CAMO GOD

CHRIST IN WINTER: Reflections on Faith from a place of winter For the Years of Winter…

Dave and Maggie Lamb came UP from IL to see us a month or so ago. I officiated at their wedding fifty years ago, and they apparently wanted me to know that I had done a good job.

Dave and I were high school friends. He was the Art Editor of “Oak Barks,” the mimeographed [1] newspaper of Oakland City, IN, High School, when I was the Editor. We were part of a group, along with Bob Robling and Donald Gene Taylor, that occasionally filled in on Sundays for absent preachers. We sang as a quartet, and I preached. I was very proud when Dave and Maggie asked me, while still in seminary, to officiate at their wedding.

I went to IN U to become a newspaper reporter. He went to U of IL to become a graphic artist. I ended up as a preacher, and he ended up as the premier “mad man” of the last third of the 20th century.

It was Dave who gave the name of “The Me Generation” to the 1970s. He didn’t cause it, but he recognized it, and so he named it, starting the decade with his “Me and My RC” ad campaign. He created the “Bring out your best” ads for Bud Light, plus their Olympic ads, that won awards at the Cannes film festival, plus many of the other iconic ads of the latter part of the 20th century.

When I have talked about him in the past, I always started with those ads. When they were UP to visit, though, Maggie told us about how he once explained to Frank Sinatra, calling on those old quartet days, how to sing. He was directing an ad for Michelob that featured Sinatra, and explained to Old Blueyes, who was acting more like Old Jerkface, “Then you walk over here, singing as you go, Just the way you look tonight…” Dave himself singing it, to be sure that Frank, as Dave calls him, got it. [I was going to say that he had to take Frank by the arm and lead him to his spot, since Frank may have been using the sponsor’s product already, while explaining how to sing, but Dave doesn’t want anyone to think he was pushing Frank around, as The Chairman of the Board still has friends in low places.]

Now I start my stories of Dave with “I have a friend who taught Sinatra how to sing.” [2]

Dave recently mused about the name of this blog. He said…


In the fall season about two years ago we took our grand kids in Arizona to a Pro Bass store. You know, the frozen zoo, with a hundred stuffed animals and fish in giant glass tanks being leered at by would be anglers. Close to the front door to the right was a book section. (Not very complicated types of reading material...mostly pictures.) But as I examined it closer something attracted, or un-attracted my attention. It was a camouflaged book almost causing it’s 9x12 x 2 and1/2 dimensions to disappear in the overall Pro Bass ambiance.

It drew me closer. What great hunter’s secrets were worth this effort?
What price would be put on something of such intellectual importance,
that obviously was meant to not gather dust but become at peace with it?
Drawing closer there was the glint of a small sophisticated font embossed in gold. The title said “HOLY BIBLE”.

Christ not in just Winter, but camouflaged! Along with Job, Moses and Mary! My first thought was of the “boys” out there in the blind reading it between beers waiting for their appointed task of obliterating mother nature. Such comfort.

I refuse to go to Pro Bass now. It has made me feel so undeserving of my Lord’s grace. I am also afraid to go to church . One never knows what might really be in there.

Dave Lamb
***
True to his persuasive abilities, Dave has made me afraid to go to church, too. I’m too old to encounter grace face to face, and our pastor seems determined to take the camo off the Gospel.

JRMcF

1] Recently Helen and I were eating with a couple of nineteen-year-olds at a family gathering. Have you ever tried to explain a mimeograph machine to someone who’s never heard of them?

2] OK, so I didn’t start with that this time, but I will from now on.

The “place of winter” mentioned in the title line is Iron Mountain, in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, where life is defined by winter even in the summer!

You are always welcome to Forward or Repost or Reprint. It’s okay to acknowledge the source, unless it embarrasses you too much. It is okay to refer the link to older folks you know or to print it in a church newsletter or bulletin.

{I also write the fictional “Periwinkle Chronicles” blog. One needs a rather strange sense of humor to enjoy it, but occasionally it is slightly funny. It is at http://periwinklechronicles.blogspot.com/}

(If you would prefer to receive either “Christ In Winter” or “Periwinkle Chronicles” via email, just let me know at jmcfarland1721@charter.net, and I’ll put you on the email list.)