May Contain Roaring Lion

I don’t know Phil Cumbia all that well, but last night at Bible study, he taught me three important life lessons. After some reflection, I decided that the ideas embedded in those lessons are universally applicable enough for me to share them with all of you today. For some context, our study was on Mark 4:35-40, in which Jesus calms a storm as he crosses the Sea of Galilee and challenges the disciples’ lack of faith.

 ³⁵ On that day, when evening had come, he said to them, ”Let us go across to the other side.” ³⁶And leaving the crowd, they took him with them in the boat, just as he was. And other boats were with him. ³⁷And a great windstorm arose, and the waves were breaking into the boat, so that the boat was already filling. ³⁸But he was in the stern, asleep on the cushion. And they woke him and said to him, “Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?” ³⁹And he awoke and rebuked the wind and said to the sea, ”Peace! Be still!” And the wind ceased, and there was a great calm. ⁴⁰He said to them, ”Why are you so afraid? Have you still no faith?”

The following discussion was sort of related to that. Therein lies Phil’s life lessons.

So here we go.

Lessons I’ve Learned from Phil Cumbia (Abridged).

Lesson #1: We’re all just like grass obsessed sheep and God is the shepherd tirelessly explaining to us how to eat the symbolic cheeseburger that’s right in front of us.

….

I don’t really see how that needs any explanation. It’s about as straightforward as Phil-isms get.

Lesson #2: Alanis Morissette makes a pretty lame god.

It was a few minutes after the cheeseburger metaphor that our study got on with it’s usual cycle of derailment. Choosing to join our discussion group is pretty much a one way ticket on the Train of Distraction.

In reality, it leads to some really great discussions that get deep fast. I don’t talk much, but Katy, Travis, and Phil tend to make some great points. For example, while we were discussing the amount of faith you’re given being a gift, just like any other skill or ability, we got off on this really good tangent about just how crazy it is that God offers us forgiveness again and again. He didn’t offer that to the angels that rebelled. They blew their chance at eternity. We did the same and are repeat offenders everyday and yet He still extends his grace. It kind of blew our minds.

Then we got back on sheep metaphors. We’re pro like that.

Then suddenly we were back to the skills God has given us and whatnot. People skills were brought up at and that was when we realized this: that Travis and my positioning on the couch made a life sized model of the introversion/extroversion scale.

Some debate ensued as to how true that really was.

If we had had a large herd of children handy at the BCM, I would have suggested a crowd test to determine our exact locations on the scale. It’s premise is pretty simple: sic a small crowd of overexcited children on the person in question and gauge their reaction to the attention.

I’m not very good at that test, despite the crowd’s eerie similarity to my eight year old fan clubs.

Also, can I just include this as a side note without comment:

The number of people in our group then spontaneously increased to 8 as other studies finished up and merged with ours. Ashley Paige laid down a pretty awesome group prayer after that and Phil shared his final words of wisdom.

Lesson #3: Poison ivy ranks pretty low on the optimal toilet paper scale. Go maple or go home.

And that was it for the night.

Except for the part where I got double cheek hugged on my way out.

It wasn’t okay.

It was like a hug, but double the awkwardness.

I’m not sure how long it will take to recover.