Coming to the Still Waters

     Well, I'm in the infusion center getting round 2 of chemo.  Not so anxious this time because I know the routine.  Maybe I will put up a silent video of me hooked up and of Stephanie.  I come in at 8:15 am and will probably get to leave around 2:30 pm.  It makes for a long day in the chair.  Trying to keep my mind from running forward is the hard part.  We are in a room of mostly elderly people this morning and I know some are on the same treatment that I am on and I wonder how they do it.      James gives me 2 more verses to handle this Sunday.  It is one more thing that he wants us to look at.  This passage I have seen over and over again over the 25 years of ministry.  Here is the passage: "My brethren, if any among you strays from the truth and one turns him back, let him know that he who turns a sinner from the error of his ways will save his soul from death and will cover a multitude of sins." ...

     It all started with our thanks again to Skype to bring our family together from Texas and Virginia.  We laughed for 2 hours through the cyberspace video call.  Seeing and hearing our kids is good medicine.        Then Saturday held a parenting seminar that we wished we would have had 20 years ago but thankful to be able to use the principles in other relationships in our lives.  If you get a chance to see it, "Getting To the Heart of Parenting" by Paul Tripp is definitely a keeper.   Some insights from the seminar are:   How do I introduce God to my conversations with my kids?   The fruit represents the behavior of my kids and the roots represents the heart and the quality of the fruit is directly related to the condition of the roots so work on the roots (heart).   Only discipline when there is a direct clear rebellion to authority.   We all want self-parenting children (not reality).   Creat...

     Why did God slow me down in James and especially chapter 5?  I think I know now.  I would have just plowed through this with the idea of physical healing and this is what you do.  It would have been right in line with what I was going through.  But God slowed me down to make 4 sermons out of 1 and then to have the extra time to look at the words and the context of this text to come to a very important point.  Even though it is a blessing and praiseworthy of God to be relieved of a physical ailment, it is even more important and a blessing and praiseworthy of God to be relieved of a weary soul.      I wanted the Bible to say one thing but it really is talking about something else that is more important than what I wanted it to say.  In verse 13 James uses the contrast of two terms, suffering - weary or suffering of the soul, with cheerful - well being of the soul to set the stage for the passage.  In verses 14 and 1...