is spray paint a sin?

The other day we had the MDC come to replace our water meter..but they couldn't complete the work because the shut-off valve by the street was broken.

So they left and spray painted the street in front of my house marking the area that had to be fixed. I hate it when workers spray paint the street! I always have...I wish someone could tell me why folks have to mark a temporary repair site with permanent paint!

The work hasn't been done in weeks and whenever I drive home I see this nasty thing in front of my house and wonder "how long?"

That's the same cry of the Saints under the altar in the Throne Room of God. Revelation 6:10 asks "How long, Sovereign Lord, holy and true, until you judge the inhabitants of the earth and avenge our blood?"

God's not in a hurry as He wants to bring more in...yet i wonder how many of us see the true atrocities of life around us, the ugly marked ones that are crying out how long? Are you as offended as God is? I drive home wondering how long until they'll fix my house and remove the paint mark in my street...yet how much more does God sit in front of His home waiting to repair the broken and remove the mark of sin?
b

Dog Spit, God's Love and Facebook...

Yesterday as many know I turned 44 and it was a great day...I celebrated a home Eucharist, had a Bible Study on Genesis 18, went to the local senior center and called their bingo game, came home and had dinner with my girls (ribs!)...

But all day long I had a Pavlovian Reaction to the little bell dinging on my iPhone...

If you have forgotten or never heard, Pavlov ran an experiment in which dogs were conditioned to expect a treat when a certain bell was rung. He measured the amount of saliva excreted when the condition occurred, showing a automated conditioned response to a stimulus. The dog heard the bell, they expected a treat, they drooled.

So this happened to me all day long yesterday as my iPhone bell dinged and dinged telling me I had another post on my Facebook Wall. I spiritually salivated as I was filled with the love of Christ as message after message came through blessing me and loving me.

Ding, He loves me! Ding, He love me! Ding, He loves me!

Now I know first hand that God's love is not conditional and is upon me even when my spiritual iPhone bell is silent...but we are called to make each other drool for the love of God in this life... why? "He died for us, so that, whether we are awake or asleep, we may live together with him."...
Therefore~
"encourage one another and build each other up just as you are doing"...
who has posted on you wall, who's wall do you need to post on? Who do you see that needs to have their bell rung?

Jesus likes to use sugar

So I walked into the living room and there was my daughter in her playroom singing and dancing into the mirror on the wall...

"just a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down, the medicine go down, the medicine go down.
Just a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down, in the most delightful way!"

I was cracking up... not just because of the song and dance (it was awesome) but God has been doing some deep work on me this Lent...and just that day He gave me such a spoonful of grace that I busted out laughing...

Growing into the man God wants me to be is painful at times and when the deep interior work is being hashed out often God is merciful and tosses us a bone.

The real medicine God gives us is the power of the Holy Spirit to change us from the inside out...He doesn't just mask the symptoms while the body heals itself, He makes a new body..and that can get uncomfortable...

So the sugar I was tossed was absolute grace from a friend...and in this action God showed me that although Grace is undeserved, it is something that God died to give away...and that my friends, is love...
and nothing is sweeter than that. With the love of Jesus in us, any medicine can go down...so what kind of sugary grace has God used in your life? What kind of medicine did you have to swallow and how did it change your life

squeaky wheels roll to heaven

I was at a nursing home yesterday with a handful of my folks from my parish. We had been asked to hold the Eucharist service that month and since our call is bring Jesus to the ends of the earth it fit into our mission statement.

I had prayed that the Lord would manifest Himself to the residents in a powerful way...and He as truly present during the service, but He revealed Himself to me as we were setting up and getting ready for the service...

I was setting the Alter and looked up, and there before me was a multitude of wheelchairs and walkers, real blind people and folks who couldn't hear a lick without a hearing aid. Most had Alzheimer's and all were not young (except for one youth volunteer)...

And the Lord took me to the words from the prophet Jeremiah 31:8 "Behold, I will bring them out from the north country and gather them form the farthest parts of the earth, among them will be the blind and the lame..."

We often joke " you'd be surprised at who you will see in heaven".... we have no need. The Word is clear...the broken who have heard and seen will be called...and they will come by whatever means necessary... squeaky, shuffling, and some even running (couldn't take a picture..but it's in my mind forever)

we all wake up at different times

I wake up early and always have. When I'm out with friends climbing or surfing they're happy because I always start the coffee...but there is a reason why I love the morning...life wakes up and I get a front row seat.

We all open our eyes at different times...and we all wake up in different manners. Some are morning people and sing sweet songs like a songbird, others hate the sun and scream like a crow...yet whatever the song or the time, we must get up and sing something...

Paul writes in Ephesians (5:14) "awake, O sleeper and arise from the dead and Christ will shine on you"...

There is one song we must sing, and one director we must sing to...Jesus...

are you awake yet...do you know where the sun rises from...are you still waiting in the dark night...awake and feel the life wake up and burst into songs of praise for Christ

out of bounds...where did this come from?

So it was almost 70 degrees today and I headed off to some local power line trails near my house because I know they act like a hot house when the sun is out...

So the sun was hot, the sky was bluebird and I had a reading from Phillipians in my head from chapter three where Paul is writing about counting all things as loss compared to knowing Christ. I walked for a bit so I could think out the passage in my head and I see these three white dots off to my right in the tall grass..golfballs?

If they were darts they would have been a good clustering but they weren't and there wasn't a house any where near me....so I had to go and see these things...

And as I sat there looking at them my mind kinda went to God leaving the garden to look for us in the way out places....far from His will, far from our original home...in the far country as Andrew Peterson sings...

I couldn't leave them there (it seemed like littering to me) so I stuffed them in the pocket of my trail running shorts and carried them home...just as Christ took us into himself to bring us home...

golf balls....goof balls...both home now