Beneath The Surface

Beneath The Surface

I hate to vacuum! This is from January 7, 2014!
There were numerous sales after Christmas and I availed myself of one. Wal-Mart had Bissell vacuum cleaners on sale for only $47 so I snapped one up. Since I was in Kansas, my brother Scott helped with the very minor assembly and I was ready to go as soon as I returned to Houston. I've always maintained that I'm messy and not dirty and there is a huge difference. One nice perk that my apartment complex provides is free carpet cleaning several times per year so mine are in good shape. And yet, one scant minute after foot activating the on button, the dirt cup, where the suctioned refuse is collected in this bag-less vacuum, was full. I was shocked. I knew it had been awhile since my last vacuuming but the carpet appeared relatively clean and the amount of waste pulled out of the rug was staggering. It was either a great advertisement for the good folks at Bissell or a stinging rebuke of the surface sterility of the floor covering on which I daily tread. As a non-scientific observation, I would guess it's a combination of the two.

I would also guess my life mirrors my carpet; relatively spotless to the naked eye but not so pretty to even a perfunctory scratching of the surface. Jesus accused the religious leaders of His day of that same condition. The Savior likened their piety to eating utensils and cemeteries in Matthew 23:
25 “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You clean the outside of the cup and dish, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence. 26 Blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup and dish, and then the outside also will be clean. 27 “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You are like whitewashed tombs, which look beautiful on the outside but on the inside are full of the bones of the dead and everything unclean. 28 In the same way, on the outside you appear to people as righteous but on the inside you are full of hypocrisy and wickedness.

Looks like times haven't changed much. We, or at least I, do our best to post a religious front to the world like a FACEBOOK status but lurking beneath is a different landscape, one that needs a constant scouring. That's where the blood of Jesus comes in, removing the garbage of the abundance of sin in my life. The Lord knows it's there and I know it's there but I try to sweep it under the carpet, to use a really bad pun. I am in awe how God loves me when I struggle to love me. Maybe because He remembers I am made of dust. I think I've rubbed off on my carpets.

Applicable quote of the day:

"The day I worry about cleaning my house is the day Sears comes out with a riding vacuum cleaner."
Roseanne Barr

God bless,
Steve
Luke 18:1

The Price For Shipley's Do-Nuts

 

The Price For Shipley's Do-Nuts

Whatever it takes to motivate kids! This is from January 22, 2018!
I often ask the Lord to give me something to write about. Sometimes, I feel an inspiration and pen a new devotional and sometimes, I use something I authored four or more years ago. I can't argue either way. If I reuse one, I guess there is someone who needed it. (My guess is very few people would remember a blog I constructed somewhere between 2006-2014 anyway!) If it's brand new, I feel the same way- there's a lesson in a new lesson. Honestly, I never saw this entry coming! Not in a million years!

My middle school girls' basketball team has fallen on hard times recently. Our schedule, through nobody's fault, was stretched out almost beyond belief. We played our last game before Christmas on December 12. We last practiced on December 15 and came back to school on January 9. We went thirty days between games and twenty-five days between practices. That's a lot of rust for kids with little experience. The games we've lost since the break were to schools having bigger kids with better skills but we lost to them by razor thin margins in November and by ten-plus points in the last week. One thing we really struggled with in the past two games was blocking out. That's a skill most middle school teams are weak at and the majority of high school girls' are as well. (To the non fan, blocking out is putting your body between the basket and your opponent when they shoot the ball- physical contact is required, not optional.) So at our practice this morning, I told the girls that if they held our opponent today to ten or less offensive rebounds this afternoon, I would go to Shipley's Do-Nuts tomorrow morning and get each girl what they wanted. To cement the deal, I had them tell me what they like: glazed donuts, donut holes, bear claws, chocolate filled donuts, strawberry frosted donuts, etc. We practiced blocking out in practice afterwards, like we do several times per week, but I was pretty sure I would not have to pay up. Like I said, it's not our strength.

We wound up winning the game four hours ago, not a big surprise as we had defeated this school by twenty points earlier this winter. The game ended with us ahead by ten but it was closer than that- their girls have really improved. As we took the court at tip-off, I reminded the kids of our bargain. I told them it's not a bribe, it's incentive! In the first two minutes, we gave up two offensive rebounds. After that, ZERO! None! Goose Egg! Nada! In all the years I've coached, I've never had a team do anything remotely close to that. I'm not sure we could do it again under any circumstances but we did today! We'll see if there is carryover- we play again tomorrow afternoon, again on the road. That deal is off the table...... but for one moment in time, it worked.

Why Shipley's? It's a Houston tradition and these kids love do-nuts! So at six AM, I'll be at the nearest location to WCS placing our order and Coach Watson, who works with us, is bringing the milk. You know, I've done the opposite before, making teams run sprints if they give up more than a set amount of offensive rebounds. Shockingly, that never carried the desired outcome! What's more effective, positive or negative reinforcement? Obviously, in teaching school and coaching basketball, there has to be some of both. If you're late, you don't start the game. If you don't turn in an assignment, your grade gets dinged. That's life and that's the learning curve we navigate if we want to make our existence meaningful and worthwhile. It's the same in the spiritual realm, I'm convinced. I have some victories over sin and some defeats at the hand of temptation. But more than ever, I'm more excited over the promise of heaven than fretting about the fires of hell. No donuts have been offered but maybe there will be some with chocolate icing and sprinkles waiting for me, metaphorically, in the sweet bye and bye. And I don't even have to block anybody out. Oh happy day.

God bless,
Steve
Luke 18:1

The Writing On The Wall

 

The Writing On The Wall

At  our basketball camp every summer, the coaches dp camper evaluations. Always, my handwriting is deplorable. I know some things improve with age but my handwriting is not one of them. The following, from June of 2006, proves the point.

I don't know how Abraham did it. God told him to move and he did. He moved with a huge group of people and a large amount of possessions. Plus, it doesn't appear there was a great of amount of time between the command and it being carried out. Next week, I'm driving to St. Louis, beginning a two week trek to visit family and my hometown. It will be all I can do to get one person on the road. There is a checklist of things for me to accomplish: take care of my paycheck, get neighbors to pick up mail, pay bills, run off maps and directions, etc. My big concern is my car. I usually fly to see family, letting Southwest Airlines worry about the details. Not this time. I had to get my Toyota checked out before the 2,500 mile road trip. Last Friday, I took my car to a mechanic shop, the Bellaire Auto Center. They were terrific! As a first time customer, there was the perfunctory paper work to fill out. I handed it back to the manager....who struggled to read my name. Jokingly, I mentioned that he should forgive my handwriting since I'm a teacher. Wordlessly, he scrawled C- across the top of my application. He was kind; I think a D would have been more appropriate! Fortunately, my penmanship didn't affect my car's evaluation. My Corolla received a clean bill of health!

The gentleman was right. My handwriting is terrible. Actually, it's a misnomer. I don't use cursive anymore. There are only two words I write in longhand anymore: Steve and Hawley and then only to sign checks and documents. Somewhere down the line, I stopped writing and went back to kindergarten block-style printing. And, as I have become more proficient on the computer, I rarely use ink. In our basketball camps, we write evaluations for the kids and I am not always sure they can interpret my comments. I noticed on last week's forms that my C and L are nearly indistinguishable. To where did my ability to communicate legibly on paper disappear? Lack of practice and my own apathy, I would say. Most guys aren't concerned with how they write. I have only had one male student with great penmanship, Carlson Reese, a high school baseball player good enough that pro scouts showed up for our games at Friendship Christian School. Teachers, including myself, let sloppy writing slide in upper grades if we can make out the meaning or intent. We do a disservice to our kids when we don't require a level of competency in penmanship but if you spend time on it in class, you give up time on something else. I also realize the computer has taken over much of the process, perhaps for the better. Sloppiness also creeps into our spiritual lives, little by little. Writing a daily devotional- a good thing- has made my life hectic. The busier I am, the less I pray. The less I pray, the less I study the Bible. It's never intentional. One day we just look up and discover the slippage or, as in the case of my penmanship, someone points it out. I sat next to a little Chinese boy at our fellowship lunch after worship today. James, a first grader next fall, proudly informed me that he can write his own name! The next time I go see the mechanic, I'm taking James with me! I've got to get that C- up to an A!
Coach Hawley's Printers' Hall Of Fame:
Class of 2007- Kia Ransome, Matthew Runnels: both can print the entire New Testament on the front side of an index card!

Applicable quote of the day:
"A man's penmanship is an unfailing index of his character, moral and mental"
4th Earl of Chesterfield

God bless,
Steve
Luke 18:1

The Apprentice

 

The Apprentice

There was a little girl on my camp team for years named Hayden who considered herself to be my assistant coach. Then, she played for me in middle school and now as a senior is my student assistant! One day, several years ago, Luis Hernandez came by to visit and he met Hayden! He's in the real world now and doing well. The following, from March 9, 2009, is about Luis who also made it his goal to be my assistant.

I'm not quite sure when but Luis began joining me at my classroom door every day before my fifth period sophomore Bible class, of which he is a member. Between classes, faculty members stand at their doors and monitor the halls. I speak to each youngster who enters and try to personalize the greeting. At times, when I am picking up papers or doing something at my desk, I ask one of the kids to be me for a minute in my hall duties. Luis must have been my stand-in one morning, enjoyed himself, and penciled himself in as a regular, leaning back against the door mimicking my cross-armed posture. He's your typical tenth grade boy, a soccer player with a wonderful girlfriend named Danielle. He takes his new responsibilities seriously. Luis is prompt and greets his classmates as they enter the room. I even let him write a hall pass to the bathroom last week. There's one more thing. If you are a regular reader, you know that I have a world class collection of ties that I wear in rotation daily. Luis brought a red striped necktie from home which he keeps just inside my classroom door. He arrives before anyone else for fifth period and loops the tie around his neck. Keep in mind that while I wear long sleeve, button down oxford shirts with my neck wear, my apprentice sports the WCS short sleeve blue polo top with his tie. We have started asking passersby if they can tell us apart. It's difficult. If you subtract the fact that I am taller, slightly older, and Anglo while Luis is Latino and a teenager, we are practically indistinguishable from each other. I signed my contract this afternoon for the 2009-2010 school year. I neglected to ask Dr. Lacey if Luis had signed his yet. You see, I think we make a pretty good team. In Luke 6:40, Jesus said, 
"A student is not above his teacher, but everyone who is fully trained will be like his teacher." 
Luis is getting it. Since becoming a teacher-in-training, his Bible grade has taken a dramatic jump. My guess is that Jesus would approve.

(Luis is fifth from the left- and also from the right- in the back row of the team picture from this year's Westbury Christian School soccer squad.)

Applicable quote of the day:
"Good teaching is one-fourth preparation and three-fourths theater." 
Gail Godwin

God bless,
Steve
Luke 18:1

Mary, Martha, Jesus.... And Maybe Lazarus

 

Mary, Martha, Jesus.... And Maybe Lazarus

 

We do a good deal of writing in my classes! This is from January 20, 2022!

I love having my students inject themselves into the Gospel stories; they can really relate to stories about relatives! Two weeks ago, my 8th graders rewrote the story of Martha getting frustrated with Mary when she invited Jesus, and presumably His apostles, over for dinner. These were their instructions:

You are to rewrite the story of Martha getting upset at Mary and involving Jesus in the process. It is found in Luke 10:38-42. There is a 150 word minimum and you must use capitalization, complete sentences, and good grammar. You may write from the perspective of Mary, Martha, or Lazarus who we presume was also present. Any direct quoting of Martha or Jesus as well as copy/pasting will result in a zero. GOOD LUCK!

Below are the observations by three of my scholars, all used by permission!

[Martha's perspective] I seriously can’t believe Mary right now! Is she really sitting down listening to Jesus tell her stories? We have so much work that we must be doing right now. She is always like this! She has always been the one to slack on her responsibilities. Me, on the other hand, practically live in the kitchen and outdoors, cooking and cleaning. All she does is simply exist, and on top of that, she never listens to me. She’s so spoiled, and behaves like a little child. I really wish she would stop listening and help me prepare the food and finish getting the house ready. But, knowing her, she won’t listen to me. I’ve been in here for hours cooking and cleaning, so that our guests can enjoy themselves. If we were to split up the duties, then maybe I could also hear what the teacher has to say. So...... maybe if I ask Jesus, he would see things from my point of view. “ Excuse, Jesus…?” Natalie

[Mary's perspective] All day long, I heard my sister complaining about how there were more than thirteen men coming to our house tonight and how I never help when there are people coming over! I do help, though! She told me that I needed to leave her alone when she’s working because I always mess things up. Lazarus is sitting on the porch laughing at us! I would’ve gone to talk to him, but as I reach the door, the men are there. I welcome them inside and glance over at Martha, who’s still trying to make enough food. I show everyone where to sit, and to my surprise, Jesus starts talking to me! Of all the people in this house right now, He chose me! I sit down and begin to listen when Martha starts to bug me about helping her. “Mary, why aren’t you helping me?” She asks. “We have a lot of work to do for these fine men.” Jesus gives her a blank look, then starts to explain how what she’s doing is great and respectful, but not necessary. I smile to myself and give Martha a teasing look. I knew I was the sister who always did things right!   Kaitlyn

[Lazarus' perspective] The other day, I had just walked into the house when I could hear Martha complaining about Mary not helping her out again. Every day, Mary sits and argues with Martha. When Martha goes to get water, Mary doesn't help. When Martha has to slaughter the lamb, Mary doesn't help. When Martha goes to the market, Mary doesn't help. But this time, it was different. Mary wasn't arguing back. Martha kept on yelling and whining. But there was no noise coming from Mary. A man named Jesus was sitting on the ground talking, and Mary was listening. This Jesus guy was talking about God and some eternal life stuff. Mary was very interested and was completely silent. I too, was highly interested so I sat down. But before that, I asked Martha why she was always arguing with Mary. I said it would help if she sat down and listened to Jesus.   Leon

God bless,
Steve
Luke 18:1

Waiting Game

 

Waiting Game

 

You often see the harsh side of life when you get called for jury duty. This entry is from May 26, 2009.

One of my mother's favorite mom-isms was, 'Many are called, but few are chosen.' Actually, it is a direct quotation from Jesus in Matthew 22:14, King James Version, although I did not recognize it the thousand or so times she recited it. I get the feeling it has applications to me and our legal system. For the third time in the last several years, I was summoned to appear and make myself available for jury duty. And for the third time, no action. We, about six hundred or so residents of Harris County, gathered early this morning in downtown Houston. As juror numbers were flashed on big screens- my number was 3208- I was placed in a pool with sixty-four strangers. We would be whittled to twelve and sit in judgement on a case two blocks away from the jury assembly location. We marched as a group to the Criminal Justice Building, took elevators to the fifteenth floor....and waited....and waited...and waited outside one of the courtrooms. Inside, negotiations were taking place involving a plea bargain. After almost two hours, we were informed the case had been settled and we were free to go home. Once again, my background in teaching US Government and Civics was allowed to go unappreciated. There will be another summons- maybe next time.

As we waited, we became restless. Standing for extended periods on tile floors takes a toll on the legs so a number of us sat down, backs to the wall. There were scattered conversations and some read their books. Some continually texted and some, like me, just sat. She came out of the court room opposite ours not long before we were excused. She could have passed for one of our older students if she had been wearing a school uniform. She was alone....and she was sobbing. Her face was devoid of hope and her body language spoke a defeated heart. I don't know what went on behind those closed court room doors but it wasn't good for her. She managed to get on the elevator across from me and disappeared.

I wish my students could have witnessed that thirty second scene that I watched this morning. From a practical standpoint, it was a great example of what happens when you get in the court system. From a spiritual perspective, I could not illustrate the judgement any better than she did. Her fate, however severe or lenient, was sealed. All of us were almost embarrassed to look at the grief-stricken girl. We probably felt it would be inappropriate to say anything or reach out in any manner so she remained by herself. It reminded me that in the parable of Lazarus and the Rich Man, Lazarus is with Abraham in the afterlife and the (former) rich man is isolated. I hope it was a minor offense the young lady committed, but her life is about to change. That's the point- we still can change. There will come a time when there will be no going back, no appeals, no do-overs, no plea bargains. And on that day, the decision will not be left in the hands of a jury.

Applicable quote of the day:
"A jury consists of twelve persons chosen to decide who has the better lawyer.”
Robert Frost

God bless,
Steve
Luke 18:1

Lucky Me!

 

Lucky Me!

I'm not a good shopper! This is from January 2, 2014.
Santa was good to me again this year; dress clothes, a microwave, personal grooming products. What the big guy in red delivered the most, though, was gift cards, including six from Starbucks. I have a confession; I struggle with gift cards. It isn't that I don't like them- I do. What frustrates me about gift cards is how to spend them. Let me give you an example. I was blessed with three Barnes and Nobles' gift cards totaling $35 and I love to read. But it took two visits and over an hour to decide what to purchase. I agonize over making the wrong choice. Once, I took five minutes standing in front of the salad dressing at the grocery store, trying to decide between two brands where the only difference was a nickel. (On the other hand, I once bought a car without really looking at it!) Let's just say I'm not decisive as a shopper.

One of my new students this year is Annie, a very bright and bubbly young lady. For Christmas, she presented me with something I had never been given before, an Amazon gift card in the amount of ten dollars. (Normally, I would not reveal the value but it is germane to the story.) I had no idea what to do with Annie's gift because I had very little idea how Amazon works. Fortunately, my sister-in-law Karen (Scott's wife) is a world class bargain hunter and universally acclaimed Internet shopper who in her great kindness agreed to help her helpless brother-in-law. She suggested I go to their website and browse and  find something I like. I did and after thirty minutes or so, I told her I had drawn a blank and I would just wait for an idea to hit me in a few weeks and I would call her. But after supper, Karen renewed her efforts. This time, she got on the Amazon website herself and started grilling me.
"How about some pants? How about some Nebraska gear? How about shoes?"
No, no thanks, I don't think so. But she persisted and asked,
"How about some cologne?"
Now, she and Scott had already given me a bottle of USHER Cologne which is awesome but she started calling out brands.
"Here's a $52 bottle of Lucky You for only $15! I could probably get it with free shipping."
She had me. Several years ago, six actually, they gave me a bottle of Lucky You and I really liked it. It was stolen on a mission trip to Honduras so apparently somebody in Central America likes it as well! I bit, she ordered it without shipping costs, and I only had to pay a modest addition to Annie's gift card. It's supposed to arrive tomorrow so ladies beware!

You know, I would have become irritated at most people who persisted after it was obvious I had made my mind up....but Karen is not one of them. Why? First, she loves me and second, she knows me. It's because we have, and I sometimes dislike the word, a relationship, which I leave blank on FACEBOOK. I trust Karen implicitly (as well as Sally, my other sister-in-law) and I know she has my best interests at heart when she pushes me where I might be reluctant to go. We might take note of that as Christians, remembering that friendship and trust often precede reception to the Gospel of Jesus Christ. I listen to people I like and trust. And in case you're interested, my relationship status is single, but that could change when a package arrives from AMAZON in a few short hours!

Applicable quote of the day:
"Indecision may or may not be my problem."
Jimmy Buffett 

God bless,
Steve
Luke 18:1