What’s in a name? When the very first congress of the United States met in 1788, it looked quite different than today’s congress, but the wrangling was quite the same. The House of Representatives, modeled after the British House of Commons, was made up of middle class representatives, while the Senate, modeled after the British House of Lords, was comprised of upper class aristocrats. So competition between these two houses was great right from the start.
One of the first items of business was what we shall call the new President of the United States. The House of Representatives decided to simply call him ‘Mr. President’, even though individual governors of the states were called ‘His Excellency’. But the US Senate objected, deciding that the leader of the new nation should have an important title like kings in Europe. So they voted to call the President ‘His Highness the President of the United States and Protector of their Liberties’. It just sounded more highfaluting.
Both titles represented the same office, one simple and humble, the other extravagant and intimidating. Obviously, it was the former title that has been used down through history. How do you see yourself? As humble or uppity? The uppity will never reach down to lift others up. Lets serve God better by staying humble while we do great things for God.
God is the great caregiver of each of us. Psalm 23 is a word picture of David’s view of God in his life: “The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.” Can you see God as the shepherd working in your life? Do you see His hand of provision?
President Woodrow Wilson was President of the United States when World War I was being fought. He was the son of a Unitarian minister. He told the story that his elderly father one day was in his carriage, being pulled by a beautiful horse. As he rode down the street, a member of his congregation spotted him and shouted, “Pastor, that horse looks a might bit better than you do.” The elder Wilson replied, “True indeed – I take care of my horse, my congregation takes care of me.”
If we have God’s blessings in our life, perhaps we should look and act like it. If we complain about things that don’t go our way, what kind of message are we sending God about our faith in Him. I will choose to rejoice today in whatever comes my way.
Tags: Horse, provision, Woodrow Wilson
I have a free App on my iPad that lets me check the weather radar to see if a rain is coming. I’ve been checking that thing daily for a couple of months. Its been amazing to see small pockets of rain coming right at Waterloo, then go north, south, completely dissipate, or divide around us. I mentioned to Anita its as if a curse was on the town and precipitation was repelled like water from oil.
I’ve asked the Lord to show us what we needed to know or direct us in our prayers, but nothing seemed to change the drought. One day last week Anita and I watched Al Gore’s documentary An Inconvenient Truth. Because the documentary had liberal overtones, we’ve never watched it. But now that we’ve seen it, we now have a pretty good understanding of global warming and why we’re seeing such global severe weather.
If the scientific information is correct, and I don’t doubt that it is, these extremes will only get worse with each year. We are destroying the natural ecosystem of the planet. These truly are signs of the times, but are they of our own making?
Have you seen An Inconvenient Truth and what do you think is happening? Is there something we can do?
Tags: drought, rain
Anita watches our 2 1/2 year old granddaughter, Raegan, on Mondays while her mother works. This past Monday Reagan announced to Anita that she wanted a job, too. So, Anita assured her that Grandpa would have a job she could help with.
Mondays are my day off, so I recruited her to help me pick up sticks that had fallen on the lawn. When I pointed out a stick she had missed, she said, “That’s not an important job, Grandpa,” and proceeded to another stick. It seemed that if she liked the stick, she picked it up, but if she didn’t like it, it wasn’t important.
What is important to you? Are things that we like doing important, but things we don’t like unimportant? What defines important to you?
There are many tasks we have to accomplish every day. Some are important and others are not. Is your service to God important? What will you do for Jesus today, and how important is it?
Tags: important, work
Several years ago I was officiating at a wedding in our church. This was a fairly formal wedding and we were doing a Unity Candle service after the vows and ring exchange. At that point, the bride and groom lit the unity candle as prescribed and then proceeded to blow out their separate candles.
The problem was, they were standing just at the right angle, and blew just hard enough, that they blew out the unity candle at the same time. Fortunately, there were lighters on the table and they quickly relit the unity candle.
I believe it is possible for us to blow out our own marriage unity candle. Because marriage is an attraction of two opposite personalities, sparks tend to fly from the beginning. In a healthy relationship, we work through those difficulties. But we have all seen people stay too focused upon their own needs and ignore the needs of the one they love. That’s blowing out your own candle.
Fortunately, there’s always a source nearby where we can relight our candle. Keep it burning brightly!
Tags: light, marriage, wedding
I’m reading a book that is the biography of James Madison, fourth President of the United States. I don’t think many people knew that he was going to seminary to become an Anglican priest prior to the Revolution. The Anglican Church was the official Church of England. The Church of England was the state church of Virginia, where Madison was from.
When the discussion of freedom of Religion arose in the founding of the new United States, Madison was skeptical because he thought the Anglican Church and its government-mandated “tythes” would be weakened if Baptists and other independent groups gained prominence. Because religious views are intense in people, this was a major obstacle to unity in the forming of our government.
It was obvious that Madison was a religious bigot, favoring only his own group, but he had to learn to be tolerant of other views to eventually gain the trust of enough voters to become the President of the United States. Perhaps we could learn a lesson on tolerance from James Madison.
Tags: history, Madison, tolerance
One day last week Anita and I stopped in to see Becky Young in her hospital room in Fort Wayne. While she encouraged Becky I tried to encourage Mike. Together we were discussing the drought and its effects. We observed that while the grass had turned brown every weed was thriving. especially the buck-horn. Not really expecting an answer, Anita observed, “There’s got to be a spiritual lesson in that somewhere.”
Becky thought a moment and then replied philosophically, “If you don’t feed your spirit, it dries up, but the weeds in your life only get stronger.” What an observation! Leave it to Becky to come up with logic like that from her hospital bed while dependent upon everyone else.
Like your lawn, if your inner spirit doesn’t get its thirst satisfied, it will go into dormancy. No life and no growth; only the appearance of death. How many Christians have already gone down that road? God is the source of life: go after Him!
Has God shown you any other life lessons from the drought? What have you learned?
Tags: drought, growth, weeds