Salvogesis

Give thanks in all circumstances; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus. - 1 Thessalonians 5:18 This weekend, of course, is Mothers’ Day. Yesterday I was thinking about a cat that we had when I was growing up. Her name was Little Spook. I remember when Little Spook had kittens. When it was time to feed them, she would call them all and lie down and they would come, snuggle up and eat. After a few weeks the kittens were big enough to go to their own homes so we sent them off to live with their new owners – except for one kitten, Simon, who we kept. Little Spook would lie down and call her kittens every day at meal time for them to come snuggle up and eat but of course none would come – except Simon. Little Spook missed her babies. Every day she would call. Every day only Simon would come. One day when Simon arrived – everything changed. Instead of getting a cuddle and a meal, Little Spook would swat Simon and chase him away. Every day the same thing: she would call her babies, ...

My family and I were on vacation in Europe when the pandemic hit the continent full force. Our first night in Europe - before we knew how COVID-19 was going to paralyze the world - we were exhausted. My wife and my older daughter were so tired at 4pm that they just couldn’t stay awake. It had been a long day-and-a-half of travel without much sleep for any of us. With my wife and my older daughter asleep I took my youngest to the park, the playground, and the grocery store (before any lock downs or social distancing were in full effect!) so that we wouldn't disturb them. At the playground I made a mistake: I sat down. I sat on a bench while my youngest daughter was playing and I just could not stay awake! No matter what I did, I couldn’t stay awake - so we headed to the apartment. When we got there we noticed that there were not enough beds for us and there were even less blankets. Our older daughter was sleeping on the couch with one blanket and my wife was sleeping on a double...

My family and I were on vacation in Europe when the COVID-19 pandemic hit the continent full force. On our flight my daughter and I were watching movies with sub-titles (we didn't have headphones). One very funny movie we watched was Blended about these two previously married people falling in love and their families coming together. The lady was divorced. The man's wife had died of cancer. We were laughing out loud so much that my wife (who was sitting a couple of rows up with my other daughter) came to see us. She asked what we were watching that was so funny; all she could find was a movie about some lady who died of cancer. It wasn't the same movie but my daughter and I couldn't help laughing all the more! (The possibility that her not funny movie was exactly the same as our funny movie to us was very funny) Now, of course, there is nothing funny about someone dying of cancer or Corona or anything else for that matter. But a lot of our healing and wholeness co...

Edouard Kitoko Nsiku writes that “While it would be going too far to say that the last chapter of Isaiah is a summary of the book, it does touch on most of the major themes: denunciation of hypocritical worship of the Lord, the restoration of Jerusalem, God’s intervention as both judge and Saviour, and Salvation for Israel and the nations.” [1]   Isaiah 66 is an important chapter with which to conclude the book.    I remember reading about the Emperor of Japan once during the Samurai era. The people believed that the Emperor was divine so the military powers wouldn’t dare harm him. What they would do instead was that the various warlord Shoguns would fight to control the area around the Emperor’s palace. That way, as they could not rid themselves of the Emperor, they could at least contain him and control who had access to him. It seems that the same thing was happening at various times in the history of Judah. The ruling classes were seemingly trying to contain Y...

Isaiah 31:1 Woe to those who go down to Egypt for help, who rely on horses, who trust in the multitude of their chariots and in the great strength of their horsemen, but do not look to the Holy One of Israel, or seek help from the Lord. Woe to those who rely on America. [1]  Egypt was the regional superpower south of Isaiah's country in Isaiah's day; America is the global superpower south of us today. This passage could easily read: Woe to those who go down to the States (or anyone else) for help, who rely on armies, who trust in the multitude of their tanks, airplanes, WMD and in the great strength of their military, but do not look to the Holy One, or seek help from the Lord. Verse 2: Yet He [GOD] too is wise and can bring disaster; He does not take back His words. He will rise up against that wicked nation against those who help evildoers. Verse 3: But the Egyptians [Americans] are mere mortals and not God; their horses are flesh ...

It has been an interesting week or so here weather wise. I remember last week when Susan was preaching she had us all turn around and see the snow coming down: Great big flakes. Thursday of this week when I first left the house I turned around and came back in to change my coat – I traded my snow coat for a raincoat but that seemed to be a pointless exercise as the weather changed so many times that day that it didn’t matter what I was wearing. Raining, snowing, sometimes so sunny that I needed my sunglasses to even see down the street. Wednesday (or last night too!) was the big snow day – I think – Wednesday was the one where I had the most shoveling to do. After shoveling at home I headed to the corps here and shoveled around the corner. Justin showed up while I was hard at it and he was a really big help especially clearing the loading bay back there! Wednesday was also the perfect sledding day. Heather and I headed out to the hill by Williamson Park sometime after school and sl...

This week we went to see lights in Vancouver. They had an Aurora (Northern Lights) festival at the PNE grounds. Heather was able to go on stage and act out the part of Santa's reindeer, Prancer; she was able to go on a lot of rides and we were able to walk around and look at a lot of really interesting lights. A few days prior, we were in Victoria. This year they have lights in Centennial Square. We took a look at those with the girls’ cousin and my folks. We also looked at the lights in Chinatown and on the Parliament Buildings. And a week ago today Heather and I went to look at the lights at Milner Gardens. That was really quite something. Heather had been the day before so she knew exactly what she wanted to show me in the garden. We looked at all the lights through these special glasses that made them look like stars, candy canes, or reindeer. Then we had story time, cookies and hot chocolate, listened to musicians and carollers and had a very nice tea and scones. Heather ...