March 25, 2020

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If you're a parent, or even a grandparent, when your kid gets a great teacher, they become a hero to them and to you. But every once in a while, a teacher does something so unforgettable that we nominate them for the Heroes Hall of Fame. Robert Bailey - he was in the news a while back - is one of those. He's a 27-year-old British teacher, serving in a school in Japan. A school that suddenly was right in the path of a monster tsunami that swamped northern Japan. The students there had eight minutes to find a safe place after the tsunami sirens went off. He described the moment that earthquake hit this way: "We first heard a weird cracking noise, and then came the violent shaking."

March 24, 2020

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Our boys wore clothes with labels way outside my budget, because of the generosity of a local doctor and his wife. He had first been a major medical blessing to us with the excellent care he provided. Then he and his wife blew us away with these bags full of cool clothes that their boys had outgrown.

There was a special connection that led us to being dinner guests in each other's home. I don't remember the dinner at their house, but I'll never forget the conversation. They knew we were Christians, and we knew they were Jewish. I thanked them that night "for how much your people have meant in our lives." Needless to say, they wanted to know more.

March 23, 2020

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Television at its best - which it all too seldom delivers - can take you to some fascinating places in the world that you might not see any other way. Like the ancient Inca city of Machu Picchu, for example. The ruins of that ancient city, high up in the Andes Mountains of Peru, are remarkably well preserved, almost as if the city was just abandoned a night long ago. A recent documentary showed burros making their way up this rugged, winding, perilous road to Machu Picchu, carrying the burdens of the humans who were leading them. You'd expect animals to be pretty skittish on a narrow trail and this deadly drop-off only feet away. Oh, but not those burros. No, they were remarkably calm the whole trip. Of course, there was a reason. They were blindfolded!

March 20, 2020

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I can't begin to count how many hundreds of thousands of miles I've flown commercially. And I don't think I've ever missed a flight where it was my fault. Well, almost never. Recently, I was on a ministry trip with one of our young Native American leaders - not a very seasoned traveler. We had one more connection to reach our destination. It was a smaller plane - so our gate was at the far end of the airport with flights being called right and left. No call yet for our flight. So I excused myself to go to a nearby counter for some health food - actually, a pastry. There are different kinds of health, don't judge me. There's like emotional health you know. When I got back to our gate, I went to check on our flight. That's when I saw the dreaded words I had not seen before - FLIGHT CLOSED. NO FURTHER BOARDING. My young associate was quite impressed with Mr. Seasoned Traveler. No way we were going to get on that plane!

March 19, 2020

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Over the years, with the arrival of each new grandchild, I've watched this device appear in their home - a little transistor radio-like looking thing. Really not much channel selection on this little radio. In fact, there was only one channel. It's tuned to Baby. When Mom put the little angel to sleep, she'd go into another room and turns on what they call a baby monitor. With it, you can hear unusual noise coming from the baby's room, and then you know baby needs you. My observation in our family was that no matter what else was going on in the room, Mommy remained mentally tuned to that one channel; always listening for a sound from baby.

March 18, 2020

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Frankly, I have never enjoyed eating worms. I don't know about you, but I assume you would agree with that. It's never really been appealing to me. But I know the saying, "The early bird gets the worm." Well, if that's the case, why would anyone would want to be the early bird? I mean, fish like worms. Oh, yeah! I never understood that, but they really do. I like pizza. But how would you like to go fishing and try to put a slice of pizza on the hook? See how many fish you catch when you use what you like to eat. Now, if you're not catching fish, I think any fisherman would tell you it's time to check your bait.

March 17, 2020

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Most of us don't have a friendly neighborhood blacksmith anymore. Some of us city folks might never see one if they didn't have them at historic sites and some old-time American theme parks. I'm pretty sure the first blacksmith our three-year-old granddaughter ever saw was the one at the park we took her to. When we stopped by the blacksmith's shop, we were the only ones there. Our granddaughter was really interested in his fire and how he pounded those hot, shapeless metal things into useful objects. Later, as we started to leave, Mr. Blacksmith stopped us. Even though he does some pretty tough work, he's obviously a caring man. He caught up with us because he wanted to do something special for our little girl - he handed her a nail that he had just made. She wouldn't let go of that nail for most of the rest of the day. And last I knew, it was still one of her treasures.

March 16, 2020

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Snacks. Oh, I know a lot of them aren't the most healthy stuff in the world to put in your body. But when you're driving, I view them as something that helps with an essential function. It's called staying alive. As in staying awake at the wheel, you know. A number of times I've asked my wife to open up some cookies or chips or some other goodies for me, only to find that when she passed them to me that they weren't all there. At first, I thought maybe the company had robbed me. No. No, see, I only had to look across the seat to the passenger side to find the culprit. It was the woman I love. Yeah, the crumbs on her lip and the chewing in her mouth; that was my first clue. Our conversation predictably would go like this: I would say, "What happened?" Then, with a whimsical smile, she would answer: "Tax. There was a small service tax." Right!

March 13, 2020

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Who has any idea when they're standing there at the altar looking all goo-goo eyed at each other what those vows really mean? But there's a reason for those vows. They anticipate what a marriage commitment to someone really means over a lifetime. I'm glad they video record or audio record weddings. As the years unfold, you need to listen again to what you promised. Our wedding was recorded. Actually it was chiseled on stone tablets by a stenographer. It was a long time ago, but it wasn't that long. No, really. It was too soon for a video tape, but we did get an audio tape. We had the privilege of writing our wedding ceremony, so we got to make a very personal commitment to each other in our vows. But for all the words we said that day, three words capture the essence of what it means to totally commit the rest of your life to someone: "forsaking all others."

March 12, 2020

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My oldest son was always a challenging child: creative, active, a mind of his own, a different drummer he marched to than his sister or brother. But we had our share of tender moments, too. Some of the ones I treasure in the photo album in my mind are the times he'd slow down a little and climb into his Daddy's lap. And we'd just cuddle for a while. Sometimes I wasn't sure how he could breathe, he had his head so buried in my chest. And then he'd look up at me with those big blue eyes and he'd say something I've obviously never forgotten, "When I'm in your arms, Daddy, I feel so safe."