Ludwig and Evangelism

When I was in 8th grade, I got a Ludwig drum set for Christmas. I told everyone that I wanted it so I could play to classic rock playing in my room in the background or play with drum solos on Buddy Rich and Dave Weckl tapes and learn to really slap the trap. But in all actuality, I really just wanted to be popular and play for our church and be in the "praise band". I went to FBC Woodward, so I was naturally recruited to play for "the band" at Youth Group on some Wed. nights, Falls Creek, and other randomly assorted times and places (which we'll get into shortly). I loved the opportunity, and the spotlight. Man, I could wail to "Lord I lift your Name on High" and "Here I am to Worship" and "Open the Eyes of my Heart" with the rest of them.

Those are memories I'd like to forget...except for learning to play to the Eagles and Pink Floyd (the first song I really ever learned to play to was Shine on You Crazy Diamond from Dark Side of the Moon). Anyway, I was cool in Youth Group terms now, or so I thought, so I played whenever and wherever they needed me. A few of those places is what I'd like to discuss now. Every now and then, I remember having evangelism type bashes at the local park or in parks in surrounding NW Oklahoma small towns. We'd come set up shop and play really bad "Christian" music in the background while other people and kids in the church went around and talked to the 2 or 3 people that came by to listen, or get the free hot dogs. We'd play for a while and act happy and all but in truth would be really disappointed that no one came to listen and check us out. At the end of the performance, the music minister or someone else would come up and play Shine, Jesus, Shine while someone else did a quick invitational time. Nothing ever happened.

So what's with these types of approaches to evangelism? The following quote from another website I found seems very appropriate...

"Christians are forever practicing weird forms of evangelism because we don't know how to have friendships with regular [or "secular"] folk. Their religions or philosophies or politics or naughty words intimidate us, make us uncomfortable... We pass out tracts because it takes a long time to get to know someone. We distribute Jesus videos, take surveys, pass out water on the corner, drag mediocre [Christian] rock bands into public parks, concoct any dog and pony show we can to get our neighbors' attention..."

Mediocre Christian rock bands. Probably an understatement. But why do we do these events? Why not just meet and love and spend quality time with neighbors/co-workers/fellow students/people we meet at Wal-Mart...whoever's not a believer. Go out to lunch, grab a beer with them, play frisbee golf, cry with them when one of their family members dies, talk about the Gospel with them, go to the Stock Car Races, anything.

I guess it's just easier to put a lame bumper sticker on your car.... or have the local praise band play at the park [see Christian Bumper Stickers post].

Tears and Enriched Milk

Did anyone watch the end of the Gonzaga/UCLA game last Thursday? It's in the past now, a game few will really remember, except for one thing. Adam Morrison's tears. When UCLA took the lead by two with 3 seconds left, Adam Morrison lost it. Absolutely overcome with emotion, he started crying before the game was even over. Gonzaga actually had a chance to win it with a last second shot but missed. After the miss and the end of the game, Morrison crashed in the middle of the court and succumbed to his tears, a staunch display of grief. Reddick had a similar experience when Duke fell to LSU a few hours earlier.

So what's my point? Well I was listening to some Rush Limbaugh at work the other day on my computer, as I sometimes do to pass the time, and Morrison and Reddick's displays of emotion were the hype of the conservative talk show. And to be honest, I agreed with a lot of Limbaugh's reactions and conclusions. If you go to a typical little league baseball game these days, it's not that uncommon anymore for a little boy to start crying and get very emotional after something as insignificant as a simple strike-out, or missed fly ball. A kid misses a catch or tackle playing football and they'll slowly walk towards the coach, or a parent, in tears. This was not always so.

Could you imagine a scene in The Sandlot in which the "ham" Porter or Timmy or Tommy Timmons would cry after striking out to "Squints" or Yeah-Yeah. I can understand crying if you destroyed your dad's Baby Ruthie signed baseball, but a strike-out? Smalls was the personification of my point. Very sheltered, weak on all fronts, not masculine at all, pretty emotional (at least in the beginning of the movie), always saying sorry to his dad and the other boys, drinking Ovaltine, the list goes on. I'm not saying that it's bad for a young boy to be emotional and cry from time to time, but cry after a grounder goes through his legs, or a soccer ball goes past him through the goal, or over a barely skinned knee after a bike wreck? We see it more and more these days.

A caller rang in to Rush while I was listening and stated that he worked in the Agricultural Department, monitoring the hormones and additives put in meat post slaughter, or fed to cattle pre-slaughter in the cattle's feed (he also monitors chickens, too). He stated that most of the additives and hormones are very rich in estrogen. Estrogen enriched food is everywhere, he said. Baby formula, processed milk, Little Debbie's, you name it. He said that we're pumping our children with extra estrogen everyday, boys and girls. For boys, more feminine personality traits show up throughout their development, and for girls, they develop physically at a much younger age. I've read that the average girl used to have her first menstrual cycle when she was 14. That was back in the '60s and '70s. Now, the average girl is 12 when she has her first period. Could it be the extra estrogen? Could Billy have cried when he missed that shot in basketball because of the extra estrogen? Who knows.

I think it goes deeper than enriched milk. Masculinity is attacked by all fronts these days. Gender lines are blurred. Girls are in the Boy Scouts. Boys are in Campfire Girls. Women are in dangerous combat zones in Iraq. Men are kindergarten teachers. We humans are a strange breed.

The Morrison and Reddick displays are an afterthought now, but seeing those men lose it on national TV like that opened the door to a topic worth discussing, and confronting. Now I realize that the NCAA basketball games on TV the other night were possibly those men's last games in their college careers (note: Morrison is only a Junior), but kids crying in a little league game after striking out? I say out with milk and Little Debbie's, in with raw buffalo meat and Sasparillas.

I'm Losing my Mind

So the other day when it was really nice I decided to go wash and detail my car at a nearby carwash facility. I parked in the washing bay and exited my vehicle to go get some quarters. Funny machines, those bill changers are. Anyway, I walked back to my car and put three bucks of quarters into the slot and started spraying away. I usually don't do the prewash. Kind of weak if you ask me.

Well I'm washing away, making my way around the car when all of a sudden, I see that the driver's side door is wide open. Soap and water are all over the inside of the door and the driver's seat. I'm an idiot.

After I finished washing the outside of the car, I pulled up to a vacuum bay to detail the inside. I had my Armor All wipes and Windex all ready. If you don't know me, I'm a type A, strong to quite strong perfectionist, clean/organized person. I take much joy and pleasure in cleaning and detailing my car/room/desk/chia pet. All that to say that the interior cleaning process for my car takes a while for me. I also polish the wheels and tires during this time as well. It was nice outside and I put some music on and rolled down the windows, so needless to say I took my time. Well, 30 minutes later, I'm cleaning the clear panel in front of the odometers and guages on my dashboard and I see that my RPM's are at 1000...aka my car was on. I had left it on, idling for 30 minutes but couldn't hear the engine because the music was on...and I was in my own cleaning world.

Insane. I'm losing my mind.

The Church?

I stumbled across this quote earlier this week. It was written by a guy defending the church he attends and its leaders. The church will remain nameless, just like when I talk about a certain camp, I mean Kamp. (clearing my throat)...

"They believe that the Church [capital C] is NOT for believers, but for the lost. Believers are already saved and there is no reason for them to remain here on earth save to find the lost. They design church events to attract the lost and seek to eliminate barriers that would separate the seeker from the redeemed. For it is the church experience that bothers most believers. That is what ---- ----- expects. They are not interested in gathering up and concentrating the redeemed, but rather, if you are redeemed, expect to work."

The gentleman goes on to say...

"The people we must find are Christ's beloved. We risk His eventual scrutiny if we fail to woo his bride and bring her into who she was meant to be... The church as it exists in America is not reaching the lost. We are becoming irrelevant. Change is necessary. In the most churched area of the nation (Dallas Fort Worth) only 27% are in church on any Sunday morning. What we are doing is not working..."

I could write a book in response to this. But I'm busy at the moment. I'll post my reactions soon.

Lessons from "Rhoid"

- Don't take your normal, everyday lower abdominal proctological functions for granted.

- Apparently, fast food is bad for you. I learned this from my extended reading sessions during my frequent warm baths I would sit in that provided temporary relief to my problem. I finished Fast Food Nation. A muckrakingly interesting read by Eric Schlosser. Fast food allegedly isn't all that healthy. Huh. Who knew? The fast food industry supposedly isn't all that friendly and kind to employees either.

- Donuts aren't just for breakfast or Carl Winslow.

- "Stool Softener" isn't just a funny sounding group of words, they serve a definite function.

- Laying on your stomach gets boring after awhile, and hurts the neck.

- Friends, even close ones, will laugh at you when you have lower abdominal proctological issues. They'll even consistently ask you if you feel better, but it's just for a laugh. Just for a laugh.

- And lastly...I now have another reason to be thankful that I will never bear children.

"Rhoid"

Sorry for the lapse in posts lately. I have a hemorrhoid. No shame there. No shame. We'll just leave it at 'it hurts like hell'. That's all I'm going to say about it. Not too delightful.

I've been out of work now for two days, but I can't quite find a comfortable position to type on a laptop, hence the absence of new posts. My apologies.

Pray for me...

NASA

The National Aeronatics and Space Administration (NASA) has an annual budget of over $15 Billion (that's with a "B", as in Bruce).

Let's take a look at what NASA has contributed the American taxpayers other than pride over the Commies, cool pictures, and moonshoes (and these are copied directly off of the NASA websight):

- light-weight compact disks
- advanced keyboard technology
- enriched baby food
- the ribbed swimsuit (?)
- scatch resistent lenses
- golfball aerodynamics (no joke, it says that)
- hair styling appliances (yep, says that too)
- the dustbuster
- and self-adjusting sunglasses

Now (as I chuckle) these things are great and all, but $15 Billion a year. There has got to be better things to do with the federal government's tax revenue. Like paying off the $8 Trillion national debt, perhaps?

Now, to be a fair, I have to be completely honest. Some things were left off the list above. NASA has also made extraordinary breakthroughs in a few different technologies. Some of which are fire-resistant material, laser angioplasty, automated urinalysis, magnetic liquids, and lastly, robotic hands.

$15 Billion, every year, for robotic hands, urine review, and flying around. Excellent.