Monday, March 12, 2007

Seattle - Earthquake! As I watched those words appearing on CNN's Breaking News, it really caught my attention in that airport. I expected to see the word "earthquake" associated with a place like California or other parts of the world, but that day it was Seattle - 6.8 on the Richter scale. Now, thankfully, the damage was not nearly as great as it could have been, but the experience was a sobering reminder of how unstable the ground beneath them really is. During the quake, a camera was rolling during a meeting in a conference room, and the video showed the reactions as the realization dawned on each person that his world was suddenly shaking. One moment, it was business as usual. The next moment, everything was moving.

Thursday, March 8, 2007

One day when our daughter was a teenager, I heard an interesting variety of emotions coming from her room. First, I'd hear her laughing, then sniffling, then she'd let out an occasional "I can't believe it!" Finally, my curiosity got the best of me; I had to know what she was doing. She said, "I'm reading my diary, Dad." Well, as she was reading that diary, she was reliving a lot of great moments, some hard times, a number of lessons learned. I've often wished I could go back and enter into how I felt at some key moments in my life. Problem is I didn't write it down.

Monday, March 5, 2007

David Letterman has been one of the kings of late-night television for years. His offbeat sense of humor has given him a prime spot in America's entertainment constellation for a long time. But one day, suddenly everybody stopped laughing. David Letterman, whose family has a bad history when it comes to heart problems apparently, went in for some seemingly routine cardiac tests. Suddenly, this comic king was rushed into surgery by his doctor and given a multiple bypass operation on his heart. The doctor saw major blockage in David Letterman's heart and he took radical action to save him.

Friday, March 2, 2007

If you want to have a philosophical discussion about the subject of grandchildren, sorry - I'm busy. Now if you want to talk about my grandson, I've got all the time in the world. I hope you do. If you want to discuss the institution of marriage, say goodnight. But if you listen to this broadcast very much, you know I love to talk about the woman I married. That would be my wife. This is a no-brainer, isn't it? It's the difference between the concept, the institution and the person!

Thursday, March 1, 2007

It's one of life's great acts of faith - checking your suitcase with an airline. You see, I fly a lot commercially, and most of my bags get where I'm going most of the time - but most, not all. Not long ago, my suitcase decided to stay in Chicago when I went to Toronto. That began a several-hour ordeal of making the rounds at the airport, trying to locate my bag.

I had carried on to the plane this very heavy, over-the-shoulder briefcase, and basically I had my office in it. My hosts in Toronto had sent a great young man named Jason to pick me up, and he was a real help. At one point, when I was waiting a long time for an agent, Jason just stood there with my heavy briefcase on his shoulder. He was slowly getting shorter as he stood there, actually. Now, we weren't going anywhere; he could have just set it down. So, I asked him a simple question, "Why are you carrying that?" He smiled sheepishly and said, "I have no idea" and promptly set it down. He felt much better.

Tuesday, February 27, 2007

Once upon a time, the Hutchcraft family had a little fantail goldfish, and what did our daughter name him? Well, of course, Fanny. And the time came for Fanny's murky old fishbowl water to get changed. Of course, he had to be in water while that was happening or he would have developed severe respiratory difficulties. So, we put Fanny into this cramped, tiny little bowl and we put it in the kitchen sink - poor little fish. He would try to swim as usual, and he just kept bumping into the sides of the bowl a lot because they came a lot sooner than usual! It really, obviously, was not fun being in that shrunken little environment, but hey, the purpose was to improve his world - right!

Monday, February 26, 2007

There's a church on an Indian reservation in the Southwest that makes the most of decorating for Christmas. They're in a remote area, and they're actually in a village where you don't see a lot of lights at night. So you can imagine what the church there looks like when they outline the entire church building and its outbuildings with Christmas lights - with a cross covered with lights on top of the church's steeple. One Christmas I had a chance to visit there and I got to see those lights of the church and that cross that really stands out against the darkness. And I met Rose, a Native woman who attends that church. Those lights are an important part of her story. She said, "I have struggled with alcohol for many years. And one night, during the Christmas season, I hit bottom. I was in the pit. I wandered outside and there it was–the cross all lit up in front of me. I came to where the cross was" she said, "and with the help of the pastor's wife, I finally found hope that night."

Friday, February 23, 2007

My son-in-law had to fight a battle that's all too familiar to frequent flyers; it's called Baggage Wars. That's when your suitcase goes somewhere other than where you're going. He fought a four-week battle, calling almost daily to see if the airline had located a missing bag with some pretty valuable items in it. Hooray! They finally found it! It had been checked to Chicago. Of course, it went to Portland, Oregon. It was checked on one airline and ended up tagged by a different airline. It started with his name on it, and it ended up with someone else's name on it. Do not ask me to explain this, but somehow his valuables did not end up where he thought they would. They were tagged for another destination.

Wednesday, February 21, 2007

I was speaking at a church in New York, and a couple who originally came from India greeted me very warmly. They seemed to be very much in love with the Lord and obviously in love with each other. When I asked them how long they'd been married, they said, "28 years." They didn't look old enough to have been married 28 years. Then came the second and by far the biggest surprise. They said, "It was an arranged marriage." Jokingly, I said, "Well, it will probably never last." But after thinking about what they had said for a moment, I told them, "Maybe that's what we're all supposed to have - an arranged marriage."

Tuesday, February 20, 2007

CNN doesn't usually do news stories about high school football players, but there's something very special about the South Carolina player they described this way: "Sometimes the biggest heart on the field can fit into the smallest player." His name is Kos. He's a Siberian orphan, adopted by an American family, and he has no legs. He lost them the day he and his friend decided to hop aboard a freight train. For some reason, his friend pushed Kos and he landed under the wheels of that train. Now he's playing nose tackle on one of his high school's football teams. As hard as that may be to imagine, Kos had several solo tackles this past season; he recovered two fumbles; he was such a threat that other teams had to assign two players to defend against him. He just swings right into the fray and knocks them down with his strong arms and his head.

His heart on the field and his infectious personality have affected more than one school. The football coach at Clemson University brought Kos in to demonstrate his skill to that college team. The coach said, "If my players would max out on what they can give like this young man has, we'd win a lot of games." By the way, Kos' goal is to get a good job and make enough money to build a big house with several bedrooms, so he can provide a home for as many disabled Russian orphans as possible.

Monday, February 19, 2007

When you live and work on a remote Indian reservation, as our sons have the past twelve years, you get good at shopping without going anywhere. Because anywhere is so far away! Our sons have gotten to be very skilled Internet shoppers. They've found gifts there that I didn't even know existed, and they've found bargains I was jealous of. Sometimes, I've been able to watch over their shoulder as they bid on an item that's being auctioned on the Internet. They've gotten pretty good at knowing what it's going to take to own what's being auctioned. For all the little tricks of the trade, there's one decisive bottom line. Everyone knows that it belongs to the one who bids the most.

Friday, February 16, 2007

Most of us had some classes in high school where we sat there and grumbled, "When am I ever going to use this stuff?" In some cases, we really have ended up using what Miss Pringle taught us. In other cases, we were right about never using it. There's one class that I've benefited from almost every day of my life, including today - typing class. Sure, I started out with one of those Selectric typewriters. Younger listeners are asking, "Selectric? What's that?" Never mind. Today, I'm typing on a computer keyboard, but I have a lot of writing to do. It's a good thing that I learned to type those many years ago. In fact, my wife says I'm one of the fastest typists she knows. With the amount of work I have to get done in a day, do I have a choice?

Of course, it isn't just the speed that counts. There's that accuracy thing, too. Going fast doesn't always mean you're getting it right. Every once in a while I'll look up at the screen only to see a string of words that don't exist, "gozornanplatz fufti." I look down. My fingers aren't where they're supposed to be on that keyboard. I learned it my first day in typing class - the home keys. You make sure your typing fingers are on the home keys, then you reach out to all the other keys from there, unless you want to produce something that makes absolutely no sense!

Wednesday, February 14, 2007

Not far from us, there is a famous Passion Play, and it wonderfully portrays the life and death of Jesus. The other day I was asking one of our ministry team members what the play is like. That conversation brought back some memories of a similar play he'd been in some years ago. I asked him what part he played, and he answered a little sheepishly, "I think maybe I was typecast. I played Judas." Then he went on to explain what an eerie feeling it was to play the one who betrayed our Lord. But, then, haven't we all?

Tuesday, February 13, 2007

They keep it under glass that seals out any air getting to it. When it's not on display, it's kept underground in a vault - actually a bombproof vault. It's the most important document in the history of the United States. Of course, it's the Declaration of Independence. The men who signed it that hot July 4th in Philadelphia knew it was very important, but I wonder if they could have possibly conceived what a sacred piece of paper it would become to the nation that it launched. Here were subjects of the English king daring to declare their independence from their king. It changed their lives forever. It changed the world forever. And once a year, every Fourth of July, America stops to remember that Independence Day.

Monday, February 12, 2007

Not long ago I was speaking at a Christian workers' conference in Alaska, and a veteran missionary approached me afterward with some intriguing information. She and her husband have worked for many years with an Indian tribe in Alaska - a tribe that has an interesting custom. If you are from that tribe, you grow up learning about your backpack. It's not a real backpack, but it's a symbol of a very real human experience. The idea is that whenever you do something wrong, a rock goes in your backpack and you carry on your back all the weight of all your mistakes all your life.

Friday, February 9, 2007

Our son's first word was the name he called me, "Da!" I know it's supposed to be "da da," but it was good enough for me. He'd greet me at the door each night with a loud and impassioned "Da!" Our grandson's first word was "mama," which he liked so much that he just let it keep rolling, "ma-ma-ma-ma-ma." Sort of the opposite of "da!" The first words that children learn can reflect what's going on around them. If they see Mama all the time, you can expect them to say her name early on. Sometimes, those first words aren't very happy words. Our friends have been dedicated missionaries in a war-torn part of the Middle East for years. Not long after their daughter was born, their area became a place where frequent bombardments and violence erupted all around them. Some of her first words told the story: "bomb" ... "gun."

Wednesday, February 7, 2007

I'm pretty sure there's a five-year-old kid in all of us (for sure there is one in me), and one place it came out in me was years ago when we took our kids to one of America's major theme parks. Like a lot of theme parks, we found you had to get there early because you have to wait for some of the most exciting attractions. The earlier you get there, the shorter the line. Of course, you can't ride all the rides simultaneously, so even the early birds end up in lines a good part of the day. Now, at this particular park, some of the longest lines are for a ride called Space Mountain. Maybe you've been there. It's basically a wild roller coaster ride through outer space in almost total darkness. When we took the kids there, I asked someone coming out how long they waited in this obviously long line. "An hour," one guy told me. An hour? Well, we did it. We even went back later and did it again. We even saw a lot of teenagers; you know, people not normally known for their patience, enduring the wait for Space Mountain. Why? Because you have to wait if you want the best stuff.

Tuesday, February 6, 2007

Tupperware can be a good thing. Those sealed plastic containers can preserve leftover food so you can enjoy it later. Tupperware can be a bad thing, if you forget about it. I know from distasteful personal experience what can happen when you do - intermediate life forms, morphing into something unrecognizable. The problem comes when that Tupperware with leftovers in it slowly gets pushed farther and farther back in the fridge, until it's tucked out of sight behind the pickle jar and the gallon of milk. Ultimately, though, the lost little Tupperware will make its presence known. As you open the fridge and utter those inevitable words: "What's that smell?" The smell isn't going away until some domestic Green Beret storms the depths of that fridge and bravely opens that Tupperware and carries away the rotting contents inside, or beats them to death with a stick, if necessary.

Monday, February 5, 2007

Sometimes, when we travel to Indian reservations in North America, we end up on roads that go where not many go. The Director of our Native work, Craig Smith, was on one of those roads not long ago. His destination was a remote reserve in Northern Canada. At one point in his 140-mile journey, he noticed a van coming from the other direction, proceeding very slowly. Craig decided to slow down, too. That's when he saw what the van driver had already seen - a beautiful deer by the side of the road. Sadly, one of his rear legs was broken and just dangling limply when he moved. My friend said it was too painful to watch. At that point, he saw the rest of the picture that had caused the van to stop in front of the deer. On the other side of the road was a wolf, stalking the wounded deer. It was obvious all the van could do was postpone the inevitable. There was no happy ending for that deer.

Wednesday, January 31, 2007

I have some friends who love to fish, and in their honor I have to tell you this great fisherman story I heard from my friend Ravi Zacharias. It seems that two men were out fishing in separate boats. And the one watched the other with a growing curiosity because he would catch a fish and keep it, then catch another fish and throw it away. And he continued this with catch after catch. The really strange part was that it was always the big ones that this man threw away. Finally, the man watching all this couldn't contain his curiosity, so he called out the obvious question, "How come you're throwing away the big ones?" The man answered back, "Oh, because I only have an eight-inch frying pan!"