Salty Zebra

  For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever. Therefore encourage one another with these words.  1 Thessalonians 4:16-18  This Advent we’ve been studying the Savior who Comes Near. In today’s passage we have a beautiful picture of a promised future day when Jesus will very literally Come Near. A couple of days ago we looked at Matthew 24 and saw that at Jesus’ return all the nations of the world will mourn. While this will certainly be true as the reality of their choices become clear to unbelievers, for those who are found in Christ, the situation will be vastly different.  I’m a very visual person and things I see often stick in my head. This can be bad when I’ve allowed images I shouldn’t ...

  “Look, I am coming soon! My reward is with me, and I will give to each person according to what they have done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End.”   Revelation 22:12-13  Time is not a constant. While seconds and minutes and hours may be measurable, they feel different at different times and in different circumstances. Disney has made an artform of having time pass quickly as you’ll have experienced if you ever waited in one of their ride queues. It’s a totally different experience from standing in line at the grocery store or sitting in gridlocked traffic. When I’m waiting in bed in the morning, half awake, for my alarm to go off, time seems to fly. When I was nine and a half months pregnant and the baby hadn’t come yet, time seemed to stand still.   The season of Advent is, in itself, a season of waiting. We are waiting in anticipation of the celebration of Jesus’ birth as well as waiting for His impending return...

Sunrise in Indio, CA from our patio  "Free three day trip - all you have to do is attend a presentation."  Have you ever been given an opportunity like this? If not, do you live in the US? Because we are inundated with this all the time.  I remember the first timeshare presentation my husband and I attended. I'm a sucker for stuff like this, so I was ready to sign my life away, but thankfully my husband has a much more level head. We walked away without a timeshare, and I don't even remember for sure if we got whatever we were promised for attending. Over the years I had friends and relatives that bought into one of these programs, and they were generous to share their benefits with us. We were able to fulfill our then 4 year old's lifelong dream to visit Big Bear Lake thanks to my Aunt kindly allowing us to book through their timeshare. Combined with airline miles that my husband had received for work travel, our family of 6 got a week-long vacation in California...

  “Then will appear the sign of the Son of Man in heaven. And then all the peoples of the earth will mourn when they see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven, with power and great glory. And he will send his angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of the heavens to the other.   Matthew 24:30-31  What are you putting off? What seems like you’ve got time and you can take care of that later? Sometimes it’s very true, in fact the longer we wait the less we think we actually need to do that thing. Sometimes putting things off puts them into perspective, but sometimes procrastination burns us. I remember one Christmas one of my then adult children put off buying their Christmas gifts too long and then when we came together to celebrate, they were empty handed. No one held it against them, at least I don’t think they did, but I know that child didn’t enjoy Christmas very much that year.   A sentiment I h...

  “Do not let your hearts be troubled. You believe in God; believe also in me. My Father’s house has many rooms; if that were not so, would I have told you that I am going there to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am.”   John 14:1-3    You’re chatting with someone after church and you casually invite them over to join you for dinner. You don’t consider the ramifications, the state of your house, or what they might walk into. Really, you may not expect them to accept your invitation at all, but they do. And so you smile, wave, and say, “See you in a few!” Then you get behind the wheel of your car and drive like a bat out of hell to beat them there, so you have a few precious minutes for scurryfunging. What’s that you might ask? Scurryfunge is an old English word that means to rush around frantically cleaning or tidying a house when you realize guests are about t...

  For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross.  Do you reconcile your checkbook each month? You know, where you go through your records and you match them up to the bank’s? My husband has always been faithful and diligent in this responsibility, but I haven’t always been much of a help. For the vast majority of our relationship, the finances fell squarely into his “to do” list, not because he was hoarding them, but because I was completely unwilling to participate. I tried it for a bit when the kids were young, paying the bills and such, but I got scattered and overwhelmed and missed a few critical deadlines and then decided that finances were not my thing and passed it off to my husband entirely. When I started getting into points and miles about this time last year, however, the finances took on new meaning for...

  so Christ was sacrificed once to take away the sins of many; and he will appear a second time, not to bear sin, but to bring salvation to those who are waiting for him. Hebrews 9:28  When I was a kid, we had a candy called Now and Later. They were a taffy candy that advertised their long-lasting flavor. You could enjoy them now, and still be enjoying them later. Turns out they are pretty long lasting because when I searched for them just now they’re still around, quite a few years later! These came to mind when I was reading our verse today about Jesus’ first and second coming.   I discussed last week how Jesus came the first time to pay the cost of our sins through His perfect sacrifice on the cross. This was necessary and important, a finished work in itself, but not everything that God has planned for Jesus to do. Jesus paid the cost for our sins and purchased our redemption on the cross. That’s the Now. Right now, our sins are forgiven when we confess them to Hi...

  But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on him, and by his wounds we are healed. We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to our own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all. He was oppressed and afflicted yet he did not open his mouth; he was like a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before its shearers is silent, so he did not open his mouth.   Isaiah 53:5-7  Jesus didn’t live an easy life on earth. When He was a baby, His family had to flee to Egypt to escape Herod’s wrath. Once Herod died they returned to Nazareth where His earthly dad, Joseph, presumably resumed his work as a carpenter. This would likely have provided sufficiently for their family, but they would not have any luxuries of this world. The Bible doesn’t explicitly state what happened to Joseph, but all circumstances point to him dying before Jesus began His ministry at about the age o...

 Ten years ago, our Homeschool PE co-op that had been operating for decades ended due to the YMCA's new policy about allowing people to use the locker room they most identified with. Our little girls seeing naked men change next to them was only one of our major concerns with this policy and after pursuing every possible means to find a mutually agreeable solution, we ended up having to dissolve our group's long-standing relationship with the Y. It was a tragedy for my kids who had been going to the Y for sixteen years for everything from Toddler Gym to swim team.   So, with this background, seeing the sign above in front of the ALL the bathrooms in the D terminal at the Seattle- Tacoma airport this weekend made me a little anxious. I'd seen lots of all gender side rooms, and that seemed like a good solution to me, but to be fair, I'm not their target audience. The building our Primary Care Physician is in has restrooms that were previously standard (one has a urinal in...

  In addition to The Savior Who Comes Near that I've been studying this Advent through LGG , I also had the desire to supplement it with a little booklet called, " Joy to the World " comprised of selected readings from John Piper. I just felt the need for some more traditional scripture readings because the LGG study had taken a somewhat non-traditional approach. This morning, however, John Piper came at me sideways with a non-traditional scripture himself! Since the children have flesh and blood, he too shared in their humanity so that by his death he might break the power of him who holds the power of death--that is, the devil-- and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by their fear of death. [Heb 2:14-15 NIV]   That's some pretty deep stuff, but my brain is not operating on a deep level this morning (I have a migraine and a pretty high body pain level), so God used it to teach me something very simple: Jesus became human so that He could die.  And ...

  The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him and said, “Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!”  John 1:29  God knew that sin would be a problem for us before He even created the world, and that’s why He had a plan to take care of it, but He had to bring us along with Him. If God had shown up in the garden of Eden one evening for His walk with Adam and Even and told them, “There’s going to be this issue called sin, but I’ll take care of it,” they never would have understood the weight or importance of it all. Instead, they had to experience personally what the cost of sin would be, most directly their separation from God. I’ve got to figure that throughout all of human history, Adam, Eve and Jesus are the only ones who fully comprehend this as they experienced perfect communion with the Father and then lost it. This is a real problem, but we had to experience it to realize that.   Over the course of time, God has patiently held humanity’s ...

  In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage; rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death – even death on a cross!   Philippians 2:5-8  Have you ever stood in line at a soup kitchen and eaten dinner there? If so, was it because you didn’t have the money for a meal, or because you wanted to identify and engage with others who were there? Have you ever even considered it? Pro tip, you’re not taking food away from someone who needs it more. Every time I’ve served in the kitchen there has been more than enough for the people in line, usually allowing them to offer seconds to those who want it. Sometimes they’ve even sent food home with my husband when he serves because there is so much le...

  “Come now, let us settle the matter,” says the Lord. “Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red as crimson, they shall be like wool.”   Isaiah 1:18  I messed up in my parenting a lot. I tried; really, really hard, but I still messed up a lot. And sometimes I messed up bad. My daughter has been so gracious in recent years. She has been willing to be honest with me about things that hurt her, ways that I didn't meet her needs as a child. She has been willing to converse, and to forgive. While it is not comfortable or fun, it's certainly not the most enjoyable part of our relationship (of which there are many), I think it might be the most important. We were making dinner together last month and I mentioned how much I enjoy cooking with her now. We did not enjoy cooking together when she was younger for a variety of reasons. I don't think I handled those reasons as well as I could have, and that weighs on me. It piles guilt an...

  Jesus said to him, “Today salvation has come to this house, because this man, too, is a son of Abraham. For the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost.”   Luke 19:9-10  The story of Zaccheus reminds me a little of A Christmas Carol and Ebeneezer Scrooge. Zaccheus was hated and despised, and for good reason. In the eyes of his neighbors, he had collaborated with the enemy, the Roman government. He worked for them, their oppressors, and collected the people’s taxes. But he didn’t just do that, he added a little on the top for himself. He had cheated them all for years and kept the profits for himself. But God didn’t see fit to send three spirits to open Zaccheus’ eyes to his deplorable condition and desperate need for a Savior. No, God sent the Savior Himself!   We don’t know what God had been doing in Zaccheus’ heart leading up to this day, but something had to be at work there to have him be so desperate to see Jesus as He passed by. The crowd was thick a...