A few words about “change”

ByHal Hammons

A Facebook “preachers” group that I somehow became attached to (you social media types know how easily that can happen) brought a preacher in Tuscumbia, Alabama, named Jesse Winn to my attention. After e-mailing Bro. Winn and exchanging a few thoughts and pleasantries, I decided (with his permission) to include his name and a link to the article in question. You can find the article here. I encourage you to read his article with the same prayer, spirit and consideration I ask when you read mine. The gist of his article was this (his emphasis):

I believe that, generally speaking, as a movement, we (the churches of Christ) need to be less afraid of change when necessary and more willing to question things.

If at first discipline doesn’t succeed, … Try, Try Again!

ByHal Hammons

Discipline fails oftentimes because the disciplinarians quit too early.  Junior is grounded because of bad grades, then he goes and sulks in his room, determined to do even worse the next test just to spite Mom and Dad.  Junior makes out on both fronts; he does do worse, and Mom and Dad get so frustrated that they quit grounding him because it “doesn’t work.”

It’s not supposed to work.  Not like that, anyway.

Read the signs!

ByHal Hammons

Social media has given a voice to people who take great pleasure in being obnoxious.  Space fails to provide a comprehensive proof of this concept; for our purposes here, I will limit my frame of reference to those who take pictures of themselves doing precisely what a sign is instructing people not to do.  Walking on the grass, swimming, smoking, the situational prohibitions run the gamut.  And the existence of the sign more or less implies that the behavior is not necessarily unlawful; people are simply asked to choose a different time and/or place.

Nope.  “Look at me!  I’m a rebel!  I break rules!  No one can tell me what to do!”  As the saying goes, it’s all fun until someone gets eaten by an alligator.

Firing

ByHal Hammons

What is with college football fans, media and administrations with regard to the firing of coaches?  It happened again recently, as Florida residents know.  Yet another coach let go before his contract expires — before Halloween, even.  You’d think no one had ever lost to their biggest rival by more than five touchdowns before.

I will confess to a bit of bias in the other direction.  It’s easy for me to wince a bit when a disgruntled population grows fed up with the status quo and lashes out at the one behind the microphone.  Been there, done that. 

Results

ByHal Hammons

Do you watch those “Fix Your Failing Business” sort of shows?  Restaurants, hotels, whatever — they’re all the same.  People with failing businesses invite in an expert, listen to their informed and professional opinions, and then launch into a litany of reasons why things are just fine as is and why the expert is an idiot.

Bed

ByHal Hammons

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.