I watched The Wizard of Oz, once again, for the umpteenth time (and I didn’t hide in my room when the twister came!). I was struck during this viewing at just how quickly Dorothy wanted to go back home to Kansas. For someone who longed for somewhere over the rainbow, she sure wanted to get back to bleak, boring-looking Kansas in a hurry. In Kansas, she felt unheard, maybe even unwanted, while in Oz there were all sorts of creatures who wanted to help her and truly enjoyed her company. Even though Oz seemed to be everything that Dorothy could have wanted, she wanted out. There was no place like home. But she needed the help of others, and she needed to help others in order to get there.
A retired medical doctor was in an accident in which he rolled his truck over in a ditch.
While making chaplain visits at a hospital, the radiator in my car sprung a leak. I had my car towed to a nearby repair shop where the repairman and I had a long and interesting discussion.
I walked into the room of a patient whom I had never met before and about whose case I knew nothing about. “Hello! I am the pediatric chaplain making unit rounds today. My name is Chaplain Ken.”
Whenever I wrap up my prison Bible study for the day, I typically try to end with some sort of “real life” application based on what we are studying. On this particular occasion, the LORD made this rather simple as we observed his power to change the hearts and lives of his children.
In my prison discussion group, one of the guys had something he’d learned and wanted to share with the rest of us. We were looking at the 10th Step of 12-Step Recovery — “Continuing to take personal inventory, and when we are wrong, promptly admitting it.” We were discussing what it’s like to admit that something we’ve done or an attitude we may have is wrong. That’s when Rodney spoke up.