No fanfare here

Well, it is Friday and my mind is pretty much mush. I awoke at 2:30 this morning wide awake and could not go back to sleep until about 4:30. I was very, very tired but could not get back to sleep. Now at work I am trying to keep focused on the menial, but necessary, tasks and it is taking a little extra effort. :) I will not be in on Monday but I will post my review (so to speak) of Chapter 3 of The Cross Centered Life by CJ Mahaney on Tuesday. Man I love that book. I really want to get the Book Living the Cross Centered Life as well. I highly encourage those who happen upon my blog to check out the links "Together for the Gospel" as well as "Worship Matters". Very thought provoking (and sometime just plain fun) to read. Anyway, I pray that this finds each of you enjoying God's grace and mercy. May the presence of the Holy Spirit be ever felt and enjoyed by each of you and your homes. --- your brother in Christ Verse for today: Psalm 28, esv To you, O Lord, I call; my rock, be not deaf to me, lest, if you be silent to me, I become like those who go down to the pit. Hear the voice of my pleas for mercy, when I cry to you for help, when I lift up my hands toward your most holy sanctuary. [1] Do not drag me off with the wicked, with the workers of evil, who speak peace with their neighbors while evil is in their hearts. Give to them according to their work and according to the evil of their deeds; give to them according to the work of their hands; render them their due reward. Because they do not regard the works of the Lord or the work of his hands, he will tear them down and build them up no more. Blessed be the Lord! for he has heard the voice of my pleas for mercy. The Lord is my strength and my shield; in him my heart trusts, and I am helped; my heart exults, and with my song I give thanks to him. The Lord is the strength of his people; [2] he is the saving refuge of his anointed. Oh, save your people and bless your heritage! Be their shepherd and carry them forever.

The Educating of my children

I have been struggling with a topic for today. Nothing would stick until I remembered an incident with my 8yr old son yesterday. Both he and his brother had pleaded to be dropped off early at school (!) so my beloved ensured they were there as asked. As background I will say here that he has been diagnosed with Asbergers - a 'high' functioning form of autism. Well, while waiting to be allowed back to his classroom he got into an altercation with another student. For him this will pretty much ruin the rest of the day. Then after he was in his class he somehow got into it with yet another student. As a result they called us to take him home. Now we've gone through the process of getting an individual education plan (IEP) in place for him. There are a lot of things about him and how his autism manifests itself, but that would be pretty intensive. But what I am trying to share today is my frustration with the school system. I am not one who shuffles my kids off to the schools system for them to educate and discipline. My wife and I take time to help with homework, etc. With my #2 though, we need help. We are needing the school system to help us teach him ways to cope with every day things most of us take for granted. Yet we continually run into teachers that just treat him as a behavioral issue - despite their own experts rating him as a "severe" case. Yesterday his assigned aide was out sick, and his regular teacher were out sick, thus they had no one there that knew how to deal with him - so they called us. On one level I understand this, but on another it angers me to some extent. How is my son ever going to learn how to interact when he is being set aside and treated this way (they have also moved his desk so that he no longer sits with the rest of the class). It will only further isolate him from his peers and eventually cause even more problems as his classmates start to treat him differently. I know what that is like because I was always an outsider in school. By God's grace I was able to deal with the situations - and I know God's grace is there for my son too - but it will be a catalyst for much more 'severe' interactions in the future. Oh well, if you are still reading thank you for listening to my venting, and BTW - shameless plug. Another short story has been posted on my other blog. Verse for today: Luke 7:1-10, esv After he had finished all his sayings in the hearing of the people, he entered Capernaum. Now a centurion had a servant who was sick and at the point of death, who was highly valued by him. When the centurion heard about Jesus, he sent to him elders of the Jews, asking him to come and heal his servant. And when they came to Jesus, they pleaded with him earnestly, saying, “He is worthy to have you do this for him, for he loves our nation, and he is the one who built us our synagogue.” And Jesus went with them. When he was not far from the house, the centurion sent friends, saying to him, “Lord, do not trouble yourself, for I am not worthy to have you come under my roof. Therefore I did not presume to come to you. But say the word, and let my servant be healed. For I too am a man set under authority, with soldiers under me: and I say to one, ‘Go,’ and he goes; and to another, ‘Come,’ and he comes; and to my servant, ‘Do this,’ and he does it.” When Jesus heard these things, he marveled at him, and turning to the crowd that followed him, said, “I tell you, not even in Israel have I found such faith.” And when those who had been sent returned to the house, they found the servant well.

Huskies & Clydesdales

Well, today is going to be brief. The group I work for has a big wig comming for a visit today. I know this happens to me as well, but it's fun to see normally sane people just seem to lose their minds when some one high up comes for a visit. One thing I've sort of learned is the VIP usually does not know all the intricacies of what we do at out levels. Nor do they realy want to know. They have enough things to worry about at their own level of operations. What they are concerned with is are we performing our tasks and what is the bottom line. There are times when they want to know what you are doing, but they will most likely not understand it. Even those that have worked their way up through the ranks (so to speak) will have forgotten a lot of what they used to do - or the procedures will have changed. IMO the visits are more to show that they are concerned about the people under them - or there is a really serious problem. In either case it is in the Lord's more than capable hands. This visit has reminded me of a funny story. When I was a fairly new Artillery Chief I had the Adjudant General for my state come to visit the gun line. Now I still had to put my helmet on, and pretty up the area, but I was pretty calm about it all. I secretly hoped that he would not come under my net - but of course he did. I did my little skit and while I was talking to him a fire mission was called down. I interupted my conversation and executed the mission, and went back to talking to him. During the fire mission one of my section noticed one of his aides smoking a cigar under my net which is a big no-no (no smoking within 50 ft of high explosives) and the soldier asked him to put it out, or leave! I did not know about that until afterwards and the guy was nervous. I told him he did exactly right and to not worry. Anyway, for me such VIP are for the 'officers' to concern themselves with. For me I just take care of my litte 'section' and all is right witht he world. Verse for today: James 4:13-17, esv Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit”—yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. Instead you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.” As it is, you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil. So whoever knows the right thing to do and fails to do it, for him it is sin.

Winding down

This past weekend I had my drill weeeknd for the National Guard. It was pretty mundane. Gunner's exams on Saturday morning, a change of command ceremony that afternoon, a physical fitness test Sunday morning, and the invariable maintenance. We got rained on during the gunners exam, which is not too bad. In the past we've had to do it in the snow (as seen on the left) so this was not too bad. :) This was the first time I was an exam evaluator though. The last time I took the section certification (which we do next month) my section score the highest in the battalion. The change of command is more for the officers involved. At first I thought, "why am I even here. I don't care who is at the top of the 'food chain'." But the more I thought about it I came to realize that it is important for us to be there. These men have been entrusted to lead those under them. Our standing there gives a visual representation of exactly what they have been entrusted with. Sunday morning we took the APFT (Army physical fitness test). Due to a variety of reasons (mostly excuses) I had not been training all that much for it - even though I'd known about it for many months. Because of my conditioning preperations I did not really push myself to do more than the minimum requirements. Which may have helped me pass the 2 mile run - the last event. About 1.25 miles in I was having a hard time getting enough air. Oh, I was breathing well, but it was not being sent to the muscles! :) I slowed to a walk for about 40-50 yards and resumed. Then again at the 1.5 and again at the 1.75 marks. I just couldn't keep my wind. I sitll made the time with 30 seconds to spare. Good thing I'm an 'old' man. The maintenance is getting to be very difficult to accomplish to standards. We have eight howitzers to maintain, but not nearly enough men to get all of it done in one afternoon. The men are very motivated, and they work very well and hard, but it comes down to mathmatics. Thank God it was a pleasent afternoon. The whole weekend I kept expecting to get called into the Commander's office to discuss a certain e-mail I sent to him (and others) expressing my intent on retiring this summer/fall. And at one point they did mention that "we need to talk", but the talk never came. As I walked around the armory and interacted with my fellow soldiers I seemed to take it all in. Twenty years is a long time. I am going to miss it. But when I got home and my kids 'bum-rushed' me, I also knew how much I was missing them when I am gone. Oh, before I forget. I got a regimental coin for my volunteering to go and help with the hurricane Katrina and Rita efforts. My 5th in my military career. Someday I might expound upon the "coin tradition", but not today. Two of the coins are special to me. This one is nice, but falls in between the group. Two others I see as "gimme" coins. That is everyone got one. But there is one military coin that I practically covet. It is the battalion coin. A lot of tradition and history in the battalion. Perhaps I will be able to receive one before I retire, but I am doubtful. Verse for today: Proverbs 25:2-7, esv It is the glory of God to conceal things, but the glory of kings is to search things out. As the heavens for height, and the earth for depth, so the heart of kings is unsearchable. Take away the dross from the silver, and the smith has material for a vessel; take away the wicked from the presence of the king, and his throne will be established in righteousness. Do not put yourself forward in the king's presence or stand in the place of the great, for it is better to be told, “Come up here,” than to be put lower in the presence of a noble.

What is Your Life Centered On?

I am finally getting to Chapter 2 of The Cross Centered Life by CJ Mahaney. In this Chapter CJ asks the above question. Just watch the media and we can see all kinds of causes that preoccupy a Christian. Some are good and some are, well questionable. And since the media is the major source of people's information it becomes the perception of what Christianity is about. At the start of the chapter CJ uses an illustration of the owner of a parrot. Almost daily the owner is going to the pet store to get things for the cage to try and make the parrot happy, but in the end the parrot dies of starvation. The pet store was working on the assumption that the pet owner had food, and the pet owner did not know what was missing - thus the vital communication of pet food never came around, and in the end the parrot dies (pg 18-19). D.A. Carson is quoted as writing, "I fear that the cross, without ever being disowned, is constantly in danger of being dismissed from the central place it must enjoy, by relatively peripheral insights that take on far too much weight. Whenever the periphery is in danger of displacing the center, we are not far from idolitry." (1), pg 22. 1 Corinthians 15:1-4, esv, states: "Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preached to you, which you received, in which you stand, and by which you are being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preached to you—unless you believed in vain. For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures" To quote CJ..."First impotance. The Bible tells us that, while there are many different callings and many possible areas that service in the kingdom of God, one transcendant truth should define our lives. One simple truth should motivate our work and affect every part of who we are. --- Christ died for our sins." (2) Even not in the site of the mainstream we are daily in danger of moving away from Christ and what He has done and focusing on the periphery. When we do focus on something other than the cross CJ points out that the tendency is to move towards legalism (basing our relationship with God on our own performance), condemnation (focusing more on our own sin rather than on God's grace), and/or subjectivism (basing our view of God on our changing feelings and emotions). (3) Like Paul says in Galations (6:14, esv), "But far be it from me to boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ." Take time to consider these things that Mr. Mahaney points out. What is our life centered on? What do we take time, when we have it, to think about? What is our first passion? What passions and thoughts do we convey to the world around us if it was to be asked? Is there anything in our faith that is not tied to the cross, and what was accomplished there on our behalf. Nothing, and we need to convey this message not just to our children, our families, our churches, our communities, and unto the world. (1) Carson, Cross & Christian Ministry, 26. (2) pg 20 (3) pg 22-23 Verse for today: 1 Corinthians 1:18-25, esv For the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written, “I will destroy the wisdom of the wise,and the discernment of the discerning I will thwart.” Where is the one who is wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, it pleased God through the folly of what we preach to save those who believe. For Jews demand signs and Greeks seek wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles, but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men. amen

Nothing too deep

Well I am trying to keep my head above water here at work today so I don't have anything too deep today. Recently I was reflecting on almost 20 years of service to the Army National Guard and I have come to the conclusion that it is a pretty upstanding organization. Granted, it has its problems. But overall it has been used by God in my life. I have seen it build charecter in men and women. It has a proud tradition, and a cohesion in the units that I have not seen in active duty components - and I have trained and worked with many. Despite the troubles around the world and the turmoil (IMO) in the American culture in general I would recommend the National Guard to any young man or woman looking to get a head start on where they are going in life. I am not going to try and sell what it can, or can't do. But for me it helped me: 1) Get my head together in regards to my work ethic 2) Taught me to respect those in authority 3) Brought me in contact with men of God, and who had an influence on my salvation 4) Gave me a sense of pride in serving my state and country 5) Helped me to go to college, and will help me in my retirement There are others, but those are the ones that come to mind as I type. The military is not for everyone - at least career-wise. And the Army may not be the branch for those that choose to go military. But for me it has been a tremendous blessing. Well, that's all I have for today. I have reserve duty this weekend, maybe my last one where I will have to stay at the armory... "see you all Monday" Verse for today: Psalm 144:1-4, esv Blessed be the Lord, my rock, who trains my hands for war, and my fingers for battle; he is my steadfast love and my fortress, my stronghold and my deliverer, my shield and he in whom I take refuge,who subdues peoples under me. O Lord, what is man that you regard him, or the son of man that you think of him? Man is like a breath; his days are like a passing shadow.

Wow

I just finished reading yesterdays entry over at Together for the Gospel, titled "A Plan for Reading and Study". Conviction (in a good way) just fell upon me. Especially in light of the encouragement of a good friend recently to get my nose back in His book more often. Good stuff...