Saturday Scraps

For a while I've been wanting to do a blog about what has been rattling around at the top of my head all week. I did not know just how to do it. Saturday mornings are the only morning the kids and I act like bums for a few hours. Rick works on Saturday first of all so we don't have the normal day off that many people around us do. So, we don't hurry to get the day going. The only to-dos we have are chores. The kids have a tradition of cartoons on one of the two stations we do get and some what we call "Saturday morning cereal" which usually is something like Coco Puffs or Lucky Charms. We don't get them every Saturday but most.
So, while they chill in their jamies I usually have my coffee and get on the computer. It makes a good time to gather those scraps together.

• I'm really enjoying the chronological reading. I'm so impressed with the issue of time. How big a barrier time is to our trust in God. Perhaps it's impressed upon me because I struggle with impatience. Looking at the bible God seems to move like a Dinosaur! Everyone in the stories struggles to wait on God and his promises. Most of the trouble comes from women trying to make things happen on their own. Yet, God still uses their meddling for all his purposes. Joseph is impressing me the most lately though with his willingness to be and do whatever the Lord puts him in and to respond trustworthy at any level of responsibility. He had such cause to be bitter for all the wrong done to him and yet he escapes this sinful attitude by continually keeping his eyes on God. He seems of higher integrity than even King David to me in many ways. Back to the timing issue as well, I was hit with the significance of that band of Ishmaelites on camels that came by and bought Joseph from his brothers. Somehow my mind took me right into that scene. Who could know that those camel hoofs as they hit and shuffled the sand, were moving history. They were ushering in the transfer of the whole nation of Israel in Egypt. God knew what was going to happen and I'm sure every hoof and every clink of coins as they were transferred must have rung in his ears. It would save the nation from dispersing itself through marriage to outsiders and redistribution of the people to new lands. It would gather them and purify their lineage but it would also bring them under great oppression for so many years. Those camels brought on their backs, a new large and significant chapter in the history of God's people. The starting thread to a great tapestry.


• I'm very disappointed with Pat Robertson and his tactless insensitivity. I don't like when Christians give the enemy fuel to feed a fire of hatred against God's people. I also don't enjoy the words he used to say that the Devil was responsible for the events against the French in that country. Satan does nothing unless God allows him and people cannot have things they want to happen happen by going to Satan and him saying "okay". Pat made Satan look powerful and God look like the impersonal crushing giant standing in heaven and saying "there you go...bam!" We can never presume what God's decisions are regarding a nation unless he tells us himself. In the OT he does do that. He says he destroyed a people because... but if he does not say, we don't dare guess at his ways. I do know that the heart of Christ weeps for these. Just as he does for every injustice, every deep painful loss, every natural disaster. The whole earth is under the curse still and all of creation cries out for relief from it. I'm sure he weeps at what the effects of that curse results in on those he created. We know that it was that love for us for which he came to die. This disaster could happen to any people at any time and God would sorrow to see it happen on any of us. It makes me remember and be thankful that he has a plan to redeem it all. "For behold, I make all things new". Pat Robertson made me feel like I was in the temple hearing the two men pray that Jesus spoke of. One who said "thank you Lord that I am not like that man, filthy and unrighteous" and the other man who beat his chest and wept and tore his clothes before God for his unrighteousness but deep desire to be saved. Jesus told us which one the Father heard.


• I've been struggling with a bizarre health problem. In early December I had woke up with a seriously painful stiff neck. It was equal on both sides and I could hardly turn it at all. It was not like you get when you sleep wrong, it was way more painful than that. It was some of the worst pain I've every felt and I've had three kids. A week later I had a huge swollen gland in my under arm that was so painful but the neck was better so I was thankful. The swelling was there about a week also and began to move down my arm with the pain. After a few more days I could not stretch my arm out palm up all the way or stretch it out above my head all the way. I finally decided to see the doctor the week after Christmas. He put me on antibiotics for 10 days thinking it was an infection in my glands. I did not notice any difference except that I could stretch it a little more out. About this time I began to battle some real fears as to what was going on in my body. I spiked a strange high fever for 24 hours as well that had no other symptoms. After seeing my dad slowly fade away and die at 54 of cancer, I knew that nothing was guaranteed me. I also knew it was probably nothing and these thoughts battled themselves out in my mind over and over. I would think things like "that's it, I just need someone to do a full body MRI to make sure I don't have cancer" and then the Lord would speak to my heart and say "I know exactly what is going on in your body, and they could do all those tests and still not see what I may be able to see". The doctor saw me again and ordered an ultrasound on my arm. It was to make sure there were no blood clots. It was fine but there was still this long hard vein in my arm that was sore and knotted inside in places (very tiny but you could feel it on the outside). He put me on a 10 day regiment of aspirin and I have noticed a slight improvement in the vein. I'm still not sure whats causing it or if there is a bigger problem but this Focus on The Family was just for me. You have to listen. A mans healing is caught on audible recording. He was just in the middle of talking about healing and how God does whatever is best for His glory. That he sometimes heals and sometimes does not. In the middle of talking you can hear him being healed. I love how he tells Dobson at the end that if we could see the purposes of God in our problems we would probably be more willing to go through them. Yet, isn't that what faith is? Falling on the certainty of the goodness of God.

I think that's it for this week. At least all that's worth a spotlight....the rest is random jumbled mess!