The Status Quo

Made a new friend yesterday who found me on Facebook. Lifelong pastor who really studied the scripture, church where he served over a decade, meeting arranged by church leader to expose his new view and condemn it, most folks too intimidated to stand by their pastor or at least study the issue. Pastor and family fired with no severance money, cast out to fend for themselves.

Do not mess with the status quo of your group, we are comfortable with what we know and believe.

Sad. Thankfully this man had a house to sell and money to transition, sadly about the same time he was diagnosed with a serious degenertive disease and cannot really pursue a new career.

I like the way someone put it recently. There is the Bible people read, and a revelation that comes from that readiing, and the two are not always equal. The history of doctrine is a reality that leaves people with the same bible on opposite sides of so many major issues that an issue not even related to a fundamental doctrine about salvation should leave us with some degree of humility on these mysteries.

Cute commercial set in a puritan village, all dark and forboding, no smiles, just condemnation and fear written on all faces, and they jump on the woman with the scarlet letters, that stand for Miracle Whip Dressing. They prepare to condemn her, she defends herself, and the village leader reveals he too is an enjoyer of MW, Miracle Whip. Very funny, but one wonders how the world view of these puritan villages was really like in terms of social and intellectual freedom. Was someone enforcing the status quo?

The after church greeting

This ritual of speaking to folks as they leave church has been so much a part of my life that I wonder just how many hands I have grasped and words I am spoken in those moments.

This is Prattvile Alabama, 1975, I am a newly wed and very new assistant pastor and youth director.

Can I afford the anger?

My facebook friends who are politically observant are very angry at government and the direction of things as they see them. They post sarcastic, and almost hateful pictures, remarks, posters that call for change and return to values.

Each day our elected officials attempt to govern and set policies and directions for our deeply divided country, and social media often becomes the place to air our frustrations with so many issues.

Sometimes when I am enjoying what is happening in someones life, or some amusing incident or photo or video is shared, I enjoy the FB experience, but when it is a constant barrage of anger against the president, the congress, the media etc. the anger feels polluting to my soul and spirit.

I don't want to be one of those folks who lost the future for failure to do something to make it better....I am just not sure this ranting is getting us where we need to be. Just sayin....!

Its a wonderful world

The fog in my spirit has lifted, it cycles because I have a streak of melancholy in me. I am prepared for the teaching this morning, and know as we head out the back end of July that we are on the home stretch of our monsoon humidity, as well as our summer super heated days and nights.

Last evening we enjoyed a drive through our neighborhood while watching what hoped to be a dazzling sunset sort of fizzle at the end, no worries, another evening to watch ahead.

Please take a moment to visit the various parts of our new church website...sunlakescommunitychurch.org. If you have the patience for it you can see a couple of my messages on the priority of love in John's epistles.

We all need help to see how we are swinging at the ball

This is Pepper, our kids puppy, high strung and energetic. Reminds me very much of my college dog Don-Anna.

Yesterday I drove to Leisure World to visit my friend Jack and got an unexpected treat. Two young golf teachers in training took a look at my golf swing, made three or four small recommendations, and suddenly the ball was flying higher and further than normal. Got a putting lesson as well, almost an hour of free help. Very cool.

Not major changes, just stopping a little habit, the way my head moves, the way I bring the clubhead back to the ball, and the results were amazing. Wrote them down so I can keep working on it.

We all need others to look at our swing, at our attitudes, at our set of core beliefs and principles, at just about everything. No man is an island. That is why I read the thoughts of others on subjects, because they change my own set ways of thinking.

Golf is a repetitive movement, and sometimes these little things that mess up your swing don't show up and you have a great day, but then they creep back in. I confess that I have mostly been unwilling to seek professional help because of my stingy wallet, so this free clinic was an eye opener that I hope leads to better golf.

Have not been so stingy when a book promises to help me on a certain subject that I have interest in. I am always blessed by study and pondering the truth of things.

The joy of reading

This family of missionaries in Thailand changed one little girls life by adopting her. She was born with aids, and this loving family made a decision to save her and love her and raise her, and who knows the effects of this love with have on the future.

The books, the teachings, the music from one era affect and change another, as does a personal decision to live in a way that honors and respects humanity. That is one of the themes of Cloud Atlas, and even though he intimates that one soul may have more than one chance to make a difference or improve, it still makes powerful points about culture and society and her tendency to decay, and power and her tendency to destroy. I really enjoyed struggling through the novel and owning the movie, which I am ready to rewatch now that I have a grasp of the authors intent. The struggle was not about the story and characters, but about the dialects and language use that kept me reading slowly in some points, and using the dictionary many times to grasp a word meaning, every great writer has been a voracious reader.

Our church has a website, if you desire to see a bit of what my ministry here in Sun Lakes looks like and how it is described please visit, and if you have the patience and the bandwidth, you can check out my messages from I John 4, more to follow. The address is www.sunlakescommunitychurch.org and the content will be changing weekly so visit from time to time.

Part of my day off will be enjoyed with a friend, a bit of time on the driving range, some time with my camera outside, and a shift to the weekend schedule of preparing to share a message of grace and hope.

Cloud Atlas

The Hendricks Family in the Late 60s, Jackson Mississippi.

I lie here moments before heading to the shower, finishing another chapter of the novel Cloud Atlas. It is not an easy read, and the gifted author is in no hurry to tell you the connection between six different stories spread over centuries. What a read, and what a joy it is to return to novels after years of laying the pleasure aside.

This morning thunder and a light rain have ushered in Laura's second week of school, one day past humpday, one more to go until the weekend. The grandkids are coming over, fun ahead.

I will talk about Cloud Atlas when I finish it, but I already bought the movie. I have heard people texting in the middle of the movie asking if its worth staying till the end. I watched it with friends who were equally in the dark as to its meaning, but to me it beckoned....what is going on here, what is the connection, what is the theme. Is it greed and violence, the triumph of good over evil, the danger of corporations? That, dear friend, is the genius of a novelist, they draw you in with the characters and have the freedom to create future worlds unseen, and to ask what the connection to our daily and yearly decisions might have on future generations. Its hints at purposefulness in the midst of mindless violence. It wonders if our souls get another chance to move up the ladder of humanity and become real caring humans.

The office beckons, last evening I restored WiFi on my computer as I rebuild the environment of my sidekick tablet. When I get to work I begin with everything turned off, with meditation, with the hope and desire that God be working all things according to the counsel of His will....and I thank Him for the morning rain, my loving wife, and another day to enjoy this world.

Technology Demons Part 2

In the midst of hasseling with the new website setup, my 18 month old Motoroal Xoom tablet that serves as the wifi hotspot for our home and office decided to freeze where it would not shut down or finish booting.

The only solution was a factory reboot which knocked out all the little improvements, the notes, the saved websites that had made this guy such a loyal assistant. I guess the computer god heard me complaining and decided to show me further demonic demonstrations of things that can go wrong with technology.

I rage against the machine.

Happy Birthday to my sister Linda.

1984?

I have been razzed unmercifully about the shortness of those shorts. They seemed cool at the time. But catch a look at those man legs!!!! Too funny!!!!

George Orwell's famous dystopian novel of a dark future, just happens to coincide with the year I bought my first computer, a privately thrown together IBM XT with no memory and floppy disks that made the whole thing work with DOS. I loved the learning curve, the first funny games, the joy of typing out my sermons without the clack of a typewriter and the need of whiteout, oh the joy of the backspace key.

Today our tech lady who is trying to get our new church website online, has asked us to do several things, assuming we understand what she means, and I am feeling old and stupid, because it sounds like a foreign lanquage. "set up these three accounts, and diret them to the new domain".....domain?, that sounds downright Orwellian!

So, we are going to have our own information website which I will direct you to visit when it goes online, and we are wondering whether this will really have any affect on attendance, or congregational well being, or whatever, because its really cool looking and full of places to visit, but will it change anything that matters?

I am hoping so, especially the sharing of video sermons with the members gone for the summer, hoping they are advance enough and have enough bandwidth to listen.

The information age technology has really been fun for me to learn, and a real help with preparing messages and keeping in touch with the wider world, but I still feel overwhelmed by how much you have to learn to stay anywhere near the cutting edge.

A place to share your pain

Both those cars behind served as transportation. The British Morris Minor got me through High School and was sold without my sayso when I went away for a summer ministry. The 64 Ford Falcon carries me through four years of college and died in South Florida during my second summer ministry.

The fellowship of like minded strugglers on the various internet sites allows people to have a voice. One which I follow is the voices of those who have been hurt in abusive churches.

Someone suggested that these folks should just forgive and get over it, and those in the conversation say its like post traumatic stress syndrome, not that easy to through off.

I have seen a few pastors misuse their power, hide their behaviours, and play the hypocrite. I was once a part of a church whose theology and doctrine have caused people to struggle with the character and grace of God.

I think all this is a good thing, and getting the problems and hurts out in the open will help the church be more responsive and less protective, and will help hurting people find like minded fellowship.

I have met a lot of hurting pastors, who have been pushed aside to quickly, whose honesty, candor and openess about struggles place them outside the neat parameters of happy church. There are places for us to go and listen as well, and heal as well, and that is good.

I see friends shaking hands.....

saying "How do you do?", what they are saying is "I love You".

The path less traveled.....

Inside the Oldest Catholic Church with continous weekly services in the US. Found myself realizing how much Latin I could read based on my knowledge of icons and church sayings.

The path to the bathroom at the old Jax Brewery building, amazing how hard it is to find a place to go when you need to in N.O.

So, the other week I heard a brief teaching on Muslim hermeneutics. Basically, anything that comes later that contradicts an earlier statement, is the truer truth. This is why Muslims can be peace loving, or radicalized. Some take the love texts seriously and some take the jihad texts more serioiusly.

Christians have differing hermenuetics as well, some read our Bible all literally and all with equal application to today. Thus creating an angry Jehovah with vengeful followers. Some see the back of the book fullfilling and changing God's whole way of relating to the world, the way of Jesus. They tend to be forgiving, grace filled, compassionate, and hopeful.

Muslims become what they believe about God's purposes, and so do Christians. I have seen Christians who are proud, full of hatred toward others, extremely judgmental, and sure God's next move comes from the back of our book, Armaggedon and the lost of 2 Billion people from the earth.

John said it, "in this world we are like Jesus".

Perfect love casts out fear!

Should I fear offending you with my New Orleans rear end shot? So many folks tell them they hated New Orleans when they went there. I enjoy it for its differentness, its culture markers, its neediness, its jazzy freedom.

John has declared that God is love, he has explained that love that is mature will love others, and here he tells us that God's love in us is perfecting and maturing when we are not afraid.

Of death, of the future, of our enemy, of the unkind words of others, of aging, of losing control. How long could the list be.

As a young Christian, I had an experience from the Holy Spirit, and my peer group theologically did not believe such an experience was legitamate. One brother in particular chose to criticize me, ostracize me, belittle me, and just downright cut me down whenever I was in his presence. I have not seen this brother in 30 years but knowing what he is doing in his career I have no doubt that if we met in a hallway, he would resume his treatment of me.

For a long time I feared such ostracization. One of the saddest things about our culture is how narrowly we define our friends and world by those who see, believe, and experience things in just the way we do. We fear those with wider experience and so we dismiss and criticize. I have done my good share of such antics.

Of late, expecially after shifting my perceptions of who God is, and what the gospel is, I just want to accept where people are in there own journey, without trying to remake and mold them into my perceptions of life and truth.

Likewise, if my point of view becomes a minority report, like conservatism seems to be these days, I do not want to have every waking thought consumed with the fear of what will happen if they win, whoever they are.

It seems to be that is what the essense of walking in love is, that that fearlessness of the present and the future are very powerful realities of a mature journey.

Extra interest in Scotland and Golf

One of my favorite pictures from Maui, 2010...using the Canon 15-85 capturing the last evening rays of the sun on the wind shiners.

Plan to enjoy the third major of the golf year as a fan. Love the fact that a couple of almost seniors played well on day one. By the Way, the Old Tom Morris commercials for Golf Now are hilarious and respectful.

My Canon Zoom lens is on the way back to the Canon factory. Hoping they find an easy and cheap fix. It's too expensive to replace.

Laura is meeting parents and students today for a start of school next week.

Zoom and Gloom?

If you enlarge these you can see how the right side goes soft and the edges of all sides are not sharp in landscape pics.

So...you all know I enjoy photography, and just recording the events of my wonderful life. This all started seriously when I entered the pastoral ministry, bought a used Yashica, a new Ricoh (I really loved that black beauty), a series of less than 100 dollar point and shoot film cameras, and then my first digitalin 2003, A Gateway, followed by a Canon point and shoot, and then in 2008 my Canon Xsi, and new the Canon T4i.

I had the kit lens, and upgraded to a Canon 15-85 Zoom in 2010 and it has been my goto lens which has taken some beautiful, crisp, and stunning shots.....until....December of 2012.

I thought it was my new camera, but something happened the weekend of Doug and Lydia Moesta's visit to sing for our church. After hearing that something was wrong I traced my pictures back to that weekend, and surmise the lens was bumped, dropped, or sat too long in a hot car??

It's in the Tempe Camera Shop for diagnosis this morning, and I await a call with a sense of Zoom and Gloom.

Emotional Ups and Downs

I love the shapability of the Texas Sage bush. Laura asked the guy to give us space to park a car, so Sage north was skinned and must repair itself over the next few weeks, and its natures way, it will.

I have always been subject to times of exhilaration and times of depression. Since I only live in my own head I cannot say this is the norm for everyone. My levels of joy, and curiosity, and humor, and interest in things around me are wonderful, but now and again I seem to lose my mojo, and my desire to read, and the joys of life seem far away.

I have learned to live through them without committing myself to therapy or dispair. My attitude is..."this to shall pass" and it does. We had some family discussions about this streak of meloncholy that seems to run in my ancestral line.

Yesterday I made two difficult visits to sweet saints in hospice, both near the point of leaving this realm, and I admit it gets me emotionally to see such frailty and suffering and waiting for release sometimes way past what one would think is reasonable. I always wonder why some people have such a hard time keeping their body systems living, and some have a hard time getting their bodies to release them.

So....I take the good times with the bad, and it all evens out to a blessed life.

The end of our Summer

Laura returns to the school tomorrow and our summer is over. Next Monday a new crop of kiddos with blank heads to fill with reading and writing, and arithmetic.

The first months are so hot that playground time is minimal. It is a nice system for spreading out the vacation time all during the year, but here in AZ, back in School in July???

Trying to project my voice above conversational level was hard yesterday. It makes it hard for me to think over the loudness of my voice. I much prefer electronic enhancement, though I should be ashamed since Spurgeon and others made their voices fill huge auditoriums a century and a half ago. Spoiled.

So nice to have my Executive Office Assistant back from her vacation. Things will get going again soon.

Unpacking and reshelving almost done.

Change of pace Sunday

Intermittent power outage, church temp was 85, so we moved to the fellowship hall for our service. People enjoyed the close fellowship and singing simple songs we enjoyed. Had to keep my voice strong which shows my dependence of sound enhancement.

The serving team brought all our finger foods over and we enjoyed the whole Sunday in our tight packed little fellowship house.

Today I am Sixty Three!!!!

Elementary School

High School

College

Twenties

Thirties

Fourties

Fifties

Last Month
Turn around, turn around, turn around and your an old man, going out of the door!!!!

It is still a wonderful life, hoping for more.

Kennedy Kids

My mom and her brothers and sisters.

As our summer winds down I am very grateful for the chance to see my family of origin in Pensacola Beach. Beach vacations are so sweet.

We have secured a room with a view, two tickets to fly, and are looking forward to our next trip to Hawaii, thanks to our church folks and their generous gift.

Ladies Golf

Looks like the slow sweet upright swing and pleasant demeanor of Korean Inbee Park has cemented her as the one to beat on the LPGA.
It interests me because her upright swing is so much like the Surge Swing I tried last year. Three Quarter limited turn.

Anyhow, I have not played for a month so we will see how it goes tomorrow if the storms allow us to play.

Lots of progress on the Chandler Regional Hospital new wing during my time away.

Salad lunch at Jason's Deli....living food, I love the freshness and variety of their veggies and enjoy their crisp crackers for helping you get a fork full.

Things worth noting today

Sun Lakes Community Church is building a website. Not as easy as saying it. Lots of work to choose the host, pick the templates, decide on what we want to share with members and the world. People really use the web in case you have not noticed.

Had many deja vu like memories because our vacation was a basic repeat of the one we took in 2010. I was thankful to make 60 then, and this Saturday celebrate 63. Keep asking the Lord for more time to enjoy this life, and trying to cooperated with the laws of healthy living, mostly.....except for buffets.....every now and then.

Laura's vacation is almost over and they bring kids back in July to deal with this oven like monsoon weather. Not fun.

We are putting together the five pieces of our Hawaiian trip, room, car, plane, trips, food stops. Departing early October and very thankful for an alone vacation.

The Food Chain

Very few of us make it all the way on the straight and narrow path. We need to help people who have fallen into the mire on either side of the pathway.

Mondays at the Phoenix Rescue Mission are interesting. A huge semi truck trailer owned by St. Mary's Food Kitchen unloads plats of food donated from grocery stores that perhaps were not selling, or were nearing expiration dates, or some such thing, and the food kitchens store and use them to feed the poor.

I was pleased to find out the the plats of water sitting in the hot sun are moved at the end of each donation day to a cooler warehouse and then chilled before being used in the Hope Coach Ministry.

They are also keeping track of all donations with receipts, in other words, the professionalism of the place is improving and the services are running well, the grounds look better and the trajectory of ministry seems solid with the transition of leadership that had taken place in the last year or two. That is good.

There was an interesting critique published about Mother Theresa's ministry to the poor in India. They questioned whether she used money to attempt to heal the sick and improve their health and condition or did she just provide a loving atmosphere for them to continue suffering and dying. Were her homes more like hospice than hospital, and did she believe that the suffering of the poor should be relieved if possible.

The ministry to the suffering and poor is plagued with such questions. I think the American versions of such ministry seeks an upward path to get people to self sufficiency if possible.

Freedom to gather and enjoy

We enjoyed our annual summer BBQ thanks to Famous Daves, and a great bunch of people. Told a some stories about family and struggle and joy while sharing a small sample of photos of our vacation.

Iv'e been flushed!!!!

Took this last evening while driving around using a golf cart to keep the battery pumped up.

I have an MD from Syria, very nice man, who practices wellness. Last month he put me on Niaspan, a prescription strength B vitamin supplement with other stuff thrown in. It is designed to lower bad cholestorol and has one side effect that causes some folks to stop taking it. Possible Flushing of the skin and body

Well, I never have any side effects to anything, I thought, till this week I put two and two together and realized that I have been flushing. Here is how it happened.

I forgot to take the pills on vacation, so when I came home and resumed them I woke up early in the week with such a strange feeling in my arms and legs, they felt funny, and it woke me up.

Last night again, woke to a feeling of tingling heat in my extremities and a feeling of hotness. Gee Whiz, it hit me. This is what flushing feels like. Now to decide what to do.

Meanwhile, in this life of tribulation, I am going to teach today on I John 4. In which John tells us what he saw, touched, and proclaimed....that God is love. Really, do you really believe that? Yes, I really do.

Kicking Evil's Butt on the Big Screen

We enjoyed Superman last night with special interest on my part to the religious tones of a man who unveils his true purpose at 33 and faces giving his life to save the world.

Of course, the evil one who demanded the ransom could not be trusted to keep his word, so Superman ended up in a colossal battle that uses all the themes of the comic and movie series over the years with some really great twists.

We learn why Zod is motivated to destroy Superman, much more interesting that the silly, I will be bowed down to, of the Reeves era.

I loved that Lois Lane sleuths out who Superman is very early and gets to play a huge role in beating the bad people, very modern.

Loved the fact that Jorel continues to have a presence throughout the movie though he is long gone physically.

This Superman is very convincing in his goodness, and in his manhood, which made the spiritual imagery tolerable for me.

Lots of buildings being destroyed, boy does Hollywood love to destroy things with explosions in the movies today.

We were very entertained in this long movie, still left wondering if in this reboot Lois knows Clark and is just playing along when he comes to work at the Daily Planet. I predict this Superman will survive to make another sequel.

Here is Ben posing GQ like at Quiettwater Beach, he likes to think of himself as a really cool dude, and he is, most times.

I love Pensacola, Florida!

It's not swanky like Orlando, or sexy like Miami, its middle america, its military service and retirees, its big enough to have all you need and small enough to feel like a town. My parents lived their last years in Gulf Breeze, and as I was passing through I saw a little church that advertized itself as an annex to the Brownsville Assembly of God and memories flooded my mind.

Over a decade ago I attended an evening service at Brownsville and had to wait an hour to get into the building. It was all quite impressive and the music and the stuff that went on were interesting. They never got to a sermon that night for all the other prayers for healing and music, which did not still well with this former Presbyterian, but it was at the time heralded as part of the great end time revival. A huge new sanctuary was being built, and its ministers were buying property and building large private dwellings out in the suburbs as a testimony to prosperity.

So, my sis tells me.....it's gone, nothing left. Brownsville was already a transitional dying area and the folks just fizzled and it all died. The flashy ministers moved on to other showy and power grabbing opportunities, I assume. (Letting my feeling show in that last comment) The property sat for sale for a long time until an energetic black pastor began to build a ministry around focusing on the real needs of the area for feeding the hungry and education of children, and ministries of mercy and compassion.

And I thought..... Hallelujah.

If we ever return to Dixie, and I admit my heart has softened toward the south in recent years, Pensacola would be a possibility of a community we would enjoy.

The Anniversary

I cannot conceive of how my life would have turned out if I had been born in another country. I am proud to be an American. I cannot really know or understand the issues occurring in Egypt that caused them such celebration yesterday, but I can relate to the struggle they have with being forced to adopt Islamic practice, and I think it has some related issues we face here as we remember the past and the virtures and values that made this country.

Christians would applaude secular Egypt for not desiring to live under Sharia law, but then we would believe that we can in a sense force Christian values on parts of our secular culture that no longer share those values. It will be good for them, its the right thing, we were here first.

I think the ethic of love and respect and honor and honesty thrives in our country because of many reasons. Yes, I desire people to know the Lord, but in our country we should respect the fact that there are people of every religious persuasion and non religious conviction and they are this soil and this heritage as do we.

The separation of church and state as it developed allowed the freedom for faith to flourish, and the desire for an evangelical to enforce a way of life, is no more legitimate than that of a catholic or a muslim. Let freedom ring, it allows for tolerance and free expression and everything that is great in this country.

I came to faith on June 27, was ordained on June 27, 1976, so my first sermon as an ordained minister was delivered on July 4th, 1976. Faith and Freedom are dear to me, and as I am just three years short of serving 40 years in ministry, I hope I get to finish the course seeing our country do the things that make for a free life, a free expression of faith in speech and practice, and a prosperity that results from hard work and free compassionate capitalism.

This was a snap from a Pensacola trip years ago. Everyone in this picture is all grown up.

Thoughts on our trip to Dixie

We had a number of occasions to pass along the gulf coast hwy between Gulfport and Pascagoula and we continue to see damage done by Katrina not replaced, and many new buildings and businesses that were better than before, its life in a hurricane alley.

The Moss Point Church is being held together by the same great families that held our youth group together 25 years ago.

New Orleans seems safer each time we go, but very saddened that Riverwalk, once a thriving mall built upon the old worlds fair setting....is dead. Plans for an outlet mall not yet begun, although the new cruise port is beyond the mall, raising hopes that it may rise again.

The coffee at Cafe Du Monde is really good, and we limited our older selves to one pastry this time. Still cannot spell the french B-word they serve.

Pensacola Beach was great, but a new attraction, a giant Ferris Wheel, did not meet their ridership expectations so it dissapeared before our eyes and was headed for Atlanta for a new try at profitability. Amazing to watch it taken down so quickly. The gondolas were gone in two days of dissasemmly.

Only two beaches in the world bark when you walk on the white sand, I was told.

In Gautier as we were leaving, I saw a young man skateboarding with an infant in his arms?????I was not sure that was wise.

We love McDonalds for coffee and restroom breaks....they are everywhere. Service seems to be slowing badly.

Moving Back In....Again

We had a guest speaker on June 9 before I left for vacation, and three guest ministers while I was gone, but it coincided with a major upgrade to our home/office/bible study space. New carpet and vinyl throughout. It gave me a week to tear down and pack up my office, and now, I sit here preparing to put it all back in....hopefully neater than it was....and...try...to...keep...the...clutter...monster....at bay. He has been my office companion for over 40 years, I have learned to cope with him but my tidy members and executive assistant are always hoping he will not rear his ugly head.

Same Place, Different Time

Return visits are unique because you renew your relationship with space, after the passage of time, and though you are in the same place there is visual proof you are not the same person. It messes with my mind, which is while I cajoled Shannon to recreate a shot from our previous visit. We notices that the tilting post was there, but the Pirates Alley Sign had been removed (stolen?) You can see what three years does to a growing young lady.