Interlude 4: The Vacation Post

Hello and welcome back.

I suppose, technically, I was the one who was gone, but who's keeping score?  All of you?  Ah.  Right.

Well, as promised, I did, in fact, take a vacation.  To Cozumel, Mexico.  Cozumel was everything that home was not.  Warm, sunny, and lacking in snow.  I was pretty ok with that.  We (my wife sized unit and I) enjoyed ourselves thoroughly.  There were some friends down there with us which made it even more fun shaped.

There was a lot of time spent in the actual sun.  No surprise there.  Tans and burns did abound.  As did food and tiny lizards.

One day we all went and took a "class".  It was called "Salsa Salsa."  The purpose of this class was "salsa".  We learned how to make different kinds of a salsa and, in the process, ate a LOT of salsa.  We also learned how to Salsa dance.  I am pretty confident that what we were being taught was "Salsa" dancing in the most loose definition of "Salsa" dancing. It was similar to salsa dancing in the same way that "blueberries" and "steak" are similar foods.  

We didn't care.  We all had fun.

We also wandered through the touristy downtown of Cozumel.  That was... well, let's just say that there are many wonderful reasons to go to Cozumel.  This was not one of them.  But if you are looking to take home some souvenirs for friends, family, and co-workers, that's where you need to go.

Completely unrelated.  Am I the only one who is always tempted to say the word "co-workers" as though it is spelled "cow-orkers"?  

Every.  Time.  I have no idea why.  But it amuses me to know end.  I've always wanted to walk into the office and, with my best knight-of-the-round-table voice greet them with, "Hello, my fellow cow-orkers!  It does warm my heart to see you well and refreshed for the days battle!"

There is literally no scenario in my life where that would be appropriate, or make any actual sense to anyone.

And thus my sadness.

Hmm...

Where was I...  

Oh yes.  Cozumel.

One thing I got to do was go scuba diving.  I was able to make four dives over two days.  Scuba diving is a ton of fun.  It's like flying.  Except, you know, you are under water.  And there are fish.  Which makes sense because of the underwater part.

The water is super clear there, and it turns out the bottom of the ocean (as if I was down miles and miles...) is quite beautiful.  We spent most of our time at depths between 40-60 feet, but did spend a little time as deep as 90 or so.  

There is a lot of white sand down there.  In that white sand is coral.  Some of it purple.  Some of it brown.  Some of it yellow.  The fish down there where colors like blue, and yellow, and black, and orange.

On one dive, we dropped into the water right in the middle of a... school?... of jelly fish.  I know what you are thinking.  "Isn't that bad?" I hear you say.  Well, usually it is to be avoided.  These particular jellies were pretty harmless.  They didn't bother you and they didn't have the long "stinger tentacles" that you usually think of with jelly fish.  Although one brave little jelly (they were all about the size of a nickel) tried to eat my friends finger.  And by "eat", I mean it basically enveloped the tip of one finger, wiggled a little, than swam away.

Not very ferocious.

They were pretty cool.  

That said, I was definitely wary.  We all know the legends of jelly fish.  The ones that sting you in horrible ways.  There are jelly fish off the coast of Australia, I think, that are pretty small, but have super long trailing "stingers".  If one even touches you, it sends so much pain into you that if you don't die before they get you out of the water, you wish you had.  The pain is so bad if you survive that no amount of pain meds even scratch the surface of it.  Unless they do a spinal block, you basically suffer in incalculable agony for days or weeks till it goes away on it's own.

Most jelly fish aren't that dangerous.  But if you get stung, you know it.

So, I was pretty wary at first.  Later on a different dive I kept seeing this... stuff, floating by.  At first I thought it was those "floaties" you get in your eyes.  But as I looked closely, they were these completely transparent... somethings.  Something akin to jelly fish.  Long and thin with long trailing "stinger tentacles."

I tried to avoid those.

I did not succeed.

Being that they were mostly invisible, I inevitably had one graze my hand right between two fingers.

Those two fingers immediately burst into flame under water.  At least, that's what it felt like.  Both fingers felt like they had been zapped by large amounts of electricity that did not immediately stop flowing.  

If you shout profanity underwater through a breather and no one can hear you, does it still count?

Probably.

It subsided after a few minutes (both the pain and profanity).  But holy electrocution, Batman!  That stuff smarts.

Scuba is fun and the wild life is beautiful, but it is not without it's dangers.  But, you know that going in and you try to be careful.  There is a lot of open space, so, you know, it's not hard to be safe.

Which brings me to the shark.

When you are floating along and look down and see a seven foot shark, should you swim over and take a look?  Or keep on floating and admire it from afar?

Well, it wasn't the super aggressive kind of shark.  It was a Nurf shark, or Nerf shark, or some word that is pronounced like that but spelled completely different.

They leave you alone.  But I suspect that if one felt you were stalking it, it might decide it needed to let you know that's not allowed.

This one played nice.

I also saw some barracuda.  They tended to travel in pairs.  I also left them alone.

The giant turtles were the coolest things for me.  HUGE lazy turtles, just swimming by slowly.  They aren't afraid of you at all.  I had one float by within an arms-length of my head.  I turned around, and bam, there he was.  

No, he didn't run into me.  

They are amazingly graceful creatures.  You just want to hug them.  They seem so friendly.  They might even BE friendly.  But, there is a no touching rule, so, we didn't.

We also saw some pretty huge crab and lobster down there.  One lobster we saw running around down there was astonishingly fast as he run across the ocean floor.  Fast enough I would not have gotten away had it been chasing me.  It was like this huge spider/scorpion thing going after something.  It was the only truly creepy thing I saw down there.

When you are underwater with nothing but a tank of air on your back keeping you breathing, you try to be hyper aware of danger and attempt to be super careful.  And, as I said, for the most part, it's really easy to be safe.

One thing did happen though.  And it's not what you may be thinking.

We were swimming through some coral arches.  No caves or anything like that.  Big, giant openings.  As we were swimming around the coral, I need to dive down farther to go under one part.  Nothing tight, just deeper in the water than I was.  As I dove deeper, one ear started to build pressure.  This is normal.  You are constantly intentionally  clearing (popping) your ears to relieve pressure.  However, for some reason, my one ear didn't want to clear that particular moment.  So, as I dove, it would start to hurt, then I would go back up.  I would try to clear it, dive and clear as I go, and it just wouldn't clear.  I thought maybe I could just live with it and go, but I couldn't.  It just hurt too much.

So, I turned around to head back up.  As I did, I was a little closer to the wall than I thought and bumped my head just a little.  Not hard at all.  Just hard enough to know I'd done it.

The walls are covered with plants and stuff, much of which is soft.  You aren't suppose to touch it, and this was clearly accidental.

I moved away, rubbed my head to make sure I wasn't bleeding or anything, which I wasn't, and after doing a self check, declared myself fine and went on.  

I had a small sore spot on the side of my head, but it didn't even bruise.  No worries.

Once we got into the boat after that dive, I had my dive buddy/doctor friend check the side of my head just to make sure I hadn't "done anything bad" that would leave me not alive soon.

He declared me fine and then we helped each other get our gear off.

As I as bending forward to help him, he saw the top of my head (I'm taller than he) and he said "Whoa, you have a cut across the top of your head."

I had no idea.

Turns out it was just a scratch.  Didn't even leave a scar.  I'm not sure it ever truly "bled".

The thing is, I don't really know for sure when it happened.  It could have happened when I bumped the wall.  That's the most likely time.  But I never felt it.  I never felt anything touch the top of my head.  Was it one of the wall creatures I bumped into?  Was it from coral I don't remember hitting?  Was it some alien jelly fish tentacle trying to bore its way into my brain and take over my mind?

I have no idea.

For all our care and careful diving, for the things I avoided and the things I knew I hadn't, the thing that did the most damage to me was the one thing I never knew that happened.

I'm pretty sure our lives are like that.  We can try so hard to control everything around us and make sure nothing touches us or hurts us.  But we never succeed.  It's always the thing we didn't see coming.  And there is ALWAYS something we don't see coming.  And there always will be.

We can make ourselves mad trying to avoid the things of life.  We can not succeed.  Our control and safety is largely illusory.  

As are most things of life.

So, take heart my fellow cow-orkers!!  (I seriously have no idea what a cow-orker is.)  If you feel you are losing control, it's ok.  It's simply not true.

You never had any control to begin with.

And that's ok.

Night.

Interlude 3: My Short Wife Post

Greetings and something.

Perhaps I should clarify my title again.  It refers to the shortness of the post, not the shortness of my wife.  Although... ahem...

As I mentioned last week, this next week we are headed to some place vacationy and warm.  As such, there is a good chance there will be no post next week.  Because of this we have been trying to make sure we have completed all the stuff which need completing before then so we have a stress free adventure.

However, this does mean that the weeks leading up to said trip tend to be extra busy and the opposite of stress free.

For myself, I had four different projects which deadlined this weekend.  These are four projects that are above and beyond my normal work load, however you wish to define that.  Super busy and stressed.  I should know better than to let myself get stressed.  But I don't always learn my own lessons well.

Fortunately (or unfortunately), I wasn't the only one having a less than stellar week.  My wife had a particularly rough week.  Especially at the beginning.

It all started off well.  At the gym this past Sunday, she accidentally ran a half marathon.  "Accidentally" is probably a misleading word.  She intended to run 10 miles.  Which she did.  But then, because she felt so good, she decided to beast-mode it another 3 miles.  And she did.  

13 miles.  One half of a marathon.  Ok, for you nitpicky types, 13.1 is half a marathon.  She did that.  It was just easier to type 13.  But then I went and explained, and pretty much ruined any advantage I had in the efficiency area.  Well done, me.

She accomplished one of her fitness goals.  We were both very excited.  More her than me, since I didn't run 13 miles.  Cause that's just crazy.  But I support her insanity.

She even accomplished another fitness goal just today by doing her Friday run while besting her previous best average split time.  Plus a couple other minor ones today as well.

A great bookended week for her.

But in the middle... holy bad word.  

She had some really random pain, her work shifts were long and full of drama, there were some unexpected money things, some more unexpected food allergy related issues, and a number of other little annoyances that just made her week not amazing.

I am sure I wasn't as supportive as I could have been being strapped in to my own cranky pants as I was.  She was trying to be considerate of me, and I was trying to be considerate of her, and we did ok... but it was a long, bad week.

But something weird happened in the middle of it all that oddly gave me some perspective.

This will probably not make sense to many of you, but here is how it went.

We finally had a few minutes, had been sitting on the couch and there may have been a couple minutes of TV watched.  After shutting down the TV device, my lovely and awesome wife went to the kitchen and dropped off the remote by the TV on the way.  As she bent down to set the controller in it's spot, she wacked her head on the TV.  Not hard.  No damage.  But it happened.

And we've all done stuff like that, right?  It happens.  But this was at the end of the worst day of our bad week.  The worst day for her.  She was hurting, tired, grumpy, and then that just before bed.

Do you know what I did?

I watched it happen and I had a minor epiphany, and as a result, I laughed so hard I thought I might pee a little then black out.

As you might expect, this was not the response she was hoping for.  But, my wife being the amazing trooper she is, eventually started laughing as well.

It was just so ridiculous.  So random.  So pointless.  It was meaningless.

We spent all week getting annoyed and worked up about stuff, and that one little act put it all in perspective. 

It's all transient.  It is meaningless.  The annoyances just don't matter.  In another week or two, they will all be fading memories and we will be on to something else.  We got caught up in the lunacy of the moment and allowed ourselves to be consumed by it.

But in that one moment, we snapped free.  Until next time.  All thanks to my wife's selfless act of taking one in the head for the team.

Don't let the unimportant minor things of life get you all worked up.  They are not constant. They will always move and change.  See the larger picture and find joy in it's beauty.

Have a great week and I'll catch you on the flip side of vacation!

Post 2: Vacations Save Lives

I was sitting in prayer meeting the other day when it happened. I realized I really really need to take a vacation.

It happened like this.

I have three churches, which means I have three prayer meetings a week. The format for each is the same, but each church is very different. But that doesn't matter for this story.

I start prayer meeting, oddly, with prayer. I ask everyone for things they want to have prayer about. They can be needs, or praises, or thanks... whatever. I write them down to keep track of them, and then we can keep the list going from week to week.

Once we have a list for the evening, then everyone will say a short prayer for the things on our list.
After that is done, which can take anywhere from 30-45 minutes, we will have a bible discussion. A topic or bible passage/chapter will be decided on, then we will read and discuss. It's great because then it's not just me lecturing. Instead we are all learning from each other.

Anyway. We were doing the prayer request portion and it was getting to the point where no one had anything more to add. So I made the last call for requests.

Now, when I make the last call for requests, I give it a few seconds just to make sure no one has anything else to add. I don't want to cut anyone short. Prayer is the most important part of anything anyone can do in their service and relationship with God. I truly believe that will all of my being.
So, when no one spoke up, I let them know we were going to pray, Set down my list and started praying.

I got three words into it, when one lady... you know, the one who apparently is never allowed to talk anywhere else on the planet?, cause she never stops talking? ever?... that lady interupts me three or four words into the prayer and says that she has something else to add to the list. So, I stopped, she expounded about her request, as usual, and then I made another last call for requests. After no response, I start prayer, get about 3 or 4 words in, and again, she says she has another request.

Now, I'm thinking that this is a bit rude, but hey, it's prayer and if someone has something important to share, then it would be wrong to not let her bring before God publically. So I stop and let her give her request.

You are probably thinking that is pretty funny. But would you believe that she did that 2 more times after that before we finally got the prayer going?

I couldn't believe it. I was just sitting there dumbfounded. The last time she interrupted the prayer I yelled at her to shut up already and then I reached across the table and slammed her head right through it.

Ok, that is decidely not true.

However, I wanted to tell her to shut up. But instead I said something else and the tone with which I said it was probably just as bad. When was finished I looked her right in the eyes and said, "Is that all?"

She said, "I think so."

I said, "Are you sure?"

She said, "Yes."

I let my stare linger for a second, then I started prayer.

And it was at that precise moment, that I realized I really really needed a vacation.
I didn't show it outwordly so much, but inside, I was furious. This lady never shuts up unless she gets interrupted. Otherwise, you wait for her to breath, then jump in. And I had just had enough of it.
I've never come that close to losing it with a church member. Even her. She is actually an extremely sweet lady. She doesn't get to talk to people much, and she is always cheery. She didn't deserve my anger.

And I knew it. Even as I was seething inside, I knew it. What was making me mad wasn't her talking. It was the fact that she was slowing me up and I wanted to get it over with already and get home.

And that is WHY I needed the vacation.

When suddenly the very thing you are called to do is an inconvenient annoyance, then something is clearly wrong. I have dealt with people are much more rude and much more annoying, and I've never even hardly so much as blinked at it. But that day I just didn't have it in me.

I was forced to ask why.

This week while I was writing my sermon, I got the answer. You know what's great about working for God? Even as I am trying to teach and help others, God is teaching me even more. It's amazing.

It's humbling.

The answer. It revolves around two words.

"Healing" and "Wings".

There is a story in the book of Matthew about a woman who had a bleeding disorder for twelve years and knowing that she probably wouldn't be able to talk to Jesus, decided that if she could just touch the edge of his cloak, she would be healed.

She did. And, she was.

Let me give you two more words. "Tsitsit" and "Kanaph".

Tsitsit is Hebrew for "fringe or tassel". Kanaph is Hebrew for "corner, edge or wing."

You see, all Jewish men were to where a cloak or covering with tassles on it's wings. The edges of these cloaks were called wings because when a Jewish man prayed, they were to put this cloak, or prayer shawl, over their head, lift their arms up and pray. And when they did, the shawl hung off their arms like wings. So they prayer shawl had tassles on it's wings because God told them to make that way back in the book of Numbers, during the time of Moses.

By now you are wondering what the point is, and will I ever get there? Fair enough.

Jesus, being a law biding Jewish Rabbi would have been wearing one of these. This is important, because in the book of Malachi, the prophet Malachi made a prediction that the Messiah(son of righteousness) would come. And when he did, he would have "healing in his wings." The word for wings there is the same word used for the wings of the shawl. The prophecy of Malachi became a story and legend that the Jews remembered.

So now we fast forward to this bleeding woman. She knows that this man Jesus claims to be the Messiah. And she knows that the prophet Malachi said that the messiah would have healing in his wings. Therefore, if this is true, then all she needs to do is touch the edge of his prayer shawl, his "wings", and she will be healed.

And she was. She showed that she truly believed that this man was the fulfillment of Malachi's prophecy. Many others did, also, because it is mentioned in both Matthew and Mark that many people would come and touch the tassles on his wings and be healed or made whole.
And it's at this point where God taught me something. I had already read about the tassles and the wings and the prophecy of Malachi. But as I was reading these texts in Greek and Hebrew, I saw something I did not expect to see.

In Mark, where I just said that people would come and touch his wings and be healed, the word used there for "healed" is the greek word "sozo."

There is only one problem. The word "sozo" really doesn't mean "healed." It actually means "saved." Literally saved.

The definitions of the word are "saved, salvation, kept from destruction, preserved." It didn't make sense to me. Then I realized that Mark was telling us that everyone who touched Jesus "wings" were saved. They had salvation. They weren't just healed physically, they were healed mind, body and soul. Every fiber of their being was effected.

Jesus told the bleeding woman to go in peace. The Hebrew word for peace is Shalom. But Shalom doesn't just mean the absence of conflict. It means "to be covered in the goodness of God. To be covered with his wholeness and completeness." He told her to go in the completeness of God. He told her that she was now changed mind, body and soul.

Because the Messiah has healing in his wings.

The Messiah has salvation in his wings. To be healed by Jesus is to be saved.

I gave that to my people as part of my sermon. But that sermon was actually for me.

As I mentioned in the last blog, it's been a long year for me. And what I keep forgetting is that, I'm still healing. And I don't mean just physically. Everything I am has been altered. And I'm still adjusting. And I'm still changing. I was saved from death.

And I'm still being saved.

And that is just my story. It's easy to know better. But knowing something isn't the same as believing something. People will go through things in their lives, and when they come through the other side of it, they will think they have finally finished, or that they have arrived.

But it's never true. And I fell into that trap. I was feeling fantastic. My mind was working better. I was feeling like things were getting to be as they should again. And then I realized they weren't.
I was so focused on healing physically, I forgot to deal with the rest of me that needed to heal. And as it turns out, the physical wounds are the easiest to deal with.

True healing is a total, holistic experience. And apparently, I'm much farther from being whole than I thought. But as long as I understand that, it's ok. Because my healing is in Jesus hands.

And Jesus has salvation in his wings.

What kind of healing are you looking for?