Words Matter

After church this morning, I listened to Curtis Bowers “Agenda Weekly”.  If you haven’t heard of Agenda Weekly or Curtis, I would encourage you to look him up and take the time to listen to what he has to say each week.  He pretty much gives a Christian World view to what is happening in these United States and the world. 

Curtis read an email that he had gotten from a listener who thought that he used the word “stupid” too much and Curtis apologized and admitted that he needed to come up with a different word. 

Many year ago, when I was doing quite a bit of substitute teaching, I walked into an art room one morning and saw a sign that said “Do Not use the “s” word”.  They say curiosity killed the cat but being curious, I had to ask the first class what the “s” word was…they were hesitant to say the word but I really did want to know.  As some of you probably have guess, the word was stupid.  Because of that long-ago incident, I had decided that I wouldn’t use that word as much as I did. 

When you decide to not use a word, you can get a thesaurus and see what they suggest to use instead of the word you no longer want to use.  Well, I didn’t do that.  Seems like I often stumble through life rather than go the easy way out.  But as most of you know, I have read the Bible through each year for many years and the one thing I noticed when I would read Proverbs is that the word “fool” was used to denote a stupid person.  With that in mind, I often have used food in my every day conversation or even in writing. 

After I heard Curtis say that he heeded to come up with a different word, I went to my Bible.  I am reading a little differently this year.  Rather than starting in Genesis and finishing in December in Revelation, this year I read one chapter starting in Genesis, one chapter from Psalms, one chapter from Proverbs and then go to the New Testament and started reading one chapter daily (started with Matthew).  I wasn’t sure how I would like all this jumping around but I am enjoying it immensely.  What I am really enjoying is the added Psalm and Proverb each day…getting a little bit of the heart of God and the wisdom of God each day.  It will take three months to get through Psalms and then I will start over, it only takes a month to go through Proverbs so I will (hopefully) gain a lot of wisdom this year being in Proverbs daily. 

I am using a new Bible this year but a version that I’ve read many times before.  I cannot read the same version yearly without spacing out so I do switch versions every year or so.  This Bible is kind of special in that my old New International Version was ragged and pages were falling out but I had decided half-way through last year that I wanted to use the NIV.  And do you know what the Lord did for me?  I went to a house sale late last summer just to see what they had.  There, only a few steps inside the door, was a NIV Study Bible still in its original wrappings and in a leather zipper cover for…are you ready for this?  $3.00!  Brand New!  I had my Bible for 2025. 

With all that background, I will tell you I am enjoying this Bible very much.  I haven’t used the study notes as much as I could because the other thing I do is mark my Bible up with different colors for different subjects so that’s kept my attention much of the time.   But Proverbs (now that I am in my second time of reading it this year) does allow me to now look at the study notes more often.  Anyone who knows me knows that I am not a big “word” person in that I don’t want to look up words in their Greek or Hebrew or whatever but this study Bible has some interesting notes on just plain English words. 

I would like to share some of these words with you because it might help use a different word instead of one that the world seems to use constantly. 

Fools:  those who hate knowledge (Pro 1:22), of correction of any kind (Pro 20:3) and “give full vent” to their anger (Pro 29:11), who are complacent (Pro 29:32) and who trust themselves (Pro 28:26 rather than in God (Ps 14:1). 

Mockers:  Those who are proud and arrogant (Pro 21:24), who are full of insults, hatred and strife (Pro 9:7-8; 22:10; 29:8), who resist correction (Pro 13:1; 15:12) even though they deserve flogging (Pro 19:23; 2`:11).

Simple: those easily persuaded and who “lack judgment” (Pro 9:4, 16), who are immature, inexperienced and naïve (Pro 19:7).

Ignorant:  those who ignore God (1 Cor 15:34; 2 Pet 3:16). 

Wisdom: skill in living—following God’s design and thus avoiding moral pitfalls.  A grantsman can be called a wise (skilled) man (Ex 31:3).  Proverbs urges people to get wisdom (4:5), for it is worth more than silver or gold (Pro 3:13-14).  The NT refers to Christ as “wisdom from God”  (1 Cor 1:30; Col 2:3). 

Prudence:  good judgment or good sense (Pro 15:5; 9:25).  Outside Proverbs the Hebrew word is used in the negative sense of “shrewd” or “crafty” (Gen3:1; Job 5:15). 

With this little bit of insight, I hope this will draw you ever closer to reading the Word of God daily.  It is exciting no matter if it’s your first time or your 38th time! 

The Evil will Attack

“For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places.”  Ephesians 6:12 NAS

God has been so good to me as I wrestle against evil like never before.  He continues to protect me as the enemy’s fiery darts come my way.  And I am so thankful as I wear the full armor of God! 

I don’t think I’ve ever stood as firm against such evil for often I found myself telling our Lord “I can’t take it anymore”.  Actually, I remember the last time I said such words and although I did not hear an audible voice, within me, I knew God was telling me “YES you can through ME”. 

These past few weeks, as I have been reading the Gospels, over and over God has shown me how important prayer is! And close behind prayer, I see in Luke how important it is to have total faith in Jesus.  How do we show such faith, it’s through obedience to His Word.  They go hand in hand for obedience strengthens faith and faith draws us to be obedient.  Luke 21:19 says “By your endurance you will gain your lives.” 

Prayer…faith…obedience.  We will endure all matters of evil as we take up the full armor of God and stand firm.  Through Him we can go forth into what He has called us to do. 

God’s Blessings…a twin and a fire

I just want to share the goodness of our Lord with you today.  Sometimes it’s the little things that we hardly recognize or think about that are our biggest blessings. 

This actually started last evening but has got me to pondering life in general and to be so thankful for the love and protection of God, my Heavenly Father. 

I worked yesterday but around 5:30 I decided that I was going to mow the yard. 

The grass was uneavenly high due to the lack of rain these last few weeks.  When I got to the back yard, I mowed outside the fence before mowing inside.  While mowing, I kept smelling something burning.  I wasn’t sure where it was coming from and as I mowed, I kept looking around.  There was once certain part of the yard where it was stronger than the other. I never pinpointed the source and moved to the grass inside the fence.

As I finished up, I hadn’t smelled any further burning and took the mower into the garage and closed up the garage.  I went in to my barking little love bugs and asked if they wanted to go out back with me as I needed to close gates.  Yes, I talk to my dogs like they are my kids and believe it or not, they answer me back! 

I went to close the side gate when I saw smoke coming from my compost pile.  Not a bit of smoke but SMOKE.  Like there was no denying that it was smoke and that I needed to act fast.  I grabbed a potato fork close by and went to the pile and moved it around. 

Yikes! More smoke and sparks that were lighting more of the compost and trying hard to make fire.  At that point, I ran to get my hose.  I pulled it as far as it would go and then had to run to where the hose was wound up and unwind.  In that process, I hit my left arm on something (it was so fast and I was moving to get that hose) and there was blood.  It looked to be more of a scrape but don’t they bleed the most or certainly hurt the most?  I turned on the water…

I pulled and pulled to get the hose towards the compost pile where smoke was billowing and filling the surrounding area.  Oh, I was hoping that no one would notice or call the fire department! 

Everything happened so fast but I was able to get enough hose at the burning sight that I just started spraying it with water and it seemed to cause more smoke and brought further terror into my thinking that it was spreading instead of dying out. 

I am telling you this 75 year-old lady was moving like I haven’t moved in a long time!  I got the fork and spread more of the compost out so that I could spray water on more of the smoking area.  There were still some sparks but the water was drowning them…causing more smoke.  I soaked that compost for another few minutes before noticing that my arm was hurting and although not lots of blood, it looked nasty.  I laid the hose on the now non-smoking compost and let the water run.

I went into the house and on my way to bandage my wound, I grabbed the phone and called Sean.  He answered as I am putting ointment on my wound, and, as a story-teller, I started giving Sean a blow by blow of what had taken place in the last 10 minutes…or maybe I started the story from when I started mowing.  He said later, “now that my friends have met you, they now know where I get telling long stories”.  But my story was too long and Sean finally says, “is there fire?”  I think I told him there was fire but I wasn’t sure if it was totally out or what I should do. 

Fifteen minutes later, Sean was helping me with the remains of what could have been a dangerous situation.  Then he took over, more water, more spreading out.  All was under control! 

Normally, I don’t go outside when evening comes because I don’t like the mosquitos or other bugs.  Normally, I shut the gate before taking the mower back to the garage.  Normally, I don’t go out with my doggies.  But God…

God just happened to lead me to mow towards evening…bugs!  God just happened to have me leave the gate open.  God quickened my senses that I was smelling burning before there was ever smoke.  God helped me think clearly enough to spread the compost and get the hose and water it down.  Praise God for His protection and guidance! 

But that’s not the end of God’s mighty hand working in my life.  I woke up in the night and thought about my brother, Pat.  It was his 75th birthday.  So, when I was 9 months old, my life changed completely because all of a sudden, I had a baby brother.  At my early age, our young mother had determined not to have two children in a crib or in diapers.  So I went to a big bed and was potty trained (I’m pretty sure my mother was the one who was trained). 

Pat and I are the same age three month of each year.  When we were not even five years old, our mother made many of our cloths and we had matching shirts made from feed sacks.  I remember many time people asking if we were twins.  I’m sure we told some that we were. 

They say that twins are connected in a way that other siblings are not.  Although Pat and I are nine months apart, I think we do have that twin connection. 

I recently read J.D. Vance’s book and was struck by what he referred to as the hillbilly connection.  They care for and stick by their family, no matter what.  And I thought about our family and how disconnected our family has been much of my life.  But this morning, as I “sang” happy birthday to Pat through a text, I was blessed by his response,

          “Good to hear from my twin sister!!! Love you”

So, in my old age, God has reminded me of how blessed I am to have a “twin” brother and how forgiving he is and how loving he is!  Each year for the past 75 years, I have had the blessing that many have not had…a twin brother. 

I share this story with you because truly, I am a story teller but I also am praying that you won’t wait until you are 75 to look deep into your family and grasp the love that God has blessed you with.