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There’s always a naked guy…

I love to ride my bike here in Florida, especially in the winter months when it’s not quite so humid.

When I’m feeling especially daring, I’ll take off peddling toward my office located 7 miles away from my home. It’s a bit fatiguing, but exhilarating as well. I’ve found the shortest path to get back and forth, and there’s a wonderful trail along the way with truly breathtaking views.

Well, one view was breathtaking for all the wrong reasons. One day as I rode my bike past, I glanced to my left. There was a man walking around his thickly-forested yard. There was a lot of vegetation, and he was watering some plants with a hose.

Oh, yes. One other detail. He was stark naked.

I did what they call in comedy the “double take”. That’s where you look at something, look away but then realize what you just saw and look back again. Yes, that was exactly what I thought it was. I kept my eyes forward, and peddled quickly on down the street.

I’ve always been a very modest guy. I was never comfortable in gym showers or the locker room growing up. So I’m always a bit surprised when my 5 and 6 year old daughters run naked through the house. Usually they’re chasing each other from the bath in our master suit back to their bedroom. I remember when I was a new father, seeing it was a little awkward for me.

On one such escapade, my wife exclaimed something like, “You’re buck naked!” Not sure where that expression came from, but it didn’t matter since our kids immediately misunderstood it. As they ran around the house in nothing but their “birthday suits”, they yelled, “We’re naked bucket! We’re naked bucket!”

There was a sign out front of Naked Guy’s driveway in Spanish: “Casa Del Something-or-other”. Not sure what the translation was, but it should have read “House of the Naked Guy” just as fair warning.

Or perhaps, “House of Naked Bucket”. My kids would have known immediately what that meant.

What was almost as surprising was he seemed so nonchalant: just a dude out watering his plants, ya know. And before you ask, he was indeed watering them the normal way.

I believe most nudists are no one you’d ever want to see naked. I’ve held this hypothesis in the past, and the man I saw that day was no exception to the rule. He was not doing the world any favors with his exposition.

You may think I made a mental note and now avoid that area. But you would be wrong. Years later now, I still ride past “Casa Del Whatever” and shudder a bit at my “Naked Guy sighting”. And in spite of the chance I might see him out “gardening” again, I always take the same route.

“Naked Guy” has a good life lesson to teach all of us (in addition to the importance of wearing sunblock evenly and comprehensively). He reminds us you will never get an “all clear” in this life.

There will always be obstacles in your path. Always.

That place where you think you’re job will stop being a struggle, and life will finally settle into an easy routine – that place is a mirage. It simply does not exist. No one ever “arrives”. We are all “becoming” until the day we die.

When you see the next obstacle in your path, you need to just nod your head and say, “Yep, I was expecting that”, even if that obstacle is buck naked. Because you should be not only expecting it, you should be looking for it. Obstacles are often important indicators we are on the right path.

If you are blazing a new trail, you should not only expect obstacles but also celebrate them. No obstacles means you’re on a easy path that has be worn down by previous travelers. But distractions and bumps in the road mean you are a pioneer in a new world.

Obstacles are also there to keep the wimps out and reward those who persevere. They persuade the less passionate traveler to settle for the low-hanging fruit. But they don’t realize the sweetest nectar is reserved only for those willing to climb to the top of the tree.

Thankfully, Naked Guy wasn’t climbing any trees that day. Count your blessings.

Somewhere out there right now, there’s a “Naked Guy” with your name on him, just waiting to jump out at you and scare you off the path toward your goal. Trust me on this. Something will always be standing in the way of your success, watering his plants with the garden hose.

Near my favorite coffee shop there’s usually a homeless man who hates my guts. Once he asked for something I couldn’t give him, and his instability has given him an unreasonable hatred for me. Now and then as I sit there writing, he walks past. Occasionally, he taunts me with some hateful remark, trying to goad me into an argument.

Do I stop going to my favorite coffee shop because of him? Do I opt for a less desirable spot and try to write there instead?

No, I do not. Why?

Because I’ve learned to be expect circumstances being less than perfect. Obstacles should be no surprise.

There will always be some naked guy hanging around (sorry, bad choice of words) your favorite bike path. There’s always the fly in your soup, the stump in your plowing row, the monkey in your wrench (perhaps my analogy just died there).

But you know what I mean. Circumstances will never be perfect. So embrace the likelihood of obstacles, and keep pedaling along to where you’re going. One of my favorite Old Testament passages says:

Even though the fig trees have no blossoms, and there are no grapes on the vines; even though the olive crop fails, and the fields lie empty and barren; even though the flocks die in the fields, and the cattle barns are empty, yet I will rejoice in the Lord!

I will be joyful in the God of my salvation! The Sovereign Lord is my strength! He makes me as surefooted as a deer, able to tread upon the heights. – Habakuk 3:17-19 (NLT)

That means in spite of disappointments, God is your strength and life is still worthwhile. There’s joy to be found in every season, even if your crops fail. It’s your faith in God that will keep you “surefooted” in those times when you’re going uphill and the air gets thin.

It’s in those high places that your view is grandest and vision is clearest.

Not only expect the obstacles, learn to celebrate them. Their presence actually validates the value of your destination. When obstacles threaten to distract you, just peddle on past. Sip your coffee and write while the angry man sneers at you. Be encouraged that while these obstacles might keep others away, they serve to thin out the crowd on your path forward.

That homeless guy’s presence guarantees there will always be an open chair for you left by others!

One other thing: don’t take your eye off the road. You don’t want to have a wreck in front of a naked guy’s house. Waking up to mouth-to-mouth resuscitation could be awkward, to say the least.

1 Comment

Barb Milburn

Posted December 7, 2020 at 6:33 am

Always something attempting to spoil the day or take your eye off the prize….or to urge you to reroute.
Happy Monday, Pastor Dave.

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Our dream house was a 120-year old 3-story Victorian home. It was just a few blocks away from one of the loveliest parks in the city and the same distance from the church I pastored. I could literally walk to work, and did so on many mornings. How convenient!

Unlike the other brick houses that lined the streets nearby, this one was painted light yellow and stood apart from the rest. Plaster reliefs of baby angels wrapped around the base of the house. They represented the children of the original owners, making the structure even more unique. It also had a three-car garage at the back of it. Few houses in this older section of town had one as large, and many people resorted to parking on the street. But not us! On just an average salary, we had bought one of the nicest places to live in the area.

I had always dreamed of owning a Victorian home. I had performed the role of Prof. Henry Higgins from the musical My Fair Lady right before we moved to our new city. So I was primed to live the life of the English gentleman, sipping tea in my beautiful old house. I loved the old wood, the stained glass windows, and our “penthouse suite” for my wife and me on the top floor. We’d be sequestered away from the noise of our little girls playing below us. It all seemed so ideal.

But it turned out to be anything but ideal. Our “Golden House”, as our little girls came to call it, was not so golden. In fact, our dream house almost killed us, quite literally.

One afternoon I got a call at the church. It was Dawn, my wife, and she was sobbing hysterically. Finally I was able to make out enough of her words to understand what was happening.

“I fell…come home!”

Almost 20 years ago, my wife had been in a bad car accident that crushed her right leg. That ankle couldn’t turn at all. So as I ran the 5 blocks to my home, I knew what had happened.

When I got to the house, I found Dawn in the basement. She was headed to the washer and drier there, and had misjudged a step going down. She hit the concrete floor hard.

After getting her to the hospital, thankfully we learned nothing had been broken. However, that would be just the first of several falls for Dawn down those steps. We eventually moved the washer and drier up to the second floor, which helped a little. But the bottom line was a three-story house with narrow stairways were not meant for a woman who had challenges with mobility.

I also learned having your bedroom on the third-floor is not a good idea for a chubby guy in his mid-50s. There were a few days I wondered if I’d still be alive by the time I reached the top floor. Though I began on the stairway to the bedroom, I might end up on the stairway to heaven…

Then there was the city. Dawn and I always loved culture, restaurants, theater and all the things a great city has to offer. So living there, we felt like kids in a candy store. There was always some new restaurant to explore, always a show playing somewhere, and interesting people living all around us. It seemed ideal.

Except for crime. And taxes. Many cities are big on those, and ours was no exception. We had both in abundance.

One of our regular nightly diversions was watching the notifications on our community’s “Next Door App” alert us to all the recent shootings and hold-ups around us. One of us would hear gunshots, and I’d watch for the posts to pop up. I’d then calculate how close it was to our home. Many were within just a few blocks, some just down the street.

We would occasionally get notices of some tax we hadn’t paid. Usually, we neglected to pay because the city had neglected to ever send a bill. Then one day, you get a notice you’re being sent to a collections agency, even though you still hadn’t received a bill yourself.

Once we got a bill for trash pick-up. We were confused because we paid a refuse bill on time every month. But a lady on the phone informed us what we had paid was in fact only the garbage bill. There was completely different bill that was a tax for just having trash pick up available to us in the city. This bill was paying for the “possibility” our trash might be picked up. No kidding.

I’m sure they’re still probably working on a way to collect a tax on our taxes.

All of this added together was a painful lesson on the difference between perception and reality. After we first moved to that city and were still living in an apartment, I walked down those very streets and fantasized about how wonderful living there would be. When we found the Golden House, we rejoiced and basically cried out, “Here, take our money” to the realtor.

But the view from the outside of a situation is always much different from the inside. Nothing is ever quite what you expect…with houses, or with life.

The problem with so many of the things we want is it’s too often based on an illusion. We think a thing, a person, or a situation will bring happiness. But happiness is never found in those things outside of us.

Real happiness only happens from the inside out.

There’s an old fashioned Bible word for this foolishness: covetousness. The prohibition against coveting is actually the 10th and final commandment. It’s easily skimmed over in favor of the more R-rated commandments against murder or adultery. Simply wanting your neighbors stuff as opposed to stealing it or killing for it seems like no big deal in comparison.

But coveting is like a powerful drug. The addict never gets enough. Once he gets that one thing he’s obsessed over, he’s disappointed to realize it doesn’t fulfill his needs and he moves on to something more. The new car he’d wanted all his life now sits in the garage most days. She can’t even remember why she bought that purse now. That’s how coveting works: whatever you get, it’s never enough. You’re always left wanting something else, and even more addicted to your desires.

Whatever my eyes desired I did not keep from them. I did not withhold my heart from any pleasure, for my heart rejoiced in all my labor; And this was my reward from all my labor. Then I looked on all the works that my hands had done and on the labor in which I had toiled; And indeed all was vanity and grasping for the wind. There was no profit under the sun. - Ecclesiastes 2:10-11

Take care, and be on your guard against all covetousness, for one's life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions. - Luke 12:15

There was nothing wrong with us wanting a house. But it was very wrong of me to think that it would bring us so much happiness on its own. The ideal life and fulfillment I was expecting from a house was unreasonable.

That kind of happiness only comes from God’s address, not mine.

Inevitably, we become like kids on the day after Christmas. We’ve opened every package, played with every toy, and we’re already bored with them. The newness wore off in a day, all because we were expecting too much from them to begin with.

Most homes stop being dream houses the minute we walk into them. Reality inevitably sets in, and the “house porn” on the realtor’s website is now just a bunch of plaster and dry wall.

We finally made it out of our dream house before it killed us. No, we didn't run screaming from it in the middle of the night like in the Shining or the Amityville Horror. When we left, it did take quite a bite out of our finances, and we had to sell for quite a bit less than we'd paid. But the wound was worth it for the lesson we learned.

We’re in a new place now, in a much smaller city. We’re renting a little one-story house we’re hoping to buy soon. We're in a little neighborhood where we hardly ever lock our front door. It's pretty boring compared to city life, but that’s just fine with me.

I’ve discovered what really makes a “dream house”. The dream is not the house, it’s the people you put in it. Regardless of the size or location, those people are what makes life worthwhile.

Everything else is just a dream. And all that glitters is not a golden house.

Our dream house was a 120-year old 3-story Victorian home. It was just a few blocks away from one of the loveliest parks in the city and the same distance from the church I pastored. I could literally walk to work, and did so on many mornings. How convenient!

Unlike the other brick houses that lined the streets nearby, this one was painted light yellow and stood apart from the rest. Plaster reliefs of baby angels wrapped around the base of the house. They represented the children of the original owners, making the structure even more unique. It also had a three-car garage at the back of it. Few houses in this older section of town had one as large, and many people resorted to parking on the street. But not us! On just an average salary, we had bought one of the nicest places to live in the area.

I had always dreamed of owning a Victorian home. I had performed the role of Prof. Henry Higgins from the musical My Fair Lady right before we moved to our new city. So I was primed to live the life of the English gentleman, sipping tea in my beautiful old house. I loved the old wood, the stained glass windows, and our “penthouse suite” for my wife and me on the top floor. We’d be sequestered away from the noise of our little girls playing below us. It all seemed so ideal.

But it turned out to be anything but ideal. Our “Golden House”, as our little girls came to call it, was not so golden. In fact, our dream house almost killed us, quite literally.

One afternoon I got a call at the church. It was Dawn, my wife, and she was sobbing hysterically. Finally I was able to make out enough of her words to understand what was happening.

“I fell…come home!”

Almost 20 years ago, my wife had been in a bad car accident that crushed her right leg. That ankle couldn’t turn at all. So as I ran the 5 blocks to my home, I knew what had happened.

When I got to the house, I found Dawn in the basement. She was headed to the washer and drier there, and had misjudged a step going down. She hit the concrete floor hard.

After getting her to the hospital, thankfully we learned nothing had been broken. However, that would be just the first of several falls for Dawn down those steps. We eventually moved the washer and drier up to the second floor, which helped a little. But the bottom line was a three-story house with narrow stairways were not meant for a woman who had challenges with mobility.

I also learned having your bedroom on the third-floor is not a good idea for a chubby guy in his mid-50s. There were a few days I wondered if I’d still be alive by the time I reached the top floor. Though I began on the stairway to the bedroom, I might end up on the stairway to heaven…

Then there was the city. Dawn and I always loved culture, restaurants, theater and all the things a great city has to offer. So living there, we felt like kids in a candy store. There was always some new restaurant to explore, always a show playing somewhere, and interesting people living all around us. It seemed ideal.

Except for crime. And taxes. Many cities are big on those, and ours was no exception. We had both in abundance.

One of our regular nightly diversions was watching the notifications on our community’s “Next Door App” alert us to all the recent shootings and hold-ups around us. One of us would hear gunshots, and I’d watch for the posts to pop up. I’d then calculate how close it was to our home. Many were within just a few blocks, some just down the street.

We would occasionally get notices of some tax we hadn’t paid. Usually, we neglected to pay because the city had neglected to ever send a bill. Then one day, you get a notice you’re being sent to a collections agency, even though you still hadn’t received a bill yourself.

Once we got a bill for trash pick-up. We were confused because we paid a refuse bill on time every month. But a lady on the phone informed us what we had paid was in fact only the garbage bill. There was completely different bill that was a tax for just having trash pick up available to us in the city. This bill was paying for the “possibility” our trash might be picked up. No kidding.

I’m sure they’re still probably working on a way to collect a tax on our taxes.

All of this added together was a painful lesson on the difference between perception and reality. After we first moved to that city and were still living in an apartment, I walked down those very streets and fantasized about how wonderful living there would be. When we found the Golden House, we rejoiced and basically cried out, “Here, take our money” to the realtor.

But the view from the outside of a situation is always much different from the inside. Nothing is ever quite what you expect…with houses, or with life.

The problem with so many of the things we want is it’s too often based on an illusion. We think a thing, a person, or a situation will bring happiness. But happiness is never found in those things outside of us.

Real happiness only happens from the inside out.

There’s an old fashioned Bible word for this foolishness: covetousness. The prohibition against coveting is actually the 10th and final commandment. It’s easily skimmed over in favor of the more R-rated commandments against murder or adultery. Simply wanting your neighbors stuff as opposed to stealing it or killing for it seems like no big deal in comparison.

But coveting is like a powerful drug. The addict never gets enough. Once he gets that one thing he’s obsessed over, he’s disappointed to realize it doesn’t fulfill his needs and he moves on to something more. The new car he’d wanted all his life now sits in the garage most days. She can’t even remember why she bought that purse now. That’s how coveting works: whatever you get, it’s never enough. You’re always left wanting something else, and even more addicted to your desires.

Whatever my eyes desired I did not keep from them. I did not withhold my heart from any pleasure, for my heart rejoiced in all my labor; And this was my reward from all my labor. Then I looked on all the works that my hands had done and on the labor in which I had toiled; And indeed all was vanity and grasping for the wind. There was no profit under the sun. - Ecclesiastes 2:10-11

Take care, and be on your guard against all covetousness, for one's life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions. - Luke 12:15

There was nothing wrong with us wanting a house. But it was very wrong of me to think that it would bring us so much happiness on its own. The ideal life and fulfillment I was expecting from a house was unreasonable.

That kind of happiness only comes from God’s address, not mine.

Inevitably, we become like kids on the day after Christmas. We’ve opened every package, played with every toy, and we’re already bored with them. The newness wore off in a day, all because we were expecting too much from them to begin with.

Most homes stop being dream houses the minute we walk into them. Reality inevitably sets in, and the “house porn” on the realtor’s website is now just a bunch of plaster and dry wall.

We finally made it out of our dream house before it killed us. No, we didn't run screaming from it in the middle of the night like in the Shining or the Amityville Horror. When we left, it did take quite a bite out of our finances, and we had to sell for quite a bit less than we'd paid. But the wound was worth it for the lesson we learned.

We’re in a new place now, in a much smaller city. We’re renting a little one-story house we’re hoping to buy soon. We're in a little neighborhood where we hardly ever lock our front door. It's pretty boring compared to city life, but that’s just fine with me.

I’ve discovered what really makes a “dream house”. The dream is not the house, it’s the people you put in it. Regardless of the size or location, those people are what makes life worthwhile.

Everything else is just a dream. And all that glitters is not a golden house.