Church Search

Well, we are still looking for a new church in Eagle River. We went back to Community Covenant this Sunday and had a much better experience than the previous visit. The pastor there is doing a sermon series entitled "Raising G rated kids in an R rated world". The topic this week was living with failure, ie: you raise your kids right and they still wind up acting like idiots. The pastor (I forget his name) used text from Judges to draw parallels from God's "parenting" of the Hebrews to our parenting of kids. It was a good message, a little light on reference but pretty heavy on application. They are having their VBS in a couple of weeks, too bad Zeke is still to young.... next year.

What does that mean?

Today's Verse:

The blessing of the Lord makes a person rich, and he adds no sorrow with it. Proverbs 10:22 NLT

This may come as a shock to you all, but I do not know everything. While you have become used to basking in the radiance of my rapier wit and towering intellect here on G.I. Josephus, today will be somewhat of a disappointment.

As I read today's verse I was intrigued by it. The first part of the verse seems pretty self-evident; God's blessings make us rich in a way worldly wealth never will. The second part however is a little bit trickier. Is Solomon telling us that if there is sorrow attached to something that it isn't from God? That doesn't seem right, maybe the message got garbled in the translation (I never liked the NLT anyway).

The Hebrew word translated sorrow here is `etseb עצב:
1) pain, hurt, toil, sorrow, labour, hardship
a) pain
b) hurt, offense
c) toil, hardship
2) vessel, creation, object

While this could possibly convey that the blessings of the Lord come with no labour or toil, that somehow doesn't fit right either. Sure the Lord can bless freely and laboring will not earn you "Lord Loot" (which would be redeemable for cool stuff on a sort of sliding points scale if it existed) but sometimes through laboring you can be blessed. If that isn't it, and blessings from the Lord are sometimes accompanied by sorrow or found in the midst of sorrow, then what is Solomon trying to say?

I read several commentaries on the matter, and still haven't come up with anything conclusive. As near as I can tell, Solomon is saying; the Lord will bless those whom he will bless regardless of circumstance, and those blessings will come irrespective of the toil of those being blessed.

Anyone else have any thoughts on the matter? Post them here and let me know what you think. And look for "Lord Loot" to make an appearance in a future post, its just too good an idea to pass up.

Filthy Heathens

So, the plan was to attend a different church in Eagle River each Sunday, re-visit as necessary until we found one we could call home. Yesterday however, we played hookie instead. With my wife not feeling well (all 4 wisdom teeth got pulled on Thurs.), I decided to take the boys and my mother-in-law on a little outdoor adventure. The trip was a success, we saw a moose and a bald eagle, as well as the Turnagain Arm of the Cook Inlet. The boys had fun and we feasted on PB&J sandwiches. I didn't deliver a sermon, but we did sing some VBS type songs in the car on the way back, so I guess we aren't completly pagan yet.

Thus, there is no update on the Church Search, sorry. You can check out last weeks update here.

Need-v-Greed

Today's verse o' the day:

Seek the Kingdom of God above all else, and live righteously, and he will give you everything you need. Matthew 6:33 NLT

Why couldn't that say want?

Worship Wrangeling

Yesterday was the first day of our search for a new Church in Alaska. I took the family to a church that I had gone to a couple times before they got up here, Riverside Community Church. I had enjoyed worship there (both the music and the message) and felt it was worth checking out together as a family. This time however, things were different, not in a bad way, just unexpected. The pastor was out on leave, so the assistant pastor filled in, which meant someone else had to fill in as praise leader, and so on down the line. This was not the difference to which the blog title alludes however, that change was the introduction of two very squirmy little boys into the mix.

At Riverside, the children stay for the beginning part of the service. I like this approach but it is a bit hard when your kids are little. If you have ever been around my kids (or any kids really) you know the only way to get them to sit still is to strap them down. The only way to get them to sit still AND be quite is to strap them down and pump snacks into them.* Unfortunately church pews don't come with seat belts and most snackable items either make a mess, are wrapped in the loudest packaging imaginable, or both.

We sat in the back of the church, and with the help of my Mother-in-Law, (always keep the kids outnumbered if possible) and a well positioned window for the kids to stare out of, managed to keep the ruckus down until it was time to exile the kids to the Sunday School wing. All in all it was a good time and we may wind up returning to Riverside. Next Sunday we will check out a different church, I'll let you know how it goes.

* Please be careful in your snack selection. Cheetos, fresh celery, or anything from the chip family will amplify apprimatley 1000 times in a church sanctuary when chewed, making that guitarist/drummer duo from the youth group, which just happen to be leading worship, sound soft in comparisson.

Did that just happen?

Judges is my favorite book in the Old Testament. I guess being in the Army the book speaks to me through its leadership lessons, the action of small unit combat, and the intimate detail in which God plans out his repeated rescues of his people. In another aspect of the book, I can identify on a personal level with the repeating cycle of falling away from God's will, needing rescue from God, worshiping him for a time, and then slowly falling back again until the next rescue is needed. I see the cycle repeated on the macro level as well in countries and churches across the globe.


Last night I watched the Veggie Tales rendition of the story of Gideon with my kids. This is a particular favorite story of mine, both for the sheer audacity of it (God has Gideon raise a huge army, whittles it down to 300 men, arms them with nothing more than lighters and kazoos, and then proceeds to destroy the invading horde and rescue his people), and the bizarreness of a particular part of the story where Gideon overhears a dream and its interpretation by his his enemies.


"And Gideon arrived and see! A man was telling his friend a dream, and he said, "See! I dreamed a dream! And see! A round loaf of barley [bread] tumbled into the camp of Midian, and it came to the tent and struck it so that it fell and overturned and the tent collapsed." And his friend replied, and he said, "This is nothing other than the sword of Gideon, son of Joash, a man of Israel. God has given Midian and the whole of the camp into his hands." And when Gideon heard the account of the dream and its interpretation, then he worshipped [Yahweh] and he returned to the camp of Israel, and he called out, "Arise! For Yahweh has given the camp of Midian into your hands!" Judges 7:13-15


While this is a relatively small part of the overall story, it does play an important part in reassuring Gideon that God knew exactly what he was doing (remember Gideon is the guy that needed multiple signs from God before he would even get started on raising an army Gideon 6:17-23) What amuses me (that may not be the right word, but it will serve for now) is why anybody would dream about a loaf of bread knocking over a tent, and furthermore; how the subsequent interpretation of the dream by a friend would be "Obviously Gideon and the Hebrews are going to wipe us all out!" Amazing.


Anyways, it is a great story that illustrates God's power and attention to detail (something I think we can all appreciate). The Veggies crew, I think, did a good job with it, and figured I would throw it up here for comments. Ever dreamed about bread? Tired of my overuse of parenthetical statements? Leave a comment and let me know.

A new twist

This blog, we can all agree, has been severely under-utilized since its inception almost a year ago. This is partly due to laziness on my half, but also because of the framework in which I set up the posts as a crossover between military life and spiritual parallels. I started strong, but have suffered writer's block down the stretch. In that light, I am going to strike out in a new direction. My idea is take an expository look at the "verse 'o the day" as posted on the Air 1 (my favorite radio station) web site. This will not be an everyday occurrence, and I certainly will not limit my postings to just that, but rather it will (hopefully) give me an avenue for more frequent postings and serve to place me more firmly in the Word more often than I have been to date.

Today's Verse:
"Therefore, we who have fled to him for refuge can have great confidence as we hold to the hope that lies before us." Hebrews 6:18-19 NLT

As Rev. Ralph Walter says, "First we have to look at what the Therefore is there for." The therefore refers to the infallibility and unchanging nature of God's promises; specifically our salvation through Christ. Earlier in the chapter (v.13-17) Paul speaks of God's promise to Abraham, that because there was nothing higher God swore on his own name to bless Abraham and multiply him beyond count (Gen 22:16-18). This is where the great confidence comes from that we as heirs of Christ can lay claim to.

Finally, what is "the Hope that lies before us"? Paul speaks often of hope, and in this case that hope is the hope spelled out more fully in Titus 2:13, "[we are] looking for that blessed hope, the glorious appearing of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ."
As such, I can read Hebrews 6:18 as: Because God promised the truthfulness of this on himself, I can go to him for shelter and be sure that Christ will return one day as my personal savior.