This light bulb is the first "start to finish" project I completed in Adobe Illustrator.

My family camps in the summer - sometimes just the three of us, sometimes with my parents and siblings. Always, there's a fire.

I can sit for hours just staring into the flame. Life-giving and life-taking. Sometimes we don't use campstoves at all - we just cook over the fire.

We keep it burning.

The Bible sometimes portrays God as flame.

One of the first times is when God entered into the covenant with Abraham. In Genesis 15, Abraham prepared the animals for entering into a covenant. The phrase most often used was to "cut a covenant" - animals were cut in half and both parties entering into the covenant walked between the halves together.

God did not do this with Abraham. The animals were prepared and God appeared to Abraham in a dream, as a smoking firepot and a flaming torch. The flame alone moved between the the halves of the animals. God alone would keep the covenant, regardless of how man would fail.

He would keep it burning.

Later, Moses would have an encounter with God - in the form of a burning bush.

The Lord said,

"I have surely seen the affliction of my people who are in Egypt and have heard their cry because of their taskmasters. I know their sufferings, 8and I have come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up out of that land to a good and broad land, a land flowing with milk and honey..."

It was the Lord that kept it burning.

Much, much later, entering the New Covenant time, it was the Holy Spirit that appeared. Divided tongues of fire rested on the people gathered and they were filled with the Holy Spirit.

The Spirit keeps it burning.

What is our fascination with fire? Life-giving, life-taking. Essential for life, yet dangerous.

Remember the line from "The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe."

“Safe? Who said anything about safe? ’Course he isn’t safe. But he’s good. He’s the king, I tell you.”

Like fire.

Like Abraham, it is not us that keeps it burning - it's God.
Like Moses, He appears where and when we do not expect.
Like at Pentecost, He rests in each of those who trust in Him.

"He's the King, I tell you..."

He keeps it burning.

I'm going to be "out of touch" for a little while.  I'm "having my head examined" - mostly the sinus part.  It seems I have a "small mouth" - I'm sure that's stunning news to some of you all - and a low soft palette.  And an overbite.

Combined, they want to do a sleep study.  I've packed and I'm not coming home tomorrow night (work, class, pick up a couple of things like cold meds, then sleep clinic).

I'm hoping that apnea is involved - if it is, then treatment for the other bothersome things is covered by insurance.  It seems weird to ask for prayer that something IS wrong with me...but...

😉

I love being able to follow incoming links! Read - and please do watch the video. As the site that I stole it from said, "keep a tissue handy."

[From Sports Illustrated, By Rick Reilly]

I try to be a good father. Give my kids mulligans. Work nights to pay for their text messaging. Take them to swimsuit shoots. But compared with Dick Hoyt, I suck.

Eighty-five times he's pushed his disabled son, Rick, 26.2 miles in marathons. Eight times he's not only pushed him 26.2 miles in a wheelchair but also towed him 2.4 miles in a dinghy while swimming and
pedaled him 112 miles in a seat on the handlebars--all in the same day. Dick's also pulled him cross-country skiing, taken him on his back mountain climbing and once hauled him across the U.S. on a bike. Makes taking your son bowling look a little lame, right?

And what has Rick done for his father? Not much--except save his life.

This love story began in Winchester, Mass., 43 years ago, when Rick was strangled by the umbilical cord during birth, leaving him brain-damaged and unable to control his limbs. ``He'll be a vegetable the rest of his life;'' Dick says doctors told him and his wife, Judy, when Rick was nine months old. ``Put him in an institution.'' But the Hoyts weren't buying it.

They noticed the way Rick's eyes followed them around the room. When Rick was 11 they took him to the engineering department at Tufts University and asked if there was anything to help the boy communicate. ``No way,'' Dick says he was told. ``There's nothing going on in his brain.''

"Tell him a joke,'' Dick countered. They did. Rick laughed. Turns out a lot was going on in his brain.

Rigged up with a computer that allowed him to control the cursor by touching a switch with the side of his head, Rick was finally able to communicate. First words? ``Go Bruins!'' And after a high school classmate was paralyzed in an accident and the school organized a charity run for him, Rick pecked out, ``Dad, I want to do that.''

Yeah, right. How was Dick, a self-described ``porker'' who never ran more than a mile at a time, going to push his son five miles? Still, he tried. ``Then it was me who was handicapped,'' Dick says. ``I was sore for two weeks.''

That day changed Rick's life. ``Dad,'' he typed, ``when we were running, it felt like I wasn't disabled anymore!'' And that sentence changed Dick's life. He became obsessed with giving Rick that feeling as often as he could. He got into such hard-belly shape that he and Rick were ready to try the 1979 Boston Marathon. ``No way,'' Dick was told by a race official. The Hoyts weren't quite a single runner, and they weren't quite a wheelchair competitor. For a few years Dick and Rick just joined the massive field and ran anyway, then they found a way to get into the race officially: In 1983 they ran another marathon so fast they made the qualifying time for Boston the following year.

Then somebody said, ``Hey, Dick, why not a triathlon?'' How's a guy who never learned to swim an d hadn't ridden a bike since he was six going to haul his 110-pound kid through a triathlon? Still, Dick tried. Now they've done 212 triathlons, including four grueling 15-hour Ironmans in Hawaii. It must be a buzzkill to be a 25-year-old stud getting passed by an old guy towing a grown man in a dinghy, don't you think?

Hey, Dick, why not see how you'd do on your own? ``No way,'' he says. Dick does it purely for ``the awesome feeling'' he gets seeing Rick with a cantaloupe smile as they run, swim and ride together. This year, at ages 65 and 43, Dick and Rick finished their 24th Boston Marathon, in 5,083rd place out of more than 20,000 starters. Their best time? Two hours, 40 minutes in 1992--only 35 minutes off the world record, which, in case you don't keep track of these things, happens to be held by a guy who was not pushing another man in a wheelchair at the time.

``No question about it,'' Rick types. ``My dad is the Father of the Century.'' And Dick got something else out of all this too. Two years ago he had a mild heart attack during a race. Doctors found that one of his arteries was 95% clogged. ``If you hadn't been in such great shape,'' one doctor told him, ``you probably would've died 15 years ago.'' So, in a way, Dick and Rick saved each other's life.

Rick, who has his own apartment (he gets home care) and works in Boston, and Dick, retired from the military and living in Holland, Mass., always find ways to be together. They give speeches around the country and compete in some backbreaking race every weekend, including this Father's Day.

That night, Rick will buy his dad dinner, but the thing he really wants to give him is a gift he can never buy. ``The thing I'd most like,'' Rick types, ``is that my dad sit in the chair and I push him once.''

Here's the video....

WATCH ME NOW

The Story:

Last week we (my class) went to the "fish ladder". The salmon are running.

Each fall many, many salmon swim from Lake Michigan up the river to a place (I'm not sure where) where they spawn. This is designed into them - they must swim and spawn. To do otherwise is something that wouldn't enter into their lives - they swim upstream and spawn.

Grand Rapids used to have rapids - now we just have a series of dams. Unfortunately, this make it difficult for the salmon. (I took this short video with my cell phone - it didn't convert very well, but it's enough for you to get the "picture". You can easily see the first salmon leap, then there are three more trying.)

They jump and jump and jump and just can't quite make it over the dam by themselves. It's too big and they just can't do it.

Grand Rapids responded to the salmon's difficulty by building this. It's called the "fish ladder" and it provides a series of steps for the salmon to make their way up the river. But the river is wide and the way into the ladder is narrow. Most of the salman continue to fight the dam and run headlong into the cement wall time after time time.

(Original image is here) you can see the triangular structure on the other side - the small rectangle is the entrance to the ladder.

There is yet another obstacle for these fish. Each day that the salmon are running, there is a group of people standing in the river - with fishing poles. Sometimes the need to eat outweighs the drive to spawn. They get caught and (much of the time) smoked.

The salmon that make it into the fish ladder have to leap a series of steps and at the top, the opening back into the river is only a foot wide, another narrow way.

The reward is life - perhaps not for them, but for their species - exhausted from the struggle past the dam, the salmon continue up the river.

The Application:

I was standing at the railing of the fish ladder, mesmorized by the running of the water (with the occasional splash of a salmon butting her head against cement).

I realized - that salmon is ME!

I have my "daily dams" - the cement walls that hurt my head after I smash into them a number of times. . Life is hard; my friend Phil tells me that "life is a testing ground, not a resting ground." Like the fish, there is "somebody" waiting to entangle me.

Unlike the salmon, I know that the narrow way is there. "In here", there is still work; the way is not easy. But it's better than "out there". "Out there", I can't even see over the "dams". The cement wall seems insurmountable - and it is, if I'm in my own strength. "In here" the steps are little and directed - they have a purpose. I can see over them. There is Somebody helping me.

We don't have to face our "daily dams" alone - our Help in time of struggles is right there beside us, waiting to guide us.

At the end of this life's struggles is the door into rest; eternity in His presence.

Matthew 11:29
Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.

Tonight in Anatomy/Physiology our professor said something interesting.

He specifically said, "the human body is designed to..."

I've sat in a class and heard the teacher use the phrase, "humans have evolved to..."

My favorite science is not biology, it's geology (but I needed a lab science so here I am in Anatomy).  I have pictures of my kids hugging a dinasaur fossil, I've walked around fossil beds and I've seen amazing things (I love south-eastern Utah).

I know that God created.  God created everything.  How?  Did he take a literal seven days?  Or not?

It's a subject that I've wondered about - I believe that "evolution" is totally wrong.  I believe that God created.

The "how" is what I've been wanting to explore...

First, I want to take a look at the three major belief systems within Christianity:
1. Arminianism
2. Reformed
3. Roman Catholicism

All three hold to the "Apostle's Creed" (first and foremost, belief in the Trinity - except for some cases in the Arminian camp)

Arminianism: The closest thing there is to a "confession" in the broadest Arminian tradition are the "Articles of Remonstrance".

Article 3
That man has not saving grace of himself, nor of the energy of his free will, inasmuch as he, in the state of apostasy and sin, can of an by himself neither think, will, nor do any thing that is truly good (such as saving Faith eminently is); but that it is needful that he be born again of God in Christ, through his Holy Spirit, and renewed in understanding, inclination, or will, and all his powers, in order that he may rightly understand, think, will, and effect what is truly good, according to the Word of Christ, John 15:5, “Without me ye can do nothing.

Article 4
That this grace of God is the beginning, continuance, and accomplishment of all good, even to this extent, that the regenerate man himself, without prevenient or assisting, awakening, following and cooperative grace, can nei­ther think, will, nor do good, nor withstand any temptations to evil; so that all good deeds or movements, that can be conceived, must be ascribed to the grace of God in Christ. but respects the mode of the operation of this grace, it is not irresistible; inas­much as it is written con­cerning many, that they have resisted the Holy Ghost. Acts 7, and else­where in many places.

Anybody who has spent time in an Arminian church has heard "everybody has a "God-shaped-hole" in them. Basically, Arminius taught "total depravity", but believed that "total" didn't mean depraved enough that people couldn't respond to God's call of their own free will - looking for something to fill in that "God-shaped-hole".

Reformed: The Westminster Confession says, "From this original corruption, whereby we are utterly indisposed, disabled, and made opposite to all good, and wholly inclined to all evil, do proceed all actual transgressions." (Chapter IV, section 4)

Instead of saying "we all have a God-shaped-hole", I put it "God has a me-shaped-hole"- there is a place prepared in glory. Obviously, God has no need for me, or any other person; the point is that God is the one that makes the move.

(note: where I find that the confessions don't agree with the Bible, I don't agree with the confessions. The Reformed confessions and catechisms were - for the most part - written in a movement away from Rome - sometimes they went a little too far. Two examples are the sections directly before and after this section.)

Roman Catholicism: The Roman Catholic Catecism says (407) The doctrine of original sin, closely connected with that of redemption by Christ, provides lucid discernment of man's situation and activity in the world. By our first parents' sin, the devil has acquired a certain domination over man, even though man remains free. Original sin entails "captivity under the power of him who thenceforth had the power of death, that is, the devil" Ignorance of the fact that man has a wounded nature inclined to evil gives rise to serious errors in the areas of education, politics, social action and morals.

Humans remain "free", but "wounded".

Why was this important to the Reformers?

The doctrine of total depravity is also known as "man's inability". The focus on the Reformers was a call to the Scriptures as the final authority and a call to the cross of Christ as the hope of our salvation and a call to the humble acceptance of the sovereignty of God.

To teach "total depravity" meant to them that all of the glory for our salvation was due entirely to God.

Every doctrine that we add to "salvation" makes the cross smaller. Every "mediator" puts distance between us and our Lord. Every requirement that man can fulfill is one more area that Christ does not have to fill.

There is nothing that I can do (or not do) that will make my feeble attempts at righteousness more acceptable to God.

It is not who I am,

but what He has done.

It is not what I have done,

but who He is.

My internet connection has been "intermittent".  Meaning that sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't.

My cable television is working ok, but comcast is telling me that I need new wiring outside my house - hopefully that will happen today.  In the meantime, if this is one of the three or four minute blocks...that's why I've been mostly silent (I pre-posted a couple of things last weekend)

The “religion of peace and tolerance” is at it again...this is not strictly a post about the persecuted church, as we know it today.  But, "the day will come..."
Sheik Abu Saqer, leader of Gaza’s Jihadia Salafiya Islamic outreach movement, which seeks to make secular Muslims more religious, called the pope a “puppet” for “that crusader George Bush.”

Muslims around the world are “protesting” the pope’s quotation of Byzantine emperor Manuel Il Paleologus, who wrote, “Show me just what Muhammad brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached."

The pope explained that the intent of the quote was to call for a dialogue on the role of religions in modern life.

Saqer said the only Christian-Muslim dialogue that is acceptable is one in which “all religions agree to convert to Islam."

Followers of Islam – in protest to being labeled a religion of violence – have killed a nun, churches have been attacked in the West Bank and Gaza Strip – a group calling themselves the “Lions of Monotheism” claim responsibility for the church attackes, saying the violence is in response to the pope (calling Islam a religion of violence – do you all see the irony here?)

We have been warned:

“The day will soon come when the green flag of the La Illah Illah Allah (there is no god but Allah) and Muhammad Rasul Allah (Muhammad is the prophet of Allah) will be raised upon the Vatican and all around the world and on the fortresses of those who want to destroy Islam, because they know that this religion obliges them to face the truth that Islam is Allah’s favorite religion. And until they join Islam, hell is their last station.” – Abu Saqer

Read more.

I lost a stick of butter this week…not much, but even if I lost “only” a stick of butter each week, over the course of a year, that’s thirteen pounds. Of course, I could be doing a lot better at one of the fruits of the spirit: self-control.

Yesterday at the Weight Watchers meeting, somebody said, “Persistence, not perfection.” I'll try to remember that; I'll also remember that when I drop an egg, I don't throw up my hands and say, "darn, the whole dozen's ruined!". In the same way, if I slip up during the day, the whole day is not ruined.

I got an e-mail from a person on a recipe list that I’m on. Her signature line is: “Today I shall…try to bear in mind the many great kindnesses that God has done for me, and ignore the relatively insignificant displeasures in my life.” In the classroom I just left, I worked with a great man. He said, "God's been so good to me, how can I have a bad day?"

This morning’s sermon was on 1 Corinthians 6:12-20. We know the middle part of this passage addresses the ritual (and other) immorality in Corinth. But the part that stuck out for me this morning (with my one lonely stick of butter on my mind) was that Paul didn’t start out talking about sex.

"All things are lawful for me," but not all things are helpful. "All things are lawful for me," but I will not be enslaved by anything.” Food is meant for the stomach and the stomach for food"--and God will destroy both one and the other. Last week, too many times, I was mastered by food. It was either “I want sweet” or “I want salty”. Too much of this, too much of that. Not enough of the good stuff.

This passage winds up with “Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body.” Yes, we relate that passage to the middle part of the text…but it’s all part of the same text. Why do we not pay attention to the first part? Is it because we tend to give a “sin pass” to certain sins (gluttony)?

What I want to keep in front of me this week is this question: Is it glorifying to God to have food (or anything else) in control of my body?

This week I resolve that “All things are lawful for me, but I will not be enslaved by anything.”