Television commercials and “Punch Buggy”

My boys are big sports fans. Nary a day goes by when they are not watching football, college basketball, hockey, you name it. My younger son reminds me of myself at his age—he is a fount of trivial sports knowledge and a true sports junkie at the age of eight. In fact, I remember one night about a year ago marveling about his sudden infatuation with professional lacrosse, which was showing on television. Anything is interesting at bedtime, right?

I have no real qualms about my sons liking sports, although I think it is important not to overdo it. There is one thing, though, that bothers me quite a bit. That is, while I don’t mind them watching sports on TV, I have grown increasingly concerned (and disgusted) over the content of commercials. Any more, they seem to be almost constantly laden with sexual and crude innuendos, off-color humor, mature subject matter (i.e. the inundation of Viagra ads), and graphic pictures (i.e. ads for horror movies, which I’ve especially noticed lately). This downward spiral has been going on for quite some time, I realize that. But I have come to a point where I ask, why should my son have to be exposed to this type of material at such a young age when all he is doing is trying to watch an otherwise appropriate sporting event? And for that matter, why should I have to be exposed to it?

So, for the last few years, in our house, we have started something new. When we watch TV—sports or otherwise—we mute the commercials. We just don’t listen to them. And while this in theory does not shield us from disturbing or inappropriate visual images, I have noticed that muting the TV tends to take our focus away from it altogether. All in all, I have found it to be a significant step in the right direction.

Despite my best efforts, however, there are periods when I forget, or the family gets lazy about it, and we don’t mute the television during commercials. Usually, though, after hearing some of the typical fare, I am reminded that we need to start “muting” again.

This reminds me—there is something that has been bothering me that I need to get off of my chest. During one of these lapses, I saw a commercial or two for Volkswagen. The theme of the ads is that various people are playing “punch buggy”—you know, the old game from our childhood where you punch someone in the arm when you see a Volkswagen Beetle and say “(red/blue/green/etc.) punch buggy.” I know there are different variations of punch buggy, but the game is centered around the Beetle, a.k.a the "buggy." The problem is, these ads (at least the ones I saw) are not for the Beetle, but for some other Volkswagen product—an SUV, a sedan, or some such.

After about the second time I saw this, I found myself getting kind of riled up and on the verge of screaming in protest at the television, “Wait just a minute! ‘Punch buggy’ is only for BUGGIES! It’s not for any old Volkswagen automobile! All of America knows that. DOESN’T VOLKSWAGEN KNOW ITS OWN GAME?” How dare they tarnish the honor of one of America’s great travel games in an effort to sell their other products! Shame on them!

Okay, it probably sounds silly to you, but thanks for letting me vent on this critically important topic. I feel unburdened now. And just to be clear, this is my only gripe with the Volkswagen ads, that is, they are not inappropriate in the ways I have described above.

At any rate, I believe it’s time to redouble my efforts at muting commercials.

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P.S.
Wouldn’t you know it—these commercials have got us playing ‘punch buggy’ on car trips lately. We count any Beetle as fair game, though in almost all cases, we see the newer model Beetles that have come out in the last decade or so. The other day, however, I saw one of the classic 60s-era Beetles, and dutifully punched my eight year old (don’t take that out of context, please). My wife and I laughed as he wildly protested, “That’s not a buggy!” Naturally, we had to explain that once upon a time there was an older model of buggy . . . you just don’t see too many of them anymore. It’s comments like that that make a guy feel middle-aged.

I need a ruling . . . letting people in

Here’s one that has perplexed me for a long time. I need a ruling on the question of what is the most “courteous” course of action in the following situation. For some reason I find myself thinking counter to conventional practice on this matter.

I’m on my way home from work, and for reasons I’ve never been able to explain, traffic always seems to get worse in the spring. There is a particular traffic light on my commute that gets notoriously backed up. I’d say anywhere from 60-80 cars wait at the light in one lane, and about a dozen make it through at each green light. So the train of automobiles meanders back for about a quarter mile.

Now, the thing is, there just happens to be a 7-11 at this intersection. And, as you might imagine, during this busy time of day, motorists are exiting the 7-11 parking lot to get back on the road. To do this, they must turn onto the busy road that I am on, entering the traffic just before the light, and ahead of the 60-80 cars that are already waiting there.

You’ve been in this situation before, haven’t you? To be “courteous,” drivers allow people in, that is, they allow them onto the road from the 7-11. But by doing so, this just makes the traffic situation worse for everyone else.

So here is the question that riddles my mind. If I am nice to one person wanting to get on the road, am I not at the same time being rude to dozens of people behind me who have been waiting patiently for much longer than the 7-11 exitee?

If I charge right through the intersection without letting the person in, I may appear rude to that person, but in fact, I am being courteous to many people. And in a sense, I would just be “being fair” to the one person. After all, if they waited for seven to ten minutes to get onto the road, they would have waited just as long as everyone else.

In a nutshell, the way I think about it, I am being nice to 60-80 people, instead of showing special treatment to one. The “greater good” concept seems to apply here, doesn’t it?

You might be wondering what I really do in practice. Well, to be totally honest, a lot of times, despite my bold intentions, I “chicken out” at the last minute and let the person in. But believe me, I’m not happy about it. A few times I have stuck to my guns and not let the person in. But in these cases, I: (1) have felt a little like a jerk for not letting the person in (despite what I have reasoned here), or (2) have noticed that the next guy behind me lets the person in, so nothing is really gained anyway.

So as I see it, unless everyone subscribes to my logic, nothing will really change. And such a change, of course, will never happen. But please tell me that I at least have a valid idea that the “better” course of action is to be courteous to the many rather than being preferential to just one. At least I can be right in theory.

I need a ruling . . .

The Helping Hand Mission

Do you ever wonder how it is that some childhood memories are rather fuzzy, while others remain quite vivid, even after thirty or forty years?

If you were to ask me to name one birthday or Christmas present that I received between the ages of six and fifteen, I couldn’t do it. I know that I got gifts. I just don’t remember what they were. Oh, I’m sure there was a football and some clothes, etc., but nothing jumps out. I can’t say “I’ll never forget that on my tenth birthday, I got such and such . . .”

On the other hand, to this day I have very strong recollections of the Helping Hand Mission. The Helping Hand Mission was a mission in a somewhat dangerous section of center city Philadelphia that I visited as a boy. I was about nine or ten years old at the time (circa 1975/1976). A group from our church would go to the mission once a month on a Saturday night to lead a worship service for homeless people, then provide them with sandwiches and coffee afterwards. My father would take my older sister and me on these trips.

What makes my memories of the mission so vivid is that they are multi-sensory. I remember the sights of the mission—the poor and homeless who would wander in. Some of them were mentally unstable, and would simply sit there and mumble softly to themselves the whole time. Others simply looked poor, dirty, destitute, helpless—nothing like what I was used to in my hometown in the suburbs.

I remember the sounds of the mission. I can remember the short walk from the car to the front door of the mission, often hearing police sirens nearby. But most of all, I can remember an enormous German shepherd behind a fence right outside of the mission. The dog, which was as big as me, would leap toward the fence, insanely barking, only a few feet from my face. It scared me to death.

I remember the smell of the mission. The mission was filled with a strong, grungy odor that was very displeasing. I recall wishing that I could hold my breath for an hour or so, but I knew that was not possible. I had to endure it. I also remember thinking how those who lived and worked there had to put up with that smell all the time.

And I remember the feel of the mission. I remember standing in line after the service, handing out food to the people, shaking their hands. A lot of these hands were old, dirty, even shriveled and misshapen. As a nine year old, I remember thinking that it felt kind of creepy, but I also was touched that many of them were so truly thankful that we were feeding them.

What I have come to realize as an adult is that what we did at the Helping Hand Mission was what true Christian charity is all about. We did not wait for the poor and dispossessed to stumble into our church some Sunday. We went to them. And we didn’t go just to hand out sandwiches, as important as that is. The Helping Hand Mission was there to meet physical needs, yes, but it was there to address spiritual illnesses as well, which is ultimately more important. Sometimes it was hard to tell if some of the people there were hearing the gospel as it was being proclaimed. But the church was being faithful in doing what it was called to do—going out into the world and preaching the Word.

My memories of the Helping Hand Mission have also caused me to think about what memories my children will have when they grow up. In all likelihood, they will not remember what presents they got on their birthdays. But have they had any experiences outside of our antiseptic suburbia that will be ingrained in them and impact their thinking to the degree that I have been affected by the Helping Hand Mission? I can’t say that my trips to the mission were “fun,” but I can say, in reflection, that they were helpful, both for the poor people there and for myself.

(By the way, out of curiosity I just did a quick search on the internet. The Helping Hand Mission, which was founded in 1905, is still up and operating in downtown Philadelphia, with the same goal that it has had for over a hundred years now. I found one photo of the mission, but it appears to be a personal photo taken by a professional athlete who was involved in that ministry, so I won't post it here.)

Does it really matter who said “Yes”? Well, yes and no.

“Whoever acknowledges me before men, I will also acknowledge him before my Father in heaven. But whoever disowns me before men, I will also disown him before my Father in heaven.” Matthew 10:32-33

This is the time of year when we recognize the anniversaries of a lot of violent, tragic events. The Virginia Tech shootings happened on April 16, 2007. The Waco siege ended in the burning down of the Branch Davidian compound on April 19, 1993. The Oklahoma City bombing took place two years later on the same day. And on April 20, 1999, at Columbine High School in Colorado, two high school students went on a shooting rampage, killing twelve students and one teacher as well as injuring several others before taking their own lives.

One of the better-known stories to emerge from the Columbine massacre is the story of Cassie Bernall. In the aftermath of the shootings, witnesses in the high school library stated that one of the gunmen pointed a gun at Ms. Bernall and asked her if she believed in God. She said “Yes,” and was immediately shot and killed.

As you might imagine, this little vignette launched a stream of inspirational tribute amongst evangelical Christians. She had died a martyr’s death, showing courage under the most dire of circumstances not to deny her Lord. Christian recording artists released tribute songs to Cassie Bernall. Her story was incorporated into many a Christian youth group meeting, and spurred other teens on to a deeper commitment to God. And Bernall’s mother wrote a book entitled She Said Yes, which chronicled young Cassie’s deliverance from a dangerously rebellious lifestyle as a younger teen.

But a few months after the Columbine event, as the dust began to settle and more details began to emerge, controversy arose. Based on the recollections of all witnesses in the library, and their relative locations in the room, it was determined that the original interchange between the killer and Ms. Bernall may not have been accurate. It seems that the gunman’s question “Do you believe in God?” and the answer “Yes” actually took place with another student, Valeen Schnurr. And, Ms. Schnurr was spared after her affirmative response.

Sadly, this set off a heated argument between supporters and detractors of evangelical Christianity. Detractors accused evangelicals as having jumped the gun on the Cassie Bernall story, and as having continued to perpetuate their version of the story to foster anti-atheist sentiment (the killers were purportedly motivated by their atheism). They further said that while we all ought to be sensitive to the families involved in the tragedy, we must also accept the truth of what transpired on April 20, 1999. Some supporters countered by insisting that the investigation was incorrect, and that Ms. Bernall really was the one who made the now-famous confession.

So what really happened? It seems that somebody stood up and acknowledged her belief in God “at the point of a gun” on that fateful day. But was it Cassie Bernall or Valeen Schnurr? This is a question that has intrigued me over the years, because I, like many Christians, have been greatly touched by the “She said ‘Yes’” incident.

I have done a small bit of reading and research on this, and although it appears now that it was Valeen Schnurr who actually had this famous exchange with the gunman, I am in no position to make any definitive, final judgments. I simply don’t know all the facts. But I do have a few thoughts.

First, the truth matters. The account of a modern day Christian martyr is a very powerful story, but I also believe it is wrong to pass off a story as true if it is not. In this case, three options exist: either Ms. Bernall said it, Ms. Schnurr said it, or it is truly undetermined (I am assuming that they both did not say it). If it is either of the last two, we—evangelicals included—should acknowledge it.

Second, I have come to believe that, in a sense, it doesn’t matter who said “Yes.” Don’t get me wrong here. As I said, I fully believe that the truth matters. What I’m saying here, though, is that whoever it was that said “Yes” is not the main story! To me, the main story is this—

Cassie Bernall was a young girl who was saved from a sinful life by placing her faith in Jesus Christ. Whether or not she had that specific conversation on that specific day, she is now in the presence of God for all eternity. Death has no power over her because she placed her faith in what Jesus Christ did some two thousand years ago. Sometimes as Christians we don’t find ourselves thinking or talking in these terms, but this is truly what we believe.

There is another part to the main story, however. That is, Valeen Schnurr, though her life was spared, apparently acknowledged God in an extreme situation. She survived that day, but did she know this when she was answering the gunman’s question? I think we would have to say that she did not.

I often have wondered what I would do if I ever had a gun pointed at me—literally—and was asked if I believe in God. My most sincere intention is that I would say, unhesitatingly, “Yes.” Maybe I would be shot and killed. Maybe I would be spared. But in the end, that’s not what matters. What ultimately matters is whether I am willing to acknowledge, in any situation, that Jesus Christ, the Son of God, is Lord.

HOV lanes

While sitting in bumper-to-bumper traffic on the interstate the other day, as I drove home from work, I looked to my left, and as is often the case in these situations, I noticed the sparsely populated HOV lanes.

And I started to think. When you are stopped in a traffic jam—not just a slow-down, but an actual jam—how many cars are stopped, say, in a one-mile stretch? Now, I suppose I could consult my local “trafficologist” (the local weather guy calls himself a “trafficologist” when he is doing traffic reports on the radio), but somehow I don’t think he took “Traffic Jam Research and Analysis” when he was at the University of Buffalo School of Trafficology. So, stay with me a minute while I do some quick calculations.

1. I am going to estimate that in a traffic jam, there is a car every twenty feet per lane (this allows for slow movement and short gaps).

2. There are 5,280 feet in a mile. Therefore, if there is on average one car every twenty feet, each lane would have 264 cars in a mile.

3. There are three lanes of traffic. Therefore the total number of cars is 264 x 3 = 792, or nearly 800 cars.

Does this sound reasonable?

Now, as I sat there in traffic, I could see a good swath of the accompanying HOV lane, perhaps a good half-mile stretch. It was mostly open road. Every ten to fifteen seconds a few cars would race by, unencumbered by the nearby jam. So naturally the next question I asked myself was “How many cars are in a one-mile stretch of the HOV lane?” Again, I need to make some educated estimates.

1. The HOV cars are doing about 70 MPH. Therefore, they cover one mile in a little under a minute.

2. My best guess is that three to five cars zoomed by every 10-15 seconds.

3. Therefore, giving the benefit of the doubt to higher HOV usage, I’ll say that five cars go by every ten seconds. So, in a minute, there would be about thirty cars in the HOV lane.

Still with me? That’s 800 vs. 30.

All this really leads to my overall question of this whole topic, and that is, what is the purpose of having HOV lanes in the first place? I thought they were established to cut down on traffic and to save energy (gas). Well, in this case (and other cases that I have observed), neither appears to be taking place.

My suggestion would be to open up the HOV lanes to everybody during rush hour. In the scenario that I have described, five lanes would be available instead of three. I see three main benefits. First, there would be no traffic jams day-in and day-out on that stretch of interstate. Second, I believe energy costs would go down. Instead of 800 cars burning fuel over an extended period of time, motorists could be on their way and finish their daily consumption of fuel more quickly. And third, I would submit that frustration, anger, and road rage would diminish considerably. More happiness. And isn’t that what it’s all about anyway?

I would caution you that I am not a licensed trafficologist, so I may be way off on this. But I would suggest that there are a number of possible explanations to the current state of affairs. Maybe the traffic authorities have not thought of the things I am saying. Or, they have studied these things and determined that I am wrong. Or, they have studied it, know that I am right, but continue the status quo, perhaps viewing HOV lanes as some kind of social experiment to effect a desired behavior among the populace. If it is the third explanation, then it is not working.

Stupid song lyrics: oldies and standards

Well, if it isn’t the second Wednesday of the month again. Time for another episode of “Stupid song lyrics.”

If you thought that stupid song lyrics are a recent phenomenon, I would gently urge you to think again. They have been around for quite a while. In this installment I present some of my favorite clunkers from yesteryear. Enjoy.

1. From the classic “I Believe”: I believe for every drop of rain that falls, a flower grows.

I, on the other hand, see no such one-to-one correspondence. In fact, my guess is that there are far, far more drops of rain than there are flowers in the world. There are, to be sure, millions and perhaps billions of flowers on our planet. I do not doubt that. But think for a minute about the last time it poured at your house. How many drops of rain do you think fell in your back yard in an hour during that heavy rainstorm? Bottom line: I think it’s no contest, the raindrops win, hands-down.

2. In 1968, The Turtles sang “Elenore, gee I think you’re swell, and you really do me well, you’re my pride and joy, et cetera.”

It’s as if they are saying, “Yes, there are several more things that we could say about Elenore—nice things in fact—but frankly, we’re too lazy to expound any more on the topic.” Truth be known, I have actually given thought to incorporating this into my own daily conversation, but I don’t think it would be appreciated. But it sure would make things simpler (for me, anyway). “Boss, I finished the reports, took notes at the meeting, et cetera . . . I’m taking the rest of the week off.”

3. Do you remember “Incense and Peppermints” by the one-hit wonder band Strawberry Alarm Clock? One line of the song states, “Incense and peppermints, meaningless nouns.”

First of all, if they are meaningless, then how could you possibly identify them as nouns? It’s kind of impossible, isn’t it? Second, and I hate to crash the whole ‘60s vibe of “there’s no true meaning because there are no absolutes” by pointing to some authoritative document, but, according to Webster’s, incense means “the perfume or smoke from some spices and gums when burned” and peppermint means “a pungent aromatic mint, also, candy flavored with its oil.” Meaningful, indeed.

4. Early-‘60s rocker Dion mellowed out a bit in 1968, providing the penetrating, socially-conscious hit “Abraham, Martin, and John.” The song tells of the contributions to freedom made by the American icons Abraham Lincoln, Martin Luther King, Jr., and John F. Kennedy. Here is how the song starts:

Has anybody here seen my old friend Abraham?
Can you tell me where he’s gone?
He freed a lot of people, but it seems the good, they die young,
I just looked around, and he’s gone.

Okay, I think I can handle this one. You see, Dion, the reason nobody has seen your old friend Abraham Lincoln is because nobody alive in 1968 had ever seen Abraham Lincoln—HE WAS ASSASSINATED ONE HUNDRED AND THREE YEARS BEFORE YOU RECORDED THIS SONG! I’m guessing you were absent that day in history class. These lyrics make it seem like Dion and Abraham were at a party together when Dion stepped aside to get a drink, and when he got back, he looked around and Abe was gone! Sometimes I think Dion would get a real kick out of hearing about the fishing trip I once took with King Henry VIII, Millard Fillmore, and Sacagawea.

One of my heroes

This past Monday, at about 11:00 P.M., my family was freaking out. My wife was yelling at the television. My son kept saying, “This is intense. This is so intense.” I was pacing back and forth. We were, as you might guess, watching the NCAA Men’s Basketball Championship game between Duke and Butler. If you saw it, or read about it the next day, you know that it was a real barn-burner. Commentators dubbed it an instant classic. The hard-fought contest went down to the final buzzer, with Duke prevailing 61-59.

As time ran out, and Butler’s desperation half-court shot just missed, our family let out a tremendous sigh of relief, then shouts of jubilation. My wife and I are alumni of Duke, and thus we are big fans. We also, as dutiful parents, have brainwashed our sons to be fans as well. Thus, with the championship secured, we danced around merrily, hugging each other and giving high-fives all around.

This was the fourth time Duke has won the NCAA Men’s Basketball championship under their long-time coach, Mike Krzyzewski, or as he is commonly known, Coach K.

Now, if you know me, you probably know that Coach K is one of my heroes. In fact, at one point in my life, my wish was to get my picture taken with two famous people before I die: Ronald Reagan and Mike Krzyzewski. Well, I never was able to get a photo with the Gipper, but as the above picture shows, I was able to get a picture with Coach K back in 2001 at a charity event at Duke University. Yep, that’s me in the picture, with my two boys. At the time, my older son was nine, and little Matthew was just three months old (I remember how my arm ached that night because I held him that way for about three hours).

The reasons why someone would hold Coach K in high regard have been well-documented. He is a great leader and master motivator. He invests in relationships with his players and others. He engages in charitable ventures, sometimes out of the camera’s eye. He maintains a high graduation rate. And, year-in and year-out, he maximizes the talents and abilities of his players and achieves outstanding results. Within the next two seasons, barring any personal catastrophe, he will become the all-time winningest Division 1 men’s basketball coach.

But some look at all of this success over the years and quite frankly are getting a little sick of it. I can understand this. In sports, it’s not always fun for the other guys when one team experiences prolonged success. For instance, when it comes to hockey, I am a Philadelphia Flyers fan (I grew up around Philly), and their rivals, the New Jersey Devils, have been so successful for so long, and have dominated the Flyers for so long, that I’m really just numb to it now.

What I can’t understand, however, is the wave of utter hatred that has been aimed at Coach K over the last several years. While one can certainly find flattering coverage of him in the media, one need not look far to see a burgeoning irrational hate for this man. He is accused of being smug and arrogant. He is accused of being an elitist. He is accused of cheating and lying. Referees and officials are said to give him preferential treatment.

But it goes further than this. For instance, last week, in the days leading up to the Final Four games, there were two newspaper articles which defamed Coach K. One was in the Miami Herald, where a reporter unleashed a stream of personal attacks against him. (The paper, in keeping with the contemporary idea of “say anything you want, then issue a brief apology later,” issued a brief apology later.) The second was an article in an Indianapolis newspaper, featuring a head shot of Coach K which was defaced with horns and all sorts of other graffiti (ditto on the “apology”). How would you feel if you saw your picture in the paper that way? And I can tell you that in recent years I have read numerous similar articles attacking Coach K. These are not coming from disgruntled, anonymous fans writing on fan message boards on the internet. This is the mainstream sports media.

The question that I find myself pondering is: Why is there this level of hate towards a successful college basketball coach? I’m pretty sure that he is not a perfect human being, but, he does embody what is good about sports in an era where there is a lot of bad. I think about how I don’t like the fact that the New Jersey Devils always seem to beat my Flyers, and I therefore “don’t like them.” But at the end of the day, I know it’s just a hockey game, just an entertainment event, and nothing more. I don’t despise them or their coach. Regarding hatred of Coach K, some answers have been posited in the media, and as with almost anything in life, jealousy seems to be right there at the top of the list. Whether it’s Duke, or the New York Yankees, or for that matter a successful businessman, barber, or bus driver, success breeds jealousy.

But I think there are some more deep-seated reasons, not just for irrational hatred of Coach K, but for irrational hatred of sports teams and personalities in general. Perhaps I will take these up in a future entry.

Pet peeve #348: Helping out the news networks

Here’s another entry from the pet peeve vault.

On a handful of occasions each year, we have what are known as “weather events.” In Virginia, they come in two main categories: hurricanes, which normally come through in August and September; and “snow storms,” which hit in the winter months, but in most cases yield only enough snow to be a nuisance to commuters.

Naturally, when a “weather event” is on the horizon, I, like most people, tune in to the local TV station to get the latest news, forecasts, and helpful tips, such as the need to stock up on water, gasoline, and movies from Blockbuster. One thing I have noticed recently as I watch the local networks is their increasingly frequent plea for viewers to send in pictures of the weather event. “Eyewitness news asks you, the viewer, to send us your pictures of Flake Frenzy 2010 [the events now often come with their own unique titles, as if the storm is a made-for-TV movie]. Just e-mail them to us at eyewitness@news.com,” or some such.

I have always found these requests to be very curious. First of all, I find myself thinking, “Wait a minute. In one breath you are warning me about these life-threatening conditions that I am about to face. I’d better hunker down and brace for shock. Then, in the next breath, you are telling me to get right out there and take some happy-snaps for good ol’ Eyewitness News, my trusted friend who is always there for me in the information era.” I feel I am getting some mixed signals here.

The other thing is, and call me an old curmudgeon if you must, but, isn’t it their job to send out reporters to take pictures of the weather event? I already have a forty-hour-a-week job, and if I am not at work due to an impending storm, I am at home battening down the hatches. Or, in the case of yet another “significant snow event” that amounts to two inches of accumulation, I am slipping and sliding my way to work, trying to dodge all the accidents as I go. The last thing on my mind is gathering up my camera and heading out into danger, like I’m Jimmy Olsen working for the Daily Planet or something.

I have been tempted to take a few pictures and send them in with the following e-mail:

Dear Eyewitness News,

I am grateful for the opportunity to help you out during the current natural disaster by providing ad hoc photojournalism services to your network. The requested photos are attached. However, having helped you out with your job, I am going to need the Eyewitness News staff to render services in kind, namely, I will need someone from the news team to cover my staff meeting next Monday morning, as well as to finish my monthly reports due out next Thursday. Your reciprocity in this matter is much appreciated.

All right, all right. I know. The networks want us to send in pictures largely for human interest reasons. But, for me, I don’t tune in to see little Susie’s snow angels in Suffolk or the big tree that fell on Hubert’s car out in Windsor. I tune in to get information about the “weather event,” not to see a bunch of fluff. The networks can send out reporters to get all of the human interest photos they want.

Yes, it’s a pet peeve, a particular vexation, a personal bugbear. But, really, why don’t they just do their job, and I’ll do my job, and we leave it at that?

Easter reflections, part 3

When I was a boy I attended a small Methodist church a few minutes from our home in Pennsylvania. I can remember attending a Good Friday service one year. I was probably seven or eight years old. People looked somber. The atmosphere was sad and very quiet. The pastor talked about Jesus’ suffering and dying. Although I was just a little boy, I had a basic understanding of what was transpiring. However, what I remember thinking to myself over and over that day was, “Why do we call this Good Friday? What’s so good about it?”

Well, I suppose it doesn’t take too much thought to make sense of it. What’s good about it is not the excruciating suffering that Jesus endured, but rather that He did it for us, in our place, for the salvation of all who believe in Him. I think 2 Corinthians 5:21 sums it up really well: “God made Him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God.” So as contradictory as it might seem, Good Friday is a somber day, yet a good day for those who believe in Christ Jesus.

When I reflect on Easter, I tend to go right to the end of each of the four gospels. After all, that is where the Passion story is recorded. But as the above-quoted verse reveals, the Passion story, and the interpretation thereof, appears all throughout Scripture. In fact, I’d like to sign off today by merely re-printing a passage that, when I think about it, ought to be required reading for all of us on Good Friday. It is Isaiah 53. To me, what is so absolutely stunning about this chapter of the Bible is that it was written about 700 years before Jesus lived, yet it depicts a man who:

(a) Was rejected and despised by men, and suffered and died;
(b) Had himself done nothing wrong;
(c) Died for our transgressions, because we are all sinners;
(d) Although dead, would somehow live again;
(e) Would be given some exalted position by God; and
(f) Will make intercession on our behalf so that we can be justified

Sounds a lot like the gospel, doesn’t it? Is it any wonder that Isaiah is sometimes referred to as “the fifth gospel?”

Here’s wishing you all a very Happy Easter.

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Isaiah 53

1 Who has believed our message and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?

2 He grew up before him like a tender shoot, and like a root out of dry ground. He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him, nothing in his appearance that we should desire him.

3 He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows, and familiar with suffering. Like one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not.

4 Surely he took up our infirmities and carried our sorrows, yet we considered him stricken by God, smitten by him, and afflicted.

5 But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed.

6 We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.

7 He was oppressed and afflicted, yet he did not open his mouth; he was led like a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is silent, so he did not open his mouth.

8 By oppression and judgment he was taken away. And who can speak of his descendants? For he was cut off from the land of the living; for the transgression of my people he was stricken.

9 He was assigned a grave with the wicked, and with the rich in his death, though he had done no violence, nor was any deceit in his mouth.

10 Yet it was the Lord's will to crush him and cause him to suffer, and though the Lord makes his life a guilt offering, he will see his offspring and prolong his days, and the will of the Lord will prosper in his hand.

11 After the suffering of his soul, he will see the light of life and be satisfied; by his knowledge my righteous servant will justify many, and he will bear their iniquities.

12 Therefore I will give him a portion among the great, and he will divide the spoils with the strong, because he poured out his life unto death, and was numbered with the transgressors. For he bore the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors.