​When we hit the corner we turn right along the south fence, just behind the old pigpen.  We haven’t had pigs since the boys left home—it would take the two of us a couple of years to go through a whole pig, but with teen-aged boys we managed easily in just a few months.  Pork chops, ribs, hams, sausage, bacon, bacon, and more bacon.  They grew up pork lovers and are to this day.

            Yes, we named our pigs.  We always called the males Hamlet, and the females Baconette, except the year we had two boys and the extra one we named Ribster.  It reminded us from the beginning why we had them, and trust me—by the time a pig is ready for slaughter it isn’t cute any longer.  It is about as disgusting a creature as you can imagine.  Slaughtering it was never a problem.  The boys understood early on that we needed these animals to survive and respected them for it.

            Just across the south fence and past the pigpen stands a live oak grove, a peaceful shady retreat we often wished had been on our property instead of the neighbor’s.  He has built a fire ring surrounded by several chairs, with a wood rack between two trees.  He planned outings with his children and cook-outs with his friends and quiet evenings with his wife.  He planted some Australian cypresses along the fence and now, after nearly ten years, they finally conceal his leafy sanctuary, a sanctuary he rarely visits any longer because his children are grown and living hundreds of miles away with all of his grandchildren.  I doubt he used his beautiful spot more than half a dozen times.  His wife passed unexpectedly several years ago. He has rebuffed friendly overtures and declined invitations to church.  We seldom see him any longer, and there hasn’t been even a lonely fire in the fire ring for three or four years.  So much for great plans.

            Chloe and I walk along that line of cypresses, peeking through the limbs sometimes, but usually watching the bottom of the fence line instead.  Up ahead of me as usual, Chloe will occasionally stop and sniff around and when I reach her, sure enough, there is a depression in the ground where something slid under the fence during the night.  Possums, coons, foxes, terrapins, sometimes we come across them during the day, but usually not.  The depressions are well worn and even if we fill up the hole, it will be back within a couple of days, or a new one will show up just a few feet down the fence line.  Interlopers will always find a way, and I can always tell from Chloe’s attention and sniff pattern whether something more dangerous has slunk under or not.

            That’s exactly why God gave us elders, because “fierce wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock” Acts 20:29.  Peter warns about false teachers who will infiltrate with “destructive heresies” 1 Pet 2:1.  Jesus himself warned about “false prophets who come to you in sheep’s clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves” Matt 7:15.  Let me tell you, sheep are just as stupid as pigs are disgusting.  We are too easily led astray, and once they get us away from our shepherds we are just as easily eaten up.

            Our shepherds have a difficult job.  They deserve our respect.  They spend all hours of the day and night protecting us from things we do not even recognize as dangerous.  Like Chloe, they see potential problems we in our ignorance and inexperience miss and all they get for it is accusations about traditionalism, legalism, and cynicism.  We can make their job easier by spending more time in the word so we can recognize false teaching; more time with our brethren so we can share practical knowledge; and more time in safe places instead of hanging around the fence line in the dark of night where the wolves are always waiting.
 
Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, for many false prophets have gone out into the world. 1 John 4:1
 
Dene Ward

​The first of a five part series running through this week.

Keith has mown a path for me, as safe as a path can be for someone with my eyesight, so I can walk Chloe, our Australian cattle dog, at least one lap every day with the trekking poles for balance and stability.  Elliptical machines are great for low impact aerobics, but you don’t get any fresh air and the scenery never changes.  With this path I get the best of both.  Let me take you for a stroll, beginning with the east side.

            When I come out and slip on my walking shoes, Chloe, always waiting expectantly under the porch, bounces out and sits impatiently on the steps, her ears tall and her eyes never leaving me.  “Just a minute,” I tell her, and she seems to have grown to recognize those sounds.  She knows I will indeed be outside shortly, but I wonder if her doggy brain wonders about people having to put on their feet before they come outside.  Sometimes she cannot abide the wait, especially if I have to do more than put on my shoes—like spot Keith as he lifts weights on the other end of the porch—so she gives just a tiny little whine, so anxious she shimmies across the boards on her rear end. 

As soon as I open the door she is halfway through it.  We cannot go anywhere or do anything until she gets a pat on the head.  Then I say, “Let’s go walk,” and she heads toward the morning sun peeking through the woods to the east, dappling the ground where we walk.  Often she has to stop and wait for me to catch up, but as soon as I round that first corner she is off again, inspecting every mound of dirt, every dew-heavy hanging shrub, every disturbed pile of leaves at the fence bottom.

Occasionally she will stop and stare through the fence to the property on the other side, heavily wooded, vines snaking up and through the oaks, pines, maples, and wild cherries.  Just over the fence lies the run.  We thought it was a creek when we first moved here, a shallow one but water always sat in the bottom, slowly draining to the south.  Then we went through the drought of the nineties and learned differently.  It’s a run.  Whenever rain comes through, the land on all sides of us for at least a half mile in every direction, runs into that narrow, deep channel and heads for the swamp a mile to the south.  After a typical summer afternoon downpour the water will rush loudly, white water at the bends and at every drop, carrying with it leaves and limbs shed by the overhanging branches. 

You do not realize how powerful water moving downhill can be until you see the aftermath.  We came out one morning to find the trash can washed up against the south fence, the run itself clear of all debris, and the pigs in the southeastern pigpen a pinky white they hadn’t been since they were born.  Only a small circle in the center of their backs remained black and muddy.  Good thing they managed to find a high spot so they could get their noses up out of the draining water that had rushed over the banks of the run, gushing through the fence and cutting across the southeast corner of the property.  We had no idea the water could rise that high.

The power of water is a constant theme in the Bible.  We completely misunderstand 1 Pet 3:20,21, especially when we read the newer translations that make water not something that saves, but something to be saved from.  Leave your new version a moment and look at the old ASV translation:   …the longsuffering of God waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was a preparing, wherein few, that is, eight souls, were saved through water: which also after a true likeness doth now save you, even baptism…  The waters of the flood saved Noah by bringing him and his family safely out of a world of sin, into a new world, one that was washed pure and clean.  Baptism does the same for us.  It saves us from the world of sin we live in, raising us to a new life free from sin—a chance to start over, this time with help from above.  It also washes away the detritus of our old lives, if we let it, if we are willing to let go of the baggage and surrender all to the Lord.

Water had saved the Israelites in a similar way.  They were “baptized” in the cloud and in the sea, walls of water on the side, a roof of vapor overhead. And then with a whoosh of water, God destroyed their enemies and set them in a new world, one where He and they were to enjoy a covenant relationship, 1 Cor 10:1ff.

Amos uses water to symbolize the power found in justice and righteousness.  Israel thought that multiplying sacrifices and feasts and other religious observances was all that mattered.  God would be pleased, especially if the prescribed rites were even more elaborate than commanded.  Then their lives during the rest of the week wouldn’t count against them.  The prophet told them differently, “Let justice roll down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream,” 5:24.

That is just a small sample of the passages using water as a symbol.  Spend some time today, as I did on my walk with Chloe, meditating on the simplest drink known to man.
 
Behold, God is my salvation; I will trust, and will not be afraid; for Jehovah, even Jehovah, is my strength and song; and he is become my salvation. Therefore with joy shall ye draw water out of the wells of salvation. And in that day shall ye say, Give thanks unto Jehovah…Isa 12:2-4
 
Dene Ward

I am still walking on that elliptical machine I told you about a few years ago.  With another measureable loss of vision lately, it becomes more and more the only safe way to exercise—you don’t step in any holes or trip over limbs or vines on an elliptical machine
            I stepped off one day a couple of months ago and looked at the read-out.  It informed me that I had “walked” three and a half miles in 30 minutes.
            “Wow,” I thought.  “Not bad.”  And then I thought to myself, “Wait a minute.”  Thirty years ago I only managed five miles in 48 minutes JOGGING.  That’s over nine minutes a mile.  And thirty years later I am supposed to believe I beat that rate WALKING?
            “Hmppph,” I muttered with my new perspective, “If that’s true, I’m a Martian.”
            Looking at myself through the eyes of cold clear logic, I cut the read-out figures almost in half.  Maybe I managed two miles—maybe.  I don’t have much faith in that read-out now.
            But—can I be just as clear-headed when I examine my heart?  Can I see with cool logic that my words and thoughts give me away?  For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks, Matt 12:34.  Can I see the flaws, the weak spots, the chinks in my armor?
            Believing the best about myself may seem “healthy. “   It may feel good.  It may give me a boost, and surely it’s more important to be encouraged than depressed, isn’t it?  Spiritual buoyancy is not the way to Heaven.  In fact, it will lead you the other direction quickly. 
              I need to see clearly.  Deluding myself about my faults won’t fix my soul any more than walking two miles will burn the same calories as walking three and a half.  And one is a whole lot more important than the other.
 
Let no one deceive himself. If anyone among you thinks that he is wise in this age, let him become a fool that he may become wise, 1Cor 3:18
 
Dene Ward
 

Today's post is by guest writer Lucas Ward.
 
            This begins a series on "Love of the Brethren."
What does it meant to love my brethren?  What does it entail?  "Do I really hafta?" (said in the best whine possible).  The logical place to start any study of love would be 1 Cor. 13:4-7.  In fact, this is an even better place to begin than some might realize, because this passage is NOT talking about romantic love, but brotherly love.  It is often read at weddings and if a man endeavors to love his wife this way and his wife reciprocates the effort they are guaranteed a long and happy marriage.  The context, though, is Paul telling the brethren at Corinth to stop fighting over who has the best spiritual gifts and learn to work together.  Right in the middle of that he gives us this definition of love:
"Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth.  Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things."
            The first thing you should notice is that love, as defined by the Bible, is not an emotion.  Love is not warm, mushy feelings, nor is it wild, passionate desires.  Love, as defined by the inspired Apostle, is action.  Love is what I do, or refrain from doing, for the one I love.  If I say I love someone but I am not patient and kind, but, rather, arrogant and rude toward them, then I don't really love them.  This is not the way the Bible describes love.  According to Paul, I can have warm, mushy feelings towards someone and not love them, while disliking someone else and still loving them.  This is how we can follow Jesus' command to love our enemies (Matt. 5:44).  I don't have to like them -- if they are my enemies and "spitefully use" me, I probably don't like them -- but I can love them by treating them as described above.
            A second thing to notice about this list is how often patience of one kind or another comes up.  "Love is patient" or long-suffering, as older translations say.  It is not irritable but does bear all things and endure all things.  That's four out of fifteen descriptions.  How much of loving someone is just putting up with them?  Honestly, you people married 30 or more years, how much of the reason you are still together is you've learned just to put up with each other?  Sure, you are fond of each other and do nice things for each other and rely on each other, but if you hadn't learned to overlook certain things over the years, you wouldn't still be together, would you?  If that is true of a marriage, wouldn't it also be true of my relationship with my brother in Christ? Be patient.
            Finally, "believes all things, hopes all things" means that I don't automatically assume that everything my brother says or does is mean-spirited and meant to hurt me.  Instead, I believe the opposite:  that my brother would never intentionally hurt me or undermine me.  "He must have misspoken."  "I must have misunderstood his meaning."  We are going to give every possible benefit of the doubt.  If more Christians believed and hoped all things about their brethren, there would be a lot less fighting in the church. 
            Love of and for the brethren is a concept much discussed in the New Testament.  Learning to live the concepts in 1 Cor. 13:4-7 is a good way to begin.
 
Phil._1:9  "And this I pray, that your love may abound yet more and more in knowledge and all discernment"
 
Lucas Ward
 

A couple of times when I was young my family, together with my aunt, uncle, and cousins, shared the rent on a house in New Smyrna Beach for a week.  It was an ordinary cement block house, probably built in the 1940s, two bedrooms, one bath, a living room and kitchen.  What made it worth renting was its location—right on the beach, which was not nearly so crowded in those days.  Every morning we four girls were out building sand castles and playing tag with the waves, floating on the undulating water just past the sandbar or diving below to play shark attack on one another.  We all smelled of suntan lotion and seaweed, coconuts and salt, and only came in for lunch and an afternoon of card games and board games during the worst of the heat, and were back out again in the evening when the sea breeze cooled enough to give us a shiver after once again dunking ourselves in the brine.
            Our parents got the two bedrooms, but we girls didn’t mind sharing the floor in the small living room, the gray, white-streaked linoleum tiles covered with quilts, the floor beneath crunching with a little grit despite all the sweeping our mothers did every day.  You live on the beach, you WILL have sand.  At 8 I was the oldest and usually the last one asleep.  No air conditioning in those days meant the windows stayed open wide and I loved listening to the roar of the ocean.  Over and over and over, the steady pounding of the surf gave me a feeling of security.  I did not have to guess if the next wave would roll in; all I had to do was wait for it, and eventually it lulled me to sleep.
            Fast forward to a time thirty years later.  We were camping on Anastasia Island, a beach 60 miles further north.  The state campground was still small back then, only one section just a few feet off the dirt trail to the beach, acres of palmetto groves separating it from the bridge to the city streets of old St Augustine.  The boys had their own tent, and as we lay in ours once again I listened to the surf crashing onshore, just as it had all those years before.  Over and over, as steady as a ticking clock, as a piano teacher’s metronome, as a heartbeat on a hospital monitor.  All those years and it had not stopped.
            And then another twenty years passed and we two spent a weekend on Jekyll Island.  This time we were too far from the beach to hear it in the night, but after a wonderful meal at the Driftwood Bistro we stopped on the beach for a walk and there it was.  The wind whipped around our legs and plastered my hair across my face, gulls screamed over us in the waning light, and the waves were still coming in, again and again and again, just as they have since the dawn of time.  They never stop.  Some days they may be rougher than others.  Some days the sea may look almost calm.  But check the water’s edge and that lacy froth still creeps onshore in its never-ending cycle.
            Thus says the LORD, who gives the sun for light by day and the fixed order of the moon and the stars for light by night, who stirs up the sea so that its waves roar— the LORD of hosts is his name: ​“If this fixed order departs from before me, declares the LORD, then shall the offspring of Israel cease from being a nation before me forever.” Jer 31:35-36
            Jeremiah tells the people that God will restore his nation and establish a new covenant in the verses just preceding those, a covenant in which their sins will be “remembered no more.”  He uses the stability of the natural phenomena that God created as a guarantee of His promise.  Only if the sun stops rising, if the moon stops shining, if the waves stop rolling in, can you discount my promises, He says.  That guarantee counts for all of God’s promises.  He never changes, we are told.  He is the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow, so yes, He will keep the promises He has made to us of redemption, of protection, of spiritual blessings and a final reward.
            Are you a little blue today?  Has your life been upended in a way you never expected, in a way you can hardly bear?  The sea God made is still roaring.  Those waves are still rolling in just as they have for generation after generation after generation.  The white caps you see are the same your parents saw and your grandparents and your great-grandparents on back to your earliest ancestors.  And God is still faithful to His people.  Close your eyes, listen to that perpetual roar, and breathe a little easier tonight.
 
I am the LORD your God, who stirs up the sea so that its waves roar— the LORD of hosts is his name. ​And I have put my words in your mouth and covered you in the shadow of my hand, establishing the heavens and laying the foundations of the earth, and saying to Zion, ‘You are my people.’” Isa 51:15-16
 
Dene Ward
 

My mother taught me when I was a teenager, that if you make the bed the minute you get out of it, it's done in 5 minutes and it was no big deal.  Marrying a man who thinks that making the bed is ridiculous got me out of that habit, but I still get it done eventually, and usually before the morning is half over.
            I've heard it from many:  why make the bed when you are just going to get back into it that night?  Well, for one thing, I like for things to look tidy and making a bed makes a bedroom 90% tidy all by itself.  For another, my bedroom is visible from our dining room table, which is usually where we are entertaining guests.  For another, when you leave it unmade, all those sheets that you put your face on all night long are open to catching whatever dust falls on them—and I have a dust mite allergy.           
            But as for that reason most people give, "why make it when you are just going to get back into it?"  Let's think about that for a few minutes.  Why wash your clothes when you are just going to wear them again?  Why wash the dishes when you are just going to eat off of them again?  In fact, why cook dinner when you are just going to get hungry again?  Doesn't work so well with all those things does it?
            What I am afraid of is that attitude will bleed off into something really important, like why try to overcome a temptation when you know you are just going to sin again?  I hope you can see that one really doesn't work.  Overcoming once will make it easier to overcome the next time, and then the next, and then the next, and someday you may find yourself sinning less often.  Isn't that what you are hoping for?  Not to mention, God always gives you a way out.  Try working your little argument on him after he has gone to all that trouble, and his Son has died in order to help you win those battles over Satan.
            No, it isn't a sin not to make your bed, not even if your mother said it was, but be careful with the arguments you use for the simple things.  Don't let it affect the things that really do matter.
 
For everyone who has been born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world— our faith (1John 5:4).
 
Dene Ward

Our grandsons stayed with us for several days in late May.  We had a wonderful time, but it was a bit different than it has been in the past.  They are now old enough to take care of things we always had to do before, like bathe and dress them, feed them, help with brushing and flossing teeth, and keep an eye on them practically every minute.  Now they do all the personal hygiene and care for themselves.  They even remember their own medicine—which didn't keep me from checking to make sure it was taken.  We still spent a lot of one on one time with them, which is the point, isn't it?  Keith had a homemade slip and slide which required him running a hose continuously over a long piece of plastic on the slope between the two sheds, and I let them help me cook—cookies, waffles, and yeast rolls.  We played the prophets game, as you have already heard about.  And I was the official judge of the Construx car building contest.  (Kind of touchy, that one.)
            Still there were times that we had things that required our attention and they needed to keep themselves busy.  For one of those times I taught them solitaire.  Not the one on the Kindle or the computer, but the one using real cards.  They ate it up and played for literally hours one afternoon while I did the laundry and cooked dinner.  Once I was free again I sat down to see how they were doing.
            "Good," one said.  "We've been experimenting."
            A little careful questioning told me what kind of "experiments" they were doing.  You and I would call it "cheating."  When every third card left them stuck, they changed it to every second card, and finally every single card, in an attempt to keep the game going.  Another time instead of putting a red five on a black six at the "bottom" of a stack, they lifted the stack and put a red queen behind the black jack at the top.  They thought it worked a whole lot better that way because they won more often and got more enjoyment out of it.
            "You know you're not allowed to do that, right?"
            "You’re not?"
            "Nope.  It's against the rules."
            "Oh.  We didn't know that."
            After that, they cut out the "experimenting."  They understood the concept of "rules" and "cheating," and that whether you liked it better or not was not the issue.  The question is:  are you playing solitaire or are you making up a whole new game you like better?
            I know a few people who need that lesson.  They decide that they don't like the way we worship, or the way the church does its business, or the life a Christian is expected to live.  So they do some "experimenting" to find something they like better.  Somehow it never crosses their mind that God ought to have a say in this, that He ought to be able to decide how He wants to be worshipped, how His kingdom ought to run, and the way His servants ought to live.  Some of them may not have thought about that before, that God has the authority to tell us these things and expect us to conform to His rules.  In fact, I have even heard one brother denigrate the idea of authority at all, as if it were rules people made up instead of God.  I worry for that one.  There are too many illustrations in the Old Testament of how God reacted to people who were presumptuous enough to change His commands and do as they pleased.  God has not changed because we live under the New Covenant now.
            So let's set the record straight here.  God is the Supreme Authority.  All the ends of the earth will remember and turn to Jehovah. All the families of the nations will bow down before Him, for dominion belongs to the Lord and he rules over the nations (Psalm 22:27,28).
            When it comes to the kingdom, He has given that authority to His Son.  And he put all things under his feet and gave him as head over all things to the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all (Eph 1:22-23). 
            Jesus gave his apostles authority to tell us how to live and worship.  And Jesus came and said to them, All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. ​Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age (Matt 28:18-20).  That you should remember…the commandment of the Lord and Savior through your apostles (2Pet 3:2).
            You may not like the rules.  You may find other ways of doing things that you like better.  But authority is authority and it won't go away just because you want to "experiment."  My little guys understood that and they followed the rules the rest of their stay.  It actually made winning a lot more satisfying than changing the rules so they could win.  And that's only for a game.  Trying to change God's rules is no game.  Learn them, follow them, and then enjoy the win.
 
For if we go on sinning deliberately after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a fearful expectation of judgment, and a fury of fire that will consume the adversaries. Anyone who has set aside the law of Moses dies without mercy on the evidence of two or three witnesses. How much worse punishment, do you think, will be deserved by the one who has trampled underfoot the Son of God, and has profaned the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and has outraged the Spirit of grace? For we know him who said, Vengeance is mine; I will repay. And again, The Lord will judge his people. It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God (Heb 10:26-31).
 
Dene Ward