We will start the first letter of John on Sunday.  He wrote three letters and a Gospel.  This first letter is the standard for Christians on where they stand with God.  The other two letters are short personal notes of encouragement.  One to a woman and her children, another to a man who is working in a church. 

Depending on the translation used, he uses the word “Love” 52 times.  And the word “Abide” 25 times.   The word “If” appears 14 times.  That word compares one side of the issue of whether you are a Christian with the other side--that you aren’t.  

He leaves no doubt about how you can know you are a Christian.  There are definite signs in your life that are impossible to cover up. When God enters your life, you will be unable to hide it.  You will be changed into a new kind of person. 

The prerequisite to God taking up habitation within you is total surrender to Him. The purpose of Jesus taking on your sin and being your sacrifice for your sins, is to put his Spirit into your soul and change the way you live life.  John clearly explains this in his letter to the churches.  Over and over again he says you can know.  Absolutely know for a fact that you have salvation.  We Christians call it new life.

 Sunday we finally did the last chapter in Ecclesiastes.  If you have never read it, it is a description of the body as we grow old.  The first verse is an introduction to a verse that we all have heard before:  “Remember now your Creator in the days of your youth, while the evil days come not, nor the years draw nigh, when you will say, I have no pleasure in them...”

Those of us who qualify as old--I am one of them--understand the warning to young people to stay close close to God and his instruction for your life because you don’t get to do your life twice.

Verse two is an analogy of loosing your eyesight. Verse three an analogy of essential tremor, lost balance and worn down teeth.  Verse four tells of your failing hearing.  Verse five of increased fear because you are no longer strong enough to protect yourself, and your hair turning grey.  Waning sexual desire, and a realization that your time is short.

That’s where Solomon was when he wrote this book in the Bible.  Older.  You may as well accept it, because that is what happens to us as we age.

I thank God that I can type.  I may have arthritis in parts of my body, but not my hands--Praise God.  The best way to live your life as you age is to get up every morning and thank God for what you have, not angry for what you have lost.  Deal with what is wrong with you with a touch of grace.  Learn something new that you can do as you age.  Not volleyball.

I had an intruder this week.  Small, grey, and a long tail.  I knew he was around somewhere because he kept leaving little “calling cards.”  So I bought traps, set them with cheese and waited.

I hate killing things, so I didn’t want to use those sticky traps that a critter gets his feet stuck on and panics and screeches and suffers.  I wanted the old fashioned kind that you never know what hit you because it is over in a milli-second.

The hard part was that his eyes were open when I caught him.  He wasn’t even aware that he was dead it had happened so quickly.  Dispatching him to his final resting place also was unnerving. 

I pray that as it gets colder that all the critters will stay outside.  I have no idea how this one got in.  Maybe when I left the door ajar as I took the trash out to the street.  If I knew how to catch a mouse and put him back outside, that’s what I would do. 

I don’t want to catch mice in traps.  But I don’t want them in my house.  It is a puzzlement.  Maybe that will be the last one.  I’ll be more careful to close the door when I take out the trash from now on.  They are God’s creatures and I don’t want to send them to heaven before their time.

I’m glad I don’t have to navigate getting my children to school this year.  It seems like a confusing situation.  Today, they said that parents had to be notified if their child was within 6 feet of a positive covid student sometime during the day.  One more thing for teachers to do.

How would you ever keep up with tracking that, recording it, notifying parents and have time to teach???  Teacher distraction all day long.  

When we let the feds instead of the local schools make rules for the school, we lost control.  You take Fed money, you get Fed rules.  

Local schools can make those decisions.  Masks, vaccinations, no masks--what ever.  Each school board is able to decide.  And people can go to the school board meetings and be heard.  Both sides of any issue.

Personally, I don’t care which rule they make, I will honor it.  I am a law abiding citizen who wants to do what is best for my community.

What amazes me is the bitterness that has been expressed by people over the issue.  They wouldn’t have been able to make it if they lived in the 1940’s.  There were a zillion rules during WW2.  We survived not being able to buy anything without a ration stamp.  Food, tires, gasoline...you name it.  And my home town was next to a German prison camp.  Middle America where it would be hard to escape.  There were lots of rules.

I made chicken salad for a couple of my friends who were here today.  I sent the rest to the neighbors and to my grandson across the street.  He likes my chicken salad.  I make it with cranberries and pecans...

I have been editing the book I have written about my brother Bill.  I gave a copy to my pastor, Blake Gideon, to read and Sunday he told me he was really enjoying it and quoted several sections that he thought were funny.  He is going to see if he can get the International Mission Board to publish it.  

If he does, the proceeds can go to Lottie Moon.  She was a missionary who gave her life to go overseas back when very few did.  Baptists pay the salary for all their missionaries out of tithes to the church.  So missionaries don’t have to come back to America to stump for money.  

The Christmas Lottie Moon offering goes for things that missionaries need in addition to living expenses.  Such as a heavy duty bike in areas where there are no roads.  Or equipment to drill a well, etc.  Extras that you and I take for granted.

I have found out ton of stuff about my brother that I didn’t know while writing this book.  The mission board dubbed him “The Macau Mavrick.” Because he always found a way to bypass the rules.  Which almost got him “dead” a few times.  He was underground, going into China before they let people in--being a doctor, they wanted his expertise.  He started missions in Asia.    

I posted over 2000 times without missing--but in the last month or two, I’ve missed a number of days.  Sorry. I blame it on the Pandemic???

I’ve been teaching from the book of Ecclesiastes.  Solomon is old and depressed for sure.  Everything is doom and sorrow.  I told my class that if you are one of those people who open their Bible and pick one verse with no plan...and take it to heart, you are in trouble if it opens to Ecclesiastes.

He says things like obviously not true, like: it makes no difference if you are a sinner or a righteous man, everything happens by chance. There are a bunch of verses just as negative  like that.  It is a rather depressing book--at least that’s what I think.  “Vanity, vanity...all is vanity.” 

You have to know who is writing a book in the Bible to truly understand what they are saying.  Their age, nation, background, current condition--along with a bunch of other stuff.  But the class got through it.  And it has some very good thoughts. You just have to dig.  But if you are only an occasional reader, stick to the New Testament!

I would encourage you, however, to be a consistent reader.  You will get much more out of it.  Just make note of who is writing what you are reading.  It makes a difference.  Paul and Peter are different kinds of writers.  So are Matthew--and Luke.  People express things different.

Bad night last night.  Squig got up six times to go outside.  He was really sick.  Of course ‘Moi’ got no sleep.  He is calmed down a little bit this morning.  They sprayed my yard for army worms, maybe he ingested some grass that was poison?  Dogs seem to like to eat grass from time to time???

My friend Jeanette embroidered some squares to make a quilt forty years ago and never got it finished.    Little animals, giraffes, hippos, etc.  She did a beautiful job.  We went to the quilt shop to see how they would quilt around the animals and how much it would cost.

Then we went shopping for outline fabric and couldn’t find a thing she or I liked.  We are going to try again today.  Interesting that out of hundreds of bolts of cotton cloth at Hobby Lobby there wasn’t a pattern that was right.  Women!!  We are so picky.

Teachers Meeting last night.  Six men and me.  Men don’t think like I do.  They listen and take notes.  I ask questions and every one of them look at me like I’m in left field.  Maybe I am.  But last week not one of them could articulate what makes them angry, or why they get angry.  Last night they had an answer...it was what I told them last week.  You, or someone, or something you care about have been disrespected in some way.

 Today I realized that I had been invaded by “army” worms.  I never heard about them, but my lawn people said they had 300 calls yesterday.  One day your fescue yard is lovely green and the next day it’s dark brown.

The lawn guy said they usually come in October, but due to the climatic weather change, this year they are here in mid-August.  In October you expect your lawn to start  changing brown.  Fescue lawn, that is.  And you get it reseeded if necessary in the spring.  But dead Fescue in August is not a good thing.  I’ve been running my sprinkler system for nothing.

I hope the worms don’t get an appetite for bermuda grass.  My back yard is beautiful and lush.

I hear that there are giant Asian wasps in the northeast moving our way.  I think we sowed the wind and have reaped the whirlwind with our treatment of God’s green earth.  Florida is being over run by exotic reptiles, Boas, lizards, etc. that people brought in as pets.  The West coast is burning up.  Entire towns have turned to ash.  

But here is the good news.  No tornadoes this year.  Not even a warning whistle.   Everything called “Tornado Alley” has shifted east.  I feel sorry for Mississippi, Louisiana, Tennessee, South Carolina, etc.  But very glad for Oklahoma.  We’ve done our part in the wicked weather category. 

As a matter of fact, it hasn’t been terribly hot, we’ve had lots of rain.  Do you remember whenever we had this much rain in August. So I guess my thought for the day is, “Look for the good.”  There is enough bad going around that you don’t have to look for it. 

Today is a “Yea” day.  Becky Bacon came to stay with me yesterday in the early afternoon and isn’t leaving till noon today. We are compatible companions.  We spend most of out time together not talking.

She tells Joe, “I’m going to Janie’s to not talk to her.”  She sits on the sofa, I sit in my chair and every now and then one of us says something and then we go back into the quiet zone.  It is such a peaceful way to visit.

But this time it has been awhile since she has been here and we have talked non stop.  She has a bedroom, lets herself in, takes her stuff to her bedroom, brings her own brand of coffee she likes and we eat “whatever.”  This morning we had pizza for breakfast.

My Becky (daughter) came over yesterday afternoon to visit with her.  They caught up, I listened.  And between the two of them I always learn something.  My grandson Steven called at 8 this morning to talk to me and turned out all I did was listen.  He and Becky Bacon talked for 30 minutes.

I’ve begged Becky Bacon to pack Joe up and move to Edmond.  But Joe, at 80, still teaches flying lessons 40 hours a week.  I told him that we have landing strips in Edmond, but he’s wired in there.  Joe gave me a book to read last time he came--about three guys that hooked wire like Ken did.  I knew one of them.  Joe knew them all.  Interesting.  Tailhook pilots. 

There’s an old saying, “You can catch more flies with honey than you can with vinegar.”  All of the old sayings like that are based on truth.

I must tell Squig a dozen or so times a day that he is a “Good Boy.”  And I always say that when he is----“being a good boy.”  He has caught on.  He loves to be told that he is a good boy and repeats the behaviors that get those words.

I wish I had used more praise raising my children.  But I wasn’t raised on praise, I was raised like every other kid in the 1940’s.  Guilt.  I learned early that if I didn’t do what my parents expected me to do I would be in trouble.  It took me a bit of time to learn about honey and vinegar.

We always learn too late to do anything about the mistakes we’ve made.  But I learned.  My first child took the brunt of my education in child raising.  I was the first child as well.  My folks had learned the secret of praise by the time my sister Lisa was born 22 years later.  

My cousin Ann was raised at the same time I was.  Every Friday we go to breakfast and garage sales and before the hour or two is up, one of us has done something to make the other one say, “Well, now you have something to feel guilty about for the rest of the day.”  My friend Jeanette paid me a compliment the other day, and it made me feel guilty because I didn’t feel like I deserved it.  Go figure.  I don’t think I will out grow it.

Facebook is depressing.  Full of people denigrating our elected leaders--locally and nationally.  Also, negative one-way-or-another comments on people who either believe in the vaccine--or those who are doubtful.

It would be wonderful if we could trap all of the venom on issues such as that and direct it toward something positive.  People on both sides seem to have a gut-response-urge to convince the other side that they are wrong.  Why???  Why are people so stirred up that they have to vent?

Every time I look at Facebook, someone is belittling someone.  Making fun of them.  Saying something bad about them.  I don’t get it, unless they were schoolyard bullies growing up.

I don’t care which side of an issue you are on.  Just stop running down the people on the other side.  It makes you look bad.

Every day, someone sends me “The Truth” article on some subject.  I’ve never seen anything like this.  Such passion to convince me to “Get on Their Side” of some issue or another.

I wish people would have the same enthusiasm to tell others that God loves them; Jesus died for them, and we are all going to have to explain ourselves to God someday.  That would be worth talking about.

This morning I had a fruitful conversation with my publisher.  She has had the manuscript of my second book on her computer for months.  Last weekend, she printed it and is reading it.  

She said, “You are a great story teller.”  Yea!!!  She likes it.  If the first book, “The Letter” comes out on Nov. 2, I can start nagging her about this one she is reading.

And then we start editing...editing...editing.  I really like her, but she has long periods in which she shuts down.  She said that she appreciated that I light a fire under her.  I will try to do a better job of doing that, now that I understand her personality better.

But you learn more about people when you get to really know them.  And different things are our touch-points.  We all respond to different kinds of things that happen to us.

Some of my friends need gifts.  Some need compliments.  Some need my time.  Some need assurance.  Some need encouragement.

I just need someone to occasionally listen.  Squig does a good job of that.

We only had five people in class yesterday.  It is much easier to teach when there are more people there.  That way, nobody thinks you are talking to them or about them.  With only five, it’s harder.

I spent two months teaching the book of Job--which could have been covered in one session.  In three more weeks our lesson book goes back to the New Testament and the Gospel. Thank goodness.  Philippians.

Yes, the entire Bible is good.  But some parts are better than others.  If the passage doesn’t have something in it that I can apply to my life to make me a better person, I lose interest.  I know...I know...I’m not supposed to say things like that.  But it’s the truth.

I could have summed the book of Job up in three thoughts.  1.  Bad things happen to good people.  2.  We don’t get to decide what happens, God does.  3.  He doesn’t always share His plan with us.

It is full of philosophy rendered by Job’s friends--who don’t know what they are talking about.  It’s like wading through quicksand trying to separate their opinions from the truth.

I learned some things I didn’t know--and that is always a good thing.  So I’ll repent of my attitude.  I’m just ready to teach the gospel.  Jesus.  His disciples.  People who were there and tell their stories.  Paul and his amazing letters.  It’s like Paul Harvey...I want “the rest of the story.”

 

 

When people let you down, remember that they have let themselves down as well.  Sometimes that is the time when they need you the most.

I’ve always believed in second chances...we give them to our children over and over again, but are not as willing to give “seconds” to others.

There is nothing better than a friend who gives you a second chance when you foul up.  We are such imperfect people that without friends who stand beside us in thick and thin, life would be unbearably lonely.

I have friends like Carolyn, Jeanette, Kathy, Sally, Becky B. and on and on that love me “warts and all.”  

Sometimes people make a mistake and don’t even know it.  Usually by something they say.

I prefer to believe that people  are just having a bad day.  Let it go.  Don’t get yourself in a fizz.  Hanging on to something someone said just upsets you and they probably don’t even know they said something wrong.

“Do unto others as you would that they do unto you,” works  pretty well  most of the time.

My posting has been erratic.  Sorry.  I’m erratic myself lately.  I’m blaming it on the olympics.  I’ve been mesmerized by gymnastics, volleyball and and swimming and have sometimes lost track of time.

We started Ecclesiastes last week and I reviewed the third chapter--which is one of the most familiar passages in the Bible.  It’s all about “times.”

To name a few:  A time to be born, a time to die.  A time to plant, and a time to reap. A time to weep and a time to laugh.  A time to love, a time to hate.  A time to be silent, a time to speak.  A time for war, and a time of peace.

I couldn’t help but wonder when we will have a time of peace.  In my lifetime from ‘38 to 2021, there has seldom been a time when there was peace.  Germany invaded Poland around the time I was born and then Korea broke out.  Followed by Mideast war after war.  

I’ve been reading two books: “Churchill,” then “Truman” by the Pulitzer Prize writer David McCullough about WW2 and Korea.  It has been very interesting.  Even though I lived through their lifetimes, there was so much I didn’t know.  Leaders of a country make so many decisions in each day that we never hear about.  There is a “Time to Lead...”  Sometimes it is thrust on you.

I think I learned how to save something on a flash-drive.  If I learn one thing every day or two, maybe I can do something by myself someday on this Mac.  I’m always afraid that I will hit a key and never be able to get back to where I was.  Or  that I will lose what I’m writing.

My friend Jeanette came over and helped me.  She was an executive trouble shooter for a big corporation and knows how to do stuff.  Which is nice for me, because when I got in a jam, I had been having to drive thirty miles to get my daughter Pat to help me.  Which was at least once a week.  Craig helps me as well.  (Becky’s husband.)  

But the problem is that when I need help, I need it right then.   (I have the patience of a gnat.)  And my helpers aren’t always available at my “right then” moments. 

I once told Ken’s mom that I prayed for patience all the time.  She said, “Oh!! Don’t pray for patience.  The Bible says that tribulation teaches you patience---so you are really just praying for more tribulation.”

In effect, you just need to exercise the patience you can muster up in the moment.  Take a deep breath.  Wait before you react.  If I live to be a hundred and ten, maybe I’ll get there.

I’ve been binging on the olympics.  And I found out that there are parts of the competitions that I can’t get into.  They have a zillion categories.

I’ve watched the gymnastics every time because Becky was a gymnast.  She broke her neck doing flips at a football game, so I think every twist and turn in the olympics will result in disaster.  And hope something like that won’t happen.

Summer is here.  And hot, hot, hot.  I’ve been bringing tomatoes in by the dozens--and giving them away.  And I only have three plants that made it.  The rabbits ate every stalk of okra and the rest of the tomatoes.  

I always thought rabbits were cute.  No more.  Next year we are  going to have a “Come to the head rabbit” discussion.  Funny thing is, Ann also has always raised okra with no problems--and the rabbits ate her okra as well.

Squig likes Okra.  And tomatoes and every fruit.  If I am eating something, he wants some.  I wonder if it was Squig who ate my plants?

No one else in the neighborhood had this problem.  Squig????  Naw! Not Squig.