Archive for ‘Grace’

« Older Entries  |   Newer Entries »
May 5, 2025

Flight diverted

by Rod Smith

After landing from Washington DC we — a packed A300 — left Brussels for Bujumbura almost on time.

Under an hour from the capital of Burundi, the captain suspended food service, the last go-round of coffee or tea and soggy bread rolls of the nine hour flight.

The plane had rocked a little here and there, but apparently seeing something only visible on the flight deck, the captain told the flight attendants to take their seats. A few weightless moments followed which got the passengers a little unsettled – think roller-coaster at Kings Island – but when the plane jolted and an overhead bin or two opened and some guy heading from the restroom lost balance and fell into a row of seated passengers as we swayed side-to-side and dipped here and there the spread of anxiety was palpable.

It was soon over and really wasn’t too intense of a storm. I’d already given the turbulence 4 out 10, maybe 5, on my turbulence scale and so I was quite surprised when the pilot announced we’d be ditching – my word not his – our scheduled landing in Bujumbura (my destination) and head for Entebbe, Uganda, to get a minor repair to the damage the aircraft’s systems was reporting.

“Flight attendants prepare for landing,” he said next, and we almost did.

I am unsure if the wheels touched ground or not but when the captain or someone in the tower changed our plans and the Airbus accelerated and expedited a sharp upwards turn the force pushing us into our seats was jolly impressive. The dignified long-haul people-carrier showed off a little, more than flexed a muscle.

“The change in plans to land had nothing to do with the storm damage,” the captain said, “it was cross winds. We are going to another runway. Different angle. We will be on the ground in a few minutes.”

It’s quite common in many parts of the word for passengers to applaud when a plane touches ground.

This time it was thunderous.

The nick on the windshield, I later heard about what was damaged, grounded the Brussels-bound outgoing flight and so we were all ferried with our baggage to The Imperial Beach Resort.

This is my second night in this gorgeous
Ugandan resort.

The food is wonderful.

All is well.

The airline is picking up the tab.

I”d much rather be teaching in Bujumbura.

Tomorrow’s another day.

I guess it was more than a nick……!

Posted in Communication, Faith, Grace | 1 Comment »

April 21, 2025

Did you know my dad?

by Rod Smith

Dad owned the tearoom near the top of Blackburn Road next to the Dutch Reformed Church up the road from Park Hill Soccer Club.

You may or not have known him by name but you may have been a woman in need of milk for her baby. He would have given it to you “under the counter” as if defying the boss which, of course, was himself. When you tried to pay he may have whispered “take the milk, my dear. No baby should go without food. Keep your money for something else the baby needs.”

Or, you may have wandered into the shop and said you had no place to stay for a while and he may have said “we have plenty of room here” and given you a bed for a week, a month, even longer.

Perhaps you knew him because you faced addiction to alcohol and he was your Alcoholics Anonymous sponsor and he said “just for today” to you and told you he’d decided he’d no longer drink “just for today” until his pledge spanned decades of sobriety.

Did you know my dad?

You may not have known him by name but perhaps you went to his tearoom where he served bread, milk, kindness and good humor and wrapped the goods with the feeling that you were known, you belonged, you were important.

161 Blackburn Road, Red Hill, Durban

Posted in Boundaries, Business, Children, Communication, Education, Faith, Family, Forgiveness, Friendship, Grace, Leadership, Listening | 1 Comment »

April 16, 2025

Today’s paper…..

by Rod Smith

Posted in Communication, Differentiation, Education, Faith, Grace, Grief | Leave a Comment »

April 13, 2025

Avoidance makes the heart grow harder….

by Rod Smith

Make peace……confront sooner rather than later……..

As well-intentioned as we may be in desiring to avoid conflict and “keep the peace,” we create more problems we must face later by running or playing hide and seek. Then, when we do face matters, we’re not the people we once were. 

Avoidance is a quick-change artist! It changes us in ways we are likely to regret. 

We cannot solve or improve what we will not face. Denial gets us no place worthy of the journey or the unintended, unwanted destination. Until we gather the courage to look difficult situations directly in the eye and expedite what is necessary to face the difficulties, conflicts will stay as they are and they’re likely to deteriorate.

What we avoid shapes us in ways we may never notice. We modify our habits in order to sustain our denial and avoidance. We change our friendships in order to sustain our patterns. We go out of our way to keep the peace but the new path is one to further avoidance. Our defensive habits defend us in unhealthy and unhelpful ways and make us into people we’d rather not be. 

Avoidance of necessary battles creates unintended distance from others — even those we truly love. 

There is no worthwhile substitute for early honest approaches to family or business conflicts. 

Avoidance makes the heart grow harder. 

Ours. 

I enjoyed this side-walk art…… 49th and Penn in Meridian Kessler, Indianapolis

Posted in Anxiety, Betrayal, Blended families, Boundaries, Communication, Difficult Relationships, Divorce, Education, Family Systems Theory, Forgiveness, Friendship, Grace, Grief, High maintenance relationships, Leadership, Manipulation, Recovery, Schnarch, Spousal abuse, Therapeutic Process, Triangles, Triggers, Trust, Victims, Violence, Voice | Leave a Comment »

April 11, 2025

Greetings from UA2080

by Rod Smith

I shall strive to speak and teach as one who has indeed much to learn.

In every classroom we are all learners.

I shall strive to listen to people in the class (and out of it) as if I were listening to the mountains.

Mountains reveal their real beauty to the dedicated observer, beauty that’s easily missed by those who offer casual hurried glances or who are themselves caught up in how they look or are dressed or what the student may think of them.

Can there be a greater privilege than jetting to Penang to teach Family Systems?

I think not.

When am I coming to your class?

Posted in Blended families, Business, Communication, Differentiation, Education, Faith, Family, Family Systems Theory, Forgiveness, Friendship, Grace, Leadership, Listening, Living together | Leave a Comment »

February 20, 2025

The Dance of Authentic Leadership

by Rod Smith

Real leaders, authentic leaders, as opposed to those who are in it for the illusion of power, love of money or the mirage of status will face multiple paradoxes and do so constantly.

Yes – daily.

It comes with the role – the “role” and not position. Leading is what leaders do.

It’s a function.

I have known “leaders” whose names are boldly declared on a suite’s entry – or the headmaster’s office, or the pastor’s study – but the leader is an under-appreciated someone somewhere whose name is upon nothing, and definitely not on a fat cheque.

Leaders lead, but must also follow.

It’s an art.

Leaders go first, but must also hold back, and know when to go last.

It’s a dance.

Leaders know that leaders are servers, first.

Leaders try to understand those whom they lead, yet cannot let their desire to understand, desire for empathy, derail decisions that are best for the whole, the calling, the gravitas, the goodness of the organization they lead.

Real leaders are aware that if they cannot lead themselves, monitor themselves, hold-onto themselves, they can lead anyone anywhere worth going.

Leaders are self-aware, self-assured, not selfish or self-less.

It’s an inner-tango, often the limbo, seldom a waltz.

And, here’s the kicker – it’s a solitary dance no matter what the music.

It has to be.

Posted in Business, Difficult Relationships, Education, Faith, Family Systems Theory, Grace, Leadership, Listening | Leave a Comment »

February 14, 2025

WWJD?

by Rod Smith

WWJD?

“Now what would Jesus do?” asked the woman glancing at her WWJD bracelet. 

“Grape nuts,” replied the companion, as if he’d served Jesus breakfast that morning. I slipped away pondering how the will and the ways of the greatest political, religious and social reformer of all time got reduced to a formula for grocery shopping. 

What Would Jesus Do is a great question to ask, but wearing it on a wrist somehow suggests that the answer is easily accessible. It suggests that if you and I will simply stop and think a little, having eyed the bracelet, we’ll get the answer. Then, as we act on our newfound knowledge, predicaments will be resolved, we will have better lives, and conditions in the world will improve all around for everybody. 

Quite the contrary: Answering the question and doing what Jesus would do in any situation is neither easily established nor executed. Finding the answer itself would take a lot of work, like tunneling back though a couple of thousand years, researching culture, geography and weather conditions and the varying political and religious climates. Then we’d have to identify, and then decipher, metaphor, understand and interpret tone and intent, humor, and immerse ourselves in at least a few ancient languages. Besides all this, we’d need a working knowledge of the subcultures and the prejudices that existed within those subcultures. Then, with all this done, we might be able to decide what Jesus might think, might say, might do, given a few, but not all, situations we face. 

The next challenge, once we’ve established the answer, would be to have the courage to do what Jesus would do. WWJD is not about “doing the right thing.” Jesus did not always do the “right” thing. If that were so, no cross would have awaited him. Doing the “right thing” would have endeared him to those who mattered and would not have required him to buck Rome and the Temple authority.

Essentially Jesus laid a platform for his followers to live differently, in ways that set both the religious establishment and Rome against Jesus and those who followed him –  embracing Samaritans, making a Samaritan the hero of a parable, illustrates this. That alone was enough to put a target on his back. It doesn’t take too deep an analysis of the Gospels to see that he despised pretentiousness and empty religious “performance” and was particularly vocal wherever he found religious zeal devoid of inner transformation. Jesus despised abusive systems and was a particular critic of those who ripped others off. So now, where will you bank, shop, invest, give, worship? How will you vote? How will our practices change were we to take WWJD seriously?

I do not think Jesus cares what cereal you buy, what dress or suit you wear or how your hair is or is not cut or if you wear a hat to church or not. But. I do believe he cares about what kind of people you and I are and whether we love mercy, humility, truth and justice. I believe he cares that we challenge systems where these qualities are absent. I do think Jesus cares about what motivates you and me. I do think he cares about how we treat the poor, the homeless, the disenfranchised. When we (you and I) elevate the rich and show contempt for the poor we get his goat.  

It is apparently forgotten that Jesus was hardly a nice guy. Today he’d be a threat to our political order and might not be able to find a church he’d attend, let alone one that would permit him to preach! Consequently, doing what Jesus would do could significantly reduce our popularity rating. 

The real question, by the way, is not “What Would Jesus Do” but rather what will you, what will I do, in response to what he has done? 

It’s not grape nuts or cheerios, but love, mercy, humility and justice that may bring us, yes, you and me, all a little closer to reflecting who and what Jesus was and is. But be careful, you might shed the WWJD bracelet and exchange it for a cross – and it won’t be hanging around your neck.

————

 * When published in The Indianapolis Star, this column certainly got me some fans – and enemies. The morning it appeared my email was as hot! I was called brilliant, I was called stupid. One reader said that finally he’d read something by an intelligent Christian about a really stupid gimmick. Another said he’d be praying for my salvation even though he was convinced I was a lost cause.

———-

Unrelated image…. Meditating a moment in an Havana Art School

Posted in Communication, Education, Faith, Grace, Leadership, Listening, Love | Leave a Comment »

January 15, 2025

Happiness

by Rod Smith

Happiness won’t happen to you, or me.

There are no blue-birds of happiness seeking nests.

It will not take us by surprise, arrive unannounced, and it won’t be ours because we read FaceBook memes or read anything inspirational or challenging anywhere, even the Bible.

And, no Podcast will do it – not even that.

Happiness has no victims. Happiness is an inside job, it is an internal state and it requires our willingness, our cooperation, and hard work.

Our happiness will be a direct result of what you and I do with our days.

Do we serve others?

Are we generous?

Do we accept and embrace and enjoy people who are different from us?

Do we look for beauty that is all around us and within everybody?

[If you think there is no beauty around you and there is no beauty in all people, well, you’ve already unearthed a major happiness blockage.]

Answering these questions with our lives will hold a few of many codes to unlock happiness and let it into our lives. And, this is a big one, our levels of happiness are never, not ever, up to others, no matter how much we may love or not love others. Happiness is not something another can provide for you at least for enduring lengths of time. Neither you nor I will be happier, or less happy, based on who or what we love or who or what we reject.

While I concede having money does make life just a little easier, our happiness levels are totally unrelated to money.

Some of the wealthiest people on the planet are clearly some of the most unhappy people.

Jesus of Nazareth said what comes out of people’s mouths reveals the state of people’s hearts or inner-beings.

Is there a millionaire or billionaire you’ve heard on TV with whom you’d want to share your daily life?

Happiness requires action and appears to play hard-to-get with those who persistently whine, “I just want to be happy.” It appears to play hard-to-get with complainers and those who seem entitled. Happiness and Laziness are not buddies. Laziness repels of Happiness. Happiness and Blamingness – I just made a new word – are not friends and, as far as I can tell, cannot co-exist in the same brain.

Finding a useful cause, a cause larger than oneself, and engaging in it with others who have the same or similar causes, and offering it zeal will quite often spark some thrill-for-life aka happiness.

While you and I are influenced even a tidbit by what others think of us (or what we think others think of us) we dead-bolt access to happinesses.

How and what we think and say of others is far more important than concerning ourselves with what “they” think and say of us.

In fact, it is a golden key.

I’m loving the snow…… what about you?

Posted in Boundaries, Business, Communication, Differentiation, Education, Faith, Family, Friendship, Grace, Leadership, Listening | Leave a Comment »

December 19, 2024

How old would you be…..?

by Rod Smith

Christmas Eve  I will be 70.

Somehow that’s tough to write, tougher to read.

In his country hit “Don’t Let The Old Man In,” Toby Keith croons, “ask yourself how old would you be if you didn’t know the day you were born.”

When I give it serious thought I come up with 42 or 45, somedays 36.

I confess, birthdays (my birthdays) have never been easy for me. 

The bulk of them were spent playing music at The Oyster Box Hotel or at T-Jetty or at The Edward or any one of the hotels in Durban and Umhlanga areas. When I was much younger, I spent them on the bandstand at the Parkhill Hall or playing at one of the many MOTH Shellhole functions for war heroes to sing “pack up your troubles in your old kit bag and smile, smile, smile” and “kiss me goodnight sergeant major” as they danced by.

A birthday is easy to avoid if you’re warming your audience with “Girl From Ipanema” with the finest drummer and bass player in the nation and seated at the the Oyster Box Hotel’s Steinway, or later, banging out “Crocodile Rock” or “Sloop John B.”

Enough about that. 

[Please leave a comment if our band played at you wedding(s), 21st, whatever…….]

This year has been quite a year. 

I won’t go into the details of the trips I have taken but they did include 5 “new” nations to me. My earliest “speaker mentor” taught me that as an international speaker I would have the best and worst experiences. He said I would sleep in stations and on dirt floors and in 5 star hotels. He told me I’d be delayed, denied, rejected, upgraded, downgraded, embraced and applauded, loved and hated. I loved YWAM’S Rudi Lack from the moment I met him (I was about 20) when I hosted him at Charles Gordon’s request for 10 days in my parent’s home on Blackburn Road.

“God is much more interested in your character than your comforts,” he declared. 

Rudi is right. 

“Always leave more than your teaching,” he said, “no matter where you go. Give more than you take. Go places that can’t afford your travel expenses.”

This year I have gathered about 25 people to empower through our nonprofit and have been able to leave thousands of dollars in scholarships for young men and women on four continents who aspire to serve and bring healing to our broken world.

Next year, God willing, I am going to do more and more and more until I’ll be at least 55 years old in response to Toby Keith’s beautiful question.

I am not a go-fund-me guy – although I happily give when I can to people and causes I believe in. I know I could post a link right here and ask for your gifts to my nonprofit – but I am not going to do that. Clicking is easy, it’s the human connection I want with you before your giving. 

Thank you to readers around the world who read my columns – in 180 Nations – and in KZN’s morning newspaper The Mercury (Monday to Friday for 24 years) and readers of The Courier Times and for those who read my work on FaceBook and all that. 

If you want to give me a birthday gift — large or small — make it to my nonprofit and I will pass it on, pay it forward, put it into serving hands and hungry mouths, and towards the education of some of the finest and most beautiful people I have ever met, many of whom most will misguidedly — simply because of where they live and their financial state — consider poor! 

Contact me – I’ll send you the link or the address.       

So, how old would you be if you didn’t know the day you were born?

Go on, tell me……  

Today, I’m at least 35.

1970s

Posted in Communication, Faith, Friendship, Grace | 2 Comments »

December 13, 2024

Of course I believe in Santa

by Rod Smith

I saw Santa at the Children’s Museum with a feather of a child pleading her case. They were locked in discussion, a confessional of sorts, as she entered into detail of her every Christmas wish. Hands, eyes, and all of her face enticed Santa closer lest he miss a detail living so clearly in her head.

“Oh, you want, oh, I see it. Why yes, of course. Perfectly,” Santa said, his voice tapering off into her ear, “I will see what I can do about that.”

Then she nestled into his side, her shoulders comfortably enveloped by his plush red suit as if to declare her mission accomplished. He was a perfect depiction of everything I imagined him to be and the sight easily immersed me in the voices and music of my own Christmases past.

Santa came all year round to our home. I’d look through the window in April or mid-August and Santa would be strolling up the driveway on his return from visits to every home on the street. He’d be wearing dad’s shoes and one of his ties underneath the tatty red coat, but I knew better than to expose his identity. I wanted to believe in Santa and he in turn needed me to believe. Such faith had rewards. I knew better than to dash my own hopes. I wasn’t ready to lose my trust in Santa for anyone and certainly not by my own hand.

He couldn’t resist visits to the whole neighborhood and would drop in from time to time and inspire children toward good behavior, perfect obedience at school, and remind them to count their blessings one by one. At every appearance in our home we’d sing “The Little Boy that Santa Clause Forgot” and we’d all have to cry. He insisted on it.

The lines “he didn’t have a daddy” and “went home to play with last year’s broken toys” really got us going.

It was clear he sang to all the children of the world who’d had to skip childhood and who had known poverty; children who’s fathers had gone to war or whose fathers or mothers had fled their families.

Donning the suit, surprising the children, was our Santa’s way of making the world right.

His visits created intrigue in the neighborhood, and to every child he repeated the promise that this Christmas, no child on this street would be forgotten. As far as I could tell none ever was.

The last Christmas we had together was in August of 1994. We were riding in a car and in the curves of Bluff Road when spontaneously he began to sing, “Christmas comes but once a year.”

The car became a holy place as I heard once more of the boy who “wrote a note to Santa for some soldiers and a drum and it broke his little heart to find Santa hadn’t come.”

The tears we both shed required no encouragement for we both somehow knew this would be the last time he’d sing this nostalgic hymn.

Now this old song is top of my list of Christmas songs.

The melody emerges randomly in my awareness, most particularly when faced with children who are in need. I have had to silence it at all times of the year.

It was the little girl’s confidence, Santa’s grace, and the loving parents looking from the side that caught my attention last week. She touched his flowing beard and told him her every Christmas dream and I found myself listing my own requests with childlike zeal.

It gave me renewed hope that you and I, the real Santas of the world, could deliver a more hopeful tomorrow for “those little girls and boys that Santa Claus forgot.”

(First published, December 9, 2000, Indianapolis Star)
————
Our home this evening….

Posted in Children, Communication, Family, Forgiveness, Friendship, Grace, Leadership, Listening, Love | 1 Comment »

« Older Entries  |   Newer Entries »