Muscles twitching

Still hard. T secret route that is.  It is an off road route from my house to Fulsher.  Pit of despair and the road of remorse survived.  Missed the Tennis court water stop and had to bail on the return dam and hit FFPS for water 61 miles 11 water bottles 4 hours, dealing with cramps.  Lots of time to think.   The ripples of our lives expand in many directions.  So if one person's ripple expands out in the same way they have been treated, then the are they responsible.  The tangle of the interrelations may or may not have been considered, but the end results are the same.

I think it is a retorical question

^{From Vode Bachum}

Jeremiah 32

²⁶ Then the word of the LORD came to Jeremiah: ²⁷ "I am the LORD, the God of all mankind. Is anything too hard for me? ²⁸

This verse

Psalm 139

 ¹ O LORD, you have searched me and you know me.  ² You know when I sit and when I rise;  you perceive my thoughts from afar.
 ³ You discern my going out and my lying down; you are familiar with all my ways.
 ⁴ Before a word is on my tongue you know it completely, O LORD.
 ⁵ You hem me in—behind and before; you have laid your hand upon me.
 ⁶ Such knowledge is too wonderful for me, too lofty for me to attain.
 ⁷ Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence?
 ⁸ If I go up to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in the depths, ^[a] you are there.
 ⁹ If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea,
 ¹⁰ even there your hand will guide me, your right hand will hold me fast.
 ¹¹ If I say, "Surely the darkness will hide me and the light become night around me,"
 ¹² even the darkness will not be dark to you; the night will shine like the day, for darkness is as light to you.
 ¹³ For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother's womb.
 ¹⁴ I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well.
 ¹⁵ My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place. When I was woven together in the depths of the earth,
 ¹⁶ your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were written in your book
       before one of them came to be.
 ¹⁷ How precious to me are your thoughts, O God! How vast is the sum of them!
 ¹⁸ Were I to count them, they would outnumber the grains of sand. When I awake, I am still with you.
 ¹⁹ If only you would slay the wicked, O God! Away from me, you bloodthirsty men!
 ²⁰ They speak of you with evil intent; your adversaries misuse your name.
 ²¹ Do I not hate those who hate you, O LORD, and abhor those who rise up against you?
 ²² I have nothing but hatred for them; I count them my enemies.
 ²³ Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts.
 ²⁴ See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.

God's Hospital

There are one about three things I remember from my college days.  One is the steps to system analysis and design.

1. Define the problem
2. Gather Solutions
3. Decide on the best
4. Implement 
5. Review

Most projects go south because people did not define the problem so they did not know what they were solving and/or they did not review so they did not know if they were successful.
One of the other things was from Dwight Edwards.  He would say that "I am just one beggar showing another beggar where to get some food for the night"  this is the attitude we should have as we show others the way to the cross.   Not proud or haughty, just moving towards the cross and picking up the wounded as we go.
I would like to suggest my own for the times when God is really moving around me.  "I am just an orderly changing bed pans in God's hospital"  Relationships are harder and more weird and sometimes God moves in because we are not able to handle it ourselves.  There is God picking up the steaming pile of goo that we create in our own failings.  Sometimes He disciplines, corrects, sometime He leans into us as we lean into Him.  Sometime He, like in the Garden, hides and we must stretch to find Him. Third Day - Call my Name
He never leaves us.  He never forsakes us.  He does refine us, test our mettel
(met·tle (met′'l) noun quality of character or temperament; esp., high quality of character; spirit; courage; ardor) bend us to the point of breaking, catches us when we fall. Yes all to His Glory and all to trust more in His huge capacity to love us.

This of course like basic training does for a soldier, prepare us to battle.  When the storm of life come we have been trained and we know how to react.  There is no question, we draw, fire and hit our mark.  The story of policemen who were found dead with their spent brass in their pockets from when they reloaded.  You see that is how they did it on the practice range.  So when they needed to do it for real they took the time to put the brass in their pocket instead of dropping it and reloading and focusing on the task.  Their improper training essentially killed them.
What great thing it is that God takes up through the various trials in training.  We are able to recognize the oncoming storm clouds gathering, batten the hatches down and get ready. Prepare ye the way

The Word of the Lord came one evening
Concerning His bride's great sin
He'd send down His Word to renew her
To prepare for the Bridegroom again
The Word said repent
From seeking vain glories
While the gifts in the Lord's name you give
Repent of all the first stones cast to kill
While your own self-righteousness lives

Prepare ye the way for the Lord
Prepare ye the way for the kingdom
Prepare ye the way
Prepare ye the way for the Lord

The Word said repent and turn from your strivings
Repent and turn from your hatred
Repent from the doctrines of men that divide
And fear like the wedding gown ripped

Walk in His love like newborn children
Walk in His love, let the wedding gown mend
Walk in His love, with humility come with pure hearts
And cast all your cares to the wind

The Word of the Lord came one evening
Concerning His bride's sin
He assured me we will be forgiven
And then let the marriages begin

Luke 3

John the Baptist Prepares the Way

 ¹In the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar—when Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea, Herod tetrarch of Galilee, his brother Philip tetrarch of Iturea and Traconitis, and Lysanias tetrarch of Abilene— ²during the high priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas, the word of God came to John son of Zechariah in the desert. ³He went into all the country around the Jordan, preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. ⁴As is written in the book of the words of Isaiah the prophet:
   "A voice of one calling in the desert,
   'Prepare the way for the Lord,
      make straight paths for him.
 ⁵Every valley shall be filled in,
      every mountain and hill made low.
   The crooked roads shall become straight,
      the rough ways smooth.
 ⁶And all mankind will see God's salvation.' "^[a]

Particpate in the battle?

Jim suggested that we move towards another book leaving the Eldredge Books behind.  The suggestion on the table is http://www.leaderu.com/orgs/probe/docs/4pillars.html 
Reading the review, this is another battle book.  "Satan's effectiveness in destroying God's image through male-female alienation, by whatever means, has been incalculably costly to the human race."(5) This is where the current battle rages.

I was wondering in yesterday's class if there is a way to rise above the battle and live victoriously.  Put another way is Jesus in the battle with us, or is He leaning on a fence post saying "what fight?  I am victorious over it"   Is this what is meant by "turn the other cheek"

Jeremiah 9:4-6

 ⁴ "Beware of your friends;  do not trust your brothers. For every brother is a deceiver, and every friend a slanderer.
 ⁵ Friend deceives friend, and no one speaks the truth. They have taught their tongues to lie; they weary themselves with sinning. ⁶ You live in the midst of deception; in their deceit they refuse to acknowledge me,"
       declares the LORD.

Isaiah 55:6-8

 ⁶ Seek the LORD while he may be found; call on him while he is near.
 ⁷ Let the wicked forsake his way  and the evil man his thoughts.
       Let him turn to the LORD, and he will have mercy on him, and to our God, for he will freely pardon.
 ⁸ "For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,"
       declares the LORD.

1 Peter 3:10-12 (New International Version)

¹⁰For,  "Whoever would love life and see good days must keep his tongue from evil and his lips from deceitful speech.
 ¹¹He must turn from evil and do good; he must seek peace and pursue it.
 ¹²For the eyes of the Lord are on the righteous and his ears are attentive to their prayer,
   but the face of the Lord is against those who do evil."

If each day turn away from our habitual sins then we can have the Jesus leaning on the fence post.  Since to get drawn down in the pit there requires a wanting to deceive ourselves, where does the pride, envy, strife come from? We would deceive ourselves to not recognize that the one who left us continued on to this day in her immorality. It is so hard to think that someone loved would be on the side of "evil" in the sight of the Lord.  Is God just mean and puts lots of arbitrary rules in place?   To look at the pain that has been created in two people immediate lives and the collateral pain from the larger community, I would say God knows best.
 How to turn?
In class they went for just a second into how to turn from evil. Sure we are pretty good at identifying evil  Being one who has been caught up in doing evil in the sight of the Lord, I would say a couple of words "you just need to stop doing that" is not all that helpful in turning away.   "I am going to stop doing evil" will just result in another day of doing it.  Real friends who speak truth into your life are a great help in this area.  The shame of them "finding out" is sometimes enough.  Of course we delude ourselves into not thinking it is not evil, but deep down we know it is. Or sometimes we just get comfortable with the evil or start drinking or drugging to make the evil comfortable by becoming numb.

Ephesians 4:24-26 

²⁴and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness.
 ²⁵Therefore each of you must put off falsehood and speak truthfully to his neighbor, for we are all members of one body. ²⁶"In your anger do not sin": Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry,

By wanting the fencepost Jesus am I ignoring or running away from a fight that is going on that has been set up by God, or am I living expectantly and where God wants me to be.

Basics

This morning's lesson in the class that we were visiting was one of basics.  I was thinking this would be good for a high schooler or new christian.  But there are always gems to be had whenever God's word is proclaimed.  One of the themes was to not let Satan get a foot hold.  This verse was used of thing Christian's should flee and totally avoid to keep satan from getting a foot hold

Corinthians 6:8-10

Instead, you yourselves cheat and do wrong, and you do this to your brothers.
 ⁹Do you not know that the wicked will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor male prostitutes nor homosexual offenders ¹⁰nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God.

I was thinking how Burning Man was exactly opposite of this verse.  Where the things done there are celebrated and how that could provide a foothold for satan.  For the one who left us, is this where the shadow began to over take the light?

Confidence

Like the air in the sky confidence is not seen but can be felt.   John would have us just slap some Jesus on it and then we are going to make it through whatever, but we don't learn to trust Jesus in on fell swoop.  It is a consistent process every day to turn little bits over to Him and learn that He is trust worthy with whatever we have.  So why would it be any different with patching the crack in the wall, or changing the tire.   You build confidence, not buy it.  Sure there may have been pieces of confidence that our dad's in some way failed to give us, but they would not have given us the confidence to say ride a motorcycle on the freeway, because that was not one of the things they did.   Should you go buy a motorcycle and jump into Houston traffic on day one?   That would be your last day on the unforgiving streets of Houston. 
Just last week I had Jury duty.  I thought it would be at the Clay road and hwy 6 office. There was the plan for a nice cruise on the motorcycle through the back of the dam and over to do my duty. I looked at the paper right before I left and it was at 59 and Chimney Rock.  Now it was a rush to get through some of the worst of Houston traffic.  When I was riding all the time this would have been no big deal, but being the occasional rider, it was a big deal.  I did not want to go 610 by the Gallaria since that is the worst of the worst.  So I took the second worst option and went via Westhiemer.  It was time to relearn all those Houston traffic survival skills, lane placement, following distance... etc.  I had a level of concern, but I had done it before so I knew it could be done.

I don't think jumping off the edge is the way to go, learning to build the skills will get you there in one piece.  The bigger question would be "Does God become annoyed when we only trust Him with a little?"  and maybe this is an unrealistic expectation since the phrases running through my head are "Being sold out to Jesus"  "a fully devoted follower of the Cross" "Luke warm will spit you out" "fence sitter"  Yes that is the goal, but do you become that overnight?  God is pretty powerful, and I would not put it past Him to do this, but we are also made in God's image so the fear and  doubt is known to God.  Maybe we need someone to tell us the steps to get to become "fully sold out for Jesus".