Psalm 136

"Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good,
for His steadfast love endures forever!"

Then follows 25 more declarations about God with the same refrain after each one.

The concept of God's steadfast love is incredible.  It holds on through everything.  That is the kind of love that I need.

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Psalm 131

Another short Psalm - the key thought for me was "I have calmed and quieted my soul."  What I get from this is that I have control over anxious thought.  I can choose calm and quiet.  Amazing!

We were camping this week at Cape Lookout.  I could have done better but I did lose some of the momentum that was going.  Let's get back on the track, guy.

Dreams:

There two that stuck in my memory long enough to tell Holly and therefore, I still have enough to report to you:

1.  I was in a car with Brett and we were practically right on top of an accident where a car spun out of control and almost went over the edge of a bridge of some sort.  We went running over to it and Brett was jumping into paramedic/firefight mode.  I wanted to help and it looked to me like I could grab onto a piece of the car and pull it in closer and hold it steady.  Brett said, "No!" but I reached out and grabbed it anyway.  Fortunately it held long enough for him to pull the driver to safety but I clearly thought that I knew better and went ahead with my own idea, even though it was contrary to the wisdom that I was hearing.  Typical?  I also heard him call out right after he reached the guy - "Blood pressure is 260 over 65 - not immediately life threatening."  My thought was, "how did he do that?  Do paramedics get issued magical blood pressure readers, or maybe there is an app for that?"  No particular insight comes from that element, except that I continue to have an interest in science and medicine.

2.  We (the family, with me as dad) we visiting with friends and a snow storm came up.  It was important for us to get home so we headed out into the storm.  At one point the was a narrow path where other vehicles had gone through ahead of us but the snow was drifted higher than the car.  We were still, inexplicably, making progress and everyone in the car was chanting, "Push, angels, push!  Push, angels, push!"  We got through that patch but then came to a place where the car would just not make it to the crest of the hill just ahead of us.  I got out to scout out the situation and climbed up to see what was over the crest.  There were 3 options if we could make it to the top but each was worse that the last.  There was a wide spot in the rode back down the hill that we could coast back to so we did that.  We had food and enough gas to warm the car periodically so we would be OK.

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Psalm 129

This psalm is much darker than the others that I have been reading in recent days.  The main idea seems to be "Greatly have they afflicted me from my youth, yet they have not prevailed against me."  I have been somewhat open in this blog about my desire to have a more healthy spiritual and emotional life. One of my other readings this week has expressed the idea that the pattern of isolation and escapist reading that I have lived since my youth is almost certainly a coping mechanism that allows me to hide from the pain of a deep inner wound.  The challenge is to identify and recognize what that wound is so that it can be dealt with.  It sounds like the psalmist identified his wound and was dealing with it - "they have not prevailed against me".  So far my wound is still a puzzle to me.  Stay tuned.  All will be revealed (well - maybe in a restrained form).

Daily Report

Morning report:
This section may take the form of a daily activity journal (a diary, if you will).  A big chuck of yesterday was spent preparing for (flowers and cookies) and attending Al's memorial service.  After that, we tried to rejuvenate at Shari's before embarking more energetically on our camping preparations. (Any one reading this thinking that means our house will be unattended for a few days should know that our firefighter son and his family will be here because we have air conditioning and it will be hot.  He is even more fearsome than I am.)  With our rejuvenated spirits in hand, we came home and took a nap.  Then I did yard work.

On the dream front, I have very interesting memories and as I started to recount them in my head, they became even more significant.  I found myself in a situation when I was significantly restricted by being forced into some sort of hiding with my two teenage sons.  At some point my rage reached a point that I shot with deadly intent at someone who was the recipient of my anger.  I was very surprised to find that my weapon had nothing but blanks in it.  I was somehow able to use this fact as leverage against my oppressor to win freedom from my restrictions and receive enough financial blackmail to supply funds for my sons to attend college.

I have run out of time to go into some of the possible relevance to my situation but a couple of observations:
1.  Somewhere in me, there might be rage
2.  Revelation of secrets produces freedom

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Psalm 128

This particular section of the book of Psalms has a lot of short chapters, but I have been finding rich insights each day.  Today brings me back to the confusing concept of the fear of the Lord.  The idea of parallelism is a frequent element in wisdom literature.  The two phrases in a couplet are equivalent to one another.  Verse one is:
 "Blessed is everyone who fears the Lord, who walks in His ways."

The psalm goes on and enumerates the wonderful blessings (wife like a fruitful vine, children like olive shoots around your table) but I was caught by the insight that the fear of the Lord is expressed by walking in His ways.  I conclude that obedience is an evidence of "fear".  Now that, I can understand.

The classic story of the two dogs that represent the good and the bad side of ourselves, battling within us for control of our behavior, was brought to mind in another reading I came across recently.  The victor in the battle is the one that gets fed.  The question is, how do I feed the good dog or starve the bad dog.  I have been working on a scripture memorization project and also cutting back on "escapist" reading.  I do not believe there is anything inherently wrong in escapist reading, but, for me, it contributes to my tendency to isolation.  I have made a commitment to eliminate (for a season) escapist reading and to give more attention to my scripture memory project.  Please ask me how that is going for me.  In my daily report that will be reflected in the use of time score.  As long as you see a 5 in that category, that means escapist reading has not been a part of that days activity.  I believe that this is one way that I can be improving in the fear of the Lord and hope to see a wife that is like a fruitful vine (just kidding, Holly).

Daily Report

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Psalm 127

This Psalm hit me right between the eyes right out of the gate.  "Unless the Lord builds the house, those who build it labor in vain."  It goes on and develops the idea through the next 3 verses, but that was enough for me.  The concept absolutely repudiates the whole performance based approval idea.  I can "try" to the limits of my strength but God is the only one that can establish or create a worthwhile result.  It's not that I don't have responsibility to work and to watch and to rise up early, but the results do not depend on me.  What a relief.

Daily Report

Reflections on yesterday

My intention is to start going back the next morning to reflect on the previous day and to report on any dreams I can remember.  The pattern I would like to establish is to write and publish my scripture based meditation in the evening and then exercise and update this section of the post with more general thoughts of the day.  This reflection is in regard to Friday.  It was the culmination of a very successful week at work, it particular in regard to my helpfulness to customers that were in trouble.  Much more than normal for me, I stepped up and made the phone calls in response to emails that were sent out to my group.  My supervisor was complimentary and appreciative.

That experience probably contributed to a dream that is a faint shadow in my memory.  In my dream, I was a heroic figure, solving difficult problems in creative ways.  There seem to have been a large number of complicated situations in my dream and a large number of characters.  I do recall a feeling of satisfaction in my accomplishments.

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Psalm 126

There are a couple of things that resonate with me in this Psalm.

One is that I seem to be having a lot of dreams recently and they are generally good.  I think I should start journaling about them and give particular attention to how I feel about what I dreamed.  The psalmist, in verse one notes:

126 When the Lord restored the fortunes of Zion,
we were like those who dream.

I don't know what that means, but there is definitely a connection between dreaming and the restoration of fortunes.  That has to be good.

Then the last two verses give a direct correlation with tears and weeping being related to shouts of joy and fruitful harvest.

5 Those who sow in tears
shall reap with shouts of joy!
6 He who goes out weeping,
bearing the seed for sowing,
shall come home with shouts of joy,
bringing his sheaves with him.

Our tendency is to despair in times of sorrow.  Gods perspective is that sorrow is preparation for joy.

Daily Report

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