Column for syndication for first weekend December 2021

Tooting My Own Christmas Horn

 

The large rectangular box my wife Becky placed under our Christmas tree, many years ago, gave me hope.

 

I hoped so much that it might be the video console game I wanted. I had even suggested that she collude with her family to cobble the funds together to bring me this Christmas joy.

 

Finally, Christmas morning arrived. Surrounded by a room full of in-laws, I unwrapped the present and was instantly speechless.

 

The box contained a case.

 

The case contained a well-worn, secondhand, trumpet.

 

No, Becky's gift wasn't a suggestion that I learn to play the instrument.

 

I'd tooted my own horn for many years and Becky had heard me play many times. Through her earplugs. She knew I was no Louis Armstrong, hence the big surprise.

 

So why did she buy me a trumpet? Because she knew my history.

She knew that, like a lot of boomers, my parents gave their children musical instruments. A clarinet for my brother, piano lessons for my sister, and a trumpet for me.

 

At ten years old, I was relegated to the garage where I practiced for hours learning to sit straight, purse my lips, and blow with everything I had. I put a lot of spit in that horn playing for school Christmas recitals, church pageants and marching across the football field with my high school band.

 

In college, the trumpet mostly lived in the closet, but occasionally I took it out to play Silent Night in church programs or taps on Memorial Day.

 

Becky and I married after college, but I continued to play my trumpet now and again.

 

I played it right up to the night it was stolen in a church break-in where I was the student pastor.

 

When it was taken, I told Becky that the theft didn't matter. My musical interest had been waning for some time. I would never miss it.

 

"I'm so over the trumpet." I claimed. "I'm studying to become a pastor and pastors play the guitar." For a few years I kept insisting that the theft was inconsequential, and I didn't need a replacement.

 

So if that was true, why did I cry the moment I pressed her gift to my lips?

 

Because my wife had just proved the adage about gift giving: "It's the thought that counts."

 

Becky saw through my denial. She saw how the thieves took a part of my childhood, my memories, and my family tradition. The old trumpet wasn't something I wanted at all, but Becky knew it was something I needed.

 

So she combined funds from her family and shopped all the secondhand music stores until she found the perfect used instrument. Then she haggled to purchase the splotchy old trumpet in hopes it would mend the pain of her husband's loss.

 

This year, if you don't know what to get someone for Christmas, you might want to follow Becky's example.

 

Look around for what's missing. Restore what's been taken. And give someone something they don't know they want -- until they do.

 

After all, isn't that the Christmas story? God saw that the world was missing something.  Something that had been taken, and because He so loved us, He knew it was something that could be restored.

 

"For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son." John 3:16a.

 

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Contact Chaplain Norris at comment@thechaplain.net or 10556 Combie Rd. Suite 6643 Auburn, CA 95602 or voicemail (843) 608-9715.

 

Column for syndication for last weekend November 2021

Happy Chappy Preaches Denial

 

In my forty years of ministry, I'd guess I've preached three times that number of funerals and fielded hundreds of comments afterwards.

 

But few comments ever delivered the punch I received after my father's funeral in 1992.

 

Like me, my father was an ordained Southern Baptist minister. However, as many of you know, I left parish ministry for healthcare chaplaincy. While my father and I differed in certain doctrine, he taught me to love people more than I loved a dogmatic fight.

 

From childhood, I knew Dad was living on borrowed time with a congenital heart defect. Fortunately, doctors added a few extra years by replacing his defective valve.

 

But on his 65^th birthday, he died in his sleep of a sudden heart attack. I was only 34 when my mother asked me to preach her husband's funeral.

 

If you've not been to an evangelical funeral, you need to know that it is the job of the pastor to talk about the deceased for ten minutes and launch into a strong salvation message for the final twenty minutes.

 

This means the service becomes a "witnessing platform," a place to convert

any unbelievers. I chose to honor my dad with the message he would want and the one the congregation would be expecting. 

 

Being well-versed in the lingo, I did not disappoint. I preached like a Happy Chappy, grinnin' and gunnin' as I told stories, anecdotes, and quoted the bible forward to back. In short, I let folks know that Dad went to heaven because he accepted Jesus as his personal savior.

 

Then like the hundreds of services my dad preached, we ended his with a song and an invitation to anyone who needed to say the "sinner's prayer" and become a Christian.

 

Afterward, people lined up to give their respects to my family. They saved the two-handed shake for me, saying "Brother Burkes, you touched my heart today." A few winked at me, saying, "You really told it like it is, pastor."

 

As the line dwindled, I peered past the man I was greeting to see the approach of a rather critical relative. A minute later, she faced me with me both barrels. 

 

"Great sermon, Pastor Burkes." She paused long enough for me to believe this was a compliment.

 

Then she said, "But where was Norris?"

 

My brain processed her coded comment for two seconds. I didn't need a cereal box deciphering ring to understand her meaning.

 

I'd wrapped myself in my pastoral role, insulated from anguish. I'd shown up as Pastor Burkes, but locked Norris in the grief closet.

 

What kind of witness had I really proclaimed? To my critic, it seemed as though my father's death transformed me into Smiling Joe Evangelist. I'd consumed a highly toxic dose of denial trying to convince myself that I was wrong to grieve.

 

Three months later I took my critic's comments into my first job as a hospital chaplain. Soon they became part of a maturing wisdom I shared with patients and family. "When bad things happen" I told them, "God will give you strength, but he will also give tears in equal measure."

 

While 1 Thessalonians 4:13 cautions people of faith to not carry on as "those who have no hope," Eccl 3:4 gives counterbalance, saying "there is a time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance."

 

Which is to say, God sustains us with resilience by baptizing us in our mourning. But in the end, "he has made everything beautiful in its time." Eccl 3:11

 

By the way, if you've read my past columns, you'll know that the time to laugh comes at the same time I begin to dance.

 

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Contact Chaplain Norris at comment@thechaplain.net or 10556 Combie Rd. Suite 6643 Auburn, CA 95602 or voicemail (843) 608-9715.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Column for syndication for third weekend November 2021

A Cry for Help Saves Pastor's Life

 

I met Pastor Terry Lawrence so long ago that I'm certain I haven't properly recalled his name, but his story is worth retelling.

 

During the summer of 1979, I served as a summer missionary for the Southern Baptist churches in Northern Nevada. I was one of hundreds of college students working nationwide, helping churches conduct Bible schools and summer youth camps.

 

Each missionary stayed within a region of churches, changing locations each week until he'd worked in a dozen churches. Most pastors hoped their missionary would be an ambitious college kid who could reenergize their youth group.

 

The pastors shared a pun amongst themselves to rate the energy of these workers –  "Summer Missionaries –  and some-r-not."

 

I was more the "not" kind.

 

Sometime in midsummer, I was assigned to Lawrence's church. The pastor was a slight, lanky man, prematurely bald, whose matter-of-fact way of speaking rang like the gospel truth.

 

After Sunday service, we sat down in his office where he outlined my upcoming week. Partway through, he noticed the drift in my love-lost eyes and asked what was on my mind.

 

So, I dropped my missionary pretense and admitted that I was homesick and pining over a lost girlfriend while trying to rekindle another. I described a depression that was keeping me out of the helping mood.

 

"It's true," he said, "we won't always feel like serving others, but the life you save this week may actually be your own."

 

He had my attention, and this is his story the way I remember it.

 

"Three years ago, I was here in the office, preparing to leave, when a phone call brought me back to the desk. 

 

"The man on the other end of the line said he was planning to kill himself. He asked if I had anything to say that would change his mind."

 

I leaned into Lawrence. "What did you say?"

 

"I said, "Go ahead."

 

"What?" I leaned back. "No way!"

 

"Yup. I told him, 'Go ahead. I'm fixing to do the same thing myself.'"

 

Then Lawrence told me how he had planned to leave his office that day and kill himself in a deserted location. He'd given away his library. He'd written the note and loaded the gun. He "meant business."

 

When his caller went silent, Lawrence asserted control of the dead-air space by reversing the caller's question. He asked the man to suggest reasons why the pastor shouldn't kill himself. 

 

Miraculously, the stunned man actually listed a few.

 

"People need you," he said.

 

"Who, for instance?" Lawrence asked.

 

"People like me," said the caller.

 

"What about your parents?" the pastor asked. "Don't they need you?" 

 

For an hour, the two kept swapping reasons the other shouldn't kill himself, until eventually, they both made an anti-suicide pact.

 

"See what happened there?" Lawrence asked.

 

"Umm, kinda," I said.

 

"Look, kid. I doubt your love life is edging you toward suicide, so I need you to see how recommitting to helping others with their problems helped me discover a way to work through my own."

 

Today, after forty years in ministry, I've come to "see what happened there" in that dusty Nevada office.

 

Lawrence's talk was steering me away from that cliché thinking that seeks to reduce the size of your problems by comparing yourself to someone in a worse situation.

 

He was telling me that we aren't so much broken people as we are interconnected broken people. In other words, there is scant help for those unwilling to help others.

 

Christian scripture puts it succinctly in Luke 6:38: "Give away your life; you'll find life given back, but not merely given back—given back with bonus and blessing. Giving, not getting, is the way. Generosity begets generosity" (The Message Translation).

 

By the way, that girlfriend I was trying to reconnect with was my wife, Becky. See what happened there?

 

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Give back by joining my volunteers in Honduras next year. See https://chispaproject.org/volunteertrip. Contact Chaplain Norris at comment@thechaplain.net or 10556 Combie Rd. Suite 6643 Auburn, CA 95602 or voicemail (843) 608-9715.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Column for syndication for second weekend November 2021

Lord, Help Me Want-to-Want

 

"Full disclosure," my wife often tells our dinner guests. "Be careful what you say, or you may wind up in Norris' next column."

 

It's a fair warning. Unfortunately, the stocking crew at my local grocery store didn't get that memo.

 

Last week, I was shopping the refrigerated aisle of our community market for chocolate milk. As I was trying to decide between low fat and full strength, two chatty clerks banged their way through the stock room's swinging doors pushing a cart full of goods.

 

After jumping aside, I immediately began taking notes.

 

Stocker 1: My wife is constantly complaining about how I don't pick up my laundry. I told her, if you want me to pick it up, just tell me and I will.

 

Stocker 2: Right. No problem. You aren't a mind reader. Why can't women just tell us what they want.

 

Stocker 1: Well, she thinks it's a problem. She says, "Sure, you'll pick it up if I ask you to. But what I really need is for you to want to want to pick it up."

 

(No, editors, he didn't stutter. No misprint.)

 

Stocker 2:  What? That makes no sense.

 

Stocker 1: Yeah. She said, "want to want to." I'm in trouble because I didn't pick it up. Now I'm in trouble because she doesn't think I want to pick things up.

 

The man's impersonation of his wife was so good I could nearly hear her myself. 

 

Wife: Honey, I'm so glad that you're willing to pick up your socks when I tell you. But I need you to be the man who has a burning desire to pick up his socks.

 

Funny, but the woman's voice sounded a lot like my wife, Becky.

 

But I get it.

 

For instance, I want Becky to understand the difference between WIFI and internet, but that's not likely to happen this side of heaven. She wishes I could "want to want" to keep my collars straight. While we've seen slight improvements in each other, these shortcomings may be here to stay.

 

If I'd had the opportunity to talk to the man's wife, I might have mentioned that sometimes we have to forgive one another's little trespasses.

 

And on that subject, his wife was demonstrating some insight. The key to forgiveness starts with her "want-to-want-to" concept. Sometimes, all we can pray is, Lord, help me be "willing to be willing" to forgive someone.

 

If I had been given the opportunity to talk to the man and his wife together, I would of course say, "You need to change for yourself and not for others."

 

Beyond that, it's fair to say that the woman also saw her husband's potential to be someone more than he was.  And she needed him to have the desire to be that person and to make a lasting change rather than merely picking up socks for this single occasion.

 

Becky and I are not far from our 42nd wedding anniversary. During those 42 years we've always settled our disagreements and never spent the night apart in anger. But more importantly – and I think this was the wife's point – we strive to be the kind of person the other believes we can be.

 

Of course, I wasn't privy to the whole conversation, but I heard a lot of hope in that snippet. The man was trying to talk it out with a friend. He seemed willing to try to change. Willingness to try is the first step toward wanting to be different.

 

Now, it seems, my wife wants me to make one more change. "Stop writing about our dinner guests. I want them to come back."

 

"Hmm," I said. "I'll get back to you on that."

 

Translation – I don't want to want to do that.

 

 

 

To read past columns or buy Norris' book "Thriving Beyond Surviving," visit www.thechaplain.net. Contact Norris at comment@thechaplain.net or 10556 Combie Rd. Suite 6643 Auburn, CA 95602 or voicemail (843) 608-9715. Twitter @chaplain.

 

 

 

 

Column for syndication for first weekend November 2021

What Are Our Veterans Thinking?

 

In the last few months, several people have asked me how veterans feel about the sudden pullout of troops in Afghanistan.

 

Honestly, I'm not sure. I do know that sometimes we can do the right thing for the right reasons, but it will never feel okay.

 

So, on a more helpful note, I do know of five things that most vets would like you to know. They are things they shared with pollsters in 2011 when the Pew Research Center polled 2,500 vets and 2,000 civilians.

• First, most of us would have you know we don't like war. Yes, we train for it, practice it, and do it well, but we don't like it. We know better than any legislator that war involves battle and as Col. Dave Hackworth said, "War is hell, but actual combat is a …." (Because this is a chaplain's column, let's just say, combat is much worse.)

 

We hate war because we value our lives as well as those who serve with us. I suppose that's why more than one-third of vets returning from Iraq and Afghanistan expressed ambivalence over whether either war was worth the cost. Hence, not sure how we feel about leaving any battlefield unfinished.

 

We should be clear to all potential foes that while we never seek a fight, neither will we cower from one. You can count on the fact that we will go where we are sent and we will even go again.

 

• Sometimes we feel alone. The war on terror was the longest period of sustained conflict in our nation's history. Yet only one-half of 1 percent of Americans have served on active-duty since Sept. 11. In some sense, our minority status leaves us feeling like paid mercenaries – and everyone knows mercenaries are expendable.

 

I guess that explains why the survey reported that 84 percent of vets believe civilians don't understand our problems and 83 percent of surveyed civilians agreed with that assessment.

 

• It's nice that three-quarters of Americans say they have thanked someone in the military, but some of us are starting to feel over-thanked.

 

To a person, most vets will say, "Thank us, but please don't worship or pity us." The draft ended 40 years ago, so most of us chose to enlist. With that enlistment, we've enjoyed pretty good pay and benefits for our sacrifices.

 

• We aren't all crazy with PTSD. While the survey says that four in 10 vets say they've had a hard time adjusting, and 37 percent report post-traumatic stress, that doesn't mean we are unable to cope. Yes, we do carry some baggage, and that baggage may have shifted during our long flight home, but we are learning to reintegrate into our civilian roles.

 

• In fact, most of us are doing fine. The large majority of us returned without getting shot at or losing our friends to IEDs. And even those who did see such carnage have returned to civilian life without debilitating or permanent damage.

 

I'd even venture to say that most of us are doing better than okay. A majority of the post-Sept. 11 veterans in the poll say that the military matured them with self-confidence. So, if you'll excuse a prideful boast, vets tend to believe that training and experience has given us a leg up on most civilians. And that, I believe, is as you caringly intended it to be.

 

So, this Veterans Day, bring your family together for a well-deserved day off. Go to a movie. Have a barbeque. But please don't forget to go to the parade, because in the words of Will Rogers, "We can't all be heroes. Somebody has to sit on the curb and clap as they go by."

 

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Contact Chaplain Norris at comment@thechaplain.net or 10556 Combie Rd. Suite 6643 Auburn, CA 95602 or voicemail (843) 608-9715.