Hey, 32 + 12!

Today I'm 32+12. Yep, it's the 12th anniversary of my 32nd birthday. I'm 44 and - according to the Missus - still cute. Of course, my niece thinks I'm just old and tells me so, but she's usually grinning when she says it.

Last year on my bd I was living the high life in Kinshasa, Congo. Several of us went as a mission team to Africa, where we spent about two weeks in house-to-house evangelism and revival services. Kinshasa is surreal - 7,000,000 people, very inadequate garbage system, extreme pollution, intermittent electricity, armed militias in the streets, traffic laws that are less than suggestions, city-dwellers cooking over wood fires, riots after soccer matches. You know, the usual unreal, hazy, "how did I get here?" kind of place that you've run into when you've fallen asleep after eating too much pepperoni pizza. Remember Apocalypse Now? Sort of like that.

But the people we worked with were wonderful, full of great spirit, great songs, and wonderful hospitatity: they didn't have anything but would gladly split it with you. And on the last day of the trip, June 14, 2005, missionary friends invited us all over and fed me birthday cake.

What a great day.

I never expected to have a birthday in equatorial Africa, but I thank God for giving one to me. In the year since, here in the USA, I've had the joy of dealing with revised expectations. How do I live with abundance? How do I tell Americans about Christ when so many don't really want to hear? How do I stay in a complacent America when so many in other places DO want to hear? And, what else does God have for the future?

All good questions.

Today I ate pizza at Tony's and then, after prayer meeting, went with the family for coconut cream pie at Marie Calendars. Also, a good birthday. Praise God for every one of them.

Puzzle Corners

This world is made of an almost infinite number of puzzle pieces, and there's always another corner or edge to pay attention to.

That means we can get busy at a moment's notice. We can drop one thing and pick up another without missing a beat. Then, after a while, we think "Whatever happened to that thing I dropped? Hmmmmmmm..........."

In my case, I got busy before Easter and had to neglect the Musings blog. A month later, when I was about to post again, I realized no one had asked where it was, why I hadn't been posting, "WHERE'S MY DAILY DOSE OF DAVID??" or whatever. Since I have plenty of other things to do I decided I wouldn't bother being a blessing if no one was being blessed! And that's been... months.

But in the past two weeks 4 people have referenced Musings of a Smalltown Christian, so I thought I should at least let people know what's going on:

I've been working hard and practicing humility.

Since I went on blog-hiatus I've been doing my usual thing (pastoring Crane Creek Baptist Church); auditioning drummers for my band, Bright Red Tie; dealing with selling some property for our church; putting in some extra time digging through historical documents for the Treasure Valley Southern Baptist Association; shopping for a new washing machine; organizing a Congo Team reunion party; and mowing my lawn. All of those things are going well, some are done, and I'd be mowing RIGHT NOW if it hadn't rained last night and made the grass soggy.

Instead, I'm blogging.

And watching the French Open.

As for the humility, my friend Steve points out that we're all about as irreplaceable as a hole in water. If we think the world revolves around us, well, that world has plenty of edges and corners to work on, and won't worry about our departure much (pass that piece of blue, will ya? it might fit in this patch of sky). If we think no one else can do what we do, there are over 6,000,000,000 people out there willing to prove us wrong. And if one blogger goes, another will take his place. Or not.

So, if you have enough puzzle pieces to occupy your time, and the loss of these Musings wouldn't negatively impact your life, God bless ya and carry on. If, however, you'd like to keep reading the odd little things that come out of my brain, drop me a line or leave a comment on the blogsite.

OK, back to Roger Federer, the GREATEST tennis player in history. Who replaces Pete Sampras as the GREATEST tennis player in history. Who replaced ol' what'shisface as the GREATEST tennis player in history.........