Margaret Gorman was crowned "The Most Beautiful Bathing Girl in America" on September 8, 1921 in Atlantic City, New Jersey, in what would later become the Miss America Pageant.  The first pageant was solely an attempt to increase tourist business in the Atlantic City boardwalk area after Labor Day.  The first pageant involved just a few contestants from several cities.  In fact, it was billed as an "Inter-City Competition."  Despite the best efforts of pageant organizers, the event developed a reputation for being a little risqué.  Through the years, many church groups protested outside the event, right next to feminists of their era.  Then there was the year the movies became involved as did outright nudity.  That was stifled quickly. Still, the women all had to compete in the bathing suit competition and I remember my daddy fussing about that.  It wasn't "decent," he said, to parade young women about in such scanty attire for all the world to see.  But despite all the attempts to make the competition about the scholarship and the community service, everyone knows it's about how pretty you are.  "She's a real Miss America," people say, and they aren't talking about her good works.  And too many times we spend far more money and time on how we look than on how we act and what we do for others.
 
               And he called the people to him again and said to them, “Hear me, all of you, and understand: ​There is nothing outside a person that by going into him can defile him, but the things that come out of a person are what defile him.” --- And when he had entered the house and left the people, his disciples asked him about the parable. And he said to them, “Then are you also without understanding? Do you not see that whatever goes into a person from outside cannot defile him, since it enters not his heart but his stomach, and is expelled?”  (Mark 7:14-19)

              You would think that a generation that is so big on “the heart” and emotions and how worship “makes me feel” would have little trouble understanding that true beauty and goodness have absolutely nothing to do with what you eat.  But more and more I see young Christian women obsessed by their diets and exercise programs.  Understand, I have nothing against diets and exercise.  When the time comes to lose a few pounds I will willingly push away the food as easily as the most conscientious dieter out there.  I used to jog 5 miles 6 days a week—until my feet gave out on me, and now my eyes.  So I hop on the elliptical machine 4 or 5 times a week for 45 minutes at a whack.

              But I will never stand in front of a mirror and tell myself that I am not beautiful today because I ate a doughnut for breakfast, particularly if it’s the first one in 6 weeks.  Jesus very plainly tells us in the above passage that we are defiled by sin, not by what we eat. 

              In fact, when my diet and exercise regimen keep me from practicing hospitality or fellowshipping with my brethren at a potluck, maybe my diet and exercise program have defiled my heart instead, making me ugly before God.  I hope that everyone has the sense to know that I am not talking about celiac disease or IBS or deadly peanut allergies.  I am talking about fads that mean far more to us than our discipleship seems to, taking up more time researching them than studying the Word, obsessions that make us anxious about the wrong things and keep us from practicing the right ones.

              And this is not meant to give you license to become a glutton.  It does however give you Biblical authority to graciously receive a meal offered you by another brother and sister who have worked all day to prepare for you the best they have.  It allows you to accept gratefully that piece of warm banana bread from the elderly widow you stopped by to see, who went to that trouble because she so seldom has visitors and who will be hurt if you refuse.  It permits you to go to lunch with that group of sisters after an hour or two of intense Bible study, to cement your relationships with one another around a shared table.  If your regimen does not allow for these things, you need to consider again what Jesus said as well as the many scriptures commanding us to offer hospitality to one another, and the examples of Christians meeting house to house to “break bread” together on an almost daily basis.
 
             Doing these things makes us beautiful in the eyes of God.  It has nothing to do with a svelte, sexy figure and everything to do with service, gratitude, and graciousness.  Don’t judge yourself ugly because you ate a doughnut today.  We are made in the image of God, and when you have your priorities straight, those who are His children will not see you as anything but beautiful.
 
Do not let your adorning be external—the braiding of hair and the putting on of gold jewelry, or the clothing you wear— but let your adorning be the hidden person of the heart with the imperishable beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which in God's sight is very precious. 1Pet 3:3-4
 
Dene Ward

We swapped computers in 2015.  The new one was supposed to be so much better for someone like me, someone whose vision is becoming more and more limited.  Why, it has no wires!  You could pick it up and carry it around with you and no, it was not a laptop.  It was one of those new “all-in-ones.”  Part laptop, part tablet, but with a screen the size of a large desktop.  You didn’t even need a mouse and keyboard.  Rrrrright.  In my viewpoint it will take them a few more years to make this no-mouse-no-keyboard thing work smoothly enough that you don’t find yourself wanting to throw the whole thing through the window at least once a day.

            But it would have been a much easier transition if it hadn’t been a Lenovo.  Does that ring a few bells with the techie crowd?  In 2014, Lenovo began building a third party adware program called "Superfish" into its consumer PCs.  If you have read anything about it, you already know where this is going.  There was so much adware embedded in this thing we couldn’t even read a line of text without pop-ups flooding the screen.  If the cursor ran across a magic word, another would instantly appear.  And the thing kept track of every website you visited, producing even more ads.  Sometimes they popped up so quickly that when you were trying to click on something on the legitimate page, you wound up clicking on an ad instead.  We couldn’t even load our desired programs for all the pop-ups.  But this wasn't the worst of the problem.  This adware made it much easier for hackers to break through HTTPS entirely, and such an attack occurred shortly after the program became public.

              As far as I know, we were never hacked, but this stuff was so deeply embedded that it took at least three trips to the Geek Squad to get it out.  And after every scrub, we had to spend time loading the programs we wanted yet again.  The first four months we were actually able to use the computer about 4 weeks.  Finally on September 5, 2017, Lenovo settled the lawsuit brought by the Federal Trade Commission agreeing to procure affirmative consent for any future adware programs and to have audited security checks for the next 20 years.  They also agreed to pay $3.5 million as part of a state level settlement.

              Satan embeds his adware into our culture the same way.  When you can’t even watch a hamburger commercial without “soft” porn invading your living room, when the teasers for the shows you avoid include language your mama would have washed your mouth out with soap for using, and when we are constantly told that we aren’t hip, cool, smart, happy, or the most interesting people in the world without beer, hard liquor, cigarettes, or dancing the night away in skimpy clothes on a rooftop somewhere exciting where whatever you do stays, then you need to watch out for your souls more than ever before.

              The world will laugh at you if you mention Satan.  He isn’t real, we are told.  Only the ignorant believe in a mythological character like that.  If you are a Christian, you must believe in Satan.  If you don’t accept that part of the Bible, why would you accept any other part?

             Growing up I thought the only New Testament verses that mentioned Satan were the ones around Jesus’ temptation and the good old roaring lion in Peter.  Imagine my surprise when I looked it up.  I counted 19 outside the gospels, less one for the Peter passage we all know, for a total of 18 others.  Then there were the ones who called him something else like “the god of this age,” and “the Devil.”  And many of them talk about his “adware.”  Check a few of these out.
 
             2 Cor 2:11 mentions the “devices” of the devil.  Eph 6:11 speaks of his “schemes.”  2 Cor 4:4 tells us he “blinds the minds.”  2 Cor 11:14 tells us he “disguises” himself.  All I have to do is look around and see those devices and schemes every day, not just on television but in the speech and behavior of people who have already been taken in.  Have you ever seen the original “Invasion of the Body Snatchers?”  Some days I feel exactly like Kevin McCarthy, looking over my shoulder to see where the pods are, and wondering which of my neighbors have been replaced.

              One of Satan’s devices are his ministers.  The New Testament warns again and again of false teachers, false messiahs, false prophets, and false apostles.   They fashion themselves as “ministers of righteousness” (2 Cor 11:15).  Not only do they appear to be doing good, they even look good.  False teachers on the whole are good-looking and charismatic.  A lot of what they say sounds good and is, in fact, good.  But 90% of rat poison is good too.  It only takes the 10% to kill the rats.  When you keep finding the good in a man you know is teaching error, maybe Satan’s adware has taken hold of your heart already.

              Our culture has become embedded with evil masquerading as good.  We had to have our computer “scrubbed to the bones” to get rid of the adware.  Maybe it’s time we all used a spiritual scrub brush on ourselves before we are taken in too.
 
But false prophets also arose among the people, just as there will be false teachers among you, who will secretly bring in destructive heresies, even denying the Master who bought them, bringing upon themselves swift destruction. And many will follow their sensuality, and because of them the way of truth will be blasphemed. And in their greed they will exploit you with false words. Their condemnation from long ago is not idle, and their destruction is not asleep.  2 Pet 2:1-3.
 
Dene Ward

The Great Fire of London began on the morning of September 2, 1666 in the home of King Charles II's baker.  By September 6, when the fire was finally put out, 80% of London had been destroyed.  You can read a lot about that fire on history sites, but I want to focus on this today:  In that fire they used something called a "squirt," a device similar to a bicycle pump that was first used on fires in the Middle Ages.  A nozzle was placed in a container of water and a plunger pulled to suck water up into the "well" of the squirt.  It was then directed toward the fire and sprayed out.  Sort of slow going for a real fire, don't you think?  Imagine if the king's baker had had a modern fire extinguisher in his home.  London might have been saved.

             We have two fire extinguishers in the house, one behind the woodstove at the edge of the kitchen and one in a back bedroom.  They have been there so long that I don’t even notice them any more.  In fact, when I think to look at them at all, it’s to dust them because “suddenly” they look like they have grown white fur.

              Fire extinguishers are great to have around, but let’s face it, they aren’t part of a beautiful decor.  They aren’t a handy item we use everyday like a coffee pot or a can opener.  They aren’t even a once a year need like my pressure canner—at least we hope not.  The only reason we have them is “just in case,” and we want that “just in case” to never happen.  We treat fire extinguishers more like necessary evils than anything else.

              I noticed something when we studied Psalm 99 in Bible class the other day.  [Speaking of Moses, Aaron, and Samuel] In the pillar of the cloud [God] spoke to them; they kept his testimonies and the statute that he gave them. O LORD our God, you answered them; you were a forgiving God to them, but an avenger of their wrongdoings, vv 7-8.

              Those two verses contain everything we need to know about who can pray to God and expect an answer.  First God spoke to them.  They listened by keeping His testimonies and statutes.  Then God answered them.

              Those three righteous men did not treat God like a fire extinguisher.  He wasn’t there just for emergencies.  He was part of their lives on a daily basis as they followed His laws and prayed for help and forgiveness.

              The psalmist is careful to point out that these men were among those “who call upon His name” (v 6).   They were not the only ones chosen to receive this blessing.  Many others “called upon His name.”  That goes for us as well.  We possess His testimonies and statutes in the written form.  All we have to do is keep them, making God a daily part of our lives, and He will hear us just like He heard them.

              The problem comes when we try to make a relationship out of one phone call, so to speak.  If we never talk to God otherwise, or more to the point, listen, He won’t listen either.  If we ignore His law with impunity, going our own headstrong way, He won’t answer—not according to Psalm 99, and several other passages (Prov 15:29; 28:9; Isa 59:2; John 9:31, etc).  We’ve seen too many heart-tugging made-for-TV movies where the old reprobate turns around at a crisis and promises God he will be good if God will just hear him this once.  God does not bargain, unless you think you are a man of the stature of Abraham, who talked with God regularly instead of treating Him like a fire extinguisher.  More often than not, old reprobates stay that way.

              Now is the time to begin that relationship, or deepen it if you already have.  If we keep God behind the woodstove until He grows some dusty fur, we needn’t think He will pay a bit of attention when we holler.
 
As I called, and they would not hear, so they called, and I would not hear, says the LORD of hosts, Zech 7:13.

Dene Ward

Although gunpowder was accidentally discovered by the Chinese in 850, the first recorded use of a cannon in battle was the battle of Crecy, August 26, 1346 during the Hundred Years War.  That is disputed by the Arabs who claim that the Mamluks used one against the Mongols in 1260.  Then there are the French who claim they used the first cannon in 1339.  But usually the English get the credit, Edward III to be specific, for the 1346 date.  In any case, cannons were here to stay after the 12th century.

              Keith was having a religious discussion with someone once, a brother as I remember, but one he disagreed with.  I had come upon a pertinent scripture in my own study a few days earlier and gave him the passage.  “Here’s some more ammunition,” I said.

              That word came naturally to me.  Keith was a certified firearms instructor for the state.  He taught probation officers, and prison guards how to shoot.  As a probation officer he carried his own weapon, having to qualify every year.  He taught me how to shoot well enough to dispose of a dozen poisonous snakes over the years and he taught the boys too.  So the word “ammunition” just came out.

              However, it nagged at me enough that over the next few days I began wondering if we don’t have that mindset much too often,  Yes, we are in a battle.  Yes, the scriptures talk about our “weapons,” weapons God Himself supplied for our warfare.  And yes, our fight is not just with Satan, but with his ministers as well.  But look at this passage:

              As for me, I have not hastened from being a shepherd after you; neither have I desired the woeful day; you know: that which came out of my lips was before your face, Jer 17:16

              Jeremiah was NOT happy about Judah’s coming destruction—he did not “desire” the evil day.

              There’s an old story about a man who was converted after thirty years of different preachers telling him he was lost.

              “Why now?” someone asked him.  “Why listen to this preacher?”

              “Because,” the old man said, “he really sounded like he was sad about it.”

              Is that our problem?  Do we get too much pleasure out of the fight?  Are we just a bunch of gung-ho cowboys in our zeal?  Are we more interested in winning arguments than in winning souls?

              God gave Jeremiah plenty of ammunition, and he used it well enough that he was thrown into prison for it.  But he never enjoyed the job.  In fact, a good many of the prophets disliked their mission.  “I went in the bitterness of soul,” Ezekiel said.  In his confrontation with the priest of Bethel, Amos as much as said, “This wasn’t my idea.” 

              That’s a far different attitude than I have seen in some brethren, who delight in slinging bandoliers over their shoulders and spraying automatic fire in a drive-by.

              We’re supposed to be saving souls, not murdering them with spiritual handguns and especially not with cannons.  Let’s take stock of our attitudes when we go out to battle today.
 
​Give glory to the LORD your God before he brings darkness, before your feet stumble on the twilight mountains, and while you look for light he turns it into gloom and makes it deep darkness. But if you will not listen, my soul will weep in secret for your pride; my eyes will weep bitterly and run down with tears, because the LORD's flock has been taken captive, Jer 13:16-17.
 
Dene Ward

In 1854 the United States bought a rock in the middle of San Francisco Bay called Isla de los Alcatraces—the Isle of the Pelicans, originally a seabird haven founded by Juan Manuel de Ayala.  On August 11, 1934, 137 prisoners were installed there in what had been turned into a maximum security federal prison--Alcatraz.  Al Capone spent time there, as well as George “Machine Gun” Kelly, and Robert Stroud, the “Birdman of Alcatraz.”  36 attempted to escape and were caught.  In 1962 three men did escape, and were never found.  To this day no one knows if they drowned in the cold bay waters or made it to safety and successfully hid.
 
             We don’t like to think about being a prisoner.  As Americans we bridle against anything that affects our freedom, our “rights.”  As Christians we proclaim that we have “freedom in Christ,” Gal 2:4; 5:1,13.  Maybe we were once “slaves of sin,” Rom 6:16-18, but no longer—we are free, free, free!

              Let’s just assume that we are free from sin, that we overcome more often than not, that it certainly isn’t a habit any longer.  Oh, if that were the only thing we needed to free ourselves of. 

               Far too many I know are still slaves of others’ opinions, of some rigid
sense of dignity, and of an overwhelming feeling of inadequacy when confronted once again with the mercy of a loving God. 

              Being inordinately worried about what others think is simply a brand of egotism.  We are placing our own expectations of them on a pedestal.  We are afraid of what they think about us, when they probably don’t think about us one way or the other.  Yet we hear one statement, view one action, and suddenly we concoct a whole scenario about their opinions of us that may or may not be—in fact, probably are not—true.  It rolls around in our minds over and over to the point that we cannot sleep, cannot eat, or we even make ourselves sick over it.  What did Jesus say to Peter when he asked about John’s future?  “What is that to you?”  We would do well to remember that line far more often than we do.  Stop being taken prisoner by others.  Fulfill your obligations to them, but do not try to take responsibility for theirs.  “What is that to you?”

              And then we find ourselves in the prison of dignity.  I vividly remember walking through the Philadelphia Zoo on the first weekend of our honeymoon.  It started to rain, and I was busy trying to find shelter “so my hair won’t get wet,” I told Keith. 

              “Who cares if your hair gets wet?” he asked as he grabbed my hand and we went running down the sidewalk in the rain.  We found our way back to our midtown hotel drenched, but laughing all the way.  When your dignity keeps you from enjoying life, from playing with your children, from worshiping your God, it’s time you let yourself out of prison.

              But the most ironic slavery we have placed ourselves in is also the saddest.  Here we have a God who loves us enough to die for us, yet we tie ourselves up in knots over our inability to repay Him.  Instead of joy over our salvation, we cringe when we think of our unworthiness.  We try and try and try to be perfect, always knowing it’s an impossible task, and so “hope,” instead of being the “full assurance” the New Testament teaches us, becomes a miserable “maybe.”  We find ourselves praying that when we die we will see it coming so we can fire off one last frantic prayer for forgiveness. 

              Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom, 2 Cor 3:17.  Funny how some of these people who spend so much time worrying about whether they “do” enough for the Lord are some of the very ones who talk the most about the Holy Spirit.  My Bible says their fretting is a sure sign they don’t have the Spirit. 

              The New Testament plainly teaches that we are to have self-control.  That doesn’t just apply to alcohol, drugs, gluttony, sexual immorality, and the other “fleshly” sins.  For whatever overcomes a person, to that he is enslaved, 2 Pet 2:19.  Did you catch that?  It can be anything, whether sinful or not.  A relationship, an attitude, a habit, your upbringing, your past mistakes--whatever controls your life makes you its slave—its prisoner. 

              Let it go.  There is truly only one Master worth serving.
 
"All things are lawful for me," but not all things are expedient. "All things are lawful for me," but I will not be enslaved by anything, 1 Corinthians 6:12.
 
Dene Ward

Nothing annoys me much more than a chirping smoke alarm.  Yes, yes, yes, I tell it.  I know you need a new battery.  I will get to it as soon as I can.  But aren't we glad we have them?
 
             It has taken a long time for affordable, reliable, home smoke detectors to hit the market.  The first fire alarm was invented and patented by Francis Robbins Upton, a friend of Thomas Edison, in 1890.  George Andrew Darby of Birmingham, England invented the first smoke detector in 1902.  Both items were too basic to be reliable and marketable.  In the late 1930s a Swiss physicist named Walter Jaeger attempted to invent a poison gas detector.  It didn't detect the poison, but the smoke from his cigarette did set it off.  This one was too expensive to produce to have much impact on the market.

              I was finally able to find a patent given to inventors Randolph J. Smith of Anaheim, California and Kenneth R House of Norwalk, Connecticut on August 5, 1969.  Their model was evidently the first battery-powered residential model that was actually affordable and reliable.  It emitted a piercing alarm at the presence of smoke.  And yes, I suppose it did that annoying little chirping thing, too.

              Maybe it’s because I am the only one around here who even needs the smoke alarm.  Keith not only can’t hear the chirping, he can stand under the thing when it goes off and not hear it.  As long as I am in the house I can wake Keith up and get both of us out in time should a fire start.  If only the toaster and the broiler and the occasional spillover on the burners didn't set it off too.

              Warnings are often annoying.  How about the various beeps in your car?  For us, it’s just the ding-ding-ding when you leave the keys in, but I have friends whose cars ring, buzz, beep, or whoop-whoop-whoop when they back up too close to something, pull in too close to something, swerve a little too close to the lane markings, let their gas tanks get too low, open the wrong door at the wrong time…  Honestly, I don’t know how they stand to drive at all.

              But only a fool ignores warnings.  And there are quite a few of them out there—fools, that is.  Just try warning someone about losing their soul, and you may well lose a friend.  They get mad, they strike out with accusations about your own failings, they tell everyone how mean you are.  Trouble is, ignoring the warnings won’t get them anywhere they want to go. The danger is still there.

              If I don’t answer the call of the chirping smoke alarm with a new battery, I may very well burn to death one night.  Telling everyone how annoying the thing is won’t change that at all.  If I don’t answer the warnings of someone who cares enough about me to brave losing his reputation and being hurt, my end won’t change either.  It doesn’t matter whether I thought he was mean or whether he needed a warning just as badly as I did.  I know the first reaction is anger.  I’ve been there myself.  But anger never saved anyone, nor accusations, nor whining and fussing about my hurt feelings.  There is a whole lot more at stake than a few feelings.
 
             Heed the warning when you get it, no matter how you get it or from whom.  It may be the only one you get.  People aren’t like smoke alarms.  Not many of them will put up with your bad reactions.  They’ll either stop chirping now, or never chirp again.  Then what will you do when the fire starts?
 
"Son of man, speak to your people and say to them, If I bring the sword upon a land, and the people of the land take a man from among them, and make him their watchman, and if he sees the sword coming upon the land and blows the trumpet and warns the people, then if anyone who hears the sound of the trumpet does not take warning, and the sword comes and takes him away, his blood shall be upon his own head. He heard the sound of the trumpet and did not take warning; his blood shall be upon himself. But if he had taken warning, he would have saved his life, Ezekiel 33:2-5.
 
Dene Ward

I made a Peach Melba crisp this summer that was pretty good, and something a little different from your ordinary peach cobbler—fresh peaches, fresh raspberries, and a crunchy topping.  I knew the original Peach Melba dessert was named after Nellie Melba, Australian born soprano, but I did not know the whole story.  Even after some research, I still don't.  It's one of those he said/she said things, as well as a few problems with the dating.  But it goes something like this.
 
             Nellie toured the world in her prime.  She sang at the Met in New York, at Covent Garden in London, at the opera house in Paris, and at La Scala in Milan; she even sang for the tsars in Russia.  Covent Garden became one of her regular stops every musical season. 

            Nellie actually had a small repertoire for a diva—she only sang about 25 operatic roles—but one of them was Elsa in Wagner's Lohengrin.  In fact, that might have been the only Wagner she sang.  The chef at the Savoy Hotel where she stayed while in London, Auguste Escoffier, was so enthralled with her rendition of Elsa, he named a dessert after hearing her, Peach Melba—peaches and raspberry sauce over vanilla ice cream.

              And here is where things get sketchy.  The last date I can find that Nellie sang Elsa in London in the early 1890s was July 27, 1891.  Supposedly, the very next day Escoffier created the dessert.  However, he says he did not meet her until 1893.  What is the solution?  Maybe he heard her that evening in 1891 and it took two more years for him to come up with the dessert.  Maybe it was a different role two years later that finally brought the dish into being.  Maybe he, or she, misremembered.  We do know this—he did name the dessert for her, and that is not the only thing this renowned chef named for Nellie.  There is also melba sauce, a puree of raspberries and red currants.  Then we have the ever popular melba toast, a crisp and dry—very,very dry—toast.  And finally Melba Garniture, which is chicken, truffles and mushrooms stuffed into tomatoes with a velote sauce.  Whatever you might think of Nellie's singing, she certainly inspired a lot of creativity in the kitchen.  Escoffier, in particular, was smitten.

              And that makes Nellie an eponym, a person after which something is named.  Many scientists and inventors are eponyms—Louis Pasteur, Alessandro Volta, Andre-Marie Ampere, Georg Ohm, Nikola Tesla, Karl Benz, and closer to home, Henry Ford and Ransom E. Olds. 

              The Bible has a few eponyms too.  Everyone understands what we mean when we say, "She is a Jezebel."  That woman, whoever she may be, is a wicked, immoral person.  Or, "He's a Jonah," which means he is a jinx.  And of course, someone who is a "Judas" is a traitor.

              So if you were an eponym, what would your name have come to mean?  I find myself using the names of those who have gone on exactly that way at times.  When I see a woman who constantly serves others, who is in the kitchen cooking for someone practically every minute of every day, whether because they are ill or just because she wants to do something nice for them, who puts thousands of miles on her car taking people to the doctor, who sews, and repairs clothing for others, and who still manages to keep a spotless home, too, I say, "She is a Melvene Wallace."  If you were blessed enough to have known that good woman, you know exactly what I mean.

              When I see a kind, gentle man, who is always looking after others, visiting the sick and the widows, inviting college students into his home for a meal, helping others with such mundane tasks as digging sweet potatoes or stacking wood, taking literal boatloads of fathers and sons on fishing trips, scheduling his vacations around gospel meetings so he can attend every night, and always in a pew with a smile when the doors of the meetinghouse are open, I say, "He's another Cedell Fletcher."  And once again, if you had known him, you would instantly recognize the kind of man I mean.  I miss both of those people so much that some days it physically hurts.

              So here is your task for the day:  What would your name be an eponym for?  Recently, I had someone talk about hearing a "Dene-ism."  I am not sure what to make of that, except maybe I talk too much!  Some of us may not be known for anything particularly bad, like Jezebel, but are we known for anything at all?  If someone tried to describe us by our demeanor and actions, would anyone say, "Oh yes, I know her."  Or would they stand with a blank look on their faces, completely at a loss for words, "Who?"

              You don't have to be a famous singer like Nellie Melba.  You just have to be someone who does good for others in whatever way you can, whenever you can, for as long as you can.  If no one else can make an eponym out of you, God will.  You want it to be a good one.
 
Looking for the blessed hope and appearing of the glory of the great God and our Savior Jesus Christ; who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a people for his own possession, zealous of good works. (Titus 2:13-14)
 
Dene Ward

Today's post is by guest writer Lucas Ward.

In our culture, most history books are written to record events for posterity.  Often, great pains are taken to give a balanced, nonpartisan account of those events.  Sometimes history books are written with the aim of bolstering a political viewpoint, but largely academic histories are written with the intent to simply tell what happened.  This is not the way ancient historians wrote history.  From Herodotus to Plutarch and on to the end of the Roman Empire, histories and biographies were written to teach life lessons. A great man’s heroic qualities were held up to be emulated and his failures were studied to be avoided.  For some reason all this occurred to me as I was reading David McCullough’s book on the Wright brothers.  So I read the book to see what I could learn from it which could be applied to my life.

The Wright brothers were known for their work ethic and their patience.  The Wrights were industrious almost to a fault.  Before they took it upon themselves to invent aeronautics, they started a newspaper while still in their teens.  They started their bike shop, working 10-12 hour days, and then went home to work on renovating their house.  When they decided to learn how to fly, they continued to run their bike shop and worked on their flying machines in their spare time.  It took better than 10 years before they perfected their flight method.

Not only were the Wrights willing to work hard, but they were patient in the face of numerous setbacks. They first learned to control a glider in flight using a method of wing warping that closely mimicked what birds do to maintain balance in flight.  The theory was good, but implementation was an on-going process that involved several minor crashes.  They would get up, dust themselves off, repair the damage to their glider and make whatever revisions experience taught them were necessary.  

They discovered that the mathematical tables in text-books regarding the shapes wings needed to have to maintain lift were wrong.  They set about to re-do the experimental work necessary.   They built a small wind tunnel and spent many hours over a period of weeks making their determinations.  Once they had a successful powered flight, in 1903, they continued to work, finally showcasing their flyer before the world in 1909.  While others had made flights in the interim, the Wrights set and reset every record for length of flight, altitude achieved, and duration of flight while stunning all on-lookers with the complete control they had over their craft.  Their patient, steadfast work had borne fruit; they ushered in the age of mechanized flight.

I hope the application to the Christian life is obvious.  We are to patiently work for our Lord.  Not that our works can earn our salvation, no, but as servants of God, we are to be busily serving Him.  A few passages to make this point clear:

2 Tim. 2:15 “Give diligence to present yourself approved unto God, a workman that needs not to be ashamed, handling aright the word of truth.”

The word translated “give diligence” in the ASV is defined by Strong’s this way: make effort, be earnest, give diligent, endeavor. The bing internet dictionary defines diligence as “constant and earnest effort”. So, becoming an unashamed workman who can properly handle the word is an on-going struggle.  I can’t cram it down in one all-nighter.  It takes the patient work of years, overcoming many obstacles along the way, chiefly my own ignorance and arrogance.

But wait, there’s more:

Heb. 4:11 “Let us therefore give diligence to enter into that rest, that no man fall after the same example of disobedience.”

Having just discussed that there awaits for us a more perfect rest (Heaven) than the rest obtained by the Israelites, the Hebrew writer enjoins us to work that patient work to ensure we can enter into that rest. Then there’s

2 Pet. 1:10 “Wherefore, brethren, give the more diligence to make your calling and election sure: for if you do these things, you shall never stumble”

Here Peter sums up his discussion of the “Christian virtues” by exhorting us to be diligent in our efforts to acquire those virtues ourselves. Why? So that we “never stumble”. Peter also tells us to be diligent to be found without spot or blemish in the day of the Lord:

2 Pet. 3:14 “Wherefore, beloved, seeing that you look for these things, give diligence that you may be found in peace, without spot and blameless in his sight.”

So, from these few passages we can see that the Christian life involves diligent effort to learn to properly handle God’s word, diligent effort to obtain the virtues all Christians should share, diligent effort to be ready to meet the Lord, and diligent effort to enter into His rest.  It seems that the Wright brothers, with their patient and steady effort, make good role models for Christians, the difference being that our triumphant flight through the air won’t be in a bi-wing plane:

1 Thess. 4:17 “then we that are alive, that are left, shall together with them be caught up in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord.”

Lucas Ward

Eduard Friedrich Poeppig was born July 16, 1798 in Plauen, Germany.  He studied and qualified as a physician by 1822, but evidently that is not where his heart lay.  Immediately after graduation he made a 10 year expedition to the Americas, spending several years in Cuba, Philadelphia, and South America.  He was only the third European to travel the entire length of the Amazon River.
His trip was financed by several friends in return for plant specimens he discovered in each of the areas he visited.  In all he sent back or took home over 17,000 of them.  When he returned to Germany he became the Zoology professor at the University of Leipzig for the remainder of his life.

              One of the plants he discovered on a hillside in Chile was the amaryllis hippeastrum, one of the most beautiful plants in the world.  I have well over a dozen now, in a bed begun after a piano student gave me one for Christmas one year.  The deep solid red is probably the most common, but I have that and everything from pale pink and bright apricot, to stripes of white on red, pink, and apricot; pink throats on a pristine white, or white throats on deep orange or red as well.  They are gorgeous, but sometimes they don’t bloom, and that leaves me disappointed, usually with half the bulbs every year.  So I decided to find out what keeps amaryllises from blooming to see if I could remedy the problem.  Here is what I discovered and what I extrapolated.

              Amaryllises will not bloom in full shade.  They may not need full sun, especially in this sub-tropical environment, but they need enough light to draw that big thick stem up out of the bulb and through the soil and mulch.

              The New Testament tells us we need the Light, too.  John says that as long as we walk in the light, we won’t stumble (1 John 2:9-11).  It variously calls us sons of light and children of light; it says we are “of the day not the night.”  And because we have that Light and live in it, we then become “the light of the world.”  Certainly a Christian who does not live in the light will never bloom.

              Amaryllises need sufficient nutrients.  Just as a larger animal needs more food, this large flower needs good soil, and ample food and water.  Many of my amaryllis bulbs were as big as softballs when they came out of the package, and many of the blooms are broader across than some of Keith’s garden cantaloupes.  Especially in this poor sandy soil, we must be sure to supply the proper nutrition if we want anything to come out of it.

              We need nutrition too.  Peter tells us to “long for the pure spiritual milk that by it we may grow up into salvation” 1 Pet 2:2.  How can we do that if we neglect all the feeding opportunities our shepherds have offered us?  How can we do it when we shun the healthy spiritual food and feast on the junk in this life?  I have seen many brothers and sisters go hog wild with the organic, all-natural, non-preservative craze when taking care of their physical bodies, yet starve their spirits with skimpy servings and junk food.  No wonder their blooms are so scarce and puny.

              This might be surprising, but not allowing them to rest will also keep amaryllises from blooming.  You can force blooms at certain times of the year, but then you must prune both the stem and leaves and water them prodigiously until they go dormant.  Then leave them alone! 

              God did not rest on the seventh day because He was tired.  He rested because He was finished, but in that rest he also ordained a day of rest for His people.  Do you understand what that means?  In that ancient time, the common people lived hand to mouth and they worked sunup till sundown seven days a week just to survive.  But not God’s people.  As long as they observed their commanded Sabbath, He made sure they had plenty.  God knows what you need and sometimes you need to rest.  It may no longer be a religious observance, but it is certainly a matter of health.  And rest doesn’t mean going on a vacation that leaves you more worn out than rested.  It means a day with no schedule, no stressful situations, nothing hanging over your head that “just has to be done.”  Spend some time with your family—just one full day a week, any day—rest your body and your mind, and talk of the blessings God has given you all, especially the time you have to be together because He has taken such good care of you.

              And this last one really surprised me.  If you take your amaryllis bulbs out of the ground and store them in the refrigerator, you should not store them with apples.  Apples will make an amaryllis bulb sterile, or so I have been told.  Apples?  Apples are good things, right?  But even things that look good can make a plant sterile and unproductive it turns out. 

              Haven’t you seen the same thing happen to Christians?  They become so involved in things of this world, good things, that there is no time left for producing the fruit God wants from us.  Or they hang around with people who are not their spiritual brothers and sisters to the point that what matters most to those people becomes what matters most to them.  Other people, people who do not understand that we are to encourage one another and build one another up spiritually, who care nothing for the spiritual warfare we are involved in, who would, in fact, think you are nuts to even talk about such a thing, can hinder your productivity for the Lord.

              So take a look at your amaryllises today if you have them.  Think about the things that affect those gorgeous blooms.  See if any of them are affecting you too.
 
And let our people learn to devote themselves to good works, so as to help cases of urgent need, and not be unfruitful, Titus 3:14.
 
Dene Ward
 

In 1950, Tulsa police officer Clinton Riggs produced the first Yield sign.  It was yellow and keystone-shaped—I actually think I remember some of those in the deep dark recesses of my mind.  That first one was placed at the corner of 1st Street and Columbia Avenue, one of the most dangerous intersections in Tulsa at the time.  The Yield sign worked like this:  Drivers were expected to slow to 10 mph and look for other vehicles before proceeding through the intersection.  If an accident occurred after the driver went through the intersection, it was automatically assumed that he had violated the law.

              Officer Riggs was born July 15, 1910.  After serving with the Tulsa Police Department for three years he then joined the Highway Patrol in 1937.  During World War II he served as an intelligence officer for the Army Air Corps, and then returned to the police department afterwards.  Somewhere along the way he got his law degree from the University of Tulsa.  He retired from the department in 1970 and passed away in 1997.  Quite a life, but he is remembered by us all as the father of the yield sign.

              The Bible has its own yield sign and it works pretty much the same way.  We are to "subject ourselves one to another" Eph 5:21.  We are to give up our rights, even take wrong (1 Cor 6:7), for the sake of our brother (Rom 14; 1 Cor 8).  We are to count others as "better than ourselves" Phil 2:3.  And why?  Because that is what the Lord we claim to follow did.  "Have this mind in you which was also in Christ Jesus."  He yielded his rights as Deity when he became human and he did it for us.

              Some of the men's business meetings I have heard about need to post a yield sign on the wall.  The conduct in them grieves the Holy Spirit and disgusts the Father who watches his children's actions.  But that's not the only place we need a sign.  Anywhere we push our opinions, demand our rights, and look down our noses on any who disagree with us are dangerous intersections where a collision could easily result in a spiritual death. 

              Anyone who has a collision with another soul after going through an intersection where a yield sign is posted, is automatically deemed guilty of breaking the law.  God's law:  Yield right of way.
 
And so by your knowledge this weak person is destroyed, the brother for whom Christ died. Thus, sinning against your brothers and wounding their conscience when it is weak, you sin against Christ. (1Cor 8:11-12)
 
Dene Ward