Monthly Archives: January 2017
“JESUS FREAKED PEOPLE OUT”
11 Soon afterward Jesus went with his disciples to the village of Nain, and a large crowd followed him.
12 A funeral procession was coming out as he approached the village gate. The young man who had died was a widow’s only son, and a large crowd from the village was with her.
13 When the Lord saw her, his heart overflowed with compassion. “Don’t cry!” he said.
14 Then he walked over to the coffin and touched it, and the bearers stopped. “Young man,” he said, “I tell you, get up.”
15 Then the dead boy sat up and began to talk! And Jesus gave him back to his mother.
16 Great fear swept the crowd, and they praised God, saying, “A mighty prophet has risen among us,” and “God has visited his people today.”
You have probably heard of “Jesus Freaks.” These are people who are fanatically (or deeply?) devoted to Jesus. But have you ever considered that Jesus himself tended to freak people out?
Take the above story, as an example. A boy was dead. His mom was a widow and she had only this one son. Now, she didn’t have him.
Tragic, yes! Freaky, no!
But then, Jesus showed up.
First, Jesus tells her not to cry.
That’s not freaky; that’s just a nasty blend of silly and cruel. Of course, she is crying. Who wouldn’t? Any of us who had just lost a loved one—especially a son or a daughter—would be even further devastated by such insensitivity. Any of us who would tell a grieving mother not to cry should probably be flogged.
But Jesus didn’t stop there. He touched the bier upon which the body was being carried to the tomb for burial. Then, Jesus said, very matter-of-factly, “Young man, I say to you, get up!”
And the young man sat up! Not only did he sit up. He also spoke up!
What did he say? We don’t know. It isn’t recorded. We can, of course, speculate.
“Thank you, Jesus!”
Maybe.
When he looked around, did he say, “What’s going on? Is this a funeral? Whose funeral is it?”
Perhaps.
“Hey! What am I doing in burial clothes?!?”
Could be.
“I’m not dead yet!”
That would be a famous line from a Monty Python movie, so perhaps not.
Whatever the young man said, I’m sure that the people were freaked out. Even his mother, as glad as she no doubt was, must have been at least temporarily wierded out.
Jesus did some strange things. He still does. I’ve never seen a miraculous resurrection, though I have heard of such things, and do believe that they happen once in a while.
But I have most certainly seen moral miracles. I’ve seen drunks and druggies raised from a living death—mostly death, with very little living. Jesus is still in the business of freaking people out. Jesus doesn’t seem to play be the rules.
Thank God for that! I myself am one of Jesus’ freaky miracles! So, perhaps, are you! Or, at least, you could be, if you would like.
“CIRCUMSTANCES AND DOING STUPID STUFF”
I use my circumstances as excuses (even I know they aren’t reasons!) for doing stupid, evil stuff. I didn’t sleep well (or enough), It’s cold and grey. It’s rainy. My wife is gone for several days, and I miss her. My kids won’t speak to me. I have to wait tables. I can’t find a better teaching position. I’m an addict. On and on and on . . . . Ad infinitum ad nauseam.
But here is the truth: I do stupid, evil stuff because I choose to do so.
And here is an even deeper truth: I can choose not to do stupid evil stuff. Instead, I can choose to do something loving for someone else. I can choose to praise God. I can choose to do the next right thing.
Circumstances are not excuses for anything. Circumstances are . . ., well let’s face the truth: Circumstances are circumstances!
Profound, isn’t it?
Well, maybe it is profound in a rather obvious way. Simple truths are the ones I most often trip over. They could be stepping stones, if I would remember to walk in the light of God. Instead I go stumbling around in the darkness of my own self-pity.
And that is the problem for me—self-pity, not circumstances. I feel sorry for myself. No amount of grey, rainy days can make me make bad decisions. Not sleeping well can make me sleepy, but not automatically grumpy.
Years ago I read the following: “No matter of ocean can sink a ship unless it gets inside.” I need to get out of the import business, when it comes to circumstances.
What would happen if I acted as if I believe what I’ve written here?
I think I’ll make some good choices and find out!
“WHEN SLAVERY LOOKS PRETTY GOOD”
“Isn’t it enough that you brought us out of Egypt, a land flowing with milk and honey, to kill us here in this wilderness . . . ?” (Numbers 16:12)
Sometimes, slavery looks pretty good.
The Bible tells about how God freed the people of Israel from bondage in Egypt (Exodus through Deuteronomy). And God’s plan was not simply to free Israel from something. God was also planning to bring Israel to something: their own land, a land that is frequently portrayed as “flowing with milk and honey.”
However, like all of us, the Israelites had a problem: themselves. They could be thankful for short bursts, but for long periods, they complained. In fact, as has often been noted, the most popular outdoor sport of the Israelites during their journey from Egypt to Israel was complaining.
What did they complain about? It would be easier to say what they didn’t complain about. They complained about food—no food, the same food day after day, no meat. They complained about water—or, rather, the lack of water. They complained about the desert they were in. They complained about the “fact” (??) that they were not able to conquer the land that God had given them. (Their penalty for this complaint was that they were not able to conquer the land that God had given them.) They complained about their leadership.
Now, before we go all smug and judgmental about this bunch of complaining Israelites, we should perhaps take a look in the mirror. Let’s face the truth on this Monday morning: Complaining is an equal-opportunity employer. We are all of us complainers. Paul warns believers of this in 1 Corinthians 10:1-13, referring to the stories of complaining (and other sins) Israel committed in the wilderness. Paul also warns us that such complaining and other sins are common temptations that all people face (verse 13). When someone asks me how I am, I sometimes reply, “Can’t complain!” However, I can complain and sometimes I do.
So, in Numbers 16, some of the Israelites are complaining that Moses has not brought them into “a land flowing with milk and honey” (verse 13). In fact, the complainers refer to Egypt as “a land flowing with milk and honey” (verse 12).
Say what!
Wasn’t Egypt where they were slaves? Wasn’t Egypt where they felt the whip of the taskmasters? Wasn’t Egypt where they had to throw their male babies into the Nile River to feed the crocodiles? Wasn’t Egypt where they had cried out to God for deliverance from Egypt and all it stood for?
Well, yes. But now that the Israelites were in the wilderness and not yet in their own land, Egypt looked pretty good. Will Rodgers was a funny guy, but he wove a lot of truth into his humor too. For example, he said, “We are always yapping about the ‘Good Old Days’ and how we look back and enjoy it, but I tell you there is a lot of hooey to it. There is a whole lot of all our past lives that wasn’t so hot.”
So, how about you and me? How did you and I used to be enslaved? How do we remember said slavery? Perhaps we complain because the past seems better than our present. (Notice the operative word in the preceding sentence: “seems.”)
However, maybe it’s the other way around. Maybe past slavery seems better because we’re complaining. Maybe if we practiced the fine art of gratitude right here and right now, we would discover a more realistic attitude toward our past, our future, and (most importantly) our present situation.
GETTING RID OF THE MID-WINTER GRUMPIES
I woke up grumpy this morning. (I will spare you the ancient joke about the woman who said, “Sometimes I wake up Grumpy, and sometimes, I just let him sleep.” . . . Oops!)
Why?
Is it really so important for me to understand the why of things? I doubt it. But here goes anyway:
- It is a grey, cold, icy day.
- I’m not feeling well physically.
- I’m worried about our financial condition.
- I haven’t been sleeping well for the past several weeks.
- We are going to a new computer order entry system at the restaurant where I work, and I am not sure that I can learn it.
But here is the bottom line: None of these “whys” are particularly wise or helpful. They are not reasons. They are excuses. The truth is that I am crabby because I am choosing to be crabby today.
So, what am I going to do about this?
I’ve already done a few things.
- I’ve made a gratitude list of 50 items. (Perhaps I should go back and review it.)
- I’ve read some Scriptures. (Perhaps I could read, out loud, some praiseful passages.)
- I already ate breakfast.
- I can listen to some good, uplifting Christian music. (Okay, so I just turned on K-Love radio.)
- I can get some exercise later today.
- I can do some fun stuff. (Writing blogs is sometimes fun.)
- I can get some significant work done. (Writing blogs is work. Significant? Well, I hope that it is!)
There is one more thing I can do. Oswald Chambers writes somewhere that “moods don’t go by praying; moods go by kicking!” Yes!
So, that is my attempt to help myself (and you, gentle reader) with my (your) mid-winter grumpies. Perhaps these things might work during any season of the year.
TIME TO PLAY, PAPAW!
Yesterday, I had a lot to do. Quite a few things didn’t get done—on purpose!
My wife is taking care of her mom, who has a lot of health problems. So, each week, my wife is gone for several days.
Her mom lives about an hour away from us, so I don’t get up there very often. Too busy.
However, sometimes I decide that my TO DO list shouldn’t be in all caps.
This week, my wife and I were talking on the phone about the middle of her time away at her mom’s. She mentioned that my mother-in-law would love to see me. (I think my wife meant that she would also be glad to see me, but I figured that I had better just assume this.) I told my wife that, no, I was too busy.
As soon as I hung up, I felt that gentle nudge that I often suspect is God. “You’re not too busy. You need to go up there,” said the Nudge.
I don’t think I would have gone (despite the Nudge), if it had not been for a story a friend of mine told me the other day. He was playing a game with his granddaughter that she had invented. She is a toddler, and toddlers invent some of the most wonderful games. This one involved her running over to a door, touching it, and running back to her grandpa, who would then scoop her up. It involved a lot of giggling on the part of the participants. It sounded as if this game for two involved two winners.
Later in the day, after they had been playing, the adults (including grandpa) were having a nice adult holiday meal. The door-touching giggle box did not seem to recognize this “adults-only” aspect. She came to her grandpa, grabbed his finger, and tried to pull him off his seat at the table. It was time to play. It didn’t take him very long to get the message!
So, because of God’s nudging and my friend’s story, I got in the car and drove to the home of mother-in-law, visited for a couple of hours, and headed back home.
Some things on my list didn’t get done yesterday, but it was a good day!
“MY UN-HORSEMANSHIP SKILLS”
When I was little, there were lots of westerns on t v. So, I thought I would like to ride a horse.
Then I got to ride a horse. It was not an enjoyable experience. My brother brought his quarter horse from Colorado to pasture it on my Dad’s farm in Ohio. He invited me to go for a ride with him to cut our Christmas tree from the back of our farm.
So there we were: a big brother who was a pretty good horseman, a fairly well-behaved quarter horse named “Sugar,” a nine-year-old kid who had never been on a horse, a two-bitted axe, and (on the way back) a six-foot pine tree.
You can tell this story is not going to end well, can’t you?
Actually, nothing tragic and permanently debilitating occurred. That was thanks to my brother and to Sugar. However, it was most definitely not a fun experience. My brother complained about me to Mom. I still remember what he said: “He sits on a horse like a sack of potatoes!”
I have never seen a sack of potatoes riding a horse. I think that may have been my brother’s main point.
Life is like that. Sometimes you get what you want, and find out that it is much more demanding than you had ever dreamed. The analogy between riding horses and life holds at many levels.
First of all, I suppose that you need to start off with a horse that is suited to your skill level. Beginners need a fairly docile horse. Galloping is neither required nor wise at this point. Wanting to do too much or to be too much too fast is not a good idea.
The path matters too. Most of us are not good enough at life to stray too far off the more straightforward paths. And there are some paths that even a master horseman ought not to attempt. As an addict, I have a tendency to want to ride my horse over a cliff. However, we are not talking about the winged horse Pegasus here. Horses and their riders need to be careful as to what path they are taking.
I have often been told that horses (as well as other animals) can sense fear, and that it is important that the rider not show (or feel?) fear. A certain amount of confidence is essential to riding. When I was little, confidence was not something I had learned to either spell or have.
Balance is important in riding. I am not naturally a balanced person. I tend to lean to the right. Then, I tend to overcompensate to the left. Before long, I’m looking up at the belly of the horse, hoping that she doesn’t kick me or step on me.
Finally, those who learn to ride a horse are those who get back on the horse after they have fallen off or been thrown. Life is not easy, and we will fall off or be thrown. An old movie about a rodeo rider (“Lonely Are the Brave,” I think it was) had an experienced rider say, “There never was a horse that couldn’t be rode, and there never was a cowboy that couldn’t be throwed.” That may not be good English, but it’s a good truth to remember.
EPILOGUE
Years after my Christmas tree expedition, my wife and I took our kids to a stable to ride horses. While the kids went for a ride on a beginner’s trail, I chatted with one of the wranglers. I admitted to him that I was not a horseman, that I was, in fact, afraid of horses. He was a nice guy who could have sold an Eskimo a freezer. Somehow he got me up on a horse (for free!), and had me riding by the time my kids got back. My kids, especially my oldest daughter, were amazed. So was I!
Anyone care to go for a ride with me on a horse named “Life?”
THE VITAL IMPORTANCE OF “WE”
One of the topics this morning in my twelve-step addiction recovery meeting was the importance of “we.” It is the first word of step 1. “We admitted that we were powerless . . . and that our lives had become unmanageable.”
One brother in the struggle commented that “we” is not only the first word. It is also the most important word.
The word “we” is important for a number of reasons.
First, the word “we” is important because it strikes at two of the taproots of addiction: secrecy and isolation. When we give our bottom lines or give a lead (tell our story), we are placing a dynamite charge at the base of the secret aspect of our addiction. To change the analogy, I am told that certain bacteria cannot survive in the sunlight. Neither can active addictions.
The second deep root of addiction is isolation. If secrecy is our choice to hide our behavior, isolation is our feeling that we are alone in our very existence. When we come together in meetings, we realize that there are others—many others, in fact—who are very different from us, and yet just like us. Such togetherness (with accountability, but without judgment) is incredibly healing.
Third, when we come together, we learn from one another. Those who have had a slip or a relapse teach us that we also are vulnerable, and that we need to be careful rather than complacent. We learn from the stories of others what has worked for them. We may try some of their ideas. Some of the things that worked for them may also work for us. Some do not. We have a saying in meetings: “Take what you like and leave the rest.”
Fourth, when people share, we often see ourselves in them. We hear their rationalizations as to why it is “okay” for them to act out on their addiction, and we suddenly recognize that we have been reasoning in the same non-rational manner.
Fifth, we receive encouragement. Even the most helpful insights in the world are not enough to keep an addict from being an active addict. Without encouragement, insights are like my weights: useful, except for the fact that I rarely pick them up. Encouragement gives us the strength, courage, and hope to make use of the insights we receive in meetings, in conversations with our sponsor, or in informal conversations with other recovering addicts.
Of course, for those of us who are Christ-followers, the word “we” is very important, too. “Jesus and me!” Yes, that is very important! But we also need the motto “Jesus and us!” As has often been pointed out, the first word in the Lord’s Prayer is “our.”
MOSES, GOD, AND THE BURNING BUSH: CURIOSITY, REVERENCE, AND SURRENDERING TO OBEDIENCE
It might seem as if the words in the title of this post have nothing to do with one another. However, there is a story that has all of these components: the story of Moses and the burning bush. The story is found in Exodus 3-4 in the Bible.
Moses had been adopted in the court of Pharaoh, King of Egypt. (You might say that he had a “court-appointed” guardian, but you would only make such a bad pun if you have my particular brand of humor. For your sake, as well as for the sake of those around you, I hope that you don’t!)
Moses eventually got on the bad side of the king because Moses killed one of the king’s low-level officials. Kings don’t like it when someone murders one of their officials. Moses ran for his life.
Eventually, he got into the d.p.p. (desert protection program), which was a bit like the witness protection program. He assumed the identity of a shepherd in the Sinai Desert.
It was while he was taking care of the sheep that belonged to his father-in-law that Moses encountered a strange phenomenon: a bush that burned, but did not burn up. (See Exodus 3-4 for further details.)
Apparently, there wasn’t a lot of excitement in the desert. No t v, no Facebook or Twitter—in fact, no internet access at all! So, Moses decided that a burning bush that didn’t burn up was worth a look-see.
Moses didn’t hear the voice of God until he yielded to his curiosity. The biblical story is very clear about that. “When the LORD saw that he had gone over to look, God called to him from within the bush . . .” (Exodus 3:4). Apparently, one of the conditions for hearing the voice of God is curiosity.
But as soon as the LORD God saw that Moses was curious, God decided to take him to another level: reverence. “Don’t come any closer! Take off your sandals. The ground you are standing on is holy ground.”
Curiosity without reverence swiftly becomes irreverence. The difference between holy curiosity and garden-variety nosiness is the fear of the LORD. I’m afraid that I am often more curious than reverent. In fact, I would hazard a guess that this is true of our entire culture. Curiosity can lead to deep insight and profound growth. It can even lead to a life-changing life’s calling. Such a life-calling can transform our own lives and can, as with Moses, lead to the transformation of others. Many a transforming liberator has begun his difficult and unwilling journey by being curious, but the journey is continued and energized by reverence.
But then, comes the really hard part: obedience. Moses struggled with that one—a lot! In the face of God’s sending Moses back to Egypt, Moses tried to wiggle out of God’s call. Moses presented one excuse after another, until finally even the All-Patient One lost his patience with Moses.
But, in the end, Moses obeyed. And while postponed obedience is disobedience, when we finally do obey, it is still obedience. It’s not pretty, but it is obedience.
Curiosity, reverence, and obedience: They may not be the Holy Trinity, but they are important.
SERVING GOD, WITH SLEEP OR WITHOUT
I did not sleep well last night. I am reminded of two approaches to serving God. One comes from the New Testament, the other from Martin Buber’s Tales of the Hasidim.
Paul, in defending his apostleship, boasts that he had served God “through many sleepless nights” (2 Corinthians 11:27).
I’m afraid that I don’t always use my sleeplessness to serve God or others. Instead, I use sleeplessness to serve as an excuse for being a self-serving so and so! (Truth hurts, but it also heals.)
But the question is, what will I do with my sleeplessness today? Will I be pleasant to people, or will be a member of that huge clan called “the Whiner Family?” Will I seek to glorify God, no matter how well or poorly I’ve slept?
Then, there is another story that goes in the opposite direction. It is the story of Rabbi Shmelke, one of the early Hasidim, who lived in Nikolsburg (a town in what is now called Moravia, near Austria). Rabbi Shmelke lived from 1726-1778. One of the wonderful stories about him involves sleep.
“Rabbi Shmelke did not want to interrupt his studies for too long a time, and so he always slept sitting up, his head resting on his arm. In his fingers he held a lit candle which roused him when it guttered and the flame touched his hand. When Rabbi Elimelekh visited him, and recognized the power of the holiness which was still locked within him, he prepared a couch for him and with great difficulty persuaded him to lie down for a little while. The he closed and shuttered the windows. Rabbi Shmelke slept until broad daylight. It did not take him long to notice this, but he was not sorry he had slept, for he was filled with a hitherto unknown sunny clearness. He went to the House of Prayer and prayed before the congregation as usual. But to the congregation it seemed that they had never heard him before. They were entranced and uplifted by the manifest power of his holiness. When he recited the verses about the Red Sea, they gathered up the hems of their kaftans for fear the waves towering to the left and right might wet them with salty foam. Later Shmelke said to Elimelekh: ‘Not until this day did I know that one can serve God with sleep’” (Martin Buber, Tales of the Hasidim, volume 1, pp. 187-188).
So, according to Paul, God can be served and glorified in, and presumably by, sleeplessness. According to Rabbi Shmelke, God can be served in, and presumably by sleep. Who is right?
I am rather fond of the saying, “If you come to a fork in the road, take it.” The truth is this: Everything, when submitted to God, can glorify God. God can and will use everything to bless us. We can also use everything to serve God and others.
The only question is this: Will we choose to do so?
No, on second thought, that is not the question. The question is this: Will I choose to do so?
“ON READING ON WRITING: SERIOUSLY FUNNY”
I am trying to learn to be a writer—or, at least, a better one. So, I am doing two things: writing more and reading/listening to good writers more.
I am rereading Stephen King’s book On Writing. I am enjoying it even more this time.
I am trying to read the what of King’s writing, but also the how of his writing. How is he doing what he is doing with a particular word, phrase, sentence, paragraph, or story?
King uses wonderful metaphors in his stories. In fact, he uses a metaphor for his stories of his early childhood. He calls them “snapshots.”
Some of the snapshots are funny. Some are scary. Some are puzzling. Some are all of those and more at the same time.
But he also annotates his snapshots. His teenage babysitter when he was four used to fart in his face. King drolly comments that this prepared him for literary critics. Yes!
Everything is grist for the literary mill. But you have to know how to mill it. And that means grinding it out.
This involves, for me at least, a light touch with serious matters. I want to write seriously helpful stuff, but I don’t want to be morbidly obese about it.
I have noticed that the authors I like to read and reread are the ones who invite me to laugh, but also to do some serious thinking about important realities: life, death, what is important, relationships, politics, work.
The Old and New Testaments also make serious observations with irony and humor.
Yes, I do realize that irony and humor are different things. But, like sibling twins, they share at least some of the same dna.
Take Cain, for example. The story about him is found in Genesis 4. He kills his brother Abel. When God asks Cain where his brother is, Cain responds with a statement and a question, “I don’t know. Am I my brother’s keeper?” I often hear people quote this saying, sometimes with approval. I wonder if they realize that they are quoting the first murderer, according to the Bible.
As part of the LORD God’s punishment, Cain is told that he will be a vagabond, a wanderer (näd, in Genesis 4:12). Yet the narrator who is telling the story says that Cain settled down in the Land of Wandering (nôd, Genesis 4:16). How on earth do you “settle down” in “the Land of Wandering?”
Precisely! The narrator wants us to see that, if we abuse or kill our brother, we will be exiled—even when we think we are settling down. As I heard one preacher say many years ago concerning the Lord’s Prayer, “We cannot say ‘Our Father,’ unless we are also willing to say, ‘Our brother.’”
So, the writers I like—whether ancient or modern—have some serious things to say, but they say those things with humor. That is the kind of writer I would like to be.
As has often been said, “Many a truth is uttered in jest.”
DOWN TO EARTH BELIEVER
- DTEB, “Getting Christ and Ourselves Back in Focus” November 11, 2024“Col. 3:1 ¶ If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Col. 3:2 Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. Col. 3:3 For you have died, and your life is hidden […]
- “Search Me!” October 27, 2024“Psa. 139:23 Search me, O God, and know my heart! Try me and know my thoughts! 24 And see if there be any grievous way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting!” (Psalm 139:23-24, English Standard Version) I am participating in a Bible study, and this is a prayer […]
- “Christian Speech” October 26, 2024“Eph. 4:29 Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as fits the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear.” Foulkes, in his excellent commentary on the Book of Ephesians, writes the following, which I quote at some length: “29. Now the […]
- “God is in the Details” October 11, 2024“The devil is in the details.” (A general saying, often quoted by lawyers, reporters, and negotiators.) “God is in the details.” (Me, almost certainly not original.) “Luke 12:7 Why, even the hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear not; you are of more value than many sparrows.” (Jesus) God does not micromanage, but God […]
- “Grandma’s Pump” October 8, 2024When I was a little critter, I would stay at my grandma’s house for a night or two sometimes. I liked this for a lot for many reasons. One thing I liked about staying with her was that Grandma’s house was much more technologically advanced than ours was. For one thing, she had indoor water—sort […]
- “Wearing the #14 Wrong-Side-Out” October 5, 2024Pete Rose, #14, is dead. Many of the old guys with whom I play softball watched him play and appreciated him greatly. I do as well. He was one of the greatest players who ever played the game. Yes, he admitted (eventually) to betting on baseball. But many of us still regard him as one […]
- “Passing Along the Love (and a Link)” October 4, 2024Several years ago, a friend of mine put me onto a daily meditation by Richard Rohr and friends. I don’t read them all the time, but I probably should. They are good! I thought that today’s writing was especially good, and I also figured that this would be a good way to post something. I […]
- “Witnessing Versus Being Witnesses” September 19, 2024“Acts 1:1 In the first book, O Theophilus, I have dealt with all that Jesus began to do and teach, Acts 1:2 until the day when he was taken up, after he had given commands through the Holy Spirit to the apostles whom he had chosen. Acts 1:3 He presented himself alive to them after […]
- “A Bathroom Prayer for Hurting Hands” September 11, 2024A week ago Sunday, my hands were hurting so badly at church that I went to the bathroom to run hot water over my hands. Arthritis perhaps, or carpal tunnel, or general orneriness—I don’t know why my hands hurt, but they do. They have for years. So, while I was running hot water over my […]
- “Waiting and Seeking” September 10, 2024“Lam. 3:19 ¶ Remember my affliction and my wanderings, the wormwood and the gall! Lam. 3:20 My soul continually remembers it and is bowed down within me. Lam. 3:21 But this I call to mind, and therefore I have hope: Lam. 3:22 ¶ The steadfast love of the LORD […]
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