After St. Paul was shipwrecked off the island of Malta (Acts 27:42, 28:1-10) he left for Rome on a ship displaying the figurehead of the twin Greek gods Castor and Pollux. In one version of the story of these twins, they are identical, with the same mother but with different fathers. Pollux was said to be the son of Zeus, while Castor was the son of Tyndareus, a human king and the husband of their mother Leda. One boy was half god; the other all human, but identical in appearance and manner. When Castor was killed in battle Pollux begged Zeus to restore him or allow Pollux to die also. Zeus agreed to place both in the constellation Gemini so that they could be together.

There are several versions of the story but the idea of identical twins each representing either deity or humanity was interesting to me.

In Christianity, our God brings both together in one person, Jesus. When the risen Jesus speaks to Mary Magdalene, “Tell them I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.” (John 20:17), he placed his closest friends firmly in the very family of God as his own brothers and sisters. He knew that God had made him the single authentic link between holy God and all of humanity.

In the Bible there are twins whose stories have shaped the history of Israel. Jacob and Esau, twin sons of Jacob, through their story of the birthright reflect the character and intentions of God by contrast to each other. Given the same parents, Esau fails to see beyond his own appetites while Jacob grabs hold of an invisible God and hangs on. Both twins are entirely human, but one becomes the patriarch through whom God will send His very real son.

The myths of the pagan gods can show us much about human nature, but Zeus’ idea of immortality was to place his son and his son’s brother in a constellation . God’s idea of immortality is to offer His son so that humanity could share His immortality , becoming his own family.

Today we give names to a constellation to represent Castor and Pollux. Today we find actual eternal life in the name of Jesus, our brother, the living son of the living God, because He loves us.

Love in Him,

Prue

“How does a whole book get inside my Kindle while I’m just sitting here?” my mother asked me. I wanted to to tell her exactly what she wanted to know, but I was as puzzled as she was, so I laughed, and said, “It’s a miracle of modern technology, Mom.”

When I think of how fast the “ miracles of technology” have changed all of our lives, I’m reminded of Paul’s words: “No eye has seen, no ear heard ,nor human heart conceived, what God has prepared for those who love Him.”

( I Corinthians 2:9) And long before Paul, Isaiah saw this truth about God: “Since ancient times no one has heard, no ear perceived, no eye has seen any God besides you, who acts on behalf of those who wait for him. (Isaiah 64:4)

Our world is full of things the eye sees and the ear hears that are briefly amazing to us, like the GPS, the back-up cameras in our cars, self parking, not to mention self driving cars, robots and phones that are companions, and even a Kindle than allows us to carry an entire library with us. All these and countless more feed the illusion of utter self sufficiency in us.

The things that human beings have never heard or seen have to do with the Person of God Himself. Though God reveals Himself in His book, His prophet and Apostle both declare that there is much, much more that awaits those who “wait for Him “in love. The things of God are eternal and internal to the human spirit. They are accessed through joining our spirits to His in hope and faith and love. These are living attributes given us by our Creator, and when activated by a turning toward Him, open the door to His life.

The very moment that we ask ourselves, “I wonder if God could help me in this situation?” the Holy Spirit answers “Yes!” The door opens , and eyes and ears that have seen and heard only man-made miracles will glimpse something they have never seen or heard before.

Jesus said, “I stand at the door and knock; if anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with that person, and they with me.” (Revelations 3:20)

This is beyond what eye has seen or ear heard, yet it is a promise of the risen Christ, foretold by Isaiah and Paul.

Love n Him,

Prue

When my granddaughter was three years old we went for a walk that took us through a brick enclosure where our voices produced an echo that frightened her. We talked about the echo and she said that she didn’t want to walk that way again: “When we go to the zoo, and you can show me an echo, I’ll go,” she added. No amount otf explaining changed her idea of an echo.

Recently I couldn’t help thinking that the Scriptures are like echoes that reverberate a message that is sometimes scary and mysterious, and comes back to us in waves as we read and as we live. The Old Testament echoes with disasters that are almost unimaginable, of battles that result in unthinkable carnage and cruelty that comes from kings and pharaohs.

Such things resound with thunderous echoes, but there is another echo that also reverberates: the voice of God in the midst of the fear: “I will never leave you or forsake you. Be strong and courageous; don’t be afraid; do not be discouraged, for the Lord your God will be with you wherever you go.” (Joshua 1:9)

This message was echoed by David many years later to his son Solomon concerning the building of the Temple in Jerusalem, and the message “Do not be afraid” is echoed by an angel to Daniel: “Do not be afraid, Daniel. Since the first day that you set your mind to gain understanding and to humble yourself before your God, your words were heard, and I have come to respond to them.”(Daniel 10:19)

The echo of the words “Don’t be afraid” travels down the centuries until those words are heard by a young girl named Mary who will give birth to the Christ.: “Do not be afraid, Mary, you have found favor with God.”(Luke 1:29. Likewise the message came to Joseph: “Joseph son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary home as our wife, because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit.” (Matthew 1:20)

There is indeed much that is terrifying in our world, as there was in the biblical world, but the loudest, most persistent echoes from the Bible are the ones spoken by our God Himself, and the God of the ancient Hebrews: “Don’t be afraid.”

My granddaughter trusted me to show her an echo. Our God has supplied a real echo in His book, of His spirit in our lives. The more we read His book, the clearer the echo becomes, and the deeper the assurance that His words are true and truly resound with His love and assurance.

Love in Him, Prue

In the book of the First Thessalonians St. Paul writes of the end of the world and the second coming of Christ: “We who are still alive, who are left will be caught up together…in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever.” (I Thessalonians 4:17). Paul clearly believes that his relationship with the resurrected Christ will mean that he, Paul, as well as the Thessalonian believers, will not ever die. Paul wrote this letter early in his ministry; it may, in fact be the first of all his letters.

Some fifteen years later Paul wrote to the Philippians something else about himself: “For to me, to live is Christ, and to die is gain. If I am to go on living in the body, this will mean fruitful work for me. Yet what shall I choose:? I do not know! I am torn between the two.” (Philippians 1:21)

Even later, close to the time of his death, Paul wrote to his much loved disciple, Timothy, “For I am already being poured out like a drink offering, and the time for my departure is near. I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith.” (2 Timothy 4:6).

The distance between these letters, from first to the last, is astronomical. For Paul to travel between being the apostle who will not have to die, to being “poured out like a drink offering” signals a profound change in Paul that can be instructive to us.

Paul’s relationship to his supernatural God in Christ never wavered. His own happy notion of his future when he finally knew both that he didn’t have the choice he thought he had, and that he would in fact be dying, was grounded in Paul’s undying love for the One who had spoken to him on the road to Damascus, who had accompanied him through his life and ministry and had shared His Spirit with him in all his travels. All that he once thought would be true for himself proved not to be. Nevertheless, Paul’s sense of purpose and even achievement wasn’t marred by any change in his expectations. He called his fight “good”, and his faith is entirely intact: “And now there is in store for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, will award on that day—and not only to me, but also to all who have longed to see His appearing.”( 2 Timothy 4:8)

More even than the things Paul wrote, his love for Christ is a letter to each of us, and a well of God’s presence in our midst.

Love in Him,

Prue

A single verse in the book of I Chronicles tells the whole story of Jabez, a man who reached high for relief from what he regarded to be a curse upon him. It was his name, Jabez, which means “Pain,” for his mother had struggled in pain at his birth.

“ ‘Oh, that you would bless me and enlarge my territory! Let your hand be with me, and keep me from harm so that I will be free from pain.’ And God granted his request.” (I Chron. 9:4)

The Bible doesn’t tell us at what time and place Jabez realized that his prayer had been answered, or how old he was when he prayed it; it tells us only the astounding news that God answered his personal prayer for pain—free and prosperous life. Why?

In Jabez’ anxiety at the possible effect of his name being a curse on his whole life, he thought that he had no control over a future of misfortune and pain. In the midst of a world only partly committed to Israel’s God, Jabez opened his life and his fears to the only Source he believed could help him, and was heard. The curse of his mother’s choice of name for him was entirely lifted.

In this single verse the writer of I Chronicles displays the work of salvation in the lives of all people. This is the God to whom Jabez prayed. Jabez had nothing to offer but the belief that Israel’s God could and would work in his behalf. Many centuries later, in Ephesians Paul wrote, “Now to Him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine . . . to Him be glory. . . throughout all generations.” (Ephesians 3:20)

Jesus said, “If you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here,’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you.” (Matt. 17:20)

Here is the promise of resurrection itself. Here is the well of hope for everyone. Jabez didn’t doubt God’s power, and he asked for what he truly believed that he needed. When he received it, he knew where it came from, and never doubted.

Jesus also said, “Ask and it will be given to you, seek and you shall find, knock and the door will be opened to you.”(Matt. 7:7) It makes a daily adventure for us, and demolishes the curse of unbelief.

Love in Him,

Prue

Aoudads are sheep with curving horns native to North Africa, but introduced on other continents and states, including Texas. They resemble hairy goats. On Monday I watched an aoudad, ( or“Barbary sheep”) bathing in Possum Kingdom Lake, while a tall white heron stood by in the water as a witness. It was a scene that lifted me to an altogether different place. My daughter had cut the motor of our jet-ski in order not to disturb either the aoudad or the heron, and we watched transfixed a ritual that must have been common to them, but that was entirely new and fascinating to us, a glimpse of reality far from my normal one. Unlike the rest of my immediate family, I had never seen one of these exotic sheep at the lake. They are shy animals and there is a great deal of cover around the cliffs that surround the lake.

“As the rain and the snow come down from heaven and do not return to it without watering the earth and making it bud and flourish, so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater, so is my word that goes out from my mouth : it will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it. You will go out in joy and be led forth in peace; the mountains and hills will burst into song before you, and all the trees of the field will clap their hands.” (Isaiah 55:10-12)

For the first time I believed every word of this passage from Isaiah. When the prophet wrote that God’s word was as sure as the natural phenomena that fill all our needs and deliver joy to our eyes and our spirits, I knew that it was true. It’s true that on earth there is enough beauty and truth to express the inexpressible things of the kingdom of
God itself, and that God intended at creation for us to see Him in His handiwork, not just with our eyes, but also with our spirits when we contemplate His world full of messages about Him.

Every dunk of the aoudad’s head in the water, every ripple from the heron’s foot, spoke of the Lord; every sparkling drop when the aoudad shook his head flashed a rainbow, a word and a promise from our God. Their message, and the song of the mountains and the hills come from the Word of God.

Love in Him,

Prue

The World is too much with us; late and soon,

Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers:

Little we see in Nature that is ours;

We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon.

William Wordsworth, 1807

Alexander Bell invented the telephone in 1876. When Wordsworth wrote “The World is too Much With us” the world was inexpressibly less “with us” then than it is today: no phone, no television, no computers, no social media, no cars or airplanes; and yet Wordsworth saw “the World” as imposing so extensively into peoples’ spirits that they (we) had literally given their hearts away. Nature, to Wordsworth, being the greatest vehicle in life by which to reach a spiritual reality, was lost to us in the “getting and spending, when humanity “gave its heart away” to the world.

Little did Wordsworth know how much easier it would be to give away our hearts in modern times, when the “world” can invade our lives around the clock and we hardly notice.

From at least the time that love was a clear commandment from God: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength” (Deut. 6:5), to the time when Jesus made God’s love a tangible reality: “Lord, you know all things. You know that I love you.” (John 21:17) ,our “hearts” have been the focus of God’s relationship with us.

Jesus warned of the “Cares of the world and the deceitfulness of wealth” causing a separation from Him (Matt. 13:22), for the core of our being is in our “hearts”, which He has claimed from the very beginning. It doesn’t take modern technology to separate us from Christ. Wordsworth witnessed human hearts moving away from the love of God with little help from technology.

“Others, like seed sown on good soil, hear the word, accept it, and produce a crop—some thirty, some sixty, some a hundred times what was sown.” (Mark 4:8) .

However mysterious this crop may be, it is full of hope for everyone who hears and accepts. It’s the answer to the changing times and to our longing hearts. It is the very path God has put at our feet, and the fruit growing along the path is delicious.

Love in Him,

Prue

In the summer my oldest sister Nancy used to teach Red Cross swimming at a nearby municipal pool. It was one of her first jobs as a teenager and she took it very seriously. Half way through her first summer she came home and told us that she had discovered that praising the children for whatever little they could do in the water worked better than telling them what they were failing to do. She said that praise worked to motivate her charges every time, and from then on the teaching was much easier. I, who had never been gainfully employed, was deeply impressed at my sister’s wisdom and insight.

At church I sang “Praise God from whom all blessings flow”, and many other expressions of praise. Eventually I read Psalm 22: “But thou art holy, O thou that inhabit the praises of Israel.” It seemed clear to me that “praise” is a valuable thing, but exactly how it functions and what it really means evaded me.

Learning to swim is built on overcoming fear of the water, of sinking and drowning, before you have fully experienced the reassuring buoyancy in water. Praise must increase the self confidence and even the joy of the experience of learning to propel yourself through the water.

If God really “inhabits” the praises of His people is it possible that praise is a true and real link between very limited and fearful human beings, and an unlimited, all-sufficient God.? The Bible shows God to love praise from us, who are His own creations: “I will praise the Lord’s name in song and glorify Him in thanksgiving. This will please Him more than a bull with its horns and hooves.” (Psalm 69:30-31)

Praising in adversity has long been known to draw us closer to God, and to yield a better relationship with Him. In praise we unite with God through faith and come closer to His holiness. In praise our relationship with Him is renewed, and we remember Him yet again. As praise motivated Nancy’s young swimmers, it motivates us, too, to conquer our fear and rely on the relationship that God sought in creating us. Thousands of years ago the psalmist knew that praise is a sacrifice more to God’s taste than a bull.

Getting into water that may be over our heads is a sacrifice for anyone learning to swim.

Praising God in adversity is like being handed the life preserver and knowing you are safe.

Love in Him,

Prue

Once while I was shopping before Christmas I found a lovely white cardigan sweater with white embroidery and made a mental note to return to the store after Christmas to see if it was still there and on sale. As it happened, I did return, and to my surprise and great pleasure, the sweater was there in my size, and price reduced. In the drive home I silently prayed, “Thank you,, Lord, for such a sweet blessing, especially when I’m not in actual need of a sweater, but I will certainly enjoy wearing it.”

The thought crossed my mind, “The sweater is not for you!” Then I thought, “What a random idea; for whom could it be intended? I don’t even know who wears my size.”

Immediately I remembered that my sister-in-law, who had been a widow for a few years, with two boys still in school, was my size. I knew, too, that Ruth never spent money on herself, as her husband had left several debts. In addition, I knew that her birthday was very soon, though we usually exchanged only cards or a phone call.

There was now no doubt in my mind concerning who should receive the sweater, but I knew that my big challenge would be whether or not I would go ahead and actually send it to her. Eventually, sending it won out and I got it in the mail in time for Ruth’s birthday.

She called to thank me, and I knew I was happier than I would ever have been wearing the sweater. “The king will reply, ‘Truly I tell you whatever yo did for one of the least of these brothers or sisters of mine you did for me’” (Matthew 25:40). This experience left me wondering how many times I ight have missed the message by being too intent on my own desires and gratifications. The pleasure and gratitude I felt, so far out-stripped the pleasure I might have had wearing the sweater, that I believed that God was giving me a new window into my own self that would sustain me better than all my shopping trips.

“For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world, and forfeit his soul?” (Mark 8:3)

I didn’t feel rebuked for buying the sweater, but only a deep reminder of God’s purposes on earth and an adjustment of our relationship that conveyed His joy to me.

Love in Him,

Prue

Toad to Wait

A friend sent me a and made bookmark picturing a frog, that read, “I was toad to wait here.” It is a pleasure to slip into my book, but to my seven year old grandson it is hilariously funny and worth reading over and over again. I keep it in “Prince Caspian”, from the “Narnia” series, next to the bed where he sleeps when he visits. By now the book mark is very familiar, but it nevertheless produces the same delight and laughter every time he sees it. In turn, it makes me laugh, and I think of the bottomless well of joy and pleasure that sometimes exists in children, triggered by a simple incongruous thing.

I believe that every shriek of laughter, every smile that meets a smile in the eyes of another is a prefigure of heaven, of the joy of recognition of shared delight.

“Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. Truly I tell you, anyone who will not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it.” (Luke 18:16,17).

Jesus doesn’t single out the elderly or women or men to receive the Kingdom of God, but only children. He is talking to adults as he makes this assertion. How can the Father God be a father if his people refuse to be children, if they abandon their child-like joy in Him and in His creation?

Paul wrote that even after he had put the “ways of childhood “ behind him, there remained faith, hope , and love, all spiritual realities of both children and adults, and “the greatest of these is love” (1Corinthians 13:11&13)

It’s no accident that the promise of a child is the linchpin in God’s relationship to Abraham, the father of the Hebrew people, and of our faith.

Jesus’ words are very strong in regard to children: “If anyone causes one of these little ones-those who believe in me-to stumble, it would be better for him to have a large millstone hung around his neck and to be frowned in the depths of the sea.”(Matt. 18:6) Such strong admonitions come from the mind and heart of a parent for his children. They remind us that our lives are his personal ,passionate concern. He clearly knows the joy of shared pleasure with children as well a the sweetness of their undisguised love and faith in him. Children, it seems, are a great bond between us and our God. They are another way in which God engages us in His own life to share His joy. Certainly, we have all been “toad to wait on Him!”

Love in Him,

Prue