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4 Amarillo Video

January 31, 2014 / / 0 Comments

Scattershooting while wondering whatever happened to Tom Henke…

The video from our “4 Amarillo” Thanksgiving Service at First Baptist back on November 24 is finally up and running now on our Central church website. To see the 67-minute service, from Burt Palmer’s welcome (“Take a moment to greet your neighbor because this is what heaven is going to look like!”) to the acappella singing of “The Lord Bless You and Keep You” at the close, just click here. Burt’s welcome comes at the 6:30 mark after the opening hymn. At the 11:25 mark, you can watch me jump off my seat in the front row to attend to Chloe. The cameras missed her nearly blacking out and stumbling off the stage, almost nailing the piano and taking out the strings section on her way to a stair well at the side of the room. She was OK. But we keep bringing it up at small group. You can watch Kevin lead the 130-member combined choir and the rest of the congregation in “Mighty to Save” at the 12:30 mark. And, yeah, as always, he finished it strong. Really strong. My sermon, “So the World May Believe” starts at the 34:50 point. Burt totally takes things over and freaks out all four worship leaders at 62:00. And we sing “The Lord Bless You and Keep You” at 65:00 . And, by the way, you Central folks will be shocked at how many times you’re going to see yourself. First Baptist has half a dozen cameras just on the crowd. They did a great job recording and editing this thing.

Whoa, what a night. More than 1,100 in the room on a freezing cold evening with snow and ice and on the streets. It was significant. It was historic. It mattered. And, just like our Lord promised, people have noticed. It’s funny, our churches have tried for centuries in a variety of ways and with varying levels of success to evangelize the world and expand the Kingdom. The only thing we’ve never tried is the one thing our Lord promises will work. Unity. Christian unity. Putting aside our minor differences and celebrating the countless things we share in common in Christ. The city of Amarillo is noticing. Christ is being preached in word and deed and our Father is receiving the glory. Amen.

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One of the classiest professional baseball players I ever had the privilege to know and to cover, Michael Young, has retired from baseball. After fourteen years in the major leagues, thirteen of them with the Texas Rangers, Young is calling it quits. He hung ’em up today at the Ballpark in Arlington with a .300 career batting average, 2,375 hits, seven All Star appearances, and one Gold Glove. He is the all-time — ALL-TIME!!! — Rangers franchise leaders in games played, hits, doubles, triples, and runs scored. He never went to the disabled list one time in his career. He was arguably the most consistent player in baseball during the past 14 years. And one of the all-time nicest guys.

Click here to read Sports Illustrated’s excellent article about Young’s career achievements. Click here to read Evan Grant’s article about Young always being a Texas Ranger. Click here to Richard Durrett’s outstanding piece on Young’s leadership in the Rangers clubhouse.

When I first began covering the Rangers as a reporter and then Sports Director at KRLD in 2001, Michael Young was the quiet, unassuming newbie, willing to play wherever and whenever it could help the team. I worried when A-Rod was assigned two lockers in that corner of the clubhouse right next to Young. I worried when Rodriguez and Young would sit quietly in that corner after every single game, win or lose, and talk together for ten or fifteen minutes before they would speak to any of us reporters. I would think to myself, “Please, don’t let A-Rod rub off on Michael!”

No way.

Young quickly developed into the leader of the Rangers franchise and stayed that way to the very end. Not one arrogant or self-serving bone in his body. Never. He always took responsibility for miscues in the field and always deflected praise when things were going really well. He would talk to us and answer our lame questions after 11-3 losses and after four-game sweeps of the Yankees. He was always there. Always good. Always right.

Congratulations to Michael Young on a great career. And thanks to Michael Young for doing everything the right way.

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For your pre-Super Bowl reading, I highly recommend this interesting and insightful article by Kate Hairopoulos of the Dallas Morning News regarding the use of the term “12th Man” by the Seattle Seahawks. The Seahawks are only able to use the term, which has long been trademarked by Texas A&M, by means of an exclusive licensing agreement with the Aggies. In the agreement, consumated by a $100,000 payment to A&M and maintained by a $5,000 annual fee to the school, the Seahawks and the NFL acknowledge the rightful ownership of the term by Texas A&M. And the Aggies hold full decision-making control over how the Seahawks can and cannot use it. Kate’s column outlines all the do’s and don’t’s of the deal, including some of the ways Texas A&M polices the arrangement. Apparently, the deal expires in 2016 and, with the Seattle franchise doing quite well for themselves, the Aggies are already devising ways to benefit even more.

Peace,

Allan

Luv Ya Bum!

October 20, 2013 / / 0 Comments

I was thirteen years old on Thanksgiving Day 1979 when the Cowboys hosted the Houston Oilers at Texas Stadium. Being in different conferences, the two teams rarely played each other; being very, very successful football teams from the same very, very football crazy state made those uncommon occasions when they did match up really special. Dallas was coming off two straight Super Bowl appearances — they beat the Broncos for the 1977 title and lost to the Steelers the following season in Super Bowl XIII — and Houston was well on its way to its second straight AFC Championship Game. And on this day, with my grandmother’s turkey and dressing and no-cook strawberry pie churning in my gut, Earl Campbell ran all over the Cowboys and won the game 34-20.

This was before cable TV and the internet, before hour-long post-game shows. It wasn’t until the ten-o’clock news on channel 8 that night that I saw it with my own eyes and heard it with my own ears. Bum Phillips, the boot-wearing, ten-gallon-hat-wearing, tobacco-chewing, straight-shooting coach of the Oilers had looked right into the cameras after the game and declared, “I’d rather be Texas’ team than America’s team any day!”

I knew immediately that he had said a very clever thing. I also knew, deep in my heart of hearts, that he was right.

It was hard not to like those Luv Ya Blue! Oilers of the late ’70s. The faces of the franchise, the Tyler Rose and the coach called “Bum,” were Texas icons. Earl Campbell was an east Texas kid who had won the Heisman Trophy with the Longhorns in Austin and Bum was a Texas high school and college coaching legend. He has assisted Bear Bryant at Texas A&M and Bill Yeoman at Houston and Hayden Fry at SMU. Before that, he had actually been the head coach for our Amarillo High School Sandies, for three seasons from 1959-1961. It was during his time here in the panhandle that he came up with his defensive numbering system that is used by all coaches and fans at all levels of football from Pee Wee to the NFL. When a defense is described as a 3-4 or a 4-3, you’re using Bum Phillips’ original terminology. He invented the 3-4 defense and introduced it to Bear Bryant during the Junction Boys days. And he brought it to the San Diego Chargers when he made the move to the pros in 1967. All real football people in Texas knew about Bum Phillips. And with Phillips calling the plays and Campbell making highlight reel runs in his tear-away jerseys, the Oilers won a bunch of football games. And a whole bunch of fans.

They packed the Astrodome, waving their Columbia blue and white pom-poms, screaming and cheering wildly from the opening kickoff to the final gun. They were crazy, these Oilers fans, in stark contrast to the cheese and wine crowd at most Cowboys games. Their quarterback, Dan Pastorini, was a gun-slingin’ guy with long hair, who wasn’t afraid of getting into a scuffle with reporters or fans in a random parking lot. Elvin Bethea was a relentless sack-happy monster of a man. Billy “White Shoes” Johnson flaunted NFL convention with every outlandish touchdown celebration. Kenny Burrough. Ray Childress. This was a fun team to watch.

And it all started with their colorful coach who, quite honestly, was more cowboy than the coach of the Cowboys.

Bum Phillips is better known for his catchy quotes than for almost anything else. He once famously said of Dolphins coach Don Shula, “He can take his’n and beat your’n and then take your’n and beat his’n.” His fatalistic line about coaching rings true: “There are only two kinds of football coaches: them’s that’s been fired and them’s that’s gonna be fired.” When asked about Earl Campbell’s inability to finish a one-mile run at training camp, the coach replied, “When it’s first down and a mile, I won’t give it to him.”

Along with the line about being “Texas’ team,” the other Bum Phillips line I remember seeing and hearing the day it happened was, again, on the channel 8 news the day after the Steelers beat Houston in the 1979 conference championship game. A frenzied crowd had greeted the team on its return from Pittsburgh at a celebration / pep rally that had been planned at the Astrodome, win or lose. It was standing room only. Nearly a hundred thousand people with their Luv Ya Blue! signs stomping their feet and cheering their team that had come a couple of plays short of their first ever Super Bowl. Bum Phillips took the stage, leaned in to the microphone, and said, “Last year we knocked on the door, this year we beat on the door, next year we’re going to kick the #@!%&* in!”

And, yeah, I was hooked. I’ve always loved those old Houston Oilers who never quite got it done, but had a whole lot of fun trying.

Bum Phillips died over the weekend at 90-years-old at his ranch in Goliad. Under-appreciated for the innovations he brought to the game, maybe a bit caricatured by his over-sized hats and personality to match. I’ll say about Bum Phillips what he once said about Earl Campbell: “I don’t know if he’s in a class by himself; but I know when the class meets, it don’t take long to call roll.”

Peace,

Allan

The Least Important Person

September 27, 2012 / / 0 Comments

(Commenting on this post automatically enters you into the drawing for the books to be given away in conjunction with this blog’s upcoming 1,000 post. Check out the details a few posts back.)

“My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you.” ~John 15:12
“This is my command: Love each other.” ~John 15:17

What distinguishes the love of Christ and marks the love of all disciples of Jesus is the willingness — no, the eagerness! — to condescend to meet the needs of others. Those being transformed by the Spirit into the image of our Savior are those who consistently imitate him by considering the needs of others more important than their own. They consider others better than themselves. They seek the interests of others ahead of their own. They are the ones who make themselves less important in order to show compassion to those around them.

Our Lord gave us the illustration for such an attitude. When he washed his followers’ feet around the dinner table on that last night, he provided the perfect example of sacrificial love. He showed them “the full extent of his love” and then commanded them to “do as I have done for you.”

What’s astounding is that Christ Jesus, the Holy One of Israel, the promised Messiah and Savior of the World, stooped down to make himself the least important person in the room.

“You call me ‘Teacher’ and ‘Lord,’ and rightly so, for that is what I am. Now that I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you should wash one another’s feet.” ~John13:13-14

There is no job beneath our dignity, there is no task beneath our pay grade, there is no calling that is under our position or status. Would it shock everybody in your office if they saw you taking out the trash? Would it be a huge surprise to your wife if she heard you loading the dishwasher? Would your neighbors gasp in disbelief if you swept up all the gunk in the alleys around everybody’s dumpsters? Would your children faint if you turned off your TV show to play a game with them? In the manner of our Lord, we are commanded to stoop, to condescend, to continually seek new ways to become the least important person in the room.

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 Now that the NFL lockout of the regular referees is over, we can look back and laugh at the miscues and botched calls, the uncertainties and the chaos that was life with replacements. We can giggle at the punny headlines of the past three days such as “FAIL MARY!” and “The Inaccurate Reception.” The funniest line I heard was on ESPN when on Tuesday one of the studio hosts noted that Russell Wilson was the first quarterback in history to throw a game-winning interception. The lockout provided plenty of fodder for late night talk show hosts and editorial cartoonists.

The greater tragedy during the past three weeks, though, has been overlooked. Something far worse has occured in the NFL that’s been overshadowed by the referee lockout and ignored by the national media. It’s brought untold shame and ridicule to a once proud franchise and threatens to undermine the integrity of the entire league. I’m talking, of course, about Jerry Wayne’s new Papa John’s pizza commercial in which the owner of the Cowboys actually raps!

Words can’s describe the embarrassment I felt for the Cowboys, the NFL, the city of Dallas, and the whole great state of Texas upon seeing this commercial for the first time Monday night. It’s humiliating. Jethro rapping and rhyming and shucking and jiving right there in bold HD, jumping up and down stadium staircases, gesturing awkwardly with his hands, striking hilariously defiant poses, selling pizza and Pepsi. That’s the owner and general manager of the Cowboys.

“Yo! It lights me up like a roman candle! Toppings and flavor almost too good to handle!”

Note to Roger Goodell: now that you’ve got the regular refs back to work, please assess some fines and penalties against Jerry Wayne for actions detrimental to the league.

Peace,

Allan

Anticipating Tulsa

March 20, 2012 / / 1 Comment

“When I prayed to make the Broncos better, I didn’t mean Peyton Manning!”

~Tim Tebow

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Carrie-Anne and I are headed up to Tulsa for our annual time of spiritual renewal and ministry rejuvenation. The Tulsa Workshop has long been a favorite destination for us. Every year we are encouraged, uplifted, inspired, equipped, empowered, enlightened, and educated. It’s in Tulsa where we sing our lungs out, we “amen” some of the best preachers in the faith, and we’re transformed. We grow in Tulsa. We change in Tulsa.

I’m approaching this year’s three day event with the same anticipation. I’m so privileged to sit with Terry Rush in his office at 6:30 Thursday morning; what encouraging thing will he say to me this time? I’m so blessed to call Rick Atchley a good friend; what valuable advice will he give me when I see him? My life is more meaningful for knowing Rick and Beverly Ross and their whole family; how will Josh challenge me this year?; how much of their broken hearts and enduring faith will Rick and Beverly reveal to inspire me?

How much of Jeff Walling’s sermons will I steal? Who am I going to run into that I haven’t seen in ten years? How hard will Randy Harris make me laugh? How long will Chris Moore’s beard be, and how many rubber bands will be holding it in place? How many tears will roll down my cheeks as Keith Lancaster leads us in “It Is Well With My Soul” while I realize that my sin — not in part, but the whole! — has been nailed to the cross?

I’ll get to see Dan Bouchelle for the first time since I took his old job at this wonderful church in Amarillo (hopefully, nobody’s told him yet that I referred to him in a sermon two weeks ago as Central’s interim preacher). I’ll get to sing praises to our God with my wife and with our old friends from Mesquite and with new friends we haven’t even met yet and with hundreds and hundreds of Christ’s redeemed. Is Marvin Phillips still alive?!? I’ll listen to Jay Guin and Don McLaughlin and Patrick Mead. I’ll come back with books and CDs and a refreshed understanding of my own salvation and a renewed enthusiasm for the mission to which our Father has called me. And we might run into Garth Brooks again at the Mexican food restaurant.

I love the Tulsa Workshop. I highly recommend it.

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My friend Jerry Schemmel, the play-by-play voice of the Colorado Rockies, has just released a brand new clothing line with a Bible-based theme. This is his baby: 1925 Sports — workout gear with logos inspired by 1 Corinthians 9:25. “…to get a crown that will last forever.”

Here’s the link. Check it out. Way to go, Jerry. Very cool. I know your schedule’s about to get really hectic. Enjoy the relative calm of the final two weeks of spring training. Someday, when you get out of baseball broadcasting to enter the full-time preaching ministry, we’ll talk about hectic. Have a great season.

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The above Tim Tebow joke was submitted earlier today by Josh Penn. Thanks, Josh. See you at the Warrior Dash next month.

Peace,

Allan

Community of Saints

January 23, 2012 / / 0 Comments

Scattershooting while wondering whatever happened to Tony “The Thrill” Hill…

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I was prepared for all that wind yesterday. I had been told about the wind here in Amarillo. I was ready for it. I’ve already experienced it many times over the past four months, so it didn’t surprise me when it hit yesterday just as church was letting out. But not one person had ever told me about raining mud! What was that, the 11th plague?!?

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Speaking of things I’m still learning about Amarillo: I knew it was flat up here. But I didn’t realize you can actually see New Mexico ski slopes from Soncy. I was having lunch with a Rotary Club a couple of weeks ago at the top of the Chase Tower downtown and I swear I looked toward the southeast and saw Cowboys Stadium. It is flat out here. And, yes, there are tumbleweeds. Real tumbleweeds. Blowing across the highway. I’ve never experienced anything like that. Tumbleweeds!

I was complaining to Matt Richardson yesterday about the five-and-a-half-hour drive between here and Fort Worth. He and Sara have family there; they know about that awful drive. But then Matt surprised me by declaring that the two hour drive between Amarillo and Lubbock is even worse. We both acknowledged that there’s nothing to look at, nothing to see on I-27, but he says it’s the moonscape! “You pass the Sea of Tranquility like four times!”

And, yeah, Matt writes his own material.

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I love Aerosmith. You know I do. But Steven Tyler should not sing America’s National Anthem.

Ever.

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I was very sad to see the Dr Pepper corporation in Plano put an end to the production of Dublin Dr Pepper out of that little bottling plant southeast of Stephenville. 

I understand that Dublin Dr Pepper was stretching way past their six-county distribution agreement. I knew something wasn’t right when we began seeing six packs of the glass bottles in our North Richland Hills Wal-Mart. You know, that actually took away from some of the mystique. It was much more cool when you could only get Dublin Dr Pepper — the only soft drink in America made with Pure Cane Sugar instead of corn syrup — in Dublin. Carrie-Anne and I always took the girls to Dublin every couple of years to check out their Dr Pepper museum (which contains much more memorabilia and artifacts than the official Dr Pepper Museum in Waco), to get a real hard-core Dr Pepper float from the old soda fountain there, and to stock up on a case or two of the special stuff and bring it home. Come on, I’ve got an “Official Dublin Dr Pepper Bootlegger” T-shirt! That doesn’t mean anything when anybody can buy it just about anywhere.

I also get that Dublin DP was infringing on some copyrights. There are Dublin Dr Pepper shirts and Dublin Dr Pepper caps and Dublin Dr Pepper quilts and bumper stickers and poodle sweaters and dominoes. It had become its own brand. They were in complete violation.

But, still, it saddens me. Dublin Dr Pepper was another one of those quirkie little peculiarities that made Dr Pepper unique. It made it a little weird and special. Now it’s gone. Dr Pepper will still bottle the sugared soda in special classic cans and bottles with the nostalgic logos and designs from the 1920s and ’30s. But it won’t say Dublin anywhere on them. And that’s a shame.

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Speaking of Dr Pepper: the people who run the world’s oldest soft drink have never been terrific marketers. Changing your logo every ten or twelve years and your advertising slogans every two or three years isn’t good. It doesn’t work. Dr Pepper’s TV commercials over the past decade or so have been embarrassing. Either really boring or really corny or over the top strange. They nailed it in the ’70s with the “I’m a Pepper” campaign. And I’m excited to see that they’re bringing it back. Have you seen the newest commercial? I saw it for the first time during the BCS Championship Game and I saw it a few times yesterday during the NFL Conference title games. I like it.

My shirt would say “I’m a preacher.”

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Life Together has become, over the years, my favorite Dietrich Bonhoeffer book. Being a part of a brand new church family has given me many reasons to re-read some of my favorite passages. One of those passages calls us to celebrate every moment within our faith community. Every person, every event, every interaction, every sub-group, every meeting, every worship assembly: it’s all a gift from God. Good or bad, life-giving or joy-stealing, fair or unfair, the spiritual giants of the faith and the immature babes in Christ: it’s all given to us by our Father in order to sanctify us.

“If we do not give thanks daily for the Christian fellowship in which we have been placed, even where there is no great experience, no discoverable riches, but much weakness, small faith, and difficulty… then we hinder God from letting our fellowship grow according to the riches which are there for us all in Jesus Christ.

Christian community is like the Christian’s sanctification. It is a gift of God which we cannot claim. Only God knows the real state of our fellowship, of our sanctification. What may appear weak and trifling to us may be great and glorious to God. …the Christian community has not been given to us by God for us to be constantly taking its temperature. The more thankfully we daily receive what is given to us, to more surely and steadily will fellowship increase and grow from day to day as God pleases.”

Peace,

Allan

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