Charlie Wear’s Notes

It isn’t enough that we have had so much rain in the past couple of weeks that forecasters are concerned that the saturation of the soil will lead to further flooding as the season progresses. Now we are being buffeted by high-velocity winds. Along with my inability to sleep through the entire night I am facing the day in a somewhat “weakened” state.

Across the ranch where we live we have had tree branches fall and trees blow over, and that was before the winds blew last night. Of course, the expectation is that these weather conditions will pass, but not without some damage, and other potential losses. I have friends and family who have experienced winds and storms of a physical, emotional and spiritual type in the past year. In the midst of these storms there is sometimes a concern that the turmoil will not relax, the storm will not cease, and the winds will not return to calm.

When I am facing that kind of tumult I do find comfort in my faith. The story of Jesus’ quieting the storm over the waters, while his followers looked on with fear and awe, is a great metaphor of what happens when I turn my eyes to Jesus in the storms of my life. Sometimes, all I can do is pray, Oh God, Oh God, Oh God! And many times that is enough. Always looking back I can see the hand of God at work in my life. His guidance and his leading have brought me to this place and will be with me on the journey forward.

Father, help me to remember that you are the Peace-bringer in the storms of my life. Amen.

We live in uncertainty. What does God want, where is he leading us? What will tomorrow bring, in finance, in relationships, in our health?

As we get older, because of life experience, the nuances become more apparent, and life can appear more uncertain. And yet, our humanity seeks stability. For many, a steady paycheck, good benefits and a guaranteed pension are unattainable goals. For millions today, even the roof over their heads can’t be counted on.

And yet in the middle of it, Paul counsels:

“Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice! Let your gentle spirit be known to all men.The Lord is near. Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” [Phillipians 4:4-7, NAS, via Biblegateway.com] “The Lord is near.”

Doesn’t that say everything we need to know? All others may seem distant, and at times God can seem distant, yet he is near. He is the empathetic friend who knows everything about us and our circumstances and loves us anyway! I looked up the word “supplication.” It means to pray earnestly and humbly, to petition.

And let this be our prayer: Lord, give us faith, and save us from our fear!

In the popular movie, Jerry MacGuire, one of the characters, a hot young quarterback is asked over and over which team he will sign with. He answers, over and over again: “I’ll surf or ski!” meaning he will play for a coastal team or in Colorado.

When faced with the uncertainty of our lives, the thrill of victory and the agony of defeat and asked to make a choice, we answer: “It’ll be faith or fear.” With fear we suffer. With faith we remain hopeful.

After a few years of riding the faith or fear rollercoaster I have racked up enough experiences to know that the things I worried about most never happened and that life is full of surprises. So, like Dr. Phil would ask, I ask myself, “How’s that workin’ for ya?,” that whole fear thing? Giving my present worries and future plans to God allows me the option of living in the certainty of his nearness, and finally of his ever-present vigilance to protect my heart and my mind. The amazing peace beyond understanding begins to fill me with the realization that my destiny lies in the hands of one far greater than I am.

Connections and clusters, everyone has them. We call them families. We call them friends. We call them congregations. We call them co-workers. We all have them to one degree or another. Some of these social connections are an accident of birth and stronger than titanium. Some of them are by choice and although strong, can be broken with enough wear on those connective relationships.

The connection between parent and child is one of those of titanium-like strength. Holidays like Christmas and Thanksgiving, Easter and Fourth of July provide the evidence of those kinds of connection. When I was growing up our connections were evidenced weekly by a gathering at my grandmother’s house. My dad and my uncles were there along with the cousins. Dogs barked and children laughed, played and shouted in the aftermath of a home-cooked meal. It was Thanksgiving every week. Saturday night it was ice cream, sometimes homemade, and Perry Mason. We’d try to guess which city would show on the TWA commercial. Grandpa would get so "nervous" with all the noise that he would "retire" to his bedroom. I always wondered what he was doing in there. I found out later he was reading paperback novels.

It seemed that those weekly gatherings were the glue that held our family cluster together. And they went on for a number of years until dissolving marriages and deaths in the family dwindled them in size. For nearly forty years now two holiday gatherings kept the cluster together on Fourth of July and Christmas Eve. Fourth of July coincided with the birthday of my half-sister. Her birthday and my dad’s love of fireworks (the safe and sane kind, really!) along with good food, popsicles and swimming in the pool kept the extended connections of our particular cluster together.

Cross-country moves dwindled the gathering down. One year it was just my son’s family, even my dad wasn’t at his own party!

Last year was the first one we missed Fourth of July since the annual gathering started. For the past few years our Christmas Eve gathering has moved to my son’s house. The number in our cluster has dwindled but the connections are strong. We keep in touch by facebook during the times in between. Those weekly gatherings at my grandmother’s house didn’t span as many decades as our Christmas Eve gathering. But my childhood memories of those times are pretty vivid, even still.

My grandmother has passed from the scene, and the homestead was sold, demolished and the staging ground for a McMansion. That was my first home. There was a flagpole in the backyard, we kept trying to climb it until we could. A concrete pond used to hold the family alligator. We wondered if we would see his offspring rising from the murky water. Paths ran among my grandmother’s foliage and a huge tangerine tree was always good for an afternoon snack. Hide and seek and tag were our weekend staples. What great hide and seek games we could have in our grandma’s backyard. We’d play until it was too dark to see and then it was in the house for ice cream! Sometimes in the evening grandpa would emerge from his den of solitude. There were discussions (arguments) among the uncles and the other kin covering every subject under the sun. Great training ground for a budding lawyer. There was love, for sure.

Distance strains these connections and we make up for their lack with instant messages and emails. They are a poor substitute at best for face to face connections around the family meal and the joy that children find in the unsupervised play of a Saturday afternoon.

These are the memories my parents created for me and they echo through the corridors of my life.

For those of us who are not techno-geeks, computers are a bit of a mystery. Maybe we understand that they operate by programs that are made up of a computer language that we call code, maybe not. We have heard about hackers, viruses and spam, but we might not understand what these are or what they do to our computer. We surely understand the frustration that happens when the mouse stops working, or the screen freezes, or for that matter, everything turns blue. If we use a computer a lot, then we know that rebooting is an accepted part of using them. Sometimes it is a “soft” reboot, sometimes it is a “hard” reboot. Sometimes we lose our data, sometimes we don’t. That’s why we are all encouraged to constantly be backing up our data. Our hope? When the reboot is done, we will be able once again to have a functional computer.
Following Jesus requires the ability to reboot, sometimes again and again. We have a great biblical example of this in the life of Peter. One of the first of those who were called to “Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men,” he was clearly right in the thick of Jesus’ ministry. His mother-in-law was healed and he was present for many of Jesus’ miracles. He confessed that Christ was the Messiah and saw him transfigured. But Peter crashed big time on the night that Jesus was crucified. Hanging around while Jesus was being questioned by the authorities, he was asked three times: “Aren’t you one of his followers?” Three times Peter’s answer: “I am not.” Fear caused Peter’s operating system to fail and even after Jesus had appeared to his followers after he was raised from the dead he still wasn’t functioning.
His solution: “I’m going fishing.” But even that didn’t work. They fished all night and caught nothing. Jesus shows up and tells them to fish on the other side of the boat and they start to catch plenty and then John turns to Peter and tells him “It’s the Lord.” Right then and there Peter starts his reboot: He jumps in the water and heads for shore.
Jesus then takes Peter through the reboot process: “Do you love me?” Yes. “Feed my lambs.” “Do you love me?” Yes. “Shepherd my sheep.” “Do you love me?” You know I do. “Tend my sheep.” And then, “Follow Me!” Reboot complete!
It’s not that hard to crash. We can get hung up on religious rituals and behaviors and forget how to love yourself and others. We can get so righteous that we have to break fellowship with fellow believers. We can get depressed. Recessions and unemployment can throw us for a loop. Sickness or death will mess with our hope and our faith. We lose our ability to function. The beauty of God’s grace is that he has made a way for us to reboot and return to functioning. Fear overcomes you? Walk in my love!
You can’t prevent failure, but you can reboot! This is good news, don’t you think?

Road trips, there is nothing like ‘em. I took a road trip from Southern California to Phoenix, Arizona. It was one day there and one day back, about five hours of driving time each way, just enough time to do some serious thinking. Enough time to get quiet enough for God to speak. I was heading to Phoenix to have a business meeting with some very good friends of mine. I was on the road early, about 2 in the morning, rainy windshields all the way from my house to Palm Springs. Then it was clear skies and then a beautiful sunrise.

On the way out I wasn’t quite sure about where I am on my journey with God. This last year has been pretty confusing. About half way to Phoenix I decided to visit a church and it looked like, if my timing was right, I could make the 9:15 a.m. service. I was hoping to hear from God, maybe get some orders from headquarters. About the time I hit the city limits I got a call from my friend’s husband. His wife was in the hospital, and had been since Saturday. I was glad that I had just pulled into the parking lot of the church. I’d need God for this situation.

If you know me, you know I have trouble with “normal” church services. I have a tendency to be critical. The music was too loud. The people were too friendly. The preacher talked to long. Those thoughts come to me pretty easily. But I was surprised. Maybe I was just so zoned out on 5-hour energy drink and early morning driving, but I pretty much loved everything that happened from the time I walked in the front doors of the auditorium until I got back in my car to head to the hospital.

I loved the music! They did a contemporary version of “Joy to the World” that really touched my heart. I had heard the preacher other times, but I didn’t remember that he was this good! Simple, straightforward, intriguing talk about the straight good news of God’s kingdom. It was about what it means to be a follower of Jesus, in contrast to being an admirer of Jesus. It was powerful. The message touched me, and I was born again, again during the message.

The preacher told a story about the GPS. His family’s first GPS was purchased on a vacation. The voice giving the driving directions was a woman with a British accent, very authoritative. When he followed her directions he did great. Disneyland was within reach. Walmart just around the corner. But when he thought she was leading him in the wrong direction, he turned the GPS off. The preacher compared his situation to that of a believer who has stopped listening to the voice of God in his life. He and his family were lost. Solution: Turn the GPS back on! Next thing he heard, the voice, not of condemnation, or nagging, but simply saying: “Recalculating!” I heard the Lord say to me, “Isn’t it time to tune into me again?” With tears in my eyes, I just said, “Yes.” Recalculating…

When the speaker gave the altar call for people to choose to follow Christ, about 40 people went forward. It was great! I followed a little later and received prayer for the situation with my friends.

The visit turned out not to be quite what I expected. My friend is recovering from surgery. I’m praying for her. We did manage to get some of our business worked out. Now I’m back home, excited to see where God is taking me for the next leg of our journey together.

You can watch the video of the service here: http://vnpproductions.com/lessons/2010/video/20101218.mp4