Humor

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Chrisisms

What is a Chrisism?  It is a Chris Wiles dry wit hilarious utterance made in passing – often going by so fast it is not heard by most people.  He is full of great one-liner comparisons and descriptions if you listen closely.

Today I thought I’d write them down while they went by. Truly the exposition of Scripture at TSF was among the best I’ve heard here, and Chris was pushing on the time and did not have as many as some other days, but:

–          “… as that great theologian Bruce Springsteen said, ‘Everybody’s got a hungry heart.’”

–          when talking about the early part of Jesus’ earthly ministry, “At this point Jesus is starting to get noticed and to gain some Twitter followers.”

–          while illustrating how people use Jesus for small needs rather than worship him as God … “It is like going to the doctor with a headache and he points out that you have a harpoon between your third and fourth ribs.”

–          “Maybe you are here today because your spouse drug you here, or literally drugged you here by putting some Tylenol PM in your coffee and donut.”

An oldie from the past, my all-time favorite Chrisism … while talking about the “Casket Store” in Dallas, where people can literally shop for their final bed, Chris said, “Imagine being a salesman there and talking to a customer and saying, ‘So, what have I got to do to get you into one of these today?’”

I have to put these on my blog, because my blog is a fun blog – some of the time. Chris’ blog – www.thornscompose.com – is more serious and academic and deep and all that stuff.  But you really should look at it, especially now – as he is blogging along with the current sermon series.

Today’s exposition of the Scriptures was just great, and really put you into the two passages in Luke that we featured this morning.

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Mr. Porkupinickuous, or, “With Friends Like This, Who Needs the Holy Spirit?”

Over my years as Pastor at Tri-State Fellowship, you may have occasionally heard me tell a story or two about a youth pastor named Mike Fen, whom I worked with at my previous New Jersey church. Actually, Mike spoke one time at TSF in my early years here, when at that time he worked for the missions research ministry called “Caleb Project.”

Mike remains a good friend. He is from Nebraska, went to the University of Texas and Dallas Seminary, was a youth pastor with me in NJ, and since then has served in a variety of ways in Colorado.

Mike and I have together been to war and back (a long story of navigating a church difficulty I am certainly never going to write about online!!). There is nothing we cannot say to the other! He always teases me about my NJ roots and Eastern accent, but he is more aggressive and confrontational than I am! That is why he has the name of Mr. Porkupinickuous!

Oh, you say you’ve never heard that word? Probably not, because he and I coined it. Back in our days together in the early 90s, one day when telling the alumni director of our seminary (Dallas) about whom was working with me, he said, “Yes, I remember him; he’s a bit like a fellow walking around in a crowd with an open umbrella that sort of pokes people in the eye here and there!”  So, the idea of poking people sort of caught on … and then it morphed into the idea of being like a porcupine … and finally, it took form as an adjective – “porky” … but it seemed it needed to sound more formal than that and also not be confused with just being obese – so it turned into the wonderful word “porkupinickuous.”  The actual formal dictionary definition is “to have or express thoughts, attitudes, or actions that pertain to feelings not dissimilar to a close encounter with a porcupine.”  You get the idea!

So, true to form, when Mike calls – as he did tonight – within minutes of a few perfunctory questions about how I am, he quickly cuts through any smokescreens, whines, rants, carnal attitudes or general crap, and with the gentle touch of a 20-pound sledge points out whatever is lacking in perfect godliness!  With a friend like this, who needs the Holy Spirit?

The truth?  Two things …

1.  Everyone needs a friend or two like this. The praise of such is applauded by a smart guy named Solomon who said, “Better is open rebuke than hidden love. Wounds from a friend can be trusted, but an enemy multiplies kisses.”

2.  Though there is a lesson in this blog post, I wrote it to see if Mike will actually follow through and read this blog as I suggested, and prove that he has by leaving a comment. How about it – you porkupinickous scagpants shrub?

 

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Already a Book on Jeremy Lin

I know I am a freak. After years of educational demands with its written requirements, along with decades of writing sermons and other church materials, I can cover page after page with text in a rather short time. That is how I feed three blogs along with everything else.

Chris Wiles makes me look like Charlie Brown hunched over a pre-electricity typewriter. I’ve never met anyone personally who can throw so much information together onto a screen or page quite so quickly. Not long ago, Chris had a short deadline and whipped off a commentary on Ephesians (or something like that) for an African Pastors digital training library … and did it all in a matter of days with little sleep.

But I might have heard of a “rapid-write” match for Chris in the person of a fellow who wrote  a book on basketball sensation Jeremy Lin of the New York Knicks. If you don’t know the story of Lin, just look back in the blog about 4-5 posts and you’ll see what I’m talking about.

The book is entitled “Linsanity: The Improbable Rise of Jeremy Lin.”  The author did the research (all online with quotes of Lin, family, and others who know him) and wrote it in its entirety in 72 hours. From idea to final marketable product, it was less than one week!

As books go, it is fairly short – about 15,000 words, and is available as an e-book. But still, having a book out this fast is linsanity! It only took a linstant to do, and I’m sure it is linteresting and full of linformation! I confess it is all rather lingenius! And my relative lack of writing speed makes me feel linept, and I’m lindecisive if it is something I’d ever like to linaugurate!

By the way, you can download the book onto your Lindle reader.

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Baseball and the Apostle Paul

There is hope … hope for the passing of winter. Just as Punxatawny Phil  guarantees only six more weeks of winter (whether the dumb rodent sees its shadow or not), so the onset of baseball spring training means that Spring is about to … well … spring! And yes, dear Christians, baseball has begun again in Florida! All is well in the world.

One of the reasons I like baseball so much is that it is a most fair sport (although, as a high school distance running coach, I could argue that running is the ultimate fair sport). Athletic talent alone cannot make you good at baseball. There are no pure naturals who excel at it the first day. It takes work and attention to detail, and over time, there is reward for those who most invest.

And beyond that, it replicates the realities of life. The season is long. Even the best fail about 70% of the time! No one person can carry a team by himself; it takes everyone working together. But one key player on a given day can win or lose the game for everyone else. Sometimes the team that deserves to win does not, but in the end, the best team who did the most right things the most often will prevail. And in the long run, the statistics don’t lie.

As a pastor and teacher, another reason I love baseball is because it also replicates some biblical teachings – particularly of the Apostle Paul.

Albert Pujols baseball - hopefully he tithes his income!

One of the major teachings of Christianity as expressed in the institution of the Church is that everyone has value and has a place of needed contribution. Though some may seem more important, everyone is given gifts and talents by God to contribute to the good of everyone else. The Apostle Paul (in 1 Corinthians 12) talks about this by using the illustration of the human body – how the body is not all hands or all feet, but many parts. And even the smallest part – one often overlooked and forgotten – when it hurts, everything hurts! So God has made it that in a church, everyone needs everyone else; it is not just teachers and preachers that are important, but equally also those folks who do things behind the scenes like care for people in their times of need.

A baseball team is a great illustration of the same big idea. In fact, if the Apostle Paul (who was clearly a sports fan!) knew about the game of baseball, and if it was played on the isthmus of the Greek peninsula in the 1st century, I am convinced he would have preferred using it as a metaphor in 1 Corinthians 12.

A baseball team that excels is comprised of a wonderful diversity of talents. A baseball team often has big strong guys to play positions like catcher and first base, smaller fast guys for the middle infield (and yes O’s fans, Cal broke the mold on that), and gifted athletes to roam the outfield. Some players hit, some catch, some pitch … where would a team be with all hitters and no pitchers; or, just the opposite?

Baseball is the best game! I am sure God loves it, but can’t give you any reference for that beyond His creation of everything in the big-inning.

If you are an Orioles fan or are interested in my Orioles writing on the Fansided Sports Network, go to http://birdswatcher.com … where if one of my articles is not featured on the front page, you can find my name on the staff writers list and check out my many, many baseball opinions.

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Thanks For Not Noticing

Well, I made it through another birthday and circle around the sun. Thanks for not noticing – truly – as I don’t like the attention of it and I go to some detail in advance to not make it visible. I don’t have it listed in profiles like on Facebook. I am a complete birthday non-sentimentalist!

But, when you have children, one needs to be making something of a fuss over them. Yet think about this – with five children … if we made a big deal out of each kid’s birthday for the 18 years of growing up, that would be 90 days, or three months of birthdays to celebrate. That is a lot of cake and candles (905 total candles, for example).

A thing I especially don’t like about birthdays is the reminder of getting old. I do not like getting old, and can’t believe a young man like me is stuck in a body like this!

But here are some recent reminders that things are getting worse:

1.  At a fast food drive-in, I remotely placed my order and was told it was $6.03 … so I had a five, a one and three pennies ready at the window. The lady opens the window and says, “That will be $5.43.”  So I replied, “Back there you said $6.03 … have you got the right person?”  And she answered, “Well that was before the senior discount – you do qualify, right?  I think?”  I said, “Well, I’m 56 for a few more days, so you do what the Lord leads!”  And she said the Lord led her to give it to me for $5.43. OK, maybe getting older has an advantage or two.

2.  On my birthday itself, I was walking across my back yard and under a tree. I guess I was not looking enough at where I was going, and like the old dude that I am in my dotage, was apparently looking at my feet too much as I shuffled along. Suddenly, the end of a tree branch poked me 100% head-on just under my eye! I am not exaggerating at all when I say that if I was about ½ inch shorter, it would have taken my eye out! So – giant scratch / bleeding / swelling, etc.  … and, I had to leave within minutes to go to a political luncheon. So there I am in a restaurant sitting next to Senator Shank, wiping the blood off my face with a napkin – hoping it would stop!

3.  I spend a lot of time doing what I’m doing now – sitting at a keyboard writing. Essentially, I am in the business of word crafting and communicating. I am very thankful for modern tools, and often marvel that I went through so many years of advanced education with an electric typewriter as my primary techno-gadget. But now, every day, multiple times per day, I go to do something either in a document file search or a web search, and in the midst of it forget completely what it is that I’m looking for among the sea of open documents and pages!  Ok, ok… maybe that is A.D.D. more than it is aging.

 

4.  I have noticed that my taste in the cars I look at (but never actually buy – so far) has changed. It used to be that I looked at sports type cars, particularly Mustangs.  Not anymore. Now I look at BMW 3-series and Benz 230s or something of the sort. I have not yet, and cannot imagine, looking for the stereo-typical large sedan so commonly associated with the elderly… but who knows what will be the next morph! If you see me drive up in a big boat vehicle, you’ll know I’m pretty near the end!

Well, it does stink to get older. I might have posted this in one of the blogs from my last life, but here are the lyrics to a song – to be sung by an older gentleman recently married … to the tune of “Side by Side” …

Well, I got married last Friday
My new wife stood beside me
When the guests had gone home
We stood alone
Side by Side

We were glad we were wed then
We got ready for bed then
Her teeth and her hair
She laid on a chair
Side by Side

One tin leg to follow,
one glass eye so small
She unscrewed her left arm
And put it on the chair by the wall

I stood there broken hearted
Most of my wife has departed
So I slept by the chair
There was more of her there
Side by Side

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Elder Board Math

My father was a math wizard and worked as a bookkeeper. He was constantly running some figures through his head, and I suppose I picked up a bit of that from just living with him.

For some reason while preparing the agenda for yesterday’s monthly Board of Elders meeting, I got to thinking about how many of these and other special elder meetings I have attended since coming to Tri-State Fellowship in 1994. The number is about 245. To put it into more manageable terms, I have spent 8 months of my life attending TSF Board meetings!

And then, on the way home, I started to calculate how many miles of driving I’ve done simply to attend these meetings. That number is in excess of 6,100 miles – which is like driving to El Salvador and back.

But you might say to me, “Randy, that is your job; stop complaining!”

Well, first of all, I’m not complaining. I’ve had the opportunity to work with wonderful men who want to serve God.

And secondly, I’m not writing this to talk about myself, but rather to put the service of someone else into perspective – Tim Thorpe.

Tim joined the Elder Board during my first year in Maryland, and has been a part of it ever since. And in that he is essentially my neighbor – who lives the same distance from church as do I – Tim has been to nearly as many meetings and driven as many miles. And his rewards are not here, but over there!

Tim is going to take a leave of absence from the Board of Elders. Do you think he has earned it? All of you who know him know that he goes through life about 100 miles per hour. The guy has earned a break! But we know he’ll be back again before too awfully long.

Tim Thorpe stories abound. Here is one: In his first year as an elder, Tim did what most of the other elders did that year – speak on a Sunday morning. This was a new experience for him! I have no memory of what he actually talked about, but I remember the coke can. He walked up front (at Northern Middle School – before our building was completed) with a coke can in this hand, and never let go – gesturing with it for 30-40 minutes without realizing he had it. During the sermon he told the story of how he was riding his bicycle one day near Interstate 70, and how he was deep, deep in thought that day. It was a mile or so down the Interstate when it dawned on him that he had absent-mindedly gone right up the ramp and onto the shoulder without even realizing it!

There is only one Tim Thorpe in the world! And I am thankful for his years of service and friendship.

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Parenting 101

As I sit here and write this on a late Saturday afternoon, my middle son Aaron has arrived and is working with his guitar and chord charts – practicing for a gig tonight as Fratelli’s Restaurant. He is playing and singing there with his old high school pal Rhet Troxell. Most of my boys have done this sort of thing from time to time.

I wrote on Facebook that Aaron is performing there and invited everyone – which in my case is 680 “friends.”  He seemed to be struggling through the chord progression on a song, so I asked him how many songs they had ready, and he said, “Not enough!” So I answered, “So, I just invited 680 people, and now you’re gonna screw up!”  (He’ll be fine!)

Anyhow, the moment created a flashback for me. When I was quite young (like 14 or 15) and began singing solos in music programs and for specials at church, my mother – a fair musician herself – was so nervous she looked like she was going to just die any moment. Her lips were pursed, her brow furrowed, and her eyes were wide with fear. I learned QUICKLY that I should never look at her! It was as if she was communicating, “If you mess up, I’m gonna just crawl under the seats and hide!”  It was not encouraging.

I’m pretty sure I never did that with my boys and their musical endeavors, but I probably did with their running! But, a difference is that with running in cross country or track, I could scream and yell at them – unlike my mother, who had to suffer in silence. (She didn’t really suffer; she was the one who pushed me into that stuff, whether I wanted to or not.)

Any of you who have had more than one child know that they are never alike. Each is individual and endowed with certain talents and personality mixes. Though familial things may be seen – like music skills or running abilities – we need to remember they are all unique, and our encouragements need to be individualized as well.

That famous verse in Proverbs (which is not a promise, but rather a word of wisdom) should have the following emphasis to catch the original sense of it – “Train up a child in the way HE should go, and when he is old, he will not depart from it.” The encouragement here is to be a wise parent who looks to see what are the unique gifts, bents, and paths a child should pursue.

Haha… as I’m writing, Aaron is singing some song I don’t know (which is most all pop songs to be truthful) and Jesse comes running downstairs and says, “What are you doing singing that?  Is Kelly Garber going to be at this thing?”  And Aaron answers, “Yes, she is, so I’ll have to sing at least one Bon Jovi song!”

Well, I’m heading out to hear him. I’m going to post this now, but I’ll edit it later with a picture or two.

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Animal Ambiance

So, my attempt at ambiance went all astray! “Animals never do what you want them to when you want them to,” said Arnold Horst. He should know – after years of farming and raising every kind of critter.

If you were not at church Sunday morning, I called the kids up front (as I did 6 years ago) and read them a story I had written about “Two Boys in Bethlehem.” To create a little bit of a stable/barn type of feel, I brought in a crate with two chickens and a rooster from my “farm.”

I thought sure that the rooster would give me at least a couple of crows – after all, he does it about every 30 seconds all day long, and even screams through half the night! But, in church, he was as quiet as a church mouse.

My Jack Russell Terrier is an incredible singer – simply amazing. She even seems to be trying to stay on pitch. I’ve thought to put her in our summer picnic talent show, but I know what would happen – she’d get the same stage fright the rooster had and clam up!

Maybe I should give up on the animals completely, but I’m not sure I’ve had a lot of success either with getting people to do what I want them to do when I want them to do it!

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Aging Through Christmas Story

A couple years ago for one of our Christmas shows, I played the part of Simeon. Lori Boutieller asked me to do it, and I always do what she asks!

Anyhow, I was thinking – this is what everything has now come to!  I’m now typecast as the old man in the Christmas story! Well, I guess I do look the part! You know – dignified, and all that!

But consider this: here is how it progresses if you are a male, and a life-long church attender. When you are a baby, you play the part of Jesus (even though you can’t remember doing it). Then, as a child, you get to be an angel, or a shepherd (and be creeped-out by wearing your bathrobe on the stage). As a young adult, Joseph is your role. When you get to be a bit older adult, you become a wise man. Next, as a more seasoned gentleman, you are given the fun part of playing the innkeeper. And finally, when you are about to die, someone like Lori comes along and says, “Could you dress up and be Simeon this year?” Sure, I’ll do it! Why … it is the pinnacle moment of a lifetime of Christmas thespianism! The next stop is heaven. It has to be; there are no more parts!

It says in Luke 2:

Now there was a man in Jerusalem called Simeon, who was righteous and devout. He was waiting for the consolation of Israel, and the Holy Spirit was upon him. It had been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit that he would not die before he had seen the Lord’s Christ. Moved by the Spirit, he went into the temple courts. When the parents brought in the child Jesus to do for him what the custom of the Law required, Simeon took him in his arms and praised God, saying:

“Sovereign Lord, as you have promised, you now dismiss your servant in peace. For my eyes have seen your salvation, which you have prepared in the sight of all people, a light for revelation to the Gentiles and for glory to your people Israel.”

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Bella-isms

A new feature of life for me that was not present with my former blog is that I now have a granddaughter – who at age 2 ½ makes many funny statements. I’ll call them “Bellaisms.” They come out of nowhere and simply leave you laughing. I remember when her father and uncles did and said such things. Actually, Diana kept a log of funny statements, and I often encourage young parents to do the same.

I’ll give two examples here:

We were finishing a dinner in a Chinese restaurant, and as Bella opened the fortune cookie, her father said, “Read it Bella, what does it say?”  And she answered, “The Cowboys are good, Eagles are bad.”  (Smart girl!)

While at our house today, she was outside with our flock of chickens and two roosters running around. One of the big bad boys – a large “Black Jersey Giant” rooster – went after her by charging at her with flapping wings, etc.  It is honestly a scary thing for anyone, especially for someone so small that she is on head level with the bird. After a few tears, she settled down and heard the rooster crowing from across the pasture. She said, “He’s saying he is sorry … it’s OK black guy!”

I’m sure I’ll be writing more of these posts in the future.