Context Matters

A little boy was asked one Sunday morning, “What is small and furry, has a long tail, and likes nuts?”

The boy pondered and answered, “It sounds like a squirrel but since this is Sunday School, I’m going to guess Jesus.”

College Search

This being the season when high school seniors are finalizing plans for next year, it seemed good to tell the stories of college searches conducted by some people I know.

 Linnea wanted to be major in Physical Therapy and started with a list of a dozen or so schools that had excellent programs.  She ruled out Northern Michigan after hearing a lady describe the beautiful scene of ice in the lake at an open house in June.  Others were gradually eliminated until two options remained.  There were friends and some scholarship money at both schools.

The final choice was tough, so Linnea devised a strategy – since Augustana cost more, the decision can be made based on their offer in scholarship money.  If they offer BIG money, she goes there.  If they offer little money, she goes to Grand Valley.

The letter arrived and the wailing began – they offered medium money.  “God, what kind of non-message are you sending me?”  Eventually her  grandparents made up the difference and she went to Augustana.

 Jesse worked with a short list.  One day the MSU recruiters came to his high school.  He talked to them, they checked his records, and admitted him.  He signed up.  Done.  We made him go on a visit to Western, just to see someplace else.  He had probably thought about it longer but he seemed to make a decision in one day.

 One other student, a long time ago, wanted to be a Math Instructor so applied to three schools known for solid math programs – a large, a medium and a small.  The medium was too far away, the small was too small, so he went to the large one.  Decisions are made in mysterious ways.

 A follow up on Linnea:  We prayed that someone at that little school in Illinois would look out for our girl and take her under their wing.  It did not happen.  But, the first week after she transferred to MSU, a woman from church called, announced  she was her advisor for the business school and asked to get together!

God works in even more mysterious (and glorious) ways!

My Man Cyrus

The historian Josephus recounts events of Babylon, Persia, and Israel that occurred several hundred years before Christ.  In his book, Antiquities of the Jews – Book XI, Chapter 1, we find:

“In the first year of the reign of Cyrus which was the seventieth from the day that our people were removed out of their own land into Babylon, God commiserated the captivity and calamity of these poor people,, according as he had foretold to them by Jeremiah the prophet, before the destruction of the city, that after they had served Nebuchadnezzar and his posterity, and after they had undergone that servitude seventy years, he would restore them again to the land of their fathers, and they should build their temple, and enjoy their ancient prosperity.  And these things God did afford them; for he stirred up the mind of Cyrus, and made him write this throughout all Asia: ‘Thus saith Cyrus the king:  Since God Almighty hath appointed me to the king of the habitable earth, I believe that he is that God which the nation of the Israelites worship ; for indeed he foretold my name by the prophets, and that I should build him a house at Jerusalem, in the country of Judea.’

This was known to Cyrus by his reading the book which Isaiah left behind him of his prophecies; for this prophet said that God had spoken thus to him in a secret vision: ‘My will is, that Cyrus, whom I have appointed to be king of many and great nations, send back my people to their own land, and build my temple.’  This was foretold by Isaiah one hundred and forty years before the temple was demolished. Accordingly, when Cyrus read this, and admired the Divine power, an earnest desire and ambition seized upon him to fulfill what was so written; so he called for the most eminent Jews that were in Babylon, and said to them, that he gave them leave to go back to their own country and to rebuild the city Jerusalem, and the temple of God, for that he would be their assistant, and that he would write to  the rulers and governors that were in the neighborhood of the country of Judea, that they should contribute to them gold and silver for the building of the temple, and besides that, beasts for the sacrifices.”

The Bible passages that describe these events include Isaiah 45, 2 Chronicles 36, Jeremiah 25 and Ezra 1.

The miracles of God are many. Isaiah prophesied both the destruction of Jerusalem and the rise of Cyrus the king.  Jeremiah prophesied a seventy year detainment in Babylon. And Cyrus was seized with an earnest desire and ambition to fulfill what was so written!

Physics T-shirts

Gravity.  It’s time to get down

Kinetic Energy: Pass it On

World Physics Society Family Reunion – be the Half-Life of the party!

May the Mass Times Acceleration be with you

I’m no rocket surgeon

Quick Change

Yesterday at 6:15am I checked the thermometer in the kitchen – 18 degrees outside.   That’s not so bad, I said as I went outside to clean off the driveway with broom and shovel.  The sky was blue with puffy clouds and the sun was getting ready to rise.

At 7:30am I was driving east down Mt hope toward the mall, and big grey-blue clouds were on the horizon, with the sun behind them and blue sky on this side.  It was quite pretty.  But, I looked at the care temperature: 10 degrees.  That was unexpected.  I looked again.  Then I looked up to notice the clouds had moved dramatically to the south and are being pushed very quickly.  Wind coming from the North, so I looked that way. Yikes! A huge wall of dark, dark clouds was just waiting to dump. 

While we walked at the mall, there were whiteout conditions outside.  At 8:15am while driving home on Mt Hope, the snow had abated but the temperature said 6 degrees.  And the outdoor thermometer at home confirmed it.

This morning, the last I looked, at 7:30am, we have negative 10 degrees!

I am thankful for a warm house, cars that work, and a God who is in charge of clouds, snow, and everything else!

 

Dave’s Favorite

A man walked into a dentist’s office and said, “I think I’m a moth.”

The dentist said, “You do know that I am a dentist.”

“Yes”

“You really need a psychiatrist, not a dentist.”

“Yes”

“Why did you come to me?”

“Because the light was on.”

Why Have Group Prayer?

Ben Patterson authored a great book on prayer, Deepening Your Conversation with God – Learning to Love to Pray.  The last chapter (pp157-171) describes the importance of corporate prayer in the life of a congregation.

Unity is one reason:

“…Jesus prays to the Father, ‘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’ (John 17:23). Note that Jesus claims for Christian unity a power he gives only to the Holy Spirit, to nothing and no one else – the power to persuade the world that he is indeed the One sent from God, ‘to let the world know that you sent me.’  The greatest argument for the authority and identify of Jesus does not have to come from philosophers and theologians and apologists.  It can come from the simplest believers who will live together in the unity of the Holy Spirit!

Why does unity have this kind of power?  One reason is that when we live together in love and harmony, it can mean but one thing: that each of us has ceased being his own lord and has submitted himself or herself to the Lord.

So what does this have to do with corporate prayer?

There can’t be one without the other – no genuine corporate prayer without unity, no real unity without corporate prayer.  If prayer is the deepest communion we can have with our Father God this side of heaven, how can we have this intimacy if we are at loggerheads with  other brothers and sisters in his family?  It can’t be done.  When we are less than one with each other, our oneness with Jesus is broken and incomplete.  So then are our prayers.  That’s why Paul says to Timothy, ‘I want men everywhere to lift up holy hands in prayer,’ and then adds, ‘without anger or disputing’ (1 Tim.2:8)”

 

There is power in presenting unity to the world, and corporate prayer goes with the unity.  Patterson presents an example of the power of prayer:

“After the first Great Awakening, three churches in Ipswich, Massachusetts covenanted to pray.  In each congregation, cell groups would meet weekly to agree in prayer.  Monthly, the separate congregations would then gather the cells and conduct all-church prayer meetings of agreement.  Then quarterly, all three would come together  for the same kind of paying.  This pattern was followed faithfully, without interruption, for a century. Two remarkable things happened during this time.  All three churches reported periodic harvest or “ingatherings” of souls, in which there would be a number of new believers brought into the congregations, about every eight to ten years.  Also, during this time, all of New England was being swept by Unitarianism.  But not these three churches.  They remained firmly true the faith while apostasy swirled around them, but not over them.  Around the time of the Civil War, the prayer meetings ceased.  Within five years these churches all capitulated to Unitarianism!”

Stop Smoking?

Two men had a discussion about smoking…

“How many cigars do you smoke in a day?”

“A dozen.”

“What do they cost?”

“A dollar each.”

That comes to twelve dollars a day, eighty-four dollars a week, over four thousand a year. How long have you been smoking?”

Fifty years.”

“That adds up to a lot of money.”

“It certainly does.”

“See that building across the street?”

“It’s nice.”

“If you didn’t smoke, you probably could own that building.”

“Have you ever smoked?”

“Never.”

“Do you own that building?”

“No.”

“Well, I do!”