Top Ten Favorite Movies

The ONLY time I watched a movie in 3D, which was Guardians of the Galaxy.  Great movie, overpriced glasses

A few people know me as a movie buff. I'm not just a lover of the films themselves, I love the "behind the scenes," the creative processes, the cultural influences they absorb and produce.  I also like all kinds of movies.  If a "romantic comedy" is good, I call it a good movie!  If a scary movie is good, I call it a movie!  And so on.  Movies are awesome!  And they can be garbage too.  My parents realized early on what impact they had on me and sought to educate me on their favorites, and I picked up a few of my own.  So here's my Top Ten Favorite Movies!  I said favorite, not best.  Sometimes the best isn't the most enjoyable, so no Citizen Kane here (definitely one of the best).  So here they are, and you can tell me how wrong I am in the comments section!  ;)

10. Amadeus (1984). You may claim to hate classical music, but I bet you know and even like Mozart. His music has been part of our lexicon for centuries, and the music is the star of this beautiful period piece. Here the wild and brilliant Mozart isn't the star, his antics and genius is observed with delicious and heartbreaking envy by his wannabe rival Salieri (played by F. Murray Abraham). I sometimes find myself even sympathizing with the devious and very-human villain of Salieri, while letting the soaring soundtrack and beautiful 16th century Vienna wash over me. It's a masterpiece, and I highly recommend this Oscar winner.  (A footnote, the sad decline of Mozart who died young freaked out my sister when we watched it together at a young age. The memory still tickles me...siblings you know).

9. The Wizard of Oz (1939).  Kids watching the Wizard of Oz is like a rite-of-passage.  You have the amazing musical score, those lavish colors, a delightful cast of characters, a million catch phrases we repeat to this day, a classic story, and.....its scary!  This movie scared me as a kid!  Not the whole thing mind you, but there are many images in this film that I can recall the kid in me that frightened me; the Wicked Witch of the West (I mean Come On!, what a no nonsense embodiment-of-evil villain, I could talk hours and hours about her), those freaky flying monkeys, the Wizard of Oz, "the Great and Powerful version," those bully apple trees, and the fantastic tornado bringing terror and chaos to the Kansas countryside, even watching Dorothy's terror as the red-sand hour glass ticked by.  A countdown done right can really add the tension.  Heck even certain scenes in the movie produced terror within me, the cruel Miss Gulch taking Toto (that poor dog, and poor Dorthy's helpless tears), the charging armies of the flying monkeys to the Witch's army, the disemboweling of Scarecrow in the Haunted Woods, to the Witch taunting Scarecrow with fire constantly, yeesh!  I had seen it enough times to know there's a happy end, still I would feel the urge to look away but couldn't.  It's a darn good story that's beautifully crafted, and when my son is ready to watch, we'll cringe and laugh together.  (And for the record, I do not like musical Wicked, at all.  Prequels ruin good villians.  See below at #1).

8. Ghostbusters (1985).  This movie still has the ability to make me laugh.  It's Bill Murray's best movie, and all you have to do is look at the guy and you'll crack a grin.  Also, who doesn't like busting ghosts?!  For me this made Halloween fun.  You know, when there's something strange in the neighborhood, so who ya gonna call?  You see, Ghostbusters in a way taught me that those creepy-crawly scary things can be defeated!  Ghostbusters had a curious draw on me growing up.  As a kid I loved the ghosts, the proton beams, the amazing comical team of Winston, Ray, Peter, and Egon, the NYC setting, and the Staypuff Marshmallow Man, it just reeked coolness!  Now grown up, I watch it now and realized how the "adult" jokes went over my head back then, especially scenes between Peter (Murray) and the Ghostbuster's first customer Dana (Sigourney Weaver).  That helps keep the movie fresh and timeless for me (and by the way, when Dana is first taken to be possessed by the monster Zuul [you know, the chair], it scared the crap out of me).  It's a fun, exciting, and funny movie, a rare combo that I love it dearly.

7. Rear Window (1954).  I had to get Alfred Hitchcock in here, and this is (I would argue) his best movie.  The story is simple, a photo-journalist Jeff played by Jimmy Stewart broke his leg on the job and is stuck in a wheelchair for months while his leg heals.  To pass the time he has taken on the habit of watching his neighbors in the apartment high rises across from his own.  They're strangers to him, but he loves watching them, giving them names, and giving them stories.  We have the dancer he calls Mrs Torso, a lonely single woman he names Mrs Lonelyheart, the traveling salesman with the sick wife, the couple who lowers their little house dog in a basket to the ground for restroom breaks, and the sculptor whose work changes as the movie moves on.  Well one rainy night Jeff hears a scream across to the other apartments and one of his neighbors goes missing.  Jeff is convinced there was a murder, but only has his peeping observations to share, which isn't good evidence, or ethical.

"Jeff's" view becomes the audience's.  It's clever, funny, and tense.

The movie picks up from there as he tries to convince his friends that something is wrong but here's the lovely catch; the movie never leaves Jeff's perspective.  There are no "cuts" to the other building, no scenes at the other apartment, or cuts to his friends talking out in the hall debating Jeff's sanity; we the audience are in the same boat as the bedridden Jeff.  We also become voyeurs with Jeff, which in our world of social media, over-sharing, and gossip carries a certain commentary today.  We share in Jeff's curiosity over his neighbors and this possible murder mystery, and we plead with Jeff for his friends to believe him.  It also doesn't hurt that the goddess Grace Kelly plays Jeff's wise and affectionate girlfriend "Lisa," who humors Jeff as he tries to work her into the role of detective.  It's an amazing movie, funny and tense, and is a wonderful ride!

6. The Shining (1980).  Every time I watch it, I get drawn further in.  It's like diving into the deep end of a pool, trying so hard to reach the bottom, getting deeper every time, but you have to stop and come up for air or else you drown.  You might get deeper everytime, and while you long to reach the bottom, you kind of hope you never do.  The Shining is like that, you long to understand it, but realize the journey to understand is much more fun than any explanation.  It's also darn frightening, which I love.  I like to be scared in movies, and most "scary" movies today just can't do it.  The scares are too predictable, the stories are done over and over, and to compensate the lack of scare in "scary" movies, today studios rely more on gore and torture to compensate.  #eyeroll.  It's not the "scares" that make a scary movie great, it's the story and the slow rise of tension.  The Shining is all about rising the tension, slowly and methodically (like Hitchcock), as we journey deeper down the rabbit hole with the Torrance family in this classic retelling of the "haunted house" scenario.  The movies starts out as Jack Torrance played by Jack Nicholson is a struggling writer, who with his wife and son agree to be the sole caretakers of a giant hotel in Colorado during the winter while the snows make it inaccessible.  The hotel has a history of death and violence (shocker), but what works is that the "ghosts" aren't like the ones in Ghostbusters.  It's clearly implied that the ghosts may be no more than figments of the imagination of each family member.  Whenever Jack speaks or interacts with a "ghost," you'll find a mirror in the room, like he may be talking to himself.  And Jack's son Danny has mental powers that allow him to hear the thoughts of others, or see traumatic events from long ago, so the "ghosts" he sees may be in his own mind...maybe.  We watch Jack's sanity slip down and down, we watch this broken family break down and down, it's like watching a train-wreck, and we can't look away.  We feel like we should look away, but we can't help ourselves.  Many people have tried to make sense of this movie and explain its confusing plot.  That may be a fools errand, but it's half the fun.  It's not so much a story as it is a place, like the cursed room 237.  We can't help ourselves but to return again, and again.  It's my favorite scary/horror movie.

I love the original poster; it matches the mood
of the film better than the "boxing" ones

5. Rocky (1976).  Don't laugh!  The original Rocky is wonderful and sweet!  The sequels, not so much.  The first Rocky has a close place in my heart.  It's a lonely movie, the lowly boxer Rocky (played by Sylvester Stallone who wrote the story) walking the city streets of Philadelphia that appear deserted to him most of the time, which for a city is weird but fitting here.  Rocky could have been great, but the world judged him to be a bum (today we would use the word loser), and he agrees with the world.  He fights forgettable local grunge boxing matches, works as muscle for a seedy local loneshark, and lives a meaningless existence.  Despite his rough exterior, his heart aches for the extremely shy girl Adrian who works in the pet shop.  Rocky buys pets there just so he can talk to this girl who feels as lowly as himself.  Adrian's brother Paulie wants Adrian to date his friend Rocky, but is hurt and lashes out as she withdrawals from Paulie's own anger and self-loathing.  Rocky's trainer "the rough cranky old man" Mickey also first appears like a cartoon, but in one scene at Rocky's lonely and empty apartment we find him feeling aged, tired, and burdened with regret.  These people feel real, and we root for them to crawl out of their holes and into the light.  Que the classic story of luck as Rocky is given a chance to take on the boxing champion of the world Apollo Creed, a Muhammad-Ali figure of equal charisma, arrogance, and skill.  You can enjoy the parts about the training and the fight, but I'm drawn to the quieter moments; Rocky begging Adrian for a kiss, Adrian finding her voice against her abusive brother, Mickey sadly walking down the street as Rocky screams his own frustrations at him, Rocky exhausted and broken after his first long morning run of training, Rocky confessing to Adrian that he doesn't want to feel like a bum anymore.  It's those emotional cornerstones that make the boxing match at the end so satisfying, as we are cheering for each of these characters to discover their own self worth.  When I'm feeling down and lowly I often dream, and in my dreams I sometimes find myself in a place that looks like Rocky's apartment, disgusting and empty, longing for someone to come and end my loneliness.  I guess what I'm saying is that I empathize with Rocky.  That may be why I love it so, just as Rocky discovers how awesome he really is through the person that knows him best, Adrian, I look to my wife whom I allowed myself to be vulnerable to and helped me discover the champion within.  I can still hear Rocky explaining to Paulie why he wants to date his depressed and quiet sister, "I don't know, she fills gaps.  I got gaps, she's got gaps, together we fill gaps."  (A little disclosure, my wife is not quiet or depressed, she's confident and freakin awesome!  I may be like Rocky in some ways, but she is NOT Adrian!)

This promotional poster captures
the spirit perfectly

4. The Little Mermaid (1989).  This is an inspired film.  If you didn't know, at the time Disney Studios was on the ropes.  They were out of money and out of ideas, and were debating closing its cherished animation studio.  Out of that desperation they sought new creative minds, and from that came The Little Mermaid.  What a breath of fresh air it is.  I can remember sitting in the theater, riding on Prince Eric's massive sailing ship, atop the mighty ocean, and then following one lucky fish into the sea, down, down, down into the depths.  Gliding past glowing jellyfish, massive giants of whales, schools of glistening fish, and the music rises, and then soaring past the camera are the mermaids!  Brilliant!  We see a world we want to explore, to enjoy, to just see, and we think we'll get that chance through the eyes of the protagonist Ariel, the daughter of the ocean ruler King Triton.  And then the story flips us around; Ariel isn't interested in this marvel of a living ocean at all.  Ariel longs for the wonders of the world "up above," ours.  As an audience we get to marvel at both, long for both, and do we ever.  Add onto that a brilliant cast; the worried but wise crab Sebastian, Ariel's nervous best friend the tropical fish Flounder, the dimwitted but lovable seagull Scuttle, the honorable and caring prince Eric, and the entertaining and crafty villain the sea-witch Ursula, and you have a classic.  I love that the villain has a brain, so many movies have dumb or shallow villains and it's annoying.  And the music, dear God it's powerful, memorable, and engaging.  I also have enjoyed my changing perspective on Ariel as I've gotten older.  At first I pulled for her with all my might as I empathized with her youthful passion.  Then as I got older I found her gullible and shallow.  Today I've grown to appreciate her street-smarts and drive.  Everything that Disney has produced since then was built on the brilliance of this original.  While I love much of what they've made since, this remains my favorite of the Disney animated films.

3. Pulp Fiction (1994).  I wish I could explain it, but I adore this movie.  I think the best word I can use to explain it is the word "cool."  This is a "cool" movie.  Now the people in it are not cool; hitmen, drug addicts and dealers, gangsters, armed robbers, a violent boxer, and an annoying coffee drinker, but man, Pulp Fiction just gets better with every viewing.  The dialogue is the key, it's a joy to listen to.  Every conversation is filled with rich and awesome conversations.  A cheap movie would have characters say something just to move the plot along.  For example, at the beginning as two hitmen are headed toward their next assignment a cheap movie would have them explain why they're in a car, why they have guns, what they're supposed to do, and then they would arrive.  Not here, the writer and director Quentin Tarantino wisely knows the audience will figure it out, and instead uses that car ride establishing who these guys are using funny and witty dialogue about hamburgers and hamburgers in France.  And what does that lead to?  At their assignment, the men they meet are eating hamburgers, and they talk about it.  An easy and enjoyable payoff that keeps repeating.  Every piece of dialogue sets up the next part of the story.  Sometimes is overt.  Sometimes it's extremely subtle (I don't want to spoil it), and every new discovery is a joy to find.  The story in of itself isn't all that original, but it's delivery (also done out of chronological order) elevates it above itself.  Every viewing this movie just gets better and better.

2. Ben-Hur (1959).  When mom told me we were watching a 3+ hour movie I cringed.  The last time she suggested that was Gone With the Wind, and I wasn't a fan of it.  Not here, Ben-Hur has everything!  Roman armies, naval battles with fire, a chariot race that is just about perfect, a great story of revenge and redemption, boo yeah!  This is also the movie I point to as my favorite "Jesus" movie.  Why?  You never hear Jesus speak, you only see him from the back of the head, and occasionally you hear people talk about him.  Why would I say this is the best Jesus movie?  Because the director William Wyler understood something most Biblical filmmakers then and now don't; it's not trying to recreate the Divine in art that draws us closer to God, it's our stories and retelling of our own experiences with the Divine that draws us to closer to God.  Take for example the Sermon on the Mount and the words, "Blessed are the peacemakers."  Most Christians have heard those words dozens of times.  I can hear the latest Jesus actor try to take it on and try to make it sound godly, and all I can hear is a British accent over hushed tones.  Been there, done that, over and over again, blah.  Instead in Ben-Hur we get the vengeance-driven fallen prince Judah Ben-Hur (played perfectly by Charlton Heston) forced to hear those sacred words delivered by his loving fiancee Esther who we see earlier waiting to hear Jesus' sermon on the mountain.  Which version sounds more authentic?  I think B.  This is the standard that I judge all Biblical epics, and almost all others fail.  I watch it almost every Easter as my personal tradition.

"Ben-Hur" meeting Jesus.  It's not Jesus' face that sells a scene (which you never see in the film), it's the reactions of everyone else.  Much like us today.

1. Star Wars IV, A New Hope.  Surprised?  Now I would say that the Empire Strikes Back is the best of the trilogy, A New Hope is my favorite.  As a singular film, it's perfect, as Empire builds on top of it (to perfection too, but this is my favorite.  The prequels are garbage as they ruin the greatest villian ever Darth Vader, and from here on I will not reference them again).  As a child I dreamed of going to these places.  I wanted to walk the sands of Tatooine, sit at Han Solo's table at the cantina, sit at the feet of Obi-Wan Kenobi, marvel at the giant mechanical marvels of the Jawas' landcruiser, see a Star Destroyer, or fly into the Death Star.  I wanted to ride with Luke down the long trench of the Death Star.  I wanted to intervene and save Uncle Owen and Aunt Beru.  I wanted to chat and giggle at C3P0 and R2D2.  I wanted to be in the same room as Darth Vader and just feel his commanding presence.  I looked upon Princess Leia with awe and respect (she's no shrinking violet, breaking the "princess" cliche!).  I wanted to scream to our band of heroes, "There's a monster in the trash water, and you're in a trash compactor!"  I wanted to duel with lightsabers, darn the consequences of lost limbs!  Since I was 5-6 years old this is still the place I find my imagination going back to.  It's why I have this movie memorized completely (and 99% of Empire Strikes Back and 95% of Return of the Jedi).  Even to this day kids find inspiration and excitement in this movie.  It's timeless.  The special effects STILL look good!  Heck at the time it came out it was received as a message of hope and optimism to a nation trapped in a decade of war and scandal.  To this day, I am able to pretend that I am seeing it for the first time when I sit to watch it.  Here's what happens when I do;  

I can feel my pulse quicken as Luke races down the trench of the Death Star, Vader in hot pursuit, Luke's friends on the moon planet below in peril.  He's all alone, and it looks hopeless.  Then comes Han Solo, "You're all clear kid!  Now let's blow this thing and go home!"  Then the musical score turns to building pulses, and I freeze.  The proton torpedoes hit their mark, but the Death Star charges its planet-destroying weapon, I find myself holding my breath. Then at the last possible second, the Death Star explodes, and our heroes triumph, I hear the voice of our beloved Obi Wan, and feel tears glisten my eyes.  Movies don't get better than this.

Star Wars IV is my favorite movie of all time, and the best.

Honorable mentions that didn't make my FAVORITES list, listed alphabetically;  Alien, Blade Runner, Cool Hand Luke, The Dark Knight (which might make my top ten list eventually), Die Hard, The Exorcist, The Godfather, Groundhog Day, High Noon, It's a Wonderful Life, The Lord of the Rings Trilogy, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, Princess Mononoke, Psycho, Seven, Silence of the Lambs, There Will Be Blood, Up, Vertigo.  Did I miss any?

Daring to Pray for a White Christmas

Yes, that's me from long ago

 You know the song "White Christmas?"  I assume you do, or just turn on the radio or Google it.  It's a beautiful song.  It was written by Irving Berlin in 1942.  As for the story regarding its origin (and it's debated); Irving was staying at La Quinta, California and it was a warm day (as most California days are).  In the midst of the heat he stayed up throughout the night penning this song, which I am sure spoke volumes to him considering the environment he was writing in.  When he was finished he told his secretary it may be the best song he had ever written.  The song was sung by Bing Crosby that same year and was fairly successful.  When Bing Crosby’s “White Christmas” film debuted in 1954 the song went “viral,” and since then it is the best selling single in the world to this date (50 MILLION copies!  Simply amazing!).

I heard this song a lot growing up, and listening to the lyrics you can’t help but to think back to your own memories of a White Christmas.  “I'm dreaming of a white Christmas.  Just like the ones I used to know…”  The trouble for me is that I've never experienced a White Christmas in my lifetime.  There have been several close calls, but not one for December 25th.  One of those close calls is where I begin this reflection;

It was about 2-3 weeks before Christmas.  I was 6-8 years old, riding with my mom in the car on a Friday afternoon.  I asked her if she had ever had a White Christmas growing up (undoubtedly asked after hearing this song on the radio).  She said that she had a couple of times, but I remember seeing a look of sadness on her face as she reflected.  There was a time that you could hope for a White Christmas, but not anymore.  Not here, in the warm South.  I wanted to take that frown off my mom’s face, and frankly I wanted to see a White Christmas too. 

That night before I went to bed I went on my knees to pray my nightly prayer.  Usually I prayed the same prayer, “Now I lay me down to sleep…”  Mom taught me the prayer, and she conveniently skipped the part about, “…if I die before I wake...”  Well, on this night though I took a different route, broke my nightly routine, and did something audacious…I prayed something different.  I remember this because it was different, and because of the audacious nature of my prayer.  It went something like this; “Dear God, please make it snow on Christmas.  My mom had snow on Christmas and it made her happy, and I want it to snow for her.  Please make it snow on Christmas, God.  Amen.”  Now don’t think I am some pious saint just yet; I also wanted it to snow on Christmas for myself!  I left that out of my prayer...how convenient.  But I went to bed and kept hoping, dreaming, and wondering.

This picture probably is from the same Christmas

Saturday morning I woke up to see a strange glow coming from the blinds on my window.  I knew what morning light looked like through those blinds, but this looked different.  I sat up in my bed, looked out the window, and saw that the entire yard was covered in snow!  A respectable 4-5 inches. 

I was ecstatic of course!  Snow is awesome!  Almost immediately I recalled my evening prayer the previous night, and I could only come up with one conclusion.  I went back down on my knees beside my bed like normal, bowed my head, and prayed, “Dear God, you messed up.  You got the date wrong.  I said Christmas!  Not today.  Please try again.  Amen.”  I remember that prayer verbatim.  I figured I needed to pray to God daily to make sure He got the snow on the right day, like reminding your parents about something “important” you also know they are likely to forget!  So I did!  Every night up to Christmas Eve.

My sister Dana and I

On Christmas Eve night, when we left my grandparents house from our Christmas Eve family gathering I saw it beginning to flurry!  I was excited!  I was proud of God, and proud of myself!  A White Christmas was in order!  On Christmas morning I looked up at the blinds.  The light looked normal.  Sure enough, all I saw out the window was brown grass and bare trees.  I figured God used all of his “snow power” on that miscue, but that miscue snow day was still a great day, and it was still a great Christmas.

So would I pray that prayer today as a grownup; full of knowledge, life experiences, and more tools at my disposal?  No.  I am certain that if I started an investigation I could look back at meteorological records and study December weather reports from the mid-to-late 1980s and find my snow day (or God’s snow day) and how its appearance was all but certain.  Back then I wasn’t watching the news or weather reports or learning weather patterns.  Now I do.  Today I have apps on my smartphone that can answer these weather questions in amazing detail.  I would never pray a prayer again…or should I?

Throughout the Gospels Jesus says that to enter the Kingdom of God our faith must be like a child's (Mark 10: 13-16, Matthew 19:13-14, Luke 18: 15-17, same story but referenced multiple times).  Why is that?  Don’t wiser, older, more seasoned adults have a place?  When it comes to children, (especially in the first century), to be like a child is to be needy, weak, a nobody; but that’s whom God favors.  The Kingdom of God doesn't have room for those who already rule their earthly mini-kingdoms; who have no need or desire to depend on God.  It is not a call to be ignorant, but it is a call to let go, give to God, and to dream.  Kids are good at that.  They dream, they imagine, they wonder, they see infinite possibilities where as adults we are seasoned to dampen expectations, to be cautious, and worry.  I think as adults we let our knowledge and experiences create barriers so we can protect ourselves from the unexpected.  Adults stop themselves from growing up further, and that's a real problem.  Kids deal with the unexpected constantly, as growing up is full of change and new experiences.  Those are the people God wants in His Kingdom; people who are ready to grow, to change, to experience, and are ready for a miracle that CAN’T be explained.

Advent is a time for miracles!  It began with the greatest miracle since the creation of the universe, when God became Incarnate through Jesus Christ, our newborn King!  This is the season to expect a miracle, and it will be one that God will give you that you don’t see coming.  Maybe God didn’t intervene with the weather when I was a kid, or maybe he did.  We can debate it, but I do think that God gave my heart and my imagination a tug to think of the possibility, and in turn make me more aware of the possibilities of the Divine in the every day. 

Advent is a wonderful time to let our guard down, to become open to the possibility that God is at work in subtle and awesome ways in our lives.  The first Christmas began in the same way.  God’s faithful lived in fear, in worry, with the future looking very dark.  They were worried grownups, but with good reason.  They prayed, dreamed, and wondered, “When will the Messiah come?”  They asked God specifically for their Savior, and many had clear expectations of what that messiah would look like (a warrior, monarch, superhero-like).  On an unexpected day in the small town of Bethlehem, the impossible happened!  Some of those same people who prayed saw this miracle years later, listened to the man from Nazareth, and prayed, “God, you messed up.  You got the Messiah wrong.  Please try again.”  Other people listened to the man from Nazareth, even as skeptics.  They dared to dream, to wonder, to believe, and followed this unexpected answer to an honest prayer.

I loved my pterodactyl shirt!

I pray that during this season of Advent, of waiting for God, or snow, or any miracle; you can let go of your fear to dream, to wonder, and that you boldly lift those prayers to God.  You may not get the answer you are looking for, but it will be the answer you need.  I assure you the answer will be as beautiful as a White Christmas!

Never Forget...For What Purpose?

Look back on years of this wretched anniversary on my Facebook feed, and unless I'm mistaken I have never written one thing about Sept 11th. Sure I have read a bunch, given some "likes" and applauded the more thoughtful and inspiring messages and essays, but not me. Why? Am I a heartless, wretched man? I don't think so. Am I just trying to ignore the pain of that day? No, I feel it every time I see a bomb drop or detonate on the news and people are shredded and children are orphaned. Why should this day be special? Because we make it so. I'm still seeking a way to honor such a day and until today I haven't found it. For 13 years we find ways to make ourselves miserable over and over like a broken record, and I wonder, "What is it good for?" (Yes, I'm quoting Edwin Starr's song; "War, huh, Good God y'all! What is it good for? Absolutely nothing!")

I was in seminary 13 years ago, and now it's a blur. I remember the tears, the anger, but there was something else; an intentional move by all these clergy in training to move to the Cross. To see sin and brokenness washed clean by the blood of the Lamb. To make this violent act the last one. There was a hope for a rebirth, a resurrection. Since then, we've waged wars, dropped our own bombs, wage violence in our own homes and streets, and have killed our own share of innocent people. Those churches swollen to the brim with people crying for mercy and healing 13 years ago have emptied. Those bended knees now stand straight, busy judging others and asking in turn not to be judged. The hypocrisy makes me nauseous. If anything we have become more fearful, suspicious, and angry. Partisanship is the symptom of this disease. It's like a national PTSD. The resurrection was teased but we are definitely still buried in the ground; weighed down by burdens of guilt, vengeance, and blood. Our chase for security has led us away from the Cross and the Tomb. Perhaps that's why so many of us seek to "remember" by reliving the horror, it's the only way we know how to feel, or should feel.

I look at my son, so happy and cheerful and blissfully unaware and I think to myself, "Thank God you don't have the emotional baggage the rest of us are carrying." I think it crassly, but maybe that's the way to go. Instead of trying to teach him everything about 9/11 every year, seeking to draw him into my own collective sense of guilt and shame, I'm going to teach him to be kind. Keep hugging, smile to friends and strangers, give high-fives, to love mightily and love God. This will not be a day of weeping and gnashing of teeth. This will be a day of joy. Remember the innocent who were murdered (today and EVERYDAY) by showing mercy and grace. I also try to do this but it's an effort. The stranger, the other, the people whom the false lessons of 9/11 teach me to hate or simply avoid, God died and lives again for them too. -Fight it Brad, shake the hand, nod, smile, befriend, offer the Peace of Christ! -But it HURTS! ...yup. And there is my son, free from such baggage and brokenness. He offers the love anyway, willing to give a high-five to any who offer. He finds joy when others smile with him. There's the narrow path I've heard so much about. 

So for this day, and any other painful anniversary, I'm going to force my knees back to the hard dry ground, pray for mercy and grace, and share that blessed light as it has been given to a sinner such as I. And for my son, who has a better world in front of him because I haven't given him my own brokenness (so much as I can help it, you know, parenting), I have more hope for him than fear. This is a choice, and in spite of my own bad instincts and what the world would have me feel, I chose hope. 

9/11 will be a day of joy and hope! A good day. I'll show joy and hope till it hurts!...and it already does. Thank you Jesus for loving and hurting for me too, and our children.

Did David Break the Commandment; Thou Shalt Not Kill?

A Camp Tekoa Discussion I’m still stuck on

            This past July I spent a week serving the 300+ campers and staff at Camp Tekoa as their “Pastor of the Week.”  Camp Tekoa is an amazing, God-filled place and I consider my annual volunteering to be a vital part of my ministry.  One of the things that I love about Camp Tekoa is not only the beautiful mountains or fun camp activities of swimming, hiking, playing, etc., but it’s the little God-moments that happen everyday.  God just shows up; in a conversation, at the dinner table, on the porch rocking chairs, and you never see it coming.  I had one of those moments this year during my Bible Study with one of the 5th grade groups. 

                       

            Sitting in the Chapel in the Woods (a small worship area in the woods beside the lake complete with benches and a stone altar) I see the 5th grade group come for the morning.  Cute kids.  Now I’ve had a dozen groups so far of all ages and most of the Bible Studies have gone relatively the same.  Good stuff, but predictable.  Here I expect no different.  After a quick introduction a hand goes up from a sweet blond-haired girl in the back.  “Pastor Brad, I have a question, and it’s been bothering me.”

                       

            I look at her counselor and she sighs, “She asked me last night in the cabin and we went around in circles, so I said we’ll just ask you today.  I’m so sorry!”

                       

            Uh oh, I think, and ask her to go ahead with her question.  “Well, the Bible says you shouldn’t kill anyone, you know in the Ten Commandments, right?”  “Yes,” I reply while thinking, I bet that wasn’t the hard question, though I hope it is.  “Well, David, he killed Goliath, so was David bad, or what’s going on?”

                       

David and Goliath lithograph by Osmar Schindler 1888

         
I lit up.  It’s the best question I’ve ever heard about the Bible in a LONG time.  I wonder if she would be willing to ask that same question at home, or in church.  My guess is sadly no.  Sometimes we go to church not to be challenged or face challenges, but to be told what we want to hear.  Kids pick up on that, that you should never rock the boat.  I’m grateful that Camp Tekoa allows such sacred space for the sharing and growing of wisdom.  I pray that here at Liberty we can do that too (and I’ve seen places where we have, let’s keep it up and make it grow).  Now to the beauty of the question; it sounds simple but it hits two major sore-spots for many Christians who don’t like to think on these things.  The two issues are these;

1.      being confronted by passages where Scripture contradicts itself

2.      the tension between war, peace, security, and the Gospel

            Now #1 makes some Christians freak out.  When they hear that the Bible contradicts itself; they feel like this is a spring-board leading to a full-wage assault on their faith.  Usually those believers become extremely defensive to the point of meanness.  Now I’m going to say something that may get you worked up too.  Note that you shouldn’t, that it isn’t as bad as you think it is.  Here’s the truth; sometimes Scripture contradicts itself.  I knew that as a kid with this one; did Judas kill himself by hanging (Matthew 27:5) or by jumping off a cliff with a splat (Acts 1:18).  It can’t be both, can it?  Well a pastor once answered me this question when I was a teen, saying that it could be both (and this gets morbid).  He told me that Judas hanged himself on a tree branch overhanging a cliff, and the branch broke and Judas fell with the “splat.”  His explanation kind of reminded me of elaborate stories kids tell the teacher explaining why they didn’t have their homework.  That’s just one.  There are others and many are minor but worth noting;

·        In the Creation account, which came first; animals and then humans (Genesis 1: 25-26) or humans and then animals (Genesis 2: 18-19)?

·        The Sermon on the Mount; did Jesus preach it from a mountain (Matthew 5) or an open plain (Luke 6)?

·        When Jesus hung on the cross, did the soldiers offer him vinegar (Matthew 27:34) or wine with myrrh (Mark 15: 23)?

·        How many angels were in the Empty Tomb; one (Mark 16) or two (Luke 24)?  

                       

            Now you may look at this and say, “Big whoop.  It isn’t that big a deal.”  Or you may say, “But the Bible is inerrant!  Brad, you are off your rocker!”  Or, “This is the language of the enemy!  Don’t listen to it!”  I’m just accepting the facts; the Bible does have different accounts for the same events.  It sometimes says one thing and then later says another.  Even Jesus was real with this in Matthew 5: 43-44;  “You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’  But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.”  He’s quoting Leviticus 24: 19-21.  So if Jesus notes it, we should too.  Now does this have to become that spring-board into a conversation of why the Bible is wrong?  Not at all.  But if you pretend these issues don’t exist, you lose credibility with the skeptics or a sweet little girl who asks a honest, serious question at Camp Tekoa.  My advice; acknowledge the inconsistencies, own them, embrace them.  Don’t fight them because a good hardened skeptic will list dozens of harder contradictions or discrepancies to pummel you.  That is also why you’ll never hear me say the Bible is inerrant.  It’s basically a rude way to say that you have no interest in talking with someone (skeptic or anyone) but that you’ll love talking at someone (or shout, yell, the garbage we’re all sick of).  The word I recently heard and love is inspired, that Scripture was and is Divinely Inspired.  The Bible has many different authors, and we need to own that.  It's not a single book, it's a library, the best library ever, but a library still.  This explains how and why many Scriptural accounts have different tellings.  This will lead you to truth, to grace, to salvation (with a little education and support of course), and you can avoid being tripped up on the contradiction stuff while at the same time acknowledging it.

David and Goliath by Michelangelo, the Sistine Chapel

            And that takes us to #2 of the question; the tension between war, peace, security, and the Gospel.  This is bigger and has broader consequences for all of us.  This is another Scriptural issue that drove me crazy growing up; reading of a God who, “is good to all, and his tender mercies are over all his works" (Psalm 145:9) and yet in other passages says; "I will dash them one against another, parents and children together, says the Lord. I will not pity or spare or have compassion when I destroy them. (Jeremiah 13:14)."  Uhh…which is it?  Is God ordering the armies of Joshua to invade and slay all the men and women, young and old, cattle, sheep and donkeys of Jericho, the enemies of God’s chosen (Joshua 6: 21), or is God commanding us to, “love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you (Matthew 5:44)?”  Can it be both?  Neither?  Is one right and the other wrong?  Did David do the right thing by killing Goliath, or did he break God’s commandment of Thou Shall Not Kill? 

            Now we are going deeper into the Word.  Good.  We are normally very shallow with it.  Usually when I think of the sins of David I think of him stealing his best friend’s wife Bathsheba and having him murdered while in war.  I never thought of David attacking Goliath being on the same plane.  In my thoughts I guess I just chalked it up as, “He’s defending his country from the Philistines and Goliath.  I mean it’s Goliath!  He beat Goliath with a sling!  It’s a great story, so it’s cool and worth celebrating!  Like the movie Rocky!!”  So in times of war, the 10 Commandments become…overridden?  Inconvenient?  We can do that?  Well, think of the Nazis, I hear the reply.  The Nazis!  We had to fight back, to defend those who are helpless!  It was the Nazis!!!  Okay, so when Jesus told us to Love Our Enemies, he only meant some of the time, or that Jesus wasn’t really serious.  Yeah, my pulse is quickening too. 

            So what about men and women who volunteer to defend our country in our armed forces, to defend the helpless and defend our values?  Are their actions, just?  When we pray for our soldiers to come home, by what means are we praying for this outcome?  Where’s the grace here, or there?  Should there have been grace and mercy when David faced Goliath?  If you’ve forgotten, not only was Goliath killed and beheaded, the entire Philistine army was killed and the Israelites lined the roads with their bodies (a grim reminder to any other army who wants to mess with Israel). 

            Do I have the answers?  I wish, but I have wrestled with this for a long time, wrestled with God too, and this powerful question at Camp brought it all back to me.  While I don’t have answers, I do have a frame of mind that I’ll share with you when faced with issues of defense, defending your home, defending your people, security, and what if anything the Good Shepherd has to do with this.

David hoists the severed head of Goliath as illustrated by Gustave Doré 1866

            First, we must acknowledge we live in a broken world.  Our world is broken, and that brokenness is not new.  What is new is the magnitude of that brokenness.  It’s widening and more visible today.  People are living in hopelessness, fear, greed, and inflict real harm on people (innocent or not).  For some, standing idly by and watching in vain is the wrong choice.  So they sacrifice their time, their freedom, their relationships, and sometimes their very lives to protect the innocent and make a difference.  I’m not just talking about those who serve in our military.  Police officers do this.  Rebel armies do this against oppressors (while others call them terrorists.  Labels can be confusing).  So does a protest movement (which are often labeled rebel-rousers, or ungrateful losers.  Labels are partisan, and we have enough of that crap).  In times of relative peace these decisions aren’t as urgent, there is no the Biblical tension, and everyone is...cool.  Truthfully, these tensions and hurts are still there, they are just hidden under the surface.  In these current times, bullets and bombs, tear gas and rubber bullets are raining in our cities, and cities and places around the world.  Sometimes a bully needs a knuckle-sandwich, right?  Who is the bully?  It's a mess, and it gives us a headache.  I’m sure many of the authors of Scripture felt that way too.  Since we live a broken world, we have a lot of broken choices to choose from.  I get it when people volunteer to serve and combat this brokenness.  I love them deeply.  I honor their courage and selflessness.  For those times of war and conflict I pray for peace, I pray for mercy, and I will not judge them for their selflessness.  Also, I also want to live a world free from those brokenness that leads to violence.  That means for myself I have to see what choices I have to make.  We don’t always know the impact of our choices, so let’s make some good, holy choices of our own.  That leads us to my second frame-of-mind;

            Second, we need to take Jesus at his word and love our enemies.  This is beyond hard.  Have you ever tried to be friends or just be friendly to people you thought were absolute jerks?  I’m sure you have.  Sometimes it’s a co-worker, or a boss, so you don’t have a choice (or an easy choice anyway).  Sometimes it’s a family member that is rude, or racist, or someone that uses you or others.  They just make you mad!  Sometimes it’s a church member, whose pride and fear dominate the life of a church community.  And these are the kinds of people that Jesus commanded us to love?  Wouldn’t you rather spend time with people you like, people you’re comfortable with, people you agree with?  Of course (me too!), and that’s part of the reason why we’ve become so partisan over the decades.  We crave comfort, conformity, safety, and security, and especially among friends.  AH!  There are the words, the words that mess us up.  Safety and security.  We all want to be safe, we want to feel secure.  We want our homes, our children, and ourselves to be safe and secure.  We will go to extremes to insure this safety.  Is playing it safe a path to holiness, or wisdom, or is playing it safe and becoming secure setting us up for a greater fall?  Here’s such a struggle (though minor) I learned on vacation this summer.

           

"Stay on the right of the road!"

At the beach this past month my son was given a bicycle to ride with training wheels.  Will loved to ride his tricycle in the neighborhood at the beach, and now he LOVES his bike.  He peddles really fast too.  We were down there during the busiest times of the year, the July 4th week.  The traffic was insane; golf carts with careless teen drivers and big cars and trucks who wouldn’t notice a 4 year old on a little bike anyway.  So I’m walking and running beside him trying to teach him a valuable lesson, stay on the right side of the road.  Will loves to ride right down the middle of the road.  I don’t blame him, but he needs to stay on the right.  It’s just common sense.  Now I could have picked a safer way to ride all together; just wait till the late fall and winter and when Will is back again for a holiday, the traffic will almost be nonexistent.  Let him bike then and have the road to himself!  Unfortunately he wouldn’t learn a thing, and there is the occasional car in those times too.  So he bikes the July 4th week, sometimes obeying the road rules, and sometimes I’m having to physically turn the wheel to the right and move him while I’m apologizing to the breaking golf carts and cars as Will protests (all the cars and people were cool and understood, but it was stressful).  The next day Will was better at staying to the right.  He wasn’t perfect, but he’s better, smarter.  So back to the safety and security words.  I’m not saying safety is all bad, what I am saying is that we should be smart, use our brains, and instead of trying to become secure we should seek to be wise.  The path to wisdom isn’t found by avoiding risks.  In fact, while we can act safe, to pursue security is really about building walls to keep God’s Kingdom from growing.  Security is a mirage, and it can be a dangerous one.

            Jesus knew this well as he began to build the Kingdom of God.  He could have played it safe by spending time only with the Jews, or the Pharisees, or even the Romans.  It would have been a fun time, eating and drinking and telling tales within a secure kingdom that seemed eternal but wasn’t.  Instead he broke bread with sinners; the poor, the lame, the weak, the pathetic, the troublemakers, the rebel rousers, those whom the world judged were without value.  It was those very people who craved security and conformity that felt the most threatened by Jesus, and they killed him for it.  Ah, now here is a defense worth fighting for!  Jesus, who is the most innocent, the most pure, is going to be arrested by his enemies to be killed.  He did nothing wrong, and they’re going to treat him like a criminal (the same kind he kept company)?  Wouldn’t you stand in their way?  Wouldn’t you cry out at the injustice?  Can you see yourself rising up to defend Jesus?  Peter did, as he pulls out his sword and attacks Jesus’ enemies (injuring the slave of the High Priest).  Peter is only doing what David did against Goliath and the Philistines, right?  What does Jesus say?  In Matthew, Luke, and John, Jesus criticizes Peter, adding in Matthew, “Those who draw by the sword will die by the sword (Matthew 26: 52).”  So much for a defense.  Now is this the exception, or the rule?

            We are confronted with many choices; to be safe or be faithful.  To be honest or be shifty.  To be true or be a mirage.  Security is a mirage.  Just as locked doors don’t keep out thieves (they us e the windows, I’ve experienced it), the greatest army on earth can’t prevent every act of terrorism.  There will never be security when people hate and they teach their children to hate, or if we do teach that hate ourselves (often we don’t even realize we’re doing it, but our actions and attitudes are passed and learned every generation).  The hate will grow when we isolate ourselves from people we don’t like, trust, and hate.  Isolation is another broken choice, so maybe we should make wiser, holier choices.  What it look like if we invited the jerks, the criminals, and the fallen to dinner in our homes?  What would happen?  The cynic in me says, “They’d steal your stuff when you go to wash your hands, or worse.”  That could happen.  Or maybe, in the breaking of the bread the fallen may see Jesus for the first time.  Maybe you’ll discover you are the fallen one and you’ve actually invited Jesus over for dinner.  You won’t know if you’ve shut the door and locked it.  Again; we experience the tension, pain, discomfort, maybe even death.  But that’s where the grace is found.

            As I watch the bloodshed in the Holy Land (which hurts tenfold now that I’ve met some of its beautiful people) I’m torn.  I understand the Israeli’s desire for peace and security where there is so much hate.  I understand the Palestinians desire for peace and security where there is so much hate.  Will there ever be peace when an eye is sought for every lost eye?  It’s the way we’ve done things for a long time, and it’s not working, but we keep trying.  To defend oneself or another in a broken world is a heartbreaking choice, and I’m torn between supporting those who take up these “noble causes” and being faithful with the commands of Jesus.  Perhaps there is no middle ground to be found in this tension.  Maybe we need to just embrace the brokenness, the hurt, and allow ourselves to be hurt in the process.  It’s how a loving relationship is nurtured.  You promise to love and trust and expect the same to be returned, but you can’t guarantee that.  If you want become secure from being hurt; don’t ever get married, don’t have children, and leave home quickly.  What kind of life is that?  What kind of life would I have if Jesus never invited a sinner like me to share the broken bread and the cup at His table, even as my brokenness and sin inflicts mortal wounds upon his flesh?

           

            There are no easy answers here, or maybe I just don’t want to admit the truth.  So I’ll return to the question at Camp Tekoa and close with this thought experiment.  “Well, the Bible says you shouldn’t kill anyone, you know in the Ten Commandments, right?”  “Yes.”  “Well, David, he killed Goliath, so was David bad, or what’s going on?”  Here’s a thought; What if the Israelites laid down their weapons and invited the Philistines to join them for supper and worship the living God before the Ark of the Covenant?  What would have happened?  The Israelites would have been slaughtered you may be saying, and perhaps so.  Instead they defended themselves, slaughtered the army who sought to slaughter them, and Israel lived another day…and Israel fell another day (to Babylon).  We face the brokenness of our world and sometimes decide that doing the right thing is a luxury and chose brokenness as the norm.  Let us pray for a better way.  I believe we may discover a better way when we embrace the brokenness, and be willing to take and accept the brokenness into ourselves.  It’s what Jesus did for us, he embraced our brokenness, and it killed him, but in that brokenness you find the grace.

            All of this was shared over hours on a bright, humid morning at Camp Tekoa with 5th graders and high schoolers.  

“There is no way to peace along the way of safety.  For peace must be dared.  It is itself the great venture and can never be safe.  Peace is the opposite of security.  To demand guarantees is to want to protect oneself.  Peace means giving oneself completely to God's commandment.  Wanting no security, but in faith and obedience laying the destiny of the nations in the hand of almighty God.  Not trying to direct it for selfish purposes.  Battles are won not with weapons, but with God.  They are won when the way leads to the cross.”  Dietrich Bonhoeffer, a German Lutheran pastor and theologian who spoke out against Nazi atrocities in Europe, who joined Nazi resistance groups, and was alleged to have been involved the assassination attempts against Hitler.  He died a concentration camp shortly before the end of the war.  Again, tension.

            I have to thank the countless number of fellow pastors and friends whose insights and debates help me craft this blog.    

I Like Walking to I Like Running; With Life and With God

I Like Walking to I Like Running;

With Life and With God 

Isaiah 40: 28-31.  "Have you not known? Have you not heard? The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He does not faint or grow weary; his understanding is unsearchable. He gives power to the faint, and strengthens the powerless. Even youths will faint and be weary, and the young will fall exhausted; but those who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint."

           

            I am not an athlete.  I hate exercise.  I like endorphins.  I love competition.  I prefer to watch sports from the sidelines.  I look at people running marathons and think to myself, "They're out of their minds!"  And I run my first 5K on June 19th, 2014 at Lake Junaluska at 7:30am.  I hate working out in the morning.  I loved every second of it.  I loved running with my sister.  I like to exercise alone.  I want to live a long time.  I want to have good health so I can enjoy a long life.  I hate giving up control.  I give God my need to control and find out I love it.

            Understand that I HATE moving.  I can be perfectly content slouching lazily in my chair, feet propped up with a game controller in my hand.  I am a gamer, through and through, though the controller could also be substituted with a good book, or my phone as I read newspapers, magazines, and blogs.  Or it could be watching sports (World Cup Futbol right now)!  Moving is simply not a natural state of mine.  And yet for 7 years now I can taken long walks with my wife to running my first 5K with my sister.  What gives?  A realization in my mind and heart actually, or I should say my joints.

            When I began working out a bit more seriously 2 years ago in my BodyPump class there was a gentleman who was busting his butt, and he definitely had some weight to lose and was putting me to shame.  One day after class I told him how awesome he was doing.  He responded by telling me he was a borderline diabetic and working to stop it to avoid having to take insulin.  He then told me something his doctor told him which I never forgot, "You're going to be facing some pain, you can't avoid it.  It's either the pain of a needle or the pain of breaking a sweat.  Your choice."  Wow.  Truth be told, I had made a similar decision a few years before.

My Sister and I at Yankee Stadium, 2003.  I've come a long way.

        

In the years before I started walking, I wasn't just overweight, I was obese.  No question.  While I wasn't happy how the weight made me look, it was also painful.  I was experiencing serious back-pain, the kind that made it hard for me to even walk at times.  I would sometimes go to sleep in my recliner because it would ease the pain that my extra weight around my waist would put on my spine, which my bed didn't provide.  The weight made my joints in my hips sore, so walking was even painful.  It hurt enough to make me grit my teeth, and Advil became a new friend of mine.  I would eat unhealthy (fast food and soda were favorites) and I would tell myself that that was normal, but the pain was the price.  There's always a price, even if we pretend to ignore it.  There are no free lunches.  The fact that my favorite hobbies also included sitting didn't help either.

            Then 7 years ago I married Renee, and she saw the potential in me and got me walking (3 miles every day and it hurt a lot, for there are prices to pay).  You probably know that story but there is more.  I also had to get over my fear of joining a gym.  Fear?  Me?  Yes, fear of judgment, that I would see people doing amazing things and I would have to look at them and look at myself and find myself wanting.  I would be forced to judge myself.  However I couldn't back out, I had to join.  We lived in an area where walking 3 miles wasn't a option anymore.  So I did something I thought I would never do, I joined the Y.  My health and well-being improved, inch my inch, drop by drop, slowly as the movement of a glacier.  Well those drops in the bucket added up, but sometimes the bucket would be poured out too.  Life does that.  The birth of my son (and the freedom to do anything goes out the window), the changing of churches and jobs, you gotta adapt or lose what you’ve gained.  You also gotta look higher, be bolder, and sometimes be crazier.  In this case, it's doing a 5K.  Big surprise, that was my wife's idea too! 

     

My 1st 5K in April

 Running even a portion of a 5K was a daunting prospect.  I was not ready for it.  I ran till I could run no more and then I walked on my 1st 5K in April (technically my 2nd, but I walked leisurely that one a year before with my wife and son.  This time I left them behind, with their blessing).  37 minutes.  Not bad, and I would aim to do the same for the next one at Lake Junaluska.  I really didn't want too, but I had plateaued in my fitness and I wanted to up it.  Beginning is often the hardest step.  I went to social media to tell of my goal to hold myself accountable to it (I thought often of backing out), to receive encouragement (I needed it), and to receive advice from my more athletic friends.  Then a funny thing happened, God threw me a curveball.  My sister Dana texts me the day before, she wanted to run with me.  Oh dear Lord NO!  She runs all the bloody time, and now she's going to run with me?  I can't keep up.  Older brothers don't like being beat by their little sisters, ask the Bernstein Bears!  But Dana is so happy, so encouraging, and I can't think of a good reason to say no without being a total jerk.  So I say okay.

Before the 5K, the proceeds go to fight malaria

         We meet at Lake Junaluska around 7:00am the day of the race.  I'm already nervous.  I am not trained to run this, I can only handle one mile and this is 3.2.  Dana insists we run most of it.  I insist we walk when necessary and not kill ourselves.  Then off we go!  There's something wonderful watching so many people from different walks of life, clergy, laity, families all running as one.  It's beautiful.  Well we didn't get 20 feet and Dana nearly loses her car-key she tied in her shoelaces.  I shouldn't have been surprised, these things happen to her….  And then off we go, again.  As we jog along I notice something; we are talking to each other a lot.  I didn't think I would have the breath for it, but I do.  I also notice that Dana's pace is slowing me down from my favorite speed, but it may be one I can keep longer.  She told me later I was forcing her to run faster than her favorite speed, go figure!  We continue our jog around the lake, joking about dodging goose poop (the lake is infested with Canadian Geese), how we're feeling, just having a great time.  I also notice that I am managing this well and I can see the Convention Center (also the finish-line) across the lake from us.  We can do this.  So I look at Dana and say, "Okay, let's do it.  Let's run the whole thing!"  Dana is excited and we continue.  I ask her if she's okay and she says, "We aren't running laps so we can do it.  I hate laps, they're the worst thing a 5K, to double back on your progress.  This is just around the lake so I think we're good!"

I'm slightly middle/left, Dana is behind the guy in black.  Our Bishop's head can be seen beside the right checkered flag.

       

    Then we reach the wooden bridge, the one that takes us back to the side of the lake with the finish (beside the pools if you are familiar), and the sign says to keep running on past the bridge.  How?  There are no access roads to get around the lake past this point without going to the main highway, and that's too far.  Then we start seeing runners going the opposite way past us.  We're being lapped back to the bridge.  I am thinking very negative words in my head as I feel my legs yell at me in frustration.  It's horrible when you have to argue with your legs.  Dana is shaking her head, her words already coming back to bite us.  Ugh!  I blame her!....I know it's not her fault, but that was a punch to the gut.  So we run on and on, and it hurts, till we see the 5K volunteer by a cone telling us to double back around her.  As we jog around her she says, "Great job you're half way!"  Now I know she's wrong, we've passed half way a while back.  I've walked this trail dozens of times before, this isn't half, this is 2/3rds.  Dana believes her and it kills her.  Still, we keep running, the joy now turned to determination, and pain.  I'll be dead before I walk across that wooden bridge I tell myself.  We also see our Bishop Larry Goodpaster walking quickly on the lap-part.  We wave and he keeps on trucking.  We look at each other.  The power-walking bishop is keeping up with us.  So we keep going.

            So we reach the bridge and jog across it, dodging dog walkers as we go, almost to the long stretch of the Rose Path.  I'm feeling okay but as we reach the other side of the bridge I see to get to the Rose Path we must run uphill.  It looks 25 miles long.  We both consider walking (but we don't speak it), and I know 2 things.  One, if we walk now we'll never get back to a jog again.  Two, my buddy Drew is at the top of the hill cheering us on, and I didn't want to hear what he would say if we wimped out now.  So we fight it, and struggle up the hill, jog past Drew as he tells us we're almost there (You don’t have to tell me!), and on the Rose Path we go.

            Now the sun's out, and the humidity jumps 250%.  It's flat ground, but the air and heat is oppressing.  Still we keep jogging.  And there is the Convention Center, so close and getting closer.  We're going to make it, I think.  We then hop onto the road seeing the runners who have been waiting on us, cheering us on.  I can see the checkered flag-gate.  "If you can sprint, go for it," Dana tells me.  "It's all I can do to run at this pace," I reply.  Then a few seconds later I look up at the nearing finishline and see a clock.  I can't believe it.  First I didn't know a fancy big clock was even up there to begin with.  Second, the time shocked me.  Remember my first 5K was 37 minutes?  This clock said, 34:55.  I've already beaten my time.  Then something clicked in my head.  "Are you going to let that clock hit 35?"  "No!!!!!!!!" I cry out in my head.

            Without warning I cry out to Dana, "Come on LET'S GO!!!" And I let loose in a full out sprint.  I can barely hear the crowd laugh and cheer at my exclamation, just in a corner of my consciousness.  Only one thought runs through my head, "I'm flying."  Literally it felt like flying.  My feet are hardly touching the ground.  I'm soaring through the air with the grace of an eagle and with more energy than when I started this thing.  I glide through the finish and jumped high and far into the air with a righteous fist-pump.  Dana comes in right behind me telling me that to keep up her heart was about to explode.  I must confess, a tiny itty-bitty corner inside me was excited I beat my sister, but 10 times more my heart is filled with joy that she was there to push me, encourage me, and that we finished this 5K together.  I can't describe how much love I had for my sister in that moment.

After the 5K, feeling like champs!

            As we confidently walk/waddle over to the crowd to find water and bananas I try to take in what just happened to me.  Something new transformed inside me.  Then the words came into my head, "I am becoming the master of my own flesh."  Usually we are slaves to our flesh; to disease, aging, death.  That's life, but we aren't victims to all of it.  We can chose the pain we experience; to break a sweat, to decline the donuts for a banana or two, to get up, to suffer for righteousness, and suffer with a friend who can bring out the powerful human being within you.  I made that choice, and in that moment of flying I felt as alive as I did on my wedding day and the day my son was born.  I'm not kidding.  As in those days a whole new beautiful world was laid out in front of me; a world without limits, a world filled with the wisdom of knowing choices, a world worth suffering for, a world where my body becomes perfected in God's Grace, a world where my life my can positively effect other lives.  This wasn't a goal that was met; this is a new beginning.

            Now you may be thinking, "Congratulations, you found a hobby and you're getting fit.  Good for you.  I could never  - or I can't -."  Thank you for your kind thoughts, but I will not accept your can't(s).  We often place more barriers in front of us than barriers that are already there.  We craft much the worlds we live in.  We are more than just victims trapped in life's chaos.  You can be swept away in the chaos, or you can chose to fight it, struggle in it, master yourself within it, and most importantly, give that control to God so that He can lead you through it.  Excuses are surrender, and we can always do better than that.  Why not chose your pain?  You have choices, and you make them daily.  Why not make good ones, even if they hurt (the bad choices hurt also)?  Now please know I have total empathy and love for people who have disabilities who prevent them from the activities I'm loving, and this isn't meant in any way to knock them.  Besides, those people have a strength and grace within them that far surpass what I have, big time!  What I am encouraging you to do, dear reader, is to take stock of what you have, see how blessed you really are, and if you're ready, start walking, and if you are walking now, start running!  Walking is where it starts, it's been my preferred speed of travel for a long time.  One day as you walk you may realize that walking is just the beginning.  God has created you to fly.  Like a plane racing down the runway to create lift, we are called to move a little bit faster, struggle a little bit more, discover pain can kill you or can create wisdom and endurance within you.  With this knowledge you move faster, stronger, and then it'll click, and you take off.  It also helps to fly with someone who is willing and ready to do it with you, to teach you, encourage you, and push you.  The odds of you taking off are higher if you have a friend or partner beside you.  It's how God made us, not to be solo artists but to be a community, a family, a church.  Start walking, learn to like it, and when you’re ready, start running, and do so with a friend!  The results will rock your world.  You'll never look back.  You won't want to.  The sky is so much greater.  It's where God is waiting for you and for me.

After the 5K.  My smile is fake, but I really feel awesome!  Dana's smile is great, as always!

More pictures from the 5K can be found here at the Western NC Methodist Conference website;