Archive for June 10, 2008

Bath Time

Posted: June 10, 2008 in Dogs, Faith, Family, Life, Spirituality

As most of you know, Heather and I do not have any children yet. The closest thing we do have is our two spoiled rotten dogs, Gaby and Kate, and I have to say we take really good care of them. One thing we always take care of as responsible dog owners is keep them well clean and groomed. We brush them and bath them every seven to ten days.

Here’s the problem: Gaby (pictured above) hates to take a bath.

It is like she senses it is about to happen and will often try to hide. We have to track her down and either push her or bribe her to waddle into the bathroom. If she is feeling really sassy or ornery, she will growl and act tough to whoever is trying to get her in the bath. Once she gets in the bath and starts to clean up, she actually somewhat likes it because it is like one big massage. Knowing the battle is already decided, she stops fighting. After the bath is over and she is dried off and clean, she excitedly runs around, woofing, and seems the joy the feeling of being freshly clean.

Isn’t that often like us with God?

Think about it. There are so many times when we are dirty and in need of a spiritual bath. I call this the process of putting a spiritual mirror up to your life – also known as refinement. 

How does God give us a bath and get us clean? There are so many times when he tries to clean us through conversations with a close friends, through times spent reading his Word, through challenging messages we hear on Sunday morning, through times of intimate worship, and through many others ways.

We (and I say we because I am real good at this) tend to hear things that God brings into our lives so that we can clean up a little and become more like him. Those times are often faced with defensiveness, pride, denial, performances that we have it all together, justifications, and straight up ignoring.

We know that God, our Heavenly Father, is trying to make our lives better by cleaning our lives up a little. And like Gaby, we also know that we enjoy the feeling of being clean and fresh in his eyes. The problem is that we often hide and avoid spiritual bath time and when we are forced to it, we go kicking and screaming.

What in your life needs to be cleaned up? Are you hiding from getting spiritually clean? Do you go kicking and screaming into your spiritual bath? 

Maybe the best thing that you and I can do today is enter God’s presence and ask him to reveal something in our lives that needs to be cleaned up and ask him to help us do what whatever it takes to get clean. I know I would absolutely freak out if Gaby voluntarily hopped into the bath one day without any prompting by me ready for her bath.

Let’s get spiritually clean today. Life is way better that way. If you do not believe me, just ask Gaby.

Horse Racing Rant

Posted: June 10, 2008 in Funny, Random, Sports, TV

Another year of the “famous” horse racing Triple Crown, another year of a horse that comes short of winning all three big races. Big Brown was the winner of this year’s Kentucky Derby and Preakness Stakes before loosing the Belmont Stakes this past Saturday. There has not been a Triple Crown winner since 1978.

My question is, “Who cares?” Please do not get me wrong, I love sports, but I just do not get horse racing.

There was all this time and hype spent on this horse possibly winning the Triple Crown and what happens? He finishes last in the race. Now they trainers have to start with brand new horses and lock those freakishly tiny “men” who ride those horses back in their dungeons so they cannot eat and actually grow (seriously those guys are tiny).

And why is it necessary to have three hours of television coverage for something that takes a maximum of two minutes. That is the equivalent of having a 45 hour preview before one thirty minute episode of Seinfeld.

And who seriously watched this on Saturday? This is 2008 people. I mean seriously, horse racing? After it was over, I turned it over to NBC to catch the last few minutes of old school knights jousting (you know where they ride horses at each other and try to knock each other off with large sticks). Before you go looking in your TV Guide for jousting on NBC, I was being sarcastic.

Hey, at least no horses were euthanized on the track right after the race this time, therefore scaring all the children present from ever seeing a horse again without crying their little eyes out. That is like watching Bambi’s mom get killed in person.