I had an interesting convergence of thoughts with Pastor Cunningham during a conversation with he and Frank. We started talking about prophecy and the future of the United States. Joan at the same time is taking a US History class that seems to have as its major focus the destruction of the Indians and the injustice of slavery. Why so much effort into destroying our sense of pride in our nation? Balancing my conversations with Joan about US History I read a book Americanism The Fourth Great Western Religion by David Gelernter. He does a great job of tracing the historical roots of our original Puritanism and bringing it into a modern character trait that is still trying to be “a shining light to the world”.

 

Yet, I know American character and culture are changing. I also read “A Study in National Character” which is the subtitle for a book published in 1948 and written by an Englishman Geoffrey Gorer titled “The American People”. Gorer is doing the work of a cultural anthropologist as he examines American character without touching upon the religious aspects. One of his main points was that because we were a nation of immigrants it was so important for the second and third generations to prove their Americanism by being like everyone else.

 

My daughter, Laura Michelle, had the opportunity to study under a fantastic professor at Saint Mary’s of Maryland named Professor Calvert. The teacher had specialized in America’s colonial religious experience. My daughter’s “St. Mary’s Project” took those beginnings, just like David Gelernter, and brought them into the present. Her main point was that there were two extremes that motivated the Puritans. One was an outward desire and action to move the world towards the good thing they had established in America. The other was to withdraw from the world and just be that shining example to the world. Both of these national pulls have been exhibited in our history up to this present time.

 

Bringing us back to the familiar chorus of “Blaming America” for everything. Here is a quote from Katie Couric speaking to the National Press Club.

"...The whole culture of wearing flags on our lapel and saying ‘we’ when referring to the United States and, even the ‘shock and awe’ of the initial stages, it was just too jubilant and just a little uncomfortable. And I remember feeling, when I was anchoring the ‘Today’ show, this inevitable march towards war and kind of feeling like, ‘Will anybody put the brakes on this?’ And is this really being properly challenged by the right people? And I think, at the time, anyone who questioned the administration was considered unpatriotic and it was a very difficult position to be in.”

 

Here is a quote from David Ehrenstein debating Andrew Breibart in a wonderful series in the LA times: A fortiori I'm not so sure about the "love my country" bit as I'm markedly disenchanted with the entire concept of all nation-states. Move an inch beyond language and culture and their meaning and purpose almost invariably mirrors that of the Crips and the Bloods.

 

Bringing us back to our conversation that afternoon. Joan’s teacher does have an idea of a future where America is folded into a better international framework to solve the world’s problems. It is called the one world government prophesized by the Bible. We will just have to watch and see.

 

I am preaching for Tom Cunningham in Casa Grande. This is my first repeat revival. When I was here a year ago, we had about a hundred people out each night. Now, the church assembles 135 people for the services. I put together some new sermons for the revival that went real well. I preached a difficult “sin” sermon Sunday morning followed with a “Somebody Loves Mr. Hatch” sermon Sunday night. God showed up at both services. Last night I preached a “money” sermon and the next two nights I will preach my ministry combo.

 

We watched “James Tembo, Detective” Sunday morning during Sunday school. I was a little more critical of the film, noticing the sound difficulties in the bar scenes, but I’m still blinded to the shortcomings by my own involvement with the people in the film. Tom is helping me with a web page to show off the film and sell some copies.

 

The latest indication of the 50/50 divide in this country is the President of Iran speaking at Columbia University. Here is a great article from the New York Post that touches upon that divide. To quote Abraham Lincoln who quoted the bible: “a house divided against itself cannot stand”.  

 

Here is a great article bringing the media transformations up to date with some good history of new media vs. old media.  

I was able to read “Somebody Loves Mr. Hatch” to the class of special students today. What a joy! I have used this book as a sermon illustration several times. The graduated assistant had paved the way by showing me how it was done. She would read and then show all of the students the pictures. Audra had told me on the phone that she had seen the book at home, and it took some doing but eventually Joan found it for me.

 

I was really looking forward to this. I wasn’t sure if an opportunity would present itself. It was a short day. Most of the students went with the assistants to do a cleaning job. We then played baseball. Two classes then joined together with Coach Jeff Brown in charge. I mentioned that I brought a book to read so he said go ahead. I stood in the center of a square semi circle. I methodically recited the story to the class. I know the story well enough that I didn’t have to read it so I could let them see the pictures as I recited the story.

 

What are these kids thinking? Are they following this? What about the instructors? What about me? I am blessed with a sense of blessing them and being blessed by them simultaneously. Another book was read and then the music teacher showed up. I just clapped along when I was asked to work with the blind, deaf and crippled girl while her teacher left for a minute. I am dancing with this girl. Hands go out, hands go up. Hands go out, Hands go up. She has got the pattern down and as I think about shifting to something else, she seems to be really enjoying this. I am relieved by Mo.

 

Coach Brown gives me a nice thank you about the book with some positive comments before I leave. I hope I get a chance to substitute here again.  

I had a great substitution teaching experience today. I got to sub for the life skills class. In my day it would have been called special ed. I am familiar with films that can portray how (not sure what the proper word to use is) people can pull on our heartstrings. I have had brief encounters with these folks over the years, but nothing that equals today’s experience. I spent the day in a classroom with about 8 students, 3 assistants and one assistant who had graduated from this very class. When I first heard “life skills” I was thinking about skills to navigate through life, but as I entered the classroom I knew that would not be the experience.

 

I sat through the first period and a half just watching the students interacting with their obviously captured assistants. They formed an assembly line, placing napkins in plastic bags, tying them and placing them in a big plastic sack for the local food bank. I closely watched the graduated worker as she methodically kept the material available for the workers. It turns out one of the students is her sister.

 

I watched as another student who was sister to a girl in a wheel chair would do things to get reactions from her sister. At first I was horrified, but then as I watched and then realized that she was the sister it all seemed OK. They had some time before the gym would be open to them, so they were given puzzles. I picked one young man named Woody to go and assist. He had the shaped pieces placed above the wrong spaces. I started to work through getting them placed in the correct places. We went faster and faster. The graduated worker let me know the names of the shapes I couldn’t name: trapezoid, octagon. I was hooked. I am not sure if Woody was just biding time, but it seemed that he could have got the puzzle right without my help, but if nothing else he made me feel good by allowing me to help him get started.

 

Then it was off to the gym where we joined with other sections of similar students. We did some stretches. We made a careful 5 lap walk around the court. Then we played baseball with some athletic, assisting girls pitching and fielding. Most could be pitched to, but some needed to hit off the stand. I am thoroughly enjoying myself. I had a small victory when Sean went up to bat for the third time. The two previous at bats he would fling the bat after hitting the ball barely missing the others. I put my hands on his shoulders and looked him in the eye and warned him to not throw the bat several times. He hit the ball and gently laid the bat down as he ran to first base.

 

More stories and puzzles before we went off to lunch. The assistants get their meals and cut them up. Some have to be fed but most can feed themselves. “Bobby” let me know that she had quit a job working for a law office to do this work for less. She can’t imagine herself doing anything else. Audra called me while we were at lunch. It turns out that a blind, deaf girl in a wheelchair spent some time with Audra when she was recovering from her operations in the school. I had watched the girl with her personal worker. Audra described their conversations, that is this girl reading Audra with her hands. We finished lunch and went back to the classroom. It felt great to identify with these folks as we left the cafeteria.

 

We then went on trash detail over the school grounds. We might have been talking more than working. I was now meeting some of the other students. They would come up to me and we would introduce ourselves to each other and they would say: “Kevin, I like you.” Just feeling too good. After trash detail we went on a scavenger hunt and school ended. All of the students went to the busses except Woody. I sat next to him as we waited for a family member to come and pick him up. He mumbles something about mother, then father and finally about his nice pack. He waits stoically until his sister arrives. What is he thinking? I don’t know, but I am looking forward to tomorrow when I substitute in that class again.

 

I plan on bringing “Somebody Loves Me” to read to the class. I have used it in sermon illustrations.  

 

Joan and I just attended a preview of PBS series entitled “The War” A Ken Burns Film at Yavapai College. In attendance were about 100 people 70 and above. Part of the program was to inform people about a project being put on by the VA that will record up to 90 minutes of interview with someone who was alive during the war. The person being interviewed gets a copy, the local VA gets a copy and a third copy is given to a national organization that is collecting these stories.

 

The film starts off with a statement made: War is not good but it is sometimes necessary. The director uses the phrase “the greatest cataclysm in human history” to describe the Second World War when over 60 million people lost their lives. The reaction that Ken Burns has gotten at screenings is that the film is “terrible and wonderful at the same time”. I think I can agree with that as I sat teary eyed next to my weeping wife watching the 60 minute preview of a 14 hour presentation.

 

A panel commented afterwards. One woman was a riveter for Boeing during the war. One of the gentlemen, and they all have to be et least 80+, reminded us that we are in a war now where our opponents are similar to the Japanese in that they have no respect for life, whether it is their own or the people they are killing. I have just completed reading “Trial and Error” the autobiography of Chaim Weizmann the leader of the Zion movement after Herzl, who was the chemist who helped the allied cause in World War I and was instrumental in helping along the Balfour Declaration that set the stage for the beginnings of the state of Israel. Mr. Weizmann had access to the highest levels of government in Europe and the US. In the book he talks of the fears that gripped the Jews of Palestine as the German army pushed the British army back towards Cairo. They knew what they would experience if the Germans made it to Palestine. He was in contact with President Roosevelt to help along the speedy delivery of the munitions that enabled Montgomery to turn back Rommel at El Alamain. I say this connecting his thoughts that were so terrifying as they unfolded, yet as he wrote about them 5 years later it seemed surreal (my words). The same feeling of seeing pictures of Americans reading the paper announcing the D-day invasion, every bench filled with people intently reading the paper.  I read about these things, I see these pictures and yet it seems so unreal, but someday someone will see the pictures of the funerals following 9/11 and think the same thing. I am not sure if I have done a good job explaining. Here is the web page for the project: www.pbs.org/thewar

Six years ago today, I was sitting with my wife, daughters and our good friends Wes and Laurie Wilcox. We were drinking coffee at a café overlooking a watering hole at the edge of a park in Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe. As we waited for animals to appear, my daughter mentioned that something happened with a plane in New York City. My first thought, like most of us, was that a small plane had accidentally flown into one of the downtown buildings. Laura Michelle did not allow me to sit there on that assumption. She insisted that I go to a room with a television and find out the whole story.

 

I came to a room with people spilling out into the hallway. The soberness of the crowd spoke volumes. It was then that I saw my first replay of a plane crashing into one of the twin towers. Wes joined me as we watched the news in disbelief. We were some of the few Americans in this place, but this was obviously a shared tragedy.  We retired early and found a television playing in a restaurant that evening.

 

The news had escalated from planes crashing to buildings collapsing. It was BBC or Skynews and they left nothing out. Falling bodies and celebrating Muslims were alternatively displayed. We were glued to the TV when an American woman from Boston and two young South Africans entered into the room to join us. This Bostonian got right in front of the TV and began to make snide remarks about President Bush. I politely asked her to refrain from her crude comments. She hushed for awhile but any time the President appeared she showed her disgust. Finally, she began her verbal tirades again and my wife said something to her. This slowed her for a moment, but she couldn’t control her contempt for the President.

 

She burst out one last time and I responded with some volume and upbraiding for her attitude during a time like this. She took offense and her friends rose up seeming like they wanted to fight. As I faced them Wes, a linebacker kind of guy, joined me and they hesitated and then sat down. I took the opportunity to try and give them a little history lesson and a peek into how this event was going to change the world we live in. The woman loudly left taking the South Africans in tow.

 

Upon our return to Mazabuka we put our American flag up at our house. It could be seen from the main highway as people passed by. We got a few honks. I already had been told that technically it was illegal to fly our flag, yet we kept it up for a month with no complaints. Many church folks came up and expressed sorrow and gave us condolences. That Saturday it was insisted that our whole family dress for church and come down for a special service put together by the church with extra effort from Mwapesa.

 

It had the feel of a funeral as we entered into the packed out tent. On the bulletin board was a picture of the burning twin towers. We were given a program and escorted to our seats by a somber usher. They had purposely gathered together before our arrival making us the last ones to be seated. We sang, we prayed and we cried. Just like a funeral we had testimonies from people with good things to say about their relationship with America and Americans. Mwapesa preached a stirring message and was able to bring that silver lining into view. We came out of the service with closure.

 

 

  

I have been preaching in Houston for Glen Pugliese. One of the highlights of this revival is the African folks he has coming to church. They include a couple of Nigerian families and some folks from Liberia. Without a doubt I share a kind of kinship with them that makes the meetings good for me and them.

 

Yesterday I was blessed with a call from my Aunt Dolores who lives here in Houston. We got together for a lunch downtown and then she gave me a whirlwind tour of the city. After touring the landmarks by car we visited a museum, garden and a meditation chapel and she still had energy to spare. She ended up taking me back to my hotel where I changed for church and she did some quick shopping. She then took me to church and attended the service. I really enjoyed having her be a part of the service. The church folks treated her very well.  

 I am preaching for Jack Gaeta in Springfield, OR. Yesterday, we had a Labor Day picnic with his church and his 3 baby churches. The picnic included the baptism of some new converts. These 3 pastors were all out of an excellent band that played here in the Northwest when we were in Seattle. Last night most of those people stayed on after the picnic and we had a great night of revival. I think of how Joan and I represent the Wickenburg church and I know these three young men take serious their representation of God and their mother church.

 

Jack and his son Arron were gracious to allow me to partake in one of the most incredible rituals in America. It is not as well practised in our modern times, but it is still one of the most powerful rituals that a young man can go through as he becomes a man. I am sure the pictures give it away, but Arron has been working part time while in High School and saved enough money to buy the exact vehicle he wanted for the price he could afford. I think God is helping him along. The photos are at the shop to have it checked out, the bank and Arron in his vehicle.