The Plumbline

"One faces the future with one's past." Pearl S. Buck The other day the hospice nurse was chatting with mom. They were talking about how mom feels like she is sometimes a burden - something I think most parents feel when they become a little more dependent upon their children for their daily needs. As they chatted, the nurse kindly reminded mom that I appeared to be very happy doing what it takes to keep her safe and well-cared for, then she said that maybe it was my turn to repay mom for the many times I may have been a handful for her in my younger days. While she didn't know me as a kid, she certainly had me 'pegged'! I did my share of things that put mom and dad through heartache and the simple acts I perform today to keep mom safe and well are nothing compared to those times! We all have those 'tales from the past' we'd rather like to keep hidden from view - things we are neither proud of, nor very appealing to onlookers. Yet, they are the...

“Whoever boasts should boast only about the Lord.” What people say about themselves means nothing. What counts is whether the Lord says they have done well.  ( 2 Corinthians 10:17-18   ERV ) Someone once reminded me my present issues and troubles don't determine where my life is headed - they merely make up the place where I can start (or perhaps even start again). I think they may have been quoting Nido Qubein who also reminds us, " Change brings opportunity ."  As a novice using Excel spreadsheets, I built spreadsheets and workbooks of data only to find the elements I needed to extract from that plethora of data were so jumbled up I could not really get much meaningful data out of that mess. Over time, I came to realize the significance of not only the data housed in these sheets, but how it was organized in order to make meaningful use of it later on. In life, we often know we are supposed to do something with what it is we have right in front of us, but it is jus...