By now you have no doubt noticed that my blog entries are sometimes serious, sometimes sarcastic, sometimes silly, and sometimes a combination of the three. With that said . . . When I was a boy, I loved watching NFL football games on Sunday afternoons. I can remember getting home from church at about 12:45, which was great because I could still catch the last fifteen minutes of the thirty minute pre-game show. This was back in the 70s—the crew at CBS was Brent Musburger, Irv Cross, former Miss America Phyllis George, and ol’ Jimmy the Greek making his predictions.My, how times have changed. Back then, there was a thirty minute pre-game show. A half an hour, that was it. Then it was off to New York, Chicago, Green Bay, or wherever the 1:00 game was. As a quick aside, back then, John Madden was the slightly crazy head coach of the Oakland Raiders who always had a tag hanging from his clothing (does anyone remember that?). Now fast-forward thirty years. I think I can say with very little exaggeration that nowadays, NFL coverage is round-the-clock. With ESPN, ESPN2, ESPN News, Fox Sports, and an array of regional television networks, you can find coverage of your favorite team in the most excruciating detail. Oh, I almost forgot—a few years ago the NFL Network was launched, a cable channel devoted exclusively to the league. Am I the only one who thinks our country is getting a little carried away with all this?When I say “excruciating detail,” I mean exactly that. Just a few weeks ago, I overheard an ESPN analysis of an upcoming game. While the commentator delved into the specifics, the video froze, one player was highlighted, then, like something out of “The Matrix,” the field spun around so we could see the play from another vantage point. Then the commentator said, “The Bengals’ linebacker has got to shoot that gap to get to the Steelers’ quarterback. That is THE MOST IMPORTANT THING!” Really? I was always taught that THE MOST IMPORTANT THING was that every human being is going to spend eternity in one of two places based on how they respond to the gospel of Jesus Christ. I guess I didn’t get the memo that that changed.There are many other examples. Studio announcers walking over to a mock-up of a football field and walking us through certain plays. Literally weeks of coverage on the NFL draft every spring. And what about our national celebration of the Super Bowl each year? It seems to have eclipsed Easter and maybe even the Fourth of July in terms of the attention paid to it.But it even goes beyond coverage of the actual games. Just the other week I heard a stat that “The Dallas Cowboys are 1 and 6 against the spread on the road since last November.” Who cares? I guess if I were a gambler I would care, but regardless, this really has nothing to do with the game itself. Or, how about ESPN’s seven minute segment updating Fantasy Football, where we hear gems like “The Detroit Lions lead the league in giving up fantasy points to opposing offensive players.” Fantasy points? Okay, at this point things are starting to get a little weird. I don’t really understand where Fantasy Football came from, or why there is a need for it. We already have actual football. In fact, let me be blunt—if you are fantasizing about football, maybe you ought to take your wife or girlfriend out on a date next Friday night.Now, I am certainly not against entertainment. I cheer for my favorite sports teams. I drop some money twice a year to go see my alma mater play a football and basketball game. I watch NFL football. I take my family to Disney World, etc. etc. And, I don’t begrudge anybody else for indulging in some well-earned entertainment, relaxation, vacations, etc. But is it possible that sports and entertainment have taken a grossly disproportionate place of prominence in our society? Is it possible that six or seven 24/7 sports channels is just a tad bit of overkill?You know what crosses my mind every once in a while? Call me morbid, but somewhere, in a very remote cave in the far reaches of the Pakistan-Afghanistan border, there are a group of young men who don’t dress fancy, and don’t eat a lot. But they are extremely smart and well-educated. Some of them are fluent in several languages. They spend their time not watching ESPN or catching up on fantasy stats, but on devising ways of obliterating places like New York City, Washington D.C., Philadelphia, and Dallas (which are, incidentally, the four cities that have teams in the NFC East division).I am very grateful for the courageous men and women who are out on the front lines right now defending our freedom, and trying to stop those who want to destroy our cities and kill us and our children. And I know that many Americans are concerned and doing their part in a myriad of ways. I just sometimes fear that, as a whole, we (Americans, including myself) overdose on entertainment, sports, vacations, etc., instead of focusing more resolutely on more serious matters—like what THE MOST IMPORTANT THING really is.
A comment on my last blog entry got me to thinking about all of the plaques, signed pictures, medals, and awards that I “earned” while I was in the Navy. You know what? Most of them made me feel pretty underappreciated. Here are a few examples:-- At the end of my first at-sea tour, as a young Lieutenant, my boss told me, “Write yourself up for an end-of-tour medal, and have it on my desk by next Tuesday.” I thought to myself, “Wow, you think so highly of me that you are giving me the honor of submitting my own name for an award? I’m speechless.” Now, this might come as a surprise to some of you, but in my younger days I was a bit of a smart aleck at times. I told my boss I wasn’t going to do it, and if he thought I deserved an award, he should write it up himself. (That boss didn’t like me very much, as I recall.) (Also, I would add, it was clearly obvious from a very early stage in my career that I would never make Admiral.)-- When I first arrived at one of my Navy commands, I was informed that as a member of the Wardroom Mess (group of officers on the staff), that in addition to my monthly dues, I was required to pay $10 a month for the first three months to cover the cost of my farewell plaque (which I would receive two years later when I left the command). I felt instantly appreciated. Let me tell you, while that plaque is, at this very moment, sitting with all my other plaques in a box up in the attic, I can assure you that that one is on top of the pile!-- Many awards and commendations I received had my name misspelled, but I kind of got used to that.-- I was once the victim of “award inflation adjustment.” All of my predecessors at a certain job had been given a particular award for a specific measure of performance. However, when it came my time to depart, I received a lesser award. I admit, I was expecting to be recognized at the same level, and I was a little discouraged. What had I done wrong? The answer was nothing, it’s just that a senior officer deemed that the previous awards were “too high,” and the time was right to “adjust” the giving out of awards to an appropriate “representative level.” Oh well. Bad timing I guess. From what I have just shared, you might think that I never felt appreciated in my twenty years in the Navy. But that is most definitely not the case. I have some vivid memories of specific times when I felt much appreciated, times when I received recognition that really made me feel good. But by and large, I did not receive medals or awards for those things. It’s weird, but a pretty consistent theme of my Navy career seems to be that I got plaques, awards, and medals for a lot of stuff that didn’t matter much. Yet, the things that I really cherish, the accomplishments I hold most dear, things I did that really caused people to appreciate me . . . those are the things that don’t show up in my collection of medals, ribbons, and plaques. And that is certainly okay by me.
Perhaps there is nothing more exciting about being a parent than having a son involved in a fall little league baseball team, or “fall ball.” You get to race out to the ball fields after work at break neck speed, so that you don’t miss the first pitch. Once you get there, you get to kick back in your chair in the brisk chill of an autumn evening—the kind of chill that leaves you yearning for the warmth of a heated car. And, did I mention the nutritious array of snacks available at the concession stand? Since you’re not getting home until almost eight o’clock, you might as well have a well-balanced dinner of a hot dog, nachos with cheese, and a ring pop.This year Matthew was on a coach-pitch team. This is just one step above tee-ball, so we are really at the basic level here. Nevertheless, young Matthew had a great season and a lot of fun. Here were some of the “highlights” from my perspective:1. One night, as I walked from my car to the field, I overheard a mom giving a stern talk to her (approximately) seven year old son. In a harsh tone, she said, “You had better bring your ‘A’ game tonight!” ‘A’ game? I didn’t want to interrupt, but does a seven year old even know what an ‘A’ game is? Most of the younger boys are still ducking out of the way when a fly ball is hit to them. Besides, I don’t think it’s even humanly possible to have an ‘A’ game at anything until about age fifteen. 2. In one game, the other team hit the ball really well, and scored a lot of runs. We did not. While walking to the car after the game, I was informed that that team had only lost one game all year. That’s pretty good, I thought, considering that we don’t keep score in this league.3. One boy on Matthew’s team experienced a monumental breakthrough before an early season game. The boy was having extreme difficulty swinging the bat—he looked pitifully awkward. The coach took him out for some special instruction, and after a few minutes, realized that the boy is actually left-handed! He ended up getting a few hits over the course of the season.4. And finally, the best news of the whole season: It rained on the day that my turn came up for working at the concession stand! In our league, parents usually have to take one turn per season. I hate it, because I usually end up getting reprimanded by some parent that is “in charge” because I didn’t thaw out enough soft pretzels, or I undercharged someone for that bubble gum that is supposed to look like chewing tobacco or something like that. It is difficult to remember everything when you don’t do it that often. Plus, I’ll confess, since I don’t like it, I seldom bring my ‘A’ game to the effort. (By the way, why is there no outrage over selling bubble gum to children that looks like chewing tobacco? Doesn’t this fall somewhere in the same realm as kids bringing toy guns to school?)5. Oh, actually, one more thing. As always, every kid got a trophy. In my entire childhood, where I played sports year-round for almost a decade, I got a grand total of three trophies. Three. And I’m pretty sure my parents didn’t pay for them. My sons each had about a dozen before their eighth birthdays, based on the fact that they participated, and because each parent threw in seven bucks. Did I mention I suffer from something known as Sarcastic Parent Syndrome? I think I’m having another attack.
In 1996, when I was a Lieutenant in the Navy, I was stationed at the Pentagon. My job was to provide intelligence briefings to the Secretary of the Navy, Chief of Naval Operations, and other of the highest ranking officers in the Navy. I presented these briefings in a small theater that held about fifty. Sometimes the theater would be chockfull of senior officers, that is, all Admirals. As you might imagine, this job was a real pressure cooker. I would normally work at preparing the briefings from about 10 p.m. the night before, until about 6 a.m. The morning intelligence briefing would go at about 8 a.m., or, the exact time when I was the most tired. But there was no room for error in this job. Lieutenants in my position were routinely reprimanded or fired if they messed up, sometimes for seemingly trivial mistakes. We were providing vital information to the top Navy brass on what the enemy was doing (the war in Bosnia was really big at the time), and we could not mess up. Some of these Admirals would take this information and use it while talking to the President.When I say we were not supposed to make any mistakes, that means more than just no mistakes with regard to content. The delivery of the material was very important as well. The “briefing team” was continually trained in matters such as making eye contact, knowing when to pause for effect, when to look at notes, when not to look at them (a typical briefing required 2-3 pages of memorization), when to put the right inflection into your voice, and how to pronounce words, names, and places correctly. Believe me, if you pronounced General Umbobguandy’s name wrong (or any other military dictator in Africa), you were dead meat. Of particular note, I often reflect upon the issue of proper voice projection. I can remember when I was first practicing my briefings in that theater. I consciously raised my voice because I knew everyone in the audience needed to hear me. However, I was surprised to be told that I was not projecting my voice well enough. Above my protests, my boss said, “If you think you are speaking loud enough, you probably aren’t. You have to concentrate and make yourself speak a bit louder. That’s the only way everyone in this theater will hear you.” Funny, I thought I was concentrating, and I was convinced that I was speaking loud enough. It was also funny to see my fellow briefers confront the same reality, vehemently objecting to our boss’s guidance because they thought they too were projecting well enough.This matter has stuck with me for two reasons. First, and most obviously, I speak and teach in front of audiences and classrooms on a regular basis—Sunday School, the local community college, preaching on a few occasions, and occasional presentations in my day job or at seminary—and I try always to remember how important it is that an audience be able to hear the speaker.Second, I often recall my experience with voice projection in the Pentagon theater because I think it has application not only to life, but to the Christian life. Let me say it like this: If a person thinks he is doing some activity in a certain way, and performs this activity at an acceptable level all of the time, he may not be doing it as well as he thinks. Maybe you can start to see the implications of this statement. If a person thinks that he has a lot of common sense, and always acts in accord with that common sense, and can clearly see how others do not, then that person may not have as much common sense as he thinks. If a person thinks that he is a good driver, and always drives safely and courteously, with care to keep all of the traffic laws, and that other people are the idiots on the road, then that person may not be quite as good a driver as he thinks. And what about serving in the church? I would suggest that if a Christian is serving in some capacity in his church, and serves regularly in that position, and sees himself as part of that 20 percent that does 80 percent of the work, then perhaps that person is not serving quite as much or as well as he thinks. I would suggest that a way to serve the Lord better is to consciously, deliberately decide to serve Him better than we did yesterday, or last month, or a year ago. These thoughts spring from my Pentagon experience, but I would add a point made in the Bible by the apostle Paul that I think captures this as well. In Romans 12:3, he says, “For by the grace given me I say to every one of you: Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the measure of faith God has given you.” Sober judgment. I think that means that we shouldn’t automatically assume that we are part of the common sense, good driver, Christian Superman club, but rather to assess each day how we are recipients of this grace of which Paul speaks, and how we should submit to the Holy Spirit that dwells inside of us. Who knows, maybe if all Christians did this, more people would be interested in becoming Christians in the first place.
A while back, on a Sunday morning, I was sitting in church, listening as the sermon began. The topic that day was serving in the church. The preacher started by relating a few humorous anecdotes—the icebreaker. He then commented that Christian service in today’s church is not what it used to be, and not what it should be. He made mention of the “80-20 rule”—you know, the old saying that 80 percent of the work done in the church is accomplished by 20 percent of the people, and vice versa. However, when the preacher stated the 80-20 rule, something happened that I thought was very strange. The congregation responded with an array of scattered clapping, many knowing nods with “mmm-hmmms” and chuckles, and several hearty “Amens.” Apparently, almost everybody in the church had heard of the 80-20 rule. In my estimation, a large majority of the congregants had reacted as I’ve described.When I heard this response, something dawned on me. “Wait a second,” I thought. “How is it that about 80 percent of the people here reacted knowingly and approvingly to what the pastor just said? If only 20 percent of the people here are doing 80 percent of the work, then only 20 percent have the right to be laughing or saying ‘Amen,’ correct?” Now, there could conceivably be several explanations for why people reacted the way they did to the “80-20” statement. Maybe they were not really paying attention, and just continued responding in the same manner as they did to the humorous anecdotes that preceded it. Or, maybe a large portion of the congregation underwent spontaneous conviction of their paucity of active church service, and felt the only appropriate response was to verbalize this conviction in some way. But I don’t think that these accurately describe what was going on. I think that a lot of folks in the pews that morning are people who have attended church for quite some time. They have heard the 80-20 rule on many occasions. And they agree with it. That is, they agree that they are part of the 20 percent that is doing the large majority of the work. But here’s the problem that is presented by this situation. Suppose, for the sake of argument, that there were 100 people in the church that morning. - In reality, 20 of those people are doing 80 percent of the work, and 80 of them are doing the other 20 percent. - But, 80 of them think that they are in the select group (of 20) who do most of the work. - But all 80 can’t be part of the 20. At least 60 of them are not part of this group. - These 60 people, in reality, are collectively doing 15 percent of the work in the church (if 80 are doing 20 percent, then 60 of them are doing 15 percent). - So the problem is this: these 60 people see themselves as part of a group that does 80 percent of the work, but in reality they are part of a group that does 15 percent of the work. That’s a huge difference! Now, of course, these calculations are based on old sayings, estimations, and various other conjectures. But, I suggest that it helps to make the point that there can be a large gap between the way people perceive themselves, and reality.So, in a sense, this situation is similar to that of common sense and good driving. That is, most people (in church, in this case) correctly recognize the problem—that there is a general lack of service within the church today. Yet, most people feel like they are not part of the problem, but rather among those who are teaching, singing, leading . . . basically doing more than their fair share of the things normally associated with serving the Lord as part of the local congregation.Up next: Exhibit D.
While sitting at my desk at work one day, conscientiously attending to the business of the day, I overheard a conversation taking place nearby between two colleagues. The first related a harrowing experience he had on his way to work that morning. “I’m sitting at a red light, about to go straight through an intersection . . . the light turns green and I start to go, when this guy, going in the opposite direction, talking on his cell phone, radio blasting, makes a left hand turn right in front of me . . . I slam on my brakes and honk my horn, and I end up with coffee stains all over my pants because of that jerk. Meanwhile he’s on his merry way, completely oblivious to what he’s done.” The other colleague retorts, “You think that’s bad, I was on the interstate the other day, and I’m coming up to an exit . . . I’m in the outside lane and a truck starts to . . .” The rest of his story dissolves into background noise as I begin to contemplate the conversation that is taking place. A thought dawns on me. I can’t ever remember hearing, or being involved in, a conversation where someone talked about themselves driving poorly, exercising poor judgment, or otherwise acting obnoxiously on the roadways. I’ve never said to my wife, “Hey, honey, I was driving to work today and I cut some guy off. You should have seen it! I could’ve merged in behind him easily enough, but I floored it and wedged onto the highway right in front of him, about twenty feet behind an 18-wheeler. I made him slam on his brakes and swerve into the other lane. It was great.” Perhaps you have heard such stories, but I haven’t. In any case, it is not the norm.Now, I’m not for a second saying that my colleagues were making up or exaggerating their stories. And I’m not saying that all of us don’t have many stories we could tell about the bad, distracted drivers out there on the roads these days. We certainly do. My observation here, is this: These “driving anecdotes” that we hear all the time divide the driving population into two categories: good drivers (the person relating the anecdote), and bad drivers (the other guy). It seems to me that most people see themselves as part of the group of people in society who drive well, pay attention, obey all the traffic laws, etc., and see others as the bad drivers—the ones who are distracted by their cell phones, are overly aggressive, etc. That is, most people correctly recognize the problem—that there are a lot of poor drivers on the roads these days—yet most people feel like they are not part of the problem, but rather among those who have it all together. Most people think of themselves as part of the group that drives safely, not too aggressively, uses common sense (not one of the “idiots” out there) . . . all those things that might go into defining what a good driver is.Next episode: Exhibit C.
Last Spring, I was at an academic awards ceremony for my older son, who at the time was completing his junior year in high school. The guest speaker spoke on a variety of topics, one of which was common sense. She asked the audience, “Did you ever notice that these days common sense is not very common?” Now, I have heard this asked before in various places—on television talk shows, from preachers, teachers, and comedians. What I noticed on this occasion was that nearly everybody in the crowd gave a “knowing laugh” to the guest speaker’s question. There were several hundred people in the crowd.Being in a contemplative mood, a thought came into my mind. Why is everybody laughing? If common sense is so uncommon, then it stands to reason that only a few people should be laughing, that is, those with common sense. Everybody else should either have been squirming in their seats—slightly embarrassed to have their lack of common sense brought to light in public—or nonresponsive, cautious whether or not they would be considered included in the select “common sense club.” But, in fact, everyone was laughing. Why is this? It seems to me the most plausible explanation is that most people see themselves as part of the small group in society that has common sense, and see others as not possessing it. That is, most people correctly recognize the problem—that there is a lack of common sense shown by many Americans out there today—yet most people feel like they are not part of the problem, but rather among the select few that have it all together. Most people think of themselves as among those who think better, faster, clearer, more practically, more analytically . . . all those things that might go into defining common sense.This is Exhibit A. Exhibits B, C, and D will follow.
On the second Wednesday of each month, the Quackenblog will feature a segment called “Stupid Song Lyrics.” I will begin today with some of my favorite instances of bad grammar and made-up words in popular music. And let me tell you, there is so much from which to choose (I almost said “there is so much to choose from,” but we all know that sentences should not end in prepositions). Anyway, enjoy.
1. Paul McCartney, “Live and Let Die.” Lyrics: “But if this ever-changing world in which we live in, makes you give in and cry . . . live and let die.”
From where did these lyrics come from?2. From another classic rock song:"You know that it would be untrue,You know that I would be a liar,If I was to say to you,‘Girl we couldn’t get much higher,’Come on baby, light my fire."The “if” in the third line introduces the subjunctive tense, which, conjugated properly, is “if I were to say to you.” Hey, Jim Morrison, was you absent in English class that day?3. “’Cause I speak of the pompitous of love.” From Steve Miller Band, “The Joker.” One thing that I’ve learned in life is this. Some people speak of the pompitous of love. Others speak of the pompitous of hate. Still others speak of the pompitous of peace, healing, or even conflict. And the thing is, you can’t do anything about it. That’s just the world in which we live in. 4. The BoDeans, “Good Things” says:"Oh no no, don’t pass me over,Oh no no, don’t pass me by,You see I can see, good things for you and I."I always have to think about this one, but I believe it should be “good things for you and me,” not “for you and I.” In fact, me is certain of it.5. From the Commodores funky 70s hit “Brick House”: “She’s the one, the only one, who’s built like an amakazon.” I don’t know what an amakazon is, but I’m sure you could order one on amakazon.com. 6. Many of you may be unfamiliar with a country song from the 1960s by Roger Miller called “Dang Me.” It is a funny song, with the following line: “Now roses are red, and violets are purple. Sugar is sweet, and so is maple surple.”I have always heard that nothing rhymes with purple, orange, or silver. But that didn’t stop Roger Miller. He has done the impossible. Let this be an inspiration to all of us.7. Diana Ross, “Upside Down”: “Round and round you’re turning me, I say to thee, respectfully.”Actually, there’s nothing grammatically wrong with this. I just like her unabashed use of the King James English. Gutsy move. Diana, from a long time Supremes fan, I say, thou possesseth moxie!8. One word: Sussudio. As in, “There’s a girl that’s been on my mind, all the time, Sussudio.”In 1985, Phil Collins gave us “Sussudio.” I don’t know what it means. I found conflicting explanations on the internet. One source says it was the name of Collins’ daughter’s pet horse. Another says it is the sound that a drowning person makes when splashing around frantically in deep water. Neither makes sense in the context of the song. I think “Sussudio” means something more like, “the final recording gets mixed next week and I haven’t finished my lyrics yet.”I look forward to the November installment of “Stupid Song Lyrics,” when I will explore the nonsensical lyrics of one of the most famous singers of our day.
I spoke last time about the odd phenomenon of “new” knowledge, most of which comes from what my third grader learns at school. For instance, that there are now five oceans in the world (not four, like when I was a kid), and four states of matter instead of three. Another tidbit I picked up is that in many schools these days, Christopher Columbus is introduced as the “first foreigner” to come to the New World.
Now, on this point, I have to disagree. Foreigner? Yes. But, don’t forget that Leif Ericson landed in North America around the year 1000, almost 500 years before Columbus. Also, Native Americans migrated from Asia to North America across the Bering Strait region over the course of hundreds of years. They were not all from the same areas. So, I suppose some of these migrants would be considered original settlers, and later migrants would have to be considered foreigners as well.
Over time, Columbus Day has become one of those holidays that has sparked controversy over the process and scope of European settlement of America. Some see it as a memorial to a daring seaman who ushered in a new age. Spanish settlement spawned French, Dutch, and English exploration and settlement, which eventually led to the establishment of our country. Others see it as an inappropriate and insensitive celebration of one culture’s overtaking of another.
But, instead of delving into that debate, I’d rather share a few lines from a letter that Columbus wrote on February 15, 1493, describing his first encounters with the native peoples of the Caribbean. I find his comments fascinating, particularly those pertaining to his belief in God and the potential for the native peoples to believe in God also.
To me, the Indians’ first encounter with Columbus is just about the closest thing I can think of to aliens landing in a spaceship and little green men visiting me at Virginia Beach as I am reclining and reading a book on a warm summer day. It was that bizarre. Anyway, here are a few excerpts where Columbus describes the land and the native peoples. Enjoy.
“Spanola is a marvel; the mountains and hills, and plains, and fields, and land, so beautiful and rich for planting and sowing, and for breeding cattle of all sorts, for building of towns and villages. There could be no believing, without seeing, such harbours as are here, as well as the many and great rivers, and excellent waters, most of which contain gold.”
“It seems to me that in all those islands, the men are all content with a single wife; and to their chief or king they give as many as twenty. The women, it appears to me, do more work than the men.”
“Of anything they have, if it be asked for, they never say no, but do rather invite the person to accept it, and show as much lovingness as though they would give their hearts. And whether it be a thing of value, or one of little worth, they are straightways content with whatsoever trifle of whatsoever kind may be given them in return for it.”
“I gave gratuitously a thousand useful things that I carried, in order that they may conceive affection, and furthermore may be made Christians; for they are inclined to the love and service of their Highness and of all the Castillion nation, and they strive to combine in giving us things which they have in abundance, and of which we are in need.”
“And they knew no sect, nor idolatry; save that they all believe that power and goodness are in the sky, and they believed very firmly that I, with these ships and crew, came from the sky.”
“Since thus our Redeemer has given to our most illustrious King and Queen, and to their famous kingdoms, this victory in so high a matter, Christendom should take gladness therein and make great festivals, and give solemn thanks to the Holy Trinity for the great exaltation they shall have by the conversion of so many peoples to our holy faith; and next for the temporal benefit which will bring hither refreshment and profit, not only to Spain, but to all Christians.”
“This briefly, in accordance with the facts. Dated, on the caravel, off the Canary Islands, the 15 February of the year 1493.”
My story . . . Part 1 of several
Hebrews 11:1 says, “Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.”
In the year 2000, I was a thirty-four year old man who was kind of floating along in what most people would call a successful life. I had (and still have) a wonderful wife, Barbara, who was my college sweetheart and definite better half. I had a son, Chad, who was (and still is) a smart, handsome, athletic young man with a strong Christian character. I was working my way up in the Navy, making all of my promotions. I had served in some very prestigious jobs, in particular as an intelligence briefing officer to the Secretary of the Navy and Chief of Naval Operations at the Pentagon. My health was great. I owned a house. I had a nice car and a nice van. I had lots of good friends. I was very active in my church, serving at various times as a deacon, a choir member, and as a preschool Sunday School teacher. What more could I want?
Well, as it turns out, in 2000, I was more miserable than I had ever been in my entire life. The reason? Barbara and I had always desired to have a family of two, three, perhaps even four children. And as we began to try harder and harder to have a second child, we just could not conceive. Finally, we consulted medical help and found that we were having what doctors call unexplained fertility problems. Over the course of several months in 2000, as we went in for various counseling and testing, I found myself growing more and more bitter over the situation. And it started to affect many areas of my life.
For instance, I had long wanted to do a Navy tour overseas, particularly in Europe. Well, in 2000, it happened. Serving in the Norfolk area, I got my next set of orders—to England for a three-year tour. Except, with all of the infertility stuff going on, I suddenly found myself not very excited about going to England. I can still remember a night in early fall of 2000, mowing my lawn and nearly in tears. I was cursing, saying “I don’t want to go to England. I don’t want this house. I don’t want anything. Why am I not able to have another child?”
What made me even more distraught about this was that deep inside, I knew how selfish I was being, and I didn’t like it. What right did I have to be angry? Many couples are unable to have any kids, and I was blessed with Chad (born in 1992 by the way), who to this day is everything a father could ever want in a son. In addition, I claimed to be a Christian, yet I was giving no thought at all to what God might want for my life. My attitude was that God should let me have what I wanted. And I wanted to have another child. In my heart I felt that I would be willing to give up my career, house, cars—all the “stuff” that I had—if only we could conceive again.
Reluctantly, I began to think that maybe moving to England might be “good” in that it would take my mind off of our infertility problems. A change of scenery would let me move on from this chapter in my life. Maybe in the future we could start looking into the possibility of adoption. At any rate, I couldn’t believe that I was once so excited about going to Europe, and now I could care less about it. So, in the fall of 2000, Barb, Chad, and I started the “overseas screening process.” We had our initial required medical examinations, and I began making contact with the officer in England who I would relieve. We started to make preparations for selling our home, too. In late September of 2000, we had our first yard sale to get rid of some of our stuff.
Among other things, we sold almost all of Chad’s baby toys, clothes, portable items (i.e. playpens), and books at the yard sale. There was hardly any baby stuff left.
First of all, I’d like to say thank you to everyone who has been reading my blog so far. I appreciate all of the kind comments. I guess many of you found out some things about me that you didn’t know before. Also, this was the first time that I have ever sat down and written out the entire story, so in a sense I was reliving a lot of it, and it was very emotional for me.
So, I thought this might be a good time to share something else that you might not know about me. You see, several years ago, I was diagnosed with a condition known as SPS, or, Sarcastic Parent Syndrome. SPS affects over 10 million adults in the United States alone, and is quickly spreading to other areas of the world. Left untreated, it can actually cause complications to a victim’s loved ones. One such complication is RES, or Rolling Eye Syndrome. RES has been contracted mostly by spouses and children of those who suffer from SPS, and is also spreading rapidly. RES is characterized by an incessant rolling of the eyes whenever someone with SPS speaks. But there is good news. Scientists and doctors are now identifying many of the signs associated with SPS. While there is no known cure, experts hope that awareness of the warning signs might be of help to those in high risk categories. Here are a few of the warning signs for SPS:1. You can’t understand why you pay taxes to support your local school, yet you still have to send in a whole bunch of supplies, to include tissues. Also, why do you have to send in tennis balls so that there will be one under every leg of every chair in the elementary school?2. You do not understand why your child has 23 parties a year in school, many of them to celebrate holidays and occasions that appear to be made-up.3. You marvel that there is a whole bunch of “new” knowledge that wasn’t around when you were a kid. For instance, did you know that there is now a Southern Ocean? It’s down around Antarctica. I just found this out from my third grader (Matthew). When I was a kid, there were four oceans: Atlantic, Pacific, Indian, and Arctic. Apparently, this fifth ocean appeared while I was on vacation or something. Oh, and by the way, in case you were not aware, there are now four states of matter, not just three: solid, liquid, gas, and plasma. Although, my guess is that it will eventually go back to three as LCD and LED sets get more popular.4. You wonder why there are so many syndromes and disorders that kids have these days that were not around when you were a kid. Don’t get me wrong. I am very happy that certain conditions are being identified and treatments developed. But, when you were a kid, the only syndrome was something called MAYGASS, or, “Misbehave-and-you’ll-get-a-spanking syndrome.” I struggled with that one for years.5. You are mortified that you live in a world where children can actually be allergic to peanut butter, which, when you were growing up, was the one and only food group.There is so much more to learn about SPS. Scientists are discovering more signs every day through experiments with laboratory mice. Only over time will we be able to grasp the full nature of SPS, and hopefully find a cure.
In the meantime, there is a desperate need for further awareness. As far as I know, there is as yet no national spokesperson for SPS. I am thinking of volunteering. That way you can send your generous donations directly to me. Trust me, I will use the money to make sure that all the little children of the world have tennis balls for their chairs. That way, SPS sufferers will have one less thing to be sarcastic about, and they’ll be able to sleep better at night. I just want to do my part.
My story . . . Part 2 of several
About a month passed, and I was feeling no different.
In late October, 2000, we were painting a couple of rooms in the house in preparation for our move to England the following Spring. You can picture the scene: drop cloths all over the carpets, empty paint cans strewn about, painter’s tape around the baseboards.
I am pretty sure it was late on a Sunday afternoon. Barb was at home finishing up some painting, and I was out with Chad. When I got home, Barbara came up to me, handed me a home pregnancy test stick, and asked me that strange question, “Does that look like a line to you?” Now, realize that at this point I had given up all hope that we would get pregnant again. So when Barb asked me the question, I had no emotional response. There was no breath of anticipation; no butterflies started jumping in my stomach. But when I took a look, my immediate thought was, “Holy crap, it sure does look like a line!”
So Barb went off to see the doctor that week, and he confirmed that she was pregnant. You can imagine the exhilaration we felt over the next days and weeks. We had been trying to have another baby for about four years, and now it was finally going to happen! It was hard to believe. At some point in the initial euphoria, it dawned on us that we had just sold almost all of our baby stuff at the yard sale. But under the circumstances we didn’t care. We could buy new stuff for the new baby.
Barbara’s due date was early July of 2001. But we were supposed to move to England in April or May of 2001. So, I thought that one of the first things I ought to do is inform the Navy of this situation to make sure there were no problems. As it turns out, there was a problem. My detailer (senior Navy officer in charge of tour assignments) informed me that Navy policy is that a service member may not execute an overseas move when his dependent (wife) is in the third trimester of a pregnancy. To make a long story short, because of the timing of our pregnancy, my orders to England were cancelled, and I was reassigned to a three year job in Virginia Beach, Virginia.
It’s odd, but I remember that when I heard that I was not going to go on this much longed-for tour in Europe, I was not disappointed. Instead, I felt a rush of relief. I didn’t care that I was not going to live in England. What I really wanted was to have another baby, and that’s what was going to happen. So we would stay put in the Norfolk-Virginia Beach area for a few more years.
During those early, exciting days of Barb’s pregnancy, Chad told us something that we thought was funny. He was eight years old at the time. He said, “I want the baby to be born on my birthday.” Barb and I laughed out loud. It was a cute sentiment. But we explained to Chad that this was just not going to happen. His birthday is on May 16th. The baby was not due until early July, about eight weeks later. We tried to make him understand that it could actually be unhealthy and even dangerous for a baby to be born so early.
Throughout the pregnancy, though, Chad would occasionally mention to us that he was praying that the baby would be born on his birthday.
Well, I suppose you may have guessed what happened.
It was May 8, 2001. Barb was about seven months pregnant and we were still very excited about it all. I had just started my new job in Virginia Beach—the one I was assigned to in lieu of England. I was a department head overseeing ten courses of instruction at the Navy’s intelligence training center. Teaching and education appeal to me, so I liked the job.
On this day I got a phone call from Barb from the hospital. She had gone in that day for a check-up, and the doctor told her that she had started having contractions—pre-term labor. She would have to be admitted for a day or two until they could get the contractions to stop, then she would probably come home and be put on bed rest for the remainder of the pregnancy. Given this likely scenario, Barb’s mother came down from Maryland to help out.
However, a week went by, and the doctors were unable to get the contractions to go away fully. Eventually they began to subside, and by May 15th, the doctors said that if all went well, Barb could come home the next day. But all did not go well.
On the evening of the 15th, Barb’s contractions increased a good bit, and through the evening hours she experienced quite a bit of pain. This didn’t seem fair. She had discussed all this with her doctor beforehand and for medical reasons it was decided that she was to have a c-section, by appointment, with a very minimum of pain. Instead, Barb had about five hours of fairly intense labor. As midnight approached, the doctor determined that there was no turning back. Barb was prepped for an emergency c-section. As she was whisked away to the operating room, a nurse threw a gown at me and said, “Put this on and meet us in the O.R.”
The operation went fairly quickly, and at 1:30 A.M. on May 16th, 2001, the baby was lifted out, appearing no worse for the wear. He was eight pounds. [Eight pounds and eight weeks early—geez, if he had gone full-term he would have been a monster!] We gave him the name Matthew, which means “gift of God.” We had decided on that name fairly early, since this is exactly how we felt. Anyway, Barb was sewn up, and led back to a room for recovery and sleep. I went over to where Matthew was being cared for, and spent an hour or two watching what was going on.
Now, at one time or another, most of you have been in a hospital in the middle of the night. Everything is a little surreal, foggy—silence, with the exception of muffled chatter here or there, and the sound of light, airy music in the background. In this atmosphere, it was difficult for me to even begin to process everything that had gone on in my life over the past year. What made it even more surreal was that after all this time I was actually looking at my new baby—a living, breathing, crying baby. It was exactly what I wanted.
After a while, I was able to put together a few thoughts. This would certainly make for a nifty story, one that I would no doubt be telling people for the rest of my life: Man and woman can’t have baby. Man throws temper tantrum in back yard. Man and woman have yard sale. Woman finally gets pregnant. Older son declares preposterous wish. Baby is born on his brother’s 9th birthday as a sign that God’s hand is in it all.
But as I stood there in the hospital that night, little did I know that in the next few days, I would begin to experience the greatest crisis of my life—a crisis that eventually caused me to change the way I think about almost everything in life.
Thinking back on it now, I can’t picture exactly where and how I heard the news. It must have been from Barbara when I went to the hospital to see her and Matthew.
But here’s the gist of it. When Matthew was two days old, in the neo-natal intensive care unit (NICU), a nurse observed him having what appeared to be seizures. This was a cause for concern, to say the least. The doctors ran various tests, which culminated in an EEG, which confirmed that he was having them. Two doctors gave us conflicting likely causes—one said it was due to a period of oxygen deprivation during the delivery, while another said it was due to hypoglycemia. But it didn’t really matter—they were happening. In addition to the seizures, over the first several days, the doctors noted that Matthew’s head was not growing, which was another cause for alarm.
In ensuing discussions with the doctors, we learned that the real concern was the possible long-term consequences. We were told that this abnormal activity was an indication that Matthew would have some degree of brain damage. There was no way of knowing the extent of the damage. It could be minimal, it could be significant. We would just have to see how it played out over time. Matthew’s progress would have to be closely monitored for the foreseeable future.
This certainly put a crimp in our neat little story. How does one react to this kind of news? Worry? Fear? Cries of “This can’t happen to me?” Well, to be very honest, my initial gut reaction was no real emotion at all—it didn’t really bother me. I simply told myself, “I’ve seen enough television medical dramas, and I’ve had enough friends with medical crises to know that in this situation, the thing to do is to get a second opinion.” If I asked a different doctor, he or she would tell me that Matthew was going to be all right. And if that doctor didn’t, I would ask a third and even a fourth doctor, until I was told what I wanted to hear.
Matthew would end up spending about three weeks in the NICU, and life became a whirlwind of travel to and from the hospital. During that time we spoke to a couple of different doctors. The problem is, each of them told us the exact same thing: it wasn’t a matter of if Matthew would have brain damage, but rather to what degree.
Finally, in early June, it was time for us to bring Matthew home. On the night before we did this, a doctor took Barbara and me aside and asked us to have a seat. She proceeded to “give it to us straight” one last time. In short, she told us that on the one end, Matthew might suffer only minimal effects of brain damage, while at the other extreme, he might never progress beyond the level of a two week old. He would probably end up somewhere in the middle. With all that had gone on in these three weeks, Barbara and I left the hospital pretty shaken.
For me, it was during these days when a feeling of fear began to sink in. I had gotten my second, third, and fourth opinions, and now I had to face reality. Around this time, something dawned on me. In the chaos of the situation, in the midst of my great plan to go out and find a doctor who would tell me what I wanted to hear, there is one thing I had not done. I had not prayed about this. Most of my family and friends know that I am a Christian, so it is very awkward for me to admit this. But I hadn’t. So, over his final days in the NICU, I started to pray that if it was possible, that God would heal Matthew, or at least make his brain damage as minimal as possible.
Now, I ask that you read this next part very carefully.
After a few days, as I prayed, I felt a very strong conviction come over me. I got the unmistakable sense that God was speaking to me—laying something on my heart. No, I did not encounter a burning bush in my back yard. I was not visited by an angel in my driveway. I was not blinded by the light of the sun on I-64. But more than any time in my life, I knew that God was telling me something. And this is what I heard Him say:
“You know, Dave, you say you ‘believe’ in me . . . you say that you have ‘faith’ . . . as long as things are going well, as long as you have this nice house and nice cars . . . as long as you have a healthy family, and a nice big church, and lots of friends who like you, and your affluent neighborhood, and your great Chesapeake school system for your child. BUT THAT’S NOT WHAT FAITH IS! Hebrews 11:1 says, ‘Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.’”
This had long been one of my “favorite” verses of Scripture, but to be honest, I never really meditated on it all that much. One thing was certain in my mind, though—I could not see any evidence, any way, that this situation with Matthew would turn out well. As the days passed, I continued to hear God convicting me in this matter, telling me something that started to help me re-shape things in my mind. He said:
“Your son is going to be okay. I’m God, I can handle that. BUT THE REAL ISSUE HERE IS THAT YOU HAVE A PROBLEM WITH FAITH!”
Well, I got to wondering yesterday whether my memory was correct. So I went back and looked at some photos, and sure enough, John Madden used to wear a tag on his pants. I could never figure out why he did this. Was it some kind of press or locker room pass? But why would he need that? Was it a "cheat sheet" of the plays he wanted to run that day? Or was it some kind of identification tag, just in case he got lost? I just don't know. Other prominent coaches of the era such as Don Shula, Tom Landry, and Chuck Noll never wore them, as far as I could tell. Nevertheless, I'm sure with a little internet research, one could find the reason why Madden always had the tag.
