Saturday, August 29, 2009

Do I Need To Love Them?

Recently the country has been captivated with the story of a young girl who was kidnapped back in 1991. She recently was reunited with her parents at the age of 29. Her story is one of horrific tragedy that we, looking from the outside, can never truly understand or comprehend.

The human side of me thinks this man should be put through every single torture device that the human mind has ever invented. There is nothing that could be done to this individual that would ever be enough to make up for the evil things that he did to this child and the emotional trauma that she suffered over the years and, consequently, will have to wrestle with for the rest of her life.

Now, I believe that this country is founded on a sense of justice. And because of this, we have laws in place to at least administer some sort of justice. Our system may not be perfect, but it's the best we have and it is as fair as any system in the world.

What concerns me is our response as Christians to this story. I have heard many comments that disturb me deeply. We place ourselves in the shoes of the victims which we should rightly do. But, then we completely dehumanize the criminal. We act as judge jury and executioner. We make comments about how this person does not deserve fairness, mercy, grace, love etc.

The message of the Gospel is that love transcends all evil. It lifts us out of the muck and the mire that we swim and relish in. For us to begin to put weight on different kinds of sin is a dangerous slippery slope. What this man did to this poor innocent little girl is no different than Hitler's murdering of millions of Jews and others. What both of these man have done is no different than my sin. When it is boiled down to brass tacks, we are all sinners and we are all separated from the love of God. I deserve death as much as Hitler or this pathetic man. The only difference between me and these other men is I have trusted in the one who gives grace and gives it abundantly. Because of which I should be more willing than others to extend that same grace and mercy to people such as this.

If we think that this man does not deserve mercy. If we think he does not deserve a voice, then lets look at some of the people in the bible that we look up to so fervently.

Apostle Paul-Murderer
Peter-selfish liar
King David-Adulterer, Murderer, Polygamist, liar
Moses-Murderer
Abraham-War Monger, Liar

This, of course, is just a short list of the people we look up to and the awful things they did. In fact if we were to judge everyone who wrote the scriptures we so dearly love, all we would be left with would be the red letters. When all is said and done, maybe that's enough. Because the message would still stand; love unconditionally, love God, love your neighbor.
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Monday, August 10, 2009

Today is D-day. I go on the phones for the first time. I would be lying if I said I wasn't nervous. They have numbers that you have to meet. If you don't meet those numbers, you could lose your job. There is a lot riding on this job. The biggest one being, the phenomenal health care that Qwest offers. So maybe I am stressing out over it more than i should. But it is scary.

So if you are calling Qwest to complain about their service or their billing, remember that you might end up talking to one of your friends.

Oh...and would you consider signing up for our great high speed Internet? How about DirecTV and the NFL Sunday ticket? Just thought I'd ask.
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Wednesday, August 5, 2009

Warning: Do not attempt!

We had been having a very active summer. Camping, fishing, circus, Independence Day activities. It was simply nice to be able to do things with having to worry about me working on the weekends and overnight. For the first time in years, I was able to enjoy my family and be awake during the day.

But on Sunday a few weeks ago things changed and became hectic in a whole new way. while my wife was attempting to move a railroad tie in our front yard from point a to point b, she managed to drop it on her toe. She tried to bounce it away from her and unfortunately it bounced back onto her. What made it even worse, was the fact that my poor wife was not wearing any shoes.

I was in the house working on some homework and decided to get up and go ask her a question (I now can't remember what that question was). As I was walking towards the front door, Kim was walking (or hobbling) up to the door as well. I asked what was wrong and she explained to me that she had dropped the tie on her toe. She limped up to the shower to wash the blood off and see how bad it was. She said that her toe had exploded and she need to go to the doctor. Even after that description, I was still thinking that all she would need was a few stitches to recover. Little did I know that the entire top piece of her toe was now detached from the rest.

We jumped in the car and drove recklessly to the doc in the box. The doctor rushed us in immediately and diagnosed the situation. He informed us that most of the top her toe was hanging by mere pieces of skin and that over a quarter inch of bone was showing. He was unable to do anything with it except bandage it up and see if he could make an appointment for Kim to see a podiatrist the next day.

The doctor was able to secure that appointment and my wife went to see the podiatrist the next day. They decided to do what they call Hyper Baric Oxygen treatments and they had planned on doing twenty of them. So basically she gets stuffed in a giant clear tube that spits out 100% pure oxygen. She has the privilege of staying in there for 90 minutes a day.

Since then my poor wife has not been able to drive. And since I just started a new job that works slightly different hours then her, I am unable to give her rides. She has been forced to find somebody that will take her to her appointments and drive her back home. It has been incredibly frustrating for her, but she has been a trooper.

As my wife said, the moral of the story is:
Good idea: Wearing gloves while working in the garden
Bad idea: not wearing shoes while working in the garden.

Pray for my dear sweet wife.
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