Fri, May 25th - 12:09PM

I have a small prayer request...

For my father, who is in surgery with a problem he has with his leg.  My mother has expressed concern and she is not one to do so lightly.  I do not have all the details, nor do I need them.  (my mother has Parkinson's disease as well, so my father's help is something she is used to -- so prayers for her mental ease are also in order...)

I thank you all,

In Christ,

Mel

Wed, May 23rd - 11:26AM

I am happier by what I am doing than with the titles bestowed upon me...

This is a thought provoked by this weekend.  I don't want to loose it, so I put down the title.  I'll elaborate as I get time...

In Truth,

Mel

Tue, May 8th - 2:58PM

Children Playing...

I am off the subject of Women in the Church.  I am off the subject of Trees and Soldiers.  I will return to them.  (soon, I hope)  I am beginning down a path of The Church and how I see it.  The ultimate is for me to say that Christ's Church is not divided, and what that means as a way of looking at His Church and Our Churches.  I may not be right in what I say, so feel free to disagree.  My intent is to provoke thought, and maybe by the thoughts you put down, find new ways of looking at the matter.

Go to a playground sometime.  Watch the children play.  Some of them take what they are doing very seriously, and fights often break out.  (the school officials may deny this, but I was a child once and I remember!)  Others are just happily making a cacaphony of noise.  To some this is joyful, and something to bring a smile to their face.  To others it is just noise, and they wish the children would just play quietly.  Many of life's lessons can be learned on the playground.  Sometimes we step in and try to control the children too much.  If they are not doing each other great harm, there are times we should let things work themselves out and not step in and interfere.  Some lessons are better learned by making mistakes and then asking 'what went wrong?'

Where our judgement of when to step in and when to stay out may be flawed, God's judgement in the matter is not.  We will make mistakes.  In a way, I think our mistakes are very much akin to those made by the children playing at recess.  To a child, some things that we would laugh over are seemingly of earth shattering importance.  We are here to guide our children on what is important and what is not.  Those of you who are parents, do you remember telling your children that something they were worried about was not all that important?  Well, I do.

On the other hand, there are times that someone must step in.  I see parents nowdays not wanting to control their children and giving them no discipline whatsoever.  We see the results of that every day.  If you do not, you are in a veritable paradise already.  You should thank God profusely for that blessing!

When we are talking to each other, sometimes we are going to be just squabbling like children.  Sometimes, we are going to be like an older child passing on knowlege that was given to them by their parents.  When we are that older child, we may be mistaken that such is what we are doing when, in truth, we are squabbling just like all the rest.  These things have a way of sorting themselves out as we grow, each of us in our own way in God's sight.

I often think of myself as an 'older child on the playground of life' but that does not make it true.  But, my own sober judgement of myself is often the best guide I have.  God steps in from time to time to set me straight.  It might be the figurative 'playground bully' who makes me think twice.  It may be the staff member chastising me for doing something pretty bad.  If I don't get the message, never fear, another avenue will be attempted to get me to understand.

That is the way it is with all of us, I think.  At times, we are doing good.  At other times, despite what we are trying to do, we are not.  Listen to the messengers God sends to us on this playground, and the lessons learned easily will not be the lessons learned hard.

Ok, Gotta go...

Peace Be with You,

Mel

Thu, May 3rd - 1:59AM

Another way of looking at the same thing

A soldier has a duty.  Many understand this, and have come to terms with what that duty is in their own understanding.  Many more, sadly, have not.

I guess I'll ask the question:

Why are we in Iraq?

Ask 7 different people that question, and you are likely to get 7 different answers.  One of the ones that bothers me most is the assertion that we are there in the interests of 'Big Oil'.

Think about it.  When is Congress sticking their nose into matters worried about the Oil Companies making windfall profits?  Is it when oil is in good supply?  Nope.  So, if by being in Iraq, the U.S. and others are trying to insure a better and more steady supply of oil, is it in the interests of 'Big Oil' to do so?  Nope.  But it very well may be in the collected interests of these various countries and their people who are soft and complain loudly when gas prices go up!  Fickle people who want it both ways and wish to absolve themselves of responsibilty by making up stories to blame someone else.  Soft and totally happy to remain ignorant if the platitudes they latch on to make them sound like worldly saints of some sort.

And some soldiers believe this.  They have to to make sense of it all.  They are, after all, as human as you or I.

Back on subject.

Regardless of how an individual soldier comes to terms with what he thinks his duty is, one thing should be clear to any soldier:

He is not there just to aggravate the people who's country he occupies.  Doing that makes his job harder, if you insist on reducing his duty to nothing and only looking at it in a pragmatic way of trying to get in get out and have the least trouble you can.  So when a road side bomb or sniper kills a buddy, what should their response be?  It depends, but one thing it should not be is what happens too often.  Rampages of Revenge.  Gee, I wonder if that is going to make the resistance stop?  Nope.  In fact, you just devalued the life that your buddy sacrified and basically just spit on his grave, so don't you dare say that you did it for him...

There is a duty.  A grave responsibility, really.  One that may call upon you to litterally lay down your life for someone who may hate you at that moment.  Is that duty always done?  Clearly not!

And to add insult to injury, the failures of a few are counted aginst all soldiers back home, by those who have not got the first clue as to what it is really like.

Are you seeing the thread between this and my last post?  This one is a little more intense, because we are talking the life and death matters.  This is real.  And I hope I am begining to make my thoughts clearer with this second post.

But in case I am not, I have yet a third post to make soon.

Go In Peace,

Mel