Page 273 was a laid-back and restful Saturday.  I was able to sleep in and then, after a late Friday, I began my morning with prayer, coffee, and the writing of yesterday’s page.  As I wrote, I would periodically check on Susan who once again slept in even longer than I did.  We used to have a Saturday morning tradition where we would go to the zoo together.  Somehow that tradition has changed to Susan sleeping in until it is time for me to start lunch.  

Once the page was written, I turned my attention to going through the photos I took yesterday.  Most of what I do in the “processing” of them is to straighten them so the horizon is horizontal in the photo.  It seems like I go through times when I can shoot fairly level photos, then I quit paying attention and most of them end up with a “tilt” to them.  There are a lot of things that my cameras do automatically, but there are still many details that I have to pay attention to in order to capture the image I want.  Some of those details are correctable after the fact, but others aren’t.  Life tends to be a lot like that — a lot of details to try to keep track of with some of them correctable if we get them wrong and others leave a more permanent mark that changes the way life looks.

By noon, Susan was ready to wake up and it was time to fire up the pellet grill to start the bacon cheeseburgers for lunch.  As I worked on lunch, the air was filled with the sounds of birds singing joyfully as they raided the remaining seeds from the row of sunflowers.  Today’s photo may appear to be of a finch perched on one of the sunflower heads, but if you look closely you should be able to find a second finch busy plucking the seeds from the sunflower it has claimed.  After taking some bird photos, I spent some time going over the sermon outline for tomorrow while lunch was cooking.  After lunch the afternoon and evening was spent relaxing, sharing photos, and letting the sermon simmer.

As I reflect on the day, here are some thoughts/lessons that stand out to me:

• God says that the sabbath was made for man, not man for the sabbath.   We would do well to heed God’s instructions as we understand His knowledge of our need for rest.
• Traditions can be good, but not if they end up keeping you from what you really need.
• Balance in life is difficult, but it becomes nearly impossible if we let the less important details distract us from a level focus.
• Some things are more difficult to correct than others but God wants to make all things new when we turn everything over to Him.
• Even the things we can’t fully correct can be used by God to mold us further into His image.
• God wants the feasting upon His Word to be something we enjoy and something we are able to share with others.

There are times when some unknown trip-wire opens the floodgates in my mind and memories that I wish were erasable come flooding in to try to drown me in their lies.  For some reason, page 271 was one of those days.  Fortunately, God went ahead of this mental flood and used the combination of a stranger and a friend to remind me last night that even when others find no value in what I do, God uses the efforts of faithfulness in ways often unseen.

My workday was filled with a lot of the usual daily things along with great progress on two different sermon outlines and content.  After the building was ready for the day, the sky appeared as if the sun was about to set it on fire at any moment so I set up my camera to time-lapse record the sunrise.  As it turned out, there was a brief splash of color and then a thick blanket of clouds moved across the sky and kept the sunrise from exploding with the brilliant color I was expecting.  When I looked at the time-lapse video later, I was impressed by the beauty that was captured even when it wasn’t what I was expecting.

I thought I had finished up my “Living as the Lord’s Servant” series a few sermons ago, but God continues to put in my mind both characters and characteristics that are important as we learn from Biblical examples about how we ought to be serving.  While love is arguably the greatest identifying characteristic of a Christian, Christ-like love will always result in serving others according to their need.  It has been a long time since I have had two sermons in process in my mind at the same time — at least not in stages that I was aware of their development.  It was fun to see them come together and to also see the way they are connected — which is likely why they are being developed together.  In case you’re expecting more info about them, I will save the summary of each sermon for the day’s page of when I actually preach them.

After work, I went home and had a mid-afternoon lunch before spending some time unwinding and relaxing.  By early evening, I had managed to catch some new photos and a video of a hummingbird that has yet to begin its flight south for the winter.  The sky had almost completely cleared of any clouds, so we headed back down to Potato Creek for a family walk and to take some photos.  While most of the photos involved the lake and/or the setting sun, the photo on today’s page is of a milkweed seed head that has burst open to allow the seeds to carried away by both wind and critter.  I guess I chose this photo for today because it kind of brings my day full circle.  The discouragement from within the day seems to come from an uncertainty of usefulness or purpose, but the advance reminder from last night was about God carrying through the air some seeds I have planted in the past until they found just the right person to settle into and grow into a blossom of encouragement in his life — and then back into mine.  

As I reflect on the day, here are some thoughts/lessons that stand out to me:

• Not all days feel like productive days — that doesn’t necessarily mean they’re not.
• Sometimes God will use someone to encourage you in advance of your need because He knows you will need it.
• It is never a bad time to let someone know how they have helped you.
• Just because something isn’t what you expect, it doesn’t mean it can’t have a beauty of its own.
• My plans often get changed when I spend time listening to God.
• The Bible is full of people who had flaws yet still lived as the Lord’s servant.
• You can’t love like Christ without serving like Christ.
• God expects us to carry, and spread, the seeds of the gospel wherever we go.  Sometimes He has specific places for us to take it and sometimes He wants us to release it and allow Him to carry it on the winds to where it needs to be.

There were no stars visible to begin page 270 as the arrival of cooler weather overnight brought some light rain with it.  As I went about my morning prayer, cleaning, and building prep routine my mind seemed to focus a lot on hope.  Like many words, I think we’ve often watered down the meaning of hope so that it no longer has the power within us that it ought to have.  We have settled for a wishful thinking kind of hope instead of clinging to the hope which offers a confident expectation.  As I prayed for the children who would soon be in the building, I wondered if my requests were just wishful thinking or filled with a confident expectation — and what really determines which it is.

I suspect that many times we settle for wishful thinking because we are not willing to put in the effort required to have a confident expectation.  The hope that I have in Christ is a confident expectation because of a faith in Him that is both alive and active.  No, there is nothing I can do to earn the favor of God, but there is something I must do in order to have it — offer an unconditional surrender of self and accept Him on His terms.  It is my action, or lack of it, that is often the pivot point between wishful thinking and confident hope.  I can look at many things in today’s world, including the children who are in the building, and either have a wishful thinking hope that everything will turn out well or increase my confident expectation by actively being involved in the things that I can influence.  For years I have thought about and talked about the idea of leading prayer-based spiritual growth retreats, but the thought just hung out in the wishful thinking area of hope until I finally began to do the work necessary to move into the confident expectation that these retreats will take place.  Granted, they may, or may not, look exactly like I expect them to, but I now have a confident expectation that they will take place and be what God wants them to be.

Once the building was ready, much of the day was divided between sermon work, maintenance details, and retreat preparation.  Once the workday was over, I headed home to relax for a while before driving down to Potato Creek with my family to enjoy the beauty of the park.  The eagles weren’t out where they were visible, so we took a walk on one of the trails to enjoy the fall evening.  Today’s photo was taken during that walk as we found a heron with a stoic pose and steadfast gaze as he kept an eye out for his next meal.  I suspect that he had a confident expectation that he would eat because he had put himself in the right place and was prepared for what he would find.  After our walk, the western sky began to turn red as the sun finished setting for the day.  After a few photos, we called it a day and made our way home.

As I reflect on the day, here are some thoughts/lessons that stand out to me:

• While the clouds and rain may keep the stars from being visible to me, their light is not extinguished.
• It’s easy to find things to pray about and people to pray for if we pay even a little bit of attention.
• I think that there is so much despair in our world partly because the wishful thinking kind of hope has left many disillusioned.
• If you want to have hope in the next generation, invest yourself in them in some way.
• Wishing you were right with God will not make it so.
• Unconditional surrender to God will result in a confident expectation that He has made all things right between you and Him.
• Dreaming can be good and beneficial, but to be productive the dreaming must lead to proper action.
• Proper action is the result of prayer and listening to God — not just pushing forward your own agenda.
• I love the old hymn that says, “My hope [confident expectation] is built on nothing less, than Jesus’ blood and righteousness.”  A lot of truth expressed in that line.
• A peaceful evening with family is a great way to wrap up a day.

Page 269 began with another beautiful star-filled sky overhead as I headed to work.  As I went about the morning prayer, cleaning, and building prep the word respect kept coming to mind.  It seems everyone wants it, but far fewer are interested in giving it.  Respect is work because the only way to receive it is to earn it.  As much as people may want or attempt to make it happen, respect will not be obtained through legislation or by demand.  In fact, efforts to force respect will generally end up building walls with the result being a further deterioration of whatever seeds of respect may have been present.  These morning thoughts directed my prayer time to the words from James, “Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to become angry.”  When we mix up the quick and slow parts in the instructions God gives, we soon find ourselves wrapped up in a deadlocked relationship because neither side cares why the other thinks the way they do.

I believe social media is a neutral tool, that like most other tools can be used for good or for evil.  Unfortunately, its design tends to make it easy to be slow to listen, quick to speak, and quick to become angry — the exact opposite of God’s instructions.  When we fail to listen, not just to the words people use but also to the reasons behind the words, we often respond hastily and in anger instead of understanding.  A few rounds of that behavior and it isn’t long before the attempts to be heard become more frantic and desperate, but by then the ears and minds on both sides of the issue have been turned off and the battle lines drawn.  Yes, it doesn’t take a very careful look to see this being played out in public situations around our country.  But this isn’t limited to national politics or societal issues that blanket a country, it takes place in workplaces, in churches, and in homes more often than most care to admit.  

The solution is simple, but it isn’t easy.  It starts with you and I putting into practice the things we say we believe.  It includes repentance and forgiveness in quantities too great to measure.  It involves asking questions to understand the why and not just the what.  It means we will work at earning the respect of others while being generous in giving respect to the people around us.  It requires humility to recognize real differences as you speak and act in ways that benefit others according to their need.  It continues as we daily surrender ourselves fully to the Lordship of Jesus in all things.

Well, that’s not what I thought I was going to write when I sat down to type out today’s page.  The rest of the day was a fairly normal workday that included a lot of prayer time, some reading, some sermon prep, some maintenance work, and some retreat work.  At home this evening, I headed back outside to see what I could photograph and this sunflower caught my eye.  Most of the sunflower blossoms have matured and the finches have done a good job of picking the seeds out, but there are still a few late blossoms that continue to add their brilliant color to the evening sky.  They serve as a good example of the beauty one life can add even when everything around it seems to be dying.

As I reflect on the day, here are some thoughts/lessons that stand out to me:

• Light overcomes darkness as long as the light isn’t being hidden — let your light shine!
• Sometimes I have a lot of things on my mind that I am praying about, and sometimes there is just a single word that my prayer time grows from.
• God calls us to come into relationship with Him willingly.
• Doing things God’s way is always the best policy — and the most effective policy.
• If we don’t take the time and make the effort to understand the why, we will likely never understand the what.
• Failure to listen will usually build walls between people.
• Hasty words will destroy even the seeds of respect that God wants to see grow.
• A quickly angered person will often act in ways that dishonors themselves even more than the person they are angry with. 
• Earning respect often begins by learning to give respect.
• When the world is full of death, decay, and ugliness, it doesn’t take a lot to be able to add a splash of beauty in its midst.

Page 268 was our pest control service day, so I was up and out the door even earlier than my usual early morning start time.  The moon is on a cycle that it had already set, so the stars seemed to sparkle that much brighter in the darkness of the morning sky.  At some point I will figure out how to photograph the star-filled night sky, but today was not the day to do that.  My morning prayer, cleaning, and building prep time took place while the pest control tech was also going through the building.  It made me think about the need to be vigilant in not allowing conditions that attract pests and to take the necessary steps to get rid of them if they do show up.  I suspect that if each of us had the same reaction to even the hint of sin in our lives as many do when they see the smallest of bugs, we would do whatever it takes to keep the sin from taking up residence in our life and take measures to remove any trace of it.

Eventually the early morning tasks were taken care of and I was able to settle into the Monday morning prayer guide writing routine.  As I prayed and considered different topics, the idea of honoring God kept coming to mind.  Being sure I have already done a prayer guide on that topic, I kept praying and seeking.  The topic kept lingering in my mind with no other idea seeming to form, so I looked it up and found that I have a prayer guide on honor  that God wants us to show to individuals, but none specifically about the honor that we ought to give God.  Yes, God wants us to honor parents, kingdom workers, leaders, elders, authority, and many others, but all of the honor that goes to them must never be equal to, or greater, than the honor we give God.  The honor that God deserves will always be perfect and supreme — because He is perfect and supreme.  

Once the topic was settled, the rest of the morning was spent in prayer writing the prayer guide introduction and daily points.  Once written, my attention turned to formatting it and scheduling it to be sent out via email and posted on my website on Sunday.  As is my practice, I sent myself a preview of the email so I could proofread it, but it wouldn’t show up in my email inbox.  Thinking I must have done something wrong, I sent it a couple more times with the same result.  So, a quick check with my email service provider and I find that they acknowledge there are “issues” they are working on, they have no idea when it will be restored, and all of their “customer service” channels are unreachable due to the high volume of people wanting to know what’s going on.  Here is an “information technology” business whose technology has failed and they are providing virtually no information — I’m not real sure they remember why they’re in business.  But . . . how often do people observe you and I wearing the name Christian, but see nothing resembling Christ, and wonder if we remember whose we say we are?

By mid-afternoon, I think I managed to get the prayer guide scheduled and ready to send out — though I probably won’t know for sure until I am able to send and receive emails in my primary account again.  After a stop for lunch, I picked up some supplies for work and then headed home to relax and unwind.  By early evening I went outside to see what I could find to photograph and while I was photographing a finch cleaning up some seeds from the sunflower heads, I noticed a hummingbird begin to make its way down the row of zinnias.  Today’s photo is one I caught of the hummingbird perched on the edge of one of the zinnia blossoms.  

As I reflect on the day, here are some thoughts/lessons that stand out to me:

• Until we view sin of any “size” as a problem, we probably won’t be too serious about keeping it out of our life.
• Our “sin control” procedure needs to work at both preventing and removing sin and the only way to do either of those things is through the power of Christ and His Spirit living in us.
• God expects us to give honor to whom honor is due and He makes it clear that sometimes that honor is due to a position even when the person occupying that position is less than honorable — the first century Christians, along with us, are instructed in First Peter to “honor the king.”
• If our honor of anyone or anything ever equals or exceeds our honor of God, we have a serious problem.
• Honoring God must be more than just words, it must be our way of life.
• Jesus said, “If you love me, you will keep my commands.”  There is no greater honor that we can show to God than to do what He says.
• It doesn’t matter a whole lot what label we wear if what’s inside doesn’t match what the label says.

Page 267 was another restful day as I slept in past sunrise before waking up and getting ready for church.  The theme of the morning seemed to be on serving as our Sunday School class wrapped up a study of John 13, where we find the account of Jesus washing the disciples feet as an example that they too ought to serve others.  Serving was to become an identifying mark for all those who would seek to become great in the kingdom of God.  The “new command” to love one another really wasn’t all that new until Jesus added the qualifier that this new love for one another was to be in accordance to how He loves us.  Too often we adopt the world’s view of success where we reach it by climbing the ladder to the top, away from those we are called to love.  The success Jesus wants us to have in order to be considered great in His kingdom, is obtained by climbing down the ladder to be with those who we ought to serve in love.

After the Sunday School class, we had a great morning worship gathering where David shared a message about serving one another because we are all a part of the same body with Christ as the head.  The following are the main points from that sermon.

• We serve because everyone is part of one unique identity — Jesus Christ.  Separating ourselves from the body of Christ doesn’t make any more sense than a part of our physical body deciding to leave and do its own thing.  When we discover our identity in Christ, we also find that serving is who we are because it is who He is.  Just as the parts of our body work together with one identity centered in the head, the parts of the body of Christ can only function when they work together with one identity centered in the headship of Christ.  Because the Head is focused on serving, the rest of the parts of the body will serve — if indeed they are a part of the body.
• We serve because everyone in the church is important.  The physical body is made up of many parts and while we may not understand the purpose for each part, they all exist by the will and design of our creator — God.  Jesus calls the church His body and it too is made up of many parts — people.  While you and I may not always understand the purpose each part has, our lack of understanding doesn’t diminish their value.  Because everyone in the church is important, we cannot legitimately say that serving is not our job — we’re too important for that kind of work — because the person we expect to do the serving is just as important as we are.  But we also can’t use the excuse that we’re too small of a part, or unimportant, to serve because God says that we belong exactly where He has placed us and He has a purpose and plan for us to do the works of service He created in advance for us to do.
• We serve because everyone has a job to do, though not everyone has the same job.  If you’ve ever had a part of your body not work, even temporarily, you should understand the difficulty caused when even a seemingly small part doesn’t do its work for whatever reason.  We serve because there is good work God created in advance for us to do that helps complete the body.  One of the easiest ways to kill a desire to serve can be to look around with envy at the work others are doing.  However, we feed the desire to serve when we follow God’s instructions to encourage one another.  When we realize that we are all part of one body and that each part is important, we begin to find value in being the part that we were created to be instead of jealously longing to be who someone else was created to be.  Your works of service within the body of Christ are important because they represent a task that God designed just for you.

The church service was followed by lunch with my family and then some time spent relaxing at home.  Eventually, we headed out to the Bonneyville Mills County Park near Bristol, Indiana where the dahlia garden was still in bloom.  Today’s photo was taken as a this butterfly made its way around the flower garden sampling many of the flowers as it went.  It was tough to catch it with its wings opened up as most of the time it either had its wings folded together or was flying.  We spent some time at the park photographing the flowers, mill, and waterfall scenes before stopping by Sam’s Club on our way home.  

As I reflect on the day, here are some thoughts/lessons that stand out to me:

• I am thankful to be part of a Bible study class that actually uses the Bible as its text.
• While the above statement is my preference, I am also thankful that there are well-written study guides available for those who need help in learning to study and teach the Bible truths.
• Serving others willingly and with love ought to be a distinguishing mark of every Christian.
• From a kingdom of God perspective, we will never lift ourselves to greatness no matter how hard we try.
• If the head serves, the body serves.  If you are a part of the body of Christ, your head serves so you also ought to be serving.
• There are no unimportant parts in the body of Christ.  If you are a part of His body, you have just as much importance to Him as each of the other parts.
• Your work within the body of Christ is valuable because it was given to you by God.  That value doesn’t change based on what others do, or don’t do.
• Spending time with my family is both enjoyable and important.

Page 266 has been a quiet Saturday as I used the day to catch up on some rest.  Starting my workdays early so I have more evening time with my family results in “sleeping in” taking on a different meaning than it used to.  At this time of year, if the sun is already up when I wake up then I’ve slept in.  Anyhow, the sun was up when I made my morning coffee and settled in to spend some time with God.  Eventually my prayer time included the writing of yesterday’s page as I didn’t get it written last night.  

Throughout the morning I would check on Susan, who has perfected the task of sleeping in.  She was finally ready to get up around noon, so while she got dressed I fired up the pellet grill to get our Saturday bacon cheeseburgers started for lunch.  After lunch I spent some time going through photos from Thursday’s afternoon trip to Ludington.  Eventually it was time for a nap to continue the theme of rest for the day.  As evening rolled around I had no new photos for the day, so I headed outside to see what I could find that wanted photographed.  Tonight it was the roses.  As I thought about the old line, “A rose by any other name would be just as sweet”, I began to consider what makes a rose so desirable.  While we identify this flower by a particular name, it is not the name that has been the cause of attraction by people to the rose.  No, it is the qualities that exist in the flower that make people want to grow them, enjoy them, give them, and receive them.  It could have been called a thistle and if it possessed the same qualities, people would line up to admire them and give them to the people they love.  The opposite is true, I could call a dandelion a rose all I want but, other than a handful of school-aged children and their moms, they still won’t elicit the same response as a real rose.

As my mind thought about the flowers, it turned to the early followers of Jesus who were eventually called Christians — not because wearing the name all of a sudden made them a certain way, but because the people around them saw Christ in them.  It is far too easy today for any of us to slap on the name Christian to ourselves, to events, even to products and services without any concern about whether they represent Christ accurately or not.  There are a lot of problems with doing that, but one of the biggest is that it really doesn’t work.  Just as putting the name rose on a weed doesn’t fool anyone with knowledge and confuses those without understanding, putting the label of Christian on anything that isn’t Christ-like will never fool those who know better and only confuse those who don’t.  Just as a rose is made a rose by the characteristics that hold true to what it is, a Christian must be known by the characteristics that hold true to the name of Christ.  A true Christian by any other name — employee, boss, dad, mom, child, parent, coworker, stranger, neighbor, etc — will still look like a Christian regardless of the name.

As I reflect on the day, here are some thoughts/lessons that stand out to me:

• The changes we make in life often influence what we do in other parts of our life that weren’t a part of the original change.
• Routines of life need to be flexible so that they don’t break us.
• Rest can look different to each of us but it is important that we find what is restful to us as individuals and incorporate it into our lives.
• It is the qualities of a rose, more than its name, that make it attractive to people.
• It is the qualities of a Christian, more than our name, that ought to make Christ attractive to the world.
• How well do you represent the name you wear?  Would the people around you agree?  Would God agree?
• If you are following Christ, you ought to add beauty to the world no matter what anyone may call you.