Crazy Drivers

People are nuts…especially when they’re behind the wheel of a car.  So, to springboard off my previous post about what we are recognized by, let me give you a few helpful suggestions.

#1  If you’re a crazy driver, please don’t put any kind of Christian bumper sticker on your car and take the little fish off your trunk lid.  You’re making life more difficult on the rest of us.

#2  If you’re a crazy driver, please slow down when you’re around me and my family.  If you want to drive stupid, drive stupid out on a backroad instead of in my neighborhood or down the middle of Highway 78.

#3  If you’re a crazy driver, please stop blaming everyone else around you.  You are the one that’s nuts…not me.  So don’t honk at me, flip me off, or pass me on a blind curve and give me a dirty look as you go by.

#4  Finally, realize that everyone knows who you are and we are already trying to get out of the way.  We recognize your car, we know what your headlights look like as they come barreling up behind us, and we don’t really like it.

 

I was reading in 2 Kings yesterday morning, and was laughing at the story I read of a man named Jehu.  He is appointed by God as King over Israel.  His legacy should be one of royalty and refinement.  Instead, in Chapter 9, there is a guy in a watchtower in the city of Jezreel.  Jehu is on the way to the city to take the position of king away from Joram.  As he comes riding up to the city, this is what the watchman says about him “The man in the chariot is driving like Jehu son of Nimshi.  He drives as if he were crazy!” (2 Kings 9:20)  Notice the watchman did not say, I think that looks like it might be Jehu…the man that God has appointed as king.  He also did not say, I think that must be someone important…I can tell by the way he carries himself with dignity.  Instead, he cries down from the watchtower…”there’s a guy out there that’s driving like an idiot…it must be Jehu.”  Just something to think about when you get in your car this afternoon.

Have a great day.  See you Sunday at Church At The Grove.  Russ is starting an awesome two-part series on marriage…don’t miss it!

“Strangers At My Funeral”

I am in the process of writing a book titled Strangers At My Funeral.  Now, by the phrase “process of writing,” what I mean is that I have the title and an opening paragraph…it will be a while until it hits the shelves.  In that book, I will write a little bit about what I hope to be remembered by.  Sure, I would love to be remembered by some big accomplishment or world-changing feat, but that’s not very likely.  It would be great to be remembered by some huge contribution to society, but that will probably not be my legacy either.  In fact, I am coming to grips with the concept that it will be the daily things in my life that will add up to my legacy…and the positive or negative memories that my name will carry into the future.

Seven or eight years ago, I spent a couple weeks trying to figure out what my purpose in life is…I was trying to write out a mission statement for my life.  The last sentence was “My desire is to leave a legacy of souls that are completely consumed by God’s love.”  It is out of that mission statement that my book – Strangers At My Funeral – was born.  When I die (whether tomorrow or 50 years from now), I hope that someone will come to my funeral whom I’ve never met.  I hope that a stranger will be there…someone that was impacted by something small that I did for someone else.  Someone that just wanted to stop by and be a part of the final chapter of my story.  We are all known by the little things in life…and we impact everyone around us by those little things.  The question is:  Do we have a positive or negative impact on them?  So, what kind of impact are you having in the lives of those right around you?  And, when you die will those people bring someone with them to the funeral…someone who will simply be there to help write the final chapter of your life?

 

The Last Minute

I must confess.   I waited until almost the “last minute” to do my taxes and finished them at about 4:30am on Friday, April 11th.  That was later than I like to get them done, but I allowed many other things to take priority over 35 pages of tax paperwork.

Then, last night, I was delivering some newspapers to the Crown Road Post Office near the Atlanta airport and I felt bad for all the people that waited even longer than I did.  At 11:15pm, I came up on the southbound I-75 traffic at the exit for the post office.  People were waiting for 1/2 mile or more to get off the exit to get to the crowded road that led to the overly crowded post office in order to try to get their taxes postmarked by midnight on the 15th.  I knew a shortcut to the Bulk Mail entrance, so I was able to bypass the 45+ minute wait that the Channel 2 news truck was covering on the side of the interstate.  It was a mess.

The problem is that thousands of people waited until the very last minute to handle this VERY important task…and I can guarantee that some of them didn’t make it in time.

Why is it that so many of us handle life like that?  At the last minute.  (By the way, I did use the word “us” on purpose, because I’m the worst person I know about last-minute-living.)  Now, when it comes to taxes, the consequences are stress and anxiety and maybe even a penalty for filing late.  In other words, the consequences are pretty minimal.  But think about all the other things we wait until the last minute to do (things which have far greater consequences)…we wait until our deathbeds to evaluate our lives…we wait until tragedy strikes to tell our loved ones we love them…we wait until we are completely overwhelmed to pursue God.  James 4:14 says “What is your life?  You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes.”  Our time on earth is short (probably less than 100 years)…too short to wait until the last minute on the important things.

So, now with taxes behind you…go out and enjoy the day…evaluate what you are doing with your life…tell your family you love them…and spend a little time in pursuit of God.  Enjoy being “mist”…because you don’t know when your last minute may be.

Have an awesome day…see you Sunday at Church At The Grove.

I’m old enough to be on microfiche

Most of you reading this will remember a pretty basic educational tool called a microfiche.  If you don’t, then let me review.  In the old days, we didn’t have all these fancy computers and scanners and stuff.  So, if you wanted to store information, you had to keep a paper copy of it in a file drawer somewhere.  As the size of the filing cabinets grew, some companies and organizations went to “microfiche” technology which basically involved taking a picture of a piece of paper and burning the image in a very small format on a piece of plastic that looked like a photographic negative.  Back when I did research in elementary, middle, and even high school, I would often find myself sitting in the back of the library at a microfiche reader with a stack of microfiche slides beside me looking through newspapers and magazines from decades before.

I just got off an unfortunate phone call where I found out that I am officially “old”…not as old as Russ (I love you, man, but I couldn’t resist the opportunity)…but still “old”.  I had to get a copy of some records from the early 1990s (when I was in high school).  The lady was pleasant on the phone while I described what I needed and she said she could make a copy of it for me to pick up later in the week.  Then, she asked me to hold on for a minute while she made sure she had the information.  That’s when I heard it…the microfiche machine turned on, the microfiche with my information on it went in the machine, and she proceeded to make a copy of the pages.

I imagined her sitting in the back room of the building blowing dust off the drawer that held my information.  I couldn’t believe that the records of my teenage years were too old to be in the computer as a scanned file…I was on microfiche.  Oh, what a day!

Besides that, I’m feeling great…old…but great!  I hope you are too (not the old part, just the great part).  Have an awesome week and I’ll see you on Sunday at CATGrove.

Termites and Hail Dents…

So, three weeks ago, my car got hit by the hail storm that rolled through the Atlanta area.

This past weekend, we found termites in our house…hopefully they have not eaten much.

Insurance is great…

     …just keep in mind that not every hailstorm is like hitting the “jackpot” (a few years ago, I got a $3600 dollar check for the damage done to a turck that I paid less than that for to begin with…and I got to keep the truck).

     …as long as you know what you’ve actually got (I thought we had “repair” coverage on the house through my termite company…we only have “retreatment” coverage).

     …as long as you realize that everything we own is JUST STUFF and that STUFF is not really important at all.

Jesus warned against holding on to our stuff too tightly.  Russ talked about that this past weekend at Church At The Grove.  Don’t put your security in STUFF.

Hope you have a great day!

Spam…fake…annoying…everywhere

Every single day of my life lately, I delete about 50 spam emails from my office email account, I delete about 20 spam emails from my personal email account, and I have another 50-100 spam emails “filtered” out before I even see them.  As if those emails aren’t annoying enough, I also get spam on this blog.  Fortunately, I moderate my comments so you don’t have to read them, but I looked through them the other day and laughed a little.

One of the most common is somebody with a goofy comment like: ”I found your site on technorati and read a few of your other posts. Keep up the good work. I just added your RSS feed to my Google News Reader. Looking forward to reading more from you.”  One of the most recent of these was from some investing firm.  The funny part is…not only was I unimpressed by the comment…but because it was so stupidly self-serving, I would also NOT ever do business with that firm.

I’ve gotten others from people (companies) who said they had added me to their blogroll and wanted me to do the same.  The two biggest problems with that are…I don’t want the 10 people that read this blog to “get cheaper auto insurance” through a company that uses spam for marketing, nor do I want them to “experience financial freedom by starting a business from their homes” if that business apparently involves utilizing spam to get business.

You see, I’m not a fan of “spam”…the electronic version is fake, self-serving, generic, and annoying…the food version is also fake (remind me to tell you of a long bus ride in Australia with a huge can of generic spam in Australia).  I prefer those things which are real.  I prefer straight-forward.  I prefer non-political.  I prefer honest.

So, thanks to any of you who read what’s going on in my mind each month…thanks for letting me be real when I write…thanks for letting me “disappear” from blogging for days or weeks at a time…and thanks for just hanging out with me as I go through this incredible journey of life that God’s given us.

 

P.S.  Jeremiah is a pretty fascinating book…I was reading some stuff in the middle that is pretty amazing…God had a plan for his people and it included 70 years of captivity…then He would set them free.  It’s pretty weird to think that God’s plans are big enough to include difficulties in our lives.  For all of you that are struggling with parts of life right now, God is big enough to use any situation (good or bad) for His glory.

P.S.S.  I saw “Horton Hears A Who” today with my kids…great movie!

Silence . . . Because nothing else needed to be said

I did not know Scott Williams very well.  We had worked together years ago.  We had been to several family functions where I got to spend some time with him, his wife, and his kids.  I had prayed for him as he battled cancer over the last year.  I did know his brother, Steve…so when Scott’s body finally gave in to the cancer, I wanted to be at the funeral…mainly for Steve’s sake.

It was a unique funeral…the pastor led the service to be a celebration of the fact that a holy God loves us…this is how Scott wanted it to be.  We sang several songs about the incredible greatness of God.  We prayed for the family and friends that had lost a friend and loved one.  And we heard about heaven…being constantly reminded that Scott was now in the very presence of God.  After a blessing was spoken over the crowd that had gathered (standing room only)…the casket was rolled out and the family began to file out row by row.

As this happened, the entire crowd of probably close to 300 people was very quiet.  It was silent…not awkwardly silent…just silent.  Nothing else needed to be said.  There is a God that loves us and sent Jesus to create a way for us to have a relationship with him.  Scott had a relationship with God that gave him peace and even joy in the midst of the cancer.  Now, Scott was no longer with us, but was instead in the very presence of this incredible God that is truly beyond description.

Sometimes, silence is good…today it was…

Now, God, comfort those who grieve.