Friday's This and That

Here it is Friday again. Where do all the days go? Seems like it was Friday just the other day. It doesn't feel like it can possibly have been 7 days ago! My internet server was down this morning for a couple hours so once again I'm running late with my blog. But this time it's not my fault! Michael has gone for a doctor appointment so it's just me and my computer and all my furry little friends.

I noticed my blog lost the About Me section. Don't have the slightest idea where it went, it just failed to appear when I called up my blog the other day. I didn't do anything to make it go away and I can't even figure out how to get it back. I didn't want it out there at first, then I got used to it and can't find it to put it back. (Or try to put it back. I'm not real good on computers.) Computers are strange things. They just sort of get ideas to do things all of a sudden and then do them. No explanation. No common sense. Just change.

My Bible verse for the day was 1Cor. 1:27-29 about how God uses the weak things of this world to show off His greatness. And he uses the things thought of on earth as foolishness to show off His infinite knowledge. The reason He does this? So that we can't brag that we had anything to do with our salvation. It begins with God. It ends with God. Our place is to simply say, "Thank You. Now live through me." That's the heart of the Christian message: God for us; God through us. That sounds too simple and easy for most people because they want to be able to say they're good enough to warrant salvation on their own. And that they do good things deserving of salvation. But the Truth of the matter is that God did it all, and He continues to do it all. Every day. All day. We are asked to live and model this in our lives. To live a life of total submission. It's not an easy thing to do because we so want to be in control of things. We want to be on top of everything. But we aren't. God is. And as we go about our day, demonstrating "Christ in me, the hope of glory" to everyone we encounter, in everything we do, God is glorified. My foolishness is God's wisdom and my weakness is His strength. But this doesn't fit well with the "old man" within me. In my carnal nature I want to be first; I want to be on top. I want to make all the decisions in my life. But that's not the kind of life I've been called to. When I accept this truth I live in little frustration. My stress is minimal and my communion with the Lord is unfettered and I can move forward in my relationship with Him. When I give Him total submission and accept my life as He has allowed it, my relationship with Him grows because He is able to take my weakness and my foolishness and make something beautiful out of it.

Our weather has been very pleasant for the past few days. I don't think we hit 100 degrees all week but I imagine it's about time for it to start heating up again. It would be wonderful if the weather never changed from this all summer long. It's been a nice, welcomed break one that was desperately needed too, I might add.

I must have slept on my back for awhile last night because it's sure sore this morning. I can't sleep on my back. I have to sleep on my side at all times or I'll wake up with a low backache. Someday we won't have all these little aches and pains but until then we're kind of stuck with them. I won't get much done today with it hurting like this. I think I'll go take some naprosyn and see if that won't help a little.

My thoughts and prayers go out to the miners and their families today. They had hoped to establish contact with them when they drilled through this morning but all is quiet. There are no sounds coming through the microphone. That's a big disappointment for everyone. No way could I be a miner and go underground like that every day. I'm way too chicken. I figure I haven't lost anything underground to go looking for it so why would I need to crawl in a hole in the first place? I just hope and pray that they're safe down there and they can hang on until they can be rescued. But it must be difficult for everyone concerned. And now I hear that there was another mining accident that killed some miners in Indiana today. Mining appears to be a very risky occupation and not a whole lot of fun either.

I watched a new show on Court TV last night and boy! was it bad. Or at least I thought it was. Bounty Girls was the name of the show and it was every bit as bad as I had thought it would be just by the title. Stephanie Plum takes the award for best bounty hunter. She manages to catch them all ... eventually! And in the process she destroys lots of cars and gets into all kinds of trouble. Again I'm talking about Janet Evanovich's protagonist. Fun reading!! Anyway I don't think I'll be catching the Bounty Girls next week. There must be a test pattern I could stare at somewhere instead. Did I just date myself? Does TV even have test patterns anymore? Don't think so. Oh well, history is fun too.

I can't believe it's August already! Fall's just around the corner. That's okay, I'm ready for a seasonal change. I'm tired of summer. Falls are beautiful up here. We don't get as much color as they get back east by any stretch of the imagination. But it still gets pretty when the colors start to change. I hope we have a nice fall this year. We had a nice spring (for a change) and a nice fall would be much appreciated too.

For someone who's unfamiliar with the Church, the blood of Christ that we talk about all the time might seem disturbing to them. But what they need to understand is that without the "shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness" of sin (Heb. 9:22 NLT) God is God and He made it so.

The law God laid down dictated that redemption was available only if the sin was transferred to a perfect substitute. In ancient times, an Israelite would symbolically lay his hands on a perfect unblemished lamb or goat, confess the sins of his people and then turn over the animal to a priest for sacrifice. Believers today are redeemed through forgiveness, but our sacrifice is a perfect, sinless Savior who willingly took our guilt and released us from the penalty of sin ... death ... by taking our sins upon Himself and shedding His blood on the cross in our place.

Everyone who accepts Jesus' death as a substitutionary, perfect sacrifice and accepts him as Savior by faith is declared Not Guilty for his or her sin. The God who decreed that the sinful soul must die looks upon Christ's spilled blood, His sacrifice, sees that the penalty has been paid, and declares us righteous. The righteousness ascribed to us through Christ's death on the cross allows us to come before God's holy presence and seek Him face to face. We can experience oneness with Him in prayer and know He listens to our every word when we speak to Him. Christ's sacrifice reestablished the harmony between God and humankind that was temporarily interrupted in Eden but is now restored in each new believer.

Through the blood of Christ, believers are forgiven, justified, redeemed and reconciled. This describes a simple process: Believing by faith that the blameless Jesus died to pay the penalty for our sin, we enter into an eternal relationship with God. Jesus' sacrifice applies to "whoever believes" (John 3:16). This includes you if you will just believe.

See you on Monday unless I get the urge to do a Saturday blog and post it. I have no plans for it right now but you never can tell with me.