Ten Things for Tuesday: More Randomness

Okay, I'm still all over the board here, so that's what you get, too.

Randomness:
1. I do not like computers today. Not on their own; not with green eggs and ham. I have spent the entire day until now (4 p.m.) dealing with computer problems at work. The good news is that I did not throw one thing out of the window today--which was a distinct possibility circa noon. Fortunately, the cavalry arrived, and things are much better now.

2. I do still like Diet Dr. Pepper today. I share this just in case you thought that the computer thing threw off my whole world.

3. Yesterday, I did yard work. I share this to let you know that that the world will be coming to an end shortly. Iffin' you don't know me personally, you may not be away that I don't do yard work--it is why I rent. Okay, that and I don't want the responsibility/bills of owning a house. And that it might be sketchy whether I am loan-worthy...but anyway, back to the world ending.

Yesterday, I spent two hours sweating and getting FILTHY while trimming our arbor, hauling fill dirt, and digging a channel for drainage. And--and this is where things get really scary--I kinda enjoyed it. And--better yet--I'm not sore today! All those workouts at the gym have apparently paid off! :-) Whee! (Uh, please don't share the 'enjoying' part with my landlord, k? *wink*)

4. I'm freezing again. This place is nuts!

5. I got tangerine pop-up post-it notes today, and I'm lovin' them! It's the small things, really...

6. Ugh. I've already got a headache, and they just started vacuuming outside of my office. The sound of a vacuum always gives me a headache anyway. Excedrin, anyone? (Oooo... I took Excedrin on an empty stomach Sunday morning, and by the time I got to the Sunday School class I teach, I had the shakes like a drug addict on withdrawal. That caffeine is powerful stuff, man!)

7. Speaking of Sunday, I learned a very important lesson that day. No, not from the sermon (what was that thing on...? Better look at my notes...), but from an experiment. And just so you know, those little "Just add milk" muffin mixes DO go bad 13 months after their expiration date. I mean, not that I would let something like that lie around my house that long. Or that I would try to make outdated muffins for my neighbors. Who would do something like that? But if you did do something like that, you might find yourself making fresh muffins from scratch at 11:00 p.m. I mean, if anyone would do anything so crazy...

8. I am still freezing. Must. go. outside...

9. I'm really excited about my Sunday School class again. We promoted a great group of kids two weeks ago, and think they will let me lead them 'deep'--and I love going 'deep' in the Word of God! This is year two of a two-year study on the book of Acts. We are picking up at the beginning of the missionary journeys, and will pause at any point where a book was written and do a quick survey of that book. This way, we get a nice sense of the flow and development of the New Testament/early church. I am very excited! Our theme last year was: God has a plan--you can trust Him! This year, we are adding to that the message they were carrying: God as a man--you can know Him! So much fun!

10. We have already sold more tickets to this year's dinner theater than we had at this point last year, and we still have a week to go. Friday night has only one ticket left; Thursday has about 20. So if you're thinking about coming, Saturday would be a good pick... :-)

11. BONUS! I am printing 'before' pictures for my Weight Watcher's meting tonight. They asked me for them last week when I passed the 60-lb. mark on WW. Total, I've lost more than 75-lbs. That is very surreal to me. I have several posts in my mind on this topic, so I'll share more soon.

Hope your day is filled with His blessings (and that you can get warm...),
-J

(c) 2008

Quoteworthy

Proof That Democracy Is Alive And Well in America:
"Whenever you have an efficient government you have a dictatorship." --Harry S Truman

There you have it! :-) Keep that in mind the next time you have to visit the DMV...
-J

Randomness - Ten Things for FRIDAY!

This really should be a "Ten Things for Tuesday" List, but I seem to be off days, and I really want to write here, and I'm feeling completely random...SO, you get what you're gettin'. (huh?)

1. Found a yummy, light recipe that I just consumed eight serving of. I wish I was kidding. I am stuffed, but how can you not love tomatoes, cucumbers, salt, pepper, cumin, fresh parsley, green onion, garlic, and fat free yogurt? I mean, fantabulousness! I can hear Sarah now..."I'm so not having dinner at your place." Sorry, girl. You're just gonna have to take my word for it--yummylicious. (I just love making up words. Two in this paragraph alone!)

2. I generally (read: always until this moment) try to keep this post a-political, even though I have some very strong interests and feelings there. However, I just have to say that this is shaping up to be a more interesting--and probably more frightening--election than I anticipated that it would be. I am prayerful and engaged. And (Forrest Gump voice here), that's all I have to say about that. :-)

3. Post-it notes are the very best invention in the world. Okay, maybe second to the printing press, but still mighty important. I don't think I could get through my day without them. And not just any post-it's--it's only pop-up post-it's, 'cause anything with a double-hyphen in it's name has to be the best! (Do you like how I just randomly inserted a hyphen in that phrase. That was just for you punctuation police out there!)

4. Since the last day of the month falls on a Sunday, we got paid today. And I am h.a.p.p.y. :-D

5. Things are really heating up at work as we start our fall season. We have three nights of dinner theater coming up in two weeks, and then two weeks after that, our six-event artist series begins. That same weekend, we host a hymn festival, and two weeks later have our fall choir retreat. Things are startin' to get crazy!

6. I'm excited to be in a position to really devote myself to the job for which I was hired. I started two years ago, but it wasn't until changes in workload were reformed in the late spring that I was really free to commit myself to the job I was intended to do. And I'm really happy--I like being fully devoted to a single area.

7. I have a Garfield cartoon next to my desk that I think perfectly illustrates the truth that life isn't always as it appears to us to be. Let me describe it for you:

Frame 1: Garfield approaches, looking bored. There is an apple sitting on the table.
Frame 2: Garfield is holding the apple and smiling.
Frame 3: Garfield's cheeks are puffed out as he consumes the apple. And I quote: "CRUNCH. Munch. Munch. Munch..." You get the idea.
Frame 4: Garfield is returning to where he came from, leaving the apple core on the table and sharing an unseemly, "Burp" with us.
Frame 5: From stage left, two worms approach the apple (core) in a hurry.
Frame 6: Worm 1 says to worm 2: "Great goodly moogly, Gladys. We've got termites!"

Tee-hee. *snort* For some reason, this really tickles my funny bone. But greater than the humor is the lesson: How things appear--causes, intents, outcomes, etc.--to you in life are not always how they are, especially when viewed from outside your 'frame' (of reference). Do you think God sometimes sees our reactions like we see the worms? Just thinking...

8. I'm missing the Diet Dr. Pepper I haven't had today. Yet. I'm feeling a Sonic run coming on...Happy Hour (1/2 price soft drinks!), here I come!

9. It's 90* outside and I'm freezing in here. I can't wait to go outside. We've been having such lovely weather, with our extended thanks to the series of tropical storms that have been sending us cool weather and lots of rain. And yes, where I live, 85* to 90* days in August IS cool. Last August, we were sweltering with 105* to 115* days, though that was unusually warm. Welcome to the South. Wanna come for a visit?

10. Well, all good randomness must draw to an end. I hope you've enjoyed these wasted minutes of your day, 'cause I'm not authorized to give refunds. (Wouldn't it be wild if we could get refunds on time? Virtually every TV show and movie I've ever watch would owe me... I'd have so much time back, I'd be, like, 10 right now!) :0)

Hoping your day is filled with both poignancy and humor,
-J

I recounted my ways and You answered me; teach me Your decrees. --Psalm 119:26, NIV

(c) 2008

An Arrow Finds It's Mark

The feeling has subsided but little, this feeling of being adrift. The picture I have in my mind is that of a boat tacking back and forth aimlessly, crisscrossing the waters, but without a destination in view. Or of a traveller, lost in the wilderness, stumbling this way and that, unsure which direction to point his nose. These are the pictures in my mind as I consider my own life. I am trying to move in the right direction, but that direction is not always clear to me.

Enter: Sunday worship. As part of our time of reflection (Scripture and songs), up on the screen pops a verse so familiar that for years I actually avoided it because it had ceased to have any meaning to me. I bet you know it too:
Trust in the LORD with all your heart
and lean not on your own understanding;
in all your ways acknowledge him,
and he will make your paths straight. --Proverbs 3:5-6

WHAM! Right.between.the.eyes! He...Will...Make...Your...Paths...Straight.

Uhh...How do I arrive at my destination? It is NOT by fixing my eyes on my destination. It is by fixing my eyes on Jesus and trusting and acknowledging HIM, and then HE makes my path straight...even if I don't have a clue where I'm going. Even if my path seems crazily skewed, it is the straightest path possible on God's map. (I knew this on some level, but this is hitting a whole new level... Don't know if I'm explaining this well...)

Do you remember that old adage, "The shortest distance between two points is a straight line"? I think I view life kinda like that. Maybe not the shortest distance part, but that the journey should be linear. I remember when my dad taught me to draw a straight line...by looking at where I wanted the line to end, my destination. But God's paths don't seem to work that way. In fact, I'm starting to think that God-journeys may be more geometric than I first imagined. And yet somehow, those are the straight paths.

All of this was brought to mind again today when I stopped by my friend Beth's website. She had this verse posted (on a lovely printable card, too, if you wanna stop by):
"Be still, and know that I am God;
I will be exalted among the nations,
I will be exalted in the earth." -Psalm 46:10

What was my focus through that overwhelming decision-making process? God, what would bring you glory? But what does He say here? J, don't fret so much. I am God; don't lose sight of that. Rest in me. Don't worry; I am working out the 'exalted' part. I WILL be exalted (glorified). Really. You don't have to stress this one.

Exhale. Deep inhale and exhalation again. Not only am I on the straight path, but God is accomplishing the goal that He made my heart claim: His glory. How good He is, and how good He is to me. Pure grace. Such mercy.

It may take awhile yet for all parts of my heart and mind to grasp this--I am filled with uncharacteristic doubt right now--but the Truth has a way of always routing out the falsehood. And so I trust that at some point, even if my route seems circuitous, I will truly know that I am still on--and have never left--the straight path. And somehow, I'm guessing this is a tiny part of the glory He gets, at least in my little corner of the world.

Resting,
-J

Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us. Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. Consider him who endured such opposition from sinful men, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart. --Hebrews 12:1-3

(c) 2008

Grieved

I am grieved. I am hurt and sad, and I think I share company with the Holy Spirit on this one.

I just finished a conversation with someone I work with, and here is what I discovered: She is angry and resentful toward someone else in the Body, and refuses to go to that person to resolve it.

I discovered this when I got a bit blasted because of my relationship/response to this other person. That hurt. It did. I had acted in love, trying to do what was best for someone, and I got smacked for it. But that's not why I'm grieved.

I am grieved because someone in the body of Christ is willingly entertaining sin in her life and in the process, she is breaking the unity that Christ Himself declared as His intent when He prayed to the Father for us (see John 17:20-21). She does this (at least now) despite having been urged strongly to go to that person and resolve the problem. And as she carries this bitterness around with her, she begins to taint and weaken not only her own self, but the whole of the Body.

And thus, I hurt. Jesus' prayer was specifically related to these kinds of things--there should be no protracted periods of anger, bitterness, etc., among us. Why? Because when we live there, we cease to be a witness of Jesus to this broken, sin-filled world that so desperately needs to know that He has come (see John 17:23)! We cease to declare that there is LIFE to be had in the midst of this cesspool of death in which we live.

Don't misunderstand. I'm not angry with this woman. I'm not saying I haven't done exactly the same thing, 'cause I am opposed to lyin' and that would be a big one. What I am saying is that my heart longs for us to live as Jesus called us to so that we might reflect the light of His glory to a world full of walking corpses. I ache that we, who have been cured from the cancer of sin, eagerly imbibe it again and again, willing the disease back into our very own selves, and thus into this Body of which we are a part.

I cannot make this woman release her anger and bitterness (though I wouldn't mind if she didn't release it on me again (-;), but I can and will pray. This I know: The God who cured us can drain the poison we drink anew. Jesus has promised to someday present His pure Bride to His Father. And He knows well what it will take to make us pure: His very own life, which He has already willingly given. Therefore, I do not lose heart, for He who has promised is faithful (Hebrews 10:23).

May it all be to the praise of His glorious grace.
In Him,
-J

"My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one: I in them and you in me. May they be brought to complete unity to let the world know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me. Father, I want those you have given me to be with me where I am, and to see my glory, the glory you have given me because you loved me before the creation of the world. Righteous Father, though the world does not know you, I know you, and they know that you have sent me. I have made you known to them, and will continue to make you known in order that the love you have for me may be in them and that I myself may be in them." --John 17:20-26

Cats!

I am a cat-lover. (I don't want to go into what happened to my last cat, so please don't ask.) So when I ran across this today I knew I had to share it. It's hysterical in its truth. Enjoy:


-J

So This Is It!

(Do you have an 80s tune running through your head now? I know, I know, that was, "If This Is It...")

I found myself posting a comment on Pioneer Woman's blog in reply to this question:
How similar is your life now to how you imagined it ten years ago? Twenty years ago? Are you exactly where you imagined you’d be? Or are you constantly asking yourself, “How did I get here?” Do you mourn the unrealized plans in your life? Or are you happy no matter what your circumstances?

And I thought I would share my reply here:
My life is in no way similar to what I pictured. Not at all. I really thought I would be traveling the world now, teaching ESL [and sharing Christ!]. Instead, I am living in the deep south (I'm from the midwest), with a nice job and bills out the wahzoo (though I did manage to get the Master's Degree--thus the bills out the wahzoo!), but loving learning to be content...appreciating the beauty and the people in this place at this time. I guess I thought I would be married with kids; I don't know that I consciously planned that, but I'm seen myself mourn those conspicuous absences over the years.

I've also learned that pretty much no one's life turns out exactly the way they planned, and that mostly, that's a good thing. (Remember Moses the murderer who ended up being God's spokesman for a brand-new nation? Or David the shepherd who became a king?) Just because it doesn't look the way I thought it would doesn't mean God isn't working out beauty in the midst of it all. And, though I still miss what I thought would be, just perhaps, this is the best path for me....

What about you? How would you respond to this Q?
In His plan,
-J

Many are the plans in a man's heart,
but it is the LORD's purpose that prevails.
--Proverbs 19:21, NIV

(c) 2008