An Occasional Thought or Photo

Moment for stewardship delivered October 18, 2020 via video at First Presbyterian Church, Urbana, Illinois. Imagine an Israelite exiled in Babylon hearing these words from Psalm 130. I wait for the Lord, my soul waits, and in his word I hope; my soul waits for the Lord more than those who watch for the morning, more than those who watch for the morning. O Israel, hope in the Lord! They were strangers in a strange land, unable to worship where they used to, maybe separated from friends and family.  Everything had changed.  But still there was hope! Is our situation really that different?  We can’t worship as we used to.  We are socially distant from families and friends.  Everything has changed.  In many ways, my shelter in place feels like an exile in place. But still there is hope.  The Israelites knew this and made sure they were not lost as a community.  They knew only too well of nations who simply dissolved from existence during exile, n...

Anyone visiting London frequently references the iconic Tube map without any idea of how its schematic representation relates to actual geographic placement.  We don't need to.  The only thing we need to do is to get off at the right station. Recently and for some unknown reason, I wanted to recall where various US Highways entered and exited Illinois and in what order to they intersect.  After staring at Google Maps, forgetting what I just saw, and repeatedly backtracking, I decided that a schematic map would do just the trick.  There no need to bother with scale, just the order of the intersections (think stations in Tube terms). I'm sure many people (at least 2 or 3) have pondered this question, so I set out on the task.  I limited myself to currently in-service US federal highways, the ones with the black and white shield.  Sorry, no route 66 since it is no longer an official highway.  Also, no interstate highways (my apologies to fans of ...

In his 1939 book Life Together , German theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote: It is easily forgotten that the fellowship of the Christian brethren is a gift of grace, a gift of the kingdom of God that any day may be taken from us, that the time that still separates us from utter loneliness may be brief indeed. When I first read the passage some thirty years ago, I felt it profound and certainly applicable to Bonhoeffer’s time as he established an underground seminary within an oppressive state.   I did not see it very relevant to me, other than providing a perspective to rise above the more trivial disagreements within a church community (like choosing the color of a carpet).   What a difference COVID-19 has made and its resulting isolation.   While Shari and technology keep me from “utter loneliness,” life is more detached.   We miss the physical presence of family and friends, especially of our parents, children, and our new grandchild.   On-l...

Inventory was out of control.  Unfortunately, that was my report to the Horizon Hobby's board one quarter.  Consumer preferences had shifted; a cold winter kept everyone inside; our forecasting tools were inadequate; and we (read that I) had exercised poor judgment in some critical buying decisions.  Ed Bachrach, retired chairman and CEO of Bachrach Clothing, Inc. chimed in, "Good judgment comes from experience.  Experience comes from bad judgment." Ed knew how to turn a bad moment into a learning moment.  "Experience comes from bad judgment" does not necessarily mean that bad judgment always leads to experience.  Similarly, experience does not necessarily lead to good judgment.  Each is an opportunity of the other, but only if I take advantage of it. Before I start bragging about all of the poor judgment I have exercised in almost six decades on earth, I had better start by filtering out all of poor judgment I ignored, that I didn't turn ...

During my first twelve years at Horizon Hobby, I had the opportunity to interact quarterly with  Ed Bachrach, retired CEO and Chairman of Bachrach Clothing, Inc., at our board meetings.  Ed brought  a variety of skills to the table, particularly in supply chain management, inventory control, and merchandising.  The highlight though was Ed's memorable snippets of dry, sharp wisdom that could put everything in context.  At one board meeting I described how we had addressed a significant business problem, but now a new and even more significant challenge had surfaced.  Ed quickly remarked, "If you're lucky in life, you'll have a new problem everyday.   If you're unlucky in life, you'll wake up to same damn, old problem every single day." I don't think Ed was talking literally about bedfellows.  He was addressing the reality of business.  Problems are never banished; they are just replaced with new problems.  Former Hori...

In 1989 I was given a one-year rotational assignment as an operations manager in AT&T's equipment business in the Chicago Loop.  It was supposedly a rounding experience.  Coming from the long distance services side of AT&T, this nuts and bolts world of installing and maintaining telephone equipment inside a customer's business was a culture shock. I was in the middle of an IBEW union shop where everyone (1) came from Chicago's south side and (2) had to have a first name that ended in "y" or "ie."  My boss was Eddie.  I worked with Mikey, Jimmy, Randy, Denny, Tommy, etc.  For the first and only time in my life I became Stevie for a year.  You wouldn't find any of these extra letters on our business cards, but their use in conversation, both in second and third person, were constant. More importantly, I learned about a place called "Outside."  When I was a kid, my Mom would send us outside when we were too rowdy to be inside....