Today's Readings and Stuff -- Monday, 19 November 2018

Another "standard week" begins.  Next-door-Niece doesn't work today, so Wife (which implies me too) doesn't get to "watch" the great-nephew during the day.  FYI, Niece went back to work last year several months after giving birth, but part-time only.  Usually, that means she works 9 a.m. -- 3 p.m. two days a week.  Occasionally more, occasionally other hours, but generally Monday and Wednesday only.  So she can walk the great-niece up to the school bus stop 3 doors up for the ride to kindergarten, and be back home in time to meet the bus bringing her home.  I can do it, we're on "the list" to meet the bus or even to pick her up from school, etc., but mom wants to do it.
But niece is off today, works tomorrow (Tuesday) instead.  So Wife gets another day to try to recuperate from the latest round of feeling lousy.

Wednesday Thursday is Thanksgiving Day, and we are to appear at the gathering of Wife's family over along the state line to meet at the home of Wife's nephew and his wife and kids, plus next-door niece and her husband and kids, as well as Wife's sister and her husband and perhaps one or two others.  No chance whatever for me to get with my side of the family, my sister and two brothers and their spouses, but then I'm fortunate to see some of them for a whole hour once or twice a year on their trips past the area.  Oh, well.

These gatherings are, well, Wife likes them.  Living so far away as we did for so many years troubled her.  She has the "FAMILY" gene.  I thought the distance was a plus, but held my tongue (for once).  It's a mission field, I guess.  Wife's sister will put on the queen bee attitude.  She's a committed Wiccan. Her son and his wife are raising their kids as atheists, or at least NEVER mentioning the Lord.  Her (sis-in-law's) daughter, next-door-niece, is "neutral".  Her husband's family seems into some sort of faith, engaged in one of those "come as  you are" offshoots  of the Methodists that meets about 2 blocks away.  Niece lets the grand-niece go to Vacation Bible School some years (not this year) and her husband seems ok with the situation.  I've been enjoined to stay out of it.  Which troubles me, and should.

Supposed to get all the way up to 38° today.  Whoopee.  That's about 21° lower than the average for the day.  Our "day" is down to 9 hours 45 minutes, losing nearly 2 more minutes by tomorrow.  Still more than a month until official Winter.  So much for the "catastrophic global warming".  I check the 10 day forecast every day, and every day, the forecast temps for the far end of that sequence are falling.  By that I mean that what is on the forecast for next Sunday, say, which is now 47° is quite likely to be lower than that for the same day when I check tomorrow.  That's been the pattern for some weeks now.  As it stands, our predicted lows for this Wednesday and Thursday are in the teens!  WELL below normal for the time of year when averaged over many years.  Even our friends in normally warm areas of the country, our one-time neighbors and co-workers, are enduring strangely cold weather and have been for weeks.  I will confess that the HEAVY snow that fell earlier, before transitioning to lighter to semi-snow/semi-sleet/semi-rain did nothing whatever to improve the mood.

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    Perhaps I can be forgiven for a slightly different type of song inspired by the text??  Please?  One of those that we forget was inspired by the Bible?  Remember "Dem Bones"?

Ezekiel 37

1The hand of the Lord was upon me, and carried me out in the spirit of the Lord, and set me down in the midst of the valley which was full of bones,

2And caused me to pass by them round about: and, behold, there were very many in the open valley; and, lo, they were very dry.

3And he said unto me, Son of man, can these bones live? And I answered, O Lord God, thou knowest.

4Again he said unto me, Prophesy upon these bones, and say unto them, O ye dry bones, hear the word of the Lord.

5Thus saith the Lord God unto these bones; Behold, I will cause breath to enter into you, and ye shall live:

6And I will lay sinews upon you, and will bring up flesh upon you, and cover you with skin, and put breath in you, and ye shall live; and ye shall know that I am the Lord.

7So I prophesied as I was commanded: and as I prophesied, there was a noise, and behold a shaking, and the bones came together, bone to his bone.

8And when I beheld, lo, the sinews and the flesh came up upon them, and the skin covered them above: but there was no breath in them.

9Then said he unto me, Prophesy unto the wind, prophesy, son of man, and say to the wind, Thus saith the Lord God; Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe upon these slain, that they may live.

10So I prophesied as he commanded me, and the breath came into them, and they lived, and stood up upon their feet, an exceeding great army.

11Then he said unto me, Son of man, these bones are the whole house of Israel: behold, they say, Our bones are dried, and our hope is lost: we are cut off for our parts.

12Therefore prophesy and say unto them, Thus saith the Lord God; Behold, O my people, I will open your graves, and cause you to come up out of your graves, and bring you into the land of Israel.

13And ye shall know that I am the Lord, when I have opened your graves, O my people, and brought you up out of your graves,

14And shall put my spirit in you, and ye shall live, and I shall place you in your own land: then shall ye know that I the Lordhave spoken it, and performed it, saith the Lord.

15The word of the Lord came again unto me, saying,

16Moreover, thou son of man, take thee one stick, and write upon it, For Judah, and for the children of Israel his companions: then take another stick, and write upon it, For Joseph, the stick of Ephraim, and for all the house of Israel his companions:

17And join them one to another into one stick; and they shall become one in thine hand.

18And when the children of thy people shall speak unto thee, saying, Wilt thou not shew us what thou meanest by these?

19Say unto them, Thus saith the Lord God; Behold, I will take the stick of Joseph, which is in the hand of Ephraim, and the tribes of Israel his fellows, and will put them with him, even with the stick of Judah, and make them one stick, and they shall be one in mine hand.

20And the sticks whereon thou writest shall be in thine hand before their eyes.

21And say unto them, Thus saith the Lord God; Behold, I will take the children of Israel from among the heathen, whither they be gone, and will gather them on every side, and bring them into their own land:

22And I will make them one nation in the land upon the mountains of Israel; and one king shall be king to them all: and they shall be no more two nations, neither shall they be divided into two kingdoms any more at all:

23Neither shall they defile themselves any more with their idols, nor with their detestable things, nor with any of their transgressions: but I will save them out of all their dwellingplaces, wherein they have sinned, and will cleanse them: so shall they be my people, and I will be their God.

24And David my servant shall be king over them; and they all shall have one shepherd: they shall also walk in my judgments, and observe my statutes, and do them.

25And they shall dwell in the land that I have given unto Jacob my servant, wherein your fathers have dwelt; and they shall dwell therein, even they, and their children, and their children's children for ever: and my servant David shall be their prince for ever.

26Moreover I will make a covenant of peace with them; it shall be an everlasting covenant with them: and I will place them, and multiply them, and will set my sanctuary in the midst of them for evermore.

27My tabernacle also shall be with them: yea, I will be their God, and they shall be my people.

28And the heathen shall know that I the Lord do sanctify Israel, when my sanctuary shall be in the midst of them for evermore.

Ezekiel 38

1And the word of the Lord came unto me, saying,

2Son of man, set thy face against Gog, the land of Magog, the chief prince of Meshech and Tubal, and prophesy against him,

3And say, Thus saith the Lord God; Behold, I am against thee, O Gog, the chief prince of Meshech and Tubal:

4And I will turn thee back, and put hooks into thy jaws, and I will bring thee forth, and all thine army, horses and horsemen, all of them clothed with all sorts of armour, even a great company with bucklers and shields, all of them handling swords:

5Persia, Ethiopia, and Libya with them; all of them with shield and helmet:

6Gomer, and all his bands; the house of Togarmah of the north quarters, and all his bands: and many people with thee.

7Be thou prepared, and prepare for thyself, thou, and all thy company that are assembled unto thee, and be thou a guard unto them.

8After many days thou shalt be visited: in the latter years thou shalt come into the land that is brought back from the sword, and is gathered out of many people, against the mountains of Israel, which have been always waste: but it is brought forth out of the nations, and they shall dwell safely all of them.

9Thou shalt ascend and come like a storm, thou shalt be like a cloud to cover the land, thou, and all thy bands, and many people with thee.

10Thus saith the Lord God; It shall also come to pass, that at the same time shall things come into thy mind, and thou shalt think an evil thought:

11And thou shalt say, I will go up to the land of unwalled villages; I will go to them that are at rest, that dwell safely, all of them dwelling without walls, and having neither bars nor gates,

12To take a spoil, and to take a prey; to turn thine hand upon the desolate places that are now inhabited, and upon the people that are gathered out of the nations, which have gotten cattle and goods, that dwell in the midst of the land.

13Sheba, and Dedan, and the merchants of Tarshish, with all the young lions thereof, shall say unto thee, Art thou come to take a spoil? hast thou gathered thy company to take a prey? to carry away silver and gold, to take away cattle and goods, to take a great spoil?

14Therefore, son of man, prophesy and say unto Gog, Thus saith the Lord God; In that day when my people of Israel dwelleth safely, shalt thou not know it?

15And thou shalt come from thy place out of the north parts, thou, and many people with thee, all of them riding upon horses, a great company, and a mighty army:

16And thou shalt come up against my people of Israel, as a cloud to cover the land; it shall be in the latter days, and I will bring thee against my land, that the heathen may know me, when I shall be sanctified in thee, O Gog, before their eyes.

17Thus saith the Lord God; Art thou he of whom I have spoken in old time by my servants the prophets of Israel, which prophesied in those days many years that I would bring thee against them?

18And it shall come to pass at the same time when Gog shall come against the land of Israel, saith the Lord God, that my fury shall come up in my face.

19For in my jealousy and in the fire of my wrath have I spoken, Surely in that day there shall be a great shaking in the land of Israel;

20So that the fishes of the sea, and the fowls of the heaven, and the beasts of the field, and all creeping things that creep upon the earth, and all the men that are upon the face of the earth, shall shake at my presence, and the mountains shall be thrown down, and the steep places shall fall, and every wall shall fall to the ground.

21And I will call for a sword against him throughout all my mountains, saith the Lord God: every man's sword shall be against his brother.

22And I will plead against him with pestilence and with blood; and I will rain upon him, and upon his bands, and upon the many people that are with him, an overflowing rain, and great hailstones, fire, and brimstone.

23Thus will I magnify myself, and sanctify myself; and I will be known in the eyes of many nations, and they shall know that I am the Lord.

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Today, we begin a new series, the epistles of the apostle John.

Brief warning:  in the next few weeks, our schedule will have us in the Revelation.  I will of course post the appropriate text.  I never, not ever, comment on the Revelation in any way whatever.

1st John 1

1That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, of the Word of life;

2(For the life was manifested, and we have seen it, and bear witness, and shew unto you that eternal life, which was with the Father, and was manifested unto us;)

3That which we have seen and heard declare we unto you, that ye also may have fellowship with us: and truly our fellowship is with the Father, and with his Son Jesus Christ.

4And these things write we unto you, that your joy may be full.

5This then is the message which we have heard of him, and declare unto you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all.

6If we say that we have fellowship with him, and walk in darkness, we lie, and do not the truth:

7But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin.

8If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.

9If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

10If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.