In light of the fact that my wife is celebrating a birthday this week (I dare not say how many!), I thought I would post this illustration sent to me recently by a lady in our church (and used by me in a recent message on change prepared for our graduating seniors).  If you are 30, or older, you might think this is hilarious!

FROM THE OVER 30 CROWD!!! 

When I was a kid, adults used to bore me to tears with their tedious diatribes about how hard things were. When they were growing up; what with walking twenty-five miles to school every morning.... Uphill... Barefoot... BOTH ways yadda, yadda, yadda 

And I remember promising myself that when I grew up, there was no way I was going to lay a bunch of stuff like that on my kids about how hard I had it and how easy they've got it! 
 
But now that I'm over the ripe old age of thirty, I can't help but look around and notice the youth of today. You've got it so easy! I mean, compared to my childhood, you live in a Utopia! 

And I hate to say it, but you kids today, you don't know how good you've got it! 

I mean, when I was a kid we didn't have the Internet. If we wanted to know something, we had to go to the library and look it up ourselves, in the card catalog!! 

There was no email!! We had to actually write somebody a letter - with a pen! Then you had to walk all the way across the street and put it in the mailbox, and it would take like a week to get there! Stamps were 10 cents! That's 10% of our $1.00 weekly allowance.

Child Protective Services didn't care if our parents beat us. As a matter of fact, the parents of all my friends also had permission to whip us too! Nowhere was safe! 

There were no MP3's or Napsters or iTunes! If you wanted to steal music, you had to hitchhike to the record store and shoplift it yourself! 

Or you had to wait around all day to tape it off the radio, and the DJ would usually talk over the beginning and mess it all up! There were no CD players! We had tape decks in our car. We'd play our favorite tape and "eject" it when finished, and then the tape would come undone rendering it useless. Cause, hey, that's how we rolled, Baby! Dig? 

We didn't have fancy junk like Call Waiting! If you were on the phone and somebody else called, they got a busy signal, that's it! 

There weren't any cell phones either. If you left the house, you just didn't make any calls or receive them. You actually had to be out of touch with your "friends". OMG!!! Think of the horror... not being in touch with someone 24/7!!! And then there's TEXTING. Yeah, right. Please! You kids have no idea how annoying you are. 

And we didn't have any fancy Caller ID either! When the phone rang, you had no idea who it was! It could be your school, your parents, your boss, your bookie, the collection agent... you just didn't know!!! You had to pick it up and take your chances, mister! 

We didn't have any fancy PlayStation or Xbox video games with high-resolution 3-D graphics! We had the Atari 2600! With games like 'Space Invaders' and 'Asteroids'. Your screen guy was a little square! You actually had to use your imagination!!! And there were no multiple levels or screens, it was just one screen... Forever! And you could never win. The game just kept getting harder and harder and faster and faster until you died! Just like LIFE! 

You had to use a little book called a TV Guide to find out what was on! You were out of luck when it came to channel surfing! You had to actually get up off your backside and walk over to the TV to change the channel!!! NO REMOTES!!! Oh, no, what's the world coming to?!?!

There was no Cartoon Network either! You could only get cartoons on Saturday Morning. Do you hear what I'm saying? We had to wait ALL WEEK for cartoons, you spoiled little rats!

And we didn't have microwaves. If we wanted to heat something up, we had to use the stove! Imagine that! 

And our parents told us to stay outside and play... all day long. Oh, no, no electronics to soothe and comfort. And if you came back inside... you were doing chores!

And car seats - oh, please! Mom threw you in the back seat and you hung on. If you were lucky, you got the "safety arm" across the chest at the last moment if she had to stop suddenly, and if your head hit the dashboard, well that was your fault for calling "shot gun" in the first place! 

See! That's exactly what I'm talking about! You kids today have got it too easy. You're spoiled rotten! You guys wouldn't have lasted five minutes back in the day!

Regards,
The Over 30 Crowd 
 
 
Several versions of the story I shared last Sunday exist today.  In some versions, the young soldier shows cowardice in battle.  In others, he is derelict in his assigned duties.  In this version, the most popular one, he is caught sleeping while on guard duty.  Whichever version one prefers, the point is still the same.  We must live up to our calling and the name we bear.

Alexander the Great, one of the greatest military generals who ever lived, conquered almost the entire known world with his vast army.  One night during a campaign, he couldn't sleep and left his tent to walk around the campgrounds.

As he was walking, he came across a soldier asleep on guard duty – a serious offense.  The penalty for falling asleep on guard duty was, in some cases, instant death - the commanding officer sometimes poured a flammable substance on the sleeping soldier and then lit it.

The soldier began to wake up as Alexander the Great approached him.  Recognizing who was standing in front of him, the young man feared for his life.  "Do you know what the penalty is for falling asleep on guard duty?"  Alexander the Great asked the soldier.  "Yes, sir," the soldier responded in a quivering voice.

"Soldier, what's your name?" demanded Alexander the Great.  "Alexander, sir."  Alexander the Great repeated the question: "What is your name?"  "My name is Alexander, sir," the soldier repeated.  A third time and more loudly Alexander the Great asked, "What is your name?"  A third time the soldier meekly said, "My name is Alexander, sir."

Alexander the Great then looked the young soldier straight in the eye.  "Soldier," he said with intensity, "either change your name or change your conduct." 

No doubt, too many times our Lord has looked down from Heaven and desired to say to me, “Christian, either change your name or change your ways.”  My hope is that I will grow increasingly aware of the significance of the name of Christ that I bear as a Christian, and in so doing, will become more faithful to my calling in that name, and thus to better represent Him through my ways.  Do you share a similar desire?  If not, should you?

 
 
 
The following clip was given to me recently by a precious church member.  It came from a newspaper way back in 1956!  

A WELL ESTABLISHED PRECEDENT

We are living in a time when there is not too much to laugh about.  The daily political sparring, the constant racial agitations, the rising rate of crime, the international intrigue and a thousand and one other unpleasant things do not make for mirth.  For us, one of the things we have enjoyed most recently is a re-reading of Sam Foss's great poem "How The Wise Old Woods Could Laugh."  For hilarious humor and philosophical insight into human nature, it's a dandy.

HOW THE WISE OLD WOODS COULD LAUGH!

One day, thru the primeval wood,
a calf walked home, as good calves should.

But made a trail all bent askew: 
a crooked trail as all calves do.

Since then two hundred years have fled,
and, I infer, the calf is dead.

But still he left behind his trail,
and thereby hangs my moral tale.

The trail was taken up the next day,
by a lone dog that passed that way;

And then a wise bellwether sheep,
pursued the trail over o'er vale and steep,

And drew the flock behind him, too,
as all good bellwethers always do.

And from that day, o'er hill and glade,
through those old woods a path was made;

And many men wound in and out,
and dodged, and turned, and bent about.

And uttered words of righteous wrath,
because 'twas such a crooked path.

But still they followed - do not laugh -
the first migrations of that calf,

And thru this winding wood-way stalked,
because he wobbled when he walked,

This forest path became a lane,
that bent, and turned, and turned again.

This crooked lane became a road,
where many a poor horse with his load,

Toiled on beneath the burning sun,
and traveled some three miles in one.

And thus a century and a half,
they trod the footsteps of that calf.

The years passed on in swiftness fleet,
the road became a village street.

And this, before men were aware,
a city's crowded thoroughfare.

And soon the central street was this,
of a renowned metropolis.

And men two centuries and a half,
trod in the footsteps of that calf.

Each day a hundred thousand route,
followed the zigzag calf about.

And o'er his crooked journey went,
the traffic of a continent.

A hundred thousand men were led,
by one calf near three centuries dead. 

They followed still his crooked way,
and lost one hundred years a day.

For thus such reverence is lent,
to well-established precedent.

A moral lesson this might teach. 
Were I ordained and called to preach,

For men are prone to go it blind,
along the calf-paths of the mind.

And work away from sun to sun,
to do what other men have done.

They follow in the beaten track,
and out and in, and forth and back.

And still their devious course pursue,
to keep the path that others do.

But how the wise old woods could laugh,
who saw the first primeval calf!

Ah!  Many things this tale might teach. 
But I am not ordained to preach. 

How’s that for continued relevance?!  The truth is, far too many of us are simply content to follow the crowd, never taking time to ask ourselves whether what we are doing is purposeful or not.  I hope you find this classic little piece thoughtful.  I hope it helps you to consider blazing a new trail.  At the very least, I hope it challenges you to consider where you are headed in life and why. 

 
 
 
By some stroke of luck (and a lot of able assistance from people who know what they are doing), I seem to have finally gotten much of the material I have been preparing ready for my little web page.  After months of promises, I have finally succeeded in converting dozens and dozens of notebooks full of accumulated paper communication resources into a useable digital format for my web page.  I am now ready to start the uploading process.

Bear with me and I’ll eventually get this mammoth project completed.  Speaking of luck, here’s a sample of the material I’ll be posting…  (Note:  I will always give credit where known.  This particular jewel comes from Dr. Wayne Roe, Senior Pastor of the First Baptist church of Tifton, Georgia, in his 08/20/2009 newsletter article.)  He writes:

Someone handed me a clipping from Sports Illustrated that took note of the death of Jack “Lucky” Lohrke, at the age of 85.  He was a major league baseball infielder that hit .242 over seven seasons.  He was better known, however, for the circumstances surrounding his nickname, “Lucky”.  Lohrke fought at Normandy and in the Battle of the Bulge.  He emerged unscathed, but four times a soldier next to him was killed.  When he was shipped home in 1945, Lohrke was bumped from a transport flight at the last minute; the plane crashed, killing everyone on board.  The next year, after resuming baseball, he was traveling with the Class B Spokane Indians on a bus trip across Washington.  During a food stop, he found out he had been promoted to Triple A, so he got his gear off the bus and hitchhiked back to Spokane.  And you guessed it - a few hours later, the bus crashed into a canyon, killing nine of his former teammates.

Jack Lohrke was dubbed "Lucky" from that point on, though he never cared for the nickname.  He insisted his name was Jack - Jack Lohrke.  As I was reading that article, I began thinking about the role we absent-mindedly attribute to luck in our lives.  What do you think about luck?  Some people say if it weren't for bad luck, they'd have no luck at all.  And occasionally, I will wish someone "good luck" as they enter into difficult circumstances; but it's more a figure of speech than something I really believe in.  Luck, jinxes, amulets, and charms are really superstitions, aren't they?  In fact, they may well represent darker forces at work that we should avoid.

When good things happen to us, let's learn to see them as God's blessings in our lives, rather than passing them off as coincidence, luck, or our own personal ability.  And when our eyes of faith are opened to His presence and His blessings in our lives, let's give Him the glory that is due Him.  After all, it’s not luck... it’s a loving God.  Jack Lohrke was not lucky, he was simply blessed.  And, by the way, so are you and I.