Archive | June, 2010

Again, the hospital becomes quicksand

10 Jun

Dad is in Memorial again.  A one or two-day stay has become “we’ve evaluated him and think you need to put him in a rehab facility for a little while.”  Honestly, the doctor is only recommending a couple of weeks.  But as quicksand goes, that could quickly become three months again.

We certainly will do whatever is best for Dad, and if that was all the news, it wouldn’t be so bad.  The doctor also recognizes and talked to Mom and me about the fact that she cannot possibly go on taking care of him by herself.  We’ve already reached the place where she needs help (which I’ve been begging her to do for a couple of months) and this will help convince her of that.  But there will most probably be a day when we will not be able to care for Dad at home.

This is part of the circle of life, albeit a very difficult one.  Thanks for all of the prayers!

The Latest on Dad

8 Jun

What could be the cherry on top of a weekend like I had?? A phone call.  Mom called yesterday morning to let me know she and Dad were en route to the hospital.  Dad was very listless and something was going on.

IRONICALLY … That morning I’d heard a brake noise on my car.  I’ve only had this car for about six weeks, so I had no idea when the brakes were last checked.  But this was the first time I’d heard this noise and I knew what it meant.

Drew and I bolted from the office (yes, Drew was there yesterday doing MORE IT stuff helping Robbie).  We ran by AdvanceAuto to get some brake pads and came home.  This car has disc brakes on all four wheels, so it wouldn’t be too difficult, and since I couldn’t get an emergency work in with my mechanic, we would have to do it.

So Drew got a lesson in doing a brake job.  And we HAD TO.  And when we pulled the pads that were noisy, we found it to be almost obliterated so I was glad we did!  As we finished, I called Mom and we decided to wait for a diagnosis before we hit the road.  I was suspicious that it was a urinary tract infection, which would not be near a serious as another subdural hematoma.

Long story short, after a series of tests they decided it WAS a UTI.  The doc offered to treat him and send him home, but Mom asked that they keep him in for a day or two while they give him the antibiotic.

So Dad is in Greenville Memorial right now.  But the diagnosis was the best possible result!  Please pray for him and my Mom!

What good is love is we don’t do it?

7 Jun

Yesterday I shared something God put on my heart.  Mostly from I John 4.  LOVE.  Loving with God’s kind of love is the key to abundant life.  If we say we love God but do not love our brother, we really don’t love God.  If we live in His love others will see what His love is all about.

Jesus said people would know we are His disciples by how we LOVE ONE ANOTHER and how we LIVE HIS TEACHINGS.  That brings me to Matthew 18 this morning.  Jesus Himself said in verse 15, “If your brother sins against you, go and show him his fault, just between the two of you.”  Where I come from, that means ONE ON ONE.  Jesus said “if he will not listen, take one or two others along, so that every matter may be established by the testimony of two of three witnesses.”  WOW, did Jesus know what we needed to hear, or WHAT???

To me, this translates to “if you have a problem with someone, you go to them.  Try to settle it with them.”  I wish we did that more.  Instead, we like to spread our dirty laundry, to attempt to garner people to “our side” of the fight.  When we do this, we damage the Kingdom of God, each other, and the reputation of the local church.  And we all have a responsibility NOT TO DO THIS and NOT TO ALLOW IT TO GO ON.

Because, when we do things like this, we hurt people in ways we cannot even imagine.  What good is love if we don’t do it?

Some days are good, some not so good

7 Jun

How did my Sunday go??  Well, have you ever felt like a kid playing in the surf when the surf gets rough.  A powerful wave knocks you down, and about the time you get back to your feet, another one hits??  THAT is what my anniversary Sunday was like.  Wow.  You really can’t imagine it and I can’t blog about it, although it definitely will make it into my book.

All I can say about it is, at least today is MONDAY.

What’s an anniversary, anyway??

4 Jun

June 4.  A day that will live in infamy … heh heh heh.  It was fifteen years ago TODAY that my career at Ebenezer Baptist Church began.  I walked into that church office for the first time as a full-time staff minister.

It had been a long road.  In 1991, I surrendered to ministry and walked away from a promising career in IT.  (Funny how God’s sense of humor has kept me in it, huh??)  I returned to college and to seminary and it had been almost FOUR YEARS since I’d had a full-time job.  In seminary, I worked three part-time jobs as well as taking a full class load every term.  It’s not that I’d been a slacker, just finishing the goal God put before me.

The road at Ebenezer has been a tough one.  I started as the Minister of Youth and Recreation.  Many know what happened after that … The pastor that called me here left us in 1999.  I was asked to be the interim pastor.  18 months later, Ebenezer asked me to be the full-time pastor.  (Many of my colleagues in youth ministry accused me of LEAVING the ministry when I did that!  And that is a joke!!!)

It’s funny … 15 years seems like a wisp of time.  Krissy went from 4k to being a sophomore at Clemson.  Drew went from being a MONTH old to now a sophomore at West Florence.  Many changes have happened in my family, in my church family, in our community, and in our world.  And we plug along, striving towards the goal God has given us!

Hitting the wall

3 Jun

Drew and I have hit the wall.  He has gone to work with me every morning at 8am, repaired several computers, chased wiring problems, and helped me debug stuff.  We’ve configured some of the replacement equipment, labeled most of the lines coming into the main switch (something that needed to be done YEARS AGO) and we both are dead dawg tired.

In the mean time, I tried to write and do a funeral and am still working on my sermon.  (I’ve usually finished it by Wednesday afternoon … I am NO WHERE NEAR FINISHED)

And we have both hit the wall.  Stressed out and kind of sick of it.  We need a break!!  And the thought that my main vacation for the summer was last week just drags me DEEPER INTO THE FUNK.

I think we will hitchhike to Hawaii.  I’ve got some buddies from school over there who “need to see me!”  LOOKOUT, BRYSON AND GREG!

Wow … this is crazy …

2 Jun

So much has happened since Monday evening.  In a nutshell, we got everything back up on a small scale yesterday.  Drew has learned to change network cards and configure VoiP phones.  That was helpful today!!  At one point yesterday, Drew was changing cards, Robbie was chasing a higher-order network issue, Dean was strategizing on how we handle the insurance stuff, and I was dealing with an EBC family death.

In other words, thanks to these guys, I am able to do MY JOB!!!  The real one!

Today we received a shipment of hardware, and by the time Drew and I left for lunch every phone on campus was working and every PC.  I am trying to study this afternoon but got a call about one PC having a problem.  But, all in all, things are stabilizing.

Now if I can just get through a funeral tomorrow, a wedding this weekend, and get my sermon STARTED, I will be in good shape!!

What does CATASTROPHIC mean today??

1 Jun

It didn’t seem like that bad of a storm … A lot of rain, but not that much pop.  Heh … heh … heh …

It all started with a phone call from our alarm company to Bill around 6:15pm.  There was an alarm going off and someone needed to meet the police.  He rode up to the church and found all of the a/c power on campus kind of at half-voltage.  NOT GOOD FOR DELICATE ELECTRONICS.

Bill surveyed the campus and found one of the three phases of electricity BLOWN OFF OF THE POWER POLE where it comes in to the church.  BLOWN OFF THE POLE.  Everything was operating on partial voltage.  Did I mention that is NOT GOOD for electronics?

Drew, Diana and I rode to the church and found Robbie and Bill running about unplugging everything they could.  And there was a definite smell of burned plastic in my office.  Funny thing about my office:  For YEARS it has been the nerve center of our campus computer network.  Not typical for a church pastor, but there is a story behind it.  This Sunday will be my 15th anniversary at Ebenezer.  For 10 of those years, I’ve been in that office.  When I got to EBC, we were on a co-ax ethernet wiring backbone.  I slowly moved us, starting with myself, into the 20th Century (yeah 20TH) with Cat-5 lines.  Over time, it ALL ended up in my office.

The Progress Energy linesman got there with bad news … In his opinion, this was a DIRECT HIT.  From my days in IT, an old addage rings true again:  NOTHING CAN STOP A DIRECT HIT OF LIGHTNING.  We are somewhat on the end of a line.  THIS IS NOT A GOOD THING FOR EBENEZER.

Robbie called me after 9 and said he couldn’t get the switches back up in my office.  Sometimes I’ve had to do strange things to get them back up, so Drew and I rode back up there.  Dean came and met us and Bill stayed with us until we made him go home around 11.  And we did have to MAKE him go home.

EVERYTHING …. was down.  EVERYTHING.  Phone system.  Network.  DSL and main switches were a TOTAL LOSS.  My desktop computer:  TOTAL LOSS.  We had to start at the beginning and work our way out.

We worked.  And worked.  And worked.  And had some failures.  And had some successes.  And at the end of our technologic pajama party, we now have a PILE of fried equipment in my office and a LONG LIST for our insurance agent.  And I am sitting here on three hours sleep.

What does CATASTROPHIC mean today??  THOUSANDS OF DOLLARS IN IT DAMAGE ALONE!  We don’t even know what other elements of our physical plant might or might not be damaged.  As an IT guy in a previous life, I have helped build this network, WIRE BY WIRE and DEVICE BY DEVICE.  I am thankful and blessed to have Dean and Robbie in this fight with me, now for quite a while.  But I have probably had my hands on EVERY DEVICE on that network.  (It really has been therapy for me, UNTIL NOW).  My nice little network IS NO MORE.

But before we left, we are operational.  Weekday is able and ready for the day.  The church office is ready and able.  I hope our insurance agent eats his Wheaties today!!!

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