Summer in Portage...

... my favorite part of Indiana Summer

double cosmos

my first Sunflower!!

I LOVE these.... but can't remember the name...

rabbits foot fern from grandpa

blooming...

:)

Two Years

Two years ago today I married Christopher.

I am blessed by a man of God who is overwhelmingly patient, hilarious and deeply thoughtful.

I remember a few months after starting to date Christopher we drove to Wisconsin for Easter. We stopped at a rest area with a giant pink elephant. Christopher took a picture of me by it and I bought a sticker of the pink elephant. I put the sticker in my journal and filled the whole parallel page with "I am the Luckiest Girl in the world"


still true. :)

Visiting Grampa

Today I was reading about the Inspiration of the Scriptures... How inspiration is God's assurance that all the accounts of scripture are free from human error (as originally written) The author goes on to talk about illumination. Both are the work of the Spirit, one is presently available to all, the later... well I can not fully understand, it is for believers, for those searching, for those who do not believe... but it doesn't happen to every person every time they open this Holy Book... I want to be frustrated as I ponder it ... but how can I . The Sovereign God created a way to convey His truth and our opportunity for redemption so simple that a child can understand yet so deep its mysteries will never be fully known.

So I visited by Grandpa yesterday, and Im still processing parts of the experience. The smells and somewhat distant staff were frustrating but as I stood in this Lutheran Medical Center I was very discouraged by the lack of celebration.

Grandpa's room is one wing over from the Alzheimer Unit, so some of the higher functioning patients sit in his lobby. Some mumble and peddle their wheelchairs in circles, others watch quietly, their eyes seeming to say 'I'm in here'. Amidst the quiet conversation and pattering of the physical therapy room there is a somber quietness. And it discouraged me.

No worship music, no deep connection between nurses and patients, no indication that the people sitting around me are perhaps measurably near eternity. It is more a magnifying glass of the fading humanity... and i wish it was different. I wish it was inspired. no i mean Inspired, spiritually. I wish the truth of God's love, transformation and redemption was a reality free from error. That the idea of fading humanity would be replaced with ... celebration, and an invitation to those who may not know Christ yet. I realize this type of inspiration i'm hoping for is not actually tangible, the Bible is inspired in a way which is Holy, I don't think anything can be inspired in the same exact way... but... the celebration is what i'm longing for.

Grandpa was lucid and humorous while i was there. He joked about Grammy shaving his face off and enjoyed my stories about Christopher chasing 'our' Groundhog. He even smirked when i told him that Pippin doesn't like wet grass. His smile is amazing! And even though I wish I could create the perfect environment for him, I share his hope. Grandpa has experience the illumination of the Holy Spirit when ready Scripture. He knows Christ deeply, and even though we don't have conversations about eternity or theology, I am very sure of his quiet confidence; that some day ( hopefully a long way off) Grandpa will be absent from this body and ever SO present with the Lord.

Happy Birthday Home

July 30th marked one year in our first house... the house is about 60 years old but just one as our home. I pulled out some boxes of college books today, and started reading 'An Old Testament Theology' by Bruce Waltke. I literally opened the front cover and started. It was very refreshing! And for the first time, I felt able to absorb it, probably because I wasn't trying to read 4-7 books at once. :) So a quote from today's reading got me thinking... here are some unrefined cogitations:

'Post modernists realize the impossibility of grounding absolute truth on the finite human mind. Unfortunately they do not look to the spiritual virtue of faith in the God of the Bible to resolve the human epistemological predicament.'

What phenomenal understanding of our human limitation (by the postmodernist). How can a human mind fully 'know' anything?

And... i think its Biblical, 'The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork... not the Human mind so much.... oceans, day and night declare Gods glory to us. We know of God's existence not by the greatness of our minds but by His creative work.

Similarly we argue rational apologetic not because we create anything profound on our own but by previous information from which we conclude. Just as we learn to speak as children not by the creation of words in our minds but by God's creation of the Father and Mother who tirelessly say the simplest words over and over.

And so the postmodernist desires to dispel scripture because the mind cannot be its own grounding yet what a lovely compass... pointing north, our mind is not what determines scriptures truth but rather our mind points to something greater than what we can contain, know or impart. For if we can know nothing for certain on our own power, how did it ever come to be, and especially come to be sustained?

The grounding for genuine faith is not in our own mind, or feelings, or even experiences but in the Rock of our salvation. Jesus is the solid foundation from which we draw all truth and light. And when we are sure of anything in our faith, and true believe needs to boldly say it is not that 'I' am sure on my own ability to know or understand but that Christ has made me sure, just as he has saved me.

... And when we are not sure... well for those of us who doubt, there is hope that despite our attempts to understand anything (for doubt is trying to be sure of something in one's own power) there is grace ever-flowing from the way, truth and life.

It is also for this reason that I recently wonder if I should be more careful about the word 'creative'. Can anyone truly be a creator? I believe all new ideas which come to the poet, painter, mathematician, or architect are a manifestation of grace and should be used as a tribute to Him. These gifts are a metaphor of His redemption. He firsts gives to us so that we may become a vessel which yeilds all things to His work and for His Glory.