This past Sunday morning our pastor delivered a sermon about the "Feast of Trumpets" or Rosh Hashanah, which took place on September 13th. A couple verses in particular caught my eye.
Leviticus 23:24 "Speak unto the children of Israel, saying, In the seventh month, in the first day of the month, shall ye have a sabbath, a memorial of blowing of trumpets, an holy convocation."
Note in particular that this was to be a memorial of blowing of trumpets. While this passage does not tell exactly what was to be memorialized, the trumpets do give us a clue. One of the first places in the bible that we see trumpets is in Exodus 19:16-19 below:
"And it came to pass on the third day in the morning, that there were thunders and lightnings, and a thick cloud upon the mount, and the voice of the trumpet exceeding loud; so that all the people that was in the camp trembled. And Moses brought forth the people out of the camp to meet with God; and they stood at the nether part of the mount. And mount Sinai was altogether on a smoke, because the LORD descended upon it in fire: and the smoke thereof ascended as the smoke of a furnace, and the whole mount quaked greatly. And when the voice of the trumpet sounded long, and waxed louder and louder, Moses spake, and God answered him by a voice."
Of course, you know what closely follows in Exodus chapter 20. The giving of the law. The ten commandments. Now in our simple reading over of these bible verses it is pretty easy to miss what a fearful event this must have been. Thunder! Lightening! Smoke! And most of all the exceeding loud sound of the trumpet. Loud to the point that everyone was literally shaking from fear. And shaking in fear was the correct response! The people were about to have the law given to them. God's standard of holiness! If any of the people were not quaking in fear before they received the law, then they certainly should have been once they did.
I have to think that this event is what the memorial of the Feast 0f Trumpets is all about.
Human nature being what it is, most of the world has never trembled before the living God. They have no fear of him despite the way he manifests himself to them, whether it be through creation, nature, their own conscience (Romans 1), or as we see here, through the revealing of his holiness (and our lack of holiness)
Of course when most of us think of trumpets in the context of the bible, we think of "the last trump" of 1 Corinthians 15:52. This Feast of Trumpets is also a foreshadowing of that event, I think. Matthew 24:30-31 says: "And then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven: and then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn, and they shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. And he shall send his angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they shall gather together his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other."
Both the memorial and the foreshadowing then have to do with judgement. For it is the law that condemns us, and it is with the return of Christ that eternal judgement will be delivered. But it is also about mercy, for it was an act of mercy for God to give the law that we might realize our sinfulness. And it is only by the mercy of God, through Christ's payment for our sins on the cross, that any of us are saved from the judgement to come!
Wednesday, September 19, 2007
Sunday, September 2, 2007
A Night at the Drag Strip
It took all of the willpower that I posses. I really had to reach down deep inside to make myself NOT do something stupid. Though I have never had a drug habit, I am quite sure that the temptation is of the same magnitude.
It started when Jason Clampitt called me a about a week ago to remind me that the Kokesh All Harley Drags which he sponsors (and bears the Kokesh name) were coming up this weekend. I had, of course, seen the race on the Grove Creek Dragway schedule, but to be honest I hadn't given it a lot of thought. Since officially retiring from drag racing, I have been on a strip only about a half dozen times, and about half of those times was in my '58 Studebaker Hawk. The newest bike in our household is my wife's '47 Knucklehead. A stock 61 cubic inch with handshift, it's not what many would consider drag bike material. Besides, most every one I know with any sort of antique bike that I might have been able to coerce into racing would be at the antique motorcycle meet in Davenport Iowa for the weekend.
Left: Jason during test and tune
But, it would be nice to help support the yearly race. In fact, events like this tend to just disappear if they don't get enough participation. And participation doesn't require being highly competitive. The clincher was probably the fact that it was to be an evening event with the gates opening at 4:00 pm. This would enable me to keep my shop open normal hours Saturday morning.
So the 61" Knuckle it would be! This bike has always run very strong for what it is. The motor, which I completely rebuilt back in about 1989, is completely stock right down to the cam,with the exception of the most mild of porting work and a stock later model carb. When I say it runs strong I mainly base that on the fact that it will chirp the rear tire and pop the front wheel about an inch off the pavement when hitting second gear hard (yes, it does have a ratchet lid on the trans).
Well, you can't go drag racing with a muffler, so the first order of business was to find a piece of straight pipe to install in place of the muffler that normally resides on the end of the stock reproduction 2 into 1 pipe. I couldn't believe I didn't have a chunk of pipe long enough in my stash of junk parts. I did have an old slash cut 2" diameter muffler that had been gutted though. By welding a short section of straight pipe onto the front of it I had a rather painless "racing" exhaust system.
Let's see, a drag bike really needs a velocity stack. That was easy, since I sell them in my eBay store The late Shovelhead Kehein carb that I have on the Knuck has the same bolt pattern as an S&S "B" carb. A little rejetting, and I would be all set!
Oh, that's right: any kind of consistent launch would require a tachometer. Luckily I had saved an old Superglide tach from a crashed bike years ago. It still works despite the glass face having been broken and now removed completely.
You may be thinking "That's not so stupid, taking an old bike out to the dragstrip just for fun." Yeah, but that's not the part that I really struggled with. The stupid urge that I had to fight off so heroically was the urge to strip all of the excess weight off the bike for the weekend. Stock fenders; way bigger and heavier than needed. Besides I have an old flat fender that could have been shortened up to the bare minimum. Crash bars; dead weight! A little bates style solo would look good in place of the big stock solo with pogo stick! No need for a headlight; its DRAG RACING! I even toyed with the idea of changing the big stock 16" front wheel over to a 19" I have laying around. Of course that would have eliminated my front brake, making it harder to do a smokey burnout. And I did intend to do some smokey burnouts!
Well, since I am still alive and able to write, it is obvious that my wife Jane did not kill me, and that means I resisted the temptation to strip her bike down to "racing weight". But let me tell you, it was close at times. Even as late as Saturday morning I was looking at that big old front fender and thinking how much air it would trap!
Other than emptying the saddlebags, adjusting the tire pressures (60 in front, 20 in rear), removing the mirror, and tilting the handlebars down as much as possible, I managed to load the Knuck up in the back of our pickup without further modifications.
I wish I could say that Jane had as much fun at the races as I did, because I simply had a blast! I am sure that her enjoyment was based mostly on watching how much fun I was having. I think those of us who are husbands often take for granted how blessed we are in having wives who are willing to find enjoyment in the companionship of doing things together. Too often the "doing" is of those things we want to do, and not what our wives may have chosen. (As usual, I owe you one Sweety)
Upon arrival at the track and getting ready to tech in, I discovered that I had left my lace up work boots at home. I had moved them from the "to go" pile over next to a chair to change into them. At the last minute I decided to wear my cowboy boots until we got to the track. Hmm....slippery bottomed boots with a narrow heel were not my first choice for doing a burnout with a rocker (heel/toe) clutch pedal. I momentarily considered not doing any water burnouts, but quickly discarded that thought as counterproductive to the whole purpose of having fun!
If you have never done a burnout as part of drag racing, here's the deal. The purpose of the water burnout is to clean and heat up the rear tire for better traction. If you are using a treaded street tire and water stays in the grooves you have probably defeated the purpose. Some guys don't do them for that reason. But when you are running a 61" Knucklehead, the real purpose of the burnout is to have fun and show off!
When you see someone doing a water burnout, and they rev their motor but get very little smoke , it is usually due to using too low a gear. The smoke comes from tire speed, not engine speed. The water may do a little cleaning, but is mostly there to enable you to initially break the tire loose.
I do my water burnouts in 3rd gear. Now it is a piece of cake to break the tire loose in water by putting both feet on the ground, taking all of your weight off the bike, and holding the front brake on. With a foot clutch however, that is not so easy to do. Since I have the front brake lever on the right side like a late model, I have to work that along with the throttle with one hand. Add to this, the fact that a stock springer front brake is about a half step better than totally useless, and you can see that the burnout was the most complicated thing to do. Getting any kind of braking force on the front required squeezing with all four fingers, which left only my thumb and palm to control the throttle. Using the rocker clutch necessitated having the bike leaning slightly to the right when initiating the burnout. The lean meant that the rear of the bike would start to slide out to the left when I dropped the clutch. I also wound up putting much of my weight on the seat. This meant that the extra weight coupled with the limited horsepower of the little 61" Knuck would make the tire try to "hook up" and move the bike forward out of the water.
Left: the Knuck
Right: Denny on left and Ken on right
It started when Jason Clampitt called me a about a week ago to remind me that the Kokesh All Harley Drags which he sponsors (and bears the Kokesh name) were coming up this weekend. I had, of course, seen the race on the Grove Creek Dragway schedule, but to be honest I hadn't given it a lot of thought. Since officially retiring from drag racing, I have been on a strip only about a half dozen times, and about half of those times was in my '58 Studebaker Hawk. The newest bike in our household is my wife's '47 Knucklehead. A stock 61 cubic inch with handshift, it's not what many would consider drag bike material. Besides, most every one I know with any sort of antique bike that I might have been able to coerce into racing would be at the antique motorcycle meet in Davenport Iowa for the weekend.
Left: Jason during test and tune
But, it would be nice to help support the yearly race. In fact, events like this tend to just disappear if they don't get enough participation. And participation doesn't require being highly competitive. The clincher was probably the fact that it was to be an evening event with the gates opening at 4:00 pm. This would enable me to keep my shop open normal hours Saturday morning.
So the 61" Knuckle it would be! This bike has always run very strong for what it is. The motor, which I completely rebuilt back in about 1989, is completely stock right down to the cam,with the exception of the most mild of porting work and a stock later model carb. When I say it runs strong I mainly base that on the fact that it will chirp the rear tire and pop the front wheel about an inch off the pavement when hitting second gear hard (yes, it does have a ratchet lid on the trans).
Well, you can't go drag racing with a muffler, so the first order of business was to find a piece of straight pipe to install in place of the muffler that normally resides on the end of the stock reproduction 2 into 1 pipe. I couldn't believe I didn't have a chunk of pipe long enough in my stash of junk parts. I did have an old slash cut 2" diameter muffler that had been gutted though. By welding a short section of straight pipe onto the front of it I had a rather painless "racing" exhaust system.
Let's see, a drag bike really needs a velocity stack. That was easy, since I sell them in my eBay store The late Shovelhead Kehein carb that I have on the Knuck has the same bolt pattern as an S&S "B" carb. A little rejetting, and I would be all set!
Oh, that's right: any kind of consistent launch would require a tachometer. Luckily I had saved an old Superglide tach from a crashed bike years ago. It still works despite the glass face having been broken and now removed completely.
You may be thinking "That's not so stupid, taking an old bike out to the dragstrip just for fun." Yeah, but that's not the part that I really struggled with. The stupid urge that I had to fight off so heroically was the urge to strip all of the excess weight off the bike for the weekend. Stock fenders; way bigger and heavier than needed. Besides I have an old flat fender that could have been shortened up to the bare minimum. Crash bars; dead weight! A little bates style solo would look good in place of the big stock solo with pogo stick! No need for a headlight; its DRAG RACING! I even toyed with the idea of changing the big stock 16" front wheel over to a 19" I have laying around. Of course that would have eliminated my front brake, making it harder to do a smokey burnout. And I did intend to do some smokey burnouts!
Well, since I am still alive and able to write, it is obvious that my wife Jane did not kill me, and that means I resisted the temptation to strip her bike down to "racing weight". But let me tell you, it was close at times. Even as late as Saturday morning I was looking at that big old front fender and thinking how much air it would trap!
Other than emptying the saddlebags, adjusting the tire pressures (60 in front, 20 in rear), removing the mirror, and tilting the handlebars down as much as possible, I managed to load the Knuck up in the back of our pickup without further modifications.
I wish I could say that Jane had as much fun at the races as I did, because I simply had a blast! I am sure that her enjoyment was based mostly on watching how much fun I was having. I think those of us who are husbands often take for granted how blessed we are in having wives who are willing to find enjoyment in the companionship of doing things together. Too often the "doing" is of those things we want to do, and not what our wives may have chosen. (As usual, I owe you one Sweety)
Upon arrival at the track and getting ready to tech in, I discovered that I had left my lace up work boots at home. I had moved them from the "to go" pile over next to a chair to change into them. At the last minute I decided to wear my cowboy boots until we got to the track. Hmm....slippery bottomed boots with a narrow heel were not my first choice for doing a burnout with a rocker (heel/toe) clutch pedal. I momentarily considered not doing any water burnouts, but quickly discarded that thought as counterproductive to the whole purpose of having fun!
If you have never done a burnout as part of drag racing, here's the deal. The purpose of the water burnout is to clean and heat up the rear tire for better traction. If you are using a treaded street tire and water stays in the grooves you have probably defeated the purpose. Some guys don't do them for that reason. But when you are running a 61" Knucklehead, the real purpose of the burnout is to have fun and show off!
When you see someone doing a water burnout, and they rev their motor but get very little smoke , it is usually due to using too low a gear. The smoke comes from tire speed, not engine speed. The water may do a little cleaning, but is mostly there to enable you to initially break the tire loose.
I do my water burnouts in 3rd gear. Now it is a piece of cake to break the tire loose in water by putting both feet on the ground, taking all of your weight off the bike, and holding the front brake on. With a foot clutch however, that is not so easy to do. Since I have the front brake lever on the right side like a late model, I have to work that along with the throttle with one hand. Add to this, the fact that a stock springer front brake is about a half step better than totally useless, and you can see that the burnout was the most complicated thing to do. Getting any kind of braking force on the front required squeezing with all four fingers, which left only my thumb and palm to control the throttle. Using the rocker clutch necessitated having the bike leaning slightly to the right when initiating the burnout. The lean meant that the rear of the bike would start to slide out to the left when I dropped the clutch. I also wound up putting much of my weight on the seat. This meant that the extra weight coupled with the limited horsepower of the little 61" Knuck would make the tire try to "hook up" and move the bike forward out of the water.
I found that if immediately after dropping the clutch, I got both legs in position so that my lower calves were braced into the front curve of the floorboards, then my feet approximately doubled the holding power of the front brake ( more of a commentary on the weakness of the front brake than the strength of my legs). Once my feet were planted I could feel the rear tire stop trying to grab and looking down I could see the smoke start to roll off the tire. When I felt like I had put on enough of a show, I would let go of the front brake as I sat down on the seat and let it walk out of the water box. Then I had to very quickly get the clutch in and the rear brake on (without letting my pant leg get sucked into the velocity stack) before crossing the starting line. I was also using the front brake at this time, but like I said, it was not a lot of help. After that lengthy description, it frankly doesn't sound like something a person should try to do. Guess its lucky I didn't try to describe it before doing it.
Even a normal burn out on a late model street bike is usually enough to get the blood pumping, so as can be imagined, my adrenaline was flowing pretty good by the time I was ready to stage the old Knuckle. Bringing the rpm up to 3500 for the launch proved to be just about ideal giving no engine bog, a little air under the front tire, and just a little tire spin. As usual, banging 2nd gear would momentarily lift the front tire again. With my chin down on the tachometer and my right leg pulled back to clear the velocity stack, each time I hit another gear it would slide me back an inch or two on the big old Harley solo saddle. By the second or third pass I had realized I was better off winding out 3rd gear rather than shifting into 4th just before the finish line. If that description sounds like I was going really fast, well...I wasn't. My best time of the evening was 10.221 seconds and 67.02 mph on the eighth mile track. How could it have been so much fun at such slow speeds?
Even a normal burn out on a late model street bike is usually enough to get the blood pumping, so as can be imagined, my adrenaline was flowing pretty good by the time I was ready to stage the old Knuckle. Bringing the rpm up to 3500 for the launch proved to be just about ideal giving no engine bog, a little air under the front tire, and just a little tire spin. As usual, banging 2nd gear would momentarily lift the front tire again. With my chin down on the tachometer and my right leg pulled back to clear the velocity stack, each time I hit another gear it would slide me back an inch or two on the big old Harley solo saddle. By the second or third pass I had realized I was better off winding out 3rd gear rather than shifting into 4th just before the finish line. If that description sounds like I was going really fast, well...I wasn't. My best time of the evening was 10.221 seconds and 67.02 mph on the eighth mile track. How could it have been so much fun at such slow speeds?
Left: the Knuck
There was not a huge turn out of bikes, so there was little or no waiting to make passes during time trials. I think I made more than 10 passes with plenty of time for the bike to cool down a little after about every third pass. Happily this was an eighth mile track so the little 61" was not humiliated as much as if it had been a full quarter. Surprisingly, many of the other bikes did not pass me until I was already in 2nd gear. Most likely they were spinning their tire off the line much more than I was.
My reaction times on the starting lights were another bright spot of the evening. I never did have great reaction times like a few racers I know. Since retiring from the pro ranks with its accompanying "pro tree" I had blamed it on not being able to adapt to a sportsman tree. Of course that was not really the case since my reaction times on a pro tree had always left something to be desired. This night however my reaction times were better than they ever have been with my best being a .006! Seems unlikely that old age would bring better reaction times, so maybe it was the extra adrenaline from the whole foot clutch scenario.
Right: Crazy John with his traction challanged 145 inch was
runner up in the 7.0 class
Eliminations consisted of index racing with a class every .5 second starting with a 7.0 class, then a 7.50 class and so forth up to a 9.50 and slower class. Jason had hoped for enough bikes to break the classes down to every .25 second rather than .5 but the turnout just did not justify it. Since my bike was the slowest one there (I only beat one bike to the finish line all night, and that was because he bogged his engine at the starting line; I did however win a few by opponents red lighting) the eliminations were a bit anticlimactic for me. However, Ken Mlsna, the service manager from American Thunder (next door to my shop) took second in the 9.0 class with his Shovelhead, and Denny Perrier, one of our customers, won the 8.50 class on his hot Panhead.
Right: Denny on left and Ken on right
All in all, a great time was had by everyone, and for me personally it will be even harder to keep myself from doing something stupid for next year!
Monday, August 27, 2007
CONGRATULATIONS!
This past Saturday evening our son Joseph became engaged to a wonderful young lady by the name of Kristen. I still can't believe that she said yes. (OK, that was just my lame attempt at humor)
My wife Jane and I are both completely thrilled with this development. I continue to be amazed at what a fine young man "Joey" has turned out to be in light of the bad example that I set for so many years. But perhaps the fact that he knew that it was a bad example helps explain it.
In reality I know that we just need to thank the Lord for yet more of his grace!
Tuesday, August 7, 2007
Let's Back Up a Moment
In my continuing series on the Stroker Flathead Engine Build I find that I have inadvertently skipped a couple steps that I should have mentioned. My most recent post in the series, Stroker Clearance and Flywheel Balance , brings us to the point of assembling the flywheels. However, I never did get around to explaining what was done to "fix" the problem with the rods that I mentioned in the post on Joe's Flathead . So if anyone is actually following this series, they are likely wondering why I would balance the flywheels with rods that were too narrow not to mention cracked!
Well, the answer is that I wouldn't. Knowing the high cost of replacement rods ($513 from V-Twin) and the likelihood that the new rods would also need to be honed to round before use, we decided to do the best we could with what we had. I sent the old rods to be magnafluxed by a local gentleman who specializes in aircraft engines. This showed cracks as I had suspected. My aircraft engine specialist recommended having the cracks welded, re magnafluxed, and then shot peened. That was the coarse we chose to take. Hind sight being 20/20, if I had realized at the time that the rods had been ground narrower, then I likely would have gone with new rods.
Once the rods were repaired, new races installed, honed to round, and bearings fit, it was time to do an initial assembly of the flywheels to determine the width of the flywheel assembly. It was during this initial "mock up" that I discovered the huge rod end play.
The reason that I needed the crank width info had to do with the Pinion race in the crankcase which I also talked about in my post on Joe's Flathead . The race needed to be removed from the case due to being spot welded into the case; not exactly an approved procedure. I have found over the years that once you start replacing case races in these old motors, there is a pretty good chance that you will have no flywheel end play even with the thinnest of end play thrust washers. This is due to the replacement races having a wider inside lip than the originals. I often wonder if the manufacturers of these replacement parts never had an OEM part to work from, or if they just lack any measuring instruments.
In any case, I knew that with a new race going into the right side, flywheel end play had to be taken into account. My first thought on the rod end play was a shorter crank pin, (one is available) but that would not bring them together enough. My next thought was thicker flywheel washers (the ones that are staked into stock flywheels on each end of the crankpin). Of course the S&S flywheels don't have washers there, but I knew that the flywheels could be machined for them, so I called my S&S tech rep. He suggested that it would be just as easy for me to send the wheels back to S&S to have the tapers machined deeper into the flywheels to bring them closer together. So that's what we did.
Now by the time you add up the cost of machining the flywheels, magnaflux, welding, shot peening, and shipping, suddenly the new repop rods don't look quite so outrageous in price. Like I said about hindsight....
As for the right side case race, that also posed a problem. After cutting through the spot welds, the race came out very easily; obviously that was the reason for said spot welds. Upon measuring the race and case, it became apparent that this would take unusual steps to repair. The race was already a +.025 and loose. The only good solution I could think of was to bore out the case and sleeve it for a new standard race. That was accomplished by bolting the right case to the table on the mill with the cam side down, bolting the left case to the right and then indicating on the left case race. Once the table was locked down the left case could be removed for easy access to the right side bore. Then a steel sleeve was fabricated to be a press fit in the case as well as give a press fit to the new standard race. By the time the new race was line lapped to size, we had perfect alignment of the two races.
So that should bring us up to date with my most recent post in this series. In my next post in this series, I will try to get into some issues having to do with eliminating piston scuffing.
Well, the answer is that I wouldn't. Knowing the high cost of replacement rods ($513 from V-Twin) and the likelihood that the new rods would also need to be honed to round before use, we decided to do the best we could with what we had. I sent the old rods to be magnafluxed by a local gentleman who specializes in aircraft engines. This showed cracks as I had suspected. My aircraft engine specialist recommended having the cracks welded, re magnafluxed, and then shot peened. That was the coarse we chose to take. Hind sight being 20/20, if I had realized at the time that the rods had been ground narrower, then I likely would have gone with new rods.
Once the rods were repaired, new races installed, honed to round, and bearings fit, it was time to do an initial assembly of the flywheels to determine the width of the flywheel assembly. It was during this initial "mock up" that I discovered the huge rod end play.
The reason that I needed the crank width info had to do with the Pinion race in the crankcase which I also talked about in my post on Joe's Flathead . The race needed to be removed from the case due to being spot welded into the case; not exactly an approved procedure. I have found over the years that once you start replacing case races in these old motors, there is a pretty good chance that you will have no flywheel end play even with the thinnest of end play thrust washers. This is due to the replacement races having a wider inside lip than the originals. I often wonder if the manufacturers of these replacement parts never had an OEM part to work from, or if they just lack any measuring instruments.
In any case, I knew that with a new race going into the right side, flywheel end play had to be taken into account. My first thought on the rod end play was a shorter crank pin, (one is available) but that would not bring them together enough. My next thought was thicker flywheel washers (the ones that are staked into stock flywheels on each end of the crankpin). Of course the S&S flywheels don't have washers there, but I knew that the flywheels could be machined for them, so I called my S&S tech rep. He suggested that it would be just as easy for me to send the wheels back to S&S to have the tapers machined deeper into the flywheels to bring them closer together. So that's what we did.
Now by the time you add up the cost of machining the flywheels, magnaflux, welding, shot peening, and shipping, suddenly the new repop rods don't look quite so outrageous in price. Like I said about hindsight....
As for the right side case race, that also posed a problem. After cutting through the spot welds, the race came out very easily; obviously that was the reason for said spot welds. Upon measuring the race and case, it became apparent that this would take unusual steps to repair. The race was already a +.025 and loose. The only good solution I could think of was to bore out the case and sleeve it for a new standard race. That was accomplished by bolting the right case to the table on the mill with the cam side down, bolting the left case to the right and then indicating on the left case race. Once the table was locked down the left case could be removed for easy access to the right side bore. Then a steel sleeve was fabricated to be a press fit in the case as well as give a press fit to the new standard race. By the time the new race was line lapped to size, we had perfect alignment of the two races.
So that should bring us up to date with my most recent post in this series. In my next post in this series, I will try to get into some issues having to do with eliminating piston scuffing.
Tuesday, July 31, 2007
A Trip to the Heart of the City
This past Sunday afternoon, my wife Jane and I, along with our grandchildren Kaya and Max, were blessed by attending a "Heart of the City" event in nearby Chaska. (Kaya and Max spent the weekend with us because their parents were away celebrating their 15th wedding anniversary - congratulations Aron and Megan!)
There had been a short presentation given on Heart of the City Ministries during our previous week's church service. I, frankly, was not over enthusiastic about attending, assuming that it would be a little to "ecumenical" for my taste, but my wife insisted. As so often happens, Jane was right and I was wrong (and if I put that in print a little more often, she will likely become an avid reader of my blog).
In my opinion, the music was most definitely God honoring. Of course its hard to go too far wrong when most of the lyrics declare the glory of God! (keep in mind this is coming from someone who is not entirely comfortable with anything newer than Amazing Grace)
Any thoughts that the whole event would be "lukewarm" (see Revelation 3:16) due to the stated purpose of Heart of the City to "bring together the body of Christ" were dashed when one of the singers gave his salvation testimony. It was one of those that make you want to jump up and say AMEN; one where you have no doubt that the man had been born again. Yep, he even brought up that it was God's law that showed him what a sinner he was and how in need of Savior! No, I certainly got the feeling this was not one of those ministries that would sacrifice truth for the sake of unity. That can be a narrow road to walk, and may God bless Heart of the City's effort to stay upon it. Sometimes its tempting to make that path so narrow that there is only room for one person on it.
So, if you ever get the chance to go and worship with "Heart of the City", don't miss it! I highly recommend them. For more information and their schedule, click on http://www.heartofthecity.org/index.htm
There had been a short presentation given on Heart of the City Ministries during our previous week's church service. I, frankly, was not over enthusiastic about attending, assuming that it would be a little to "ecumenical" for my taste, but my wife insisted. As so often happens, Jane was right and I was wrong (and if I put that in print a little more often, she will likely become an avid reader of my blog).
In my opinion, the music was most definitely God honoring. Of course its hard to go too far wrong when most of the lyrics declare the glory of God! (keep in mind this is coming from someone who is not entirely comfortable with anything newer than Amazing Grace)
Any thoughts that the whole event would be "lukewarm" (see Revelation 3:16) due to the stated purpose of Heart of the City to "bring together the body of Christ" were dashed when one of the singers gave his salvation testimony. It was one of those that make you want to jump up and say AMEN; one where you have no doubt that the man had been born again. Yep, he even brought up that it was God's law that showed him what a sinner he was and how in need of Savior! No, I certainly got the feeling this was not one of those ministries that would sacrifice truth for the sake of unity. That can be a narrow road to walk, and may God bless Heart of the City's effort to stay upon it. Sometimes its tempting to make that path so narrow that there is only room for one person on it.
So, if you ever get the chance to go and worship with "Heart of the City", don't miss it! I highly recommend them. For more information and their schedule, click on http://www.heartofthecity.org/index.htm
Friday, July 27, 2007
Cheap Rocker Arm Bushing Tool
Here's a quick and easy tip for you. This is the quickest and easiest way to remove the bushings from Shovelhead, Evolution or Twin Cam rocker arms that I have found. It is the tap from a kit by Colony for installing an oversize timing plug. The Colony part number is 7502-2 (which includes the tap and the plug). Thread is 9/16-18 List price is $36.64 (V Twin stocks the Colony parts under the Colony part number, but for more money)
If you have been working on Harleys as long as I have, you may already have one of these laying in the junk drawer of your tool box.
Simply use a ratchet with socket to screw the tool into the bushing and then drive it out from the other side with a punch (note the mushroomed end) I have been using the same one for over 15 years with great results. A normal tap might work, but will not be as easy to start straight and will likely shatter after a few times hitting it with a punch.
Monday, July 23, 2007
Meeting the Author
I attended a funeral this past week, but this post has nothing to do with the deceased. Rather I would like to address something I noticed in passing. Hanging on one of the walls of the church where the service was held was a "tapestry" (if I am using the word correctly). You have probably seen similar ones if you visit many churches, or may even have some on the walls of your church. Usually they have a solid colored background with some sort of images on them along with a line or two of text declaring something theological. This particular one caught my eye because it stated something to the effect of "You need to continue with bible study until the day you meet the author"
Now I know as well as anyone the danger of "bumper sticker theology". Its just too easy read into a one line text nearly any thing you want it to say. If all truth could be conveyed in just a line or two, then certainly our Lord would not have given us so many books in the Bible. And believe me, I understand what was meant by this saying. Clearly it was meant to mean that we will never know enough about God's word until the day we die. However, that didn't stop me from critiquing the saying in my mind.
I will certainly admit to the tendency of being overly critical of things spiritual that are coming from a source with doctrine that I disagree with. In many cases I do think I would do better to practice Christian charity by giving others the benefit of the doubt as to their intended meaning.
In this case though, I know that the intended meaning was right and a nice positive message, but the saying still brought a negative rebuttal to my mind; "If you haven't met the author before you die, it will be too late." You see, all that Bible study will have done you no good if you have never met the author. In Matthew 7:21-23 Jesus said; "Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven. Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works? And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity. "
This passage of scripture should be enough to give every one pause! Have we not prophesied in thy name? And have we not cast out devils? (actually I have done neither of those first two things) And have we not diligently gone to Bible studies? And have not we been baptized in thy name? And yet despite all these wonderful works, Jesus will say in that day that he never knew them. Are you sure that you have already met the author?
Now I know as well as anyone the danger of "bumper sticker theology". Its just too easy read into a one line text nearly any thing you want it to say. If all truth could be conveyed in just a line or two, then certainly our Lord would not have given us so many books in the Bible. And believe me, I understand what was meant by this saying. Clearly it was meant to mean that we will never know enough about God's word until the day we die. However, that didn't stop me from critiquing the saying in my mind.
I will certainly admit to the tendency of being overly critical of things spiritual that are coming from a source with doctrine that I disagree with. In many cases I do think I would do better to practice Christian charity by giving others the benefit of the doubt as to their intended meaning.
In this case though, I know that the intended meaning was right and a nice positive message, but the saying still brought a negative rebuttal to my mind; "If you haven't met the author before you die, it will be too late." You see, all that Bible study will have done you no good if you have never met the author. In Matthew 7:21-23 Jesus said; "Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven. Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works? And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity. "
This passage of scripture should be enough to give every one pause! Have we not prophesied in thy name? And have we not cast out devils? (actually I have done neither of those first two things) And have we not diligently gone to Bible studies? And have not we been baptized in thy name? And yet despite all these wonderful works, Jesus will say in that day that he never knew them. Are you sure that you have already met the author?
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