How our reading can affect our direction...

God's Boys will be good boys!

Like a delightful respite, we enjoyed a nice conversation about how Pastor MacArthur's book affected Christian music for our good, this recent past quarter of a century. It is true that we have been blessed by the direction and assistance of god-blessed study and writing. Can it be that there was a great and silent awakening that we have enjoyed? Looking at the development of Christian music, you and I and the rest of your siblings rejoiced that "excuse me!"{by Nicholas} was not the only example of Christian exuberance of those long days ago.

Sometimes we look at the days of the puritans and miss the things that are just past us. This time, the joy of spiritual fruit of the glut of Christian instructors and music were our reason to rejoice. Sadly our Christian profession has not outshined our verbosity in music and instruction. What if we are measured by the weight of our words compared to the weight of our personal profession? What if we are compelled to really be what we talk about and listen to? " Let us love and sing and wonder..."

Let us be what we hear and write and talk so much about. We are technoinstructed, super abundant tools for the spiritual warfare? Still, we are all too anemic in our victory. HELP, LORD!

Thank God, you are not a father yet! I am grateful for that.

God's Boys will be good boys! I imagine the idealest of circumstances for fatherhood. Relative obscurity, security of finances and a loving marriage and then...children. I imagine Prince William {certainly not the idealest of circumstances to be a Prince} always looked at and fawned over, but God has a plan for such uncomfortable circumstances, as well.

My daddy challenged my every faculty from my earliest moment. He looked at me as his soul, what he would have done or been, had he a father. It started at 6 months and I certainly would never recommend this, but he heard the guys on the job talking about their walking children and he was determined that I should be one of the early walkers. He placed me against the wall and of course I fell flat on my face. I don't remember this, but they told me this.

Infancy is for relationship development. I think my Daddy and I bonded very early. It is about teaching the child to trust you and know you. "Getting to know you" time. Don't mistake their inability for inattention. I think they are more attentive than we could realize. My children would remind me of things that had happened to them, when I thought they were unaware, the year before, when they were 2 or so that I thought that they would never remember. I would take at least an hour every day,{were I a young papa} playing age appropriate games with little baby-mine and introducing some of my interests also. If I am engulfed in a book of my liking, I would spend some time reading that book to baby, while bouncing or tickling toes.

They need muscle stretching, we learned from Grandma Ruth. Dad would talk about his horror at watching her stretch the small infants for a few minutes everytime they went to the in-laws house. She did it to everybody and she always told us it was good for the babies. I recommend it. Range of motion exercises for baby's development of movement. Eventually they won't need it, because they will do their own things.

I don't like techy things for babies. I think it will mess up their eyes and no mirrors in the crib. Grandma Rosalee says it makes them teethe hard and we experienced it first hand with Evvy. She was the only one that we disobeyed that law with. We had to go to the hospital for her first molar, it was purple.

I do hope that one day you'll be able to stomach the melodrama of the "Lloyds of London" movie.

God's Boys will be good boys!

I am thinking this morning about the touching scene when Mr. Angerstine first meets the little impoverished Jonathan and becomes his mentor. The affection that takes a man from a civil duty to a paternal duty was played so well in this movie. Every once in a while someone grabs our heart and doesn't let it go. Maybe, they don't know they have won our paternal prayers and concern. Providence has sent us brothers and sisters and father and mother, but grace and mercy weaves relations in Christ that are as dear and life-giving and soul-uplifting. We fear so, that some will take advantage of our heart's affection and this keeps us distant from one-another. I pray, dear boy, that you would be aggressive to carry your brothers in your heart in prayer and good relationship. I pray that you would nurture that relationship and expand your fellowship to develop yourself and others throughout life. Be encouraged to grow your fellowship.

{For Enoch, one day when you're a father, at the birth of the new prince}Even the best of fathers will feel the enormity of the task at times.

God's Boys will be good boys! My poor dad had no dad of his own around to show him the ropes and yet providence, etc. had placed 7 souls on his doorstep for fathering. I imagine Elizabeth Taylor in Father's Little Dividend, only the opposite for fathers. There was no movie about Buckley. He, like your dad had examples of different fathering styles to choose from. I can't tell which is worse. The primitive birth of the 50's and later where the style was live in closeknit parenting. Maybe that is great. Like she{Elizabeth Taylor} spoke about keeping the baby close at all times, is a temptation for fathers whose fathers were somewhat in absentia. We all hate something about our fathers and mothers and sware off ever being like that. Only to find them in the mirror in a few years. Looking above them, I think best. Acknowledging the pain of your own experience and attempting, gratitude and effort to do differently. Seeking first the kingdom of God, means reading scripture and praying with them, but it also means pouring yourself into that life. What a more difficult part of the job description! Thank God that He doesn't leave us to our own devices. Love and forgiveness can forge a path to healthy, though never perfect fathering, for even the broken. God can make a monument out of a molehill.

What My Son?

God's Boys will be good boys!

What, My Son, as you Graduate?

Getting ready for prom!

God's Boys will be good boys! Everytime it is promtime for my children, I cringe. I wonder, why God makes me so sensitive of this occasion for my children. I wonder why much of my heart goes out in prayer for my child to have a memory that I never had. The fire that would have consumed our house on that night and the gladness that I still have the real treasures of my life that I would not have had, if my prom hadn't been such a source of contention between my mother and I. She wanted me to miss it. Or she was having a premonition. I don't think that prom and hunger are exclusive. I think that you can have food and prom and sisters to love for the rest of your life. I think that God can protect you if you dance from your heart. I don't think that the knowledge that you are a good dancer will make you too proud. I hope you dance!

Topic of the day, conversation about "To God be the Glory!"

God's Boys will be good boys! Humble, humbling? We were conversing this morning of the benefits of various methods of education. Does any group have a handle on challenging and coaxing the minds of young people to greater endeavors without endangering their souls in the process. This is truly the question of the day. Do we let them wander in unbelief, finding truth after truth and hope that they bump into God as they wander, aimlessly? Do we train them vigorously, always pointing out the privileges of their disciplines and point them to God and make great pharissee-like people who grow knowledge, but whose pride endanger them moreso? It is truly a dilemma. Discipline is important. Humility is important and Christ has dominion and bought salvation for us, by His blood. I think that we steal precious years of relationship with God from children, by our expectation that they will bump into God on their own accord. On the other hand, we endanger them more, if the pride of place that they inherit in their faith condition, keep them from knowing the true and living God. {God resists the proud} I do see the examples of our era being the apostle Paul and Daniel. They were both men of great faith and great intellect. Sometimes, it seems that our faith impedes our study and the antithesis is also frequent. I imagine Daniel in the laboratory with some other faith filled people in the captivity in Babylon and someone asking him, why he is studying so hard. Doesn't God give knowledge through prayer and waiting upon Him? This is the frustration of faith. The scriptures show the apostle in Corinth, after redemption had already been purchased and his greatest enemies were the people of faith. God is love and God is also clearly represented in the truths that He has revealed in the natural revelation. I think that this is a great discussion for Pi day. We will discuss it more, later. It is the Christian's responsibility to be a student as well as a pray-er. God has given us minds to serve Him with as well as emotions. Humble acceptance of His ways and still avid search for how He accomplishes His will on the earth are not in isolation from eachother, but, hand in hand they guide us into "greater and greater light of God's ways" "unto the perfect day". {until we are able to see His ways more clearly}

SAT story

God's Boys will be good boys!

We've been intending the SAT's for years and years. From birth, we start talking into the children's ears about the perfect score that we intend for them to have. Everytime one of mine has an SAT scheduled, I cry about not having been able to discuss the test taking tips that I have learned over the years. We have baby mobile's with SAT questions and multiple choice ditdots for the baby to bop around with. We ask them vocabulary questions here and there with words that we are sure will be on the test. We've had some false starts. SAT discussions seem a Bodden delight. ie. children who got perfect scores, here and there dotted around us. Where, oh where is the smart "Bodden child" who will verify our teaching skills, by getting a great grade on the SAT's, so we can brag about it? None of our children are there, yet. {we are saving some accomplishments for Stoney to show all the rest of the grandchildren up in,LOL}

It amazes me that other families don't even talk about the SAT's till after they are over. Those are the ones who score the best, I think. Ours are all duds, we lament. They are beautiful children with no ambition for a perfect score. We will have to pay their way through college, or live working at Walmart forever. No shame in that. My children, I have found have very little test taking ability. They are smart in their sphere and test takers they are not. Me, my adrenaline lives for testtaking opportunities, none of them have inherited my lust for the perfect score.

The last time we tried for the SAT's Enoch had forgotten is i-d card. We were soooo disappointed and discouraged. How can we get this elusive test behind us? The wall seemed to grow and grow for the SAT's. The reschedule of the SAT's for us was postponed, on account of snow in January and today was the reschedule. We were holding our breath and crossing our fingers. Will he be able to take the SAT's. I tried to give him every trick that I had thought of for good test-taking. We've been talking about the SAT's from birth. He is not one of the children who takes the SAT's at 12 years old, but he is a good young man, who has dreams that seem always to grow a wall around them and the SAT's began to represent a wall around our dreams for this young man. Last year's scare and emotional time included. I simply cannot go into the cataclysm of events that nearly kept us from being able to transport him to the SAT's because of auto misfortunes. We had a blocker for that tackle and it was Ben who was in charge of the transportation dilemma. Now, we had transportation, identification...what else is coming at us, to try to keep my student from being assessed? We could only guess.

We woke this morning as we had the time before. We got ready and we could feel all of the cumulating SAT stories swirling around in our heads; with the knowledge that this day would be history in the making as all of the other's have become.

I let him make his own breakfast.{maybe my doting on him had jinxed the times before, I thought} We are not going to make a big hullabaloo about this. It will come and go. We drove out the door at 7 to be there by 7:45, making sure that he had the necessary Identification for himself and whatnots. A lunch, a mother's kiss, talking to's. Snow started falling as we got to the school. Students from around were also taking their SAT's. I don't know why I felt like crying. I didn't cry when Emily took hers or Elyse. They had their stories, but not so emotional.

The school that we go to for the SAT's has a nice little campus and darting around in the snow were a community of sundry birds who were playing in the snow. Amazing that they had no care of the SAT's and what they can mean for a person's future. They seemed to tell me not to worry. I listened. God will take care of En. With or without the SAT's he will get along, I know and I giggled to think that God is reminding us not to worry, even about our life situation and the dilemma's that we live under, in this shadow time.

I do wonder if it will stop snowing. It did stop and we left my boy, as if in the kindergarten, although he's a man. I care about him and he knows it. A humble resignation to the inevitable, seems to be the emotions that he exudes. He is really so introverted, that we really can't guess if he's nervous or not. He never wants to bother anybody, in any way. He's got this and we are here for him, either way.

My heart was in my stomach for him all day. This is not easy for a Walker fellow. They are great at design, but tests take them all to their limits. I've seen my children squirm at the thought of a vocabulary or mathematical assessment. I would spare them, but I live in the light of their difficulty in this. All day, I cast my care on Jesus, for my dear boy. I walked and prayed and hollared at anybody I could, namely Ben. He's so patient with me in these days. He must wonder why I care so much about these little things. I do.

He called and I heard the dropping of a weight in his voice. "Is someone coming to pick me up?" He's a man now. 18 and finished the SAT's applications for college need the score for him. He is definitely a hardworking student, but with no SAT score, there is little hope of any future at all, in this world, they say. We know God is in control, regardless. The heavens seemed to applaud the Walker's accomplishment of this high hurdle. The snow came down in drodes to mark the day and we are all in the excitement of a day well spent in the focus on the most unassuming and dearly delighted in, "boy of my dreams", doing the natural next thing. Taking the SAT's.

The man of the hour!

God's Boys will be good boys!

Today is the first day of the second and last semester of Highschool for the eldest son of my womb. We have come a long way from the little fellow who used to drop to his knees to sing, how can a young man keep his way pure? Still pursuing purity, sometimes to the chagrin of his less conservative sister. The comments were well taken this morning. Modesty must be pursued, you reminded us. Learning the right way to share this difficult concept for women is all around you. We are listening, even when we don't seem to be. Running to the tape of highschool and trying to do the best we can, is the task at hand. We are expecting much from you.

Confessions of your recovering Chocoholic mother!

God's Boys will be good boys!

Dear, dear hearted boy, I know that you are concerned with your mother's welfare and health. It is delightful to know that I am blessed with children who care. {I don't like it when you show too diligent a concern for my chocolate habit, but I know that it is love}. Last night, at the turn of the year, 51 years into my life, I discovered a flavor. This flavor is new to me, in sparkling cider flavors. I had thought that I had tasted all of the flavors that they had made. But, as we toasted the new year, my pallet was again initiated into a new delight. You will find that the older you get, the less you find new flavors to impress your pallet. Especially, if you have a sweet tooth, like we both do. My tastebuds are entirely given over to the tasting of chocolates, in the sweet family and have a semi-caniption if I give them anything but chocolate. I try to avoid the tastebud downer that happens when I eat other things; but, my overindulgence is being paid for by the emotional indolence to any other flavor in sweetness. My excitement button was pushed by the flavor of blueberry grape, sparkling cider. A sweet, slightly pungent sparkling pleasure. I am not a sparkling cider critic, but if I were, I would swirl the blueish concoction in my glass and smell the "bouquet", as they call it. I was at church, so I had to behave myself with decorum. I gobbled mine down, before the toasting had been done. I was embarrassed and hoped that the other brethren hadn't noticed my obvious greedy behavior with this new flavor. Everyone else was tapping glasses with everyone else and I was looking for another cup to consume. What a greedy girl I was in 2013. As a critic, I should have taken the first mouthful in and allowed my tastebuds a second or two to be bathed in the new flavor. Because I hadn't done this, my tastebuds were yearning for another cup, but I dare not ask the Pastor if anyone was going to have those 5 or 6 full glasses that were sitting on the table. I hoped that no one else was coming in to get more of the sweet tasting cider. I did get another of cups off of the table. I don't remember if I was offered or just pilfered. By this time the curiosity of the new flavor was consumptive. I just knew that the next time that I went to the store, I would be buying blueberry grape sparkling cider for some occasion or another coming up very soon. Surprise of surprises, there was another bottle that was offered to me by one of the brethren to take home with me. What a gift! This new flavor was the first taste that I consumed upon my arising, after my toothpaste. I am a mess. I will slowly, glass by glass, figure out why this taste is so attractive to me. I guess there are other good flavors than chocolate. LOL.