BigJolly says…..

it was an exceptional weekend. Had a great time practicing with BT and it was fun being up there with him yesterday. Even got him a job filling in for the regular pianist next Sunday! What an agent I am. He should sign an exclusive contract with me.

Class was very good, the guys were many and the discussion lively. Managed to avoid political talk and focus on the Word. It’s fun to see guy’s faces when they are confronted with truth.

Spent most of yesterday afternoon cleaning the pool under the bright blue sunny sky! How about that? And the sunset was most incredible, it’s just awesome sometimes.

And so here I am, ready for another week. May all I do glorify God.

more than the corruption of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Time and time again we see the pure gospel infiltrated by one thing or another and few people are courageous enough to say hold up, this is wrong.

In yet another example of Christians corrupting the gospel, we have the partnering of the NAE with a group of scientists (both of the faith and atheists) to combat global warming as outlined the the Newsweek article, An Unlikely Alliance. A better title would be An Unholy Alliance. BTW, for anyone not paying attention, this church group is the same one formerly headed up by one Ted Haggard.

So what does it take to partner with someone? Compromise, no? Yes. How’s about this one:

Do you think that God created the Earth?
That’s an interesting question. I feel I’m a deeply religious person. I’m not identified with any particular faith. I actually have an orchard in central Massachusetts, and I spend a lot of time growing fruit, and I feel a very deep reverence for nature. And that reverence, I found, is very deeply shared by my evangelical colleagues in this effort.

In other words, let’s all worship Mother Nature. Fine and dandy by me except for one thing - half of this partnership supposedly worships Jesus Christ.

And why, oh why, would a bunch of intellectuals who think that belief in a deity is some kind of black arts thing, something from the medieval era of history join up with a bunch of guys who (theoretically) believe that God created the earth and that He is involved in earth’s affairs? Well……

Why is it to the scientists’ advantage to have the evangelical population involved?
They’re very well organized, they have a great deal of credibility in the United States and great numbers, and a great deal of influence in many sectors of our society.

In the trailer park speak, that would mean that we can use them. Much the way everyone else uses Christian groups. That is why we cannot and should not form Christian political groups. Groups of like minded citizens who happen to be Christian? Sure. Exclusive groups formed in the name of Christ for political gain? NO! Pastors should use their pulpits and resources to teach the Bible. Nothing less and nothing more.

On one of the blogs I frequent, I asked a question about singles and the church, as in how should the church deal with loneliness? One of the responses I received was: “Get ‘em a puppy….”

I think that so often we as a society and most particularly as The Church, tend to minimize the emotion of loneliness. I wrote a bit about it here and other places but the link in that post to Messy Christian’s post is far more insightful. Another response I received (to the point) was:

Social events is, I think, one half of it. The other would be helping them feel part of the rest of the body of the church. Oh I don’t know, adopt a single. Have a family keep in touch with a single. Invite them over for dinner. See what needs they may have (broken car, dead A/C, whatever). Hey! Show you care, what a concept!Being single is not a disease or a stage in life towards marriage. It is often unrecognized in church as one of the most complicated stages in life. Some have never been married, some have and are now divorced and still others widowed. Some have kids, other never have and still others are empty nester’s.

Loneliness is the toughest issue and belonging comes right along with that. Help them(us) feel part of the church in what ever way you can find and even if it is not a great success you are at least showing you can and that can go a long way, if genuine.

I could feel the emotion come seeping through the words written. And it hit a nerve today as I think of the problems one of the couples in our class is going through and how they are letting the momentum of the moment drive them apart, hurling towards divorce. We often think in the moment but not of the aftereffects. As I’ve been delving into Kris Kristofferson’s song’s the past couple of days, he addresses this phenomenon is his song, Come Sundown:

And it hurts to know it’s over,
For the hurt, lord, has just begun.
’cause this morning, she’s just leavin’,
But, come sundown, she’ll be gone.

Isn’t that what we do? This morning, she’s leaving. Tonight, the loneliness sets in.

Wilson singing Kris Kristofferson’s Sunday Morning Coming Down, just relaxing in the knowledge that God is merciful. Even for me. I was beginning the process of preparing for next Sunday’s class, reading Psalm 139, switched over to Eugene Peterson’s The Message. Man, that ol’ Catholic priest nailed this paraphrase.

God, investigate my life;
get all the facts firsthand.
I’m an open book to you;
even from a distance, you know what I’m thinking.
You know when I leave and when I get back;
I’m never out of your sight.
You know everything I’m going to say
before I start the first sentence.
I look behind me and you’re there,
then up ahead and you’re there, too—
your reassuring presence, coming and going.
This is too much, too wonderful—
I can’t take it all in!

Is there anyplace I can go to avoid your Spirit?
to be out of your sight?
If I climb to the sky, you’re there!
If I go underground, you’re there!
If I flew on morning’s wings
to the far western horizon,
You’d find me in a minute—
you’re already there waiting!
Then I said to myself,
“Oh, he even sees me in the dark!
At night I’m immersed in the light!”
It’s a fact: darkness isn’t dark to you;
night and day, darkness and light,
they’re all the same to you.

Oh yes, you shaped me first inside, then out;
you formed me in my mother’s womb.
I thank you, High God—you’re breathtaking!
Body and soul, I am marvelously made!
I worship in adoration—what a creation!
You know me inside and out,
you know every bone in my body;
You know exactly how I was made, bit by bit,
how I was sculpted from nothing into something.
Like an open book, you watched me grow
from conception to birth;
all the stages of my life were spread out before you,
The days of my life all prepared
before I’d even lived one day.

Your thoughts—how rare, how beautiful!
God, I’ll never comprehend them!
I couldn’t even begin to count them—
any more than I could count the sand of the sea.
Oh, let me rise in the morning and live always with you!
And please, God, do away with wickedness for good!
And you murderers—out of here!—
all the men and women who belittle you, God,
infatuated with cheap god-imitations.
See how I hate those who hate you, God,
see how I loathe all this godless arrogance;
I hate it with pure, unadulterated hatred.
Your enemies are my enemies!

Investigate my life, O God,
find out everything about me;
Cross-examine and test me,
get a clear picture of what I’m about;
See for yourself whether I’ve done anything wrong—
then guide me on the road to eternal life.

Wow. All the fancy preachers in the world can’ touch that. May I be worthy to discuss it.

I still gotta say it was a good Friday. Oops. Not religious Good Friday. Just a “good” Friday!

Although to be perfectly honest, it didn’t start out quite that way. At 5:30 this morning, I’m getting ready to saddle up on the Marauder and I sense something a bit askew with my right foot. You know that feeling when you step and it just doesn’t feel right? Yep, that was me. Seems little dog (senile pound mutt) has decided to, um, deposit something in the garage (okay, so trailers do have garages I guess). And no, it isn’t a welcome deposit, as winning the Lottery would be. Nope, this is one of those in the dark, squishy feelings. You know what I mean. Little dog, its about time you met euthanasia. Arrgh.

Okay, so I recover and head to the plantation. Over it, done with it. Not a bad day at the plantation, all in all. Not much happening, fired up the company grill and seared a couple of poultry breasts. Topped with Grub Rub purchased at the big Canton market. Also finished up the new flag mount pictured earlier.

Flag mount. Yeah. So, after leaving the plantation, I’m fueling up the Marauder and get a call from the plantation, never a good thing, right? Turns out the flag mount didn’t work as well as anticipated and the question on the phone was, hey, um, boss, did you like, um, lose a flag? So’s I look over and yup, no flag. Back to the plantation for a repair, luckily Danny boy found the flag complete with pole and half a mount on the highway. Fixed it up and rode on as they say.

Now the fun starts. Decided to crash the Shakeyfest, otherwise known as a get together of bloggers from headshaker.com. Great time. Got to meet, in person, The Dude (and Mrs. Dude), Hamous, Smacktle, Jimb, Sargevining, Elizabeth, Neocon, Nancy Drew, Emperor Bacchus, EmmeKelley (and son), Daniel James and once again, Southerntragedy. What a fun time, no one even blasted me! How’s about that? Great bunch of folks, enjoyed crashing the party.

Is it really Saturday? Late.

resigns read the headline, at least as it appeared in the Drudgereport. Of course, as with much of the media these days, that’s not quite right. Turns out that Dr. Karla Holloway of Duke actually resigned as head of a committee. Wow, what a leap of faith she has shown her poor, struggling black students. Right.

“The decision by the university to readmit the students, especially just before a critical judicial decision on the case, is a clear use of corporate power, and a breach, I think, of ethical citizenship,” says Dr. Karla Holloway, the William R. Kenan Jr., Professor of English and Professor of Law at Duke. “I could no longer work in good faith with this breach of common trust.”

Oh, really? Or was it because of this:

Professors like Holloway — who had condemned the players — are now facing criticism for prematurely assuming the players’ guilt and, ironically, making racist charges against the White players.

Methinks the latter. I think I’m a fan of this science professor:

“The faculty who publicly savaged the character and reputations of specific men’s lacrosse players last spring should be ashamed of themselves. They should be tarred and feathered, ridden out of town on a rail and removed from the academy,” he wrote.

Perhaps we could convince him to work on some of our two-faced politicians while he’s at it.

plantation today. Used a little time to create a page recalling my Patriot Guard rides. Even got a couple of videos up and running, that took a bit of doing. I think it turned out pretty good, me being the Bigjolly and all. Link on the header above or click here.

Made it to visitation last night even though I really didn’t want to go. Sometimes you have to force yourself to do things you don’ want to do. We had an uneven number, so Pop had to go with someone else and I went by myself. Just as well, he was irritating me about RSu. My visit wasn’t home so it was a short night.

Wasn’t quite as cold riding the Marauder in this morning. I’ve been kinda zombied out the last couple of days, not sure exactly why. As I was riding, it felt like I was in one of those old movie sets where they sit the actor on a stationary motorcycle and film him looking at a movie screen, complete with fans blowing wind over them. Weird. Just not all here right now.

Interesting stuff going on in the blogsphere today about Sen. Dan Patrick. I’m not surprised so many are attacking him on the whole but am somewhat curious as to why so many over at LST are. Just because Dan did what he said he was going to do on his first day instead of kowtowing to the old guard. Good to see he’s still Dan.

Speaking of the blogosphere, there is a fairly interesting group over at Headshaker. Not a family friendly sight, so be warned, the language can get rough and the sexual innuendo can be pretty graphic (I’m convinced that some men never grow out of that pre-pubescent stage of life). Okay, enough of the warning, you are on your own. The thing is, these guys/gals actually discuss real issues and have real differences of opinions, not the typical everyone piling on stuff. They had a great thread about oil prices a couple of days ago, and one about Wal Mart before that. I enjoy lurking there. The proprietor of the blog seems as confused about religion as I can be from time to time.

Okay, there has to be something to do around here. Late.

no scheduled funerals in Texas for American soldiers. Very good news indeed. After 2 funerals in 3 days and 3 funerals in 6 days in the Houston area alone, it is encouraging to see a blank calendar.

Got home well after the sun went down last night and was chilled to the bone. Man, once the darkness sets in the temps really drop quickly. When I made it to the house, SU had dinner prepared and a couple of old friends were there. We had a nice evening, it was really good to see them. RSu is now the pastor of a small church near Dayton and seems truly happy. SU is going to do women’s retreat there in March and I’ll get to do the music. Cool.

JM is going to make his way to the trailer on Thursday to show me his new guitar and amp. I took my Carvin Custom in for a little work last week. Picked it up Friday and it is just as awesome as it used to be. Carvin is about the best value I’ve found in electrics, hard to beat the price/performance. As is the norm for me, mine is butt ugly and goes well with Big Ugly, my beat up 1991 black Taylor 615. I think being ugly adds to the tone.

Rode the Marauder in to work again, although I couldn’t get out of bed when the alarm went off this morning. Slept an extra hour. Light week at work so not a problem.

goes through the mind of a father, mother or sibling as they are sitting inches away from the honor guard folding the flag that has been draped over their loved one’s casket. That was my thought today as I stood in silent respect directly in front of the family. As I marveled at the way the flag was folded, at the precision with which it was done, at the stillness of the moment, I wondered what was going through the minds of the family of Spc. Dustin R. Donica, 22, of Spring, TX.

It was a beautiful day, crisp cool air, bright blue skies and the warming rays of the full sun. Was the dad remembering tossing a ball to Dustin? Or helping him learn to ride a bicycle? Perhaps the first shave. Was the mom remembering the joy of holding her newborn son? Of his first day in Kindergarten? His first date. Was the sister thinking of the laughter shared after the parents went to bed? Of the cake at his birthday party? His call from Iraq.

Another young American hero was put to rest today and once again, ordinary citizens turned out in the hundreds to honor his life and service. Rest in peace, Dustin, and may God bless your family.

in the life of jolly. Where can I start on such a day as this? Perhaps last night, as I was telling 1 that I really didn’t want her to head out on her own today, going away to school again. Yeah, that’s where. But it doesn’t end there.

It’s been a long road for 1. She lost a full year of school because of her illness. Were it not for the local community college allowing her to get back into the life of a student, it would’ve been a year and a half.

I can honestly say that not only does God answer prayer but that He does it His own way, in His own time. And that His way and His time is better than my request. For my request was for 1 to be healed immediately, be back to the same little girl that I sent off to school. But His answer was to heal 1 slowly, through the skill of a young doctor, through the persistence of her mother, through the miracle of modern medicine. It is said that iron sharpens iron and that trial by fire produces gold. Both are accurate in 1’s case.

For as I observed this process, I saw the child as a woman. I saw the doctor as gold. I saw the mother as a rock, willing to do anything to help her child.

Over the last 16 months, the child in my eyes became the woman that her mother raised her to be. Strong. Enduring. Courageous. As far as I know, the only tears of pity she raised were in her bedroom late at night, wondering when the trial would end. She never cursed her illness in front of me. She never questioned “why me?”. And she could have. Most would have. She is the child her mother raised.

But a child no more is she. No, she is the woman she ought to be. The apple of her daddy’s eye is she, the little girl no more to be.

As I played the guitar in class today, asking for prayer requests along the way, I stopped and praised this child of mine, this child that strengthens me. For if I ever sway, I need only to look her way. And there, what will I see? This child, that strengthens me.

I love you.