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Thursday, July 14, 2005

Boxing. Now, some people like it and some people don't. But those ever-present "Rocky" movies seemed to give us boxing as a mythical battlefield between the nice guy underdog and the not-so-nice favorite. A lot of boxing fans thought it was sort of a Rocky matchup when several years ago Evander Holyfield went against Mike Tyson for the WBA heavyweight championship. Holyfield was a 25-1 underdog when the fight was booked. Tyson was the almost invincible "Iron Mike" then - called by some commentators "the baddest man on the planet." Well, much to everyone's surprise including Las Vegas, where a lot of money was lost, the underdog Holyfield soundly defeated Mike Tyson. USA Today's lead sports story carried this headline, "Holyfield puts faith in more than his fists." It went on to tell about the boxer's strong emphasis on prayer before and during the fight. In fact, let me quote an amazing perspective from that article that goes way beyond boxing. "Holyfield sang along to a gospel tune on his CD player before leaving his dressing room, leading his camp in a joyous, revival-style celebration. One fighter said, "It was as if the fight was a preliminary. He had already won the main event in the dressing room!"

Tuesday, July 12, 2005

Remember those classic Alka-Seltzer commercials - the two tablets dropping into a glass of water to the tune of "plop, plop, fizz, fizz"? Usually they showed someone eating something disagreeable just before bedtime. Right? And someone who could only be rescued from terminal indigestion with a "plop, plop, fizz, fizz." Several years ago I met someone who knew the agony of late night stomach revolt. Terry works in the theater on Broadway in New York. He told me many show people just can't eat before they go on, so they're starved by the time the show is over and they get cleaned up. It's around midnight then. And Terry said they would go out together for a big dinner and shortly thereafter head home for their night's sleep and their night's wrestling match with what they had just eaten. Eating's nice - if it's followed by digestion!

Thursday, July 7, 2005

I had just finished speaking for a Christian leaders' gathering that was part of the countdown to a Franklin Graham Festival. The setup team there was in their early days of working together on this massive mobilization. The team leader thought it would be a good idea to get his team together for a few minutes after the meeting ended, and he invited me to join them. Then he handed me a cluster of helium balloons tied together. Suddenly, I felt like I'd gone from speaker to like circus clown. And, you know, I've read Winnie the Pooh stories to our kids enough that I couldn't help picturing Pooh Bear being carried into the sky by just such a bunch of balloons. After all, I'm not much bigger than Pooh Bear. But in spite of my trivial imaginings, the team leader there had a holy purpose for having me stand there with those balloons. He asked his team members to spread out around the room. They ended up widely separated. He asked them to get as close to me and my balloons as they could. Within moments, those workers, who had been so scattered, were shoulder to shoulder in a clump around me.

Monday, July 4, 2005

The love of Mary Ann's life, Tom, was coming for a visit. He lived in another state, so those visits were really special. He was due to arrive Friday night or Saturday sometime, and Mary Ann's room had been declared a federal disaster area. Finally, on Thursday afternoon, she decided she'd better get busy trying to recover her room. It was in pretty embarrassing condition. You know sometimes you have to make things messier in the process of getting them put away or thrown away. Mary Ann's room was at that point on Friday morning when the phone rang. It was Tom. He was calling to say he loved her and that he was looking forward to seeing her soon. That was all the incentive she needed to finish the job. Unfortunately, she didn't get that opportunity. Tom had called from downstairs. He had arrived earlier than Mary Ann expected. So in he walked and there she stood, dressed in her "grubbies," hair matted on her forehead, surrounded by an indescribable mess!

Friday, July 1, 2005

It was supposed to be a one-hour fishing trip off the coast of South Carolina. For 17-year-old Josh and his 15-year-old friend Troy, it turned out to be a six-day nightmare at sea. When they set out on their little 14-foot Sunfish, they didn't know about the small craft warnings in that area. Within hours, the fierce winds had pulled them out to sea - to a point 111 miles north - well outside of the Coast Guard's search area. They fought to stay alive by eating raw jellyfish and gargling sea water. They were severely sunburned, exhausted and dehydrated. After 48 hours, the Coast Guard announced they were suspending their search and moving from a rescue operation to a recovery operation. But there was this uncle who refused to concede the boys were dead. He's a police officer, and he thinks rescue. After studying the weather and the currents, he concluded that they might be as far as the area where they actually were found. He made sure that fishing vessels in the area were alerted to be looking for the boys. And as they were praying that God would either take them home or take them to heaven, some fishermen spotted them - and saved them.

Wednesday, June 29, 2005

Eight wedding showers in a month! Six hundred guests scheduled to be at the wedding where 14 bridesmaids and 14 groomsmen would attend the bride and groom. Four days before the wedding, the bride went missing after she went out for a jog. The American news channels were dominated by the all-out search and investigation into the case of the vanishing bride, and now we know what happened. The bride turned up in Albuquerque, New Mexico, claiming she had been kidnapped; a story which she later changed to tell the real story of what happened. She said that the stress leading up to her wedding had given her cold feet, and she just kept running with those cold feet. In retrospect, I'm sure folks must be saying, "Girl, why didn't you just tell someone what you were feeling?" Instead she ran from her family, her community, her wedding, and even from the truth. Tens of thousands of dollars and countless man-hours were spent looking for her. Now she faced the additional stress of negative national notoriety and even the possibility of legal or financial penalties. Running solved nothing. It never does.

Tuesday, June 28, 2005

"Our planes were in the air." That's what the Air Force briefing officer told us as we had the privilege of touring a major American defense command facility. He was talking about a day during the Cold War when, unbeknownst to most Americans, World War III may have almost begun. America's warning systems had indicated clearly that Russian planes were in the air and headed for the United States. In those days when nuclear war was our greatest fear and a real possibility, the orders were given to get our planes in the air. Those planes were headed for the Soviet Union with the capability of starting a nuclear war. Thankfully, the trackers discovered in time what sent out what turned out to be an erroneous message about the Russian planes - one defective computer chip. Now that's a close call.

Monday, June 27, 2005

I was watching on TV the observance of the tenth anniversary of the Oklahoma City bombing, and my mind raced back to this unforgettable personal visit I had to the site of, well, what was a very deadly tragedy. In a pre-September 11th America, that terrorist bombing of a Federal Office Building left most Americans in stunned disbelief; at least it did me. My guide for my visit to the memorial made it really special and very moving, actually. Because he's a state trooper who was one of the rescuers that day. His recollections of the joy of rescues and the heartbreak of lost lives are something I'll never forget. Of course, all the traces of that bombed-out building are gone now. The site is now a beautiful lawn with a stone chair for each of the victims. What was the street that day is now a reflection pond. Nothing remains there from the day the world stopped at 9:02 A.M. - nothing, that is, except the tree. On an embankment across from what was the building site stands a big old tree, still partially blackened by the bomb blast. We stood there, my rescuer friend and I, and we prayed beneath those branches that somehow had endured the blast. They call it The Survivor Tree.

Friday, June 24, 2005

The Department of Homeland Security is a relatively new idea in America; a government body that coordinates our efforts to keep our country safe from forces that could hurt us. But "homeland security" is hardly a new idea. It's been the job of every parent since children were invented - the sacred assignment of guarding our family from the things that could hurt them. That job has never been more difficult.

Wednesday, June 22, 2005

Here's two unlikely words to be matched up - channel surfing. Of course, they have been matched up. Channel surfing refers, of course, to the practice of skipping from one channel to another to see what's on each one. Men have mastered that! Oh, we've got the most powerful thumbs in the world. When there were only a few channels, we didn't surf much, but look what cable has done. You've got dozens of channels to check out - hundreds sometimes. As you surf, you may get a glimpse of a sports channel, a food channel, a travel channel, then a movie channel, a country music channel, a nature channel, and of course, a home shopping channel. Increasingly, a lot of what you'll come upon is either raunchy or dumb or boring. Or, maybe you can't stand, let's say, country music. Or you fall asleep watching someone cook. Or you don't care about sports. Whatever, it's okay. You can't decide what's on each channel, but it's totally up to you what channel you watch!

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