Category: Imagine

Out of Bounds?! Brought Home, Again!

Friday, April 8, 2022

Go This Far

Not Past The Treeline!

Or Do You Live Outside the Boundaries?

2 Samuel 12:13

David said to Nathan, ‘I have sinned against the Lord.’

Nathan said to David, ‘Now the Lord has put away your sin; you shall not die.’

Colossians 2:13

When you were dead in trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made you alive together with him, when he forgave us all our trespasses.

Words of Grace For Today

Going out of bounds.

Growing up in Tanzania before the land was so densely populated so that our backyard went on for miles and miles of bush once we crossed the dry creek bed (which flowed strong and dangerously in the wet season) and on two different farms in ‘northern’ Minnesota both of which were surrounded by open land for miles, and in the Twin Cities where our back yard bordered on an old farm yard surrounded by acres and acres of undeveloped land which continued across the road into a huge impenetrable swamp, when we played we had free reign for miles. In each place there were boundaries as to how far we would venture, sometimes how far we were allowed to venture, sometimes how far we had agreed with each other to venture when we played. There had to be boundaries so that the games we played would work.

We did venture outside the boundaries, of course. We were after all children.

We did venture outside the invisible boundaries, like the time my older brothers killed a bird, started a fire, roasted it, and we each had a small bite. So exciting, in part because killing was ‘out of bounds’, starting a fire was ‘out of bounds’, and eating a wild bird was ‘out of bounds’. Thinking about it today the fire was reasonably dangerous, but eating a wild bird was ridiculously dangerous. Today, with all the ‘new’ diseases around it would be even more so.

Then there was the time that I just absently minded, not yet 5 years old, ventured beyond where my three older brothers were playing in that dry creek bed behind our house in Kiomboi. I was making what-I-cannot-remember in the sand and gravel. Darkness approached. My brothers probably yelled for me to come with them. They took off for the safety of the house. I continued to play, unawares of what was falling fast all around me. It was a short hike back home. Twilight lasted a mere 24 minutes at best. Once it was into dusk …

At night in the dark, as we were tucked into bed, each in our own bed, four beds, four older boys, in one large room with windows on one long side and one shorter side of the oblong room, the shrill piercing vicious cries and growls, the gaping mouths filled with big teeth, the yellow eyes and long noses of the hyenas more than often enough would jar us back awake and keep us awake for hours. Not that the hyenas wasted that much time at the windows, but our hearts would make up all sorts of terrible scenarios of them breaking in through the glass and/or the screens if the windows were open to cool the room for the ‘quiet’ of the night.

There I was, out of bounds playing in the sand and gravel of the creek bed, darkness falling fast as I was unawares. And then it fell. I jumped up in terror-alarm, and sped as fast as my panic fuelled short legs would carry me along the path between the bushes. The growls began behind me, the shrill cries pierced my little mind and my legs just would not pump any faster.

When I reached the closest door, the door to the kitchen, I grabbed it with what strength I had and …

…

Susanne, our house helper, pulled me in, closed the door behind me, and soothed my fears, before she stepped out the door for her walk home.

I was safe, and that welcome from Susanne told my little heart and mind that, though I had strayed outside the boundaries of safety, I was welcomed home, even if that welcome cost her her own safety as she made the trek to her own home of safety somewhere out there past the dark boundaries for us little boys, though well within her boundaries.

David steps many times outside the boundaries God has set for the ruler-warrior of the Israelite nation from its infancy to its heyday. The time he must pay with his life is when he has not only taken Bathsheba for his own, but he has ensured that her husband, his good general on the battlefield, will not return. David arranges for ‘friendly fire’ to kill Uriah, so that he can keep her, and cover up that she is pregnant with his child.

Nathan steps up to give David a lesson, a lesson that proud, powerful David needs, in order that David can confess once again how far out of bounds David has ventured, this time worse than many other times. The punishment must be David’s own life in exchange for Uriah’s.

Like Susanne at the kitchen door, once David has confessed his terrible sin, Nathan pronounces God’s forgiveness and welcoming of David, back ‘into bounds’, back into the safety of living in God’s house, in God’s creation, within God’s boundaries, boundaries that keep us safe from ourselves and from the evil ‘hyenas’ out there ready to tear us apart without hesitation.

So it is as always that God’s unconditional and steadfast love restores us to life. We can trust that even when we stray ‘out of bounds’, as we confess God promises us that we shall not die. Indeed God makes us alive together with Christ, forgiving us all our trespasses.

Stay safe today, and always. Know that even when we stray, God welcomes us home to safety with open arms, and the honest love of friends like Nathan, and soothing comfort of people like Suzanne.

Covid Costs! Listening to Whom?

Monday, April 4, 2022

What Do We See?

What Do We Hear?

Whose Voice Do We Follow?

Psalm 23:2-3

He makes me lie down in green pastures; he leads me beside still waters; he restores my soul. He leads me in right paths for his name’s sake.

John 10:27-28

My sheep hear my voice. I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish. No one will snatch them out of my hand.

Words of Grace For Today

Covid has exacted a huge cost on us. Not to mention the cost to global, national, and local economies. Not to mention the many people Covid has killed in one of the most excruciatingly painful ways. Not to mention many of those who survive serious Covid symptoms continue seemingly without end for years long-covid: fatigue, pains, circulation and nerve malfunctions, organ malfunction, brain fog, and depression. So much depression.

The greatest number of people suffer even though they have not had Covid, or the symptoms were so mild they barely noticed more than as if they had a light bout of the flu or a bad cold. The suffering is part and parcel, we are told, of living through a pandemic.

Mark Gollom described it this way:

“pandemic fatigue”
Alberta Premier Jason Kenney recently said that, despite the rapid spread of the Omicron variant across the country, Canadians may be at their “outer limits” of what further public-health restrictions they’re willing to accept.
While many people are “burnt out” on COVID and COVID-related news, many [say]
‘We’re sick of it. We hate it, but we’ve got to do it anyway.’
However, the researchers also discovered that pandemic fatigue affects “a substantial minority of people” who tended to have “greater levels of emotional burnout, pessimism, apathy, and cynical or negative beliefs” about the pandemic.
“In other words, pandemic fatigue was associated with heightened self-interest to the expense of community needs,”
That has led to a form of “systematic desensitization…. it’s as if we had built up antibodies against fear.”

https://www.cbc.ca/news/health/pandemic-fatigue-omicron-covid-19-1.6290026 Dec 18, 2021

There are many, many more things going on with all of us, not all of us equally, and some of us to the point that we are nearly totally debilitated, unable to live anything like normal, even taking into account that we may be isolated physically from others.

The words that describe what we suffer go on and on like this: languishing, languor, lethargy, apathy, listlessness, supine (laying on one’s back), supineness, anxiety, fearlessness, angst, dread, disquiet, foolhardy, imprudent, reckless, irresponsible, depression, desolation, despondency, gloominess, dispirited, bleakness, Weltschmerz ….

Or as University of Calgary classics professor Peter Toohey put it in an interview with CBC’s Chattopadhyay: We’re experiencing the ancient state of “acedia”

https://www.cbc.ca/player/play/1800018499786 1 year ago

There are so many voices blaring all over the place, whispering in corners, projecting over crowds and chat rooms, telling us what to think, what to do, who to blame, how to ‘return to normal’, how to be done with Covid, how to cope with Covid, how to live with Covid, for while we may be done with Covid, Covid certainly is not done with us!

Which voices will we listen to?

Like never before, like always before for every person in every generation how we see the world greatly determines what we see, how we feel (the emotional response that takes in all our perceptions, mixes them up with our convolutions from our past experiences), which in turn forms our ‘take’ on the world happenings, which in large part determines how we respond.

So how do we start each day?

Do we enter the new day with angst, panic, depression, apathy, detachment and fear?

Or

Do we listen to the voice that we know, the voice of the One who knows us completely, who created us and loves us and forgives us and renews us.

The One who makes us lie down in green pastures; who leads us beside still waters; who restores our souls. Who leads us in right paths for God’s name’s sake.

Whatever else we know about this day, first and foremost we know that No one will snatch us out of Jesus’ hand.

With that assurance, we are ready come what may.

Mags and Hagar

Sunday, April 3, 2022

No Matter the Wilderness We Find Ourselves In

God is There with Us.

Genesis 21:17-18

God heard the voice of the boy; and the angel of God called to Hagar from heaven, and said to her, ‘What troubles you, Hagar? Do not be afraid; for God has heard the voice of the boy where he is. Come, lift up the boy and hold him fast with your hand, for I will make a great nation of him.’

Hebrews 12:12-13

Therefore lift your drooping hands and strengthen your weak knees, and make straight paths for your feet, so that what is lame may not be put out of joint, but rather be healed.

Words of Grace For Today

Mags met Silvia at one of her first DNA and nanobot treatments. ‘Met’ is a bit much. Mags saw Silvia laying unconscious, her treatment almost done. Mags was next. Margaret was her real name, but that’s what they called her grandmother, and Maggie was her aunt, so she’d been tagged as Mags since she could remember.

Mags and Silvia had little in common. Where Silvia was single, Mags was married with three kids just pushing into teenage traumas. Where Silvia had years of treatments behind her, this was Mags first round of cancer. Where Silvia worked with refugees, Mags stayed home with the kids and volunteered at her church as the secretary, in the office two mornings and one afternoon a week and working from home the rest of the week.

Where Silvia doubted God more than trusted God, Mags was faithful in everything. She trusted God, thanked God for her blessings, her three kids and a wonderful husband.

Mags knew the Bible pretty well, and certainly the stories of Sarah and Abraham, and the ugliness of their stories, especially what they did to Hagar and her son. She could not imagine how anyone God chose could do such a thing to another person. Yet she trusted that God would do for many, many people what God did for Hagar and Ishmael; God encouraged them, strengthened them, guided them, and saved them. Mags trusted that God would continue to save her and her family. She had almost died as a teenager, stupid as she had been playing with dangerous drugs for the thrill of it. She hoped that her lesson would be clearly remembered by her kids.

A month ago her last physical showed something wrong in her blood, and the follow up was a chance discovery: even though she did not feel it, she was terribly sick, with less than a few months to live as cancer ran rampant through her blood, bones, nerves, muscles and all her connecting tissue. She’d been a bit tired, and then this news ran her into the ground. The treatments started, her Mondays and Tuesdays disappeared and she woke up in her bed on Wednesdays, unable to move even if she’d wanted to.

The day after Silvia received her shocking and wonderful ‘miracle’ news, the doctor sat next to Mags’ stretcher and explained that the treatments were working for her, but her body was falling apart faster than the treatments could rebuild it. He told her she might have a few more weeks. Certainly not more.

A few hours later Mags sat up to talk with her kids and her husband. Why not sit up, it would make no difference anyway. She encouraged her kids to trust God in everything, and to pray constantly. Her suffering from cancer would be short, her death quick. They planned her funeral together to be a simple worship service streamed and recorded for the congregation to take part in online. Her burial would be simple, since most of her organs and limbs were going to be used in science research for how the DNA manipulation and nanobots had worked and not worked for her. The little part of her body that was not taken would be cremated. They picked out a simple urn for her ashes. They bought a cemetery plot online. They would dig the little grave together. All ten family members would gather as their pastor led them in a short service of thanks.

When the kids were about to head off to bed after the funeral planning, she reminded them of Hagar and Ishmael’s story. If God could take care of those two in the dessert, certainly God would guide, provide for, and save them as well … after she was gone.

Plans and Plans

Wednesday, March 30, 2022

Beauty and Blessings

Nehemiah 13:2

They did not meet the Israelites with bread and water, but hired Balaam against them to curse them—yet our God turned the curse into a blessing.

2 Corinthians 5:19

In Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting the message of reconciliation to us.

Words of Grace For Today

Ah, the plans and schemes of mice and men … and women and … well, all the plans of pretty much all of us.

They just are not anything like God’s plans for us before creation, and for every day of our lives.

We try hard to make life on our own, and our enemies try hard to undo our plans with their plans.

Thankfully God’s plans prevail.

God turns our enemies efforts to curse us into blessings for us.

God turns our many trespasses into renewed life, by the work of Jesus who reconciles the whole world (even us) to himself.

Of course, each day, we still need bread and water … and every once and a while we need something a bit more nutritious, and every day we need something to feed the rest of us.

More than food, we need to have our souls fed and nourished.

We need to be nourished so that even in the darkest darkness of life we can remember the work that Christ has completed for us, the work of reconciling us to God.

No matter what happens, God always has work for us, carrying the message of Christ’ reconciliation to all whom we meet.

Busy with that work we can surrender our plans so that we can fit into God’s plan for us, and all God’s people, and all of creation.

Nice as it is to try to work our own way forward, there is no better life than to spread God’s reconciliation wherever we go, however we go, no matter what challenges we face.

‘Reframability’ & Possibility

Monday, March 21, 2022

Shadows Point to The Light

Each Morning, Noon, and Night

Psalm 143:8

Let me hear of your steadfast love in the morning, for in you I put my trust. Teach me the way I should go, for to you I lift up my soul.

1 Timothy 6:6-7

Of course, there is great gain in godliness combined with contentment; for we brought nothing into the world, so that we can take nothing out of it.

Words of Grace For Today

While many strive to gain comforts, privileges, and securities (of many kinds, all futile), we seek the only gain that is sure: that God provides us love and faith (by Grace, ie as free gifts) and contentment in our lives, for while we come into life with nothing and we can take nothing with us, we do leave behind our own story.

What will that story be?

Will others gain faith from our stories? Or will they only learn to chase after what cannot offer them life?

It is not insignificant what story others have from us (as opposed to the stories that are untrue that many tell about us – those untrue stories work against the liars who create them and tell and retell them). It is not insignificant what story others have from us because each day, we humans are privileged to be able to ‘reframe’ our new day with how we think about life past, present and future.

That is: we are not written in stone from one day to the next. Some take this as opportunity to lie about their past and to scheme to ‘improve’ their future with more lies. Oh, what a waste that brings misery and despair to so many people, those liars and so many impacted by their lies.

God provides this opportunity to us each day (actually every minute), so that we can repent, that is so that we can turn our lives around, reframe them according to God’s Grace, Love and Hope for us (demonstrated in Jesus’ story), and proceed to be more of who God created us to be!

So we pray with the Psalmist: Let me hear of your steadfast love in the morning, for in you I put my trust. Teach me the way I should go, for to you I lift up my soul.

It is not that we have never heard of God’s steadfast love, or that we do not know God’s way for us, or that our lives are in ruin and need to be rescued from the hand of the Devil, the Great Deceiver (though too often that is the case). It is simply that since we get to reframe our lives, we also must reframe our lives. If we do not turn to God to receive the Word that will reframe our lives according to God’s steadfast love for us, the Devil will certainly provide all sorts of words, lies always, that will draw us in, slowly turn us away from God, and consume us, until we are nothing like the creatures of steadfast love that God created us to be.

So what do we want to be today?

What word will reframe your day, this morning?

May God save us from the Deceiver’s tempting words that suck us in to the downward spiral away from life itself.

May God provide wondrous words to communicate God’s steadfast love, grace, and hope for us.

In a Word, we pray (it is not too much to ask, and it is everything so we beg):

May we see Jesus each morning!

Where, Oh Where … !?!

Friday, March 18, 2022

Where Is God?

Down This Path?

On This Mountain?

Beside This Lake?

In The Crowded Cities?

God Save Us, Now!

Psalm 10:1

Why, O Lord, do you stand far off? Why do you hide yourself in times of trouble?

Mark 4:38

But he was in the stern, asleep on the cushion; and they woke him up and said to him, ‘Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?’

Words of Grace For Today

I flew out in the fall to a remote fire tower to make a pastoral visit to the crew there. There was no way to announce my visit. I just took off, navigated by dead reckoning, and landed at the small grass clearing that served as a air strip. I’d circled over the tower and taken in the paths through the bush that wound the kilometre or so between it and the air strip. Airplane secured, I set off and …

hours later I was deep in the bush with no way of finding the tower in time to spend even a minute with the crew and still find my way back to the air strip before dark, and before dark I needed, most desperately needed to be in the air. There was no way a take off in the dark in an unknown airstrip was something I was even considering as doable. And anything not doable was certainly not ‘well, let’s see if it’s possible!’ So I oriented myself by the sun low in the sky back towards the plane.

As I came to a junction of paths in the bush, both directions on the new path hidden from view until I stepped into the junction, I got the scare of my life, or one of many.

There, not more than six feet to my right (the direction I needed to turn) was a calf and her mama, a cow moose. The calf was half size and still looked down at me. I froze. Moose have a pea size brain, and they survive only because they are bigger, tougher, and faster than most any predator.

Encounters with humans are so dangerous because, being so … well stupid … they are totally unpredictable and usually they charge, especially when their young are threatened! The results are usually -10 for the human and no effect on the moose.

Where was God!? How could this be happening to me? Why was this happening?

Always the photographer I reached for my camera hung on my shoulder, slapping my backpack with every step until I froze in my tracks. Why not document this so that if I did not make it someone would know how I came to my demise (or at least the last few seconds?) If I’d had a rifle, that would have been a smarter option, but useless as well, given the moose’s speed.

Before my hand was on the camera, mama and calf were well on their way across my path and down the to the left.

I breathed, settling the adrenaline rush to tolerable, and marched on. By the time I reached the plane all that adrenaline was gone. The take off was in the shadows, the sun just below the horizon, and my way home full of wonder.

God sometimes does save us from our own stupidity, from terrible circumstances, and from sure death. Other times we join the Psalmist’ and the disciples’ desperate plea: God where are you!? Do you not care what happens to us?!?

…

Only with time, and sometimes not even then, do we gain the insight to see and know … and trust that God walks with us, and suffers with us everything we suffer, and provides life abundant in every hour with every breath we breathe on this gift of creation God has brought us to live in.

So we pray, with full trust (or maybe barely any trust) that God hears us, for ourselves and for all other people faced with disaster, illness, and death this day, this week, this year: God be not stern with us, but gently save us and help us live each minute you gift us.

A Voice That Cannot Be Taken From Us!

Monday, March 14, 2022

Even Those Clouds Know the Voice That Calls Us,

And Sends Us Out in Joy!

Isaiah 55:12

For you shall go out in joy, and be led back in peace; the mountains and the hills before you shall burst into song, and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands.

John 10:3

The gatekeeper opens the gate for him, and the sheep hear his voice. He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out.

Words of Grace For Today

When we give up trying to come in first in the ‘game’ of life, and we allow God to come in first, then we find life is full of celebrations, little ones each day as God wins (bringing grace to bear on our lives) and big celebrations less often as God wins again (bringing grace to bear on our enemies’ lives).

Whether we live or whether we die is not so important. What is important is how we live and who we follow.

When Jesus calls, we like even stupid sheep, know how to follow Jesus’ voice, for Jesus calls us by name and leads us out …

out into a world that cannot accept Jesus’ way, God’s forgiveness (for that requires admitting one needs forgiveness!), and the wonderful life we have as the Spirit guides us each year, day and moment, to be less for ourselves and more for God.

We do not celebrate alone, for the saints in light who have gone before us, are over joyed at our following their footsteps as they followed Christ. Even the hills and mountains, the clouds and the birds, the fish and the whales, the planets and stars, sing and rejoice with us, for we are a small part of the universe,

and the universe is all God’s.

Coming in First

Sunday, March 13, 2022

We spend so much energy trying to find the light of life.

Doch God gives it to us, freely and generously.

Psalm 33:16

A king is not saved by his great army; a warrior is not delivered by his great strength.

Mark 10:31

But many who are first will be last, and the last will be first.

Words of Grace For Today

When Solomon raced, he gave it his all. He was naturally fast. It was in his jeans. On the soccer pitch he had that full awareness and predictive vision which allowed him to know where everyone else was, was going, and when they would get there. He was also unnaturally competitive and disciplined, able to push his thin body to produce results that were amazing, on the oval track running, through the woods on cross-country races, and on the soccer pitch.

It was marvellous to watch him run. Everyone threw accolades at him for his winning.

Life, at first, appears to so many to be exactly this kind of event, a competition where the most gifted, wealthy, powerful, and famous people pit their wits against others in order to gain even more. The one with the most wins. Unfortunately, so many people live and die believing this, whether they are the ‘winners’ or the ‘losers’ in this frantic take on life.

God intends something entirely different for us. Ever since creation right through to the morning sunrise today, bright and brilliant that gave way to clouds and snow (again …) God intends for us a completely different measure of who wins and who loses, what it takes to win, and precisely what the ‘game’ or ‘competition’ actually is.

Not only are the first (according to the human ‘game’) actually last, and the last first, the ‘game’ is not to see who can get, have, and keep the most. God’s intention for us is to see how many people can actually live, live well, and living well be God’s instruments for bringing life, life abundant, to other people.

A king is not saved by his great army; a warrior is not delivered by his great strength.

We, each and every one of us, is saved only by God’s grace, by God’s free gifts that forgive us, renew us, and send us out equipped to be God’s grace for others … not through ‘winning’ but actually through ‘losing’, through self-sacrifice, always pointing to truth, love, and hope.

I, too, was proud of Solomon, but not as much for winning as for competing as he did, knowing how much he gave of himself to run as fast as he did, how hard he worked and pushed himself, and how little he received where it really counted for him.

The discipline of competing that we learn from life God uses (when we surrender to God’s Will) as a self-discipline to not be deterred, no matter the costs, from speaking the truth, loving the undeserving, and hoping for the hopeless.

Do Not Leave Me Defenceless

Friday, March 4, 2022

It is one thing to have the time of age lean in on one, as death looms.

It is an entirely other thing to have other people work to advance the arrival of one’s death.

God save us from such people.

Psalm 141:8

My eyes are turned towards you, O God, my Lord; in you I seek refuge; do not leave me defenceless.

John 14:19

In a little while the world will no longer see me, but you will see me; because I live, you also will live.

Words of Grace For Today

Lots of people are dying from ‘natural’ causes, some of the ‘natural’ causes are induced by other people, so the causes are not that natural, rather homicidal. Lots of other people are trying to kill even more people, forget about inducing natural causes, these efforts run the gamut from open violence to secretive schemes, and all of them are the work of the Devil and people cooperating with the Devil. Lots of people will die because others are trying to kill them. Lots of people die because of the Devil and his followers.

That’s the way with humans. It’s terrible. It’s worse if you are one of the people induced or openly or secretively sought to be killed by others, the Devil’s sacrifices in an attempt to supplant God’s rule over all creation and all beyond the universe we know or imagine.

So we, the people who others seek to kill … we pray: My eyes are turned towards you, O God, my Lord; in you I seek refuge; do not leave me defenceless.

We trust, no matter whether we live or whether we die, whether by natural or very not natural causes, we live and we die with Christ at our side.

As Jesus lives, even though Rome crucified him at the behest of his own religions leaders, so also we, no matter who seeks our deaths or how, we too shall live, and not just another day or week or year, but for all eternity.

The truths that guided our living will live into eternity.

The lies told by those that seek to kill us, will be remembered as lies for all of eternity.

We are not defenceless, though we die. For our God is our rock and our shield, a mighty fortress against all the works of the Devil.

So we sing: In Him there is no darkness at all, The night and the day are both alike.

And

Von guten Mächten wunderbar geborgen, erwarten wir getrost, was kommen mag.
Gott ist bei uns am Abend und am Morgen und ganz gewiß an jedem neuen Tag.

(Sheltered wonderfully by God’s loving powers We look forward confidently to what may come.
God is with us in the evening and in the morning and surely on every new day.)

Wait? Courage? Humour?

God will let us go with it.

Sunday, February 27, 2022

There’s Trees,

There’s Forest,

There’s Light.

Wait With Courage!

Meanwhile,

Learn To Enjoy

the Humour!

Psalm 27:14

Wait for the Lord; be strong, and let your heart take courage; wait for the Lord!

2 Corinthians 1:7

Our hope for you is unshaken; for we know that as you share in our sufferings, so also you share in our consolation.

Words of Grace For Today

We all want justice now! Justice that does not first sacrifice truth in order to proceed with lies, bias, corruption, and blatant replacing light with darkness, sweet with bitter, life with death, and justice with cruelty.

God walks with us. Not that in the moment that really helps, we still want justice now! Even so, and even though, we already know that we must wait for the Lord. We must be strong and let our hearts take courage and wait … wait … wait for the Lord.

Sometimes the little things get blown out of proportion because the big things are so unjust. And then … well then there are hours and hours of darkness like the following:

Wait for it.

…

The Bad News: It’s been so cold, -40⁰ or so for nights now. I’ve been burning through wood. I’m running out of wood. It’s a lot of work to haul and split enough and I’m getting behind.

The Good News: I wake the other morning and after working so long to haul and split enough wood the previous day, despite being exhausted and sleep deprived (stoking the fire every 2 hours night after night will do that) the wood lasted easily through the cold night!

…

But Wait for it.

…

Bad News: the wood lasted because there was no fire from 21:00 to 1:00 and the shelter that houses the wood stove got down to zero! It usually needs to stay at 50⁰ to keep the water tank from freezing, especially in this cold! (But I was so tired I fell asleep at 18:30 and woke at 22:00 ish to a phone call.)

Good News: when I saw the fire was out I brushed away the ashes and looked closely at the fire bricks. Yep!

…

Bad News: under the chimney the brick had a hole, if left it would burn through the stove wall itself.

Good News: I’d seen a crack in the brick two days ago and bought stove cement and fire bricks with points (I’m out of money and need to save for food) earlier yesterday.

…

Bad News: the bricks were sort of held in place by a retaining bar held by bolts, which are unreachable without taking the whole furnace apart. That’s possible but it’s a 10 hour job and it’s NOT possible when it’s cold, especially not this cold.

Good News: the brick were all so broken I could pry them out with a screw driver.

…

Bad News: new bricks had to be fit in past the retainer bar.

Good News: the bar was burned away at the chimney and the rest could be bent with a pliers far enough to slide all the bricks in under what was left of the bar.

…

Bad News: the bricks were too tall by 3/16 of an inch.

Good News: they can be cut with a cutting blade on a hand grinder and fortunately I’ve been loaned a grinder with plenty of cutting disks.

…

Bad News: the grinder runs on 110volts and my camp has no utilities: no electricity, no water, no sewer, no nothing but Grace.

Good News: I’ve been loaned 2 small 2200watt generators that only weigh 65 lbs to provide electricity when I need it.

…

Bad News: I need gasoline to run them.

Good News: There’s still some gas left in both generators.

…

Bad News: they are not supposed to be run at anything colder than -5⁰C and it’s below -20⁰, which is 10⁰ colder than I’ve ever gotten one to start.

Good News: one’s inside.

…

Bad News: I’m too tired to haul the generator from inside to outside where it can be run. I can’t risk pushing my bad back and spasming leg muscles too much, especially when I’m so exhausted and fatigued and sleep deprived!

Good News: Small miracle! After 40 pulls on the starter cord my shoulder has not given out on me and I get the other one – the one out in the cold – to fire up and run.

…

Bad News: it takes until past midnight to individually cut each brick to custom fit, clean the ash and crud out from where they need to slide in, and get them fitting in place. And then 2 brick are still flopping loose where there is no retainer bar left to hold them!

Good News: the stove cement maybe, perhaps, might just hold them until summer when I might be able to rebuild the whole stove again for the third time. So I glue the two bricks with furnace cement and start a fire that will light and burn fast. Heat at last.

…

Bad News: there’s hardly any heat for a half hour and I’m so so tired, so tired, so tired … and then I have to stoke the fire yet again.

Good News: I’m finally in bed after 1:00 ish.

…

Bad News: I’m wired and can’t sleep.

Good News: I’ve got no meetings in the morning so I can sleep in. (I never have meetings, ever, really. No one really cares to meet with a person who is homeless. It kind of shames them that they don’t fix the systemic problems that cause homelessness!)

…

Bad News: I wake at 4:45 to almost no heat, 17⁰ in the shelter (and the water tank is at 0⁰!), and a chilly 12⁰ at the bed.

Good News: I get a fire going.

…

Bad News: it takes 50 minutes.

Good News: the bed is still there.

…

Bad News: morning is there too.

Good News: I don’t care. I’m punch drunk tired, laughing out loud at it all, thankful the stove will last, maybe, another year.

…

Three nights later I finally get enough sleep to start breaking out of sleep deprivation.

…

We wait, and with courage wait, and wait, and wait, for the Lord, who works at God’s own pace in God’s own time and in God’s own way.

We have courage to wait because ‘Our hope for God is unshaken; for we know that as God shares in our sufferings, so also God shares in our consolation.’

Think about it. God dies. God suffers with us. God finally got enough sleep to start shaking off sleep deprivation.

Makes one wonder …

Who was in charge of creation while God is sleep deprived,

or unconscious for suffering,

or dead?

…

The other persons of the Trinity? That’s a (weird) argument for a Trinitarian God, eh!

Good News: God will let us go with it. There are far greater humorous things to laugh along with as well! Learn to laugh at them all. It builds courage as we wait!