Mark's Views, Perhaps — from behind my eyeballs
O Lord my God, shed the light of Your love on my child. Keep him safe from all illness and all injury…. I do not ask that he be wealthy, powerful or famous. Rather I ask that he be poor in spirit, humble in action, and devout in worship. Dear Lord, smile upon him.
— Johann Starck
“Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you in due time: Casting all your care upon him; for he careth for you” (1 Peter 5:6,7).
Luke and LaVay’s fourth child. And our fourth grandchild.
He was born at the hospital in Madras (Oregon) in the wee hours of the morning. On October 1. At 2:36 am.
After I dropped Ruby off at the emergency entrance at 2:24 — after leaving home at 11:45 (or was it 11:54?).
So here’s Ruby holding him at 2:56 in the hall outside the room in which he was born — a scant 20 minutes earlier!
Late the next afternoon, we stopped by the hospital before heading for home.
I was impressed again by the well-crafted little hands of a newborn. Here are four pictures I took: Read it all
Every summer (for the last eight?!), we try to get down to the mid-Willamette Valley to take rides with Russell in “his” bale stacking outfit.
We almost missed it for this season.
But after lunch yesterday, Ruby and Andrew and I took off.
Here are eleven photos I took. Read it all
We’re almost a week past Father’s Day in the USA.
My heart aches for the children whose dads treat them unjustly. I have observed that far too often, even in Christian homes. Shame!
So here are two tips for dads:
Nurture your children; don’t provoke them.
Don’t exasperate your children or they’ll lose heart.
Do any of the following flaws (or sins) describe how my children experience (or just perceive) me?
If you think your child is too young to catch on to these things, don’t kid yourself!
And even if your child hasn’t caught on yet, your Heavenly Father has! And He will make you pay for being unjust to your children, especially the little ones.
Oh, those two tips with which I started?
They’re actually commands…from God:
“And, ye fathers, provoke not your children to wrath: but bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord” (Ephesians 6:4).
“Fathers, provoke not your children to anger, lest they be discouraged” (Colossians 3:21).
Fathers, how we treat our children influences their perception of the Heavenly Father. Check this out:
“Like as a father…his children, so the LORD…” (Psalm 103:13).
OK, dads, I offer a question to help guide you in your day-to-day interaction with your children:
I got up around 5:15 this morning — that would be roughly an hour and a half ago.
And there — exiting the spare bedroom — were our oldest and their oldest.
They were heading home to Madras! (Her husband is likely out in field already.)
Our oldest — aka LaVay — was the last to bed last night and the first up this morning. After a big day yesterday which included picking and doing up strawberries.
How does she do it?!
Now she’s driving home…probably going by Mt Hood as I type. (She’s probably got about an hour to go.)
Oh, I mentioned seeing them exiting the bedroom. LaVay had already taken their second oldest out to their vehicle. And while she escorted their practically-sleep-walking oldest, she carried two others — their youngest and their truly-youngest.
She’s due in late September, as I recall.
You go, girl!
United Nations Population Fund Leader Says Family Breakdown is a Triumph for Human Rights
| A leader in the United Nations Population Fund UNFPA has declared that the breakdown of traditional families, far from being a “crisis,’ is actually a triumph for human rights.
Speaking at a colloquium held last month at Colegio Mexico in Mexico City, UNFPA representative Arie Hoekman denounced the idea that high rates of divorce and out-of-wedlock births represent a social crisis, claiming that they represent instead the triumph of “human rights” against “patriarchy.” “In the eyes of conservative forces, these changes mean that the family is in crisis,” he said. “In crisis? More than a crisis, we are in the presence of a weakening of the patriarchal structure, as a result of the disappearance of the economic base that sustains it and because of the rise of new values centered in the recognition of fundamental human rights.” “Day after day, Mexico experiences a process of this diversity and there are those who understand it as a crisis, because they only recognize one type of family,” one of the speakers on the panel also told the audience. |
This must be one of those stories buried by the regular press.
Maybe they just missed it.
HT: The Berean Call