Scatter the flowers

Fall and Expulsion from Garden of Eden. 1509-1510 Michelangelo, Sistine Chapel "Or perhaps in Slytherin, you'll make your real friends, those cunning folks use any means to achieve their ends."  ~the Sorting Hat, Harry Potter I'll be completely honest - I have no idea why God created snakes.  From literally the beginning of mankind He allowed them to be in the Garden.  Why, God, why?  And ever since then they just harm, scare, annoy and cause us extreme anxiety, plus let's not forget the deception thing that has cursed all of mankind til Jesus came and rescued us.   *Disclaimer: this post will justify and promote my fear, contradict science and probably offend a few of you who are in the one percentile and appreciate snakes.  Also, I only put cartoon pictures of snakes because they are cuter than the real thing. Who can trust anything that has no eyelids?  Oh yes, they sleep with their eyes open because they cannot blink!  EWWWWWW. ...

  Reading of "Oh The Places You'll Go  "Congratulations!  Today is your day!  You're off to great places!  You're off and away!  ~ Oh The Places You'll Go by Dr. Suess It's that time of year - hundreds of thousands are graduating from preschool through college and Dr. Seuss wrote a primary book that applies to each one of these levels - it's really quite genius. 🎓  Touching on some of the conceptual highlights, as always we sift them through God's Word... 🎓  "You have brains in your head and feet in your shoes" - "So prepare your minds for actions and exercise self-control.  Put all your hope in the gracious salvation that will come to you when Jesus Christ is revealed to the world."  1 Pet 1:13 🎓  "You can steer yourself any direction you choose"; avoid the 'not so good street'.  "Trust in the Lord with all your heart; do not depend on your own understanding.  Seek His will in all you do, and He will s...

  "A mother is the truest friend we have." ~Washington Irving Do you remember being separated from your mom when you were little - in a store or a public place?  Were you traumatized as you surfed through knee after knee of full-grown humans that weren't your mom?  Or as a young child ever accidentally grab the hand of an adult that wasn't your parents'? Ahhh!  The horror! I distinctly remember as a young mom leaving a child (or two) at church and driving almost all the way home before I realized they weren't in the third row seat of the new car we just bought.  My defense is I wasn't used to looking in a third row.  And while my daughter was very young and still knew enough to go to the safe Sunday School lady, my son (on a separate occasion) was still up in the tree he climbed and didn't even know he was left behind. My husband says he often thought as a preacher's boy when he didn't think anyone was home that the Rapture happened and he was ...

"And I took the one less traveled by..."  from the poem "The Road Not Taken" by Robert Frost   Road trips.  You either hate them or you love them.  I married into a family that will go anywhere in a car, anytime, any distance.  They don't bat an eye at traveling cross country from Cali to New England to see the leaves change color.  And they always want to take the obscure routes less traveled (thank you Robert Frost).  They love road trips so much they start planning the next one during the current one.  I, on the other hand, have moved road trips on my "Rating Spectrum for Travel" from ' loathe'  to ' heavily avoid' , just a few notches down from going into a public hot tub (but slightly above eating slimy okra).  Car sickness has been a constant travel companion of mine, along with Flaming Hot Cheetos, lattes and those chocolate covered acai things from Costco.  I can't say for sure whether car sickness comes before or after my ...

  "Does someone need a hug?" ~Elf, to a raccoon Have you hugged today or been hugged?  Hugging is or should be a vital part of our existence.  Science says it produces "cuddle" hormones that relieve stress and endorphins that are more powerful than morphine. Apparently there is a 4/8/12 rule according to  Virginia Satir (author & psychotherapist):  We need 4 hugs a day for survival, 8 hugs a day for maintenance, and 12 hugs a day for growth. Sounds like hugging has a lot of benefits.   Don't you wish you could just send or receive hugs to people with more impact than an emoji?  Somehow the impact of 🙏 doesn't seem to convey the emotional support we need in times of distress and anguish.   At times, though well-meaning, the phrase "praying for you" can sometimes seem rote and convenient, when we may want to love on them or be loved by them more fully. How can we support and encourage friends and family when they are reaching out in ...

  "Good Friday is a day of hope disguised as sorrow." ~unknown Good Friday always seemed like an erroneous word to me when I first became a Christian.  It seemed like a day filled with whippings, wrongful accusations, hatred, torture, abuse, and crucifixion for our sinless Savior should never be labeled as good.  But then, as Peter was scolded in Matt 16:23 , I see that I was not setting my mind on things of God, but rather looking at things the way Satan would have them.    Christ Carrying the Cross, Luis de Morales 1565, Getty Museum In order for you and I today (as well as countless others in the past, here now, and in the future) to be able to be reconciled to God, Jesus had to fulfill these prophecies and die.  He had to sacrifice His sinless Self for our sin, deny His own comfort and power to overcome their evil, so we could be reconciled back with God and spend eternity in heaven. "So we live in the face of death, but this has resulted in eternal lif...