I have discovered many things about people living where I live now. Some have questionable family backgrounds, things that would make you squirm in your seat to hear. Some have had very bad church experiences. You may think that the Roman Catholic Church leaders are the only ones that have abused people and then covered it up, but you would be wrong. Some have been married, unhappily, multiple times and yet would like to try at least once more. Some had wonderful marriages and now miss their spouses terribly. Everyone has a story or two. It can be pretty rugged, or it can be pretty wonderful. But one thing is common here. One thing that everyone will talk about freely.

Everyone here has the perfect grandchildren.

I know, I know.....your grandchildren are the most perfect. I understand. But to listen to folks here, you are dead wrong. You are living a lie. So, I have put together some stories from various sources about grandchildren. It is amazing that even when it is a story of a grandchild doing bad, it is really about an angelic little fart, uh, grandchild.

The first concerns a grandmother as she was in the bathroom, putting on her makeup, under the watchful eyes of her young granddaughter, as she'd done many times before since grandmother lived with the family. After she applied her lipstick and started to leave, the little one said, "But Grandma, you forgot to kiss the toilet paper good-bye!" The little one had mistaken that final dabbing of the lips to take away the excess lipstick as kissing the toilet paper good-bye. Why squeeze the Charmin when you can kiss it.

Many folks here have children scattered all across the country, which doesn't seem to bother them too much. But that also means they have grands scattered everywhere. That creates distress. But all our new forms of communication helps with that. Phone calls, texting, video chats, it really is a very good thing. Not unusual to hear one grandparent explaining to another grandparent what the best app to use when making those calls. It is a special joy to connect with the little ones. One little great-grandson called his grandfather to wish him a happy birthday. "Grandpa, how old are you now?" Grandpa replied that he was 80 now. There was quiet for a moment, and then the little guy asked in wonder, "Did you start at 1?"

One grandmother was visiting her daughter and family and she was having a wonderful time spending time with the two grands. One evening she paid for her daughter and husband to have a night out. The plan was to have a fun night with her two little angels. But without parental supervision, the little ones where more wired than sweet. Finally, grandma had enough and, lovingly and gently, got them ready for bed. Now to relax! After putting her grandchildren to bed, grandmother changed into old slacks and a droopy blouse and proceeded to wash her hair. As she heard the children getting more and more rambunctious, her patience grew thin. Finally, she threw a towel around her head and stormed into their room, putting them back to bed with stern warnings. As she left the room, she heard the three-year-old say with a trembling voice, "Who was THAT?"

A grandmother was telling her little granddaughter what her own childhood was like. "We used to skate outside on a pond. I had a swing made from a tire; it hung from a tree in our front yard. We rode our pony. We picked wild raspberries in the woods." The little girl was wide-eyed, taking this all in. At last she said, "I sure wish I'd gotten to know you sooner!"

And finally, a grandson was visiting one day when he asked, "Grandma, do you know how you and God are alike?" Grandma mentally polished her halo and said, "No, how are we alike?'' "You're both old," he replied.

So now, finish your tea and go on to bed and don't make me come up there!

I would have done anything to get to be active in the ministry when I was 19. 

The Bible college I attended had 84 churches in the mountains surrounding Chattanooga and all the way north to Knoxville. Some of these churches were fair sized, but most were 10-15 people. All the churches had pastors, youth pastors and ministers of music who were my fellow students. It was an effort to provide students with experience in real church situations. I wanted to get involved, so I signed up for any opportunity.

I would have done anything.....

There was a church on a mountain just across the state line in Georgia. They were going to have a revival. In February. Northern Georgia is a lot warmer than where I come from in Ohio, but it was the mountains and it was February. The pastor of this little church was driving his rattle-trap old car up the mountain. It seemed to be getting colder with each rotation of the tires. Next to the pastor in the front seat was the man who was going to preach this revival, the evangelist. The exhaust was leaking into the car, so the rear windows had to be opened. Sitting in the back seat were the pastor's wife and two small children. Oh, and me. I was going along as the guest song leader. I had no experience in this, but the regular guy refused to drive in that weather. Calling me the 'guest song leader' made me sound special, I guess. 

I had just been told that afternoon I was doing this, so I had no music ready. The pastor and the evangelist were talking in the front seat and talking very loudly to be heard over the broken exhaust. I tapped the evangelist on the shoulder and asked him if he had any particular hymns he wanted. He turned in the seat and gave me a glare.

"LISTEN, BOY!" (He was in his last year, so he was four years older than me. I was Boy.) "WHEN I PREACH, I PREACH WHAT THE HOLY GHOST LAYS ON MY HEART. I JUST LET GO AND LET FLY! YOU BETTER GET PRAYED UP AND LET THE HOLY GHOST PICK YOUR MUSC!" 

OK, I had been told. When I got to the church I asked the older lady who was playing the piano what she thought and she said the regular lady wasn't there, so she was playing. She only knew five songs and two of those were Christmas carols. So.....we sang her five songs and I was told on the way home that my services were no longer desired for the rest of the revival. Strangely enough, I was quite happy to sit in my dorm room the next night and listen to the sleet beat at the windows.

2 Timothy 2:15 says, "Study to show yourself approved unto God, a workman who doesn't need to be ashamed, rightly handling the word of God." Funny in a way. No where does it say let go and let fly. When the Jews sang on the way to Temple, they sang certain songs at certain places along the way. When children were taught in Hebrew school, the lessons were strict and prepared. We are to be prepared when we step up to teach or sing or preach. Even when we do none of those things, we need to be prepared to minister to someone when they need some Jesus. 

Imagine you are going in for open heart surgery. A man walks in wearing tennis clothes. "Hey, what do you say we do this! Let's see...Oh, my. Your chart says triple bypass. Yeah, I can probably do that. I'll just wing it!" Or someone trips on a root in your yard, cracks a vertebrae and sues you. You don't want your lawyer to be family law and know little about how to help you. You don't want to take your spouse to an expensive restaurant and get a toasted cheese sandwich. Shouldn't you do the best you can to present the Lord in the best way possible? It is our job.

Study!

    What does one write about in the week leading up to Father's Day? Well, of course, Father's Day! We fathers are viewed sometimes as walking ATMs, tellers of lame jokes, less bright than our wives and children and hopelessly inept at the social graces of civilized society. We deserve some praise. But that is not what is on my mind these days.

    Fifty years ago this past Sunday, I graduated from high school. A bit of a wake-up call. Somehow, even with illnesses and struggles and gray hair these last several years, I didn't hear old age rushing up behind me. That is probably because my hearing is going. But I have had to face the fact that eighteen year old Larry is gone for good.

    And yet, I haven't been thinking about my classmates much. It isn't because I have anything against my class, we were just never all that close, even during school. Other classes were, but we just never fell into that groove. My best friend, Keith, was in my class. We met when we were three years old. I loved Keith like a brother. Keith passed away three years ago and left a hole in my heart. But our friendship was mostly out of school. With everyone else, when the final school bell rang for the day, we all went our separate ways.

    No, I really haven't been thinking about my classmates. Mostly I have been thinking about the passage of time and the changes that have taken place. You never could believe a politician back then, but you wanted to believe. Now you don't even consider that they might be telling the truth. We thought a vehicle that got thirteen MPH was pretty good. Now, forty MPH is the benchmark, and government mandate is trying to change that. When four or five guys were all peering into the engine compartment while another guy was bent over the engine working on it, the other guys were offering advice based on their knowledge of auto repair. Now, if several guys are looking into an engine compartment, they are looking to see how you plug it in, since they couldn't find the plug on the outside. Back in the olden days, when we were simple minded folk and before society became so enlightened, we actually thought there were just two genders. Now, since we have become so smart, there are 107 different gender identities. I am not kidding. Just put in Google how many genders are there in 2024 and be amazed.

    Now, here is one for you. According to the Center for Disease control (and why they keep statistics on this is beyond me), every thirty six seconds a marriage ends in the USA. Prisons are full of inmates from broken homes. Obviously, marriages ended back in my day, but it was only seen as the most extreme option. Now, it is the first or second option. In the state of Ohio you have to be licensed in the state to perform marriages (one of the few states that require it). You have to meet several standards to prove you are ordained or licensed by a church. When I returned to Ohio from Indiana, I decided not to reapply for that license. I don't ever want to do another marriage. When the emphasis is more on the party after the wedding and the dress and the cake than the sacredness of the marriage, as it usually is these days, there are problems on the horizon.

    I heard an interview by Red Skelton back in the mid 1090s about the state of comedy at that time. Red was not a perfect man. He was not a pillar of decency. But he was funny. He said in the interview that the problem with comedy in the 1990s was that people thought you had to be vulgar in language and subject matter. When was the last time you heard a comedian who didn't sprinkle in some vulgarity. Some comedians start with vulgarity and get worse as they go along. It is hard to maintain your personal decency while being assailed with garbage.

    So, since June is the 'marriage month,' I thought I would give you Red's secrets to a good marriage. Think what a current comedian would do with this subject and then read Red's. Maybe our problem is we have forgotten how to laugh while learning how to be offended at the least little thing. Everything is so serious and filled with hate. Anyway, Red said.....

1. Two times a week we go to a nice restaurant, have a little beverage, good food and companionship. She goes on Tuesdays, I go on Fridays.

2. We also sleep in separate beds. Hers is in California and mine is in Texas.

3. I take my wife everywhere, but she keeps finding her way back.

4. I asked my wife where she wanted to go for our anniversary. "Somewhere I haven't been in a long time!" she said. So I suggested the kitchen.

5. We always hold hands. If I let go, she goes shopping.

6. She has an electric blender, electric toaster and electric bread maker. She said "There are too many gadgets, and no place to sit down!" So I bought her an electric chair.

7. My wife told me the car wasn't running well because there was water in the carburetor. I asked where the car was. She told me, "In the lake."

8. She got a mud pack and looked great for two days. Then the mud fell off.

9. She ran after the garbage truck, yelling, "Am I too late for the garbage?" The driver said, "No, jump in!".

10. Remember: Marriage is the number one cause of divorce.

11. I married Miss Right. I just didn't know her first name was 'Always'.

12. I haven't spoken to my wife in 18 months. I don't like to interrupt her.

13. The last fight was my fault though. My wife asked, "What's on the TV?" I said, "Dust!"

    And like Red said to finished every show, "And may God bless!"

 

I was young. In Christian college in Chattanoga, Tennessee. I was every bit of twenty years old, so you know it was a long, long time ago. I had been serving in a church in Loudon, Tennessee for a year while going to school. I was inexperienced and extremely unsure of myself, so I was an easy target for jokesters. Mr. Williams, one of our deacons, was the best of the best of these jokesters. One day he began telling me of a preacher who had started a ministry on Saturday evenings and I should go one evening to support him. All the signs were there that should have tipped me off that Mr. Williams was about to make me miserable, but I was impressionable and I respected Mr. Williams. Retired Army major with a chest full of medals from WWII and Korea. He thought it was great fun to torment the young preacher boy. The national average that someone stays in the ministry is only five years, and part of the reason is that nearly every church has a Mr. Williams. 

Anyway, when that Saturday night came, Mr. Williams picked me up and we drove to an old, abandoned cinema. At least, I had assumed it was abandoned. Windows boarded up, just a few letters on the sign outside, an old movie poster still on the wall. Abandoned. However, the preacher he wanted me to hear had rented it and had picked up the trash and debris in the first ten rows and had put an old, beat up pulpit on stage and called it all the only Holy Spirit filled church in the whole county. There was no music, just this preacher ranting and raving up on that stage. This went on for about an hour and a half. Other than Mr. Williams and me, there were maybe ten people there, and most of them were asleep by the end. I was having trouble staying awake myself. You can get so used to yelling that it just bounces off you.

The preacher was winding down and then he said, "Now, brothers and sisters, old Arnold down here has brought a young preacher boy with him and I want to say a prayer over him. Young brother, y'all come down here!" I didn't know he was talking about me. I didn't know Mr. Williams' name was Arnold. I guess I would have sat there quietly, but Mr. Williams was telling me to go down front. The preacher was standing on the elevated stage about fifteen feet above us and he was pointing at a spot on the floor at the base of the stage. So, I got up and went down to that spot and bowed my head. The preacher started praying, then he started yelling, then he started stamping his feet, begging God to fill me with the Holy Ghost. Literally yelling at God. I finally decided I was done and was just about to leave when there was a boom next to me. Startled, I opened my eyes to see that the preacher had jumped from the stage to the floor next to me. His hand smacked on my forehead so hard it dazed me, and then his long, boney fingers wrapped around my head. He started jerking my head one way and then another, commanding me to be filled with the Holy Spirit. It was all I could do to stay on my feet. It finally ended and Mr. Williams managed to hold it together until we got to his truck. Then he roared with laughter. Somehow, I saw no humor there.

I have had some conversations in the last week or so about the filling of the Spirit, and I am surprised at what the world sees and understands about the filling of the Holy Spirit. Almost without fail the unbeliever thinks Christians equate being filled with that raving preacher back in Tennessee. But what is more surprising is that most Christians do not want to be associated with being filled because they think the same as the unbelievers. They don't want to act stupid. So I thought we would look at the Bible.

The gifts of the Holy Spirit allow us to share the Gospel of Christ. The fruit of the Holy Spirit lets others know we are Christians. We are familiar with the gifts, except some Christians use them  for other reasons than to share the Gospel. So let's look, briefly, at the fruit. 

Galatians 5:19-24; 19. Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, 20. idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, 21. 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. 22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness,  23. gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. 24. And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. 

We see what the works of the flesh are, and we see what the fruit of the Spirit is. Many believe that being in the Spirit is getting wound up by loud music and shouting from a preacher. But those folks have a hard time living for the Spirit outside of the church. Why? Because the reality of living for the Spirit is so very boring. We want our hearts to pound, but is that the Holy Spirit? Think about the fruit of the Spirit. Love, joy, peace patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self control. I don't see shouting there. I don't see loud music there. I don't see speaking in tongues there. I don't see healing with a touch there. Do you show the fruit of the Spirit or the works of the flesh in your own life? 

Do something for me. Think of these things and then think of the person who best shows the fruit of the Spirit. Give them a call and thank them for being an example. I can think of a few and every one of them would be embarrassed to be thought of as a great example. That is called humbleness and that is a hallmark of someone who bears the fruit.

Blessings.