By the dozen

I won't bore you with my regular introduction of "we have the best family dinners ever," but last week we had a particularly funny episode that I'll recount in part.

So, we were were talking about the old-timey way of hanging people (throwing them up on stakes on a wall, just in case you were curious), and other random things like why my brother and I long misunderstood Ezekiel 4, and eventually we started talking about clocks. This is because we have a heinous clock that chirps, hoots, and makes other bird noises ever hour, on the hour. It's awful. I took the batteries out one time, but my mom actually likes the clock, so she found new batteries and now the clock is as loud as ever. This is fine, as we say, because what makes her happy makes us happy, but during supper we kept hearing it (it ended up being a long supper, so we heard the clock at least twice, and possibly even three times) and it was quite the topic of conversation.

That brought us to the thought that we should manufacture a clock with the twelve disciples on it! By the way, this may seem like a confusing train of thought to you, but we were talking about clocks, and we'd been talking about hanging people, and Judas was a disciple, and he hanged himself... well, somehow this made sense to us.

So anyhow, we had great discussion about how the clock would look. Would it have sounds for each disciple? Like Matthew, being a tax collector, would have clinky money sounds, and John would have some angelic sound, and Peter and the fishermen-type guys would have... fish sounds. Well, we decided that maybe the disciples wouldn't get sounds after all. But then there was the discussion of where we'd put the disciples. Who would get the 12:00 spot, right at the top of the clock? I voted Peter, but there was significant pull for John. Then we questioned if Judas should even get a slot. Maybe we could stick Matthias instead of Judas. My brother, of course, thought that perhaps we could have Judas at the 6:00 slot, and the clock could show the rope hanging him.

My mom wasn't impressed.

After a while we thought maybe we should just skip the disciples (too much drama!) and just do the twelve tribes. Of course, then there's the discussion about which tribe you should leave out (remember, Joseph got two tribes), and then we started all over again.

I Googled "twelve disciples wall clock" later, sure I'd find that somebody had already invented it, and to my surprise, didn't find anything. I looked only casually, but the closest I could find was a Last Supper clock and an old clock in Prague with the twelve on there, but it's an old clock, and not for sale. Also, there's a rock formation in Australia called The Twelve Apostles, and you can get clocks with the rock formation on the face, but that is, in fact, no help at all.

So one day if you wander into a Christian bookstore and see a twelve disciples clock, well, perhaps it was I, who somehow managed to finagle a deal to design clocks. It could happen!

All about Love

"If ye love me, keep my commandments." John 14:15

That verse tends to be a good reminder for me. When I do something wrong it doesn't mean that I don't love the Lord any more, but it means that my desire should always be to keep his commandments because I love him. Not out of duty or a sense or moral right and wrong, but rather that I love Him.

I was thinking about love even before work today, where I was informed that it was my duty to "love the plants" so they'll stop dying. I'm supposed to talk to them and remind them that they're doing a good job. Sometimes I can't believe they still pay me.

Asking about Acts - Part II

Let's talk for just a minute about Acts 27. Great chapter, truly it is, but there's one thing I always hear about it that sort of gets to me. Which is to say, Acts 27:29. "Then fearing lest we should have fallen upon rocks, they cast four anchors out of the stern, and wished for day."

The romantical side of me just likes to hear about a ship full of people wishing for day. Sounds cool (especially since you know they all survived at the end, phew), but it's the four anchors I hear a lot about. I'm not sure if any of the rest of you hear about these four anchors, but I highly recommend that if you're not familiar with a good sermon or two on the subject, that you head over to Google and, well, google it. "Acts 27 four anchors" is all it takes to come up with dozens of thoughts on these anchors.

I hear all sort of thoughts about them. Article number one on that Google search says that the four anchors are representative of Paul's steadiness in the storm. 1. He was in the presence of God, 2. He was God's possession, 3. He had a sense of purpose, and 4. He had a positive confession of his faith.

Well, these things are all good and right, but is that really what those four anchors represent?

Another article (also in the top ten Google listings under the search for "Acts 20 four anchors") says that the four anchors were that Paul 1. Prayed, 2. Had the Word of God, 3. Obeyed God, and 4. Had the hope of salvation. Once again, great things, but is that what those anchors mean?

I've heard other things. Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, if you'll believe it, were once referred to as the four anchors. In Acts 2:42 mentions new Christians continuing steadfastly in 1. The apostle's doctrine, 2. fellowship, 3. Breaking of bread, and 4. prayers. That's pretty popular from what I've personally heard.

Anyhow, there are more, which doubtless I'll remember in the middle of the night tonight, but you get the idea.

Now, I'm not trying to be contrary (although I realize I come off as sort of contrary sometimes), but I'm trying to be practical, I guess. My hang-up with this whole situation is this: why are we comparing things to these anchors, anyhow? The anchors sure didn't help the ship, did they? This was a ship that, if we're trying to compare apples to apples, wouldn't even be qualified as a Christian ship (re-read the chapter, I'm sure it'll make sense in a moment!). So the illustration is already a little flimsy, in my opinion.

So, like I say, we have a ship who'd been trying, on its own merit, to reach land, cast these four anchors into the sea, and, well, that didn't work either. The ship broke in pieces, much like Humpty Dumpty, I imagine, only with less yolk.

May I reiterate: why do we like this illustration so much? These four anchors gave those sea-sick people not one ounce of help, and I'd like to keep viewing prayer and obedience to God as something that'll help me, thanks for asking. I once decided that I was going to sermonize all on my own, and started telling people that I thought that the four anchors referred to Jacob's four wifely things. Moral of that story? Have just one wife. For some reason that doctrine never really caught on, funny... =)

This really solved nothing, I suppose, but it felt nice to spit it all out.