Apes Don't Kill Apes

One of our movie channels seems to always offer either one of the Godfather movies or one of the Planet of the Apes episodes.
I didn't know there were so many: Escape from the Planet of the Apes, Beneath the Planet of the Apes, Return to the Planet of the Apes, Son of Planetof the Apes, Planetof the Apes Takes Manhattan, Planet of the Apes VII: The Death of Spock.

I was watching part of one the other day. In it, one of the Gorillas kills the child of one of the leaders. All the Apes begin chanting their ancient Law that Apes Don't Kill Apes. Plasee note that I am not in any way comparing Apes and Muslims because we kow all too well from the news that Muslims do kill other Muslims.

But I thought of that movie when I read that Major Hasan supposedly snapped because he did not want to go overseas to counsel soldiers who may have killed his fellow Muslims.

There are several things wrong with that theory. First, he had been dealing with such soldiers previusly in his other postings. There are between 12,000 and 15,000 Muslims serving in the Armed Forces. Some of them must have killed enemy combatants who were Muslims. British-Americans killed British soldiers in our first two wars as a nation. Mexicans joined other Texicans in defending the Alamo against the Mexican army. Native Americans served with the US Army in fighting other tribes. German-Americans fought Germsns in two world wars. Koreans and Vietnamese fought on both sides of their wars.

And Muslims do kill other Muslims. What are the chances, when one blows himself up in a marketplace in Iraq or Pakistan, that he will kill other Muslims? Sometimes Sunnis and Shiites target each other. Hasan could have even killed fellow Muslims at Ft. Hood. I heard Hispanic names and I think an Oriental one, but didn't notice any Arabic names in the listing of the dead and wounded. If there had been, I'm sure someone would have mentioned it by now.

To kill so he wouldn't have to deal with killers is a stupid argument.

Gunfight at Ft. Hood

I had just arrived at school for my Spanish class Thursday evening when Tricia called me and told me to pray for my son. At first I thought she meant James, our younger, because he was supposed to have gone to have a health problem checked out. Instead, she told me that Thomas, our older, had texted her to tell her that there had been a shooting at Ft. Knox where he is stationed.

I know that there is often gunfire on military bases. While we were visiting Thomas and his family, one evening we heartd machine gun and mortar fire in the distance. He assured me it was an exercise. I also knew that they live so far from anything else that they would be safe since no terrorist could find their house.

She called back a few minutes later to tell me that he had called her and she had learned that it was actually Ft. Hood, where he had been stationed several years ago. I explaind to her that, as your eyes get older those little letters on the phone look more and more alike: Knox and Hood both have "o"s and an"H" and a "K" can look remarkable alike.

I guess that was an answer to prayer. God had taken away our need for fear or anxiety. But I prayed for those involved in Texas. Mjy dad had been stationed at Ft. Hood after WWII and Tricia and I had visited it on our trip through Texas many years ago. I don't remember any security; we just drove around. She has since visited Thomas there, but I didn't. I know our original visit was long before 9/11 and we have seen the increased secutity at Ft. Benning, Ft. Lee, Ft. Riley and Ft. Knox as we have visited him in various postings.

I was impressed with the response of the Tesas police sergeant who responded and shot the shooter four times while being wounded herself.

I was curious about the shooter expecially when I saw that he had an Arabic name, but he was referred to as a convert to Islam. Apparently he is of Jordanian heritage, so he must have been an ethnic Christian (or less likely a Jew). I am waiting to be told by the pundits that we must remember that not all Muslims are violent, etc. They said that when the convert to Islam shot a couple of soldiers in Arkansas at the same time they were telling us that all pro-life people are potentially violent just like the one who shot the abortionist doctor in Kansas. Yes, and all Indians walk single file; at least the one I saw did. I never did hear much about the man who shot the pro-life demonstator recently. But I know we would have heard a lot more if it had been the other way around.

Haven't there been investigations recently about Muslim groups that were planning to attack military bases in New Jersey and Virginia? Sorry, just wondering. I was impressed that the Texas shooter's family has denounced the action and declared that he was not brought up that way.

Our prayers are with the families of the victims and with the injured in Texas and also inFlorida.

Belated Anniversary

I just realized that I have been doing this blog for two years and change. I began 306 postings ago with one called "Welcome to my world." That was on October 31, 2007. The second one, on the same date, was an essay about how Christians should look at Halloween.

Halloween is a week in the past already, but I just saw this item on the internet. The new pastor of the Old Dutch Church in Sleepy Hollow, NY, (which we know from Washington Irving's "The Legend of...."). refused to allow a couple to be married in his church on Halloween with a Halloween theme. He did offer to marry them in the church cemetery, which I thought was an appropriate compromise.

I think I would have followed his example, but when it comes to Halloween, I think we are sometimes guilty of straining out gnats and swallowing camels.

Halloween was fairly calm here in the Miller household. We had to go to Madison Friday morning for a court appearance and hospital visit. We rushed back to Juda to spend the afternoon setting up the community center for the Fire Department's annual party for the kids.

Tricia has been chair of the committee since she joined the Department and does most of the set-up. She usea a lot of her own decorations and games.

She had told her committee that she would not be able to be at the party since she had to sleep before going to work at the jail at 11:00 PM. She told them to leave things and she would get them on Saturday. She was pleasantly surprised to find that all her stuff had been packed neatly into her boxes.

With her sleeping Friday evening, I was responsible for passing out the treats to the kids. I like that task because I enjoy seeing them and know many of them from church. If you're read my posting on Halloween mentioned above, you may remember that I see Halloween as an outreach ministry.

I soon became able to predict when the doorbell would ring. At first the dogs gave me a clue, but after I brought them inside, Icould still predict. I was working on my end-of-the-semester presentation for the conversational Spanish classs I am taking. Every time I had fingers stuck in several places in the various dictionaries and grammars I was using and was trying to use my magnifying glass and pen with the same hand, the bell wouold ring.

But I managed to get both projects done before the witching hour and then I had an extra hour to sleep, but that was the next night, wasn't it?

November Newsletter Article

It is obviously possible but I would think it would be very hard to sit through church week after week for years and years and yet never become a Christian. By Christian, I don't just mean "a name I call myself" but one who has eternal life which Jesus Christ Himself defines as having a personal relationship with the Creator of the universe through His only-begotten Son.

Even if one attended one of the all-too-many churches where the pastor wouldn't know the Gospel if it fell on him (or her), there is still that pesky Bible which is read from time to time. That Book describes itself as the sharp, two-edged sword which the Holy Spirit uses to reach into the souls of human beings. And the Holy Spirit is active in most churches because it only takes two or three believers for Him to be preent as Jesus promised.

I think it would be equally hard to be a Christian and not attend church. A man once told me that he and his family "home-churched." I laughed but quickly realized that he was serious. I think he was wrong, but he was serious.

The focus in the New Testament, as well as the Old, is on the corporate body of God's people. The promises given are overwhelmingly in the plural. Unfortunately the Englsih language doesn't bring that out as well as some other languages. Perhaps it would help if we all spoke "Southern" English. "I am with y'll always" and "Y'lls body is the temple of God" bring out the meaning of the Greek.

The Lord's Prayer is another good example. All of the first person pronouns are in the plural: "Our Father...Give us...Forgive us...Lead us...."

The personal relationship is essential, as in Psalm 23, but the underlying assumption is that God's people will be worshipping, studying and working together.

The Methodist movement builds on that in what we call the connection. We are bound together as a reminder of Paul's description that the Church is like a body with various organs and systems working together to accomplish the common good. From two-point charges like we are on to circuits and districts to conferences and jurisdictions, our organization reminds us that we are working together. Does not God set the example in the Trinity?

I have been hearing recently about apps (which is short for applications). They apparently have something to do with communication devices. My cell phone doesn't have all of those extra devices. I can make and receive calls. That's enough.

In United Methodism, we have two apps to assist us in the work of the church. Both are based on the conference level. One is appointments and the other is apportionments.

Through the appointment system, the Bishop and District Superintendents , working in conjunction with the pastors and local church leadership, seek to place available pators in churches where their gifts and graces can be best used. The system, like all human systems, is not always successful. It is a work in progress.

The apportionments are also a way of working together as each church pays part of what is needed to do the work of the Church within the conference and beyond. A pastor friend of mine refers to them as "franchise fees" and I think of them as our missionary budget. We give so that others can have opportunities to hear about Jesus.

I can get along all right with just my simple cell phone, but I know I could be more effective with a few apps on it. In the same way, a local church can muddle along, but we can come closer to accomplishing our purpose if we make use of the apps that are set in place within our Conference system.

Having a Real Life in Christ

(This was the clergy column in the October 31, 2009, issue of The Monroe Times.)

I grew up in the country about four miles from a town roughly the size of Monroe. We lived just off the state highway that ran south toward Pittsburgh. This area grew rapidly during the time we lived there. My brother described it as "When we moved there, it was the sticks. When we moved back into town, it had become the suburbs."

By the time my family moved into town, I had gone off to college in the big city of Philadelphia. It's not quite a "toddling town" but it had its good points. I spent four years in downtown Philadelphia, then four years living in the western suburbs and commuting into West Philadelphia for seminary classes.

The first week I was in college, we had freshman orientation. One day they took us to Washington Crossing State Park for a day of recreation and fellowship. I hated it. That evening we had an old-fashioned camp fire with singing and testimonies.

It was an eye-opener to hear what Christ had saved some of my classmates out of. One said he had been a burglar and gone to prison where he met Christ. Another said he had been a drug dealer before Christ saved him. One co-ed told how she had been a prostitute until Jesus Christ changed her life.

As I sat there in the dark, I wished I had an exciting background to brag about while testifying to the mercy and love of Jesus Christ. How wonderful (for me) to have been an airplane hijacker or a bank robber. But, alas, I had been a small town kid who had taught Sunday school, worked at a church camp, and dreamed about becoming a minister.

But the more I thought about it, the more I realized that I had just as real a testimony of the grace of God as anyone else there that night. God had indeed saved me from a life of sin. I had been deeply involved in dead religiosity.

In July, 1961, I went to work for a week at a church camp located near my home and church. There, the first night, I heard the clear claims of Christ. I'm sure I must have heard them in my church, but sometimes it is good to hear familiar things in a new place, form a different person. I sat there on the plank pew in the little chapel listening to the babbling brook outside as the congregation sang 69 verse of "Just as I am without one plea."

I know they didn't sing that many, but it seemed like that. I felt I could not go forward because I was a staff member. Later, other staff helped me understand what it meant to accept Jesus Christ as my Savior and Lord.

If God had not changed my life that July night so many years ago, do you know what I would be today? I would be a United Methodist minister. OK, so that's what I turned out to be anyway. But I'm a minister who can testify to the saving grace of Jesus Christ and invite you to share in it.

A Memorial

I deleted the last posting which was dated October 10 because it asked for prayer for my friend, Edwin Elliott. He passed away the following day. I would ask for continuing prayer for his family and for his congregation there in Manassas,VA.

I have not written anything here for the last two weeks because I did not want to look at that last posting and be reminded of his death.

I was a stranger to death for many years. I remember as a very youhg boy being at the visitation for the infant daughter of a cousin. I remember knowing about the deaths of an uccle and an aunt. I remember being told by my parents that a favorite neighbor, Mr. Rice, had died. "He's in heaven now," we were told. My parents decided that we kids should go to thefuneral home to see him before we had to go for a relative. (This must have been very early, before the other events I've mentioned.) When we were told that we were going to go see Mr. Rice, my brother, who was two years younger, asked wide-eyed, "How's us goin' get up there?"

I remember knowing about the death of a classmate's brother who was killed in a sledding accident. Who gets killed in a sledding accident? I don't remember ever hearing about a kid getting a head injury from a bike accieent, but this boy got one from a sledding accident. Yet we never hear that kids should be wearing "sled helmets." I suppose that will come.

I remember in my senior year in high school, a very close friend of my brother's was klled in a car accident. I went to the viewing and told his grieving mother that I had always respected him. He had been in my Spanish class and on the staff of the school paper with me.

In college, we had an epidemic which forced a number of us to be consolidated in one dorm. I was placed in the room of a student who was in the hospital suffering from cancer and who would die later that year. I think I was too sick to care whose room I was in.

While in college, my paternal grandfather died. My maternal grandparents had died before my parents married. I went home, across Pennsylvania, for the funeral. I remember watching my dad stand beside the coffin. Iwalked over and stood beeside him and put my arm around his shoulders. Thirty years later, I was standing at my father's casket and I felt an arm around my shoulders. I looked up and saw it was my son, Thomas. I hope my dad appreciated my gesture as much as I appreciated my son's.

I was totally unprepared for funeals when I entered ministry. I attended a few for neighbors during my first pastorate and l prepared what I thought was the perfect all-purpose funeral oration. I used it for a dozen years there in Florida, adding personal things where needed. It worked because I had a very fluid congregation. I had no funerals in Canada, so when I arrived in New Jersey, I used my one-message-fits-all eulogy when someone died in the one church and was buried in that town. Several months passed and someone from the other church died. I went to the funeral home in that town, with my universal eulogy and saw that half the congregation had been at the other funeal. I immdiately began adding to my repertoire.

I enjoy that aspect of ministry--seeking to comfort the family and sharing the Gospel with people who will probably not seek out any other way of hearing it. I try to make each one unique and distinct. I never read the obituary at the service. That was done at my grandfather's funeral by a minister who did not know him at all. I always figure that everyone there has already read it in the paper and probably knows more about the person that what was listed.

Early in my ministry, my grandmother passed away. I did the liturgy but not the eulogy. I believed that she had made a commitment to Christ in her younger years. I knew that death is normal for people her age. I had the same response when my father and mother died and various aunts and uncles andin-laws (a number of whose services I did). But along the line, a cousin died. I felt a twinge in the fabric of life. Death had invaded and violated my generation. Welcome to the world of adulthood, as I often tell my children. And then death claimed my brother. The inner walls had been breached.

In recent years, it has seemed that death has made too many trips into that circle and also among my contemporaries. Too often I see someone my age listed among the 80 and 90 year olds in other obits.

Close frinds have been taken away too. Old and dear friends whom I counted on for advice and encouragement. And whom I gave those things to.

The most recent was Edwin Elliott. I never met the man but we have beeen friends for years. I think our association goies back to my days in Florida. I wrote sevral articles for "TheChritian Observor." We used to write letters and make phone calls and send e-mails. But I never met him.

We came close about five years ago. My son, Thomas, had finished his basic training at Ft. Benning, GA, and had gone to Ft. Lee, VA, for advanced training. I flew down to his graduation and we flew back to Wisconsin for the Christmas holidays. I had arranged with Edwin that we would have lunch while I was in Virginia. But that mornning his daughter called to say that he was not feeling well and would have to cancel.

He kept trying to get me to attend meetings of the Hanover Presbytery. He was instumental in helping me to get ccredentials with that group when I had a problem transferring from one denomination to another. He was a great encourager of me in my ministry and often joked that I was the only person he knew who collected ministerial credentials like others collect stamps.

He encouraged me in my writing and was instumental in my getting this blog started. He said he enjoyed my sense of humor. Not everyone does.

I used him as a reference when I applied for pastoral positions. He told one search committee when they asked about my marriage that Tricia and I "seemed quite fond of each other."

He was a man of understatement, of understanding, of uplifting and upholding others in prayer. He knew what he believed and why he believed it. And he "seemed quite fond" of his wife and family.

I found out not too many years ago that he was a Pennsylvanian by birth.

Others have written mdore eloquent staements. Few will read mine. But I will miss him and look forward to the day when I will finally meet him face to face in heaven. "Well done, good and faithful servant."