I’m lame

School starts next week, so Christians on Campus has been really active.  We’ve had open houses, moved students into their dorms, breakfasts, lunches, and everything in between.  This morning we had Sunday fellowship at our campus house and the topic was Mephibosheth.  Now, lets be real for a second.  How many of you can honestly say that you know who Mephibosheth was?  I couldn’t.  But after our fellowship this morning, I’ll never forget his story.

Let me give you the verses from 2 Samuel and then I’ll re-speak (or type) what the brothers shared this morning.

2 Sam 4:4 “Now Jonathan, Saul’s son, had a son who had crippled feet.  He was five years old when the news came of Saul and Jonathan out or Jezreel.  And his nurse took him up and fled.  And as she hurried to flee, he fell and was made lame.  And his name was Mephibosheth.”

9:1 “And David said, Is there still anyone left of the house of Saul, that I may show kindness to him for Jonathan’s sake?

3b-9 “And Ziba said to the king, There is still a son of Jonathan; he is crippled in his feet.  Then the king said to him, Where is he?  And Ziba said to the king, He is just now in the house of Machir the sone of Amiel in Lo-debar.  And King David sent men and took him from the house of Machir the son of Amiel, from Lo-debar.  And Mephibosheth the son of Jonathan, the son of Saul, came to David and fell on his face and paid homage.  And David said, Mephibosheth.  And he said, Your servant is here.  And David said to him, Do not be afraid, for I will surely show kindness to your for the sake of Jonathan your father; and I will restore to you all the land of your father Saul, and you will eat food at my table continually.  And he paid him homage and said, What is your servant that you should look upon a dead dog like me?  And the king called Ziba, Saul’s attendant, and said to him, All that belongs to Saul and to all his house I give to your master’s son.”

10b-11 “…and Mephibosheth, said to David, shall eat at my table like one of the king’s sons.”

13 “And Mehibosheth dwelt in Jerusalme because he ate at the king’s table continually.  And he was crippled in both his feet.”

Ok, so Mephibosheth was Jonathan’s son, which means he was Saul’s grandson.  Just in case you don’t know the story, Saul was the first king of Israel, but after a while he turned away from Jehovah and eventually lost His blessing.  Jehovah then chose David, who was one of Saul’s attendants who played the lyre.  Even though both Saul and Jonathan realized that David would be king someday, Saul tried to kill David but Jonathan made a covenant with David that he would always show kindness to his house (there’s a lot more but this is the abridged version).  So after Jonathan and Saul were both killed in battle, David became king.  This is why Mephibosheth’s nurse ran – she was afraid David would kill everyone in Saul’s house.

But he didn’t.

He invited Jonathan’s only descendent – the grandson of the man who tried to kill him – to eat at his table continually.

The brother who shared this morning pointed out that this story of Mephibosheth actually represents our Christian experience today.

Romans 5:10 says “For if we, being enemies, were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more we will be saved in His life, having been reconciled.”  Just like Mephibosheth was an enemy of David, so we were enemies of God.  But we were brought back to God through another – through Christ, or in the case of Mephibosheth, through Jonathan.

And like Mephibosheth, we are also lame towards God.  According to Romans 3:10-11 “There is none righteous, not even one; There is none who understands, there is none who seeks God.”  But luckily, Romans 2:4 says “…knowing that God’s kindness is leading you to repentance.”  If you look back in the verses, King David sent men and took Mephibosheth.  He didn’t seek out David, just like we, in our lame condition, can’t seek out God.  God sought us and His kindness leads us to repentance.

So what happens after God finds us and leads us to repentance?  We eat!  For free!  All the time!  Once Mephibosheth got to David’s house, all he did was eat at the king’s table.  Continually.

But the point that really got me was that when Mephibosheth sat down at the table, he didn’t see his crippled feet!  When he sat down at the table all he could see was the food on the table. He forgot about his lame condition and just enjoyed!  I don’t know about you, but it seems like I’m always bombarded with thoughts from Satan about what a miserable sinner and terrible person I am.  He likes to bring up all of my sins and shortcomings and it’s so easy to get depressed and try to hide from God in Lo-Debar, which by the way means “no pasture,” “not having,” or “not having.”  But that’s the perfect opportunity to quote Ephesians 2:11-14 and claim my status as a child of God through the blood of Christ.  We don’t have to look at our crippled feet!  We can just come to the table through our Savior and eat!  Why stay in the place of no supply as an enemy of God when you can feast at the king’s table!  Don’t stay in Lo-Debar!  Come to the feast and forget about your weaknesses!

USA Olympic Swimmers Sing “Call Me Maybe”

Okay, so I’m not a fan of this song, but I love this video.  It’s completely amateur and homemade, but for reason I couldn’t stop watching.

New York Cafe Sells Only Water

Am I the only person that thinks this is kind of silly?  I drink from the tap all the tap, and nothing’s wrong with me, except for the fact that my fingers and toes glow in the dark.  But that’s beside the point.  This guy has to be making a ton of money selling designer water to hipsters and the like.

For some reason I can’t get the embed code to work, probably because I drink tap water.  Anywho, here’s the link:

Water Cafe.

The 50 Cutest Things That Ever Happened

This list called “The 50 Cutest Things That Ever Happened” is on Buzzfeed, and it actually is the fifty cutest things that ever happened.  I can’t embed the page, but here’s a few of my favorites.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hope you go to full post!  There’s a lot more cuteness to be seen!

 

Ordinary Days

Well, I was going to write a post about why I changed the name of my blog to “Ordinary Days,” but then I stumbled upon this blog post from A God-Man in Christ, and it was everything I wanted to share with you and more.  So instead of writing something completely original, I’ll just point you to a blog that already said what I was going to say.  Please visit agodman.com for the full post (this is just the first three paragraphs)!

“Our Christian life is not a spectacular life, filled with all kind of amazing and out-of-the-ordinary events, but it is a normal daily life under the divine dispensing. The Triune God has been processed and consummated so that in His Divine Trinity He may dispense all that He is into us – and this takes place in a daily way, in a normal way, and even in a fine and detailed way. As we turn to Him here and there, He dispenses Himself into us little by little, day by day, bit by bit, causing us to grow in the divine life in a normal way!

Just as our human life, our Christian life is not filled with spectacular things or extraordinary experiences. On the one hand, from time to time, such experiences may occur, but they are not of a daily occurrence. We shouldn’t expect to have a spectacular time each day in receiving the divine dispensing. We shouldn’t expect spectacular results in our Christian life. Rather, we need to be content and satisfied with ordinary days filled with regular and normal practices in our human life under the divine dispensing!

We love our time in the morning with the Lord – seeking His face, touching Him, spending time with Him in a personal way, and being revived by Him every morning. After such a time – which is not spectacular but is a normal experience in the divine life – we go ahead in our daily life and live our life with its daily routine, activities, to-do’s, etc in the divine dispensing. We go to school, we go to work, we travel, we visit, whatever we do during the day, we live ordinary days in the divine dispensing, receiving the fine and sweet dispensing of the Triune God!”

Recently I’ve been enjoying a song that talks about this, and I’ve been impressed with the fact that my Christian life shouldn’t be something so miraculous that it somehow gets separated from my normal, everyday life.  Yes, especially awesome things may happen every once in a blue moon, but that isn’t the Christian life our God has ordained for us.  Our Christian life is a little by little and day by day life.  Daily getting into the word, singing hymns, and meeting with other believers are just a few ways to live this normal Christian life.  In my own experience, I’ve also enjoyed writing verses on my mirror to help me get ready in the morning and listening to online messages of Christian conferences while I clean my house and do laundry.

Ephesians 5:16 says “Redeeming the time, for the days are evil.”  The footnote in my translation says “I.e., seizing every favorable opportunity.  This is be be wise in our walk (v. 15).”  There are so many small times in my day that could be spent with my precious Savior that I overlook.  Waiting in line, driving, and cooking are just a few examples.  O Lord open our eyes!  We want to seize every favorable opportunity to enjoy You!  To love You!  To gain You!

Here’s the song I mentioned earlier.  You can listen to it here.  (I added the verse references to each verse incase any of you wanted to look it up!)

Little by little (Exo. 23:30) the Lord is cutting off all our natural life.  As we grow in Him He replaces us with more of His life divine.

It is our destiny to live a normal life, in the divine dispensing.
It is a blessing to be satisfied with ordinary days in the divine dispensing.

Day by day (2 Cor. 4:16), our inward parts are being renewed by the Lord. Everyday, fresh and rich supply to us He does afford.

Here a little and there a little (Isa. 28:10) Christ reveals Himself to us.  When we read His word, we are satisfied and we enjoy Him thus.

Morning by morning (Lam. 3:23) Jehovah He is faithful to awaken us.  He instructs our ears, with just a word the weary to sustain we must.

From strength to strength (Psa. 84:7) we’re on the highways to enter into our God. Though Satan opposes we are strengthened to lay hold on more of God.

Grace upon grace (John 1:16) the Triune God is processed for us to enjoy.  The law is over, now we can partake of His supply with grace.

From glory to glory (2 Cor. 3:18) we are in the process of being transformed. Beholding reflecting, to God’s image with all saints we’ll be conformed.

Lionzebragiraffe one, poo, free.

So it has been an extremely long time since the last time I posted.  Sorry about that.  I also changed the name of my blog (I’ll explain that in a later post).

This week we made a lion mask, and because I just have to be different, I decided to incorporate a couple of other animals into my mask (and yes, I insist on doing all of the crafts my students do, and not just giving the directions.  It’s more fun that way)…

I don’t think any of my students knew what I was doing, even after I explained it to them.  That’s ok.  They colored their lions blue and purple and tye-dye, so whatever.  Let me have my lionzebragiraffe.

My students are working on counting in math, and even though I am so sick and tired of working on that goal I laugh every. single. time.  I love hearing them count to ten.

One

Poo

Free

Pour

Pive

Seas

Seben

A

Nime

Tin

Gets me every time.

From BBC News: “Inactivity killing as many as smoking”

A lack of exercise is now causing as many deaths as smoking across the world, a study suggests.

The report, published in the Lancet to coincide with the build-up to the Olympics, estimates that about a third of adults are not doing enough physical activity, causing 5.3m deaths a year.

That equates to about one in 10 deaths from diseases such as heart disease, diabetes and breast and colon cancer.

Researchers said the problem was now so bad it should be treated as a pandemic.

And they said tackling it required a new way of thinking, suggesting the public needed to be warned about the dangers of inactivity rather than just reminded of the benefits of it.

The team of 33 researchers drawn from centres across the world also said governments needed to look at ways to make physical activity more convenient, affordable and safer.

Global challenge

It is recommended that adults do 150 minutes of moderate exercise , such as brisk walking, cycling or gardening, each week.

The Lancet study found people in higher income countries were the least active with those in the UK among the worst as nearly two thirds of adults were judged not to be doing enough.

Continue reading the main story

Case study

From Monday to Saturday, the streets of the Colombian capital of Bogota are packed with cars.

The city – one of the largest in South America – is a teeming metropolis, home to more than seven million people.

But on a Sunday vehicles are nowhere to be seen. Instead, the streets are taken over by pedestrians, thanks to Ciclovia, a traffic-free streets initiative run by the city authorities.

The scheme, backed by successive mayors, has been running in one guise or another since the mid-1970s.

It now covers nearly 100km of roads in the centre of the city on Sundays and public holidays.

But as well as making Bogota a quieter place to roam, the ban on cars also has a health benefit.

Research has shown about 1m residents regularly walk around on a Sunday, a fifth of whom say they would be inactive if it was not for the ban on vehicles.

Dr Michael Pratt, who was involved in the Lancet research on physical inactivity, said the Bogota scheme was a “wonderful example” of how governments could be encouraging more exercise.

Although the researchers admitted comparisons between countries were difficult because the way activity was estimated may have differed from place to place.

Nonetheless, they said they remained confident that their overall conclusion was valid.

Pedro Hallal, one of the lead researchers, said: “With the upcoming 2012 Olympic Games, sport and physical activity will attract tremendous worldwide attention.

“Although the world will be watching elite athletes from many countries compete in sporting events… most spectators will be quite inactive.

“The global challenge is clear – make physical activity a public health priority throughout the world to improve health and reduce the burden of disease.”

Prof Lindsey Davies, president of the UK Faculty of Public Health, agreed:

“We need to do all we can to make it easy for people to look after their health and get active as part of their daily lives.

“Our environment has a significant part to play. For example, people who feel unsafe in their local park will be less likely to use it.”

But others questioned equating smoking with inactivity.

While smoking and inactivity kill a similar number of people, smoking rates are much lower than the number of inactive people, making smoking more risky to the individual.

Dr Claire Knight, of Cancer Research UK, said: “When it comes to preventing cancer, stopping smoking is by far the most important thing you can do.”

I think I’d take this over the Taj Mahal

Useless Box Makes Me Happy

The Mystery of Human Life Infographic

Look who made her first infographic!  It’s not perfect, but I think it’s pretty good for a first-timer!

For more information on the content of this infographic please visit Living Stream Ministry.