Here and Now

Proverbs 10:2 Ill gotten treasures are of no value; but righteousness delivers from death. My first thought was...um...huh? What an odd pair to put together. Ill gotten treasures and righteousness? Heh - and, of course, as soon as I read "Ill gotten treasures" I remembered a quote from the TV show M*A*S*H (Michael, Google it...heh) where Hawkeye Pierce says something about "Ill Booten Gottey" (instead of "Ill Gotten Booty" which is a saying about...oh, nevermind). But then I started to think about our Bible study this morning. We're...how can I put this tactfully...um...PLODDING our way through Leviticus and we just read about the Year of Jubilee (chapter 25) and there's a couple of passages in that chapter that talk about not loaning money with intrest (and that's probably a whole 'nother topic). But we jumped to Jeremiah 7 & 9 because one of the guys this morning had some insight from God about this whole thing. And there (the v...

I had a woman in a church that I served who used to like to say, "Be careful what you pray for. I prayed for patience and God gave me Allen (her youngest son)." Now, I understand what she meant by that, but I think her perspective is way off. I don't think God was listening to her prayer and thinking to Himself, "Hmmmmm, she wants patience, does she? Well, I'll give her something to be patient about!!! Muhuhuhahahahahahaha ." Sigh, is God really like the Monkey's Paw? Or the evil Genie? Two and a half weeks ago, I woke up in the middle of the night. That's not all THAT unusual, but I woke up with a sudden and urgent need to pray - but with no direction to pray. That IS unusual. So, I started praying for the church and the people here - the youth and some of the events that were coming up. Then I started praying for my family. You know, those general, nice, inoffensive prayers that we too often pray. But then I started praying about being ...

"A wise son brings joy to his father, but a foolish son brings grief to his mother." My first thought on reading this is how I want to hear my Father say, "Well done good and faithful servant." But that's too simplistic. Here's a pop-psych reading of this: men draw their identity from what they do, women from who they know (heh, yeah, life is just that simple, of course). So, a wise son will bring joy to his father because the father will say "I have done well in raising this boy." The foolish son brings grief to his mother because she will say, "Our relationship failed, therefore I am a failure..." The truth? Well, as I see it (and that's where the potential heresy comes in, doesn't it?) is that a wise child will be a joy to both parents and both parents will grieve over the foolish choices of their children. It's poetry, people. I think about the foolish choices that I made as a kid - whipping apples at cars (an artform...

...put up a "clever" "pithy" or "neato" church sign again. Check out this website. I mean, I went there on a lark and then I read the critiques, and he's right about most of them... We put such STUPID things on church signs. Do we really think that our culture is that impressed by "CH_ _ CH What's Missing? U R "? Come on... I found this website today: http://www.crummychurchsigns.com/

Hating Blogger today.... lost the whole post. don't want to retype and try to rethink the whole thing... That's okay, it was probably heresy anyway...

Here's the beginning of a new series for my own benefit. Join in if you like. A Proverb a day (will it keep the doctor away?). I'll be trying to go sequentially through the book of Proverbs - though I can't really promise that I'll hit one a day...if I really keep up with this I might create yet another blog for it...heh...probably not, though... My child, if sinners entice you, do not consent. (Proverbs 1:10) Chapter one of Proverbs has a couple of long sections that can, rightfully, be called proverbs. The first is 10-19 and it's all about staying away from sin. It makes perfect sense, as I've pulled it out of context, doesn't it? I mean, don't associate with sinners. After all, they're, um, sinners...and I'm, um, not? Actually, the whole thing is about not giving in to temptation. Verse 15: my child, do not walk in their way, keep your foot from their paths; Don't DO what sinners do. But how do you even hear their voices if you are...

Found a couple of really good sites that I will be checking back on again and again: http://www.churchmarketingsucks.com/ You really have to check out this site: they're all about helping the church not suck - at least in how it communicates itself... http://www.lifechurch.tv/ This seems to be the coolest church in the world...well, maybe not in the WORLD, but they've really got something going on. I'm a media junkie, and they really know how to do media...but more than that, they really seem to be able to CONNECT people - THAT'S the biggest issue, I think...

"Bearded Youth Pastor" (heh, good one Aaron) posted a great quote on his blog http://aaron-behindthemask.blogspot.com/ "a rebel attempts to change the past; a revolutionary attempts to change the future." I don't know where Aaron got it, but I love it. It's so true of Jesus and His ministry. His life and death and resurrection absolutely changed the future of the whole world. And, let me suggest that a revolutionary can also REDEEM the past. I'm not just thinking of Jesus here (though, His redemption of the past is eternal and perfect), but of people like MLK who, in many ways, sought not only to change the future of race relations in our nation, but to heal the past wounds of our country's racism. Ghandi, Mother Teresa, Tutu & Mandela (BTW, not too many people remember that FREDRIK WILLEM DE KLERK was the co-winner of the Nobel Peace Prize with Mandela in '93 - but he became as much a revolutionary as Mandela since he was from the racist ma...

Michael Airgood pulled out a John Wesley Quote on our Talk About... blog and now I'm getting all "Methodist-y" here... From The Story of Methodistm Throughout the World, from the Beginning to the Present Time; Tracing the Rise and Progress of that Wonderful Religious Movement, which Like the Gulf Stream, Has Given Warmth to Wide Waters and Verdure to Many Lands; and Giving an Account of Its Various Influences and Institutions of To-day. (heh, no kidding) by A.B. Hyde, D.D., Professor of Greek in the University of Denver; Member of American Philological Association; of American Society of Biblical Exegesis; of Summer School of Philosophy, etc.; lately Professor of Biblical Literature, Allegheny College, Pa. (heh, no kidding). Published 1889... [Methodism] introduced to the world no new ecclesiastical institute, but a newness of life; not a new formula of doctrines, but a fresh and full experience, under doctrines accepted from the beginning, the simple foundation doctrine...

Here's a post from our newsletter that I wrote in mid August (heh, probably a day or three AFTER the deadline...man, I gotta get more organized). The God Who Sings Rachel and Elie dance. Mommy and Daddy don’t. Now, those two sentences might need a little unpacking, so bear with me. When my girls are excited, happy or just plain bored, they dance. They dance to celebrate something good that has just happened, like a new toy, a favorite dessert, a visit from a friend. They hear music that I don’t hear and they dance in quick little happy steps or broad, sweeping graceful steps. Sometimes I try to hear the songs they hear, I try to dance the steps they dance...but I’m not too successful at it. A year or more ago, Rachel and I were playing with Dominoes (she’s pretty good at the game, by the way, so watch out if she challenges you to a match...). I left the room to do something and Rachel came dancing quick, excited steps into the room. ...

Ugh...Elie got the stomach flu last night...pretty sure I've got it right now... Nobody needs the details... If I didn't have to wait around here for someone to drop something off...I'd be at home right now...

Ugh...Elie got the stomach flu last night...pretty sure I've got it right now... Nobody needs the details... If I didn't have to wait around here for someone to drop something off...I'd be at home right now...

Well, today is Elie's first day of preschool. I don't think Lori cried like she did on Rachel's first day of kindergarten (last week)...but it's a momentous occasion nonetheless. And it was Rachel's first SICK day of the year... at 11:20 we heard her yelling for us. She was throwing up... got her settled down in clean sheets and a new nightgown...and she threw up again... So I took her downstairs...where she threw up three more times (these times only hitting the garbage can, thankfully...). The last bout was at 1:00 AM...so, since I got up at 5:45 this morning with Lori - I'm really tired... But I made Lori stay in bed last night because she has such a long day - bookended with a 45 minute drive... and I function marginally better exhausted than she does... So - the good and the bad. Rachel still wasn't feeling very well when I left this morning... I hope that rest works this out of her. She didn't have a fever (weird)... So - it got me think...

So, at our church, this seems to be the year of peace... At the beginning of summer, our children's Sunday School classes began making Peace Cranes - origami birds that we are hanging in our hallway. Apparently, there's a story behind this ( http://www.sadako.org/sadakostory.htm ). Over the past three months, the children (with some adult help) completed 1,004 cranes: Here's the first one Rachel (my 5-year-old) folded: So - now our United Methodist Women are studying the book Shalom, Salaam, Peace which is about the three religions that come from Abraham... So - what about peace? Elvis Costello asked: (What's So Funny 'Bout) Peace, Love and Understanding? Elvis Costello As I walk through This wicked world Searchin' for light in the darkness of insanity. I ask myself Is all hope lost? Is there only pain and hatred, and misery? And each time I feel like this inside, There's one thing I wanna know: What's so funny 'bout peace love & understanding? ...