Thursday Thought

Their entire species is being threatened.  With each passing day, their numbers dwindle.  Yet few seem to notice–and even fewer care. I'm not talking about a spotted three horned owl. Rather, it's something much more mundane.  So ordinary its passing is off the radar screen of general concern.  Letters. Old fashioned, hand-written letters are a species in deep decline.  And in case you're wondering, that's not just a sentimental feeling. Ask the United States Post Office, where decline in letter volume (ie. revenue) is creating a major case of mail box blues.  No secret as to why. Email and texting…

An Open Letter to Street Beggars, pan handlers and what would be labeled in a less politically correct age as…bums.  Please know that I hear you and see you every time I walk downtown.  See your handwritten cardboard signs, your coffee cups hungry for coins.  And like most followers of Jesus, I struggle in knowing how to respond. So here's the deal I'm making—it's admittedly something of a compromise.  If you ask me for food, I will buy some—as long as it is in my power.  You have my commitment to doing what I can to alleviate your hunger.   I…

My wife and I spend most of our summer weekends camping.  And lately, I’ve been intrigued with the dragonflies we’ve been seeing.  There’s just something about the way they zoom back and forth, almost like a space vehicle in a video arcade game. You know it’s only been in the last 10 years or so that we’ve really come to learn much about these four-winged fliers.  For instance…did you know there are about 5000 species of dragonflies worldwide—and new species are still being discovered!  Dragonflies can be smaller than one inch, or longer than four inches, with a wingspan exceeding…

It happened unexpectedly.  I had just stepped through the revolving door onto LaSalle Blvd  in downtown Chicago It was then I heard the sound above the rumble of  downtown afternoon traffic. Could it be? The unmistakable strains of “Just as I Am.”  Where was the music coming from?  As I stepped on to the corner of City Hall, I was swept up into a fog of sorts.  Though the music playing was instrumental, I could hear the words in my head. And I looked out at the faces on Randolph Street and wondered…  What if this was a giant urban…

Recently, my wife and I visited a friend who is in prison.   If you've never been to one, it's a sobering and sensory exercise.  There's an unmistakable institutional smell—a fragrant bouquet of floor cleanser, window dust and the faint odor of new paint,  There's the sound of doors buzzing, keys jangling, radios squawking…along with the thud of your own pulse. Faces around the room bear a sad and anxious presence.  You wonder who they have come to visit….what the crime was–and you know that they're wondering the same about you. As we chatted in the official visiting room with my…

Expectations.  And prayer meetings.  If your experience is anything like mine, they rarely go together.  Our prayer meetings are almost entirely predictable.  To the point of….dare I use so harsh a word…. boredom?   Expectations and prayer meetings don’t go together in the same sentence, let alone the same gathering room at church.    In my opinion, this is one of the biggest reasons our prayer meetings are attended by handfuls—rather than “room-fulls.” Sure, we know that Scripture calls us to prayer.  But on a chilly winter night, with a warm supper settling in our gut, there’s little motivation to go out…

The second most important book on your shelf.  What would that be?  When it comes to living a consistent Christian life, a world atlas might just be the second most important book on your shelf. Right next to your Bible, of course. Did my suggestion surprise you?  Give me a moment to explain. You see, there's a problem with our evangelical worldview.  For many of us, there's very little “world” in it.  While on paper, we agree to the urgency of what we call the “Great Commission,” most of us suffer from a great omission.  We simply do not know—or…

Hospitals.  They're no fun when you're sick—but remarkably instructive if you're healthy. Recently, my wife went into the hospital for kidney surgery.  So I spent four nights sleeping out in the waiting room, and countless hours observing.  I've come away with three lessons I'm trying to hang on to. Lesson #1: Everybody is hurting—from something. Hospitals, of course, are filled with the sick, the broken, the bleeding.  There isn't a hallway you walk down that doesn't offer some kind of evidence of intense personal pain.  Yet this is also true of life, itself. Everybody's hurting over something.  The problem for…

The Waldo Canyone Fire.  By the time it was finally put out last July more than 300 Colorado homes were destroyed.  One person was killed, with nearly half a billion dollars in damages.   Like any disaster, it's one thing to see it on the web…or watch it on your flat screen TV.  Quite another to be there. On a recent trip out west, my wife and I decided to visit the ruins.  The scent of burning is still in the air, months after the last of the flames were silenced. What we saw was beyond sobering.  Block after block…

Last night I dreamed a horrible dream.  It has haunted me to the point where I can no longer delay sharing it.  Understand that I am not a prophet, nor do I claim to have the biblical gift of prophecy.  But…this is my dream. I was in my own town.  Familiar streets and places.  Yet I was very far away.  It seemed like evening, but I couldn’t really tell. The sky was dark, but not black.  More of a strange gray greenish color. As I walked around, I was surrounded by violence—and its evidence.  Broken things.  Broken relationships.  People using…