This entry is on behalf of and out of respect for my
friends who are coaches at GBWHS and all the athletes they impact. Alongside learning to play football, young men today need to learn about integrity, determination, commitment and loyalty. The modeling of such good character by these coaches will go a long way toward influencing the lives of their players. It was a great season guys! I’m already looking forward to next year.
Watch video …Tradition Never Graduates
Nearly 90 percent of all diseases in the world are caused by unsafe drinking water, inadequate sanitation, and poor hygiene. Every year, there are 4 billion cases of diarrhea as a direct result of drinking contaminated water; this results in more than 2.2 million deaths each year—the equivalent of 20 jumbo jets crashing every day. The weakest members of communities are the most vulnerable; every day water-related diseases claim the lives of 5000 children under the age of five. That’s roughly one every 15 seconds.
This Christmas, I want to take his words more seriously – “I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink.” -Jesus
Recently I came across some quotes on marriage. I thought they were worth sharing.
For two people in a marriage to live together day after day is unquestionably the one miracle the Vatican has overlooked. -Bill Cosby
It is not a lack of love, but a lack of friendship that makes unhappy marriages. -Friedrich Nietzsche
My advice to you is to get married. If you find a good wife, you’ll be happy; if not, you’ll become a philosopher. -Socrates
Do not marry a man to reform him. That is what reform schools are for. -Mae West
What counts in making a happy marriage is not so much how compatible you are, but how you deal with incompatibility. – Leo Tolstoy
Getting married for sex is like buying a 747 for the free peanuts. -Jeff Foxworthy
I think a man and a woman should choose each other for life, for the simple reason that a long life with all its accidents is barely enough time for a man and a woman to understand each other and to understand… is to love. -William Butler Yeats
As for his secret to staying married: “My wife tells me that if I ever decide to leave, she is coming with me.”-Jon Bon Jovi
The first bond of society is marriage. -Cicero
It is sometimes essential for a husband and a wife to quarrel – they get to know each other better. -Goethe
Love seems the swiftest, but it is the slowest of all growths. No man or woman really knows what perfect love is until they have been married a quarter of a century. -Mark Twain
For reasons known primarily to the PCC crowd, I’ve been reading and studying about a lot of different anmials these days. Some might argue that all God’s creatures are beautiful. Well, I’m willing to say they are amazing but not beautiful. Just today I heard about the Scotoplane – aka the Sea Pig.
Honestly, if I were a pig – I’d be offended.
It’s been a weekend focused on life. A memorial service at PCC on Saturday for a friend [about 1,000 people showed up] was a reminder of how life is brief. Then on Sunday, Nancy Beach [WCC pastor, author] shared at Parkview on how we should slow down and live full lives by savoring every moment. She is right. Too often we rush through our days failing to appreciate the life we have….at least I do.
Here are a couple more quotes I came across over the past few days.
I HAVE a deep sense, hard to articulate, that if we could really befriend death we would be free people.… Our lives would be significantly different if we could relate to death as a familiar guest instead of a threatening stranger. … Many people seem never to befriend death and die as if they were losing a hopeless battle. But we do not have to share that sad fate.
-Henri J. M. Nouwen, A Letter of Consolation
Have courage for the great sorrows of life and patience for the small ones. And when you have finished your daily task, go to sleep in peace. God is Awake. - Victor Hugo
A friend died this week. When I got the news and the reality began to set in, it seemed like the world should stop for a moment and take notice. But as I looked out my window I realized the passing of my friend failed to effect the cycle of nature. Things just kept on moving. Traffic was flowing. Birds were flying. People scurried about their seemingly important tasks.
The universe is relentless. There is a cycle of life which is never content, never arriving at a point of resolution. Nothing ever changes. It’s like the universe is a big machine which simply grinds people into the dust and keeps on going. The same cycle passed over Socrates, Plato, Shakespeare, Stalin, Hitler and Churchill. It has ground up loved ones in our lives and it will grind us up too.
I suppose this is Solomon’s point when in ancient wisdom literature he writes,
“Generations come and go, but the earth remains forever. The sun rises and the sun sets, and hurries back to where it rises. The wind blows to the south and turns to the north; round and round it goes, ever returning on its course. All streams flow into the sea, yet the sea is never full. To the place the streams come from, there they return again. All things are wearisome, more than one can say. The eye never has enough of seeing, nor the ear its fill of hearing. What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun. Is there anything of which one can say, ‘Look! This is something new’? It was here already, long ago; it was here before our time. There is no remembrance of men of old, and even those who are yet to come will not be remembered by those who follow.” [Ecclesiates 1:4-11]
Granted, not the most encouraging outlook on our existence but at least Solomon is honest. Humanity under the sun cannot and will not outlive the cosmos. For each of us [like my friend] our time on earth will come to an end. On its own, the monotonous cycle of nature and the universe offers us no meaning.
Solomon’s answer? Embrace God. Without Him, life is as meaningless as chasing after the wind. He writes, “Remember your Creator in the days of your youth, before the days of trouble come and the years approach when you will say, ‘I find no pleasure in them.’” In short, the sooner in life you remember the One who gave you life — the better off you will be and the more you will celebrate and appreciate the life you have.
Another Thanksgiving has come and gone and once again, many of our people at PCC spent the day making holiday celebration possible for hundreds of less fortunate in our community. 43 Turkeys, 12 Hams and tons of other food – all served and/or delivered to those in need. It’s a huge undertaking but always a rewarding event…more than that, it’s a tangible way to be Jesus to our world. For anyone who reads this and was involved in the effort one way or another — THANKS.
Why are we so impatient? This has been on my mind recently as I’ve had to wait at railroad crossings when I’m already late for an appointment. I’ve asked the question in check-out lines, Starbucks, Doughnut shops, libraries, even in the context of church. Why are we [I] so irritated by delay? It’s tempting to try to explain our impatience by invoking the argument that our lives have gotten so busy and crowded that a million different things are competing for every nanosecond of our attention. Or that because we have developed such a fast paced, post–MTV, IM attention span, we no longer have the tolerance for long drawn-out processes. Yet – let’s be honest. We are capable of spending hours futzing with our FACEBOOK pages, downloading ringtones, posting photos online and perpetually text-messaging our friends with less than critical information. The hard fact is that our attention and patience is only limited when we are not the central focus of what is going on around us or we are being kept from getting exactly what we want. We are not impatient merely because we’ve got so much to do and so may places to go. I am thinking we lack patience with things and people because we have become more arrogant, cynical, self-absorbed and greedier than ever. Is that possible?
Sometimes, admittedly – even with best intentions and self-restraint it is extremely difficult to be truly patient.
Borrowing from a famous political phrase, while doing some research in preparation for a talk on sex, I learned that when it comes to happy marriage experts are declaring, “It’s the friendship stupid.” In other words, so much emphasis in our culture is placed on sex that what is absolutely crucial is overlooked. Now, don’t misunderstand me – sex is important to a happy marriage but get this: recent Gallup research indicates that a couple’s friendship quality could account for 70% of overall marital satisfaction. In fact, some psychologists and sociologists suggest the emotional intimacy married couples share is five times more important than their physical intimacy. How they figure that out – I’m not sure but it seems to ring true. Apparently it did over one hundred years ago as well. German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche wrote, “The best friend will probably get the best wife, because good marriage is based on a talent for friendship. It is not the lack of love, but the lack of friendship that makes unhappy marriages.”
Husband. Father. Senior Pastor of Parkview Community Church in Glen Ellyn, IL.
