I Don't...

I used to run.

I did not keep track of and certainly cannot remember the number of 5K and 10K races I ran.  Certainly, most of them were run in central and southern Indiana, but a couple or three were run in Kentucky, and I even traveled to Window Rock, Arizona to run in (what was then called) the Washington Pass Classic.  I was in the "Run with the Bats" 10K once...a portion of the race course led through Marengo Cave...that was pretty cool. I wasn't an overly good runner, I just enjoyed the experience...the crowds of fellow-runners...the friends who ran most of those races with me.

I ran about twenty half-marathons...mostly the Mini-Marathon held in conjunction with the Indy 500 auto race in May.  For a few years, maybe three or four, I would run the Kentucky Derby Half-Marathon early in May and then the Indy Mini-Marathon in late May (it was originally run on the same weekend as the auto race, but in recent years has been moved to very early in May).  In 2011 I ran my last Mini-Marathon.  The best time I posted in a half-marathon was just a few seconds over 97 minutes.  Not great, but not bad for me.  The worst time I ever posted was...well, there were some bad times I posted.

I used to run.

It is not unusual these days to see stickers on the rear-windows of vehicles that read either 26.2 or 13.1.  Those stickers suggest someone in the vehicle runs either Marathons (26.2 miles) or Half-Marathons (13.1 miles).

I saw this rear-window sticker on a car in Bloomington about two weeks ago:

That's my sticker!  I used to run.  I don't run anymore.

I don't.  I don't because my knees ache too much after even a few yards of running.

BTW, here are some more things that I don't:
~I don't wear socks unless I really have to.
~I don't eat green beans.
~I don't pay attention at all to total nutsos trying to defend the unregulated access to guns in this country...folks like Wayne LaPierre and Ted Nugent.
~I don't look when I am given a shot or have blood drawn...too big a chance that I will pass out.
~I don't read romance novels.
~I don't like being sick.
~I don't play Bridge.
~I don't know why on earth some folks are so against gay and lesbian couples being allowed to marry.
~I don't understand why so much really silly religious stuff is written and spoken; and believed.
~I don't want to face the morning without several cups of coffee.
~I don't enjoy snow near as much as I once did.
~I don't like birds crapping on my car.

And, did I mention, I don't run anymore. 

And the Winner Is: Grace!

My NCAA basketball brackets were shot the minute that Harvard won in the opening round!

And it didn't get any better when Florida Gulf-Coast University made a run deep into the tournament.

And why the heck is it that Notre Dame is always the Non-Fightin' Irish when we get to the post-season?  (And what was with those awful uniforms that Nike designed for ND?)

Well, at any rate, there is a winner to declare...even ahead of this next weekend's Final Four games.  And the winner is: Grace!  Hands down.  Every time.

Yup, this is gonna be a religious-type post.  About grace.  About how the unmerited favor and forgiveness of our Creater trumps anything else that will ever happen to us.  (And just to lay my cards and my argument on the table, no substitutionary sacrifice is needed to satisfy the honor or perfection of the Creator in my view of Grace.  The Creator acts gracefully because the Creator is graceful.  That's all.)

I read this somewhere, and I like the image it creates: "God spreads grace like a four-year old spreads peanut butter.  All over the place."

Of course, what we want to hear is that everything will be OK.  That we just need to have faith.  And it will all work out for the best.  Except everything will not be OK.  And whatever faith you hold to, not everything is going to work out for the best.

Of course, what we want to hear is that everything will get better.  But the truth is that everything will not get better.  Some things will get bad.  Very bad.

Perhaps instead of what we want to hear, we should hear something like this...something that comes closer to the real lives we live than the fairy-tale lives some platitudes want us to believe we will live:
~When life is good...and when it is not, God spreads grace like a four-year old spreads peanut butter.  All over the place.
~When things go our way...and when they do not, God spreads grace like a four-year old spreads peanut butter.  All over the place.
~When we are hemmed in by troubles...and when we are not, God spreads grace like a four-year old spreads grace.  All over the place.
~When sin is involved...and when it is not, God spreads grace like a four-year old spreads peanut butter.  All over the place.

Does that still sound too much un-like the kind of life you experience?

Let me try one more thing.  Here is a quote from author Brennan Manning:

"My life is a witness to vulgar grace — a grace that amazes as it offends. A grace that pays the eager beaver who works all day long the same wage as the grinning drunk who shows up at ten till five. A grace that hikes up the robe and runs breakneck toward the prodigal reeking of sin and wraps him up and decides to throw a party, no ifs, ands, or buts. A grace that raises bloodshot eyes to a dying thief’s request — 'Please, remember me' — and assures him, 'You bet!'


"This vulgar grace…works without asking anything of us. It’s not cheap. It’s free…Grace is sufficient even though we huff and puff with all our might to try and find something or someone that it cannot cover. Grace is enough…Yes, all is grace. It is enough. And it’s beautiful."

So yeah, why not go with "Grace Trumps Karma," and "God spreads grace like a four-year old spreads peanut butter.  All over the place!"

Hope. Or, Why Its OK to Rage Against the Machine.

I wonder exactly what can and what cannot be created or accomplished by "HOPE."  What's your guess? 
On good days, I suppose I imagine that hope can lead to the opening of new ways, the lighting of dark corners, and the answers to life's difficult questions. 
On not-so-good days I am pretty sure that I imagine hope is sorta like daydreaming: a pleasant diversion, but not at all productive.

If preachers like me, or motivational speakers, or inspirational writers are going to talk about "hope" then we also need to talk about "hopelessness."  We need to acknowledge the darkness of the human condition, including our own condition, into which hope may still bring some small shaft of light.  Not all the time, but sometimes.  Not always a bright light, but most often bright enough to show us our surroundings.

On a more positive note, hope always shifts the focus forward.  And forward is a much better way to go than backward.  And standing still.

And, hope is always a choice...from among many other choices...that we can make.  Try this list on for size and see what more you could add to it:
-We can choose hope...over fear.
-We can choose hope...over anger.
-We can choose hope...over discouragement.
-We can choose hope...over desperation.
-We can choose hope...over violence.
-And, we can choose hope...over hopelessness.

The painting above is titled "Hope."  It was painted by George Frederic Watts in 1886.  (You can Google the name of the painting and read much more about it than I will offer here.) 
It shows a woman with bandaged eyes and broken dreams.  She is sitting on top of a not-very-inviting-looking world.  Unable to see ahead, she is holding in her hands a harp with all but one of its strings broken.
That one unbroken string is hope...and she plucks it repeatedly, sending out into the darkness a melody that moves the clouds and gives birth to a star in the otherwise lightless sky.

That's the first rendition of Watts' painting I just described.  In the second rendition that I have pictured above, Watts removed the star because he felt the original painting was too happy, hopeful, and cheery.  So, in this painting the hopeful melody played by the non-seeing woman has yet to strike just the right note to birth the star.

I wonder what can and cannot be created or accomplished by hope.

And so, I turn to, and offer up for us all, some words from the book, "The Impossible Will Take a Little While."

It reads as follows:
Our mission is to plant ourselves at the gates of  Hope...
...not the prudent gates of Optimism, which are somewhat narrower;
...not the stalwart, boring gates of Common Sense;
...not the strident gates of Self-Righteousness, which can creak on shrill and angry hinges;
...not the cheerful, flimsy garden gate of "Everything is gonna be all right."
But a different, somewhat lonely place...
...the place of truth-telling;
...the place of resistance and defiance;
...the piece of ground from which you see the world both as it is and as it could be - as it will be;
...the place from which you glimpse not only the struggle, but joy in the struggle.
And there we stand.

I wonder...

I Have No Idea...

I have been to elementary school (Lydick Elementary), high school (New Carlisle High School), college (I.U. South Bend, El Camino College, Cerritos Junior College, Indiana Central College), and graduate school (Christian Theological Seminary).  I have served as an adjunct professor for Vincennes University (teaching courses near Ft. Benjamin Harrison on Indy's east side).  So, I got me some book learnin'.

I have been exposed to some great ideas by some very smart teachers and professors.  And colleagues.  And friends.  And family.

But there are some things that I have no idea about:
-I have no idea how it is that every time my car gets washed, it rains.
-I have no idea why it is necessary for me to "spring forward" and "fall back" every year.
-I have no idea why violence is so easy and so easily resorted to, and peace is so hard and hardly ever resorted to.
-I have no idea why all the dumb "reality shows" on TV aren't relegated to something called "The Reality Channel" so I can delete it from my TV's remote control memory.
-I have no idea why the folks at "Westboro Baptist Church" can even claim the name "church."

And, I have no idea why the kind of stuff depicted in the picture below proliferates and is popular...but goodness knows, it does and it is.

We could write some other "I have no idea why's" and put them in the mouth of Jesus.  Fairly easily, I think.  Let's see how it might work.  Here goes:

-"I have no idea why they turned me into a religion either."
-"I have no idea why people think I am the only image of God either."
-"I have no idea why churches make creeds and confessions-of-faith so all-fire important either."
-"I have no idea why folks make up such fanciful and even unbelievable tales about me either."
-"I have no idea why some really silly and hurtful ideas are made to look like they came from me either."
-"I have no idea why sports fans or athletes think I supernaturally participate in the outcome of their games either."
-"I have no idea why people think I take sides in wars either."
-"I have no idea why the Red Sox traded Babe Ruth to the Yankees either."

OK, so the last one is probably the least believable...but who knows.

It was a fun exercise, I hope.  Did you get to laugh a bit at some of the religious silliness of our time, or of any time?  Were you able to exorcise a few demons?  Demolish a couple of sacred cows?  Stake out your own faith-turf with a wee bit more clarity? 

I have no idea what this blog will tackle next...

A Pet Rock. Seriously. Very Seriously.

April 1975.  In April of 1975 I was living in the second parsonage of the Edgewood United Methodist Church on Epler Avenue on the far southside of Indianapolis.  I was the Associate Pastor, mostly concentrating on youth ministry...and finishing up my final semesters at what was then known as Indiana Central College (now known as University of Indianapolis).  I was working on plans for a youth work camp trip to Redbird Mission in Beverly, Kentucky, and I was doing not enough training in preparation to run the 500 Festival Mini-Marathon late in May.  The New York Yankees were on their way to another disappointing season (they would finish in third place in the American League's Eastern Division...twelve games behind the Boston Red Sox...ugh!).
That was April 1975 for me.

What were you doing (assuming you were alive that long ago) in April of 1975?

In April of 1975, Gary Dahl was in a bar in Los Gatos, California dreaming up the idea for marketing Pet Rocks!  Seriously. He sold over a million and a half of those crazy things and became a millionaire.  Very Seriously.

He sold the Pets with a 32-page Training Manual.  Seriously.  The training manual offered advice on how to teach your Pet such tricks as "sit," stay," and "attack."  Good luck with the more difficult tricks like "stand," "rollover," and "shake hands."  Of course, potty training your Pet was no problem at all.  Very Seriously.  Its a rock, fer cryin' out loud!

In September of 2012 Rosebud Entertainment began marketing the things again...the Target store down the street from me sells them. 

A Pet Rock.  Gary Dahl was a genius.  Those of us who bought the things were somewhat less than geniuses.  Those of us who bought the things made Gary Dahl a very rich genius.

Amazing, isn't it, what can be dreamt-up, marketed, and sold for a ginormous profit?  Word is that the rocks cost Gary a penny each...the straw was free...and the box and the Training Manual were really cheap to produce.  Really cheap.

And, to quote from an Eagles' song, "Jesus, people bought them!"

I wonder what else we have eagerly purchased over the years that wasn't really worth the asking price.  Probably all kinds of stuff...all the way from deep-fried-chocolate-covered-insects (Seriously), to a cooked-up war: Hey-let's-invade-Iraq-because-they-got-WMDs (Very Seriously).  

Tempus Fugit

This month, twelve days in, I will turn 68.  As in 68 years old.  I was born in 1945.  The second world war ended in 1945. 

In 1945:
-A first-class stamp cost 3 cents.
-The Chicago Cubs played in the World Series!  (They lost to the Detroit Tigers.)
-Gene Autry, Frank Sinatra, Judy Garland, Glenn Miller, and Bing Crosby topped the music charts.
-John Steinbeck's "Cannery Row" was published.
-ENIAC (the first all-electronic computer!) was completed.
-The first atomic bomb was detonated.
-Rod Carew, Eric Clapton, Sammy "the Bull" Gravano, Bette Midler, Goldie Hawn, and Henry Winkler (yeah, The Fonz) were all born the same year I was.
-Pepe Lepew made his debut in a Looney Tunes cartoon.

Jim Butcher says that, "Life is a journey.  Time is a river.  The door is ajar."
That makes it all sound so wonderful, so sweet, so...oh, I don't know...so spiritual.  Maybe.  But I could tell you some horror stories from my soon-to-be 68 years.  It ain't been all wine and roses.  (BTW, a really good movie, "The Days of Wine and Roses," was released in 1945.)

And there has been wine and roses...great times, exciting adventures, wonderful people, outstanding children, meaningful work, love, forgiveness, grace, and on...and on.  I am thankful.  And very pleasantly surprised.

But time marches on.  In fact, it flies...more and more quickly, as I realize how little of it I have left (compared to how much I have already experienced).

I have come to agree with Francis Bacon, Sr., who wrote:
"Begin doing what you want to do now.
We are not living in eternity.
We have only this moment,
Sparkling like a star in our hand and melting like a snowflake."

Sparkling and melting. Yup, that seems about right. 

Hey, What's Behind that Door Over There?

How curious are you?  Curiosity killed the cat, of course.  Too bad for that cat. 

Albert Einstein said, "Curiosity has its own reason for existing."  He also said, "Never lose a holy curiosity."  Maybe that cat had an unholy couriosity.  Who knows.

Walt Disney said this: "We keep moving forward, opening new doors, and doing new things, because we're curious and curiosity keeps leading us down new paths."  Maybe that cat went down the wrong path.  You think?

According to Graham Swift, "People die when curiosity goes."  So maybe that's it, huh...cats and people are different.  That cat was done in by curiosity; I will be done in when I am no longer curious.

Hey, what's behind that door over there?
Are you curious?
What would it take for you to open that door and walk through it?

It sorta looks like there is a big cliff-type drop-off behind that door, doesn't it?  Sorta looks like that door might be sitting on a cliff overlooking the ocean.

Everything you know up to now is on this side of that door.  On the other side, you could find more things to know than are knowable now.  You may not even understand many of the things beyond that door.  (Not that you've understood all that many things on this side!)

Its relatively safe on this side of that door.  I mean, you are alive up til now, right?  Mostly unscathed.  On the other side of that door, well, don't forget about that cat.

Everyone you know, every relationship you enjoy, is on this side of that door.  If you open it up and walk through, it just might close behind you and you would have to start all over in the love and relationship areas.  You might do worse on the other side than you have done on this side.  Or better.  No guarantees.

Your religious faith in God is pretty much solid on this side of that door over there.  You have questions and doubts, of course, but when push-comes-to-shove you pretty much have it together in the Almighty department.  If you understand God thru Jesus, or thru the Tao Te Ching, or thru Buddha, or thru Muhammad, or thru the Bhagavad-Gita...or in some other way...on this side, its all pretty clear.  To you, at least.  And that's the only person it needs to matter to, right?  On the other side of that door, if you dare open it up and walk thru, the faith-view you hold now could be stood on its head.  Truth on this side could be falsehood on the other side.  Or not.  Nothing is for sure, is it?

Well, how curious are you?  You're not a cat, you know.  And probably its true that people die when curiosity goes.