Runaways

Someone once asked me about school.  I told them that I hated school.  I love to learn, I just hated school.  I loved math and history, tolerated science, hated English and spelling.  Then they asked me about my grades.  I said that I hated school so much that I made straight A’s, was a Beta Club member, and president of the Beta Club my senior year of high school. 

When students told me they hated school I inquired of their grades.  Usually, their grades were bad and most had failed or taken summer school.  I would say, “You must really love school to fail and take the class again.” I said if they really hated school they would make A’s.  They would quiz, “Why?”  I replied, “You graduate quicker.”  

I often spoke at high school Baccalaureates, college students, civic organizations, and preached since 1983.  When introduced as Dr. Hopper, I got rounds of laughter and sometimes ovations.  I would tell them that the D R stands for Documented Redneck.

I would tell students that I started school in 1959 at Beloit Kindergarten in Beloit, Illinois and graduated Beeson Divinity School at Sanford University in Birmingham, Alabama in December 2002.

Hopper tradition proves we deplore school.  Mom went to the seventh grade and quit to hoe and pick cotton. Dad went to the eighth grade and quit to cut and load, by hand, pulpwood.  My younger brother, Glenn, and I we were school runaways.  My sister Diane and other brother David were not as bold and daring as Glenn and I were.

When I started kindergarten in Beloit, it was mandatory, and I loved it.  My teacher was a beautiful young blonde and reminded me of Beaver Cleaver’s teacher on the television show “Leave it to Beaver.”

I got to finger paint, go to the creek, and catch tadpoles.  The best part was it was only a half day.  There was no homework, tests, or any pressure.  It was wonderful until I started the first grade a Beloit Elementary.

In first grade I had the oldest and meanest teacher.  She had to be at least a hundred years old and was a robust Yankee tyrant.  This first grader from central Alabama did not speak as did the other students.  I was a shy introvert, and she was a fun making bully.  She shamed my Southern drawl, criticized my reading, and analyzed by inability to skip with both feet.

After school started, I saw my teacher at a sporting event.  When I saw her in that old gangster car, an old Buick with bullet hole fenders, I was terrified.  Momma worried and warned us about the evil ninety miles to the east in Chicago.  The St. Valentine Day Massacre happened many years before, but momma still fretted.  I thought that that
Gangster Yankee teacher was going to kill this little Johnny Reb.

We lived three or four blocks from the Elementary school.  I would walk to school and eventually I got fed up the “Attila the Hun” and sometimes I would enter the breezeway of the schoolhouse and return home crying.

When the snow came, I would walk to school in the snow.  On extreme snow days day would drive me to school.  He would put me out and I could beat him back to the house hiding under the kitchen table for long periods of time. 

In March of 1960, we moved back to Alabama the Beautiful.  My cousin Floyd took me to school in Jemison.  My teacher was a Ms. Shirley, and she looked a lot like the one in Illinois.  I was terrified.  She made fun of me because after three years up North, I picked up the Yankee brogue.

To complicate matters, I asked to be excused to go the restroom.  Welcome to the South and outside toilets.  I had an outside toilet at home, so it was no big deal although the inside ones in Illinois were nice.  Returning to the classroom, Attila the Hun’s sister asked me a quest on the subject I missed will in the toilet.  I could not answer her, and she made me sit on a stool in the clothes’ closet with a dunce hat.

The school is six miles from home so I couldn’t walk home.  But the school bus circled with a quarter mile of the house so I would get off the bus and walk home.  We had only one vehicle, so I got to stay home claiming various ailments.

After being threatened within the inch of my life by momma I did not pull the ailment scam.  I did get off the bus where I normally escaped but it was on the way home.  I felt sick but I had cried wolf so many times did not believe me. 
Turns out I had the mumps.  Momma sure did feel bad.

I honestly do not know had I got in the second grade, but I did.  I had Mrs. Nellie Glasscock for second grade, and she was like a sweet grandmother.  In the third grade we did not a permanent teacher until Christmas break.  God blessed us with a beautiful blonde angel named Mrs. Avis Harden.  I went to making excellent grades.  She was inspiration for the rest of my schooling.

My brother Glenn was a first grader when I was in the ninth grade.  Most of the teachers we had had taught mom.  They were old.  Glenn would run away from school.  He made across the railroad tracks or a mile or so from school like an escape convict appended and returned to prison.

My fondest memory is ninth grade civics class.  Danny Pike, a friend sat behind me.  Mrs. Miller was cousin to the Huns and was very strict.  Danny had a special touch to get my attention fearing the wrath of Mrs. Miller.  He whispered, “Your brother is at the door.”  There was my little brother with saddest face and expression that said, “I want to go home.”  I was his last hope.  Glenn will be sixty-five this October.

Glenn was head and shoulders taller that his first-grade cell mates.  When his ancient teacher threatened to give him a baby bottle he was not as quick to make an escape.  We finally told momma years later about her baby runaway.  I think she was more sympatric than angry.

 

Jesus’ parents were relieved when they found him in school.  He ran to school where the Hoppers were runaways.

 

Every year Jesus’ parents went to Jerusalem for the Festival of the Passover.  When he was twelve years old, they went up to the festival, according to the custom.   After the festival was over, while his parents were returning home, the boy Jesus stayed behind in Jerusalem, but they were unaware of it.  Thinking he was in their company, they traveled on for a day. Then they began looking for him among their relatives and friends.   When they did not find him, they went back to Jerusalem to look for him.   After three days they found him in the temple courts, sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions.  Everyone who heard him was amazed at his understanding and his answers.   When his parents saw him, they were astonished. His mother said to him, “Son, why have you treated us like this? Your father and I have been anxiously searching for you.” Luke 2:41-48   KJV

Rainy Day Memories

 It was a rainy Thursday in Alabama, and I was happy.  I love rainy days whereas most people become depressed.  I have a dear friend in Demopolis, Alabama that gets very depressed when it rains.  She told me that when it rains, she thinks how much I enjoy it, and she becomes more depressed because I love it.

One of my favorite things is to take my old 1977 GMC pickup, nicknamed Gymmie, for a ride.  There is something magical and hypnotic about riding in the rain.  It is the rhythm of the windshield wipers as they repeal the precious jewels of heaven falling on the glass.  Then there is the flutter of angel wings as the dual glass pack exhaust sings a lullaby that will send passengers into a wonderful sleep.  

As I spend a few precious moments of my being in Gymmie, I thought of the 48 years that I have driven the old truck and the special stories Gymmie could tell.   Yesterday was special because it was my youngest son’s 38^th birthday.

For the first three years of his life, he did not sleep all night.  After working midnights at the cement plant, his mother demanded that I get Aaron out of the house where she could get a few moments of sleep.  I would lay him in the seat beside me, this was pre car seat days, and before we got a mile down the road, he would be asleep.

Aaron loved Gymmie.  He loved it so much that when the seat became ragged, a cousin of mine did some work on Gymmie and replaced the seat with one identical.  Aaron was a teenager and was not happy until I retrieved the old seat and placed it back in the truck.  The seat had worn spots created by our rear ends!

Aaron and I spent many hours riding in Gymmie.  When he got in trouble with his older brother and sister and mom, I would take him and console him and prepare him for life.  When he left home and finally moved away to Texas, I thanked God for the special moments that I encouraged him on life’s journey.

Around 2013, Aaron and I started rebuilding Gymmie.  His older brother had totaled Gymmie 1988, and we renamed it Joseph because Gymmie had a “coat of many colors” as did Joseph in the Bible.  Front fenders, front bumper, and hood were demolished when striking a pecan tree in the front yard. 

We drove it for several months with no hood, a primed right fender, and deer rammed left fender.  I did get a rusty hood from a junk truck at the cement plant.  Aaron only knew the wrecked Gymmie.  Gymmie was so bad that a preacher friend once asked, “Was anyone killed in the wreck?”  Aaron and I quizzed, “What wreck?”  The “so called friend” grinning said, “The one y’all got out of!”

Aaron and I stripped Gymmie to the frame giving it new life.  We changed broken and worn-out parts.  We repaired the interior first with new seat covers, new dash, and all the components that made it brand new inside.

We purchased new fenders, hood, doors, chrome, grill, tailgate, and bed panels.  I had a friend give Gymmie a professional paint job.  The pickup that I could not give away suddenly became the object of lust for boys and men.  We transformed a junker into a show truck.  It is not a show truck.  Aaron and I did not want a “trailer queen” but a truck we could drive.  To put the finishing touch on it we had the engine and transmission rebuilt.

The most asked question is, “Is it for sale?”  I say, “No.”  Some are very persistent.  They have made some very tempting offers but I say, “You will have to get on a very long waiting list.”  Some say every man has a price.  I tell folks that I have promised it to Aaron.  It is my gift to him for all the memories of our lasting impressions, “our butts”, and other times that rainy days help create and keep our hearts joined.  Happy Birthday son.

One day Aaron can give it to his son Jack Barrett Hopper.

The Bible has 139 scriptures on the begats.  Here is a look at our heritage since coming from Scotland:

Thomas Hopper, b. 1747, Amherst County, VA; d. 1837, Oglethorpe County, GA     

Rolly Hopper, b. 1775, Amherst Co., VA; d. 1860, Elbert Co.

Mitchell Brady Hopper, b. 1816 or 1817, Oglethorpe County, GA; d. about 1857 in Perry County, AL

William Hopson Hopper, b. August 24, 1853, in Perry County, AL; d. September 9, 1935, Lawley, AL

Mitchell Clark Hopper, b. December 7, 1887, at Lawley, Bibb County, AL; d. March 30, 1935, Lawley, AL

Mitchell Clark Hopper, Jr., b. April 9, 1924, in Waycross, GA; d. April 27, 1994, Jemison, AL

Bobby Earl Hopper, b. December 13, 1952, in Clanton, AL

Aaron Christopher Hopper, b. May 29, 1987, in Birmingham, AL

Jack Barrett Hopper, b. July 19, 2023, in Baytown, TX

 

When people inquire of Gymmie I tell them that it is a labor of love of Father and Son.  Gymmie is a reminder that the Love of The Father and Sacrifice of His Son can transform and give new life the life’s wrecks.

Therefore, if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new. 2 Corinthians 5:17 KJV

Purpose Driven

 Before the millennium, I got an invite from Danny Daniels to spend time with Dr. Rick Warren and the folks at Saddleback Church.  Danny was Rick's best friend.

A preacher friend, Gene Hitchcock had been stationed in California and Rick and Danny served with him there.  Gene was a retired Marine Major.  Gene introduced me to Danny, and I asked him to preach an Easter Revival for me at the Friendship Baptist Church in Clanton, Alabama.

Danny was on staff at Saddleback as Evangelism minister and working with the Billy Graham Organization preaching in areas that would eventually invite Dr. Graham for area-wide crusades.  Danny desire to get started in the Southeast United States.  It was after the revival at Friendship that Daddy invited me to California.

I told several friends of the invitation, and they seemed uninterested thinking I was dreaming.  That was until one of the Southern Baptist Convention's when Danny and I accidentally met.  Another preacher friend and I were resting when Danny spotted me.  I introduced Danny to him.  Danny wanted to know when I was going to visit him at Saddleback.   I told him that I planned in the near future.  He winked in agreement.

Roland, my friend, all of a sudden realized that my invitation was real.  He and I did visit Saddleback.  Roland had received a special grant and paid our way to California.  Danny planned the trip and booked us near Saddleback.  

Dr. Warren was having one of his conferences and Danny secured all the necessities.  Before the conference Danny took into Rick's office and the operation of Saddleback and the The Purpose Driven Life phenomnon.  Danny told us that if Rick had chosen to be a minister that he would have become President.

We were not able to meet Rick who was suffering from severe back pain.  Rick did the conference via video.  During one of the breakout sessions, a gentlemen notice that nametag showed I was from Alabama.  He said, "My name is Jimmy, Rick's dad and I have a sister in Alabama.  Her name Anora Gant and she lives in Titus.  I moved to Texas years ago."

Brother Jimmy did a study guide that accompanies Rick's book.  I hold it as one of the treasures in my collection of books.  My preacher friend was astonished.  He said everyone here is trying to see Rick and his dad chose you.  Hopper, You are something else.

I little later at another time out, a lady approached me and she saw that I was from Alabama.  She looked me in the eyes and asked, "Why do people in Alabama shoot one another?"

I looked at her name tag and saw that she was from California.  I pondered the question and replied in a slow and premeditated Alabama "redneck" southern boy drawl, "Mam, I think that the latest shooting was near LA when some California weirdo shot a rifle off a freeway bridge.  I think that the last school shooting was on the West coast."

Her next question was, "Why do you people in Alabama have so many guns?"

I said it real slow so she would continue to think I was stupid, "To kill for food to eat."  I went into my pastoral voice and taught her about guns and Southern pride, wisdom, and know how.  I said from a young age we are taught to respect a gun.  The Golden Rule of a gun is, "Do not point it at something unless you intent to kill it."  Guns do not kill, PEOPLE KILL.  Cars do not kill, people kill, cell phones do not kill, people kill.  Cigarettes, Alcohol, and drugs do not kill, people kill people.  All the items mentioned left by themselves will never kill.  One of my first lessons in like was I pointed a toy shotgun with corks attached to the barrels at my sister and said, "I'll kill you."  I was playing.  Dad wrapped my new Christmas present around a tree, whipped me, and made me tell my sister I was sorry.  Then, he lectured me on the horror of killing.  He served in WWII and saw plenty of killing.

I drew her attention to a small window and said, I have a small son that can already fire a rifle.  I can tell him to shoot out that window and he can.  He is a very excellent shot.  I told her for the number of guns owned in Alabama, versus the intentional and premediated murders and crimes is not comparable.

She said you eat food you kill.  I told her yes, and someone kills the food you eat.  She was shocked when I told her that I killed hogs, squirrels, rabbits, cows, and even fish.

I had a wonderful adventure visiting California to the Purpose Driven Life Clinic and got to teach a lesson on the purpose of guns and the reality of the hearts of humanity.  Even in Birmingham, Alabama there is a heart condition.  The University of Alabama in Birmingham is one of the finest heart hospitals in the world.  Daily there are murders in Birmingham and surrounding towns.

We must teach our children the realities of life. 

Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it.  Proverbs 22:6

Thou shalt not kill  Exodus 20:13 KJV

For as he thinketh in his heart, so is he  Proverbs 23:7 KJV

Check out Danny Daniels book Mortal Midnight

PONDERING THE JOURNEY

Standing on top of the lime kiln silo I pondered my journey.  Adored with hardhat, safety glasses, respirator, overalls, steel toe boots, and leather gloves I gazed to the south down a big valley toward home.  Holding a number two flat shovel which we called a “Red Neck” dragline, I was in an emotional quandary.

Overcome by the pungent smell of sulfuric acid, the distinct odor of crushed limestone, and hydraulic fluid, I questioned why.  The task at hand was several tons of limestone spilled on top of the silo due to the neglect of a lazy or half-asleep lime feed end employee.  Instead of limestone entering the silo by chute to start the process of making lime, it covered the top of the silo.  My equipment to direct the crushed limestone in the silo was the number two flat shovel and a wheelbarrow which we affectionally called a “Redneck Euclid.”

My crushed pride had me feeling low on a high silo.  It was a test of faith and confidence.  I had just graduated from the University of Montevallo with a Bachelor of Arts degree with a history major and English minor.  I had gathered several honors along the way.  I received all this while on a five-year layoff from the cement plant.  The plant included cement, lime, and quarry operations.

The tears from my eyes were from a combination of sulfuric acid, dust, and broken heart.  As I spoke with God that morning, He directed my attention to the quarry wall that was very visible from high above.  It was a mystic moment as the fog from the lime hydrator, dust from the limestone crushers, and exhaust from the kilns created an Old Testament meeting like unto the prophets.

The quarry is in the geographical center of the State of Alabama.  The Heart of the Heart of Dixie is a gigantic hole.  The limestone mined from the hole is some of the hardest in the world.  The limestone was formed from tiny seashells liken to the conch during the Great Deluge.  The quarry walls are layered at an angle.  Most of Shelby County dotted with limestone and lime plants.  Limestone not conducive for lime becomes gravel.

Here is what the Lord taught me in that spiritual moment.  The limestone was once a living sea creature and after the Great Flood settled into the valley in what is central Alabama.  Dead for thousands, possibly millions, of years until holes were drilled into the limestone beds and explosives packed in them to create limestone rocks that can be a small as dust and as large as the Euclid trucks and loaders that haul them.  Once dead, the Dunamis (dynamite) power begins a new creation.

Some of the limestone must be crushed in a primary crusher where some travel unscathed and large ones crushed.  A secondary crusher will continue to size the stone.  Again, some are untouched.  Before leaving the quarry via conveyor system, a tertiary crusher will make the remaining rock usable aggregate.  Some stone travels from blast to process untouched while others were crushed repeatedly.

Conveyors carry the aggregates to the lime kiln silos where I am having a divine moment.  These will enter a fourth crusher, a jaw crusher, that will feed the lime kilns were the stone will be exposed to intense heat to create “quick lime” which will enter a hydrator to make lime used in almost everything especially the purification of water.

Some branches of the conveyor will carry aggregates to a large “ball” mill that will mix in sand, iron ore, aluminum to create the “raw mix” used to burn in the cement kilns.  The kilns will cook the mix to make clinkers which enter a clinker breaker to resize to send to another “ball” mill called a finish mill to crush the clinkers mixed with gypsum into power making Portland cement.  The cement will be mixed with some sand and rock, mostly limestone making concrete to be used in construction.

During my five-year layoff I worked with Alabama Bridge Builders.  I help pour tons of concrete for beautiful bridges that help travels arrive to their destinations.  In process of building a bridge, some limestone was used directly after the Dunamis power separated it in the quarry.  Some limestone faced very few changes, but yet it is used in the bridge.  Some had many changes but in the end all that were transformed were used to help people in life’s travels. 

God was showing me that my journey would involve many times of being crushed and exposed to transforming trials and to be the only one on top of the silo with a college degree operating a Red Neck dragline loader and Euclid hauler.  God had blessed me!

 

The LORD is near to the brokenhearted; He saves the contrite in spirit.  The LORD is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit       Psalm 34:18

 

But He was pierced for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon Him, and by His stripes we are healed.  Isaiah 53:5

We Hired You for Your Back Not Your Mind

When I started at the cement plant in Calera, Alabama back in October 13, 1976, I was introduced to making cement.  I remember my first day and all the wonders associated with manufacturing cement.  The first thing that my supervisor showed me was clinkers.  He reminded me that cement making is dangerous work.  He looked me in the eye and said, “Hopper, you were hired for your back and not your mind.  Work safe, you may walk into the plant and before the day is done we may have to tote you out!”

Clinkers are made by kiln burning raw materials of lime, iron ore, sand, and aluminum.  Years later I would be a kiln burner operator and watch as the blended ingredients would start a four-hundred fifty feet journey down the kiln.  I trained my eyes to watch the “burning zone” as the powder turned to liquid, then to a clinker as the liquid turn solid as it rolled down the kiln wall. 

Clinkers varied in size from dust particles to baseball size.  They could be gigantic if there was a disruption during the burning process.  The largest I witnessed was four feet in diameter.  It looked like a Volkswagen Beetle rolling toward me.  That’s a story for down the road.

One of my first jobs with the labor crew was helping to tear out bricks from a kiln.  Kiln bricks are 9 inches x 4.5 inches x 3 inches making a circle in a 12 feet diameter kiln hull.  That’s a lot of brick.  Back in the seventies management told us that replacing one row or course of brick cost $125,000 considering all the variables of down time, removal, replacement, and startup curing.

Brick removal is very dangerous.  First a “key” has to be cut in the bricks.  A 90 lbs. jackhammer is the principal tool to cut the key.  The jackhammer weighs more than 90 lbs.  It takes 90 per square inch of air to run it.  It is hard using it on a flat surface and more difficult to operate it in a 12-foot circle surface which 36 feet around the kiln.

Most of the time, about 3 feet high on each side of the key is as high as one could operate the jackhammer.  The rest of the row incorporated a sledgehammer that we effectually called “Percy” in honor of Percy Sledge the recording artist who was an Alabama native.

I had the privilege to operate both the 90 pounder and “Percy.”   One of my first claims to fame involved the sledgehammer.  I had the strength to sling the hammer.  I could tear out the brick but with one fatal flaw.  I would break the head off the handle.  That day I broke every sledgehammer in the plant which was no small number.  My co-workers replaced the handles until they had used everyone the storeroom had driving the cost a little higher.  It is like the man of God replacing the lost axe head in II Kings.

Another time Don, my co-worker, and I were charged by our supervisor, Hubbard, and the plant production manager, Killingworth, to cut a key in the burning zone of the cement kiln.  This area of the kiln reaches temperatures of 2200 degrees and uses a more expensive brick.  $125000 multiplied by 100 rows (75 feet) is $12,500,000 for a rough estimate in 1976.

Don and I asked how far they wanted the key cut.  They responded, “Don’t worry about that, just cut to we get back.”  So, we did as instructed.  I ran the jackhammer and Don tossed out the brick.  I cut three bricks, then four for seventy-five feet key.

Suddenly, Don and I smelled the aroma of a pipe in the draft of the kiln.  Hubbard, which we called” Pawpaw”, could not sneak up on us because of the pipe.  Killingworth, which we called “Killer”, not because of his name but due to an attempted suicide, entered the kiln.

It was a grand entrance.  Killer’s face turned blood red like unto a cartoon character and tossed his hardhat up the kiln in anger and cussing like a Corinthian sailor.  Pawpaw had some unlike Pawpaw words as well.  “Why in the &@!$#did you tear out so many bricks?”

 Our answer was classic.  “You told us not worry about it just tear them out to you got back.”  They denied it but Don that Pawpaw kind of favored said, Hubbard you did say tear them out to you got back.”

Don and I had worked hard without stopping while they were gone.  They were only going to replace 15 feet.  Killer and Pawpaw told everyone that the brick were rotten and that is why Don, and I removed them so quickly.  Killer and Pawpaw had to report to upper management, but everyone in Calera knew they were just covering their very costly blunder.

All they had to do was tell us what they wanted.  We just used our backs and did not think.  

 But as one was felling a beam, the axe head fell into the water: and he cried, and said, Alas, master! for it was borrowed.  II Kings 6:5 KJV

He becometh poor that dealeth with a slack hand: but the hand of the diligent maketh rich.  Proverbs 10:4 KJV

Dad's Last Supper

 This past Sunday, Resurrection Sunday, Union Springs Baptist Church observed the Lord's Supper during the Worship.  My mind goes back to that last supper when Jesus became a servant and washed the disciple's feet.  True to who He was He humbled himself to the lowest of servants.  It was a nasty job.

I'm reminded each time of being the one in my immediate family that had to empty the "slop jar" each morning.  Some people would call the "slop jar" a chamber pot.  Our slop jar was an empty gallon paint can.  We couldn't afford an inside toilet nor a store-bought chamber pot.  They did not have them in Jesus' day and the lowest of servants would empty the clay jars of human waste at the local dung gate or dump.  I emptied our tin gallon bucket in the edge of the woods.

The slop jar resided in my brothers and my bedroom.  Our sister had to do "Number Two" in it almost every night.  I believe did it because I had to empty it.  My brothers and I just went outside to pee and to the outhouse (toilet) when dad built one.

When Granny Hopper would stay with us, she always used the paint can slop jar.  There was no modesty curtain and our ten-by-ten bedroom with the army cot which was my bed and my brothers' double bed filled one end of the room.  A baby bed used for clean clothes that mama ironed was at the foot of my cot.  Each corner beside the door opening (no door) were wires nailed loaded with clothes and coats.

I was ashamed carrying the slop jar especially when we had company.  When there was company, I would place the tin bucket through my sister's bedroom window outside on the ground.  I would carry and empty it.  The edge of the yard was so beautiful green where I deposit my sister's number one and two. 

My sister was like one the Buc-ee gas station’s rest rooms sayings, “We are number one at number two.” 

Sunday marked the forty-first Easter since my dad died.  As were observed Communion, I thought back to the Last Supper I had with dad.  It was the Monday night after Easter, and we had convinced momma to take some time off.  She had cared two years for dad who had a brain tumor.  He was in his last hours.  Momma had babied daddy and his nursed could not believe how healthy he was.

Momma had fixed daddy a wonderful meal with his favorite potatoes, green field peas, pepper sauce, corn, tomatoes, cornbread, and sweet tea.  I wheeled dad to the supper table in his wheelchair.  He was very feeble and could not speak.  I prepared him a plate and began to feed him.  Every time I watch Driving Miss Daisy, I weep.  I think of feeding daddy what would be his last meal. 

I would take a fork and point it to his food.  If he wanted it, he would nod his head yes.  If he did not want it, he would nod no.  One time he nodded no to everything.  I finally bumped the sweet tea glass, and he smiled and nodded yes.  It is a precious moment in his and my being that I will forever cherish.

I feed him some cornbread, and he choked.  I thought he was going to die, and I was alone with him.  We had a great time not realizing it would be the last time we would communicate.  During the night he slipped into a coma.  Early Friday around four in the morning, daddy died.  I would spend our last moments holding his hand.  When he the nurse pronounced him dead, I shook his hand and said, "See you later pop."

Daddy had turned sixty on April 9, 1984.  Easter Sunday was April 22, 1984, and I fed dad his last meal on the 23rd which is today's date for this article.  He died on the 27th.  

Jesus knowing that the Father had given all things into his hand, and that He was come from God, and went to God; He riseth from supper, and laid aside his garment; and took a towel, and girded himself.  After he pureth the water into a bason, and began to wash the disciples' feet, and to wipe them with the towel wherewith he was girded.   John 13:3-5 KJV

"Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in me." John 14:1 KJV  

Greatest Night in History

 

So, after receiving the morsel of bread, he immediately went out.  And it was dark. John 13:30

How many of you know someone that has so much potential and refuses to live the good life that God has for them?  Each of us knows someone who has allowed alcohol, drugs, and other deadly vices destroy careers, marriages, families, and fortunes.  How many parents grieve over a child that could have been a great Christian working to improve society but falls victim to the sins of society?  How many neglect the opportunity to serve the Lord? Do we consider how much we grieve the Father when we do not live according to His plan thereby not living to our potential?

Journey back to the night of Jesus’ betrayal.  What was the greatest night in the history of the world when the disciples were gathered together with God turned into a restless night of confusion, separation, denial, guilt, jealousy, murmuring, and rejection.  An intimate relationship with Jesus and with each other becomes a night of revelation about the hearts of the Twelve where unfilled areas of the heart were exploited by sin, especially Judas.  Jesus loved Judas knowing his future betrayal.  Jesus knows and loves us in-spite-of our actions. 

Long Cold Journey

 I love Spring.  New life is everywhere.  The sunshine creates thousands of shades of green, millions of different colors decorating the landscape, and in Alabama temperature changes that baffle the mind.  In the mornings you need heat and clothes that keep you warm and are removable because afternoon you need an air-conditioner and shed clothing.

Night times are marvelous with clear skies and billions of stars that remind us how insignificant we seem in this universe God created.  The Bible reminds us that humanity is His greatest creation and all that He created was for us.

One beautiful spring Saturday, my son Aaron and I decided to make a road trip.  Living in Linden, Alabama we were a hundred miles from Sugar Ridge my home where I grew up and where I am now retired.  Aaron has a Jeep Wrangler, and we removed the hard top and doors and started to make the trip just to check on the house and property.

I went into the house and got me a jacket.  It was a good sun shining morning and Aaron questioned my getting my leather jacket.  I reminded him that it might turn cold before we returned to Linden.  He reluctantly got him a jacket, a down one I might add. 

Aaron had a friend that had testicle cancer and had lost all his hair due to treatments.  Aaron decided to shave his head to encourage his friend.  He asked me to shave it, and I did.  I add this information because it is pertinent to our adventure.

The journey was one that helps bring a father-son relationship a cherished one.  Aaron had the best time that day.  My hair was blowing in the wind while Aaron's bald head was getting a tan.  It was exhilarating viewing the spring unfolding its beauty.  It was fantastic watching from the jeep.  We took our time and took in every special moment.

The Spring began sinking into the western horizon.  Sunsets are gorgeous on Sugar Ridge.  We started our one-hundred-mile journey back to Linden.  My leather jacket looks great but lacks any warm thermal qualities.  I carried mostly for blocking the wind.  Aaron started home in his short sleeves.  We went through Clanton the county set of Chilton County got us some grub from Sonic as darkness dominated the skies.  The air began to cool.

Traveling down Alabama Highway 22, it got cold and colder.  Aaron finally put on his jacket and turned the Jeep's heater to high.  On 22, we discovered all the cold spots and the colder spot that trees had shaded during the day.  Warm spots we few and far between.  My leather jacket did not warm me.

With the temperature steady falling, I begged Aaron to stop, and I would use political signs to make us doors for the jeep.  It was election year and there was plenty if signs.  He pulled his jacket over his bald head, I shivered, and the Jeep began a refrigerator.  When we reached Selma, we stopped at a redlight and the heat from the pavement temporally gave us some warmth.  

I don't know if the cold froze Aaron's brain, but he would not stop.  Outside Selma we were halfway to Linden.  We could not feel the heater any longer.  Aaron was driving so his left leg was exposed the cold from the missing door.  As passenger I my right leg was freezing.  He slowed the Jeep hoping it would reduce the and we could feel the heater.  It did not good.  Two icicles finally arrived in Linden to a warm house.  Both of us still had cold legs.

We laugh at our frozen escapade now.  It was a journey that I will always cherish mostly because I made this wonderful memory with my teenage son.  

Thanks, Aaron, for making life fun and unforgettable.

Thank you, God, for your wonderful creation and unpredictable Alabama weather.

O Lord, our Lord, how excellent is thy name in all the earth! who hast set thy glory above the heavens.  Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings hast thou ordained strength because of thine enemies, that thou mightest still the enemy and the avenger.  When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which thou hast ordained; What is man, that thou art mindful of him? and the son of man, that thou visitest him?  For thou hast made him a little lower than the angels, and hast crowned him with glory and honour.  Thou madest him to have dominion over the works of thy hands; thou hast put all things under his feet:  All sheep and oxen, yea, and the beasts of the field; The fowl of the air, and the fish of the sea, and whatsoever passeth through the paths of the seas.  O Lord our Lord, how excellent is thy name in all the earth!  Psalm 8 KJV

While the earth remaineth, seedtime and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease. Genesis 8:22 KJV

The Right to Vote

 It was a November evening in Alabama.  The Hopper family loaded into a 1958 Chevrolet Biscayne and headed to Posey’s Crossroads.  It was Election Day.  Day had changed his election voting location from Randolph, Alabama to Posey’s Crossroads which was less than a half mile from our home.

Dad had moved us back from Beloit, Illinois in March 1960.  Dad had been registered in Randolph even while we lived in Illinois from1957 to 1960.  This had to be 1964 and one of the most memorable moments of my life.

Mom, my sister and two brothers sat in the Chevy as dad entered the polling building which was a car shed which exists until now.  Things in the ballot house started to deteriorate when they refused to allow daddy to vote.    He had returned back to the house to get the legal documents that verified that daddy had changed his voting place.  

Dad walked back into the car shed and produced his documents.  What they told dad was that his name was not in alphabetical order and was added to the back of their registration roaster.  The irony was that dad was registered and all the men running the voting were personal friends with dad.  They often played checkers across the road at our local store/filling station at Land Mart.

There was a big commotion building as faces turned red, shouting continued to get loud, and face to face confrontation grew intense.  Then it happened.  Escalating, dad began to roll up his long-sleeved shirt.  We all sat in the Chevy watching something like at the movie drive end.

Momma said, “Bobby, go get your daddy.  Tell him it is not worth it.”  What those so-called friends of daddy did not realize, they were about to feel the wrath of my dad.  It was a defining moment for the Hopper family.

Dad’s rolling of the sleeves was a signal that some serious “butt kicking” was about to explode.  Mom always bought regular shirts for her Hopper man and his three sons.  They never fit because we were not regular.  We were taller and bigger.  I have pictures of us growing up.  Regardless of the sleeve, short or long were worn one to two rolls on them.  When dad got serious, working or kicking butt, he rolled them higher above the bend of the elbow.

When we lived in Beloit, Illinois, daddy worked at Beloit Ironworks in Beloit Wisconsin.  We lived one block from the state line.  One morning after a midnight shift, a raucous began across the street at a tavern named The Brown Derby.  Police were trying to arrest a drunk.  He had escaped and wound up in our back yard.  He had wrapped his arms around on a utility pole.  There the police had handcuffed him there.

Daddy woke from all the commotion and went out to investigate.  He asked the officers what was happening.  They said they could not put the man in the patrol car.  The drunk did something that most Yankees do not take offence but to Good Old Southern men and boys it is the unpardonable sin.  The drunk what’s it to you SOB as he spat in daddy’s face.

Dad slowly removed his wristwatch and his beloved ruby ring and handed them to one of the bystanders as he rolled up his sleeves.  With one bow to the jaw of the drunk, he slid down the pole, the officers thanked dad, undone the handcuffs, and laid the unconscious twice smashed intoxicated man in the patrol car.

The person that took dad’s ring and watch gave them to mom as the neighbors gave dad an ovation.

I went into the voting shed and took daddy by the hand as he rolled his sleeves.  I was almost twelve years old.  Looking at dad with eyes of pity and respect I said, "Momma said to come on that they are not worth it,” She knew dad would do serious damage and be in serious trouble.

The real damage was that we spent the rest of the evening traveling to the county courthouse trying to help daddy vote he never did.

That is one of few times I witnessed my daddy being hurt.  We heard him telling the poll men that he fought and was wounded in WWII, that he paid his pole tax (abolished in 1966), and that he was registered.  None of the men at the polls had ever served in the military.  From that day on, dad never respected or had any relationship with those men.

Not long ago someone posted an Easter picture (below) of my sister, brothers, and me.  People wanted to know, “What’s up with these Hopper boys and rolled up sleeves.”   As Hank Williams Jr., another Alabama boy would say, “It a family tradition.”  We all still do it even though our lovely wives buy us shirts that fit.  It’s a habit and reminder of the right to vote.

For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind. 

II Timothy 1:7 KJV 

It is joy to the just to do judgement: but destruction shall be to the workers of iniquity. 

Proverbs 21:15 KJV

Notice the sleeves on the Hopper boys

MIRROR, MIRROR

 

            One of my earliest memories is getting a haircut. I remember sitting on a board on the arm rails of one of Mr. Bratton’s barber chairs. As I looked in the mirror, I could see the barber cutting my blond locks from my small head. I have a very large knot on the back of my head, and, for years, the barber would gap my hair and cut my head. During that first cut the barber pulled my hair, and I have hated a haircut since that time.

            I never understood why Daddy made my brothers and me get a haircut every two weeks. We were very poor, and the $1.50 charge was more than the hourly minimum wage. I think that the other boys being long-haired hippy freaks might have played a major role, but most of the haircuts came before that era.

            The trip to the barbershop was not all bad. While Daddy supposedly ran chores, I would read comic books. There were Spiderman, Batman, Superman, and the Incredible Hulk.

            The most fascinating thing was the barbershop mirrors. Behind and in front of each barber chair were large mirrors. Looking up from deep in the bat cave while reading Batman, I could see the mirrors reflecting one another. It was endless. One reflected the other until it got so tiny you could barely see the reflection, but it kept on going. That was long before the Energizer bunny!

            I do not like mirrors, because they reveal too much. The better the mirror the more flaws one can see. Take the poor stepmother in Snow White. The poor woman was the fairest in the land until the day Snow White became a young woman. I studied Bettelheim's interpretation of fairy tales in college. He said that in fairy tales the wicked stepmother is really the mother who loses the husband’s affection to the budding young daughter. In other words, Snow White became a daddy’s girl. The poor mirror just reflected what stood before it. Father time caught up with the mom.

            My brother-in-law had a revealing experience once in a steakhouse. He was at the potato bar. As he loaded his baked potato, he noticed a man on the opposite side of the bar. The man had a huge potato, covered with cheese, bacon bits, butter, and sour cream. My brother-in-law was amazed at how much the man put on the potato. The potato had so much in it that it spilled over onto the man’s plate.

            My brother-in-law thought to himself, “What a pig!” My brother-in-law noticed that the man stopped when he stopped and started when he started. He thought the man was watching him. He noticed the man’s arm and realized that the man was wearing a red and black flannel shirt, just as he was wearing. The man continued to mimic my brother-in-law’s movements.

            Curiosity killed the cat, so my brother-in-law lowered his head to see who was on the other side—only to see his own reflection in the mirror. The thoughts my brother-in-law had had about the man were really his own condemnation. It always looks worse when we watch someone else doing what we do.

            A colleague of mine said his dad ran an auto repair shop. When he visited there, his dad asked some advice to help him organize the collection of repair manuals he had in his office. My colleague suggested that his dad could put more shelves behind his desk if he would remove a large mirror. His dad told him the mirror had to stay. He said that when customers became angry during a repair, he would invite them into the office for coffee and discuss the problem. He said he never had a customer get irate or even very angry. They would not—because they could see their reflection in the mirror.

            While attending university, I worked in the carpenter’s shop. On one occasion, we placed mirrors in an exercise room for the athletic department. Every piece of exercise equipment in the room had a full-length mirror where a person could see his or her progress. People did not know that it was an experiment.

            Each participant followed the same routine. The first mirror distorted the person’s reflection to make him appear heavier than he actually was. Each mirror targeted a specific part of the body, and the exercise equipment in front of it worked that area. When he completed the workout, he looked in the last mirror, which made him look thinner than he was. The mirrors encouraged people to exercise.

            Mirrors help dentists, mechanics, electricians, welders, and truck drivers see places they normally cannot see. If you drive, you know the importance of a rearview mirror. “Objects are closer than they appear.”

Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like a man who looks at his face in a mirror and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like. But the man who looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues to do this, not forgetting what he has heard, but doing it—he will be blessed in what he does. (James 1:22–25, NIV)

 

How will the reading of God’s Word aloud help reveal more of God? 

Do you think about being made in God’s image when you see your reflection in the mirror? 

How is the Bible relevant in your life today? 

 

Prayer: Father, thank You for your eternal word that helps us see what we cannot see. Your Word reveals You and helps us see ourselves as You see us. It does not gloss over sin or sinners and does not compromise. Your Word is perfect, and blessings flow when we live it. Help us to be reflections of your marvelous grace and infinite mercy. Thank You for creating us in Your image.

page 26, I Will Speak Using Stories: Thirty-one Day Devotional 

Matters that Mattered

 

But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. Philippians 3:13b-14

The apostle Paul challenged Christians at Philippi to look to the future and not rest on their accomplishments.  He stressed the importance of pressing forward toward the upward call of Christ or be under the threat of perfectionism. 

Christ liberated Paul from the old Pharisaic values and sins that consumed him.  Paul challenged those who experienced liberation to look to those things ahead.

Paul’s epistles reveal that he lived a real life in real circumstances with real options to choose.  He made some wise choices.  He pursued matters that mattered.  He said, “One thing I do.”  Without a defining, central priority, there can be no sensible priorities in life.  Paul knew that all his priorities grew from this consuming priority. 

Priorities help us choose, but a consuming priority redefines how we say yes and lives to make that yes a reality.  Paul challenges: Don’t look back, stretch forward, and never give up.

Heard Through the Grapevine

 

Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of God, for it is written, “Vengeance is mine, I will repay says the Lord.” Romans 12:19

A few years back gossip wrecked my ministry.  As a pastor, my reputation was rooted in confidentiality, honesty, and moral integrity and all these dissipated when well-intended folks spread rumors rooted “appearance of evil.”

I learned as a young man that things are not always as they appear.  I tell folks not to believe everything they hear and only half of what they see.

Those that knew the truth tried to squelch the rumors, but juicy gossip attracts more attention than the truth.  The hardest thing has been to forgive the perpetrators and ignore the gossipmongers.  The “country boy” in me wants to even things, but my faith says wait on the Lord.  I know that the Lord will judge accordingly.

The Lord has blessed my faith with a renewed ministry, a more compassionate heart, and better understanding of forgiveness.

Hold to the truth.  God knows the truth and repays.

Love of the Game

I love to play football.  From the very first time I played on the school playground I was hooked.  I had thrown the football in the yard with dad, but never really played the game until physical education at Jemison elementary.

It was fourth grade recess, and two teams were playing.  I didn’t know anything about the game and had never watched one on television of been to one at school.  On one particular play a new kid had transferred from Calera Elementary and seemed to know about the game.  His name was Tony and he was quarterback.  I didn’t really know what a quarterback did, but he was the one throwing the ball.

As he dropped back to pass it, I realized he was throwing it toward me.  In yard football we played more running than throwing.  I was more Rugby than football.  I reached up and caught the ball.  The guys around me hollered “interception” and the new kid that threw the ball asked, “Whose side you on?” Not really knowing, I yelled, “Yours.”  He yelled, “Touchdown!”   That was the beginning of many passes that my future brother-in-law would toss me.  I would play many PE games before I actually witnessed a real game. 

 My best friend during my school years was Ricky.  He was a small boy and an avid University of Alabama football fan.  Tony my other new friend was an Auburn University football fan.  Being an ignorant poor boy from across the tracks, I was clueless about college football.  I had no idea about national championships.  As I said, never watched one and had no idea that a Bear was coach at Alabama or that a guy named Shug was coach at Auburn.

 One day in the lunchroom Tony and Ricky were arguing, as most Alabama and Auburn fans do, about who was better.  They would almost fight over it.  Finally, they asked me who I was for, Alabama or Auburn.  Now I was clueless about who or what an Auburn fan was, but I knew I lived in Alabama and said, “Alabama of course.”  Ricky and Tony would be bitter rivals until the die-hard Alabama fan went the Auburn University for an engineering degree. 

In the spring of the seventh grade, Ricky talked me into going out for football.  Spring training was much harder than PE football.  On the first scrimmage coaches lined up across from a junior named Tracy.  He was a monster.  I found out that he was a very good tackle.  He made All Conference the previous season.

I had never played organized football, so I asked the coach what I was supposed to do.  It sounded simple.  He said, “Tackle the man with the football.”  I had done a little of that at PE with my peers from fourth through seventh grade.  They were nowhere near the size of Tracy. 

Suddenly the center snapped the ball, and I disappeared in a cloud of dust and under a mass of humanity.  It hurt really badly, but I was determined.  Same thing happened over and over.  The best thing about the spring practice was I got to watch my first real live football game from the sidelines.

In the ninth grade I had the privilege and honor to be one of the practice dummies for the first every state championship playoff in Alabama and for Jemison.  We ended second in the State of Alabama Two A playoff.  In the off I have the privilege of seeing my first T-bone steak.   I couldn’t eat so I gave it to one of our running backs.   I got to go to a football banquet and received my first football letter.  They gave away trophies and I determined to win one the next year.

God blessed my football training by chasing hogs and I found that catching football players were much easier.  I played defensive end and offensive tackle/end.  I remembered what they told me at my first ever practice, “tackle the man with the ball.”  So, I did.  They added a bonus.  They said hit the quarterback every play.  So, I did when there was no one else to tackle. 

I earned two trophies for best defensive player for my junior and senior years.  Made all conference and had scholarships offers.  I received one from Dartmouth College and another from a junior college.  Alabama and Auburn said I was too small.

 I loved to hit quarterbacks.  I love the game.  I loved it enough that I received a cussing every day when I got home from walking six miles to house and feeding hogs and getting in firewood.  I loved it enough that we played most every Saturday and Sundays between morning and night services.

My dad worked evening shift.  One night my sophomore year, I went to the sideline for a breather.  Someone said your dad is here.  I looked and there stood dad in the tunnel leading to the field.  He was in his work clothes, covered in grease, and wearing a hardhat.  I was proud and happy.

My junior year he sacrificed and took off work to travel to Selma, Alabama to watch me.  That night I had hit the quarter back most of the night forcing him to pitch the football.  The coach changed the scheme and had me take the running back.  When the Selma quarterback ran the option, he looked to see where I was.  When he saw me, he pitched to the running back whom I hit immediately forcing a fumble.  The football shot high in the air and hit in the end zone spinning like a top.  I jumped on it scoring a touchdown.  Dad was there.

The new Name Image Likeness (NIL) rule breaks my heart.  Going to the highest bidder replaces team loyalty.  Love of money has replaced love for the game.

 

 For the love of money is the root of all evil (I Timothy 6:10)

This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased (Matthew 3:17)

Imago Dei

 The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and the knowledge of the Holy One is insight. Proverbs 9:10

Have you ever heard someone say, “God is out to get me?”  I had a co-worker that continuously said it.

We are created in the Image of God, “Imago Dei.” The world says we evolved however, Christianity, on the authority of God’s Word, states that we are created.

We are created with a purpose, to glorify God and enjoy Him forever.   He loved us enough that He imparted us with the dignity of being free moral agents, the ability to make choices, to choose evil or good

We are created with meaning and have interpretation in relation to God.  Our understanding of ethics, law, education, and sexuality depend on what we believe about our beginning.  We begin with God or a mindless processes and dramatic consequences.  We have God’s moral rules. Finally, one night I told my co-worker, “Jesus did not come to earth to get us, but to die and resurrect for us.”     

The Great Deceiver

 

In the Garden of Eden came the first lie

The Deceiver said, surely you will not die

The woman decided to give it a try

To the Garden of Eden, she said goodbye

 

A lie has the tendency to grow

Further and further from the original it will go

Where it comes to rest, we may never know

It creates havoc and a really big show

 

The lie a reputation will ruin

People accused of that not doing

Juicy gossip with mouths chewing

Imaginations in the mind brewing

 

Lies believed before the truth a way of life

Partial truths are malicious, deceptive, and anti-life

Lies are colored causing trouble and strife

Simple and selfish is the black lie creating lowlife

 

Fibs are lies of trivial matter especially from a child

Jocose lies are told in jest, a tall tale that is wild

Grey lies are hard to clarify, ambiguous and begild

Whites lies avoid hurting someone and acceptably mild

 

Exaggerations are lies with fundamental truths within

Half-truths can be the whole truth with a deceiving end

Told big enough and long enough a lie will be the trend

Just remember the Great Deceiver is where lies begin

Bobby E. Hopper