Babbling

When I was a kid, I attended a Methodist church.  When 7th grade rolled around it was confirmation time.  Having completed the study’s and  my first ever over-night retreat (which happened to correspond with my first ever pen-pal crush) I was confirmed into the church.  My grandparents gave me a navy blue, thinline, NIV Bible.  I didn’t pick it up or use it for a few years, as my “faith” took a wayward turn after confirmation.  But, when I did actually make a commitment to Christ, it was that very Bible that I used most often, and that God used to speak into my life. 

I’ve still got that Bible, recently re-bound, and ready for another several years of action.  I had never noticed, but among the study helps in the back is a list of 150 famous Bible stories in cannonical order.  So, I recently decided to slowly walk through them and re-read those I’m not as familiar with – and even the ones that I’ve never heard of.  (wow, that’s a long intro)

I re-read the story of the tower of Babel from Genesis 11 today.  A couple things caught my eye – I won’t bore you with all of them.  I’ll just bore you with one. 

Verse 6, God says, “If as one people speaking the same language they have begun to do this, then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them…”  Go ahead, re-read that.  Then, the Lord scattered man all over the earth and confused his language. 

I don’t have any commentaries here at home, and my web access is spotty today.  So, it’s just me and the Holy Ghost wrestling with this.  I think this makes a statement about humanity; I’m just not entirely sure what that statement is.  Does is speak to what we are capable of when we’re in unity?  I wonder if God saw a train wreck of sin-bent humanity wielding too much power in unity. 

I’m not entirely sure what to think about this passage, but I look forward to wrestling with it for a while.  I love that Scripture doesn’t usually give me a neatly bound answer-pill to swallow.  It would probably produce greater laziness in me anyway. 

Thoughts?

Encouraged

So, I’ve started leading a LifeGroup of middle school guys since their leader has had to step out for some family issues.  These guys are awesome.  They’re students that I know pretty well and I love em.  Our group times are often goofy, un-focuesd, frustrating, and generally feel pretty un-productive. 

Last week, I decided we’d chat about what we, as a group, would be about.  What ensued was a 25 minute “brainstorm” session.  I got out a whiteboard and jotted down everyone’s thoughts.  We discussed, debated, and gnawed the list down to the three things that we would be about.  Here’s the list:

1) We will appreciate and love each other.

2) We’ll work to gain more knowledge of God to develop a deeper connection with God. 

3) We’ll find some excitement and have fun together outside of our group time. 

I found it pretty stinkin cool that this bunch of 7th and 8th grade guys focused in, shared, discussed, debated and arrived at these statements of what we’ll be about.  I purposely don’t underestimate middle school students, but I was slightly shocked, and fully encouraged by their/our list.   

Here she comes

I can’t believe that its almost time for our little bundle of joy to join us!  Lind is due on February 21st – but I think that she’ll go a little early.  (Dad’s intuition say’s its the 16th – but I’ll probably be wrong now that I’ve put it in writing) 

My mom and sister Cori came and painted the baby’s room last weekend.  It’s not done yet…it still needs a chair-rail and window stuff…

                                     

All this pink makes it feel a little more real.  The scary thing is that I kinda like it…

quote

You can’t build a reputation on what you are going to do.
  – Henry Ford

A little word of wisdom from ‘Ol Henry.  It’s on my igoogle homepage for today.