Daily pages of reflection...for knowledge, understanding, to wisdom
Section of The Last Supper, Leonardo Da Vinci Section of The Last Supper, Leonardo Da Vinci

Aloneness

August 13, 2019
Year 4, Day 225 | No Comments
Section of Sistine Chapel ceiling, Michaelangelo, 1508-1512

Much of society plays with and acts out caricatures of what God, working with mankind, formulates to the meaning and purpose for human life.  I repeat here a major point in these Pages and that is that God has provided a useful and effective pattern of what is practical in life context on earth, even without a perception of God.  Biblical values and formations are worth the attention of any people, no matter what their spiritual faith, or lack of it, may be.  A careful study of the motivations and programs of nations will verify relevant assertions.  In passage of years the original ideals may be modified or amended, as seen in the movement of same sex marriage from hetero-sexual… Read more

Witness

August 12, 2019
Year 4, Day 224 | No Comments
Section of The Taking of Christ, Caravaggio, 1602

Every person is a witness to something.  That something is usually not an element but a compound which is to say a witness to more than one thing.  Sometimes one thing is so great in the public mind that any other thing about that individual is subjugated, much or little, in the story of the person – the message of the person.  At the time of this writing an entertainer, highly regarded for his talent as an actor and humorist for decades is now alleged to have been a sexual predator with numerous women who have emerged to accuse him of sexual abuse that may have followed drug induced events.  Suddenly the sponsorships, the regard for the man, the influence… Read more

Preachers

August 11, 2019
Year 4, Day 223 | No Comments
Section of The Taking of Christ, Caravaggio, 1602

I remember an excellent review (now lost to me) of the uses of language.  One of the main points in the book related to the sometimes stumbling relationship of written and spoken language.  The most favorable conclusions favor spoken language.  Writing came long after the sounds of thoughts and emotions proved mankind to be above all else in the management of world administration as God gave it.  The benefits of language cannot be denigrated by the sometimes ill uses of it, and the prejudices, contradictions, and ignorance pronounced and/or proved through the medium of language.  Whatever its faults, language is all we have for the purpose of leading to some precision in formulating communicable thought packages about ourselves and that… Read more

Courage

August 10, 2019
Year 4, Day 222 | No Comments
Section of The Last Supper, Leonardo Da Vinci

From the love, power, and presence of God we discover the base of our feelings.  Emotions are highly impacted by love, and its paradoxes.  Some persons approach the matter from human insight, and may distort the meaning.  It is likely if one had talked to Hitler in the 1930s he would have declared his love for the Aryan Race.  To prove that love he would hate the Jews, even to annihilation.  Hating Jews was a habit for some societies.  Persecution of Jews preceded the arrival of Jesus, so to relate it to the agreement among mixed representatives as judgment for the crucifixion of Christ may distort history. Jesus was crucified by Gentile authority, with the approval of some Jewish leadership… Read more

Courageous Love

August 9, 2019
Year 4, Day 221 | No Comments
Section of The Taking of Christ, Caravaggio, 1602

The disciples shared the ministry of Jesus for about a thousand days, commonly stated as three years of ministry and instruction to the point of the crucifixion of Jesus.  That ministry was continued for about a month after the resurrection – to believers.  In the forty days until the ascension, Jesus was not always with the disciples.  Of all Christ’s earthly days, the Apostle John chose about fifteen in the thousand to write about.  About a third of the Gospel he wrote took place on one day.  John was taken with several themes for accent.  One theme was love.  He identified love as something in the nature of God, represented in the love of Christ to the disciples, and from… Read more

Doubters

August 8, 2019
Year 4, Day 220 | No Comments
Section of The Taking of Christ, Caravaggio, 1602

For some years Barbara Kruger has, in my view, played with language.  I believe she has served purpose in demonstrating what language might do, but she would not likely agree with me on the contribution.  She has a knack for using single words, in large form pasted on background photographs so as to provide some information not expressed in the words she imposes.  The first image I recall from her appeared to me some years ago.  It was simply a hand holding a card with the words: I SHOP therefore I AM.  She meant it to be an arrest for consideration of the consumerism culture.  The statement is a take-off from the concept of Descartes, I think, therefore I am. … Read more

Suffering

August 7, 2019
Year 4, Day 219 | No Comments
Section of The Taking of Christ, Caravaggio, 1602

When managed well, suffering provides some clues about both physical and spiritual life mysteries. The reference to the suffering of prophets provides an important insight.  The genuine prophet lived in the message revealed and advanced.  If the prophecy was of warning about difficult days to come, the prophet lived with the burden of what was proclaimed – if of blessing there was anticipation that became suffering in that the blessing might be beyond his own participation and influence to fruition.  Even prophetic messages might change, and the prophet is left, perhaps to be branded a false prophet.  Circumstances change, and merciful God amends to the penitence or in patience awaits the further decline of the people that may gain even… Read more

Stewardship

August 6, 2019
Year 4, Day 218 | No Comments

When we transition from the inward (privacy) nature of the family to social awareness and participation in society (public); and, if our personal development is not damaged by omissions and distortions in the informal contexts of humankind, we look for respect as persons of value – and we offer to others the same respect.  Much that is wrong in the world arena and human experience can distort and betray the idealism, but we remember that we do not fault an ideal by the practices of many who violate possibilities.  We should not permit society to form a mix of good and evil, so to splash fouled ingredients over a good and moral pattern.  A well prepared salad can be ruined… Read more

Stewardship

August 5, 2019
Year 4, Day 217 | No Comments
Section of The Crucifixion, Pedro Orrente, ca. 1625–30

God certainly doesn’t need our money for himself.  He simply requests to route it in direction he wishes for ministry, and we appreciate the privilege of being in business with him.  He is no person’s debtor. My wife and I learned to live by percentages.  Especially did we adopt our 10-80-10–Plan.  I began to preach about it in family conferences and some leading persons said afterwards that they adopted it.  The idea, inspired from Scripture, slipped into other books than mine, here and there, with some slight amendments.  The plan was simply that one should give ten percent to God, and save ten percent for the family.  The remaining eighty percent comprised the amount the individual would apply to living… Read more

Generational Differences

August 4, 2019
Year 4, Day 216 | No Comments
Section of The Crucifixion, Pedro Orrente, ca. 1625–30

In the real world we live in a forest of differences.  It has always been so.  If the differences are large enough we can trace them, from bad to good and back again.  I have lived long enough to discover that the changes occur rapidly enough that a person can live in a context claiming and abetting a virtue that is praised and advanced by individuals and society during one period and found to be wrong and abusive in another.  The illustration used here could be carried over in various areas using the appropriate practices and evidence in the search for truth and understanding – to propriety and success.  For our purposes here we will refer to physical punishment.  In… Read more

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