The other day I read a thought provoking post over at the Internet Monk where he decries the way “[w]orship is now a major audience event, led by skilled entertainers, aimed at a demographic and judged by the audience reaction.” He goes on to assert:

Worship has now become a musical term. Praise and worship means music. Let’s worship means the band will play. We need to give more time to worship doesn’t mean silent prayer or public scripture reading or any kind of participatory liturgy. It means music.

After I read this post, I went away and pondered what I read and I disagree with him about the music is used as a form of worship.

I have always liked the formal liturgy that is used in Catholic and Anglican churches. There is a certain stately measure in the more formal worship service that appeals to the OCD part of my nature. It’s also the form of worship I grew up with in the Conservative Baptist church my family were members of. But there is another part of me that is drawn to music as worship.

There are seven references in Psalms about worship through songs. All of them refer to music as a “joyful noise.” I like that term. It doesn’t say “joyful harmony” so don’t worry about being able to carry a tune! Two of the references in particular point to music as a form of worship:

Psalm 95:2
Let us come before his presence with thanksgiving, and make a joyful noise unto him with psalms.

Psalm 98:4
Make a joyful noise unto the LORD, all the earth: make a loud noise, and rejoice, and sing praise.

Have you ever been to a Southern Baptist or Full Gospel (Pentecostal) church service? They really know how to make a joyful noise! If you allow yourself to get completely caught up in the joyful singing, you can be raised up to a place where all your burdens, distress, unhappiness, and all the other negative thoughts and feelings drop away.

I can’t think of a better way to place all your burdens in God’s hands – submission, acknowledgment,  praise, and adoration all wrapped up in music. So make a joyful noise –in church, at home, in your car… turn up the music and sing along at the top of your lungs. It’s good for body, mind and soul.

I have just spent a great week with my family in Sacramento. My oldest grandchild and only granddaughter just graduated high school and that’s something a grandma just has to be there for. My son and his family flew in from Illinois. This is the first time in the three years we have been living in Maine that I have seen my family.

I also had the marvelous opportunity to see one of my best and oldest friends. We met when her youngest son and my only son were about 6 months old. Her birthday is the same as my daughter’s and we are only a few months apart in age. We lost touch with each other a long time ago. Recently I just happened to “google” her and found an email address. Now she is on Facebook and we will make sure we stay connected.

So. Here I sit in the airport waiting for my plane. I’m wishing I had paid more attention to my return itinerary because I would have changed it. I fly out of Sac at 6:00 heading to Phoenix. In Phoenix I change planes with a 2 hour layover. (!?!?!?!?!?) But wait. It gets better. I leave Phoenix for Boston at about 9:20 this evening arriving in Boston at around 5:30 am. Then I get to hang around Logan for three hours leaving for home at 8:40 am. (?!?!?!?!?!?!) What WAS I thinking??????

I think I will go get something to munch on and to drink. I am trying my best to avoid the Cinnabon kiosk but I’m not sure I’ll make it…

My daughter has a heart big as California where she lives. She has done the most courageous and selfless thing I’ve ever seen her do. In spite of her aching heart, she knows she has done the right thing by letting the love of her life walk away instead of asking him to be something he’s not. It’s natural to think of all the “what ifs” in a situation like this, but thinking like that doesn’t  change the present. My beautiful daughter, let yourself grieve for your loss, but know that your heart will heal. And never lose hope that love is out there.

Employees at Chrysler’s Kenosha Engine Plant are upset because Chrysler is closing the plant and moving operations to Mexico. No one likes to see jobs lost – especially when the jobs are outsourced. But…

Many years ago, unions brought about some important changes in labor that protected laborers from abusive treatment by employers. However, I firmly believe (and so does my democrat husband) that labor unions are now redundant and detrimental to American business. American manufacturers can no longer afford American workers – especially unionized workers – so they are taking their plants outside the country to places with cheap labor. The thing is, what’s cheap to us can be wealth to the workers hired in other countries.

I can’t help but wonder how long it will be before the unions realize they have bitten the hands that feed them one too many times.

When Brad asked me to marry him, I told him I was barely domesticated so don’t expect me to be domestic.  His response was I’m a big boy, I can take care of myself. I, on the other hand, like to manage the finances. (Except when they look bleak.) Brad hates to do the bill paying bank reconciling ad nauseum.  A marriage made in heaven, right?

Since our move to Maine I am now doing a little more around the house because I don’t have to punch a time clock. But I still hate to do housework and it shows sometimes – like now. It’s amazing how much dirt and dust I can tolerate before I give in and clean. I did clean in the bedroom after about a year of dust bunnies. Yes. A year. Brad is still confined to his recliner because of his shoulder so when he cleans house he never goes in there. Out of sight out of mind I guess.

It’s now been four weeks since his shoulder replacement surgery. He is doing remarkably well and now only wears the sling when he’s up and about – like right now… As I’m typing… vacuuming the carpet in Soho. It’s a light canister with an upright carpet attachment. But still. Four weeks. Should I feel guilty?

Nah. It was his choice and he’ll stop if it hurts. I think I’ll go see if it’s dry enough outside to go play in the gardens.

My daughter is my keeper of all dates important.  So I get a message on Facebook from her yesterday asking if I called Jesse on Thursday.  To say Happy Birthday.  Ummm, I forgot?  Actually, I knew it was his birthday, but I got distracted.  Not an excuse; an explanation.

There are certain milestones that track our passage through time.  Births, marriages, deaths… and certain birthdays.  I hit one of the birthday ones last year when Jesse turned 30.  (I am not old!!!!!)  I probably didn’t acknowledge that birthday either (probably because of that… number.  On Jesse’s 26th birthday I wrote a post dedicated to him. I would like to re-post it here.  It’s all the same, he’s just a little older. Sos… here goes…

Jesse was climbing his way out of his playpen almost before he could walk and figured out how to get out of his crib shortly after that. We moved into a house with hardwood floors when he was 2 1/2 and I quickly decided to put him in a regular bed so he wouldn’t crack his skull letting go from the top of the crib.

Jesse spent his toddler years decorating the walls with crayons and discovering what items would NOT flush down the toilet. We had to pull up the toilet in the hall bathroom three times in one year because the items that tried to go down got so thoroughly stuck in the neck that pulling the toilet was the only way to get them out.

After that, Jesse discovered matches. He tested them out on some grass outside – fortunately the flames didn’t touch the house six inches or so away. He and his sister even tried playing with matches in his bedroom closet. I still shudder to think… another time he decided that the hallway from the living room to his bedroom would make a great bowling alley. Unfortunately, the ball didn’t stop until it had gone into the wall. We had a vibrating recliner in the living room. While it was plugged into the wall, he decided to cut the cord “just to see what would happen.” He managed to break the circuit, ruin the cord AND the scissors. He didn’t hurt himself only because the scissors had rubber shielded handles!

When he was in the third grade, Jesse’s science project was about the life cycle of the frog. He paid a visit to the field at the end of our street and collected a number of small toads that he put in a jar. As a “late bird,” he started class an hour later than the “early birds.” When the “early birds” got out for recess, he was waiting at the door with his jar and began generously passing out the toads to his classmates. When his teacher told me the tale, she said she was able to rescue all but two of the poor little toads.

Fortunately very shortly after that, Jesse became involved with Little League and found a new (and healthier) outlet for his energy. And he discovered girls. A running joke while he was in high school that every dance picture was with a different girl. There was only one exception — and he married her.

Now my baby is *gasp* 31 and has two sons of his own who look like they are going to be as great a challenge for his parents as his father was for me. Jesse has turned into a fine, responsible young man and I am immensely proud of him.

Happy birthday, my son.

We are experiencing a good long spring rain.  The kind of rain that finishes melting snow, greens the grass and waters the gardens to wake up the flowers.

I lived across the border in what is now called Aroostook Village from 1956 to 1958 and  I still have a few memories of that time.  In our climate here we get summer rains and often it’s still warm enough to remain outside (especially if you are a kid).  My childhood playmate back then was my cousin, Karen, who lived about a mile or so south of our grandmother’s house where I was living.  I would walk down to play with her and we would go up behind her house to play in an abandoned homestead.  It provided us with shelter when it rained and I can remember singing:

It’s raining, it’s pouring
The old man is snoring
Bumped his head and went to bed
And couldn’t get up in the morning

Another time we got caught outside in a thunderstorm.  Karen’s cousin, Doug, lived just up the hill from my grandmother’s and we often played anywhere and everywhere in between.  This particular time we got wet and I smelled something… it was me and it kind of smelled like something burning… Doug said I had been hit by lightning – what did I know?  I was only six!  I ran home crying and hid under my grandmother’s kitchen table.  When asked why I was scared I repeated what Doug had said.  The grownups just laughed indulgently and told me I was smelling my wet woolen sweater.  But ever since I have been terrified by thunder and lightning.

I was raised in a conservative home ­– religious and political. However, I’ve noticed that the older I get the more moderate (and Libertarian) I become. My opinion regarding separation of Church and State (note the capital letters) is probably at odds with many in my family. Most of the arguments in the debate on separation are from non-believers (in Christianity) and are, for the most part, rather extreme in their desire to keep public institutions completely secular. I am on the other side of that argument. I believe that governing and politics should be kept out of the pulpit.

In my opinion, Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson and other like-minded Christian leaders have done more harm than good in their attempts to promote a political agenda that can be construed as legislating morality.  If they were to be successful in creating a government that adhered to the platform of the Moral Majority Coalition, would that government be any different than Iran’s Islamic government?

We live in a secular society governed by secular laws. Respecting and obeying those laws is no different than respecting and obeying God’s laws.  Part of being a Christian is to also be a good citizen.  I don’t even have a real problem with the Moral Majority Coalition – I just don’t want to see politics preached from a pulpit where Christ’s teachings should be paramount.

Considering the eternity we will be able to spend in Heaven, our time here on earth is rather fleeting. I think it’s more important to be a “beacon of light” to those around me than to “play politics” with my faith.

We are in what I refer to as weather purgatory.  It’s something you only experience when you live in a location where there are four distinct seasons – and the transitions between seasons.  The ugliest of those transitions is the one between winter and spring.

The Vernal Equinox may be in March but up here in northern Maine, spring hasn’t really gained a foothold yet. Weather “purgatory” is that time when the snow hasn’t quite finished melting leaving dirty white patches here and there looking like pimples on the ground.  The leafless trees stand stark against the sky and the lawns are a dreary brown.

Don’t despair.  Here and there you can see signs of new life:

First Crocus

It seems like these days there is nothing more depressing than the news. The Arabs and Jews are trying to destroy each other in the name of God, terrorists are trying to destroy the United States in the name of God, and the Catholic church appears to have been infested with pedophiles using God to gain access to little boys. Adults and teens with grudges kill for revenge. Gangs kill as part of initiation or in drug and turf wars. It’’s enough to make a person want to hide under a rock or run for the hills; and everyone asks: Why? Why do people do these things? If He exists, how could God allow this to happen?

At some point in the last 50 years or so ethics got thrown out the window and replaced with “I can do anything I want as long as I don’t hurt anyone else.” Then someone decided that children who did poorly in school and got in trouble weren’t really responsible for their actions. It was the fault of a society that didn’t provide those children with the opportunities and lifestyle they “deserved.” As a result, we now have at least two generations who feel entitled to have anything they want without having to earn it or pay for it. And society is now paying a heavy price for not teaching ethics and accountability from the time these children were born.

Newton’’s Third Law of Motion states that “for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.” In other words for every decision we make there is a consequence. Of all the things I tried to teach my children while they were growing up, the one concept I tried to instill in them was the concept of consequences. Our lives are filled with decisions and choices. Many are small and may only affect ourselves. Some choices, however, can affect an entire family, community, nation, or the whole world. The choices we make, whether large or small, have repercussions, or in other words, consequences. Depending on the choices we make, those consequences can be good or bad.

How ironic that the people who rail against God for all the bad things that happen can choose to do so because God gave us free will. God wants us to believe in Him, obey His commands and live as He teaches, but because we want to not because we have to. The bible says in Psalm 8:

4 what is man that you are mindful of him,
the son of man that you care for him?

5 You made him a little lower than the heavenly beings
and crowned him with glory and honor.

6 You made him ruler over the works of your hands;
you put everything under his feet:

We have the ability to think for ourselves, to learn and grow, to make choices for ourselves that will affect our success in life, to do great good for others. We also have the capability through our choices to do great harm to ourselves and others. And the bottom line is that no one is to blame for our decisions and choices but ourselves. Not God, not the devil, not society, not our parents. Ourselves.