I have been leading the Tuesday morning prayer meetings this past month.  The cycle of events at our church ramps up in August when college, international and youth ministries get back into full swing.  So, for the first Tuesday, I contacted the ministry leaders, asked for their fall start-up dates and put together a chronological list.

I am thinking, “What a great tool for prayer!”  That day, only Keith showed up and we spent the time praying for the upcoming move of his mother-in-law to an assisted care facility. Good, I say, we can use that same ministry list next week.  And it worked well, providing information and topics for the group of five assembled that day.

Using the same list one more time seemed a bit repetitive, but it was still very relevant, so it was relegated to page 2.  But what to put on page 1? A couple of seemingly lame ideas popped up – Ask a Question, and pull items from the Church Prayer Chain.  Best I got on a Monday night.  How many copies to make?  I’ll go with the normal number, glad that I have lots of paper and a printer that makes double-sided copies. The Question was pulled from what I considered a short and weak blog post (8/18/14): “What do you do in your daily devotion time that helps your participation in group prayer?”   I hoped this would go ok.

On Tuesday morning, it was once again clear that God can set the table for an event and make the leader, the materials, and the plan secondary.  One event NOT on the ministry list was the first seminar for the new interns, to be held right after they attended the Tuesday morning prayer time!  The staff members leading the training showed up for the first day, and their topic would be Personal Devotions!

The Question had relevance for the seminar topic. The Prayer Chain included people the interns knew well.  The ministry list was appropriate for staff and interns.  The prayer was rich and warm.  And, as wise men and women answered the Question, an addendum made the weak blog post stronger.  PTL.

I still have the second 15 ounce bottle of baby shampoo I purchased 10 years ago in a BOGO – buy one get one – moment.  The optometrist suggested it would be a simple way to treat the rosacea on my eyelids – close your eyes and rub a little shampoo over the area every once in a while in the shower. It would have made sense to get a little bottle and try it out, but sale items at stores really can cloud your judgment. Right after the office visit, the stuff was on sale – BOGO! This will last for some time; I won’t have to worry about replenishing; and look how cheap it is! 

(As an aside, I can’t say BOGO without thinking of the doctoral student with that name who attended URC for several years in the 1970s.  He was from Indonesia and brought his family over for the last couple years of his work here.)

I often speculate (while standing in the shower) on whether this was a wise purchase.  Logistics optimization analysis just doesn’t work very well in this case. I certainly did get the best cost per ounce price possible. But the sale amount was so small that opportunity costs are negligible, and the only other thing I might have bought was a pack of baseball cards which have lost all value anyway. Storage costs might apply but the bottle didn’t bother anyone, sitting serenely on the crowded shelf for seven years before it was opened.

I do wonder if the shampoo is any good after all this time.  It seems to be darker than the contents of newer bottles although there is no expiration date – maybe they didn’t use expirations back then.  A couple of times I actually used it on my hair and it still lathers up just fine.  I’m not sure what to make of the optometrist’s latest admonition about taking care during the application, like maybe the whole concept was flawed…

In three or four years when the current bottle is nearly gone, I hope I will buy just one smaller bottle and not mind wasting the four cents I could “save” with a larger size.  But I will likely only make the purchase when there is a sale, and it will probably be one of those “25% off all health and beauty items” deals, with a minimum purchase level so I will have to lump it together with Q-tips, cotton balls, and toothpaste to meet the requirement.  Hopefully I will have a coupon for the toothpaste.

Here is how I know it is important to for old guys to find a sport to continue to play. When we started in the Over-40 basketball league, we shared the gym with the Over-50 teams.  They had a strange rule – no fast breaks.  What?  We were all young pups who had just qualified for our league, hooted privately at the restriction, and licked our chops at the prospects awaiting us in a decade.  Sadly, I don’t think any of us were still playing at age 50 – some combination of knees, hamstrings, backs, and interest failed each one. Despite our noise, those guys on the other court were the real stamina stars.  (It also makes sense now why they had so few teams!)

So what can we play?  First, remember that everyone says walking is less punishing on the knees than running but walking by yourself is still punishing.  And know that tennis looks easy but the court is hard, you have to chase the ball a lot, and Diane broke her foot one time while playing.  You can ride around in a cart while golfing, but it can be expensive.  My friend Hank was disappointed when Parkinson’s was ruled out as a diagnosis for his tremors and balance issues.  Evidently Parkinson’s patients could get free golf at his local course.

Watch the crowds at retirement centers like my Dad’s, and on Senior Mornings at the Mall.  They all sit in chairs and do exercises – light weights and leg lifts and arm rotations, all in a safe environment.  The more aquatic crowd does water aerobics, although my friend Tom tells me to be careful because you get a lot more tired than you realize because of buoyancy.

If you want to play a game, consider bocce ball.  Roll the balls and go get them.  Repeat.   For more variety, play ultimate Frisbee at the IM East intramural fields on Sundays in the summer after the evening service.  The grass is soft and cushioning when you fall. The sun sets after 9 PM, allowing a good hour and a half of playtime before the mosquitos come out.  The crowd includes young kids and college stars as well as older, more “experienced” players.  The stars run a lot; fast breaks are allowed.  The old guys with basketball or soccer memories know where to stand and how to play defense.

So the best advice for those seeking a continuing sport is to paraphrase Dory from the Finding Nemo movie: “Just keep swimming, just keep walking, just keep exercising, and play Frisbee as long as you can.”

With hitch-hiking out of vogue (see last week’s post) I have discovered more examples of captive audiences.  A few years ago we received a small check from our life insurance company for a class action settlement of a lawsuit.  I was not sure how we were qualified to receive the check so I called the agent to arrange a meet.  Eric did a good job of answering the questions I had about the class action suit and using our life insurance policies and then he wanted to ask me questions, “to update my profile.”

First up was “What is your goal in life?”  I have been waiting years for someone to ask me that and I was ready.  “My goal is to go to heaven and take as many people with me as I can.”  I think I heard this answer some year at Ichthus, the weekend long rock concert for high school youth groups.

The next question was teed up just right: “Can you expand on that?”  “Yes.  I will have to tell you good news.”     And I was off and running.   Eric did not become a believer that day, but he did listen patiently to the gospel of Jesus Christ.

 

When my Dad was in the nursing home near St Louis, they would have a Bible study on Friday mornings, and the wonderful activities lady was determined to get Dad involved.  On weekends that I came to visit, I would take along a “talk” and give it to the group. Usually the messages were from Sunday school lessons I had done or Kevin sermon outlines.  Dad enjoyed the “that’s Bill’s son” compliments and seemed to appreciate the talks. 

Those opportunities taught me to stay humble and that God is in charge of conversions.  One Saturday morning all my siblings were in town, and I was scheduled to do a sermon Sunday night back in Michigan.  I asked if they would let me practice the sermon on them, and they kindly agreed to listen and delay watching one of the 1940s Turner Channel movies Dad was fond of.

Well I thought I did a great job.  The gospel message was included.  There was wisdom from James 5 and examples of wisdom in action following Jesus in Luke 8. At the end, applause broke out from my brother and sisters.  The humble part was when Dad said, “That was great. Now can you get me to the bathroom because I think I peed my pants.” 

Back in the day when hitchhikers still wandered the land, our church was using the James Kennedy Evangelism Explosion program for following up with people who visited the church on Sunday mornings.  This method has the well-known pair of questions for assessing one’s relationship to the Lord: “If you were to die today, do you know you will go to heaven?” and “If God asks you why he should let you into heaven, what would you say?”

The correct answer to the second question goes something like “Dear Father, I believe in your dear Son Jesus Christ as my personal Lord and Savior.  You promised that anyone who does so would be welcomed into Heaven and live forever.  And you keep your promises.”  I know in my head that is the right answer, but I suspect after reading about the encounters  Isaiah and Moses had with God  (Isaiah 6.1-6 and Exodus 3.1-6) that if He asked me such a question, I would be unable to speak or move and probably just fall right down on the ground.  The common bad answer to the question?  “I have been good, even very good.”

The Kennedy program provided a presentation and outline along with the questions.  We had to practice.  My best practice times were to a “captive audience.”  I would pick up hitchhikers on the highway.  My part of the conversation would go something like, “what’s your  name?  Where you headed?  We are doing a new program at church. Can I practice with you?”  I would launch the presentation, ask the two questions, and see where the conversation went.   

I don’t recall any of those hitchhikers turning their life over to Jesus on the spot.  But as far as I can tell, my responsibility is to say what I know about Jesus, and the Holy Spirit takes care of changing attitudes, convicting of sin and righteousness, granting salvation and all the other heavy stuff.  I just wish there were more hitchhikers around.

 

The following is a mildly bizarre but true event in the life of a homeowner…

It was Friday, 10/09/09.  A month prior was a great day; a month and a day later was sequentially wonderful; that day was just weird.

The Board of Water and Light (BWL) flushed the hydrant at the corner that morning.  Imagine my surprise when the upstairs toilet and sink filled with nasty brown water.  I did not remember for half an hour or so that I had a load of laundry running.  Good thing it was darks, and good thing it was Allan’s t-shirts and old stuff; it was all brownish. The dishwasher was done by that time, so we had clean dishes. 

I called BWL and the nice lady said to just let a faucet run for 20 minutes or so and that should clear it out.  I called back after an hour and a half when the flow of brownish-red gunk was worse than when it started.  The second nice lady with an undetermined accent said, “Oh, you must only have the lowest faucet in the house on just a trickle, otherwise it will stir up the water in your loins.”  So, I asked, “shouldn’t I just turn the water off and let it settle?”  “Well, no, that way you will never get the sediment out of your loins.”  I didn’t know what to say.

Twenty minutes later two BWL technician types (they had a truck and left the flashing light on while in the driveway) arrived.  They took a sample of the water, tossed in some chemical, and declared the water free of bacteria.  I suspected they made that up because it sounded like a line from NCIS.  They also said, “that red stuff is iron from the pipes, and here are two bottles of Iron Away (or Red Be Gone, or some other dismissive name).  Just follow the directions and you can use it on your load of laundry or toilet or sinks or whatever to get rid of the redness. And just let your faucet run until Monday. Any faucet you want, just let it run.”

“Monday?” I asked.

They explained that they had just taken a meter reading and would come back on Monday to get another reading, and they promised we wouldn’t have to pay for any water or sewage charges from then until Monday. 

 “Well, what about the suspected junk in the hot water heater?”  The answer: “since the water is free, go ahead and run several loads of hot water through the washer and flush it out of the hot water heater.”

So we let the water run in the basement sink Friday night and Saturday night.  The laundry was clean Sunday, so we turned the water off.  When the BWL fellow returned, he tested the water again and pronounced it good.  It would have been a better test if he had taken a drink of the water.

 

 

A line from the long ago Redd Fox show caught my fancy.  The main character was talking about naming a child and lamented, “All the good names are taken, like Scrapiron and Skillet.”

I suggested those names for our kids, but they were shut down (along with Christopher and Katherine – Kit Knapp and Kat Knapp). Ever since, I have offered them to pregnant couples, just to expand their options.  Sadly, no takers. The closest thing is a rock group called Skillet.

A couple of weeks ago Diane and I were at the Prairie Arts Festival in Schaumburg, Illinois with daughter Linnea.  Lots of fancy jewelry, paintings and woodcarvings, plus one guy who took old garden tools, springs, and sparkly things and made them into art.  The springs make necks, and the creations bob their heads gracefully.  I bought one because I knew everyone who saw it would be impressed. 

“What are you going to name it,” Linnea asks.  “I don’t know…  but not Fred.”  “How about ScrapIron?”

“YES!”

So, now Scrapiron is calmly hiding in the back yard.  Come visit him when you have a chance.

Bob and I have been walking in the morning for a few years now.  I asked him to join me in January of 2010 to get some exercise in the mall.  That April we moved outside, usually on the campus of MSU because we could park at the old church building.  One summer we watched the progress as they took down the old MSC smokestack near the stadium.  We settled into two mornings a week and adopted our walking name after an observant bike rider going the other way on the river walk behind McDonald Hall pointed at us and said, “Hey, you guys are Tuesday-Thursday!”

We stay outside as long as we can, on Tuesdays in the neighborhood behind the new church, after prayer service, and on Thursdays on the River Trail by my house.  And then we retreat to the mall when the outdoor route is too slippery.

Bob’s dog JD (stands for John Doe – he was found with no tags or other identifiers) has joined us lately.  The exercise seems to do him good, and he has figured out Tuesdays and Thursdays – Bob gets up earlier than usual those days, so JD prances a bit, watches carefully, and probably gets the leash ready.  It rained one morning recently, forcing us into the mall.  JD was majorly disappointed, so we have a plan for the next inclement day that involves a cane, dark sun glasses, and one of those special dog harness things for JD.  Our major hope is for no pooping in the mall.

 

My friend Justina recently gave me a rambling math history book entitled Here’s Looking at Euclid, by Alex Bellos.  Besides the punny name, it starts right out in chapter zero with a math finding that echoes the idea of general and special revelation found in Romans 1 and Hebrews 1.

What?  Math supports the Bible? Check this out. 

Romans 1.19-20 says “For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them.  For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made.” Everyone has enough evidence to conclude there is a creator God – general revelation.  Hebrews 1.1-2  tells us there is more to know: “Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed the heir of all things, through whom also he created the world.” The Son, Jesus, who was present at creation and is the heir of all things, is also the one who was given so that whoever believes in him would not die but would have eternal life (John 3.16) – special revelation.

Now from the math side, Bellos describes the efforts of researcher Pierre Pica with the Munduruku, a tribe of Amazonian Indians whose language has no words for numbers larger than five.  He wanted to know how they process those larger counts.  Here is his research technique:

“Since the Munduruku don’t have numbers, Pica tested them using sets of dots on a screen.  Each volunteer was shown an unmarked line on the screen.  To the left side of the line was one dot, to the right ten dots.  Each volunteer was then shown random sets of between one and ten dots.  For each set the subject had to point at where on the line he or she thought the number of dots should be located. Pica moved the cursor to this point and clicked.  Through repeated clicks, he could see exactly how the Mundruuku spaced numbers between one and ten. “

What seems obvious to us is that the numbers would be spaced evenly on the line. But the uneducated Indians have a different view of magnitude.  They see large intervals between one, two and three, and progressively smaller intervals as the numbers increase.  The author’s explanation: “Imagine a Munduruku is presented with five dots.  He will study them closely and see that five dots are five times bigger than one dot, but ten dots are only twice as big as five dots.”  Ratios are more important than counting.

It turns out that the natives’ perceptions are the same as those of young children. Other researchers did the same experiment with kindergartners, first graders, and second graders.  The Kindergarten response is like the Munduruku – large spaces between small numbers, and decreasing spaces as the numbers get larger.  The second grade response has the numbers falling in equal spacing – a linear model.  First graders are making the transition.

The Amazonians and the unschooled children have an intuitively logarithmic view of quantity.  There are many lasting impressions that come from logarithms – our idea of the passing of time shows up as we remember time passing so slowly when we were younger, but it is zipping by now.    Yesterday seems longer than all of last week.

But exact numbers and equal spacing, which must be taught, are necessary for measurements and they facilitate calculations.  The linear model provides the doorway to deeper understanding of number theory, calculus, binary systems used in computers, and waves of “higher” math.

We all have an innate, general revelation understanding of logarithms.  But there is more to know.  We are taught the special revelation of linear and other numbering systems that allows us to understand more fully the math world around us.  Both are real and valuable, but you can’t send men to the moon with just logarithms.  Similarly, it is wonderful to see the beauty of the creator in nature, but you can’t appreciate the wonderful grace of Jesus Christ without being taught the basics of God’s plan as revealed in the Bible.

Our first apartment was in the MSU Married Housing complex called Spartan Village, in the back, close to the laundry.  Our building became a gathering point for young church couples because Diane worked in the administrative office for Married Housing and did the assigning of applicants to apartments.  So over the three years we were there (September 1972 through May 1975) Diane arranged for us to be neighbors at times with Steve and Marilyn, Ron and Joyce, and Joe and Debbie.

When it was time to move, I was worried we would not be able to afford higher rent.  I had finished the Master’s degree, so we were no longer welcome in University housing.  The Yingers were living in an East Lansing duplex and they were urging us to move into the other side which had come open.  The standing joke when we would leave after visiting them was, “just think, if you lived next door, you’d be home by now.”  But the rent was going to double.  How could we afford it? Diane was also unemployed after finishing a one-year eighth-grade pregnancy-leave Middle-school teaching-job in Laingsburg  (sorry, the hyphens got away from me there).  The pregnancy leave baby was born, the teacher was returning, and we had no guarantee of continued employment. 

But God and Determined Diane found a way to make it work.  It turned out there was a fifth-grade job opening at the Laingsburg middle school, but the “successful applicant” had to have an elementary certificate.  Diane’s high school English and Journalism certificate worked for a one-year eighth grade gig, but no lower.  She checked with alma mater MSU who said it would take two years and another round of student teaching.  Discouraged Diane contacted other schools; Central Michigan promised they would grant the credential if she could take five classes and eighteen credits during the shortened summer term!  Delighted Diane agreed, got the job (provisionally), and we moved to Orchard Street.  

 A key component to class success was Diane’s childhood bicycle, a fat-wheeled, high handle-bar job that had seen better days. It was just right for riding on bumpy campus sidewalks and needed no lock since it was agedly unattractive.  For five weeks in June and July, Datsun-driving Diane made daily trips to Mount Pleasant, where she would park in a far-off lot, jump on the bike and ride to class.  At the end of the day, she would ride back to the car and drive home.  After the last day of class, she kissed that bike goodbye, and we have always hoped it was discovered by a worthy CMU undergrad.