Bits and Pieces

The last few days have been interesting. It seems I don't accomplish my plans but hopefully what was done was at least useful. One item has been some email between myself and someone else on the relation of emotion and intellect. I find that I can get quite caught up at times in trying to prove my point(s) - a very intellectual approach. Since the other person is also intellectual it can get quite 'warm' at times on the emails :). On the other hand both of us, I now believe, have been sending some pretty strong messages in regards to our 'emotions' as well as the words being written. To add to that experience I spent at least a few hours talking to my younger brother concerning some of these things. He has been learning how to relate to the God given emotions inside of him and he shared with me lots along that topic - as well as several others. As I would share some of what I had put in the emails at times I could see that I was actually responding intellectually to an intellectual question when in fact the request was often really looking for an emotion based response. I'm not real good at the emotion based communication modalities but by God's grace I am learning.



I stopped by a local thrift shop looking for a washing machine. I also spotted a rug we could use for our living room and picked it up. I was sort of half dragging it to the check out when a man kindly picked it up for me. He was asking them to hold a table top christmas tree ($3.50). After I was through he carried the rug out and put it in my car. We got to talking as I asked him if I could give him a christmas present and handed him the money for his tree. He told me that he had been homeless for about 2 months but had just gotten an apartment. The place he had lived before was drug infested and he chose to stay on the street to avoid those influences until he could find something better - which he had just recently done. I asked how he was doing and he mentioned that he did not yet have a bed. Upon my request he gave me his phone no. After going home and unloading the leaves into the garden from our truck I came back to get the washing machine and also brought a twin mattress, box springs and a nice chair for the man. He seemed delighted with it and I felt very good too.



I have slowly been getting a few more things done around my place lately. Our son has been working on getting his room in better shape. Hopefully we can get more done on it next week. Last week I 'shrunk' my office space in our living room again. I have a big office in the big house next door but when we rearranged two bedrooms I ended up with a whole bunch of furniture - that I am still trying to figure out what to do with so most of what I get done is from our house for the time being.



Part of the answer as to where to put the 'extra' furniture may have come this evening. A friend who used to live here came by this evening and said that he was going to be moving his 'office' to where he is now living. (We had been sort of holding one room as his office for legal purposes although most of the time it has been as much of a store room as an office.) Anyway, I hope to set up that room with at least some of the furniture not needed upstairs and it might also be able to be used as a guest room. Time will tell. But right now I am working on our house.



It is getting cooler these days. We usually have been firing up our woodstove in the evenings. But soon we may need it more split wood for burning. We don't have a lot of wood split yet so that is going to become a priority real soon.



Our church has been putting new floor coverings in. The meeting area got new rugs. (They let me have the leftover pieces and I am contemplating making a patch work rug out of the pieces combined with some other color rug pieces as well. We'll see.) Downstairs in the church a tile that looks like wood has been installed. I was hoping to have a rug for my children's room (I teach the younger children) but I have decided to just go along with what others think is best. I don't really have anything to say about what is being done in the church. They had a remodeling committee who oversaw that part. Sometimes I forgot that and gave my 2 cents but as usual it got me into trouble.

The lady friend I have been helping seems to be rebounding quite well. We are still unpacking but her house is looking better all the time. I am not needing to spend as much time there now and she is doing a lot more on her own. We had thanksgiving dinner at her place and enjoyed it. I still seem to be misinterpreting what she says but I think part of that stems from the fact that she is far more 'emotion' based and I have been 'programmed' far more intellectual, meaning that at times - more often than not - when she says something she is seeking an emotion based answer but when I come up with an intellectual response it can be confusing to both of us. (It can work both ways.) But I am very thankful for the lessons I have learned through her as my friend.



With so many different things going on, at first glance one might wonder if there is any hope. Yet, with a deeper look I am seeing God teaching me how to be more like Him through each one of the above situations and many more.

God's form of peace is not dependent on circumstances. I am also becoming more and more convinced it is based a whole lot more on attitude (mine). Certain choices of mine can definitely influence true peace, but even that, I don't think, has as much influence as my attitude.

It is getting late so I will close for this time.

May God's Sabbath time of Peace this coming seventh day fill you with both God's peace and joy.

Bringer of Peace