Let's Do the Twist

There are few events to which the people of Perry look more forward than the Georgia National Fair which is held right here in our beautiful little city. All year, the community sign on Sam Nunn Blvd. counts down the weeks -- and then the days, until if finally reads, "Have fun at the fair!" And tonight was Sneak-a-Peak when everybody from Perry shows up. Everybody.

Twenty-eight of us from my own family -- amidst the thousands of people -- seemed to find each other in the crowd.

For the first hour, we moved and grooved to a local group called The Grapevine. And finally, at 8:30, the main attraction took center stage: Chubby Checker.

The legend himself.

When I had originally heard that Checker was to play the Fair's Sneak-a-Peek, I was thrilled. When I shared with my 22 year old daughter that "Chubby Checker is going to be this year's Sneak-a-Peek performer," she just looked at me quizzically and said, "Who?" So just thinking she didn't hear me, I reiterated, "Chubby Checker." And then, Lord have mercy, she said, "Who is that?" "WHO IS CHUBBY CHECKER???" Where, oh, where did I go wrong? For a moment I seriously thought I had failed miserably as a parent and considered turning in my mother button; but when I said, "You know, the Twist," praise God, she at least said, "Oh, yeah."

And so Checker began his show -- and for the next hour and fifteen minutes, it was American Bandstand all over again.

Our special cousin Lynn loves 60's music -- and Chubby Checker. She came all the way from Jacksonville, FL.

Granddaddy and granddaughter snuggle and wait.

My brother and his granddaughter take it in. (And he can still shake a leg.)

Yet another brother and his boy who was actually "dancing" on his daddy's shoulders.

From the youngest to the oldest, people just couldn't stand still. Babies jumped in their granddaddy's arms, youngsters bounced on their daddy's shoulders, teenagers acted as if they themselves had lived the 60s, and the 60+ year-olds danced knowing they really had. Even the most reserved could be seen shaking a little knee or swaying a might in the hips. And our friend standing behind me who is a few years my senior sang every single word to every single song! After all, it was Chubby Checker, the originator of the Twist. The Twist: the only single to top the Billboard Hot 100 twice. The Twist: voted the number one song for the entire decade of the '60s. The Twist: the first rock song to ever win a Grammy. The Twist: named the biggest chart hit of all time by Billboard magazine. The Twist: the grandfather of all the other "solo" dances (such as the Jerk, the Pony, the Watusi, the Mashed Potato, the Monkey, the Funky Chicken).

The performance was non-stop with Checker moving from one song to another with hardly a breath -- certainly no break in the music, when there finally came a crescendo to the evening and the moment for which we had all been anticipating: "Come on, baby, let's do the twist...." And for the next 20 minutes, we did just that. I have to say that in all my 21 years now of attending the Georgia National Fair, this was the most exhilarating and exciting time I've ever known: actually Twisting with Chubby Checker himself. My husband, my brothers, their wives and children and their children; my parents, my cousins, friends from church and friends from the community and, yes, even the governor himself with his family -- we threw caution and certainly all cares to the wind -- and we danced.

Oh, yes, we Twisted!

As the final note waned and the crowd continued applauding and celebrating the legend before us, I experienced a very uncanny and mysterious moment -- a sacred moment, if you will. I realized the gift the Lord gave to the world through this man at a time when our nation was experiencing such turmoil some 50 years ago. And the same was true tonight. It was a moment of coming together as family -- as community ... of forgetting heartaches ... of laying aside fears ... and just dancing.

And so amidst the accolades and ovations of the crowd, and with the same sincerity of gratitude when experiencing a beautiful autumn sunset, I lifted my eyes and raised my hand to heaven and thanked God for Chubby Checker.

And then the fireworks began.

Just an ordinary moment...

Sunday School Appreciation

Today on the way home from church, I witnessed a couple of children playing out in a neighbor's yard -- children I knew who had not been to church or Sunday School this morning (or any other time this week, for that matter). And it really broke my heart. It also reminded me of a question in my Bible study this week. The author put it this way: "Historically, have you seen God more as someone searching you out and eagerly awaiting an opportunity to give you a second chance or hiding from you?" And then, "What teachings or experiences have helped to shape your view in this regard?"

So what does that have to do with the children romping in the yard? Everything. I am who I am today because my parents thought it not only necessary but absolutely crucial to my spiritual upbringing that I be in Sunday School each week -- not for the attendance pin (my dad saw to it that I always missed at least one Sunday a year as not to receive it, because he didn't want a pin to be my goal) but because they knew the truths I learned there were foundational. And whereas I can't ever remember opposing that conviction, I'm so grateful they saw it as an important part of their parenting. Yes, I cut my teeth on the back of those little Sunday School chairs. I folded my hands in prayer and sang "Into my heart, into my heart, come into my heart, Lord Jesus..." each week. (And He did!) I learned that "Yes, Jesus loves me" as well as "all the little children of the world." Week after week, year after year, I viewed Jesus as a framed Shepherd -- a good Shepherd -- who seeks out that lost sheep and with joy brings him home resting over His shoulders. Experiences that helped me shape my view of a God who does not hide from me, but rather searches me out.

I am so thankful for those teachers who fed me the milk of His Word. "Little Nina," Mr. Boone (with his little bow-tie), Mrs. Hicks, and the list stretches on. If it weren't for them, and their saying "Yes" to serve in such a lowly but mighty way, I wonder where I would be today? Would I be struggling with issues of truth? Would I be questioning God's existence? Would I be following who knows what religion -- or just picking and choosing the part of each that works best for me?

Thanks also to you, Mom and Dad, for loving the four of us children enough to see that we were where we needed to be each Sunday morning. That you didn't take your parenting lightly when it came to that demand. That you knew Sunday School was an essential part of training us in righteousness. That we are who we are today because of the foundational truths that were implanted in us then.

The thing is this: if we needed it so desperately as children then -- some 50 years ago, how much more do children need it now in this generation? O Lord, have mercy.

Just an ordinary moment...

Poetic Worship

Poetically challenged. That describes me perfectly. Unless it has the lilt of a nursery rhyme, I've never been able to read it well, understand it, or certainly not write it. But Wednesday morning, I came across two poems in my early morning reading that spoke to me in a way uncommon to my poetic ability -- or lack thereof. So much so, that I returned yesterday morning to it and then again this morning.

Both poems were written by Gerard Manley Hopkins who was born in 1844 in Essex into a High Anglican family but later converted to Roman Catholicism when in college. He became a member of the Society of Jesus -- known at the Jesuits, where he involved himself in a life of intense prayer and spiritual discipline. Much to the world's loss, Hopkins died at a young age in 1889 of typhoid, but not before, as my friend Len related to me, he "destroyed a lot of his writings as proof of his 'commitment' to the Catholic church." How sad.

Personally, I'm so grateful these two made the cut. Read them out loud ... and worship.

GOD'S GRANDEUR

The world is charged with the grandeur of God.
It will flame out, like shining from shook foil;
It gathers to a greatness, like the ooze of oil
Crushed. Why do men then now not reck his rod?
Generations have trod, have trod, have trod;
And all is seared with trade; bleared, smeared with toil;
And wears man's smudge and shares man's smell: the soil
Is bare now, nor can foot feel, being shod.

And for all this, nature is never spent;
There lives the dearest freshness deep down things;
And though the last lights off the black West went
Oh, morning, at the brown brink eastward, springs --
Because the Holy Ghost over the bent
World broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings.

PIED BEAUTY

Glory be to God for dappled things --
For skies of couple-colour as a brindled cow;
For rose-moles all in stipple upon trout that swim;
Fresh firecoal chestnut-falls; finches' wings;
Landscapes plotted and pieced-fold, fallow, and plough;
All all trades, their gear and tackle and trim.

All things counter, original, spare, strange;
Whatever is fickle, freckled (who knows how?)
With swift, slow; sweet, sour; adazzle, dim;
He fathers-forth whose beauty is past change:
Praise him.

Now couple that with a heavy dose of Psalm 84 and it just doesn't get much better.

Just an ordinary moment...

Harvest Moon Blessing

Last night marked something that hasn't occurred since Sept. 23, 1991 and won't happen again until 2029 -- a Super Harvest Moon. For the first time in almost 20 years, autumn began on the night of a full moon. As the sun sank in the west, bringing to close a very hot summer, the full Harvest Moon rose in the east, heralding the beginning of fall.

Just as it implies, the Harvest Moon is an agrarian term. Before electricity, farmers depended on the brightness of the moon to extend their workday beyond sunset. It also obviously gave lovers a chance to "spoon" a little longer as evidenced by the words to that old song -- the one which I've hummed all day:

Shine on, shine on harvest moon, up in the sky.
I ain't had no lovin' since January, February, June or July.
Snow time ain't no time to stay out-doors and spoon,
So shine on, shine on harvest moon, for me and my gal.

But something about the moon has always wooed me. I can remember as a very small girl reciting with both my mother and grandmother as we sat in the swing on that extended front porch those words that still warm my heart today:

I see the moon; the moon sees me;
The moon sees the one that I want to see.
God bless the moon; God bless me;
God bless the one that I want to see.

Yes, that's it. The moon gives me connection. In some strange way, it ties me with those who have gone before me. That beacon that shines through my window even now as I sit here in my "garden enclosed" was the same source of light that surely gave comfort to my great-great-grandfather as he walked home from Virginia to Georgia when the Civil War finally ended. And no telling how many times my grandmother watched it rise as she sat in her rocker on that front porch of her farm house after a hard day of labor. But even long before that, this same moon lit Abraham's path as he walked from Ur to that land yet to be seen. It's the same moon which inspired the shepherd David to sing and the one which cast a glow upon a bather as an older David walked on his rooftop. And no doubt, it was this same moon that lit up the face of Jesus -- by, for and through whom it was created -- as He cried out to His Father, "Take this cup from Me."

But tonight I am drawn back to the present and to those upon whom its light is cast this warm September evening. I disengage the alarm system and walk out into the middle of the yard where this Harvest Moon slips its rays between the branches of the oak and the pine. But this time I don't sing. I just softly recite the prayerful wish:

I see the moon; the moon sees me;
The moon sees the one that I want to see.
God bless the moon; God bless me;
God bless the one that I want to see.

Receive your blessing, dear reader.

Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good; His love endures forever ... who by His understanding made the heavens; His love endures forever .... the moon and stars to govern the night; His love endures forever... Psalm 136:1,5,9

Just an ordinary moment...

Early Morning Prayer

I awoke early this morning and saw my husband off to work while it was still dark outside. Instead of turning on my little lamp in my "garden enclosed," I opened a window and sat in the dark with my Parisian Lights black tea warming my hands. It was a special time of just Him and me. No book was open on my lap; no music; not even any birds at this moment. Just the sound of a cicada yearning to free itself.

Somewhere in the process of just "being," I began to lift the names of those who had been brought to my attention lately -- those who needed or had asked for prayer. Debra and her mother ... Christi ... Ken ... Kathy .... Erin ... a little boy named Jay who has an inoperable brain tumor and his dad who is about to be deployed ... Dawn's mother ... Tonya ... Don ... Debbie ... Janice ... a particular couple ... Julie and Mike, and the list continued with an almost overwhelming length and need.

But as I sat there in the darkness, calling out names and pausing with each, I was reminded of something I asked the ladies in Bible study to do last week. As they sat around in their small groups, I had them share what their particular life-story was telling others about God. For example, one lady said that she hoped her life-story was reading, "God is faithful." But then a funny thing happened: other ladies at the table began sharing what THEY saw in way of God by that person's life. In other words, how the Lord was manifesting Himself through that woman. And without fail, every revealed characteristic of God resulted from a place where that person is being or had been broken. That every revelation proceeded from and was due to some type of hardship. How odd.

But you know, I'm so grateful I serve a God of redemption, and that He does not allow anything to come into our lives that cannot be redeemed for His glory. That He takes our mistakes, our losses, our sicknesses, our dysfunctions, our pain, yes, even our messes and turns them into something beautiful: bread by which a broken world can be fed. Indeed, it is in the breaking that we are given and that He is revealed.

So, yes, Lord. Come and minister to each of these whose names have been called out before Your throne this morning. Touch their source of need and answer as only You can. Do Your complete work. And in a way that is so far beyond our comprehension, shine Your everlasting light through their brokenness and reveal Your Son in and through their lives.

How appropriate that as I had finished my prayer, the room was no longer black and the earth was no longer silent. The sun had broken the darkness and the song of nature had begun. Praise the Son of Righteousness who awakens the dawn and rises with healing on His wings.

Just an ordinary moment...