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So I'm settling into my hotel room. I'm out of town, and I'm going to turn on the TV probably to get a little of the local flavor. I especially like to watch the local weather and the local news. That's pretty much what I do at home. Now, if I'm in the U.S. listening to the local news and weather, that's easy. It gets kind of frustrating in another country sometimes.
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In college, our daughter wrote an award-winning essay about the power of radio. In that essay she wrote, "radio has the power to go through walls and sneak past border guards." That's true. For example, go back a few years to the fall of Communism. Uncle Sam broadcast Free World messages behind the Iron Curtain through an organization called Radio Free Europe. People got to hear truth about the rest of the world they never would have heard otherwise. Of course, the Communist leaders didn't want people hearing the rest of the story, so they would broadcast on the same frequencies, often just trying to drown out the truth with noise.
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When you're the parent of a little kid, you know that one of your great challenges could be getting that little one to sleep at night. When you are the little child, you know why it's hard to get to sleep at night. First, there's that prayer. You know, the one where your Mommy has you pray, "Now I lay me down to sleep; I pray the Lord my soul to keep." OK, that's good so far. Then, "If I should die before I wake..." Wait a minute! Hold it! Not going to sleep! Who in the world put that line in that prayer? Then there's another reason little kids have a hard time getting to sleep. The monsters, you know the ones in the closet. Oh, I know we had them in my room, how about yours? See, parents never really seem to get it. But all of us kids knew that once the lights all went out, there was a really scary monster waiting in that closet. So, you lie there with your eyes wide open, afraid of what the monster might do if you fall asleep.
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At a party with some of our ministry staff and volunteers, we had a lot of fun with a common party game. Okay, each person brings something they really want to get rid of, beautifully wrapped. Everyone draws a number. When your number comes up, you have the choice of opening one of the unopened gifts and making it yours or taking that unopened package and trading for what someone else has already opened, and then you leave them with whatever is in that still-wrapped package. Somehow, there always ends up being a few items that everybody wants. And depending on how aggressive your people are - and we've had some pretty aggressive ones - they remember who's got the hot item and they go after it with a vengeance. Those few items just keep moving around in trade after trade.
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I heard a while back about a novelty company that made a lot of money on people having birthdays that they might not be real excited about. You know, like those milestone birthdays: 40, 50, 60. I'll stop there. Of course, if you're sad about how many birthdays this is, consider the alternative. That means you've stopped having birthdays, and that's not good. This company actually produces a whole line of birthday products called "Over the Hill." Maybe you've seen them. There are these black balloons with these words on them, black banners, cards; all kinds of dark little reminders that tap into the very things you don't want this birthday to mean. A friend of mine was facing the classic Baby Boomer crossroads of turning 60 and was talking about it to an older man that he knew. And that man said something that made me laugh several times since then. He said, "Hey, how can I be over the hill when I've never even made it to the top yet?"
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Mothers are never really off duty - even at the beach...especially at the beach. My wife was reminiscing one day about those summer days when she would take the three little Hutchcrafts, plus two little friends, to a lake near us. And they would run into the water and frolic like children. And is mother just lying on the beach, catching rays or going for refreshments? Nope! She is sitting on the beach, counting to five about fifty times. That's five, as in five little heads in the water. Good news! There were always as many kids in the station wagon leaving the lake as there had been coming to the lake! That's the goal. Our kids played without fear, and they could. They were safe because someone who loved them was always watching them.
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Skiing to the North Pole - now that's an adventure. Apparently, a documentary producer thought so, too. That's why I got to learn about that adventure a little was watching it on TV. Needless to say, Skier Man had many unpredictable and perilous moments as he encountered weather challenges, terrain challenges and, of course, some really big animals. Like the polar bear he suddenly came upon with her babies. Mama Bear wasn't too happy to see this strange creature coming in her direction and her little ones. No, Skier Man had to think fast, and he did. He raised his ski poles over his head; held them up over his head like some gigantic metal antlers. Even though the polar bear was much bigger and more powerful than he was, she backed off. Skier Man had succeeded in creating the illusion that he was bigger than the bear!
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Somehow, children become very effective psychologists without ever taking a day of Psychology Class. They learn to push Mom and Dad's buttons really well. They learn to play Mom and Dad against each other to guilt trip their parents. (I wonder where they learn that, by the way?) They learn to pout - all kinds of methods of getting their way. Fortunately, most of us parents gradually develop some immunity to being manipulated by our kids. But I've got to tell you, there's one thing my kids would say to me that grabbed my heart and wouldn't let go and almost always worked. It was those times they just said, "But, Dad, you promised!" Man, those were convicting words. If I had promised, I just had to do everything within my power to keep my promise.
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I don't think women have any idea of the power they have over a man. Listen, I've seen a 250-pound he-man reduced to quivering jelly by a little 95-pound blonde. Most guys can relate to the trauma of trying to work up the courage just to call a girl for a simple date. I can remember looking at the phone for 45 minutes, rehearsing all these impressive lines and the macho tone I was going to use. But it didn't matter how long I thought about it, when I finally heard that little voice on the other end of the phone say, "Hello," my reply would come back with this pitiful, "Hello-oo-ooh."
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Why is it so hard to get us guys to go to the doctor? Or especially to the dentist? Oh, wait! "I think I want to make an appointment to see my dentist. How soon can I go see him again?" No, that doesn't happen. If you're a dentist listening, this is my problem; it is not your problem. You're doing a very valuable service, and I've paid a price for putting off those appointments. But it's amazing how we tend to avoid appointments that may be unpleasant. We'll put them off as long as we can. Right? And in most cases you can do what I do. You can put it off, you can cancel, even meetings you don't want to have. That is in most cases.
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It wasn't just another news story. It was loaded with so many layers of tragedy. It was one of the worst I'd ever seen. Maybe you remember several years ago when Japan had a massive earthquake and then a massive tsunami, and then the nuclear emergency. Now, those kinds of things tend to disappear from the front page. But, I'll tell you what, this particular situation, well, it's had lasting effects for a long, long time.
Like the workers at the damaged nuclear power plants. They had to know that something bad was happening to their bodies and their futures as they kept working in that radiating place, but they continued to go in there. They also knew that lives were at stake in their efforts to try to contain the invisible killer that was leaking from those plants. And they heroically risked it all.
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Tim Tebow's been a rather fascinating young man on the American sports scene. I remember some years ago he was playing football, and it was the Broncos/Patriots playoff game. And it actually hurt to watch that. There were no last-quarter or last-minute miracles. Tim was quarterbacking and his team lost and they lost bad. Final score...45-10! They weren't just beaten, they were crushed.
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Our sons had always dreamed of playing high school football. When they finally got to realize that dream, they got to play for one of the winningest coaches in our area. He turned what was once a team known for losing into a team that was usually in a championship series. And because I worked with the team for several years as sort of a spiritual coach, I had an opportunity to observe one of the great secrets of his success. He was a genius at knowing what position each player could play best. A lot of times they disagreed with the coach; they saw themselves as being a star at some position they really wanted. But he could size up their capabilities like no coach I'd ever seen. And invariably, the guys who thought he was wrong about the position he gave them, well, they'd end up being all-conference and all-county in that spot.
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Our friend - we'll call her Diane - shocked her family years ago when she announced at the age of 17 that she was pregnant. Even with some folks urging her to have an abortion, she made the choice to have that child - a son. When her son was seven, Diane met a guy we'll call Gary, and she knew they were falling in love. So, with some fear and trembling, she told him about her son. Gary said, "Let's go meet him." And Diane's boy took to Gary immediately. Diane and Gary got married, and the boy grew up with a wonderful relationship with Gary. But something happened when he turned 17 - this unexplainable rebellion that ultimately made him decide to go live with his biological father. A few months later, he returned to the home he'd grown up in. He'd made a powerful discovery in those intervening months. He said to Gary, "You're the one I walk like, you're the one I talk like, and I do things the way you taught me. You are my father!"
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The saying is about as old as dirt, "While the cat's away, the mice will play." To the extent that's true, the mice don't usually announce that they're planning to exploit the cat's absence, but not so with one business in our town. Where we were living back then, I drove by there. I saw a new display on the big sign that was in front of the business. The sign said, "The boss is away, so we will play." Let's hope the boss didn't come back early. Or maybe we should hope he did.
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It was always pretty exciting traveling with my wife. Well, but my wife with her camera was really exciting, because she could see things that I didn't see. Oh, yeah, I'd have to stop the car for what appeared to be no reason because she'd go, "Stop! Quick!" And, you know, when I'd see the picture, then I'd realize why we had to stop back then.
Oh, sometimes it was a little sign that later told a powerful story, or she'd seen one face in the middle of a hundred faces, or that one face captured on film some very poignant human emotion. Or we all got to see that glorious sunset, or that bird she saw in flight, or some very interesting scene that she saw and I missed.
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For most of us it's rare to see an eagle, and so an event when you do see one of those majestic birds soaring overhead it goes something like this: "Look! An eagle!" If you're driving when you hear that, your passengers might be in serious danger. Of course, an eagle isn't born knowing how to fly. Just like us learning to walk, they need to learn to fly and it's actually I imagine a pretty traumatic experience. Mama Eagle takes you high for a ride on her back and then she dumps you. Suddenly, you are hurtling through the sky with the ground below racing toward you. All the while, Papa Eagle is circling overhead, just watching. In a panic, the little eagle remembers watching Mom and Dad use these feathery things at their sides, so he clumsily extends his wings and starts flapping them frantically. That's a good start, but it's not enough to save him from this rapidly approaching disaster below. At that moment, Papa Eagle suddenly swoops downward at eye-blurring speed, flying straight for his falling child. And in a perfectly timed rescue, the father swoops in under his baby, catches him on his back, and takes him back to the sky.
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I was getting pretty bored with our family fishing vacation in Minnesota. So my dad decided to take little nine-year-old Ronnie to see Paul Bunyan, the legendary giant lumberjack. Actually, it's this huge Paul Bunyan, sitting on a chair with his big ax and Babe the Blue Ox nearby. And there was this little log cabin at his feet. My dad went over to the ticket booth and came back with my ticket, which I eagerly gave to the ticket taker so I could go in and see big old Paul. As I walked in, I almost became the youngest heart attack victim in Minnesota history. Paul Bunyan's big old voice boomed out across the grounds and said, "Hello, Ronnie." I was blown away! How could I know that this was all a conspiracy? The ticket booth guy gets the kid's name, relays it to the little man with a microphone in Paul's log cabin, who then uses that information to welcome some unsuspecting little guy like me. All I knew was that that big guy knew my name!
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Jeff was the quarterback of our high school football team back when we lived in New Jersey. He always attended this little Bible study we had pre-game, but he never made a commitment to Christ. Well, I saw him on one of his breaks from college. He said, "You know, Ron, I have made a commitment to Christ now, but it was hard to do it in high school, especially because we were guys.
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Our daughter was gone for the morning and a friend had come to babysit our two grandsons. That was a brave lady! Actually, she had a relatively problem-free, crisis-free morning, except for one time when she just had to reprimand our three-year-old angel. Being a firstborn, he was very sensitive to being corrected. His later comment indicated that he had clearly recorded what was a very gentle reprimand - the kind you do with a smile on your face, not a snarl. When Mom returned and asked our little guy how his morning was with "Miss Wilma," he invented a new phrase to describe her correction. He said, "Miss Wilma got mad at me; she got happy mad."
