Sunday, March 31, 2019
SUNDAY MORNING LESSON
CHRIST THE
REVOLUTIONARY
Born to raise hell
Born into the working class, Christ’s story has been one shrouded in
mystery and intrigue. From the very beginning, Jesus’ life was recorded by
writers as divine: A virgin birth; declared “King of the Jews”; the Savior of
mankind. It was clearly not a royal birth, having taken place in an out
building of an inn in Bethlehem. And immediately, the Roman government was
worried about this birth.
The gospel’s give us the only accounts of Christ’s birth,
life, and death. The first book was surprisingly not Matthew, but was Mark. * (123)
Mark was written some 35-70 years after the death of Jesus, by an anonymous
writer. * (67) The writer was more than likely sitting in Rome, using stories
that had been transmitted by oral tradition. There were no firsthand accounts
of Jesus life. Josephus, a prominent historian of the time, mentioned an
apocalyptic preacher who was roaming the countryside at the time, but there
were numerous preachers doing so. It remains unclear who he was referring to.
No one was there, standing next to the writers, telling them what they saw.
They relied on orally transmitted stories.
The facts surrounding Jesus life has been argued for the
last 2000 years, and will no doubt be argued the next 2000. For me, it is not
the facts that are as important as the story. The story highlights what
Christians should be striving for: Revolutionaries for the poor, mistreated, sick,
and forsaken.
(to be continued)
·
“Introducing
the New Testament.” Achtemeier, Green, Thompson. Eerdmans Publishing, 2001
SUNDAY MORNING SERMON
The Zen of Growing
Older
We baby boomers are getting older. It somehow just seems to
happen. One day you’re hitting a homer for your high school baseball team, the
next you’re wondering whether you can get out of bed.
It’s funny, but in a lot of ways, I don’t feel old. I
suppose by today’s standards, I’m not. Seventy-one. They say it’s the new
fifty. I’m not so sure.
I still like my music loud and I can tolerate most anything.
My only problem is, I can’t make out most of the lyrics nowadays. I don’t know
if it’s my ears or the younger generations propensity for mumbling. Whichever,
I still like my music, even some rap and hip hop.
I can still shoot a basketball pretty well, although I can’t
make many trips up and down the court. I gave up softball ten years ago. I
could probably still hit okay, but throwing would be difficult, for medical
reasons.
I don’t think my thinking has turned old, but I’m probably a
bit bias. Sometimes I get the feeling I’m slipping into geezerdom. I hear
myself complaining about the younger generations at times, but I think rather
than disappointed, I’m envious. Then again, if I had the chance, I don’t think
I would want to be younger again. Once was enough.
My main issue with growing old is medical. There are times,
if it’s not one thing, it’s another. With our modern medical technology, they
find everything. At times, I long for the old days when it was “take two
aspirins, and sleep it off.” You either got better or died.
One good old age benefit is social security and Medicare. This
is a socialist program most old people, many readily against socialism, partake
of. Retiring early, I took my benefit at age sixty-two. I don’t really think a
whole lot about it. I’m viewing it as getting a bit even with Uncle Sam. I’ll
lose money if I make it to age 75.
I will say, the older I get, the more I enjoy simple things,
like waking up in the morning. There is a certain pleasure in opening your eyes
and seeing the familiar. I like sitting on the back porch watching the golfers.
The deer are very entertaining at night. Hearing the ambulance in the distance
gives me the simple pleasure of knowing that I’m not in it. Pulling weeds,
having a beer with a friend, doing some writing on the back patio, playing a
little golf, watching some senseless show on TV. The little things get more
enjoyable, probably because there are fewer big things.
Growing older isn’t all that bad, although I’m not so sure
it’s all that good. It is what it is. Four days, I'll be 71. Ah, the wonder of it all.
Sunday, March 24, 2019
SUNDAY MORNING SERMON
WHAT WORD CAN BEST BE USED TO DESCRIBE PEOPLE WHO TAKE CHILDREN AWAY FROM THEIR PARENTS AT THE BORDER AND PLACE THEM IN DETENTION CAMPS? FASCISTS JUST DOESN'T QUITE DO IT. SO FAR I HAVEN'T COME UP WITH ANYTHING I CAN STOMACH AND DOESN'T MAKE ME THROW UP.
SUNDAY MORNING MESS
TRUMP EASILY WON ELECTION HERE IN THE VILLAGE. THESE ARE PEOPLE WITH SUPPOSEDLY A HIGHER LEVEL OF EDUCATION THAN NORMAL. (SO MUCH FOR EDUCATION). MOST PEOPLE THAT LIVE HERE CAME FROM THE SUBURBS AND/OR GATED COMMUNITIES. THEY HAD NEVER SEEN A CON ARTIST.
Friday, March 22, 2019
TRUMP'S EDUCATIONAL PHILOSOPHY
“We want one class of persons to have a liberal education, and we
want another class of persons, a very much larger class, to forgo the privilege of a liberal education and fit
themselves to perform specific difficult manual tasks.”
Thursday, March 21, 2019
GUN LAWS IN ARKANSAS
TO OWN A GUN IN ARKANSAS, YOU HAVE TO BE AT LEAST TEN AND HAVE MINIMAL EYE-SITE.
FIVE THINGS GOING ON IN THE VILLAGE THAT ARE WRONG
1.
It is wrong for a public body to do business in
private and not report the action taken to the public. If a company requires
you to hire them and keep it a secret what you are paying them, that company should
be told to go away. Elected officials are responsible to the public. Keeping
things secret is wrong.
2.
Lending money to individuals is not a good
policy. Where would that kind of policy end? Friends, neighbors… The lawsuit
currently in the court to recover money from one such loan is a frivolous
attempt to cover-up a loan that should never have been made. It was wrong.
3.
How hard is it to show that we are in
financially sound shape when the POA escrowed upwards of a million dollars
after doubling our dues with the 2-tier scheme? Dah. We have obviously not been
keeping up with our maintenance and infrastructure. This helps the books in the
short term. Combine the two, and boy, do we ever look good. But it is wrong.
4.
All information, for the most part, should be
available to us from the POA. All board votes, salaries, contracts, etc., is
our information. We are the POA. We are paying the bills. It should not require
a lawsuit to get this information. A lose-lose situation for us. That’s wrong.
5.
The gate fiasco is looking more and more like it
is our fault. A lawsuit again is being used to cover-up a mistake made by the
POA. This is an expensive way to do business. Again, a lose-lose for us. It is
wrong for the CEO and directors to blame everyone else for their incompetence,
lack of over-site, and apparent abandonment of common-sense.
Monday, March 18, 2019
Sunday, March 17, 2019
SUNDAY MORNING SERMON
INVISIBLE
He walked into
my office over fifteen years, now. His skin was fragile,
transparent,
like a fine piece of china, a beautifully patterned, hand-painted cup,
this one with
spidery cracks down the side, like they get with age. It looked like the
slightest
touch of his arm would draw blood. His face had deep wrinkles; his brows
were wild and
bushy. It was the eyes I noticed most.
They were blank, hollow,
blurry. Like
they had seen everything in the world there was to see. He shuffled
into the
office slowly, with a slight limp. His clothes hung on him like a scarecrow
that had been
through one too many thunderstorms.
It was mainly the booze. Whiskey. I asked
if he remembered when he started
drinking. “I
don’t remember, I have always drunk” Have you had any sobriety?
“Yes. Usually
no more than a month or so. One time, I made it six months. But she
always calls
me back. I am under her spell.” Have you used any other drugs? “Oh,
I’ve tried
just about everything at one time or another. But it’s always the alcohol.
She summons me
into her arms, and I go willingly.”
For a family therapist, it is not the
details you are looking for, but what lies
beneath them. While I am seeing a single person, who is
it that follows
invisibly
behind him into my office? To understand this requires knowledge of
systems theory,
the mantra being: “The sum total of the parts is equal to more than
the whole.” In
this case, one equals more than one. It’s the “more than” that I’m
looking for.
Unseen and elusive, but always there.
He talked. I listened. Back from prison.
Homeless and living on skid row.
Begging on the
street. Married and divorced three times. Three children. A
bleeding
ulcer. Pancreatitis. Beaten so many times he now only vaguely
remembered the
injuries, much less the people or reasons.
“I was promised a job in Kansas City. My
wife and I and our child were living
in Indiana. We
packed up what little we had, spent what money we could scrounge
up, and moved.
We got settled in and I reported for work. They had given my job
to someone
else. I went on a two-day bender, got into a terrible fight. When I
returned to
our apartment, bloody, battered, and bruised, my wife and child were
gone. I never
saw them again.”
He came back from many stories like this.
Promises broken, nightmares of his
own making.
Each time saved, he was thankful. But not enough to quit drinking.
He left relieved that he was able to get
some things off his chest. There was no
need pushing.
He was not going to quit drinking. It
would have been more fitting
that I were a
priest than a family therapist. It was more absolution that he
was looking
for.
Several months later I saw his obituary.
There were no marriages listed, no sons
or daughters.
Only that he had lived and then died. That night I had a dream. A
man was
standing on the street-corner, begging. When he looked at me, I had this
strange
feeling that we had met before. I shook his hand and handed him a five
dollar bill.
“Thanks,” was all he said.
According to Carl Jung, dreams are a way
of communicating and acquainting
yourself with
the unconscious. Dreams are not attempts to conceal your true
feelings from
the waking mind, but rather they are a window to your unconscious.
They expose the
invisible. They guide you to wholeness and offer solutions to
problems you
are facing in your waking life. Therapy, like faith, involves giving
yourself over
to the invisible. Believing in what you cannot see. Both take hard
work. You
never quite get it right.
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