Who Does He Think He Isn’t?

I don’t publish comments on old posts, so I deleted this one which appeared yesterday, but I am reproducing it here for a reason. It comes from someone calling himself or herself “Sane”:

What about all the babies that have died this summer because they were left unattended in hot cars? Maybe your angels could have saved a few babies instead of murdering Assyrians?

Let’s assume your god really does exist (he doesn’t, of course). Why would you worship someone who creates tiny little helpless babies, only to let them (or worse, MAKE them) die in a hot car, or in any number of other horrible ways? What kind of a sick, twisted being would do that? What kind of a sick individual would WORSHIP someone who does that?

Instead of waiting around for help to come, try to get yourself out of the situation. In the meantime, help out others who need it, and maybe you’ll be lucky and they’ll return the favor someday. If you wait for your god to help, you’ll be sorely disappointed.

I don’t want to get heavily involved in the obvious responses to these ancient arguments, apart from noting: 1) I wait for God to help all the time, and he comes through over and over, 2) I do help others, because you can’t have the Father if you don’t love your fellow man, 3) atheists should wonder why they are so furious at a person they claim is nonexistent, and 4) the fact that you disapprove of God’s behavior does not mean he doesn’t exist.

Here’s what I have to offer. Sane, tell me about a problem you have. It has to be something a Christian God would be willing to fix; it can’t be something like, “Dope is too expensive in my neighborhood.” I’ll have people pray about it. If God fixes the problem within seven days from the time I post the request, let me direct you to some good resources where you can learn more about him. If not, go on your way.

Everybody get behind this in prayer, if you will.

Now, back to your regularly scheduled blogging.

Life seems to get better every day. God answers one prayer after another. Where did we get the idea that Christianity was about obeying rules or being good or going to heaven sixty years in the future? It’s about self-actualization here on earth, seeing your dreams come true moment by moment, with God at your side. Heaven, as the movie title says, can wait.

My involvement with my church keeps growing deeper. I can’t walk through the place without talking to five or six friends along the way. People stop me to compliment me on the food I cook. I talk guitar with the musicians. It’s fantastic.

Today I’m going to our monthly volunteer meeting. We have 700 volunteers, so we get together and try to get more organized. I’m not involved in the music ministry, but I’m going to show my “new” Japanese Resuporu (Les Paul!) to one of the guys. It will be great to get his input on it.

I still have no respect for Japanese acoustics, but the quality of my $500 Burny has convinced me that Japanese electrics are superior to American electrics. I’m sure you can spend $4000 and get an American guitar that is somewhat better, but then you can also spend $2000 and get a top-notch Japanese guitar that beats the $4000 job. Japanese guitars will always be a better deal, because the people at Gibson have gone completely insane. They charge so much, anyone in the world can undercut them. I wonder why American Fenders are still fairly reasonable.

I have had some frustration with the electric guitar, trying to lean how to play slowly. In bluegrass, there are no long notes on the guitar, so if you hit the string at all, you’ve hit it right. When I work on B.B. King music, however, I have to play a lot of long notes, and a lot of them involve shaping the notes as they sound, moving the pitch up and down. This takes skill, patience, and concentration. At first, I wondered if I would ever get it to work, but as with so many musical issues, it turns out the problems magically go away with practice, even when I’m not consciously working on them.

I bought a Fat Sandwich distortion pedal. I was disappointed when I tried it with the Burny Les Paul. It seemed like the distortion was very intense, no matter how the pedal was adjusted. Then I tried it with my other guitars, and the problem went away. I guess I’m getting lesson on pickups. Apparently, some pickups distort easier than others. The Japanese L8000 humbuckers in the Burny must be considerably hotter than the Texas Specials in my Strat, because they blow the Fat Sandwich up regardless of what I do. Oddly, I don’t have this problem with my Ibanez Tube Screamer.

Maybe the Fat Sandwich was a bad move, but I’ve listened to samples over the web, and I know some people have gotten wonderful sounds from it.

I’m considering going to Haiti at the end of the month. We are still doing missions. I was involved in doing the press releases right after the earthquake, but I was never told how we could get to Haiti. I assumed the church was contacting people and asking them to go, because of their special skills. It turns out anyone who is willing to spend over a grand to go can do it. I wish I had gone in January. I didn’t know it was possible.

I’d like to go, but man…Haiti in AUGUST? That almost sounds like a metaphor for hell. The weather report says Haiti is going to be about six degrees hotter than Miami this week. That means a lot, when it’s 90° here.

One of my friends has gone at least once, and she’s going this time. She’s urging me to go. She said you have to wear some kind of electrical thing to keep mosquitoes away, and you have to bring a fan to put by your bed, otherwise you can forget about sleep. There is no air-conditioning. And she said something about wearing sandals in the shower to keep the parasites off your feet.

Okay.

What about the cabanas and pina coladas? What about those? I haven’t heard anything about the important stuff yet.

In all seriousness, I am wondering if it’s a good idea. I have all sorts of unusual skills, but I don’t have a single one they need. I am not a medical professional. I am not a builder or a mechanic. I am not an engineer. I can sue people for them, I guess, if they can find a way to do it in a Florida court.

Maybe I should just send them the money and stay here.

If I go to Haiti, what do I do for a guitar? There is no way on earth I am going to lose a week of practice. You can do that with many instruments, but with the guitar, one week off means six weeks of rehab. Forget that. No way, no how.

I guess the intelligent thing would be to take an acoustic. Maybe the cheesy Tacoma Papoose I never use. The action is a horror, but I suppose that will keep my fingers working.

Some day I may get an electric travel guitar. They’re about two feet long, and they have no headstocks. The amps are internal, and they have headphone jacks. On the other hand, I have two Asian guitars I didn’t pay a lot for. Maybe this is a good use for them.

I am trying out a Bugera amp that attenuates down to 1/10 of a watt. I did not know this amp existed when I got my 1/4-watt Vox. This amp has five advantages. 1. It plays at lower levels. 2. It has reverb. 3. It has a headphone jack. 4. It costs half as much. 5. It has a gain control. I think the Vox sounds better, but that may be because I’m not sure how to work the Bugera. Anyway, it’s a good cheap practice amp, and you can use it without pedals.

I plan to resume playing ZZ Top. I had some moral concerns, but without going into details, after prayer and so on, I have come to the tentative conclusion that it’s okay to practice the dirty songs in private, just for technique. Maybe I’m wrong. I won’t play them in church, even for practice, and I would not take part in a performance where the lyrics would be sung. We’ll see what happens.

I better get over to Guitar Center. I have to buy a case.