Flat-Out Tired… March 13, 2013

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Finishing my morning writing session yesterday, having spoken to you about how problems are really doorways to new ideas, I came outside to discover that I had a flat tire on my van.

Candidly, a flat tire might just be the symbol for all representations of inconvenience. Some people would just reach in, grab their spare and change it. I admire those folks–the way I appreciate individuals who win the Decathlon in the Olympics.

It is not me. I am not lazy but my inability combined with my unwillingness can certainly resemble lethargy. But because I had just written to you about doorways, I realized that all this event really did was create a new scenario to some things which absolutely needed to be accomplished anyway.

I had known for two weeks that I should purchase new tires for the back of the van. I was putting it off as long as possible–in order to fulfill my ongoing reputation for a bit of procrastination. There was no more need to procrastinate.

So instead of becoming frustrated, I realized that my morning had changed. Fortunately for me, right next door to our lodging was a car repair shop. Unfortunately, the young manager who walked over to see if he could assist informed me that his business did not handle tires. But in the process of discovering this, he asked me to locate the jack, so I searched through the van, and lo and behold, in moving a few things around, came upon a twenty-dollar bill. Even in the midst of my harried pursuit, I felt a great burst of appreciation.

I tucked it in my pocket, not thinking any more about it, and when it became obvious that this fine gentleman was not going to be able to help me, I reached into my wallet and gave him five dollars for his time. He refused it but I insisted–and he took it and strolled away.

Talking with Jan, we decided it was a good idea to get our tire fixed and incorporate our other duties around the perimeter of the process. So she went back next door to see if that non-tire-repair shop could simply air up our tire, in order for us to drive someplace to get it fixed. Because we had been generous with the young man with the five dollars. two of his employees came over, got the van lifted up with their equipment, took off the old tire and put on our spare. We were grateful.

So I reached into my pocket and pulled out my magic twenty and gave it to them. We went down the road, got two new tires on the van which we needed anyway, and the whole excursion only cost five dollars and a bit of changing of our agenda.

I learned something–I shall call it the “Here Philosophy.”

Life comes along and says, “Here it is.” Honestly, most of us are stalled with just the vision of the situation set before us. If we would just understand that “here it will not change the situation, no matter how much we discuss it or avoid it, we could move to Step 2, which is:

“Here we are.” The essence of this maneuver is to understand that there’s nothing wrong with being dismayed, as long as in the midst of your lamentation, you are gathering your resources to resolve the dilemma. After we survive “Here it is” and we allow ourselves to discover “Here we are,” God arrives.

“Here I am,” He says.

That’s right. If I had NOT been in the midst of trying to solve the problem of the flat tire, I would never have moved things around in the van and found the twenty-dollar blessing God had waiting for me. You see what I mean? “Here it is” leads to “Here we are” which leads God to be able to say, “Here I am.”

And once God is linked up with your efforts, you can smile, step out and say, “Here we go.” We are on an adventure instead of a death walk.

And it was. It was NOT a problem–it was a doorway. And once I came through the doorway, I enacted the “Here philosophy:”

• Here it is: stop fighting it.
• Here we are: start bringing it.
• Here I am: thank you, God, for uncovering that twenty-dollar bill.
• Here we go: we got the tires we needed in the first place.

And, by the way, we were very successful in achieving most of the other projects along the path.

Sometimes life is flat and our tires imitate. When it happens, put into practice the “Here philosophy” and understand that you will never get God to show up–until He’s convinced that you showed up.

The producers of jonathots would humbly request a yearly subscription donation of $10 for this wonderful, inspirational opportunity

Ah-choo … September 10, 2012

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I like to sneeze. I didn’t used to like to do it. At one time in my life, I thought every sneeze was a precursor of the common cold, lending itself to bronchitis or even pneumonia. I now realize that a sneeze can be quite a pleasant experience–the body’s way of expelling something unnecessary in the nasal passages so the little troupers can work better. If you think about it, a sneeze feels good–clears the head and lends itself to an invigorating nose blowing. It’s not only healthy to sneeze, it’s also quite beneficial to accept the fact that sneezinghappens (although I don’t think you’ll ever see that on a bumper sticker).

Original caption: Not faked. I was trying to take a hankie photo cos I have a cold and sneezed! (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Here’s the question: what else happens? What other factors are so common to us as human beings–and needful–that they pepper our existence every day?I can immediately think of two: failure and fear.

Let me play prophet. I predict that you, sometime during this twenty-four-hour period, will experience a failure, and will need to deal first-hand with a fear cropping up in your life. You see? That’s a guarantee.

After all, chances are you won’t win the lottery. It’s unlikely someone will walk up on the street and tell you how beautiful you are. You probably won’t get that promotion. And rainbows are saved for special occasions–or we wouldn’t pull the car over to stop and look at them. What IS going to happen to every human being every single day is failure and fear.

Now, nobody wants to talk about this because it sounds negative. But believing that failure and fear are negatives is similar to thinking that every sneeze is going to lead to death. Just as the common sneeze is available to us to expel unnecessary invaders in our sinuses, failure and fear come into our lives to excavate and evict emotional, spiritual and mental intruders. It’s just hard to understand that. It’s difficult when anticipation paints such a beautiful picture of what could be–to end up, in its place, with a smeared finger-painting done by a five-year-old.

Failure hurts. Then fear comes along to try to relieve the pain by replacing it with an ache of its own. And then, of course, we have the compounding situation that we begin to experience failure because we’re afraid. So on top of the natural conclusions that happen via time and chance, we add unnecessary decisions brought about by weakness and anxiety.

So how can we learn to be the kind of people who approach failure and fear like we do sneezing? After all, spirituality is not expressed through the amount of study we pursue, but through the confidence that is left behind through the graduation.

If you believe in God, your face should look more hopeful than the face of someone who doesn’t believe. It can’t be faked; it has to be real.

Since I am going to fail, what is my best reaction to the inevitable shortcoming that invites my long-suffering? Jesus said it was good cheer. Of course, good cheer sounds like something we wish people at Christmas time, as we are surrounded by bows, presents, pine trees and holly. But good cheer is the awareness that filure is our friend. Good cheer knows that most failure is the way to get rid of bad ideas, and if we stop resisting the natural conclusion to pursuing an inadequate path, we don’t have to waste time having our feelings hurt or wondering where we made a bad turn.

The only real certainty in life is uncertainty. So how can I co-exist with an uncertain life plan and still be of good cheer? It’s really quite plain: prepare to adjust.

For instance, when they repair your car, they tell you to come in later on to have it adjusted. We don’t question that–it makes sense. Driving down the road can shake things up, make things different and loosen up parts. We gladly comply. Yet when we make repairs on our lives, we think they should be air-tight and never need a good screw-down. Ridiculous.

Good cheer is the willingness to watch out for signs that tell us we need to adjust, and then to go ahead and do it without feeling loss or frustration over the revision. That is what keeps us from fear.

Fear is what comes into our lives when we lose love. What is love? Love is a committed affection. So fear enters our thoughts when we lose our commitment. And what should we be committed to do? Pursuing our plan and preparing to adjust. It’s not merely pursuing our plan. We must be willing to commit to the evolution that is inevitable in all things earth-bound.

And then we have to maintain the affection. You see, there are people who make corrections to their previous plans, but they do it in such a nasty, angry way that they abandon the joy and fun in the process. Is there anything uglier than feeling compelled to do good? Affection for life is what gives us passion for each other, ending up with yearning to have a closeness with God.

When we lose our commitment, the fear of what is going to happen next overwhelms us. When we walk away from our affection, the fear that we’ve placed our faith in the wrong project taunts us.

Ssince failure and fear are as common as sneezing, and we intelligently follow the action of sneezing with, “God bless you,” we should follow all failure with good cheer and all hints of fear with love–a committed affection.

In conclusion, I will tell you that in touring on the road, my plans are dashed dialy without apology or the courtesy of a phone call. I am often frightened by the mortality of aging and the limitations of my skill and finance.

What I do is maintain my sense of good cheer by fully being aware that God has nothing to gain by making me look like a fool. I overcome my fear by recommiting to quality ideas that are evolving and finding new reasons to give a big hug to why I do what I do in the first place.

Failure and fear are much like sneezing. They help us expel foreign objects from our being that intend us no good. If you can learn to at least understand them, if not enjoy them, you gain the control of your next move and brighten the countenance of your future.

The producers of jonathots would humbly request a yearly subscription donation of $10 for this wonderful, inspirational opportunity

Testing the Repair … September 6, 2012

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Confusion is a bad thing. It tends to make us frustrated and lazy. It should be avoided. But how can you avoid confusion without either developing some sort of “pie in they sky” philosophy, or walking around so disgruntled that you put the entire human community on edge?

Here’s what I do–I relate everything to me. I know that may sound arrogant, so let me qualify. I try to envision any situation in the world around me and compare it to something about me or something I’ve experienced.

So when people talk about education, I pursue learning and personal instruction in matters that will enlighten me and make my choices more informed. When people talk about food and healthy selections, I go to the grocery store and look around for things that fall within the spectrum of what is considered to be nourishing, and from those particular possibilities I grab my personal favorites to form my diet. When people talk about God, I envision a father much like myself, who through trial and error is trying to do the best for his children in instructing them while continuing to love them at all times.

So when they talk to me about politics and business, I don’t let my head spin with a bunch of statistics being offered by both Republicans and Democrats, who are promoting their cause and agenda. Instead, I like to take the situation happening in our economy and apply it to my own life–thereby getting a deeper understanding. Let me hush up with the explanation and give you an example.

I told you earlier in the week that I was “leaky”–that is, my radiator. Well, it turns out it needed to be replaced. Now, I don’t know much about radiators, so I contacted some friends and asked their opinions. You might call them my “advisors.” I got four different outlooks on the issue.

One friend insisted that I needed to take it to a dealership because they were the only ones who completely understood my vehicle, and I shouldn’t enlist some local repair shop, even if it cost me more to go to the big guy.

Another of my counselors asked me if the van was presently leaking. I explained that some friends in South Lyon had put some Stop Leak in it and that it was not dripping any fluid at all. He just laughed and said some variation of, “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.”  I think it was, “If it don’t leak, don’t plug it.”

A third friend I conferred with said I should go out and get it welded, or sautered, or whatever they do–get it repaired. It would be cheaper. For after all, he said, there was no need to throw away ninety per cent of a good radiator just because ten per cent was being fussy.

And the final person I spoke to thought I should go to a junk yard, find an old van and remove the radiator from that vehicle and place it into my transportation–because it would be cheaper, even though I would have to put on my rummaging shoes.

Please understand, I took all four perspectives into account. Each one of them was pretty sure he was giving me superb advice. I suppose I could have taken each particular maneuver, applied it and achieved some level of success. Instead, I pursued a fifth option.

I found a reputable repair shop and had them put on a new radiator. It was expensive. I realized if I paid all that money for the radiator and it ended up not working very well or something else broke down in the next few weeks, I would be compiling great financial turmoil for myself and probably end up looking pretty stupid.

Bold maneuvers always put you on top of a mountain, where it’s hard to escape being peered at by the congregation below. So if I bought this radiator and it went well, within a few weeks I would be so happy that I was cruising along without fear of my Stop Leak giving up its “stop,” or my junkyard radiator being junk, or my repaired water holder being irreparable, or paying even more by having the reassurance of a dealership.

I had to risk looking stupid to give myself a new, fresh opportunity. Even as I drive down the road today, heading towards Indiana from Michigan, I am not out of the woods. Every mile is a test-drive of my decision on how to repair my van.

The holes in the radiator were not my fauilt.I don’t feel guilty that the problem came up. I don’t feel responsible that it occurred “on my watch” instead of the time-clock of the former owner. I just want to make sure that I give myself the best chance to resolve the situation, even though my wallet took a hit and I put myself in a vulnerable position, where if something else goes wrong, I might just end up looking stupid. Remember–“smart” is often “stupid” which survived the trial. Do you see my point?

I think the same thing is true in our country. The last thing in the world we need in the US of America right now is an election. What we really require is a revival of common sense.

We need our teachers to instruct in subjects that will prepare the students for a real-life situation in this twenty-first-century global economy.

We need corporations to stop sitting on profit margins, contriving new bonuses, but instead, taking the good old-fashioned capitalist risk of venturing into new schemes which will require more employees.

We need politicians to stop campaigning and start considering ways to make ideas functional, even though often when you implement them they may seem scary at first because you do not know if they will actually take care of the repair.

And we need ministers and spiritual people in this country to stop plugging religion and give us the impetus and motivation to believe that “NoOne is better than anyone else” and that we are the only “we” that is available at this time in this season for this situation.

What do I think about America? I think we decided to do something four years ago, as a nation, by a majority, and now we’ve got a little “buyer’s remorse.” As I drive along today, I am hoping that my choice on how to repair my van is going to hold up and work. Any good American should be feeling the same way about the choices we’ve made to repair this country and its economy. It doesn’t mean other things won’t come up. It doesn’t mean we won’t need each other for further counsel–to tweak the solution. It just means that sometimes, all you can do is choose the best you can and then work with your best guess.

I do not condone either party or support either candidate. I know this–as in the case of the radiator on my van, every choice I made had its good points and bad points. I made a choice. Yes, I gave my van a stimulus program. We’ll see if it works. And if it doesn’t, I’m going to need those friends who gave me their input, to help me find a way to reclaim a new solution. And if it does work, I need to humbly bow my head in prayer and thank my Father for being merciful to this child.

It’s time for Americans to stop fighting. Hang in there with each other; make some subtle changes–but test out the repair. It took us eight years to screw up the economy–and the people who did it weren’t bad. It’s just that their repair didn’t hold up. But since it took eight years to get in trouble, I don’t know whether we can expect to escape in four.

• What we need are people who will believe without demanding that their opinions be supreme.
• What we require is faith in one another.
• What we don’t need is to tear our nation apart over tiny points of legalism and end up with too much to prove for any good to come of it.

So here I go–my confusion about the United States has been clarified by a decision I had to make this week about a radiator. Am I right? Am I wrong? I won’t know until I test the repair.

But I do know this–whatever happens, I won’t blame anyone, including myself. I’ll just take the next better idea that comes along, thank whoever gave it to me, and make it my own.

The producers of jonathots would humbly request a yearly subscription donation of $10 for this wonderful, inspirational opportunity

Even Stephen … May 7, 2012

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Possibly one of the most arduous treks across this great country would be the stretch of miles along I-20 between Dallas, Texas and El Paso. Historically I have chosen to make this journey at night to avoid the heat and glare of the day. One time as I sojourned on this particular piece of real estate, I saw lights in the distance. I was approaching the small city of Odessa, and as the brightness grew in size, I assumed it WAS Odessa. But as I came closer, I saw that it was an edifice, the size of a city itself–actually invoking a sense of awe, which grew in intensity as I came closer. For me, it merged the sensations of Christmas, Las Vegas and the Beverly Hillbillies–for it was an oil rig. The largest one I had ever seen. 

Black gold.

Texas tea. 

Suddenly my nostrils were assailed by the burn of that unique, pungent odor — and it smelled GOOD. Now, there may be folks who would disagree with me, but I like the smell of fresh oil being pumped from the earth–the very energy of both power and also of prosperity. It was a visceral moment on a very long, dark journey.

I had a similar sensation yesterday doing two performances at St. Stephen’s Lutheran Church of the Valley in Palmdale, California. As I shared, I literally witnessed minds opening–like lubricating the gears on a bicycle with oil. For truly the main problem I have with traditional religion is that the inevitable result of repetition is the literal numbing of  people’s minds.Once-meaningful liturgy, through repetition, becomes mindless drone.

I would like to encourage churches everywhere to make two simple changes in the format of the church service: to replace one liturgical recitation with a moment of personal testimony from a parishoner, and during the passing of the peace, instead of offering one another a “peace be with you,” instead offer the exhortation: “Be of good cheer!”

Because just as repetition produces rusty mental gears, the sharing of personal experiences generates the oil of gladness. After all, Jesus said that in the world we WILL have tribulation. Our only job is to “be of good cheer.” That’s it. We don’t have to solve every problem today–and his job was to overcome the world. We don’t have to do that, either. We only have to understand that our place in the great scheme of things is to avoid repetition, share personal experiences and receive the good cheer that results.

Yesterday, as I witnessed lubricated gears beginning to move and saw the resulting good cheer, I saw that there is another, final culmination in the process–the oil of healing. Yes, mental freshness produces good cheer, which fosters the environment for healing–be it depression or terminal cancer.

Similar to the awe I sensed as I drove past the Odessa oil rig, with its power and energy, I felt the same wonder yesterday at St. Stephen’s Lutheran, viewing–and feeling myself–the energy of the oil of lubrication, the radiation of the good cheer and the power of healing oil passed among my brothers and sisters and back to me.

We try to make it hard. We talk about “contemporary” and “traditional.” But it is really just giving good people a chance to lubricate their rusty gears and then feel the oil of gladness and healing. After all, like the Tin Man, we all need a good oiling now and then.

Why not take the steps to make it happen?

  

The producers of jonathots would humbly request a yearly subscription donation of $10 for this wonderful, inspirational opportunity

Click, click, click… May 5, 2012

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Possibly nothing is more terrifying than knowing about trouble that might happen, probably won’t, but doesn’t seem to want to go away.

It was 1990 and I was traveling with my family in California. We were in the Sierras, scheduled in the town of Lone Pine. Now, to get to Lone Pine you first had to drive to Nowhere, take a sharp left turn into the forest, drive about eight miles through the underbrush, and then all at once–you’re there.

Our means of transportation in that season was a 1977 silver Mercury Cougar pulling a travel trailer which had given up the will to live years earlier. We had decided to resurrect it from the tomb, reverently believing it was our savior.One of the more bizarre aspects of this particular trailer was its lighting system. There was a series of little wires which looked like disconnected arteries desperately pleading for a heart, which had to be strategically placed in the correct holes to make sure that when we put on our brakes or turn signals, the people behind us could be aware of our transitions. It was a hit-or-miss project.On days when the lighting actually worked well, like Viking warriors, we felt that the gods were with us. On those days when the lighting lost its sense of illumination, we were constantly nervous about all stops, turns and passing officers of the law.

One particular night, as we were leaving Lone PIne to head north, we were cruising along–my son Jerrod (then about fifteen) in the front next to me; my wife, Dollie, and oldest son, Jon Russ, and our little three-year-old, Jasson, in the back seat. Those in the rear had already fallen asleep. It was a moonless night, a little bit chilly. Suddenly our lights began to blink ferociously, accompanied by the horrific sound of a “click-click-click.” I immediately pulled the car over and asked Jerrod, who was in charge of the lights, to go back and work on them. He was a fine, industrious young man, so he leaped from the car, went back, opened the trunk–where the lights of the trailer connected to the car–and came back and said, “It all looks good, dad.”

And he was right. It was about twenty-two miles of “good.” Then, all at once, it began doing that startling “click-click-click” again. Pulling over, I decided I had better go back with him and check it out for myself. I reached in the glove compartment for my flashlight, and discovered that the batteries were dead. So I stepped out of the car into the chilly night air, and was immediately greeted by the mournful howling of a coyote. I cannot describe to you how disconcerting such a sound can be when the air is cold, the night is dark and you’re confronted by a problem that you have absolutely no idea how to address, let alone solve. I was not an electrician. My God, I didn’t even know an electrician.

So the two of us climbed into the dark trailer, crawled on our bellies to the back-end, where the lights went into the rear of the cab, and without being able to see anything, attempted to negotiate rewiring our system–ala Helen Keller. About that time, I looked out the rear window of the trailer and saw the shadow of red, flashing lights. We had apparently acquired the interest of a passing highway patrolman. I crawled out of the trailer and went back to talk to the policeman. I explained my situation and he offered us the use of his flashlight for a few minutes, which was very handy and enabled us to complete our best attempt of not knowing what we were doing.

Just as we were finishing up, he got an emergency call on his radio and he had to take off, wishing us well. As he left, my son and I walked slowly to our car, knowing that in short seconds we would know if our particular patchwork had actually “quilted” our lights together. There was the another call of the coyote as I climbed into the car, turned it on, and we flicked on the lights. They worked.

We rejoiced. Being the believing sorts that we were, we actually said a couple of “glory hallelujahs.” Our little praise session for divine inspiration lasted another twenty-five miles before “click-click-click” returned to taunt us, reminding us of our human ignorance and frailty.The true horror of the experience was that the interruption was intermittent. In other words, we could drive ten miles and the lights would be just fine, and then suddenly we were in the middle of a disco show.

We tried to pray. Let me tell you something about prayer. Prayer is a wonderful thing to do when you’ve been given an accurate diagnosis of a problem, the prognosis is clear and you are fully aware that any human effort is probably not going to meet the need. Yes. Ask God’s help. But ignorant prayer is often a plea for grace. And grace resembles mercy. And Jesus made it clear that mercy is only obtained by us if we’ve extended it to others. So it’s difficult in the middle of a dark night with flickering lights annoying your travel, to ask for mercy unless you’ve already been living a merciful life yourself.

We were fortunate. Although Jerrod attempted to slumber, periodically our car’s tribute to Saturday Night Fever went off with its “click-click-click,” awakening him with a start. We somehow survived the experience and made it to dawn, when, with a great sense of relief, I reached over and turned off the headlights, thus ending our ordeal.

At our next stop, we discovered that the problem had nothing to do with the trailer, the wiring, or anything beyond the front dashboard of the car. We had a bad light switch, which turned on the headlights.There was a short in it, so anything we could have done would have been meaningless.

It was a good experience. It taught me that the grace of God is often more valuable to me than the intervention of the divine. Because unless God was going to come down and heal my light switch, nothing was going to work. And honestly, if God’s going to heal something, it probably should be that little girl in a hospital somewhere in Alabama who’s dying of cancer instead of my ailing car part, don’t you think? Most of the time what I need is the mercy of God instead of having all my problems solved in one big explosion of blessing.

And receiving that mercy requires that I live a life of giving mercy to others. It’s a good deal. It’ll get you through the night–and keep you from being eaten by coyotes. 

  

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