One of the things I missed about my “real job” is cheap insurance. I didn’t realize how much my employer’s group plan truly saved me until I became a musician by trade.
My insurance company - found after a long thorough search for the best - charged me over $6,000/yr for a very basic health policy and only paid me $325/yr in actual benefits. So I canceled. And I signed up with Samaritan Ministries.
Their program is like no other, and it’s not an insurance policy. For all you musicians and ministers, self-employed or just jobless out there, I’d highly recommend Samaritan Ministries’ program as a replacement for your current over-priced basic health insurance coverage.
If only local churches would create programs like this of their own, for their own, and then use the money members save on covering the health needs of those outside the Church. Now that would be better for everyone.
Got thoughts? Post a comment below or discuss on my message-board.
My kids call my father-in-law “Papa”. And Papa is best known for his slew of stories just before bedtime each night of his visits.
Each tale the same as his last. Each begins with “One day little Papa...” Then the plot moves quickly and predictably, always retracing Papa’s supposed childhood. The story moves through some mundane activity like “little Papa was picking strawberries” or “little Papa went to bed” and then there’s a brief, very brief, suspense.
“One day little Papa was walking to school and he saw a little old lady standing on the corner. She looked like she needed help crossing the street so little Papa walked over to help her. ‘Can I help you,’ little Papa asked. And little Papa reached out to take her hand and...’AHHHHHHHH!!! I’m gonna eat you, little Papa.’ ‘OH no! It’s that big bad wolf!!”
And screams erupt from wide-eyed faces and quickly cross-fade into shrieks of laughter followed by, “Tell another story!”
And he does. “One day little Papa...”
Honestly, he’s a bad story teller. Predictable. Brief. No characterization. No denouement. No tension and resolution. Always little Papa. Always a wolf big and bad.
But it’s good to the audience. They’re enthralled and thrilled every time. Not because of the words spoken but because of the one speaking. In the right company, in the right voice, the most unprofessional yarn is heard as an epic as grand as the listener’s love for its teller.
From time to time, when there’s nothing interesting enough about my life to journal for others, I’d like to introduce you to great minds and lives that have in some way impacted my own. Today: Stanley Hauerwas.
This introduction is from The Progressive…
“As a theological ethicist, Duke University Divinity School professor, and as a writer cruising through his forties and fifties, Stanley Hauerwas enjoyed the twin blessings of personal achievement and professional obscurity. Then, in 2001, the assessors of talent at Time magazine declared him “America’s best theologian.” Oprah Winfrey gave him air time. Invitations to talk, exhort, and entertain poured in.
Hauerwas, a Texan who speaks in the twangy cadences of Jim Hightower and is as adept with the barbs and jibes, guffaws when recalling the praise from Time: ‘Best is not a theological category! Faithful or unfaithful are the right categories. The last thing in the world I’d want to be is the best.’ “
Hauerwas is full of quotable quips that provoke us to anger and holiness. Here are a few that have made me think:
“I do not have a foreign policy. I have something better--a church constituted by people who would rather die than kill.”
(On the movement he calls religious conservatism) “Christianity is defended not so much because it is true, but because it reinforces the `American way of life.’ Such movements are thus unable to contemplate that there might be irresolvable tensions between being Christian and being `a good American.’ “
“Generally, I think the strongest argument against pacifism is it’s immoral. Namely, we abandon the innocent who should be protected. Just war is committed to believing that you cannot commit an evil that a good may come. You cannot bomb Hiroshima and Nagasaki. It’s better for more people to die on the beaches of Japan than to bomb Hiroshima and Nagasaki. That’s murder. So we are people, those committed to just war and non-violence equally, who often have to watch the innocent die for our convictions.”
“The problem with capitalism is it makes us wealthy, and being wealthy is not a very good thing for Christians to be, if we believe the Gospels.”
To read more about Hauerwas check out this list of links.
Our church got a new pastor when I was eighteen. He wasn’t like the old one. Sure his hair was regulation for a Baptist minister; short and parted to one side. His suit was pressed and usually blue and his shoes were wing-tipped and shiny leather. But he was different I soon found out.
I discovered it the night I first rang his doorbell. I wasn’t there to pay him a visit though. It was one of his daughters I was interested in. I didn’t care which one. Any one of the three would do. I was meeting up with several other rival suitors (and a few girls from church we’d grown too accustomed to having around to be attracted to) to watch a movie with the preacher’s kids at their house.
They were always having people over. And we all came I suppose because they, the sisters, were the only remotely new things in Tyler, TX that Summer after high school. So I rang the doorbell, excited to meet these rumored sisters and the new pastor face to face for the first time.
I was early, too early to be cool at all. I was nervous. I’d spotted the oldest sister at church that morning and really hoped she was home that night. She was a few years older than me. RIght out of college. I wondered if she’d taken a job in Dallas or left to get an advanced degree somewhere like I’d heard she wanted to. I wondered and hoped. I rang the doorbell again.
And waited.
And waited.
And when the door opened there he stood. My formerly suited pastor. Scratching his stomach. No suit. No shirt. No shoes. No pants. Just socks. And underwear. And a grin that gave away the joke.
My father-in-law was - is - like no other pastor I’ve ever met. A head full of theology, enough to make him a Doctor of something-or-another, but a desk drawer full of fart machines and a mouth spilling stories that all end the same way: with a laugh that borders on a scream.
My mother-in-law needs prayer. She lives with the man and the desk drawer and the mouth that came with him. And she raised three beautiful and giving daughters somehow in spite of him. And then gave one away, the oldest one, to a musician as irreverent as her husband. Poor woman.
I’m consoling her and humoring him this week. They’ve taken our bedroom and sent me to the couch and Becky to a kid’s floor. But in exchange my mother-in-law is cooking - and she’s the best cook - and my father-in-law is helping me ready the house for sale - painting the deck. And I’m grateful today for in-laws that tell jokes instead of being the butt of mine. And for family that plays and thinks and works together after all this time. That’s a rare thing.
Why are you here at SHLOG.COM? You’re probably goofing off instead of working. Well, you can do better. Here are some better places to go to waste time:
BLOGS TO READ:
Lord Vader’s Blog
This is Lord Vader’s blog. Read about his daily activities and thank God for your job. It’s hard defending an evil empire against rebels with bad hair.
How I Am Becoming An Astronaut
This woman is an astronaut in training. Read the realtime development of the right stuff.
Bring Back The Couch
The best I can figure this is a blog by the former couch of the Daily Show on Comedy Central, recently replaced by a chair and not thrilled about it.
Casual Friday
Read the 10 highlights of a guy’s every day - things like “Sniffed fingers aggressively in crowded elevator” and “Regained the record for who can hold their breath under water the longest at the pool...I beat Jaimie (9 yrs. old) by 5 Mississippi’s”
STUFF TO WATCH:
Vintage21’s “Jesus Videos”
StrongBad’s e-mail at homestarrunner.com ("Guitar" is my favorite one.)
T-SHIRTS TO BROWSE:
Threadless.com
People upload their shirt designs. You vote on them. The best get manufactured. You can buy one for $10. Fashion for the people, by the people, at a price the people can afford.
RandomShirts.com
Random shirts sold for $10. And the money goes to a good cause.
FONTS TO DOWNLOAD:
DaFont.com
FontDiner.com
HUH?:
Men Who Look Like Kenny Rogers
That oughtta last you ‘til lunch. Happy goofing off. Glad I could help.
One of the things I missed about my “real job” is cheap insurance. I didn’t realize how much my employer’s group plan truly saved me until I became a musician by trade.
