Bethelehem's Child - A poem

Bethlehem’s Child

I’d like to tell you of Bethlehem’s child,

Born in a manger, but king all the while.

Born of a virgin a gift of love,

Given by God, in heaven above.

He came to earth to suffer and be

A sacrifice for you and me.

The shepherds came and wise men too,

To worship one they hardly knew.

Yet those of us who bear his name,

Must often bow our heads in shame,

For we’ve forgotten a gift to bring,

To Jesus who was born a KING.

A king, whose anthem around us sounds,

Whose love and peace know no bounds,

Who calls us to his side to rest,

And offers us his very best.

No peace we’ll have ‘til him we bring

To live within, to make us sing.

To bring us love, and peace and cheer,

Helping conquer every fear.

Let all of heaven’s anthems ring,

Let us praise and glory sing,

And worship him through gifts we bring,

To Bethlehem’s child who was born a King

Color tour on 11th Street

We have just returned from a tour of Texas and we saw plenty of roadside color as we went. The colder weather has accelerated the change in the colors and when we returned we found some right in our own backyard so to speak. These are in our neighbor's yard.

A couple of other pictures from two different trees.

I'm Thankful for...

Thanksgiving is around the corner, and I thought I would post a word or two about the things I am thankful for. I read the story of Jesus' healing the 10 lepers in Luke 17 where only one of the 10 returns to thank Jesus for the healing. Why was that? Well probably for the same reason that we don't express gratitude for the blessings we receive.

First for loving parents; I don't think anyone had any better ones. They raised me in the admonition of the Lord and they did not spare the rod when it was needed.

Second for my wife; She is a loving helpmate in all of life. I do not know where I would be without her. Thank you Martha.

Third for my kids; They turned out pretty good in spite of my failures. I am very proud of them. Thank you Christy and Cory for just being you.

 There are more but those will suffice for now, I am sure I don't say thank you enough, like many others I take things for granted. For the future my goal will be to not allow an opportunity to pass without expressing my gratitude, it is the least I can do.

What about you?

Appropriate Response

Genesis 17:1 I am God Almighty, walk before me and be blameless.

As I began to prepare a lesson for Sunday, These words greeted me. "I am God Almighty, walk before me and be blameless". There are several things that jump out at me when I read this verse.

First God is strong and in fact he is the only God. The Hebrew word here is El Shaddai and it conveys the idea that God is more powerful than any other entity.

Second, 'walk before me' implies the idea that we are always in the presence of God. Our lives should reflect that presence in a way that others can see that we are followers of Jesus. When we come to Christ, the Holy Spirit comes to dwell within us and so we are always in His presence. The amplified version says walk habitually. It should come naturally. Too often, I am afraid, we fail to give God the respect he deserves as we go about life as if He doesn't exist.

Third, What does it mean to be blameless? It cannot mean moral perfection because the bible tells us that all have sinned. None of us are perfect in that sense. The word is translated elsewhere as perfect, mature, or with integrity. It is the same idea that Jesus expressed in the Sermon on the Mount when he says "You must be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect". I think we can only accomplish that as we allow the spirit to lead us . We must make walking with God a habit, something we do because we are continually in his presence.

Notice Abram's response in verse 3, Abram fell on his face in worship. How often do we really fall on our faces in worship of a Holy God. For me I know it is seldom, what about you?

Eclipse

Supermoon in eclipse

Sunday night was the last of 4 blood moon eclipses in a row. Scientists call this sequence of 4 eclipses a tetrad.

Another view

The dark line that appears on the moon is from a power line that I could not see in the camera viewfinder. There isn't a line on the moon even though pictures never lie. It was dark for about an hour and then;

The shadow starts to move on

Thanks for watching

Dragonfly revisited

A few weeks ago I posted a picture of a dragonfly here and we have him captured again so thought I would post a couple of newer pictures

He or she is quite an interesting bug.

Grasshopper in the Cana Lilies

A local grasshopper blending with the plant

Another view

And Then Some

 

Clarence told me that if I ever wanted to, I could hi-jack his blog and write something, so here we go.  Let me tell you about my “AND THEN SOME” wristband. 

This past summer one of the messages at church was from Matthew 5:38-48.  Here’s a short excerpt from that passage:

  . . . . and if anyone wants to sue you, and take your shirt, let him have your coat also. And whoever shall force you to go one mile, go with him two. Give to him who asks of you, and do not turn away from him who wants to borrow from you. You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you in order that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven . . . .

The focus of the message that morning was that as Christ followers, we should be willing to do what was required of us “AND THEN SOME”.  How very true that God wants us to act beyond the expected and let Him shine through us as we go the extra mile for someone else.  

A few weeks ago after the church service, we all received wristbands with “Matt 5:41 AND THEN SOME” printed on them.  It was to be a reminder to us, as a church family, to be known as someone (and as a church) who would go that extra mile.  As I was walking out of the church I saw that mine had some red on the top edge and spilling over round the “S” of SOME.  Hmmmm, it’s marred already I thought.  I commented to someone walking beside me that my wristband must have gotten too close to a red one, or somebody bled on it or something, and we laughed about its unique marking. 

On the drive home, as I continued to ponder the marking, I suddenly realized that the red wasn’t a mar at all, but a unique reminder to me that when I was completely, totally, devastatingly lost in my sin with no possible way of escape, Jesus did “AND THEN SOME” and shed his blood for me.  Wow. 

But that’s not the end of my pondering, because that wasn’t the end of what Jesus did.  He died for me, then God let man take Jesus body from the cross and put him in a dark, dirty, damp tomb where he stayed for three days . . . “AND THEN SOME”thing happened, Jesus rose from the grave into life everlasting.  Wow again!!!  

To my amazement there’s yet another AND THEN SOME. Jesus not only rose from the grave, but He wants me to live with Him for eternity. Imagine that!!!   Even though He saw my dirty sin (think pig rolling in mud here) He was willing to die for me, He rose again and conquered death, then to top things off He offers to clean me up and take me with Him.  This is almost unbelievable isn’t it?

But wait, there’s more to come.  I have a home waiting for me in Heaven, and while I am still here on earth that home is being prepared for me, He keeps adding to it, He has made it just right for me AND THEN SOME. 

If you are reading this account, I want you to know that the “AND THEN SOME” things Jesus did weren’t just for me, He has done all this for you too.  If you don’t know Him as your Savior accept Him now and let Him clean you up.  If He is already your Savior, remember all that He has done for you and determine to let Him reach out to others through you by telling them about Jesus and living an “AND THEN SOME” life so that they can see Jesus in you, and maybe when they ask why you would do “AND THEN SOME” you’ll have the opportunity to tell them about the “AND THEN SOME”s that Jesus did.

Dragonfly

A dragonfly in the back yard

Double click the picture for a larger image. The detail in the wings and legs is great.

Tribulations and Trials - Oh my

What do yo do when trials come your way?

Romans 5:2b-4
we exult in hope of the glory of God. And not only this, but we also exult in our tribulations, knowing that tribulation brings about perseverance; and perseverance, proven character; and proven character, hope;

This passage, well verse 3 & 4, came up the other day as a "Verse of the day". I don't know about you but I rarely exult in tribulation. In fact I would probably prefer that tribulation (or trials) just go and jump on someone else, surely they need to exult more than I do. But God doesn't seem to work that way. So I have to wonder... Does God send the tribulation? Or does he just latch on to some tribulation that is floating around looking for a place to light, and use it. Or maybe we cause our own tribulation by our decisions or the life style we choose. What do you think?

"Consider my servant Job" God says. What do you think about him?
Satan answers; "Job is righteous because you bless him, let me touch him and he will surely fall".

He didn't fall but what about me? I want to hope that my walk is close enough that I too would succeed but sometimes I am doubtful. My mother said; never pray for patience... God has a way of developing it that you will not like. I think she is right in a way but Paul says we are to exult in tribulation, that means "get happy" about the trials and tribulation that come your way. Notice that the result is something called proven character. How do you prove character? It is said that character is what you are when no one is looking. So maybe we should exult or get happy when trials come our way, proven character is something to be desired. I love the way James puts it in his letter;

James 1:2-4
Consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. And let endurance have its perfect result, so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.

Endurance and perseverance are the same and both produce the desired condition of being perfect and complete with proven character. Are we there yet?

Godly Wisdom

The verse for today is one from James. James speaks much about wisdom and in chapter 3 he compares the wisdom of the world to Godly wisdom. The verse for today is James 3:17, Here it is from the NASB.

¹⁷ But the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, reasonable, full of mercy and good fruits, unwavering, without hypocrisy.

Notice that he has the qualities in order. Wisdom from above, James says, is pure, that it is holy, God is the source and it is therefore acceptable to Him. Then it is peaceable  which says that it promotes harmony among mankind. Jesus in the beatitudes said Blessed are the peacemakers for they shall be called the sons of God. Do you think it is easy or hard to be a peacemaker? Third, it is gentle or kind and considerate. I think that Godly wisdom is never harsh or ugly but always seeks the best in everyone. Fourth it is open to reason, always ready to listen. Then it abounds in compassionate love and good works. The last two qualities are stated negatively, Wisdom from above is unwavering, consistent or without uncertainty. Lastly it is without hypocrisy, It doesn't pretend to be something it isn't.

Wisdom from above is the real wisdom and if we lack wisdom, that is what we should seek.
Have a great week,

Radio on the Roof

Radio on the Roof

We have a crew working on the house, and today they are on the roof. The contractor is one who has to have some music going in the background or he just can't work. Maybe you're that way too. Fortunately he is a Christian music fan so the music is pleasant to listen to. By the way, they are going to repair and repaint that gable! The house will be like new when the job is finished.

Verse of the day

A few years ago, when I first came to Howard Payne, there was a program that displayed a verse of the day at the DOS prompt, and waited for you to press a key to continue. The verses were not random but were from a table so the verse for each date in the calendar was the same year after year. That is July 20th always produced 1 John 3:1 and always in the King James Version. I rewrote the program in Visual Basic to make it more user friendly and for the rest of my time there it came up on every computer when you rebooted it or turned it on. I was always amazed at how the verses were so appropriate for the day that they appeared on. Today's verse is no exception.

Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God...
I John 3:1

That love is a self sacrificing love that is completely unconditional. In Sunday school we recently looked at the letter to the church at Ephesus in Revelation 2. This was a church that had lost or forgotten it's first love. That first love was that which God had bestowed on them when they believed. They had received it but had failed to pass it on. The will of God, given to us in the great commission is that we share that love with all we meet, how are we doing?

Grow where you are planted

Last night in Bible study we were looking at Acts chapter 8. There were a couple of key verses that stood out to me. Verse 1 and also verse 4. Here is what they say;


8:1 And on that day a great persecution began against the church in Jerusalem, and they were all scattered throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria,


8:4 Therefore, those who had been scattered went about preaching the word.


First I notice that the Christians were scattered. Persecution was not an abnormal thing, God's people have been persecuted to some extent in every generation and many times the result is the same, scattering. We can look at it as God scattering seed like a farmer. Not that we would accuse God of sending the persecution but since it happened, he makes use of it. He scatters his people across the land and plants them in new places. Notice verse 4, the people who were scattered, "went about preaching the word". That is God's plan for growing His church. He moves us, He plants us and He expects us to grow. As we grow we plant more seeds and they too grow so we are charged to preach the word wherever we are planted and the word is powerful, the word is our seed and God uses it in His unique way to draw people to Himself.


If you have opportunity, plant a seed today.

Water over the dam....

As a result of the rain in the last post, lake Brownwood came up to about 4 feet over the spillway. In our time in Brownwood I can only remember 2 times that it has over topped the spillway. One was in July 2002 and the other was in 2007. On April 26th of this year the lake level was 13 feet low and today it is still 2.5 feet over the dam. Here are some pictures we took last evening at the spillway

A view back over the spillway

A hundred yards downstream

Water headed downstream toward Brownwood

When these events happen we get flooding in Brownwood. The Walmart and various other businesses will take on water if the water gets high enough. Invariably someone tries to drive through one of the low water crossings in the hills around the lake and we lose someone. That seems to have happened this time as well. In spite of all the warnings and reports we never learn.

Rain, Rain, Rain

The rain gauge overflowed at 6 inches overnight and another 2 inches since we emptied it. That is at least 8 inches in the last 24 hours. We are a bit waterlogged to say the least/ The lake, for the first time in a long time, is over the spillway by .08 feet. That means Pecan Bayou through town will be running bank full or more. This has been an unbelievably wet spring and summer so far.

I forgot to include the cat

It occurred to me after yesterday's post that I had forgotten to include a picture of the cat. She is not always helpful on these trips but she goes along much better than at first. Here is her favorite pose.

When we first took her with us to the creek, We took along her drinking fountain, made out of a fish bowl and a small recirculating pump. She would not touch it there but she used it great here. It was like a foreign object to her. She seems to take on a different personality when we travel with her.

The best laid plans...

Well you know the rest of that ditty, and yes they do go astray. We traveled to the creek house with 3 sizable projects in mind. We wanted to paint the outside of the house, we wanted to install a new water heater, and we wanted to replace the top on the silverware cabinet and cover it with Formica to match the main counter top. Then we wanted to replace 2 of the heating elements in the kitchen stove. The first Saturday was already taken with my sister's 50th wedding anniversary celebration. Weather forecasts made the painting iffy and then on the way back from the anniversary gig we found that the lift bucket that we planned to rent was not to be found. Both Lowes and Home Depot have none on hand. Since the top of the end walls are about 25 feet off the ground. plus the weather, the painting was scratched.

We had to wait for Monday to get the water heater so on Sunday I tackled the stove. Should be simple, 3 connections to each element, take them off and put them on and it should be good as new.

   
I did that and tested it but not by cooking on it. Martha did that later and it failed miserably. The element is controlled by a 5 position switch and the coolest 3 positions did not work at all, not just on the new ones but on all 4 elements. So cooking was difficult to say the least.

Monday came and we were getting ready to go get the water heater when the refrigerator repairman called and wanted to come replace a fan that had failed on Spring break, We were expecting that but didn't know when. That delayed the trip for the water heater until afternoon. So we got a water heater and all the plumbing supplies to connect it and returned. Other stuff took up time and it was after supper before we opened the box to get it out. When we did, we found a this.

So now we faced a 60 mile round trip to return it. That would wait until Tuesday morning and then we discovered that all the water heaters like this that were in stock were similarly damaged. So scratch project 2. That leaves us with project 3. We had purchased a piece of MDF to use on the top so the top was cut and Martha began cutting the Formica to size. Here she is working on it.

I worked on installing the Formica and trimming the edges with a router. See below

So after a couple of days work we had the cabinet ready. It came out at a perfect height and the Formica was the same pattern as the main counter so I thought it looked really good, here's a shot...

So we accomplished 1 of the major projects and the minor one didn't do well either. I removed the new elements and put the old ones in but nothing improved so I brought them home and will inquire where I bought them to see what my mistake was. Hopefully we can get it fixed on the next trip. Here are a couple of general pictures to finish up.

Daybreak Friday morning

Taking a break on Friday afternoon, no fish...

All together we drove 975 miles and it was a good trip. The weather did act up with storms on Tuesday and Wednesday with winds of around 40 MPH. We would not have wanted to be up in the bucket painting in that. We had a couple of brief rain showers but all told it wasn't bad. The anniversary celebration was great also and we got to see family that we rarely see.

Spring Break work

It is apparent that I failed to post something about our spring break trip to the creek. Some of you may want to see these pictures. We have been working on the kitchen for over a year and now it is pretty close to finished.

Here are a couple of pictures of the living area. It also looks better than it did.

Butterfly on the boat cover

The garden has grown, first Tomatoes

It is amazing what a little rain will do to the garden. We have had more spring rain this year than we have had is several years and it shows. Lake Brownwood is up 6 feet and Proctor lake is 2 feet over the spillway. Proctor was so low that they had closed all the boat ramps two weeks ago.

Look for the tomatoes in the next picture. They are right in the center, a bit fuzzy but they are there.

The Garden

Here is a picture of our garden. We only have tomatoes, peppers and squash but there should be plenty of each. This year we are trying a drip irrigation system This allows us to water a few minutes every day and with a timer we can automate the process. The timer I have leaks so I will need a new one to do the automation bit. I will do it before we go away for more than a day. The garden uses 1 gallon per hour drippers and applies the water directly to the roots of the plant, thus saving water but getting what we need on the plants. They will only run for 5-10 minutes each day. We will also use the same system to water some flowers. In close proximity to the garden we have Canna  Lilies and roses, 2 of the roses are pictured below.

Smoking meat

For a while I have been wanting to get a smoker to make Bar-B-Que and I finally did it. This one is an electric smoker and it works quite well. We have used it 3 times to smoke a brisket, some spare ribs, and a pork loin. All three were good but it takes some getting used to when you try to figure out how long and how hot. Most meat is smoked at about 225-250 degrees. So far we have used Mesquite and Hickory wood chips to produce the smoke and various combinations of spices for a rub to season the meat. As you can see it also makes a good cup warmer. You can't see the smoke here but there was some. The pork loin is inside and I failed to get a photo of that to include. I will next time.

This gives you an idea of the size. There are two racks inside for the meat and a water pan on the bottom. There is also a chip pan to put the wood chips in. All in all it is a very useful device and we like it.

We also got a couple of chairs to go on the patio and we used it for breakfast the very next Saturday. The chairs are quite comfortable and seem to be more durable than the ones we used to have.