Andrew It Out … April 27, 2013

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As I get older I realize it more and more.

The game is not fame. The game is not acclaim. It’s about leaving behind a plain path of understanding concerning your life so that others can study it, follow it and progress the idea.

Imagine how excited I was when I discovered that my Sunday would be spent at St. Andrew Lutheran Church in San Antonio, Texas. Andrew is one of my favorite Bible dudes. He is one of a quartet of fishermen from the little town of Capernaum who Jesus welcomes into his “kingdom dozen.”

Andrew was among the first to discover the message of Jesus.  Here’s an interesting fact: even though he was one of four fishermen, three of them–Peter James and John–became what we refer to as the “inner circle.”

Andrew was not included.

We do not know why. We don’t even know if there is a “why” to it. But there is no incident listed in which Andrew pitched a fit or ended up betraying Jesus because he felt cheated. What we have is a man who found his place, occupied his space, made his case and finished the race.

Andrew did three really notable things.–and as I said, as the years pass, I realize that I want to have more of the spirit of Andrew in me, and not insist on being a Peter, James or John.

1. He came early. Dear God, may I learn that in the matters of spirit, justice and equality, to arrive first and jump on the bandwagon of freedom instead of dragging my feet because my culture and prejudice have taught me to be reluctant. Andrew met Jesus and went with it. How amazing. Come early, folks. It’s not as crowded, and you get to share beautiful moments with something beginning instead of later on just being part of the maintenance crew.

2. He brought a friend. Yes, the Bible tells us that Andrew brought his brother, Peter. Every night when I walk onstage and share my thoughts, I realize that they may never gain international attention, but there is always the possibility that I will inspire the mind and spirit of someone in the gathering who has the capability of doing things much greater than me. Sometimes the best thing you can do for the world is to stimulate somebody else who has the power to change it.

3. Andrew encouraged young humans. When it was discovered that five thousand men needed to be fed, Andrew was the one who found a young lad with five loaves and two fishes and brought him to Jesus. He gave this fledgling kid a chance to be the hero of the day. He gave him a lifelong memory. He gave him a place in the Bible.

There are two ways to become old: you can become old and grouchy or you can become old and hip. If you’re old and grouchy, you think everything young people do is stupid. If you’re old and hip, you look at what young people do, remember what you did, laugh and encourage them in their better choices.

I want to be Andrew. I want to ignore the inner circles of life. I want to show up early, bring a friend and encourage young humans.

If that’s what’s going on at St. Andrew Lutheran Church, they are on the verge of revealing the Kingdom of God.

Andrew: enjoying your portion without needing the whole platter.

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

Fearfully and Wonderfully… April 4, 2012

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The Psalmist declared that we are “fearfully and wonderfully made”–fearfully in the sense that the same energy that can empower us can also blow up in our faces, scattering our dreams into oblivion; and wonderfully made because even though we continue to gain great insight on the human condition, we still remain the final frontier for discovery.

Over the past several days I have presented human life in six twelve-year packages. Let’s take this morning to sum it all up and also conclude what might be better choices in applying these precious dispensations of time.

From birth to twelve we have the chilled-hood–a time when boys and girls are so similar that it is often difficult to tell them apart–both visually and certainly in ability. But it’s also a dangerous time, when the prejudice can be planted in the young, fertile soil, promoting a lifetime of  begrudging appreciation. For understand this–prejudice is not an idea. It is a disease. And once you allow children to be infected by this germ by alienating members of the opposite sex, then the disease of bigotry continues in their lives and they will find it difficult not to apply the same principle to people of color and people who vary in size. What’s the best thing you can do for your children? Teach your boys to rejoice over being equal with girls and your girls to enjoy equality with boys–AND that this could be the norm for our species, not the temporary. Yes, the message of chilled-hood is that we don’t require antagonism between boys and girls, which can lead in the future to the disease of prejudice, turning us into bigots. Let me be bold–there is no one who thinks that men and women are different who does not also have the inkling that black people and white people are from separate worlds and that the size of a human being determines their value and intelligence.

And when thirteen years of age comes along, in that phase I dubbed addled essence, an introduction of the drugs of testosterone and estrogen permeating the bloodstreams of emerging adults, it is a great occasion to draw a line in the sand and insist that these “addled essence” individuals tolerate tolerance. I love that phrase. What do teenagers hate to do? Enjoy things they didn’t come up with. So the greatest thing we can do for those between the ages of thirteen and twenty-four is place them in situations where they need to tolerate tolerance. In other words, they need to understand that their future primal relationship will be with someone different from themselves, and the more they learn to understand, the greater the compatibility will be. To the addled essence, we require that you tolerate tolerance.

And when twenty-five years of age rolls around and the human being moves into the phase of “you’re kidding,” where procreation seems more important than being creative, we should remember that birthing your own life, and THEN another, is the key to being an excellent parent. Nobody can help anybody else be happy if they are discontented. So before you bring another human being onto the face of the earth, make sure of your own joy about being here yourself.

We move on to years of  thirty-seven to forty-eight. I dubbed this Re-Spend-Ability. The solution here is really quite simple. Love and money don’t mix. Do you want to talk about your love, your romance and your relationship? Terrific. But no signs of the dollar should ever come into the discussion or you will taint the beauty and sanctity of love. And honestly, when it’s time to talk about money, a pencil, paper and a calculator is sufficient rather than memories of your honeymoon and misgivings about whether you are appreciated and heard. The best way to sustain a long, living love affair is to make sure that love and money are never in the same room together.

Just around the age of forty-nine, estrogen in a woman and testosterone in a man begin to wane, hinting towards a loss of the feminine mystique and the macho persona. People get scared so they start picking at each other and blaming each other for their condition–dissing in action. What is the goal? To get older but not old–because even though as a man you are losing some of the ability to run races and lift boxes, and as a woman you are not going to be giving birth to children anymore, what you have gained is experience and wisdom, which enables you to keep a cool head in times of crisis. Can I repeat the by-line for this group? “Get older, not old.” And the best way to stay young is to be current and funny.

Which leads us to our last twelve-year period, which for many people extends even into their nineties. Eco-quality–where nature and human creation were meant to come into peaceful unity, returning us back to our chilled-hood spirit of cooperation. It has a simple and delightful slogan: learn and play. Unfortunately, most people who find themselves in the post-retirement era become grumpy and unwilling to learn, and think playfulness is immature. But if you can escape the urge to be cranky, you can realize there is still much to learn because a whole world of possibility is being invented right in front of you. And there is more time to play because you aren’t lifting boxes and don’t have to wipe the runny noses of your offspring.

There you have it. Now let’s put all the by-lines together and see what we come up with:

We don’t need the seed of prejudice but instead should learn to tolerate tolerance, birthing our own life to joy before we welcome another into our fold. Separating love from money while getting older but never old, we finally arrive at the true wisdom of the human journey, which is to learn and play.

It is a great system that first removes the antagonism that exists between the sexes, which relieves the pressure to be superior and frees us to live a life of true spirituality, which is:  “NoOne is better than anyone else.”

**************

Below is the first chapter of Jonathan Richard Cring’s stunning novel entitled Preparing a Place for Myself—the story of a journey after death. It is a delicious blend of theology and science fiction that will inspire and entertain. I thought you might enjoy reading it. After you do, if you would like to read the book in its entirety, please click on the link below and go to our tour store. The book is being offered at the special price of $4.99 plus $3.99 shipping–a total of $8.98. Enjoy.

http://www.janethan.com/tour_store.htm

Sitting One

 I died today. 

I didn’t expect it to happen.  Then again, I did—well, not really.

No, I certainly didn’t expect it.

I’ve had moments of clarity in my life.  Amazingly enough, many of them were in the midst of a dream. For a brief second I would know the meaning of life or the missing treatment to cure cancer.  And then as quickly as it popped into my mind it was gone. I really don’t recollect dying.  Just this unbelievable sense of clear headedness—like walking into a room newly painted and knowing by the odor and brightness that the color on the wall is so splattering new that you should be careful not to touch it for fear of smearing the design. The greatest revelation of all? 

Twenty-five miles in the sky time ceases to exist.

The planet Pluto takes two hundred and forty-eight years to circle the sun. It doesn’t give a damn. 

The day of my death was the day I became free of the only burden I really ever had.  TIME.

Useless.

Time is fussy.  Time is worry. 

Time is fear.  Time is the culprit causing human-types to recoil from pending generosity. 

There just was never enough time. 

Time would not allow it.  Remember—“if time permits …”

Why if time permits?  Why not if I permit?  Why not if I dream?  Why not if I want?  Why does time get to dictate to me my passage? 

It was time that robbed me of my soulful nature.    It was time that convinced me that my selfishness was needed. 

I didn’t die. The clock in me died, leaving spirit to tick on.  

So why don’t we see the farce of time?  Why do we allow ourselves to fall under the power of the cruel despot?  Yes, time is a relentless master—very little wage for much demand.

I died today. 

Actually … a piece of time named after me was cast away.

Eco-Quality… April 3, 2012

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A gift.  For a gift to have true value it has to possess two attributes–it has to truly be “mine” and I have to understand it. I have received presents that were not gifts, because the instructions came in German or Chinese and I was unable to access the true worth of the intention.

Likewise, around the age of sixty-one through seventy-two and beyond, we receive a gift. Unfortunately, most people of that age do not believe there IS a blessing imparted their way. Maybe it’s because the instructions are in the language of logic and we’re looking for something deeper or more mature. Maybe it’s because we focus too much on the difficulty of implementing the gift and fail to recognize the benefits. I’m not sure. But the ecosystem of Planet Earth is perfectly balanced within the human species by having us begin as children and basically end the same way.

Estrogen and testosterone removed as chemicals of dependence, we arrive in our later years once again on an even playing field, able to communicate if we so desire.

It is an eco-system that proffers quality, which I have blended to form a new word: eco-quality.

We are children again. As children, we can either choose to be child-like or childish. Verily, verily I say unto you–the greatest natural resource unused in this country is not natural gas trapped beneath the surface, but rather, our retired, aging, experienced, elderly population, which is set aside to vegetate and die. Maybe it’s because they never got over their addled essence and have decided to live a life that is adversarial rather than friendly. Maybe it’s because they wish they were still “kidding” and become overly involved in the lives of their grandchildren–ending up  interfering more than enlightening. Perhaps it’s because they think they’re still in their forties, struggling to make ends meet and haggling over the price of toilet paper at Costco. But more often than not, they get stuck dissing in action, and continue to pick at one another, finding fault and resenting each another because everything didn’t turn out quite as perfectly as planned.

So instead of having a flourishing, mature population, full of experience and wisdom, we have bratty old folk who need to have their diapers changed, bitching about eating their strained prunes and broccoli. I cannot disagree with those young humans who find this both annoying and pathetic. If you reach sixty-one years of age and the things you wanted to do with your life have still not happened, do yourself a favor and get up off of your rocker and imitate some of your aspirations with the energy you still have remaining. If we can teach our graying citizenry–many attending Woodstock, who were part of the disco revolution and survived all sorts of financial meltdowns–yes, if we can teach them to take on the better parts of chilled-hood and put that into practice in their everyday, senior citizen existence, we can unleash an intelligence for our youth and probably save a lot of money on medical care.

When children are happy they do two things–they learn and they play. If you reach sixty-one years of age and you think there is nothing for you to learn, you might just want to go to meet your Maker, who will be more than happy to explain to you the error of your conclusion. There is nothing more exciting, amazing and enthralling than an older person who is still willing to learn. We insist that you cannot teach an old dog new tricks, but since we are not of the canine species, we might want to rise a little above our “dogged” determination.

Learn. What’s necessary in order to learn? Two things: (1) “I don’t know,” and (2) “please teach me.” Since testosterone has ceased making men sexually obsessive, and estrogen isn’t cloying at women’s souls to keep them domesticated, we can actually enjoy things together and learn simultaneously.

And of course, play. There is no joy in longevity if we can’t find a way to pleasurably do everything. If life is a chore, please bring sundown so we can go home. But if we can find a way to make grocery shopping interesting, going to church a new vista of experience, or even a doctor’s visit to be a time of learning and information-gathering, then every day seems to have purpose and potential.

Yes, the greatest resource that is lost in our society is not the oil from old fossils, but getting our old fossils who are still alive to squeeze out some oil of gladness.

God gives us the tools:

1. We are not living in the pressure cooker of addled essence, where our hormones are screaming demands, making our bodies twitch with indecision.

2. We no longer have the pressure of “kidding.” I will be honest with you and hopefully others will join me–I enjoyed being a parent, I find grandparenting interesting, but I am glad I am back to my life being my own, thank you.

3. We have the intelligence to dodge the futility of Re-Spend-ability–causing us to fret over money–and  instead can take our experience and patience–to use it more wisely.

4. Hopefully, we will cease from dissing in action,  generating an atmosphere of tension, which has digressed to an ongoing silence of dissatisfaction.

Learn and play. Everybody gets older, but no one needs to get old.

The years from sixty-one to seventy-two and beyond should be conducted with two mantras:  (a) “I really know a lot, which makes me want to know more.” and (b) “if it ain’t fun, it ain’t done.”

A simple submission to these two precepts would change our society from a youth-crazed, fad-driven mania to a more balanced situation of looking at things through the eyes of experience instead of need and greed.

Let’s not kill off our old people, but let’s create eco-quality,  joyously returning to our chilled-hood, when male and female were much the same and we we had great fun bouncing a ball … and learning our biology.

 **************

Listen to Jonathan sing his gospel/blues anthem, Spent This Time, accompanied by Janet Clazzy on the WX-5 Wind Machine

 

**************

Below is the first chapter of Jonathan Richard Cring’s stunning novel entitled Preparing a Place for Myself—the story of a journey after death. It is a delicious blend of theology and science fiction that will inspire and entertain. I thought you might enjoy reading it. After you do, if you would like to read the book in its entirety, please click on the link below and go to our tour store. The book is being offered at the special price of $4.99 plus $3.99 shipping–a total of $8.98. Enjoy.

http://www.janethan.com/tour_store.htm

Sitting One

 I died today. 

I didn’t expect it to happen.  Then again, I did—well, not really.

No, I certainly didn’t expect it.

I’ve had moments of clarity in my life.  Amazingly enough, many of them were in the midst of a dream. For a brief second I would know the meaning of life or the missing treatment to cure cancer.  And then as quickly as it popped into my mind it was gone. I really don’t recollect dying.  Just this unbelievable sense of clear headedness—like walking into a room newly painted and knowing by the odor and brightness that the color on the wall is so splattering new that you should be careful not to touch it for fear of smearing the design. The greatest revelation of all? 

Twenty-five miles in the sky time ceases to exist.

The planet Pluto takes two hundred and forty-eight years to circle the sun. It doesn’t give a damn. 

The day of my death was the day I became free of the only burden I really ever had.  TIME.

Useless.

Time is fussy.  Time is worry. 

Time is fear.  Time is the culprit causing human-types to recoil from pending generosity. 

There just was never enough time. 

Time would not allow it.  Remember—“if time permits …”

Why if time permits?  Why not if I permit?  Why not if I dream?  Why not if I want?  Why does time get to dictate to me my passage? 

It was time that robbed me of my soulful nature.    It was time that convinced me that my selfishness was needed. 

I didn’t die. The clock in me died, leaving spirit to tick on.  

So why don’t we see the farce of time?  Why do we allow ourselves to fall under the power of the cruel despot?  Yes, time is a relentless master—very little wage for much demand.

I died today. 

Actually … a piece of time named after me was cast away.

Turn Offs–September 17, 2011

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September 17, 2011

Jason was a friend of mine who died. (Now there was a horrible opening sentence…)

He was a few months younger than me but he insisted on getting old as soon as he saw the age of fifty looming in the near distance. He got some gray in his hair, and rather than dying it, he wore it as a badge of honor, but also carried it as evidence of being decrepit. My teenage sons hated Jason because he spoke slowly and paused frequently—doing his best impersonation of impending dementia, and became infuriated if one of the boys interrupted him because they wanted to fill the space.

He explained to them that they needed to respect him. They, being ardent adherents of adolescence, said: “Why?”

“Because I’m older,” growled Jason.

It is one of the classic turn-offs in the human family. The notion that we are improved because we’re older or somewhat fresher because we’re younger is nether true nor holds any water in the great bucket of life.

Older people haven’t done anything but age. I will agree—with age there is the potential for learning, but certainly not a requirement. Matter of fact, aging can make you become resistant to receiving knowledge and cause you to believe that you’ve retained enough data to make decisions on almost anything. “I am older than you” is one of the most useless phrases uttered from the mouth of a human being.

I live in an ageless mindset. I listen just as intently to my six-year-old granddaughter as I do to a sixty-year-old pastor with a doctorate that’s been at a church for twenty-two years. Because not only out of the mouths of babes come words of wisdom, but also often questions which need to be asked but are shuffled to the side by those who have had too many birthdays—but not enough parties.

Now, I never went to college. Even though I have performed in them and instructed in them, I never took a class in a university. I share that with you neither as a badge of honor nor as a cloak of shame. It’s the way my life went. I was married when I was eighteen, had my first son by age nineteen, and now, forty-one years later, have raised seven children—four of my own making and three I adopted. I have been rich and I have been poor, but I have always been creative and I certainly know that the smartest thing you can do in life is laugh more than you cry.

I, like you, run across people who feel it is their job to communicate to me that they are smarter. I was always uncomfortable with the phrase “I am smarter” because it usually requires a follow-up of proof. And if the proof is in the pudding, then the pudding is in the stirring. And when you stir your ideas all together and they pop out of the bowl, they’d better be both palatable AND usable.

This is one of the problems going on in our country today. Our leadership does not know the difference between paper ideas and people ideas—because there are often things that look good on paper that do not serve the needs and feelings of humanity. It is why I enjoy the gospel of Jesus—it’s heavy on spirit and light on law. It takes into consideration the fragility of mankind, yet without treating us like we’re stupid.

“I am smarter” is the second great turn-off to those around you.

So what is the best way to convey intelligence in a society of touchy, insecure fellow-travelers? Just shut up, do it—and let’em watch. Wait for the question. Never give advice to anyone unless you hear a question mark at the end of their phrase. Here’s a clue—when people see something is working, they believe. You can criticize that all you want to, but you’ll end up expressing your frustrations to an empty room.

And finally, and unfortunately, those who feel they are older and smarter often come up with some philosophy, religious jargon or perhaps even political persuasion that expresses: “I am better.”

“I am better” is why the planet suffers slings and arrows.

Until we dispel the notion of chosen people, manifest destiny, special anointing, preferred races and genetically enhanced beings, we will eventually take our aged hand and in a moment of what we consider to be smartness, push the big red button to destroy ourselves.

Write it down somewhere so you can see it every day: NO ONE IS BETTER THAN ANYONE ELSE. The reason you need to write it down is because every, single person on this planet has been brought up to believe that they’re better than someone else. You may object to that statement and cite that your parents and even your grandparents were free of that contention, but somewhere along the line, they infused into you the notion that you were better than someone in some way. And it has robbed you of relationships that would have been rich with emotion, and has crippled you with a cross you cannot bear.

“I am better.” It is the final turn off that turns on all the hatred in the world.

I thought you might be interested in this today because these three statements—“I am older;” “I am smarter,” and “I am better”—are what cause us to believe that we are persecuted.

But NOT for righteousness’ sake. Nope. It’s just for a big, fat batch … of dumbness.