Reminder 11/21/20

Desoto State Park, Fort Payne, Alabama

And the Lord God commanded the man, “You are free to eat from any tree in the garden, but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die.”  ~ Genesis 2:16-17

It dawned on me this morning that I’ve not presented much in the way of biblical messages for many months, but this morning, God spoke to me during my devotionals and prayer time.  Don’t you just hate it when He uses your own concerns and disappointments and turns them into a personal lesson? (Yes!  Thank You, Father!  My son, do not despise the LORD’s discipline and do not resent His rebuke, because the LORD disciplines those He loves, as a father the son he delights in. ~ Proverbs 3:11-12)

So here I am, passing on what I was reminded of, in the hopes that it may help someone else out there.  And just maybe, by thinking on it some more, and writing about it, it will help cement the lesson in my own mind and heart as well.   . . .Who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God. ~ II Corinthians 1:4. I know I’ve taken the verse out of context, but it’s the right sentiment.

We have wonderful sons (if I do say so myself), but as proud as we are of them, and as many things as they do right, they are not perfect.  Neither are their parents.  And any credit for their character and personality goes directly to God.  He’s the one Who created them.  He’s the one who raised them into exactly what He wanted them to be.  He just used us (and others) as imperfect vessels to help carry His teaching to them.

I’m going to go personal now. 

Believe it or not, both of our adult sons, on various occasions have lied, been willfully disobedient, committed sins against God and others, attempted to rationalize their mistakes, and ignored sound wisdom saying, “No thanks, I’ll do it my way.”.  All these have occurred not only against us, but to others, to themselves, and to God.

There’ve been times in my adult life when I could also be counted among the guilty.

All of these things they’ve done may or may not have angered me at various times, but all of them have certainly disappointed me, and at times deeply.  But my love for them always wins out.  Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers over a multitude of sins.  I Peter 4:8.

This is where God pointed out that He feels similarly about me when I do those exact same things.  Oh, it’s not that I surprise Him with my sinful ways.  He’s perfectly aware, and perfectly aware of each step I take – even before I take it and each thought – even before I think it.  But I think He still feels the disappointment.  And yet He loves me in spite of myself. 

Oh praise God for the knowledge that I am ALWAYS perfectly forgiven, perfectly used for His glory, and above all, perfectly loved!

Psalm 139 is a wonderful reminder!  This portion was my prayer today:

O LORD, You have searched me and You know me. . . You discern my going out and my lying down; You are familiar with all my ways.  Before a word is on my tongue You know it completely, O LORD.  You hem me in – behind and before; You have laid Your hand upon me.  Such knowledge is too wonderful for me, too lofty for me to attain! . . . If I say, “Surely the darkness will hide me” . . . even the darkness will not be dark to You . . . For You created my inmost being . . . All the days ordained for me were written in Your book before one of the came to be . . . How precious to me are Your thoughts, O God!  How vast is the sum of them! . . . Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts.  See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.

Amen.

It was planned that I’d do laundry, work on the blog and do a little Christmas shopping today.  Well, I managed one out of three.  Blaine set me up outside so I could try to work on the blog and do some shopping research, but even with his above and beyond effort, I was still unable to get much service.  The blog was a total wash (15 minutes to upload one picture).  It just wasn’t worth the aggravation. The research took so long, I didn’t get much accomplished.  Heavy sigh . . . Hopefully, our next stop on Monday will prove to be better.

While I washed clothes, Blaine went for a walk for a few hours.

When he returned, he watched THE Ohio State/Indiana game. (I was outside working)

And thanks to Blaine’s conniptions, OSU ended up winning 45-32 over Indiana. 

This evening, we watched a movie called, “The Free State of Jones”.  It’s based on a true story and stars Matthew McConaughey.  It was pretty good, and tells a story from the Civil War that we’ve not heard anywhere else.  Maybe we’ll run across it somewhere someday.  In the meantime, here’s a brief description of what happened.

Newt Knight joined the Civil War as a Confederate from Jones County in Mississippi, but in October 1862, after the Confederate defeat at Corinth, Knight and many other men from his same area, deserted from the Seventh Battalion of Mississippi Infantry. It wasn’t just the starvation rations, arrogant harebrained leadership and appalling carnage. They were disgusted and angry about the recently passed “Twenty Negro Law,” which exempted one white male for every 20 slaves owned on a plantation, from serving in the Confederate Army. Jasper Collins echoed many non-slaveholders across the South when he said, “This law…makes it a rich man’s war and a poor man’s fight.”

So he rallied the men, and they began fighting what amounted to their own war against the Confederacy, as they hid out, forming a community in the swamps.  They eventually forced the Confederates out of Jones County and claimed it as a Union victory, and called it “The Free State of Jones”.

Newt had a wife and child before he left for the war, but essentially his wife left him.  He met a black woman and claimed her as his wife, and had children and eventually, he settled down with both wives and continued having children.

Mississippi continued with their stringent “one drop” law, which said that it was unlawful for whites and blacks to be married.  In the movie, they showed snippets from a real trial that took place in the 1950s or 60s with one of Knight’s descendants – a young man with one-eighth of his DNA showing black.  And he was married to a full white woman.  The court ruling?  Divorce your wife, or go to prison.  He stood his ground for what was right (like his ancestor), and was sentenced to prison for five years.

Can you believe that???