I confess, I will read the collections of stories about, for instance, the worst customer a food-service employee ever had. Then I’ll read one about the worst service anyone ever got from a waiter or waitress. And I find myself wondering, maybe these are just the same stories told from two different perspectives. Maybe they are equally insensitive, equally impatient, equally self-involved.
There is always another side to the story.
People don’t believe me when I talk about how introverted I am. Truth be told, I would just as soon hole up alone with a good book or game on most evenings. I genuinely enjoy seven-hour car rides by myself.
That doesn’t mean I don’t enjoy socializing. I absolutely do. But when I am with someone, I feel responsible for their entertainment as well as my own.
Gail Borden was an early Texas land developer — what they used to call an empresario — in the early part of the 19th Century, before the Davy Crockett and Sam Houston years. His cattle empire took a bit of a step forward when he developed a process for condensing milk and putting it in a can where it would keep awhile on the grocery store shelf. Yes, that Borden. The county seat of Borden County in West Texas is named Gail. Not a coincidence.
Some people have five talents. They have all the skill, all the charisma, all the opportunities. It seems as though service in Jesus’ kingdom comes naturally to them. We are not surprised to hear when they have done great things in His name. We expect it out of five-talent people
Some people have two talents. They are not as privileged as the five-talent people, obviously. But we still admire them. They get the most out of what they have. They do not envy the five-talent people for their success and the glory that comes with success. They just do their job and do it well. Sometimes they even wake up to find they have become five-talent people themselves. And good for them. Good for us. And then there are those with only one talent.
Simplicity, as pointed out to me recently by Bro. Ed Bragwell, is the opposite of duplicity. Yet again, Hal slaps himself in the face and wonders how something so obviously true and practical escaped his notice for 52 years.
“The simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ” is addressed in 2 Corinthians 11:3.
What does two hours of “worship piano” sound like? I had to know. After all, the all-knowing YouTube seems to have thought I would like it.
And I did, I guess. I love piano music. Very relaxing, very melodic. As good, at least, as the rain forest noises that accompany my typical Sunday afternoon nap.
I wouldn’t call it “worship,” though. If you want to argue the piano player was “worshiping” during the performance, we can have that discussion another time. But I certainly wasn’t worshiping. I was listening.
For everyone who has been fretting that television-watching conditions in the average American home have been just too oppressive, there is good news. Now there is a bed that transforms into a theater. Literally.
