Those who are not in families might disagree, but the facts are, those without families are out of place and feel out of place, often, because of it. Young women who feel out of place in their own families often marry early in life, in an attempt to find the feeling of being in a family.
We get a family by being born into a family. Those who were not born to a family may not agree, but the facts are, those not born into a family often are also feeling out of place and have great difficulty, often, in making wise social decisions.
Family should be the foundation of every life, whether the sad facts of our existence allow that it actually is, or not. It should be.
The orphan, widow, or divorcee is never the goal. Parents and spouses make family. Good parents and good spouses make good family.
And family should be the foundation, and not just a very fine thread that barely holds its members together.
And the one thing that separates families probably as much as, or more than, any other one thing is: entrapment.
Entrapment? What?
Yeah.
You’re not entrapped?
Think again.
We are entrapped by the TV, by games, by workaholism, by imagined standards, by debt, by promises, and by many other controlling factors.
Some entrapments, we never meant to get into, but they slowly encircled us.
Others we judged necessary and entered cautiously.
Family watching television, c. 1958 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
And some, we flew into, headlong, with great delight. And if we notice the entrapment in them, and the way they divide our family, we scratch our heads or shrug, but make no effort to escape. Oh, we do many of them, each at the same time, so we call it family time . . .
Those last ones, the ones we love and shrug about, are the ones I want us to consider.
You see, the word entertain actually mean entrap. Yes, entertainment is entrapment.
Games, movies, music, fantasy, novels–they trap us like sticky traps and we wallow in them as if they were the most important things of life, until we are totally bound up and unable to escape.
If you cannot go 21 days without some entertainment, I’d say your are entrapped.
I was reading a blog site where the commenters are allowed to make attacks. The author of the site feels it makes livelier discussion. She has one commenter who is hateful and who said, “REBORN Christians are the dumbest kind of Christian.” I chuckled and could not wait to read the answer farther down the page.
I kept reading, hoping someone would get to it. No one ever did.
Not wanting to hijack her site, I’ve come over here to get a few things straight.
Reborn Christians are the ONLY Christians. Get that? Don’t we have it from the mouth of the Christ, Himself, that we must be reborn? Am I missing something here?
The word “Christian” means “follower of Christ” or “believer in Christ”. Someone who has no idea what Christ taught could hardly claim to be a Christian. He might be a believer, saved, and even born again, but tell me, what does the word “Christian” mean? — “Follower of Christ.”
Sighs.
Dead Sea Scroll – part of Isaiah Scroll (Isa 57:17 – 59:9), 1QIsa b (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
There were hateful things said about the Bible, too. (Imagine denigrating the Koran!)
All the old-fashioned objections to the Bible were obliterated when they found the Dead Sea Scrolls. Although these scrolls were the most astounding and faith-building archaeological find EVER, the fact of this find was carefully hidden from the public.
Why?
Because they decimated all the old-fashioned arguments against the veracity of the Word.
What was it about them, you ask?
Well, these scrolls were merely ancient, ancient copies of the Bible and had been hidden from enemies for centuries, sealed in jars in caves. What
Qumran in the West Bank, Middle East. In this cave the Dead Sea Scrolls were found. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
they found was that while these hand-made copies were hiding, the act of copying was continuing to this day, and, lo and behold, there were hardly any discrepancies!
Only one-tenth percent was different.
If we realize how carefully the copyists made sure they copied it right, we would realize how seriously they believed in the absolute importance of getting this right.
For instance, they could not even be considered for the copying job unless they could recite the entirety of the Holy Writ, WITHOUT MISTAKE. A boy began memorizingas soon as possible and worked a large portion of his life to EARN the privilege of being a copyist. Then, once a section was completed, it was read by others who also had it all memorized both ways. It was read both ways to find mistakes. If one mistake was found, it was thrown away.
Period.
They cared a LOT more than the villains who throw up complaints in blog comments, misspelled and full of typos.
And as for objections to retranslation, from time to time, the very argument that so many bring up, that word meanings change, is the very reason we MUST redo the work from time to time.
Whew.
Furthermore–King James did not translate: He hired the most brilliant verbal thinkers of his day to do the work. A very large team of brilliance, some experts in ancient Greek or Hebrew, others experts in the current usage of English. And considering the fact that until then, similar villains would kill anyone who tried to give the English-speaking public a copy of the Word in their own language, this was a huge GIFT.
NOT something to be spit upon.
It is true that the Word is alive and active. It breathes and acts. It speaks. It’s a little like the mystery of holding a conch to the ear and hearing the entire ocean from which it came. The Word contains, indeed, in a way, it IS, the God from which it came. It embodies Him in a unique way, noticed not only by us, but also by the writers of it, when they said it is living and active and able to separate a person’s motives from what he THINKS his motives are. I love that about it. I can read along, thinking I am so sweet and good, and then bang. Right between the eyes. I’m human again. Yay God!
Okay. Now. The Ark. Villains attack the Ark, too.
Noah did not have to gather the animals. The Word says God brought them to him.
He did not bring two of every variety, just two of every kind. Two dogs, period. Two cats, period. We must remember the gene pool was much better back then. MUCH better.
The Word does not say they were adult versions. Very young animals would not have exhibited animosity, as we see from stories of kittens and puppies that grow up together. Also, they would not have needed as much food or litter, nor taken up as much space, nor given off as much stench, and likely would not have feared water nor grown seasick, nor gotten pregnant. Also, they would have slept more.
If we WANT to believe, it is simple to see how it could be done.
Also, go figure: The thing was huge. Like a football field.
There was more I wanted to say, but my eyes are getting bleary. Go to my posts on this topic that begin here.
Do you ever encounter non-Christians in sheep’s clothing? How do you deal with them?
I write on Arkansas Women Bloggers’ Website, today, about what used to be my phobia, and once you read it, you will know why it was my fear and how I got rid of it.
For more excitement you can read some of my posts about fear:
And finally, before you skip on over to Arkansas Women Bloggers, allow me to tell you a story about a daughter of a friend of mine. I’ll call her Emily.
Emily was a newly wed and at first, she and her husband lived in her parents’ hunting cabin, in the form of an old trailer house, near a river around here, while they worked to build up savings and tried to find the perfect house. They also needed to buy the furniture for their new life and had just purchased a brand new hide-a-bed couch and had placed in the living room of that trailer house. On a whim, one night, they decided to try out the mattress inside that new couch.
That night, unbeknownst to them, a tornado approached and tried to take their lives. However, since they were asleep in the hide-a-bed when it hit and lifted and rolled the trailer house, their “bed” folded up upon them and enclosed them in that brand new mattress while all the jumble of being in a tornado was going on.
They escaped unharmed except for bruises.
After examining the damage they realized the rest of the miraculous protection they had received that night: In their bedroom, where they might have been except for the “random” decision to try out the new mattress in the living room, they found the dresser had landed on the mattress of their bed and had cut it into two pieces.
They would have been dead except…
Before very long they bought a beautiful, old. two-story house in the graceful section of town and another tornado hit, toppling an old oak tree directly into their upstairs bedroom. They were not at home, another “random” decision, this time to accept an impromptu dinner invitation.
After that, Emily was convinced she was the safe one during tornadoes.
We live where large-scale farmers grow tomatoes for market. Emily’s job was humble, working in the tomato fields alongside migrant workers, picking tomatoes.
It pays.
One day, as they all were working, a tornado approached, visibly, and, of course, all the workers were terrified.
Except for Emily..
She firmly commanded all the migrant workers–who all were men–to gather around her, as she claimed God would not let a tornado harm her. They believed her, and like a mother hen, Emily enclosed all those men very close to her, wrapping her arms around them, and they all prayed, not all in English.
When I was 18, I was 5½ feet tall and wore a size 7 shoe. Now days, I’m most comfortable in a 10. I can hardly believe it. I’m no taller, some heavier (110 lb. was too skinny), but my feet probably have added a pound, themselves.
I’ve been thinking about it. Maybe this foot growth in old age indicates something else going on in the personality or psyche.
Long ago, I also used to say about carpet that I disliked it. I would say, “I prefer a firmer foundation.” It was a sort of religious statement, I suppose, likening carpet to sugar coating the truth, or something. I’ve always preferred hardwood or ceramic tile, or even linoleum; not carpet, and I wanted it to appear that I had spiritual reasons for it. It was an unfair assertion, on my part. I don’t use it so much, anymore, unless I find someone discouraged about having big feet.
Now my feet are big. Hmph. I have that firmer foundation, now. Along with it have come larger ears and a longer nose. They never stop growing, either.
That explains how someone as elongated as some elderly folks appear to be could find spouses who thought they were cute, in their day. Cuteness has not changed.
Facial structure and appearance does, though. It’s not just wrinkles we’re up against—we face (literally) a long (literally) list of appearance changes, given enough longevity. (No pun.)
I strongly desire the longevity, but am appalled at the lengthening I find in the mirror.
Used to be, I could stay trim with only the exercise that housekeeping provides. Now days, I need strength-training exercises, first, just to be able to perform the housekeeping. Used to be, I enjoyed a short workout with a hoe. Now days, I can put myself out of commission if I reach up wrong to grab the hoe from the shed.
I have not spent long years inactive—just a short winter of no hoeing can lay me up.
Same for twenty minutes of hoeing.
The reason, they tell us, is the body does not replenish muscle as efficiently, in old age as in youth. I guess it’s too busy making longer bones, or something.
So, if I’m a building with a firmer foundation and added square footage, I also need the walls re-plastered and the stairways reinforced on the interior. I think that is true spiritually, too.
I have deeper thoughts, more strongly believed, but I forget them by the time I sit down to type them to you. It’s called longevity. I like it over the alternative.
Now my feet are big. Hmph. I have that firmer foundation, now. Along with it have come larger ears and a longer nose. They never stop growing, either.
Home's Cool! 