Pickle Heaven Press-James R. Johnson

something to help you laugh and think about life with Christ

Tag: nursing home

smackdown — January 1, 2025

smackdown

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I entered the room of a friend in nursing care.  Blaring on the TV was the program Smackdown from World Wrestling Entertainment.  The wrestlers were doing all their legendary moves: the tombstone; the piledriver; the powerbomb and the stone-cold stunner.

But what was truly stunning was that the person watching the program was an elderly, Great-grandmother who was missing most of her teeth.

I was amazed and amused.  It caused me, however, to consider my viewing habits.  My wife and I were recently watching a military drama on TV.  We finished the last season but found that we could purchase two more seasons from another provider. 

So, I spent $19.99 and began to stream it but we were quickly disgusted.  There was a barrage of vulgar profanity.  I had forgotten that the nasty stuff had been bleeped out of the seasons that we had previously watched.

This got me to thinking.  About that same time, I was reading through the Gospel of Mark, and I found some applicable words from Jesus. He addressed His disciples saying, “Take care what you listen to” – Mark 4:24.

His concern was the teaching of the Pharisees.  He wanted His disciples to be aware of the sinister way that evil teaching can penetrate and destroy.  

But I am thinking Jesus might look at my TV screen and also say to me “Take care what you listen to.” 

You see, as a teenager I cussed like a sailor.  But at age 19 I was crucified with Christ and raised again in the newness of life.  My life changed in every way, including my vocabulary.  I learned a new way to think, and to express myself when I hit my thumb with a hammer. 

But I find that when I watch a program with profanity or I’m around people who use it, it tends to energize and resurrect my old vocabulary.   Then when my thumb gets mashed, I may not spout profanity, but I think it.  And I don’t even want to think it!

The patriarch Job was concerned about the things that he saw.  He said, “I have made a covenant with my eyes. How then could I gaze at a virgin?”  Job 31:1.

Evidently, Job had decided to never lustfully gaze upon a woman who was not his wife.  That was how he protected the sanctity of his mind and his marriage.  This would be hard to do, however, if his flat screen were streaming smut.

Did you know that you are 6 times more likely to yawn after seeing someone else yawn?  Our course you know that.  You may be yawning now just because it was mentioned. What we see and hear influences the way we think and act.

I learned that the first recorded use of a firearm was in 1364 A.D. So, we have a history of almost a thousand years of guns.  But what we do not find in history are people going into schools and malls and randomly shooting the innocent. 

Yet it happens today with a sickening frequency.   Could it be because we are not so careful about what we see and hear?  Could this be what happens when a kid fills his hours with violent movies and video games?

All I know is that what I hear and see affects what I think and do.  I have always treasured the words of David who wrote in the Psalms.  “Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in Thy sight, O Lord, my rock and my Redeemer” – Psalm 19:14.  I have even put the verse to music. 

But how can the meditations of my heart be acceptable to the Lord, when I am hearing and seeing things that poison my soul? 

I flipped the TV off and decided to count the $19.99 spent as lost.  But what I’ve kept is of far greater value. 

A PRAYER: Lord this is a constant battle for me and many others.  Help us please!

This has been Jim Johnson with pickleheavenpress.com

May the grace of our Lord be with you

Scripture passages are from the New American Standard Updated edition

what’s the plan? — March 20, 2024

what’s the plan?

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My wife and I are still reasonably healthy and yet – we recently moved into a nursing home.  We bought a house that was originally designed to be the last home of an aging couple. 

So, they built for themselves a practical one-level ranch.  Included were grab bars positioned next to the toilet and the bathtub for the day that their legs would lose their lift. 

There is a nice bench in the walk-in shower for a mid-shower rest.  And the halls in the house are wide enough to accommodate a king-sized wheelchair or a dump truck if needed.

They were thinking ahead and were therefore able to comfortably live out their last days in the home that they had built. 

The Lord applauds that kind of planning and preparation for the future.

For instance, Proverbs 21:5 says, “Careful planning puts you ahead in the long run.”   I believe ahead is quite a bit better than behind.”

Consider the ant for example. Solomon wrote, “Watch it closely; let it teach you a thing or two. Nobody has to tell it what to do.  All summer it stores up food; at harvest it stockpiles provisions.”  – Proverbs 6:6-8

The ant plans for the future.  He gathers and stores when he can, so he will have food when it is needed.

There will certainly be someone who would object saying, “Planning is contrary to believing.  We need to walk by faith and trust God for the future.”

Well, we certainly do need to trust God.   Proverbs 16:9 says, “We plan the way we want to live, but only God makes us able to live it.”  Our plans need to be made on our knees.  

But planning is not at odds with our faith.  Jesus said, “Is there anyone here who, planning to build a new house, doesn’t first sit down and figure the cost so you’ll know if you can complete it? If you only get the foundation laid and then run out of money, you’re going to look pretty foolish. Everyone passing by will poke fun at you…” –  Luke 14:28-30  Jesus clearly understood the need to plan.

So for what do we plan?

Sarah is headed off to college, – but she needs to check out the job market before she gets that degree in bagpipe technology. 

Lamar is so excited about his beautiful brand-new baby girl.  Oh, but there will be an expensive wedding in her future.  He may need to start setting aside a little money for that. 

I have friends who do a yearly inventory of their marriage, and then make specific plans for dates, trips and so on to help strengthen their marriage in the year to come.

Terrell and Tammy are in their fifties now.  They are finally starting to plan for retirement, but the projections are not looking so good.  They really regret not having started to save when they were younger.

Planning works with lesser things as well.  Who hasn’t gone on a trip and forgotten their toothbrush?  Consider downloading a travel checklist app or create your own.

Store the list in your computer and print it out and use it each time you pack for a trip.  You’ll never forget your toothbrush again, and the airline passenger next to you will thank you for it.

And what about your forever future?  We can plan and prepare for that as well.  John 3:16 says, “For this is the way God loved the world: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life.”  NETBible ®

How does the old adage go, “When we fail to plan, we plan to fail.” Seems true enough to be in the Bible.  

As for me I am planning to go sit down and take a shower!

A PRAYER: Lord pry us from the present to help us plan for what’s ahead.

This has been Jim Johnson and pickleheavenpress.com

May the grace of our Lord Jesus be with you.

(Unless otherwise noted, Scripture is from THE MESSAGE: The Bible in Contemporary Language © 2002 by Eugene H. Peterson. All rights reserved.)

bound to set free — April 10, 2019

bound to set free

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Jim Johnson – 654 words

The word “helpless” fits.  We were at the nursing home visiting my grandmother.  Our kids said an obligatory hello to her and then went to wait in the lobby.  There is only so much cheek-pinching a kid can take. 

Time to check on them.  From a distance I saw the boys teasing the caged dove that sat on the coffee table.  I was about to rescue the bird and reprimand my boys, when one of the aged residents shuffled up behind my ten-year-old son K.C. 

He froze, thinking it was my hand on his shoulder – thought he got caught.   But then she uttered words that brought an even greater dread, “I got to go to the pot!”

She grabbed his hand and began to drag him off to the women’s bathroom as she frantically and loudly repeated, “I got to go to the pot.”  “I got to go to the pot.”   She mistook him for an aide.  Her frantic became his, times ten.

I watched from the distance with shock and amusement.  He looked back and saw me as she pulled him forward.  The angst on his face pleaded with me to intervene.   I just couldn’t. It was too, too rich.  (OK so I am not the most compassionate dad.)  Fortunately, she ended up dragging him over to the office where they came to her (and his) rescue. 

Helpless!  That’s what he was feeling.

I wonder if Jesus felt that way?  He was led away to a worse situation.  I was reading again of His last few hours and came across this, “Then Annas sent him, still tied up, to Caiaphas the high priest.”  (John 18:24) -NET Bible®

Jesus was being shuttled to the high priest to face a kangaroo court.  He was escorted by soldiers and His hands were tightly bound with rope to keep Him from grabbing a sword and breaking free.  He wasn’t going to make bail. 

So ridiculous and unnecessary!   He had freely surrendered to the authorities at Gethsemane. And yet His hands were bound. 

Those hands had such a history.  His newborn hands once rested in the soft sheltering hands of His mother.  They were later calloused by the work of a carpenter.  Those hands touched and healed the untouchable skin of a leper.  They were laid on a coffin to bring life to the dead boy within.  Mothers brought their children to be touched by Him and even at Gethsemane He picked up a severed ear from the dirt and restored it to His foe.

But – those hands were now bound up and out of business.

The hands of the priests “slapped Him.”   The hands of Pontius Pilate were washed as if his guilt could be dissolved, but Jesus’ hands were bound. 

We typically use our eyes to look, before we use our hands to grab.  The eyes help a person to see the immediate future and prepare for it.  Now psychologists have found that when our hands are tied, our eyes are also tied.  When we cannot use our hands, our eyes cease to look ahead.   Not true of Jesus.  His hands were bound but His eyes were on the objective before Him.

He chose to ascend Calvary hill.  He then laid down on a rough-hewn beam and stretched out His hands to be pierced with cold steel.  By those hands He was suspended in agony until He finally uttered, “It is finished!” And He died.  

BUT He was not helpless.  This was all according to His plan.  This was a “must” for Him (Matt 16:21-22) and a must for us as well, for it is by His suffering, that we are healed.    

Once raised again, He offered His pierced hands as proof that He was the Son of God and that His redemptive work was complete.

What some might regard as helplessness, He meant as help-for-us.  He was bound to set us free.  

______

I enjoy playing hymns on the classical guitar.  Here is a recording of one of my favorites.  O The Deep Deep Love of Jesus.  Enjoy!

O the Deep Deep Love of Jesus. Guitar: Jim Johnson