Charlie Wear’s Notes

Wear Sunscreen, the faux commencement speech popularized by Baz Luhrman’s music video, contains some good advice, which, as the speech says, "like youth, is probably wasted on the young." The advice I am focused on today is the sunscreen advice.

The source of most skin cancers, according to my dermatologist, is sun exposure, and most of the negative exposure occurs prior to the age of 18. So parents, add sunscreen to the daily routine for children who will be playing in unprotected sunlight.

Of course, I do use my cellphone near my left ear, so I suppose the skin cancer theoretically could have been caused by cell phone use or by the gamma rays that are generated by vegetarian computer users!

In any case, I am healing well from the procedure that removed my growth last Friday. I have moved into the "Golly, that sure does itch stage." One of the disadvantages of having a skin cancer removed that is near your left ear under local anesthesia is that you get to hear everything that is happening just like you have THX sound or a set of Bose earphones.

The funkiest moment was when they were stretching the skin that would cover the 50-cent piece size wound that was left after the cancer had been cut off. I am not sure that I could ever endure a face lift, but that stretching was the wierdest feeling.

In the aftermath of the procedure I have some numbness in my scalp from nerves being dislocated from the skin they were ennervating. The doctor says that numbness should go away in time. Meanwhile, I have these itchy sensations that tend to be quite annoying.

For those of you interested, here is the Wear Sunscreen video (with Spanish subtitles):

I’ve had an itchy spot on my scalp behind my left ear for some time now. At first I thought it was somehow caused by my glasses rubbing up against my scalp. Every once in a while it would scab over. Didn’t heal. I had my wife, a nurse practitioner,  look at it about a month ago. She said, "That doesn’t look good." She looked again and said, you had better see a dermatologist.

Expecting it to take a month to get in to see the doctor I was surprised that I got in to see him the next day. He said, "That looks like a basal cell carcinoma, but we will take a biopsy to make sure." Carcinoma? Biopsy? For an itchy spot on my scalp? The doctor did the biopsy which took about five minutes and told me to call in Wednesday for the results. While I was waiting for the doctor to return my call on Wednesday a good friend called. It was great to hear from him. I said, "You have just made my day by calling." He said something like, if my call makes your day you must be having a pretty bad day like sitting around waiting to hear bad news from a doctor. I brushed off his off-hand comment, it was a little too close to home.

After we hung up, I called the doctor’s office and found out the news: Basal Cell Carcinoma. "We can do a procedure and remove it, let me have my colleague speak with you to arrange it." The appointment was made for yesterday at 9 a.m. Turns out my spot was actually a pretty big spot. The procedure involved removing the growth, taking a slide of the fringes to make sure all of it was gone, and then closing up. So between the "removal" and the closing up there was about a 30-45 minute wait holding a bandage up to my scalp to provide pressure.

I was in good company in the waiting room with others who had bandages on their noses and ears. Eventually they brought me back in and said there was a small spot remaining but that it would be removed when they pulled together the loose skin to close the wound. About a half an hour later I was on my way home, an ace bandage wrapped around my head like a turban to apply pressure and minimize bleeding. My wife is using the turban effect to hold a bandage in place while I work today (see self-photo, right).

This weekend I am taking it easy, keeping the pain medication flowing. Expectations? Full recovery with about a 4 1/2 inch scar in my scalp.

On Friday, right after I got home my wife took Ben and they went to get my prescription filled and run some errands. As soon as they walked in the door Ben said, "I want to pray for you, daddy." "Dear Jesus, Help my daddy’s head to get healed, Amen."

I liked Tony Snow, and I wasn’t alone. For several years I watched him as he hosted Fox News Sunday. He died too young at the age of 53 from cancer. His fought his disease in a very public way, with optimism and courage. Another young (remember, I think people who are in their 50s are young) journalist dead before his time.

It wasn’t hard to compare the heartfelt tributes to Mr. Snow to those for Tim Russert. Here were two men, on different sides of the political spectrum who managed to make people who disagreed with them to like them personally. Both of them were family men and good fathers. Both of them were caring to those they worked with. Both of them had a strong faith.

I couldn’t help but notice the number of people who praised Snow for his authenticity. In his last short time since leaving his post as White House press secretary he worked hard to raise some money to support his family in the years to come. We can all pray that the grief of his family will be soon forgotten as memories of his grace and humor outshine them.

4th of July is for families. Starting about 35 years ago my father started having a 4th of July party at his home in Southern California. Over the years I have only missed a couple, notably last year when we were in Florida. The highlight of the party is usually the burning up of small amounts of gunpowder (fireworks) in my Dad’s back yard. When the parties started all those years ago there was a small number of attendees and over the years it grew in size, probably 20-30 at its peak.

A couple of years ago, my Dad didn’t make it to his party! This year there were 10 of us. We swam in the pool and then headed home early. Victims of ordinances that call for a $1,000 fine for shooting off fireworks. There is just too much fire danger. It was a great day with the family all around, a family tradition for sure. We came home and around 9 p.m. in the evening a huge fireworks show happened, practically in our backyard. Ben said, "This is the greatest day of my life." (our own attempt at pulling a few poppers left me with a bad attitude and a stung finger.

We don’t have a cake, like my good friends the Banes’, but this annual event is a kind of anchor for the Wear family. I don’t know how many more years the event will continue as the family has scattered to Alaska, Oregon, Maryland, Florida, Tennessee and other American venues. But as long as it does we will enjoy our family time together.

I was talking to a friend of mine the other day about, among other things, church leadership in large churches. We were talking about the difficulties of keeping the evangelism flame alive in a large church. I said something like, "When Evangelism is your job, you are in trouble."

I think the same could be said about being a preacher, worship leader, or other paid staff member of a large church. So many influences come into play when you get your paycheck as a result of being successful in an endeavor that is primarily an activity of the Holy Spirit or it’s influence in our lives. And, for God’s sake, what do you do when everything you used to do in your "job" stops working?

Of course, there is plenty of information out there on the subject "Why Evangelism Doesn’t Work," and I think it is fair to say that the entire process has become much more difficult, at least in the North American culture I live in. For those of us who are not "professional" evangelists, preachers, etc., let’s pray that the Holy Spirit would breathe new life into the work of those who make their living from these endeavors. Burnout is inevitable, fresh infilling is a necessity.

I’ve been around ministry long enough to be nostalgic for things that happened in the past, have you? One time I was part of a small group that used to feed homeless people on Saturdays in a park. Now, we were the kind of group that believed it is better to seek forgiveness than to get permission, so we were set up on a Saturday afternoon underneath a covered pavilion. We had been doing this for awhile and had developed a reputation for providing some very good food.

This particular weekend was rainy. I know, very unusual for Southern California. As one of the leaders of the group I began to panic when I saw that about 300 people had lined up. We had igloo coolers full of stew and chili and lots of other good stuff, but I was sure there was not enough food. I was in the serving line ladling out some outstanding potato based stew with big chunks of meat. I had been at it for some time.

Here’s the way it worked. The guest would hand me their bowl, I would lift the cover just enough to scoop my ladle into the stew. Out would come the steaming stew. It wasn’t long before I noticed that every time I ladled out a serving there was a large chunk of meat in it. This seemed unusual. I mean, I should have missed once in a while, right?

I opened up the lid and noticed I had used up about 40% of the contents. I stirred the contents and was not able to come up with pounds of meat. Fewer than 40% of our guests had been served, so I had reason for concern, but I commented to one of my fellow servers, "Wow, this is the meatiest stew I have ever served."

The line continued processing. I continued ladling. The meat continued plopping into the bowls. I didn’t lift the lid again until every one had been served. When I did lift it, there was still about 20% of the stew remaining.

Not only did we serve that overflow crowd. We sent the leftovers to a shelter for abused women and 24 more adults had food that Saturday. It wasn’t loaves and fishes, but our entire group was convinced that God had multiplied the food and fed those people that afternoon. As we sat around a restaurant table afterwards sharing our experience, we couldn’t keep from smiling and shaking our heads. The New Testament had come alive in our own lives! Wow…

I was reminded of this story as I read a post on my friend Scott Bane’s site. He is planting a church in northwest Indiana. As I looked at his post I realized that he is living through his "good old days" right now. And then, as I thought about Scott and his family, the Holy Spirit quickened in my heart that he has some more "good old days" for me to live in…Wow!

Is there anyone in the US (who watches TV news, reads a newspaper, or checks out Google News) that does not know that Tim Russert of NBC’s Meet the Press died yesterday? I was not a regular viewer of Meet the Press but I always enjoyed Russert’s hardhitting interviews when I would see them from time to time. I especially enjoyed his well-known admiration for his father that was clearly evidenced in his NY times bestseller, Big Russ and Me.

Russert was clearly a man of faith, a strong family man and someone who was "tough but fair" as John McCain said about him yesterday. He was the first of his family to attend college and was the product of the working man values instilled in him by his father who supported and educated his children after service in WW II as a sanitation worker and a truck driver.

Russert was 58 years old. I suppose that is one reason why his death has moved me so much, because he was just a few months younger than I am. He was a man at "the top of his profession" as McCain said. He was involved in the news story of his life, the 2008 presidential campaign and election. He collapsed at work doing the thing that he loved to do.

A few years ago the Tim McGraw song, Live Like You Are Dying was on an endless loop on my ipod. I was struck with the realization of my own mortality. The realization moved me to make choices to fashion a life that was more in line with the idea that our days are numbered. Of course, people, young and old, die every day. Some have made a big ripple in this pond we live in, some have not. I guess what is more important for me, at this stage of my life, is that I live each day in a state of contentment. That I appreciate the daily blessings I receive and that I pass them to those around me.

Some of you may know that I was up to my eyeballs in the outward-focused, servant evangelism ministry over the past couple of years. One of the things I like about this stuff is that when we decide to make our selves available to serve others, God shows up and touches people.

You can read about a $1 car wash that was recently done by a church.

Or watch the short video:

Okay, you have got to check out this article (via Todd Hunter’s new ministry website 3isenough.org)…the author simply loves his small group!

Todd Hunter has launched his new homepage, 3 is enough. Be sure to check it out for information on this new ministry.