myopic pilgrim

Have you heard the one about the man with cancer? A new nurse is filling out paperwork, asking him a string of questions. The she asks the reason for the doctor’s visit and he tells her, cancer. She’s shocked out of her routine and asks if he’s terminal. He says, aren’t we all?

I don’t care how healthy you are. We’re all terminal. I’m dying a little every day. My body is slowly breaking down and one day it will just stop working. And even then it will continue to break down because everything in the world is fading away.

Families are breaking down if for no other reason than its members are dying. Plants, mountains, planets in their orbits are all slowing down until they stop dead. We’re all on our way out. We’re all dying a little every day.

But what Jesus does is give us life. Read the rest of this entry »

A year ago I wrote a love song for my wife that some of you have heard. I thought it was time to share it with everyone. I’m not afraid to be soft and tender. I love my wife. It’s no secret.

a link to Secret Weapon mp3. You can download this for yourself by right-clicking the link and saving it to your computer.

My timing is a little rushed in some areas. I wrote and recorded this in one day. That’s my excuse.

I heard a story long about a Native American people which I’m going to mangle in a second. Read it if you’re a Christian because it may sound familiar to you. Here’s the story. Well, it’s less of a story and more of a description about a religious practice.

To insure a good hunting season the people were instructed to take extra care not to have any accidents, for example, stumbling or hitting your thumb with a hammer, spilling milk, and so on. If one were to have an accident they were to tell the shaman (priest) right away and presumably he’d do something mystical to negate its effect. When the hunting season turns out to be successful, well, thank goodness we went through that ritual. But if the hunting turned out poor, well then, we know someone must have stubbed her toe and not told the shaman.

As Christians we ask God for a variety of things, like a good hunting season or that God woud cut us a break. And when God comes through, we say thank God for answering our prayers. When he doesn’t come through, well, it just wasn’t in God’s will and we sing “thank God for Unanswered Prayers.”

This has always triggered my skepticism. I’m still not sure what to do with it. Mostly, I ignore it. What do you guys do?