Category: Purely Personal
Gadget, gizmos, gimmicks and my out-or-control life
I’ve had this new Andriod the past couple of months. It’s amazing and I love it. There are thousands of apps! It’s a GPS, music player, TV, video player, game box, bar code scanner, and probably hundreds of other things of which I am not even aware. I can keep up with the latest news, weather, sports and all my email. The productivity features are really why I got it. At least that’s what I keep telling myself as the justification I used to buy it. Isn’t that sort of like saying you buy Playboy because of the great articles and journalism?
Yes, as I learn to navigate this new gadget, my productivity is going to increase a thousand-fold, and I’ll be more efficient and have time to do the stuff that’s really important. Right?
No! You want the honest truth? Here’s the bottom line: the real difference between this gadget and the previous generation gadget is this – the colors are deeper and sharper and the screen is bigger. Oh, and the football scores come up in .0456 seconds versus 1.732 seconds on the previous generation gadget. Or something like that.
I’ve been through all the time management fads – e-v-e-r-y- s-i-n-g-l-e o-n-e of them. Even before Franklin, there were others – notebooks, books, classes, seminars, pens with four or five different colors, index card systems, lists and all sorts of stuff. Then came the Palm and other early PDAs as they were called. Outlook was supposed to save us, but instead took us all straight to Microsoft Hell. Out of the ashes rose up a great and mighty mythical beast called Google. The millennial kingdom surely was near. Now smartphones have given us back hours each day by helping us manage our time so we can answer the 568 daily emails and the 136 text messages that wrap around our lives like chains on a death row prisoner. Now we take our smartphones to the bathroom so we can catch up on texting and email. Come on! Admit it! I can tell you I NEVER took my Franklin Planner to the potty! God have mercy! What an indictment on our society,
Long ago when I used to teach time management to pastors and leaders (what a joke!), I used to talk about people I call Power Suckers. You know who they are, don’t you? They love to monopolize your time at just the wrong moments. They can talk about nothing for hours on end, and they are convinced you are really seriously interested.
Growing older and wiser, I now realize that no one but me has control over my life. If people suck time and energy from me, it’s because I allow them to do so. If I allow them to do so, it’s probably because I’m afraid they will get upset. Or maybe it’s because I don’t want anyone to think that I am less than wonderful, full of compassion and full of time. Sometimes I think I operate on the basis of knowing that I have eternal life and am therefore content to let anyone and everyone drain from me as much time as they want. Since I have an eternity full of time on my hands, that shouldn’t be a problem, should it?
Wait! If I don’t step up and set some boundaries in my life, I sure can’t complain if people wandering by don’t see the fences and walk all over my green grass. No one is responsible to do this but me. God has given me a mind, a will, and plenty of wisdom based on his entire book of truth principles we call the Bible.
Make no mistake. I still love my Android. It does some really, really cool stuff. When I’m in some boring meeting I can play games on it or check scores and people think the man of God is contemplating the precise wording of a passage in one of the five translations of the Bible in three languages that I have loaded onto my little device. But, it will still not solve my sin problem, bring world peace or even make me more efficient in managing my time. I’m the only Droid who can do that.
So, looking forward to the inevitable resolutions of the coming year, I have decided to become the CEO of my life and begin reporting directly to the President of the board, God himself. I don’t mind working hard, but my life has been a string of 16 to 18 hour days, wall-to-wall meeting and less and less time for things like the family or even the gym. This is no one’s fault but mine and no Android is going to turn it around. No one but me can establish boundaries in my life.
Sorry, but this means I am may not be available for every anniversary, birthday or social opportunity. I might not be spontaneously available for that cup of coffee or to welcome every drop-in-visitor who just wants to say hey, chat for a while about the weather or drone on for a couple of hours about all that is going on in his or her life.
This is hard for me because it might mean that you think I am not really a nice guy. It might mean that you resort to saying stuff I’ve heard many times before, like “Jesus had time for everyone.” Or, “you just don’t love people.”
I guess I’ll have to learn to put up with that. I don’t want to, but so far I haven’t found a “peace of mind” app for my Android, or a “healthy life app” or even a “happy marriage” or “family” app. Let me know if you find one.
Update on Cheryl
First, thanks for the many prayers and expressions of love and concern.
Cheryl was in the prep room early this morning with IV in place and ready for a knee replacement when a lab test revealed her UTI (urinary tract infection) had not cleared up as expected. The level of infection was too high to risk the operation. While we both understand, appreciate and agree with the decision to not operate, you can perhaps understand that she was plenty bummed having suffered with this bad knee since a gym injury in Jr. High School.
She’s fine and will be OK. She was just looking forward to a life without constant knee pain. For the past three years she has battled with recurring UTI’s and our next course of action will be to try to deal with that. It’s just frustrating having been referred from one specialist to another, each with a different idea and no one who has been able to get to the bottom of the problem.
So, tomorrow we will start back down the UTI path while the operation will be postponed indefinitely. So many people wrestle with much tougher physical challenges we have nothing to complain about and know we are blessed. Still, it’s not been a very good day. Tomorrow, we’ll get back to something closer to normal. Thanks for listening.
Our Granddaughter’s View of Our Recent Trip to San Salvador
I’m catching my breath while trying to catch up after my whirlwind around-the-world past month. Tomorrow, I’m up early to take Cheryl in for her knee replacement.
In the meantime, I thought this might make a fitting wrap up to my recent posts on our trip to San Salvador, El Salvador. This is through the eyes of our eleven-year-old granddaughter who was visiting her mother’s former home for the first time. Click here to go to Kiersten’s blog.
Shocked Speechless
Be not forgetful to entertain strangers: for thereby some have entertained angels unawares. (Hebrews 13:2)
What does that even mean?
Spare me the emails and posted comments on what you think that may mean. It’s not that I don’t care what you think; I’ve just heard a fistful of ideas and don’t think you’re going to suggest something I haven’t considered. Besides, it probably doesn’t really matter.
I think it’s dangerous to read too much into this verse, as though every water meter reader might really be an angel. The emphasis of the words used here is of shock or amazement at having received someone in the spirit of hospitality and then realized that there is far more going on that what you see on the surface. Most commentators think this might be a reference to the time Abraham received angelic visitors into his tent who had come to announce the impending judgment upon Sodom and Gomorrah. The point is simply that we would be shocked to know the way our lives touch others and vice versa.
There is still much about this verse that I would love to explore, but last week I think I came as close to understanding the spirit of this statement as much as at any time in my life.
***
It was Wednesday night and I had just finished preaching at the Miramonte Church in San Salvador, El Salvador. I was doing the visiting preacher/celebrity thingy, hugging, kissing, expressing delight at seeing people I hadn’t seen for years, signing a few Bibles (hate that, but do it with sincere pleasure and gratitude).
A lady came up, stood dead in front of me, looked into my eyes with equal measures of admiration, anticipation, anxiousness and trepidation. I looked into her eyes, noting something that I couldn’t quite identify.
No se si se acuerda de mi, pero yo soy P_____. Trabajé en su casa.
I’m not sure if you would remember me, but I’m P______. I used to work in your house.
Looking into my eyes now, she probably saw a couple of little hourglasses spinning around as my brain struggled to engage. My face that was frozen in a smile of seemingly endless encounters with old friends, now was suddenly simply frozen in perplexity.
The name, the face, the circumstances – I am seldom at a total loss for words -this time I was stunned. After more than a quarter of century, could it really be that this is who she said she was?
I was somewhat conscious that some awkward words were sliding out of my mouth, but I could never tell you what they were. I was also semi-conscious that I was just staring at her in disbelief.
She two children she said, who were now in their 20′s and she was married to a wonderful man. I think she said some other things, but I was still trying to get a grip on it all.
***
P____ was a scrawny, skinny 14-year-old when she started working as domestic help in our home. At that time, even middle class homes usually had domestic help to assist in the many daily chores that are now automated. With young children, as we had at the time, such help was also a live-in babysitter. P____ probably weighed no more than 80 pounds and had thick, incredibly curly hair that had never been cut; it came all the way down her back to the ground. She was like a cute little terrier puppy that follows you home.
She came from a little pueblo in the middle of nowhere. She pretty much had literally fallen off the proverbial turnip truck. Life for such a young woman at the time offered not much hope. There might be a couple of months work during the coffee harvest, but to work as a household domestic, pick and sell fruit or vegetables or some other menial task was about the best that one could aspire to do.
The normal pattern was to be wooed by a gardener, messenger boy, market worker or simple vagrant, get pregnant, have a child out of wedlock, return home to have the child, leave it with mom and head back to work. She would work until her kids got old enough to get pregnant in the same cycle, then go back to the pueblo to take care of her grandkids while her kids worked to be the providers. That’s just pretty much the way things were.
When she first started working for us she suffered from horrible migraines. We took her to an MD who was also one of the pastors of our church. His thought was that the weight of the hair was a bit much for the tiny frame. Cut the hair; cut off the migraines.
My father will kill me! was the wide-eyed reply of the young girl.
Well, the doctor said, I’m afraid you don’t have much choice if you want to end the headaches. I’ll write a letter to your parents explaining that I have medically prescribed you to cut your hair.
She got a bob and immediately the pain went away. She was still as cute as she was before, but a lot lighter. Cheryl and I loaded her up in our vehicle along with the RX and headed for the country to personally explain to her parents why the hair had to go.
A steady stare sized up the daughter they were seeing for the first time with short hair, but they were nice enough to us. What were they going to say? We were the bosses. We had the nice car. We lived in the city, had the nice house and education and all the rest. The social and cultural gap that separated us was huge.
We did find out later that she got a beating from her dad. She survived, of course.
She got along great with our girls. Shoot! She was a girl herself! We now had three daughters, but we paid one of them to be the older daughter, watch the younger ones and do some chores.
Over the years we had a flow of women who worked in our home, young, old, some better, some worse. Some were lazy, some had an attitude and some stole. Having household help was not a luxury, but a necessary intrusion. There were two or three that lasted longer than the others, were wonderful employees and of whom we grew fond. P____ was one.
Over the course of time, Cheryl had the chance to share the Gospel with her. She made her profession of faith. How do you know if a young girl who works for you on the other side of a Atlantic-sized cultural gap is really understanding or just going along?
So, when we left to go to the States, P____ was passed to a family that were friends. We knew that they would treat her well and that she would do a good job for them. The time came to go and we gave her hugs and kisses, never expecting to see her again in this life. That’s just the way things were.
***
Other people had come up to me by now, pulling from every side. P____ had blended back into the crowd. I walked over to where Cheryl was standing and asked her if she knew who that was. Cheryl had had the same brief conversation and was as equally stunned.
We both suddenly realized that we let her wander off with much more we needed to know. A conversation later that evening with the pastor and his wife revealed that P____ was a regular and quite involved in the church. They confirmed that her husband was indeed a good man, but his job as mid-level management in law enforcement made it difficult for him to attend as much as he would like.
At an event a couple of nights late, her husband introduced himself to us. He had come that night instead of his wife. We were both taken by what a solid, intelligent, good-looking man he was. He appeared to have a genuinely sweet spirit and oozed good character if you know what I mean. We made him promise to get P___ to look us up at the big anniversary celebration Sunday. We wanted our daughter to see her and to take a picture for our daughter who could not make the trip. He gave us his assurance.
We did have the reunion with her on Sunday and got a chance to talk more in depth about her life these past 25 years. As the young girl from the country observed a lifestyle and world view she had never before seen, she became a young woman determined to grab for the brass ring of life. She saved, she studied, she worked hard and went on to graduate from college, married a great guy with a future, and she herself became a teacher with two boys of her own. Wow!
She posted a comment to a previous post I did in Spanish. Let me paraphrase just a bit of what she said.
What a thrill it was to be able to see you both again! You gave everything good to me and what pleases me the most is that you still remembered me. Believe me when I say that I remember everything I lived when I was with you in your home and how God gave me the great blessing of knowing you. But above all that I met my heavenly Father through you. Thank you, thank you so very much for being my spiritual parents, and know that you have a very special place in my heart.
I still find it hard to think about this without tearing up. I think about where she came from and where she is today. I think about the power of God to touch lives through the lives of others in ways that we often never know or understand. I wonder how many times I have had the chance to touch a life and blown it. That scares me silly. But to have a glimpse into one such life that was transformed gives me a profound sense of awe at what God can do if we only live out his truth in front of others.
The hair is still short, and it is still incredibly thick and curly. She is no longer the scrawny teen that worked in our house. She is an attractive, together woman, mother, wife, teacher and a committed follower of Jesus.
This was so surreal. It was almost like being allowed to come back to a life you had previously lived and see the effect of your wake that y0u never realized. It was kind of like Ebenezer Scrooge’s ghost of Christmas past taking us back to see what we could never see on our own.
I sometimes get discouraged. This event, however, gives me hope that life is truly worth living every day, even on a bad day. People are watching, even on a bad day. They want to see a good God living through good people like us, even on a bad day and especially not at church. Life can have purpose and significance. To have a glimpse of P_____ is a treasure I will cherish.
I know what you mean to say, but …
Huh?
Those words can sting! But, they can also be greatly insightful if spoken in love and received with openness and humility.
Yeah, but they still sting! Dang!
The words were coming from a trusted friend and confidant. So, I kept my mouth shut and listened.
Preacher, educator, cross-cultural specialist – you might say I’m in the communication business. You’d think I might know just a little bit about communicating, but I also understand that the biggest factor in communication is perception. For that reason, I am sensitive to the fact that one can never be too sure about the effectiveness of communication.
What I’ve been trying to communicate in the past few posts is that each of us has the responsibility to establish boundaries in our lives. If you perceive frustration, it is not at people in general but at me in particular. Here’s what sometimes frustrates me:
If you read this blog often, you know that I am very introverted in my personality and interactions with people. But, I love people. I really do. That’s not a contradiction. Introverts can love people, but they just need time alone to recharge and feel mentally comfortable. I know extroverts who don’t like people but they need to be around them to keep from feeling lethargic and bored! We are all a bit strange, complicated and contradictory, aren’t we? (It has also been reported to me that we introverts spend far more time talking about and apologizing for our introverted nature than extroverts do about their opposite tendency).
Here’s the point - I know what you mean, but …
How are other ways these words apply to our lives? Communication is not so much what you mean to say but what the other person or persons hear and interpret.
This means that just as much as speaking clearly, effective communication requires seeking feedback to make sure the intended message was received and understood. It also requires careful listening, asking for clarification and giving thoughtful responses to make sure we are correctly interpreting what was meant. Whether our communication involves our job, relationships or sharing our faith or other important concepts, communication is a two-way street (or maybe an eight lane, high speed freeway!).
Here’s a classic Christmas illustration of this point of perceived communication. A good friend named Tina has a story she shares every Christmas about a famous cranberry sauce holiday recipe. It’s pork rind cranberry sauce. She got it from her hair stylist. You can check here for the whole story told as only she can do, but the bottom line is that what she heard was pork rind cranberry sauce. What her stylist really said was port wine cranberry sauce. Never assume that people understand what you said regardless of how clearly you think you said it.