OK, so where on the introvert/extrovert scale do you fall? If there is a 40 point scale with up to 20 points for introvert and up to 20 points for extrovert where do you think you would land? Here is what the scale might look like:

EXTROVERT 20------10-------0-------10------20 INTROVERT

Don't get super-spiritual on this - Jesus was probably balanced in the middle but to my horror - I ain't Jesus! Neither are you...you are how God made you,and it's all good.

I am such an introvert I get nervous in crowds and I get even nervous-er one-on-one with people whose name is not Cathy.(my significant other)

I wish I was more extroverted - gosh that sounds like a chemical deficiency - it would make life a lot easier, I think. But alas I am a bookworm, study-miester, non-party animal. (My wife says boring...)

Just know this - we introverts need extroverts to bring us from the backside of the moon back into reality. I love alone time and all that but my life is so much sweeter when someone makes me - what's the term----------talk. Yeah, that's it, talk.

By the way, extroverts need introverts to help them think stuff through. They can tend to think or act first then think about it later. That can make for interesting social gaffs (can you say Senator Biden?)

Truth is we need each other to have balance in our lives. Not that balance is everything - I have based a lot of my life on being somewhat unbalanced - you could call it my strategery for success(George Bush called and reminded me not to mis-underestimate the importance of clear communicatation.)

Anyhow, give some love to the extrovert(or introvert as the case may be) in your life - they are just wired a bit differently than you. But it's all good.

Now, back to my study of quantum physics and lunar dark sides.

Have a good one...

My Harley is lonely. No kidding. It sits there when I walk by with a stack of books under my arm and just pouts. The dust on the saddlebags and tank is now thick enough to write and draw pictures in. You can push the dust into little piles and form your own personal Everest or Grand Canyon. Terrible...

That's the problem with life in the USA. Everybody is so busy with the urgent stuff they don't do the important stuff. Get up, get to work, get the kids to school, run the errands, pay the bills, do the dishes, mow the yard, buy the groceries, do the wash, fix the lawnmower, clean the car, clean the house, clean the office, fix the faucet, paint the fence, make the beds...

I did a memorial service for a sweet lady who belongs to a sweet family. Best of the best. Bestest of the bestest. They had pictures of all the stuff they did together - fishing in Alaska, Disneyworld, Colorado, Canada, and lots more. They played games together, did fireworks , cooked out, traveled all over and shared lots of laughs. I love that they did the IMPORTANT stuff together. Not just the urgent stuff. They have more memories than most people have dreams. Maybe that's the key - if you dream of doing the right stuff with the right people for the right reasons you'll actually wind up DOING some of it.

Resolved: I will do some important stuff with people I love - the tyranny of the urgent be blasted!!

I feel better already. How 'bout you?

That's my Harley you hear coughing into life. I think I sense a smile on my face.

Peace.

Last three nights we joined several other churches for joint community services. What a blast. I learned some lessons from this I did not see coming:

1. It is cool meeting your 4th grade teacher again - she is still just as nice and still teaching 4th grade.
2. You can have a hand bell choir, a mass, multidenominational singing choir, a worship band, hymns, a drum line, responsive reading, high church, medium church, traditional church, comtemporary church and 3 sermons from 3 pastors from 3 denominations and it was all good - very good!
3. Chocolate chip cookies will bring people together - I suspect they will exist throughout eternity! World without end...Amen.
4. All people, all tribes, all tongues can love and worship God together and pray for the salvation of their city - and I think it thrills the heart of God.

Worshipping together the way we did the past few days is a prophesy of Heaven. Somehow I do not think we'll be separated by much, if anything, when we get there. Cool.

Have a good one...

I am a child of the sixties - I remember the summer of love in 1967, I remember the JFK, MLK and RK assassinations. I remember the 60's college campus demonstrations and riots. I remember the Kent State Massacre. I had the Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young recording of Woodstock. I remember when the Beatles were twenty and skinny and singing... If I Fell, HELP, I Wanna Hold Your Hand, Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds, She Loves You, Yesterday and every other hit they made in the sixties and seventies.

I remember when Glen Campbell posed the musical question, "Galveston." I remember getting a "dollars worth of regular" at the gas station and knowing it would take you back and forth to work for about three days. I remember Dick Clark, IKE and Tina Turner, The Who, Chicago Transit Authority, The Association and the Mammas and the Poppas. I remember Lufkin, Texas pre-loop 287, pre-Mall, pre-El Chico, pre-Whataburger, Pre-(ohmigosh) McDonalds. I remember the Rock House Cafe, Beams, the Panther Drive-In, the Redland Drive-In, the Pines Theater, Sharkeys Market, Shifters, and watching color televison through a store window with my mouth open in amazement. Corvairs, Simcas, Belvedeers and Pacers were all cars best left in antiquity. In short - I'm older than dirt, grass and sliced bread.

But God is eternal. Whoa. No context for that. Eternal. That means He has never NOT been. I'm sure you get that but I can't get my brain wrapped around it. Lost too may brain cells in the seventies to think that one through. But one thing I know. He loves me. Not really sure how or why or what for. I'm just glad He does. By the way - He's nutty about you too. Thinks about you all the time... well, He's thinking about you now. Good thoughts, loving thoughts, eternal thoughts. Rest in that today. It's enough. It's a lot.

Wonder if God used to like to watch the chariot races back in 7 A.D.? Bet he did.

It occurs to me that I have a talking problem. Oh, it's not that I talk too much - it's that I would rather not talk. It's the Great Stone Face Syndrome. I am blissfully content to listen, listen, listen as others speak or as no one speaks. Silence is Golden is the concept I tend to live by. I remember my mom telling me that as a small child I used to sit in a corner with a toy I liked and play for hours without making any noise. She was happy about that because I was easy to take care of and generally not a problem till I got hungry. At that point I would usually ask for the dinner menu and dessert list...and scream like a panther until I got fed.

Sometimes people speak to me at length and get very little or no response. After awhile they come to believe I have died. (Sometimes my wife tries to talk to me and realizes I may not be hearing her - she will say things like, "The pope just killed President Bush and has run off with Laura to the Bahamas." ...just to see if I blink or even burp. I have caught her checking my pulse numerous times.)

I know other people with talking problems. Usually they talk like a gatling gun shoots. No worry about aiming just FIRE and keep on FIRING. When everyone nearby is dead, reload and prepare to FIRE again. If you get 2 or 3 of these folks together at the same time it sounds like a a young war.

Some people are very determined to talk and make their point. Their mantra is, "If you can't make people understand what you are saying TALK LOUDER, especially if some one else tries to speak or make a different point." If people get charred along the way by pure volume, energy and superheated air, so be it. (Can you say political coverage on TV?)

Then there are the normal folks - most people I think - who can talk and listen equally well. My wife fits neatly in this group although she enjoys talking a bit more than listening. Don't mean to say shes not a good listener - I said 8 words last thursday and I believe she heard almost all of them. I'm just saying she has a talent for communicating (this is gonna cost me a bundle). Point is, she is normal and is used to both expressing herself and hearing others express themselves. People love to talk to her because she can actively listen and they to listen to her because she can express herself well one on one. She is the balance in most every area of my life.

What about prayer? It can't be just talking all the time (Rata-a-tat-tat-tat-tat-a-tat) or being quiet all the time (Huummmmmmmmmmmmmmmm...) God wants to speak to you and be spoken to. Its a two way street. Bear your soul - give Him your deepest needs and concerns, requests - your praise and worship. But let Him speak to you as well - learn to rest and wait on Him - He has a lot to say to you. Every day...

Enjoy your time with Jesus today - -and if you see me very still, place a mirror in front of my mouth and check for breathing...

Its raining today in Springfield. One of those days when it's seems to be raining all over the world. Rain, rain, rain. A little softer, a little harder, a light mist and then a downpour that makes the metal roof our the school rumble like the thunder-rumble of an intense East Texas storm. When one of those thunderboomer storms comes through at night complete with flashing lightning and sudden, swooshing winds you feel like God must me really emotional right now...



Here's a silly question: Where does all that rain go?



Down the gutters, drainpipes and driveways, down the streets and culverts, down the ditches and creeks, down the rivers and eventually to a lake or even to the ocean. Carried along by the powerful surge of water is all the flotsom and jetsome of life - the dirt and filth and oil from the streets, the leaves and grass clippings, the chemical residue from over-fertilized yards and the assorted other junk that was clogging up everything everywhere. Rain is God's way of cleansing the world of all the garbage of mankind. After a sweet, cleansing downpour the world looks brighter, fresher and it sparkles with the sheen of cleansing.



That's what, in part, fasting and prayer does for us. We turn our fickle, sour, self-oriented hearts to God and say, "God cleanse me, refresh me, change me, use me." The Holy Spirit is God's precious rain that does the cleansing work in our hearts.

In a larger sense the flood of God's Spirit in our world from fasting and prayer crashes through the dams and obstructions the enemy has erected to prevent God's will from happening. The result is souls saved, bodies healed, clarity in decisions, breakthrough in relationships. Your fasting is having powerful effect on the world.

Let God pour rain into your soul this month - your life will be refreshed and our church and city will be renewed as well.

Monday was a long day of travel for me. Drive to Shreveport, fly to Atlanta, layover 2 hours, fly to Springfield (finish that last required text on the plane), get your luggage, wait an hour and 15 minutes at the rental car counter 'cause the guy is new and doesn't understand the computer, drive to the hotel, in the room at 11 p.m., asleep by 12:30 a.m., up and in class at 8 a.m.

Is that what your day feels like? My impression is that life is jogging faster than my little brain can jog. I meet myself coming back too often. My get up n' go has got up and went. Tuesday seems to get there before Monday is done. I am thinking of calling President Bush and ask for 250 billion hour bail out! Maybe congress can vote on it (no, theres not enough time for that!)

Look, don't let life run over you like Ike blowing through Galveston - it will if you let it. Even Jesus left the crowds and took a nap once in awhile. He's well-known for snoozing in the back of fishing boats. As a friend told me a few days ago, "you're climbing a high, rocky mountain - you'll make it if you learn to rest on the plateaus along the way!" Good advice.

Plan a little YOU time this week - some R&R, a holiday, vacation, nap-time, bike ride, hot bath, cold shower, the alone-zone----you get the picture. God never wanted you to destroy your self - He gets no Glory from that. He would rather you laugh more and stress less. We all have lots to do that has to get done - that will likely never change. But enjoying the ride is something you have to plan to do because it will not happen if you do not plan.

Face it - you're worth it - valuable and special to God - Trust me - He treats His stuff very well (...consider the lilies of the field?) He wants you to treat YOU well, too.

Nuff said.

Did I make my reservations for class next month? Oooops.