Sit Down Comedy … February 28th, 2020

Jonathots Daily Blog

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A wake-up call.

When I traveled on the road, I frequently requested one from the front desk clerk at the motel. He or she punched a few buttons, and sure enough, the next morning at the specified time, my phone rang.

It was startling—so loud that I decided to purchase a small traveler’s alarm clock, which could still awaken me but without a heart attack.

The only problem with this new apparatus was that it was gentle and had a snooze button, which permitted me to rob ten more minutes of sleep. Sometimes I just didn’t get out of bed on the right schedule.

A wake-up call should be alarming.

It should sound the cry: “WAKE UP!”

So what happens when you don’t permit a wake-up call, or you’ve deafened your ears to such an extent that you no longer find the sound alarming?

I don’t know which one has happened. But there are certainly things going on in this great country—things we all share—which would have alarmed us at one time, and now have been relegated to the status of background noise or surrounding scenery.

I, for one, think we once thought it alarming for people to treat one another without civility. We were cordial, even to people we didn’t like. We chose our words carefully.

Perhaps there was more gossip because true feelings were being uttered behind the backs of our enemies, but “a hospitality of congeniality” kept us from being openly hostile, on the verge of rage.

I am alarmed that we’ve lost our civility.

Likewise, it stands to reason that a faulted people should be served by a faulted leader. So what happens when the leader of the nation no longer believes that he or she has any faults? Won’t all the citizens want to imitate such an arrogant profile?

“If it’s good enough for the top dog, why don’t the little puppies get to bark at will?”

It is alarming to me that we seem to have lost the awareness of our own fragility and consciousness concerning our weaknesses.

Killing used to bother us. It really did.

Many years ago, when four students were murdered at Kent State University during a Viet Nam War protest, the country was stunned. Now I’m not so sure that four victims destroyed during a shooting would even make it into the second news cycle before disappearing into the past.

Once killing gains acceptability, it no longer matters who, and unfortunately may someday not matter how many.

I am extremely alarmed that the term “socialism” is being bandied around like a cultural volleyball by those with little awareness of the horrors suffered by souls in the Eastern Bloc of the European continent, or the stunted status thrust upon the good folk of Cuba.

Especially alarming is tying the word “socialist” to the adjective “democratic,” or harkening back to FDR and the New Deal.

Socialism has no place in our country’s governing.

And concerning programs to help the aging and poor, we must realize that as a nation, we have historically been able to come up with such plans and opportunities without ever having to wave the banner of socialism.

Then finally, I am alarmed with bias.

Whether it’s the religious right continuing to hold women in subjection to men or the liberals celebrating culture, only to further focus on our differences instead of our similarities, or just trying to keep all colors, mindsets and religions seemingly revered, but banished to a distance—it is alarming.

We’ve lost our way.

Our nation is sleepy.

We’re waking up intoxicated by our own foolishness, yearning to snooze, ignoring the need to rise up and make a difference.

How loud would the alarms have to be to awaken us from:

• following a leader who thinks he makes no mistakes
• supporting a Presidential candidate who dubs himself a socialist
• joining into a general national nastiness that puts us at continual odds with each other
• permitting a bloodbath of treachery and murder that leaves us baffled but unmoved
• or supporting an ongoing bias against gender, race and religion?

It is time to wake up.

It is time to sound the alarm, hear the alarm and be alarmed.

Good News and Better News … June 6th, 2016

 Jonathots Daily Blog

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On February 25th, 1964, I was twelve years old when Cassius Clay totally surprised the boxing world by destroying Sonny Liston in Miami Beach.

It had been an interesting ninety days. Within three months, John Kennedy had been assassinated, the Beatles appeared multiple times on the Ed Sullivan Show, and now a 22-year-old black fellow was ranting and raving about his greatness.

My home town hated all three.

I was told that John Kennedy was a philanderer, the Beatles were communists and Cassius was an uppity colored man.

It got worse when Mr. Clay chose to change his name to Muhammad Ali, becoming a foreign, dangerous infidel.

I was in my twenties before I felt the freedom to think for myself and develop new opinions about JFK, the Fab Four and Ali.

I was thinking about this very thing in my green room yesterday at the Otterbein United Methodist Church in Martinsburg, West Virginia.

Muhammad Ali was cursed, threatened with prison and had his title removed because he refused to fight in the Viet Nam War. Why? Because at the time it seemed important to do so.

But we were wrong. We were wrong about him, we were wrong about Viet Nam, we were confused about the Beatles, and Kennedy certainly had some moments of brilliance.

You see, it’s not a political issue and it’s not a spiritual issue. It all comes down to deciding whether to live a life where you complain or an existence where you create.

Because complaining people don’t create, and creative people don’t complain.

My heart’s desire yesterday, as I sat in front of the audience and shared my journey, music and insights, was to communicate that simple thought–complain or create?

Because even though Muhammad Ali was condemned by society, his consecration to his causes has endured the test of time. Matter of fact, the southern city of Louisville, Kentucky has tributes to him all over the metroplex. Isn’t that amazing?

You see, it’s simple.

The good news is that if you stop complaining, you start to learn. And the first thing you learn is that the more you create, the less you need to complain.

The better news is that there were a handful of folks in Martinsburg who got the message.

Others will be driven down the streets named after the men they once condemned–on their way to the graveyard.

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Ford Every Stream … August 12, 2012

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His name was Gerald Ford. He was a great American. I define that distinction as any politician who is able to escape the bonds of the party line to do what is really right for the country.

He became President of our nation after Richard Nixon resigned in disgrace. He took over a country preoccupied with Watergate, sick to death of the remnants of Viet Nam and cynical about anyone who would ever campaign for a vote.

He had some remarkable achievements.

Gerald Ford, official Presidential photo. Français : Gerald Ford, premier portrait officiel du Président américain, (1974). (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

First–he pardoned Nixon. The last thing in the world the United States needed was to put a former President on trial for felony charges. It was also a bold move because he attacked someone from his own party and told him he was guilty and in need of absolution.He was President when we finally dislodged ourselves from Indochina and the Viet Nam war. He managed to rally the spirit of our country for the celebration of a beautiful bicentennial in 1976–only fourteen months after the removal of Nixon. He was married to a woman named Betty, who was very honest about her weaknesses, and the clinic she began (Betty Ford Clinic) is still a symbol for rehabilitation for those who find themselves trapped in some form of addiction.

He did one remarkable thing that we must always honor him for and hopefully, learn from ourselves. He kept things from getting worse.

Sometimes we forget that the only path available to us is to make a courageous stand and keep things from getting worse.

I am America. The reason I say that is that my story parallels what has happened in this country during the past four years. In 2008, I had a very expensive house on a lake in Tennessee, escalating in value at what should have been considered an alarming rate. There was no reason for ME to be alarmed–after all, I was getting rich. I was living beyond my means, utilizing an abundance of credit cards to fund the fantasy. I was involved with many vanity projects in the sense that I was throwing money into efforts to substantiate their importance and confirm their value.

I had recently lost eighty-five pounds, landing at my new fighting weight and felt proud. I had health insurance, which allowed me to go to the doctor four times a year, where I was able to confirm my present status of unhealthiness. And then suddenly, like millions of other Americans, it was all gone.

I sit here four years later without my house, without credit cards, having lost no additional weight (though I have continued to try) and devoid of any cash to pursue vanity. I also do not have health insurance, so my present physical well-being is an intriguing mixture of the remains of my medical history mingled with my faith in God.

People would say that I am worse off than I was in 2008. They would be wrong.

My life now is vacant of deception, worry, misrepresentation and I have been present while all the bubbles have been burst. What is left to me is the ability to understand that I have taken this journey with the rest of my countrymen and have come out the other end praising God that it wasn’t worse.

It has legitimized my efforts. It has made what I pursue realistic instead of fantastic. Now, every day I have the honor of writing this essay for the Internet which you are now reading, I put out a weekly letter of fellowship weekly to several hundred pastors across the country and I interact with hundreds of people face-to-face, sharing my heart and listening to theirs.

It is clean, pure of heart and it is real. When I reach into my wallet, the contents of that leather pouch is mine and not partially owned by Bank of America.

So as we determine the future of our lives and our country, let me present to you to four questions that really confirm progress.

1. What has really taken place? In my case, I went from being a puffed-up poet funded by credit, to a traveling artisan who presses flesh and interacts in a human way with human beings.

2. Is it anything of what I expected? Once again, I return to myself. Life is never what we expect, but occasionally is gracious enough to allow some of our ideas to be included. In other words, there have been many surprises but the greatest gift to me over the past four years has been the ability to energize my own mission.

3. What have I learned? Volumes. First of all, I learned that you can maintain your weight and still become healthier by increasing exercise and improving the quality of your nutrition. I learned that merely writing something is not the same as blessing the world around you. I learned that simplicity is powerful when it’s paid for and within your abilities.

4. What can I use going forward? I can use everything that does not demand that I become presumptuous. That is the problem with our country. We are a presumptuous lot. We presume superiority, we presume finance, we presume spirituality and we presume manifest destiny. All of these things are available to us but they do require our humble involvement.

I now know in my life what works and what doesn’t. The only question that remains is, will I pursue the functioning parts or habitually insist on chasing evaporated dreams?

We can learn a lot from Gerald Ford. Although he was never elected to the Presidency and failed to gain the office in the 1976 election, he stepped in a gap and kept things from getting worse.

For after all, in the case of a gun shot wound, the first step to healing is to stop the bleeding. I don’t know about you–this past four years has helped me to stop the bleeding.

I am grateful.

 

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