The Lord will rescue me from every evil deed and bring me safely into his heavenly kingdom. To him be the glory forever and ever. Amen. -- 2 Timothy 4:18
Again, we are very busy.
This is not that unusual. We
often get pretty hectic going into fall and winter. I’ve been working for the company so long
that I get four weeks of vacation I don’t get to take instead of two or
three. It’s great. So far, I have managed to use four days. Which means that between now and the end of
February, if they do let us carry-over, I need to burn three week and a day so
I won’t lose it. I only lost a week last
year. I don’t know what I would do with
four weeks of vacation. We never go
anywhere.
I have a short respite while I’m waiting around for gateway access so I can do
something productive. I’m trying to
figure out how to go through the Book of Job in my usual pattern of taking a
few verses and thinking about them. Job
doesn’t really lend itself to that. It’s
a debate, so it is necessary to summarize a given speaker’s position unless you
want to quote a chapter or two at a time.
Meanwhile, I think the above verse from Paul, as an aged
man, probably very near the day of his death, is in line with what we have been
talking about lately. Evil deeds do come
around. No one, no matter how pious and
devoted, is immune from the attacks. In
fact, speaking of Job, sometimes our piety is the reason we are targeted. Satan’s job, so it seems, is to try us, to
put us in the fire like the three Hebrew children to see what will burn. In their case, only the ropes that bound them
were consumed in the heat. They were set
free and unharmed.
Perhaps Paul is even thinking of that story as he realizes
that the worst his enemies, fleshly or otherwise, can do to him is release him
from this prison of clay with its “bars of bone”. I have seen a little of God’s grace in
deliverance the past couple of days. I
struggle with so much and forget so often to turn to Him and let Him get me
through. I’m trying to be more
deliberate in surrendering my fears and my frustrations to Him. I hope that I am seeing some progress.
Also, I picked up a couple of books yesterday from the
bargain shelf. One is a volume
containing four of Lewis’ works: Surprised by Joy, Reflection of the Psalms,
The Four Loves, and The Business of
Heaven. I had a copy of Surprised by Joy at one time and must
have given it away or left it somewhere.
I don’t remember reading The
Business of Heaven so I’m looking forward to plowing through all these
again.
The other book is Walter Wangerin’s Saint Julian which is about ten years old. It’s not one of Wangerin’s more highly rated
works, to say the least. A lot of
reviewers didn’t like it or didn’t get it.
It does appear to be a work of great significance to the author, and it
may suffer from the closeness. Julian is
a hunter. We’ll see how it goes.
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