HomeComing

Luke 15.11-32

Homecoming

Just come home

God wants you back

No matter why u left

   Just come home

   God wants you back

No matter how u left

   Just come home

   God wants you back

No matter where you went

   Just come home

   God wants you back

No matter what u did

   Just come home

   God wants you back

No matter who u did

   Just come home

   God wants you back

No matter how far you rose

   Just come home

   God wants you back

No matter how far you fell

   Just come home

   God wants you back

No matter who u associated with

   Just come home

   God wants you back

No matter what changed your mind

   Just come home

   God wants you back

No matter your fears

   Just come home

   God wants you back

No matter your worries

   Just come home

   God wants you back

No matter how much you beat yourself up

   Just come home

   God wants you back

No matter what u might think of yourself

   Just come home

   God wants you back

No matter what your older siblings might say

   Just come home

   God wants you back

No matter what your family might think

   Just come home

   God wants you back

No matter what any one else might tell you

   Just come home

   God wants you back

Pack Properly: for the adventure sometimes comes looking for you.

Pack Properly: 

Not just for the adventures you go looking for but for the adventure that finds you.

I have written in another place in this blog the items that I have packed. But now I will tell you WHY. 

Its because I have gone on adventures. Its because I love to read about adventures. Its because I love to play video games about grand adventures. Its because I have studied the grand adventures of the past. 

In each story, there is ALWAYS some item that the main character must find, must build, must claim. They never pack it. 

On my adventures: some with my family, some during my times at camp, there was always the chance to pack something.

I learned early on to ask two kinds of questions about the adventure. How long will we be gone from home? What will the weather be like?

I also had several adventures involving school. There were 2 great questions there as well. What do I need to turn in? What things will I need to complete the assignment?

Sometimes you get a packing list. For an adventure climbing mountains you will need different gear that going on a canoe trip. And there are lists for school supplies, and reading lists for each class.  

Sometimes you don’t get a packing list. And then you have to make one up based on the kinds of adventures you have already had. Or get advice from others

So I started keeping track of the things that I was consistently wishing that I had with me. I also wound up finding a community of people that had also kept track of those same kinds of items. I took notes and incorporated some of their ideas.

I know that I am not packed for EVERY adventure. But to do so would require that I carry around SO much stuff that I would be more worried about the stuff and would miss the point of the adventure. Or I would be so worried about not having the right stuff with me that I would spend all my time gathering the gear but never use it. 

I have discovered that even when I’m not looking for an adventure I am less concerned because my bag is packed not just for the adventure that I’m already on. But also packed for adventures that might come looking for me. But it is also not so full that I can’t add other things to it since half the adventure is adding to your skills and gear the things you find/claim.

Is your bag packed? Go have an adventure.

Where would you like to find it?

An organization tip: If you had to find an item in an extreme hurry some random Thursday afternoon where would you like to find it? Put it there.

If you had to find an item

This could be anything. Your keys. Your school books. A pay check/stub. Your passport. Legal papers. Your clothes. 

In an extreme hurry

The phone rings, you needed to be at the hospital 10min ago.

A set of police cars are sitting out front of your house. 

A letter from the bank.

An airplane is deliberately off course.

ZOMBIES :)

On some random Thursday afternoon

Emergencies never announce themselves with enough time to prepare. 

They never get scheduled with forms filled out in triplicate.

Where would you like to find it

I won’t tell you where you should find it. I do have opinions on it though. Each of us has different patterns and things that drive us. But do spend a moment each time you handle an item as to where it should be. 

Put it there

Don’t wait to shift things around. Do it now. Minimize the scramble. Lessen the frantic rushing. When that item leaves your hand and you are finished using it, it should be in the place you want to find it next time. 

Even if that spot is across the house. Next time you will have to cross that space AGAIN but this time it will be in a panic because IT WASN’T THERE. Go put it back.

P.S.

I have opinions on certain items. 

Keys should be near the door closest to the car, but out of reach of little ones that shouldn’t have access to them. OR in the bag that is always grabbed on your way to anywhere. (We will talk about bags later)

School books should be in your bag. Yes, your books will come out to be used but when you are done with the book put back in the bag. Homework is the same way, until it is handed in. I remember both and I still have books I’m reading and papers that I’m working on/with.

Pay check/stub should be filled. Either at the bank so it goes in your account or in a file at home with others of its kind so it can be called on for taxes and school loan issues.

Passports are either in a file at home or in a safe spot with you. Other than your drivers license this is one of the most important identifying documents you have. More so if you are outside your home country.

Legal papers are filed by subject(other papers that are like it) and chronology (the order in time in which they happened)

Clothes should be clean and put away. Clean, why would you want to put on dirty clothes? Put away in dresser drawers or bins for each type of clothing. We are looking for speed of getting dressed in the morning.

Take it up a notch? Pick out what you will wear the next day and lay it out the night before. 

Take it up ?too far? I know of a professor that would by 7 new suits every year. With a tie to match. One suit for every day. And always the same color dress shirt. He always knew what he was going to wear the next day.

Today is a class. There is ALWAYS a test tomorrow.

Today is a class. There is ALWAYS a test tomorrow. How do you want your grades? Paychecks? Smiles? Respect?

I am always learning something. Sometimes I learn a thing that I set out to learn. Most times I learn things that I could never imagine. Often I learn the right and the wrong way to do a thing all at the same time. 

The things that I am learning each day often find a use in the days to come. And those lessons both sought and unlooked for play a part in passing tests that come my way.

Tests that are not always announced that they are tests. Tests that even when announced the content is unexpected. Tests that you don’t realize you took till the grade comes in. 

Each test I have taken has shown me some new things to learn. Things I already knew but could do better. And things that I THOUGHT I knew but didn’t really have a clue.

I have failed many tests, but since the class of life never ends, I have had a chance to retake those tests. 

Tests of honesty. Tests of loyalty. Tests of confidentiality. Tests of endurance (mental and physical). Tests of patience. 

Each of these tests has a grade. Most of the time its a pass/fail. Sometimes even a passing grade won’t get you much, some tests seen to be worth more, or weighted differently depending on the person or the context. Sometimes the only person who grades the test will be you. But I guarantee that when you least expect it, there will be somebody else watching that test.

The grades are not always straight forward. There are no letters or GPA. But a smile or a complement is a passing grade. But a tear or a slammed door is a fail. A job offer or a pay raise is a pass. A loss of trust and conflict is a fail.

What you will learn is up to you.

How you engage the tests is your choice.

But you are being graded, and the ultimate grade will determine your success, and happiness.

Inner Space: The NEXT frontier.

Outer space may be the FINAL frontier. But can we make inner space the NEXT frontier?

“Space: The final frontier.” These words open every episode of the original StartTrek series. As a person who loves dreaming about what could happen next the science fiction style has always apealed to me. Granted I tend more StarWars than StarTrek but each of them points us out to the stars. 

We have held FRONTIER as a goal for many generations. Always seeking out the new and the different. Sometimes to meet it, sometimes to study it, often destroying it. Always misunderstanding it in some way first.

We are slowly running out of physical frontiers on this planet. The seas, some caves, beckon to be explored. But the satellites are mapping every inch of the planet in ever more detail. For physical frontiers we are having to look off this planet and out into the black of space. 

What though makes us think that the vastness of space will calm our tendency of violence and misunderstanding the realms we explore. 

We need a plan for exploring not just the physical frontiers but also to explore the inner spaces of our lives. In that exploration we will find the connections between each other on this planet.

In that exploration of inner space we will find the ways to care for each other and quit sabotaging and disregarding the excellent work around us because in exploring the full inner-space with each other we discover people to meet, to study, to misunderstand, perhaps to destroy. 

We must make peace with the grand variety to be found not just in the frontiers of this planets’ physical form. Not just with the dedication needed to take us out to explore that final frontier of space. But also the infinite variety of the people here and each individual’s inner-space. 

I am up to LOTS of good

I solemnly swear I am up to lots of good.

This is a variation on a quote from JK Rowling’s Harry Potter series. The original quote read “I solemnly swear that I am up to no good.” This being the activation code for a magical map known as the Marauders Map. The titular Marauders being Harry Potter’s father and his father’s three best friends. The map would show every passageway and person on the school grounds in real time.

I created the variation because I do not intend to be up to “no good.” It might be interesting to have my quote as a passcode to some guide book that contains wisdom and advice for certain situations in a characters life. 

A swearing means that you will keep your word. But if you are a person up to no good why should you be believed? If you are up to good things then swearing to do so is mostly irrelevant.

I am, as a United Methodist, a fan of John Wesley. His injunction on doing good is, I think, quite appropriate for this variation. Do all the good you can. By all the means you can. In all the ways you can. In all the places you can. At all the times you can. To all the people you can. As long as ever you can.

I look forward to many more years of doing good, and unlocking the good in the lives of other people.