Had I ever become the prize-winning writer God intended me to be, my first book would have been called Jesus Never Went to Junior High, because he didn’t give us a clue about dealing with this unique subset of early teenagerism. At some point, however, through something akin to a God-given epiphany and thanks to my pastoral duty of preparing middle schoolers to become church members, I discovered that these really were the “wonder years” as portrayed by a 1980’s sitcom. My wife’s calling to be a gifted middle school teacher might have had some influence on this opinion. While […]
Uncles of a Bygone War
They became known as “The Greatest Generation”, those men and women who served this nation during the Second World War. Those of us born between 1939 and 1945 were called the “War Babies”, and 1942 put me smack dab in the middle of the bunch. I don’t remember much about that bygone war itself, except for the rationing coupons for sugar and our Victory Garden in the backyard. I do recall two of my uncles were in that war, one in the Pacific Theater and one who was involved in the D-Day invasion of Europe. Uncle Marshall Bennett, one of […]
Time To Be Holy
Some of us feel guilty and inadequate when we simply can’t find the time to take the “time to be holy, speak oft with thy Lord…” as one old hymn suggests. My quiet moments of solitude, which, in any given decade, are few and far between, are very seldom intentional ones. They happen in a more serendipity fashion when I’m preoccupied with other things less holier than thine. The world in which I live and move and have my being doesn’t have a pause button. Time is like an ever-rolling stream, and each day brings an ever-loving load of things […]
Mama’s Will
Mama let me be a lot of things, but three of the most important were these: she let me be one of her children; she let me become a minister; and in her later years she let me have her power of attorney. Had I had that “power” first, we could have resolved a lot of other issues…like what size switch was appropriate for the crime! When she died eleven springs ago, her family and friends gathered in the Chapel of the Cross near her birthplace, and, as a combination of my three roles, I asked them to think of […]
Living Our Eternal Lives Already
Remember those billboards with that disturbing question: “Where will you spend eternity?” The object of that question was to scare the living hell out of the beholder and encourage him or her to come to Jesus before you die and it’s too late to decide. You have to choose, which puts you in the cat bird’s seat; a bad assumption. Another bad assumption is that eternal life can’t begin until we get rid of this current living situation by dying. Raising yet another conundrum: is there life before death? A lot of religions use this outdated worldview as part of […]