Important Issues

Quote of the Day:
Remember, God’s will was for John to be exiled, Paul to be jailed, Jesus to be executed. Why do we assume God’s will for us is to have a great job, a happy wife, and a large bank account?
—Kevin A. Thompson in his February 20 blog post

Picture of the Day:
Bill and Verna Weber were with us today all day. Bill taught the "Perspectives" class last night in Dayton and tonight at the Cincinnati Vineyard. Evelyn enjoyed a leisurely breakfast with them this morning while I went to work. I joined them for lunch at Mimi's, and they treated! Mimi's serves not only a tasty lunch, but a well-presented lunch. Witness my choice of lobster bisque and harvest salad with fruit cup.
We had leftover vegetable soup and grilled cheese and tomato sandwiches for supper with Verna while Bill was off to his assignment.
It's always good to visit with them. We always find so much to talk about--beyond surface into important issues quickly and always.

No Lie!

Quote of the Day:
We lie when we claim we are more confident than we really are. The culture of pretending within Christianity seems almost at an epidemic level. Many of us feel the need to hide our doubts and questions. We feel compelled to act like our faith life is totally satisfying, when in fact it often feels limited, dry, cold or numb. I think we also believe that our "witness" will be less powerful if we reveal a less than "perfect" religious experience. The funny thing is that the opposite is often true. Non-Christians are often drawn to stories of an authentic and even struggling faith.
—Tony Kriz, "Seven Lies Christians Tell" at Leadership Journal

Follow the link to consider all seven lies.

Picture of the Day:

Ruby and Nora Weber came to visit us this evening, and I persuaded them to pose just before they left to go back home. They accompanied their mom and grandma, and all four of them joined us for vegetable soup and salad for dinner, followed by ice cream and strawberries and brownies for dessert. Bill and Verna Weber are staying with us tonight and tomorrow night while Bill teaches Perspectives classes in several locations not far from here. He dropped Verna off at Webers 2.0 earlier today, on his way to Dayton for his class. Jocelyn brought Verna and the girls to our house in time for supper. Bill will be back here after 10:00, when he can get here from Dayton. We're always glad to have them with us, and that's the truth!

Thinking Future

Quote of the Day:
The main part of Fallon's audience wasn't watching a one-hour show at 12:35 a.m., rather going online. Fallon created a lot of snackable media - and it is his digital audience that really matters. Those viral videos, tweets, Facebook likes, those are the real consumers that NBC is after. Leno, for all his fan loyalty and competitive TV audience metrics, didn't deliver digitally. 
—"The Real Reason Jimmy Fallon Took Over 'The Tonight Show,'" at Mashable

 Anyone thinking about how to engage in our digital future should follow the link to this whole piece. Some insights here for the church.

Picture of the Day:

This is just part of the panoply of medicine, home cures, and desperate strategies I've assembled to help
myself get over the worst cold I can remember having in a very long time. As I mentioned yesterday, it went into a wicked cough yesterday, and by the end of the work day today, I felt flushed and wrung out. I went to the grocery to get the stuff on Evelyn's list, warmed up some leftovers, and vegged out in front of Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy before attempting to do anything productive.
I did plan our study of The Story for our Thursday-morning small group, but that's about all I got accomplished this evening.
I had planned to make progress on a major project with some extra hours yesterday and tonight (remember that picture book I mentioned a couple of weeks ago?). But this cold has taken away all my margin of energy, so alas, that good task has been shuffled farther into the future.

Drying Out and Digging In

Pictures of the Day (Yesterday):

 Above are the two industrial fans that have been running in our hallway nonstop since Wednesday. to the right is the giant humidifier thats been running along with them. We turned the fans off for a few hours Friday night while we had company for dinner, but that's the only time they've been off. We're able to mask the constant roar by closing the door to the stairway. But we've been staying upstairs and watching the small, tabletop TV that is usually in the kitchen. Those skiers are not nearly as impressive o this tiny screen.
The men came Saturday and decided the fans needed to blow for a couple more days. So we've listened to them all weekend, but hopefully they'll be gone by tomorrow.
After that comes the insurance adjuster and all the work of tearing down sheetrock, resealing the seams, and repainting. We see if that patch of carpet at the bottom of the steps needs to be replaced.
When Paul and Sev Friskney were here for dinner Friday night, we got to talking about the Oscars. Paul is a real film buff and tries to see all the best-picture nominees every year. We decided on the spur of the moment to meet them Saturday to see Nebraska starring Bruce Dern.
We met them for the 5:00 showing at the Esquire theater in Clifton. The black-and-white movie is a gray story depicting brokenness, dysfunction, lost dreams, and limited horizons. "I'm sorry the movie was so depressing," Sev wrote Evelyn on Facebook today, but we weren't depressed by the movie. We were glad to see the remarkable performances, especially, of course, by Bruce Dern. The movie is not a musical, but it has some good music. It is not a comedy, although we did laugh out loud more than once. It ends on a positive note, but I couldn't help but think of the thousands of folks all around us whose lives are as bleak as those portrayed in the film.
Afterwards, Sev and Paul took us to one of their favorite spots, a new restaurant for us, Jason's Deli in Rookwood Exchange.
"Deli" doesn't describe this huge restaurant with "the best salad bar in the city," and a menu full of homemade soups (try our choice, the chicken pot pie soup) as well as sandwiches and main dishes. And every meal includes free soft serve in a cone or a cup!
It was a wonderful meal, and we enjoyed debriefing the film with Paul and Sev.

This morning Terry and Shirley Wuske visited Christ's Church as Mason again, and we went to Bob Evans to grab brunch before heading home. Evelyn and I stopped at Kroger's and then spent the rest of the afternoon and evening at home. My sore throat had progressed into a nasty cough wracking my chest. I wrote a draft of my column for Tuesday and then rested in the recliner for an hour, or was it two?

Quote of the Day:
"God says, 'I am bigger than your situation, your problem, your need.'"
—Trevor DeVage, sharing the Moses story in this week's service in The Story series.

A Fine Friday

Quote of the Day:
Jesus: Come with me.
Peter: What are we gonna do?
Jesus: Change the world!
—Dialogue in Son of God, showing in theaters starting February 28.

Picture of the Day:
A bouquet of tulips from the Kroger garden seemed a fitting way to celebrate temps in the 50s and the
disappearance of all the snow (save for melting mountains in the corners of parking lots across town). We're going to have highs in the 20s next week, they say, but this brief respite reminds us that our hope is not out of line. Spring is coming!

Highlight of the Day:
Yesterday (Friday) there were two. First, reconnecting with John Turner at lunchtime. Second, enjoying dinner at our place with Paul and Sev Friskney. They had missed the Christmas dinner we planned with them and the Webers, and I don't remember when we had seen them before that.  (Paul's dad was in the hospital suddenly then, an episode not connected to the car crash and hospitalization in January, from which he did not survive.) Evelyn made a wonderful supper including some old favorites (the wonderful chicken and stuffing casserole first introduced to us by Virginia Beddow when Geoff was born!) and applesauce Jello. Dessert was angel food cake with fresh strawberries and raspberries and whipped cream. We retreated to the living room after awhile, turned on the fire (it was normally chilly outside after dark), and chatted till almost 10:00. A nice way to end the week.

Speaking to Writers

Quote of the Day:
"A lot of people think God is like Scott Hamilton during the Olympics. That He sits in Heaven looking down His nose at our every mistake. That His job is to view every sin we make, and hold it against us. But that could not be further from the truth. Or why else would Jesus die on a cross? God knows we are trying desperately to skate our way through a very hazardous routine, and He delivers a way for us to work through those times when we just can’t get it right. It’s called forgiveness. It’s called grace. It’s called mercy. Look! You just received a perfect score! But you didn’t have to be perfect to do it. Jesus did that for you."
—Tim Hartman, posting on Facebook yesterday

Picture of the Day:

John Russell invited me as the guest for the Paraclete Northern Kentucky ministers meeting. We met today at Lakeside Christian Church on Buttermilk Pike. More than 20 preachers and other minister types were there. John asked me to speak about how to get published, and I spoke with them about five outlets:
Christian Press
Secular Press
Community Press
Local Church Press
Digital Outlets

I gave 'em a handout with lots of web links and other resources. It was good for me to do it, and maybe a writer will rise up out of the group.

By the way, Tim Hartman, quoted above, posts some wonderful vignettes on his Facebook page. He's a good writer!

"We Have a Problem"

Quote of the Day:
"We have a problem."
—Evelyn's first words to me when she called at 5:00 to say water was leaking from the roof to the basement.

Pictures of the Day:

This was (is) the problem. An ice dam on the roof is causing a backup of water and a leak in the ceiling over the stairwell that leads to the basement. I trudged out there about 5:30 to try to dislodge the ice, but it was frozen hard and thick. I swept snow off the roof, as far as I could reach, but there was no way to get the leverage I would need to chunk away the 3- or 4-inch buildup of ice.
We're grateful it's not worse. The leak above was very steady for an hour or so, and even though the drip, drip, drip was in the background as we watched the Olympics tonight, now, at bedtime it as really slowed down. We don't think we'll have to empty the wastebasket overnight!
I didn't try to picture the wall below the corner leak. The  wallboard is buckling a bit at the seams. We have some significant moisture back there.
A steady rain this afternoon was part of the problem, and the rain has stopped now. Warmer temperatures are predicted for the rest of the week, and I'm hoping the snow and ice on the roof melt away soon.
Meanwhile, I'll be calling the good man at the insurance agency to see what's next.

More than a Reunion

Picture of the Day:
We visited Reunion Church, a church plant of Plainfield Christian Church, where Brian Lowery is the
pastor. He had a wonderful sermon, thought-provoking, original, challenging.
We had driven to Plainfield yesterday to spend the night with Wendy Wagoner. She cooked us a wonderful dinner, and then Todd and Lynn Dillon stopped by later for dessert. Always lots of laughs with the Dillons, accompanied by serious talk about important subjects--this time it was worship.
After church this morning, Brian joined us for brunch. We went to Stone Creek, and I think the vegetarian omelette was the best I've ever tasted.
My first reason to be there was to visit with Brian about an idea I have for Christian Standard. I'd like his help to create a new feature in the magazine, but we'll see if he decides he could take it on. I really hope so! It was wonderful to get acquainted with him and learn of his heart for ministry as we met for about an hour after lunch.
Evelyn and I talked with Wendy for a couple of hours after my meeting, and we were off for home by about 5:00.

Quote of the Day:
What if the very first message you received each day was from God's Word, instead of from Facebook or Twitter or the radio?
—Brian Lowery, in this morning's sermon

Discovering Joy

Pictures of the Day:
They let us leave work at 4:00 today because of the steady snow that had started much earlier, probably by noon. That was good, because I needed to get home, pick up Evelyn, and then get back to pick up Dave and Mary Lautzenheiser, our traditional Valentine's Day dinner partners. (Is this the third or fourth time we've celebrated Valentine's Day with them?) The snow was coming down steadily, but most of the roads were still clear as I made my way home late this afternoon. The trees, bearing a coating from the heavy, wet snow, were more beautiful than I could capture with my iPhone.

The snow continued throughout our trip to pick up Dave and Mary and throughout our dinner at

Mimi's. Service was slow, and our conversations were rich, and we lingered at our table for almost two hours. The trip home was a bit more challenging. Some of the roads were covered, as if they had never been touched. But we got home without incident, in time to put our things together for our trip to Indy tomorrow, with time left over to watch some Olympics before going to bed.

Quotes of the Day:
The American church often shares the surrounding culture's obsession with glory and power. One of the reasons our ministries are so ineffective is because we don't make room for God's power, since we are so enamored with our own. We don't make room for weakness—everything in our churches has to be dynamic and excellent. So we schedule things by the minute, rehearse our transitions and prayers, seek out the next killer series or curriculum or program. And all the while Jesus has moved on to people who have nothing other than him.

The American Dream is to live in our strength; God's dream is that we live in our weakness. 
—Mike Erre, "The Way of Weakness" at leadershipjournal.net


Along with hearts and flowers this Valentine’s Day, successful Christian marriages will celebrate the self-sacrifice and kind deeds that may express love better than any greeting card. And so they can realize what my preacher encouraged and our Lord taught: The way to discover joy for yourself is to provide it for someone else.
—"Real Love, Real Joy," the column I wrote a year ago for christianstandard.com

No Obsessions

Quote of the Day:

Christians need to stop obsessing over being right and having all of the answers and start focusing on following Christ’s example: sacrificially serving, helping, comforting, and loving everyone around us.
For Christians, it’s often easier to yell and scream instead of doing the very hard—and humble—work of loving others. Arguing is addictive because it feeds off of our need for self-glorification, self-righteousness, pride, power, and recognition.
- See more at: http://www.redletterchristians.org/six-things-wish-christians-stop/#sthash.MBqGMhGj.dpuf

 Christians need to stop obsessing over being right and having all of the answers and start focusing on following Christ's example: sacrificially serving, helping, comforting, and loving everyone around us.
For Christians, it's often easier to yell ans scream instead of doing the very hard—and humble—work of loving others. Arguing is addictive because it feeds of of our need for self-glorification, self-righteousness, pride, power, and recognition.
—Stephen Mattson in "Six Things I Wish Christians Would Stop Doing" at redletterchristians.org.

Discovery of the Day:
Paper, the new Facebook app for iPhone (and many other devices). I came across something on it on the web or somewhere and I decided to download it. I've played with it for only about 5 minutes, so that's what I'm going to do as soon as I make this post, while we watch the Olympics a little while before bedtime.

Thought of the Day:
Speaking of the Olympics, I am amazed each time I watch that human beings can make their bodies do what these Olympic athletes are doing. (This from a guy who can't walk on ice on a parking lot without falling and risking a concussion!)

Christians need to stop obsessing over being right and having all of the answers and start focusing on following Christ’s example: sacrificially serving, helping, comforting, and loving everyone around us.
For Christians, it’s often easier to yell and scream instead of doing the very hard—and humble—work of loving others. Arguing is addictive because it feeds off of our need for self-glorification, self-righteousness, pride, power, and recognition.
- See more at: http://www.redletterchristians.org/six-things-wish-christians-stop/#sthash.MBqGMhGj.dpuf

Christians need to stop obsessing over being right and having all of the answers and start focusing on following Christ’s example: sacrificially serving, helping, comforting, and loving everyone around us.
For Christians, it’s often easier to yell and scream instead of doing the very hard—and humble—work of loving others. Arguing is addictive because it feeds off of our need for self-glorification, self-righteousness, pride, power, and recognition.
- See more at: http://www.redletterchristians.org/six-things-wish-christians-stop/#sthash.MBqGMhGj.dpuf

Christians need to stop obsessing over being right and having all of the answers and start focusing on following Christ’s example: sacrificially serving, helping, comforting, and loving everyone around us.
For Christians, it’s often easier to yell and scream instead of doing the very hard—and humble—work of loving others. Arguing is addictive because it feeds off of our need for self-glorification, self-righteousness, pride, power, and recognition.
- See more at: http://www.redletterchristians.org/six-things-wish-christians-stop/#sthash.MBqGMhGj.dpuf

God Knew We'd Need Him

Quote of the Day:
God knew we'd need him, so he walked with Adam.
God knew that, in spite of all that He is, He is not all that we need.
So he made Eve.
And in making Eve, he made family.
And, the good became the very good.
And, lo, He is with us always, even to the end of the age.
—Tom Lawson, on Facebook this morning, reflecting on the sacrifices his family has made as he and his wife, Linda, have walked through her cancer diagnosis and treatments together.


Picture of the Day:
Shirley Temple Black died today, and I've been pleased and sort of surprised that all the glowing reviews of her life have not mentioned her anti-gay activism of some time ago. 
Maybe the gay activists think they've already won the argument. Snapped this picture at the Hallmark Valentine's display in Kroger's yesterday.

Things Will Work Out

Quote of the Day:
Many of the psalms are downright jubilant. They are brilliantly thankful–whether observing the weather, the crops, the state of the nation, or whatever–and this thankfulness is directly linked to God. Yes, they are confident, and that confidence comes because they know and believe that God is powerful and God is good.
 
But other psalms are extremely woeful. “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (22:1) They just can’t believe that things have gone so bad. They scream protest. They cry out in misery. But here’s the thing: they protest because they believe that God is powerful and God is good. They are sure something is wrong. It’s not supposed to be this way! How can it be this way?

Thus, whether jubilant or woebegone, they believe that things should work out. In the short run, obviously they don’t. In the long run, they still believe. If they didn’t, they wouldn’t protest. They would just quit.
—Tim Stafford at http://timstafford.wordpress.com/2014/02/07/a-healing-world/

You'll be blessed by reading the whole post!

Picture of the Day:

The sun was an orange orb, floating in the sky as I drove to work this morning, but by the time I could stop to take a picture, the thick clouds had turned it into a gauzy, shapeless light. The sun shone all day, but the temp was only 20-something as I drove home. The radio this morning said our temps are about 20 degrees below normal. They're predicting below zero tonight.

Happy Birthday, Nora!

Pictures of the Day:

We were pleased to be invited to Nora Weber's birthday dinner last night, hosted by her parents,
Donovan and Jocelyn, enthusiastically joined by her sister, Ruby, and also attended by grandparents Verna and Bill Weber, good friends who moved away to Indianapolis more than a year ago.
Jocelyn had a wonderful supper featuring a new recipe for vegetable soup with homemade croutons, and the birthday cake was a tower of mini cupcakes adorned with candles and topped with the number announcing Nora's age.
It was great to reconnect with the Webers. We hadn't talked with Donovan and Jocelyn since they brought the girls to our house for dinner and trick-or-treating 'way back in October. He was anticipating a new ministry then and is settling into that ministry nicely now. And Jocelyn is serving in a new position, a counseling job at Oak Hills High School as part of a program sponsored by Children's Hospital, where she's been employed for some time.
I can't even remember when we saw the senior Webers last--sometime last fall, before the holidays. Bill just returned from an extended trip to Myanmar, accompanied by his grandson Noel Brooks, and it was great to hear about the trip as well as just generally catch up in our fine evening together.

Ruby (right) was eager to help Nora blow out the candles on her pyramid-of-cupcakes birthday cake.

Every time Evelyn and I are around parents of preschoolers, she remarks, "Now I know why God gives children to young parents. Today I'd never have the energy to keep up!" And when I see the patience and consistency of good parents like Donovan and Jocelyn, I'm reminded of how tired it must make God when I whine or cry to get my own way or resist what he tells me, as if I know better than he what I ought to eat or how I ought to act or when I ought to go to bed!

Quote of the Day:
"God's first word in his command to Abram was 'go.' And Jesus' last word in his command to his followers was 'go.' "
—Trevor DeVage in this morning's sermon at Christ's Church at Mason 

Makes you think God wants us to GO, doesn't it?

What else? The snow!

Picture of the Day:
No, I didn't take this one. I found it at the WCPO-TV website. I chose it because it shows the shimmering layer of frozen rain on top of the snow that threatened to bury this fire hydrant. We didn't have that much snow overnight, but there was definitely a layer of frozen snow and ice atop the 4-6 inches we found on our driveway this morning.
Evelyn (bless her!) helped me shovel. With the ice, the snow was heavy enough and difficult enough to shovel that we concentrated on clearing only a path wide enough for the cars to travel. We didn't worry about getting edge to edge. We were done by 7:30, and I came in to take my shower.
I called work to discover we were on a "delay" (see the quote below), so I answered some e-mails and wrote my part of Christian Standard's weekly e-newsletter before braving the roads to head into work.
The worst part of the trip was the parking lot at work! They were still plowing it, and many of the parking spots were not cleared, because cars had started the rows of spaces before the plows got there. I had to park quite away from the building in a remaining spot that wasn't snow covered.
Management took pity on us and ordered LaRosa's pizzas for the whole office for lunch. That was nice!

Quote of the Day: "CFM corporate offices will be on a two-hour delay. The office will be open at 9 a.m."
—Message on the company's "weather closing" voice mail this morning. 
For those of us who usually get there at 8:00 or 8:15, it was a little difficult to interpret exactly what that announcement was saying.

Treats for a Birthday

Quote of the Day: Even when we choose wisely and well, we still must live in a world that dreads death, fears disease, and vainly tries to hide from disaster. Two bad decisions, Eve’s and Adam’s, have left us longing for Eden but trapped on a planet characterized by travail.
—"Living with the Lie," my column at christianstandard.com, posted today.

Picture of the Day:
Today was Sheryl Overstreet's birthday. We celebrated by taking her to her choice of lunch spots, which today was Cracker Barrel. I hope she enjoyed her french toast, because I thought the Tuesday lunch special meatloaf was great!
Sheryl decided to bring a wonderful assortment of her favorite snacks for her office birthday treat, and I persuaded her to pose by the spread after we got back from lunch.

Quite a Remedy

Pictures of the Day:
I was blessed to hear our choir sing and Brad Wilson preach in the 10:30 Classic service this morning.
The opening video set the stage for a message about God's creation, man's sin, and God's remedy. A powerful thought to realize that sin is behind all the grief and pain in the world, but God's story is the story of providing us the remedy. I've begun studying for our small group's study of Chapter One of The Story, and I'm even more looking forward to this study.

Quote of the Day: If we believe the remarkable truth stated in Genesis 1:1, "In the beginning God created the world," it's not hard to believe the rest of the Bible.
—Brad Wilson in this morning's sermon.