No explanation needed

 But you, children of God, flee from all skunks. 

Pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, endurance and gentleness. 

(I Timothy 6:11)

emphasis, of course, mine

Some analogies just write themselves.  

This weekend my big, dumb dog Truman decided to play with a skunk.  This is the fourth time in just as many months.  Sometimes I think our cat is egging him on, saying, "Oh, look.  Why don't you go play with that black and white one?"

This time it happened late Saturday night.  I was working at the computer when I hear a frantic banging sound at our sliding glass door, and look up to see poor Truman plastered to the glass.

I open the door and my big boy slinks inside, immediately trying to hide in our living room.  He's 170lbs of stink and shame; hiding isn't an option.  With the hour being late, and my humor being poor, I quickly rinse of his puffy eyes, then banish him to the laundry room.  This produces all sorts of whining and puling as he usually sleeps all snuggled under the covers of my daughter's bed.

The next day, things get even worse.  It's bath time. He doesn't usually mind his bath, but when he's covered in skunk he knows it's going to be rough.  His eyes are going to be thoroughly rinsed, his ears are going to be scrubbed.  There's going to be lots of shampoo, baking soda, and Dawn.  Buckets will be dumped,  and tomato juice will be flowing.  The whole time words like, "Why do you play with skunks?" and "Won't you ever learn?"  will be whispered and not so whispered in his ears.

Eventually he's all clean and snuggled up in my arms.  I'll remind him that skunks are never his friends, but I have a feeling we'll be back here again.

Like I said, some analogies just write themselves. 

Enough Meddling

The ladies running our Sunday School class have been doing way too much praying.  They keep picking these books which are downright convicting, forcing me to take a look at myself, my thoughts, and my actions.   Frankly, I find it meddlesome, and I'd really rather they just stop. 

For instance, they chose Priscilla Shirer's, Discerning the Voice of God.  Let me just say, I wouldn't recommend it.  She keeps harping on the John 14:21, which basically says, "Those who love Me, are the ones who keep my commandments."  She pushes it even further by telling me I not only need to listen to my God, I need to respond to Him with costly obedience.  Do you know how hard it is to enjoy the late night reruns of one of my favorite sit-coms after reading those words?  All that keeps running through my mind is 'Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable--if anything is excellent or praiseworthy--think about such things. 

Well, great.....off goes the TV and all I'm left with are profitable things like talking to my husband, writing, and making my way through these studies which are causing all the problems in the first place.  Down right inconvenient I tell you.

To make matters worse, we are now on Leslie Vernick's book, How to act Right when your Life goes wrong.  Listen to this excerpt.

                 What we love the most will rule us.  Or to put it another way, what we most fear losing will control us.   God says He is a jealous God and He wants to be first in our hearts.  Many of us repent of wrong behaviors, even wrong thoughts, but we don't understand that we can't grow to be more like Christ unless our heart loves something (Him) more passionately than we love ourselves or our own desires.

Ouch!  How I am supposed to keep putting my desire to be right, admired, and respected above being loving, humble, and gracious after reading those words?  How am I supposed to keep nurturing my anger and bitterness over past wrongs?  Goodness, if I start giving these things up, all I'll be left with is a life free from self and fear of man's disapproval.  Where's the drama in that?

Like I said, the Sunday School ladies need to stop praying and meddling.  If they have it their way, I'll be experiencing the goodness of the Lord right here in the land of the living! 

Scraping the Windshield

There are few things in life I despise more than scraping windshields.  My hands get cold, and chips of ice make it into my coat and down my shirt as my children sit waving to me from the warm car interior.

Due to this abhorrence of  the whole process, I usually cheat by scraping as little of the windshield as possible; doing just enough to give me a hint of visibility.  Without fail, this shortcut leads to me crouching down, peeking  through the tiny hole the defrost has begun to make.  Admittedly, there have been several times I have actually had to stick my head out the window in order to see. 

Another one of my tricks is to spray copious amounts of washer fluid all over the glass with the wipers on full blast.  This, however, just causes the liquid to freeze, making a pretty crystal collage my children ooh and ahhh over, while I again roll down the window to stick out my head.

Honestly, the whole thing is ludicrous, but I do it almost every time!