WHERE 2 OR 3 ARE GATHERED [4-6-25]

BEYOND WINTER: The Forgotten Memories of An Old Man—WHERE 2 OR 3 ARE GATHERED [4-6-25]

 

It was Sunday morning, 7:00 o’clock. The phone rang. My first thought was that someone was calling about one of my parents. They were old. There was always something about to go wrong with one or the other. [They were several years younger then than I am now.]

No, it was Paul Sellers, my District Superintendent. It’s always a bit of an adrenaline rush when the DS calls at this time of year, when the Cabinet [Bishop and DSs together] is fixing pastoral appointments for the coming year. It took me a couple of moments to remember that a DS would not be calling on a Sunday morning to tell me I would be appointed to the Raccoon Circuit. I had retired the year before.

The call was indeed about a problem with an old person’s health, but it was not about my parents. It was Paul’s mother-in-law. He and Diana had to leave immediately to go to her. That meant I had an hour to get presentable and eat breakfast and get on the road to Beecher City and Shumway, where Paul was scheduled to preach.

Paul seemed to think that I owed him, since he had not thrown me out of the ministry when he wanted to. I hadn’t actually done anything to get tossed during his years as DS, at least nothing he knew about, but my District Superintendents were always sure that I was just about to do something that would cause them trouble. As I closed in on retirement, Paul and I were chatting after a district meeting, and he mused, “If we can just get through one more month without you doing something…”

Also, Paul had sold me his father-in-law’s car when he could no longer drive, and he seemed to think that meant I should drive it to where he needed it to go. It’s a good thing we had that car, because that morning Helen was joining the church in the town we had moved to in retirement. [1] She would have to take our other car and sit in church by herself. She was used to that, but she had thought that it would be different in retirement.

 

I didn’t know where Beecher City and Shumway were, but I had a map. Remember those? They had never seen me before, but the folks at those churches took my presence in stride. Whatev. As long as somebody is here to preach…

At least, I assume they took me in stride, for I can remember nothing at all about the Beecher City and Shumway churches. I can’t even remember being there. But I know I was, for just now I came across some notes from a day-long retreat I led for the clergy of The Okaw River District shortly after. I told them this story.

If I can’t remember the churches of Beecher City and Shumway, I’m sure no one there can remember me, either. But we worshipped together that morning, and we helped one another get our spirits ready for another week.

I have worshipped with others approximately five thousand times in my lifetime. I preached at about three thousand of them. I can remember only a few moments from those occasions with my fellow-seekers. But each time, one way or another, we got renewed to face the world for another week, because Christ was there. [Mt 18:20]

That’s why we worship together, to be reminded of Christ, to be reminded that Christ is love, to get ready for what comes next.

John Robert McFarland

1] Methodist clergy do not belong to the local church where they live, or the one in which they are appointed to preach. We belong to the Conference, the amalgam of everything Methodist in a geographical area. My membership is in The Illinois Great Rivers Conference.

 

POTHOLES ON THE ROAD TO WISDOM [F, 4-4-25]

BEYOND WINTER: The Irrelevant Musings of An Old Man—POTHOLES ON THE ROAD TO WISDOM [F, 4-4-25]

 

St. Augustine said that “the so-called innocence of children is more a matter of weakness of limb than purity of heart.”

Anyone who is a parent, school teacher, or church nursery worker will verify that observation.

I think that the so-called wisdom of old people is more a matter of slowness of mind than increase of understanding.

When I look thoughtful, preparing to dispense some sagacious perception, I’m really trying to remember what the conversation is about, or trying to recall the name of the person I intend to quote… “Was it Dudley Moore, or Paul Baker, or Kowalski, on The Penguins of Madagascar, who created The Serenity Prayer?”

By the time I figure out that it was Reinhold Niebuhr, the conversation has gone onto something about Paris, but I’m not sure if it’s Hilton, France, or Illinois, so I just keep looking thoughtful.

In former days, when I decided to do something stupid, I went from thought to action in a nanosecond. Now when I decide to commit some egregious sin, by the time I’m able to get off the sofa, I can’t remember which sin I had in mind. I can’t even remember what “egregious” means.

I read The Road to Wisdom by Francis Collins, MD, PhD. It’s a good book. I recommend it. But it’s primarily useful because his personal story is interesting. There’s no special road to wisdom, just as Euclid said to the king that “there is no royal road to geometry.” You get wise by paying attention as you grow older. If you don’t pay attention, you just keep being stupid.

Will Rogers said “A man’s just about as happy as he makes up his mind to be.” That’s true. It’s also true that a person’s just about as wise as they make up their mind to be. If you want to be stupid, it don’t make no difference which road you take; they all lead to stupid.

We are not wiser just because we are older. Sometimes aging just means we have made the same mistakes so long that we’ve become used to them and think they are normal.

But maybe wisdom isn’t really necessary. Maybe all we need to know has been with us all along. Paul Tournier, the Swiss physician, said: “You’re never too young or too old to commit your life to Christ, and after that, what more is there to do?”

I spent my life trying to explain to other people what it means to commit one’s life to Christ. I have never attained enough wisdom to explain it to myself. The great thing about old age is that you don’t need wisdom, even if you look old enough that you ought to have some. You can be wise or stupid. Either way, what you really need is God. “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.” [Proverbs 9:10 and Psalm 111:10.]

Getting in touch with God is real easy, since God is already there… wherever “there” is.

John Robert McFarland

 

 

INSPIRATION VS EXPIRATION [W, 4-2-25]

BEYOND WINTER: The Irrelevant Observations of An Old Man—INSPIRATION VS EXPIRATION [W, 4-2-25]

 

I’ve told you this story before, but since the new baseball season is here…

It was in the days when the Athletics had moved from Philadelphia to Kansas City on their way to Oakland to Sacramento to Las Vegas. They had not yet built a major league level ball park in Kansas City, so they played in a more “porous” minor league park, the kind where a dog might just wander in.

That’s what happened one day. It ran out to home plate. The fans began to yell at it. “Go for first.” “Take a walk.” “Bite the umpire.” It ran to first. “Go for second,” they shouted. It ran to second base. “Run to third.” It ran to third base.

There it stopped. People continued to clamor. “Go for home.” “Get a run.” “It’s the only run they’ll get.” Louder and louder. But the dog just sat on third base, until the grounds keepers came and carried it away.

A sports writer, reporting on the dog’s adventure, said, “It never got to home, because in all that shouting, it couldn’t recognize the voice of a master.”

From as long as I can remember, I went to church to be inspired, to hear the voice of the master, one that would lead me home. That’s what I wanted, needed, expected--preachers who inspired me to be an authentic person, a follower of Jesus, a respecter of others, one open to the leading of the Spirit. They told stories of others who lived authentically. They made me laugh. They made me feel lighter. They made me feel that I could do it, that I could conquer the demons and dilemmas of life.

I was inspired not only by preachers in church. I was inspired to be a good person by seeing goodness in action, in the lives of relatives and neighbors and friends and teachers.

Church, though, seemed to be a special place for inspiration, a place, a community, where that was the main task, to be inspired, to have fun, to spread joy, to sing and pray together.

So when I became a preacher that’s what I tried to do—inspire, in my preaching, in the rest of the worship service, in the rest of the church life.

There is more to life than inspiration, of course, and more to church. Preachers need to provide opportunities for education and fellowship and service. “Faith without works is dead.” [James 2:14-26]

Some would say that inspiration is encouragement toward anything, including lives of hate. There are orators who speak with mighty tongues encouraging people to hate. But that is not inspiration. That is expiration. Inspiration is for life. Expiration encourages death.

There is no joy in expiration. If humor is attempted, it is laughter at, not laughter with. It is bullying, hating, disrespecting. It is not making fun, but making fun of.

Many preachers, many churches, now preach not an inspiring gospel of good news but an expiring gospel of bad news, a gospel that extols greed and hate. It is sad.

So many churches, so many people, shout and run, but they never get to home, because in all the chaos and clamor, they never hear the voice of the master.

John Robert McFarland

ANSWERING THE CALL WHEN THERE IS NO CALL [M, 3-31-25]

BEYOND WINTER: The Irrelevant Musings of An Old Man—ANSWERING THE CALL WHEN THERE IS NO CALL [M, 3-31-25]

 

Our pastor is preaching his last Lent. Well, at St. Mark’s. He’s retiring at the end of June. He’s a good preacher, though. It’s unlikely that the bishop will let him get by without some part-time work. [1]

He’s earned his retirement. He has the looks and energy of a well-preserved fifty-year-old, but he’s seventy.

I was once chatting with a middle-aged, second-career Episcopal priest. He told me that when he was being ordained, he said to his bishop that his only regret was that he spent so many years as a business man before going to seminary and becoming a priest. “How many years will you be a priest before retirement?” the bishop asked him. “Only twenty.” “My God, man, that’s enough!”

Our pastor has put in 44 years all together, so that’s twice enough.

Social research has concluded that the Episcopal bishop was right. Twenty years is plenty for any job. Actually, these days, if you can get twenty in before technology or culture eliminates your job, you are doing pretty well.

Rapid cultural change causes many problems, because the basic needs of humans remain the same, even though the means of fulfilling them change. One of those basic needs is satisfying work, work that at least comes close to being a vocation, a calling.

When I felt the call to preach, the ministry was referred to as “the high calling.” I think the title was called high so that we wouldn’t notice that the pay was low.

Calling, though--the feeling that you are doing what you are supposed to do--does not necessarily go with job title. The job might be called high, but if you don’t fit in it, your life is low. I have known homemakers and teachers and farmers and bus drivers and cooks and gardeners and carpenters and so many others who experienced their lives as a calling, even if they didn’t use that language. They fit their job.

Even then, though, you probably need some sort of renewal. And these days, that twenty-year rule seems to apply. I knew a plumber who said, “The first seventeen years, I thought I had the best job in the world. I didn’t mind the yucky parts of plumbing because I enjoyed so much diagnosing problems and fixing them. But then there were no new problems, only old ones, ones I’d seen before. It wasn’t satisfying anymore.”

Well, you’re right. What can someone my age know about this? I haven’t worked in a long time. Even more, since this column is for old people, why bother? We don’t have jobs to get tired of.

But we do have lives to get tired of. That’s the point—satisfaction with job means satisfaction with life. After twenty years of not having a job, we can get dissatisfied with retirement. When you get dissatisfied with retirement, it’s a short time before we are dissatisfied with life itself. As Charles Albert Tinley put it in his great hymn, “Stand By Me,” when my life becomes a burden… stand by me.

We have a calling only if there is a call. A call from God is a call to trust. Trust depends on neither work nor age.

John Robert McFarland

1] After I wrote this, I learned that he is already slated to be the interim pastor in a nearby congregation.

 

 

 

THE REPAIR OF THE EARTH [Sat, 8-29-25]

BEYOND WINTER: The Irrelevant Musings of An Old Man—THE REPAIR OF THE EARTH [Sat, 8-29-25]

 

For as long as I can remember, I felt that I was responsible for the life of anyone I met, making sure they were safe and happy and… well, alive.

Strangely, even after I had acquired a lot of experience and a lot of knowledge about such things, I was remarkably unaware of that motivation, probably because of my profession. I mean, preachers are supposed to take care of everyone, aren’t they, all the way into eternity?

If I thought about it consciously, I charged my obsession with creating a life for everyone to my call from God and to my ordination vows.

No, I think my feeling of responsibility for others, my charge, if you will, preceded my call to preach. So where did that obligation to create life for everyone I met, where did it come from?

One of the frustrating things about old age is that every time you gain a significant insight about yourself, the origin is shrouded in mystery, almost always before your conscious awareness. But I think there is an answer in the Kabbalah.

Kabbalah is the mystical expression of Judaism, mystical meaning direct contact with the holy. In the Kabbalah, this feeling of obligation to others is referred to as Tikun Olam, the repair of the world.

It’s not surprising to me that my original and continuing impulse is Tikun Olam, which in the Kabbalah is the restoration of life to wholeness, the re-creation of life as it is meant to be, in Love. I have always been aware of the presence of God, not in a touchy-feely way, not in a surrounded by light way, not in a hearing voices way, but simply as awareness, like someone beside me, and just a little behind, just out of my peripheral vision, is looking with me through the window at the world. [Yes, I talked about this in the column for 2-24-25]

I think we are all born with Tikkun Olam, just as we are all born with its opposite, Original Sin. John Wesley called it Prevenient [preventing] Grace. Popularly, we refer to it simply as “conscience.”

Original Sin is the concern for self, over all others, the desire to satisfy our own needs and wants without regard to others. It has many sub-categories: greed, lust, rapacity, gluttony, etc. Preventing Grace and conscience are good words to express the force within that opposes Original Sin, but I like Tikkun Olam because it is translated as “the repair of the earth.”

Tikkun Olam isn’t just doing good, like prevenient grace and conscience urge us to do. It is the repair of what is already broken.

Repair is such a visual, hands-on word. It’s what a carpenter does…oh, wasn’t Jesus a carpenter…

John Robert McFarland

Just a reminder that I now call this column Beyond Winter because I’m so old, I’m not even in the winter years anymore.

BETWEEN THE LINES [R, 3-27-25]

BEYOND WINTER: The Irrelevant Confessions of An Old Man—BETWEEN THE LINES [R, 3-27-25]

 

I am excited, far more than I should be. But it’s Opening Day! The very first professional baseball team, my team, the Cincinnati Reds team, is starting the season! They’re still in first place! “In the spring, a young man’s fancy turns to… baseball!”

I am embarrassed by the amount of time I spend on sports. Well, no, I’m not really embarrassed, but I should be, because it borders on obsession. In fact, my Rubicon is far back in the rear-view mirror. [1]

When we lived in Iron Mountain, MI, I had a dentist who is a MI State U fan. Chris Selden is as sports-obsessed as I. We talked about it. We concluded that there is something wrong with us. His hygienist, Kyra Scott, agreed. When I apologized one day for refusing to let her start scraping on my teeth because Chris and I were talking sports, she sighed and said, “It’s okay. I schedule extra time when I know you are coming in.”

I once cancelled a TV service because it did not have the Big Ten Network. When I was nominated as a “distinguished alum” at Garrett Theological Seminary, my love of baseball was mentioned before my love of theology. I have an honorary contract with The Cincinnati Reds; I didn’t ask for it, owner Marge Schott just sent it.

When daughter Katie and her husband taught history at Auburn U, and granddaughter Brigid was born there, Perry & Sue Biddle were gracious enough to let us spend the night with them in Nashville on our way from IL to AL. They usually had a party for us, inviting old friends we had met in Scotland, Amos & Etta Wilson, with other folks they thought we might enjoy. One man, as he left one night, said, either with admiration or bewilderment, “I’ve never before met a minister who knew so much about sports.”

I don’t know why I have this obsession. I don’t come from an athletic family. I hardly knew sports existed until we moved to Oakland City, IN, when I was 10.

Maybe it was the isolation of the farm. We didn’t have a car. From the last day of school in May until the first day in September, I didn’t have any playmates, unless my Uncle Johnny [John H. Pond, my mother’s youngest brother, 15 years older than I] drove over from Francisco, five miles away, after he had closed his hardware store, and hit flies to me. He was single and lived with his mother in a town of 600. There wasn’t much for him to do in the evenings. I so looked forward to those moments with him. He was the best friend of my childhood and the best man at our wedding. To this day, when I am at loose ends, in my mind I go to that field and chase those fly balls.

I was able to justify my obsession, at least in my own mind, by participating in sports. It’s good exercise. It keeps one healthy. But my sports activity came to a screeching halt, unless you count walking as a sport, when I was 70 and we moved to Iron Mt and there was no softball league for old people, and where the only sport is strapping a couple of sticks to your feet and sliding down a long slope and then hanging in the air, buffeted by blizzard winds, until crashing into the tops of red pines several miles away.

Now, though, I just watch. It’s hard to justify sitting in front of the TV several hours a day, watching field hockey and water polo if there is no football or basketball or baseball, relieved only by Big Bang Theory re-runs, and claim that’s good for one’s health.

There is more than one answer to this sports obsession, and I’ll look at some of the others later this week, but right now, in this time of political turmoil, I’m aware that sports provide an oasis. It’s called “between the lines.”

When you are “between the lines” on a baseball field, you have to concentrate so hard on the game that you can’t think about anything else. In the chaos of family life as a child and puberty as an adolescent and stupidity [mine as well as that of others] as an adult, sports has allowed me to drop all concern except the next pitch, the next snap, the next shot.

Everybody needs a spot “between the lines,” be it knitting or carving or… You name it. You’re never too old to find a spot between the lines.

John Robert McFarland

1] I don’t want to insult anyone by suggesting you don’t already know this, but the Rubicon was the border [river] that Caesar crossed and was thus irrevocably committed to civil war. When you’ve “crossed the Rubicon,” there’s no turning back.

RIP, GEORGE FOREMAN [T, 3-25-25]

BEYOND WINTER: The Irrelevant Memories of An Old Man—RIP, GEORGE FOREMAN [T, 3-25-25]

 

I have been trying to stick to the Lenten theme for these 40 days before Easter, but I can’t ignore the death of George Foreman. The children in the pediatric cancer unit of MD Anderson in Houston have lost a true friend.

He’s better known, of course, as a heavyweight boxing champ, and for naming all 12 of his children George, regardless of gender. When asked why, he would reply, “Who would you expect me to name them after, Muhamad Ali?”

Helen and I met George once, sort of. I was invited to speak at a cancer conference at MD Anderson, along with Steve Allen, Jr and Scott Burton and, of course, George. It was a two-day conference [three?], and all of the speakers were there for the whole conference, doing break-out sessions and book signings and such as well as speaking. Except for George, who appeared only for his one speaking occasion.

Helen and I were invited to the conference by Judy Gerner, who had heard me speak at a previous conference in Denver. Judy was the director of MD Anderson’s patient services.

In telling us about the other speakers, Judy said that it was fairly well known that George visited the children in the hospital’s cancer ward, but no one know how much. Many days he would show up completely unannounced, just going from room to room, with that big smile that always made everyone smile back and feel better.

Now, the purpose of this column is to give credit and appreciation to George for his active commitment to cancer kids, but I must repeat a story about that conference that is more about Helen…

We were in a huge room, seated around tables, about 500 people. When it came time for George, Judy led him through a door at the back of the room. As they threaded their way amongst the tables to get up to the stage, people jumped up from their tables and crowded around and began to take pictures of George. So did Helen.

I was amazed. Helen is not a big sports fan. As a teen, she and her mother would go to pro wrestling matches in Gary, Indiana, to see Don Eagle and Gorgeous George. Helen even got their autographs and to this day mourns the theft of her autograph book. But that wasn’t really a sport. That was just what you did in Gary because “the mob” didn’t allow anything else.

Nonetheless, there she was, elbowing her way through the throng to get several pictures of George.

When she got back to our table, I said, “I didn’t think you even knew who George Foreman is. Why were you so eager to take his picture?”

“Oh, you mean that nice bald man with Judy? I wasn’t taking his picture. I want my hairdresser to fix my hair like Judy’s when we get home, and I needed a picture of it. But if I just took a photo of Judy’s hair, that would be weird. I figured if I got the pic while everyone else was taking photos of that big man…”

John Robert McFarland