Friday's Fave Five, 10/28/16

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1. I have a new camera this year and am going to attempt to improve efforts at bird photography.  Here are last week's attempts.  This is the best picture of the two (after a lot of deletes).  It's a tufted titmouse.

This one is a tad blurry (those little things move really, really fast), but I love it because it shows a red-breasted nuthatch with the seed in its mouth.  We have not had any of those since 2012.  I'm hoping that this is the season that we will have all three of the types of nuthatch at our feeders.  Two so far.

2. Mike just fixed the lamp next to my chair that flickered constantly.  A big thank you.

3. I had a lovely interview with a former student yesterday.  She was to interview a veteran teacher for her Intro. to Ed. class, then write a paper based on what the teacher said.  It was a pleasure to pass the baton a little bit.

4. I finally got some black dress shoes that fit right.  One store: Great shoes, too big.  Another store:  Similar style, one-half size smaller, too small.  eBay: The first shoes, more expensive, half-size smaller, still slightly big, but wearable.  I'll keep them.

5. And finally - The Cubs have made it to the World Series!!  Go, Cubs, Go!!

"Long Stairway"

From Macarthur's Romans 1-8 commentary, p. 348:

"After a businessmen's luncheon at which I spoke, a man said to me, 'I've been in this group for a long time, and I'll tell you how I think you can get to God.  You see, there is this long stairway, and at the top there is a door and behind it is this guy Jesus.  What you really want to do is try to make it up the stairs and get through the door and then hope Jesus lets you in.  As you're on your way up the stairs, you've got all these preachers and movements cheering you on, but you just continue going up the stairs your own way.  I call it the stairway of hope.  That's what I think the gospel is.'

"With a heavy heart I replied, 'Sir,you cannot be a Christian.  What you said has nothing to do with the gospel, and your stairway to heaven is hopeless.  You need to depend on Jesus Christ alone for your salvation.  You have no idea of what it means to be saved, and you cannot be on your way to heaven.'

"A person cannot invent his own way to God, no matter how sincere his efforts might be.  God has established the only way to come to Him, and that is the way of faith in His Son, Jesus Christ.  And saving faith in Jesus Christ is built on God's revelation about Him, not on men's ideas about Him.  There is divinely-revealed content to the gospel, and the person who rejects or circumvents that content gives unmistakeable evidence that he is not truly seeking God's kingdom and His righteousness."

Every Sunday Morning

It's 8:15 a.m. on Sunday morning, and I just heard my neighbor start his truck and pull down his driveway.

We've lived in this house for two months shy of 16 years, and every single Sunday morning, unless he and his wife are out of town, I have heard him start his truck and leave his house at 8:15.  Every single Sunday morning.  You could set your clock by it.

He is an usher at his church, and he has to go early to get things set up before Sunday school and church.  And he participates in an early morning men's prayer meeting each week.

I think that that kind of faithfulness is a great testimony all by itself.

Friday's Fave Five 10/14/16

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1. Husband is a happy man - he got a 150-lb., 8-point buck on the opening morning of deer season.  Plus he's been seeing some deer in our back yard.  That really makes him a happy man.

2. A really fun day in sophomore English.  (I've got pictures, but am not supposed to post pics of identifiable students on personal social media.)  We finished Julius Caesar and celebrated with a lunch on the stage of our cafetorium.  We ate Little Caesar's pizza, Caesar salad, and Italian creme cake, and drank grape juice.  They all brought sheets that they made into "togas" for the occasion.  And most of this was their idea!!  Very creative class.

3. A new flower bed out by the road.  Mike pulled out an old plant that hasn't done well for years, moved rocks, added railroad ties, soil, and mulch, and bought and planted pansies.  When he takes on a project - he does it right. 

4. We went to see Sully last Saturday.  Good movie.  The NTSB (National Transportation Safety Board) is portrayed as being heavy handed, but nevertheless, it is a feel-good movie that has very little in the way of objectionable elements.  A couple of words here and there, but not much.  We had an enjoyable afternoon.

5. Son is OK after being bucked off a horse last Sunday.  It could have been really bad, but after one uncomfortable night he is doing fine.  He may have a slightly cracked rib, but there is nothing that can be done for that anyway.  We're glad it was not worse.

Immortality?

It's a new week.  It's easy to wonder - what will this week bring?

So far - it's brought one of those "Mom, I don't want to worry you, but..." phone calls.  Turns out son got himself bucked off of a horse.  Fortunately he feels much better today.

This morning brought this announcement on the intercom.  Part of the morning devotional said "God has given us immortality". . . but the girl who read it said - you guessed it - "God has given us immorality."

Later in the day, I was teaching another class, when I got off track and wandered so far away that I couldn't figure out what the purpose of the tangent was.  (Maybe there was no purpose...)  Whereupon a young man known for his wit says "Don't worry, we'll see that we get you into an Alzheimer's unit somewhere with good ventilation."

Friday's Fave Five, 10/7/16

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It has been a difficult week for our community.  Ten days ago a teacher and two children, at a school about ten miles from my home, were shot as they exited their classroom to the playground.  Six days ago one of the children, a little boy, died from blood loss and accompanying cardiac arrest and brain damage.  Wednesday was his funeral.

Knowing that a sweet six-year-old boy died as a result of merely walking out from his classroom to recess is a sadness that just won't leave me, or many others in our area.  An innocence has been shattered from the entire community.  This should not have happened.  Our safety really is an illusion.

I have many more thoughts, some already shared in a previous post, and more to come.  But for now, here are some positives from a sad week for our town, county, state, and really our world.

1. The little boy loved attending Good News Club at school, and going to Sunday school at a church that we are familiar with.  That is a sweet fact to know about his life.

2. The point man for this entire tragedy is a fine pastor that we know well.  His children went to our school.   He has been a faithful pastor at the same church for many years.  He loves God and could address the people in the funerals and services with an eternal perspective.  That is a great blessing.

3. The little boy loved superheroes.  People wore superhero T-shirts to his funeral, and all over the area, people wore the same outfits to school, work, and out in public.  There has been a great show of support for the family, school, and community.  The tragedy has really brought people together.

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4. In other matters:  Last Friday I got three shots in my lower back to relieve the low-grade back pain and sciatica that I have dealt with for many years.  The pain management doctor is very good.  He said the relief would not be immediate, but that over the next few weeks I should note some improvement.  That would be great.

5. And finally: Last Saturday Mike hung all my bird feeders, bought 50# of seed, filled the feeders, and trimmed the overhanging branches.  Let the migration begin, and let the winter birds start finding us!

A Local Tragedy

This week's school shooting took place about 10 miles from our house, and just a little further than that from my school.  A father is dead, a first-grader is dead, two people are injured, because a 14-year-old boy snapped.

We have no direct ties to the tragic event, but we do have several indirect ties.

• The pastor whose church the students were taken to, who has directed special services for those affected and who is preaching the funeral of the murdered father, has four children who all graduated from our private Christian school.
• The shooting site is located very close to the location where we love to look at birds.
• A neighbor is a teacher at the school, and was deeply affected by the tragedy. 
• Several students in our school know the perpetrator and several know the victims.

For a very brief second, after hearing some of the horrible details, I had a fleeting thought that perhaps we really do need more control on guns.

And then I remembered:  The problem is not that gun use is out of control.  (That is an insult to the thousands upon thousands of men, women, and young people, who have responsibly used guns for hundreds of years.)

The problem is that the world contains more unstable people than ever before.

And that problem is compounded because society at large doesn't really address the root cause of the instability.  There are more unstable people because there are more sin issues in the world.  More children lonely and miserable, most because parents have failed them.  More anger issues, more homes broken beyond repair, more teens abandoned to electronics.  More people in general who have no hope, because society has minimized the knowledge of the only hope that works: faith in Jesus Christ and His saving work on the cross to rescue us from all this sin.

Are we going to quit letting children go on the playground?  We can't make schools into fortresses.  No matter how well-protected with cameras and systems they are, every single school in the U.S. can plan, and plan, and plan, and yet not come up with a solution for every possible scenario.  And that's true for every public building as well.  There is no way to completely protect people from determined pain-inflicters (and there are plenty of other ways to commit mayhem besides guns) short of digging holes and caves, and never coming out --which of course is impossible.  We can't quit going to church, shopping in malls and stores, attending events, working, or just simply living.

I am reminded again that our only hope of any peace at all has its roots in the Lord.  "The horse is prepared against the day of battle: but safety is of the LORD."  (Proverbs 21:31)  Yes - Prepare, be aware, and be careful - but realize that no one is safe in this world.  We have to first of all know the Lord personally, then have faith that He is the source of our safety - and then realize that if something bad occurs, He in His perfect will has allowed it to happen. 

A little child barricaded in the bathroom this past Wednesday said to his classmates, "We don't have to worry.  Jesus is with us." This young child may not know all the theology behind his words.  But the faith of a little child is what we all need to keep from being terrified at what our world is becoming.