Chernobyl, Katrina, and Hope

Earthquakes, hurricanes, tornadoes, and floods remind us that there are more opportunities for ministry than normal.  Watching tragic events unfold before our eyes makes one realize that our world is in a mess.  It is messes that help us keep the perspective that we need a Savior.

Hurricane Katrina was a reminder of how quick death and devastation hit.  Missing people, sex predators, and disregard for human life are demoralizing to any society.  Overnight, New Orleans turned diabolical.  What happened in moments will take a lifetime to rebuild.  Some things will never recover.  Local residents told me that one third of New Orleans’ population will never return.

There seems to be no end to world turmoil and the reality that at any moment there could be a nuclear holocaust that would make Chernobyl look like a boy scouts’ campfire.  The Chernobyl explosions and the resulting fire sent a plume of highly radioactive fallout into the atmosphere and extensive parts of western Soviet Union, Eastern, Western, and Northern Europe, and North America.  It had four hundred times more fallout than the A-bomb of Hiroshima.  Ireland experienced a light nuclear rain.  The Ukraine, Belarus, and Russia were badly  contaminated.  My friend Alice was teaching school in Italy at the time of Chernobyl and witnessed the devastation.

Speaking of first hand Chernobyl experiences, I had the honor and privilege of flying to Los Angeles to spend a week at Dr. Rick Warren’s Saddleback conference several years ago.  The man sitting next to me on the flight was a retired editor from Time Magazine.  He was returning from an editorial summit in South America.  He had been there to judge young journalists and rate their potential as writers for major magazines.  He was very articulate and global in his conversation.  I shared with him that I was a former cement worker.    

When I asked him to share some of his travels, he related my cement vocation to the Chernobyl incident.  He told me of a Russian general he had befriended while in Russia.  He said that this General was wealthy by American standards and lived an extravagant lifestyle, but could not enjoy it because he dying from radiation poison.  He had been exposed to radiation while working in the Chernobyl nuclear facility when it developed the leak and became one of many victims.  The editor said the world would never know just how many died trying to save the earth from radiation poison.

I told him that I had a friend who was teaching school in Italy when it happened and that she said the devastation was so severe that livestock and vegetation were died where she was teaching.  It was then that he told me the horror of what happened according to the general.

The general said that the radioactive material from the leak was eating into the earth at an alarming rate.  Russian scientists feared that it would eventually eat to the core of the earth causing worldwide catastrophic problems.  Hundreds of workers perished as they tried to stop the leak.  Massive earth moving machines raced to dig below the material to pour concrete several feet thick to contain it.  They were trying to form a bowl.  After several unsuccessful attempts, they finally stopped the leak.  The human cost was great.

This is one of many detrimental incidents to our planet.  All the things that we have done to the spaceship we call earth has a price.  Hurricanes, earthquakes, wars, and rumors of wars are the result of sin.  Sin caused the creation to fall from its perfect state.

“The creation waits in eager expectation for the sons of God to be revealed.  For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the glorious freedom of the children of God.  We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time.” (Romans 8:19-22 NIV)

How has a catastrophe affected your life?

Are you optimistic of pessimistic about the future? Write down your feelings.

What are you doing to help the environment of this planet we call earth?

Prayer: Father, as believers, we can see the world physically decaying and spiritually degenerating. Help us to be optimistic and not to be pessimistic, because we have a blessed hope. Thank you for the brighter days that lie ahead for the whole creation, for a time is coming when the curse will be removed, and creation will be restored to its original splendor. Thank you for the promise of resurrection with our glorified bodies, like the body Christ now has in heaven.

"Uncle"

Do you have a favorite uncle?  I know most families have that weird aunt or uncle that they avoid discussing.  For some reason or another, this aunt or uncle has alienated herself or himself from the family through an embarrassing moment or shameful event.  I bet right about now that person is on your mind.

Most everyone has a favorite aunt or uncle.  It is hard to choose a favorite because I have some good uncles.  My favorite was Uncle Clifton.  I think he was because he is the first one that I remember.  He lived with us when we lived in Illinois.  He was the reason that we moved there initially.

Uncle Clifton was my dad’s younger brother.  He ran away from home when he was sixteen because he had a heart condition and Granny Hopper would not let him participate in football and any other activity that would put a strain on his heart.  So, as the old timers would say, Uncle Clifton went missing for several years and went wild during that time.

Leaving the slow-paced South in the 1940’s, Uncle Clifton settled in the fast and wild area of Illinois ninety miles west of Chicago in the mid 1950’s.  We moved there in 1957 and daddy went to work with Uncle Clifton at Beloit Ironworks in Beloit.  Beloit, Alabama, on Highway 22 near Selma is named for the college located in Beloit, Wisconsin.  If you haven’t figured it out, Beloit was on the Illinois/Wisconsin state line.

For a five-year-old kid to have an uncle who raced cars on a dirt track, rode a Harley with saddlebags, had tattoos, rolled his cigarettes in his white t-shirt sleeves, and wore a black leather jacket with a Marlon Brando motorcycle hat, why would he not be his favorite uncle?

Uncle Cliff and I had a special relationship.  It was wonderful to watch Uncle Clifton race old # 7 at the Madison Raceway, it was fun riding on his Harley, asking about his tattoos, and just listening to him speak in that Yankee brogue.  Uncle Clifton loved and looked up to my daddy.  That made him special.

Uncle Clifton would tell me about the times that daddy would rescue him from barroom brawls.  The police would call daddy and tell him to come get Uncle Clifton.  Uncle Clifton said when daddy entered the barroom, that dad started cleaning house.  Uncle Clifton said that one time he was fighting this guy when a big hand grabbed his shoulder.  Uncle Clifton turned to knock the guy’s block off, but stopped short when he saw that it was dad.  Dad told Uncle Clifton to get in the car.

Years later, long after moving back to Alabama, and Uncle Clifton settled down and married Aunt Maxine, they would make yearly visits to Alabama.  We looked forward to them coming and telling of all the times we had together in Illinois.

By 1982, dad had a brain tumor and started wasting away.  Uncle Clifton could not afford to come to Alabama as he once did.  He had heard how bad dad was and a few weeks before daddy died, Uncle Clifton managed to see dad.

Momma said that when Uncle Clifton saw dad in the hospital bed there in the living room that Uncle Clifton said he had to step outside for a moment.  From the kitchen window, momma saw Uncle Clifton outside by dad’s tractor.  He was crying.  When he saw daddy wasting away, it was more than he could take.

Momma went out and consoled Uncle Clifton convincing him to go back in and see dad.  Uncle Clifton struggled as he watched his big brother and hero wasting away.  Trying not to break down in front of dad, Uncle Clifton spent a few precious moments sharing brotherly love bragging what a big man dad was to him and many others in Beloit.

The last time I saw Uncle Clifton, he had stopped by the Pastorium at Gallion as he made the rounds seeing the ones he loved.  As we sat on the front porch there in Gallion, he talked of dad and told me how much he loved him.  He told me how difficult it was watching dad, and later, momma, Uncle James, Aunt Bessie, and Aunt Gertrude wasting away from cancer and that he did not want to waste away with cancer.

He surprised me when he told me how much he admired me.  Then, he shocked me when he told me that at one time he felt the Lord was calling him to preach, but he ran.

Shortly after becoming Director of Missions, I received a call that Uncle Clifton died from a heart attack while making the loop to see his loved ones.  I knew that he was on his way to visit Linden, but instead I traveled to Beloit, walked down some old familiar roads, and smiled.  I, like uncle Clifton, cried as I looked down at the body of a once young and vigorous body now broken and ravaged by disease.

Uncle Clifton was not the first, nor I the last, to look upon a body wasting away by some demonic disease.  When I read how Job’s friends found him, I think of Uncle Clifton and him seeing daddy.

Now when Job's three friends heard of all this evil that was come upon him, they came every one from his own place; Eliphaz the Temanite, and Bildad the Shuhite, and Zophar the Naamathite: for they had made an appointment together to come to mourn with him and to comfort him.  And when they lifted up their eyes afar off, and knew him not, they lifted up their voice, and wept; and they rent every one his mantle, and sprinkled dust upon their heads toward heaven.  So they sat down with him upon the ground seven days and seven nights, and none spake a word unto him: for they saw that his grief was very great (Job 2:11-13 KJV).

I like how the Message translates the friends seeing Job: When they first caught sight of him, they couldn’t believe what they saw- they hardly recognized him!

Ain’t it amazing how the Bible speaks to us and makes life relevant?

Pollution It's Everywhere

Do you remember the commercial on pollution with an Indian Chief as spokesman?  It is the one where a Native American, Iron Eyes Coty, sheds a tear as he looks at a polluted stream.  Every time I saw the commercial, I thought it looked a lot like the roads, streams, and creeks in Chilton County.

When I walk the fence line on my property in Jemison, I have to carry a garbage sack, sometimes two, to pick up behind sorry folks who throw out their trash.  I don’t know about you, but I do not like picking up other people’s trash.

I have identified some characteristics of those people that want us to pick up after them.  One is they like fast food restaurants, especially McDonald’s.  It is bad enough to pick up hamburger wrappers, but it is wrappers, open catsup packets, tissue, and bit and pieces of hamburger, buns, and fries.  These folks try to be helpful by tossing out the whole bag where a family of four has chowed down on the grub, in their old jalopy, on the way to who knows where.  Undoubtedly, it is a place where there are no trash bins or containers.

Another thing is that these polluters smoke cigarettes, especially Marlboro lights in the box.  It’s bad enough that they empty their ashtrays in the public parking lots, but they decorate the highways with butts and empty boxes.  Every time I see someone toss a butt on the ground I want to pick it up and toss it on his or her car, but that would make me like him or her.  I need to be careful here, I want to preach a minute on the dreadful odor of nicotine and the awful sight of discarded butts when entering places that are clearly marked, “A Tobacco Free Facility.”  The ones at hospitals are kinda of an oxymoron.  Oop’s, I almost got on a soapbox.

Another identifying mark of the polluter is they drink alcohol, especially Bud Light.  They usually prefer the dark long neck bottles that break on impact.  These babies create safety hazards for the unprotected hand and the unsuspecting lawnmower tire.  The long neck bottle provides a nice handle to use the bottle as a projectile to toss at mailboxes, especially the fancy antique aluminum ones or the very elusive metal fence post that gallantly holds the barbed wire and retains docile livestock.

Coming in second in alcohol arena is empty pints of whiskey.  These are more durable and are not easily broken, excepting when you run over them with a tractor.  They shatter pretty good when a water filled rear tractor tire sits directly on top of them.

The lowest of polluters is the one that uses plastic soda bottles as temporary holders of urine.  These pee bombs wreak havoc on the unsuspecting lawn care worker who is so diligent to keep his or her area of the county right-of-way Southern Living Magazine perfect and help lower the high cost of county maintenance butchering, I mean bush hogging, of grass and trash.

Pollution is not confined to the streams, creeks, and roadsides.  Radio, television, movies, music and iphones, and all manner of social media have a lion’s share of pollution.  One evening at Linden Fitness and Tan, some young men tried to play some polluted music from their iphones.  They would not because a certain man was in the gym.  He told me that he was going to hang around because they will not play it in his presence.  I told him not to worry and that I would handle it.  Sure enough, just as soon as he left, these young men started to play their filthy music.  I calmly walked over and asked if their music contained bad (lewd or suggestive) music.  They said no, but they turned it off because I heard some filthy stuff.  There were some young girls in the gym and I reminded these two young men that neither the girls nor I wanted to hear it.

It is sad that filthy language is becoming more prevalent each day.  Madison Avenue advertising tries to put offensive and suggestive language in commercials for hamburgers, credit cards, and most recently Chevy trucks.  Thankfully, people complain and they remove the offensive language.

O.S. Hawkins in his devotion, The Joshua Principle reminds us that in the last days there will be a polluted pulpit.  One of the sure signs of the Lord’s Second Coming is that pulpits will turn from the truth.  Paul said, Preach the word; be instant in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering and doctrine.  For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears; and they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables.”  II Timothy 4:2-4

Polluted pulpits create polluted congregations.  Believers are to be in the world, but not of the world.  The Word of God is forever true.  As the Word of God unfolds around us, my we influence culture rather than culture influencing the church.

The picture I see here is not of Iron Eyes Coty shedding a tear, but of our Lord Jesus Christ shedding His blood.

I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me. (John 14:6 KJV)

"Celebrate, Celebrate"

Celebration is an important part of our lives.  If you are like me, you celebrated the Christmas Holidays and the beginning of a New Year.  I was so enthralled in celebrating the New Year with four wild grandkids, that I went to bed way before the ball dropped in Times Square faintly hearing some fireworks exploding in the neighborhood.  Being from rural red-neck Alabama those sounds may have been the illegal discharging of firearms by my neighbors. I decided long ago not to be outdoors to see the fireworks in case it was falling lead.  I wanted to celebrate life with four wild children on New Year’s Day.

According to an article that I read years ago, there are numerous fatalities from celebrating by shooting at the stars during times of celebration.  There is a right and wrong way to celebrate.  Random firing in the air for celebration can cause a lifetime of regret. 

My daughter had a volleyball teammate whose brother did jail time for shooting in the sky during a Halloween haunted hayride.  When the 22-caliber bullet ricocheted hitting a small girl in the neck.

The shooting of fireworks is extremely dangerous.  In high school I had a classmate that returned from the Christmas Holidays missing his middle finger from throwing a “cherry bomb” firecracker.  My daughter also bounced a bottle rocket off her cousin’s granddad’s head in celebrating New Year’s.

We do a lot of celebrating.  We celebrate birthdays, holidays, weddings, anniversaries, victories, achievements, grand openings, graduations, retirements, and funerals.  We give cards, flowers, money, watches, certificates, pins, and plaques.  But, how many times do we celebrate God in worship.

It would behoove the church to celebrate the blessings of God rather than the church’s tendency to murmur and gripe.  For some reason churches forget the great things God has done and dwell on things that God has not done or that we think He should have done.  All one must do is see how quickly the Hebrews started complaining when they exited Egypt.  I like to paraphrase like this, “Where two or more Baptist are gathered there will be murmuring and fussing.

Celebrations have two extremes.  I remember reading an editorial in the Clanton Advertiser many years ago of an irate mom concerning here child’s graduation from kindergarten. According to the irate mom, there was not enough celebration because the principal and teachers were so thoughtless of the great achievements of little ones graduating the vicious and demanding academia of kindergarten.  She wanted caps, gowns, and pomp and circumstance, along with a boring speech, REALLY!  Let the kids have cake and ice cream and be thankful they will be entering the academia of the first grade.  Years later, I attended my grandson’s kindergarten graduation and I realized it was more for the parents, not the kids, as the teachers and aides pushed and commanded the children to act like the graduating class of Harvard Law School. 

After the extraction of last tidbit of information drilled into the child’s head, teachers and aides cut them loose to be kindergartners.  They ran and were excited about the cake, ice cream, potato chips, and punch and could not wait to get out of the caps and gowns.  Now that was a celebration. 

Then there is the extreme celebration and often taunting of the athlete who gets a penalty of excessive celebration upon a great achievement of running a touchdown all by himself.  Last time I played; I remember that ten other teammates helped the overly zealous running back score.  If we celebrated, we had to do pushups.

What about celebration on the Lord’s Day?  Is our role the one of the irate mother who thinks there should be more or are we the zealot who fellow parishioners want to throw the penalty flag?

Do we know how to celebrate God?  Is a worldly celebration more important than one for God?  How many editorials do the local newspapers write for churches celebrating or lack of, God at worship?  Is not the work of God more powerful than anything man has done?  Are we afraid to worship?  Do we really understand why we gather on Sundays?  Do we know how to worship?  Are we following tradition, or do we follow the examples of God’s Word? 

In Psalm 22 David wrote a mournful psalm that Jesus quoted while own the cross.  In Psalm 23 David wrote of the gentle shepherd that would help in times of need. In Psalm 24, David knew how to celebrate God’s majestic and triumphant presence.  The Ark of the Covenant had been returned to Jerusalem.  The people were ready to celebrate the presence of God.  David realized that when the heart is prepared, the desire to worship God becomes an integral part of our lives providing direction and focus.

Our moments together at worship are a time of celebration.  In our getting and giving, in our saving and spending, we remember that all belongs to God.  Seduction by the genius of Madison Avenue marketing and advertising distorts celebration by taunting us with pleasure from material wealth. 

God created it all and He is redeeming it all.  Celebrating God is recognizing His redemption.  We celebrate life because Christ lives.  Celebration is conditional.  Celebrating is acknowledging that everything is God’s.  He created us to worship, He redeemed us to worship, and He instructed us to worship. 

There are moral qualifications for worship.  We come with blameless conduct (clean hands), we do right with right motive (pure heart), we are to be faithful to God and to neighbor, and we are to be truthful in dealings.

The earth is the Lord's, and the fulness thereof; the world, and they that dwell therein.  For He hath founded it upon the seas, and established it upon the floods.  Who shall ascend into the hill of the Lord? or who shall stand in His holy place?  He that hath clean hands, and a pure heart; who hath not lifted up his soul unto vanity, nor sworn deceitfully (Psalm 24:1-4 KJV).

Write today’s worries in the sand.  Chisel yesterday’s victories in stone – Max Lucado

Collard Greens, Hawg Jowl, Cornbread, and Black-eyed Peas

Now that we have had time for our hawg jowl and blacked-eyed peas, cornbread, and collared greens to digest, how are our New Year’s resolutions coming? 

Momma always served the poor folks meal in hopes that the peas would bring more pennies and the collards would bring more dollars.  They never did but we did enjoy the food even though daddy said that cooking collards smelled as bad as a dead person did.

New Year’s resolutions usually last as long as the first piece of red velvet last with a cup of coffee.  They last less than trip to the gym and much shorter than the soreness from the exercise.

Have you ever thought who started resolutions?  New Year is the oldest of all holidays.  Ancient Babylon observed it about 4000 years ago. Around 2000 BC, the Babylonian New Year began with the first New Moon or Vernal Equinox (first day of spring).  The beginning of spring is a logical time to start a new year since it is the season of rebirth, of planting new crops, and of blossoming. January 1, on the other hand, has no astronomical or agricultural significance. It is purely arbitrary.

“The tradition of the New Year's Resolutions goes all the way back to 153 B.C. Janus, a mythical king of early Rome was placed at the head of the calendar. With two faces, Janus could look back on past events and forward to the future. Janus became the ancient symbol for resolutions and many Romans looked for forgiveness from their enemies and also exchanged gifts before the beginning of each year.
The New Year has not always begun on January 1, and it doesn't begin on that date everywhere today. It begins on that date only for cultures that use a 365-day solar calendar. January 1 became the beginning of the New Year in 46 B.C., when Julius Caesar developed a calendar that would more accurately reflect the seasons than previous calendars had.
The Romans named the first month of the year after Janus, the god of beginnings and the guardian of doors and entrances. He was always depicted with two faces, one on the front of his head and one on the back. Thus he could look backward and forward at the same time. At midnight on December 31, the Romans imagined Janus looking back at the old year and forward to the new. The Romans began a tradition of exchanging gifts on New Year's Eve by giving one another branches from sacred trees for good fortune. (answerbag.com/q_view/39353)
In the Middle Ages, Christians changed New Year's Day to December 25, the birth of Jesus. Then they changed it to March 25, a holiday called the Annunciation. In the sixteenth century, Pope Gregory XIII revised the Julian calendar, and the celebration of the New Year was returned to January 1.”

Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended: but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.  (Philippians 3:13-14 KJV)

Black-eyed peas and hawg jowl, collard greens, and cornbread are good food to eat, but as believers, our spiritual nourishment comes from God’s Word.  Resolutions are made to break, while sacrifice last.  There is no good luck, but God marvelous grace and the opportunity to press forward.

"Baling Hay, Playing the Guitar, and Out of Shape"

One morning as I was reading my daily Proverb, I thought of J B.  J B was a good friend, coworker, and brother in Christ.  As a kid, I would watch him fly past our house in a Baggett tractor-trailer truck.  I thought it was the grandest thing to know someone that actually drove a Semi. There were not many big trucks that traveled our country road.  We saw plenty of pickups, produce trucks, and pulpwood and log trucks.  

My brothers and I would run to the road, put our arms up, and pull down trying to get J B to blow his air horn.  J B would just laugh as he blew the horn and we would say, “There goes J B.”

Most everyone up home had side jobs to compensate income.  J B farmed on the side.  We raised pigs and crops.  J B had cattle and hay.  When J B was not in the semi ridge, he was on his Ford tractor fertilizing hay, cutting hay, raking hay, baling hay, and storing hay.  J B continued to do the small square bales instead of the large round rolls.  He contended that the large round rolls had too much waste.

One summer years later, many years later, my brother David and I were helping J B and another friend of ours, Calvin, haul hay.  We loved helping load and haul hay.  The only problem we were not young any more.  Like the proverb says, “The glory of young men is their strength: and the beauty of old men is the gray head.” (Proverbs 20:29 KJV)  David and I were gray.  In fact, J B had gone to work at the cement plant.  Calvin had been there for years and I was working there.

J B and Calvin loved the longer square bales for their cows.  David and I struggled to throw the hay on the trailer.  Calvin pulled the trailer as J B continued to rake and bale as David and I tired.  David and I both realized that we were bad out of shape.  Calvin commented that we had become soft and weak.  We struggled to lift the bales.

Calvin had mercy on us and volunteered to rest us.  On the first bale, Calvin struggled to life the bale.  As he reached for a second one, he threw it to the ground and said, “Good gracious boys! Why didn’t you tell me the bales were heavy?”  David and I looked at one another and said, we thought we had gotten sorry and weak.  Calvin said, “These bales weigh over 200 lbs.  They are too green!”

Calvin flagged J B down.  J B must have thought he was still driving for Baggett.  He was flying on his tractor raking the cut hay.  Calvin told J B that he did not want to burn down his barns with green hay.  If not dry enough, green hay will go through a heat and catch fire.

I will never will forget what J B said.  “Dutton, I like to bale it a little green.  The cows like it better.”  Calvin won the argument and David and I were relieved.  First, we needed rest and second we were glad we were not as out of shape as we thought.

Most people in our church and community worked hard to make a living.  However, a few in our community did not.

One time J B was raking and baling hay in his fields.  He needed someone to help him so he turned to his neighbor named Joe.  Joe was a tall, slender, and well able to help with the hay.  Watching him growing up I never knew of him holding a job or working.  As J B toiled in the hot summer son, Joe sat on his front porch swing and played his guitar.  J B hired him to help load hay.  Joe helped a short spell and told J B that he had better go home which was across from the hay field.

J B inquired as to his abandonment.  Joe said, “I might be seen by someone and lose my government check.”  J B was furious as he raked, baled, and loaded hay while Joe sat on the front porch and played the guitar.

Every time I see the cartoon movie with Porky Pig as a farmer working hard while his neighbor, an old fox, plays a guitar on the front porch of a shack, I think of J B and Joe.  When winter comes, Porky is feasting while the old fox starves.  Porky’s conscience bothers him and invites his neighbor for dinner.  The sorry fox says that come spring he will work hard.  When spring comes, the old sorry fox returned to playing the guitar.

The sluggard will not plow by reason of the cold; therefore shall he beg in harvest, and have nothing (Proverbs 20:4 KJV).