Rainy days:)

Awesome Halloween costumes!

     When I was a pre-schooler ( I don't think we had that term back then), I used to hate rainy days.  To get me over my crankiness, my grandmother would have me recite the little rhyme:
     Rain, rain go away
     Come again another day....

My grandmother

     Being gullible, I can remember repeating  that poem  fervently and then getting on the couch, kneeling on the seat cushions  with my arms folded over the back of the sofa, watching through the window  to see if the sky would obey me or not.
    Most of the time, the answer was "not".
    Only now, 50 years later, does it occur to me that the little poem doesn't even make much sense. If I hated rainy days with a passion, which  I did, then banishing the rain to another day just meant that sooner or later I would have a rotten, rainy day.

    Ironically, over the years, walking in a light rain at evening time has come to be one of my favorite things to do.  I could do it every day in fall, spring, and summer and I don't think I would grow tired of it.  (Well, if I were in the Rain Forest, I would but...) And when there is a huge downpour where the water just floods off our porch overhang and creates a white curtain that sort of shuts the rest of the world out, I have to stop and watch it, always amazed at the power of the deluge   as well as the sheer beauty of it.
    Right now, I wish it were that easy to wash away the impurities of my heart.  To wash away the stress and strains of family life.   To wash away the nastiness of national politics.  And finally, to wash away the black ink, literally off the newspaper that delineates another terrorist attack.

    Another memory I have  from when I was small: sitting in a tiny country church (the singing could best be described as caterwauling, truly), while adults fanned themselves with Funeral HOme paper fans and we kids played until someone, usually me, got a bit carried away and then, literally got carried away... (My grandmother had the ugliest black shoes in the world and they sounded like artillery going off when she stomped across the church floor to jerk me up by the nape of my neck... Some memories never fade!)

My grandfather and my grandmother

    But somewhere among the playing and the paddlings, I still remember these lyrics:
    Showers of blessings, showers of blessings we need... Mercy drops round us are falling but for the showers we plead...
    Maybe an old hymn.. but I think we need it now as much or more than we did when I first became acquainted with it.

My Great Uncle Nathan getting ready to baptize someone.

PHil 3 and 4

   
You can't steer a car by the light emanating from the brakes or even from the the tail lights. You can't go forward if you spend all your time looking in the rear view mirror.
      We all know that.  However, if you live very long, you may be tempted to live in the light of the past. I certainly have been and still am from time to time.
      Why did I  do such and such?
      What if I had done such and such instead?
      Is the backlash from  _________  ever going to die down?
      Why didn't I do what so and so did, back when I was younger and had the chance?
      Philippians has been called the mental health book of the Bible with good reason.
      This morning as I was reading, these are some of the commands/examples that I saw:
            *Rejoice in the Lord.  Somehow - don't know how - this protects us.  (3:1)
            *Serve in the power of the Spirit of God. (3:3)
            *Boast in Christ Jesus (3:3)
            *Do not put confidence in the flesh (3:3)
            *Forget what is behind, what is past. (3:13)
            *Move forward to what is ahead. (3:13)
            *Set your goal - to go after the highest prize, the one gain that is better than having
                - a famous, well-respected family going back for generations
                - a position as an ardent patriot and national leader
                - a prestigious academic career  (having more degrees than a thermometer as a friend used to say)
                - a stellar record as a passionate activist
                - an impeccable, unsullied reputation  (and who wants to give up their reputation if it's impeccable?)
            Give up all of that?  Why?  Not to be poorer but instead, to be richer...
            In order to  know Him, experience His power,enter into the fellowship (circle) of His suffering, and eventually to be conformed to His death as well as  raised with Him to dwell in a world without end.
           

           Basically, in Paul's society, he had it all. In our day, it would be as if he came from the top echelon of our society, graduated from Harvard,  became a noteworthy expert and a sought-after leader, and proved by his zeal that he was fearless as well as ruthless in protecting the things his society valued. People looked up to him.
       
           And then God felled him.
           Falling to the ground, he heard a voice saying to him, "Saul, Saul, why are persecuting Me?"
           "Who are you, Lord..."
           "I am Jesus, the One you are persecuting..."
                                      Acts. 9:3-6
           This brilliant leader went out with zeal and then, as he wrote in Acts 21:22, was felled to the ground by a light... yes, a light. Not an army.  Not a sword.  By a light. One of the greatest scholars of his day, he suddenly couldn't see. Anything.  There he was, on his knees, probably terrified, maybe scrabbling around in the dirt, trying to find solid ground in more ways than one.  This is what he wrote: "I was led by the hand of those who were with me."

          Little children and older adults are led by the hand.  The blind, the sick, and the weak are led by the hand.  How could this be happening to him - someone at the pinnacle of society?
         A better question would be - how did this experience affect him?
         He gave up everything. He turned his back on his family heritage, he gave up his reputation, he became a member of a low-life, despised sect, one of the ones that he himself had been hunting before God felled  him with a light.
       He could have easily wasted hours upon hours regretting his pride, his zeal which led to the arrest of many people that he now knew were innocent and he certainly could have dwelt on the souls who died because of his passion.  He could have cringed time and again as he dwelt on the fact that God had to literally knock him  to his knees in front of his followers to get his attention.
     But apparently, when he was blinded, he saw something - or someone - for the first time.  And like the  Wise Men following a brilliant light in the sky, he kept his focus on this unbelievable treasure - this astounding being - this One whom he considered more desirable than anything else that he had ever owned or ever attained and more precious thanany other person   he had ever known.  E. Stanley Jones once said that he found the pearl of great price and ever since, he had been hugging himself because he had the good sense to sell all that he had in order to buy the field where it was hidden. I think Paul would agree.
     His advice?
     Rejoice in the Lord.  
    Go after Him with all your being.
    Forget what is past...
    Move forward.
    In Phil 4, he elaborates on how to do that:
    Again, he writes:
   Rejoice in the Lord  (4:4).  (Either Paul stuttered when he wrote or this was very important to his Christian walk...)
   Don't worry about anything (4:6)
   Pray about everything  (4:6)
   And think on these things:
            what is true
            what is honorable
            what is just
            what is pure
            what is lovely
            what is commendable
            what is morally excellent
             what is worthy of praise.
In other words, focus on  the Light, not on the past...
  

      

Ten on the Tenth... For these things and many others...

1. I'm grateful that my hope is not in the government, not in the Republicans and not in the Democrats.

2. I'm grateful that the Bible says God finds a woman's quiet and gentle spirit (I Peter 3) beautiful and it doesn't mention mascara, fat-free foods, platform heels, spandex tights,  or designer clothes...

3. I'm grateful the television has an "off" button that works and that I know how to use it...

4. I'm grateful for Hummingbirds that feed in front of our living room window during the day and lightening bugs that flit across our yard at twilight.  Seeing them brings happiness; something that observing fine jewelry really doesn't  do for me.  Man's best creation pales beside God's least...

5.  I'm grateful that I can slip into church on Sunday morning  and it's like coming home after a long, stressful  day; I can relax and set aside the cares of my heart.

6. I'm grateful for quiet week-day mornings when I can get back into bed  and enjoy the luxury of perusing  the morning paper while our two terriers curl up at my feet.  From the paper, I learn what's wrong with the world. From Lilly and Buddie I learn what's right with the world.

7. I'm grateful for summer nights when I can sit up until the wee hours, practically biting my nails as I pursue countless ne'er-do-wells across the spotlighted page of my Kindle.  It's amazing how many times the world has been saved over the past month around 2 or 3 in the morning...:)  Book lights and e-books are wonderful...

8.  I'm grateful for the way foliage is reflected on the still surface of a pond and for the Blue Heron who used to rendezvous with me at the Oasis from time to time. He would stand silently in the shallow water while I sat silently, watching him from the dock.  The first time we met in solitude  was Sept. 11, 2001.  Watching him brought peace to my troubled heart and mind.  I'm glad God created Blue Herons and sent that particular one into my world at that particular time.

9.  I'm grateful that my son still has friends who feel free to come and go at our house, sometimes bunking overnight.  And that I still never know for sure how many air soft guns I'll find in the living room or who will be sleeping on the couch and/or in the guest bedroom.  (I'm also grateful for frozen pizzas, pizza rolls, hot dogs, and cereal as well as for the fact that the guys are old enough to fix their own).

10. I'm grateful that over the years, as ordinary as our house is and as bad a housekeeper as I am, God has used this place as a temporary dwelling place for people who just needed somewhere to stay for a night, a week, a month, or even a year or two.  I wish it had been used more.  No one ever stayed here without giving as much or more than they received.  In some way, each one is still a part of our lives.

For these things and many others, I'm grateful.... 

Not in this life; not in the next...

     I didn't follow the Casey Anthony trial - really was totally clueless until comments started popping up on Face Book.  Even then, I didn't start reading about it until after the verdict was read - which obviously steamed a lot of people.  So what many in the nation have been following for weeks/months, I've just been reading about over the past 24 hours or so.
    In spite of being a late-comer, like many, I believe the mom probably did it. Going back to the basics, she had the means and the opportunity and  I think it could be reasonably said that she had motive -she simply didn't want to be encumbered with a child anymore.  She didn't want a babysitter; she wanted to be totally free to pursue her own agenda.
    Like many, I feel the facts, taken as a whole, point to guilt.  The fact that Casey didn't report her child missing. Even more to the point, the fact that she covered up Caylee's disappearance for a month - something murderers (but also accomplices) do...  The fact that she borrowed a shovel and Caylee's body was found buried.  The fact that at least one expert testified that chloroform had been in Casey's trunk and that her mom said the trunk stank like a dead body had been in it. The fact that Casey's computer showed google searches for chloroform and how to break necks, not your usual search-engine topics.  The fact that the defense's explanation of these google searches did not hold water.  The fact that the child was found with masking tape around her skull - something that does not occur with drowning deaths...   The fact that Casey  was photographed happily partying a few days after her daughter disappeared.
   All these are pretty damning in my opinion.
   But I don't think the law failed.  Or the jurors screwed up.  I've read that some of the jurors have said that they wanted the prosecution to have a stronger case, they wanted enough evidence to put Casey away. They just didn't have it.
  And really, they didn't.  As a mother, I know there's something horribly wrong if you don't report that your toddler is missing and even try to hide that fact for a month.  And you for sure don't go out partying two days after your child goes missing.  But that's a gut feeling.
  In order to prove the case, they had to prove how Caylee died and they simply couldn't do that.  The body had been in the ground for too long.  That wasn't the fault of the prosecutors or the jurors.  A legal decision, especially in the case of murder, has to go by the book - not by the gut.
  But there is another legal system, as the Sullivan Four blog clearly states.  At some point, justice will be done.  In Genesis, Abraham pleads with the Lord to spare the righteous in Sodom and Gomorrah.  He argues, "Will not the Lord of all the earth do right?'  The implication being:  yes, You, the Lord will do what is right. I know that. That's why I am appealing to You for the sake of my loved ones.
   Sometimes right is so hard to balance.  The cry coming out of Sodom and Gomorrah was very great, according to the Lord.  The Holman Study Bible commentary says that it was the cry of the victims that God heard. Also,  He saw the wickedness in those cities - which included gang rape which sounds like Darfur in some ways. And He saw the righteous in those cities even though there was only a handful left - still He saw them.  He sees  the Caylee's of the world whose blood cries out from the ground (and there are many), the Casey's of the world who have no moral compunctions, only Machiavellian plans to achieve their goals (I have no regrets... I trust my judgement completely.. I can only hope the end justifies the means).  And He sees the decent people of the world who don't deserve to be swept away with the wicked.
   God sees it all and He has to judge it all.  Some of the tares cannot be separated from the wheat until the harvest is all in.  Sometimes, for whatever reason, the wheat is overcome by the tares and the weeds of wickedness seem to run rampant.   Only God can sort it all out and only when the last act is played, can all the real justice begin.
   In Genesis 15, God told Abraham what the future would hold for his descendants. He didn't hold back in his description, telling him that his offspring would be "enslaved and oppressed 400 years".(v13.)  He went on to say that He, God Himself, would judge the oppressors and return the Israelite people to their homeland after 400 years. Why so long????  Couldn't He have done it sooner? ?  Because that's how long it would take for the iniquity of a people called the Amorites to reach the place where they would be ready for judgment.  Apparently their judgement would coincide with Israel's return to their homeland. In other words, the Israelites would beat the heck out of the Amorites and take their land away from them because, behind the scenes, God had said, "Enough!  You've had plenty of time to repent! You're done! I'm sending the people of Israel to clean your plow and take your place."
   Sometimes justice is served through the law but.. it's not enough.  Always, there is God's judgment looming ahead and it will be enough.  In the meantime, I think God sometimes (not always) uses natural consequences to bring about justice as he did when the Israelites took over the Amorites.   Were the Amorites into debauchery and wickedness in violation of God's law ?  Had that wild life-style  weakened them to the point that they weren't able to stand up to the Jews who had been living off the land of Egypt, working hard as shepherds and then as slaves, eschewing the "good" life because they had no other choice?
    What I guess I'm saying here is, yes, my gut says Casey is guilty and it twists a bit when I think about the verdict.  But would I want to be Casey?  Not in this life; not in the next.  If the debauchery that marks her life doesn't take her out at a relatively young age, the company she keeps will certainly turn on her in the end.  From what I've read "hedonistic", "narcissistic", "pathological liar"  and "not a nice person" (as one juror called her) pretty much describes her, apart from the issue of murder.  As Beth Moore likes to say, "Baggage attracts baggage."  Or as one of my son's friends put it a while back - nice, quiet guys don't run with wild, nasty girls.  In the end, slime calls to slime and I really don't believe that Casey will get off in this life or in the next. I think she carries the seeds of her own judgment within her and I don't think any sane person would want to trade places with her, the current verdict notwithstanding.
 

Turning children's hearts toward Columbia...

  This should be refreshing b/c it isn't about me:)
  Many years ago, when we were involved in IFO ministry, we became friends with a neat girl from Columbia.  She gave our son Spanish lessons and went camping with us - was just a conscientious, hard-working, tender-hearted college student. She missed her family but as the time drew near to return, she was worried because so many people have been kidnapped in Columbia.
  Having the privilege of knowing this sweet girl put a human face on a problem that for us, had never even been a blip on our  radar screen.  Then last August, I got to hear Russell Stendahl speak at a conference.  I was impressed by his quiet demeanor and his powerful message. But it was no wonder his message was strong - he had been held by Marxist Guerrilla soldiers for 5 months when he was younger.  God spoke to his heart during that time and since his release, he has continued to work in Columbia and had his kids working by his side as well.
  Just to let you know, Voice of the Martyrs puts together small packets which they drop into the jungles of Columbia - Russell Stendahl drops them from his plane in addition to his treks on horseback into this dangerous area.  The packets carry the Gospel and they are working - some of these kidnappers are finding the Lord and having their lives totally turned around.
   You can order a few packets and then turn it into a family project because kids can help put them together. I think this is a neat way to teach children about missions, about Columbia,and at the same time, help change lives.

  The first and obvious goal is that these women and men, many of them still in their teens, will come to know the Lord. The second is that sweet people like our Colombian friend will no longer have to live in fear of being kidnapped.
 

What is learned...

     Sometimes I think that various members of my family could have won a gold medal in the sport of leaping off the deep end; maybe the only sport we could have excelled in as a family, now that I think about it... We weren't very athletic...
    In my family, things tended to be either/or, now or never, wonderful or terrible.  Small mishaps were perceived as hidden time bombs that could lead to a whole chain of events ending in nothing less than nuclear meltdown. If you made a minor mistake at work, that revelation could lead someone in the family to freak out and paint a dire scenario of how this one mistake could eventually lead to being fired which meant you might not be hired ever again and before you knew it, boom, there you'd be: on skid row...  Seriously, that was one aspect of my upbringing. And I learned those lessons well.
   Today,some Gremlins came calling:  "what if", "oh my gosh what have I done" and "w'ere headed to heck in a hand basket" came visiting simply because I have finalized our plans to travel overseas.  It's a lot of money... what if one of us gets sick.. or the airlines go on strike and we can't go and we lose thousands of dollars.......or what if I spend the whole two weeks hot-flashing through Israel..? Why did I ever think I could take my geriatric self to a country in the Mid East?  Or what if something happens back home while we are gone... Or what if.... I'm sure you get the picture.
   While I was stressing,  I was doing laundry - if anyone doesn't understand the meaning of eternal, they can live with us for a week and watch the never-ending supply of laundry pile up every morning like manna in the wilderness - and I had an epiphany. (Btw, my epiphanies always happen either in the canned goods section of Krogers  or in our laundry room - don't know why - they just do).   At any rate,  I suddenly felt like God was asking me, "Who taught you to fret like this?"  The answer was: my mom fretted like this. The next thought that was still-voiced through my heart was: That's right; it didn't come from Me.
    I thought about that.  I thought about what some of the O.T. prophets wrote and they were definitely a gloomy bunch. They delivered one downer of a message after another because  Israel persevered for years in the wrong direction.  But God wasn't quick to write them off; instead He kept trying to turn them around, giving them second and third and fourth and fifth chances. And even when they continued to mess up, He always told them: yes, there is a time of punishment coming but afterwards, you will turn to Me and I will restore your blessings. In other words, He never wrote them off completely no matter how many mistakes they made.
    And then there was Abraham - I was reading about him this morning. Like he tried to pass his wife off as his sister because he was afraid that if people knew she was his wife, they would, um,  kill him in order to get her. And she did get taken by a pagan king. ANd if that had happened in my family, whoa Buddy!  There would have been hand-wringing, stress-city like you cannot imagine.  It would have all been over!  You'll never get your wife back!  You've ruined this whole God-thing that you were supposed to have going!  The family line will end here in the deserts of no-where and our name will be mud forever b/c you got scared and told a lie and now look where we are!!!! And what about the neighbors (pagan nations) around us - what will they think?  etc...
    And really, Abraham's lie did get them into a serious bind.  But God didn't stress and he didn't write Abraham off as a lost cause and while Sara probably had a few choice, even dire thoughts going through her mind as she languished in the king's harem, none of those dire things happened. God intervened and carried on with His plans for Abraham, human weakness, frailty and error notwithstanding.
    Bottom line: God is patient and He's not into jumping off the deep end, fretting is not His thing.
    And it doesn't need to be mine either. What is learned.. can be unlearned...
    And that's good!
 
 

This is not the time to cry; you have to play...:)

      Today I got to work with a class of three-year-olds at church: the Ducks.  (I'm a little worried about my next time to volunteer - I'll be in with the Squirrels...:)
      These are the things I learned...
       *Windows must be shared... There was only window pane that went all the way to the floor.  So when the parents started coming to the pre-school area the kids all wanted to crowd into that one space to watch for mom and dad. But it wasn't just that they wanted to watch... they wanted to make sure that no one else got to watch!
       *Washing hands with real soap is a fun activity  -more so than playing with the toys scattered on the floors. (Toys are there to be scattered, stacked, thrown,  and/or grabbed from others; they are not for playing with).
       *If one child has to go to the bathroom, they all have to go to the bathroom...
       *Not all kids at this age are potty trained. Workers need to ascertain this vital fact before taking a kid to the bathroom.  Kids who are not potty trained can reel out a surprising amount of toilet paper from the dispenser in just a short time.. and while they are cluelessly playing with the toilet paper, someone who is potty-trained may be in a bind...
      * Parents should I.D.kids' shoes.  Two girls. Two pairs of white sandals. Both sets of footwear kicked off early in the game.   Both kids claimed both pairs of shoes.. until just before mom and dad arrived and then, suddenly, they magically knew which pair belonged to which!
       * Barney toys now have buttons that not only sound like a car horn honking but also have the chirp-chirp of a car locking - times have changed since my child was pre-school... 
      *Name stickers on the backs of clothes are worthless... except as a potential toy.
      *And when a child, thirty minutes into the worship service suddenly realizes mom is gone and begins to wail, the best response is to go over to them, take them firmly by the hand and say, This is not the time to cry, you have to play now...
      Although it may sound like I didn't have fun, I did.  Three-year-olds are at a sweet age and I loved looking at their little faces, even the ones that were puckered up, ready to emit a siren-like wail.  Maybe it's because I'm approaching my second child-hood, but I could actually  see how hitting the soap dispenser 40 times or pulling out a yard long string of toilet paper could be fun.  And honestly, I wish someone had explained to me when I was younger that there's a time to cry and a time to play - a useful piece of information in my mind!