55 thoughts on “Our Daily Thread 11-2-15”

  1. Good morning, all.
    I was surprised to see discussions on Reformation Day yesterday. In the Liturgical calendar, yesterday was All Saints Day. In the Lutheran Church, last week was Reformation Sunday.

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  3. I’m still running ahead of time.
    We’ve already been to the Y.
    It’s raining here too. The local weather man says we’re expected to get the monthly average for November by the third day. It’s really coming down.

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  5. I had wanted to share this with you this morning instead of what I did. Further proof of what a small world it really is…
    A man from my Monday night Bible study attended a church in Georgia yesterday. Somehow he met Make It Man and had me in common. I am not quite sure how they discovered that but it is something isn’t it?

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  6. Peter L.
    I was pondering what teams I would select for a tie breaker. I considered
    S. Carolina/ Tennessee
    Purdue/ Illinois
    But that would force me to take a likely loss.
    So:
    My choice for the tie breaker is:
    <b<Duke – North Carolina.

    Nobody I know hat an attachment with any team.
    I' saying North Carolina 21-7.

    But Duke diserves a break after last Saturday's game.
    It's almost impossible to execute a play like that without something going wrong.

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  7. Rained all weekend. The Kid didn’t get to go trick or treating. He kept waiting for his friend to call and make a plan. Turned out the friend’s phone was broken and was having a party right down the road. Now I have a boat load of candy that none of us really likes and I promised the kid I would buy him some more from all the stuff that, hopefully, will be on clearance.

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  8. Raining elephants and hippopotomuses (?) here. I had a dental cleaning appointment at 7:30. Really bad droving weather. Not looking forward to longer drive to the office. Good report at the dentist. Great hygenist and dentist. That can make a big difference in life. I’ve had one bad dentist before and at another time a rough hygenist. Not good at all. Now I can look forward to my next visit. I found this dentist through my son’s orthodonist to whom we paid a small fortune. This referral was worth it as a side benefit.

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  9. So does that count as 1/2 a meeting, Kim? 🙂

    Beautiful, soft, glorious drizzle for several hours yesterday followed by a long rain last night. So very thankful for how gentle it was and nourishing. Everyone was delighted by the rain, but so hopeful it wouldn’t cause mudslides in Cobb Mountain. In case you didn’t see, I wrote four blog posts about our sifting experience, the last one here: http://michelleule.com/2015/10/30/clearing-after-a-fire-personal-thoughts/

    At the bottom of the page is an arrow that takes you to the previous post, FYI.

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  10. Well yay for us:

    LOS ANGELES — A cold storm system out of the Pacific Northwest will bring Southern California rain, lower temperatures, high winds and perilously rough seas today, National Weather Service forecasters said. …

    And maybe snow, too, in the mountains.

    We had a fire in the downtown area at around 4 a.m. so I need to go by there this morning … Thankfully the 1930s Art Deco theater was spared, but it came awfully close.

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  11. Okay, Chas. But you don’t need to predict your score so soon. And all you need to do is predict the winner since you always have the same score of 21-7. Consistency is a good thing.

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  19. I’ll start with corporate worship — an encounter with the living God through the preaching of the Word, confession of sin & the pronouncement of forgiveness for those who trust Jesus, prayer, the singing of Psalms and hymns, the Lord’s Supper (which our pastor says is an especially direct encounter with Christ). It is a time in which God’s people receive His truth and grace, a time in which we are revived and renewed and have fellowship with one another.

    And, yeah, beautiful photo!

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  20. Worship begins with the focus of the heart. All that follows – Bible reading, singing, praying, fellowship, preaching, etc. – flows out of that focus. “Out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks.”

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  22. I found a good definition of worship in a book I am reading, but I don’t have it here. I’ll post the answer in that book later. But it does start with our attitude toward God, or what \ever a person worships.

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  24. Just catching up on weekend discussions. On Martin Luther and the Jews, I have been reading the Early Church Writings, and so far I am in the first couple of centuries after Christ. What surprised me was how stern these early Christians were towards the Jews. One has to remember that then the Christians were the minority and that the Jews actively persecuted them, even outside of the land of Israel. Now, none of these writers try to stir up violence against the Jews – but there is none of the modern-day “We worship the same God” sentiment. Justin Martyr’s writings include an entire debate with a Jewish philosopher, in which he pulls no punches pointing out how the Jews have left the true faith. His outspokenness so exasperated the philosophers whom he debated, that they denounced him to the authorities who put him to death.

    Today, Christians have a lot of very sentimental ideas of standing with the Jews spiritually that come from a combination of dispensational views of Israel with the very correct realization that the Holocaust was wholly wrong. The attitude we should have isn’t some wish-washy idea that they are on our side. I have read enough from the Jewish religious community to know that Christ is as offensive to them as He is to the Muslims. Nor should we make the same mistake as Luther, that of hating our enemy and cursing those that scorn us. Rather, we can look at both how Christ and Paul spoke of how to view and interact with the Jews or any other opposing religion. Christ put it very simply, “Love your enemy”, and “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do”. Paul pointed out in Romans 9-11 that we should not think ourselves better than the Jews, and his own selfless concern over their salvation should be ours. Luther’s weakness was his haste and anger – his attitude toward both the Catholics and the Jews stemmed from his own human emotions. In that area, he failed to walk in the grace which he preached; but his mistake is one that many Christians make. I just read a comment on a World article that displayed fear and anger towards the refugees. It is the same sin as Luther’s.

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  25. Worship happens when we turn our focus to God, recognize His grandeur, and take an action because we can’t hold back expressing how great we think He is. This can be on the individual level or the corporate (gathered community) level. The actions taken can be quite varied, but they all point to God (Father, Son, and Holy Spirit) to bring attention to His glory and greatness.

    I think that really goes along with what Roscuro said.

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  26. Worship seems to me to be a matter of the focus of ones heart, as others have already mentioned here. (It is also something that should be done in private as well as with our brothers & sisters in Christ.) We can attend church, sing the songs, listen to the sermon, etc., but not really be worshiping. Some have said (not here, but elsewhere) that anything we do while our focus is on the Lord (particularly in praising Him & seeking Him) is worship.

    Would it be going too far to say that cleaning ones kitchen (or fixing ones car or mowing the lawn or doing ones outside job) while praising God, & doing an excellent job “as unto the Lord” is an act of worship? (Maybe that’s QOD pt. 2.)

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  27. Linda, my father-in-law likes to say (in a virtuous tone of voice) that he never kissed his wife before they got married. And then he will point out that she wasn’t his wife before they married, and he’ll laugh.

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  28. Hebrews 12 is an excellent worship chapter, especially the ending (vv. 28-29): Therefore let us be grateful for receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, and thus let us offer to God acceptable worship, with reverence and awe; for our God is a consuming fire.

    I think the “reverence and awe” is a big part of what it means to worship.

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  29. One of my Facebook friends from church shared a poster that showed a military man with lots of medals. The text on the poster said that he was conceived in rape. (It’s message was about abortion not being the answer.)

    I’ve seen it before, & others like it. But what shocked me was when a mutual friend, a sweet lady & strong Christian, commented that that was how she was conceived.

    You just never know a person’s story. There are a lot of people out there who know they were conceived in rape, & I cringe for them whenever I read things that make it sound like their very existence is horribly painful & punishing for their mothers, or that they aren’t worthy of life because they weren’t conceived out of love.

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  32. Kim, I am reading a book , Back to Bienville, A Journey Into Wellness, by Melinda Matthews, which has a lot in it about Mobile and Atlanta. It makes me think a lot of you with the Mobile setting and hunt for her home in the Bay area. Have you heard of the book or author?

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  40. It’s dark and I’m still at work. The downside of standard time, but it’s almost dark during daylight saving time when I leave work anyway (except when it’s at its height and stays light until almost 8).

    But it’s supposed to rain tonight, so I’m anticipating a fun dog walk. 🙂

    Spent most of the day on this fire story, sorting out who took what photos we wanted to ask permission to use from FB. Fire started at 4 a.m. so our photog didn’t get there until it was mostly over. It’s a charred mess, but at least the historic movie theater survived (by a whisker).

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  43. Au contraire, Cheryl. I was very much looking forward to (finally!) walking in the rain. (There was a song about that when I was growing up … )

    But alas, our rain petered out. As a friend just posted on FB: It’s damp outside. Was that our storm? Weather app says we’re done.

    Sigh.

    And I was even wrong about that song. It wasn’t “Walking in the Rain.” It was “Walking in the Sand.” How appropriate.

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  44. My friend in CA had to make a raincoat from a plastic bag for her dog making him look like the caped crusader. Poor dog has not seen rain in his life at her home! He could not imagine what the bag on him was all about. Miss Bosley, however, would consider it great fun…another place in which to hide and jump out of at unsuspecting feet mousies.

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  47. Hi, Jo, i am awake for a little while before I go back to sleep. Do you ever listen to audiobooks? The more I listen to them, the more I like them. Do you ever use recorded books in the classroom? I remember that one of the kinder classes son attended, before we homeschooled, offered a center where the children could put on headphones and listen to books being read.

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  49. Just got out my tub of books and cd’s in the last week or so. No headphones, I just have the children keep the sound low. Since I have a 75 foot room, it is not a problem. Just purchased from the book club Fox in Socks with a cd. I remember reading that book and having a numb tongue when I finished.

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  50. I love to listen to audiobooks when I am driving somewhere. Here, I just read.
    Some obnoxious person has a megaphone and has been preaching or something, loudly for the last hour or so. He could be down the hill or across the valley. I so wish he would stop.

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  55. Well, I forgot to get on here last night and missed AJ’s second photo. I don’t understand our internet filter at work. Sometimes I can see the banner pictures and sometimes I can’t.

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