Papa Pat Tiny Devotionals

 A great good morning to all my friends and neighbors in Internet Land! And to family members who have dropped by, I had the drier replaced. Open your mouth, judge righteously, And defend the rights of the afflicted and needy. Proverbs 31:9, NASB Before the celebration of the Righteous Woman, King Lemuel’s mama had some advice for him about ruling, concluding with this verse.  Makes me wonder if he was hopping around like a lion cub singing “I Just Can’t Wait to be King!” Why be concerned about rules for kings? The only King I know is my little friend in Bogo City. He’s a toddler, and while he DOES have rules, his mother, father, and Big Brilliant Blessed Beautiful sisters Kech and Kehr establish his boundaries, not the rules.  (Anyone with a big sister can testify to this!) King and the Beautiful Ladies Here’s what occurs to me: if we know the rules for leaders, we have a means for assessing how our leaders are doing. If they fail to ‘Rule by The Rules,’ then we get to v...

A great good morning to all my friends and neighbors in Internet Land! And to family members who have dropped by, it’s Alicia Ann’s 17th birthday. Got presents? There is a kind who is pure in his own eyes, Yet is not washed from his filthiness. Proverbs 30:12 NASB In Proverbs 30, Agur, son of Jakeh, supplies wisdom statements that didn’t fit in elsewhere. In this section (v 11-14), he lists people to avoid; FilthyGuy is one of them. I spent time in the company of FilthyGuys on Marta buses some years back.  In rush hour, the buses are packed. You can’t move, once the doors close, and people sit or stand in silence. That’s when I’d find myself next to FilthyGuy.  The stench was eye-burning, sinus-opening, paint-melting BAD. This was an accumulation of DAYS of funk, NOT just missing the morning shower. Sometimes, FilthyGuy used a lot of cheap perfume; that was worse.   Contact with FilthyGuy is bad, but contact with SpirituallyFilthyGuy is MUCH worse. And the worst of a...

A great good morning to all my friends and neighbors in Internet Land! And to family members who have dropped by, I think there’s stuff in the refrigerator. By wrongdoing an evil person is ensnared, But the righteous sings and rejoices. Proverbs 29:6 The first line is very straightforward, and so simple that even small children understand it, as well as  pets other than cats. “Do crime? Do time!” The expected second line is some version of “Do good, and go free!” But the verse goes much deeper than that. Sometimes, the righteous get ‘ensnared,’ and this verse doesn’t ignore that. A very few of us will experience one of the awful miscarriages of justice, which ensnare physically. Universally, though, we are ensnared when someone we love suffers, no matter the reason.  Every parents recognizes this as truth. Why can the righteous sing and rejoice, regardless of circumstances? I don’t if it’s the whole truth, but I think the answer is: PRACTICE! I’ve known Rod and Linda Price fo...

 A great good morning to all my friends and neighbors in Internet Land! And to family members who have dropped by, DON’T eat the pizza on the table! I'm walking in integrity here! Better is the poor who walks in his integrity Than he who is crooked though he be rich. Proverbs 28:6, NASB Today, I have to dive into the world of translations and word meanings. If the dive is trivial, you won’t see this, because that will likely only be of interest to me.  Reading this verse, we see that one thing is good; the other thing is bad. Right? But WHY? First, let’s dump the (ancient, Gnostic) heresy that poverty is good, and wealth is bad:  In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus says the blessing the poor will receive is a permanent relief of that condition. Luke 8:3 mentions by name some wealthy supporters of Jesus’ ministry; and, although Paul is misquoted as saying money is the root of all evil, what he actually wrote is that it is the LOVE of money. Achievement ‘Dump Heresy’: UNLOCKE...

A great good morning to all my friends and neighbors in Internet Land! And to family members who have dropped by, I forgot to fix the clothes drier. A sated man loathes honey, But to a famished man any bitter thing is sweet. Proverbs 27:7, NASB “Eat everything on your plate; there are children starving in _____ who would love to have what you are turning your nose up at!” If your parents were raised during the Great Depression, you may have thought that was a part of saying grace.  Along with the contempt of the six-year-old for carrots, it has the virtue of being true. It’s true, but it’s not the whole truth. To illustrate that, we have to go along with Rosalynn Carter, then the First Lady, to a refugee camp in Thailand in 1979.  “...please eat, baby, please eat…” she whispered,  as she tried to get the emaciated infant to take the bottle.  She was doomed to failure, because the whole truth is that extreme deprivation produces the same reaction as extreme provision:...

 A great good RED Friday morning to all my friends and neighbors in Internet Land! And to family members who have dropped by, R emember E veryone D eployed. Like an archer who wounds everyone, So is he who hires a fool or who hires those who pass by. Proverbs 26:10, NASB Observe:  It’s the employer who wounds, not the fool! Being a fool ain’t easy. It requires frequent infusion of lots of resources to survive. Meanwhile, the wise person knows that money earned during prosperity MUST provide for times of poverty. They make wise purchases; they save; they invest. When the day without a paycheck arrives, they have reserves to draw on. The fool has no reserves; so hunger either TEACHES (hopefully), or KILLS (sadly). In either case, the fool no longer troubles the community. Unless something interferes with that process, of course; enter the inspiration for today’s verse:  The Employer Of Fools ( EOF ). Almost our entire environment is built around the principle of logical co...

 A great good morning to all my friends and neighbors in Internet Land! And to family members who have dropped by, Cheerios, or whatever. He graduates high school today Do not claim honor in the presence of the king, And do not stand in the place of great men; For it is better that it be said to you, “Come up here,” Than for you to be placed lower in the presence of the prince, whom your eyes have seen. Proverbs 25:6-7, NASB This is an IMPORTANT lesson! Jesus extends and expands on it in Luke 14:7-24, and provides spiritual etiquette for both attending and giving feasts.   The Proverbs passage is a simple rule for avoiding public humiliation, an experience devoutly to be avoided (personal experience!).  But: even if you follow the rule, and don’t elevate yourself higher than you should,  YOU MIGHT STILL GET CLOBBERED! You might do something the boss doesn’t like, something that’s not an error, and get slapped down. You might not do anything wrong at all, but dis...

A great good morning to all my friends and neighbors in Internet Land! And to family members who have dropped by, pray for Guam and  those in the Philippines; Super Typhoon Mawar is active. The devising of folly is sin, And the scoffer is an abomination to men. Proverbs 24:9 NASB Perhaps our ancestors knew the precise meaning of these words due to frequent use, but when was the last time you wrote the word ‘folly’ in an email? Ever tweet it? Not I! Implementing perhaps-useful translation tools, I find a biblical alternative: insanity. The best definition I have for that is: believing something is true, when it isn’t, OR believing something isn’t true, when it is.  The person who keeps on doing the same thing, and expecting different results? Insane! Because, if you keep on doing what you are doing, you will keep on getting what you are getting.  If the repeated act ONLY affected the actor, then we might excuse it as harmless silliness: “There he goes again!” or “That’s ju...

 A great good morning to all my friends and neighbors in Internet Land! And to family members who have dropped by, cold brew coffee with chocolate Boost. My son, if your heart is wise, My own heart also will be glad; And my inmost being will rejoice When your lips speak what is right. Proverbs 23:15-16, NASB Proud I’m not sure if it’s possible for a son to know how much he can bless his father, until he becomes a father himself. And since those are the only two roles I have played, I have zero idea about the mother & daughter interaction; it IS the same with father/daughter, though. Confession: had I read this passage as a teen, and possibly as a young adult, my response would likely have been: “I don’t CARE if your heart is glad. In fact, I hope your heart ISN’T glad.” Clearly, I had MAJOR issues I needed to address; and clearly, so did those who stood in the place of the father figure in my earlier life. But this is NOT an attempt to lay blame; instead, I speak to the core of...