Peter’s Posts

My bible reading plan has taken me through the minor prophets. Today I was in Zephaniah 3.

It reminded me that my hope is in God and his plan of salvation for the world. It is frustrating and useless to hope in anything else.

“The Lord has taken away His judgments against you, He has cleared away your enemies. The King of Israel, the Lord, is in your midst; You will fear disaster no more. In that day it will be said to Jerusalem: “ Do not be afraid, O Zion; Do not let your hands fall limp. “The Lord your God is in your midst, A victorious warrior. He will exult over you with joy, He will be quiet in His love, He will rejoice over you with shouts of joy. “I will gather those who grieve about the appointed feasts— They came from you, O Zion; The reproach of exile is a burden on them. “Behold, I am going to deal at that time With all your oppressors, I will save the lame And gather the outcast, And I will turn their shame into praise and renown In all the earth. “At that time I will bring you in, Even at the time when I gather you together; Indeed, I will give you renown and praise Among all the peoples of the earth, When I restore your fortunes before your eyes,” Says the Lord.”

Zephaniah 3:15-20 –

In Jesus, God has removed all the judgments against me, my two worst enemies, sin and death, are defeated and powerless against the blood that Jesus shed on the cross, and the power that raised him from the dead.

There is hope. His name is Jesus.

It was a cold and cloudy January morning. I had just left college to become the manager of my families business, the Burger Bar Cafe. It was Sunday so we were closed. I was in the back room getting breakfast for my pregnant wife. We were newly weds and pregnant with our honeymoon baby. So much change in one year. Getting married, getting pregnant, moving three times, starting college to become a pastor, leaving college to become a dad.

It was that morning in that restaurant back room right next to the dishwasher that I finally understood that God loved me, not based on anything I did or didn’t do, not on my “works” but just because he is a loving and gracious God, a God who “stoops low” to aid those he loves. That’s the day that Ephesians 2:8-10 came to life to me. That’s the day I was saved.

Part of my desire to go to college and become a Pastor was the need to please God. To earn his favor. I had just given that up and I was floundering. But this verse popped into my head and I understood that I couldn’t earn Gods favor, because he had already graciously given it to me through Jesus.

” For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith–and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God– 9 not by works, so that no one can boast. 10 For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.”

Thank you Jesus for the path you put me on and for loving me and our family. For dying for our sins and also providing for all of our needs. Thank you for being gracious to me, for saving me. I love you Jesus.

(Originally posted 8-27-15)

You will keep in perfect peace those whose minds are steadfast, because they trust in you.

Isaiah 26:3 NIV

This is going to sound stupid but this is one of those verses that bugs me. It bugs me because its sounds like it can’t be true. Like it’s the picture of the imaginary Christian life, the pretend Pollyanna Christian life.

The reason is that I have been utterly terrified before. Waking up after having your head bashed against a dashboard, the vehicle upside down and family members moaning and crying can bring on overwhelming fear. I have been in stark terror.

That car accident has been my scariest moment, but my most blissful peaceful moment came only minutes later. Somehow the people who came to the wreck got me out of the wreckage and put me in an ambulance. As I laid there fear was almost to crazy level which is 5 clicks past 11 on the fear dial, then I heard words,in my head or my heart or my ears I don’t know, the words were “Jesus will take care of you”.

Peace flooded over me and I relaxed. That could be when I died I don’t know. When we arrived at the hospital I was clinically dead, no pulse and not breathing.

You will keep in perfect peace those whose minds are steadfast, because they trust in you.

Isaiah 26:3 NIV

Maybe in the days since then when I’ve encountered fear, it wasn’t God’s fault, it was mine for losing sight of him. How can we fear if we know the God who said to nothingness “let there be light” and there was light, who created mankind and watched as we as a race defied him, then he provided a way back to him through giving up his only son to be punished in our place. If we know that God, and can keep him in our sights and believe and trust in his existence and receive his persistent love, maybe our souls can experience peace.

Perfect peace, really.

Romans 16 is kind of like the credits at the end of the movie. I’m tempted to walk out of the theater at the end of chapter 15 but I hang in there just in case there’s a blooper reel or a teaser for the next installment. Maybe there will be a secret little gem that only those who stay to the end will see.

I had to ask google about the lists of people and here’s what I found out: Pheobe was the mail woman, the next group were the Romans that Paul knew personally and was saying “hey” to. The second group was Paul’s personal team. Now we know about these folks 2 millennia after they left the earth.

I have my own list. A list of people I pray for every time I sit down and read my bible.

It started with one guy I used to work with. I found out he was struggling with some stuff and I was asked to pray for him. I wrote it down so I wouldn’t forget. I kept adding people. People I thought need a touch from God, people I want to see in heaven with me, my family. my wife Mary made the list, she’s on the bottom of column two. One morning it dawned on me that she needs to be covered in prayer as much or more than the other people in my world. She has to live with me.

There are some Hollywood folks, people from my past, people in the news. All my grand babies are there. There are many friends from work and I pray about the things that they have shared with me. I pray for my neighbors. I don’t know all of their names but God does. I meet and greet when I get a chance.

I had to scribble off one name. He died earlier this year. That was hard.

I have limited myself to one page but I have room on the page for more.

(Originally posted 8-25-2015)

“I love the LORD, for he heard my voice; he heard my cry for mercy. Because he turned his ear to me, I will call on him as long as I live.”

God is merciful.

For some of us that is the problem. His mercy attracts us but also repels us. If he can forgive me, and welcome me, then what’s to keep him from forgiving and welcoming my enemy? How can he forgive the person who hurt me so deeply? It isn’t fair.

Some of us are stuck in the attraction/repulsion zone. We know what Jesus said about forgiveness, that to receive it we must give it.

“Matthew 6:12-15 And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.’ For if you forgive other people when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive others their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins. ”

We get stuck right here.

There are 3 things to consider if we find ourselves stuck, needing forgiveness, but unable to forgive.

1. God knows. He knows our hearts. He also knows what happened. He will take us where we are, how we are. We may not be able to forgive today, but once we are God’s he begins to make us new.

2. God will change us from the inside out. The person that enters a relationship with God through Jesus death for them and his resurrection, will be transformed, from the inside out. Hurts will be healed, slowly, sometimes instantly but always persistently he moves to completeness and wholeness and health. We won’t finish our lives, as we Have started them, once we have given control over to God. Like a master carpenter/engineer/builder remodeling a shambled wreck, he restores, renews, rebuilds us.

3. God is infinitely merciful and he is infinitely Just. We find this in Acts; “Acts 17:26-31 From one man he made all the nations, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he marked out their appointed times in history and the boundaries of their lands. God did this so that they would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from any one of us. ‘For in him we live and move and have our being.’ As some of your own poets have said, ‘We are his offspring.’ “Therefore since we are God’s offspring, we should not think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone—an image made by human design and skill. In the past God overlooked such ignorance, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent. For he has set a day when he will judge the world with justice by the man he has appointed. He has given proof of this to everyone by raising him from the dead.” ‘

There is still a day of accounting to come. This will be the day when all things wrong get righted. I don’t know how it will work. I know Jesus has paid for my sins so I will not be punished, but somehow he will make up for wrong that I did. His way of Justice will be as perfect as his way of Mercy. He is infinitely powerful and infinitely creative and solutions are unlimited to him.

Today, please consider surrendering to the great God of mercy and let him begin the process of renewal in you.

(Originally posted 8-24-2017)

(Originally posted 8/22/2017)

It is a strange coincidence that I should read Matthew 24 the day after a solar eclipse. These words are recoded there; Matthew 24:29 “Immediately after the distress of those days “‘the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light; the stars will fall from the sky, and the heavenly bodies will be shaken.’ “

I don’t think yesterday’s eclipse was what Jesus was talking about here however If we are clinging to the status quo This chapter has some frightening things .

In the muppets Christmas Carol there is a point right before the ghost of Christmas present appears where Gonzo and Rizzo leave the audience out of fear. I would like to do that here but it was for our comfort that Jesus gives us the warnings of this chapter.

The future has some dark days ahead but it’s okay, God is in it and it’s all part of His plan.

“Matthew 24:1-14 Jesus left the temple and was walking away when his disciples came up to him to call his attention to its buildings. “Do you see all these things?” he asked. “Truly I tell you, not one stone here will be left on another; every one will be thrown down.” As Jesus was sitting on the Mount of Olives, the disciples came to him privately. “Tell us,” they said, “when will this happen, and what will be the sign of your coming and of the end of the age?” Jesus answered: “Watch out that no one deceives you. For many will come in my name, claiming, ‘I am the Messiah,’ and will deceive many. You will hear of wars and rumors of wars, but see to it that you are not alarmed. Such things must happen, but the end is still to come. Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be famines and earthquakes in various places. All these are the beginning of birth pains. “Then you will be handed over to be persecuted and put to death, and you will be hated by all nations because of me. At that time many will turn away from the faith and will betray and hate each other, and many false prophets will appear and deceive many people. Because of the increase of wickedness, the love of most will grow cold, but the one who stands firm to the end will be saved. And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come.”

When our daughter Hannah was little, when she was watching a movie with a scary part and she sensed it coming up she would start yelling “mote mommy mote” which translated to “please fast forward past the scary part!”

The only fast forward button that I see is that the church get busy and stay busy telling the world about our amazing savior Jesus.

Who can we tell today?

I have a hydroponic test garden out in a field. I collected rain water to supply it. I am growing several different kinds of plants seeing what will grow in this harsh environment. I have a leaf lettuce, some kale, a red pepper, a petunia and two tomato plants. I was looking at one of my tomato plants yesterday. It almost died. Every branch had turned black. The trunk was still yellow/green and there was one line baby tomato barely hanging on.

Then something changed. It started sprouting new branches from the almost dead trunk.

Seeing this happen reminded me of some verses in Ephesians.

“As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our flesh and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature deserving of wrath. But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions —it is by grace you have been saved.”

Ephesians 2:1-5 –

By God’s Grace, this plant came back to life. A similar thing happened to me. I was dead in my sin, dead to God, alienated, estranged, but then I received Jesus gift of grace, he died to pay for all of my sin, and I was brought back to life, brought into God’s loving embrace, brought into God’s family and given life. This offer is open to all people. Will you receive God’s gift of life today? If you already have it, will you tell someone else about God’s gracious gift?

My bible reading plan took me to the book of Lamentations chapter 3. Wow what a sorrowful book. The writer was in a horrible place in their life, not one good thing was happening, poor, homeless, destitute, physically ill, despised and mocked by the people around him, even persecuted and tortured. He was living a lamentable life, and yet he says this about God, “I remember my affliction and my wandering, the bitterness and the gall. I well remember them, and my soul is downcast within me. Yet this I call to mind and therefore I have hope: Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. I say to myself, “The Lord is my portion; therefore I will wait for him.” The Lord is good to those whose hope is in him, to the one who seeks him; it is good to wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord. It is good for a man to bear the yoke while he is young. Let him sit alone in silence, for the Lord has laid it on him. Let him bury his face in the dust — there may yet be hope. Let him offer his cheek to one who would strike him, and let him be filled with disgrace. For no one is cast off by the Lord forever. Though he brings grief, he will show compassion, so great is his unfailing love. For he does not willingly bring affliction or grief to anyone.

Lamentations 3:19-33 –

Life sometimes is very hard.

God is good.

Both of these can be true at the same time.

“I called on your name, Lord, from the depths of the pit. You heard my plea: “Do not close your ears to my cry for relief.” You came near when I called you, and you said, “Do not fear.”

Lamentations 3:55-57 –

The writer goes on from here to pray for vengeance against his enemies. That his enemies receive from God, what their behavior has earned them. Give them God, what they deserve. That may be the worst curse ever. What we deserve is the punishment that Jesus received. He took upon himself the punishment of us all.

Thank you Jesus for bearing my sins on your shoulders. Thank you Jesus for paying for me, buying me back with your death and now living forever and inviting me to life with you.

It’s an open invitation to whom so ever would. Will you receive God’s gift today?

Romans 14 has a nugget of good news. We all, every person that has drawn a breath, will meet HIM. We will meet God. At the end of our days we have an appointment with our creator.

There is a down side. We will have to give an account for our lives.

“10 You, then, why do you judge your brother or sister[a]? Or why do you treat them with contempt? For we will all stand before God’s judgment seat. 11 It is written:

“‘As surely as I live,’ says the Lord,

‘every knee will bow before me;

every tongue will acknowledge God.’”[b]

12 So then, each of us will give an account of ourselves to God.”

For those of us who have accepted Jesus as our savior this this will be when we get to see Gods unmerited favor, his grace, truly become amazing. Our meanest acts, most brutal, most selfish, most shameful, all covered by Jesus’ substitutionary death. He stepped in and took our punishment. He absorbed it all, and God has absolved it all.

Thank you Jesus for dying in my place. Thank you for loving me, I love you Jesus.

Is there a standard that we can live by? Is there like a code of conduct that if we applied to our lives, it would make the world a better place? I didn’t say a code to force onto others, I said a code to live by, one that I apply to myself and my children.

Romans 13 has a code of conduct.

“Romans 13:7-10 Give to everyone what you owe them: If you owe taxes, pay taxes; if revenue, then revenue; if respect, then respect; if honor, then honor. Let no debt remain outstanding, except the continuing debt to love one another, for whoever loves others has fulfilled the law. The commandments, “You shall not commit adultery,” “You shall not murder,” “You shall not steal,” “You shall not covet,” and whatever other command there may be, are summed up in this one command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” Love does no harm to a neighbor. Therefore love is the fulfillment of the law.”

It could work.

But it isn’t something to muster up, to force on over our lives like a wet suit that’s 2 sizes too small. It is only possible from a heart change that takes place when we have received God’s forgiveness through Jesus death on the cross.

Step 1. Admit our need. Which means we will need to one or all of the list below:

I). Stop justifying ourselves by either saying what we’re doing isn’t wrong or by comparing ourselves with someone else and seeing ourselves better than the other person. (Unless we are comparing ourselves to Jesus which should be done).

II). Stop trying to pay off our mistakes with good works. You can’t pay off mistakes with used sanitary products, which is what Isaiah called them “Isaiah 64:6 All of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags; we all shrivel up like a leaf, and like the wind our sins sweep us away. ”

Then, confess, say out loud, that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead.

From that beginning our hearts are changed and we will have Jesus living in our hearts. He can empower us to live out “Love your neighbor as yourself.”

It’s not just the code of the west, it’s the code of all who believe in and follow Jesus.

“Love your neighbor as yourself.”

“Though in your sin you are undeserving and undesirable, He loves you when your mind disavows it, your heart dodges it, and your soul dismisses it. He loves you right now as you are, not as you think you should be.”

I don’t have to shower or shave, to change my socks or undies or my habits before God will love me. He just loves me.

I put a period at the end of that last sentence but my emotions want to put a question mark there. Even me? Even me God? Have you seen me? Have you looked at all of my life?

Yes he has, and the truth is still the same for even me. For God so loved (my name here) that he gave his one and only son so that (my name here) would believe in Him, he gave the power to become a child of God and give him not death, but eternal life. That was John 3:16 from a paraphrased memory. Here it’s quoted:

“John 3:16-17 For God so loved the world (our name here)that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever (and here)believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world (and here), but to save the world (and here) through him. “

I rejoice that so many of my Christian friends read my early morning devotional ramblings but I also hope that someone who doesn’t know about Jesus love for them yet might read this or at least hear the message. Will you, the person reading this, tell one other person today that God loves them and Jesus came to die for them so they can share in God’s love and have eternal life? At least one?

Thank you.

(Originally posted 8-16-2017)

We had a yard sale Saturday morning. It went well. The weather was great. Once it was over the wind kicked up and brought in some lightning, thunder and rain, a lot of rain. I was in our basement checking on something and noticed the floor drain was backing up. I thought it was the extra rain but when I tried to clear it, there were signs of a clog. I did my best but we had to hire a professional to unclog the drain. It’s fixed. It cost about 1/2 of what we made at the yard sale. Yesterday Mary noticed a shiny spot on the lawn. We have a broken sprinkler pipe.

Stuff happens. Our world is breaking and dying, at best we maintain what’s here. Sometimes we make improvements in one area but neglect another. We have found that windfalls of money usually are placed in our lives not to be rich but to provide for a need that we didn’t know was coming. We call it the zero dollar principle. Maybe the yard sale preceding the plumbing problem is just such a situation.

Proverbs says “Keep falsehood and lies far from me; give me neither poverty nor riches, but give me only my daily bread. Otherwise, I may have too much and disown you and say, ‘Who is the Lord?’ Or I may become poor and steal, and so dishonor the name of my God.

Proverbs 30:8-9 –

My bible study this morning led me to Proverbs 3. I found some verses that I need to remember.

“Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight. My son, do not despise the Lord’s discipline, and do not resent his rebuke, because the Lord disciplines those he loves, as a father the son he delights in.

Proverbs 3:5-6, 11-12

Sometimes life gets hard. My natural inclination is to whine, then try and figure out a way out. Well maybe God is teaching me something in the circumstances. Do I believe he loves me? If so, I will be disciplined and corrected and taught by Father who loves me and wants me to be faithful and productive.

The writer of Hebrews quotes 11-12.

“In your struggle against sin, you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood. And have you completely forgotten this word of encouragement that addresses you as a father addresses his son? It says, “My son, do not make light of the Lord’s discipline, and do not lose heart when he rebukes you, because the Lord disciplines the one he loves, and he chastens everyone he accepts as his son.” Endure hardship as discipline; God is treating you as his children. For what children are not disciplined by their father? If you are not disciplined—and everyone undergoes discipline —then you are not legitimate, not true sons and daughters at all. Moreover, we have all had human fathers who disciplined us and we respected them for it. How much more should we submit to the Father of spirits and live! They disciplined us for a little while as they thought best; but God disciplines us for our good, in order that we may share in his holiness. No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it.

Hebrews 12:4-11 –

Life is sometimes hard, stuff happens, the world and everything and everyone in it is winding down, and wearing out. God loves me and will carry me through all of this. Sometimes the hard stuff is God disciplining me, sometimes it’s just stuff breaking (or plugging up). God is with me through it all. He provides for me and my family, sometimes before I even know I need it.

Romans twelve. The lifestyle chapter. If you want to know how apply Christianity to life this would be good chapter to memorize.

This morning I can’t stop thinking that this chapter is the Mayberry RFD of Christianity.

-Bullet points-

Offer our bodies as living sacrifices

Don’t conform but be transformed by renewing our mind

Be humble and also know that we have a place in the body of Christ and so too we have a job to do for and with the body of Christ

Love, love with sincerity

Be joy full, be hope full, be patient full (?)

Be real with those around us, cry and laugh when appropriate

Be humble

We don’t get to get our revenge. Our story should never make a good spy novel.

Live at peace, as far as it is possible, with everyone

Give your enemy his needs, food and water. Our enemies are people who hate us, because there are no people that we hate.

Do not be overcome with evil but reverse that, overcome evil with good

And now i will whistle a tune and smile. Knowing who i am and whose I am. Probably won’t fish for fish but I might fish for men. A very mayberrian life.

I can’t do it. I want to but I can’t. Fit in. Mold myself to the culture around me. I try but I can’t. I get stuck half way. Wanting to conform but this whole Jesus thing, his love for me, his sacrifice, he died for me, it calls me back. Most of my day I spend running back and forth between two masters. How can I just stop being drawn away from Jesus who loves me, to the world and worldly pleasures that I love?

I read a verse today, I have read it many times, but if I put this into practice, I will be launched and supported in the way I should go.

“Therefore I urge you brothers in view of God’s mercy to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God-this is your spiritual act of worship. Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is- his good, pleasing and perfect will.” Romans 12:1-2.

Putting this into practice will mean I act on this verse by adding the rest of the Bible, bit by bit, to my heart and head. Head and heart, I know what it says, and I believe it, and I do it.

I have been a Christian since 1981 and in that time I have gone through seasons of intensely following Jesus and seasons of coasting, like journeying up a river, against the flow, and then at times pulling in the oars, laying down and taking a nap, waking to find that the boat that is my life didn’t stay where I pulled in the oars. What a rude way to wake up, with the roar of the falls of destruction in my ears, and the mists of the tears of the fallen on my face.

The Christian life is rowing the boat against the current of our culture and our world, but not in judgement of those around us floating with the flow, in concern and care of them, warning, loving, helping.

I’ve said enough. I need to get back to rowing.

The book of Romans has some hard things. Chapter 9 is especially hard in places. Election, mercy and where do we fit?

The take away for me this morning is this:

“What if he did this to make the riches of his glory known to the objects of his mercy, whom he prepared in advance for glory– 24 even us, whom he also called, not only from the Jews but also from the Gentiles? 25 As he says in Hosea: “I will call them ‘my people’ who are not my people; and I will call her ‘my loved one’ who is not my loved one,” 26 and, “It will happen that in the very place where it was said to them, ‘You are not my people,’ they will be called ‘sons of the living God.’ ”

I have been adopted into Gods family, not because of anything I have done but because God is a merciful God.

“I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil that I do not want to do- this I keep on doing.”

The voice of my sinful nature is never silent and the pull of my fleshly appetites never goes away. Like gravity there is a constant tug to go the opposite way that God is calling me to follow. How do I do what is right? Like a dog being called by two “owners” I am conflicted. I need to follow the one who loves me the best. The one who loves me the best is the one who made me, paid for me, that is bought me back out of the slavery that I sell myself back into, and wants the best for me not only now, but in the life to come. The “owner” that loves me best may not have a treat in his hand, but he has love in his eyes and his voice as he says, “come, follow me”.

“…Who will rescue me from this body of death?thanks be to God- through Jesus Christ our Lord!” Romans 7:18,19,24,25

I’ve been reading through the book of Romans this year. I started in January. I read through a chapter a day and start over when I’m done with chapter 16.

This month I have been posting as I read through and verses jump out at me.

I am up to chapter 8.

Anticipating what I would say about chapter 8 before I read it because it holds my “life verse”. That verse that explains me and my relationship with Jesus better than any other single verse in the bible.

“And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.” Romans 8:28

My childhood was traumatic. I have a steel plate in my jaw and some nasty burn scars on my face. I got these before I turned 12. When I was burned I almost died. Getting the injuries that resulted in the steel plate I was actually clinically dead by the time I reached the hospital.

Again, ” And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.”

You’d think scars on a face would be a deterrent to finding love. It worked the other way around for me. Mary was actually drawn to me because I was scarred yet I was still laughing. Our story reminds me of the joke about the soldier in a doctors waiting room with a spear stuck through him. He was asked if it hurt. His answer was “only when I laugh”. Mary and I became friends in part because of my scars. We became friends, then boyfriend and girlfriend and then we got?

Broken up. You thought I was going to say married. Well we did, eventually but first for almost a year we were broken up. We even dated other people. I did not do well with that. I wanted out of town. I decided to join the Air Force. I was going to quit school, I had all of my credits already, quit and join and get out of town. I had all the papers signed except one. The medical release form. The recruiter went through rather casually until we got to the question about steel pins or plates. As it turns out the Air Force wouldn’t take folks with steel plates in them. I was stuck in Soap Lake and that and a big blue Dodge Polara are how Mary and I got back together.

The steel plate in my jaw God used to keep me around so that I could participate in the greatest blessing of my life. That blessing was to make up with Mary and get engaged to Mary on the same night then get married, have 4 kids and 10 grandkids and still be married 39 years later.

“And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.”

Even burn scars and a brief dance with Death with a steel plate as a bonus prize. God has used all things in my life, even ugly and painful things for my good.

Tomorrow is our 39th anniversary. Happy anniversary baby! Love you SO much.

(I originally posted this in 2015, I updated the numbers to post it again this year)

Nehemiah 1

When I read about tragedies, when I see the life of a family destroyed by the effects of sin, how do I respond? Do I get angry and rant? Do I yell and scream and take my stand?

Nehemiah received news that his people, his extended family that had returned to Israel and specifically to the Holy city of Jerusalem were under constant attack.

“Hanani, one of my brothers, came from Judah with some other men, and I questioned them about the Jewish remnant that had survived the exile, and also about Jerusalem. They said to me, “Those who survived the exile and are back in the province are in great trouble and disgrace. The wall of Jerusalem is broken down, and its gates have been burned with fire. ” When I heard these things, I sat down and wept. For some days I mourned and fasted and prayed before the God of heaven. Then I said: “ Lord, the God of heaven, the great and awesome God, who keeps his covenant of love with those who love him and keep his commandments, let your ear be attentive and your eyes open to hear the prayer your servant is praying before you day and night for your servants, the people of Israel. I confess the sins we Israelites, including myself and my father’s family, have committed against you.

Nehemiah 1:2-6

How did Nehemiah respond to the news of his people being ravaged by enemies back in his hometown of Jerusalem? He wept and prayed and fasted. He began to ask God for a role in the rebuilding.

Families in my neighborhood are under attack. They are like sheep without a shepherd. Some don’t know about Jesus yet. What is my role? What is my response? “Too bad for you, I got my Jesus, heaven is for sure for me and mine, you people should get a clue…”

I want to have a heart like Nehemiah.

One other thing that Nehemiah did that I glossed over on my first pass of reading was that Nehemiah acknowledged the sin of his people and he owned it and repented of it.

Nehemiah had it good. Cup bearer to the king. It was a dangerous job but I can imagine that it had some perks. And yet he identified with those of his family that were suffering.

Another thing Nehemiah did was to praise God. He reminded himself as he prayed about the character of God, the great God of love, the great God of compassion, the God who keeps his promises. Even after the 70 year exile and the return to a devastated city, Nehemiah declared God’s goodness and faithfulness as he prayed.

God may I be given a heart like Nehemiah, repentant, worshiping you, dedicated and sensitive to the needs of others. And God use me to touch the lives of my neighbors with your love.

Have I publicly expressed my deep hatred of the tree of heaven? It’s the weed tree that is also called stink tree. It grows so fast. I cleared one section of my garden two weeks ago. Not a tree left standing. Now two weeks later we have close to a hundred some as tall as 5’.

Imagine if we could grow carrots or broccoli or pine trees that fast?!

I think they are spawning from the mother tree which was cut way back but not cut out.

To put a spiritual spin on this, it’s a picture of a bad behavior that we cut back on but don’t uproot. Sin will sprout from the roots of behavior we just “cut back on”.

I hate the trees. I want to do whatever I have to do to destroy them. Do I hate my sin? Do I hate it enough to uproot it and burn the brush pile?