Walk-off Homeruns in Heaven?

I love baseball.  I have always loved baseball.  I still play it at nearly age 52.  In fact, this is the first year in a while other than injury where I have missed playing with my teammates down in Florida.  They are there now.  I play all summer and never get tired of it. 

In watching the World Series, that sixth game was everything that makes baseball great.  It was one of the best games ever despite the fact that there were five errors and lots of sloppy play.  But the backs against the wall comebacks are what makes the game great.  And then in the bottom of the 11th, the ultimate – a walkoff homerun.  The picture of the hero, David Freese coming home after that homerun reflects pure, unbridled joy.  I would love to have some of that kind of joy in Cleveland.

I have a completely different perspective of heaven after reading Randy Alcorn’s book on the topic.  Think of the most incredible joy that you can experience on this earth and then multiply it and you have heaven.  What an injustice that we picture heaven as this big long boring church service.  It is not sacrilegious to think of this kind of joy in heaven.  In fact, it is what God says.  The psalmist says in God’s presence is “fullness of joy” (Psalm 16:11) and that in the courts of the Lord, “we will sing for joy to the living God” (Psalm 84:2).  How cool is that?  I believe some of that joy we will receive will come from accomplishments and as we have responsibilities in heaven.  After all the master put the servant in charge of many things as he enters into the joy of the master (Mat 25:21).  

That joy only is available to those who love God on this earth and believe in his Son as the atoning sacrifice for their sins.  God gives us some semblance of the joy in heaven on this earth and all experience that joy to some degree on this earth.  The birth of a baby, the rush of going down rapids, the walk-off homerun.  But the joy in heaven is discriminatory and will only available to those who appropriate God’s love here and now.  Thanks be for that indescribable joy.

Prevailing in Circumstances

At 12:02 AM early on a Thursday morning, the Boston Red Sox were in first place on their way to another playoff appearance and avoiding it appeared, the worst collapse in baseball history.  At 12:02, Orioles infielder Robert Andino slapped a game winning single against Boston closer Jonathan Papelbon, and three minutes later Tampa Rays Evan Longoria hit a walk-off home run against the Yankees propelling Tampa past Red Sox into the playoffs.  So in three minutes the Red Sox had gone into baseball ignominy. 

Have you considered the fact that your life can change in an instant?  It could be an illness, an accident, a mistake.   Life could throw you a curveball.  I have been reading in the book of Job where unmitigated catastrophe befalls Job and for most of the book, he and his friends try to rationalize it.  But God’s ways are not our ways.  The thing that must stay constant is a deep, abiding relationship with Him.  It comes down to trust and how God can work in our lives.  I heard it this week described as a canvas, a work of art.  I am not a big fan of artwork, but I can appreciate the beauty that is expressed in each work of art.  God’s purposes are trustworthy and can prevail over the bumps that God allows in our lives.

The Mind Keeps Going

We have had horrible weather this year surpassing record rainfall and it is not even November.  So the last two weeks we were unable to blow the leaves off the lawn because it has been raining.  But we had a very nice weekend and so I was able to get out yesterday and rake the leaves.  My iPhone is what keeps me going.  I was out blowing leaves (helped by my beautiful bride) for four hours.  For four hours there was constant repetition – back and forth, back and forth.  Without my iPhone, I would be bored stiff, but with my iPhone, I was kind of in a zone.  I listened to multiple podcasts, a couple of sermons and before you know it the four hours was up.  A friend of hours spends every year driving to Florida.  He sleeps pretty much all day, then they leave at 3:00 and drive all night.  He keeps awake because he is engrossed in audio books.  It keeps his mind active preventing him from falling asleep.

Paul talks in Romans about the mind being transformed.  He says “Do not be conformed to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind” (Rom 12:2).  Renewal of the mind is something that every one of us can identify with.  The mind has the capability to completely set us off track.  Our mind can cause us to obsess with something completely wrong for us.  The mind can make us a prisoner of sin (Rom 7:23).  Paul says to set our mind on things above, not on things of this earth” (Col 3:2).  So we have to train our mind.  We have to set the iPhone content of our lives on things which train us for godliness.  That is why I memorize Scripture because I am training my mind.  It is incredible how God churns the word back and forth in my brain.  When I am in deep, dark valleys, the word of God comes alive in my mind. 

I am shocked at how many Christians do not train their minds.  Emotions rule the day.  This allows them to get too high or too low.  Paul says in Romans 8:6 that the mind set on the Spirit provides life and peace.  In the ebbs and flows of life, it is the mind that keeps us on the right track.  

The Ultimate Homecoming

October is the typical month for Homecoming festivities whether in high school or college.  We attended the 30th anniversary of my graduation from Valparaiso University.  Yes, I know it is hard to believe that I am 30 years removed from my graduation.  The turnout at Valpo was very disappointing but still got to see a few of my fraternity brothers.  We also stopped by and saw my old friend, roommate, and fraternity big brother on the way home after 30 years.  We spent time reminiscing and getting caught up.  My wife was a jewel enduring the conversations of that weekend although secretly she was texting our daughter saying to “get her out of here”.


I got to pontificating on what home really is.  I know how good it feels to arrive home after a long day at work.  When our kids were young, they would yell “DADDY” always a reminder of the joy of being at home.  You just get a general sense of peacefulness arriving at home.  Home is where family and friends are.  We have a core group of friends that we get together with typically once a month or at least once a quarter.  We got together with friends this past Friday and we just laughed and laughed.  I could always take or leave these kinds of social gatherings, but the older I get, the more I appreciate them because they represent home as well.

But despite the love of being at home, in this life we will never feel completely at home.  Because home here is only for a small percentage of our eternal existence.  There is a longing to be somewhere else where the frailty of life does not exist and the presence of the eternal God is omnipresent.  Now Jesus says in John 14 that this is a physical place that He is preparing for us.  It will have many rooms, but more importantly this place is where He is.  And he has been preparing such a place for me (and you) for over 2000 years.  If that is the case, then as the late songwriter Keith Green says then “we are living in a garbage can compared to what is up in heaven”.  The Bible says we yearn to arrive at our eternal home.  I have got to believe that the pleasure of home in this life will be a drop in the bucket compared to the pleasures we will experience in our eternal home.

At our 30th college reunion, you see all kinds of people.  Some that age well and some that don’t age well.  But eventually all of us do age.  The law of entropy says that we all degenerate and decay.  But heaven does not experience entropy.  In fact, I think it gets better over time because the addition of souls is what makes it better.  As we arrive at this Homecoming, we will be forever reminded of the ultimate sacrifice made by Christ allowing us a ticket to this special Homecoming.

Reflecting on Steve Jobs

Before Steve Jobs passed, I was going to write a blog on Homecoming, which I attended last weekend at my alma mater Valparaiso University.  I am still going to write that blog, but they actually are kind of related. 

Steve Jobs passed away this past week and many of us who use the technology that Steve Jobs created are very grateful because it has indeed changed our lives.  I am an iPhone user and my life literally has changed as a result of this device.  I do much of my bible study on that machine, I receive e-mail, manage my calendar, listen to tunes, map to my next destination, and on an on it goes.  I literally run my life on it.  I also use iTunes which has revolutionized how music is distributed.  I listen to Podcasts every day and it has become a staple of my life. 

So in reflecting on Steve Jobs, we reflect on his legacy of innovation.  We need innovation pioneers like Jobs.  But unfortunately, we don’t reflect on Jobs as a person who influenced our lives in our relationships, whether relationships with each other or relationships with the Creator God.  I can’t speak for Steve Jobs’ relationship with his wife, with his God, with his children, or with his Apple employees.  Steve Jobs had no influence on me with any of those corresponding relationships with me either.  So as a result, his influence is confined to the time and sphere of this existence and it makes our lives clearly better on this earth.  However, it has no eternal ramifications.  Did it draw me closer to God?  Did it impact my relationship with my wife or my kids?  Did it cause me to more fully or deeply desire Scripture?  Those are the things that have a much longer shelf-life than the improvement of technology.  Again, don’t misunderstand me – the innovations have great impact, but not for eternity.  But the fruit is grocery perishables. 

I am CEO of a technology company that desires to implement and expand technology at lower costs.  That is an admirable ambition and one that I invest my time in.  However, I don’t want to be remembered as a technology CEO, but as an individual who made a difference for eternity in people’s lives.  Technology cannot do that by itself.  I want to be remembered for the impact that I make in people for eternity.  I can use the vehicle of my company, my class, but in the end, it is our lives that create enduring value.

Tuning into the Call of God

I have been completely inconsistent in my blog posting.  The reason is because I took on the challenge of teaching a class at Kent State and it has completely sucked up what little free time I have.  I did not quite realize how much time it would take.  But isn’t that the case with all of us.  We get so hung up on the busyness of life that we miss the important things.  This summer has come and gone.  We are now officially in Fall.  For us in Cleveland, Falls are not so bad.  It is the winter and the absence of spring that is so bad. 

We had Bethany here with us for six weeks or so this summer.  And as we have gotten to appreciate the summers here, we ate out on the deck a lot.  And because we had so much rain in the spring, the mosquitos were out in force.  There were a number of days where we had to go back in because they were “bugging” us so much.  But I had heard on one of my podcasts of a new type of iPhone app that actually emits a high piercing sound that apparently drives away mosquitos.  So in searching around, I found a number of apps that do just that (after all there is always an “app for that”).  I downloaded the app and it actually seemed to work, although Debsue and Bethany may dispute that.  The other thing we learned is that I could not hear the pitch of this app, but Bethany could.  In fact, if I cranked it up, it was bothersome to her.  We even ran a test where I turned it off and on to see if she really could hear the sound and she convinced me through the non-statistical sample that she could in fact hear the noise. 

While an incomplete analogy, I did think of the fact that some of us are attuned to God’s calling and some of us aren’t.  We hear God speaking into our life and we act on it.  Maybe it is a prompting, an urging that comes from Scripture.  Maybe it is a pastor speaking a sermon that almost seems to be written specifically for us.  Maybe it is that small voice of God speaking to us in relationship.  Whatever that is, it is coming from the Holy Spirit and we have to be sensitized to it.  If we do not open ourselves up to hearing, we will not hear.  It is called “quenching the Spirit” (1 Thess 5:19).  It is so easy to do – we get hung up in ourselves that we are not pliable to the Spirit. 

I have found memorizing Scripture to be one of the best formulas to training my mind to receive the Spirit.  We need to have “ears to hear” (Luke 8:8, 14:35) which is a readiness to hear God speaking into our hearts.  Another avenue is just being quiet before God.  That is so hard for me to do.  I am a Type A and always on the go, but just relaxing and talking to God in an attitude of expectant prayer is the ticket.  Worshipping God through music is yet another way of opening yourself up to the call of God.  I find that when I listen to gospel music the first thing in the morning, I am much better equipped to hear God’s voice throughout the day.  Finally, it is repelling of sin that is essential to allow us to hear God’s voice.  Psalm 66:18 says the Lord will not hear us if we are in sin.  If He can’t hear us, He won’t be speaking to us either.  That is a sure fire way of driving the Spirit’s speaking to us.  So we have to have repentant hearts that immediately repents of sin and calls out to God for help in ongoing rejection of sinful habits.  By filling our minds with Scripture, prayerful attitudes, and joyful worship, God is able to speak to us. 

Remembering 9/11–Best and Worst

I am one day late in writing this post but better late than never.  Everyone remembers what they were doing on 9/11.  I was in a board meeting and I remember the shock when someone told us a plane had hit the World Trade Center.  I remember being very concerned because I knew my brother-in-law did business in the tower.  As it turns out, he was supposed to be in the tower mid morning.  I remember after the full brunt of the impact had hit that we gathered our company team around and I just led us in prayer.  I remember some of our team being stuck in California as places were grounded and one of our guys having to share a ride back across country.  This same individual lost a family member in the WTC bombing.  I remember dismissing everyone mid-day so they could reflect on what had occurred. 

But what I most remember is the best and the worst.  The worst being people bent on destroying other people in the name of false religion.  Doesn’t something not add up when you can somehow justify killing innocents?  Christianity is imparting life and life abundantly and eternal.  Are you about life or are you about death?  The best was our country’s response.  I am very proud to be a U.S. citizen and we rallied in the face of a new threat.  As Americans, we live our life to the fullest.  The other major part of the story is it caused us to reflect on what we value most.  We hugged our spouse and kids tighter that night as we realized life can be fleeting.  But most of all, we realized that there is a path to eternal life and it wasn’t the way the terrorists envisioned it.  It had a shocking death too, but it was not to take life but to assure it.  The terrorists chose the path that leads to death.  It is the way to the cross and to the death Christ gave that leads to life.