COMMENTS

I have changed some things around to make it easier for readers to comment. At least I think I have. I value your input and love the comments I get. Some even teach me new tricks. If you do not want to share your name, you can now do that (I think).

Anyway, the changes should make communication much easier. I don't even think you have to be a member now. Although it is cool to have followers. Of course, I'm not leading anyone anywhere so why should I have followers.

SUNDAY SERMON

Last night a fellow came in with the first real theological question I’ve been asked since I’ve been here. There have been attempts to get me involved in debates on creation and abortion. While I care about both issues, I’m not interested in debates. Now that I have offended everyone – the question was why didn’t God answer my prayers. I prayed and scripture says ask and you will receive and I asked, but didn’t get anything.

On the contrary, God always answers your sincere prayers. The real problem is that we don’t like His answers when He does not answer as we requested Him to answer.

I am only going to touch on what I choose to call selfish prayers. Those prayers we pray with a specific answer in mind. I am going to try to explain why God says no to those.

The issue was that he had prayed he would not go to jail nor be put under house arrest for drunk driving. He argues that he was not drunk and that he was under the breathalyzers limit. The court says he was driving erratically and was a danger to others. End of discussion!

He argued, “but I prayed that God would not let me go to jail or be under house arrest. God did not answer that prayer. Oh yes He did. God said no and told this man that he must accept responsibility for his behavior and pay the piper for his actions. God rarely ever delivers anyone from facing the consequences of their actions. If you screw up there are penalties to pay. No amount of prayer will remove those. You put your hand on the hot stove you will get burnt. You steal and get caught you will appear in court. You get caught breaking the speed limit you will pay the fine or go to jail. You pray for your will to be done, the answer is no.

Why do we think that because we love God and try (yes I said try) to do the right thing and we can escape the consequences of the wrong action? We don’t pay for everything in the next life we pay for plenty here and now. Drink to excess and be drunk enough you can loose your job, your family and your health. Those are consequences.

We are like little children dealing demanding that our parent comply. But you promised. Yes I did but on condition. I promised to take you to the park if you cleaned your room. You didn’t do that. But I want to go to the park. Yes, and I want you to clean your room. You’re mean. First the demand and then the accusation! Try looking at yourself.

So we accuse God when we do not get our own selfish way. We demand and argue but we do not obey. So I asked the man why there was still liquor in his apartment. After all, he had announced he no longer drank.

He has a fear of loosing his job. Possibly legitimate. Did he know that his drinking might affect his work? Yes. Did he care? Maybe, but he generally thought no one would notice. While it’s true people do not notice all the actions of others, God does and still holds you accountable. Reminds me of my own son screaming, “It’s not fair.” Really?

AND THE LORD SAID…

I’m reading “The Given Day” by Dennis LeHane. It’s not the kind of book my parents would have approved. The language you know. Tonight I read a passage that helps put words to my real feeling about growing up in the church.

The story is set in 1917 America. Luther and Lila left Ohio when he lost his job and moved to Oklahoma where her aunt would help him get a job. At their arrival Aunt Marta learned that Lila was pregnant and not married to Luther. Uncle Cornelius is a minister and neither was going to allow an unmarried couple to live together in sin in their home. Besides, Luther needed to man up and marry the woman he made with child. They were married that night. Luther sort of loved Lila, but at 22 was not ready to settle down to one woman.

Luther got a job and began spending nights out with the boys drinking whisky, playing pool and taking small amounts of heron. He feels Lila is holding him back. On Sundays they attend church and spend the afternoon with the aunt and uncle. Luther is upset that they all seem to be trying to be white folk. He hates them for this and thinks they will never be accepted no matter how hard they imitate white behavior.

So often the Sunday afternoon conversation turned to what God thought about things and it irritated Luther. This quote hit me like a ton of bricks.

“Their saying fell more along the lines of ‘The Lord hates a …’ and ‘The Lord don’t …’ and “The Lord shall not abide …’ Making God sound like one irritable master, quick with the whip.

All I knew as a young teen was that I didn’t like church. I didn’t like the screaming, the crying, the threatening and I was afraid of God. Few at that time in history came to God because of love and compassion, but rather as a fire insurance policy to escape hell. I have told many a person that growing up in my church I believed God had declared that anything fun for a teen was a sin. The only thing they never mentioned was what to do about sexual urges so a good many kids stayed out of pool halls and movie theaters and did not play cards, but needing to do something with their time they were necking in very dark places. No one said they couldn’t.

I good friend of mine drew me into a Bible quizzing program with Youth for Christ. What that did was cause me to begin to read the Bible. That led me to a grand search for the “no’s” of God. There were some, But I found more “do’s”. Neither did I find a single no about most of what I was hearing preachers say was an abomination to the Lord. In fact I began to see how ticked off God was at all the phony baloney leaders laying guilt trips on people He loved and laying burdens on the laity that were to heavy to bear.

That’s why Martin Luther tacked his thesis on the Wittenberg church door. It is by Grace we are saved, not by works. Scripture has everything to do with “doing” and very little do with “don’t” The don’ts there are seem to be very much common sense which explains a lot since there is not much common sense going around these parts.

WEATHER

Yes, life is strange. Better yet so is the weather. It started out cloudy and cold. I grabbed my coffee cup and left for “the gathering.” No gathering. Head office was having a big meeting in the commons until 11:00. I never did find a note to that affect. Doesn’t matter, they were there.

I took off to find some economical stores and buy myself a new pair of pants for my birthday. I held back on some medical bills to treat myself. Treat may not be right. This was a real need. I have only two pair that fit properly, and not torn or stained so bad I’m embarrassed. Found two I could afford. Very happy!

When I came out of the stores it was sunny and warming. Looked to be a nice day ahead. Stopped at my barber and watched it get brighter and saw a man walk into the barber shop wearing only a t-shirt. Must be getting even better.

Went back to the other building to see if headquarters was finished. They weren’t but a group was gathering in the pool table room. Clouds were forming. The commons meeting broke up at 11:00 and we moved in closer to the snacks and coffee. Within ten minutes it was pouring rain. Not the typical northwest drips, but real rain, like pouring down rain. It takes only seconds to develop a pool outside the commons window. It was also pounding the window.

The weather broker 30 minutes later so I went to my apartment. There I worked on the newsletter for a while and took a nap. I know I was getting tired, but a 3 hour afternoon nap was long even for me. But I feel terrific. The sun was gone when I awoke. I left to check my mail and was told they were serving corn chowder at Bingo. I don’t play. But I go eat the food. While I am eating at the normal coffee break table, it hails like someone dumped a large bucket of ice balls all at once. It was over in a minute or less and, of course, the sun came out.

My daughter dropped off the two younger grandkids for a few minutes and Morgan told me about the hailstorm at their place. It was just a hard but much longer. Their whole yard was covered and it looked like snow. I asked had he been outside in hail. Yes he had. Did it hurt? No, it was cool. I guess ice is cool, come to think of it. Then as only a nine-year-old boy would say, what if the hail was this big (he made a circle above his head about the size of a beach ball)? That would hurt. What is it were slushy? Well, then it might break on your head and slide of your shoulders with you standing in the muck. That would be nasty, wouldn’t it. No, that would be cool.

I have certainly moved along way from the days when I thought things like that were cool. They left a few minutes later with it raining. But before he left he pulled out a temperature gage from his pocket and announced it was 82 degrees. If it were only true.

WHERE DID THE DAY GO

Have you ever just sat back and reflected on where the day went. I seem to be doing that even more than usual. I got up early to take Maria to her 9:00 appointment with her eye doctor, She is nearly blind and they often give her a shot right in the eyeball. It hurts just writing about it. I think I would rather have the colonoscopy. Come to think of it, I did. The needle goes right into the eyeball. Yikes!!!

Since the procedure takes 1 ½ - 2 hours I came back to hang out with the coffee klatch. It is still a klatch when men are there because for a while there were only two men? All I really wanted to know was what was wrong with the garage door. When I pulled up to run my card over the sensor to let me in there was a note that read: “Door broken, use the back door.” When we opened the doors with a remote button in our cars that worked well. But now the front door opens with a swipe card and the back door opens when you run over the trigger cord. If I wanted to open it from the outside I would have to park my car with part of it sticking into the street (door is very near the street) use my key to get in through the pedestrian door, push the button to open the garage door, wait for it to get to the top so I can lock it in position. Back to the car, get in start it and drive in. Once inside I need to get out of the car, release the lock so the door will come down.

Finally I must get down to my spot and fight with getting my car turned around and into its angled spot striped the opposite direction. All of this is more work that I typically do in a whole day. See, it’s not easy following weird directions.

When Rocky came through the coffee room He asked what happened to the door. At that point I had only heard a rumor — the bread truck backed into the door. Rocky went out to have a look. Meanwhile, back at the coffee ranch, the two ladies who let the bread man
In returned. Small problem. He was so close to the door that the bottom lip of the door struck the truck bumper. As soon as it hit, the ladies tried to put the door back up. Now that lip caught under the bumper and stripped the motor. Rocky was mad and determined to resolve it immediately. After a somewhat lengthy argument with the food bank they settled and agreed it was their drivers fault. And everyone lived happily ever after.

Now that insurance companies are involved we will be without the door for 7-10 days while each outfit investigates, we argue some more, they refuse to pay, more arguments and finally they try to pay for a quarter of the costs. They won’t get away with that with Rocky. He’ll take the money out of someone’s hide if necessary.

After this excitement, I picked up Maria and brought her back. She was exhausted, probably slept most of the day. I grabbed a quick lunch, picked away at the newsletter for May and went to Bible study. Increasingly there is very little of the Bible that gets studied. lots of talk and many, many stories. That’s usually OK, but I wanted to lay down about half way through. So it was back to my apartment, ate a light snack and fell asleep in my recliner. As usual, my feet went to sleep. I must remember to lie on the sofa. That way my feet stay awake.

MY PLACE pictures part 7

Wow! I’ve been lazy. It’s not that I haven’t had time I’m just swamped — resting. That includes reading, sleeping, yakking, puzzling and generally goofing off. Sounds like college doesn’t it? I was going to do this earlier today, but I got motivated to clean my apartment and start dumping more things I don’t need. I know, surprising. It even surprised me.

Well, back to my building and a look down the long hallway. I live at the last door on the left and right next to a back exit. This is a small building with only 18 apartments – nine on each of two floors floor.

My front door has several of my drawing hanging on either side. These are prints. I am enjoying trying to sale some of them. The table usually has something sitting on it that is seasonal. I guess I could have put up an umbrella. All it’s doing is raining. To the left of my door with the funky welcome wreath is the exit. Because I’m on the end, I let my family in at that door. When they come they just knock on my window. It works great.

To the left as you enter my place is the kitchen, tiny, but workable. At first I felt like there was not enough space, but you get used to it and eventually start getting rid of unused items and then you have plenty of room. Still want a dishwasher. I hate doing dishes.

Straight ahead is the living room with my comfortable leather sofa. My work space it to the right. I have a very old Mac. It should be upgrades, but the last time I did a major upgrade I had to upgrade all my programs. I’m trying to stick with what I have. Besides, I can’t lift my computer anymore. I decided not to straighten up the stacks, as that is not me. If there are not stacks around I have probably moved. You may as well know the truth.

There is a hall that parallels the kitchen and leads to a very large bathroom and the bedroom on the right. No bedroom photos. The place is a disaster. As you can see the hall holds many of my books. I keep telling myself it is silly to buy books as there are libraries here and the community library is only a block away. There is something about owning a book that seems to have meaning for me. Usually it means I am running out of money.

The next photo looks back to my door. On the left behind the leather recliner in which I live is a drafting/light table. My best buddy made that possible. I have no table for meals and the drafting table can flatten and be a table. Talk about multitasking.

UNCOMMON COMMONS pictures Part 6

One more area in the other building before we return to my building: the commons! Everything that involves a large group happens here. There is a monthly meeting of residents where we celebrate the birthdays of the month and get chastised for things we are screwing up: All garbage must be in plastic tie bags. There is no

smoking in the buildings. The public areas will be re-carpeted next week. Please take your hall decorations into your apartments.After the announcement there is laughter, scoffing and/or demands for more information or why. Also, all potlucks and meals are here as well as coffee and snacks available 9-4 Monday to Friday and of course bingo.

This is the morning coffee table piled with snacks. It is hard not to take something, especially

The bread table is a result of a couple going to the war front and fighting for our share of free bread. Since my heart attack I consider myself wounded in action and have not returned to Bread Wars. I have been replaced at the front. Yeah! Residents had already taken a rather large amount of bread before I took the picture. The bread comes Wednesday and most is gone by Friday.if one of the ladies baked something fresh. Most snacks come from the area food bank. They deliver bread and sweets every week. You can see the coffee pot in the back group and the open lighted area behind is the kitchen. In addition to coffee there is tea and hot chocolate. To the right of the snacks is our congregating table. You can only see a chair or two and a corner of the table. In reality the table only seats five, but there have been up to twelve squeezed near the table. Most mornings are a lot of fun and laughter.

A hall photo is weird, I know. It is taken from the entrance to the poolroom. To the right is the commons and the left is the elevator. There are doors on the left side of the hall that lead to restrooms and to the right is the kitchen. Heading left down the hallway takes you back to the main entrance past the mailboxes.

The last photo is a bit of space filler, as I didn’t want to move back to my building until the next blog. This staircase is beautiful at Christmas with greenery, ribbons and lights. In fact, the entire building is beautifully decorated. I know, it takes using your imagination.

I think I’ll leave this as is and some my cutting remarks for the next edition. Unusual!