Good evening from wet Houston which is temporarily, at least, experiencing a dry spell. No school today but we are at this moment on for tomorrow barring a reoccurrence of the deluge which hit last night and early this morning. I never saw it coming. My first inkling was yesterday when a school announcement cancelled our annual booster club golf tournament on the calendar for Tuesday- that got my attention! There was extensive flooding on the bayous, even one a mile from our school and my apartment, along with, tragically, some loss of life. Rain is in the forecast through Wednesday so many prayers are being offered pleading for the return of the visible sun.
You might recall that the NCAA Men's Basketball Championship, AKA The Final Four, was played out in Houston several weeks back on a Saturday/Monday format. Several of my students were able to be there in person. NRG Stadium is only six miles from WCS and there were seats available. Under normal circumstances, I would have watched on television but the powers that be decided the last two days of the tourney would be shown on TBS. As TBS is a cable station and I'm not a subscriber, I had to follow at a distance on the Internet. This is just me but apparently the ratings were historically low so maybe it will be back on CBS next year! I hope so!
Since the games were off-limits to me, I needed some other entertainment while eating so I found myself watching a VH1 Behind The Music episode. The spotlighted artists were the members of the girl group, as they were referred to, The Bangles. Originally called The Bangs, they were forced to change monikers when it was discovered another band had that name. Adding les to honor The Beatles, The Bangles were ready to take on the music world. One roster change, adding bassist Michael Steele to sisters Debbi and Vicki Peterson as well as Susanna Hoffs, put the pieces in place for a long term run at the top. And it worked for a time. But fame led to jealousy and friction and the firing of manager Miles Copeland and the whole thing went down in flames. Friendship turned to discord as Hoffs began being pushed to the forefront on the lead vocals and the initial equality of singing spotlight was left by the musical wayside. It wasn't drugs or alcohol that did them in; it was themselves.
What kills families and businesses and teams and bands? There's no one answer or the solution would be simple. But love and teamwork and improvement and success are fragile and fall apart so easily for us in our humanity and we destroy what we work so hard to create. Believers are not exempt from the problems that plague all of mankind. James 4:1 asks the question:
What causes fights and quarrels among you?
James answers his question with another query which has the inevitable answer of YES:
Don't they come from your desires that battle within you?
Of course, they do. That hasn't changed in thousands of years. As I watched the documentary, I was struck by how the four ladies were so likable and well, so normal. Fame and attention and envy can potentially change any of us and the only way to know we are immune is to become famous, not a likely scenario for most. I was happy to see that after ten or so years of separation, they reconciled and though they never replicated their earlier success, they seemed at peace. Ironically,my favorite Bangles' song has always been If She Knew What She Wants. The problem was, they didn't realize the truth until it was too late.
That was the big lesson for all of us. Everything was going great on paper, but we all became miserable because we were so caught up in the machinery of how you make that happen, it took away the sheer joy.
Susanna Hoffs
God bless,
Steve
Luke 18:1
www.hawleybooks.com
E-mail me at steve@hawleybooks.com
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