Today (5/7/15) marks two years of blog posts here at AKnappforthat.  Thanks for tuning in today.

I’ve been able to do a post most days, and the categories continue to be helpful. The counts so far, by category:

Clean Jokes:                                       301

Cool Numbers:                                  122

Fear and Awe:                                   72

Gospel Messages:                           79

Group Prayer:                                   67

Holy Lists:                                            90

This I Know:                                        75

Two or More Categories:              11

The numbers make some sense.  Jokes are generally Tuesday, Thursday (but not today), and Saturday, so there are more of them.  Every Sunday is about the cool number dates in the upcoming week.  I quit applying the Two or More Categories label after the first year, so I should get rid of that one.  And the other five are about the same – Holy Lists has the most because it is the easiest one to write in a hurry!

When I started I thought I could fill up the days with wonderful, heart-warming stories of my youth (This I Know).  But it turns out there is not much to say about me, and there is a tremendous amount of material when writing about God (all the other ones!).  As John famously says in his gospel, “Now there are also many other things that Jesus did.  Were every one of them to be written, I suppose that the world itself could not contain the books that would be written” (verse 21.25).

Tomorrow is El Cinco de Mayo, and my friend Rebecca from Mexico clued me in to this interesting bit of history – it is an American, not a Mexican, holiday.

The following is the Amazon blurb for El Cinco de Mayo: An American Tradition, by David E. Hayes-Bautista.

“Why is Cinco de Mayo – a holiday commemorating a Mexican victory over the French at Puebla in 1862 – so widely celebrated in California and across the United States, when it is scarcely observed in Mexico?  As David E. Haves-Bautista explains, the holiday is not Mexican at all, but rather an American one,  created by Latinos in California during the mid-nineteenth century.  Hayes-Bautista shows how the meaning of Cinco de Mayo has shifted over time – it embodied immigrant nostalgia in the 1930s, U.S. patriotism during World War II, Chicano Power in the 1960s and 1970s, and commercial intentions in the 1980s and 1990s.  Today, it continues to reflect the aspirations of a community that is engaged empowered, and expanding.”

So El Cinco is not what I thought, but that’s okay because May 5 is actually my half-birthday.  Regardless of Mexican-American influences, I can still celebrate my Hobbit side.

By the way, today is May 4 – Star Wars Day.  May the fourth be with you!

The recently completed Masters Golf Tournament was sponsored in large part by IBM Analytics.  They touted their use of high capacity, well-programmed computers to do awesome things.  They can measure the noise made by individual railroad car wheels to determine which ones have a crack.  They can analyze MRI images to find even obscure potential anomalies.  They can instantly provide information from prior arrests, cases, motor vehicle registrations, and events to help solve crimes.

Often during the televised tournament this year, I was swimming about in the Gulf of Mexico, contemplating ocean waves.  All of the wonderful IBM applications pale when compared to the sovereign and providential care that God has in sending every single ocean wave onto its designated coastline all over the earth. Imagine the number of waves that have hit any single point of land in the last year.  Multiply that by the number of shore points around the world and by the millions of years when oceans have been on this world. Crashing or calm, surf-able or float-able, each wave – containing lots of water, varying amounts of salt, sea junk, and life forms – is prepared and propelled by a loving Father’s hand.  Each wave is unique, like a snowflake. God’s creative power is beyond any computer’s capability.

And, God not only knows where the train car wheel cracks are, he can fix them.  He not only knows where health problems are, he can heal them.  He knows who committed the crime, where the perpetrator is, and what the criminal needs to know in order to have his sins forgiven.  Analytics, indeed.

We have had our share of angels helping us out.  Four favorite true stories are published  about Ohio, St Louis, home, and the hospital.

God made several things happen together Wednesday morning to provide a moment’s wonder to one who was watching.  The sun, from 93 million miles away, provided abundant light for making shadows.  The early pre-dawn fog had lifted and the bedroom window shade was raised so that the sun’s rays were unobstructed. The sun and the earth were briefly in just the right relative positions so that the sunlight poured through the window and lit up the TV screen on the far wall. A watcher sat down in the bedroom chair to read and pray. And a Cardinal landed in the tree outside the window.

The watcher’s eye caught a movement on the TV and looked up to see a shadow bird dancing there.  The tail flipped up, the bird hopped to the side, spun around, cocked its head and flew away.   The show lasted about five seconds but long enough for the watcher to realize this premier performance was a personal treat unlikely to be repeated.

I rejoice to know a sovereign God who orchestrates all things at all times for the good of His people and for His glory.

It is just so hard to imagine the work that went into food preparation in bible times, without refrigerators, microwaves, or running water.  There is an amazing culinary scene at the beginning of Genesis 18.2-8 when Abraham is trying to impress three lordly gentlemen who had come to visit:

He lifted up his eyes and looked, and behold, three men were standing in front of him. When he saw them, he ran from the tent door to meet them and bowed himself to the earth and said, “O Lord, if I have found favor in your sight, do not pass by your servant. Let a little water be brought, and wash your feet, and rest yourselves under the tree, while I bring a morsel of bread, that you may refresh yourselves, and after that you may pass on—since you have come to your servant.” So they said, “Do as you have said.” And Abraham went quickly into the tent to Sarah and said, “Quick! Three seahs of fine flour! Knead it, and make cakes.” And Abraham ran to the herd and took a calf, tender and good, and gave it to a young man, who prepared it quickly. Then he took curds and milk and the calf that he had prepared, and set it before them. And he stood by them under the tree while they ate.

First, picture the 97 year old Abraham RUNNING to get the meals arranged.  That would have been worth paying good money to see.  Then after offering “a morsel of bread” he had a three course meal prepared.

They must have had a different definition of “quick.”  Three seahs is roughly seven quarts. That is a lot of flour, and somebody had to go get enough water to mix up the batter.  Since you don’t just throw out some wet wheat globs in a couple of minutes for glorious guests, there was probably some rising yeast involved. Mixing, rising, cooking and without a nice gas grill, the fire had to be stoked.

Separately, their young chef was grilling the meat.  There was no nice hunk of steak aging in the cooler; this meal started with a live animal on the hoof!  Butcher it, clean it, put it on the spit.  Cook it up just right and plop it on a plate with cottage cheese.  Must have taken at least two hours, even if the herd was right next door.

I can see where the jokes come from when service is slow at a restaurant: “they sent somebody down the road to Meijer to get a head of lettuce!” or “the butcher must be on a lunch break.”  But the three men in Genesis didn’t seem to mind waiting and probably had a pleasant conversation.  I will try to remember to do the same.

I was first introduced to Psalm 16.6 by my friend Joyce back in the 1970s.  It just rolled off her lips one day – “the lines of my life have surely fallen in pleasant places,” she remarked one lovely summer afternoon.  It had a nice ring to it then and has grown in meaning over the years.

For a long time I reserved its use for those special periods when everything was going well and peace reigned.  Like the day almost every March when the snows have melted, the NCAA basketball tournament is underway, the smell in the air tells me the next six months are going to bring longer days and warmer weather, and the cars’ gas tanks are full. Or we have the day before Thanksgiving off, providing four straight Saturdays in a row.  Or it’s the first day of spring break, you have arrived at your destination, and a great, relaxing holiday awaits.  The physical pleasure that always comes to mind when I hear this verse is the huge swing ride tucked into the back of the Cedar Point Amusement park – it spins around fast enough to generate a sense of gentle weightless flight with no risk of jolting roller coaster direction changes.

The verse has developed a broader scope as I more fully realize the impact of Romans 8.28 – God is working all things together for my good and my salvation.  Not just the high points and joys but the setbacks and annoyances are part of my life.

• I am very thankful for a wife and children who know the LORD. We can do family Bible studies and laugh together regularly even though daily living events can cause stress.
• I am overwhelmed that God’s great plan includes the Bible, prayer, forgiveness, and a Savior.
• I am blessed to be in a solid church family that is growing in maturity as disciple-making disciples of Jesus despite pastoral, legal and denominational issues.
• I have been providentially provided with well-paying work I enjoy even though some days are too busy or frustrating.

I am mobile enough to play Ultimate Frisbee (in the summer) not because I am highly skilled but because I know where to stand on the field. And I can proclaim that the lines of my life have fallen in pleasant places because I know Him in whom I stand.

There is at least one more voice in the discussion amongst scientists who support Naturalist Darwinism or Intelligent Design – Theistic Naturalists believe there is a God, and that he is the one behind Darwinian natural selection.

I am seeing at least six ways that the groups are similar.

1. They each have an underlying worldview that affects their reaction to others’ opinions. The Intelligent Design folks (Stephen Meyer, Michael Behe and more ) believe there is a God who created and providentially controls the universe; many of them base their view of God on the Bible. The Evolutionists (Bill Nye, Richard Dawkins and more). The Theistic Design group (Stephen Collins, BioLogos) is trying for the best of both worlds, saying that God the creator has cared for his universe through evolutionary methods.
2. Many of the contested events (origin of life, development of humans, dinosaurs, the flood) happened so long ago that evidentiary records are slim. We have more and more information about the current state of affairs, and must make theories that look backward in time.
3. Each group has at least one common response that (a) they use when they don’t know the answer and (b) it ticks the other groups off. The intelligent design crowd (at least the Christian ones) are very willing to fall back on “God has always been in charge and that’s the way he wanted it.” The Darwinists say “the time frame is so vast that even very unlikely events have been able to occur.” The Theistic evolution folks can use both!
4. Analogies are very popular. Darwinists point to the similarity of bat, human, and bird arm bone structures and see them as all having descended from a common ancestor. Intelligent Design folks speak of the irreducible complexity of the human eyeball as being similar to a manufactured pocket watch – there must be a designer behind it.
5. The groups jab at each other – I am not sure if there are buttals, but there are certainly lots of rebuttals. Each group can cite experts, documents, and research that agree with their position. Each group has a standard apologetic supporting their view.
6. All agree that on the BIG side, the universe is a monstrously huge and awesome place. All agree that on the SMALL side, a single cell of a creature’s body is a marvelously complex and intricate structure of amazing flexibility and

The “discussions” among the parties remind one of Republican / Democrat differences of opinion or disagreements between religious groups. Most humans have a hard time playing well with others who don’t agree with them.

My friend and I had read a number of Christian-oriented books that I suggested:  The Case for Christ, The Case for a Creator, the Gospel of Mark in the Bible, and Christianity Explored.   Now we are looking at a book that he suggested – Undeniable; Evolution and the Science of Creation.  As we starting reading the latest book, I was struck by three things immediately.

First, the author seems a bit dismissive, referring to “Creationists and other uniformed people” or the “kooky ideas that Creationists teach their children.”  Second, our definitions are not in sync on the term Creationist.  The author uses the word to describe those who hold to a literal six 24 hour days as the timeline of the biblical creation story.  I view myself as a Creationist, believing that God created the universe and all that is in it. But I would be more in tune with one of the other four common interpretations of the Genesis text, as explained in the ESV Study Bible  (I gravitate toward the geological-age idea).   And third, the author assumes too much about my knowledge on things that are obvious to him, like the multiple species of finches on the Galapagos Islands as recounted in Darwin’s initial work.

As I described these things to my friend, he related to them, because he felt the same way about the Christian books we read.  We were both in tune with phrases like “obviously” or “apparently” which were used to make points that were not so clear from the supporting information.

One thing we do agree on is the starting point – there must be a God behind creation. I like the explanation in the words of Romans 1.20: “For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made.”  My friend says a “creator” makes sense to him because the Big Bang has scientific support and there must have been some force behind that event.  But we both stand in awe of the enormous, varied, and seemingly infinite universe that we live in.  And maybe we should collaborate on our own book.

A current fad in collectibles is game-worn equipment – jerseys, gloves, mitts, or anything else a player actually wore during an actual game.  I was reminded of this recently at the Lansing Lugnuts store, where a rack of shirts are available for purchase.  They must have been authentic; they had grass stains on the shoulders.

It turns out this is not a new idea.  We see an example in the book of Esther, full of intrigue and God’s working at just the right time in multiple ways.  Way back in chapter 2, Mordecai the Jew, uncle of Esther, had reported a plot against the king.  The event was forgotten but recorded in the Book of Memorable Deeds – an archivist’s dream tome!  Chapter 6 begins late one night when the king couldn’t sleep and started checking out the cool deeds book; he came across the Mordecai story and determined to honor the man.

The next day, Haman the Jew hater who had created a huge gallows for hanging Mordecai because the Jew would not bow down to him, walked in to the castle just in time to hear the king’s question about what should be done to ‘him whom the king desires to honor.’  The king is thinking Mordecai, Haman is thinking himself.  Haman describes the ostentatious activities he would like, including a crown, parading on a fine horse, and being escorted by a nobleman who proclaimed the recipient’s honor to all.

In verse 8.8, the game-worn articles are included in the package: “let royal robes be brought, which the king has worn, and the horse that the king has ridden…”  You may think game gear is in the Bible, so it must be a good thing.  But remember that Haman’s ideas were generally bad, and the real hero of the story was God, who worked all things together for good for his people.