Serve by Design

I seldom play golf anymore. I used to enjoy getting out on the links with friends. But truth is, I am terrible at the sport! I tend to swing a club like I would a baseball bat. That is not the best way to address a golf ball! I couldn’t play competitive golf because I shank the ball across the whole course and into the rough, bunkers, and any nearby fairways when available! No one can compensate for that much bad technique! I’m tired of yelling, “Fore!” 😊 Visual Credit: NBC News My sorry golf game depends on copious mulligans! These are the extra strokes or “do-overs” allowed by gracious friends who are anxious to move the game along. There are types of mulligans or second chances in many sports outside of golf. Tennis has the second serve after a fault. You can throw a bowling ball a second time to knock down the remaining pins. In basketball, there is the one and one at the foul line, and  you have another chance after a false start  in a competitive swim or track meet when...

Since my teenage years, I have loved to get up early to see the morning sunrise! It started with those 3:30 am wake up calls by my squirrel hunting neighbor, Jim. He was around my dad’s age and served as a mentoring influence to teach me everything about hunting and gun safety. Jim would lightly tap on my window on Saturday mornings to rouse me. I was a light sleeper and would usually be anticipating the prompt. I would quickly get dressed, grab my rifle, and report to the truck. A Sherman Sunrise! We would go to a nearby 24-hour day restaurant for a bowl of cereal and then get into the timber in time to be set and in place when the squirrels began their early cutting of hickory and walnuts. It was always a treat for me to look out on the horizon and see the daylight peeping through the treelined woods. As the moments of sunrise progressed, the light would form into beautiful and brighter layers of purples, blues, oranges, and yellows until the rays were so brilliant I could not look d...

One of my first articles on this blog site has proven to be one of the most popular. To date, there have been nearly 3,000 pageviews of “Uncle Billy Moments!” It features the absent-minded uncle of George Bailey in the beloved seasonal film favorite, It’s a Wonderful Life . I think the reason we are drawn to Uncle Billy is because he represents the failings of so many of us! We see ourselves in him! When iPhone Meets Car Tires! It's Not Pretty! Well, I had another “Uncle Billy Moment” this past week. I don’t know what it says about me (or maybe, I do!), but it seems I am having these moments more frequently lately. I used to pride myself in being able to multi-task, but the ability to juggle multiple tasks simultaneously is getting harder to achieve with age! Last week was an unusually busy time with a doctor appointment, some Serve by Design consulting, church calls, and visits, preparing for a Sunday small group teaching assignment on top of the regular commitments of blog wri...

Have you ever been “gifted” with a very ripe banana? I used to wilt (another related pun idea!) when during my college days, my pastor and future father-in-law, would reach up to the top of his refrigerator and offer me an undesirable banana that had been languishing for days. I wanted him to like me for several reasons. So, when he’d say, “Here Mike, take this home with you!” What was I to say? I’d tuck the little booger in my pocket and say with an insincere mumble, “Sure. Thanks.” Ripening Bananas! freepikcom I’m a little cautious about eating anything labeled as a “genetically modified organism” or GMO for short. But a recent article about what some British scientists are doing with bananas has caught my attention. Now I’m thinking, “Maybe?!” I love bananas on my breakfast cereal, but like many of us, I have trouble managing the basket of bananas before they become so ripe that the only alternative is to make banana bread or pancakes. And I’d rather not add more carbs to my diet! ...

Monique has just completed a two-and-a-half-day stint with a fourth-grade class. She likes the continuity of substituting in the same class consecutively! This assignment was a bit more challenging though. She was required to teach a math-measuring, specifically geometry, exercise using a protractor. During her twenty-two years in the classroom before retirement, she taught her second graders mathematical concepts on many occasions. However, the math that fourth graders are doing these days looks a lot more like what was done in high school back in the day! Image credit: pixabay.com It's a good thing we have a family math expert in one of our daughters who majored in the subject and taught high school math for 14 years. Michelle usually gets a call for assistance when mother is faced with questions about obtuse and acute angles, tangents along with various geometric shapes. As you can imagine, this is quite “above her pay grade” as an elementary school substitute. This time the dau...

“If it wasn’t for bad luck, I’d have no luck at all!" Have you ever tried to console yourself with this saying? My misfortune is that if there is a small nail in the roadway, it will find one of my new tires! If I wash my car, it will rain later in the day, even if it was not forecast. And that leads to another example of bad luck at the wheel. If there is a specimen of “road kill,” anywhere, my car will steer toward it like a heat-seeking missile! Bad luck! Image Credit: istockphoto.com The latest instance of roadway rotten luck happened again today, (I will explain the “again” later.) It was five-thirty in the morning, and I was heading to Vandalia to eat breakfast with my 92-year-old Dad and his oldest grandson (my son, Matt!) at the local eatery. I had just pulled onto the interstate and was momentarily distracted while setting a favorite news-talk station on the radio. As I looked up in the darkness, I thought I saw some raw and bloody roadkill flesh in the headlights. Next t...

This is the season of Lent for churches following the Christian calendar. Our church has been participating in a version of Lent for several years now. There have been times in the past when a guest speaker was invited to lead in revival services for a few days. On most occasions, the pastor has preached special messages on personal renewal to encourage humility, repentance, and selfless service for others during the weeks leading up to Easter. Again this year, we have plans to commemorate the Lord's death on the cross with a Maundy Thursday "Service of Darkness" and observe the Lord's Supper. And of course, we will be rejoicing in the Risen Christ on Easter Sunday morning as worshipers share the Paschal greeting and acclamation, "Christ is risen! He's risen indeed!" These Easter practices are like a spiritual spring cleaning! The "tools" of spring cleaning! My Mother practiced another kind of spring cleaning. It was the literal seasona...