Monday Special: Spam Nuggets, Breaded and Fried

© David Hartman

     One of the neat things about worship service for me is the scripture reading. There's a difference between reading it yourself and hearing it read. Often a voice inflection or something will trigger me to think in a different light about a passage I've read a hundred times on my own.

     That happened again yesterday during the reading from Matthew. Jesus has finished the Sermon on the Mount, and he and the apostles get on the boat to get away from the crowds. Jesus sleeps. The storms come. The apostles panic and wake him up to save them from becoming fish food.

     Then Jesus asks them why they were afraid, and where was their faith? Kind of an odd question to ask given the circumstances, don't you think? I would have been afraid, too. Where was my faith? My faith was in the guy who I believed could save me. That's why I woke him up. Duh.
     But maybe it wasn't so much a rebuke or a questioning of their faith that Jesus had intended. Maybe it was a challenge to them to start becoming what they were really meant to be in this new kingdom he was establishing.
     Later in the gospel story, we read how the apostles performed miracles on their own -- certainly after receiving the Holy Spirit post ascension, but even before that when Jesus sends them out to preach and heal and then report back to him. There's no Holy Spirit mojo going on in them at this point, just instructions from Jesus on what to do and how to do it. If the Matthew story is linear, the limited commission occurs shortly after the rocking boat.
     Maybe the question is Jesus' way of letting them know they could have done for themselves what they woke him up to do for them. He's getting them ready for what they're going to do themselves in short order. All they had to do was believe that the power was real and in them.
     Maybe not. It's just a thought, albeit one that hadn't crossed my mind until yesterday. Still, I wonder how many crises in life we add to or don't solve at all while we're waiting around for Jesus to take care of it because we think that's the way it's supposed to work. If Jesus is truly in us, maybe the whole point is that he wants us to handle some of this stuff ourselves without sitting on our hands waiting for him or someone else to work the miracle.

...

     A recent Facebook status from old college friend Billy Willis: "OK, so I saw this question posed the other day and I thought I would see how my Facebook friends would answer. Who would you want to walk 1,000 miles with and why? The person can be living, dead, or imaginary."
     Without thinking too hard, I can come up with three names pretty quick.
     One would be Mike Royko, the most gifted writer I've ever read. Oh, the things he could teach me about telling stories over the course of 1,000 miles.
     Another would be Garrison Keillor. I'd bore him, but he'd never bore me.
     The third would be Alison Krauss. She could sing to me to help pass the time. A thousand miles later, I still wouldn't be sick of her voice. And somewhere along the 1,000 miles she's bound to get all hot and sweaty. That would just be a bonus.

...

     The latest Facebook scam or virus or whatever apparently is disguised as a link to a video titled "When Panties Go Bad!" The thumbnail pic is of some thong-clad girl's behind.
     It's to the point now where I just don't click multimedia links on Facebook at all anymore. But I knew this one was a fake when it was recommended to me by the wife of a longtime elder at the Memorial Road Church of Christ. This is a woman I used to work with at OC. A woman who once scolded me for wearing a Ralph Marlin "Mona Lisa" tie on campus because in the famous painting, Mona's not wearing a turtleneck sweater. So I'm fairly sure this elder's wife is not asking me to watch any video with the word "panties" in the title.
     Anyway, I don't need to see a video of what happens when good underwear goes bad. In my house, when good underwear goes bad, you turn 'em inside out and give 'em another week or two. And then you go wash them at the public laundromat.
     You're welcome for the visual, Kenna :)