“George of the Jungle” aka Third Time Is a Charm

My family and I were enjoying a much needed vacation at a little resort in the Virginia mountains. Not long after lunch we decided to move from the indoor water park to the outdoor area that included a wave pool and water slide.

I vaguely recall hearing a sound that resembled a gong at the very same moment I recognized a couple of colleagues who were vacationing in the same place came into sight. We were walking one direction and they were headed the other but I certain that I saw them just as that gong sounded.

I really wanted to tell my family that I had spotted them. I really, really, wanted to call out to my colleagues and say, “Hello!”, however, it was then that I realized the “gong sound” I heard was actually coming from the sign post that the side of my head had  made contact with as I walked along.

The sound was followed by a blinding bright light and I really could not understand how whole family was able to see me and grab hold of me when this light was so bright. I couldn’t see them. How could they see me? But they did. And they gently – but laughingly – led me to a place that I could sit down and assess the damage.

My vision cleared quickly and it was pretty apparent that I had suffered no lasting damage, and so I told my family that the only reason the pole and my head met was because I had seen these friends there.

“Was that before or after you smacked your head?” one of my loving, caring, daughters asked.

I didn’t answer but just let it go until we ran into…wait, bad word choice there…until we met the folks I saw a little later in the other part of the water park.

 

 

I love this story about myself, Perhaps my love for it goes back to my childhood love of the cartoon “George of the Jungle.” Perhaps I like it because it reminds me to be humble because its hard to tell when I will next make a fool of myself.

I love this story so much that I used it in my sermon this past Sunday. When church was over, Pam, my mom, and I got into the car to head to lunch. As I drove, Pam said, “You know, Scott, you have told that story before.”

“Of course I’ve told that story before,” I responded. “It’s one of my favorite stories and I have used it everywhere we lived.”

“No,” Pam continued, “you’ve told that story here in Huntington.”

“No way! I’ve only preached seven sermons here. I may not have been updating my story database but there is no way I have used the same story twice in seven weeks!”

Pam was silent.

Later that evening, as I carefully made note of the “Massanutten Head Smack” story being used TWICE at First United Methodist Church in Huntington – July 21 and August 25 – in my now very up to date story database, I could almost hear a gong…almost see a blinding light.

But I could definitely remember that there is nothing that will humble a person more completely than the act of preaching.

To Pam…thanks for setting the record straight. You were right. I was wrong. Bet that happens a couple hundred more times in our lives.

To my congregation…I’m sorry I assaulted you with the same story twice. I hope it was better the second time around.

To poles and illustrations everywhere, I pray I don’t run into you more than once. If I do, just know I will be thinking of my old hero George.

Cardboard Assault

There is a smell here of both hope and anxiety. It is a smell that is fresh but acrid as it attacks my nostrils, triggering memories of days gone by while making my eyes water as I focus on the days to come. It is a smell that carries weight itself even as it gets weighed down with the possessions of life. It is a smell accompanied by promise, even as it is locked tight with the screech of tape rubbing against its surface.

It is the smell of cardboard. My house is filled with its aroma.

I’m an itinerate preacher in the United Methodist Church. This year I join with thousands of colleagues around the connection as I pack my belongings and prepare to move to the place my Bishop has assigned me to go. On the surface, that seems like a simple thing: Jobs change. You pack the boxes and you move. This is life.

I have a friend in the Army who has moved 19 times in 31 years. I don’t envy him. I don’t even want to think about moving that much. However, I think it’s different for him. Sure, we both signed up for an itinerant life. But there appears to be so much less understood about the preacher that moves her or his family from town to town than there is about the multitude of soldiers who move from base to base. And maybe that is part of it. When soldiers move, they are almost always leaving with others or arriving with others. They are moving out of and into a community of “movers.” Preachers and their families move from and into communities of “stayers.”

The ones I am leaving behind have been taught by me, frustrated by me, and joined me in the worship of Someone much bigger than all of us. I know their stories. Some families have been here so long the roads and buildings have their names on them. And they know each other. Their houses are known not just by the community of faith but the whole community. Their place is here. My place will soon be “not here – but there.” And the folks there have more than likely been there a while as well, rooted in the area and each other. Familiar with worship, with one another, with the jokes that have gone on for generations. Sure, they know we are coming, but what does that really mean? They’ve had preachers arrive before. They are watching one leave now. How does that affect everything? I feel for the loss at both places. But the smell of cardboard reminds me that I am the one moving. I am the one without a place.

IMG_20190516_214216.jpgI take one of the old boxes that I have used to move before, unfold it, and let the dust assault my senses. I fix the box for filling and start packing in the contents of life. But it is more than stuff that is going into these boxes. It is memories. This is the place my two youngest graduated from high school. This is the home they left for college, and left again for grad school. I will fill the boxes with some of “their” stuff and even more of “our” stuff but when they get to the new place, something will be very, very different. And when I smell the low-grade heat of the adhesive tape locking away that stuff, I smell that which is getting left behind.

Sometimes I take a box and start filling it with my life, and the aroma that arrives is one that reminds me that there are new things headed my way. New challenges. New friends. New experiences. New mistakes to make. New. New. New. It is hopeful and promising but just like holding one of my newborn children there is something frightening in all that newness. The responsibility of it all. The knowing I am going to a place where everybody knows my name, but I don’t know theirs. The new routes I will have to learn. The new celebrations I will share in. The new ministry that will take place. The hope of all this newness is weighty, even heavier than the cardboard filled with the dishes from the china cabinet.

Sometimes I prep a box for packing and the aroma that reaches me gives my mind a shot of racing fuel in the form of adrenaline. Are the movers sure they can do this job? Are they really going to show up? Am I going to get to say good-bye the way I want, to everybody that I want to say good-bye to? Is my spouse packing that stuff or am I? And who is sorting through that part of life over there? Will this break en route?

Will anyone be here to say, “So long. We love you.”? Will anyone be there to say, “Welcome. We love you.”?

Sometimes I get a box from the stack of recycled moving materials and even though it is empty, I have trouble moving it. A dense and heavy fog surrounds the box. The fog interrupts normal conversation modes between my spouse and me. It makes me tired, oh, so tired. It overwhelms me. To borrow from an all too popular show on TV: Moving. Is. Coming. And with it comes the change in the relationships even in my house. Excitement. Grief. Excitement. Grief. It wears on any marriage. I’m just fortunate enough to have a spouse who patiently keeps on packing, even when it seems it will never end. Because in the end, we want to be together. We choose each day to love each other and no tension, not even the tension of finding the right box for “that” will end that choice.

My house smells of cardboard. It is hopeful. It is anxious.

It is dust – held together by pressure and glue. Someday it will be dust again. Then again – so will I.

So will we all.

My house smells of cardboard – a holy smell leading me away from and towards the place that is not quite home.