Month: June 2022

No other gods?

Monday, June 20, 2022

God, Above All Else, Reflected in Our Lives,

Gets Tangled in Our ‘Reeds & Weeds’

Exodus 20:3

You shall have no other gods before me.

John 6:68-69

Simon Peter answered him, ‘Lord, to whom can we go? You have the words of eternal life. We have come to believe and know that you are the Holy One of God.’

Words of Grace For Today

It’s all too easy to say, ‘Yes, I have God before all other gods!’ And then run off to serve the requirements and demands of life as we have chosen to put together for ourselves of those promoted or sloughed off on or left for the dregs by this society. Still we choose a life, and it’s demands are ‘other gods’ to us, taking our lives and life energies and time, so that we barely have anything left for God.

But we still say, ‘I have no other gods before God!’

Everyone agrees with us, because they do the same deceptive dance.

This civilization, it can be argued, requires this of us. God will have to make do. So we choose this civilization that is more barbaric behind the scenes, behind closed doors, in dark alleys, and all too often in the open bright of the day for all to see. Then we are aghast at the barbarism displayed. We demand better gun control. We demand better care in senior’s homes. We demand more housing for the homeless. We demand fairer taxes. We demand sanctions against the unwarranted aggressors.

There is nothing we are able to do, because we are not willing to pay the price of eliminating all barbarism, for it would take too much from us.

Which, if the cost would be nuclear bombs going off in North America near cities and military bases, I guess I’m not quite willing to pay that price either (since I live near the biggest air base in Canada).

So how can we honestly, wholeheartedly, say with Peter, ‘Lord, to whom can we go? You have the words of eternal life. We have come to believe and know that you are the Holy One of God.’

How can we honestly and wholeheartedly follow the first commandment, putting God before all else, and not allowing anything else to gain the stature of a god in our lives?

We cannot.

Thank God, God knows this long before we figure it out.

God planned before time for this, too.

God forgives, cleanses, and renews us, and sends us out to tell of God’s great mercy and bountiful grace that saves us again and again from ourselves and all evil … and God gives us the Holy Spirit to guide us so that we can at least strive and somewhat have no other gods before God, and know that only Jesus has the words of eternal life. So we turn again, to Jesus, in prayer begging for forgiveness and life, and in thanks for the promise of life abundant.

Just another day, God watching our every thought, cheering us on to blessed living sharing God’s wonders with all people.

Are we up for it?

The Gift

Sunday, June 19, 2022

It’s not a painting on a dik dik skin.

It is what I have to offer

on my (forced) adventure of a lifetime.

Proverbs 11:24

Some give freely, yet grow all the richer; others withhold what is due, and only suffer want.

Acts 20:35

In all this I have given you an example that by such work we must support the weak, remembering the words of the Lord Jesus, for he himself said, “It is more blessed to give than to receive.”

Words of Grace For Today

Give to the poor?

Keep for one’s own future, security, and dependants or descendants?

Give to get rich?

Hoard to avoid starvation?

Help others a little?

Make it look like one is generous while really being careful to keep enough for oneself and one’s future?

There are all sorts of attitudes to have concerning the poor.

The greatest difference is whether one considers oneself poor. The richest people worry that they are not rich enough, do not have enough, are barely making it, can be wiped out in a day or year. The poorest people can live generously sharing what little they have.

In three small villages in Africa, a place close to my heart, the people were not rich by any standards. Many years ago a wise elder saw how the wet seasons were sometimes sufficient to provide water and growth and food to carry them through the dry season, and sometimes not. That elder had brought his village together and convinced them that they would better survive and even all thrive if through the times of plenty and hard times they would share among all members of the village. For decades the village survived and often had enough to share or trade with neighbouring villages.

A descendent of that wise man grew up not knowing hunger and was able to paint on dik dik skins scenes from their life high on the plateau. She also dreamed. One day she set out to realize her dream. She travelled away from her village for days to ‘see the world.’ She arrived at the ocean, where fishers plied the sea in small outriggers bringing in their catch to feed their families. She befriended one family and offered the small gifts, her paintings, she had brought along on her ‘adventure of a lifetime’.

When she returned she had a greater gift to offer her village. It was such a great gift that she shared it with a neighbouring village, and they shared it with yet one more. The fisher’s family also received this gift and shared it with their village and they shared it with two more villages. The gift was simple: they would come together, all six villages, as one village. Their children would travel to the other villages high on the plateau or down to the sea. Perhaps they would find mates there. The bonds would grow. They would share what gave them joy where they lived and in the other villages. And they would share what they could to feed, clothe and sustain each other in a bond of cooperation.

Now centuries later there are twenty villages, for the people have had more than a few children. These villages are known for miles and miles around. The people are generally happier than others around them. When difficulties arise, they respond more graciously with each other and with the real unsolvable problems of life. And, above all, the children grow up knowing that they will always have enough because they and all the villages together will share among themselves, and even with outsiders, all they have.

The attitude that sets these people apart from their good neighbours is one of gratitude.

This is the gift that the wise elder gave and shared with that one family by the sea, which they shared with their villages and with two more villages.

Today, have we the possibility of sharing this attitude with everyone we encounter?

Why not! Give it a try!

Great Scotch or Wine?

Saturday, June 18, 2022

Like Shadow to the Sun,

Our Needs Point to God’s Generosity

Psalm 107:9

He satisfies the thirsty, and the hungry he fills with good things.

Philippians 4:19

My God will fully satisfy every need of yours according to his riches in glory in Christ Jesus.

Words of Grace For Today

To be satisfied.

When one has so much, that may seem to be a cart blanche that will fill one’s every wish, a great fulfillment of whatever one can dream of.

When one has not much, and really not enough, to survive even one day at a time, God’s promise that the thirsty will be satisfied and the hungry will be filled, and not just filled but filled with good things and the promise that God will satisfy our every need … well there just is not better news that anyone could give us. No more going hungry. No more enduring thirst with nothing good to drink. (That’s not a reference to finding a good Scotch, or a good wine. It means good, clean, cool water!)

To be satisfied.

For most of the people in the world, it’s great news!

If you really though that ‘satisfying the thirsty’ meant Jesus provides a good wine or scotch, then this probably is not good news for you at all. Someone is going to help God provide the food and drink, and all that satisfies people’s every need. That probably means those that have more than they need.

So today, for those already with all their needs met, is probably going to be another bad day. But for those of us who need to work just to stay alive another day, God’s promises give us a boost.

Food, Drink, and all our needs. Yes, thank you God!

It’s going to be a rainy, thunderstorm kind of day, so sit safe and work when you can. Just because God promises, doesn’t mean that we are not going to be the ones doing the work to make it happen! Rest for bed at night. Joyful, thankfully onward. There’s lots to be done.

The Purpose of the Worst …

Friday, June 17, 2022

I’m not sure the purpose in all that cow crap and straw piled in the barnyard was,

But now it makes for fast-growing tall weeds

that take a lot energy to mow down.

Psalm 104:1-2

Bless the Lord, O my soul.

O Lord my God, you are very great.

You are clothed with honour and majesty, wrapped in light as with a garment.

You stretch out the heavens like a tent, you set the beams of your chambers on the waters,
you make the clouds your chariot, you ride on the wings of the wind,
you make the winds your messengers, fire and flame your ministers.

1 Peter 2:9

You are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people, in order that you may proclaim the mighty acts of him who called you out of darkness into his marvellous light.

Words of Grace For Today

What is it for?

The grass gets long, so that I can mow it?

The bugs are ferocious, so I can wear a head net to protect myself?

The wind blows, to knock down weak-rooted trees to provide material to build a shelter?

The trees fall too far away to haul in by hand, so the straps hold them behind the truck in low 4×4 pulling them in?

The sun shines brightly and hot in the window so the shade is drawn to keep it cool in here and I do not see intruders invading the yard to steal firewood?

The medicine that I need to live without pain and eventually cancer is not covered by Seniors Blue Cross, and even though the medicine I need has been approved twice before and fully covered by Alberta Income Support, this time requires yet another doctor’s letter costing up to $150 (when that’s all I have for groceries and gas each month). There is no possible purpose this has happened. It’s wasting my life, my limited finances, my time and a lot of government time and money to go through this approval now for the third time and worse to not approve the medicine, making an appeal necessary and emergency funding requests in the interim … unless of course I want to risk developing throat cancer and living in great pain in the meanwhile and risking that my back and other muscles will spasm with the least provocation, disabling me wherever I happen to be, including out in the freezing temperatures of winter emptying the ashes from the stove (as it did last time, and I barely made it back to the shelter where it was warm) or out in the bugs that would eat me alive slowly until I wasn’t any more.

The courts and the witnesses, including RCMP, lie, so that … opps, that one is hard to come up with a purpose for … maybe so that we eagerly await God’s judgment?

All these things have some truth in them.

The one truth that is not lost by human deceit and greed is that God is clothed with honour and majesty, wrapped in light as with a garment. God stretches out the heavens like a tent, God sets the beams of your chambers on the waters, God rides the clouds as chariot, God flies on the wings of the wind, God makes the winds God’s messengers, fire and flame God’s ministers.

So what are we humans purposed for?

God makes us a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people, in order that we may proclaim the mighty acts of him who called us out of darkness into his marvellous light.

Not bad of a bunch of rag-tag sinners.

Of course only sinners can proclaim the mighty acts of God, because the greatest, mightiest, and most wondrous act of God is …

when God forgives us miserable sinners our sins. Actually we are really good sinners, which makes us miserable people.

We are forgiven, not to save our sorry little butts, but rather so that the world has something to see: God saving the worst, the least deserving, the most hardhearted, stiff-necked people the earth has to offer.

We may wish God chose us because of our great personalities and wondrous things we do, but that just ain’t so.

God’s people have a history, a real ugly history. Only God’s intervention makes it somewhat tolerable to start to tell or hear.

God’s miracle of saving such people as us, makes our stories (God’s story) the greatest story every told or heard.

What part are you playing in that story today, before God saves our sorry little butts, or after?

Your choice.

God’s delight, no matter what you choose.

Yeah, Sure!

Thursday, June 16, 2022

You Can Say Whatever You Like,

But That’s a Lake,

As Sure As Covid is

a Serious and Deadly Pandemic.

Exodus 23:25

You shall worship the Lord your God, and I will bless your bread and your water; and I will take sickness away from among you.

Matthew 6:31-32

Therefore do not worry, saying, “What will we eat?” or “What will we drink?” or “What will we wear?” For it is the Gentiles who strive for all these things; and indeed your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things.

Words of Grace For Today

Quite sure sickness is rampant among us. Coming out the back end of the Covid pandemic, and it’s not done with us yet by any means, is anyone ready to say that as we worship God our food and bread is blessed and we have all sickness taken away from among us? Covid is simply so contagious that measures to stop it are useless (well not really but people are no longer willing to pay the small price of wearing masks and keeping physical distance and restricting their social interactions to a small group of people so … well so measures are not kept and therefore governments are giving up on keeping them). The greatest sickness is exemplified by the guy who says Covid was a big hoax. Tell that to the families of all the people who died!

I’m sure that if I do not work hard for wood to heat with in the winter, and persist to find money to buy groceries with and show up at the food bank to supplement the ever smaller amount of groceries I can afford, and, and, and … I am sure if I do not strive heftily, I will meet my physical death.

So these passages are difficult to hear.

The truth of the matter is, when we worry about food and water, rather than actually working to ensure we have them, our worry sucks the life right out of us.

The truth of the matter is, sickness will never be wiped out from among us, not completely, and when we either think that it can be and behave like it has been or we ignore that sickness is part of life, we endanger ourselves and so many people around us.

The truth of the matter is that God created the world and said it was good! Hunger, poverty, drought, thirst, illness and death are part and parcel of our being able to choose to either love God or not.

Today is another day of opportunity: to ruin our days with worry and denials of sicknesses and death OR to enjoy our days with thanks for everything God gives us, and appropriate work to secure our daily needs and have enough to share with those without enough, and to live sensibly and cautiously so as to foster our own health and the health of those around us.

What’ll it be today for you?

Rains and Wind and Trees Down

Wednesday, June 15, 2022

Trees Should Not Lean On Campers!

Psalm 121:8

The Lord will keep your going out and your coming in from this time on and for evermore.

2 Thessalonians 3:3

But the Lord is faithful; he will strengthen you and guard you from the evil one.

Words of Grace For Today

Yesterday the rains fell, the winds blew, and I slept, fitfully with wild dreams in tune with the ruckus outside.

I woke to see leaves against the back window of the camper. Winter tarps strung on frames quickly assembles as the cold set in, gave out around the camp. Tarps danced with anger in the wind.

I wandered out in rubber boots and my bathrobe to survey the damage. The top rain tarps were whipped back exposing the insulating tarps. The protection for firewood was mostly gone, and I freed the tarps the rest of the way to keep it from ripping itself any more. The tree, well … a tree was blown over onto the back of the camper. Thus the leaves at the window were that tree’s, yesterday a good 6 feet away, today up close and pressing on the glass.

I had hauled in wood the day before yesterday. The ‘ropes’ were still in the truck. I positioned the truck to pull a rope, wrapped around another tree (low for better leverage and less risk of pulling that tree over on to the camper) and on to the tree kissing the camper as high as I could reach (for better leverage on that wayward wood.) With a tug in low 4×4 the tree came upright, and then settled against another tree back towards the ‘pulley’ tree. I reattached the rope straight from truck to fallen tree, and backed up (praying the tree would not find it’s way back on to the camper just 6 feet away). It followed the rope and settled nicely in front of the truck (also a concern that I may not be far enough back and the tree would more than kiss the truck!)

A Kiss, Thankfully, Just a Kiss.

So it was: my morning. A day with plans to endure the rains. I’ve survived a flood, watching waters rise to within a metre of destroying a house that I build with my own hands, crossing up over the river valley to the plain away from town. Then travelling (instead of 3 km to town) back and around and over the dam up river (the only road still in tact over the river) 17 km to get to town, and hearing the rain each night, each day, and the reports that the dam was softened and shifting.

Real dread fills my bones still when heavy rains persist day after day.

This tree, this rain, did little damage that cannot be repaired. The tarps and their supports needed to be better designed and built before another winter. Now it will be done a bit sooner in the summer. A good thing at that.

So it is that I can heartily echo these readings:

The Lord will keep our going out and our coming in from this time on and for evermore and the Lord is faithful; he will strengthen you and guard you from the evil one.

It’s just another normal spring day (normal given climate change.) What will I do with it? What will you do with it?

Does God Do Everything? Or Anything?

Tuesday, June 14, 2022

God certainly does not collect, cut, stack and stoke the firewood.

God does provide trees that die to become firewood.

Psalm 127:1

Unless the Lord builds the house those who build it labour in vain.
Unless the Lord guards the city, the guard keeps watch in vain.

Philippians 1:6

I am confident of this, that the one who began a good work among you will bring it to completion by the day of Jesus Christ.

Words of Grace For Today

I decided one day that I would let God do everything.

I stayed in bed and waited for the fire to be stoked, breakfast to be served, and my writing to be done.

My back got sore, I got real cold after the fire went out, I got hungry for no breakfast showed up, and when I looked later I was hours behind on my writing schedule.

God, I decided, does not do everything. It wasn’t personal or anything. God did not just ignore me. God was speaking real loudly at me. I was not listening.

Paul writes to the , the Philippians, who had embraced him early in his ministry, funded him well, and always continued to support him in every way possible as he got into more and more trouble – because he kept preaching a radical Good News, Jesus loves you! When he does, we get to listen in on some of the most profound truths about the Gospel. Paul is less guarded, less polemic, writing to people less inclined to mis-hear or mis-take his words.

Jesus started a good work in the Philippians, in Lydia and her household. Paul assures them that Christ will bring this work to completion. Not they themselves. Christ.

The Psalmist writes what many have come to know is true: we can work all we like and as hard as we like, but if God is not working in us, for us, and through us, our labours are all in vain.

So God does lots.

God does everything.

That does not preclude our having to work hard. It means that as we work hard we need to give God thanks and remember that only God working in us makes it possible for us to do the work we do.

This morning, I got up and made a fire, a blessed fire that boiled water for coffee and washing.

This morning, I gathered more wood for the fire, and will stack most of it in preparation for the winter cold when I will burn lots of wood to stay alive and a bit more to be comfortable.

This morning, I came in and got breakfast ready, which is really not much work at all. It’s just pulling things out of the drying rack, out of cupboard and out of the fridge, and pouring boiling water on the coffee in the french press.

(I’m not french in anyway. It’s made by Ikea probably not in Sweden. And I use it to make coffee. So it’s a coffee press to me. The French can keep the guillotine and lots of other things, too. It’s just this is a coffee press every morning. It makes coffee from somewhere in the world and mixed and roasted and ground and canned. Not french at all. Of course we could say it’s a God press, because everything is from God. But then nothing would have any distinction. So everything is from God, breakfast, coffee, fire, boiling water. But it’s a coffee press to me.)

I’m working at my writing, bit by bit, though I’m still behind schedule, or maybe I gave up on the schedule.

Still, God is at work in all this or this means nothing, to me or to anyone else.

This day God made full of surprises and work and delights and daily bread and forgiveness and … lots more, and I’m still waiting for Christ to complete the work begun in me at baptism, though I’m doing everything I can to get on with that work, and get out of the way of God working hard through me.

One hopes one would be thought of as kindly as Paul did of the Philippians, and not the Corinthians, though I gotta say, sometimes I’m probably more cantankerous than even that lot. God has lots of work left to get done in me.

As for today, the tasks at hand are more than enough to fill the day. It is a small delight to get a few of them accomplished, even if the bigger tasks never quite seem to come to completion. That’s life. I guess when the work is done, it’ll only be so for me because I’m dead. Then the incomplete tasks will be someone else’s.

As for today, it’s time to take delight in God’s gifts, starting with time, breath, and energy to work.

Getting It Done

Monday, June 13, 2022

Ours is the Grass,

God’s are the Mountains

Psalm 65:6

By your strength you established the mountains; you are girded with might.

John 14:14

If in my name you ask me for anything, I will do it.

Words of Grace For Today

Consider God.

Not just a heavy weight champion for millennia and eons, God is the winner in all contests of strength, power, might, abilities, and smarts … oh, and wisdom.

The mountains and the oceans have always attracted humans to them, to be astounded by them, inspired by them, to be dwarfed by them, to be renewed by them … and to be made afraid by them.

God spoke a word, and the mountains and the oceans … and for that matter all matter and the universe itself, were created.

No contest, God is greater.

At least we are able to gawk and shudder at the immensity of God’s works.

Then we try to do marvellous things, building towers to the skies, flying through those skies, building cities that cover miles and miles of land, sending fragile ships across the oceans and into space, and writing and speaking words as if ours could possibly create a universe.

Our words alone can inspire and save lives, redirect civilization, capture memories to be marvelled at and used as guides by future generations (if they’d only read and understand!), and our buildings and cities are amazing, and our ability to travel around the globe in air, on sea, and in space are all astounding accomplishments

and they barely compare to what God does.

Forget about creation for a this moment,

but consider what God does with our sinful, burdened hearts, when God forgives, redeems, renews us, and sends us back into life to be God’s instruments of grace for other people.

That is more awesomely amazing than all God’s word of creating the universe.

And it cost God Jesus’ life. Not cheap.

Jesus promises then that if we ask for something in his name he will do it!

Carte Blanche, with just one proviso: that it be God’s will.

Ask this day, of the Creator and Redeemer and Inspirer, all that you need and want, and trust that God will do what God wills for you, and for us all.

Then it’s time to set about the day’s tasks, of life and of love and of being God’s blessing to others. It’s not nearly as awesome as God creating with a word, but it’ll have to do as today’s ‘blow my mind away’ thought to bring us alert through the 24 hours God gifts us, again!

Majorities and Truth, Not The Same!

Sunday, June 12, 2022

Stand With the Crowd of Liars

or

Stand Small Alone?

Is It Really So Hard a Choice?

…

Is It Really a Choice at All?

Exodus 23:2

You shall not follow a majority in wrongdoing; when you bear witness in a lawsuit, you shall not side with the majority so as to pervert justice.

Ephesians 4:15

But speaking the truth in love, we must grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ,

Words of Grace For Today

It is self explanatory that we would only speak the truth.

Life is not that way for so many people.

I cannot say I understand that, for I’ve stood for the truth often against a crowd who all together speak lies and commit crimes, theft, and fraud, and worse in court where all the other witnesses perjured themselves including RCMP members, and worse, the judges themselves lied about what was given in testimony, one even deleting a section in order to make a false conviction.

These things I do not understand. Speaking the truth always seems to me to be a basic, like eating healthy food.

You may get away with lies temporarily but they still hurt you, and eventually they will be exposed to be lies … and then there is nothing left of the liars. So little gained, and eventually everything lost.

So how is it then, that speaking the truth in love we grow up into Christ?

However that is, today is another day, of paying the costs for others lies, and receiving blessing up on blessing from God.

These blessing pour down on us as rain showers coming and going through our days, sometimes overwhelming us, but always sufficient (for we are not in a drought here, nor in a flood, thank God!)

Today, another day of living blessed and grateful for everything, and praying that God will keep people that so easily lie far from us.

24 Hours, Ours Again

Saturday, June 11, 2022

Before the Sun Sets,

What Will We

Be and Do

These Hours of Ours?

Isaiah 2:4

He shall judge between the nations,
and shall arbitrate for many peoples;
they shall beat their swords into ploughshares,
and their spears into pruning-hooks;
nation shall not lift up sword against nation,
neither shall they learn war any more.

Luke 3:14

Soldiers also asked him, ‘And we, what should we do?’ He said to them, ‘Do not extort money from anyone by threats or false accusation, and be satisfied with your wages.’

Words of Grace For Today

God chose to make a life for us, a life filled with peace, grace and love for all people.

We’ve turned it into an entirely different thing; it’s cruel, short, and disappointing. Instead of loving all people, we’ve learned to exert our will over others. Conflicts dominate couples, families, churches, cities, countries and the world.

Isaiah has seen it all. Actually Isaiah is more than one person of more than one generation, so ‘he’ has seen it all through multiple generations, from before Israel was conquered and exiled to Bablylon, during the exile when most of the leaders were in Babylon, and when the exiles return to rebuild Israel. Isaiah starts early on with the vision of God’s justice prevailing, so that, even as Israel is under attack by it’s more powerful neighbours, war will not exist any more.

It’s quite the hope-filled vision, one that we can easily claim as our own still today. We are still caught in the turmoil, suffering, and destruction of conflicts. Evil seems to win at every turn, and the best people suffer injustices they do not deserve. Canada, so proud, polite, and reserved as it may have a reputation of being, is no exception. Evil abounds, corruption prevails, the unjust accumulate more and more … and more and more people suffer trying to live on less, many without enough to subsist on.

Jesus comes promising God’s future is now. People want to see that play out in their daily lives. First they want the Roman rulers to give them independence. Then they want the religious leaders to be replaced with truly faithful priests. And they want prosperity for all people.

So we today would still wish for ourselves. The names of rulers and corrupt religious leaders and evil-doers have changed but the ‘game’ of this cruel, short, and disappointing life are pretty much still the same.

Jesus’ promise, though, is not to bring all that to be. Instead, Jesus leads people to a reform that starts within.

For example, there will still be soldiers. The will be just, not corrupted, and be true peace-keepers.

All our roles in life will be similarly reformed from within. Instead of holding our own interests first, we will celebrate God’s blessings by sharing the basics of life with everyone, ensuring that all people more than subsist. All people will live abundant lives, able to share God’s blessings with their neighbours.

Today, how is the Holy Spirit reaching into our lives to reform our hearts to see not the cruel, short, and disappointments of life, but God’s abundant blessings freely showered on us all?

Will we spend today again chasing after ‘our fair share’ of the limited resources of earth and life? OR

Will we remember all we have is free gift from God and be ready and eager to share these blessings with everyone in need?

Today. It’s just 24 hours. Everything happens within 24 hours. Today is ours to do with as we choose. What will we choose to be and do in these hours?