Today is a revisit of a “Christmas Classic” from last season. How does a blog become a classic? 1) It is your blog, your site, you pay the server charge and you can call it whatever you want2) You have no time to write today So here is a gently read post from Christmas past… One of my contributions with this modest little blog is to continually ask the tough questions. While listening to  “Away in a Manger” at a Christmas program my inquiring mind kicked in. You likely know verse three of the song. The cattle are lowingThe poor Baby wakesBut little Lord JesusNo crying He makes As I listened an important series of difficult and probing inquiries popped into my head. What noise, exactly, were the cattle making when they started lowing? Was this normal cow talk? Did lowing just sound better than mooing in the lyric or is lowing a more spiritual cow sound? And then the most important question came to mind…what is
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I suppose the reader’s bar is set pretty low when you visit a site entitled “Confessions of a Bad Christian”. So I don’t imagine you will be at all surprised to learn that I love the comic strip Pearls Before Swine. And that my favorite character is a mean, cynical, self-centered rodent named Rat. I love Rat because he exposes the dark side that the rest of us try to whitewash and hide. Today’s strip was classic. Rat is talking to his porcine pal named, surprisingly, Pig. Creator/Strip Writer Stephen Pastis didn’t agonize over character names. The cynical Rat has decided to make two lists and everyone in the world will be slotted onto one list or the other. List number one is called “People I don’t like” and the other list is “People I can’t stand”. The sensitive and caring Pig immediately sees the hopelessness and cynicism in such categorizations. “Oh, That’s very cynical Rat…you need to make a third list of people
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Our lives changed forever on D-Day of 2006. Diagnosis day was March 20th of this year and that day seems like it was years ago. It is hard to fathom that in real time it has not quite been nine months since we found out about Joni’s breast cancer. My wife’s recent post made me realize how much our perspective has changed in those nine months. Joni was sharing one of the most exciting developments in her cancer journey. The headline was typically Joni…to the point. I have eyebrows!!! Chemotherapy patients know the trauma of losing your hair, eyebrows, and eyelashes. Joni’s words reminded me how much we daily take for granted. It amazes me how a simple thing like eyebrows can be so  exciting.  My eyebrows are coming back along with eyelashes and about a half inch of hair on my head.  But it is the eyebrows that excite me the most.  Cancer changes your priorities a bit, doesn’t it? Last
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Last night the lovely Mrs.Burchett and I enjoyed a wonderful night of music with Michael W.Smith, the Dallas Symphony, and hundreds of our closest friends. Michael’s Christmas Time Tour 2006 is fun, inspiring, touching, and glorifying to God. See it if you have a chance. Michael W.Smith has more musical talent in one hair follicle than I have in my entire body. And I confess that I entertained a bit of envy in the early part of the concert. I always wanted to be a musician but I just didn’t want to commit to that whole practice and hard work thing. Right after I moved past my talent deficit envy I happened to notice, really notice, something that happens at every concert. At the end of a stirring song a stagehand quietly and efficiently moved onto the stage, set up two microphones, and left without fanfare. And it occurred to me that his small role in this gigantic production was
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Next week will be a fun week of reminiscing as the TV Land cable channel unveils their list of the 100 Greatest TV Quotes and Catchphrases. It was nostalgic to review the list and remember my season of life when a particular quote or catchphrase was popular. I don’t have a strong recollection of Joseph Welch telling Senator Joseph McCarthy that “he had no sense of decency”. Perhaps that was of little interest to a fourteen month old baby. And not having a television in the family home might have been another factor. We didn’t join the TV revolution for a couple of years until we were sure it was going to “catch-on”. But I can remember most of the others on this list. I am embarrassed to recall that I quoted many of these on a far too regular basis over the years. But I guess I was not alone.“Danger, Will Robinson” (Robot, “Lost in Space”)“De plane! De plane!” (Tattoo, “Fantasy Island”)“Elizabeth, I’m coming
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Truth can be so annoying. If annoying truth was a Jeopardy category it might look like this… “I’ll take Annoying Truths for $100, Alex.”This famous preacher said,  “Give me five minutes with a person’s checkbook, and I will tell you where their heart is.”“Who is Billy Graham? I’ll take Annoying Truths for $200, Alex.”This missionary to India said, “You can give without loving. But you cannot love without giving.” “Who was Amy Carmichael, Alex. I am getting very uncomfortable with this topic so let’s take “Sins that make you worse than me for $100.” Money is an uncomfortable topic for followers of Jesus. One anonymous writer noted that a lot of people are willing to give God the credit, but not too many are willing to give Him the cash. Twenty-six years ago a man in Kansas City made a choice to give away the cash. It was a choice that changed his life and the lives of thousands more. The Associated Press reported that for
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Regular readers of these ramblings know that my bride is in the midst of a battle with breast cancer. For the last eight months that unwanted and unexpected foe has rearranged our lives around doctors, hospitals, chemo days, and radiation days. Joni’s prognosis is good. The love and outpouring of prayers and well wishes from many of you has been amazing and uplifting. More than you will ever know. Joni has just over a week of radiation left and then several months of a targeted chemotherapy drug. That will be administered every three weeks so at least our schedule has a chance to return to some semblance of normalcy. Yesterday was another day at the chemotherapy infusion room that Joni and I call the Slow Drip Spa. It is a place that has administered “treatments” to me as I watch Joni receive her infusions. I get regular infusions of perspective into my self-centered veins and heart. I watch people display courage and
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