Right up front:  NO not that!! 

Sometimes blogging can be a sterile environment.  It is sort of like online chatting.  Jo & I watched CSI: Miami while eating supper Monday night (she likes it & I watch it because I am with her), and the show was about the lying that online chatting allows to happen.  A perp can get online and pretend to be someone they’re not.

BLOGGING CAN BE LIKE THAT.  YOU DON’T KNOW ME.  I DON’T KNOW YOU.  EXCEPT WHAT WE WANT EACH OTHER TO KNOW. 

So that is why I called it a sterile environment.   My first blog was published February 20, 2008.   I have written 1,436 posts and have approved 20,698 comments.  I say all that (definitely) not to brag.  I have been passed and lapped thousands of times over by others. 🙂  I say that because, unless I tell you the truth about me, or reveal something personal, you really have no clue who I am.  There are few who have known me for some time.  Like Jan, who used to attend the church I once pastored.  I have met a few in person, so a handsome face has been put to my name.   The caricature that Dan drew on my header doesn’t do me justice (he was way too kind).    So, let’s get rid of the sterile environment and tell you a little more.  (I can see you are waiting with baited breath).

If you read yesterday’s post, you know that my mother is in heaven.  My father lives in PA and remarried back in the mid 80s.  I am the oldest of 4 boys.  It is them I want to tell you about in the next two posts.   My next brother is my “hero,” even though he would never want me to say that.  Rob is 1 1/2 years younger than me.  He took the long route to his faith, questioning and rebelling during his teen years.  I will never forget the night at camp he sang (great voice even then) “The Savior is Waiting” and eventually answered God’s knock and recommitted his life to Christ.  He went away to school in NY; met his first wife, Barb, while in the hospital having an appendectomy (who says God doesn’t have a sense of humor?); continued to travel and sing and preach; then finally got off the road after 20 years.  It was about a couple of years later Barb succumbed to cancer.  Rob raised three children as a single parent, all the while dealing with Barb’s death and pastoring a church.  He eventually moved to Louisville, KY to pastor a church, where he stayed for 9 years.  While there he renewed a friendship with a lovely lady named Joy,  whom he had met while traveling, and whose husband had tragically died in a tractor accident. I had the privilege of performing their wedding ceremony on May 14, 2010.  He has since chosen to move to PA to be where she is, and has renewed his own ministry.  Check it out here.   (He is also available to come serve your church. How’s that for shameless promotion?)  I have told Rob how much he means to me, and how much I admire him.  We have come a long way from our sharing of a bedroom, and the one-and-only  fist fight we once had.  😛  I will tell you about my other two in the next post.

How about you?  Any siblings?  Any of them your hero?  Please…I know Jesus is supposed to be our Hero.  Humor me.  🙂