Journal - A Sad Day

Well, as some of you already know, last Tuesday, September 17th, we suffered the loss of a dear, dear friend: my truck, which Joni fondly referred to as “Destiny”. Yes, it was a tragic day. My 1999 Ford Explorer, which I have owned since 2002, met its end going up 2nd Avenue in Kearney.

First let me assure you that no humans were injured, but there was a rather violent collision that took the lives of two perfectly good American automobiles. I was driving up 2nd Avenue on my way to work Tuesday morning and just as I was entering the intersection at 33rd Street, a red car darted out in front of me. Of the two, I think my truck had more momentum going for it and was hardly moved from its original path, but I let it veer off the street onto the grassy lawn of a business that stands at that corner. The lady had been coming south down 2nd Avenue and was making a left turn at that intersection. There was a school bus on my side also making a left turn so that it was blocking her view of me, and my view of her. I never even saw her until she was right in front of me.

A sad day

After bringing my truck to a stop and turning the engine off (yes it was still running, what a trooper) I hopped right out and approached her car from the passenger side. I saw that it was a rather old lady inside, which gave me a moment of dread, but as I spoke to her through the passenger window she seemed okay: she was able to look me in the eye and tell me that she was okay. By that time a man had come out from a house nearby and together we got her out of the car. We decided to go ahead and do that because her car was full of the smoky gas from the airbags and she was clearly not seriously injured. I went back to my truck and, after digging around for a minute, found my phone and dialed 9-1-1. I told the operator that the lady didn’t think she needed an ambulance but the operator told me that someone had already called in the accident and the ambulance was on the way. Before I could even disconnect the call the ambulance was there as we were just a couple of blocks from the hospital.

So long Destiny

So anyway, some policemen were on the scene pretty quickly and began asking their usual questions. The lady decided to go to the hospital after all to get checked out and I subsequently learned from her insurance agent that she was fine. Then we were just standing around waiting for the tow-trucks. While we were waiting I took out my phone again and started taking pictures because I didn’t really know what else to do. Also, I suspected that would be the last time I ever saw my truck.

Coming home from Baltimore

Yep, I had my truck for 11-and-a-half years and we covered about 75,000 miles together. In all that time and all those miles she never let me down one time. Oh, I had the usual flat tires and dead batteries, but she never broke down on me or left me stranded anywhere. I remember the trip to Baltimore to pick up Joni and Adam and bring them back to Dallas where I was living at the time. That was a trip of about 2,700 miles round trip, and the return trip was with a U-haul trailer hooked up. My truck ran like a champ all the way. Joni called the truck “Destiny” ever since. We drove through a lot of rain on the way back too come to think of it. There were several trips from Dallas back home to Nebraska over the years, and of course that final trip when we moved up here in 2009. In 2011 and 2012 we made more trips to Omaha than I can remember to see my eye doctor. For a while it seemed like we were living in that truck.

Okay, I know I’m making a big deal out of dumb old car, but gosh darn it I really loved that truck. I really am thankful that no one was hurt. I know God doesn’t want us getting too attached to our earthly possessions but I suppose I needed a reminder of that. Each night before we go to bed, Joni and I read bible studies and passages from the bible. That night our bible study focused on how we should be willing to give up what we have. If you’ll indulge me for just a moment, I’d like to share the closing remarks from that study:

RESPONSE: Today I will live in the realization that people are more important than things.

PRAYER: Help me, Lord, to not be tied down by my possessions but be open to sharing what You have given me with others in need.

The main point was really more about sharing, but I think it applies pretty closely to my situation as well. I know I get too attached to my things sometimes and I should learn to be a little more fluid and flexible. That is something I’ll have to work on I suppose.

Matthew 6:19-21 19 “Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal, 20 but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. 21 For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. ESV

Hebrews 13:5 Keep your life free from love of money, and be content with what you have, for he has said, “I will never leave you nor forsake you. ESV

Journal - Yard Work, Possessions, and Music

Let’s see, where was I? Oh yes, last Friday Joni and I traveled to Grand Island for Distric Music Contest at Grand Island’s Central Catholic High School. Adam, who joined the choir this year, was performing with a group, and Kylie was performing as well. We left at about 9am and made the trip to GI, which is just under one hour away from here. We had obtained the physical address of the school and so with our trust TomTom GPS unit, we had no problem finding the place.

As it turned out, Adam’s group and Kylie’s group were performing in the same room, one right after the other so that made it pretty easy to see both. Adam had also been in a group earlier that morning, and Kylie had another group later that afternoon, so we were glad of the opportunity to see both kids perform.

Adam’s group of about seven boys sang an old Billy Joel classic, “For The Longest Time.” Some of the boys in the group had trouble with the tempo and the pitch, but I have to admit that Adam did a good job. I could actually hear him singing, which surprised me. He’s kind of reserved in public sometimes and I didn’t think he would sing out that well. Also, when he sings at home he has a lot of trouble finding the pitch, but with the piano and the other boys he sounded right on tune. Next up was Kylie’s quartet. They sang “Ave Maria”, not the version you traditionally hear around Christmastime, but a different one. It was a really beautiful song and the four girls sang it really well.

And that was all we stayed for. On the way in, I had noticed that we passed a Home Depot store and I asked Joni if we could stop on the way out to look for a fuel line for the weed eater. So we stopped in and found one without too much trouble. After that we headed on home.

Saturday was kind of a cool day, but it was sunny and not too windy so I went on out to see if I could get that fuel line in. This is when I discovered that it wasn’t actually the fuel line I was replacing, but the line that runs from the primer. There are two separate lines running into the fuel tank. Not too worry, the package I had picked up at Home Depot had both lines in it. So after fighting with the trimmer for a little while we finally managed to get the primer line installed. Unfortunately it still wouldn’t start. I pulled and pulled at it but it never even tried to catch. The only other thing I can think of is to try some fresh fuel. The trimmer uses 2-cycle fuel, gas and oil mixture, and what we had on hand has been sitting around for about three years, which is the last time we were able to use the trimmer. So I decided to try some fresh fuel in it as soon as I could get some.

Also on Saturday I kind of piddled around the yard a bit. I didn’t have anything specific that I wanted to work on so I just kind of messed around here and there. I watered the various flower-beds and such.

Sunday we made it to church. I was glad we did since we hadn’t made it the week before. Two weeks in between church services leaves me feeling a bit frazzled more often than not. Pastor Mike’s sermon was about possessions and riches. It was something I really needed to hear as I have struggled with that. Not with riches, I don’t struggle with riches at all since I have none, but I do struggle with possessions. I have many possessions that are very important to me, even though I know I shouldn’t place so much importance on them: things that I’ve had for a long time, or things that once belonged to now-deceased grandparents and such. I would be devastated to lose those things and I know that’s not healthy. Anyway, it was a good sermon that left me feeling kind of thoughtful the rest of the day.

I can’t remember if it was on Saturday or Sunday that we discovered the pumpkins. I was looking for sprouts on the potatoes that I had planted, and thought I found some. I was wrong. The little green sprouts were coming up in the middle of a pile of pumpkin seeds. The seeds came from two pumpkins that Mom had placed on our front steps as a surprise for our return from Omaha after my surgery in October. The pumpkins lasted a good long time, but when they finally got soft and mushy we picked them up with a shovel and tossed them into the garden area. Well, some of them are coming up. In case you ever need to identify pumpkins sprouts, they have thick rubbery leaves, and they all grow with two leaves on each sprout. We had actually picked up some pumpkin seeds at Walmart, but I guess we won’t need them because there are quite a few coming up. As for my potatoes, I dug up a couple to see if anything was happening and they’re not sprouting at all. So that experiment failed. Pumpkins will be fun though.

Then on Monday the choir had their concert at the school in Gibbon where many of the groups that performed at Districts get to show off for the home crowd. We got to see Adam’s group again as well as the other group he was in that we had missed on Friday. We also got to see Kylie again which was nice since she’s a Senior and it was her last choir performance before she graduates. Mom and Bobbi were there too and there were a few tears afterward. This also marked my first visit to the new school in Gibbon since my surgery. It worked out well: we had to drop off Adam early so we had plenty of time to look around before the concert began. My favorite thing was the class pictures. The old school had the senior pictures for each class in large frames going up and down the hallway. The new school has gone digital, with all the class photos displayed on a large touch screen mounted to the wall in the common area. You can choose a class to view and it brings up the pictures for the whole class. If you want to see a larger photo you can touch the student and it brings up a larger image. It was pretty cool.

Matthew 6:19-21 “Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. ESV

Mark 8:36 For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and forfeit his soul? ESV

Letting Go

When I was a kid, I used to love reading about animals. Everything about animals: what they ate, where they lived, everything. I had a subscription to a magazine called “Ranger Rick.” “Ranger Rick” was a kid’s magazine that was all about animals and the environment. Grandma Howard got me the subscription for Christmas one year, and she renewed it every Christmas until I finally outgrew it. Okay, maybe a year or two after I outgrew it. Sometimes it’s hard to let go of something so comfortable and familiar. I also had another magazine called “Zoobooks.” “Zoobooks” was much more detailed and scientific. Each month, they focused on one particular animal and told you absolutely everything about that animal.

I can’t remember which magazine it was, probably Zoobooks, but I remember reading about a particular type of monkey one time. It told about a method that hunters or poachers would use to catch the monkeys alive. The hunters would hollow out a small opening in the face of a large boulder or something similar. At the end of this narrow opening, they would carve out a slightly larger opening and then put food in it that the monkeys liked to eat. You see, the opening was barely large enough for the monkey to slip his hand in, but when he clenched his fist around the food, his hand no longer fit and he was stuck there. Even as the hunters approach the monkey, he was so unwilling to let go of the food that he allowed himself to be captured.

How alike we are to those monkeys. We are so unwilling to let go of the things we have, that we often miss out on something even better, maybe even our own salvation. Just like those monkeys, we cling so tightly to our possessions that we become trapped by them. And just like those hunters, our enemy, the devil, knows of our weakness, and knows how to use it against us.

I am probably more guilty of this than most. I don’t have a lot, but I really like the things I have. My home theater system, my magic-motion clock, my computer, my comic books, not to mention the things that once belonged to my grandparents or great-grandparents. Those things are all so important to me and I would be devastated to lose any of them, even though I know that God doesn’t want us to cling to the materials of this world.

This is a lesson that God has placed on my heart and mind very clearly recently. Pastor Mike has delivered, I think, three different sermons now regarding this topic in various forms, and whenever I “randomly” browse through the bible, the topic seems to come up. It seems there is something that God wants me to give up, and I confess that I have been dragging my feet and not looking very closely at the matter. It’s never easy letting go of things. Then yesterday at church, Pastor Mike’s sermon was about following God’s will all the way, not just doing the things that come easily, but also the things that are hard.

This is going to take some thought and prayer, like almost everything else, and I want to make sure I’m clear on it. I got seriously dissed by someone close to me last week and it’s left my head in kind of a mess. Also, I have this thing with the Lion’s Club hanging over me and I’m still not sure what I want to do about that. Where do you draw the line between rushing into something, and doing more damage by taking too long?

Well, one thing that I’ve learned is that no matter how badly I screw something up, God will always be there to help me pick up the pieces. There is comfort in that, at least.

1 Peter 2:15 For it is God's will that by doing good you should silence the ignorant talk of foolish men.

1 John 2:15-17 Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For everything in the world—the cravings of sinful man, the lust of his eyes and the boasting of what he has and does—comes not from the Father but from the world. The world and its desires pass away, but the man who does the will of God lives forever.

Inspirations - Smoke Signals

Hi there, it’s me again. I’m glad you stopped by today, because I have something that I want to share with you. Every now and then, I go surfing around the ‘net, looking for inspirational stories, or just ideas for things I can talk about on my blog. I found a good one the other day, take a look.

“The only survivor of a shipwreck was washed up on a small, uninhabited island. He prayed feverishly for God to rescue him, and every day he scanned the horizon for help, but none seemed forthcoming. Exhausted, he eventually managed to build a little hut out of driftwood to protect him from the elements, and to store his few possessions. But then one day, after scavenging for food, he arrived home to find his little hut in flames, the smoke rolling up to the sky. The worst had happened; everything was lost. He was stunned with grief and anger. "God, how could you do this to me!" he cried. Early the next day, however, he was awakened by the sound of a ship that was approaching the island. It had come to rescue him. "How did you know I was here?" asked the weary man of his rescuers. "We saw your smoke signal," they replied.”

I can definitely relate to that. My hut burned completely to the ground recently. I just hope someone saw the smoke!

Naturally, I get frustrated sometimes, wondering why God would allow my hut to catch fire. At first I was devastated because it seemed like everything I owned was in that hut. After awhile, however, I began to realize that not all of my things were in there, some of them were hidden in the jungle, nearly forgotten. In fact, I didn’t even know some of them were there. I did lose some of my stuff, though. Luckily, I have the greatest insurance agent in the universe! I admit, He can be harsh sometimes, deciding how valuable my possessions were, and which ones are worth replacing, but I’ve heard rumors that He can also be very generous, replacing the old useless things with brand new ones that are even better. It's almost like Christmas, waiting to see all the nice new things He wants to give me.

Okay, enough with the metaphors. Seriously, God puts us through some rough situations, and it’s hard to keep our eyes on the big picture. The big picture, of course, is God! As long as we keep our eyes on God, and trust Him, He will take care of us, no matter what trials and tribulations we are facing. Sometimes that means getting rid of the old junk we carry around with us, and replacing it with new, more useful stuff.

Incidentally, that story reminded me of one that Pastor Mike told us during his sermon one Sunday. It went something like this:

“A man had been shipwrecked on a deserted island for many months, when finally he was rescued. When the rescuers found the man, they discovered that he had been quite industrious.
“Wow, said one rescuer, you built three huts! What’s that one fore?” he asked, pointing to the first hut.
“That’s where I live.” Said the castaway.
“And what’s that one for?” asked another rescuer.
“That’s where I go to church.” Said the man.
“And what’s that third one for? Asked the first rescuer.
“That’s where I used to go to church.” He replied.”

I can’t remember exactly what Pastor Mike’s point was; I think it was something about commitment. How we always find it easier to find something new, rather than sticking with our old stuff and trying to fix it. It’s a good point, our society has become so disposable.

Well, that’s it. I’m going to go looking for more blog material. Thanks for listening.

2 Corinthians 4: 16-18 For which cause we faint not; but though our outward man perish, yet the inward man is renewed day by day. For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory; While we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen: for the things which are seen are temporal; but the things which are not seen are eternal.

Philippians 3:7-9 But what things were gain to me, those I counted loss for Christ. Yea doubtless, and I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord: for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and do count them but dung, that I may win Christ, And be found in him, not having mine own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith.