameron’s dad was coming for us, he’d either have to turn on the lights (giving himself away) or risk running through our field of booby traps.

Well, we were focused on the best way to set up a defense, and busied ourselves with strategy, plans, and fall-back areas. We had it all planned out. “The decoy dives over here while the other guy pops up and nails him from over here! When he pivots to focus on that guy, the decoy army crawls through this makeshift tunnel and hits him from the other side of the pillar! He won’t see it coming! ”

While we were making our grand strategy, we both thought we heard something out in Cameron’s room that sounded a lot like a little chain falling onto metal jacks. We both froze, wondering: 1. if we had actually heard something, 2. if it was a false alarm, and 3. now what?

Before we could do anything, Cameron’s dad burst into the storage space, filling the air with a hail of rubber projectiles. Surprised shrieks filled the room as we dove for cover but still got hit multiple times. There were so many rubber bands in the air at the same time, it’s like the guy had four arms with eight fingers and three thumbs on each hand, and they were all working on delivering stinging hits to the two of us. Well, we couldn’t mount any kind of coherent defense, and it was a massacre. Cameron’s dad shellacked us pretty good, and there was no denying who won that particular engagement.

You may have had a similar experience (in the metaphorical sense, at least). You recognize that you’re exposed to temptation from certain sins, and you’ve taken the precautions that you believe will be effective in keeping you safe. As it turns out, though, either your precautions didn’t work or something else went wrong, and you ended up not being as safe as you thought. Maybe you put your trust somewhere you shouldn’t have. Maybe you blocked a specific website but you found a different one you shouldn’t be visiting, or you stopped talking about people behind their backs, but now you disguise the gossip as a prayer request.

These things happen. You have to constantly check your defenses, taking frequent looks at your life to evaluate where you’re vulnerable. Things change rapidly; don’t rely on old measures that no longer reflect the modern vulnerabilities in your life. Know yourself and know what you have a hard time overcoming, and place countermeasures in your life that enable you to stand up to them. (In some cases, that requires a literal fleeing from the situation.)

Rubber bands can sting, but there are things that sting much worse. Set up the protections you know will help you be more effective in standing up to temptation.

For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places. Therefore, take up the full armor of God, so that you will be able to resist in the evil day, and having done everything, to stand firm. –Ephesians 6:12-13

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It’s A Good Idea To Have Some Backup

In my younger days I thought it’d be cool to get SCUBA certified, so while I was stationed in coastal Virginia with the Air Force, I found a dive shop and got signed up for the course.

I had been on a few “escorted” dives prior to that, and I enjoyed them, so I figured this would be a fun hobby to get into. The course was split up into sections; we had classwork, pool time, and time in a lake.

The academic work made sense to me, and the pool time was a good warm up as far as familiarization with adjusting equipment and figuring out how to operate underwater. The lake was the part I was looking forward to, though.

When the day finally came, we showed up and went over a few things from class. Then we went over the dive plan and a map of the area where we’d be diving. Finally we paired off into teams of “dive buddies” and suited up.

It was much different from the pool. I didn’t wear a wetsuit; I wore a semi-dry suit, which made me very buoyant. It took just about all the extra weight I owned just to maintain neutral buoyancy. The instructors helped me with a few tricks and some extra weight, and got me ready to go. After we got our equipment situated to our liking, we began the dive.

It started off fine. We followed the plan, moving from one underwater landmark to the next without a problem. Over time though, something started feeling wrong. The buckle holding my air tank in place somehow came loose. The tank began sliding out of place, moving down my back.

Because of where the buckle was located and how the tank was seated, I couldn’t get the leverage or the reach to fix things on my own. My dive buddy was in front of me, and I tapped him on the leg to get his attention. He turned to look, and I pointed over my shoulder at my tank, but I guess what I was trying to communicate wasn’t very obvious. He turned back around and kept swimming according to our dive plan. I grabbed him and pointed again to my tank, making more exaggerated gestures. (It was frustrating being so close to someone without being able to talk to them!)

He finally figured out what I was getting at. I turned my back to him, he slid the tank into the right position and locked the buckle in place. After that I was good to go and we were able to resume the dive according to the original plan.

Sometimes, you just need a buddy. My prayer is that something I write on this blog helps encourage you to step out in faith and use the gifts God’s given you to bring glory to Him. My hope is that the fruit of your efforts goes way beyond anything you thought it would be, but make no mistake: if you attempt to give God glory, you’ll run into opposition. You’re going to get discouraged. You’re going to get knocked down. Having a buddy to help you get back on your feet is a great asset to have.

A person standing alone can be attacked and defeated, but two can stand back-to-back and conquer. Three are even better, for a triple-braided cord is not easily broken. –Ecclesiastes 4:12

As you embark on your efforts to employ your God-given gifts and talents, keep your buddy/buddies close, and be quick to lend a hand when they get knocked down, too.

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Let Someone Else Worry About That

Last week our family had the opportunity to travel for Christmas. On the way home from seeing relatives we drove through western and central Pennsylvania. Due to some poor planning on my part, our drive coincided with the first significant wintry storm of the season in that area.

Things weren’t real bad at first; it was mostly rain. After awhile though, the rain started sounding different. It wasn’t water hitting the windshield, it was wet ice, and it started accumulating on the road.

I guess the snow plows were enjoying the holiday

Before long it got bad enough that the tires periodically lost their grip on the pavement and the traction control light frequently flashed on the dashboard while the tires suddenly spun faster and the speedometer spiked. I slowed down, but we started passing lots of accidents where people had spun out or slipped off the road. When it was all said and done, my wife counted at least eight incidents. The local emergency responders got numerous calls, and on two occasions, we stopped for just-happened accidents and stayed with those involved until someone showed up. (In one, I slowed down because I saw a car up ahead on the left side of the road that had spun around and was facing traffic while a woman and her teenage daughter ran across the highway to get to safety; in the other a man and his dog slid off the road in a car, spun around, and ended up in a creek bed in a few inches of water.) It was a harrowing trip for sure, and by the time we got home, I was worn out from focusing so hard for so long.

This guy and his dog were fine, but they were probably stuck there for hours.

That night I wanted to use the day’s events as a teachable moment with my kids. They’ve seen car accidents on the side of the road as we’ve driven past them before, but I think this was the first time they really experienced a drive in rough conditions and saw the fear in peoples’ eyes after their day took an unexpected turn. I don’t think my kids have ever seen me so thankful to have completed a trip safely.

The next day my oldest daughter let me know that she had done some thinking. She was more appreciative of a safe trip, for sure, but she also let me know she realized that she trusted my driving so much that it never even occurred to her that things might not go according to plan. She’s been driving with me her whole life without any major issues, so she didn’t even consider the fact that we, ourselves, could get in an accident.

This was a little sobering for me. (Should I ever let her know I’m not a perfect driver, or should I let her figure that out on her own?) I don’t know if the kids were worried at all about the drive, or if they were, how much. At least one of them, though, didn’t sweat it, because “Dad’s on it.” She had no idea I was white-knuckle driving while she was able to be largely care-free, perfectly at peace knowing that the situation had my full attention.

Now, just so you know, I’m under no illusion that I’m immune from accidents even if I’m paying full attention and my vehicle is perfectly maintained at all times. (They’re called “accidents” for a reason.) It made me think, though, of how wonderful it is that we have Bible verses that encourage us to come to our Savior and give Him our worries.

This is a rough time of year for many folks, for any number of reasons. I want to encourage you to be completely open and honest with God about your worries. Are you anxious? Tell Him why. Do you have doubts about your faith? Let Him know. I don’t know how He’ll work in your life, but I know that solid relationships include openness and honesty.

I hope you had a great Christmas, that you’re excited that Christ came in the flesh to save you, and that you have a blessed New Year! See you in January!

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How Important is Focus?

Starting training in the military is generally a miserable experience. In the Air Force, it’s called Basic Military Training (BMT). If you’re an instructor at BMT, you have to take Americans from all cultural backgrounds and give them a common understanding, giving them the foundation to be a professional warrior, sometimes for people as young as 17.

Before you can build recruits into what you want them to become, you have to tear down what they currently are…individuals with their own sense of self, their own moral compasses, and their own priorities.

On the first day you arrive for BMT, you’re arriving in buses that came from airports, railroad stations, or other bus stations. Everybody’s dressed in their own street clothes. Some men have long hair, some are completely bald, some have mohawks. For the instructors to begin their work of tearing down recruits’ sense of individuality, they largely take the approach of scaring the bejeezus out of everyone.

Almost no instructor speaks in a normal voice. It’s all yelling. If they whisper or speak quietly to you, it’s really bad. You’re taught to stand there, motionless, with a thousand-yard stare. For how long? It doesn’t matter, keep standing there until they tell you to move. That was one of the first lessons they taught us on the first day…there are times when you are not to be distracted, even when you’ve got nothing to do.

The sheer logistics of confirming the identities of hundreds of men and women and verifying that they arrived safely takes a well-oiled machine. They eventually had to start moving us from the parking lot to a spot indoors, so they arranged groups of us in line and we’d wait our turn to shuffle inside.

As the line crept forward and I neared the entrance to the building, there was a large window to the foyer, through which a waiting room was visible. Inside it stood a man dressed in street clothes. I didn’t look at him directly, but he started gently knocking on the window, and from the corner of my eye it looked like he was trying to get the attention of either me or the guy in front of me.

Man, I didn’t want any trouble. Our friendly instructors had just finished telling us not to be distracted. Maybe this guy wanted to tell me my shoelace was untied or my fly was open or something. He kept knocking, but I kept staring at the back of the head of the guy in front of me. That knocking was persistent. Focus, focus, focus! Knock, knock, knock. Just as I was about to look over at him, the guy in front of me turned his head just a little too much to look at the guy, who then got a big smile and then pointed straight at the guy in front of me. Immediately what seemed like a horde of angry instructors descended upon this guy, yelling with red faces and bulging neck veins, reminding the offender that they had just talked about the importance of not losing focus!

I knew it was probably a trap, and I was still about to give in!

I’ll lay it out there in plain terms. As Christians, we’re here for two very simple reasons: 1. know God, and 2. make Him known. While there are countless ways of sharing the news of God’s love with the world, anything that’s taking you off point is a distraction. A word of caution: sometimes you may recognize that a distraction is a trap, but I’d guess more often than not, you’re not going to see it for what it is. Be on guard.

Think Trump will be re-elected? Who’s right, Black Lives Matter, Blue Lives Matter, or All Lives Matter? Will COVID-19 and climate change wipe out half the earth’s population by 2030?

See what I mean? It’s easy to allow yourself to be pulled off course. You may have already completely lost sight of what I’ve been writing about. Don’t take your eye off the prize. There will always be distractions, and they’ll come in many shapes and sizes, but they can all be characterized as things that take you off your mission: 1. know God, and 2. make Him known.

And He said to them, “Why did you seek Me? Did you not know that I must be about My Father’s business?” – Luke 2:49

Happy Birthday America! You’re not perfect, but neither am I and there’s nowhere I’d rather live!

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Marching in Your Own Direction

You know, the world has been dealing with a lot of serious stuff lately, so here’s an entry that has no point other than to entertain you.

In Air Force Basic Training, you’re part of a “flight” of anywhere between probably 40-60 people. In my particular flight, we probably had 45-50 guys that all showed up from across America and got thrown together to live in two giant rooms for the duration of Basic Training.

In Basic, we had to travel all over the base on foot. Imagine mass-processing people off the street and turning them into professional Airmen. In order to do this on an industrial scale, there are facilities set up exactly for this purpose. Getting clothing issued, haircuts, physical training, vaccinations, eating three times a day, going to medical appointments, getting financial accounts established, talking to counselors about your career choice and their additional requirements…it all needs to happen in an orderly fashion, and the Air Force has become pretty good at it.

To get anywhere, our instructors needed to march us between locations. I hated marching. Flights would march four trainees abreast and the column would extend as far back as it needed in order to include the entire flight. The tallest people would be in the front, decreasing in height the further back you go in the column. As one of the tallest guys in my flight, I was always very near the front of the group anytime we’d be marching anywhere. That’s fine, except you need to be paying close attention to the instructor’s commands to turn left or right, because you’ll have less time to react than if you’re in the back.

I don’t know what it is about Basic Training, but it has a way of making people that are ordinarily smart into…well…people that aren’t smart. Honest, most of the time I’m a smart guy. Put me in Basic Training, though, and I overthink things, question myself, stumble over my words, and agonize over whether I sufficiently folded my socks. Things that are not normally a big deal become obsessions. I hated Basic.

I don’t remember where we were coming from, but one day we were on our way to lunch. It was old hat for us at this point. Our flight usually got “parked” outside the door while we awaited our turn to go in. As we arrived we could see the “parking space” where our instructor was going to put us, but we needed to do a pair of turns to end up there. This is where I almost got myself into trouble.

To end up in our spot, we could either turn left and then right, or right and then left. I’m not sure what happened, but I somehow got it into my head that our instructor told us to turn right, but the flight of trainees had started turning left. I could have just gone along with everyone else, but in my sleep-deprived state I must have decided that no, we were all going to be punished somehow for not paying attention to the instructor’s verbal commands. Well not this guy!

In a rare flash of independent thought at Basic Training, I decided to strike out on my own and break away from the pack. When the entire column of men in my flight turned left, I turned right.

This was an absurd sight. Hopefully there were no cameras that caught this moment. If there were, I imagine it got lots of air time in the instructors’ lounge. I marched at the same cadence as everyone else, but in the opposite direction. Our instructor either didn’t notice or pretended not to see me. He gave the command for the second turn, and I don’t know which direction he said, but I didn’t care anymore, and took the opportunity to start moving back to rejoin the flight. I met back up perfectly with the group and slipped right back into the spot I had just left.

I don’t think anyone ever said anything to me, and to this day I honestly don’t know who was right (though I tend to believe the massive group of people who turned left probably outweighs the single schmuck who turned right and was out there marching around on his own).

I guess it’s true what they say…I’ve always marched to the beat of my own drum. Thankfully it didn’t land me in hot water this time!

Hey, don’t be afraid to laugh at yourself. It’s rough out there these days, but things are looking up. Wash your hands and avoid groups of people, but if you think you can make someone smile with something as dumb as a story like this, go for it. We could all use a smile right now.

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How Are You Not Cheating?!

My wife is one of four sisters, and each one of them is married with kids. The four families are spread out across the country, but when we can make it happen, it’s fun to get together.

A few times in the past, after most of the kids go down for the night, the parents have pulled out board games. It usually ends up that the teams get split into husbands vs. wives. The hubbies are able to squeak out wins in some games, but the wives are freakishly dominant when it comes to Pictionary.

I don’t know what it is; maybe all that time spent together as kids developed some kind of shared consciousness or something. It’s actually embarrassing to be on the other team. One of the sisters will be halfway into drawing a stick figure when another one shouts “ooh, ooooh…the Berlin Wall!” “YES! You got it!” Or one of them might draw a circle, and a half second later two of them will simultaneously yell “an apple a day keeps the doctor away!” After that the artist excitedly points at them and shouts “Yes, that’s it!”

Team Hubby just sits there bewildered, looking at the drawing, then at each other. The ladies are either extremely good at cheating and not letting us find out about it, or they benefit from a collection of minds that are on the same wavelength, with a singular focus and common understanding.

Oddly enough, that’s sometimes how Christianity works. I love hearing stories about how God weaves lives together to benefit one or more of them. Believers (and even unbelievers) become answers to urgent prayers. Complete strangers walk up to someone and, prompted only by the Holy Spirit, hand over money that the recipient desperately needed. Collectively, people employ their different spiritual gifts or use their various resources to achieve improbable or unique feats.

At times Christians work together without any earthly coordination. Something from your devotions combines with a “random” song on the radio and something you read (maybe even this blog!) to result in a message that’s being shouted at the hearer.

The hearer asks “what does this mean?” Well, if you’re the one hearing it, you’re the one that’s in the best position to make sense of it. Continue praying and seeking God’s guidance for your life. Not just once or twice more, but each day, multiple times a day, and He will eventually make it clear. Once He does, act on it. It’s your ticket to being a part of the freakishly dominant team.

PS – No, we don’t play Pictionary at family events anymore. The wives see that Team Hubby is getting bent out of shape, so they let us win other stuff and act like we won through our raw talent.