Pain

Friends:

A tragedy has hit our dear friends – a day meant to be one of great rejoicing & celebration of the newness of life is instead crushing. Numbing.

I feel powerless. Broken into small pieces. Wishing there was something that I could DO to make the pain go away, to make their situation better. To ease the loss. The most well-used cliches & religious pontifications come off as insensitive, thoughtless, & antagonistic. This pain is beyond words, beyond being able to be fixed by something that we can do or say.

I know of nothing – except being. Standing with. Standing by. Loving.

Celebrate with those that are celebrating.
Rejoice with those that rejoice.
Weep with those that weep.
Mourn with those that mourn.

I pray for peace. And grace for our friends.

It’s Wednesday…

Wednesday

  • I have German class today – And I am weary of the amount of work that I have to do because the teacher is functioning at a pace that wears me out… we started with 30 people in the class & last Monday were down to 5. We’re getting through a lot more material, a lot more homework, a lot more intensity with 5 than we did with 30. Frau Carson, please. Let up a bit.
  • The Bean is prepping for a women’s retreat for our church family this weekend… which means me flying solo while she wraps up loose ends. She has stress, esp. about wanting the weekend to be beneficial for the ladies that go; & not like the horror stories of “women’s retreats” that so many people have experienced. Stories where they’ve been rejected, judged, & made to feel unacceptable for being unique & believing that being a godly woman doesn’t mean submitting to a cookie-cutter creation…
  • Next week this time, I will be in Deutschland. Hooray. And “oh my.”

  • A niece…

  • Youngest bro (YB) & his wife reproduced – born Monday at 3 p.m.ish via C-Section, after labor & an attempt to turn the gargantuan 7 lb 6 oz baby failed. Baby went without a name for 2 days, as in typical YB fashion, he waited as long as possible to make a decision. Name it (her, I know, her…) Ellie Grace. I had a dream that it was Elanor, like Samwise’s firstborn – from wikipedia, which anyone can contribute to, so you know you can trust the info you find there…
  • More recently J. R. R. Tolkien created an alternative meaning for this name using his made up Elvish language Quenya. In his novel The Lord of the Rings Elanor means “sun-star” (el: star, and anor: sun), and is the name of a golden five-pointed flower that grows in the woods of Lothlórien and the given name of a golden-haired child.

  • We haven’t seen the baby yet because it (she) is 45 km away in a hospital & because the hospital has a rule: no one admitted who isn’t 12. I have a 10 year old daughter, The Weez, that I refuse to not allow into the room if the rest of the family is in there. Talk about torture. We took it up with the hospital & they offered up the sage advice, “Just tell them she’s 12.” Oh. You mean, lie. Tell my daughter to lie. Of course. Why didn’t I think of that? How about no. Pound sand Carson Tahoe Hospital.
  • There’s more, but I’ll save it for later. If you made it all the way through this post, you deserve a prize. Go get yourself a cup of great coffee, or whatever foo-foo drink you like, & drink it, all the while thinking, “I’m rewarding myself for reading all the way through that post.” Cheers to you.

    Yet another reason that justifies the belief that babies are jerks…

    David, recently relocated to Lawrence, a place where they have “real” college campii, (as opposed to the tripe that Nevada has to offer,) often comments that he believes babies are jerks… perhaps its because they’re so cute that they can get away with all kinds of devious behavior , & are never suspected for it, because, hey, they’re babies. It’s not like they’re doing this stuff on purpose. Or are they?

    This article says differently:
    “Following studies of more than 50 children and interviews with parents, Dr Vasudevi Reddy, of the University of Portsmouth’s psychology department, says she has identified seven categories of deception used between six months and three-years-old.

    Infants quickly learnt that using tactics such as fake crying and pretend laughing could win them attention. By eight months, more difficult deceptions became apparent, such as concealing forbidden activities or trying to distract parents’ attention.

    By the age of two, toddlers could use far more devious techniques, such as bluffing when threatened with a punishment.”
    READ Lying Babies article HERE

    The Jesus Family Tomb & other musings…


    The ‘idea’ that has been posited by James Cameron et al isn’t a new one IDEA – many have attempted to discredit Christ & His followers using poorly & selectively researchd “Science, Archaeology, & the thoughts Old Dead Guys.” Its the case of starting with an agenda & creating a case to try & validate it.

    The Apostle Paul addressed those that were saying that there was no resurrection of the dead – they had largely based these thoughts on a belief that the physical body was inherently sinful & that only the spirit was pure – Paul points out that the resurrection of Christ is the cornerstone of the Christian faith – without which we “are the most miserable people in the world.” Loons. Delusional. To be pitied.

    But that’s not the case.

    1Corinthians 15:14-23
    14And if Christ was not raised, then all our preaching is useless, and your trust in God is useless. 15And we apostles would all be lying about God, for we have said that God raised Christ from the grave, but that can’t be true if there is no resurrection of the dead. 16If there is no resurrection of the dead, then Christ has not been raised. 17And if Christ has not been raised, then your faith is useless, and you are still under condemnation for your sins. 18In that case, all who have died believing in Christ have perished! 19And if we have hope in Christ only for this life, we are the most miserable people in the world. 20But the fact is that Christ has been raised from the dead. He has become the first of a great harvest of those who will be raised to life again.

    21So you see, just as death came into the world through a man, Adam, now the resurrection from the dead has begun through another man, Christ. 22Everyone dies because all of us are related to Adam, the first man. But all who are related to Christ, the other man, will be given new life. 23But there is an order to this resurrection: Christ was raised first; then when Christ comes back, all his people will be raised..


    On that same note – take a look at the following excerpt from an article by philosopher, academic, & deep thinker Ravi Zacharias – it addresses the reality of Christ’s resurrection using the evidence of the lives of the ones who witnessed it:

    One thing is historically incontestable: the disciples went to their deaths proclaiming the resurrected Christ. And it is here that it seems we are left with common sense questions. For if the disciples agreed to propagate a story, having even the slightest bit of intelligence, wouldn’t they have thought to conceive something less remarkable–perhaps a story that would accommodate the arguments they would undoubtedly face? Why wouldn’t they have come up with something unfalsifiable? If they would have only claimed that Jesus had spiritually risen again, how would the antagonists have proven them false? And in so doing, they would not have to worry about hiding the body or about what would happen to them if the body was ever discovered. Furthermore, if the disciples agreed to propagate a story, when standing up for these falsified claims became a matter of life and death wouldn’t at least a few of them have buckled?

    But the disciples did not say that Jesus spiritually rose from the dead, and nor did they back down when the time came to stake their lives on it. They took the dangerous road–indeed, the inconceivable road–and they not only went to great lengths to proclaim that Jesus bodily rose from the dead, but they went to their deaths proclaiming it was true. Now why would they risk everything proclaiming the actual, physical resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead if they knew it was a lie?

    You can read the entire article at this link:

    ARTICLE

    Reunions…


    I chose the picture of Adam Sandler from The Wedding Singer because I believe that it epitomizes the decade of the 80s, stereotypically, better than any one image i could post. Perhaps you could find another one to rival it? If so, post the URL in a comment & we’ll break-dance fight to see whose picture wins.

    A few weeks ago, I received a notice that the 20th High School Reunion for the McQueen High School class of 1987 was officially on… for the weekend of August 10-12. Which just happened to fall on the weekend after when the Bean & I are flying to Frankfurt with a team to visit our sister church there. Bummer.

    Some may wonder, “Why would you want to go to a reunion?” My oldest son is in that boat, esp. because 20 years is SUCH A LONG TIME.

    Part of the reason I really didn’t want to miss this one is that I was in Romania 10 years ago for the 1st reunion – I missed an opportunity to reconnect with some people that I wish I hadn’t lost contact with. The 20 year provides just such an opportunity…

    (Disclaimer: I have no Bryan Adams, “Summer of ’69” “those were the best days of my life” delusions. High School was painful in some ways, but good in other ways – people ways. Friend ways. And I believe that God had me in that spot for a purpose & that 20 years later, part of the purpose may be discovered. Or, I may just get a chance to hang out with some old friends, & bring my wife into a part of my life that she has so far never been a part of. Moving to Carson City in 1987/88 meant losing touch with anyone who was still around in Reno – so by the time I was dating Joni, the people that had been in my life as friends were no longer there… remember, this was before wide-spread email, Al Gore’s inventing the internet, & ‘everybodies got cell-phones’, which made it easy or easier to keep in touch & have a plethora of means to do so.

    I have literally attempted to find, just short of stalking, friends by calling their old home phone #, the only # that I had for them, but to no avail… Bean never got to meet any of my friends or the people I hung out with – maybe 2 of them, but not to actually see & talk to them. But I digress…)

    So, I wasn’t going to be able to go to the reunion, though the Bean & I considered taking a later flight to Frankfurt so that I could go to the reunion. I prayed that God would work it out – believing that the desire in my heart to go to this reunion, for some reason, was a big one, & may have come from Him. If so, God, would you please make a way for it to happen?

    Today, I got a note from the reunion coordinator – due to HAN (Hot August Nights!) the reunion had to be moved to the weekend of 8/3-5… dates that work just fine for me, thank you very much.

    Thank you.

    In The Know…

    People are definitely impacted by the culture they consume – the web sites they visit or the music they listen to, for instance. Pastors need to be informed about what’s out there in order to understand how the culture is influencing the people they are trying to reach.
    -Ron Sellers :: President :: Ellison Research

    Pastors In the Know? Article…

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