Fine Prints: July, 2007

Of Trash and Treasure July 7

The Way of the Transgressor is Hard  July 14 

Indelible Images  July 21  

Boys Will Be Boys, But . . . July 28

Of Trash and Treasure

Not long ago Leonie and I spent a couple of days wandering around St. Augustine. While she shopped for bargains in antique stores, I checked out their used books. Fascinated by the contents of a McGuffey’s Fourth Reader, I decided to buy it—until I saw the price: $28. Suddenly a cold chill settled over me, and it only indirectly had to do with the book I held in my hand. Let me explain.

When a couple of centuries ago government surveyors in the Midwest plotted the land boundaries and laid out the roads, they opted for the grid system. Roads, whether running east and west or north and south, were typically one mile apart. And every square mile of land was called a "section."

The government planners also wanted to ensure easy access to public education. So one-room schools were typically built near the adjoining corners of four sections. That way no student had to walk more than about two miles to school.

To attend high school, students would have to go far greater distances. During the week, they might even have to board in town with relatives or friends.

In the mid 1950s the rural elementary schools in our region "consolidated," meaning they all closed. The students were bused to one of three big (by one-room-school standards) new schools in town—an elementary, a junior-high and a high school.

New, larger school buildings meant a bond issue and higher taxes. So the word "consolidation" bore decidedly negative connotations in our household. My parents—who were both products of country schools, and my mother had taught in a one-room rural school—didn’t subscribe to the "bigger is better" philosophy.

After consolidation, the little schoolhouses in our area of Missouri were padlocked and left untouched for about eight years. The grass grew tall in the playgrounds. In some cases roofs sprung leaks. Dust and cobwebs staked claims.

In the early 1960s, my father was hired as the maintenance man for our region’s three consolidated schools. One of his assignments was to visit each of the abandoned rural schoolhouses and take inventory, deciding what should be salvaged and what should be discarded. School was out for the summer so I accompanied him.

Behind each padlocked door lay an adventure. Some of the schools had been left in perfect order. Aside from the dust, everything was ready for class to begin. Other schools were left in disarray, as if everyone had fled during a fire drill, knocking over desks and dropping items as they rushed for the door.

Some playground equipment and a few globes and blackboards were taken to the new schools and put to use. Most of what we found we were told to dispose of. We threw truckload after truckload of "trash" into ditches on our farm to help prevent soil erosion. A major component of what we threw away was books. Hundreds of them. Books like the $28 McGuffey’s Fourth Reader that precipitated my cold chills when I was in St. Augustine.

Like millions of others, in millions of varied situations, we didn’t realize the potential value of something we possessed—at least, not until after it was gone.

Jim Coffin, Senior Pastor

The Way of the Transgressor is Hard

While flying from Denver to San Francisco about 25 years ago, I sat next to a bounty hunter. He was about 6 feet and 7 inches tall, weighed close to 300 pounds, had a pock-marked face and growled his words rather than spoke them.

He wore cowboy boots only slightly smaller than the state of Louisiana and a belt buckle substantially larger than Rhode Island. In size, shape and color, his fingers reminded me of sweet potatoes. It didn’t take long for me to decide that I wouldn’t want him pursuing me.

"I have my own version of the Miranda," he said as he expounded on his philosophy and described a few of his exploits. "I say to anyone I apprehend, ‘You’re entitled to two telephone calls—one to a doctor and one to a priest. And if you give me the slightest trouble, I promise you that you’re going to need both.’"

A few years ago I received a phone call one afternoon from a parishioner who asked if I would come get him out of jail. His bail had been set at $1,000. I needed to cough up $100 to get a bail bondsman to cover the balance.

As it happened, the bonding company’s in-house bounty hunter was looking after the office that afternoon. Since it was a slow day in the world of criminal activity, and since the jail was even slower in getting my parishioner processed for release, I had time to ask quite a few questions about the nuts and bolts—one bolt in particular—of bounty hunting.

The bounty hunter told me he’d had a heavy steel plate welded under the floor of his car. Welded to the plate and protruding up through the floor was a large eye bolt. Once arrested, a bail-jumper would be handcuffed. Then one end of a six-foot chain would be wrapped around his neck and padlocked, creating an inescapable collar. The other end would be padlocked to the eye bolt in the car’s floor. "I’ve never had a prisoner escape," he said proudly.

The bounty hunter explained that in the case of distant cities, he tried to wait until two or three bail-jumpers were in the same general area before going to get them. While any subsequent arrests were under way, the prisoner (or prisoners) first arrested had to sit—chained!—in the car. If they were lucky there’d be a shade tree to park under.

With all the arrests completed, the bounty hunter would begin the journey home, with only a steel-mesh cage separating him from his chained captives. Both he and the prisoners would sleep in the car.

Being the curious type, I had to ask about "potty breaks."

"Cornfields," he answered. "One person at a time. Handcuffed. With me standing nearby pointing a double-barreled shotgun at him. "Basically," he said, "when someone jumps bail, they forfeit all rights. They become nothing more than a commodity that happens to be human. And bounty hunters trade in that commodity."

About that time the phone rang. A jail guard said my parishioner was ready for release. For his sake, I certainly hoped he would show up for his court appearance.

Jim Coffin, Senior Pastor

Indelible Images

Events that make such an impact that our lives change forever have often been called "defining moments." Some other experiences, while perhaps not as life-changing, leave us with what I call "indelible images." I’d like to tell you about one such image.

During the1971-1972 school year I went to Northwestern Mexico as a student missionary. I was 19. My assignment was to teach English, physical education and horticulture in Grades 7-12—in addition to supervising a team of 14 lawn-maintenance workers three hours each day. (My only "qualification" to teach horticulture was that I’d spent long hours weeding our family garden when I was a kid—hating every minute of it.)

Midway through my sojourn, two former bosses who worked as framing carpenters came to explore Mexico with me during one of the school breaks. Because they weren’t the kind who were attracted to tourist hotspots, we left the beaten track and wandered into places where "gringos" seldom go.

Late one afternoon we pulled into a little mountain town that in every respect looked like the stereotypical Mexican village from a western movie. The small town square was cobblestone. A few adobe buildings faced the square from each side. In the center of the square was a watering trough. Water bubbled up through a plain pipe, the overflow running into a gutter through the cobblestones.

It had just rained hard. The cobblestones and everything else glistened. The sky overhead portended more bad weather, and mist enshrouded the surrounding hills. To the west, however, a small patch of blue sky had opened up, and the sun was shining through, giving warmth and light.

The town was deserted. Not a person or animal was in sight—and certainly no other cars. The only sound was the water bubbling from the pipe, and from the hillsides came the faint tinkling of bells as the goats that wore them frisked about.

The lone building on the west side of the square was a Catholic church, typical of thousands of others that occupy Mexican villages. Suddenly, from out a nowhere, an elderly Mexican appeared. Beckoning to us, he opened the door to the church, motioning for us to enter. He stepped aside to let us pass.

Inside, the church was minimally adorned, except for a stained-glass picture of Jesus above the altar. The sun, at just the right angle as it shone through the gap in the clouds, perfectly illuminated the face of Jesus, flooding the little church with a wondrous warmth. Wordlessly the old Mexican motioned toward the picture.

For several minutes we just stood and looked, mesmerized, absorbing the beauty of what lay before us. No one said a word.

When the clouds began to rob the scene of the sun’s majestic light, we turned to go. As we passed our benefactor, he said nothing. Nor did we. It just didn’t seem appropriate to talk. We merely nodded our appreciation for what he’d done.

And just what had he done?

Because of him, we’d been privileged to experience the wonder, and feel the warmth, of the light that can shine on us through Jesus.

It left an indelible image—not to mention that it taught me a great lesson.

Jim Coffin, Senior Pastor

Boys Will Be Boys, But . . .

About four years ago, our son Josh and I stopped by the Taco Bell at Lake Buena Vista.

Inside were four high-school-aged boys who definitely were trying to make the day memorable. It was impossible to sit anywhere in the facility without being painfully aware of their rude, obnoxious presence.

We watched them fill their pockets with packets of taco sauce. As we followed them out, they proceeded to throw the packets all over the parking lot in much the same way that the biblical farmer sowed seed in Christ’s parable.

No doubt they were dreaming of the pop, pop, pop and the spraying of contents that was inevitable as car tires or human feet crushed the packets. Or maybe they were envisioning the mess that someone else was going to have to clean up.

Let me confess, when I see boys engaged in such activities, it’s rare that I shake my head in wonder, suck in my breath and pose such pious questions as, "What’s our world coming to?" Because such behavior doesn’t surprise me. I did my fair share of it. And I raised my fair share of adult ire by doing so.

Indeed, it was a flashback to my own youth that led me to take my next step—which was to do what any adult male would have done back then had he seen me doing what they were doing. I usually don’t intervene in such situations, but they’d pushed it a little too far.

Before the youthful driver could close the door of his new SUV, I stepped up and said in a polite and almost naïve way: "Excuse me, but you dropped something back there."

His evasive, blank-faced response evoked déjà vu to my core: "Oh, it must have fallen out of my pocket. But I don’t need it."

"You still need to pick it up," I said cheerfully.

Then the sparring began. With each lame excuse he offered, I turned up the heat gently, letting him know that I expected him and his cronies to clean up the mess. I could see the wheels turning in his mind: Is this guy for real? Or will he cave? Do I dare put him to the test?

During the exchange, Josh had slipped into the front seat of our car and slumped out of sight as much as he could. The old man is up to it again. Why does it always have to happen when I’m around?

Knowing that kids should be allowed to make their own decisions, I finally said—all the while toying with my cell phone: "OK, guys, you have a choice: Do you want to clean up the mess because I ask you to or because the police make you do it?"

They decided they preferred to work for me.

After having been sent back three times, they finally got every packet. I thanked them profusely.

As we headed home, I had a moment to muse. Is the delinquency problem in our world today primarily about the fact that boys will be boys? Or is it equally about the fact that too often we men refuse to be men?

Jim Coffin, Senior Pastor