Easter Eggs

It's that time of year again. Here on N. Wintzell we're preparing for Easter Sunday, and I hope that it will be a good one, as we celebrate the Resurrection. This Saturday, we'll be hosting an Easter Egg Hunt at 10:30, and we'd love for you and your children to come out and be a part of it. A lot's changed since I hunted Easter eggs. Back in the good old days, we actually dyed chicken eggs. Instead of being stuffed with candy or *gasp* money, they were stuffed with hard-boiled egg yolks and whites. As a non-egg eater, there's nothing particularly appealing about finding these kinds of eggs, other than the thrill of victory and the opportunity to throw rotten eggs at each other down the road.

Regardless, Easter's a special time of year, filled with its own traditions, including making your children wear matching clothes. Mama made us wear matching clothes and now we're passing on the tradition to our kids. There's a picture out there with me in a Kelly Green sports coat from 1989 that I hope never sees the light of day. To share in the fun, my boy will be in orange plaid shorts this year. For those of us privileged enough to be of a certain age and to have been raised in this little patch of Alabama, we had the opportunity to share in one particularly fine Easter tradition. All over the world, children will get Easter baskets on the big morning, but for many of us, those Easter baskets came from my Aunt Gernes' store, Landry Dry Goods.

If you never had the opportunity to shop with Aunt Gernes, your life is poorer for it. The store had a little bit of everything and nothing was ever thrown away. Books could be filled with the stories of people who searched all over only to find what they were looking for at Landry Dry Goods. During this time of year, the shelves would fill with Easter baskets, and as a child, I knew that candy time was just around the corner. At the register, there would be a small box filled with a candy treat, appropriate for the season, the Cadbury Creme Egg. You know the ones I'm talking about. Every trip to Aunt Gernes' would find me begging Mom for one of those eggs. I'd seen the commercials and knew about the chocolate shell and the promise of rich, creamy goodness on the inside.



Occasionally she cracked and bought me one. What a let down. Cadbury Creme Eggs wrote the book on overpromising and underdelivering. It all seems so right, but when the fateful moment comes, the reality is that those Cadburys just aren't very good. A lot of water has passed under the bridge since those days and Aunt Gernes and the store are gone, but I haven't changed all that much. Just last week I found myself at CVS and saw a bin full of those eggs. I just had to try one, to see if I'd like them any better now. They taste just like they did last year, and the year before as well. They never fail to disappoint. Just thinking about those Cadbury eggs is downright depressing,

Thankfully, those Easter baskets had something better in them:


Behold! The perfect Easter candy.

Year in and year out, my baskets would have those old Elmer's Heavenly Hash eggs in them. No commercials, no quacking rabbits, just candy goodness. They never let me down. They're dependable. I've learned to trust them. No matter how many I have, I always want more. No substitute will work: I need Heavenly Hash.

This year at Easter, we're offered many substitutes for the Resurrection. We're invited to believe in a god who is heaven's wishgranter and a Jesus who is little more than a wandering prophet who said nice things and made people happy. A Jesus whose greatest desire is that all those who follow will engage in self-actualization and be healthy, wealthy, and wise. We can go to church on that Sunday and hear again the message of the Cross and the hope of the Resurrection and walk away from it to the comforting embrace of old habits and a life without faith that calls us to "come follow me".

But it wouldn't be very tasty. It's a faith that overpromises and underdelivers. Its the Cadbury Creme egg of beliefs. I don't want it. I'm tempted by it and occasionally I find myself desiring it, but I know that it won't deliver. Give me the Son of God sacrificed on a cross, bearing my sin. Give me a risen savior who calls me to forsake all to come after Him. Give me someone who has loved me with a steadfast love beyond my own understanding.

And give me another Heavenly Hash egg.

That's what I'm ready for, here on N. Wintzell

Praying for Japan

So, it's been awhile since I last updated the blog here on N. Wintzell. I hope that this writing finds all of you well. A few things have changed around the world since I last wrote. Unrest in the Middle East, rising gas prices, and now an earthquake in Japan have a lot of folks on edge. The unrest in the Middle East is all too familiar a phenomenon to cause me too much anxiety. Gas prices hit my wallet, but I made a decision about those several years back. In the wake of Katrina, with my wife 8 months pregnant, I found myself struggling to get life back to normal. If you live here on the coast, you probably remember what I'm talking about. Thankfully, we suffered no significant damage and we got power back in a relatively short amount of time. My one outstanding memory of that time was the gas shortage. I can remember driving all over the county to try to find gas and coming up empty, or hearing a rumor that a local station was going to get gas and sitting in line for hours waiting on the truck. During one of those waits, I promised God that as long as it was readily available, I wouldn't complain about the cost. So far, so good.

When I heard the news last week about the unfolding events taking place in Japan, my heart broke. Back in the Winter of 2003, I had the opportunity to travel to Japan as part of a team from the University of Mobile and it was an experience I'll never forget. From the view of Mt. Fuji, to the drive under and across Tokyo Harbor, to our visit to the Imperial palace, I was awed by what I saw there. In our work with the churches in Tokyo and Yokohama, I was blessed by the warmth of our brothers and sisters as we shared with each other. One of my favorite memories of the trip was the opportunity to preach at a New Year's Eve service for one of the local churches. For a kid from the Bayou, the chance to encourage these believers was the opportunity of a lifetime and an honor that I'll cherish forever.

I've not returned to Japan, but it's a nation that has often been on my mind. I loved my experience there and considered returning for a short-term period of service. As I watch the news and see the devastation this beautiful country is experiencing, I weep for the people of Japan. I think about those folks who are left to pick up the pieces as the news appears to grow bleaker every day with financial peril, nuclear danger, and other problems arise. I'm grateful for people who are on the scene responding to the needs. I'm a proud patriot and while I don't love everything about my country and its policies, I'm blessed when I see our people, privately and publicly respond to the needs of other nations.

Often, I hear people parroting a few familiar phrases: "We've got enough hurting people in America, we just need to take care of our own" and "I bet nobody else would come help us if that had happened in the U.S." To the former: we do have hurting people in our country, but very few of us are facing the kind of destruction that the folks we've helped are. Remember that gas crisis that I mentioned earlier? To hear people talk you would think that $.50/ gallon was going to cause all of us to starve to death. Here's the reality: the vast majority of us will rest our head in a warm bed tonight with a full belly. We may have to cut back on vacation time or have a few pots of lima beans instead of ribeyes, but we'll be ok. Very few of us in our nation, particularly those of us under 70, have any real idea what it means to suffer total loss. Many of the folks that I hear say this are doing quite well. I hope that they're dedicating their resources to helping our local folks that are in need.

To the latter statement: Thank God! Thank God that we have the privilege to live in a nation that's chosen not to be just like all the rest. I'm reminded of the repeated conflict between the Lord and Israel in the Old Testament. What does Israel want? Whether through its idolatry, injustice, or it choice of king, Israel just wants to be like every other nation. At the same time, the Lord is constantly calling Israel out to be a people separate from the nations of the world. He wants them to be a peculiar people that He uses to show the world His glory. We're not Israel, nor do we have its place in the history of redemption, but I hope that we always seek to be a nation that is willing to share the blessings of life, love, and liberty with those who are in need. I'm praying for Japan, as I know so many of you are. What else can we do? God help us to be willing to go the extra mile to be a help to the hurting.

That's my view, anyway, from here on N. Wintzell.

A Fish Tale

If you're from the Bayou, you're probably familiar with these guys...

My son is officially a Bayou La Batrian now. This past weekend was relatively quiet on our little plot of N. Wintzell. My eldest spent the weekend away with my in-laws at the Cheersport national competition in Atlanta. Needless to say, the absence of his favorite playmate left Joseph more than a little bummed out. To attempt to balance things out a little bit, we tried to do some things that he wanted to do over the weekend. For some time now, Joseph has been wanting to go fishing. He loves seeing the fish when his Pop and I catch them and he loves to pretend fish so, first up, we took a fishing trip.

Friday afternoon, Joseph and I headed to the Bayou with a light, our rods, and a little bit of squid en route to our first father-son fishing trip. If any of you have ever fished with an almost 3 year-old you know what an adventure this can be. (Protective eyewear should be worn at all times when fishing with an almost 3 year-old) He and I had different goals for the fishing trip. When asked what he hoped to catch, Joseph replied "like a thousand sharks". Needless to say, this was not my plan. I hoped to catch something that would require as little effort as possible and be insignificant enough not to feel bad about throwing back. So, with that in mind, we went to work with little success. By little success, I mean "not so much as a single bite". After moving locations a few times around the shipyard, I made an executive decision to set up a light and take a break until dark. We made a bug juice/Coca-Cola run to the Raceway and waited on night to fall.

By the time we made it back to the yard, it was good and dark and the light was beginning to attract some minnows to the top of the water. We were ready to try it again. Almost immediately, I felt a tug at my line and I knew that I had hooked something small. My catch? A croaker. (For any of my out of town readers, check out the picture above) I cast again and over the next few minutes Joseph and I caught 3 croakers. They were perfect. He got to help reel them in, they were biting pretty quickly, and I had no desire to keep them.

Joseph was quite excited by the catch, but after nearly 3 hours of fishing, he was about ready to call it a night. I started to gather our things to head home, when he stopped me and said "Thank you Daddy, for letting me come along with you". It hit me then that he didn't know what I was doing. He had no idea that the trip was for him. I wasn't going fishing that night for me, but I was doing it for him. I was being intentional about blessing him, but he was just happy for the chance to be with me.

How often do we miss it? Maybe they don't come everyday, but our lives are full of opportunities to give people the greatest gift we have- time. Moms and Dads, Grandmas and Grandpas, and even you kids out there. Don't miss the chance to spend some time with those that you love. It doesn't have to be anything that special. You can just go catch a few croakers down on the bayou. Just do it together.

That's the view around here, on N. Wintzell.

A Lesson Learned (Hopefully)

As a parent, it's amazing the things that I learn through watching my children. The farther I go along the more I recognize that the basic problems of humanity don't discriminate by age. Last week on N. Wintzell, I had just such an experience. My son, Joseph, is getting ready for his third birthday this month, but in the meantime, he's still stuck in the terrible twos. Because as soon as they turn three kids don't have anymore problems, right? Overall, he's a pretty easy kid. He responds well to discipline and is pretty good about following directions. Occasionally, however, his temper gets the best of him and last week he learned a hard lesson about the cost of anger.


Christmas 2011

The toy pictured above was one of my son's favorite Christmas presents. It's a VTech Mobigo and I have to say, we've come a long way from the Tiger electronic games we had when I was a kid. It's a pretty impressive setup with some quality educational games. Joseph loves this toy. I'd find him in bed underneath the covers playing it while he pretended to sleep. It included a Toy Story 3 game, and as Woody and Buzz are two of his favorite characters, the Mobigo and Joseph were a perfect match.

All of that changed last week. Joseph was having a two year-old moment. I gave him an instruction to follow. He refused. I repeated the instruction. He got angry. I repeated the instruction again, with defined consequences for his inaction. Then the fateful moment came, he spiked the Mobigo. (As a sidebar, throwing things in anger is a grand family tradition. We never throw things at anybody, we just chunk whatever is handy. There are probably thousands of dollars worth of wrenches and hammers in the bayou around Landry Boatworks. Once, I even managed to toss a Yazoo pushmower.) Oddly enough, those things weren't intended for that type of use.

The favorite toy is now broken and Joseph is dealing with the consequences of his actions. I hate life lessons. Every now and then, Joseph goes and picks up the Mobigo and wonders what it would be like if it still worked. Watching him, it breaks my heart for him. I wonder if this is how God feels when he looks down at me and watches me deal with the consequences of my own actions?

The Bible has a lot to say about anger, and very little of it is positive. While there is an appropriate type of righteous anger, I believe that it is the exception and not the rule. I'm reminded of Paul's words on the matter:

26 Be angry and do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger, 27 and give no opportunity to the devil. 31 Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice.

Ephesians 4:26-27;31

For everyone of us, we can probably look back to some person, some thing, some organization, or some relationship that we have helped to break as we have acted on our anger. Let's take care that our lives aren't dominated by anger. Otherwise, there will be lots of broken pieces to sift through. When anger controls us, ultimately, the person we destroy is our self.

Of the 7 deadly sins, anger is possibly the most fun. To lick your wounds, to smack your lips over grievances long past, to roll over your tongue the prospect of bitter confrontations still to come, to savor to the last toothsome morsel both the pain you are given and the pain you are giving back--in many ways it is a feast fit for a king. The chief drawback is that what you are wolfing down is yourself. The skeleton at the feast is you.

-Frederick Buechner

That's the lesson for the day, from my spot here on N. Wintzell

Clean Hands?

Greetings from N. Wintzell! Last week was a good week around the church, and I look forward to see what the next week holds. If any of you out there grew up in a country church, you know that last night was an important time in the life of our church, as well as many others. January 30th was the fifth Sunday of the month and fifth Sundays mean Sunday night singin'. We had two special guests on tap for our singing last night, but unfortunately both fell through at the last minute. So, at the zero hour we made plans to fill in with some of our own talent and I prepared a brief devotion to go along with the music.

In preparing for the devotion, I visited one of my favorite passages from the Psalms.

3 Who shall ascend the hill of the LORD?
And who shall stand in his holy place?
4 He who has clean hands and a pure heart,
who does not lift up his soul to what is false
and does not swear deceitfully.
5He will receive blessing from the LORD
and righteousness from the God of his salvation.
6Such is the generation of those who seek him,
who seek the face of the God of Jacob.
Selah

Psalm 24:3-6

As I've shared on here several times before, my first real job was working for my Dad over at Landry Boatworks. If you've ever worked on or around boats, you know that it can be dirty work. I hate trying to anything with dirty hands. Through the course of the day, as my hands got dirtier, I would do what came naturally to me: I'd wipe my hands off on the most convenient spot. Within a few hours of being on the job, I'd be completely filthy, whether my particular job was that dirty or not, because I had wiped my filthy hands all over my shirt and blue jeans to try to get them clean. While it removed some of the grime from my hands, the overall effect wasn't too pleasing. In fact, the harder I worked at cleaning myself up, the worse shape I got in. No matter how hard I tried, I just got dirtier.

I discovered along the way, that the only way to really get clean was to go wash my hands. I needed some outside intervention. The reality was that it was impossible for me to have clean hands without some help. My efforts to wipe them clean only made the situation worse.

I'm convinced that many of us are going through our spiritual lives with the same problem. We carry with us the guilt of sin and rebellion and rather than choosing to clean our hands we try to wipe them off on our pants. The baggage grows heavier and we find ourselves spiritually, physically, and emotionally broken down by the weight that we are carrying, and no matter what we do, the situation only grows worse. Some try to ease the pain through substance abuse, intimacy, or even isolation. Some try to absolve themselves through church participation or volunteerism. But at the end of the day, they never find peace.

How can a man stand before God with clean hands? Is it through perfect sinlessness? None of us could achieve that. I believe that we find the answer in God's call to confession. As we admit our failures to God, our hands are cleaned and we receive the freedom to walk in fellowship with Him. Folks, God's a forgiving God and His desire is for His children to walk in the light of that grace. He doesn't want a bunch of servants walking around with filthy hands. John reminds us:

If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us of all unrighteousness.

1 John 1:9

Here on N. Wintzell, I'm resolved to be a man of clean hands.

Welcome Home!

Welcome home, indeed.

Lest you think that the picture is somehow mistaken, it is related to this blog post.

I like going to Disney World. A lot. A lot more than most any other grown man I know would willingly admit. I've been there a few times. OK, maybe more than a few times. When I was a kid, we went there on vacation. A lot. Every year, my parents would try to get us to broaden our horizons and my sister and I would beg for another trip to the World.

Since I've made the transition from son to husband and father, the affliction has only grown worse. Walt Disney World has a strong pull on me that fills me with a sense of nostalgia for attractions long extinct and trips long past. When I'm there, it's 1986 all over again and I have just won a lighted 15th anniversary visor. Sadly, my Google image search for this visor failed to bring you a visual. The World is not only a place that connects me to my roots, but it's a place that I enjoy sharing with my wife and children. I'll never forget taking Maggie on her second trip in 2008, the first one where she was really aware of what was going on. We arrived at the Magic Kingdom, and as we began our trip down Main Street, U.S.A. I knelt down beside her and pointed to Cinderella Castle across the Plaza. As she caught sight of it, she put her arm around my neck, gasped, and told me, "Daddy, it's beautiful." No squeal of delight or dance of joy, just an awe-filled sense of wonder at what she was seeing: a fairy-tale land come to life.

At my core, I'm an EPCOT Center geek. You see that silver golf ball and I see Buckminster Fuller's geodesic sphere realized in its fullest form. Inside, the history of human communication is unfolded in a narrative inspired by Ray Bradbury. While the park has changed quite a bit since its heyday in the 80's, its still my favorite. My fandom runs deep. Thanks to the wonders of the Internet (thanks Al!) I found out there were others like me. Through podcasts, forums, and blogs, we share our fandom. We have our own language where we talk about ADR's, touring plans, and Tonga Toast. We distinguish EPCOT Center from Epcot. We participate in endless debates about the relative quality of current attractions versus their earlier incarnations, but at the end of the day, we share a common love.

In case you needed some quality 80's cheese today

I think the genius of what the resort offers can be summed up in the phrase I hear every time I check into a WDW resort. As I walk up to the counter and begin the check-in process, the person behind the desk will inevitably tell me the same thing they always do, "Welcome home, Mr. Landry". It's not my home, but it conveys to those of us who love it a sense of belonging and longing that can only be called homesickness.

When I'm not in WDW, it's usually not far from my thoughts. I have an app on my phone, just in case I need to know what the wait is for Space Mountain today. I read blogs and forums, and listen to podcasts about my favorite vacation destination. I'm always scheming how I can get back down there. It is present in my thoughts at all times and often dictates the decisions that I make in my daily life. In fact, it affects every decision of my life!

OK, maybe I'm exaggerating a bit. But when I think about the love that I have for my home away from home, I'm reminded of the desire that I should have as a believer for the homeland that I'll be going to soon. Faithful Abraham lived with that homeland in mind:

13 These all died in faith, not having received the things promised, but having seen them and greeted them from afar, and having acknowledged that they were strangers and exiles on the earth. 14 For people who speak thus make it clear that they are seeking a homeland. 15 If they had been thinking of that land from which they had gone out, they would have had opportunity to return. 16 But as it is, they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared for them a city.

Hebrews 11:13-16

What my life look like if heaven were at the forefront of my life and its daily activities? I have a homeland that I look forward to going to, but I forget about it sometimes. In my current Sunday night series, we've spent a lot of time talking about heaven, and I'd venture that in the past few months I've spent more time looking at heaven than in the rest of my ministry combined. Unfortunately, I too often live and act as though this earth is all that there is. What about you? Where do you call home? Are you ready to go there? Do you live as though you are planning on going there? Is your aim heavenward? I'm reminded of this quote from C.S. Lewis:

Aim at Heaven and you will get Earth thrown in. Aim at Earth and you get neither.

What are you aiming for?

Found!

Well, after several weeks on radio silence here on N. Wintzell, I've emerged from hiding to update the blog. Actually, I haven't been hiding, I've just been incredibly busy. In the wake of the holidays, I spent most of my free time preparing for a seminar that kept me in New Orleans most of last week.

If you're like me, you often question why you do what you do. Several times over the past few weeks when I found myself up late working on another book review or paper, I wondered why in the world I was back in school. My 20's are in their death throes now. I'm married with 3 preschoolers. I've started a new ministry and now I was making preparations to travel to New Orleans to sit in 24 hours of class.

On the way home from the seminar, I had no doubt I was doing the right thing. I was challenged by the books that we read and I gained insight from my instructors that I'm sure will be helpful in my ministry, but the greatest joy that came out of my class was the relationships built with my classmates. I came away from the experience encouraged, challenged, and looking forward to the next seminar. The Proverbs remind us "As iron sharpens iron, so let one man sharpen another" and I experienced that through the fellowship I enjoyed with these brothers in ministry.

So, now after a week of playing catch-up, I hope to be able to update the blog more regularly in the weeks ahead. So far, my new year is off to a good start, and I hope yours is as well. If you're looking for a church home, come by and check us out at First Baptist, Bayou La Batre, conveniently located at 13500 N. Wintzell. On Sunday mornings we're looking at some things we can do to make 2011 as good a year as possible, so come out and be our guest this Sunday at 11am!