There's Still Work To Do

William Wallace vs Bill the Ass

In Junior High school a teacher told us that we should sign our work using our proper names and middle initials. The advice stuck, so I recently found myself signing "William R. Scarrott" to a book proposal I’m putting together.

My wife is my first editor, and she pointed at the hoity-toity signature and raised an eyebrow. “Is that how you want it?” she asked. It was very diplomatic of her, and unearthed some nagging doubts that I had been trying to bury alive.

I’m proud of my name. You’ve certainly heard of William Wallace. Well, I’m Scottish too. And we mustn’t forget William the Conqueror, William Tell, Prince William and the illustrious William Shatner. Yes, I stand a little straighter in the company of such men.

What caused my wife confusion is the fact that she knows me. (It’s a common, though not universal problem with marriage.)

It’s not that I don’t possess some good qualities. Let me get Karen over here to fill in some blanks…

…Hi. This is Karen. For the record, Bill is a great kisser, an amusing freestyle dancer, a thorough and passionate lover and has a rockin’ manscape. Oh ya, did I mention his great muscles? Hmmm ya…

Okay, Bill here again, and for the record that is the last time Karen gets on this computer. Goodness gracious, honey, we're trying to keep it in the vicinity of PG-13. I’m moving to the friggin’ basement.

ANYWAY, what I would like to point out is that she called me Bill, not William, as is the case with anyone who really knows me. This fact was not lost on my friend Troy when he first read The Lord of The Rings. He gleefully pointed out to me a little known character in J.R. Tolkien’s manuscript who went by the moniker of Bill the Ass. If the shoe fits, right?!

The lesson here is that we need to quit trying to be who we’re not. People need to see Jesus before He puts on His stage makeup.

Bill the Ass? Fine- at least he was a donkey for the good guys. He carried his friend’s burdens. I can only hope for such a legacy when my chapter ends.

Final Score: 25-0

A guest post by Mike Cala

I couldn’t believe it. I had just had my butt handed to me by my 12 year old son. 25 – 0? How did he beat me so easily? Granted, I hadn’t gone into the game thinking I could actually beat him, but I had hoped to make it close . . . sorta, maybe, kinda.

He had played the game before, I hadn’t. He does have ninja-like reflexes and some mad game skills; I’m more senior-citizen-like in my reflexes and am still trying to figure out which button does what when I play any HALO game.

BUT 25 – 0?!!! I believe I was actually down 20 to -1 at one point . . . I didn’t even know -1 is a score you can get!

I looked over to my son, who was grinning from ear to ear, face flush with the beat-down he had given me, somehow gloating and beaming a cherubic smile at the same time. He walked over, patted me on the arm and said quite sincerely, “Good try Dad!”

My gut reaction was - That’s it, you’re going down little man!!! I had to defend my status as the alpha male! I had to show him that Dad was still the biggest, the baddest, the best at all pursuits and things manly! There was no way I was gonna go out like that  . . . but then I saw the look of pure pleasure and joy he had on his face. He had beat Dad at something. Sure it was just a video game, but to him it meant everything.  He and his father had spent some time together doing something he really enjoyed and . . . he had come out on top! It just doesn’t get any better than that for a young boy. So I pushed down my manly pride and and simply said, “Yeah, you kicked my butt”. I think his grin got even wider at that point. 

I lost, but I also won. And won big.

Stuck Like a Pig In ____, and the Christians Just Want Bacon?

Sometimes I think I’m all alone; that all the other bad people found a great hiding spot when the religious people were busy reading the Left Behind series. Then I come across people like you, and I’m just so relieved!

Please don’t be embarrassed. Don’t go away. People like you and I need to stick together. There are a lot of perfect people out there who want our souls but will settle for our heads. You’ve probably met your fair share along the way, haven’t you? We both know that we’re nothing but a couple of screw-ups. The last thing we need is for someone to come along and try to beat it into us with a consecrated wiffle bat.

It’s hard for me to admit how depraved I am, and that I’d just like to be clean again. I feel like a pig in a pen. If I tell another pig that we’re dirty, I’ll either get a shrug of the shoulders or a mud pie right in the kisser. The Christians are on the other side of the fence all squeaky clean and smiling. I’ve seen that smile before though; if I remember correctly, it was in the line at a local breakfast buffet before a pan of fresh bacon.

Now it’s time for CHOOSE YOUR OWN BLOG ENDING! If you’re feeling fairly virtuous or have a sudden craving for ham, go to ending option 1. If you sense that your life or your soul is less than tidy, go to ending option 2).

ENDING OPTION 1

Why are you looking at me like that?

Perhaps I should have made you aware that I’m trying to write for people who need grace and forgiveness. Evil people like me. If you have made nasty faces at your computer screen then it may be that you are good, and perhaps you don’t belong here… yet.

I’m sorry I offended you, and I hope you leave a comment, go away, and come back again when you can relate.

ENDING OPTION 2

The fact remains that it would feel real good to wash some of this crud off. To think that some people pay money for this and call it a beauty treatment! Yuck.

Did you know that there is a story in the Bible just for you and me? It’s the one where Jesus died. He’s gets executed in a somewhat painful and humiliating way, but before he dies he forgives someone just like us who was hanging on a cross right beside him! Then after three days of being dead and buried he comes back to life to show us that He loves us, He’s in charge now, and we get to start over!

This is good news!

I should have known all along that water fresh from the source is the purest. Check out this music video:

Blessings: Scrambled or Over-Easy?

There are times in life when a story squeezes a dollop of your heart out of your chest and carries it like a freshly laid egg into God's kitchen to be fried on the griddle of Truth. You always get your heart back, but it never looks the same. Often the only decision left to make is scrambled or over-easy.

Aubrey Sampson is a friend of mine who has agreed to share such a story with us. I’m not ashamed to say that my eyes were sweating half way through this story.

Grab a Kleenex and be blessed.

(Note: This video was originally prepared for a writing and speaking course that both Aubrey and I are enrolled in.)

Sloppy Ice Cream Offerings

The slumping, squishy remnants of my daughter’s ice cream cone perched precariously on the tips of my thumb and two fingers. A combination of summer heat, soft serve, and capacious amounts of saliva had conspired to reduce this work of culinary and engineering art into a mass of goo that could barely support its own weight.

It takes a real man to eat something like that.

I shoved that half eaten glob of lukewarm sweetness into my mouth, and some primitive synapse in the back of my head undoubtedly fired off a message to my gag reflex. I am a father though, and the highly evolved electrical superhighways that make up my paternal neural pathways steered that erroneous communication into a place from whence it shall never return.

That means I liked it.

There is something special about ice cream that was never meant to be mine, especially if it is offered to me freely by a certain charming, chubby cheeked preschooler.

Having said all that, here is the lesson for today:

You currently sit on God’s thumb and two fingers, right about at eye level. He’s big enough that if you glance sheepishly His way all that you’re going to see are His eyes. He is fully aware that your past is a half digested mess, your dreams have wilted in the heat of life, and parts inside of you that were meant to hold you up are bowing under the strain of… well…you.

In spite of all you are and are not, take a look at Him again. Do you see the lines at the corners of His eyes? They are laugh lines. They are there because He is happy just to have you. If you would only allow Him to consume you, you would finally understand why you are here.

You were made to make Him smile.

Cowboys and Jesus

When I grew up I wanted to be more than a cowboy; I wanted to be a rancher. My days would begin with a bowl of steaming oatmeal and a scalding cup of coffee, black as sin. (Truth be told I probably enjoyed fruit loops and hot chocolate more, but I knew I’d have to change my ways if I was going to earn my spurs.) I made my mom shop for my clothes at the local cowboy store. I begged for her to buy me a lasso when she was paying for my Wranglers, but she was harder to move than a Baptist mule (sorry mom). My favorite shirt was baby blue. It had a horse’s head framed by a star stitched onto each breast pocket. Ooooh ya, it was hotter than a can of campfire beans.

I needed a poster for my room to complete my western motif, and found one the next time I visited the nearest Christian bookstore. Like all good boys, I picked one that had a quaint saying on it that went something like, In God’s Pasture You Can Run Free. It pictured a horse with his mane flowing, the background blurred with the effort of matching the camera to his excessive speed.

I was really happy about the way I’d spent my parent’s money. For about a day.

The next morning I lay in bed still pining for that lasso. I could have negotiated better, I thought. I could have managed without those new jeans. I would’ve gone to school in nothing but my tighty whities if only I could’ve had that rope in my hands.

It was the poster though, that really chapped my rawhide. I didn’t know what exactly was wrong with it, only that there was something about it that sat like a burr against my tender western tush.

It was only years later that I had the insight to understand what the issue was. Right behind that stallion was stationed a fence. A sturdy, white picket wall against the wilderness. The supposedly Christian side was all manicured and safe. On the other side was… evil?

Okay, I’ll buy that. On the other side was evil. Sure. What I will no longer stand for is the idea that evil gets the wild real estate, or that the powers of darkness get a monopoly on the adventure and excitement.

The Bible has the more correct picture. Adam and Eve were living in paradise. I think the guy who wrote the story was a gardener, hence the reference to a garden of some sort. Having lived in Africa I think it was more than a few rows of carrots and beets, and more likely resembled a remote tropical shoreline.

They had the world, and settled for one stinking tree.

Do you want paradise back? Are you looking for the untamed life? I think what you’re missing is the Kingdom of Grace. Let me introduce you to my friend Jesus.

Poker and Jesus

My stack of poker chips sat there in front of me, scowling. I had disappointed them, I think, using them like a holiday trailer full of cheap harlots- to be enjoyed, yes, then quickly disposed of. I’m under no illusions that they left for any other reason. I had behaved shamefully and treated them poorly.

Troy spoke from far away behind his own stack, his eyes just visible over the top of the largest denominations. They aren’t scowling, he said, they’re smiling. I looked at him quizzically. Because they’re coming home to daddy, he answered, and his eyes got that twinkle.

I chuckled way down deep in my heart, and wanted to punch him in the face.

Playing cards with the boys during our annual motorbike trip is cheap fun, and for entertainment purposes only. (Troy will be able to entertain his wife and son to a half dozen donuts thanks to me.) I tend to play loose and reckless, trusting a gut feeling that often has more to do with an assortment of snacks and beverages than the cards on the table.

So anyway, there I sat financing my friends’ fun, and I thought of how often I use the very same strategy in real life. The stakes are higher of course, but I tend not to dwell on that. My opponent is wiser, understands the odds, and knows when I’m bluffing. I still play loose and reckless. It’s rarely turns out well for yours truly.

Whatever lessons I’ve learned from poker, what amazes me is how long I spent thinking I was playing against God. He was there to destroy me, I thought. I felt like I was losing everything and it was all still just a game to him. Hand after hand, my debts piled up at just about the same rate as my desperation.

But it was never God I was playing against. God is the one who paid everything he owned to buy into the very game I was so proficiently losing.

Don’t forget it: Jesus sat down at your table and played your losing hand so that you could walk away. If you knew what it cost him, you wouldn’t be walking around trying to find another game.

The Fleas of a Thousand Camels

“May the fleas of a thousand camels infest your armpits.”

It was with these words of affectionate harassment texted from my uncle to my brother that our British Columbia fishing adventure began. My brother, dad and I were waiting patiently for our flight at the Calgary International Airport. My uncle being the more intrepid traveler, or perhaps a general sucker for punishment, had decided to drive with a friend the 1357 kilometers to Prince Rupert. His poetic little rant was no doubt in response to… well… I can’t recall! It certainly wouldn’t have been because of any disrespectful, unwarranted comments on my brother’s part.

We all finally made it to Prince Rupert and settled into our rooms at the Moby Dick Hotel. No, I’m not kidding- that’s what it was called. It was a nice place. Yup, nice. They had beds, televisions, and other things you might expect to find in hotels in Canada. Things such as a Tim Horton’s just a block away. I’m telling you, it’s all about location!

Our fishing guide, who was born in P.R. and had lived there all his life, said that in all his years he had never seen July weather as bad as this last weekend. The fish we baited must have agreed with him and decided to stay home instead of eating out. You might think this was discouraging for us, but it was actually to our benefit. We only had one cooler of fish to pay extra baggage fees for when we returned home to our [very supportive] wives. Some hotshot group of guys who dubbed themselves the wolf pack (ooo, aahhh, very manly!) must’ve paid a fortune for the eight coolers they had to haul around! Dang overachievers… gripe grumble grouse.

We didn’t reel in much fish, it’s true. What we did catch, however, will stay with us a little longer than a few fillets. We caught a glimpse of the histories that make us brothers, sons, and fathers.

The victories won and the losses endured.

The snoring that begs to be smothered, and the alarms set to the wrong time zones.

The honesty that exposes our vulnerabilities and the grace that guards our backsides.

I have to admit that I was a bit jealous of the wolf pack (you may not have caught on to that earlier). It is a cool name- wolf pack. I wish we could’ve had a groovy name, but when I think of the guys I spent this last long weekend with only one word comes to mind:

Men.

Tortoises and Tire Trouble- the Tale of Herbert the Unswift

Herbert the Tortoise died a gruesome death under the wheels of a truck, on a hot African afternoon.

When I first met Herbert (or Herb for short) his untimely demise was not a part of my plan for him. Nor, I think, was it in his plans for himself. I don’t suspect he had grandiose visions of a dramatic martyrdom. Like many tortoises of his age and disposition, I believe he wanted to live out his life frustrating the appetites of weak-jawed carnivores and making slow, slow, slow love to a Mrs. Herb, if he had been so lucky as to woo one.

Alas, Herb the Tort was never given the chance.

As tortoises go Herb was fairly average, which is to say, Herb was slow in word and deed. This accounts for his being captured by a poor African farmer, his inability to talk himself out of slavery, and his subsequent sale to yours truly, the passing missionary.

Yes, and Herb mourned his loss of freedom. I know this because in spite of an unending supply of food and water, Herb was always trying to make his way out of the safe haven I had provided for him. Adventurous little bugger that he was, he tired quickly of city life and longed for the wilds of the West African bush. His stout heart was ready to brave the snakes and general African nastiness for a chance to find a young reptile of like species with a sexy little mini-shell.

It came as no surprise then, when one day Herb was seen slowly making his way to the gate of the compound we called home. He had placed himself in the perfect position for a hasty escape.

And “hasty” is exactly where his strategy fell short of genius. He was a tortoise after all. As those gates swung open the first thought that entered into his tiny little head might have been “Freedom!”, but the last thing he saw was rubber.

Oh Herb, you were such a good friend, and even now in your death you give us a nugget of eternal wisdom.

Friends, we too are often slow. Slow to forgive. Slow to sacrifice. Slow to love. We want our freedom, and if it isn’t delivered just how and when we want it, we’ll go take it. It doesn’t matter that life will lead us into trouble by default- we feel the need to add our poor choices and selfishness to the mix.

But pause now, and watch Herb in his last few moments of life. Gaze into his eyes as he turns his knobby little head towards you, the realization of imminent doom looming large in his pleading expression. I made a mistake, he says. I was brought here so that I wouldn’t be made into soup, and now it’s too late for me. Go back. Trust Someone bigger. Put your life in the hands of Someone swifter. Go back.