Happy Birthday Jonesy. She had a birthday party at Burger King with friends, Jamie H. and Mimi, and then a birthday dinner with family(Justin made it in) at Golden Corral(her choice) . Thank you to everyone who wished her a happy day. She has blessed our lives and we are grateful to God for entrusting her to us.
Jones worked hard to earn money for the past several months. She saved to pay half the cost of her new bike. She got her ears pierced for her birthday and she bought a new dress and shoes(from Gran-nola). The snowman (presents) were from Mimi. Thanks for the great decoration Mimi!
Today is Jonesy's 6th birthday. She got her ears pierced for the occasion and is hosting her own surprise party at Burger King this afternoon. I adore her "style".
Ryan is an insurance salesman, not a preacher, but he delivered a humdinger of a message to his home congregation last week. If you have children you need to hear this. 6-01 Truth vs. Fiction by R Versus
“I request that both you and Leslie write on the topic so I can hear both of your perspectives, if that's not too much to ask. How did you decide to have four children? We're about to have number two, as you know, and are considering at least one more... but have some questions about how that would all work. Seems like you guys are doing great at it, and our families have lots of similarities (I'm a stay-at-home mom, too; Dave's schedule is erratic and nutty; we want to please God and raise our kids to know Him; our families don't live nearby - though we have you way beat on this one!; etc...).” -Lisa in Alaska
I’ll begin with saying that I believe in the Providence of the Lord Almighty. It is a beautiful mystery and I don’t claim to understand it. I believe and profess a faith in it. I could end my response right there, but I suspect that you want a little more than that so I’ll try to explain a little more, but in reading the rest of this and in your own day to day, I encourage you to keep those first three sentences in mind. Another thing to keep in mind: Words are important. I believe that we are created in the image of God, therefore I believe that the words we speak into our world have power just as the words of God have power. I’ll probably work on another post further exploring this idea. You asked how did we “decide” to have four children. Unless you are adopting, and even then outcomes are uncertain, you can’t decide to have any number of children unless that number is zero. I’ve seen a lot of heartache result from people using words like “we’ve decided to get pregnant”. God the Creator is the Giver of Life.
When we were first married Leslie was on the pill. After a few months of marriage I found myself watching that little packet of pills on the counter and dreading the fourth row. When she got to the fourth row, my normally kind and sweet wife became not so sweet and kind. I didn’t know how to handle it (what man does?). She would get upset with herself and apologize. I tried my best to be understanding, but we both grew tired of the emotional rollecoaster. Like so many newlyweds we had a desire for children, but didn’t feel confident that we were financially secure enough to start making babies right away. We talked a lot about it and finally fell back on our belief in the Providence of the Lord. Leslie went off the pill. We had faith that if and when she became pregnant that the Lord would provide. Her emotions smoothed out even though Aunt Flo’s visits were still a little stressful sometimes. About six month later, I started working for the railroad and a week after that we found out that she was pregnant with Jonesy. Our kids are, 15 months, 22 months, and 27 months apart. Believe it or not, we did employ some other forms of pregnancy prevention between them, but our love for our children and the desire for more always won out. In fact Leslie was disappointed at not getting pregnant fast enough between #3 and #4. I think Leslie would agree with me that our attitudes about having children have changed, matured, and taken on new perspective over the course of our marriage. Today’s cultural norm is to get married, delay childbearing, and “decide” to have two children. Among Christians and pagans alike it is the norm. Why? ( I could give you a list of reasons why I think that has become the norm, but I think I’ll leave that to those of you who wish to take advantage of the comments section. ) Over the course of my marriage and experience as a father, it has become difficult for me to reconcile praying “thy will be done” and reading scriptures extolling the blessings of having children with today’s family planning culture. My mom was one of six kids, and her father was one of thirteen. When I was growing up she often proudly pointed this out to me. I remember wondering to myself, ‘If a bunch of kids was so great then why does everybody just have two these days?” My dad was one of four, and both of my parents grew up in houses that weren’t any bigger than the one Leslie and I own. We recently heard someone say that our generation has come to love drywall more than children. Is that true? Leslie and I are often baffled by people who love our kids, always want to hold our babies, and tell us how precious they are then say that they don’t want to have anymore of their own because they can’t afford them or don’t have room for them. I believe that children are a blessing, not a liability to be figured into a cost analysis. I’m proud that the Lord has seen fit to bless us with four of them, but please understand that I’m not saying that a barren womb is a curse. Having a beautiful voice is a blessing, but that doesn’t mean that not being able to carry a tune is a curse. I believe that if you are willing to accept the blessing of children from the Lord, then you should give it over to Him. I don’t have any official stats, but I would guess that raising up a passel of children in the fear and admonition of the Lord is probably more effective in fulfilling the great commission than leaving your life savings to a missionary fund. Like many newlyweds who grow weary of the “So when are you going to have kids?” questions, Leslie and I sometimes get weary of “don’t you know what causes that?” and “are you done?”. My answers are we enjoy what causes that and we’ll let the Lord decide.
I know that Leslie is working on her response to Lisa’s question, and I’m sure that she’ll offer a different perspective. I know my response may lead to more questions and I welcome them. As I often say, I don’t have all the answers, but I do have a lot of opinions.
This week’s song is Nora Jones performing “Hands on the Wheel”, from Willie’s Red Headed Stranger album.
Red Headed Stranger was released in 1975 and became the first platinum selling country album. It is a brilliantly constructed concept album that is best listened to in its entirety.
It contains the song “Time of the Preacher” which I borrowed for the title of this blog, the classic “Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain”, the gospel classic “Just as I Am”, and “Red Headed Stranger.” The album and the story it tells were eventually turned into a movie of the same title with Willie in the staring role. It should have won an Oscar for best picture in 1986, but was shunned by the Academy in a political conspiracy that gave the award to Oliver Stone’s “Platoon”.
I included “Hands on the Wheel” on the first mixtapeCD that I gave to Leslie during our courtship. It is a beautiful piece of poetry set to music.
“Hand’s on the Wheel”
At a time when the world seems to be spinning hopelessly out of control,
There's deceivers and believers and old in-betweeners,
That seem to have no place to go.
Well, it's the same old song, it's right and it's wrong,
And living is just something that I do.
And with no place to hide, I looked in your eyes,
And I found myself in you.
I looked to the stars, tried all of the bars.
And I've nearly gone up in smoke.
Now my hand's on the wheel, I've something that's real,
And I feel like I'm going home.
And in the shade of an oak down by the river,
Sat an old man and a boy,
Settin' sail, spinnin' tales and fishin' for whales,
With a lady they both enjoy.
Well, it's the same damn tune; it's the man in the moon.
It's the way that I feel about you.
And with no place to hide, I looked in your eyes,
And I found myself in you.
I looked to the stars, tried all of the bars.
And I've nearly gone up in smoke.
Now my hand's on the wheel, I've something that's real,
And I feel like I'm going home.
1. Now that I have a laptop to take on the road with me, I resolve to not have extended lapses between posts.
2. I’ve decided to join facebk as a way of increasing traffic here at TOTP. I heard the other day that facebk is now worth $50 billion. When I went to the facebk site to check it out, I saw that they have a slogan: “It’s free, and always will be.” Then I started thinking. With advertising revenue down and most subscribers more than six months behind in their subscription payments, I’ve decided to offer Time of the Preacher free to the public. It is my hope that by joining forces with facebk, TOTP traffic will increase leading to increases in advertising revenue. I plan to eventually be bought out by gougle or yahou. Then I’m going to retire and move to Mexico.
3. I’m going to keep a record of the books I read and try to do a review of each one. I’ve intended to do this in the past, but I’m going to resolve rather than intend it this time, so hopefully it will get done.
4. I’m going to document a week of life on the railroad with as much detail as I can. It is it’s own micro-culture and is a hard thing to explain. I think if I can document a full week, then perhaps my friends and family will understand why I don’t know if I’ll be there tomorrow, but I fish a lot in the middle of the week.
5. I’m going to take requests. I’ve done this a time or two and am already working on the first one of 2011 (see the comments section from the Jan 1st post), but I’m going to open it up to all of you now. If you have a request for an article you can email me or leave it in the comments section.
6. I resolve to resume the reader profiles that I started last year. I think six resolutions is enough. I hope your new year is off to a good start.
As 2011 gets underway, I feel a need to take stock of things as they are, count my many blessings, and set about forming a vision for the year to come. Leslie and I recently heard something from an older woman on a panel discussion on parenting and family life. It was a very simple statement, but also very true and it has been on my mind continually since I heard it last week. She said, “You will end up where you are headed.” She then described taking note of some friends when she was younger and thinking to herself, “They are headed for a divorce if they don’t start treating each other better.” They did eventually divorce. They got where they were headed. And of another couple she thought, “If they don’t stop spending money like this they are going to end up bankrupt.” They did end up bankrupt. Simple yet profound. We will reap what we sow. I’ve heard a lot of talks and seen plenty of books and commentary on the fruits of the Spirit, and most of them seem backwards to me. They often admonish us to do or be the things described in Galations 5, love, be joyful, peaceful, patient, kind, etc... in order that we may be filled with the Spirit, but that is not what St. Paul said. He said, “If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit” and that the fruits of the Spirit are love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. Fruit is the result of seeds planted. My prayer is that I may sow seeds of righteousness in my life, that my family might reap the fruits of the Spirit filled life.
“Cast your bread upon the waters, for you will find it after many days.” Ecclesiastes 11:1
Even though the rest of the world has flown to facebk, I’m going to continue on here in the blogosphere. My number one reason for keeping this blog is to have a record of our life for my children to look back on when they are older. My number two reason is to keep our current readers updated on what is happening in our life. My number three reason is to allow myself an outlet for my writing. I’ve always enjoyed writing and this is a great format for me. As I’ve expressed in several recent posts, I’ve struggled lately to find computer time at home to write and post. Well, Santa Claus brought me a laptop to take on the road so I should have ample time at the hotels to write more this year. As an aside...My daughters all learned the words to the Christmas classic, “Santa Looked a lot Like Daddy”. Makes me smile every time they sing it.see I’m considering opening a Time of the Preacher facebk account to reconnect with some people and to be able to see pictures of family and friends.
To start this year’s blogging I’d like to review 2010......
My son was born. He tops the list for 2010. “Like arrows in the hand of a warrior, so are the children of one’s youth. Blessed is the man whose quiver is full with them!”
Jonesy and Georgia went camping with me. So much fun that we’re planning to do it again this year with Leslie, Annie, and West hopefully making the transition from daycampers to overnighters.
Leslie and I completed Financial Peace University and, in the midst of the “Great Recession”, had our best year ever financially. Not because we made a lot more money in 2010, but because we budgeted every paycheck and were faithful in our giving. Jones has been saving for the last several months to buy a new bicycle. I told her if she would work to earn and save half the cost of the new bike that I would pay the other half. She recently surpassed her goal. Before we went bicycle shopping, I took her aside and did my best to explain to her about giving of our firstfruits when the Lord blesses us. I showed her our budget notebook and she saw that at the top of each budget is our giving. She cheerfully side a portion to place in the offering at church. I was awed at her understanding and further encouraged to do my best to be a good example of stewardship for my children.
Jones started Kindergarten. This has been a big life changer for our family. After years of living on a railroad schedule, or lack of schedule, we’ve had to adjust to a school calendar. We’ve been blessed to have a great teacher, principal, and school for our daughter.
Georgia started Tuesday/Thursday pre-school. She continues to mature and has become quite the big sister and is especially protective and possessive of her little brother.
Annie is continuous entertainment. She loves to sing and talk and is usually doing one or the other if she is awake.
Leslie held us all together. She painted toes and kept other people’s kids for a little extra income and continued to lead and participate in Mother’s Of Pre-Schoolers, her Ladies Bible class, and her mom’s meet-up group.
I read a lot of good books in 2010. I’ll try to recount some of the highlights here in no particular order: I read the first eight of the seventeen books in Louis L’Amour’s Sackett saga. Lots of powerful life lessons in those books and I look forward to reading the rest of them. I read several of Elmer Kelton’s and Zane Grey’s books. My favorite being “The Call of the Canyon” in which the West was almost its own character and confirmed for me the naming of my son. I read (and am almost finished with) Herman Wouk’s “Winds of War” and “War and Remembrance”. I’ve learned more about World War II from these books than I ever learned in any history class. I read a few more of Lee Child’s Jack Reacher novels. Great entertainment. I read Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar’s “The Duggar’s: 20 and Counting”. This was one of the most encouraging, practical, instructive, and spiritually uplifting books I’ve ever read. I would highly recommend it to anyone. I read a couple of Francine River’s novellas. “The Priest” and “The Prophet”. I’ve never been disappointed by any of her works. She ranks as one of my favorite authors. “Story Craft” by John Erickson, the author of Hank the Cowdog. A book on writing, art, and life. I read the History of Roosevelt County, NM. I don’t remember the exact title, but it was compiled by the editors of the newspaper there and published in the 70’s in celebration of the county’s 75th anniversary. I also read a couple of other books and booklets on the settling of that region that I received from my Grandma. It’s important to learn about where and who you come from.
I got to attend the 3rd Annual Weekend at the Lake with a bunch of my college friends. There were 12 of us there this year. It has become one of the highlights of each year and plans are already being made for this year’s get together.
I had to say goodbye to Willie, my faithful canine companion. I often told people that I’d had him longer than I’d had my wife. He was a good dog.
Jones and I got to meet Willie Nelson the day before West was born. Just a short visit at the Austin airport, but a chance meeting that I will always remember.
Jones worked hard to earn money for the past several months. She saved to pay half the cost of her new bike. She got her ears pierced for her birthday and she bought a new dress and shoes(from Gran-nola). The snowman (presents) were from Mimi. Thanks for the great decoration Mimi!
