Charlie's Journey's Journal

The concept of friendship is ancient.   The Old Testament put it eloquently when it noted, “ A friend loves at all times, and a brother is born for adversity.” (Proverbs 17:17).  The adage “people need people” might also be interpreted as “people need friends”.   With such an extensive history in the field of friend-making one might think that it should be a breeze today, but I think that friendships are waning in modern society.  Some have even attempted to reduce friendship to a scientific process, but human interaction is not cold and calculated.  This brief bulletin article cannot completely address how to be good friends, but here are a few thoughts on developing deeper interpersonal relationships: 1).  Be willing to touch .  Modern society has shunned touching.  Social media interaction, personal space expansion, fear of germs and the perception of inappropriate touching is drawing us toward a touchless world.  There might ...

Many of us have heard the caution “everything must be done decently and in order”.  Through the years this has been applied to discussions ranging from singing camp songs on Sunday morning to applause during worship to raising hands while singing and praying.  For better or for worse, this warning has become kind of a catch-all for taking the time to examine the prudence of introducing something different in worship.   The authority for this warning comes from Paul’s caution, “ But all things must be done properly and in an orderly manner.” (I Corinthians 14:40).  To appreciate these words we must consider their context – the worship in Corinth.  The church was struggling with a spirit of disunity that invaded every aspect of their Christianity, including the worship.  There were people trying to out-shout each other during their assembly. There were multiple languages being spoken, but not understood.  Their “fellowship dinners” lacked fe...

When and where I grew up (as well as in the family that raised me) public displays of religion were not necessarily encouraged.  Sure, we were expected to be seen walking into the church building every time the doors were opened, but things like wearing religious jewelry, taking a Bible to school or publicly praying over a meal were things we didn’t do.  I am sure that every family and each person had a reason for the choices that were made, but ours was based on the negative example of the Pharisees whose religion was more for show than for spirit.   As I fast-forward through the last five decades I have come to see “religious displays” in a more favorable light.  Today, when religious expressions seem to be based more on genuine faith than showiness, maybe it is time we start displaying our religious nature in public.  No, praying over a meal in a restaurant or reading the Bible in the breakroom is not necessarily a sign of deep spirituality, but it does...

Each generation seems to have a “Date That Will Live In Infamy”.  For “The Greatest Generation”, their date is most likely December 7, 1941; the day Pearl Harbor was attacked.  For our generation, that date is probably September 11, 2001.  Most of us who are adults today can remember very well what we were doing the morning that the flying bombs struck the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and that lonely field in Pennsylvania.  That day brought about national mourning and changed the way many of us looked at the world. Typically, there are a couple of questions that accompany these historic dates:  Should we have known what to expect and could we have been better prepared to deal with the event?  I remember that once much of the initial shock  and sadness of 9/11 abated our national attention turned to these two questions.  For the months and years that followed we assessed the information in an effort to uncover the truth. December 7 and Sep...