The Joy of Family

From the physical standpoint, this week has been rather difficult. Twice in the emergency room and then admitted to the hospital. But God has bestowed on me great joy as I have had not only my wife beside me but my daughter and son with me. They didn’t come because I needed them right now. Their plans for several weeks were to be here this week to visit. We were going to do a lot of things together. The Scripture reminds us that “I know the plans I have for you.” My plans involved playing games, having a home movie night, taking them to a special restaurant. God’s plans were to have them here for encouragement and for help for Emily. The Scripture reminds me that “In his heart man plans his course, but the Lord determines his steps.” Instead we have had some wonderful times to talk, to be with each other, to pray together, and to reminisce. Lots of treasured memories!

And I remember Exodus 15:26, “I am the Lord who heals you.”

What a great God we serve!

Haiku Images

I thought you might appreciate reading through the Haiku Cluster that the judges thought were worthy of first place winner in the competition. All of the haiku spring from the Scriptures related as listed.

Appropriate for the Easter season is “To say ‘I love you’ God sent a cross.” The truth that we are co-heirs with the eternal Godhead is incomprehensible, but the Scriptures certainly remind us how rich we are in Christ.

If a haiku or two moves you and you would like to share your thoughts, I would love to meditate on them with you.
A HAIKU CLUSTER
I bequeath to you,                                                                   Romans 8:17a
every sunrise I’ve painted,
all originals. -God

Adam, while you slept,                                                           Genesis 2:21-22
God slipped Eve into your bed,
then he left, smiling.

To say “I love you,”                                                                  John 19:17-18
we send flowers or a card,
but God sent a cross.

Five little fingers                                                                       Luke 2:7
squeeze young Mary’s nose and face
as God lies on straw.

Often mothers ’ prayers                                                         I Samuel 1:27
mend the broken jars of clay
they molded from birth.

Silent, by a grave,                                                                   II Corinthians 1:4
arm around a friend, healing
a hole in the heart.

Before life’s bookends                                                         Amos 4:12b
squeeze away your last-held breath,
prepare for closure.

A Conference to Remember

Last week my wife and I had the privilege of attending the Florida Christian Writers Conference at Lake Yale in central Florida. What an exciting adventure from the moment we registered on Wednesday afternoon and picked up our room key until we left on Sunday afternoon after lunch.

The time was filled with speakers, appointments with publishers and critique personnel, continuing classes and workshops. I learned so much from them as I had opportunities to talk about my writing – haiku, memoir, devotionals, and Bible studies for small groups. Outstanding!

But the most rewarding experience was spending time with Christian people who have the same love for our Lord and want to share it through their love of writing.

Marti Pieper, chaplain for the conference, critiqued my memoir, Naked with Clothes On. Diane Matthews critiqued my devotionals and also taught 3 days of 2-hour classes honing our skills in devotional writing.

More about it next week. In the meantime, I would love to hear from you if you have ever attended a Christian Writers Conference, or any other Christian Conference. It’s a time of getting to know fellow believers who are also on life’s spiritual journey. What a time we are having on this earth, and we only see through a glass darkly until we are eternally with the Lord.

I am asking the Lord to help me improve my writing skills so that they can “Spur one another to love and good works” (Heb 10:24).

NOTE THE NAME CHANGE: The blog name has been changed from Umbilical to Guardedhearts.

Wheelchair and Story Book

A finger pointed at me and a voice yelled, “You didn’t bring me my Bible!”

As I was leaving the nursing home, a motorized wheelchair spun around in front of me, blocking the exit. Thinking the man had lost control of it, I stepped around him, but he popped a wheelie and ended up in front of me again.

“You didn’t bring me my Bible you promised!”

“I”m sorry. What’s your name?”

“Jerry. Now, where’s my Bible?”

“I’ll be glad to get you a Bible, Jerry” and extended my hand. “I’m Leon.”Someone had promised him a Bible two months ago and had not followed through.

I purchased a Bible and had his name engraved on it. My wife and I took it to him. He was in bed, his head covered with a blanket. “Jerry, I’ve got your Bible.” He threw back the covers, grabbed it, and clutched it, “My own Bible.”

“Jerry, why did you want a Bible?”

“I like the stories in it?”

“Well, then you’re a Christian?”

“Oh, no. I just love the stories.”

The next two weeks, we read and discussed the flood (his favorite) and Jonah. The third week we studied John 3. The fourth week, I asked him if he wanted to personally know the Author of all his beloved stories??

“Yes, to know ’im just like you.”

“Whoever” and that means you, Jerry, “ believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.” He grasp my hand and we prayed. “So now I’m a Christian!”

“Yes, you’re born again.” He started introducing me as “his Reverend.”

Two weeks later, the Lord took him home from stomach complications.

Now Jerry is sitting at the feet of Jesus, hearing more stories he loves from their Author, the greatest Story Teller of all times.

Got an unusual conversion story? Please share it with others at leonpippin@gmail.com.

Wheelbarrow and Faith

One of my childhood fantasies was being a circus aerialist. I could picture myself flying through the air on a trapeze or walking across the tight wire, carrying a chair. Years later I read about Charles Blondin and relived my fantasy.

In 1880, before an English audience he pushed a wheelbarrow on a 180-foot  rope stretched above the cement floor of Crystal Palace in London. He then asked his awe-struck audience for a volunteer to ride across in the wheelbarrow. There were no takers.

To the spectators’ horror, a very young girl stepped out of the crowd and volunteered. As Blondin began to climb down the ladder, an elderly lady stepped up to her. “Little girl, do you know how high that rope is?”

“Yep!  Forty feet.”

“What makes you think you can trust this aerialist with your life?”

“He’s my dad.”

Just then, Blondin approached the lady, “Oh, I see you’ve met my five-year-old daughter,” he said as he hoisted Adele onto his shoulder and climbed back up the ladder.

He lovingly lifted her off his shoulder, carefully placed her into the wheelbarrow, and pushed her across as the crowd watched in unbelieving silence. The thunderous applause that followed was deafening.

None of my aerialist fantasies ever materialized, but as Adele trusted her earthly father, I want to trust my Heavenly Father to take me through fearful situations that often challenge my faith. So practice with me Jeremiah 17:7:  “Blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, whose confidence is in him.”

If given the chance, would you have gotten into that wheelbarrow?

*Picture used by permission

God and the Violin

A freak sideshow in nature? No, it’s for real.

After we had moved into our new home in Florida, one of the first projects on our “to do” list was to get bird feeders up and filled. My wife and I play a game to see who can be the first to identify a particular song bird. We marvel at the red-throated hummingbird’s sounds. We marvel at the painted bunting’s high-pitched singing in short phrases of variable pitches. But we marvel most at the sound made by a small tropical bird, different from the song of any other bird.

Deep in the tropics of Ecuador, an ornithologist heard what sounded like a miniature string orchestra. Baffled, he pushed his way through heavy vines and underbrush to watch a bird sing with its wings. A tiny red-headed bird’s wings created a loud, clear tone that sounded as if it came from a violin. The bird, called a club-winged manakin, sings, not with his throat but with his wing feathers as they vibrate to create violin-like sounds. If this ornithologist had been in tune with the manakin’s Creator, his discovery would have provoked praise to God as well as surprise.

The psalmist calls for all the birds to “Praise the Lord from the earth small creatures and flying birds” (148:10), so the manakin plays his “violin” to delight his Creator, a God of variety and surprises.

When the manakin “plays his violin,” he wings his music heavenward, first and foremost, to his Creator and his Creator lets us enjoy what he hears. As our human voices add our hymns of praise to the manakin’s “violin,” then our blended musical praise soars for the pleasure of, and glory to, our music-loving God of the universe.

Every time now when I hear a violin playing, I think about our delighted Father listening to his unique club-winged manakin’s “violin,” deep in the forests of Ecuador.

 

E-mail me and tell me what bird song you have recently heard that reminds you of God’s unique creation.  leonpippin@gmail.com

 

 

Did Jesus Really Preach Hatred?

Jesus turned to the crowds and said, “If anyone comes to me and does not hate his parents, his spouse and children, his siblings, and yes, even his own self, he cannot be my disciple!” Luke 14:26

He stopped them in their dirty, sandaled feet with that shocking statement.

Obviously, there is no half-heartedness, no neutrality, no middle ground, no lukewarmness, no fuzzy feelings in Jesus’ mind.

The praise chorus got it right: “Follow hard after Him.”

I once knew a professing Christian mother who lacked Jesus’ kind of “hatred.” All her waking hours were devoted to her 6-year-old son, with him, and for him. He dominated her conversation. She literally worshiped the ground he walked on.

I asked her one day,“ Don’t you think you give your son too much attention?”

Without hesitation she said, “Oh, no. He’s all I live for. He’s my life!”

That mother got it right. She correctly defined Jesus’ “hatred” command, but misapplied it.

Jesus is still turning to the crowds.  He stopped my Floridian sandaled feet one day.

He said, “If you come to me, you must doggedly chase after me so that you cultivate such a passionate devotion for me that the attachment to everything else seems as “hatred,” a lesser love.” [Pippin’s paraphrase]