Humor - The Chicken and the Road

Why did the chicken cross the road?

That question has plagued mankind for ages.

What might a few famous people have said to answer this question?

Captain James T. Kirk: To boldly go where no chicken has gone before.

Dr. Seuss: Did the chicken cross the road? Did he cross it with a toad? Yes! The chicken crossed the road! But why it crossed, I’ve not been told.

Colonel Sanders:  What? I missed one?

A Very Moving Experience

On Sunday afternoon I had the great pleasure of participating in the ordination of David Scarlott at Hurstbourne Christian Church in Louisville, Kentucky. It is an awesome thing when the congregation ordains someone for Christian Ministry and says to the rest of the church that this person is qualified to be a pastor.

There is always some minor problem in proceedings like this. The church ordered a robe and stole as a gift for the new pastor. They were to be part of the  ordination service. The robe arrived in time but the stole did not. As I have a whole set of stoles I offered the loan one of mine for the ceremony.

The stole was one I purchased in 1999 when I stayed at the Episcopal Cathedral in Jerusalem. It is silk and made by the Cathedral Alter Guild as a fund raiser. My host the Archbishop of Jerusalem was pleased that I purchased the stole and laid it up on the alter and blessed it for me. To see it used in an ordination was a moving experience.  

PUNishment Joke

A fellow got up one morning and decided he no longer was going to shave himself, he was instead going to the barber for his morning shave. 

The town barber also happened to be the local pastor in town. When the guy walked into the barber shop the barber/pastor was not there, he was out on a pastoral call but his wife Grace was in the shop. 

The man said to Grace, "I want a shave." Grace told him to climb up in the chair and she gave him a shave. When Grace was finished he asked her how much for the shave and Grace said, "Twenty dollars." 


"Twenty dollars, that seems a little steep," the guy replied. 


Grace said: "That's my charge." 


So the guy gave her $20 bill and went on his way. The next morning when he got up he went to the mirror and looked and his face was as smooth as when he was shaved the day before. He checked the following the day, same thing, a week went by, two weeks and his face stayed as smooth as a baby's face. 


Finally after the third week he stopped back in the barber shop and Grace happened to be there. The guy said to her: "Grace, I can't believe I still don't need another shave. You did some kind of magnificent job." 


And Grace replied, "Well, you have been shaved by Grace and once shaved always shaved!"

Always Seeking Understanding

I love the Bible and it has been my passion for the past forty plus years to study and seek a greater understanding of its content. This passion has driven me to study the history and archaeology of the bible lands, the language and politics of its peoples. It is a constant effort to keep up with new scholarship regarding the scriptures and its people. It seems that every year archaeologist and historical scholars uncover new and exciting information.

The bible looks like a single book however it is a whole library of books written by different authors in at least two languages over a period of some four thousand years.  I love to pull a book off the shelf so to speak and delve into it and learn all that I can. I ask questions like who wrote this, when, in what language, to whom, and what was going on in the world at the time? Of course the big question is why was this written?

I always start my Bible study with a prayer. “God there is something about this book I do not know, open my mind to understanding and your wisdom.”

I have been teaching my version of through the Bible in a year course for over forty years. I call it my Basic Bible Study and I just finished my latest two classes at Hurstbourne Christian Church in Louisville. Each time I teach this course I learn more than my students. For me it is an awesome experience and I love it. I have been teaching an on line version for about ten years to students all over the world.

Betty and her SISTERS

Ever since my darling daughters put me on to JournalSpace as a place to blog I have enjoyed the friendship of three sisters who had journals there. Betty, Sally and Paula were all three good writers and great Christians. They befriended me almost as soon as I joined. When JournasSpace crashed the wonderful community there dispersed but I managed to keep up with the “Three Sisters of JournalSpace.”

When Betty’s husband died a part of her died too and now she has joined him. I will always remember her as a good soul who seemed to endure a lot of drama in her life. She was kind and had a heart of gold filled with love. I know that Sally and Paula will miss her and they are in my prayers.

SPRING 2011

Spring showed up on Sunday and I was unaware. I spent most of yesterday working in the back yard still cleaning up from the winter. Today I will turn the earth for the vegetable gardens so my darling can plant peas.

I love the Forsythia we planted last year because in the spring it is all yellow and then it turns green in the summer. We had them in the parsonage yard in Missouri and I have really missed them.

The warmer days lets me walk in the neighborhood rather than a mall and I do so enjoy that. The earth just seems to be waking up and i have an urge to make it a cup of coffee and say good morning.

Enjoy your Spring!

The Quick and the Slow of it

James 1:19  "You must understand this, my beloved, let everyone be quick to listen, slow to speak, slow to anger."

Our time is our life and yet we spend so much of it focused on things that sap our energy and crush our spirits. So many people only half listen to what others are saying and thinking that we have heard something we disagree with we lash out.

In doing so we lose life's many blessings that slip by unnoticed as our anger clouds our vision and our hearing.  Every moment of our lives are precious gifts that need to be savored and enjoyed. To waste them in needless anger robs us of love, relationships and joy. Taking the time to really listen to those around us is worth the effort and may reveal some wonderful blessings.

Be Quick to Listen! Be Slow to anger! Be even slower to speak out! When you do speak make your first words a positive affirmation of the person you are with then offer a corrections if needed and end with another positive word of praise. My mother use to tell me that God gave us two ears and one tongue so listen twice as much as you speak.