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Written by Rex M. Rogers

Published: 28 December 2010

For about 25 years now, maybe longer, I’ve used this week between Christmas and New Year’s as a time to write long hand, yellow-pad notes to people who’ve made a particular impact upon my life in the past year. Not a lot of them, actually maybe just four or five, or on a big year as many as seven. These notes or short letters are my way of expressing thanks and touching people who’ve touched me.

I know other people do this because I’ve heard them mention it or seen their Christmas letters. But most of the ones I’ve seen are more generic, sent to one and all. Nothing wrong with this.

I’m talking about personalized notes to selected individuals who’ve done something, modeled something, been a listening ear, or simply “been there” in some way that made a difference in my life, family, and/or career.

Writing gratitude notes to people during New Year’s Week has been a good habit for a number of reasons.

First, it makes me take stock. The practice forces me to remember people and actions in detail and recall why they might have been important. It reminds me that I didn’t do as well or accomplish as much or live as well on my own as a quick glance might lead me to think.

Second, this practice requires me to put into words how the people or their actions affected me and to put into words my expression of gratitude. It makes me articulate what up till now may have gone unsaid.

Third, it allows me to see how God has worked in my life and family in the past year, using people to bless or direct us. It helps me see how God has corralled me or used others to remind me what’s really important.

Fourth, it’s a good reminder of which individuals built into my life and who, if I am wise, I’ll maintain contact with, listen to, and seek to return the blessing.

I share this habit as a recommendation. It’s a practice that’s probably blessed me more than it’s blessed anyone who received the snail-mail note.

I need to get out of this blog now. I’ve got gratitude notes to write.

© Rex M. Rogers – All Rights Reserved, 2010

*This blog may be reproduced in whole or in part with a full attribution statement. Contact Dr. Rogers or read more commentary on current issues and events at www.rexmrogers.com or follow Dr. Rogers at www.twitter.com/RexMRogers.

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Written by Rex M. Rogers

Published: 25 December 2010

Christmases come and go and always Grandpa anchored events from a big chair in the corner. Now, Grandpa’s gone and Dad’s visiting my sister, so I’m the anchor. How did this happen?

There was a time when NFL quarterbacks were my age. It was good to play the game vicariously through their similar faddish words, dress, and insights. Now I’m old enough to be the quarterback’s father. His hair is funny looking—won’t see me wearing hair swooped to the center in a pointy Mohawk—he uses words coined yesterday, and his insights at times seem laughably immature. Don’t even ask me about college quarterbacks. How did this happen?

There was a time when someone else picked up the restaurant tab. We were, after all, young marrieds with more kids than dough. Now I pick up a lot of tabs.

There was a time when my kids were little eepers fawned over by grandparents. Now my kids are parents with little eepers of their own and we’re the fawning grandparents, “Grandpa Rex” in the parlance of our grandsons. Because “Grandpa Rogers” is my Dad when he’s able to come and of course our grandsons have grandfathers on the other side of their family too.

There was a time when we piled the kids in the car and went to the grandparents’ house. Now the family comes to our house. Not a bad deal, this. Grandma works more in the kitchen but enjoys it and Grandpa can steal away to write a blog. Meanwhile the house is full of noisy boys. Pretty good.

I remember my grandfathers, patriarchs in their own way, both men short of stature with take-over-the-room personalities. Now I am, I guess, an “emerging Patriarch.” What this means besides picking up the tab I’ve not yet figured out, but I’ve picked up a few things so far:

--Patriarchs pray over meals.

--Patriarchs good-naturedly endure jokes about gray hair, putting on weight, snoring, and falling asleep at the cinema.

--Patriarchs offer opinions, solicited and unsolicited, on pretty much everything.

--Patriarchs take out the trash, bring in the wood, and stay out of the kitchen.

--Patriarchs read the Christmas story on Christmas Eve.

--Patriarchs love the resident Matriarch, modeling this for all to see.

--Patriarchs grow into this idea of being the oldest one in the room and try to wear it well.

Being the oldest one in the room has its own joys and privileges. Your horizon’s bigger, so you see farther. You understand things differently and more deeply than you did when you were younger. You get to be amused and bemused by your progeny. You appreciate God more because you’ve seen more of what he’s done. Pretty good.

I’ll watch Dad when he’s in town. And I’ll keep working on this patriarch business. Judging by how my grandfathers handled it and how Dad is conducting himself now, I know patriarchs are supposed to finish well. Pretty good.

© Rex M. Rogers – All Rights Reserved, 2010

*This blog may be reproduced in whole or in part with a full attribution statement. Contact Dr. Rogers or read more commentary on current issues and events at www.rexmrogers.com or follow Dr. Rogers at www.twitter.com/RexMRogers.

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Written by Rex M. Rogers

Published: 25 December 2010

My wife and I visited the Holy Land in 1996. We traveled with a busload of about 44 other people as part of university tour. Our tour guide was a woman who turned out to be a font of 4,000 years of history everywhere we paused to ponder.

Our first tourist stop, Mt. Carmel, took place in a driving rainstorm. What made that location memorable for me was that I was coming down with a bad cold and felt more miserable by the moment. More memorable still, though, was the realization that I was looking west to the Mediterranean Sea, watching thunderclouds just like Elijah did centuries before when he challenged the prophets of Baal.

During the next two weeks we traveled to most of the best known historical sites. They were all interesting. But what began to bother me was that everywhere something significant was thought to have occurred an ancient church or altar or shrine had been built to commemorate it. Soon, we weren’t spending as much time looking at historical sites as we were being shown an old grime-encrusted edifice where people came to light candles, say prayers, and worship the place. Undoubtedly some pilgrims worshiped God in those places, but I saw many who broke down in tears or embraced a rock or in some other way venerated the location.

Bethlehem was special, of course, because it was Bethlehem. I was glad to be there and eagerly visited the Grotto, now within the Church of the Nativity, where tradition says Jesus was born. Frankly, I was disappointed, not because I expected something recognizable from the birth of Christ to remain from 2,000 years ago, but because the place was again a focus of worship.

People acted smitten, as if they were in the presence of God himself. In no sense do I disrespect these sincere religious individuals. I’m only confessing my own feelings fourteen years later.

Bethlehem as a holy place was, to me, not all that interesting. Bethlehem, the home of people who live there and the issues it confronts today, is intensely interesting. Bethlehem is a place I would like to revisit. It is a place of history, yes, but even more a place to engage the complex issues facing the Middle East today.

Christmas time reminds us of Bethlehem and the honored position it holds in the history of the Christian faith. But Bethlehem is not in itself sacred. It’s the child in the manger who grew to become the Savior on the cross, buried, and risen who is holy. I pray for the peace of Bethlehem and peace in hearts, all possible because of the Prince of Peace.

© Rex M. Rogers – All Rights Reserved, 2010

*This blog may be reproduced in whole or in part with a full attribution statement. Contact Dr. Rogers or read more commentary on current issues and events at www.rexmrogers.com or follow Dr. Rogers at www.twitter.com/RexMRogers.

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Written by Rex M. Rogers

Published: 23 December 2010

Despite conservative outcry, fear-mongering, and dark warnings of a hastened Armageddon the demise this week of the United States military’s “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy doesn’t matter all that much.

Congress voted earlier, and Wednesday this week President Barack Obama signed into law a repeal of the nation’s “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy toward gays and lesbians serving openly in the United States armed forces. The policy had been in effect since 1993 when the Clinton Administration supported its adoption as a compromise policy allowing gays and lesbians to serve as long as they or their commanders didn’t make an issue of their sexuality. Prior to this time, gay and lesbian citizens were denied entry into the American military and were dismissed if discovered.

Since his days as a candidate President Obama has made no secret of his support for this change. In the sense of a promise made and delivered this is a victory for the Obama Administration. After the President’s brokered tax deal this month he’s on a small roll. He should enjoy it. Given the tough budgetary choices, volatile economy, and chronic wars and rumors of wars facing him he’s not likely to have too many more good days.

Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell doesn’t matter much for several reasons. Gays and lesbians have been and are serving in the military, sometimes with distinction and rarely with issues developing around their sexuality. Gays and lesbians already have access to virtually every other professional opportunity in the American economy and culture, so why not the military?

If it’s a matter of civil liberties, than it’s a no-brainer. Gays and lesbians, however much some people find their sexual orientation unacceptable, are just as much citizens of a free country as heterosexuals.

A number of years ago I watched as a local school district all but crucified a teacher who'd been outed. He was, by virtually everyone's testimony, a good, effective teacher. His only "crime" or "unprofessional" act is that he was gay. Christians in the community led the charge to oust this person, made national news, and it wasn't pretty. It was awful. Had the man done something inappropriate than surely he should have been held to account. But he had not. This was all about who could be the most moral by casting the first stone. No one "won" in this charade, least of all not the community, the school district, certainly not the teacher. It was politics not moral suasion. It was ineffective and wrong.

Women have been serving effectively in the United States military since World War II, and even before that in non-soldier or sailor staff roles. Since the Persian Gulf War women have flown combat aircraft for the United States. While they yet do not serve in combat arms positions, women serve in virtually every other role in the American armed forces.

So what’s the point? Doesn’t it seem logical that if any emotional or psychological or gender-related issues develop in military situations they are far more likely to develop between straight men and women as opposed to heterosexual and homosexual individuals? For one thing, there’s simply far more straight men and women serving than gay or lesbians serving. In this case, gender tensions are more likely to develop from time to time than any tensions rooted in sexual orientation. So if heterosexual people can manage to serve near one another in the American military, without inappropriate consequences, why can’t homosexual individuals do the same along with them?

And why, pray tell, are conservatives or religious groups so bent out of shape over potential immoral homosexual activities when the armed forces certainly has its share of potential and real immoral heterosexual activities? The reason is, of course, an implication that homosexual immorality is worse than heterosexual immorality, a moral distinction not found in Scripture.

Let me be clear: I do not embrace or condone homosexual behavior. I believe the Bible’s teachings on sexuality, heterosexual, homosexual, and otherwise, are quite clear. Sex is a gift of God reserved for monogamous, lifelong, heterosexual marriage. Sex outside this definition, gay or straight, is in God's eyes immoral.

But I think conservatives and/or Christians have long since lost the culture war on this one—and I've written about it—and need to determine how they are going to live in a society that openly allows homosexuality.

Sure, gay and lesbian interests will declare the repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell a great victory and try to use it as a springboard furthering their other social goals. But won’t they work toward those goals anyway?

In the end, when it comes down to it, gays and lesbians can be and have been just as patriotic, sacrificial, noble, brave, or heroic as any other soldier or sailor. I say, “Let them serve.” Address moral concerns with moral living and a moral message, not politics and not the military.

© Rex M. Rogers – All Rights Reserved, 2010

*This blog may be reproduced in whole or in part with a full attribution statement. Contact Dr. Rogers or read more commentary on current issues and events at www.rexmrogers.com or follow Dr. Rogers at www.twitter.com/rexmrogers.

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Written by Rex M. Rogers

Published: 23 December 2010

It seems our home is a breeding ground. Workrooms are apparently getting together late at night. Next day, voila, more workrooms.

It’s the season, I think. There’s something about Christmas that demands space for stuff, hidden and lounging about. Stuff to be wrapped. Stuff to wrap with. Stuff to “conspire, as they dream by the fire.”

The wife is in the middle of all this, managing the workrooms like different fronts on a battlefield. Right now, all’s quiet on the Western Front, but the Eastern one is aglow with frenzied activity. I can hear Christmas music and rattling paper, smell candles burning. Things are happening there that will delight grandchildren and bring smiles to daughters and daughters-in-law. The men involved will grin in a manly man sort of way. I know, I’ve been there, done that.

The wife, the Grandma, you see, is the conductor and soul of the Thanksgiving-to-Christmas symphony. She signs off on the right tree to cut, I erect it, and she decorates it. Actually, she bedecks two, one real, one artificial. Used to be three when the kids were home: one real—the big one, one artificial—the artistic one, and another real one—the smaller one adorned with kids’, traditional, and sentimental family ornaments. Whatever, she is seen in them all.

The wife is the one, too, who actually works in the workrooms. I make forays in and get out quickly, like a medic on a field of battle. She stays in the line of fire and directs the action. She wraps decoratively. I tape paper around purchased items. She is the one, of course, who envisioned, found, purchased, and carried home the stuff—gifts—in the first place. She’s the one who transforms the stuff into Christmas memories.

So multiplying workrooms are a symbol of love not labor. God give us more workrooms.

© Rex M. Rogers – All Rights Reserved, 2010

*This blog may be reproduced in whole or in part with a full attribution statement. Contact Dr. Rogers or read more commentary on current issues and events at www.rexmrogers.com or follow Dr. Rogers at www.twitter.com/RexMRogers.