Papa Pat Tiny Devotionals

Monday, April 30, 2013 Today is the last Monday of my middle age. I turn 60 next Sunday and will be officially an old person. Now, from the outside, that may seem to be a bad thing. Eww. Old. Can't do stuff. Rickety. But the outside view is wrong, wrong, wrong. (WARNING: VAST OVERSIMPLIFICATION AHEAD!) I chose to take all of the behaviorist classes I could while I was in school. What makes behaviorism different from humanist, or existential, developmental, gestalt, and the other million ways of understanding the human condition is that it focuses strictly on behavior. It's not true that behaviorists deny that there is a soul, or a mind; it's just that the behaviorist says "It's not your mind that gets you into trouble. It's your behavior." The Hollywood stereotype of the psychoanalysist has the patient lying on a couch, talking about dreams, what were the first things he remembered, etc.The behaviorist says: What problem behavior do you want to change, or ...

Tuesday, April 23, 2013 Proverbs 23: 26 Give me your heart, my son, And let your eyes delight in my ways. I don' t kno w of a scripture that has hit me as hard about parenthood as this one.  Earlier in this proverb, there are a number of admonitions to sons: don't do stupid stuff, son, you'll break yer mama's heart. Said much better than that, of course. And it's all really, really good advice. But this verse, right here, gets to the fundamental essence of being a parent.  First, Give me your heart. The promise of "I'll take good care of it" is implicit. Give me your heart. Trust me. Give me your heart. Believe in me. What an audacious statement! What parent would DARE to say to their older-than-10 child, "give me your heart?" And yet, isn't that what we are saying to them, with everything we do? Even if we don't ever, ever say those words? Isn't every act of loving and caring for a child saying , give me your heart? My grandson c...

Well, yesterday I searched my heart and learned somethings. And, in an expanded form, I think yesterday's blog might be worthy of going further. But I have to add this addendum, because it is also an illustration of the fool rushing in and paying the penalty. Background: After months of anti-inflammatory therapy with meloxicam, the day came when my gastro-intestinal tract could no longer tolerate it it. From heartburn to the other end, it seemed like I had nothing but problems. Doctor suggested another, milder NSAID, but it did the same thing. My gut symptoms gradually eased, while my pain symptoms rose up and grabbed me by the throat and shook me like a terrier shakes a rat.  Over time, of a couple of weeks, I began to tolerate the pain better, or it eased, I don't know which. I do know it became less demanding. But the gut stuff never quite went away. Now, we're in the midst of pollen season here, and the levels are such that if you don't live in it, you wouldn't ...

Monday morning, April 22, 2013 Proverb 22: 3 (NASV) 3  The  prudent sees the evil and hides himself, But the  [ b ] naive go on, and are punished for it. I had a long teachable moment on this topic this weekend. It involved a parable/aphorism and a true story, and what it looked like was Kenneth and I sitting on his bed with the door closed. The aphorism first: "If you poke a dog with a stick, you might get bitten. If you poke a bear with a sick "; here Kenneth interrupted me and said "he'll kill you."  Yeah, I said, he might. He might run, but he might kill ya. You never know. And then I told him the story.  I was in the Cub Scouts, and I think it was in the 3rd or 4th grade. We wore our uniforms to school, and there was another Scout there, a much bigger, much older boy. His uniform showed that he had been in Scouts for three years, but he only had three merit badges. I thought that was hilarious, and so I proceeded to make loud fun of him. "Three years i...

Well, the last time I did this, I suffered a shiver-me-timbers blood sugar episode, and that left me unable to do much more than close my eyes and lean back. Then later on in the day, suffered another one, not as strong the second time, though. It did keep my pretty much shut down for the rest of the day. BUT: now let me return to I Thess 1. Paul writes: Grace to you, and peace. Growing up in the semi-rural South, I knew the word 'grace' first from the prayer that was said at the start of every meal. It seemed to take three forms: the rote prayers of children (God is great, God is good); the rarer times, usually at holiday meals, when it was an opportunity for someone to be long-winded; and finally the occasions I remember as a young teen when my step-father would use the occasion to scold me to God. Now maybe he wasn't doing that; sure felt like it. But, whatever form it took, it was a prayer said before a meal, and that CAN'T be what Paul was writing here.  The second...

I'm still in a study of I Thessalonians 1. In fact, I'm still on verse 1. But today is different from yesterday. Which is kind of apparent, hey?  But let me point out a couple of ways that today is differnt from yesterday. For one, it's Friday. and from now on, all Fridays are Red Fridays. Remember Everyone Deployed, until they all come home. For another, I've decided that the music to listen to while I'm writing is better to be Brooks Williams on Pandora, as opposed to worship music. It's not that I have anything against worship music; it's just that the function of the music is largely to drown out the sound of the kids and not to distract me, and the LOVELY acoustic guitar licks of Brooks Williams do a much better job of that than worship music. Elevator music for the soul? Nah. It's just that it's soothing, delightful, and it doesn't demand my attention the way that worship music does from time to time. And another thing that's different ...

I'm reading Paul, Silvanus, and Timothy's letter to the church at Thessalonica. And I'm trying to break it down into little chunks so i can understand it. And I'm trying to put that into this blog, and I'm doing it with a needy cat in my lap. I wonder if Paul ever had to deal with a needy cat? And the first thing that strikes me is that the grammar is sort of strange. If I was writing to Liberty Church, I'd write it "To the church  of God in Marietta." Not that Liberty is the only church in Marietta, nor is Liberty a part of the denomination called the Church of God. But the letter says 'church OF the Thessalonians'  'IN God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.' I really don't want to put a whole lot of emphasis on prepositions, since it's been 30 years since I took Greek and I didn't study then, and I'm not pulling out my Greek New Testament, and I'm not even comparing the NASV with the NIV. But let's just pret...

Saturday, April 6, 2013 I've been sober now for over 25 years; 9227 days, in fact, if the counter on my desktop is accurate.  I didn't quit because I wanted to join a neat club, although I have joked that the reason I wanted to join AA was so I could hang around with people with tattoos and and have to worry about getting beat up. I quit because I was desperate.  I quit a LOT of times because I was desperate. And then, after a couple of days, I wouldn't be desperate anymore, so I'd drink again; or after a week (don't know how long I might have pulled off THAT much dry time) I'd be desperate, but this time desperate for a drink, so I'd drink again. And I'd drink until the next time I was desperate. But what made me quit, and STAY quit, was not desperation; it was the slight tingle of hope. I went to a meeting, and I heard Ron talk about what it had been like, and what had happened,and what it was like now, and I got this idea, that maybe this thing might ...

I've noticed that my typos are significantly more numerous than they have been in the past. Not just here, but everywhere I type. Well, I think it COULD be because I cut off the end joint of the middle finger of my right hand. I just ain't able to hit the keys with that finger like I useta, and it's thrown me off. My ring finger is gradually taking up the slack, but until I get the new habits well developed, It's gonna be clunky.

And it's Friday. How's the circle going? Well, it's doing just fine. I received encouragement and direction for my home group leader, Andrew. Then I received extensive counsel via email from my pastor PJ, and after working through basic issues, met with him and Andrew and Chuck, the care pastor for our service. And that was a good circle. PJ chewed on me; he knows I'm chewable, and that I take him seriously. Wanna know what my sin was? Wanna tell me what YOUR sin is, first? No? well, I'll tell you: it's that I let things go, and then over-react.  Okay. I can deal with that. Defend it? No way.  Why would I ask somebody to tell me how to do the right thing, and then spend my time telling them I already knew how to do the right thing? I'm after healing. I ain't tryin' ta justify myself. There's nobody I care to justify myself to; either my behavior commends itself, or it doesn't, and if I want to get any better, I've got to let my circle tak...