I’m always behind on Friday.  But it’s good.  Eating breakfast with Ann East Nelson is fun.  We are full of stories that nobody else remembers about our mothers--who were sisters as well as best friends.

They were never totally satisfied with either of us.  They were always pushing us to be better, do better, try better...better was the operative word.

Over-achievement was our fate.  

And we both feel guilty all the time that we aren’t doing “More" now that our mothers are gone.  We were raised on guilt by two women who were awesome.  We were lucky to have mothers like ours who expected us to do our best and never accepted anything less.

We lived within a block of each other and had two mothers--not one.  Whoever got to us first told us what to do and expected immediate compliance.  I just thought everyone had two moms.

Ann is the closest thing I had to a sister, and although I am a few years older, we were raised in the same time frame and in the same way.  She understands what I am thinking and knows what I am going to say before I get it said.  I am blessed to have a cousin and friend who loves me.

  

It’s raining cats and dogs here.  But something good happened in the last few months concerning the rain.  Squig has decided that he can go out in the rain to do his business without it killing him.

It was a fight at first.  I had to pick him up and toss him out into the back yard.  He would run back to me and I would toss him out again--until he finally gave up.  Now, I open the back door and out he goes. On his own.

For thirteen years he has been terrified of rain.  Not thunder.  Not lightening.  Just rain.  Now, when he is ready to come back in, I wrap him in a towel and dry him off and he struts around like he is a super hero.

He has conquered his fear.  Or I have forced him to conquer it.  Whichever it is, I don’t dread the rain anymore.  Always before, I knew I was going to have a fight on my hands.  He would shiver until I thought he would faint.

It is the only thing we have ever had a disagreement over.

He is the most wonderful companion.  When I have to go somewhere, I tell him, “I’ll be back in a minute.”  He sits quietly.  But if I just head to the door without saying those words, he comes unglued.  He knows he is going to get to go with me.  It is his favorite thing--going in the car somewhere with me.  If I could clone him, I would make a dozen Squigs.

Every now and then there are days when we are stressed.  We know we are to trust in God.  We know we are supposed to be still and know that he is God.  We know.

But our nature is to trust ourselves.  Giving control of anything in our lives is difficult.  Which is stupid, because we don’t have control of anything anyway.  But we think we do.

I’ve had a couple of days like that lately.  And I just had to take a deep breath and say, “Okay.”  It’s not like I have any control in the first place. 

But it feels like--if we say to God, “I want your will to be done,” we are giving up on what we want.

There is a dichotomy.  He says to ask for what we want.  Which is sometimes contrary to saying, “Thy will be done.”

Jesus faced a situation like that when he was facing death.  He asked God if there was some other way to go about what he was facing.  Did God have a plan B?  But finally he prayed, “Not my will, but thine be done.”

God’s will is always the right thing...we just can’t see what he is going to do and we want to know ahead of time.  It’s a control issue on our part.  Give up.  That’s what God wants.  Give in to his will.  It’s always better.

My huge oak trees in my front yard survived the freeze.  Justin, my tree guy, spent 8 days climbing and trimming out the dead branches and both of us wondered if they would live.  They aren’t pretty, but they are alive and turning green.

They look like a bald head starting to grow hair after chemo.  Scraggly.

I have been vindicated about my statements that the north and south poles move and aren’t where they were in the past.  The Oklahoma City paper posted an article about it today.  

Seems that warming is melting the ice at the poles, water levels are rising and the poles have shifted to the east since the mid-nineties.

I had mentioned that magnetism changes in rocks indicated the poles had shifted.  But people have a hard time imagining that.  But true is true.

A number of island nations and villages have vanished and are now under water due to rising sea levels.  And the ice at the poles continues to melt.

We need more trees.  If everyone in the world would plant a tree, oxygen levels would increase.  That’s something you and I can do when we feel helpless in the face of a changing earth.

I asked my class yesterday what they would do first if they knew it was the last day of their lives.  

Answers varied, but most centered around family and making sure their loved ones were in the right place with God.

Jesus knew he was at his last or next to last day when he had the Passover meal with his twelve disciples.  He had observed the Passover every year of his life, but this one was different.

This was his last Passover.  A meal to remember God’s rescue of the Israelites from Pharaoh.  God required that they put the blood of a lamb on the door so that the angel of death would pass over them.

Jesus told his disciples that this would be the last passover meal he would have until the “Kingdom of God” came.  And instead of remembering Egypt and the meal of the lamb and unleavened bread....that this was no longer about that passover. He said, this is my body.  This is my blood.

In other words...it wasn’t about the passover any more.  It was his way of saying that he was the ultimate sacrificial lamb.  It was His blood that would save them from sin.  Jesus was the true “Lamb” of God.  His blood and body would be their salvation.  And ours.

 Every Friday, Ann and I go to the Waffle house at 8:00 AM and have pecan waffles, or to I-Hop and have crepes with strawberries and whipped cream.  Then we go look for junk at garage sales.

I rarely buy anything.  I’m trying to get rid of every thing.

But today, I bought a huge bag of colored pencils for the girls that are marking words in their Bibles.  For a dollar.  That’s my price to be remotely tempted to buy something

I had spent 25 dollars at Mardel for 6 colored pens.  Wish I had waited.  That would have paid for two breakfasts on Fridays.

After we rummage, I go get my hair done. I didn’t do that last year.  It was a mistake.  I can’t do it myself anymore 

So on Friday, I am always late posting.

My friend Rebecca Perkins has given me a name of a publisher to try.  Next week that is on my agenda.

I just sent the book I wrote about my brother to him to edit.  He hasn’t seen it yet.  Carolyn is going to get a copy as well to edit.  Maybe I will get their approval.......?

I can’t believe it was freezing yesterday in Oklahoma.  But, then again, it’s Oklahoma.  I covered my tomatoes.  They made it.  That makes three times it’s been at 32 or below this month.  Freezing in April !!!

Every time, I put the plastic covers in the shed, I would think, “That’s it.  Now the tomatoes will start growing.”  Nope.

Just when I think it’s safe to remove the covers again, it freezes.  I hope this is over soon.

All last year I kept thinking, “I hope this is over soon.”  What a year.  I think we all were wishing our lives away.  It’s like a year went missing.

The worst part was for school children.  Who ever thought social connections were such an important part of a child’s life.  I’m a hermit, so it didn’t really occur to me.  But after watching stories of the world of children crashing on TV, I feel most sorry for them.  They lost a year of childhood.

We will see the result of that for years to come.  You can’t reclaim those years.  I think of the friends I made in school that I am still in contact with. I was in the same homeroom with them only once.  If I had missed that year, I might not ever have known them.  Friends are sometimes even more important than family.  Especially when you need to reminisce.

Perhaps the thing that impelled the writer of Hebrews to put into words the things that he wrote was due to Paul’s visit to the disciples in Jerusalem.

In the book of Acts, which incidentally is the only true book of history in the New Testament, Paul gets into an argument with some of the disciples over circumcision, eating things which were strangled or offered to idols.

They especially wanted to retain portions of the Jewish laws for Gentiles to follow.  You would probably have to become a Jew before you could become a Christian.  

You would have to become a part of an elite organization that determined whether someone was worthy of salvation.  Sound like a couple of church denominations I know.

The writer of Hebrews puts those arguments away as invalid.

Jesus is all you need.  Faith in him.  You repent, give Him your life and trust in his power to save and keep you.  He puts his laws in your heart is what the Bible says.  

No more rituals are needed.  Ever.

 Oh, Happy Day!  O Happy Day!  Since Jesus took my sins away.

My friends and I have finished our color-marking in the book of Hebrews.  Pink halos for the word “angel.”  Blue for the word “Rest.”  Orange for the word “Priest or High Priest.”  And today, purple for the word “Faith.”

It is written like a trial.  There is a judge--God.  There is a prosecuting attorney--the writer of the book.  There is a jury--Christian Jews.  We know they are Jewish Christians from Chapter 3:1-2.

The writer begins by saying that the old method of informing people--the prophets--is over.  The new voice of God is Jesus.  The old way of informing people--angels--has been replaced by the Son of God’s words.

The writer then explains that if you wanted rest back in olden days, you had to wait, but now we can enter into the place of rest.  Then the writer explains that we don’t need Levitical priests--or any kind of priest ever again--because we have a high priest.  Jesus.  There is only one way to the throne of God.  Through the high priest who shed his blood. Jesus.

The book ends by saying that salvation has always been through faith.  He says that nobody was ever saved by the blood of sheep.  That everyone in the Old Testament was saved by faith.  And lists the people of faith in the Old Testament in chapter 11--the faith chapter in God’s Word.

Becky’s company--Swan Estate Sales--is having a huge sale this next weekend.  Go online and look at the pictures.  Sometimes I go to these sales, but they are so big that parking wraps around three or four blocks.

She has the cleanest, most organized sales I’ve ever been to.  She hires a professional photographer to take the pictures and you can look at everything before you go to see if there is anything you want.  She works it really hard.  It makes me tired just to see the before and after pictures before she gets it set up.  Cleaning out and organizing stuff is a big job.

Everyone in the family works the sales.  Stacy and Meghan come for three days from Pryor.  Makenzi, Stacy’s other daughter does the cash register.  I used to help by writing tickets in one of the rooms.  I can still do it if I have a chair to sit in.  She has others who are always there to work.

It has gone from small to huge in three years.  I guess you can do a thing you have never done before if you are willing to work really hard.  Becky works really hard.  Many of these houses are full of stuff that hasn’t been used in years.  People grow old and can’t take care of their homes and many of the things haven’t seen the light of day for years.

I think I am getting there myself.  Most of what is in my house could go right out the front door. There isn’t any dust on things in heaven.

 Today I am going to catch some people up who missed Monday’s Bible study.  We noted the words “Priest,” and “High Priest.”  In the book of Hebrews.  Here’s what I think the format is in Hebrews:

The writer is holding a trial.  He is the prosecutor.  The jury is a group of Christian Jews--we know that because Ch. 3:12 the writer says: “Wherefore, holy brethren, partakers of the heavenly calling, consider the...High Priest of our profession, Christ Jesus...”  Because the writer calls them: holy brethren partakers of our profession...Jesus.

They probably are part of the group that Paul chewed out when he went to Jerusalem and met with the apostles who wanted the Gentile converts to “become Jews” before they could be Christians.  The group was all upset over Jewish rituals and thought Gentiles should follow them.  They should not eat meat offered to idols, etc., etc...

The writer explains that we do not need priests on earth anymore because we have a High Priest in Jesus.  Over and over the writer says the same thing:  Jesus is the only way to get to the ear of God.  Jesus has replaced priests on earth.  Levitical priests and any other kind of priest.

That’s why we pray, “In Jesus name.”  He’s our high priest.

 New frustration.  I got up this morning and when the sun was past the window line, I realized I couldn’t open the blind.  The cord toggle was at the ceiling, ten feet high.  

I would have to use a ladder to reach it and my girls have threatened me if I get on a ladder.

Companies make the cord like that because of irresponsible parents who put a crib next to a blind.  Government solution: make the toggle so short that you can’t reach it. 

Government wants to make a law for every one in a million possibility, but not solve the things that affect us all.  Like holes in the road that cause accidents when you hit one unexpectedly.  I wonder how many children are hurt by that problem.  Certainly more than one in a million.

Government likes to make laws that cost nothing.  Rules and more rules.  We have so many rules that we can’t know what all of them are.  And they vary from state.  Some states still don’t let you turn right on red.

I wish we lived in a place where people just did the right things without laws.  Did what was right for the safety and courtesy of others.  However, I think that might be called heaven.

Today, my blinds for the entire house arrived.  And you know the rest. 

 The order was all wrong.  Instead of single blinds, I got split blinds.  And those don’t align.  The slats are jiggled.

What did I expect?  It was a custom job.

I had the installer put the one up on the East where the sun blinds me every morning when I am trying to do the crossword puzzle.  It was broken, and he didn’t see the break until he got it up--so he will trade it out later for a single and I don’t have to pay for it.

Frustration!!! At least I have a blind for now to block the sun.

The woman who wrote up the order called and said she was going to change the entire house out to another manufacturer.  One she uses that doesn’t make those kinds of mistakes.

So.......that’s good.  I expected no less than a complete adjustment.

The good thing is that in the middle of the mess, a friend called and said “Let’s go to lunch.”  Perfect timing.

 I finished the book about my brother’s time in China.  Took it to UPS and had it printed.  And will get it to him for editing this weekend.  Hopefully there aren’t too many mistakes.

What I need is a publisher.  If any of you have suggestions---I’m open to it.  My publisher finally called me, then texted me, said she would get the final edition on flash-drive a week ago.   Nothing.  It’s making me nuts.

I spent yesterday going through the book of Hebrews.  It is like a jury trial.  The jury is the Jews who are Christians and want to hold onto the past--the laws and Levitical priests..  

The writer is the prosecutor.  And he or she--we don’t know who wrote Hebrews--makes the case for Christ being our high priest.  That we don’t have to ever go to a priest again and take sacrifices.  Christ is our sacrifice and he died once for all.  We can have access to God through Christ.

One point he makes is that when you have the Holy Spirit, you are a part of the family of God.  If you sin, you know it, are repentant, and don’t do that again.  But you don’t have to be “re-saved” because as the writer explains, then Christ would have to be crucified all over again.  He died once for all sin.  The writer says that God puts the law in your heart when Christ comes into your life.  And you want to obey him. You are changed.

Yesterday’s lesson was the story of Zaccheus.  Who was short.  Tall men have the advantage--statistics tell us that about the real world .

It is an incident, not a parable.  One that only Luke recorded.  There were many incidents in the life of Jesus that didn’t get written up...this one did.  It is the actual occurrence of what salvation looks like:

1. A person tries to find God.  Zack climbed a tree to get a better look.  “Seek me and you will find me,” is what the Bible says.

2.  Jesus knew his name.  When the Holy Spirit pulls at you, it is always personal.  God knows your name.

3.  Jesus told Zaccheus what to do.  “Hurry, come down.”  Zack obeyed.

4.  Repentance occurred.  “I will give half of what I have to the poor.  If I have taken anything I shouldn’t, I’ll give back 400%,” Zaccheus said.

5.  Jesus went home with him.  When we give our life to Jesus, he comes in and takes a place in our soul.

This is not a story about being short.  Or being a tax collector.  It is the story of salvation.

                   

Every Friday it is late afternoon when I realize I didn’t post.  My cousin Ann picks me up and we go to breakfast and then go garage sale hunting.  

When I get home, I go get my hair done, then read the morning news paper and do the puzzles.

What I am saying is that I am a creature of habit and when something different happens as it does on Friday, I forget my system and don’t remember to post.

Happy Friday.

It looks like tornado alley has moved to the east of us.  For my entire lifetime, it came up right through the middle of Oklahoma and carved a path of death and destruction every spring and summer.

But last year there weren’t many of them in the state.  No bad ones this year either.  Arkansas, Mississippi, Louisiana, Georgia, Tennessee and South Carolina seemed to get most of it.  I feel sorry for them.  Tornados are awful.  You don’t know where they are going to hit exactly.

Before doppler, my mom was the early warning system.  The minute the skies didn’t look right to her,  we were going to the cellar.

The maddest I ever saw my mom was once when we were all under ground and she looked around for my dad--who was nowhere to be found.  He was in the house killing flies with a fly-swatter.  They lit on things when the weather got muggy and day my dad thought it was an excellent opportunity to reduce their population.

My dad was never afraid of anything.  He came from wild-west stock.  Tornados were just a momentary irritation to him.  He would stand outside the cellar with my uncle Cleo and watch the clouds.  I don’t remember either one of them coming down into the cellar with the rest of us.

 Today we are looking at the first couple of chapters in Hebrews, and circling the word “Angel” in pink.  Making a halo around the word.  Then we are going to look a the book of Revelations and note the seven angels of the seven churches.

I’m sure some scholar has written on the seven angels of the seven churches.  The churches were probably the largest Christian populations at the time.  And were the ones who got letters and were asked to copy the letters and pass them on to smaller groups.

Whatever, they got pointed out, and their good and bad characteristics noted.  And each church had an angel.

After finishing with the “Kingdom of God” group of words, I couldn’t help but think that within church memberships--which contain both Christians and non Christians--that the Kingdom of God is made up of believers who have repented.  And that group has an angel who watches over them.

We also noted that the angels are always “doing” something at the direction of God.  Most of the time to do something for us.

It is comforting to know that angels are watching over us, directed by God himself.

Craig had a job in France that flew him to China on a regular basis.  They made reproductions of almost everything in Singapore.  They made “Rolex” watches that were almost impossible to detect as fakes.  He brought one to Ken and told him it wasn’t real and where he got it.

He said that Ken wore the watch from then on, but never mentioned to his buddies that he ate breakfast with on Saturdays where it came from or that it was a fake--just that Craig had given it to him.

After months, one morning at breakfast, Ken said he didn’t really like the watch and was going to get a better one.  He threw it on the table, and asked if anyone wanted it?  Joe Mike Bacon took it, surprised that Ken was going to give his Rolex away, thanked Ken and wore it from then on.  

Ken said all his breakfast buddies thought Ken was the most generous man in the world.  Ken said, “I never told them it wasn’t real.”

Craig reminded me of the story--I had forgotten it.  Joe eventually caught on that the watch wasn't really a Rolex.  I don’t know if he told the others.

Craig said that Ken got tickled at of the looks on his buddies faces.  He never told them it was a Rolex.  He got such a kick out of doing things like that.

We all miss him.  

Last night, Craig told me and Becky a funny story about Ken that I had never heard.

We had all four gone to Tulsa and since Becky and I were both in the resale business with booths, we wanted to go to Goodwill.  Which is not very high on a fella’s list of things to do--but they went with us.

Craig said that Ken went to the ladies dress rack, picked out the ugliest dress he could find and took it over to me and said, “I really like this dress.”  Craig said I took one look and said, “That’s the ugliest dress I’ve ever seen in my life.”

Ken put on a rejected face, hung the dress back on the rack and winked at Craig.  “That’s how you do it son.  They won’t be asking us to do this next time.”

Becky said, “My dad was the most honest man I’ve ever known.  But he could always prevaricate with a straight face.”

He was an honest man.  He really did  like the dress because it was the dress which was going to get the two guys out of the Goodwill store.