We would spend a week with my aunt Anna every summer in Greenfield. She was kinda rich we thought, and she took us everywhere on our visit including baseball games, the museum, the aviary, and the flower show. You could see old Forbes field from her back porch, where the Pirates played ball. At night we would walk to McGee field to watch the Soft-ball games as my ruddy complexioned aunt sold concessions in the bleachers, salty pretzel sticks and pop. The lights and warm air, fans and players remain in my memory today. Pittsburgh was a sports town back in the days when John Henry Johnson ran touchdowns for the Steelers. He was an upright runner but had a lot of leg movement and was hard to corral and bring down. I remember that in spite of J.H.J. the team stunk up the field weekly and my Father said…
Tag: <span>Spiritual priorities</span>
When sports teams compete throughout a regular season schedule, many variables are possible. For instance, a team starts out strong and has early success, while another team gets out of the gate slowly. Mid season may bring changes; an injury or two, a disagreement among players or coach, or a suspension. On the positive side, a new player arrives, a team gels, a player finds his game, a team unifies. Then, one team may finish out strongly, winning a last playoff spot. The toll of the season’s ups and downs crushes hopes for another group. I have seen a player’s personal issues hinder or help his or her team. A blunder at week 3 destroys the confidence of an athlete or whole team. I watched a very skilled girl miss 6 straight free throws at the end of a game which her team lost by 1 point. She was never…
2Co 9:8 And God is able to make all grace abound toward you; that ye, always having all sufficiency in all things, may abound to every good work: 2Co 9:9 (As it is written, He hath dispersed abroad; he hath given to the poor: his righteousness remaineth for ever. 2Co 9:10 Now he that ministereth seed to the sower both minister bread for your food, and multiply your seed sown, and increase the fruits of your righteousness;) 2Co 9:11 Being enriched in every thing to all bountifulness, which causeth through us thanksgiving to God. The allusion is to the act of sowing seed. The idea is, that when a man scatters seed in his field God provides him with the means of sowing again. He not only gives him a harvest to supply his needs, but he blesses him also in giving him the ability to sow again. Such was…
Sometimes God uses people to test our faith. Circumstances are difficult but nothing like the pure unadulterated face to face, heart to heart, psyche to psyche, flesh to flesh, hair raise. We need some skills, the main ones being; bullet biting, crow eating, cheek turning, appearance avoiding thereof, and downright Biblical longsuffering. Without these our faith shipwrecks quickly, truth fails, equity stands afar off. On the more serious side, it’s the shed blood of Christ, a Lamb without spot, which does the essential cleansing needed. Why needed? That blood cleanses away defilement of sin, sins, and also the mere interaction with “world” as God understands it. This Cosmos, this whole earth, lies in the hands of the wicked one as conveyed in 1John 5:19. For this reason, we find that Jesus, dying for the sins of men, nevertheless, did not put His trust in men, John 2:24 We likewise must not esteem…
And psychometry is the discovery that the mind can act outside the human body and that the ‘psychometric sensitive’ can read the past like an open book. Then came a discovery called ‘statvolism,’ signifying a peculiar condition produced by the will, in which the subject can ‘throw the mind’ to any distant place, and see, hear, smell, and taste, what is going on there. Then came a discovery called” Pathetism” …By this the mind could withdraw itself from the consciousness of pain and cure diseases. Jesse Penn Lewis “Through the Spirit we do mortify the deeds of the body.” This mortifying operation works not through soul-power. “If Christ be in us the body is dead because of sin.” These verses are in Romans 8. See, the impotent soul cannot effect or give life or death, for that matter; without the Spirit, it only retains its inherent life and develops…
We walk together with a person, Jesus. We get to, actually. He moves from place to place and from glory to glory. We go too, both ways. Together we go from strength to strength, faith to faith. Strength does not move to greater strength, but new strength. Faith also becomes new faith, not increased faith. We do not progress by resisting the resistance but by following on to know the Lord. We are not associates with Him, we are One. We go from Tom to Jesus, from diminishing glory to the new inward Hope of Glory We go together to the Father, by Him. The lighted path brightens more light, new illuminations all. First pales and dies, second resurrects renewed. First withholds, next gives; First decays, next sprouts. Originally we fail, new makes it work; First ends, next starts again. In the beginning it breaks, following reveals treasure; First wounds, then healing comes.…
Good coaching goes this way: “back to fundamentals boys, back to the basics.” The hidden word here is “foundation,” and any team going anywhere has to build from the bottom. When that group forgets what got them to their present successes; they need to go back and do a revisit now, (I mean Right Now!). Hey, if the Bettenhausen Lady-birds’ softball team drift too far, they lose sight of the nest, and the chickadees ain’t gettin no food! Its time to get back to business! This is a comic picture but true. “We need more unity, we gotta get together, we ain’t sticken together as a unit.” What happened? Well, it happened in the hearts of the individuals first, manifesting itself second in the “lean mean fighting machine.” The synchronized power-generator started disintegrating because of the parts breaking down. For the Mannheim Sheep Dogs, maybe, the wolf in sheep’s clothing…
“The man who refuses to judge, who neither agrees nor disagrees, who declares that there are no absolutes and believes that he escapes responsibility, is the man responsible for all the blood that is now spilled in the world. Reality is an absolute, existence is an absolute, a speck of dust is an absolute and so is a human life. Whether you live or die is an absolute. Whether you have a piece of bread or not , is an absolute. Whether you eat your bread or see it vanish into a looter’s stomach, is an absolute. There are two sides to every issue: one side is right and the other side is wrong, but the middle is always evil. The man who is wrong still retains some respect for truth, if only by accepting the responsibility of choice. But the man in the middle is the knave who blanks…
Men epitomize peculiarity and exemplify complexity and have diverse shades, both dark and light and in between too. Who can know a man but God, and who can know the spirit in a man but God the Spirit? Man has tons more aptitude for creating than our “predecessors,” the fish and the ape. (Ha, ha, just kidding about our ancestry), of course; what can an animal really do? Animals can operate instinctually, which connects to their self-preserving nature. They sense danger, flee or attack, evoke camouflage. They procreate, feed their young. Some animals can learn conditioning-response to commands, but mostly when bribed ala food treats, or pleasures. I was watching the amazing dolphins swim, jump and more. I noticed they never refused the little fish prizes given after every feat of wonder. To their favor, dogs and pet grizzly bears will defend their human masters. After all, they know when…
I knew a man in Christ, a father, a friend, a counselor, mentor and inspiration. I knew a man in Christ, he taught me how to think, how to live, how to die. He taught me the Bible, removing all gray areas; preciseness was his forte, accuracy his norm. He taught dogmatically, leaving no room for doubt; exposing the foolishness of inferior systems. Yes, I knew this man in Christ. When my pastor spoke, there was an anointing, clear, distinct, heavenly, penetrating. Sometimes came tears, sometimes a display of authority. Often the message pin-pointed the exact issue of my current experience. I sensed the ministry tuned into me, to me personally — adjusting my thinking, feeling, and conscience. I was a part of it, my listening perpetuated it, my heart embraced it, my soul bathed in it. Many times, I wept. I sensed something very deep happening — A healing, deliverance,…