Stories and other stuff

You know the story.  Abraham is promised a child by Sarah.  She's old, way past child bearing years.  They take matters into their own hands.  Abraham has a child with Sarah's handmaiden, Hagar named Ishmael.  Bad things happen.  And then God ultimately makes good on His promise and Isaac is born. God's plans can't be thwarted. Bucket is my dog.  He's not always been my dog, but long before I knew God as I do these days, something told me to spend the last $136 I had to my name to adopt him.  He's run away several times; he's friendly and curious.  I gave him to the ex-wife, who gave him to her dad, who gave him back to me, so he's been on two road trips....one to Indiana, one home from Indiana. Bucket is my dog, because he's supposed to be my dog.  No matter what has happened, Bucket has been from the time I adopted him, my dog. He ate a hole in my brand new bedspread and I wanted to murder him, but he's still my dog.  Alwa...

A week ago, we were very blessed to have a missionary, the Rev. Katie Longkumer, deliver a message to us at church.  She and her husband, the Rev. Taku Longkumer, are missionaries (not called that anymore, there's a different term used these days for their safety, something like development coordinator or something...I forget) but they're working in India and the church there is seeing some serious growth.  I think that's a great thing...especially in a part of the world where you can't just throw up a church building on every corner.  I listened intently (as much as I could....these six day weeks are killing me) as she explained what they do, where their area they work in is, and the progress and difficulties they see and face.  It was interesting, so much so that I decided that I need to help support them. Well, pretty sure the Holy Spirit had something to do with that, but it's one of the things that's a core belief of our church that we send and support ...

For background, here's what I know about angels: They exist. And I'm not really sure, but I think I may have just met one.  It's not out of the realm of impossibility is what I'm saying. And without bending or twisting Scripture, I want to share this story with you. I'm off today.  I need to be, for a plethora of reasons, not the least of which is that I'm freaking exhausted.  My life is hard for me and I have the strength of ten grinches plus two.  The intended reason for being off tonight fell through, but it could be that I just needed to be off and I'm too stubborn to know when enough is enough, so the circumstances of my day unfolded as such that I am off, albeit not for the initial reason. I was going to go to work, be an hour late, when things changed and my evening wasn't going to go as planned, but in looking at how the day unfolded, it may be that off is exactly what the original intent was.  Even in that, though, God answered a prayer ...

I posted some pictures on Facebook of the sitting room I put together for the future.  I read something about leaning hard into your future so I did.  I'm trusting God to not let me tip over. I have had two beers.  I am working on number three.  It's been that kind of a weekend.  Having beers is not a habit I plan to return to anytime soon, but I enjoy a cold one while working in the yard and I worked in the yard today.  I will be working in the yard for the next several months.  The yard is still winning. I did manage to get peas, potatoes, and carrots planted.  Will they grow?  We'll see.  We had the seeds.  They are leftovers from whenever.  We'll try them and see what grows or doesn't.  We're really scaling back on the garden this year, mostly because the yard is still winning.  Not next year, though.  Next year, there will be grow boxes and brand new dirt.  And grass.  Lots and lots of grass....

On a good day, my life doesn't make sense.  On a GOOD day.  I'm not so sure what kind of day today is going to be, but I know there's direction.  One of the things I'm looking for these days from Jesus is some clarity about where we're headed and I think I may have gotten that this morning, from, of all places, a conglomeration of posts I shared on Facebook. My ex, Wendi, explained to me once after I posted some stuff on her Facebook page, that it was like her virtual front yard, where friends walked by and waved.  That made a lot of sense to me and I took down what I said.  That was years ago, by the way.  But the analogy stuck with me.  It's why I only have people I know as friends (with one exception).  I like that we can walk by each others' front yards, and sometimes stop and say hi.  On days when it seems I'm oversharing pictures and memes that have a Jesus theme, there's usually a reason for it, and often it's that they're tellin...