WACKY WEDNESDAY WISDOM: Getting Rid of Anxiety in a Flash

     I will warn you in advance that this column is rated PG and includes bathroom humor. Or at least bathroom references, humor notwithstanding. It also includes numerous references to our family dog Flash, who has appeared in several of these posts over the years and continues to be the most requested member of our family as it pertains to updates.
     As you may remember, Flash likes to sleep, chase squirrels, drink from toilets, lick my middle son's face, and counter surf- which is when canines raise up on their hind legs and eat food off the counter that was intended for human consumption. As far as dislikes, she has a negative attitude toward hard dog biscuits, being outside during rain, delivery men (or women), Jehovah's Witnesses, or anybody else who shows up at our door unannounced.
     But the thing she seems to like the least (or hate the most) is going to the vet. She cooperates fully until the part where one of us puts her on the leash and starts walking her toward the front door of the vet building. She goes into resistance mode as soon as we hit the cement walkway. Recently something else hit the cement walkway as she approached the front door. Flash chose that moment to relieve herself (not number 1, but number 2) on the sidewalk, which is not her usual habit.
     She knows better. I thought she did it out of rebellion or as a protest, but since that point, I have come to realize that anxiety was likely the reason because she has repeated that same procedure on several occasions since then, and each of them involved situations where she was nervous.
     She did it on our cement driveways after an unsuccessful chase of a squirrel and again after she treed a stray cat that wandered into our yard. She did it on the cement when a neighbor dog invaded her turf and stayed longer than it should have in our yard. She did it on the cement when she hurt her foot chasing something or another and started limping immediately afterward. She's a nervous Nellie and she tends to handle her nerves by suddenly forgetting how to control her bowels.
     I feel for the poor dog. I can only imagine how that must feel physically and emotionally. I suspect there must be an embarrassment factor even if you are an animal and not a human being.
     Though losing control of my bowels when I experience anxiety has never been one of my issues (I have many but that's not one of them), I will admit that anxiety has affected me both physically and emotionally during my lifetime. It has caused me not to be able to eat at times and at other times has led me to eat too much. Anxiety has caused me to utter words I didn't really mean and at other times has led me to remain silent when I should have spoken up.
     Anxiety has caused me to lose sleep at night, while leading me to feel unenergetic and unmotivated during the daytime. It has caused me headaches, stomach aches, and heartaches. I don't like anxiety. It serves no practical positive purpose, but certainly creates plenty of negatives.
     The Bible reminds us in Philippians 4:6 to "not be anxious about anything, but in all situations, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God." I know there are degrees of anxiety, worry, and concern. I don't think God is saying I shouldn't care or be prepared or concerned about things, I think He's saying I should share my worries with Him and then let Him take care of them instead of me stressing my life away and allowing anxiety to distract and consume me.
     1 Peter 5:6 says I should cast my anxiety on Him. Wow, that's quite a concept. I kinda get the picture of grabbing my fishing rod and baiting up the hook with all my anxiety and casting it off into the distance where God is waiting to deal with it. As long as I don't try to reel it back in, it can't sting me like the catfish I caught recently did.
     I wish I could teach Flash how to cast her anxieties on the Lord instead of on the cement, but she is still a work in progress. In the meantime, we'll keep the scooper ready.

WACKY WEDNESDAY WISDOM- Pigs Get a Bad Rap if You Ask Me

     Pigs get picked on too much. “Let’s have a Pig Pickin’,” people say when they’re hungry and want to congregate with other people in a social setting. After a pig is picked out and picked apart, he is then laid out for human beings to pick through and pick over. And occasionally somebody picks up an apple and stuffs it in his mouth to pick on and humiliate the poor fella even more. When it’s done he’s been picked to pieces at a Pic Pickin'.
     Human beings also sell Boston Butts when they want to raise money for various sorts of things humans need money for. And the poor pig is usually the victim in that instance as well. Despite the Butt, the meat doesn’t come from his hind quarters. (It's actually his shoulder). Says the pig, “If I’m sacrificing my future in this deal, at least get your facts straight.” No respect.  
     We pick on pigs when we utter ridiculous statements like, “You can’t make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear.” True enough I suppose, but why not substitute a donkey’s ear or some other barnyard animal. Nope, it’s almost always the pig bearing the brunt of the insults. Humans get mad at other humans sometimes when they think they’re being lied to and they holler out, “Hogwash!” or “Baloney!”, both of which are offensive to a pig. It’s bad enough he’s sacrificed for bacon, sausage, ham, etc.- now he’s a replacement curse word as well.
      Less than respectful types of human beings refer to our fine officers of the law as pigs, and it’s not a compliment. Pork is a bad word in politics that keeps representatives from getting reelected (or at least it should) and people who take up too much of the street when driving are called Road Hogs.
     The poor pig even has a dreaded disease named after him. Swine flu made a comeback a few years ago and everybody had to get shots again like they did in the 70s. Kids who don’t keep their rooms picked up hear things from their mother like, “You’re worse than a pig” or the dreaded, “This place is a pig sty.” I never knew growing up what a sty was but I suspected it was untidy.
     But I think the most audacious statement ever invented about our swine friends is the one I heard my wife utter recently- "You can't put lipstick on a pig." There's also a version of that saying that goes, "You can put lipstick on a pig, but it's still a pig." To solve the dilemma, I searched some images on the internet and I have concluded the former expression is more accurate than the latter. It seems to me there's no real location on a pig's face to adequately place lipstick that would look anything like it's designed to.
     What exactly does it mean when we try to put lipstick on pigs? It means something to the effect of not being able to cover up what somebody or some thing really is at its core, no matter how much you try to disguise it. Which is in essence a contradiction to the saying, "If it looks like a duck, swims like a duck, and quacks like a duck, then it's probably a duck." Not so much with a pig in lipstick.
     The Bible tell us in 1 Samuel 6:17 that "The Lord does not see as man sees. Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord sees the heart."
     I think I am guilty of putting lipstick on my pig self at times. Like most of us, I try to put my best foot forward and present myself in the most positive manner possible. I hide my deepest secrets and I think thoughts about people that aren't good at times, even though my face is smiling. Maybe we've all done that. That doesn't excuse it. God sees straight into my heart and sometimes I'm not so proud of what is going on in there.
     But God doesn't reject me, you, or anyone else for the gunky goop junk inside our hearts. He sent Jesus as a custodian to collect our garbage and recycle it into something beautiful. I still don't fully understand how or why but I think it has something to do with how much God has loved us from the beginning of time.
     I encountered a pig a few years ago at a local high school football game. While heading to my parked car after the game, I glanced to my left and a few feet from a containment fence, amongst several goats, lay an enormous pig. “She’s pregnant,” said one of the teens in our group who attended the school. I stopped and stared at the Mom-to-be. For a few brief moments, our eyes met. And for the first time in my life, I truly felt sorry for a pig. It was bad enough that a pregnant pig mom had to endure the loud and obnoxious sounds of the crowd cheering, the band playing, and the lights glaring- but now, most every human exiting the premises would be passing by and hurling an insult or two her direction. “It could be worse,” said one of the baby goats as I stared, “She could be one of us.” Knowing the chap had a valid point considering what people were calling the poor kid who dropped the pass that would have been the winning touchdown that night, I whispered to the baby goat, “Hang in there, Kid. And go easy on the lipstick."

WACKY WEDNESDAY WISDOM- Selfish and Spoiled? (Not so much)

     As a follow up to my column a few weeks ago where I admitted that I dance and sing in my truck, I decided I couldn't pass up the opportunity to share with you the events that took place recently involving a similar concert. The fact that I wasn't driving gave me more freedom to express myself  that day, as five of us joined in on the make-shift concert. If you added the ages of the three youngest participants together, they equaled my age. The fourth was the driver and he was only twenty so I was surrounded by youth in their prime. How did this all come about, you may ask.
     For each of the last twelve years, I have spent a week of my summer participating in a mission project known as Mission Serve. It's where youth groups from various parts of the country meet at a location and provide labor for low income houses that need new roofs, repairs, and paint jobs- stuff like that. Normally there are about a hundred of us and we stay on the floor in air mattresses at a local church. The kids get up at 6 a.m. and work all day long in the hot sun. And they do it so that someone who can't afford it will have a home improvement project they desperately need.
     They work their buns off in the summer heat and share their faith with the people they meet in the neighborhoods where they are stationed. After a well deserved shower each afternoon, they eat supper then attend a praise and worship service every evening. For several years running now, I've had the privilege of being the worship speaker who delivered the message each night. After the service, they meet with their individual youth groups for a time of sharing and devotions. Then it's off to grab some sleep as they prepare for another day of work and worship.
     These high school and middle school age (and a few college) youth group kids have their share of problems just like any other kids. Some have been victims of abuse, sexual and otherwise. Some have been suicidal at times, others have struggled with rebellion, and many will admit that their home situations are less than perfect. Yet they show up, work hard, and bond with each other while at the same time putting hands and feet to their faith by laboring in the hot sun to make someone else's life better.
     As the worship speaker recently, once of my responsibilities was to travel around with some of the summer staff and volunteers to each of the groups during the day. I was most definitely the old geezer in the truck. But these kids made me feel welcomed and included me in on all their shenanigans, including their musical concerts that took place as we traveled about.
     So on the aforementioned day, when the classic song Don't Stop Believing by Journey blared over the speakers, they encouraged me to join the concert. A water bottle served as a microphone as each member of the impromptu concert belted out the words to a song most everyone knows all the words to. For a moment, I was 18 again (despite being 54). And I rather enjoyed it.
     Here's my take on the younger generation. We older folks are too hard on them. Yes, they can be immature at times. Yes, many things are easier for them than they were for our generation. Yes, they probably spend too much time on their phones.(But then again, don't we?) Maybe some of them are spoiled, but that's less their fault and more ours.
     I'm sick and tired of pundits on television bashing the younger generation and calling them selfish, spoiled, and disrespectful. Maybe it depends on where you look. I know one place you won't find a whole lot of that. That place is Mission Serve and other programs like it where these so-called spoiled youth bust their behinds for a week to serve their Lord and help others in need.
    1 Timothy 4:12 speaks directly to young people when it says "Don't let anyone look down on you because you are young". Which is what we older folks tend to do more often than not. 
    I realize it's popular and easy to bash the younger generation but I refuse to do that. I've seen too many of them who have inspired me beyond words. I've seen them hit their knees and pray with a homeless man. I've seen them put their arms around an elderly woman whose family had abandoned her to live alone. I've watched them bake in the hot sun on a roof they were repairing and then take the time to stop before they left at the end of a day's work to tell the homeowner that they loved him. All three of my sons have participated in Mission Serve and it has made them better human beings. There's something about serving others that makes one less selfish and more compassionate.
    After the kids had left on their last afternoon of work recently, I had a chance to speak with one elderly gentleman who lived alone. With a tear in his eye he said softly, "These kids have re-energized me. They have given me a renewed hope for my life."
    So go ahead and bash them if you wish. There's plenty of knucklehead youth out there who make the evening news for the wrong reasons. But don't tell me they're all like that because the majority are not. I've seen many of them in action, and I'm profoundly inspired. They're finding their way just like my generation did many years ago. Think what you want to but my advice is this: Don't Stop Believing in these kids, because they're still early in their Journey. And the future is bright because of them.