Put down the cell phone and talk!

"Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching." - Hebrews 10:25 (NIV)¹

Perhaps a strange quote combination, Garrison Keillor and Hebrews, but there is a correlation here.

too many young American men suffer from a desperate lack of social skills ... just the simple art of extending yourself in a friendly manner to someone you don't know, which is crucial in any job in which you brush up against the great unwashed public. (Or in politics, or spreading the gospel, or simply living a rich life in multivarious America.) Over and over and over, you run into young men with the personalities of warehouse security guards.²

Garrison blames our electronics, cell phones, e-mail, text messaging, etc. Here's his advice:

We can talk L8R about bad spelling and whassup with the acronyms — my concern is that electronics, which seem to open up new vistas in the world, may be shutting us down. Put down that cell phone, good sir, and look me in the eye and tell me something. How are you? Good. I like those tattoos. And the big safety pin in your ear. You from here? No? You're from Oklahoma? Really? Where the waving wheat can sure smell sweet when the wind comes right behind the rain? Cool. Awesome. Totally.²

Life is more than information exchange. Social skills are developed ONLY through personal interaction.

Almost like it was planned that way, real Church fellowship gives believers a future spiritual and social advantage; don't neglect it!

- fritz

^{1 - Hebrews 10:25 (NIV)
2 - The Silent Brotherhood, Prairie Home Companion, April 20, 2010}

Carpe Diem!

The Gospel spread like wildfire in part because the world had a new common language. Those whose native tongue was something else wrote the Bible in Greek; barriers were stripped and the Word of God held its own in the public arena!

NOW is another wonderful opportunity - think about it!

"We live in a literate time, and our children are writing up a storm, often combining letters and numerals (U R 2 1derful), blogging like crazy, reading for hours off their little screens, surfing around from Henry James to Jesse James to the epistle of James to pajamas to Obama to Alabama to Alanon to non-sequiturs, sequins, penguins, penal institutions, and it's all free, and you read freely, you're not committed to anything the way you are when you shell out $30 for a book, you're like a hummingbird in an endless meadow of flowers." - Garrison Keillor ¹

With this has come the ability to reach out; barriers are again stripped and the Word of God is free to hold its own in the public arena!

To Garrison, a veteran author, the era of self publishing is cheesy:

"And if you want to write, you just write and publish yourself. No need to ask permission, just open a website.... And if you want to write a book, you just write it ... the future of publishing [is] 18 million authors in America, each with an average of 14 readers, eight of whom are blood relatives ..." ¹

But, it's a good thing! If every 14 reached 14 more, calculate the results!

So, dear 14 readers (and , Hello, uncle Bussy!), seize the day's opportunity, share Christ, there's nothing to stop you except you!

- fritz

1. The Old Scout, A Prairie Home Companion, May 25th 2010

An armload of Zucchini

Garrison Keillor, though not in my spiritual or political camp, makes an important point how we should recognize ourselves in today's information overloaded society:

"You've come armed with 20 minutes of wit and wisdom ... like a man with an armload of zucchini, and your audience has been eating zucchini all week and would now like never to see another one.

And so you cut to the chase."¹

- fritz

¹ A Prairie Home Companion May 18, 2010

Why Men Don't Talk...

Women say, "Why don't you talk to me anymore? I wish you'd tell me what's going on with you!" so I start talking (like now) and they say, "How can you say that?" This is our dilemma.

- Garrison Keillor, A Prairie Home Companion June 16, 2009