Tag: Birmingham Alabama

Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving is probably my favorite holiday. It’s just like Christmas, but you don’t have to get anyone a gift. I don’t really need any help getting sentimental, but Thanksgiving seems to draw it out of me. I am genuinely thankful for all that God has done for me, and I think it’s proper to have a holiday set aside to be grateful.

Every good gift and every gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning. James 1:17

Though it is my favorite holiday, I’m not attached to any Thanksgiving traditions. Perhaps in part because my grandfather Tinker Reynolds died on Thanksgiving day in 1989. He had suffered a heart attack earlier and it affected him so deeply that he asked the Lord to just take him the next time rather than put him through another heart attack. After he died, we never developed a Thanksgiving tradition that stuck as a family; it was different nearly every year. This just adds to the charm for me.

The first year I was away at college, a friend invited me across the Mississippi River to spend Thanksgiving with his family in Illinois. The extended family came over to eat and other than actual home made cranberry sauce not from a can, stuffing that was made from croutons instead of cornbread, and the midwestern accents, it reminded me of being back at home. I did turn out to be a big fan of whip cream on the pumpkin pie, I don’t know why we never thought of that. I was thankful to get to spend the holiday with family, even if it wasn’t my family.

I had to report to work the next morning at my retail job, so a different friend and I rode back to the college dorm on Thanksgiving night. The interstate was almost like a parking lot, there were so few cars. The campus was nearly deserted. I think there were only a couple of Canadians camped out in their dorms enjoying the week off. The abandoned college campus called to our adventurous nature and we forcefully explored one of the older buildings after a friend cut his hand on a broken window. I’m not sure how the statute of limitations works on all that, but I think the Lord has forgiven me.

I skipped Thanksgiving a few years ago to move into the first house I bought. But I haven’t missed a Thanksgiving with Zach and Lindsay since our Mom died. Our kids think that this has always been a tradition. They don’t know that when Lindsay asks me to taste the dressing we are both secretly comparing it to Nonna’s. They don’t know that when we consciously add the extra butter to melt on top of the mashed potatoes we are doing it because that’s what Mom did. In short, our kids don’t know that we don’t really know what we are doing. They just know that they are with their cousins.

One day I’ll be a proper old man with a pocket full of peppermints.

This year my sister introduced us to a brand new baby boy. He doesn’t even know that we are celebrating Thanksgiving as we pass him around and spoil him. Other than his birthday, this is his first holiday. He will probably always think of me as an old man. This will lend me credibility as I help establish Thanksgiving traditions for him. We may teach him how to carve a turkey one day. But maybe he’ll just figure it out by watching us. That’s how we learned how to do everything at Thanksgiving.

Open For Business

There aren’t many things that I have done that have been more fulfilling than teaching music.

My parents bought me my first guitar. I kind of forced them into it by signing up for guitar class at school. I didn’t learn a whole lot about playing guitar in that class, but I got a refresher on music theory. Eventually a proper flat-picker wandering into our church and showed me how to read tabs and chord diagrams, the major scale, how to play Bluegrass rhythm in G, and one Tony Rice lick before he told me, “I can’t show you anything else. If you really want to learn you will.”

In one sense, being told it is time to sink or swim really motivated me to learn. Conversely, I still had so much to learn and I had to learn it the hard way. Not having a teacher forced me to be a scholar. Learning how to learn on your own is what teachers really mean when they say you need to study. I have been studying guitar for over twenty years. As the physicians say, I am a practicing musician.

Learning to play guitar did wonders for my self confidence as a teenager. As an adult it still amazes me that I can play. This skill has also opened significant doors in my life.

Earlier this year the Lord delivered me from my one hour commute to work. The first things I did was start teaching guitar lessons again. There aren’t many things that I have done that have been more fulfilling than teaching music.

Get something in your life that God can bless.

Pastor Jeremy Wilbanks

Pastor has been saying that a lot lately to the church. It is one of the reasons that I wanted to start teaching again. I also feel like I need to put some of things I have learned while studying business in college into practice. Most significantly, I feel a responsibility to help musicians avoid having to learn the hard way. And God is blessing it.

Here are the answers to some of the frequent questions I get asked about learning guitar.

Should I start out on acoustic or electric? Choose the one that you want to play. You won’t be motivated to practice the acoustic if you really want to play electric.

What age do they need to be to learn? The youngest that I have successfully taught was seven. As long as they can pay attention and have enough hand strength to fret a note I can work with them.

Am I too old to learn? You are never too old to learn.

So if you or anyone you know is interested in learning guitar or bass guitar please send them my way.

zanewells@yahoo.com

Names I’ve Been Called: Volume II

Today is my last day at work with the State of Alabama. I will miss the people, but I will not miss the phone. This job has involved a lot of answering the phone and having the same conversation with different people every day. It is always pleasant to talk to someone who has mastered professional phone etiquette. But it is more entertaining to talk to the unprofessional callers. Have you ever been serenaded through the phone by a drunk plumber playing the guitar? I have.

Something I have noticed at this agency is that the people who really have their act together found all of the answers to their questions on the FAQ section of the website. Everybody else called to ask me their questions and they were never really ready for the answers.

“Give me just a second, I got to find a pen.”

“Hold on, I’m driving, let me pull over.”

“Can you e-mail me that? I ain’t got nothing to write with.”

My parents named me Zane after the dentist turned western novelist Zane Gray. I realize that this name has grown in popularity in subsequent generations, but not many of my peers share my name. Couple this with speaking through the phone and it is understandable that people mishear my name. To be clear, it doesn’t bother me when people get my name wrong over the phone. I gotten so used to it over the years that I have made a game of it. I have been updating an Excel spreadsheet titled Names I’ve Been Called since December 2018 and I wanted to share it with y’all. I omitted all of the cuss words.

I should have included Buddy and Boss. I’m not sure why people in this particular industry have adopted those two nick names. For the record I prefer Shane over Buddy.

  • Bande
  • Bill
  • Chad
  • Chaim
  • Dan
  • David
  • DeWayne
  • Gene
  • George
  • Ian
  • Jay
  • Jimmy
  • Josh
  • Kyle
  • Lloyd
  • Sam
  • Shay
  • Vane
  • Vann
  • Wayne
  • Zang
  • Zen
  • Blaine (2)
  • Dean (2)
  • Sane (2)
  • Sean (2)
  • Jay (4)
  • Jane (5)
  • Lane (6)
  • Zach (6)
  • Dane (30)
  • James (34)
  • Shane (93)

I made a similar list a while back that you can read here.

Fair

Frankly, it wasn’t much different from where I grew up. A dot on the map with no hope of moving out, and no reason to move in.

I came back from college in December after one semester. I was back home with my parents while I prepared to move to Virginia in March of 2006. It was during this short window of time that Dad and I made several trips to Waveland, MS to help rebuild a church that was leveled by the fury of Hurricane Katrina. On our way back from one of these exhausting forays we stopped somewhere between Mobile and Montgomery and ate at Subway.

“Dad, we are in the mouth-breathing South right now.” I observed as we watched some of the clientele approach the Subway counter. We chuckled a bit. Frankly, it wasn’t much different from where I grew up. A dot on the map with no hope of moving out, and no reason to move in.

This turned our conversation toward Virginia. How it might be different. How it might be the same.

He wasn’t finished with his sandwich when he dropped his napkin on the table and exclaimed through tears of frustration and pain. “Son it ain’t fair! I’ve raised you and Zach and tried my best to get y’all to do God’s will, and now He’s taking you both away from me.” And it wasn’t fair. And I didn’t have an answer for him.

I got a phone call this morning at 7:20am from a dear friend who I haven’t seen since my Dad’s funeral. He asked if I remembered something that my Dad said right before he died.

It was around the time when I begin to realize that God was not going to heal my Dad. And maybe Zach was feeling the same way when in tears of frustration and pain he told Dad, “This is not fair.” And it wasn’t fair.

Dad replied, “Son, God’s not running a fair, he’s running a kingdom.”

Yes. I remember.

God is not fair! It is an old complaint. But it feels so fresh when you are the one hurting.

Yet ye say, The way of the Lord is not equal. Hear now, O house of Israel; Is not my way equal? are not your ways unequal? Ezekiel 18:25

God is just.

There are a lot of things about the Kingdom of God that run counter to our human ideals of fairness.

For whosoever hath, to him shall be given, and he shall have more abundance: but whosoever hath not, from him shall be taken away even that he hath. Matthew 13:12

So the last shall be first, and the first last: for many be called, but few chosen. Matthew 20:16

I hope that this comforts someone today. I encourage you to read these scriptures in their full context.

3,909.2

Have you ever failed to reach a goal? Sometimes the feeling of failure is so strong that you struggle to find the courage to begin again. Sometimes almost reaching a goal gives you the motivation to try even harder the next time. I had planned to cycle 4,000 miles in 2022, but I fell short by 90.8 miles. That is one really good day of riding. Or one week of consistent riding. Or somewhere between 2,500-3,500 calories, I’ve never really trusted my burn rate calculations. I did not achieve my goal. No one really wants to hear excuses why I didn’t. But I almost did it.

There are some goals where almost doesn’t cut it. Like finding a good wife. That’s an honorable goal. You don’t want to almost find a good wife. This is a discrete goal, where you either achieve it or you don’t. You don’t almost shoot a deer and expect to feel good about your effort. However, if you have a goal that is on a continuum, a number like 4,000 miles may have been picked arbitrarily because it is a nice round number.

I feel good about almost riding 4,000 miles this year. I think the main reason I can feel good about almost reaching that goal is because it still took a lot of hard work.

By nature I am a list maker. I am constantly making Birthday lists, Christmas lists, to-do lists, wish lists, grocery lists, and inventories of guitar gear. One of the most important and closely followed lists I make is a list of goals for each coming year. A lot of my yearly goals involve doing something every day: reading the Bible, studying Spanish, playing guitar, and cycling. I am a believer in daily habits. It is the daily things that make the big things happen. Although it is interesting when someone does something remarkable in one day, it is the people who are able to be consistent on a daily basis that really impress me.

You would be hard pressed to find an athlete on the planet that could cycle 4,000 miles in a single day. Maybe there is someone who could learn a language in a day, but I have not met them. Most of the people I know who have accomplished remarkable things also tend to be extremely self-disciplined. And I suppose that is one of my biggest goals: to be self-disciplined.

Self-discipline sounds like a a miserable thing to a lot of us. It comes out in our language when we comment on things that take a lot of self-discipline. “Why would you want to do _________? That sounds horrible!”

The Bible is clear that temperance (self-control) is a fruit of the Spirit. And whether you call it self-control, self-discipline, self-restraint, or temperance, it is against our human nature. It just isn’t natural. We need divine help in this area.

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, Meekness, temperance: against such there is no law.
‭‭Galatians‬ ‭5‬:‭22‬-‭23‬

I want to wish everyone a very happy and temperate New Year.

On Time

The art of time management is a very grown up thing. It is ultimately what distinguishes us as adults.

I suppose I have the same self awareness as I did in my earliest memories. But lately I’ve been feeling very grown up.

Perhaps it’s is because I have a mortgage now. A death pledge to pay a lot of money plus interest. There was a time when I would roll my eyes at stuffy grown ups who didn’t know how to loosen up and have fun. Now I wonder when silly young people are going to quit wasting time and get serious about life. I think there is a keener awareness of time that comes with age and gives older people the ability to be sharp and direct with words. I haven’t reached that point yet, but I can see it in the distance.

A lot things that adults have to do are not enjoyable, which is why a lot of people are reluctant to become adults. People who do not choose to evade responsibility are grown up. Responsibility often looks like a father working to provide for a family, a mother taking care of a home, a child taking care of a pet or a toy.

I think the main reason that I am feeling so grown up lately is because I am keenly aware that I cannot do everything that I would like simply because of time.

One of the greatest things about being a grown up is being a master of your own time. One could argue that working a job does not make one a master of their own time. I suppose that may be the case for many people, but I tend to look at time as currency that I can trade for resources to support my family.

The art of time management is a very grown up thing. It is ultimately what distinguishes us as adults. Time is the ultimate responsibility. How someone spends their time defines them. If you don’t believe this ask someone who is doing time.

How we treat time perhaps is more telling of our character than how we spend time. One could hardly deny that the irascible, impatient, reckless driver forcing his way through traffic like a Bull of Bashan has a concept of his own time, but a total disregard for the time, and indeed the life, of others. These people are bound by time, not masters of it. Frankly, they are not grown up.

There is chronological time, which is what most of us think about when we think of time. You can measure chronological time with the steady predictable ticking of a clock. We can think of this kind of time horizontally, like a timeline. And there is kairological time, which cannot be measured with a clock and could be thought of vertically. Heaven often operates on kairological time.

Jesus spoke of “The times and the seasons.” Chronos and Kairos. Acts 1:7

Kairological time is manifest when an unpredictable event comes and unapologetically crashes into chronological time. The birth of Jesus Christ, The Crucifixion, The Resurrection, and The Day of Pentecost are the most significant kairological events in the history of mankind. But kairological events are not limited to these. Every time the Word of God is preached there is potential for a kairological moment. Every time someone is filled with the gift of the Holy Ghost is a kairological moment.

The Apostle Paul wrote to Timothy Preach the word; be instant in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all long suffering and doctrine. II Timothy 4:2.

Instant in season and out of season: Kairos and Chronos.

It is simpler to get a handle on chronological time. The whole world operates on chronological time. And how we handle it defines us as humans. But there is much less awareness of kairological time. The entire Cosmos operates on Kairological time. And how we handle it defines us as spiritual beings.

Ice Cream

I love ice cream. I once received an emergency haircut after I snuck out of bed to finish off the ice cream. I stuck the empty plastic ice cream bucket over my head and licked the sides. There was no hiding the evidence in my hair the next morning on the way to take Zach to school.

My parents had an old Amana ice cream maker that was louder than three holiness preachers. Like so many other appliances from the 80s, it was brown and tan. I am not sure it came from the factory that loud. When you’re a kid you think broken things are normal, like the refrigerator that won’t stay closed. The noise didn’t ever stop us from partying though. And my parents hardly ever made ice cream without it being a party. After all, what you need to have a party is special food and special people. So by that definition, every night was a party at our house.

I suppose the rackety Amana was better than the hand crank ice cream makers that some of my older friends have told me about. I guess you’ll gladly do whatever it takes to have some ice cream. I imagine you could rig up an exercise bike to an ice cream maker if times were tough and you were smart enough. I bet Creed could do it. Anyway, I’m not thinking about engineering, I’m thinking about ice cream.

Like I was saying, the ice cream machine noise was part of the atmosphere of a party. All the adults would be sitting around the table playing Rook. They yelled anyway, but they had to put in extra effort to raise their voices above the electric motor whining away in the kitchen. The kids probably got away with more mischief since the noise was running interference for them. No one ever said anything about the noise until someone turned the machine off.

“Man that was loud.” Somebody would say as if Jesus had just rebuked the sea and the disciples were marveling at the calm.

They always made vanilla and strawberry. Those were the only flavors I thought homemade ice cream came in. Man was it ever good. Strawberry is probably still my favorite, but ice cream has to be real bad for me to not like it. In Virginia they made Grape-Nuts Ice Cream and acted like it was the best thing ever. If you’re not familiar with Grape-Nuts then you probably don’t know about fried bologna neither. It’s a cereal that poor people used to eat instead of food. Just put a little bit of fine gravel in the vanilla next time you make a batch of homemade ice cream and you’ll get the same texture and maybe a little better taste. It tastes bad because you had to grow up eating it for it to taste good.

To someone out there, homemade ice cream with Grape-Nuts in it will bring back a flood of fond memories. It just didn’t do it for me.

Sis. Beane made some lemon ice cream one time at youth camp. She put it three or four times the amount of lemon flavoring that the recipe called for. Bro. J.L. Parker took a big bite and made a sour face. “Sister, that’s the best I ever tried to eat.”

Dad used to tell us about how Pop would ask him and Uncle Melvin what kind of ice cream they wanted from the store.

“Rocky Road!”

“Chocolate!”

No matter what they asked, Pop always brought back Cherry Vanilla.

Dad would laugh about that story.

It was around the time that he knew he was about to die that Dad asked for some Cherry Vanilla Ice Cream. As many times as he told that story, it was the first time that I ever remember seeing it. One of the last things I saw dad eat was Blue Bell Dutch Chocolate. I fed it it to him. I don’t think I’ll ever be able to eat that flavor again and not think of him.

So I’m thinking about getting an ice cream maker, or seeing if Creed can do the bicycle powered deal. I want to experiment with some different flavors. I think peach ice cream would be good. And apparently they used to make that at Nonna’s, but I just don’t remember it. Or maybe we can use some of these blackberries that grow on the back fence. I mean just about any fruit will be good in ice cream.

“Anything with five cups of sugar in it is bound to be good.”

-Bo

I think I’ll start with strawberry though.

How to Ride 100 Miles on Your Bike

No one is going to be impressed if you tell them, “Today I rode my bicycle.”

Unless you are a child who has never ridden a bike, or just got off of training wheels, there is nothing remarkable about that. Any average adult could’ve done the same thing with little effort and no planning.

But it if you tell someone, “Today I rode my bike 100 miles.” Then you are more likely to get a different response. Some people will be impressed, some will think you are crazy as an outhouse rat. But most everyone is curious about things that require something more than marginal effort. It is that extra effort-work, planning, dedication, etc.-that stands out to people.

Riding 100 miles on a bicycle sounds like a nearly impossible task for some people. But it is really quite simple. It’s just takes hard work and some planning. To a cyclist (I guess I am an official gel eating, ride in the rain cyclist) riding 100 miles, or a Century, is a right of passage. As ridiculous as it may sound, it is something that cyclists work their way toward achieving.

I am not saying that it is not possible to get on a bike without any training and ride 100 miles without a plan. But I am saying that it will be difficult to ride the day after you do that. In fact it will be difficult to do anything the day after. I also can’t promise that you won’t injure yourself.

I’m sure there is someone more qualified to tell you how to go about riding 100 miles, but if you are a regular reader we both know that cycling is not really what we’re actually talking about here. At any rate, this is what I would recommend if this is something you really want to do.

Commit to Cycling.

Unless you commit to cycling and go out and purchase a bicycle, riding a century is going to be like anything else that you would just like to do. There is a commitment beyond simply purchasing the bike: riding the bike. Every day. Something will hurt every day that you ride. You will be out of breath and have to do the walk of shame on some of the hills, pushing your bike up as you wonder if you’ll ever get to a point where this won’t hurt. It won’t quit being hard, you’ll just go faster.

Eventually, there will come a point when that one hill doesn’t whip you any more. This only happens to the people that don’t quit.

Set Small Goals First.

There will come a time when you will have to set a distance goal that is beyond what you are capable of doing in your early morning ride. You won’t be quite sure how hard it will be to ride x miles, but you have a rough idea of how much time it will take because you ride n miles every morning and n•5=x. You’ll be confident you can ride that far because you have done it every week for a few weeks, but you’re not certain that you can do a week’s worth of riding in one day.

This is when you have to saddle up one morning and not get off until you have completed your goal.

Fortunately for you, you have me to tell you to pack plenty of food because you stand to burn about 2,000 calories for a 50 mile ride. If you don’t eat and drink enough you will run out of energy and it will take a while for you to feel better.

If you think you don’t need those padded underwear you will change your mind after that first Half Century.

Plan a Route.

The first time I rode 50 miles I had to psych myself up for it. If I am honest I didn’t have a lot of confidence in myself to finish. So I purposefully mapped a route. It is hard to give up when you are 25 miles from the house.

Mapping out a route is even more important when doing a Century. Nothing kills motivation like not having a plan.

Where there is no vision, the people perish…

Proverbs 29:18

You don’t want to have to spend the last 15 miles of a Century mapping out a route. You won’t be in the right frame of mind.

Follow the Plan.

I believe in following the plan. You made the plan when you were thinking straight. At mile 80 you won’t be thinking straight. If you planned to do 100 miles, then all you have to do is follow the plan.

Century I

For your first Century I would avoid any roads with “mountain” in the name.

Century II

Once you ride 100 miles in a single day, any distance below 100 miles doesn’t seem that far. It is a psychological barrier that must be broken. Once it is broken there is also the danger of not riding shorter rides any more because they aren’t 100 miles. I feel pretty strongly that these simple daily rides are just as important if not more important than any Century ride.

Light gains, heavy purses.

-Poor Richard’s Almanac

Anything in life worth doing is probably going to be hard. Easy things hardly ever stand out as great things. The paradox is that great things are generally simple, but simple doesn’t mean easy.

You may have great things that you would like to do but haven’t done yet. I believe that you can do them. It is amazing what you can do with a little commitment and planning.

Garden Talk

I just want to talk about gardening.

I enjoy listening to people talk about their gardens. Even the hippies. The new age hippies that think the government won’t know where they live if they quit paying the power bill and live out of a converted horse trailer. They will talk on and on about non-GMO milk, free-range green beans and raw, unpasteurized chickens. I am not quite a hippie but I have been using organic toothpaste since the Bush administration. I can appreciate their enthusiasm though. Especially on social media.

I can appreciate anyone’s garden enthusiasm on social media. I genuinely enjoy seeing someone share a picture of their garden. The people that care about gardens, really care. When someone shares a garden picture what I see is a lot of forethought, patience, and hard work.

Who I really like to listen to talk about gardens are the people who have had gardens for fifty or so years.

“Did you get any lids yet? I got enough for 75 quarts of green beans, and 105 quarts of vegetable soup base.”

“If you run that heavy tractor tire between them rows it’ll pack that dirt down hard and won’t no weeds grow in it.”

“I like to put some of that field-kicker on it.”

“I only plant Rattlesnake Pole Beans. Them’s the ones you like.”

I think the retired people have the best looking gardens. They have the kind of time it takes to keep rows neat and tidy. I see these kind of garden’s out in the country while I’m riding my bicycle. It’s as if they are expecting the Garden Inspector General to swing by unannounced and grade their work.

The last two years I’ve had Bro. Art come over and plow up a garden plot that is way too big for me to manage. It usually gets out of hand around mid-July and I feel guilty for letting the weeds overtake it. I don’t want that to happen again this year so I had Bro. Paul come over and plow up a garden plot that is way too big for me to manage.

In an effort to keep our garden as low-maintenance as possible, I didn’t plant any pole beans this year. I think I’ll just plant two crops bunch beans staggered by a couple of week. Sarah did plant one lonely tomato plant, although neither of us eat tomatoes. It just seems like the right thing to do.

Hollynn likes tomatoes though.

I do chuckle a bit when people say they are planting “non-GMO” crops, as if people for thousands of years haven’t been crossbreeding plants to arrive at what we have today. The Native Americans from the Maya all the way up to the Iroquois planted the Three Sisters: corn, beans, and squash. None of these crops are found in the wild, they have to be cultivated. The Three Sisters grow well together; the beans will climb the corn stalk. Meso-Americans were so good at developing this kind of agriculture that the pre-Columbian population could have been as high as 112 million. I don’t plan to grow on that scale anytime soon, but it is fascinating to me. This is the kind of stuff I think about when I look at a garden.

It would be difficult for most of us to pick a favorite vegetable. Except for the potato people. Potatoes is the only vegetable that they even eat. I think I would have to choose green beans, but I would make sure that all the other vegetables knew that I loved them too. My favorite way to eat green beans is sauteed in oil and garlic. Or cooked to death in bacon grease; I’m not particular.

Earlier this week my beans started sprouting. I was so excited. I told my brother thinking he’d be just as excited.

“I feel like I’m talking to my Dad.” He said laughingly.

It is a wonderful feeling to see something shoot up out of the ground from a seed. It is a spiritual experience. One that never gets old. I hope that you all grow record tomatoes this summer and that your beans don’t quit producing until it frosts.

While the earth remaineth, seedtime and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and not shall not cease. Genesis 8:22

Between Books

There is a certain amount of guilt that comes with giving up on a book.

Sarah can always tell when I start reading a new book that is really good because I’ll stay up past 9:30pm. There is nothing quite like a book that really captivates you. You’ll find yourself thinking about the characters and plot even when you’re not reading. When you finally do finish it there is a bit of sadness because it is over. Then you have to hope that the next book your pick up is as good, but you never know. Sometimes you feel obligated to press on through an uninteresting book. You try to press on, but when a book is boring there is no motivation to read, and instead of staying up to read you close the book and go to sleep. There is a certain amount of guilt that comes with giving up on a book. When you finally make the decision to ditch a bad book you run the risk of going through this whole process again. This is what I call being stuck between books.

I guess now is as good of a time as any to confess that I am a bibliophile. I don’t just love to read, I love books. A book case is the first thing you see when you walk into my home. I love the smell of a century old book. I love the feel and color of old paper with words that were mechanically printed with ink and typeset. My parents bought books not only to read, but to display.

When a book is really good it becomes a part of our family language: an integral part of how we express ourselves.

Being between books demands a decision. We can either reach back for old books that we’ve already read (and there are some books that should be re-read) or we reach forward for the unknown of a new, hoping that we will chance upon a story that will become a part of us. Or we can stop reading.

In a larger sense, we can compare our lives to a series of books. There is romance, love, horror, tragedy, adventure, mystery. There is one exception though, you can’t really re-live any of these books. You cannot start over, but you can start new. And there is still a possibility of getting caught between books.

In life it is sometimes hard to tell when one book ends and another begins, which can make for dangerous transition traps. Thankfully, early on these lines are drawn more clearly for us. We go from Kindergarten to first grade and so on; each school year a new volume in the library of life. Once we graduate we lose the preset beginnings and endings that school provided for us yearly from age five until whenever we stopped our schooling. Because of this, we can all too easily forget the feeling of beginning anew once we become adults, and many people feel the pressure to somehow to make forty year run until retirement with no new fresh starts. In short, it is quite difficult for people to affect a new positive change in their lives-or even recognize a when a change is necessary- without help from an outside force.

As a result people get caught between books in life. Or worse, they continue re-reading a bad book hoping in vain to finish with a different ending, or without a concept of ever finishing. To use Bible language, these people are drifting aimlessly through life “having no hope.”

The basic message of Christianity is repentance. Or making a complete new start with the understanding that the routine that I was in before is no longer an option. It takes a lot of guts to make a new start like that. Jesus Christ said it best:

The law and the prophets were until John: since that time the kingdom of God is preached and every man presseth into it.

Luke 16:16

John came preaching “Repent, for the Kingdom of heaven is at hand.” What an offensive word: Repent. It is still as offensive today as it was then. No one wants to hear that they are doing anything-much less that they are living and thinking-wrong. But the message of Christianity has not changed since the birthday of the church in the book of Acts, and the preaching of the repentance still pricks people in their hearts, or cuts them to their hearts. This kind of preaching demands a decision.

There are many people who see what this kind of change requires and are unwilling to pay that kind of price, and they go away sorrowfully like the rich young ruler.

In fact a lot of “churches” have long ago quit preaching any semblance of conversion, because they also have quit preaching repentance in an effort to be less offensive. These assemblies, or congregations-I’ll not call them churches-offer no hope to people who desperately need a new start.

Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new. I Corinthians 5:17

So, what have you been reading?