Everybody's doing it

I caught a bit of a show the other day and heard the mother telling her daughter that her father had a very small area of control—limited to drivers ed and barbecuing. I can remember shows where the husband makes fun of his wife’s cooking both at home and to his friends. Now in these shows the writers were probably aiming for laughs, but the sad thing is I’ve heard these comments and others in real life. Husbands and wives pointing out one another faults in public just to get a laugh. Yes, sometimes it can be humorous, but sometimes the joke can go too far.

Proverbs 31:10-12 (NIRV) says

¹⁰ Who can find a noble wife?
She is worth far more than rubies.
¹¹ Her husband trusts her completely.
She gives him all the important things he needs.
¹² She brings him good, not harm,
all the days of her life.

Wives, do you really think your husband NEEDS you to tell all your friends the only thing he is good at is grilling and he never picks up his underwear or socks? Do you think it brings your husband good or harm the way you talk about him to your friends and family?

Ephesians 5:25-26, 28 (NIRV) says

²⁵ Husbands, love your wives. Love them just as Christ loved the church. He gave himself up for her. ²⁶ He did it to make her holy. He made her clean by washing her with water and the word. ²⁸ In the same way, husbands should love their wives. They should love them as they love their own bodies. Any man who loves his wife loves himself

Husbands, do you really think it is loving to tell your friends how awful your wife’s cooking is?

So, husbands and wives, could you please think twice before you crack that joke? Could you reconsider before you join in with the crowd’s spousal bashing?

Personally, I think my husband is the most wonderful husband, an awesome daddy to our two daughters, a good cook, fabulously dependable, and very supportive and encouraging.

Lot's Wife

The other night as I was running, I was thinking about regrets in my life—then God reminded me of Lot’s wife. Genesis 19:26 “But Lot's wife looked back. When she did, she became a pillar made out of salt.” What did Lot’s wife have to do with this? Was God warning me about looking back?

But what about all those times You told Israel to remember? (Deut 32:7) I wanted them to remember in order to learn from their mistakes and remember the proof that I AM.

So why did she look back? Why the pillar of salt? I thought Christians were supposed to be salt. I reviewed the story and noticed that Lot and his family had become quite luke-warm and possibly even people-pleasers. And they wouldn’t even leave on their own but had to be led out of the city by the messengers of God and specifically told not to look back. Did Lot’s wife not believe the cities would be destroyed? Was she curious what the destruction would look like? Was she looking back with regret? I suppose if she had been turned to stone, travelers could admire her beauty. I did a little research and found she probably hesitated leaving a party lifestyle to be saved by God and that becoming a pillar of salt could have been the natural consequence of being too close to burning sulfur that rained down from heaven.

So …
Look at the regrets, change what you can to improve the present.
Realize you have changed and improved and you are no longer that person of the past.
Keep your focus on your improvements – “see how far you’ve come”
Leave the rest of the past in the past to rest
If you keep looking over your should at the [regrets] past, you will miss the joy, happiness, etc of the present and future

I don’t want to be stuck in my past, growing more bitter in regret as Lot’s wife. I want to focus on how God has changed and improved me then look toward the present and future.

Fathers do not exasperate your children

Ephesians 6:4 Fathers, do not exasperate your children; instead, bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord.(NIV)


“Honor your father and mother” and “Obey your parents” were preached and taught often when I was growing up, but I always wondered about this scripture. What does it mean to exasperate? Dictionary.com says: “to irritate or provoke to a high degree; annoy extremely.” Why didn’t they talk about this one? How exactly can fathers, or either parent, exasperate their children? At first I thought “Isn’t just being a parent annoying and irritating to kids?” But then I realized even proper parenting can be taken to the extreme. Reminding your child to pick up their things can turn into nagging. Encouraging them to improve can become overly critical if done in the wrong tone. Seeing or hearing a parent do something the child is told not to do can be very confusing to a child. As adults our lives get busy with deadlines and commitments, and spending focused quality time with each or our children should also be a commitment. And children don’t react the same as adults when they are irritated or annoyed. Their behavior will be altered—sometimes acting out in anger, sometimes acting out for attention, sometimes withdrawing because they feel undervalued or unwanted. So the next time we recite “Honor your father and mother” or “Obey your parents” maybe we should ask ourselves if we are doing anything (or not doing something) that would exasperate our kids. We can’t expect our kids to behave any better than we do.

Pilots and Christians

I read a story by a pilot friend of mine about the importance of checking all the instruments and gauges on the dash of a plane or jet. There is a gauge called an attitude indicator and the standby is a gyro. The attitude indicator is the instrument that shows you up from down. Some younger pilots will tend to ignore the gyro because it needs more maintenance—it needs to be righted after big turns and rolls. This friend wrote how even he tended to ignore the gyro in his younger days. There was one day he was thankful he maintained his gyro and paid attention to all the instrumentation—the day his main attitude indicator went out. If he had continued to only pay attention to his main indicator, he would have continued into a nosedive and crashed. Instead, by maintaining the gyro and watching all the other instruments, he was able to right the plane and land safely—with a little help from the approach controller.


As I read that story, it reminded me so much of our Christian lives. We can walk into a situation and ignore our initial reaction, our conscience, our attitude indicator. We can make excuses. We can try to rationalize. But if we read our Bibles every day and keep the communication open with God and surround ourselves with Christian friends who will keep us accountable, we can still right ourselves instead of crashing and burning in temptation.


Proverbs 15:22 (New International Reader's Version)
22 Plans fail without good advice.
But they succeed when there are many advisers.


P.S. You can read the pilot’s story here:
The Ops Check That Saved My Life

Why does God allow suffering and evil?

Why does God allow suffering and evil? It’s a popular question. There are scriptures that are frequently used to answer and explain. But I want to look at this logically for a moment.

Are you a parent? Have you ever warned your child: If you do that someone is going to get hurt or something will break? Did they still have to learn the hard way?

Yes, Satan likes to inflict suffering. Yes, we have been warned of personal trials. But I think in the big picture, God created us with a choice and He is allowing all of humankind to make their own choices so that maybe some of us will learn from the consequences that our own ways are not best, His are. If there was less suffering and evil in the world, would we be as likely to seek God and ask Him for help? Would we be as likely to depend on Him for safety and strength?

Psalm 23:4 I will fear no evil, for you are with me, O Lord; your rod and your staff they comfort me.