Dave's Devotions, Dragonflies, and Dandy Lyonaise

I am NOT part of the "99%"

2011-10-28T07:27:00.000-07:00

…or am I?

I recently read a blog post from an Occupy movement (Occupy Wall St, Occupy Boston, etc) sympathizer. The writer had take exception to a photo that was going around the internet that was posted in direct contrast to the claims of this movement. Although I do not agree with all of the conclusions of that writer, it was an interesting glimpse into the mindset of this segment of our society. More importantly it has driven me to deeper thought on the subject for the last few days. After all, that is the purpose of a protest, is it not? To bring attention to a social disparity, perceived or real, and cause others to think about it more deeply.

Every movement in history striving to bring about social change has begun with a small band of noisy protestors. The suffragette movement, the anti-slavery movement, the civil rights movement, the environmental movement, and on and on. What scares us about this type of thing is the perception of chaos and threat to our lives and livelihood. What is driving this movement is an underlying need to be heard by a small, but apparently significant segment of our society.

Good economic times cover many sins of society. Bad economic times can bring those sins to the surface, often in chaotic threatening ways. The members of this movement are berating corporate America for their callous disposal of so many lives in the form of layoffs and cutbacks. They see these actions as driven by “corporate greed”. The reality in many cases is that it is not corporate greed but corporate arrogance that has brought us to this point. And it is truly a corporate, with a little “c”, as in society. It is not the letting people go that is the root of this problem. That is merely the result of previous errors in judgment. It is the historical expansion that is beyond fiscal responsibility that is driving much of our current dilemma. Growth beyond our ability to sustain ourselves: individuals do it via bank loans and credit cards, government does it via debt sales and taxation, corporations do it via stock sales and cash flow management.

There is a very good reason that most of the parables of Jesus recorded in the Bible deal with the issue of money. It has been a problem ever since Adam brought home that new Ronco field plow and Eve just had to redecorate the kitchen because the neighbors had a new fire pit. (sorry about the stereotypes here, but you get the point) It is our nature to want more, to improve, to strive for something better. It is when we lose sight of what is “better “ that we get into trouble. Is “better” really just having more stuff? Absolutely not. “Better” is having family and friends whom you can help when they need it and who can help you when you are down. Sometimes “better” is being that boss, or corporate CEO that can provide opportunity to the work force through leadership that God has gifted them with. Sometimes "better" is being the best darn bolt inserter on the assembly line from 9-5 and going home on time to play catch with your kids. The common ground for everyone here can be found in the lessons of the Bible: live within your means, do all things for the good of others, and do not strive to reward yourself – your rewards will come in the form of blessings from others whom you have touched with your life.

So am I part of the “99%”? I’m still not sure. No, I’m not going to go downtown and camp in the park or anything. But I am going to take a look at my checkbook and see where my money is going. You should too. Maybe together we can make a little difference in at least one person’s life.

Visualize Whirled Peas

2011-09-16T05:55:00.000-07:00

My daughter doesn’t like peas. Never has, probably never will. She gets that from her dad. Lima Beans or green beans no problem, but peas…? There’s a reason they call those straw things pea shooters (which are more accurate and less messy if the peas are still frozen, by the way). Yup, you got your whole condiment artillery here: Pea shooters for close range, olives make great sling shot ammo for the mid range engagement, and of course the potato gun for those long range targets. I have nothing against potatoes, but peas and olive have no other use in my life.

There are times in our lives that we are faced with things that we just don’t want to do. We stare ahead with disbelief at what is being required of us. How can we get out of this? How can we get around this? Or when all else fails, how can we swallow without having to taste it at all? What options do we have? We can try to leave the table when no one is looking. But then they just find out you are missing and come and find you. We could hide it and say we are done. But then they just find it later and, you guessed it, come and find you. We could hold our nose and choke it down. Make sure you make a lot of really dramatic sour faces when doing this. It gives you the personal illusion that you are causing guilt in the person that served you this meal.

My preferred method, however, when faced with these situations, is to make pea soup. For some reason, as much as I dislike peas, I really like pea soup. So next time life serves you up a great big helping of peas because “it’s good for you”, do something different! We don’t always have to take life the way it is handed to us. There are things we do just because they need to get done. That doesn’t mean we need to do them in an unpleasant way now does it?

Black gravel below my feet

2011-08-27T20:52:00.000-07:00

The following was unwittingly inspired by my wife's far fetched example of what my daughter could use as a subject for her poetry writing assignment:

Black gravel below my feet
Gritty greetings at the street
Tarry here for far too long
Light of green, heart of song

Beyond this asphalt chasm waits
A journey grander than my pace
The little shops and play yard side
Awaits my first and single stride

But here I wait, no one should pass
This asphalt chasm my thoughts amass
It is too far, It can not be
It just seems simpler to flee

My courage rises within my soul
Beside me does my hand take hold
And stepping forward I venture on
Man not mouse, a champion

A few more steps, almost there
Victory near, like floating on air
I have triumphed here, I have beat this beast
I’m five years old, and I’ve crossed the street
(with my mother’s help, of course)

I hope you enjoyed this little side trip in my mind. I am sure there will be many more to follow.

Now I Sit Me Down to Write

2009-03-11T06:33:00.000-07:00

Now I sit me down to write

I ask God for words not trite

I wish I can, I wish I might

Pen a masterpiece tonight.

Many times as we sit down to write, visions of grandeur fill our minds. After all, how hard can it be? I am sure Charles Dickens or Samuel Clements simply put on paper whatever came to mind didn’t they? It is simply a matter of letting the words flow from our exceptionally creative minds through our fingers to the page. Right?

If it were only that simple. Plot line? What’s a plot line? What do you mean I should rewrite that? I like it that way! For every potential Oscar winning screenwriter out there, for every potential poet laureate, for every possible Nobel laureate for literature, I say enjoy your craft. Do not write for the accolades of man. If you do, your work will find itself becoming a creature that you do not enjoy. Enjoy your craft.

To sit and write for the enjoyment of others, for the edification of others, for the lifting of man’s spirit is more fulfilling than any prize to be won. Enjoy your craft. Find the joy in the development of your story. Watch your characters grow as if they were your own children. Your ideas coalesce into a nearly physical being in your mind as you press on in your work. Enjoy your craft.

Let rewrites become a joy as you mold your piece like a potter would shape a vase. Let your critics become your friends, for the truly honest ones are invaluable to the writer. Enjoy your craft. As with the work on the potter’s wheel, know that many works do not end as originally intended. In well trained, experienced hands many will become great works admired by man. Many more, still will be simply useful, bringing a smile or a reflective moment into someone’s life. Still others will be broken and discarded. But even here the broken pot thrown to the ground becomes the foundation on the soil for new works to begin. Let nothing go to waste. Enjoy your craft.

For the joy in writing comes not in the far flung dreams of grandeur obtained by so few in our world, but rather in the moment of discovery. The birth of an idea, the epiphany of a story line that returns to it path long ago lost in the ramblings of your wandering mind, the joy of one person living a better life because what you put on that page spoke to them when they needed it most. Enjoy your craft and your craft will bring joy.

Is Darwin Dead?

2009-02-22T17:56:00.000-08:00

I have recently been thinking about the ongoing debate concerning Darwin and his theory of evolution. Not that I haven't thought about it before, in fact I've studied it to some extent, I've just been recently thinking about it again. No particular reason.

The whole idea of evolution continues to amaze me. In the late 1980's there was a saying: Disco is dead, the Bee Gees just don't know it yet. I would put forth today that Darwin is dead, the Evolutionist just don't know it yet. Now before you cut straight to that reply button at the bottom of my post, please let me explain.

For decades now the argument has been creation vs evolution, or evolution vs creation. It's as if God and Darwin are the only two beings in history to ever have an opinion on the subject. Now Creation Theory, by it's very nature, must be taken on faith. Creationism can not be scientifically proven. It happens to be what I do believe, but I recognize that it is my choice by default and not by scientific reasoning that I believe this way. Therefore I have no means by which to convince you that creationism is the "correct" theory. That belief is entirely up to you.

Where the evolutionary pundits fail in my mind is that they present evolution as fact, which it is not. Remember it is called the Theory of Evolution by Darwin himself. This theory fails on the same test as does the creationist theory. It can not be scientifically proven i.e. it has not been observed in nature and it can not be duplicated in a laboratory.

"Not observed in nature" you say??! What about all of those birds on the Galapagos Islands? What about fruit flies in Hawaii? What about - fill in the blank? Well I hate to be the one to break it to you, but the birds in the Galapagos are still birds. The fruit flies in Hawaii are still fruit flies. The fill in the blank, my guess is still a fill in the blank. What Darwin observed was adaptation, not evolution. Evolution was the mindspring that Darwin created by taking these observed adaptations to an extreme conclusion. Creatures of our planet adapt all the time. The fruit fly was introduce to Hawaii through international shipping and thus has a known point in time that it was established in the Islands. It is not a native to the South Pacific, but it changed over many generations to live and thrive in the warm climate. It adapted, but it is still a fruit fly. You would adapt if you moved from Florida to South Dakota (although adapting to the reverse scenario would be much more palatable.) That in no way means that you have evolved or that your future offspring will be anything but a human like you, even if they are much colder.

Many facets that are taught in schools today as facts of evolutionary theory have in fact been scientifically disproven. The idea of life coming from some promordial ooze not only can not be scientifially proven, it has been show to be chemically impossible.

I was watching a documentary recently about animals in Africa. The show had a decidedly evolutionary bent to it. The commentator began to explain how the giraffe has a special valve in its throat. Without this valve the giraffe would not be able to drink because of the extreme distance below their body mass that they need to reach to be able to drink from the ground. This was very interesting. Something I had never heard of before. Then the commentator went on to explain how this valve had evolved over millions of years of giraffe evolution to bring us to this day of this modern biological marvel, the giraffe that we know and love today. Only one thought came to my mind: If the ancestors of the giraffe did not have this special valve in their throat, how did they drink?

On that note I leave you with my thoughts and the opportunity to ponder your own meaning of the universe.

Please Pray for Me.

2008-03-16T18:17:00.000-07:00

We hear it all the time in the church. At least I hope that we do. We ask a group if there are any prayer requests. And, it seems, there always are a few. Sometime there are very deep needs that require our prayer attention, sometimes we get the feeling that we, as a group, are just trying fill up this spot on the schedule like a disc jockey fills dead air when the traffic report isn't on time. Aren't we supposed to say something? If we don't have any prayer requests something must be wrong! Right?

I spent many years enjoying the fellowship of a group of people that devoutly prayed for each other. Every week when we met prayer requests were noted and prayed for. We were a very close group and we could be honest with each other about any need or any praise that we had (both are equally important in my mind). Each time we met, one elderly lady in the group would always have a prayer request. At times it was almost irritating in how trite some of the request seemed to be. You know the type. The one person that causes everyone in the group to groan inwardly when they stand to say a prayer request. "Please pray for my husband's co-worker's daughter who has a cold." "Please pray for my cousin Joey's son's friend who's car broke down." "Please pray for my sister Verna's cat, Fluffy" Well, OK. I don't think she ever asked for prayer for anybody's pet, but you get the idea.

But how does God see it? Does God have a ranking scale of how important a prayer is? Sometimes it seems that we do. I really don't think God has a priority box and a "round-to-it" file. But sometimes we come to prayer thinking that our problems aren't big enough to warrant God's time. Praise the Lord! If that is the biggest problem you have, please, don't go out and look for trouble just to "improve" your prayer life. But, sometimes we place those same values on the prayer requests of our fellow believers. That is where we walk on dangerous ground.

God implores us in his word to bring all of our burdens to him. Who am I to judge the burdens of this fellow believer? Do I actually think them weaker than I that they bring such small problems to the attention of the group? Are they less secure in their walk with God that they feel a need to bring every little detail to the throne of God through prayer? Weaker? Less secure? There is a weaker one here, but it is not my prayer warrior friend. What incredible strength there is in trusting God with every detail. My friend has a need and desires the prayers of fellow believers. Needs for prayer that have been placed upon their heart in a unique way for the glory of God. Those needs are driven by an incredible faith that no problem is so big, or so small, that it can't be handled by our God. Who am I to judge?

Whether it be the salvation of a friend, or the healing of Uncle Paul's bunion, there is no problem too big for God's help or so small that God would not be concerned. If you feel a burden on your heart to pray for cousin Joey's son's friend or whatever it may be, that burden is there for a purpose and should never be ignored. So pray for me, my friend. Pray that I will see the strength in weakness and have the faith to trust even in the little things in life.

Gentle musings on a lazy day

2008-03-16T18:05:00.000-07:00

My Morning Walk
By D M Hyde

The mist settles on the wayward dell
I would not have come this way
But for the loon, forlorn it calls
On this misty quiet day

So silent the world this misty morn
The cry it calls me on.
I must find this bugle sound
This sound of the loon, forlorn

The mossy green, the scented air
The trees - giant brambles low
On ahead the loon it calls
What reason, I do not know

The babbling brook, soft to speak
Ahead my goal surmised
Again the call echoes the sky
Forlorn, alone, alive.

My quiet walk has brought me far
Through mist and morning tones
In meadow open ‘fore me now
Unseen, the bond it grows.

Silent now I settle down
Like mist upon the pond
Soon I see him drifting by
My loon, my forlorn song.

God must be busy

2008-03-01T06:36:00.000-08:00

I heard a song on the radio the other day. I don't know if it was a new song or if it was just the first time I had heard it. The artist sang about all of the troubles in the world. About the war, crime, gangs, problems at home and on and on. Needless to say, it was not a happy uplifting song, but it wasn't meant to be happy and uplifting.

What really troubled me about what they were singing was their reason for all of these problems: God must be busy. The artist sang about how terrible life is and how he keeps praying about things, but the problems don't disappear. God must be busy. Even going so far as to say that he is nothing more than a grain of sand in the eyes of God, that the creator of the universe doesn't have time to answer his prayers. God must be busy.

If I remember my Sunday school Bible lessons correctly, God knows the number of hairs on our head and the number of sparrows on the earth (Luke 12:6b-7). Do they think God is busy counting hairs and sparrows? What is it that is keeping God so busy if he doesn't have time to answer our prayers? Maybe He's playing hand ball with St. Peter, or a Father / Son outing on the other side of the universe.

By the time the song was over I found myself fighting that urge to yell at the radio. You know the feeling. Not an angry yelling, but a "what are you talking about, would you please wake up and start making sense" type of conversation. The trouble here isn't the size of the song writer's problems. It is the size of their God. Mr. Brookes and Mr. Dunn have told the world through their song that, to borrow from Dr. Seuss, That they are Horton and their god is a Whovillian. Of course the problems the Who's had wasn't that they weren't answering, it was that no one was listening. Hmmm..

Psalm 34: 17 tells us that God hears the prayers of the righteous And delivers them from their troubles. A wise friend once taught me that prayer is a conversation with God. A conversation is a two way street: talking and listening. This song gave us the artist's wish list prayer to God, which that's OK. It is good to ask God for peace in troubled times and for answers to your problems. But if you aren't going to wait long enough to listen for the answer you might as well be talking to a wall.

If you believe what the Bible says, then you believe that God is all powerful and all knowing. He knows our past, present and future. The part where we all seem to have a problem is that God also knows what is best for us better than we do. Sometimes we don't like God's answer to our prayer. Sometimes he doesn't wave his magic wand and make our problems go away. Sometimes he answers our prayers, and the answer is "no". Ouch!

But who am I to question God? I don't think God is the one here that is too busy. God is there, listening and answering. Are we waiting around long enough to hear? Are we willing to grow and accept the answers God gives us? For the sake of our world, let's hope so.

A letter from James 1:2

2008-02-27T20:39:00.000-08:00

"Consider it pure joy my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds," I have been studying this passage for about a week now and am utterly amazed at the difficulty we face as people of this earth in getting our minds around what, on the surface, looks to be a simple concept. Yup, put on a happy face, buck up buckaroo, don't worry about spilled milk because the sun will come out tomorrow.

In a fairy tale world these words come awfully easy. But easy answers aren't always so easy in the real world. Sometimes the hard answers are what we need to hear. Yeah, buddy: We don't like that!

As a children we usually learn things the "hard way". One friend of mine taught me many lessons while I was in my younger years. Lessons like: don't touch the metal part of the plug when it's still in the wall socket; or don't bite into a lemon like it's an apple; or don't "stand right there" when someone holding a home made bow and arrow tells you to "stand right there". What did I learn from all of this? Well eventually I learned not to do whatever my friend told me to do, that's what. That may sound a little harsh, but for me at the grand old age of five it was a lesson I needed to learn. Was there joy in getting zapped, smacked, and shot? No, not really. Is there joy in the lesson learned? Absolutely.

We are all products of the experiences that have brought us this far. The joy and the sorrow. The parties and the pain. It is easy to find the joy in the pleasant moments of life. The joy in the trial often is not fully known until long after the lesson is over. I encourage you to look back on your troubles. See how far you have come. Find that bright shinning star, that glimmer of hope that carried you through. And use that memory to strengthen yourself when new trials arrive. Each of our past trials give us the strength to endure and persevere when new trials cross our path. Consider it pure joy, my brothers. Every day is a new lesson learned.