Nobody Likes To Hug A Porcupine

        Interesting the silly little games we play to get our way in life.  I remember coming home from work back in the days when my wife and I got along like fire and ice.  She would sniff and snort and make shrewd comments about my lack of taking out the garbage, or not noticing some new trinket she had placed on the porch.  I of course was wrongly accused, I mean who would notice the new porch stuff when I was so busy trying not to trip on the Garbage bag in front of the front door?   Any how this would go on as we verbally spar our way to exhaustion.  Finally I would burst out with “Woman, what do you want from me!” ( by the way I do not suggest or condone these behaviors, merely using them as examples from our past).  Her reply to my disrespectful plea,  “I just want a hug”.   This was a common theme in those days but, one day I finally yelled back,  “Nobody wants to hug a porcupine.”    Thru the mercy of God I survived that comment and eventually we got the help we needed and our rocky marriage smoothed out to  the point that now we only schedule a few easily resolved fights a couple nights a week in order to practice our conflict resolution abilities.  However I want to point out.   Who really does want to hug a porcupine?  Now I haven’t personally tried it, but I am fairly comfortable in making the claim that if you ever attempted it, you won’t be trying it again in the near future.   Ok, so we have pretty well established the general lack of desire in mankind to hug porcupines.

So let me ask you this, why is it that we think we can pop up our quills in the form of our rotten attitude, and suddenly everyone should stop what they are doing and come rushing in to hug us, pat us on the head, coddle us and say all kinds of sweet nothings to soothe our damaged feelings?  You see it all the time, its very common and actually pretty easy to see, after all the porcupine at the party sorta....um sticks out.   Unless of course the guy with all the quills is...me.   What!..gasp, surely not.  Yeah well unfortunately I think we are all able to contract this spiny disease if we are not careful.  I know I’ve been guilty a time or two, or hundred.  Have you?   Wait before you answer let me warn you, this sneaks up on you.  After all its hard to see your own back so maybe you can’t tell if you have quills poking out all over the place, and by the very nature of the problem most folks aren’t going to come waltzing up and letting you know of your condition.  
            So here are a few, tho definitely not conclusive ways you can check the mirror to see if your getting a little quilish:

1. people keep a 10 yard space between you and them
2. no matter where you go all the people seem to have the same unfriendly avoiding mannerisms
3. the only things people say to you during a conversation is, “hmm”, “I see”, “interesting”, “wow”, “sounds rough”.  They never say “Yes, so true” or “No thats not true”.
4. People make you mad
5. Feels like the Preacher is using your life for message material
6. People don’t ask “how are you today”
7. People don’t ask you to help with anything
8. Your counselor starts going to see a counselor
9. Your spouse tells you
10. Rednecks beat you with baseball bats

         Ok, maybe you get the point....eye roll please.  I know I’m guilty more times than I want to admit of huddling up in my little ball of self pity and poking my quills up at the world and wondering why nobody will just see what I see is wrong with all of them.   Sometimes I just have to be reminded that I won’t compel others to engage by my disengagement, and sometimes I just really need to see my own sin of selfishness and pride.  

Search me, O God, and know my heart!  Try me and know my thoughts!  And see if there be any grievous way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting! -Psalm 139:23-24

Changed From The Chains

Before my life was truly changed by the Gospel, extra biblical regulation (or standards) was my safety net, Christ was the ticket but being careful and old fashioned was the currency to heaven, which for me was just the other option outside of Hell. I was constantly measuring myself against others in order to think I was good enough for God.  I was living trying to ensure my ticket to Heaven didn’t expire.

  I am so thankful to know that it’s the Cross plus nothing that equals my salvation.  All the religious activities, and laws and regulations had become more about fooling others than living in any kind of joy of salvation.  The stress caused by what people perceived me to be and what I knew I was had become a life of bondage and defeat.

 As I grow in the knowledge of the Gospel truth, I have to praise God for the changes He is bringing into my life.  I am no longer bound to proving to the preacher or others that we are doing “good” spiritually by fulfilling religious, churchy obligations, and yet I am learning to find joy in that I get to serve within the church.  My wife and I are able to pray together and to ask each other for forgiveness and to ask others for prayer and advice when we face struggles in our marriage.  In the past the inability to be open and honest about the problems in our marriage almost destroyed our home, because we were so bound to the fear of man.  

Because of what Christ is doing in our lives we are growing in the desire to see others know the Gospel.  I used to care very little about other people whom I considered deserving of judgment because of my assessment of their “sins”.    Because of the Gospel, I see now that people are souls in need of salvation, & that I am the biggest sinner I know.  Joy, belief, and confidence in a finished work of salvation is replacing the old “I need a safety net” mentality.  I can now come to a place of worship and I’m able to raise my hands and sing songs of praise because Jesus is worthy of worship regardless of how much I messed up last week.  I can face the natural and spiritual conflicts of day to day life knowing that the battle for my soul has already been fought and Jesus has won the victory for me.  

The knowledge of the Gospel, “Christ in my place” is giving me the desire to learn more about my savior, to view heaven as more than a “better option”, to lead my family to the Gospel, and to serve others and see them changed by the Gospel as well.  

I cannot claim ownership of the positive changes in my life, it is all because of Christ for Gods glory…I can only thank Him. 

The Joy of The Hunt

(The following is a short story I wrote several years ago for a small youth church magazine.  I recently stumbled across it and decided to share it.)
      Before I was old enough to hunt, the first day of hunting season would find me standing at the picture window of my grandparents home, with the sound of burning logs crackling in the fireplace, and a warm cup of hot chocolate in my hands, waiting and watching for any sign of my frozen relatives returning from the hunt.  
       Hunting has always been a big event for my family.  Even my grandmother hunted.  Some say that out of all my family, she was the best shot when using open sights.  Since my family hunted on the land surrounding my grandparents house you could always tell the dedication of the hunter by the number of visits they made to the warm house during the cold day.  A really dedicated hunter only came in for lunch and he always came in later than normal lunch time.  Anybody who came to the house for anything, at anytime besides lunch, risked much shame and ridicule.  If we had made a list of hunters and house visits made, a typical day would look like this:  Grandpa: one visit (maybe), Grandma: one visit, Dad: one visit, Uncle Tom: one visit, Brother Jon: nine visits, Brother Jim: fifteen visits.
       In those days, I couldn't wait to hunt.  I thought that great day would never arrive.  I dreamed of huge, antlered, monster bucks being dropped in their tracks by my expert marksmanship.  My family would never need to worry about putting meat on the table.  In my minds eye I could see my family sitting around the kitchen table eating the venison.  My dad would say, "We sure are lucky to have such a dedicated hunter to provide such an abundance of wild game for the table.   And to think, he didn't even make one trip into the house."  My brothers would squirm in envy and shame.
        Now years later, I have become a hunter.  The crackle of the fireplace is replaced by the crackling of my teeth violently colliding with one another.  My hand is filled with the cold stock of a hunting rifle instead of the cup of hot chocolate.  I have managed to shoot several deer early in my hunting career, which for several years left me with the mistaken impression that hunting was easy.  Now it seems my beginner's luck has run cold along with the weather and I must depend upon my hunting skills to bag the quarry.  In short, I have become, if not the deers' best friend, at least their greatest joke.  Now don't get me wrong,  I'm probably just as good a hunter as the next guy.  Providing the next guy is half blind and doesn't know a rifle from a walking stick.
         I like hunting though.  If it wasn't for the cold and the freezing rain and snow, or the early rising time, or the long hours of endless boredom broken only by the sheer excitement of a lump of slushy snow falling off a pine branch and plummeting down the back of you neck, or the risk of shame and ridicule for making a visit to the house...I'd probably even love it.
          "So why keep hunting?" you ask.  Well thanks for asking. Let me explain.  To answer your question, let me share with you the common answer you will get from any hunter who has just returned from an unsuccessful hunt.  Through purple, quivering lips he will say, "I just like being out in the woods and enjoying the wildlife."  Now that is what he will say, but because of his chattering teeth, it will sound more like, "I chitch chit bing oush it aa shuds and chita chita ildchife."  At this point it is best not to poke fun at him.  Remember his patience has long since been totally used up and he is also armed.
         Despite all the miseries of hunting, I still venture out into the frosty woods each year in hopes that a deer will be stupid enough to walk within my shooting range, which is approximately 10 feet.  And then if he doesn't move too much and if the wind is right, and if he doesn't see, hear, or smell me, I might be able to shoot him.  Of course then the fun really begins, but I won't go into detail for those of you who might be eating as you read this column.
          Now I've tried to explain why I hunt, but maybe you still ask, "What is so great about shooting a deer?"  the answer is simple...You can go in the house. Duh!

Moments In The Dash

         I once attended a meeting where the speaker read a poem written by Linda Ellis about the dash between the birth date and death date on a tombstone. When we are laid to rest our entire life will be represented as a small dash. Our thoughts, ambitions, dreams, goals, accomplishments are all there between two numbers. We have a start date, a vapor to live, and then a end date upon this earth. If you are reading this, I thank you for stopping in and for a brief moment sharing in some rambling pieces of my dash.