20-Year Reflections

It's a week for nostalgia.  Tomorrow we leave for a summer Kansas City vacation, just like I used to have when I was a kid.  It will be fun to take my kids and Liz to the sites I looked forward to visiting each summer, as well as spending some time with the people (whom I have rarely seen in the last decade or so) that made those trips so special.

Sunday is also our 12th wedding anniversary.  It's hard to believe it's been 12 years.  It's also hard to believe it's only been 12 years, since it's hard to remember life without Liz.  Twelve years is how long it takes to get through school, and I must say I've enjoyed these dozen years much more than those school years.

Speaking of which, chance would have it that tonight is also the day of my 20-year high school reunion.  I can't attend, of course, since it's pretty impossible to get to an 8 p.m. party on a Saturday night in south Texas when you need to preach in Arkansas on Sunday morning.  But I have been seeing pictures on Facebook, and, along with all the other nostalgia of the week (did I mention the KC trip winds up with a family reunion?), it's got me in a reflective mood.

I think the first thing that pops into your mind when you think about seeing people from high school is whether or not you have met the expectations that you imagine that they had for you.  I think I sort of imagined ten years ago that I was "proving" something when I was able to come and "show off" Liz a little bit (I did get married!).  And I was a little sheepish about my weight gain.

So looking back, I'm happy to realize that, although I've been packing it on lately, I'm no fatter than I was ten years ago.  And we've added three impossibly adorable kids to the family since then.  But I also remember the plans I told people about back then, and I've lived to see them altered, crushed, re-shaped, and re-made over the past decade.

I've also come to realize that these thoughts I've imagined in others are just my own insecurities and expectations reflected back to me.  Because my high school social circle was small and I've been removed from that area since that time, I'm firmly in the category of "Who?" or "Oh yeah, I guess I remember him" for 98% of the people in my class.  The question really is whether I feel good about my life right now, and my definition of success has undergone a radical overhaul over the past couple of decades.

"No Matter What": The Letter, part 2 (excerpt)

(read part one here)

            As I crawled into bed, my open spiral notebook caught my eye.  Near the bottom of the page, I saw my name, signed “Jay C. McGee.”  I paused.  The first clear thought of the afternoon shot through my mind: Did I really sign my name using my INITIAL?!

            The fog began to dissipate quickly as I remembered what I had done.  I remembered being so proud of it, but I struggled to remember exactly what I had written.  With a shaky hand, I reached for the notebook and began to read.

"No Matter What": The Letter, part 1 (excerpt)

 

CHAPTER 2 – THE LETTER

             Our standard birthday celebration for my dad was not enough to distract me from the inevitable thoughts that would flood my brain as I tried to go to bed that night.  So there I lay, with my stomach still cooled by the homemade ice cream we had that night and my mind relentlessly haunted by Nicole’s image.  I closed my eyes in a vain effort to sleep, but the only thing I saw was the vision of her, laughing, talking to her friends in the department store. 

            Why didn’t I talk to her?  Would she have talked to me if she had seen me?  Surely she would have at least said, “Hi.”  After all, she was one of the only girls that had shown any interest in talking to me at all before I got my contacts.

            I stared into the darkness and sighed.  Why is she such a roadblock to me?  Roger’s right.  I really should ask Amanda out.  Maybe Amy.  But I still liked Nicole.  A lot.  I had never asked her out, not in five years of knowing her.  Now here I am, sixteen years old, without a single date under my belt just because I can’t get the guts up to ask this one girl out.  Geez, she could say ‘yes’ for all I know.

            I moaned in frustration into my pillow and pulled it over my head.  How could I possibly tell her how I felt now? I can’t just come out and say it.  My feelings have gotten way too out of hand for that.  And of course there was no chance I would call her.

            So there in the dark that night, I made a decision: I had to do something about Nicole Ellis if I was ever going to get on with my life. 

"No Matter What": Summer Detox, part 2 (excerpt)

This is the rest of chapter 1, "Summer Detox"  Read part one here.

*  *  *  *  *  *

    It seemed to me that most guys looked at Nicole like cartoon characters—you know, the ones whose eyes would pop out of their head and tongues would hang to the floor?  But I really couldn’t look at her that way.  I didn’t know her all that well, but my feelings for her had always been strangely warm and caring.  Thinking of her in terms of her body parts, as so many of my friends did, made me feel wrong, even dirty.

    I came to this realization that morning in the shower.  Even during the summer, she would still enter my mind when at that groggy, vulnerable time most mornings.  I congratulated myself on my emotional depth and sophistication as I got out of the shower.  If only she knew I was better than those walking hormones who surround her all the time, I thought.

The Forgotten Nation

I invite you to imagine with me a country with a rich Christian heritage.  Old church buildings dot the landscape, once filled to capacity but now home to a dozen members in one building, a couple dozen in another, perhaps a hundred in the larger churches.  These nearly empty places of worship are signs of the declining influence and impact of the gospel in these communities.  A remnant remains, but these faithful people have aged, grown tired and defeated, seemingly overwhelmed by the cultural changes around them.

You might be imagining a country in "post-Christian" Europe, and though the country I am describing does have a population roughly the same as the United Kingdom or France, it is much closer to home.  Yet this country is usually seen not as a missions priority but as a stepping-stone for a young minister to gain experience for a couple of years before moving on, or a soft landing for a tired old pastor, working his way toward retirement.

In case you haven't figured it out yet, the "nation" I am describing is rural America.

Which 'Kingdom Character' Are You?

To get you started on the concepts of this study, I have created a quiz.

Which of the "Kingdom Characters" do you resemble most?

Take the Quiz!

Indiana Straw Man

A "straw man" is defined as "a weak or imaginary argument or opponent that is set up to be easily defeated."

It seems like the best concept to introduce when attempting to address the hysteria surrounding Religious Freedom Restoration Act that was signed into law in Indiana last week.

Now, with Arkansas passing a similar law today, we need to take time to see through the absurdities and look at what this is really all about.

It's easy to get people to hate a law when it is characterized as "a license to discriminate" (particularly against homosexuals), and boy do people hate it.  Companies have already announced they are not coming to Indiana, the NCAA has expressed concern about its continued presence there, a liberal church denomination has decided to change the venue of its upcoming convention to a different state, and now the governor of New York is placing some sort of restriction on travel to Indiana for state employees.  #BoycottIndiana has been trending on Twitter for days, and now it's #Boycott Arkansas.

How could anyone stand for such an odious law? 

The answer is that no one can and no one will, because the law as it is being portrayed is a myth.  It does not exist.  It is a straw man.

In a recent post, I expressed concern that the current political/news climate of our country is turning us into a nation of what the Bible calls fools.  In the Bible, fools are people who make no attempt at understanding but will angrily air their own opinions.  This post is an attempt to help us really understand what is going on here.