Why is it all of a sudden that my thoughts are filled with medical issues? Not the ones in our family, but those in books that I read, passages in my daily reading and, this morning, even a blog that I stumbled on while looking up something on Google.
Let me present a small bit of detail on the above.
I have been engrossed in reading When Crickets Cry, by Charles Martin, and this book focuses on the world of doctors, heart transplants and the trauma and feelings of those involved. I finished it before I went to sleep last night, and now need to go back to a couple of parts of it and see if I can determine the answer to a question that the last page left for me. Regardless of the subject matter, it was a great read, and I would recommend it.
As I got into the Bible readings this morning, the Gospel reading was in John 5, the narrative about Jesus healing the man at the Pool of Siloam. There was that medical tie again.
I thought I would look up some info on that Pool and the meaning of the incident in Jesus' ministry, and in doing so I stumbled on a blog site that used the name of that spot, Pool of Siloam, as its title. I started off to try to find out the reason this person chose that title and ended up reading all the entries back to its beginning.
http://siloampool.blogspot.com/
It is a recent blog, going back into 2012 and with the last posting in July of 2013. It is the journey of a couple being blessed with a little boy, born with spina bifida.
This incredible couple are living through all of the uncertainty of the medical issues with a faith that inspires. I'm sure that all of their days are not "up days", but they have, as evidenced in the postings, come to grips with this aspect of life and seem to be resting in the fact that God is in it all. I read every post and was inspired with their dedication and their outlook.
I don't think they used this verse in their writings, but it could have been their's as they went through all of this, and are they still are on this journey, Jeremiah 29:11:
" For I know the plans that I have for you,’ declares the Lord, ‘plans for welfare and not for calamity to give you a future and a hope."
I had already been reminded of this same verse earlier in my meditations this morning and felt it was speaking to me also, even at this stage of life. Are there still plans that are for me?
Knowing that I am still on this side of the heaven, I feel there are reasons for my life also. My prayer today is for the willingness to listen to God for what He wants me to do, and to realize that His plans for me are good.
Plans for today, plans for tomorrow, plans to bless others, and plans to use me.
These are what I look for.
Let's Go
Saturday, August 17, 2013
Friday, August 16, 2013
My World Is Ever So Small
We have had a plethora of rain lately. Over the past few days, storm clouds have gathered in the afternoon, and rain has been our weather.
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As I stood on the back porch and watched the clouds gather, I thought about how others would cope with this new storm. It seemed to me that those clouds I saw encompassed the whole world, that the entire planet was turning darker, and that others were seeing the same scene I did. It is easy to project everyone else into the scenario of my own life and existence and make the assumption that it is the same for all others.
But I know that it is not so. Even as I took a look at the weather radar, with those black clouds billowing outside, I could determine that those folks just a few miles south of where I stood were in the clear. They were not seeing the same things that I was, and their experience was completely different.
How much the same plays out in my life. I am in my own little world, and there I stay, insulated from the world of people around me by what i can see and feel. My thought processes and vision need to be expanded.
It can be so easy for me to just hunker down in the storm cellar of my life and forget others, but, even as I take another look at the photograph above, I see that there is more just to the west, a different sky with light, and there are people living out there.
The whole thing is not about me. The world is so much bigger than that.
God, please help me to see and hear and care.
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As I stood on the back porch and watched the clouds gather, I thought about how others would cope with this new storm. It seemed to me that those clouds I saw encompassed the whole world, that the entire planet was turning darker, and that others were seeing the same scene I did. It is easy to project everyone else into the scenario of my own life and existence and make the assumption that it is the same for all others.
But I know that it is not so. Even as I took a look at the weather radar, with those black clouds billowing outside, I could determine that those folks just a few miles south of where I stood were in the clear. They were not seeing the same things that I was, and their experience was completely different.
How much the same plays out in my life. I am in my own little world, and there I stay, insulated from the world of people around me by what i can see and feel. My thought processes and vision need to be expanded.
It can be so easy for me to just hunker down in the storm cellar of my life and forget others, but, even as I take another look at the photograph above, I see that there is more just to the west, a different sky with light, and there are people living out there.
The whole thing is not about me. The world is so much bigger than that.
God, please help me to see and hear and care.
Thursday, August 15, 2013
Do You Ever Wonder?
I am currently reading a book by Charles Martin, When Crickets Cry. The device that the author uses to tell his story is to begin the book in the present time, then flash back to a distant past, then back to the present, then a nearer past, so that, I presume, in the end the past and the present will come together to reveal how everything has come about. The main character is hiding a fact of his past life, and the author is dropping bread crumbs in those incidents of his life to get the reader to wonder and speculate as to what has happened to bring all of this about, and to predict how it will end.
Just as the author uses this writing technique to keep the reader wondering about the past and the future of the hero, so too do I wonder about times in the Bible where a fact is stated and then the narrative moves on. Like the incident in John 4 where Jesus meets the woman at the well. Toward the end of the story a verse states:
"So when the Samaritans came to him, they asked him to stay with them, and he stayed there two days."
As I read it this morning, I began to wonder what happened in that town in those two days. What did Jesus do that caused many to believe. Was there healing, were there other miracles, what parables did he use to teach? What if someone had used a video recorder for 48 hours? What would be on the tape or card?
It is so very easy to just read a statement in any book, even the Bible, and just pass on by without stopping to think about it. History is filled with incidents that have happened, and there is no way to really know the causes or all the things that led up to that one time. We just speculate and wonder. That is our nature.
Are there people living today whose lives are a testimony of what happened in that Samaritan town so many years ago? Those were real people with real lives, real concerns, hurts, fears and joys. What did they pass down to their children and grand children? If God threw a pebble into a pond on those two days, what have the ripples produced?
I wonder.....
Just as those Samaritans could not know the future events, so it is with me. I can't see past the current moment. I don't know about the pebbles and the ripples, I just see what is set before me, and can't even know all that preceded that, what other pebbles and ripples have come together to set up that one brief time. I can wonder, but in the end it is what I do, what rocks I drop into that water, that affect those that come after me.
So, I wonder about things, but I need to do more than just sit and speculate. As God gives vision, action is required.
Those folks who lived in that town 2,000 years ago, did something after that two day time, and what they said and did affected their lives and the lives of those others who came after them.
What will be the ripples of my life?
Will others be blessed?
Will God be pleased?
I wonder.....
Just as the author uses this writing technique to keep the reader wondering about the past and the future of the hero, so too do I wonder about times in the Bible where a fact is stated and then the narrative moves on. Like the incident in John 4 where Jesus meets the woman at the well. Toward the end of the story a verse states:
"So when the Samaritans came to him, they asked him to stay with them, and he stayed there two days."
As I read it this morning, I began to wonder what happened in that town in those two days. What did Jesus do that caused many to believe. Was there healing, were there other miracles, what parables did he use to teach? What if someone had used a video recorder for 48 hours? What would be on the tape or card?
It is so very easy to just read a statement in any book, even the Bible, and just pass on by without stopping to think about it. History is filled with incidents that have happened, and there is no way to really know the causes or all the things that led up to that one time. We just speculate and wonder. That is our nature.
Are there people living today whose lives are a testimony of what happened in that Samaritan town so many years ago? Those were real people with real lives, real concerns, hurts, fears and joys. What did they pass down to their children and grand children? If God threw a pebble into a pond on those two days, what have the ripples produced?
I wonder.....
Just as those Samaritans could not know the future events, so it is with me. I can't see past the current moment. I don't know about the pebbles and the ripples, I just see what is set before me, and can't even know all that preceded that, what other pebbles and ripples have come together to set up that one brief time. I can wonder, but in the end it is what I do, what rocks I drop into that water, that affect those that come after me.
So, I wonder about things, but I need to do more than just sit and speculate. As God gives vision, action is required.
Those folks who lived in that town 2,000 years ago, did something after that two day time, and what they said and did affected their lives and the lives of those others who came after them.
What will be the ripples of my life?
Will others be blessed?
Will God be pleased?
I wonder.....
Wednesday, August 14, 2013
Frittern
Time is a gift. I guess that is an old man talking, realizing that I have spent much more of any time that I am allotted than I have left to spend. When I was younger, time seemed to extend out from wherever I was toward infinity, but now it seems like there is a definite end coming one day.
I thought of an image that I captured some months back:
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The hands on this clock in the garden of a friend have stopped. Though actual time runs on, for this one it is frozen. One day my earthly time will be like the timepiece, only a decoration in a garden, if that much.
I had a quick reminder of all of this on a short walk this early morning. Knowing I had a meeting in less than an hour, I sensed that I still needed to walk. I had already read some, and I wanted to be able to write, but I walked anyway. I stopped to talk to a man in the other building, and while we chatted, I felt a pull to get back home and write, that I really did not have the time to stand there and gab.
But then I thought "maybe this was the purpose of my getting out, to have a few moments with this person. Maybe he was needing to talk to someone". Now, we did not talk on a deep level, but I did still take the time to acknowledge him, and maybe that was all he needed.
As I continued on back to the condo, a line from a Broadway musical came to mind. From the Music Man:
And all week long your River City
Youth'll be frittern away,
I say your young men'll be frittern!
Frittern away their noontime, suppertime, choretime too!
I can spend my time "frittern" away on things that do not matter, or I can listen to prodding of the spirit and get out and go, taking the time along the way to see other people and to hear them also.
As the clock in the garden reads, my 10:25 time can come at any moment.
Please God, help me not to fritter.
I thought of an image that I captured some months back:
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The hands on this clock in the garden of a friend have stopped. Though actual time runs on, for this one it is frozen. One day my earthly time will be like the timepiece, only a decoration in a garden, if that much.
I had a quick reminder of all of this on a short walk this early morning. Knowing I had a meeting in less than an hour, I sensed that I still needed to walk. I had already read some, and I wanted to be able to write, but I walked anyway. I stopped to talk to a man in the other building, and while we chatted, I felt a pull to get back home and write, that I really did not have the time to stand there and gab.
But then I thought "maybe this was the purpose of my getting out, to have a few moments with this person. Maybe he was needing to talk to someone". Now, we did not talk on a deep level, but I did still take the time to acknowledge him, and maybe that was all he needed.
As I continued on back to the condo, a line from a Broadway musical came to mind. From the Music Man:
And all week long your River City
Youth'll be frittern away,
I say your young men'll be frittern!
Frittern away their noontime, suppertime, choretime too!
I can spend my time "frittern" away on things that do not matter, or I can listen to prodding of the spirit and get out and go, taking the time along the way to see other people and to hear them also.
As the clock in the garden reads, my 10:25 time can come at any moment.
Please God, help me not to fritter.
Tuesday, August 13, 2013
A Quick Morning Glance
As I was driving in to a breakfast meeting early this morning, I glanced up, as I passed the church and noticed this sight:
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The cross just stood out in the early morning sky, before the sunrise, and so I stopped and went back to get a picture.
The picture seemed to say it all for me. The cross is a symbol of God's sacrifice for mankind, and personally for me. It gives me reason for life and hope for the future.
How many times have I passed this way on my way to somewhere and never noticed? Since, on this Island, this road is the only one going north and south, I must have gone by hundreds of times since we moved back here in 2005, but most times the church is just part of the scenery, if I even notice it at all.
How many times in life do I see a cross and just say, "there is a cross", or not even say anything? It is just there, pretty, but that is all.
There is rich meaning in that symbol, for me and for many others. There is hope for all in that cross. There is life.
I don't want it to be just a pretty sight, but another reminder that Jesus Loves Me.
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The cross just stood out in the early morning sky, before the sunrise, and so I stopped and went back to get a picture.
The picture seemed to say it all for me. The cross is a symbol of God's sacrifice for mankind, and personally for me. It gives me reason for life and hope for the future.
How many times have I passed this way on my way to somewhere and never noticed? Since, on this Island, this road is the only one going north and south, I must have gone by hundreds of times since we moved back here in 2005, but most times the church is just part of the scenery, if I even notice it at all.
How many times in life do I see a cross and just say, "there is a cross", or not even say anything? It is just there, pretty, but that is all.
There is rich meaning in that symbol, for me and for many others. There is hope for all in that cross. There is life.
I don't want it to be just a pretty sight, but another reminder that Jesus Loves Me.
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Monday, August 12, 2013
What Matters?
When we come right down to it, what really matters?
God matters
People matter
I matter (not in an egotistical way, but I matter to God, and the things that I do are a matter, to Him, to others, and they should be to me.)
Last week I got off on music in the church in a blog. The very next day, I had to confess that a lot of my rant was out of line as God showed me that this was not the big deal that I thought it was, that other things were much more important. Then yesterday, and this morning, I realized the further evidence that I needed to get back on base.
Yesterday was youth Sunday in church, and featured testimonies by 4 young people, testimonies of what God is has done and is doing in their lives. Now I did not even know personally, these 4, but they had been impacted by God, and they shared their joys, struggles and victories. As I listened I thought:
This is what I would like to hear from my own kids and grandkids.
This is what church and youth ministry is all about.
I'll bet their music preferences are not similar to mine either.
So I am reminded, by God again, that my personal preferences are not that important. He is, and those youth are, and I am privileged to be in on it.
This morning I saw three members of the bird flock. An osprey on the lookout for his morning repast, a heron enjoying his on the bank, and a cardinal, seeming to be well satisfied on a branch near the path. What do they have to do with all of this?
I remember those verses about God taking care of his birds of the air and flowers of the field, and I see the evidence, right before me, of how much God cares.
I pray that God will help me to stay awake to Him first, and to those others out there that He puts on my path..
Just as He continues to do with these white herons I photographed the other morning.
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God matters
People matter
I matter (not in an egotistical way, but I matter to God, and the things that I do are a matter, to Him, to others, and they should be to me.)
Last week I got off on music in the church in a blog. The very next day, I had to confess that a lot of my rant was out of line as God showed me that this was not the big deal that I thought it was, that other things were much more important. Then yesterday, and this morning, I realized the further evidence that I needed to get back on base.
Yesterday was youth Sunday in church, and featured testimonies by 4 young people, testimonies of what God is has done and is doing in their lives. Now I did not even know personally, these 4, but they had been impacted by God, and they shared their joys, struggles and victories. As I listened I thought:
This is what I would like to hear from my own kids and grandkids.
This is what church and youth ministry is all about.
I'll bet their music preferences are not similar to mine either.
So I am reminded, by God again, that my personal preferences are not that important. He is, and those youth are, and I am privileged to be in on it.
This morning I saw three members of the bird flock. An osprey on the lookout for his morning repast, a heron enjoying his on the bank, and a cardinal, seeming to be well satisfied on a branch near the path. What do they have to do with all of this?
I remember those verses about God taking care of his birds of the air and flowers of the field, and I see the evidence, right before me, of how much God cares.
I pray that God will help me to stay awake to Him first, and to those others out there that He puts on my path..
Just as He continues to do with these white herons I photographed the other morning.
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Saturday, August 10, 2013
A Reminder from a Spider
There is a prayer at the end of the Moravian Daily Reading, this one for today:
"O Holy Spirit, you are our light during the day and at night. We thank you for this day. Help us to make the most of it. Help us to let our light shine so that others may see you in us in work or at play. Amen"
I don't think too much on the unseen world that is out there. I give lip service to the idea, deep down I know that there is more to life than what I can see, but I don't dwell on it. There is a lot that happens that I can't see either with my eyes, or with my mind or even with my heart.
The Bible talks about spirits, about angels, about demons What am I to make of all that other realm?
The 3rd person of the Trinity, the Holy Spirit fits in here. I did not consciously think about this during my walk this morning. Nor did I consider those other parts of the unseen world, I just walked with my eyes open and looked at what I could see.
It was not until I got back to the condo and ran my hand across my head, that I realized that I had walked through a spider web that had been spun over the path that I had walked on. I did not see it at the time but there it was, clinging to my hair. How many other things had I not seen, even on this short time outside?
Just as I do not see the things of the Spirit as they are taking place around me, and not even a physical thing such as the spider web, so it is that my eyes and mind and heart are not even open to things that I do see and just don't recognize.
As I have prayed many times, God, let me see with my eyes and heart, those things and people that will come into my life, even today, and let me see where I fit into those situations and lives.
There are reasons as to why those people and things will be in my life today, not just coincidences, and I need to have the heart and will to respond in the way that honors God.
Help me not to just write all this and then promptly forget it, help it to stick.
Maybe I should not try so hard to get all that spider's work out of my life, but let it be a reminder of that world that is unseen but real, and to see God's hand in it all.
"O Holy Spirit, you are our light during the day and at night. We thank you for this day. Help us to make the most of it. Help us to let our light shine so that others may see you in us in work or at play. Amen"
I don't think too much on the unseen world that is out there. I give lip service to the idea, deep down I know that there is more to life than what I can see, but I don't dwell on it. There is a lot that happens that I can't see either with my eyes, or with my mind or even with my heart.
The Bible talks about spirits, about angels, about demons What am I to make of all that other realm?
The 3rd person of the Trinity, the Holy Spirit fits in here. I did not consciously think about this during my walk this morning. Nor did I consider those other parts of the unseen world, I just walked with my eyes open and looked at what I could see.
It was not until I got back to the condo and ran my hand across my head, that I realized that I had walked through a spider web that had been spun over the path that I had walked on. I did not see it at the time but there it was, clinging to my hair. How many other things had I not seen, even on this short time outside?
Just as I do not see the things of the Spirit as they are taking place around me, and not even a physical thing such as the spider web, so it is that my eyes and mind and heart are not even open to things that I do see and just don't recognize.
As I have prayed many times, God, let me see with my eyes and heart, those things and people that will come into my life, even today, and let me see where I fit into those situations and lives.
There are reasons as to why those people and things will be in my life today, not just coincidences, and I need to have the heart and will to respond in the way that honors God.
Help me not to just write all this and then promptly forget it, help it to stick.
Maybe I should not try so hard to get all that spider's work out of my life, but let it be a reminder of that world that is unseen but real, and to see God's hand in it all.
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