Friendship

I have been reading a book my Dad gave me a while back called "The Speed of Trust". This book talks a little bit about John Adams and Thomas Jefferson and their friendship. When John Adams became the 2nd president Jefferson, being of the opposite political party and receiving the 2nd highest number of votes, was made vice president. The two had grown close while creating the declaration of independence and basically helping establish our country. When they took office Adams expected that he would have Jefferson's full support as he ran the country, but that was not the case. Jefferson wanted to be president and their friendship was greatly strained by the constant butting of heads. Years later Adams was encouraged to extend an "olive branch" to renew the friendship. When he did so Jefferson responded positively and the friendship was renewed. Interestingly enough the two both died 14 years later on the same day, the 4th of July none the less and the 50th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence. I can't help but think God has a hand on situations like that. Anyway, what really made me think was a quote from John Adams to Thomas Jefferson. It is as follows, "While I breathe, I shall be your friend".

To me this quote says that no matter what may occur, as long as I'm alive I will consider you my friend. That is an expression of a powerful bond and it made me consider some of my friendships. I would say I have a handful of friends that I feel that way about. That no matter what were to happen I would still consider them a friend. Having said that I also remember past friends with whom I felt very close and may have said the same thing but now I am not close with them at all.

These words are moving and the bond that they reveal is definitely something to be strived for. But I would say the quote is also a statement of a commitment. How committed are we to our friends? Are we so committed that we can look past a friends mistakes or shortcommings? Are we so committed that when a friend hurts us, offends us, or casts us aside we are able to forgive and continue to pursue the friendship. If so, is this something we communicate to our friends? I value my friends very much and try to be good to them but I don't know that I have ever told them straight out how much I value them. My name "Jonathan" comes from the Bible and in the Bible Jonathan is best known for his friendship with David. I feel like the quote John Adams made about Thomas Jefferson is one that Jonathan probably would have said to David. I've never been one to say your name and what it means or where it comes from should play any sort of guiding role in your life. But in this particular circumstance I think it gives good insight into the level of friendships God likes to see among his people.

Just some stuff to think about. Enjoy!

Bumper Stickers

I've decided I don't really care for bumper stickers or any sort of sticker people put in their windows or frames that go around license plates. Mainly because I feel like they are usually one of 3 things: some sort of advertisement, some statement that makes a jab at some one else or a group of people, or some lame shot at humor. On occasion you will see that random bumper sticker that is kind of funny but those ones don't ever seem to be mass distributed. The ones that are all over the place are usually the crappy ones.

Over the next few days pay attention to what you see on cars and let us know if you see any good ones. You can also point out some of the bad ones too.

Here's some of the typical ones I see that I'm tired of, if you have one of these don't take it too personally that I don't like one of your car decorations.

Anything related to the Skin Industries brand - these are the window stickers that outline girl devils and what not.

NOTW - the not of this world window stickers can be very ellaborate but I think it's kind of an odd message to give everyone driving behind you. Most people probably don't know what it means.

Any "I'd rather be..." license plate frames. Quite frankly I don't really care and it is usually stuff I could guess anyway considering most people would rather be doing anything than driving around town.

Political stickers - I don't need to know who people voted for 12 years ago, "Clinton/Gore" is really no longer a valid sticker.

Social Issue statements - When you put these on your car, are you really doing that much to improve the issue? Do people really make an effort to save the dolphins because it said to on your car. Or do I have the power to legalize marijuana and I was just waiting for your bumper to tell me to do it?

Bands - what's funny about a lot of these is if you read it and you've never heard of the band, chances are you don't realize its a band name you are reading.

Honda Sticker - When you're driving a Honda Civic it doesn't seem necessary to put a big sticker in the window that says "Honda"

Calvin - I'm almost curious with this one of what all people can portray calvin doing, and where is Hobbes in these illustrations?

This list is getting long so here's all the rest: Honor Student/Student of the month, Any sort of ribbon sticker that tells people to do something like support our troops, pencil sketches of your family members with their names on them, old harvest crusade stickers, in memory of window decals.

I hope I don't anger any of you too much with these!!

My parents spanked me

At work today we some how got into a brief discussion on disciplining kids. In this discussion I was basically told that it is no longer acceptable to spank your kids. My question is, when did things change? When I was a kid I was actually a pretty good kid and didn't get in too much trouble, but when I did I was usually spanked by my parents. A spanking was usually done on a spur of the moment basis, like I just talked back or said something I shouldn't or hit my sister or something and my parents would say "Hey! Get over here!" then they would spank me on my butt once or twice and say "you are not allowed to talk like that" or "don't talk back to your mother that way". It wasn't so much that these spankings hurt, especially as I got older, but they sent a firm message that what I was doing would not be tolerated by my parents. In instances where my parents found out about something I did in the past, maybe a few days ago my punishment would be "something like go to your room and we'll talk about this later" then when they would come speak to me they would explain their dissappointment in my actions and explain or re-explain that it is not acceptable behavior. I think ultimately both the spank and the firm talking to served as a wake up call to me, to let me know that doing what I did was wrong and should not be done again. The spank was often a little more abrupt but I think the shock of it, that shock of my parents suddenly turning on me because of my behavior sent a strong and clear message.

Now I know some people prefer to use a time out system or something that rewards the good and ignores the bad or whatever and I am fine with that. I really don't care how other people choose to discipline their kids, I think its completely up to them. What I don't like is how people have suddenly decided that it is some sort of crime to spank your kids and if there is any sign of it you should be reported to the authorities. Sure no kid should be excessively beaten and if for some reason they are warranting a spanking on a regular basis then things are out of hand. But my parents spanked me simply to keep me on the straight and narrow and I believe it worked very well. Therefore I plan to spank my kids if and when I have some if they behave in a way that I feel warrants it.

I'm interested to hear your thoughts on this. How did your parents discipline you? was it affective? why or why not? how do you plan to discipline your kids and if its different from how your parents did it why?