Salute To My Dad

After 4 months of not posting a blog, I have now decided to enter the world of the blogosphere once again. It was not that there was a lack of things to blog about, rather it was me not being motivated to blog. I was beginning to think I was not going to blog again, but last night I got the urge to post a blog, so ready or not, here am I.

Yesterday evening I attended the Veteran's Day service in Gainesville. It was a pretty neat service with a massive fireworks display for the finale. The local bands and choir were good, the speakers and performers did a good job. But the real stars of the evening were the Veterans themselves who had come out to the event. Most veterans wore something identifying themselves as a Vet. Some came with obvious physical discomforts brought on by their service. All were there with a quiet, classic dignity only a Veteran seems to carry these days. During the service I could not help but think of my dad (pictured above).

A Veteran himself who recently turned 84 last month. On his 19th birthday he got off a troop transport and marched to Pantanella Air Base outside of Canosa, Italy. Courtesy of Uncle Sam, my dad was a member of the 15th Army Air Force, 465th Bomb Group (H), 781st Bomb Squadron. He served as the ball gunner on a B-24 Liberator flying missions over the Alps to bomb Nazi targets in Austria, Hungary, Romania and throughout the Balkans. (The ball gunner is the gunner located on the underside of the plane.)

As a young teenager learning to shoot pheasants, I was always in awe of my dad's ability to consistently hit pheasants flying fast and far away. On one hunting trip I ask my dad how he was able to always hit the birds with seemingly so little effort. He commented that the hours of practicing shooting at fighter planes flying at all possible angles while moving at 275 m.p.h. made shooting at pheasants seem rather pedestrian.

I have found this reply to be fairly typical from Veterans. Having a lifetime of experiences forged into their character in a few short years, they go about their lives with little acclaim and no need for attention. They work, play, serve and bring much betterment to each community where they live. Their sacrifices given in years past seem too easily taken for granted by those never having to serve their fellow man through the military. Quietly productive in most all they do, building our nation up and moving her forward. True champions of liberty are the men and women serving us through their sacrifices of military duty. God bless our Veterans. Thank you one and all. And thank you, dad, for you're the best of them all.

Summer Days

So quickly does time go by. One month to go before school season is upon us. The last rush to go someplace before the fall season starts is upon us. My personal trip will be to the Philippines to visit Christie and the kids! In fact, in 4 days, 09 hours 14 minutes from now I will be leaving for Tagbilaran. The first four days of my stay in the Philippines will comprise traveling to and from speaking opportunities. One of these speaking engagements will be to about 30 South Korean missionaries/Christian workers serving in the Philippines. Following this we will head to Baguio City. This appears to be the dream vacation site for the Filipinos. At least Christie is very excited to get to go there. I think it is sort of like us going to the Rocky Mountains for vacation. The big adventure for me in getting to Baquio City will be renting a car and getting out of the Manila traffic alive and in sound mind!

Last week I had the wonderful privilege to host Pete Valdez here at the house. Pete is from the Philippines and I knew him from his interpreting some at a pastor's seminar last January. During the week we moved from acquaintances to friends. It was fun to introduce Pete to Texas culture. As he had been visiting California for a week before coming here, he was privileged to experience the better side of life in America! (Note: This is humor with a tinge of truth for my thin skinned friends on the west coast!) We did spend one afternoon shooting guns. He thought this was much more fun than a day at Disneyland. Pete has moved on to St. Louis and all is quiet for now. Two days after my return from the Philippines will be the arrival of Tomek and Renia from Poland. These are dear friends who were able to spend a week here two years ago. It will be good to have them back in the house again for a visit.

Did you know? Botanically speaking, the banana is an herb, the jalapeno is a fruit, and apples and peaches are members of the rose family. Now you may qualify for a TV game show knowing this trivia! Tonight is a great night for ice cream. So ice cream is on tap for part of the supper fare. Whoever came up with ice cream needs their name etched in immortality. Actually, ice cream dates back to the second century BC, when Alexander the Great enjoyed snow and ice flavored with honey and nectar. Tonight as I have a Root Beer Float I will again declare that God is good, therefore Life is good!

Blessings

How Did You Do That?

The fireworks on July 4th went off as usual. 33 guests came for hamburgers and fireworks. Some little kids shot off fireworks for the first time. The bigger kids were off shooting their fireworks a few feet away. And the really big kids (menfolk) had the best time of all! Amazing how this works.

The clock is ticking. 13 days, 9 hours until I see my wife waiting for me at the Tagbilaran airport. It will have been only three months since we were married but it seems like an eternity since we were last together in the same country. A quick update on the status of Christie and kids coming to the U.S. The papers and documents have been sent to Homeland Security where they will do background checks on the "newest Halls" and determine they are kosher enough to apply for a visa. This usually takes 3-4 months. All in all I am still believing for the family to be here by Christmas. Thanksgiving would be nice, but Christmas is just fine too.

This week I have as a guest in my home - Pete Valdez. Pete is a pastor in the Philippines. More than this, Pete is a godly man and a good friend. In fact, he was one of the sponsors for Christie and me at our wedding. (Perhaps Christie sent Pete here to check me out to see if I was really as good as I appeared to be in April!) Well, as you can see by the photo, Pete has to earn his keep around here. Mowing grass and preaching. What more could a Filipino want to do while staying here. How about golf and shooting guns! This might be a week he doesn't forget.

Now for the "How Did You Do That?" story. I got a call this morning to fetch a set of spare car keys and get to Wal-Mart as soon as possible. Seems someone had flushed the car keys down the toilet! Now I must admit to laughing out loud when I heard the plea to come to the rescue. I was stumped as to how an adult could flush keys down a toilet. Maybe a 5 year old, but an adult? Reaching to give the spare set of keys I had to ask, "how did you do that?" It's really simple. Here's how. The lady is on the toilet and the cell phone rings. Reaching into the purse and moving stuff around to get the cell phone made the keys come alive and crawl out of the purse and jump into the toilet. Well there is only one thing to do and that is to reach in and retrieve the keys. So rising off the toilet to go after the keys, before you could say Jimminy Cricket, the automatic senor activates and a giant "Whoosh" whisked the keys out of sight! Who would have thought about the automatic sensor? Next time she will!

God is surely good on every front. There is always something to cause somebody somewhere to get despondent as they grouse about. But God who is always good and always has good counsel tells us to "Rejoice always" and to "Be joyful always". So I choose to heed his advice and look at the gracious goodness of our Heavenly Father all around. As I do this, I find my 'eyes of faith' are sharpened and my perspective is always shifting into alignment with God's perspective. I may not do this perfectly and consistently, but I am better at this than I used to be before I made a conscious decision to heed this admonition. I find God's grace changing my natural view on things and for this I am grateful.

Blessings,

Farewell June

Well here we are 1/3 of the way through summer. Farewell to June. July is going to be great. July 4th is always special as we celebrate our nation's Independence. For me this means grilling out with friends and shooting fireworks after dark. Next year I get to teach my son, John, how to 'do fireworks'. Yes, papers have been sent in and now someone in the bureaucracy called Homeland Security will decide whether my new family are terrorists or not and give permission for proceeding on to visa application. So the waiting game has formally begun in getting Christie and kids over here with me.

Everyone repeat after me: Kansas is God's Country. The other day I went to open the refrigerator door and there it was. A refrigerator magnet stating, "Texas - God's Country." What? How did that get there? In all the people coming and going through my house someone slipped that thing onto the refrigerator. Under normal conditions I would consider this graffiti. But since it obviously came from a friend, albeit anonymously, it stays as a reminder of valued friendships who love to 'tease' with good humor. (After all, whoever it was who placed that thing on the refrigerator has had to put up with my humor for many years.)

At the end of July, (actually 25 days, 11 hours from now) I will be landing at the Tagbilaran airport in Bohol as I travel back to the Philippines to be with my family for a brief visit. During the trip I will have the privilege to share with a conference of Korean pastors ministering in the Philippines as well as preaching in two churches new to me. As exciting as these opportunities are, they are really side trips compared to spending time with Christie and the kids. The picture posted is a view of the Chocolate Hills on Bohol. During the dry season the vegetation on the hills dry up and the hills look like hundreds of Hersey Kisses have been dropped from heaven and landed in the center of Bohol.

The rest of the summer will have an international flavor here at the house. Pete Valdez, pastor, then interpreter, then acquaintance, then a sponsor to my marriage to Christie, and now friend (this is the progression in our relationship) will be spending week here with me during July. Pete is a wonderful man of God from the Philippines. When August roles onto the scene I have the honor to host Tomek and Renia Bieniek for a week. Tomek and Renia spent a week here two years ago and enjoyed it so much they are coming for a return engagement! This couple from Poland are precious and have hearts so in love with the Lord. It promises to be a great summer.

Before I close I need to share that Hannah Davidson, a college age student from CTC, is now in Tanzania for five weeks. Be praying for her as she serves the Lord among orphans in Tanzania. If you want to follow her adventures this summer, check out her blog at the following link: prayfortanzania.blogspot.com

Blessings to all!

Living Well

Driving home yesterday from the funeral of my sister-in-law who died four months after discovering she had inoperable cancer gave me a chance to reflect on a life well lived. Listening to those who shared about Colleen's impact on their lives I found myself in agreement with what a great gal she was. And yet a part of the story was left out in the narrative of her life. Yes, Colleen was a believer in Christ (and a very effective and mature one), but the story behind the story is the transforming work of grace in Colleen's life. The power of the Holy Spirit is so real and is able to renew a life and make the heart and soul on an individual so in sync with the Heavenly Father that what naturally flows out is the image of the Father. Colleen excelled at this. Life - the life of God came forth from her so naturally. This is as it should come forth - naturally. As Paul states in Philippians 1:6, God is at work in us throughout our lives. Colleen worked to remain open and pliable to the things God was depositing into her life. As a result of her open heart to the things of God in combination with the transforming work of the Holy Spirit, throughout the years Colleen consistently brought God's life to many others. Well done, Colleen. Well done, Holy Spirit!

My countdown clock shows 30 days, 2 hours until I return to the Philippines to spend time with Christie and the kids. Four days ago we officially filed papers to start the process of getting Christie and kids visas to come to the U.S. Time wise we are hoping sometime in December there will be cause to celebrate the family uniting in the U.S.

Life is certainly good. Family and friends in abundance. A great country in which to live. A future brighter than the past. A new golfing buddy coming back to Valley View. And a God who loves so extravagantly. Life is good.

Blessings

107 - Pancakes - Electricity

I am writing this blog from Arizona while attending a conference. Landing at 4:00 in the afternoon to be greeted with 107 degree temperature did feel rather excessive. However, the conference site keeps the meeting room so cool that I get "goose bumps" before each session ends. So the solution (since I did not bring a jacket) is to run outdoors at every possible break to get warmed up! The conference has been great. I head home tomorrow to more normal temperatures.

At lunchtime on Monday I found myself staring at the Denny's menu offering "all-you-can-eat-pancakes" for $4.00. When I asked the waitress what the record was she said 9 pancakes (by a 12 year-old boy) was the most any of her customers had eaten. Ah, the challenge. I can do more than that. So here you have me vainly trying to revert back to my gluttonous childhood and consume 10 pancakes - just for the record. All was going well on the road to the record even as each bite of the 7th pancake told me a wiser person would quit while still able to crawl back to the car. But just 3 more pancakes and the record is mine! As I was finishing off pancake number 8, the waitress brought pancakes 9 and 10 along with horrifying news. The waitress on the other side of the room said she had served an eight year old girl 11 pancakes. This is like moving the goal line whenever you get close to it. I've played games with people like this. They keep informing you of another rule to the game as you go along. Of course, the new rules never seem to be an advantage to you. 10 pancakes were within distance but 12? How stupid was I going to be on this afternoon?

On the home front. This morning I heard the statistic that there are 1 billion persons on the earth living without electricity or running water in their home. (U.N. statistics) As of today we can remove 4 of those statistics. Christie and children have now gotten electricity to their home! The first electric appliance Christie was going out to buy was . . . an electric rice cooker! I will get to see how well Christie cooks rice in 46 days, 5 hours, 12 minutes. That is when, according to the countdown clock on my computer, I will land in Tagbilaran to see Christie and the kids again!

Well God is certainly good. It is fun being His child. And, by the way, I did quit at 10 pancakes. I decided to let the eight year old girl keep her record. And yes, I felt stuffed for at least 24 hours.

Blessings.

Wild Thoughts on a Summer Afternoon

Here are some thoughts floating through my mind while waiting for the last graduation service of the year.

Someday I may "get it". I just received a text from my sister coming back out of the Rocky Mountains. How could someone want to spend a week in the mountains when they could enjoy the wide open spaces of the prairie? Someday I may understand this phenomena. But for the time being I will enjoy watching the masses cross the prairie to the mountains totally oblivious to the beauty surrounding them. When I watch this migration I am reminded of the lemmings running blindly over the cliff to their deaths.

The oil spill in the gulf is a great boon to the evolutionary scientists. With so much oil spewing forth in the gulf it must surely be creating such hostile environments that today's species will have to evolve into something different to survive. The fittest of these survivalists will one day get their pictures in "Nature" and "Science" magazines. So the evolutionists are gleeful in their anticipation of these future new species. The only problem is, they won't be around in 50 million years to know if this ever occurred! Oh, the poor evolutionist. He will have to live by "faith" since he will never be around to observe what he believes.

An idea worth pondering. With the gulf oil crisis having no end in sight this is another opportunity to explore additional alternative energy sources. How about inventing cars that run on hot air. Then President "O" can nationalize all the BP gas stations in the U.S. as a punitive measure for their mistake. Government owned and operated service stations will then be available for all freedom challenged individuals. Now this is just the first step in getting America back to work. Next will be the construction of a pipeline network connecting the government owned and run BP stations to a source of hot air to run the newly invented "hot air automobile". Millions of Obamajobs will be created. Endless Obamajobs - just building another BP service station will require another pipeline to the source of hot air. Where, you ask, will all these pipelines run to the source of such massive quantities of hot air. Follow the pipelines east, young man, east across the Potomac to a big white house and an outhouse with 535 stalls.

Blessings (and enjoy the day)