Last year, about this time, I wrote about my trip to the Secretary of State. It was a long day, that one.

It seems only fair then, to give some credit where credit is due.

This morning I stopped by the downtown branch of the Secretary of State to transfer the plate from my son's truck to my wife's car. My wife drives a 1998 Mercury station wagon with 160,000-ish miles on it. The car is valued at less than $2,000, but the plate costs $210 to renew! A couple years back, a helpful SOS employee told me about a frequently used loophole to save some money.

I simply transfer the least expensive plate I have to the station wagon, and then re-plate that vehicle. Here's how it works:

Option A:
Renew plate on station wagon: $210
Renew plate on truck: $54
Total cost: $264

Option B:
Renew plate on truck: $54
Transfer plate to station wagon: $8
Purchase new plate for truck $54
Total cost: $116 - a savings of $148!

Frankly speaking, the savings alone would have made me a happy SOS customer today. But even better than that was the efficient, friendly service I received today. It took 16 minutes from the time I parked until the time I pulled out of my parking place today. And, I was helped by a friendly professional named Nancy.

Today's grade for the Secretary of State: A+

Things are not as they should be

"When a plane flies into a building killing thousands, we know that's not right.

"When a four-year-old dies from a brain tumor or a mother of three dies slowly of breast cancer, we know that's not right. . . .

"Whether we believe in God or not, most of us know intuitively that there are certain things that shouldn't happen in the world. It's that intuition that makes us want to ask why in the first place.

"But where does it come from? Why do we have this sense, not just that life is difficult, but that things are not the way they're supposed to be?"

Those thoughts are from a book I've just finished reading: Plan B - What Do You Do When God Doesn't Show Up the Way You Thought He Would?" by Pete Wilson.

And they're compelling.

For as long as I can recall, people have struggled with the problem of pain - the idea that an all-powerful, all-loving God is a divine oxymoron and, therefore, and impossibility. I'll admit, I've struggled with it, too.

Growing up, I watched my mother endure surgery after painful surgery in a series of failed fixes for a body wrecked by a teenage car crash. When I was little, I knew only that mom was "going to the hospital." As I grew older and the enormity of her pain began to sink in, I recall pleading with God for her healing. I begged. I made deals with God. But she remains, to this day, in constant pain.

So I know something of the inner tension one feels worshiping a seemingly enigmatic deity.

I've always heard the problem of pain touted as proof that God is, at best, absent or, more likely, nonexistent. Turn the problem-of-pain argument on its side, though, and the shifted perspective reveals something startling - at least to me.

Absent a deity to reveal to us the way things ought to be, how does humankind recognize that there, in fact, is a problem with pain? Apart from God, how did you and I come to realize that there is a way things should be and a way things should not be?

It is innate to us.

We view injustice - a young woman gunned down by Iranian secret police because she stood up for freedom - and we just know, "That's not right!" Nobody had to tell us. An inner script, an unspoken voice deep within . . . and we just know.

A forty year old mother sits in a lawn chair at her daughter's graduation open house, unable to walk to the kitchen and back because of the cancer she is fighting. Pride mixed with anxiety. Sorrow with joy. Unspoken by every person bearing graduation gifts is the knowledge that something is fundamentally wrong. This should not be happening to one so young, to a mom that is just now seeing the fruit of a dozen-and-a-half years of child rearing.

And how do we know?

I don't recall a single lesson from my parents, or in school, or in church where I was taught that getting cancer, or child abuse, or murder are not the way things are supposed to be.

And so, we are left with two possibilities. Either that knowledge is the result of an evolutionary process that was not just physical but also moral - that humankind became moral beings - or we were given that knowledge by God.

I choose to believe the latter.

When Adam and Eve ate the forbidden fruit, the Bible tells us that they became like God, knowing good and evil. In Plan B, Wilson writes:

Did you notice what the forbidden fruit was? It was knowledge - the knowledge of good and evil. Once Adam and Eve disobeyed God and ate that fruit, they would know too much. They'd gain something they never had, something that would drive them crazy the rest of their lives. They would know when things are the way they should be and when things are all wrong.

That, of course, is exactly what happened. And because they had introduced sin into the world at the same time, they were now in a double bind. Because they ate the fruit, the "good" they now understood and yearned for would always be out of their reach.

I intuitively know when something is or is not right because, as a son of Adam, I have eaten Adam's fruit.

But this curse - and it is a curse - is also a blessing. Because the knowledge that things are not right, is a powerful apologetic for the existence of things, or The Thing that is right, namely, God.

C.S. Lewis wrote that the reality of hunger proves that there is such a thing as food. In this same sense, the reality of evil, of wrong-ness, proves that there is such a thing as good, such a thing as right.

Evolution cannot explain that. Secular humanism provides no clarification for the way things ought to be.

The only explanation I can comprehend is the One that is beyond my comprehension. The only sensible explanation for the way things ought to be is the God who will remove the curse. Who will wipe away every tear from every eye. Who will put an end to mourning. To crying. To pain.

In this world that remains less than it ought to be, that is enough for me.

Let the church be the church

When senior citizens at a retirement center near Savannah, Georgia were told they could no longer have a communal prayer at mealtime they were, understandably, upset. So was their mayor and their families. After all, this generation has been praying before eating since they first learned, "God is great; God is good; Let us thank Him for our food." Some of them were praying for their daily bread when it was a lousy Army issued K-ration wolfed down in a French foxhole.

According to a WSBT news report, the company that provides their meals is contracted with the federal government to provide subsidized meals. Seniors are charged only 55 cents for food that costs the feds $6.00 per person. Consequently, the food service contractor has grown jittery about the separation of church and state, and has replaced the community voiced prayer with a moment of silence - much to the dismay of those breaking bread together.

My question: now what?

In particular, how will the churches of Port Wentworth, Georgia respond to this decision?

I they're like many churches I've read about, they'll meet in their basements and paint picket signs. They'll mobilize for action. They'll call folks of like sympathy and prepare to march on city hall. They'll write their elected officials. Within a day or two of the story hitting the wire, we'll be reading about Christian organizations across the country decrying this decision. It will be on Christian television. Political action committees with right-leaning Christian sympathies will send out mailers to their faithful coffer-fillers urging them to "give generously to continue the fight."

Not that any of that is bad, necessarily. It's just that it doesn't work.

But what if the eighteen churches of Port Wentworth would take a different approach entirely? What if they told Uncle Sam to keep his lunch money and, instead, began providing the meals themselves? What if they said, "You know, there was a time when the church fed widows. Had a whole committee of seven guys set up to oversee it. Called 'em deacons. Didn't charge the old ladies a dime, and nobody went hungry." What if that happened?

Frankly speaking (that is the name of the blog after all), it should never have come to this. Twenty centuries removed from the first church we've abdicated our responsibility to care for our senior citizens to the federal government. The federal government? Shame on us.

When I read about the church's very first "meals on wheels," I can't help but notice what happens next. Right after the amazing description of how the early church cared for it's senior citizens we read, "So the word of God spread. The number of disciples in Jerusalem increased rapidly, and a large number of priests became obedient to the faith."

Maybe if the twenty-first century church would follow the example of our first-century fathers and mothers we would see similar results.

William Willimon on growing churches . . .

Making disciples is the job of disciples in Acts. Mainline North American Protestantism, faced with steady decline in membership over the most recent decades, tends to waver between superficial techniques for church growth or unconvincing alibis for church death – “We are not really dying; we are tightening our ranks for service.” “Only the reactionary, conservative churches are growing. We are too liberal and socially progressive to attract new members.” Luke would not know what to make of a church no longer in the business of making more disciples. While the mission of the church is more than growth, it is not something other than growth. It is certainly not decline. We live in the gracious interim for witness (Acts 1:8). In Luke-Acts, any church bold enough to preach the Word, which dares to challenge the cultural status quo, which refuses to accept present political arrangements as eternally given, which is convinced of the truth of its message, which is willing to suffer for the truth will grow. God gives growth to such churches.

An open letter to Marion Jones, et.al.

Dear Marion,

I read on Yahoo Sports this morning that you signed a contract to play for the WNBA's Tulsa Shock. Good for you.

We all make mistakes. And while there are plenty of people who are quick to pile on with phrases like, "We're all under pressure, but we don't all take performance enhancing drugs," I'm not one of them. None of us can understand the stress, the weight that led to your taking PEDs. I've not walked a mile in your shoes, and God knows that there are plenty of reasons why you and many others could point an accusing finger at me.

I taught our congregation last week that "God deals in paragraphs, not periods."

It is human nature, I suppose, that causes us to punctuate people's lives with one final, and seemingly irrevocable period. With a what-have-you-done-lately attitude, we assess one's most recent failure or media-exploited blunder and assign to them an undeserved finality.

God doesn't do that.

If he did, Moses' life would have ended, "Glancing this way and that and seeing no one, he killed the Egyptian and hid him in the sand." If God punctuated solely with periods, King David's biography would have concluded with the Prophet Nathan telling David, "You struck down Uriah the Hittite with the sword and took his wife to be your own. You killed him with the sword of the Ammonites."

But God deals in paragraphs. And, unlike periods, paragraphs signify the beginning of something rather than the end.

Because of God's predilection toward paragraphs, Moses led the children of Israel to freedom. David became known as a man after God's own heart. (Leading, I might add, to big things for Cecil B. DeMille and Michelangelo.)

And because of that, Marion, you, too, can make a new start.

There will be plenty of people who will insist on reminding you of your previous errors in judgment. They are the same small, petty people that sit on the sidelines of life offering unsolicited criticisms. They're the people that choose the longer line at the grocery checkout so they can peruse the covers of gossip magazines and wag their fingers at the others' mistakes. They're the same people who, with barely disguised smugness, smirk as they gawk at Tiger Woods on the cover of People Magazine.

Ignore them, Marion, and remember that God deals in paragraphs and not periods.

And because of that, the last chapter in your story - and perhaps the best - is just beginning.

Mid-Michigan High Schoolers For Haiti

When the Student Leaders from our High School Youth Group, Modified, decided to challenge one another to a little peanut butter competition, I’ll bet they didn’t expect this to happen.

Their original plan: for Grand Ledge High School to challenge Everett High School to see which school could collect the most peanut butter to send to Haiti. Our students talked to their respective administrators and student councils and began collecting Jif and Peter Pan.

Then one student decided to call 97.5 Now-FM to see if they would be willing to donate a prize to the winning school. 97.5 called back and asked, "If two schools can do this, why can’t all 28 high schools in the Tri-County area do it?" An idea was sparked and soon Mid-Michigan High Schoolers For Haiti was born.

Here is how it will work. Beginning tomorrow morning, Citadel Broadcasting will begin talking about Mid-Michigan HS4Haiti on their flagship station, 97.5, as well as their other five affiliate stations. They are issuing a two-fold challenge – to give money to the American Red Cross, and to give "hard goods," from the list that we have printed on our church’s website.

Here’s the thing: all of the hard goods that are donated by the 22,000 high school students AND Citadel Broadcasting's 400,000 weekly listeners will come through our doors before being sent to Northwest Haiti Christian Mission. Yes, you read that correctly.

It is entirely possible that we will be looking at over 100,000 jars of peanut butter and Tylenol and anti-biotic ointment and . . . well the list is pretty long actually.

In other words, this is going to be huge.

97.5 will run the contest for the entire month of February, and they are making a substantial contribution to seeing that it succeeds. The winning schools (there are three categories based on enrollment) will each receive a cash grant that they can use to bless a not-for-profit in their own community. In addition, the winning school will play host to an exclusive live concert in their own gym or auditorium hosted by 97.5 morning deejay Josh Strickland and an up-and-coming regional band.

They are also planning to visit school assemblies, and have live broadcast remotes planned throughout Mid-Michigan to promote this event.

This is going to be huge – did I mention that already?

What can we do? Soon we’re going to be buried under an avalanche of Haiti supplies. We’re going to need a massive turnout of people on short notice to count, sort and repackage these items to ship to Haiti.

This Sunday we will give you specific instructions for how you can help with this effort.

Until then, please pray. God is already doing "immeasurably more than all we can ask or imagine," with this project. (Let me just add that I am so proud of our Student Leaders and our Youth Minister, Chad Cronin. Their out-of-the-box thinking is going to save lives in Haiti!)

That’s all for now. Just get the word out. Listen to 97.5 tomorrow morning from 6 AM - 10 AM to get the early word on what is happening. Facebook this information. Find the links on the 97.5 webpage and put them on your Twitter and your blogs. Get the word out, and then watch what God does.

There is a woman sitting behind my wife and me as we pull into the driveway of our home. She has a job, her own car. Is headed off to college in the fall. Just the other day she sat in our mini-van munching on a Happy Meal and dumping her Hi-C on the floor.

Not anymore. She's a woman now.

I pause at the garage door and switch the headlights off. I press the opener, and the door rises like a curtain on opening night. When my wife, Tracy, asks, "What are we waiting for?" I tell her, "Just look at that garage. Have you ever seen a nicer garage?"

"Um, sure. No. Whatever. What are you talking about?"

"I swept the floor and mopped yesterday."

From the back seat my daughter deadpans, "Nice. Can we pull inside the nice clean garage now?"

We do. Like every other day, our hands are full. Book bags, grocery sacks, mail and dinner - McDonald's again - are balanced carefully as we labor to get in the house. Abby sets her drink - no longer a 12 ounce Hi-C, but a 32 ounce Dr. Pepper - on the frost covered roof of the car and reaches in to retrieve the suit she just bought for the scholarship banquet she'll be attending next week.

The soda slides, slowly at first, then picking up steam it careens off the car and explodes on my clean floor. Mother and daughter glance at one another, and then at me. I smirk; they giggle. Soon we're belly laughing at my obsessive need to keep a garage floor clean and the obvisous silliness of it all.

And yet, hidden in my laughter is a tear, knowing that my daughter has nearly completed her journey from Abby to Abigail.

Haiti Relief

The unprecedented events of the past week have challenged everyone that has watched the events unfolding in Haiti. None more than the brothers and sisters at South Lansing Christian Church that have prayed for, supported financially and served alongside ministries in Haiti.

Nearly two years ago our church collected 9,000 jars of peanut butter to send to Haiti. It was distributed within about six weeks. Imagine how desperate their need for food is now, with transportation and distribution crippled by the devastating earthquake of earlier this week.

How can we respond as a church? Let me detail some of what is already taking place:

First, our church has been designated a Regional Collection Location by Northwest Haiti Christian Mission, one of our partner ministries. Next week NWHCM will be placing a 40 foot shipping container in our church parking lot. Together, with Christian Churches from all over Michigan, we intend to fill that container with high protein food and medical supplies. For a complete list of details on the items we are accepting click here.

On Sunday we are going to be asking you to sign up for a shift to help load the container. In the meantime, begin to get the word out that South is collecting items for Haiti. We need to work fast. Talk to your friends and co-workers. Connect with Christians in other cities. Let them know that time is of the essence. We need to fill the container in seven days.

South will also be doing what we can to make a financial commitment to our partner ministries in Haiti. In addition to NWHCM, GO Ministries , a ministry in the Dominican Republic, is crossing the border into Haiti to minister in the Capitol City, and Waves of Mercy, is planning to bring 50 children that lost their parents in the earthquake from Port au Prince to their campus in Port-de-Paix.

In addition, Jeff Badgero, the father of South’s own Brenda Glinke, is traveling to Haiti on January 26th. A veteran Haiti missionary, Jeff is fluent in Creole, and will be working directly in rescue and recovery efforts. The best way we can help Jeff help Haitians, is to make sure he goes to Haiti with his pockets full of dollars.

Sunday night, at 8 PM, I will be moderating a meeting of our elders, deacons, missions, and finance teams. Our first order of business: to pray for Haiti. After that, we are going to put our heads together to figure out how we can best help our partner ministries help Haitians.

You are invited to this prayer meeting too.You are invited to this prayer meeting too.

I believe God is calling us to do more than just write a check. That’s too easy. Earlier this week, Tracy and I started listing items on eBay. We believe that we can use those dollars for Kingdom purposes. What would happen if we all began sacrificing our "want items"? Something amazing, I believe.

All we really need to know is this: Haitians are hurting. We can help.

Pray, friend, and come prepared to do something this Sunday.

Trading Stuff for Ministry Money

We've been studying the Bible book of Acts at South Lansing Christian Church. The deeper I go, the more I think it has the potential to ruin my life. Last week I challenged the congregation to have the same attitude that the early church had - that the return of Jesus Christ was imminent. Following his ascension, the disciples returned to Jerusalem and, while they waited for the promised Holy Spirit to arrive, they contemplated Jesus' return. They expected it, even.

You cannot read the rest of Acts without recognizing that the first Christ followers anticipated Jesus return. That is why their priorities were so radically altered. That is how they were able to rid themselves of material baggage the sale of which could do good for others in the here and now, but that would be useless once Jesus returned.

Sell your land and put the money in the offering plate? No big deal. Jesus is coming back. Loan you the stuff that belongs to me? No big deal. It all belongs to Jesus anyway. Shed myself of possessions and use the money for ministry? "I can do that." was the reply of the first believers.

I went home Sunday afternoon after preaching Acts 1:1-11 and my wife and I began listing stuff on eBay and Craig's list. One of the items I listed was my collection of The West Wing DVDs - you know, the television series with Martin Sheen. I love that show, but the fact is I haven't viewed the discs in months. They just sit there on the shelf. I thought, "If they're still sitting there when Jesus returns and I could have sold them and used the money for ministry, how will I explain that to Jesus?"

So tonight, in about 45 minutes I'm going to hand them over to some guy and take his 50 bucks and do some good with it. . . .

UPDATE: Just left the grocery store parking lot where I exchanged my DVDs for $50. Felt like we were doing a drug deal. Got home and walked in to find out that Haiti just had an earthquake. The quake is the most severe in the country's history. The damage is significant. One of the missionaries our church supports, Jose Castillo, is in Port au Prince and cannot be located at the present time.

That $50 will make a difference invested in ministry. The DVDs would not.

What else can I sell?

If I get serious about being an Acts 1 Christian, it might ruin my carefully thought out and scripted life. But then, maybe that is what God wants to happen. Maybe his plan is better off.

Should I sell my DVDs?

I read this interesting article on Yahoo tonight: 10 Things Not to Buy in 2010. My personal experience validates what this article reports.

Tops on the list: DVDs. Mrs. Frankly and I had a conversation just the other night about the futility of buying more of them. We probably own about a hundred, including all seven seasons of The West Wing and the first four seasons of The Office. I considered asking for season five this Christmas. But why, when I can watch it on Netflix. For many, opting for online delivery or delivery by mail rather than purchasing DVDs is a matter of convenience.

As a follower of Jesus it ought to be more than that for me.

It ought to be a matter of stewardship.

Why do I need to own a movie when I can rent it or borrow it from the library. I can only watch one flick at a time, after all. For the same price I expected to pay to round out my Office collection, I was able to buy nearly four months of Netflix. (Of course, there is another question entirely of whether or not movies are good stewardship of my time and mind.)

I am surrounded, it turns out, by stuff. Collectibles. Books. Tools. My son said just tonight, "Dad, you really have a flashlight fetish." And he's right.

I plan to preach this week from Acts 1 about how the early church anticipated - no, expected - the imminent return of Jesus Christ. This expectation affected their entire lives. I somehow doubt, for example, that the first Christians would have collected every episode chronicling the Josiah Bartlett administration on Digital Video Disc.

Rather, they pared down their possessions. And why wouldn't they? Why collect stuff if Jesus was due back any moment?

The history of the early church records:

All the believers were one in heart and mind. No one claimed that any of his possessions was his own, but they shared everything they had. With great power the apostles continued to testify to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and much grace was upon them all. There were no needy persons among them. For from time to time those who owned lands or houses sold them, brought the money from the sales and put it at the apostles' feet, and it was distributed to anyone as he had need. (Acts 4:32-35, NIV)

Author and preacher Ed Dobson told in his book, The Year of Living Like Jesus about giving away his clothes. He took John the Baptist's suggestion, quite literally, to give away half of his clothing. He gave away more than half of his suits to young men at a nearby seminary. Dobson is living like the early church lived.

Will I?

I'm not sure I can really preach that sermon without having a conversation with my family about our attachment to possessions. About our willingness to let go of some things. But if our church is going to become the church God intended, if I am going to be the man God intended, there will probably be many more uncomfortable talks.

And also a few changes.

Dick Clark, if you only knew . . .

Dick Clark was there tonight. I assumed he would be. New Year's Eve wouldn't be New Years without Dick Clark.

The Grahams were there. Jeff sat on the end of the sectional beside Beth. Becca was sprawled on the floor and Megan was in the recliner hammering away on her brand-new Blackberry. Caleb was somewhere playing X-Box. He showed up just in time to see the ball drop. Jonah was there, too.

The only one missing was Abby. Having worked yesterday, and needing to be at work tomorrow, she had to stay home.

For the first time in eighteen years our family was not together for New Year's Eve.

I was listening to The Forest Gump Suite on my iPod when that reality hit me.

There are a lot of reasons to look forward to 2010. I have such hope for this year - heightened, I think, by being able to close the book on a brutally difficult chapter in my life. And yet, 2010 will be a year of mixed emotions, I think.

As the ball dropped, I couldn't escape the milestones our family will realize in 2010.

10 . . . my 25th high school reunion. Are you kidding me? 25 years?!

9 . . . Abigail graduates from Grand Ledge High School. She just learned to walk and talk and.

8 . . . In two weeks, I teach my first college class. I am a little terrified, to be honest.

7 . . . My son, Caleb, becomes a high school Senior. By this time next year, Tracy and I will be looking at a second graduation open house and a nest with only one "egg."

6 . . . Our baby becomes a high school Freshman. And joins the "real" Grand Ledge football program.

5 . . . Twenty-three years of marriage to Mrs. Weller. Wow!

4 . . . My daughter moves out of our home and becomes a college Freshman. Un-be-lievable.

3 . . . One last family vacation together? Maybe.

2 . . . A final marching band season with my son on the drum line.

1 . . . Caleb's last Christmas (and we just went through this).

I know. Nobody's dying. I imagine they're all going to be there next year even though they are not "in our home" so to speak. Somehow, though, I imagine it just isn't going to be the same.

By the time the ball came to rest on its sparkling "2010" and the last strains of The Forest Gump Suite had faded I was pretty melancholy. I still am.

And though I expect to smile a lot this year, I suspect that, in 2010, I'll weep more than a handful of tears.

Clinging to George Bailey

I've invested some time in reflection these last several months. During the dark moments - and there have been many - I have reflected on the "could haves" and "should haves" in my life. I've ruminated over regrets. I've agonized over choices made and opportunities lost.

To be completely honest, it has been difficult. Painful. Draining.

I am forty-two years old, and I can't help but think that, by now, I should have gotten it together. When I was a younger man and I would make a mistake, those around me would chalk it up to youth and inexperience. When I would offend someone, they were quicker to look past my actions and assume the best about my intentions.

But those days are long past.

I have this sense that, by now, I should have fewer of those regrettable moments. There should be more distance between my relational missteps. And, actually, I think there are fewer of those moments, I think. I am more relationally adept. But at age forty-two, and in the work that I do, even a very occasional mistake seems to carry with it more consequence.

It's a Wonderful Life was on the television tonight. I can relate to George Bailey. George lived with regrets. And in the darkest moment of his life they flooded his mind like a tsunami. He saw the places he wanted to go but never did. He thought how his wife would have been better of if she had married Sam Wainright. He even went so far as to reckon that his family would be better off with a $15,000 life insurance settlement and no husband and father.

Is there any man who hasn't wondered if he should have taken a different turn at the crossroads of his life?

I have - especially on days like today.

It is then that I cling to George Bailey. At the conclusion of Frank Capra's masterpiece, George learns that he really did make a difference. Maybe he didn't build sky scrapers or design railroad trestles, but he really did make a difference. At George's lowest point, Clarence, George's guardian angel tells him, "Each man's life touches so many other lives. When he isn't around he leaves an awful hole . . ."

There are a lot of things I guess I would do differently. But here I am. I haven't made a million. I am not the pastor of a mega-church. My mailbox isn't overflowing with speaking invitations.

But, like George Bailey, I am trusting that my legacy is at the same time more obscure and more profound. My legacy is named Abby; my legacy is named Caleb; my legacy is named Jonah. I'm clinging to that, this Christmas.

Shop with a Cop (Chaplain)

Last Saturday I enjoyed spending the morning with little Davey (not his real name) as part of the Lansing Police Department's Shop With a Cop program. We had a blast.

I'll admit that I was a little nervous at first. And when Davey's mom told me that he was really quiet and shy I was even more so. But when we loaded up to head out to the Wal-Mart, Davey began to loosen up. And why not. We were in line with over seventy-five police vehicles with sirens blaring and lights blazing - every little kid's dream parade! Davey and his brother rode in back while I rode shotgun with Officer George doing the driving. Questions and squeals of delight came from the back seat as motorcycle cops raced ahead to block the intersections between us and the Wal-Mart.

When we arrived Davey and I got in line to get his picture taken with Santa. We had to wait a while, but he was patient, if a little fidgety. When Santa and Mrs. Claus asked him what he wanted for Christmas he wrinkled up his nose and thought really hard before answering. I leaned in to listen but missed his reply. Then he hopped down, grabbed the cart and we headed off to the toy aisle.

Because of the generosity of the program's benefactors, each child was allowed to spend $100. the next hour was a test of my math skills and Davey's shopping prowess as toys went in and out of the cart faster than shoppers through a revolving door. Davey finally settled on a couple of GI Joe vehicles and a Star Wars storm trooper helmet and blaster. He remembered to get a gift for his mom, and his brother and sister, too.

When we headed to the cash registers to check out, he had a smile on his face and a twinkle in his eye. After a meal at Subway, we headed our separate ways.

Hopefully Davey will have a Merry Christmas. Because of the generosity of the LPD and the supporters of this program, over 90 children will have a brighter holiday. And, if any of the officers are like this police chaplain, I know their Christmas will be brighter, too.

The odd hardcover book

I grabbed my copy of William Barclay's commentary on Romans this morning to examine his thoughts on Romans 14. My Christian Doctrine professor, Mr. Fisher, frequently warned us against using Barclay as he denied the miracles of Jesus. Or at least that is what I recall him saying. Still, good ol' Bill has helped me understand the Jewish-ness of the New Testament, and I find that he adds to my understanding of scripture more often than he takes away from it.

The book is part of a complete set of Barclay's Daily Bible Study Commentary. My associate, Wally, has his commentaries scattered in scriptural order. All the Luke commentaries, followed by those from John, then Acts and so on. I prefer to keep them in sets. There is something about having similar bindings together that gives me a feeling of orderliness. My College Press commentaries have faux marble dust jackets and sit on the second-to-top shelf. Keil and Delitzsch, with their gold lettering on brown cloth reside on the Old Testament section just above James Smith's five volume Old Testament set. I know where they all are and they, staring at my back while I work, seem to know where I am, too.

The sets look uniform. All of them, but the Barclay, that is.

Bill's books are nearly all paperbacks. Most are blue; a couple are green; and two are even hot pink. And one - Romans - is the lone hardcover, a cloth-bound island in a sea of paperbacks.

The hardcover - the only one in the series that I ever paid for - I purchased from Claudia McGilvery, the proprietress of The Christian Bible House in Kokomo, Indiana. Claudia and her husband, Bill, were members of the first church I served full-time, the Kokomo Church of Christ. Her cramped little bookstore on Lincoln Avenue was longer than it was wide, and it was packed from floor to ceiling with books, curriculum and all manner of teaching aids long before WWJD bracelets and "Bud-wise-up" t-shirts began littering the Christian landscape.

I don't remember why I bought the book. I was a youth and music minister back then and preached maybe three, four times a year. One of those must have been a sermon from Romans.

Normally, a multi-colored, odd-book-out set would offend my sense of order. (The more cynical reader might say, my obsessive compulsive disorder.) To the contrary, the motley assortment of colors and coverings is a reminder of how I came to own them. They were gifts from Violette.

Claudia was amazing, so when I moved to Butler, Indiana to become the preacher at the Butler Church of Christ, I was surprised to find another, equally godly Christian bookseller - Violette Patee.

Violette was a pioneer in Christian retailing. I could write a whole column about her alone - how she went sixty years without missing a Sunday; how she broke her leg on the way into church, taught Sunday school, and then went to the hospital to have it set. But the lasting impact that Violette had on my life is in my library.

One October - it was pastor appreciation month - Violette sent our church secretary on a clandestine mission to find out what commentaries I had, or rather didn't have. When she learned that my "set" of William Barclay consisted of my lonely Romans volume, she gave me a couple more to keep him company. The next year she did the same. Occasionally one would show up at Christmas. Before too many years, the set was assembled, as Johnny Cash sang, "one piece at a time, and it didn't cost me a dime."

Violette passed away one August a few years back, and I was privileged to preside at her funeral. And yet, years after her death and over a decade since she gave me the first of many, many books, I can't pick up one of Violette's books without feeling the imprint that she left on my life.

My Violette books are emblematic of my life, really. I am who I am because, like my library, people have contributed to me bit by bit, patiently adding worth here and there, refining, carving, and polishing. There is very little that I have achieved on my own. (Is there anything at all?)

And for that, I am grateful.

Comet Marching Band

My son's band, the Grand Ledge High School marching Comets, perform their field show at the 2009 Grand Ledge Exhibition, performing selections composed by Dmitri Dmitriyevich Shostakovich Wednesday, October 7, 2009. (The last several seconds are, regretably, cut off on this video as I ran out of memory on my video card.)

Inspired play from the Junior Comets

Jonah's 8th-grade football team defeated a determined Dewitt squad earlier today with a last second goal line stand that will be remembered long after these boys stop dreaming of NFL glory. It was their second such defensive denial of the game.

Previously, with the ball spotted at the Grand Ledge one yard line, the Dewitt boys lined up for a fourth and inches first-down try.

All day long the Dewitt squad had run behind their huge left tackle, a surprisingly athletic eight-grader that was listed on the roster at 305 pounds. With their backs to the wall, the Junior Comets called on their goal line defense package to come in and plug the gaps. My son's task: stop the Panther's enormous left tackle from plowing a path through the Comet defense.

When the ball was snapped, the D-line fired off and stuffed the Dewitt runner for no gain. With the ball turned over to the Comets on downs, the scoring threat was averted.

The Ledge took an 18-7 lead into the fourth quarter, but that was quickly trimmed to 18-14. And, with time running out, Dewitt was threatening to score again. Masterfully working the ball down field in as fine a hurry-up offense as I have ever seen executed in eighth-grade play, the Junior Panthers were threatening to snatch the victory away from the Comets. With first-and-goal, a pair of timeouts and thirty seconds, they hammered away at the defense pushing the ball all the way to the Comet two yard line.

After their final timeout, with only twelve seconds left on the clock, the Junior Panthers hustled to the line of scrimmage where the ball was spotted less than six feet from victory. Once again they ran behind their massive left tackle, who by now was referred to by the Comets simply as, "Mountain."

Once again, the Comet defense held.

I have never been more inspired by of proud of my son's effort on a football field.

At the conclusion of the game, as we were slowly walking across the field with a chill wind blowing in our faces, Jonah said, "Dad, I hit that guy as hard as I could, and every time I did, it hurt."

Maybe so, son. But I am pretty certain it hurt him, too. And you have a win to show for it.

Atta' boy!

Pennies, people, and things that matter . . .

My friend, Paul, took me for a spin in his new mini-van the other day. Aside from the fact that Paul surrendered and is now driving a grocery getter in anticipation of the imminent delivery of his firstborn child, I learned something else on the trip. Paul is frustrated by one of the vehicles accessories - or the lack thereof. Paul's vehicle, like many others, comes with a spot for coins. Just not a spot for the pennies.

There is one for quarters, dimes and nickles, but President Lincoln is just out of luck, I guess.

Naturally, I was compelled to check each of my vehicles. Turns out Paul isn't the only one that got short-changed (sorry - couldn't resist). My vehicles are similarly configured. My Dodge, in fact, even has a spot for fifty cent pieces, but nary a place for a penny.

Paul and I considered why that was so. I finally settled on this explanation: you don't use pennies for tolls and meters so the designers didn't include them. That was preferable to my more cynical conclusion - that pennies are just worthless. Turns out there are a lot of folks that think that way, including a congressmen and a biophysics professor from Berkeley.

Some think pennies are a waste of time. Others believe they are a waste of resources (they're made, mostly, of zinc now).

And yet, there is strong opposition to pitching them penny from folks who long for more nostalgic days and from those who love Abraham Lincoln too much to confine him to the five dollar bill.

Pennies might be worthless, or they might not be. The thing that I find striking is how some folks have the same attitude about people. Some look at their neighbor and find him or her a waste of time. Some think they're too much trouble. They're a waste of resources; they have no apparent purpose, but instead are just left over from the transactions that "really matter."

I'll admit that, while I've never consciously voiced that opinion or even consciously thought it, may actions have communicated, from time to time, that people don't matter.

But they do.

Every time.

All the time.

There are no useless people; no societal "leftovers." And while there might not be a spot for a penny in my mini-van, I hope there is always room for another person. Because people matter.

Come to think of it, I think I like pennies, too. Turns out that one of the leading proponents of keeping the penny is a guy named Mark Weller (a distant cousin perhaps?). His organization, Americans for Common Cents, lobbies in Washington, D.C. for the penny's preservation.

And, if we're going to lobby congress for the preservation of something as relatively insignificant as a penny, then I am certainly going to do all I can to preserve people.

Take the next step

The thing is, spiritually, we never arrive. There is always something more. Some other challenge. Some "next step" that we are called to take.

Take sanctification. ("Please!" some would say.) Just when the Holy Spirit cleans up one part of my life and I begin to think I am finally getting the hang of this faith thing, God reveals another area of my heart that needs swept clean. I'm reminded of the Mennonite Bishop that told his protege, "When you've been practicing the discipline for forty years it goes this much easier," as he held his thumb and forefinger a fraction of an inch apart.

Or what about service? God - though never demanding more than He was willing to give (and gave) - always urges me to do more. Paul expressed it this way:

I'm not saying that I have this all together, that I have it made. But I am well on my way, reaching out for Christ, who has so wondrously reached out for me. Friends, don't get me wrong: By no means do I count myself an expert in all of this, but I've got my eye on the goal, where God is beckoning us onward—to Jesus. I'm off and running, and I'm not turning back.

God always challenges his followers to take the next step.

What is the next step for you?

At South Lansing Christian Church, we focus on seeking, studying and serving God. And we frequently challenge people with where they are in that process. What is the next step that God is calling me to make? Does God want me to take a step of faith and serve him somewhere or with someone that challenges my comfort? Am I being called to take the next step by embracing some spiritual discipline that will help me seek God? Does God want me to take a step of faith and start doing life together with others in a study group?

The next step . . .

Over the course of the next four weeks, South is going to be exploring this idea of taking the next step in your spiritual journey. At the conclusion of that series, on October 4, I will challenge you to take the next step - wherever God is leading. And, there is a concrete, specific way that you can demonstrate that you're going to do so.

On Sunday, October 4, I am asking every person that commits to taking the next step to bring a pair of new or clean used kid-sized boots or shoes with them to church. We'll be donating them to kids that need them. Can't afford boots or shoes? No problem - bring a new pair of socks. We'll gather them all up and distribute them where they're needed.

Your generous donation will serve two purposes. First, it will signify that you're going to take the next step in your faith journey. You're going to go where God wants you to go - whether that is joining a study group, or committing to a regular time alone with Him, or diving into an area of service. And, in a very real way, your donation will bless a child with warm toes this winter.

I hope you will join me and take the next step.

Walt's rolling over right now . . .

My daughter and her Indiana friends made this distorti . . . er adaptation of the Disney classic, "I'll Make a Man Out of You," from the movie Mulan. Wow!

School bus . . . racing!

Saturday was a loooong day for me, but a great one. The day began with a speech at the ribbon cutting ceremony for Butler Public Library in Butler, Indiana. When I lived in Butler I was President of the library board when we embarked upon a facility expansion. I helped raise some of the money and got the ball rolling on the project, and then I left town. The new President, Larry Moore, together with Library Director Ellen Stuckey and his fellow board members picked up the project and saw it through to completion. And they did an amazing job! What a great way to start the day.

Then I headed back to Lansing where I performed two weddings. They were beautiful and went off without a hitch. I stopped in at both wedding receptions before heading over to I-96 Speedway where I drove in an 8 lap school bus race on their eighth mile dirt track. It was a blast! I started on the inside of the first row. When the flag dropped, my friend Fred Lab, who was positioned just outside of me, tried to cut me off in turn one. I hammered him. By the time we made it around turn two I had about half of my paint on the side of his bus and was clearly in the lead.

I maintained the lead for most of the race, but on lap seven things began to get interesting. Chris Rice, who is Kenny Wallace's crew chief was driving one of the other buses. Apparently he didn't hear track owner Mike Mouch's talk about sparing the radiators. He started banging into Fred's back end, and then into me! That pushed me up high on the back stretch enabling Rice and Freddo to come in underneath me.

Naturally, Rice and I made a Fred Sandwich. All down the back stretch we were hammering Fred. We went three wide into turn three with buses scraping and rubber burning. It was intense!

Chris Rice ended up winning the race with Fred a close second and me third. We finished with a length of each other, I think. We got the thing on film and, when I figure out how to download it, I'll post it up on Facebook.