Most people don’t realize this, but pews in a church are designed to only last 25 years or so. Of course, it depends on the wood, but pews are rarely built out of the very best wood. No one could afford them. After you pass the 25-year mark all warranties are over. After that, if a pew breaks or collapses, you are on your own as far as the impending lawsuit goes. Our pews are way older than that, so it might be something to keep in mind.

          We were once at a church where we had a pew problem. The church had been built in 1840. The first pews were crafted by the men in the church and those early records tell of complaints from folks about splinters and babies falling through the back of the pews because the backs didn’t come all the way to the bench. Those pews were replaced 30 years later out of necessity. The original pews began to come apart all at about the same time. The new pews were made by a local craftsman, so they all had the advantage of looking alike. Over the next 50 years or so they were painted, repaired and discarded one at a time. Sometime in the 1930s those pews were replaced. The new ones lasted not quite 20 years. One buckled and dumped an entire family onto the church floor. Save a little money but buy twice. Foolish. In 1952 the church bought the next set of pews. Those were the pews that were their when Marsha, our son and myself arrived in 1995.

          As pews go, they were fine, I suppose. I figure that even if the pews look a little rough (and these did) you can put enough people in them so that no one notices. These pews had held up pretty well precisely because there hadn’t been many people in them for a long time. They served their purpose.

          The problem started as attendance began to go up. As people began to see new folks coming in and the church growing Spiritually, there began to be a new desire to take better care of God’s house. Updating the church began to be an issue. Painting started, first in the sanctuary, then throughout the church. After painting and minor repairs, new tables were bought for the fellowship hall and Sunday school. You can’t have new tables without new chairs, right? New, padded chairs were bought. We had a room off the sanctuary called The East Room. It was as long as the sanctuary and about a third as wide. It was separated from the sanctuary by a folding wooden wall. The original idea was that this room would be over flow for the sanctuary, but normally would serve as a lounge and meeting room. Since the sanctuary sat just over 200 people and there hadn’t been that many in the church in a long, long time (the day we were voted in, which is a big day for a church, the vote was 48 for, 1 against) that wooden wall had not been opened for a long time. The furniture in The East Room had gotten old and nasty. When the day came that we needed to open the wall and set up chairs, people could see how decrepit the old place was getting. So, The East Room got a make-over and new furniture and they did my office at the same time. New furniture all the way around.

          If you are going to repair and paint and do all that, you need new floor coverings. It was the new floor coverings that ended the old pews.

          The carpet in the sanctuary was old. No one could remember when it had been laid. It would need to be replaced first. That meant that the pews would need to be moved out. They were bolted to the floor, so it took a bit to remove them into The East Room. The new carpet was to be laid, but first we put down laminate over the whole floor, then the carpet in the aisles and open areas, so those bolt holes had to be cut into the laminate. We thought of everything. Except we never thought to mark the pews to tell us where they were in the church. That was an issue we hadn’t considered. All the bolt holes matched up, so the pews all went back without a problem. But over the years buildings will settle and even twist. Since the pews had been bolted to the floor, they went through those same, gradual changes. In some places the floor had bowed up a few millimeters, which cause the pews to do the same. In other places the floor had bowed down a few millimeters, causing the pew to do the same. In some places the floor had flexed a tie little bit, as did the pew. Nothing you could see with the eye and no real problem.

          Except now the old pews had to bend and flex in new directions. Old, dried wood doesn’t do that well. Within the first few weeks a packed pew cracked during morning service. Seriously, it sounded like a gun shot. It didn’t fall and the people safely evacuated. We all kind of laughed about it and went on. The way it cracked it could not be fixed easily. In the next month, three more cracked. We needed to do something.

          Thus, began my education in pew science.

          We got quotes from all over, finally settling on a company out of Toledo. I was determined we were not going to go with the lowest bidder, and the committee did well looking for price, quality and comfort. We all learned more than we ever wanted to know about pews, but it ended up worth it. We finally settled on a plan and put in our order. The pews were not already made; they would be made to order. We would be out of pews for two to three months.

          First, we offered the old pews to anyone who would give a certain amount to the Youth fund. Sold a few that way. Then we posted them on Craig’s List for anyone who wanted the rest. Everything was explained about their condition. We offered them free. You had to come and get them and take the whole lot. A church un Indiana came and took them away.

          Now we had a sanctuary empty of everything. It echoed. We had VBS during that time and the sanctuary became the center of it. It rained every night, but we had that wide-open space for games and activities. We decided they would only need a month to build the pews, so we would use the chairs from Fellowship Hall for the sanctuary. As it turned out, it took four months and people started bringing lawn chairs. We never even brought out the Hall chairs.

          We become creatures of habit. Sit in the same pew, talk to the same people, use the same door. Human nature. Those four months changed that. First, with the lawn chairs people sat anywhere they wanted and with whomever they wanted. We tried to keep some order. We took an offering every week and we also did Communion every week, but we could not get people to sit in neat rows. We solved that by having people come forward to take their Communion and give their offering at the same tune. Streamlined the service. You would think that people would all try and sit at the back windows, but just the opposite was true. They all gradually moved forward. And you would also think that attendance would fall off. Again, the opposite was true. Attendance actually went up. We became the ‘fun’ church in town. Quite a site to be in the pulpit area and look out at a sea of lawn chairs arranged in a chaotic manner. It was the fun church.

            Everyone in the church was disappointed when the pews finally came and were installed.  

          The pews were the last thing to be done there as far as renovations. From the time we arrived at the church to the pews arriving was seven years. When we were all done we had spent just over $300,000 on the structure. It was 1990’s money, so it would be much more now. When we went to there, the church had less than $10,000 in the bank in various accounts. When the last pew was screwed down we had over $75,000. How is that even possible? Also, during the 11 years we were there, we expanded the ministry each year. Something new all the time. We spent way more money than we had to start with, yet we had plenty at the end and we never borrowed. When we went there the church had various fund-raising events to raise money to keep the church open. By the end, the ladies’ group, equal to our Guild, had a rummage sale once a year to raise money for their ministry and we sold grape pies at the Grape Jamboree for the Youth. We got to where we didn’t even count the cost when we felt like something we were going to do was in God’s will. We did it on faith and He never let us down.

          When people look at God’s leading and say, “We can’t afford that. Another, bigger church, maybe. But not us” that church is saying, “We don’t have enough faith.” When I am told it won’t work here, I can only think what can be done if the people open themselves up to real faith and see in themselves a new desire. I wish for you that you could experience the joy for yourselves.

          You will never sell God short. He will just prove Himself again with another congregation. You only sell yourself short.

          I have been attempting to attach a picture to this edition of the blog, but it isn’t working. I guess I will have to have Mary Earle, from the ‘Mary’s Moments’ blog come in and school me some more. But the picture appeared in the Painesville (OH) Telegraph on Sunday, September 1, 1973. Wow! Forty-four years ago! It was taken during a high school football game. It has no interest to anyone now, except that the young fellow punting the ball was Tom Orosz, who went on to be an All-American at Ohio State and then played for the Miami Dolphins and the San Francisco 49ers. There is a player from the opposing team who is flying at him, arms raised to block the punt. The flyer is way off the ground and in Tom’s face, but Tom took a stutter-step before he punted and faked the player who is suspended in air to commit too early. Tom punted the ball under the flyer. The flyer, actually, was me and the future NFL player made me look foolish. Didn’t matter. We won. Marsha found this picture in my mother’s Bible after she died in 2002. It was old and yellowed and brittle. She knew I would have just thrown it away as an old piece of paper, but it was apparently special to Mom. Marsha showed it to me some time ago and I scanned it into the computer. This is the first time I have ever tried to do anything with it and I cannot. Trust me, it is awesome. Tom looks great.

          The point here is not for me to remember the old days, but rather, to remember the old attitudes.

          American involvement in the war in Vietnam had ended in January of 1973. But we all knew that it was just paper. The war could fire up at any time, so long as we still had soldiers there. Gathered in the stands at this football game were dads of the players, most of whom had served during WWII or the Korean War. All were patriotic men who had put on the uniform and went away into the smoke and gore of war, and they were proud of their service. But none of them wanted their sons to go into a distant jungle to be wounded or die. There is a policeman in the photo. He is there as crowd control, but he was the only uniformed officer there. There would be no problems at this game, or at any other played by either team for the rest of the season. It just wasn’t done.

          At this point in time, patriotism was pretty low. Vietnam had gone on for a long time. Many young men had died. Others had come back maimed. Still others had come back seemingly healthy, but, thanks to chemicals that had been used to defoliate the jungle, were harboring the building blocks for various kinds of cancers, Hodgkin’s disease, Parkinson’s disease and a host of other long-term sicknesses. Others were coming home with mental wounds that would affect they and their families for generations. Even those patriotic men in the stands were opposed to a war that seemed more and more pointless. My own parents had already told me that they wanted me to go to Canada upon graduation for a few years to avoid the draft if things started back up.

          Racism was a problem in the country. It wasn’t manufactured, either. In a real sense, it was justified. Desegregation was being implemented around the country. African-Americans weren’t called African-Americans. They were called black folks, just like I was white folk. Our previous three wars had been in a large part fought against Asians, so there were some nasty words used to identify them. Japanese cars were ‘rice burners.’ Homosexuals were scorned, avoided and made fun of. The recent riots in various cities in the countries had put the police in a bad light, deserved or not.

          Entertainment was in a state of flux. More science fiction, more nudity for no reason, more violence in movies and TVs. Some comedians were shocking crowds with their routines. There were those who were trying to pass laws to get people to conform certain standards. In sports, most athletes had to have jobs in the off season to provide for their families’.

          Politically, we really were in a mess. The president was on his way to becoming the first American president to have to resign due to scandal. Sex accusations were becoming more common and more lurid. There were those who openly hated the country. Flag burnings had taken place during some of the riots. There wasn’t much of that, but the news built it up.  Soldiers and marines and seamen and airmen had been spit on and mocked, as were the police. The system was in disarray. On that long-ago day in 1973, the future seemed bleak.

          But, a short while before the above picture was taken, before the game began, the two bands from the two schools had marched out on the field. It was a messed up, sick country, with many problems to pull at us. But the boys on each team took off their helmets and lined their respective sidelines. The Moms and Dads and other fans in the stands stood and removed any head coverings they might have had on. That lone police officer snapped into a parade ground salute. A color guard from the local recruiting station presented colors and a small contingent of Boy Scouts attached an American flag to a lanyard on a pole in one end zone. At the first note of the National Anthem the flag began its slow accent to the top of that pole. And, at the first note of the Anthem, all of those people began to sing. Black people who deserved the same rights as white people, Vietnam vets who had been poorly treated by the media and their own government, older vets who now wrestled with the thoughts that their own children would have to fight a bad war, old people, young people, perhaps, if they were there, gay people, began to sing. Not because their country was perfect. No, it wasn’t. Not because they were being forced to sing. They were not. Not because the government had the answers. They certainly didn’t. No, those people lifted their voices because their country and their flag and the very nation they stood upon, offered them, all of us, hope. Hope in a way no other country on the planet could offer their citizens.

O! Say can you see by the dawn’s early light

What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming.
Whose broad stripes and bright stars through the perilous fight,
O'er the ramparts we watched were so gallantly streaming.
And the rockets' red glare, the bombs bursting in air,
Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there.
Oh, say does that star-spangled banner yet wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave?

          The world was different then. It was worse. Nuclear war seemed it could happen anytime. Our leaders wouldn’t have been good leaders of a flock of sheep. It wasn’t the ‘good old days’ by any means. BUT WE WERE FREE AND WE KNEW WHY WE WERE FREE.

          Today? A bunch of spoiled brats are working to take away the hope and the joy our country offers. And we are in agreement. We watch the football games, we buy the products, we spend the money. I no longer watch the NFL. Haven’t for years. If I want to watch spoiled children play, I’ll go to a daycare. This past week a baseball player for the Oakland A’s major league baseball team took the knee during the Anthem. If that is left unchecked, I will cease to watch or listen or read about the majors, too, and that includes my beloved Cleveland Indians. We are Americans. If we cannot stand up for our country, do we have to backbone to stand for our God?

          My parents grew up going to church every Sunday morning and night, as well as Wednesday night. That was pretty much what you did in the hills of Kentucky in the 1920s and 30s. But when they got married and moved to northeast Ohio, church ended. There were no churches around the area like good old Grace Baptist Church in Russell Springs, Kentucky. So, we just didn’t go. I was five years old when a fellow my father knew invited all of us to his church. I think the only reason my mother and father went that first time was because it had the same name as their home church; Grace Baptist Church.

          I knew nothing of church, but from the very beginning, my two sisters (6 and 3 years older than myself) were expected to not only behave, but to know and understand everything that was going on. Included in that was the ability to know all the songs. The sisters had the advantage over me in that they could read, but I listened well and actually had a very good vocabulary. As I have said before, music hurts my ears and gives me a headache, so I listen closely to the words. I believe that started back when we attended Grace. I distinctly remember being scared half out of my mind the first or second Sunday there.

          “Y’all take the thin black hymn book out of the rack and turn to page 47. ‘There is a Fountain’.” (For some reason that little church had three different hymnals in the book rack on the back of the pew. A regular sized green one, a regular sized black one and a thin black one.) I was listening intently, and this is what I heard;

There is a fountain filled with blood, (WHAT??? I knew what a fountain was and I knew what blood was, and they had a fountain of blood?)

Drawn from Immanuel's veins; (No way! This bloody fountain had blood from some kid named Immanuel?)
And sinners, plunged beneath that flood, Lose all their guilty stains: (They put bad people under that blood? I whispered to my mother, “What’s a sinner?” She told me it was someone who wasn’t saved. I told her I didn’t want to be saved if it meant going under blood. She laughed out loud and told the story quite often until she died. Thought it was funny I didn’t understand. Never tried to explain it to me, either. Just assumed I should have understood.)
Lose all their guilty stains, Lose all their guilty stains; (I gotta do that?!!?)
And sinners, plunged beneath that flood, Lose all their guilty stains.

The dying thief rejoiced to see, That fountain in his day; (I had no knowledge of a dying thief, but apparently he was happy to see Immanuel’s blood spurting up into the air.
And there may I, though vile as he, Wash all my sins away:
Wash all my sins away, Wash all my sins away;
And there may I, though vile as he, Wash all my sins away. (Again, I was going to have to wash in that blood!)

Dear dying Lamb, Thy precious blood, Shall never lose its power, (Wait, OK, it wasn’t a kid named Immanuel. It was a lamb named Immanuel. Must have been a powerful lamb. At least it wasn’t a boy like me.)
Till all the ransomed ones of God, Be saved, to sin no more: (‘Ransomed’ wasn’t a word I knew, but I understood I couldn’t sin anymore. Didn’t know if I could do that, but if it meant not going under that blood again, I guess I would try hard.)
Be saved, to sin no more, Be saved, to sin no more;
Till all the ransomed ones of God, Be saved to sin no more.

E'er since by faith I saw the stream, Thy flowing wounds supply, (I wasn’t confused. I understood most of it. The wounds meant Immanuel was alive, but bleeding. Now, he was bleeding so much that it was like a stream, like that drainage ditch way out in the field behind the house. Man, Immanuel had to have been one BIG lamb!)
Redeeming love has been my theme, And shall be till I die:
And shall be till I die, And shall be till I die;
Redeeming love has been my theme, And shall be till I die. (No idea what ‘redeeming’ or ‘theme’ meant, but I understood ‘love’ and ‘die.’ ‘Redeeming’ and ‘theme’ had to be pretty bad things if they were going to kill me.)

When this poor lisping, stammering tongue, Lies silent in the grave, (Now, the thing is, I did lisp as a kid. Still do when I am real tired. Sometimes, as a kid, I stuttered if I got to talking fast. When I heard this verse, I realized IT WAS TALKING RIGHT TO ME! I was going to be in a grave if I didn’t wash in that sheep’s blood.)
Then in a nobler, sweeter song, I'll sing Thy power to save:
I'll sing Thy power to save, I'll sing Thy power to save;
Then in a nobler, sweeter song, I'll sing Thy power to save. (Oh great! I was not only going to have to wash in sheep’s blood but then I was going to have to sing, too, and I didn’t know any of these stupid songs!)

          I didn’t like church there ever. We only went a few years. Before we went on Sunday mornings my father would get the beer bottles out of the car. Once in the car my parents would each smoke a cigarette and then chew gum like mad so no one would know they smoked. Maybe when the church folks could smell the smoke on our clothes they thought my sisters and I were smoking, but then again, they were all probably doing the same thing before church and couldn’t smell it anyway. Nothing that we did at church made it home. No prayer, no Bible reading, no controlling your language. In time, the folks figured it was too much trouble doing the things they needed to do to get us all to church. Farming needed to be done, sometimes fishing, sometimes Saturday nights were pretty rough. My sisters were fine with not going, too, since they now got two mornings to sleep in. As for me, I was more than happy to stay away from church. It was years later that I accepted Christ at a camp for athletes. My salvation had nothing to do with church.

          Most of you will read this and see humor. I was scared to death. Songs like “Power in the Blood” and “Are You Washed in the Blood” and “Nothing But the Blood” had me living in fear by first grade. My mother thought I was silly, but I just had no clue.

          Do I think we need to do away with songs about the blood of Christ? Absolutely not! Well, maybe “There is a Fountain.” That thing isn’t even Biblical. This edition of the blog really isn’t about songs. It is about understanding. When we are in church, we do ‘churchy’ things. We stand at certain times, we sit at certain times, we pray at certain times. We talk in ‘churchy’ language. It is like a club that has its own secret words and order. When someone comes in, particularly if they have little kids, how are they supposed to understand? When people understand the world and then come into an atmosphere that is totally different, will they ever come back? Will the words in the songs we want to sing scare a child?

          It is going to be different no matter what we do. But there is a way to bridge that gap of misunderstanding. Be friendly. Be loving. Reach out. That may mean getting out of your pew and walking a little bit to greet someone. Also, greet one another. Visitors see that. When you talk to someone new, get their name. Quite often someone will come up to me after church and say, “Who was that couple sitting five rows back?” Folks, when I am in the pulpit area and someone stands to ask for prayer, I don’t know who it is until they speak. My vision being what it is, I can see you but cannot tell who you are. Unless that visitor comes in a little early while I am getting around and saying “Hi,” or if they go out the front door afterward, I don’t even know they are there. You talk to them and get back to me with it, and we will contact them.

          Step out of that cocoon of church we wrap ourselves in and start doing things for the Kingdom.

Blessings.

          It has been really nice knowing you folks. It may sound odd, but my one regret in this life is that I never saw the Cleveland Indians win the World Series. I thought this would be the year, but now we will never know.

          The world, as we know it, will end on September 23, 2017. A near miss by the planet (or brown dwarf star) Nibiru will cause destruction and calamity throughout the world because of the massive gravitational disruptions, resulting in earthquakes and volcanic eruptions. This will usher in the well known events of the Book of the Revelation. Next Saturday is the day. Gather with your loved ones. Shortly after all this begins, the rapture will take place. We know this is true because a Christian numerologist has figured out the numerical codes of the Bible which, along with Luke 21:25 and 26 and Revelation 12:1-2. It is inescapable and clear. He who has an ear to hear, let him hear.

               Why September 23? The Biblical numerical code, of course. David Meade is the name of the Biblical numerologist. As he said, Jesus died at the age of 33. The total solar eclipse was on August 21. Oddly enough, 33 days later will be September 23. As if that isn’t real enough, Luke 21:25-26 says---And there will be signs in sun and moon and stars, and on the earth distress of nations in perplexity because of the roaring of the sea and the waves, people fainting with fear and with foreboding of what is coming on the world. For the powers of the heavens will be shaken. What else could this be except the eclipse being the end of time herald? And finally, Revelation 12:1-2 tells us this---And a great sign appeared in heaven: a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars. She was pregnant and was crying out in birth pains and the agony of giving birth. The constellation Virgo (the virgin) will be clear in the heavens during September and on the 23rd the sun will seem to pass over the head of Virgo and the moon will seem to pass beneath the feet of Virgo and there will be a grouping of twelve stars about Virgo’s head. Finally, Jupiter will be visible roughly in the area of Virgo’s stomach and on the 23rd will be passing out of Virgo’s belly, JUST LIKE A WOMAN GIVING BIRTH!!! It is all over.

          Of course, this is all nonsense. In my life time, there have been at least 77 end of the world prophesies made for the end times that have been recorded. Names such as Billy Graham, Jerry Falwell and Pat Roberson are just a few of those making predictions, but there are many others. Some set a second date after the first didn’t happen. One man set a second date, and then when that didn’t happen he set a third date and then a fourth. One would assume that he would have set a fifth date if he hadn’t died. A couple of ‘prophets’ went so far as to say that their predictions did come true, but in the spirit world. I wonder how that works? All of these predictions have been religious predictions, usually preceded by the words, “It is clear to see.” So clear it never was seen.

          But, this could be the one! Someday it is going to happen! This could be it!

          The Lord may return this Saturday, but it will have nothing to do with this silly prediction. The Bible says that no one, even Christ, knows when it is going to happen. If you really believe the Bible, then that means NO ONE knows. The person who thinks they have figured it out evidently thinks that they are more deserving to know than Jesus. They must think they are better than Jesus. They must think that the Bible doesn’t apply to them. The belief of Mr. Meade that the solar eclipse was a sign is absurd, since there are at least 2 every year somewhere on the planet and sometimes as many as 5. The fact that we can accurately predict the solar eclipses for centuries in advance only means that the earth, sun and moon are constantly turning in their regular orbits. Mr. Meade’s statement that the sun appearing above Virgo and the moon below and the twelve stars around the head and Jupiter in assentation has something to do with the end times ignores the fact that it has happened many, many times before. The name of the constellation, Virgo, is not valid. Other cultures use different names and different cultures even use different stars. Our names are based on Greek and Latin names, but the majority of the population of the world does not have a Greek or Latin background. Then, there is no planet or brown dwarf star called Nibiru. It is a mythical name, made up. If there were really a planet or star that close we would be easily able to see with the naked eye.  And, as far as numerology in the Scripture is concerned, it is quite simple. The number ‘7’ and it’s multiples are considered holy, as 7 is the holy number. The number ‘6’ is considered to be the number for man, and is not holy. That is pretty much it. Everything else is manmade. It makes for interesting books and movies, but it is not real. God wanted the Bible to be read and understood. Why would He code it? That is senseless.

          Think about it. Seventy seven end of the world prophesies in the last sixty one years. EVERYONE of them have been untrue. Seventy-seven opportunities for Satan to make us look stupid. Seventy seven opportunities for the news media to make fun of Christianity. Seventy seven opportunities for people as a whole to reject Christ. Predictions made by arrogant people who think they have knowledge even Jesus didn’t have.

          We should live every day as though Jesus would return before supper, but we shouldn’t make up nonsense and we shouldn’t believe nonsense.

          During the 1970s and the first half of the 1980s, Marsha and I lived in South Florida. We had gone down there to go to school and while we were there we became part of the culture. I learned more Spanish there than I ever learned in school. We became parents there. We, for all intents and purposes, grew up there. Once in a while you will hear one of us recall the time we lived in Miami, but that isn’t really true. From south to north, there was Coconut Grove, Coral Gables, South Miami, Miami, North Miami, Hialeah, Miami Shores, South Beach, Miami Beach, North Miami Beach, Hollywood, Pembroke Pines and Fort Lauderdale. Unless you really knew where you were, it seemed to be all one big city. You went from one city to the next, surrounded by concrete. Some yards, some palms and lots of concrete. For the first few years we lived in Coral Gables, just across the street from the Coconut Grove town line. Later, I became the Associate Pastor at Sunset Hts. Baptist Church in Hialeah, so we moved there. You couldn’t tell the difference from one place or the other. To the people back in Ohio we lived in Miami, and that was more or less right.

          If you drove eight miles to the west, you were inhe  the Everglades. Really a strange place. A mile from where we lived was the causeway that went across to Key Biscayne, which at that time had whole sections that were basically jungle. Beautiful. It was also on the Key that President Nixon had his Florida estate where he had gone to escape the pressures of the White House. When we lived there the house and grounds still existed, but were surrounded by a high fence.

          Going shopping was always a treat. You would be bombarded by a half a dozen languages. Spanish was the main language, but there was English, Creole, French, Portuguese and, for some reason I never understood, German. Street signs and billboards were mostly in Spanish. I was around Spanish speakers all the time, so I picked it up. Marsha, on the other hand, had a mental block when it came to Spanish. French was doable, and the two languages are in the same family, but she just couldn’t do Spanish. We had to do grocery shopping together because she couldn’t read the signs.

          And the culture! Vibrant, diverse and weird. The metro area was filled with people from the Caribbean, South America, Cuban refugees and the United States. All those people and all their cultures combining to make one insane mix, but it was fun. Like any big city area, there was crime, but for Marsha and myself, the only crime visited on us was from Americans. We lived in a Spanish neighborhood and we had no trouble with any of them. One of our favorite memories from the time concerned our day spent with a Haitian church. Our only real problem came at the hands of good old Americans. The others were mostly over joyed to be in a free land.

Miami was a city that truly never slept. Marsha and I occasionally went bowling at 2 AM. You could go shopping at any time, and we did. One of our favorite restaurants was a Puerto Rican place called Koke’s (pronounced Kokee). There you could get a steak that covered your entire plate, smothered in French fries, and a cola for $2.01. Granted, that was in the early 1980s, but even so, $2.01 was a crazy low price. And it was good! A completely different taste. We went there for about a year and a half, and then we found out that all the horse thievery we had been hearing about on the ranches north of us was being perpetrated by the Koke family. They would steal a horse or two, butcher it and serve it in the restaurant. So, Marsha and I have eaten horse. And it was good!

  When the communist Cuban revolution under Fidel Castro came in 1959, many evangelical Christians left that island. We think of Hispanics as all being Catholic, but there are more and more who are becoming evangelicals. At first, they were free to go. But that changed and more and more of these evangelicals were imprisoned for their faith. From 1959 through 1970, many of these fled to America for religious freedom. Some who reached our shores had just served their time in prison for their faith and were weakened from the systematic beatings and starvations. A great many made their way to Hialeah to settle, and there they created lives for themselves. Along with being successful business people, they also brought that Latino passion to their churches. By the late 70s and early 80s almost all the community was Hispanic. Ours was one of the last Anglo churches in town. (An Anglo is someone whom we here would call an American. There the Hispanics consider themselves to be American, too, which most are. So you have the Hispanics and the Anglos.) We had a large complex built back in the day (late 50s, early 60s) when the church ran 500 people. As the community changed and the Anglos moved away, our church, Sunset Hts. Baptist Church, dwindled. By the time Marsha and I arrived we had dropped to around 50. Meanwhile, there was a Spanish church that shared our building, meeting after us on Sunday morning and their sound and Sunday night. They were Estrella de Belen, or the Star of Bethlehem church. They packed the house every Sunday, over 500 strong. My job for Sunset Hts. Was to focus on music and youth. For Estrella de Belen, I often ran their sound and had their Youth in my group.

 My first real neat discovery was that they sang many of the same songs we sang, just translated to Spanish. Our sound booth was actually in another room and you looked out through a window. Through headphones I could hear what was going on. But the booth was sound proof. While they would be singing, I would be singing as well. Eventually I picked up the Spanish words, which sometimes created a problem in the Anglo church, where I actually led the music. Sometimes I would start a song in Spanish and have to catch myself. When I was running the sound, the preaching time gave me fits. Mostly, I could understand if you spoke slowly. But Spanish folks get more and more animated the more they get into the conversation. So as the pastor (Renaldo Medina, one of my three heroes) got more impassioned, I got further behind in understanding.

Another discovery was that the Spanish folk don’t sit still. All during the service they will wander around. Our Spanish youth wanted to start coming to the Anglo church, because they spoke very good English and because they wanted to be where I was. I had to tell them to remain in one spot throughout the service. When the Spanish did it, it was not disrespectful. They wanted to hear from different locations. It was not disrespectful to the pastor.

And then there was the waving. When someone has a special piece of music in our church, we sometimes clap or say ‘Amen!’ Not in Estrella de Belen. There they waved at you. Energetically waved at you. Like you were a long lost friend they were seeing across a busy street. I laughed out loud the first time I saw it. It just caught me by surprise. I would run the sound, then go home and our Sunday afternoon would begin and I just never told Marsha much about the Spanish church. One day Pastor Medina asked Marsha to sing at the church. She would sing an English song and most of the folks understood English pretty well. I thought I would tell her about the waving, but then I decided not to tell her. I wanted to see her reaction. She did the song and then started to walk away and everyone started waving at her like crazy. She stopped and stared, started to walk away and stopped again. Everyone was still waving, so she waved back. Just killed me.

 But their faith was so real to them, so personal, so alive. Isn’t it amazing that people of faith, regardless of language or country or politics share this amazing thing? Jesus Christ died for them and for you and for me. It makes all the difference.

          Blessings.

          1957 was an eventful year. Now no one really cares about what happened in 1957, unless you happen to have been born in that year. But there is a reason that 1957 was important for us now. Let’s take a look at that year, sixty years ago.

There are similarities to our current moment in time. People were struggling to buy homes and thus live the American Dream. The average home in 1957 cost $12,220. Seems like a pittance to us now, but remember that the average wage was $4,550 a year. They didn’t keep household income numbers then, but they do now. Household income in 1957 was probably the husband’s income. In 1957 most married women didn’t work outside the home.  The average price of a new home in the US now is $371,200. The average household income now is around $57000. So, the cost of a new home then was 4 times the annual income, now it is 7 times more. Quite a bit harder to afford now. Then the average rent was $90 a month. Now it is $1,500 a month. A gallon of gas was .24 then. This morning I paid $2.56. It is harder to get by now, but we manage.

Kids have to have toys. The best toys were electric. Batteries were a must in any home. Electric robots, space craft and cars. Toys with flashing lights and noises. Then there were the slinky dogs and Frisbees and petal cars. Toys today all need batteries, too. But you really don’t ‘play’ with toys today. They play themselves and you push buttons.

Clothing is kind of funny. Women’s clothing has changed dramatically. A woman in 1957 clothing would look totally different from a woman in 2017 clothing. But a man of today could wear 1957 clothing and not get a second look as he walked down the street.

Space was in the news then, as it is today. The difference then being there was only one manmade satellite circling the globe. Today we are exploring Mars. Movies were big then, as they are now. Action and adventure included ‘Gunfight at the OK Corral.” Science fiction had “The Incredible Shrinking Man.” The big ‘chick flick’ of the year was “Funny Face.” Toyota started selling cars in the US in 1957. Today even our domestic models carry foreign made parts all throughout the vehicles. Russia was our enemy then, as the Soviet Union. Today they are still an adversary. Sixty years ago there were wars and rumors of wars. France, England, Israel and Egypt were fighting over the Suez canal. The US was sending advisors into Vietnam to aid the South. The cold war was heating up. Fidel Castro was in the US trying to raise support for his planned revolution in Cuba. The Asian Flu was sweeping the globe and TB was hated and feared. Little has changed as far as war and illness, just the causes and the names and the answers.

Politically, the Democrats and the Republicans were at each other’s throats. The Democrats were seen as the party of the regular people, the Republicans were seen as the party of the elite. The difference between the two parties then and now is that mostly everyone liked the Republican president, Dwight Eisenhower, whereas President Trump is roundly despised. If Mrs. Clinton had won the election, she would be despised. Politics..

Weather wise, Hurricane Audrey slammed into Texas and Louisiana, killing over 500 people. There were eight major Atlantic storms in 1957, ten this year. Summer was slightly cooler in the heartland, as this year. People didn’t try to explain the weather or blame others for the weather. You didn’t wait for the federal government to come and dig you out. You lived with the weather, dealt with its unpredictability and got up and went to work the next day.

Mostly, things are pretty much the same now as they were then, just the names and events have changed.

So why have I picked 1957? Because December 7, 1957 was sixteen years to the day America was attacked at Pearl Harbor. September 11, 2017 (today) is sixteen years to the day that America was attacked in New York, in Washington DC and in a field in Pennsylvania. Sixteen years after Pearl Harbor the country was largely united and moving forward. Sixteen years after 9/11 the country is largely divided and is growing stagnant. The Democrats blame the Republicans and the Republicans blame the Democrats, but both have been in power the same number of years since 9/11.

After Pearl Harbor, American went to war, a war that was fought with a strong will. After 9/11, America went to war, although without as much gusto. WWII drew the country together; our current war is splitting us apart. We have no national identity, no national voice. What is the difference?

On any given Sunday in 1957, 61% of the population was in church. Last year (the numbers are not in for this year) it was 31%. The difference between national attitude from 1957 and 2017 has nothing to do with technology, ideology, politics or anything else that is commonly named. The difference has to do with the state of the church in America. Galatians 5:17-23 says this--- For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other, to keep you from doing the things you want to do.

But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law. Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.

          Does the United States of America follow the fruit of the Spirit, or the works of the flesh? I am not foolish enough to say that 1957 was a paradise. It wasn’t. But well over half the population was being taught decency and goodness at least once a week, regardless of their religious beliefs. Today, less than a third.

          To whose doorstep can we place the blame for this decline? Prayer being taken out of school? Abortions on demand? The rise of the homosexual culture in America? Have we moved away from church because of the amount of activities that exist now? Who is to blame for the moral and ethical decay of our nation?

          Christians in America are to blame. It is September 11. Have you told anyone this month about the saving power of Jesus Christ? In the last six months? In the last year? When was the last time you invited anyone to church? When was the last time you have prayed with someone? We sing about “Sweet Hour of Prayer,” but when was the last time you prayed that long? When was the last time you laid your devotional book aside and just picked up your Bible and read it for a half hour? Donald Trump cannot make America great again. But you can.

          On this day when we remember the thousands who lost their lives because a coward in a far off land ordered it, let’s take back what God has give us to be stewards over. Let’s be Christians.

2 Chronicles 7:14--- If my people who are called by my name humble themselves, and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and heal their land.

          I feel detached, worried and at odds. As I write this I am sitting in my car at 7 PM on the campus of Concordia Theological Seminary in Ft. Wayne on Thursday evening, September 7, 2017. A soft breeze drifts through my open windows. The pond is just to my right front. I have long wanted to come and visit this picturesque campus. Visit the library, maybe sit in the campus cafeteria and listen to the students talk and visit. Just sitting here in my car there are memories everywhere around me. Not that I have ever been on this campus. I haven’t. But it is not that different from the campus Marsha and I spent several years at back in the 1980s. Quiet, peaceful, serene. There are three students, loaded down with books, headed back to the dorms after a late class. I have done that walk. There goes an older man hurrying along. Maybe a professor? Hard to tell. Professor’s don’t necessarily wear suits anymore. If I had chosen the path Dr. Hamrick tried to get me to follow, that older gentleman hurrying along could have been me right now, a professor hustling home after teaching that late class. If I close my eyes and relax my brain, even the breeze smells similar. Except…….

The breeze in Florida smells different. It’s been well over 30 years since I walked the paths of that campus. This moment in time should be sweet with long ago memories. The problem is, Hurricane Irma, already being called the biggest Atlantic storm in recorded history, is due to hit land late Saturday/early Sunday. We have friends scattered everywhere in the state. People are on the move, evacuating their homes. Some are securing their churches or businesses. Communications are limited. People are being asked to not use their cell phones so emergency communications can be maintained. When the recent hurricane hit Texas, I was concerned. A high school friend lived in the path. A member of Joel Osteen’s church, David was there when they finally opened the doors to let displaced people in. David’s caring heart didn’t let him stay safe at home. But he was one friend and the storm, beyond the rain and storm surge, was only a medium storm. Irma, on the other hand, is a monster and is threatening the place that used to be home for us. I used to pastor there. Friends are there. One of Marsha’s best friends lives in Miami Lakes. One of my best friends lives in Bradenton. The winds are approaching tornado speeds, but with a hurricane the winds last for hours and hours before it moves on, while a tornado is here and gone. It is going to be a really bad storm.

Will the storm hit and then move up the Atlantic coast of Florida? Or will it eat up the Keys and then turn north and go up the Gulf coast? It doesn’t really matter. Irma is huge. It doesn’t matter which coast it attacks, it will stretch across the state, side to side. Unless it crosses the state and hits somewhere in the Gulf of Mexico. Texas again? Louisiana? The Alabama/Florida panhandle coast? Mississippi? People will die. Usually when people die in a hurricane they have been careless or live close to the ocean and ignore the evacuation orders. But this storm, well, the winds will be as big a problem as the water. Anyone in the path will be affected. Unless it makes an unexpected turn to the northeast in the next few hours, there will be real misery.

We are an amazing people. We think we have everything under control. But we don’t. And don’t call it Mother Nature. God, not Mother Nature, put everything in motion. Hurricanes and other big storms do much good. They clean the air, they bring much water that the earth needs, they readjust the ecosystem. But they also bring the stupid out in people. Especially when those people decide to have hurricane parties and such. On the other hand, they also bring out the best in some people. People who would otherwise be in conflict over politics or religion or race or whatever, will come together and work together to save others, to reach out to one another.

When 9/11 happened in New York City sixteen years ago, the thing that really grabbed me was not the people running from the collapsing buildings and that huge cloud of roiling dust, but rather, the people running towards the collapsing buildings. Over the next week we will hear such tales. Courage, self-sacrifice, selflessness. The news media will do their best to show us the looting and the selfish acts of certain people, but we will see heroism, too. The best of America.

I have just taken a short break from writing this blog to take a text from a girl who used to be in my Youth Group in Miami. Not a girl now. Her youngest daughter, Briana, is 24. She is stuck in Miami, alone. Her Mom is vacationing in Boston and she cannot get home to be with her daughter. She is frantic. She reached out to me to pray for her daughter, which I will. In a way, that feels nice. It has been three decades or more since I was her Youth pastor. On the other hand, I am worried about Briana.

It is now 7:43 PM on the Concordia Campus. It is growing darker. My keyboard is disappearing right before my eyes. I am going to put this away and remember other such nights, long ago and far away, and I am going to take some time and pray for friends and others in the path of this storm. If you would, please lift them up in prayer, too.

Blessings.

          Back in my school days, Dr. Adams asked us one day what was the most important things a pastor needed to be able to do. Lots of answers on that one. Know the Bible, inspire, lead, be an organizer and so on. All of these things were important in their own right, he told us, but to be an effective pastor one had to be able to listen to a person without hearing what they say. His point was that actions speak louder than words. Body language as well as actions, reactions and auditory signals can tell you much more about a person than what that person has to say. One of his favorite things was to tell us to watch their eyes. Eyes can be more expressive than any part of the body. Dr. Adams basically taught us the basics of reading body language. Since that time, and it has been a loooonngg time since that time, I have watched people as well as listening to them. I find it fascinating.

          I really enjoy going to a restaurant. Partly because there I can eat things Marsha won’t make for me at home, like fried foods. But mostly I enjoy watching people. Labor Day was such a day.

          We had gone for a long drive to a town we had never been to before. We stopped to eat at a restaurant. We were shown to our table and we both began to scan the place. Marsha was looking at pictures and décor, I was looking at people. The first couple that caught my eye was a male and female, 19 or 20 years old. The girl was cute as a button (I find, now that I get to order from the Senior menu, that young women are usually cute as a button. Not sexy, not ‘hot,’ and certainly not homely. When they are as old as my mythical granddaughter would be, they are cute as a button.) The boy was a different case. Ball cap kept on during his meal and worn backward. Barely communicating with the girl even though she was looking at him with adoring, love filled eyes. When he stood up my assumption was proved correct; his pants were worn just barely hanging on. (How do they do that without their pants falling off? Do they have some kind of piercing in their hips that the pants hang on?) The girl was well dressed and sharp, the boy was sloppy and responded to her, when he responded, with grunts. I knew, after watching them casually for a few seconds, that she was going to pay the bill. Sure enough, when the waitress dropped off the bill the girl picked it up, looked at it and made a bit of a face, but said nothing. When the boy finally finished eating, she asked him if he could pick up the tip. He glared at her until she dropped her eyes, then he pulled out his wallet. When he stepped between the girl and the table, I knew he was going to stiff the waitress. And he did, pretending to pull money out of his wallet and slip it under the plate. Then he walked out ahead of her with that rapper/gangsta walk that seems so popular now. She followed him out, head down, ashamed she had to ask this incredible guy for some help. The waitress came over to bus the table, saw there was no tip, shrugged her should and worked on.

          I mentioned this to Marsha. My wife is an interesting character. We had already met our waitress, who happened to be the same waitress for the young woman and rapper/gangsta boy. Marsha had engaged her in conversation. As far as Marsha was concerned, she was our waitress now and she didn’t appreciate anyone stiffing our waitress, especially a rapper/gangsta boy and his love-struck date. Now she was doing a slow burn. Which was why I had told her. It is fun to see her getting angry. There was a time, years ago, when it worried me she started getting angry, but now it is enjoyable because you never know where it is going to go.

          Our waitress also had the table next to us on the other side. A mom, a dad, a mouthy 13-year-old daughter and a grandmother. They were demanding and condescending to the waitress. Just rude. The position of their table kept me from really seeing them, but they were quite loud. Marsha had the better view. (Now I know some of you are disturbed that the Pastor and his wife were watching people in a restaurant, but to me we were doing just what we were being invited to do. When you choose to adopt the rapper/gangsta look and actions and when you sit in a restaurant and insist on talking loud and being rude, you obviously want people to watch you. Otherwise, you would act and dress in a decent manner. If you are going to provide the floor show, you must expect the audience to watch. And you watch, too) When the family got up to go, Marsha saw them leave our waitress a $2.00 tip. Now the slow burn started to heat up. But then Marsha seemed to calm (which is worrisome) and she looked across the table at me. “I know what you’re thinking. You are not leaving the tip. It’s not up to you to make it up to our waitress. I will leave the tip.” All of our married life, the tip has been an issue. I worked as a bus boy at an exclusive restaurant when I was in college. I remember how the waitresses depended on those tips and I remember how hurt they could be with a little tip or nothing at all. They needed the money, but a tiny tip, or nothing, told the waitress that her service was unacceptable. Therefore, do tend to leave more than most. Marsha, on the other hand, wants the waitress to receive something, but she doesn’t want to take from the rent money to do it. When she said she would leave the tip, I just nodded my head, thinking I would drop a few bucks extra as I left the table.

          The rest of our stay was very nice. We visited. (We do not pull out cell phones during a meal together. We talk and visit with each other.) We offered each other a bite of meals. We relaxed.

          Then it was time to go. We’ve been married a long time. Marsha and I don’t often surprise each other anymore. She reached into her purse for the tip and I reached into my pocket for the money I was going to augment her tip with. She pulled a bill out and laid it down. I was shocked. It was actually more than I was going to leave, and I was going to be generous. Marsha looked at me and said, “Not a word.” I just nodded and we walked out to the cash register. I got in line to pay the bill and Marsha slipped away to the restroom. I was passing time talking with the woman at the register when our waitress popped up. “Thank you both so much. Thank you!” Her eyes were moist and she was truly grateful. Marsha hadn’t left her enough to pay off her car or anything like what you read about occasionally. It was just a bigger tip than usual. But for her, that day, it was what she needed. Strangers saying to her that she was appreciated, that she did a good job, that she was a little bit special. I smiled and nodded my head and she disappeared, headed back to her job. Marsha came back and I told her about it as we walked to the car. It was a pleasant ending to a fun trip.

          There is no reason to make anyone’s life harder than it already is and there is every reason to give people a ‘pick-me-up’ now and again. Galatians 6:2-3 says--- Bear one another's burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ. For if anyone thinks he is something, when he is nothing, he deceives himself. Lift someone up today and be a blessing.

          Hurricane Harvey this week has devastated the greater Houston area. Unless you have actually been in such a storm, it is hard to describe. A friend of mine who lives in Houston (and goes to Joel Osteen’s church, which is another story) kept filming out his living room window and posting on facebook until they had to evacuate. Scary stuff. Hurricanes are bad things, anyway, but it seems the ones in the Gulf of Mexico are extra rough. That may be because there are so many city’s of some size that can be battered.

          Part of what makes a hurricane so fearsome is the fact that you know it is coming for days in advance. When Marsha and I first moved to Miami FL in 1978, we were treated to an announcement on the evening news that there was a tropical disturbance off the cost of Africa. We looked at each other and kind of snickered. So what? Does that mean something? Little did we know that this is where almost all Atlantic hurricanes, and over half of the Gulf hurricanes, start. A tropical disturbance off the coast of Africa. Back then when you went to get groceries, you took them home in brown paper bags provided by the super market. We had noticed that on the bags there was printed a chart, with latitude and longitude lines, that showed the ocean from Africa to the North American coast, with all the islands, and on into the Gulf. As it headed west that tropical disturbance strengthened into a tropical wave, then a tropical storm and then am hurricane. As it drew closer to the mainland the local news would break into programming every hour and update the chart. We would take out our grocery bag chart and keep marking it, as well. This storm took a week to cover the ocean from Africa to where it threatened Miami. Since it was our first one, we stayed glued to the TV. Along the way it hit Haiti and several other islands pretty hard. It continued to strengthen as it drew closer. Then, just as we began to feel the first head winds (it was still a day and a half away from Miami) it moved a little south. It slashed into Cuba and churned right along and went into the Gulf of Mexico. There, wonders of wonders, it spun itself out without hitting anything very hard.

          We learned quickly what the procedures were that you were supposed to follow in the face of a hurricane. Fill the bathtub with water. You would use that to flush toilets and drink water when the power went out. Stock up with seven days of food. A bad hurricane would stop everything for a week. Be ready to evacuate at a moment’s notice. We lived three quarters of a mile from the ocean. We couldn’t see the ocean because of all the buildings, but the storm surge would easily reach us in a moderate to severe storm. Obey law enforcement and rescue workers. Stay off the phones. Call emergency numbers only with an emergency, not to get weather reports. Have lots of batteries for flashlights and radios. It was all very frightening.

          The thing was, there would be storm warnings all the time during the hurricane season. At the beginning, every time a disturbance would form off the coast of Africa, we were getting our grocery bag charts out. We were buying extra food, we were filling jugs with water, we were putting tape on our windows so when they blew in glass would not go everywhere. And nothing would happen. The disturbance would slowly go away or if it did develop into a storm it would just be a tropical storm with winds around 50 mph and rain. The natural movement of an Atlantic storm is actually to turn north before landfall and churn along a couple of hundred miles off the Atlantic seaboard until it would spin out. Sometimes it would turn into land around the Carolinas, sometimes go as far north as New York. And quite often, the storms headed for Miami would drift south and enter the Gulf. We were rarely hit while we were there. In fact, in the years we were in the Miami area, we were hit only once, after about seven years. Prior to that, it had been twenty years since Miami had been hit.

          This gave rise to an attitude of, “it is never going to happen.” A hurricane would be closing in and people would have hurricane parties, which were just opportunities to drink. People wouldn’t evacuate. They would ignore the warnings. We were just as bad, eventually. Time after time you brace for the hit, then it goes away. You know it can happen, but you get to where you ignore it. Until…..

          When it finally hit Miami, I was expecting it to turn away at the last minute. I needed to go up to Ft. Lauderdale and so I went. I was on the highway when the hurricane made landfall. We had been there seven years and it hadn’t happened. Now it was there and I, being the genius I am, was on the road. And when the storm blew the back end of my truck into the canal, I had to get out, which was an even more terrifying thing.

          We need to pray for Houston and surrounding areas. This has been a massive storm. But we need to see a connection, also. The Bible says that the Lord is coming back. We have gotten so used to Him not coming back we have gotten ho-hum about it. We think we have lots of time. Actually, we don’t think about it at all, mostly. John 4:35---Do you not say, 'There are yet four months, then comes the harvest'? Look, I tell you, lift up your eyes, and see that ¹the fields are white for harvest.  The Lord’s coming will be unexpected, but our time is running out. Now is the time to seek the harvest.