Life Review: Immigrants

My mother's father, my abuelo, immigrated into South Florida from La Zona de Monte Cristo, La Havana, Cuba early in the 20th century. He was a restaurateur... and a professional gambler.  When my mom was about 9, her father was killed by a hit-and-run driver in Miami.  It is unknown whether or not he was murdered, or an accident victim, but my mom and her two brothers lost their dad, regardless.

Mom's mom, probably overwhelmed by the sudden loss, and lacking resources, sent my mom, and younger brothers, Ramon, and Manuel to a Masonic orphanage in St. Petersburg.  Mom's mother remarried, had another son, and when that husband died, ended up marrying a third time to the only grandfather I ever knew on her side, Johnny Phillips, for whom I was named.

On the day of my mother's funeral, all 5 of us sons were sitting around the old family living room chatting.  It dawned on me that my Mom, being the oldest had an Anglo name, Mary, whereas her two younger siblings had Latino names, because of their Cuban heritage.  I asked my brothers about this oddity.

My older brother, Doug, quickly explained it. "Her name wasn't Mary, it was Maria!"

And of course that makes perfect sense. My uncle Ramon was called "Raymond"Manuel, was called "Man-u-el" (not much way to Anglicize that one).  So, Maria was called "Mary".

But isn't it a bit odd that I never knew that until the day of her burial?

In the early part of the 20th century, many immigrants wanted to quickly assimilate into US culture (if there is such a thing).  Whereas I understand the impetus, I find it sad that my Mom lived her life under the wrong name.  I wish too, for selfish reasons, that my Mom and her sibs had been Spanish-speakers.

I am extremely proud, perhaps excessively so, of my Cuban roots. I love hearing people's heritage stories. I find people from different cultures to be fascinating, and am probably too aggressive in seeking those stories.  Perhaps that explains why I have such an affinity for Jewish culture.

Christians owe our existence to the Israelite nation. Our creation was from Jews, and our Messiah was definitively Jewish. I revel in Jewish things, and eat more kosherly than many modern Jews. I have a mezzusah on my door, and own two kippas and a prayer shawl (tallit). I know the first of the "Shema" and all of the shehecheyanu.

So, I am proud of my Cuban roots, and my Judaic ones too.  Shalom!

A GREAT Little Book

I am doing a slew of speaking this spring.  In preparation for some of it, my daughter Kelly has loaned me several books. Because I am in the middle of two other books already, I asked her which was her top couple.  She named them, one of which was Supernatural Living for Natural People, by Ray Ortlund Jr.  This is an excellent study of Romans 8.  I highly recommend, it.  He gets to the point and all 39 verses are covered in only 143 short pages with study questions at the end of each chapter.

I am writing down several quotes that I will use, hopefully, for the next several years. The topics of Romans 8, are living as a disciple, and the work of the Holy Spirit.  I will be speaking on both these topics, so that may explain why I like the book so much.

Another reason I like the book is that these two topics:  the Holy Spirit and Discipleship, are mostly under-considered in US evangelical Christianity.  I have speculated before about the influence of capitalism on Christianity in the USA.  We like to count things, and once you are baptized, there isn't too much to count.  And, I am an ardent capitalist!

It is sad to me, that we seem to have so many Christians in the USA who have bought a spiritual "life insurance policy". We have sold the idea of grace, which is undeniably the only true means of salvation, so strongly that most of us Christians seem to want to live our lives primarily in the flesh with a trip to church at Christmas and Easter, and maybe a bit more.  After all, we know we are saved.

But, Ortlund explains that this is a wholly inadequate. G^d has paid a very high price for you and for me. How should we then respond? 

Here is an Ortlund quote (pg. 37) that seems to capture some of this, "The love of the world, and the love of G^d are like the scales of a balance; as the one falleth, the other doth rise." (from The Life of God in the Soul of Man, by Henry Scougal, who taught at Aberdeen Uni in the 1600s).  Practical yet profound, eh?

Rather than write more, let's just meditate on that quote for a while...

On the Road Again

Brenda and I have made a LOT of road trips in our 45.5 years of marriage.  Our latest was a trip to Dallas for our Cru Faculty Ministry mid-year conference. For the last 3 years I have been invited out, usually to give a short talk or two.  In fact, last year at this very conference it dawned on me that we needed to go ahead and retire and go on staff.

This year I begged for a chance to speak to the folks being recruited to join us on Faculty Ministry.  I am very passionate about faculty ministry, because faculty have such a great opportunity to impact so very many for Christ. One of my points, that I hoped to make was, "If you really have a heart to reach college students for Christ, then you should really devote time to engaging faculty in ministry. If a faculty member teaches 30 years, and has 200 students total per year (some have a lot more), they have the opportunity to impact 6000 students! And many of those students would NOT choose to participate in Cru student ministry!"  I also talked about other aspects of faculty ministry such as participation with student mission trips.

G^d has given ALL of us many opportunities to serve Him, most of which I miss. I miss these because of: fear, busyness, distraction, and lack of role models.  And that is too bad.  I could be laying up treasures in heaven, if I weren't so occupied with the "here-and-now".

How about you?

Life Review: Siblings

I grew up in a family of 5 boys.  I had one more older brother, who died at 18 months or so, which was not all that unusual in the late 1930's.  My older brother Doug is 7 years older than me, and so, according to the folks who are supposed to know of these things, I am a "first" born, even though I am third born. My brother David is only about 18 months younger than me, so we were only one grade apart, and were pretty good buddies all through youth and High School. My next brother Danny was 7 years younger, and Patrick, I think is 10 years younger.  Not that everyone references his birthdate to mine, but this sets the age range easily.

To my knowledge we had a pretty ordinary, southeastern USA experience. As I have mentioned before, our little town was quiet, and "dry". We never got in much trouble, and generally we got along pretty well.  It strikes us as a bit odd when we run into fractured families with some siblings refusing to speak to others.

We all participated in some sports including a bit of American football, some track and field.  David and I wrestled on the same team, with some success.

We have had a few brother-inspired reunions.  Our first was in the Okefenokee swamp, and we did another a Myrtle beach.  Out last one, was a few years back in Murphy, NC, when Doug lived there.  We communicate mostly through email these days, and through facebook.

We have been mostly professional educators. In fact, it occurs to me that it is likely pretty unusual that 4 of 5 of brothers have been chiefly professional educators. I am guessing that we are a very small % of the population to have such similar professions.  We have also mostly all stayed in the SE USA.  Doug worked in MD for several years, but at his first opportunity he moved south.  Doug and I both went to the same undergrad program, and we both earned doctoral degrees.  David and Patrick have Masters degrees.  I am guessing that is a bit unusual too.

Though we have similar professions, we have no shortage of differences.  They are too numerous to enumerate here, but trust me, there are plenty.

It is comforting to have three brothers who I can call on in a pinch.  It is also comforting to have Christian bothers who we could also call on in a pinch.

G^d has blessed me, and really all of us, in a great many ways, and my brothers are one of those blessings.  Thanks be to G^d.  Amen.

Absolutely Sure There are NO Absolutes!!

I love a good self-contradiction.  It seems there are plenty to go around right now.  Many of my friends are absolutely sure that there is NO absolute TRUTH!! If someone suggests that "Thous shalt not kill", they will insist that this is NOT true, and that a woman's right to autonomy says she can kill.

Likewise, as I have previously noted, many of these same folks are ABSOLUTELY sure that parent-administered corporal punishment is absolutely wrong!

And now my relativistic friends are not only absolutely sure that Harvey Weinstein should go straight to the non-existent hell, they are sure that "Fake News" is pervasive.  But, if there are NO absolutes, as my friends exist, how can any information be "fake" it can only be one person's perspective based on his own post-modern experiences.

I know the conservatives have also cried about "fake news", but at least for most conservatives, there is such at thing as "truth" and in the case of untruth, "fake" news complaints make some sense.

Now, sometimes readers are enraged by my viewpoints on this type of thing, and I understand. I am just a bit perplexed about when things can be absolute, and when they are merely relative. I am not a post-modernist, but I can sympathize, I simply cannot resolve the inconsistency.

Perhaps someone out there can explain it.  Thanks.

Some Thoughts on Being Rich

I just last month taught Chapter 15 of the book, Befriend the Rich and Powerful by Scott Sauls. I didn't think he got to say, in that brief chapter, all that needed to be said.

Most all, actually all, of the men in the Bible study were rich, by the metric most of the world counts wealth. So, of all the chapters in the book, this might be the KEY one.

Scripture has a LOT to tell us on this topic:

Most familiar is 1 Tim 6:  ⁹But those who desire to be rich fall into temptation, into a snare, into many senseless and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. ¹⁰ For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evils. It is through this craving that some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pangs.

But there’s plenty more…

Lk 18: ²² When Jesus heard this, he said to him, “One thing you still lack. Sell all that you have and distribute to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me.” ²³ But when he heard these things, he became very sad, for he was extremely rich. ²⁴ Jesus, seeing that he had become sad, said, “How difficult it is for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God! ²⁵ For it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God.” ²⁶ Those who heard it said, “Then who can be saved?” ²⁷ But he said, “What is impossible with man is possible with God.” 

Lk 12   ¹³ Someone in the crowd said to him, “Teacher, tell my brother to divide the inheritance with me.” ¹⁴ But he said to him, “Man, who made me a judge or arbitrator over you?” ¹⁵ And he said to them, “Take care, and be on your guard against all covetousness, for one's life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions.” ¹⁶ And he told them a parable, saying, “The land of a rich man produced plentifully, ¹⁷ and he thought to himself, ‘What shall I do, for I have nowhere to store my crops?’ ¹⁸ And he said, ‘I will do this: I will tear down my barns and build larger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods.¹⁹ And I will say to my soul, “Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; relax, eat, drink, be merry.”’ ²⁰ But God said to him, ‘Fool! This night your soul is required of you, and the things you have prepared, whose will they be?’ ²¹ So is the one who lays up treasure for himself and is not rich toward God.”

Matt 6:19-21

¹⁹ “Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust^[a] destroy and where thieves break in and steal, ²⁰ but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. ²¹ For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.]

Lk 12: ¹⁵ And he said to them, “Take care, and be on your guard against all covetousness, for one's life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions.” ¹⁶ And he told them a parable, saying, “The land of a rich man produced plentifully, ¹⁷ and he thought to himself, ‘What shall I do, for I have nowhere to store my crops?’ ¹⁸ And he said, ‘I will do this: I will tear down my barns and build larger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods.¹⁹ And I will say to my soul, “Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; relax, eat, drink, be merry.”’ ²⁰ But God said to him, ‘Fool! This night your soul is required of you, and the things you have prepared, whose will they be?’ ²¹ So is the one who lays up treasure for himself and is not rich toward God.”

^48 b Everyone to whom much was given, of him much will be required, and from him to whom they entrusted much, they will demand the more.

Keep in mind, G^d has befriended the rich many times in Scripture:

Foundational= Abraham, Job, Solomon, David...

Christian = Zaccheus, Rich young ruler, Nicodemus, Joseph of Arimethea

Two Qs:

1  1)      What do Scriptures tell us about how to live as rich people?

2  2)      What will we do to befriend our rich acquaintances, neighbors, etc.  How do we minister to them?

         Matt 16:26- What does it profit a man to gain the whole world and lose his own soul?  Or what will a man give for a soul?

 You, like most foIks, are probably denying that you are wealthy, but most likely you are.  You have enough money to live on, plus some extra for vacations, and other little luxuries.  No reason to be afraid to admit it.    Take a look at these instructions:

Conclusion:

I Tim 6: ¹⁷ As for the rich in this present age, charge them not to be haughty, nor to set their hopes on the uncertainty of riches, but on God, who richly provides us with everything to enjoy. ¹⁸ They are to do good, to be rich in good works, to be generous and ready to share, ¹⁹ thus storing up treasure for themselves as a good foundation for the future, so that they may take hold of that which is truly life.

Running into Folks

On a recent airplane I turned around and saw one of the U of A football coaches sitting two rows back of me.  I introduced myself and we chatted for a couple of minutes whilst waiting to deplane.  This was a flight out of BHM, so it was no big surprise to see him.  Upon arrival back to BHM from that same trip I ran into a young man and his wife who I have known for many years.  Again, it was not so strange to see folks, only about 60 miles from home.

But over the years I have run into some folks far away from anywhere familiar.  Last year coming back from Honduras, I ran into one of my friends from Liberty U in the Miami Airport.  Many years ago, probably over 20, I found myself seated in the very back of an airplane with a famous guy who I didn't recognize.  I think his handlers were a bit chagrined that I didn't.  They somehow clued me in that I was sitting with Tony Robbins who is a National star in the motivation/success speaking/writing business. On another occasion, I caught on that I was flying with a famous Baltimore Orioles a few years after his retirement.  I believe it was the great Brooks Robinson.

I have run into a few other folks in odd places, which I have mentioned in posts before.  It's kinda neat, kind of interesting, but not a super big deal...

One of these days, we'll consort with Moses, and David, and Sampson (yeah check it out in Hebrews 11), and Paul, and Timothy, and Peter, and... well lots of folks.  But those of us who have trusted in Jesus the Christ, will be eternally with the G^d of the Universe, and with our L^rd Jesus Christ.  Now, that will be a BIG deal!