How You Doin'?

If you’re an avid television watcher, you probably have watched several episodes of “Friends.”  Between Ross, Rachel, Monica, Chandler, Phoebe, and the oh-so-lovable Joey, many of us would spend our Thursday evenings with this group and imagine that we too had a special affinity with our own circle of peeps.

One of the most quoted lines from “Friends” would have to be Joey’s “How you doin’?”  These words would be uttered to women he found attractive and wanted to get to know better.  Usually they were combined with an interested smile and twinkle in Joey’s eyes.  The effect could be devastating or disastrous, depending on what the writers of the show were striving for in that episode.

Yesterday, I met my own Joey.  Sort of.  Okay, he really wasn’t anything like Joey except for his concern for his fellow man.  As our buggies met in the crafting aisle at Walmart, he immediately caught my attention.  Talk about a cutie!  Of course I had to initiate a conversation and I’ll summarize it here (otherwise this blog would get too wordy and we wouldn’t want that to happen, now would we?).

“Hello!  You sure are cute” I said.  “Are you getting that so you can paint some rocks?”  

He responded and then he asked me how I was.  I told him I was a little sleepy after having had lunch just a bit ago and wondered if he liked to take naps too.  Oh, now before your minds start going places they shouldn’t, let me clarify something:  this handsome fella was all of eighteen.  Months, that is.  Ha ha!  Got you!  Shame on you for thinking such illicit thoughts!

Anyway, as is customary for us Southerners, I returned his question to him and asked him how he was?  His response?  “I’m doin’.”

I’m doin’?!

What kind of response was that?  I wondered.  I pondered.  And then I appreciated.  After all, there was no pretense there.  No social niceties of saying that of course, I’m fine, while internally lying and hoping no one notices the falseness of the reply.  No whining, either, about how awful his life was, how his parents wouldn’t buy him this, nor that he felt like that.  Just two simple words:  I’m doin’.

He taught me a lesson.  Keep it simple.  Stick to the facts.  When someone asks about you and you don’t want to lie, don’t want attention, and don’t want pity, just use these words.  Because, quite frankly, sometimes that’s all that we are really capable of, isn’t it?  To just do.  To just be.  To just keep putting one foot in front of the other.  To stand when we are at our wits’ ends but still believing that somehow, somewhere, Someone is not going to let us fall.  

Thank You, Lord, for kids.  Thank You for simple truths that have such profound effects on my daily walk.  Thank You for keeping me upright and fixed when my eyes stay on You.  I’m doin’, Father.  I’m trying to do what You called me to do and yes, there are happy times when all seems well and sometimes there are sad times when I need all the help I can get but refuse to ask for.  

Thank You for providing others in my life for times when I need a little extra.  May I be a Joey, Lord, as I endeavor to befriend my fellow man and genuinely care about the responses to when I question about others’ well- being?  I want to be.  I want to be a doer, Father.  Will You help me?  I ask these things in the name of Christ Jesus, Who already did it all.  Amen.  

What's Love Got To Do, Got To Do With It?

 

If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing.

Good morning!  This is my third attempt at writing a blog so far and I thought it was going to go one way but it didn’t.  I thought it might go down another path but that too was a dead end.  As I began this one, I thought I was on the right track but just received a message from a friend who wrote of a loved one’s condition and in that message there were these two words--words that I had been considering anyways but wanted to keep this blog light and airy today rather than sad and melancholy, so I put them on the back burner, saving them for another day.

Okay then, let’s see how this one goes, Stef.

Bruised heart.

Those were the two words she wrote.  

A couple of days ago my heart--nay, my soul!--was hurting.  I had been invited to a celebration ceremony where many hard-working kids were about to be rewarded for their diligence in their studies for the past school year.  So many proud parents, grandparents, and other caretakers (hmn, that’s an interesting word:  caretakers.  It implies ones who take care, right?  Keep that in mind as you continue reading.) were on hand to see their precious child(ren) receive ribbons and certificates.  Cameras abounded and the gymnasium was...well, it wasn’t as full as when other types of programs went on, but perhaps that was because this order of events was limited to a certain sect of the whole population.

Or was it something else?

As I gazed about the mostly cheerful faces, I noticed something missing.  Perhaps I should say I noticed someone missing.  Where was that one’s dad?  And that kid over there--where was her adoring fan club?  The little kid beside me who kept talking about her daddy really broke my heart because, you see, daddy and mommy were no longer a pair but apart.  Why didn’t he come to see his kids be rewarded, even if it meant sitting on the opposite side of the gym?

Trying to focus on the good that was going on, I purposed myself to pay attention to the better things.  So many achievements by so many students!  How wonderful to see their love for knowledge and to hear of their excellence.  But then, as I listened closely, maybe not by so many after all.  It seemed like I kept hearing a lot of the same names called, just for different categories.  I watched the faces of the classmates as their peer’s name was called.  Some smiled as they shared the pride of knowing that was their friend who was getting an award.  Some clapped enthusiastically when the child’s name was read out.  One parent was quite exuberant in his excitement over what his son had accomplished and let out a huge “Whoop!” which was soon mimicked by the toddlers around me who were getting bored by this time.

But then there were the students who just sat there with blank looks upon their faces.  They knew they were just there because, well, they were just there.  Nothing special was going to happen to them and they knew it.  No awards were coming their way and they knew this as well.  No one was going to take their picture as their hands were shaken and ribbons placed around their necks.  Un unh.  Pats on the backs and words of “Well done!” or “Excellent job” and mostly “I’m so proud of you!” would not be spoken about them.  Getting that one certificate of promotion to the next grade was all that was in their future.

Sigh.

Bruised heart.

Hurting soul.

When do kids lose it?  When do they lose the favor of the ones who brought them into this world?  When did they lose the attention span of the adults who used to hang on their every word, their every achievement as they learned to speak, to walk, to run, to read, to jump, to sing, to learn?  When did mom and dad turn their focus away and basically left the kids to their own devices?  When did the caretakers stop taking care?

Sigh.

Bruised hearts.  Hurting souls.  

Someone used to sing to them “You are my sunshine, my only sunshine.  You make me happy when skies are grey.  You’ll never know, dear, how much I love you.  Please don’t take my sunshine away.”  When did their light stop shining?  When did the parents stop looking for that light and instead choose to live in the dark?

At the start of this blog, I quoted from First Corinthians.  My meme featured a verse about the same topic.  Love.  The title of my blog asks what love has to do with it.  And though it’s been a scattered essay, I leave you with this question:  are you loving today?  Are you truly loving or are you just making noise that you are a good parent, a true friend, a considerate person, or are you just performing when it makes you look good to the world rather than to the one who needs you the most?  Those kids shouldn’t have had to had sad faces and gone home without ribbons around their necks.  They shouldn’t have had to try to find things to amuse themselves with while their friends were being photographed and fawned over.  They didn’t have to maybe collect the awards they did receive and tuck them carelessly in their backpacks to maybe show off later--the next time they got to see mom or dad...whenever that might be.  They didn’t have to not know love.  Their hearts didn’t have to be bruised nor their souls filled with anguish.  They’re just kids!  They didn’t ask to be brought into this world but here they are, waiting to be loved, waiting to be someone’s sunshine.  Let’s not leave them in the dark, friends.  May we all love in deed and in truth is my prayer, my plea, asked in the name of Jesus Christ.  Amen.

Son, Go Bring My Children Home

The other day, this kid I know was mesmerized by my sunflowers.  They’ve grown so much these past two months and he wanted to know just how big the biggest one was.  He borrowed a tape measure from Steve and went out to get the specs.  A few minutes later, he came in and told me about the width and height of my sunflower.  After agreeing with him that it was probably the largest one out there, we went on about our business and I just chalked it up as to natural curiosity and “what will they think of next” questions that kids ask.

But then today, in my personal Bible study this morning, I came upon these verses from Ephesians 3:14-19:

For this cause I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,

Of Whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named,
That He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with might by His Spirit in the inner man;
That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love,
May be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height;
And to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fulness of God.

As I too ponder on the wonders of God, of creation, these verses show that man has been pondering them for centuries.  The breadth, length, depth, and height of the love of God is unfathomable, isn’t it?  The Grand Canyon, The Sedona, and the Rocky Mountains were places I was fortunate enough to visit earlier this spring.  I am blessed to live in the mountains of North Carolina and their beauty is one I consistently marvel at.  Don’t even get me started on the sunrises and gorgeous sunsets I get to witness as often as I take the time to do so!

But all of this beauty is nothing compared to the amazement I have that God loves me, that He chose me knowing how rotten I was and how much my inadequacies would hold me back from being all He wants me to be.  I’ve struggled for years with issues of not being good enough.  I’ve felt a void in my life for as long as I can remember, a sense of not being whole.  Day by day, that hole is being filled yet it also is growing at the same time.  The love and lessons I learn through creation, through studying God’s Word, and spending time with His people fills my soul with those good, true, noble, lovely, pure, and admirable things He has designed for me.  However, until I am united with God, that sense of emptiness will never go away.  The feeling of being incomplete will not change until my Lord calls me home and I get to snuggle up next to Him, hear His stories from His own mouth, hold His hand in mine, and just bask in the presence of my Lord and Saviour.  Ahh, what a day that will be!

Let’s pray.

Dear Father, I again thank You for my sunflowers.  Who knew what a tiny packet of seeds would produce in my life?  

You did, of course!  So many lessons You have taught me this summer, Father, about life, about growth, and about beauty in all its forms.  While down here we as man will continue trying to label and calculate all the good things You give, we will fall short because Your love cannot be measured.  Oh for the day You call us to You, God, when You say to Jesus, “Son, go bring My children home for I want them gathered ‘round my throne.  It’s time to reap the harvest You have sown.  Son, go bring My children home.”

Even so, come Lord Jesus.  It’s in Your precious name I pray.  Amen!

The Fun Ones

It all started out innocently enough.  Steve and I were minding our own business at The Golden Corral, enjoying a nice lunch, when this family came and sat down beside of us.  We didn’t pay them much attention because we were discussing some things that needed to be dealt with.  We, naturally, smiled at them each time either they got up to refill their plates or we did.  When there are kids around, it’s hard for us to not be friendly and make some sort of comment.  That’s just the way we are.

Towards the end of our meal, though, we began to watch them more.  Mom, Dad, cute little baby girl who was too young to talk but her smile could sure light up the room, and...hmn.  How do I describe the son?  Cute?  Definitely!  Mischievous?  Mmn, almost.  He didn’t look like he was trying to get into too much trouble.  We made some general friendly comments to them and kind of connected with the little fella.

Steve decided he needed some chocolate soft-serve ice cream and asked if I wanted anything.  I said that those Gummy Bears did look good and maybe I’d get a bowl of them.  As we rose, I noticed the son had some cotton candy.  Of course I had to stop and chat about it.  He was a sweet guy but also, he was a kid.  Deciding to have some fun, I got him to look waaaay over yonder while I snuck his bag of candy.  Dad played along and Mom smiled as he turned back around.  At first, he didn’t notice the candy was gone so I did a little twirl of sorts, holding the bag behind my back, and when I was in midstream, then he noticed.  He grabbed it out of my clutches while we all laughed and then he proceeded to play tricks on us while we were gone to the dessert bar, such as sneaking my sweet tea.

When we got back to the table, I showed him my very own bag of blue cotton candy.  He tried my tricks on Steve, trying to get him to “look” at something while he snuck his lid that the waitress had brought while we were gone.  I twirled again, holding the bowl of Gummy Bears behind me, and stood “gazing” at what he was showing us until he noticed and took the candies.  He was so proud of himself for being so sneaky.  We talked with his Dad and exchanged info about how we had three grandsons and it turned out their son was the same age as our oldest.  Blah blah blah.  In between, he and his son translated for Mom while Little Miss Sunshine continued to smile at us each chance she got. We sat back down and enjoyed our dessert while talking with this family.   

Soon it was time for us to go so we started saying our goodbyes.  It was then that Dad told us his wife said to tell us that we were so sweet; that most people looked at folks like them like they were...trash.  Not good enough.  I’m not sure the exact term she used but the meaning was still the same.  They thanked us for having fun with their kids and that’s when I told them that that was what we were:  The Fun Ones.  It’s our little name for us that the boys and us go by, so much so that for Steve’s last birthday I had him a sticker made for his truck to let the world know.  It was Buy One Get One Free so I got one for Celine too!  Anyways, they laughed again and I reiterated that it was true:  we are the fun ones and if they looked out at the parking lot, they’d see proof.  Lily (Steve’s truck) just so happened to be parked right out the window there so we laughed again as the husband explained to the wife what was going on.  We said our goodbyes and left, thinking and chatting to one another about how nice that whole situation was.

This past week has been a rough one for our country.  Racial tensions were at a high peak.  Again.  As I recall now as the little boy was telling me “adios” and I told him I didn’t know much Spanish, other than “taco” (huge smile), “enchilada” (big wave of his belly as he recollected how much he himself loved enchiladas), and “adios” it makes my heart warm and sad at the same time.  Warm because aren’t we all just people, regardless of skin color or ethnic background?  Sad because we are all people with various skin colors, beliefs, and prejudices.  Won’t it great when That Day comes and none of this matters?  I think so too!  Even so, come Lord Jesus.  Amen?  Amen!