Category: Blogroll

Day 26

I’ve been told that for me to say that I know for certain that I’m going to heaven is arrogant. This conclusion is most likely based on the misconception that to have such certainty, I must be saying that I’m so good, there’s no way I’m going to miss out.

That sentiment could be further from the truth. I’m not good. But I know I’m heaven-bound because of God’s Word:

1 John 5:13 “These things I have written to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, so that you may know that you have eternal life. ”

I’ve believed, therefore I know. It’s a simple, logical conclusion based not on me, but entirely on Christ’s work and God’s grace.

Here’s an illustration I heard in a message recently: A person is saved from drowning. Upon reaching shore with his rescuer, he joyfully tells anyone who will listen, “I’ve just been saved from drowning!” Is that prideful? Of course not. For someone to say, “Wow, you’re arrogant!” would be ridiculous. The glory would go to the savior. Obviously, the same is true the spiritual realm.

So . . .

I’m no-doubt-about-it saved – all glory to my Savior!

Day 27

I love running. I haven’t run in a long time because of certain muscles like a hip flexor that still nags me for mangling it back when I ran cross country in college (very very very slowly, mind you), and certain joints like my right knee which doesn’t like the pounding pain it feels after I pound the sidewalk a little too hard. These days, walking is my modus exercisi.

Still, deep down, and sometimes bubbling up to the surface, I love running. Many people don’t. Some think running, just running, is boring. I’ve never been bored on a run. I’ve felt like I was going to die on a run. I’ve felt like I wanted to die on a run. Running has challenged me, enthralled me, hurt me, but it’s certainly never bored me. I’m far more apt to be bored walking.

When I run, I feel fast and graceful. I know I’m not. I’m pretty clumsy and probably look more polar bear-ish than cheetah-like. But I love the breeze on my face and the steady smack of my sneakers on the ground. A few weeks ago when it was still spring, I threw caution to the wind on a grassy field back behind MU. I sprinted. Arms flung wide, I ran that for all I was worth.

It was delicious.

So, I’m thinking someday soon I’ll get to that point where I say, “Forget my knees, forget my muscles.I’m gonna go running.” No doubt, that sentiment will come back to bite me.

But when you wake up every morning to the strains of the theme from Chariots of Fire, as I do, eventually resistance becomes futile.

Onward.

Psalm 119:32 “I run in the path of your commands, for you have set my heart free.”

There’s no truer freedom – from sin, guilt, fear, death – then when one walks (or runs!) on God’s path.

Day 28

I, like most MKs, have lived a lot of places and have always had a hard time with the “where’s home?” question. Hey, forget “where’s home”. . . I have enough trouble with “what’s home”, as in what does the word even mean anymore?

So . . .

Katie’s Inexhaustive Dictionary of the English Language strikes again.

home (n.) – 1.) Heaven (the truest definition) 2.) the place where I am currently living  3.) a place (not so much these days) or a time (more likely) where I am content, comfortable, I love those around me, and I am loved by them in return (i.e. where I belong).

And an expansion:

Home is where I write when I send emails to my family. They all start with “Dear home . . . ” Home is an evening in a brown styrofoam and chicken-wire house on the edge of the Rift Valley, eating homemade baked ziti and having non-sequiter conversations. Home is a sun-splashed afternoon in Room 904 of Houghton Hall in downtown Chicago, reading O. Henry to my knitting friends. Home is surprising my siblings by coming back to PA for spring break the last time they were on furlough. Home is a Wednesday night after church, going to a coffee shop with friends, teasing and talking theology and figuring out wedding countdowns.

“I hold home inside, close to my heart, so it’s a place I can always be. And wherever I go, it’s a new start, with more home to add to me.” – a bit from my book that seemed fitting at this juncture.

Here on earth, that’s what home means to me.

Day 29 

“Those who forget the pasta are condemned to reheat it.”  ~Unknown

This quote works especially well with certain accents (e.g. Italian) – and you can get very close to the original that way. 

Onward.

Proverbs 18:10 “The name of the LORD is a strong tower; The righteous runs into it and is safe.”

I’ve always liked that image of the strong tower. In my mind I see a storm swirling, dark clouds, lightning, and then little me running into a huge stone fortress.

I feel very safe.

Day 30

It’s fun running into someone on accident. There’s no planning, no deciding, no pre-deliberation on your part or mine. You  get up in the morning and go about your ordinary. You go to school or work or the bank or the post office or to Jimmy John’s for a vegetarian sub, and you turn the corner and there I am. Of course, I’ve been going about my business, too. Then I come out of the library, and there you are.

A happy “Hey!” and “What are you doing here?” and a pleasant conversation may be all that ensues. Still, it just made my day a little brighter, bumping into you.

Onward.

This is our family song. We sang it yesterday in church, and I felt that old familiar lump, especially around the words “What he says we will do, where he sends we will go, Never fear, only trust and obey.”

I love this song because the order of things is so right: trust Jesus first, then obey. Obedience for a Christian not a blind thing. When you know the Lord and his character and his love, and you completely rest in him, it just makes sense to obey him. 

And you can be saved, you can be “in Jesus”, but unless you learn to trust and obey, you won’t have true happiness or true joy.

When we walk with the Lord in the light of His Word,
What a glory He sheds on our way!
While we do His good will, He abides with us still,
And with all who will trust and obey.

Refrain

Trust and obey, for there’s no other way
To be happy in Jesus, but to trust and obey.

Not a shadow can rise, not a cloud in the skies,
But His smile quickly drives it away;
Not a doubt or a fear, not a sigh or a tear,
Can abide while we trust and obey.

Not a burden we bear, not a sorrow we share,
But our toil He doth richly repay;
Not a grief or a loss, not a frown or a cross,
But is blessed if we trust and obey.

But we never can prove the delights of His love
Until all on the altar we lay;
For the favor He shows, for the joy He bestows,
Are for them who will trust and obey.

Then in fellowship sweet we will sit at His feet.
Or we’ll walk by His side in the way.
What He says we will do, where He sends we will go;
Never fear, only trust and obey.

Refrain

Day 31

It’s a little round ceramic box with a little round ceramic bear on top. Wherever I move, I carry that little round ceramic box with me. It’s always one of the last things I pack (if I pack it at all), thoughtfully and carefully. If there was ever a fire, it’d be the first thing I’d grab. It is my most prized earthly possession, but not because of the box itself; because of what it contains.

Inside is a tiny rosebud. You wouldn’t know it anymore to look at it – it’s a jumble of brown shriveled petals that look like they’ve been through the washer. They have, actually. Once, I wrapped the box in a sweatshirt to protect it during a move. I forgot that it was inside it the shirt and threw it in the laundry machine. The rose came though the spin cycle surprisingly well and I managed to salvage most of it and return it to its proper place – inside the box. It’s very clean.

You’ve probably guessed by now that this is not just any rose. Oh, no. It’s a very old rose – as old as I am. This rose was the one that my father gave his little girl on the day I was born. And so whenever I open up that little round ceramic box, I don’t just see a bunch of shriveled petals.

I see my daddy’s love for me.

Day 32

The ants were at it again. Building their little castles in the sidewalk cracks, including the specific crack next to the bottom step in front of my building. For days, I’d been watching those three little hills grow into tiny ant mountains, and for days, I’d been waiting on the inevitable. Which happened Thursday.

When I came home for lunch, the hills had been flattened, complete with a sneaker print left in the middle of the dirt pancake. It must be irresistible for some people to stomp on an anthill, just as it is irresistible for some of us to take a mini-detour just so we can step on what looks to be an especially crunchy leaf.

I knew it was going to happen. I shrugged on the inside and went off to have my peanut butter and jelly.

The next afternoon, an ant hill had miraculously reappeared. Just one, but it was tall and round and very much there.

Those ants sure are diligent, persistent, hard-working little bugs. I don’t know about you, but I always think it’s fun to see Biblical principles played out in creation. There is much to consider, much to learn.

Day 33 

A high school classmate who writes a blog wrote about the “holistic” approach to evangelism, which involves caring for the whole person, not just for their spiritual needs. He asked for responses, so below is what I wrote with some expansion.

Jesus: “Go into all the world and preach the gospel . . .”(Mark 16:15)

Paul: “I am determined to know nothing among you except Christ Jesus and him crucified.”(1 Corinthians 2:2)

The believer’s role as an ambassador on this earth is to share the Gospel of Jesus Christ. (i.e. He was God who became Man, died on the cross for our sins, and rose again, so that whosoever believes in him shall not perish but have everlasting life {John 3:16}.)

Compassion for people’s physical needs is indeed Christlike. That compassion can lead to a tremendous ministry. I am not at all against caring for those needs. HOWEVER, my concern is that much of today’s”holistic missions” is focused on giving people bread, or fighting for “social justice”, or giving them a vaccine, or building them a house – i.e. meeting physical needs. Let me reiterate, these things are good things, and I’m not encouraging anyone to stop doing them. But when they become the focus and the Gospel is left out, or minimized, or reduced to a mere “Jesus loves you, so here’s a bag of rice”, that is hardly holistic. It is, in truth, hardly loving. Any unsaved moral person can do that, and many do. I’m afraid that often when we aim to be “holistic”, we may end up instead becoming “unbalanced”, leaning too much in the direction of an individual’s felt needs.

We must never forget that we have something of eternal value to offer.

We need to realize that these people, for all their other needs, are on their way to hell. A lack of sharing eternal bread is a grave error that I’ve seen and heard from many (and especially) short term mission trips. To use the old illustration, you’re painting a sinking ship when you neglect the gospel – you may fill their bellies, tell them nice (even “spiritual”) stories, or protect them from the wind and rain, but have you done anything to make them aware of their greatest need? Our primary purpose, as seen in the Great Comission, is a spiritual one.

Paul was a man with deep love and compassion for others, and yet his primary focus was not ridding the world of evil and injustice. As he stated in the letter the Corinthians, his goal was to glorify Jesus by spreading his gospel. His goal was to see the lost saved from hell by God’s grace.

Day 34

Actually, it was, in fact, watching a car wreck.

Yesterday, a little before one p.m., I’m crossing  in the middle of 16th St. (Jaywalking, yes. Bad Katie. Bad, bad Katie.) and I hear that awful screech of tires. Not close to me, so don’t be worrying. Down the road about 150 feet at the intersection of 16th and Clybourn. I turn my head just in time to see a red car plow into a blue car and the two cars go spinning and sliding to a rest right at the sidewalk corner. I automatically start running down the sidewalk toward the accident, but stop, realizing that A.) I don’t know CPR, B.) I don’t have my cell phone, C.) There are a dozen people closer to the scene than I am, including a public safety officer barking into his walkie-talkie.

So I save my heroics (ha) for another day. I talk to the officer a little later, and he said everyone is ok. The cars are totalled – the bumper from Red Car is still out on the sidewalk at 10:30 pm when we drive home from church.

One time when I was at college in Chicago, I saw a smaller accident from the rooftop of my dorm overlooking LaSalle. Me and my friends were hanging out, arms slung over the old chain-link fence, watching the traffic, enjoying our skyline, shootin’ the breeze, when we saw a moving car smack into a parked car (as opposed to seeing the parked car smack into the moving car). This being Chicago (I suppose), the driver of Moving Car appeared to take a moment, regain control, and then kept on a-moving down the boulevard.

I’m not entirely certain that this is the way these things are supposed to go. I am pretty sure, however that the owner of Parked Car was none too happy with the whole episode.

Onward.

I’ve just started “reading” a book called A Meaningful World by Benjamin Wiker and Jonathan Witt. I say “reading” because it is one of those esoteric books that I find intimidating and difficult to follow, yet at the same time fascinating and irresistable. The arguments are hard to be understood, but they are worthwhile.

As it’s title suggests, this book is out to show that the world is not just a jumble of meaningless particles that were produced randomly in the primordial stew. It explores everything from Shakespeare to chemistry and shows the meaningfulness of the natural world. An early quote:

“Against the materialist attempts to reduce biology to chemistry, we find instead that the latest science is uncovering more a more evidence that the elements are strangely fit for biology, the lifeless fashioned for the living.” (p.27) That’s a pretty amazing thought. Hey, could this be because there is a Creator?

Indeed!

P.S. Happy Flag Day. Or as they say in my part of the country, “Flayg Day”.

 Day 35

‘Cause no one else will do it for you:

Gotta love true resourcefulness:

No comment needed:

Sigh. I do miss that place.

Onward.

John 9:25b “One thing I do know, that though I was blind, now I see.”

The man who spoke these words was physically born blind. Jesus healed him. We who have believed in Jesus Christ were born spiritually blind (and separated from God). By his grace, he has healed us spiritually. And only those of us who have experienced this regeneration can truly understand the song “Amazing Grace”.

“I was once was lost but now am found, was blind but now I see.”

Day 36

On Sunday, the 3-5 year old Sunday School class was learning about Day 3 of creation, the day that God made seed-bearing plants. As an object lesson, the teacher (I was the “helper”) brought in several kinds of fruit and cut them open to show the kids the variety of seeds God created. We had them touch the different fruits and guess how many seeds were in each.

Now, I can’t remember when I learned that cantaloupe and apples had lots of seeds, that cherries and peaches only have one, and that the banana’s seeds are those little brown flecks in its center. That knowledge is dry to me now. It has simply become part of What I Have Learned Since 1980. It has ceased to be amazing.

But on Sunday, I was surrounded by 7 kids for whom seeds were New. They crowded, their eyes widened as the knife sliced, revealing juicy insides, they guessed that peaches had 5 seeds and stated with assurance that bananas had no seeds. They made mistakes with carefree abandon. They asked for seconds (and thirds) of cantaloupe and peanuts.

They learned. And thanks to their enthusiasm in doing so, I was once again instilled with amazement at our Creator and his creativity.

Day 37

This morning, I was waiting . . . just waiting. The clinic room was set up, the internet cued to the page I needed, and my lesson plan and client file were on a chair in the observation room for my supervisor to peruse. All was in readiness.

But my client was late. And I was stuck in that strange limbo of suddenly having a bit of time on my hands, but not really sure what I could do with it. I couldn’t really go and start anything, because of course the moment I did, she would show up. Yet pacing the hallway empty-handed and looking out at the sidewalk felt odd. It was almost like I was in a moving paralysis, able to wander around a little but bound by uncertainty and an undefined amount of time.

Just waiting.

Onward.

Psalm 27:14 “Wait for the LORD; Be strong and let your heart take courage; Yes, wait for the LORD.”

Unlike my just waiting today, the wait for the Lord is not paralyzed, uncertain, or uncomfortable. When believers wait on him, when we rest in his will, his plan, his purpose, and his timing,  there is peace and joy. We can be strong and courageous when our waiting is on such a Shepherd.

Day 38

There’s an investment ad I’ve been hearing on the radio lately that starts out with this (probably government-mandated) warning: “Investments and securities involve the risk of loss.” When anything related to money, business, or economics comes up, I tune out. I’m not concerned with rising stocks, bull and bear markets (?), or any of that. Probably because I don’t get them. This morning, though, that little warning line I’ve heard a dozen or so times really grabbed me.

It wasn’t so much the investment part that made me think. I know you can lose out with bad investments. But securities involve the risk of loss? Granted, I don’t have a clue what securities are. But securities? Come on, now – how can you call something a security if there’s a risk of loss? Seems a little strange.

Maybe that’s because I’m so used to God’s economy: Nearly 2000 years ago he bankrupt heaven to make an incredible investment in the destiny of lost sinners: his Son, Jesus, died on the cross, fully paying our sin debt, so that if we simply believe in him, we receive the free gift of everlasting life, which is an eternal security that involves no risk of loss.

And that, my friends, is the way security should be.

Day 39

Back a dozen or so years ago, which was a while before the internet reached our town in Kenya, it was rather hard to follow American sports of any kind. That’s completely understandable. I mean, do U.S. papers keep track of cricket scores in Australia? Of course not!

So I’ve gotta give the Daily Nation (one of Kenya’s newspapers) credit on that point – they did make an effort to keep us baseball fans informed. To an extent. Every day, I’d go to the library and flip through the sports to find the baseball “section”. Now granted, sometimes they did have the full standings – American League & National League, all six divisions. But in other cases, they’d only print say, the NL West and AL Central. Maybe that’s all they had room for. But when the NL East Phillies were in the thick of the pennant race (hey, I can dream), the sporadic coverage could be a tad frustrating.

These days, thanks to the wide world web and satellite TV, it’s a lot easier to follow sports. You can find out who won the Super Bowl in real time, rather than huddling around a shortwave radio the next morning to find out the results from BBC. You can listen to Phillies announcer Harry Kalas’s lively description of another Chase Utley home run (“That ball is WAY outta here!”) if you don’t mind the  game’s 2:05 AM E. Africa start time.

Indeed, people do go to great lengths at times to catch their teams live.

For example, in December 2005, a Monday Night Football game between the Philadelphia Eagles and the Seattle Seahawks was being broadcast live by ESPN (or someone) in Africa. Thrilled to be able to go watch “our team”, my 2 youngest brothers, who were on break from school, got up in the wee hours of Tuesday morning to go to the video room to watch it. Mom went along (as an adult needed to be present) and apparently got her grocery list and the whole week’s menu done during the game. She’s definitely the queen of multi-tasking.

Anyways, you can guess what happened. Murphy’s Law took over. The Eagles were utterly shellacked. 42-0. I remember watching part of the game here in Milwaukee, but I gave up on them before the first half was over and went to bed. Noah and Daniel stuck it out to the bitter bitter end. I guess when you only get to see a live game of your team every few years, you do that.

But they didn’t even get to see an Eagles touchdown. Sigh.

Onward.

Here’s the benediction Grandpa mentioned in his comment yesterday. It was the one read at their wedding nearly 56 years ago.

Hebrews 13:20-21 Now the God of peace, who brought up from the dead the great Shepherd of the sheep through the blood of the eternal covenant, even Jesus our Lord, equip you in every good thing to do His will, working in us that which is pleasing in His sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be the glory forever and ever. Amen.

Day 40

Yesterday and today my diagnostic partner and I conducted our first evaluations. They were about as different as 2 sessions could be. Yesterday’s evaluation consisted of two and a half hours of chasing a two and a half year old girl around the room with testing materials. We were a just a leetle tired after that one. Nothing really went as planned, the video only got half the session, and we didn’t formally complete all the tests. But it was fun and we managed to get what we needed. Also, our client had quite the excellent attention span for a person her age – it was better than mine. Almost.

Today, we had an accent reduction evaluation. Foreign accent clients are always an interesting challenge because they aren’t disordered, they have a “difference”. We get a lot of teaching assistants from overseas who learned English mainly from books (which, in case you were wondering, is among the worst ways to acquire a language). They arrive in Milwaukee, start teaching, and their students struggle to understand them. So they come to us for help. (I’m thinking I’ll write a post on accents at some point – it is quite an interesting topic. Nerdy, yes. But interesting.)

Anyway, that evaluation also was successful  – it was two hours of sitting with a very-easy-to-talk-to adult. Everything went according to plan. It all flowed nicely with no hiccups. Rather pleasant, actually.

I was thinking about how absolutely opposite (Can you have something that’s “absolutely opposite? Or is “opposite” superlative enough on its own?) the sessions were, yet how we came out of both of them saying, “Hey, that went pretty well.” Truly, variety is the spice of life. And also, apparently, of my chosen profession.

Onward.

Jude 24-25 Now to Him who is able to keep you from stumbling, and to make you stand in the presence of His glory blameless with great joy, to the only God our Savior, through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory, majesty, dominion and authority, before all time and now and forever. Amen.

I think this is my favorite benediction in all of Scripture. I love the way Jude describes not just the incredible attributes of the Lord, but also our position in Christ, and his tender grace toward us. Awesome, in the truest sense of that word.

Day 41

Today I would like to suggest for your reading pleasure, a classic: The King’s Stilts by the venerable Dr. Seuss. This tale of noble King Birtram of Binn (as well as his stilts), courageous page boy Eric, and dastardly Lord Droon is, in my opinion, Seuss’s best and enjoys a long and honored history in my family. In fact, it is the first book I ever remember being read to me. My father actually recorded a cassette tape of his rendition of the story, and that tape has been listened to countless times.

I was just perusing some Stilts excerpts at Amazon, and with each line I read, I could hear the echo of Dad’s enthusiastic narration in my mind, pulling me back to Walnut Street, Catasauqua, PA, circa the mid-1980’s. Twenty or so years later, these memories serve to enhance my enjoyment of the adventure which includes Binn’s constant battle against predatorial birds called nizzards, the borderline-treasonous theft of King Birtram’s stilts by the evil Droon, and Eric’s dire quest to retrieve them (Before It’s Too Late, of course).

Eventually, all is set right. The kingdom is saved, and when the villian is locked up, we are given an account of his prison menu in what is one of my favorite lines of the book: “Stewed nizzards for breakfast. Cold nizzards for lunch. Fried nizzards for supper. And every other Thursday, they served him nizzard hash.”

Try it. You will like it, you will see. (The book, my friends, not the hash.)

Onward.

I definitely want this sung at my funeral. If I have one, of course.

Some day when the toils of life are over/And the saints are caught away/We will gather ’round the throne of Jesus/For his coronation day.

Chorus: I want to be there when we crown him King of kings/I want to be there when the court of heaven rings/With the happy song the angel chorus sings/I want to be there when we crown him King of kings.

All the universe will be assembled/Numberless the gathering there/Angel hosts and all the ransomed army/Glorious sight beyond compare.

Only those who put their faith in Jesus/Trust the work of Calvary/Will behold that crowning day in heaven/Day of final victory.

Hallelujah! I’m going to be there.

Day 42

I was lesson planning for tomorrow’s session with my 3-year-old client (Side Note: He’s the one who, totally unprompted, gives me a hug and a kiss on the cheek after each session – talk about serious heart meltage.) in which we will be focusing on correct production of the cluster “sn”. For part of the session, I’ll be reading 15 “sn” words to him, so this morning I had to come up with my list.

Now, “s” by itself is a very nice. “N”, too, is lovely alone. But put the two sounds together, and somehowly you get (deep breath): snooty, sneer, snort, snit, snore, snot, snarl, snide, snicker, sneak, snoop, snake, sniffle, snap, snarky. Hmm. For whatever reason, our language seems to like using “sn” to convey our not-so-nice ideas. I tried to find more neutral “sn” words to share with Richie, and there are some, such as snack, sneakers, snail, snow, and sneeze.

Still, we English speakers are quite obviously biased in our use of “sn”. Kinda interesting.

Onward.

Some Thoughts from the Proverb of the Day:

Proverbs 6:6-11 Go to the ant, O sluggard, observe her ways and be wise, which, having no chief, officer or ruler, prepares her food in the summer and gathers her provision in the harvest. ⁹ How long will you lie down, O sluggard? When will you arise from your sleep? “A little sleep, a little slumber, A little folding of the hands to rest “– your poverty will come in like a vagabond and your need like an armed man.

Day 43

That’s the comment I overheard when I passed two girls last night leaving the library. I didn’t hear anymore of their conversation – you know how you catch bits ‘n’ pieces of others lives as you pass by – but that was a very interesting bit ‘n’ piece my ears grabbed as I walked home.

In my mind, I thought, Me too. I get in this tunnel vision rut, or I’m like a Kentucky Derby horse with blinders securely fastened. I hardly see what’s going on in the world besides what takes place in my own little corner of Milwaukee, and more specifically, in my own little life. This feels especially true during these busy summer weeks – it’s get up, go to clinic, go to work, go home, go to bed, repeat. I’ll get irritated when someone interrupts my rut, ahem, my routine. My routine. As in, it’s all about me. Hoo boy.

Last night, I was graciously and gently convicted of my self-absorption. And the Holy Spirit used a “random” comment by a stranger to do it. 

Philippians 2:3 “Do nothing from selfishness or empty conceit, but with humility of mind regard one another as more important than yourselves.”

Yes, regard one another. Thanks for the reminder, Lord.

Day 44

This is my 100th blog entry, so I thought it appropriate to share some thoughts I wrote . . . on writing.

Word Wrestling – 16 September 06

        Writing is not easy for me. It’s hard work. More often than not, I find the process frustrating.  It usually goes something like this: I’ll wake up in the middle of the night with a half-baked idea – it’s getting crusty around the edges, but it’s still a little raw inside. There’s a great (even brilliant, I think) first line and a snazzy ending. The middle part needs some work, but I fall back asleep certain that everything will be sorted out in my brain by the time I crawl out of bed.

      Of course, it rarely is. In the morning when I sit yawning at my computer, that brilliant first line isn’t quite so shiny, the finale is shabby rather than snazzy, and the muddled middle sits and stares up at me unsympathetically with all the Times New Roman indifference it can muster. I can’t hit the delete key quickly enough. Sometimes, I only type a dozen words before realizing the futility of the effort. Other times I’ll trudge along through a paragraph or two or three, hoping with each keystroke that it’ll somehow get better, that I’ll somehow be able to salvage the mass of banality I’ve created. In either case, the end result is the same: a blank screen.

      Are there people out there for whom writing comes easily? Are there wielders of words whose essays and poems and stories always hit the target, who never face writer’s block or need a thesaurus, whose thoughts spill from mind to pen to paper in an uninterrupted flow of wit and wisdom? Or are they all like me, a word wrestler who goes to battle with grammar and semantics, challenging amorphous thoughts to become coherent and yes, even beautiful, to the world outside my head?

      I often, too often, come out on the losing end of the fight, with the score reading: Pristine Page – 1, So-Called Writer – 0. Yet, in spite of the disappointments, I can’t help myself – I keep coming back for more. Because on those rare occasions when I do emerge victorious, when oft-unsubmissive syllables and sentences stand in perfect order, when words become a backdrop for my ideas and not a distraction from them, I delight in language. I delight in its Creator. I delight in the joys of written communication. I delight in the gift of being able to share thoughts that cause people to ponder, to laugh, or to cry.

      And because there are such delights, I wrestle on.

Day 45

Going to heaven has absolutely nothing to do with one’s lifestyle, character or behavior – ever.

(Query shamelessly stolen from Ian’s facebook profile.)

This question was brought to the forefront of my thinking yesterday when I was reading a Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel opinion column. Steve Paske wrote about how some kids in this city seem unconcerned about committing violent crimes because they believe in God and think that that will get them to heaven in spite of their actions. The author was advocating for more “brimstone” teaching in Milwaukee churches to strike fear into the hearts of the youth. While I’m all for bringing up hell in the context of witnessing – people need to know what they need to be saved from– I find some of Mr. Paske’s premises troubling.  Here’s the link: http://www.jsonline.com/story/index.aspx?id=613596

And a response to a couple of points in the article:

“Perhaps if our city’s preachers took on a more punitive persona, perhaps if city sermons reminded Christians that violent acts will result in a violent afterlife – even if they don’t think that is the case – then perhaps fear of eternal punishment might actually get kids to think twice before they pull the trigger of a gun leaving a 4-year old-girl dead.”

I am one of those who do not think that violent acts of necessity equal a violent afterlife, and I could not stomach listening to a teacher who proclaimed that.

“Perhaps the Christian God is so forgiving that you could kill someone and still stamp your ticket to heaven.”

Yes, sir. He is so forgiving.

You see, we are not saved because we are good. We are not even condemned because we are bad. Our sins truly do make us worthy of hell. But Jesus Christ paid the price for our sins on the cross – all of our sins: past, present, and future. The question that now stands before a sinner (i.e. everyone on this planet) is “What do you think about Jesus Christ?”

John 3:18 “He who believes in Him is not condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.”

So, it is not, “Are you a ‘good enough’ person, or a ‘too bad’ person?” It’s, “Do you believe that the work of Christ alone was sufficient to save you, or are you still trusting your ‘good works'(which according to the Bible are filthy rags before a holy God)?”

Am I defending or condoning the rapes and murders committed by these young people mentioned in Mr. Paske’s article? Absolutely not. Sin is always anathema. God hates sin. I am saddened by foolish and wicked acts such as the murder of 4-year-old Jasmine. Am I saying the ones who commit these crimes are going to heaven? I don’t know. I don’t know their hearts or beliefs. There’s a lot of unsaved monotheists running around today. And their actions certainly do not line up with the Christ-like life that should be the believer’s aim; in fact they are the opposite. Based on these people’s deeds, I would seriously doubt their claim to salvation. But based on Scripture, I cannot say that these sinners, whose criminal acts at times defy belief, are not indeed saved.

Because those sins were paid for on the cross, and if they trusted ALONE in that work of God’s Son, their eternal destiny is settled. Heaven is a gift for sinners; it it is not a reward for good people.

Romans 6:23 “For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

Oh, and by the way, the answer to the question at the top is true.