First Call of Abraham
We got our porch back yesterday. When I arrived home from my office at the church, Linda said Mary had posted on FB Friends of Harbour Village, stacks 16-19 are released back to owners. Happily we cleared the living room of porch furniture back onto 7H porch, sat out there, celebrated with a glass of wine, and contemplated the burn across StAndrew Bay on Tyndall, about from Redfish Point to Davis Point.
Burn at Tyndall AFB Saturday afternoon, competently planned for drifting offshore.
Late, 6:00 pm, and two points of flame visible from 7H, one low, one seems to be dancing high and growing, then more flare up. Wee hours of morning, now contained, all black and dark over there, though the Bay is bright and our strip of beach seven levels down, the moon waxing gibbous at 97%. For Bay-side scaffolding, can't see Betelgeuse, but https://www.forbes.com/sites/jamiecartereurope/2020/03/06/now-whats-going-on-with-betelgeuse-the-future-supernova-just-isnt-that-cool-say-astronomers/#10f808093368
Confirmation & Bible Study in adult Sunday school class this morning. Half & Half, no time for taking on all the lectionary snippets, so leaving Jesus and Nicodemus to the preacher, not me, my intent is Genesis 12, God's first call of Abraham. Poor guy, 75 years old, just sold his law practice in Haran, bought that classic BMW he wanted, and HaShem rings. Yo, Abe! Yo, Ya, what's up? Abram and Sara are retired, childless and resigned to loving it, when all of a sudden they are promised land, progeny, and not only blessings but that they will be a blessing to the world. Straining my ears outside here on 7H porch, I can hear the groaning from four thousand years ago.
At 75, Sara 65, their adventures are about to begin. Somewhere around here I have a book of Buechner's essays with a sketch of Abram & Sara driving off into the sunset in a BMW 2002. My visualization: chicken coop strapped to the car roof and the sunroof closed tight. This sexy young septuagenarian couple find that kings fight over Sara, Abram gets rich off of it, and HaShem shows up every few years to renew the promise.
Which he, Ha, Ya to Abram, doesn't seem to take seriously until Abe is a hundred and Sara ninety. and HaShem hears Sara cackling at Abraham's perpetual naivete when Ya makes the promise for the fourth or fifth time over the past quarter-century. That was under the Oak Tree at Mamre, remember, Abraham feasting with the Three in One while Sara eavesdrops inside the tent fancying the same handsome young angel who a couple centuries later will charm Zechariah's wife Elizabeth and then ultimately Mary, betrothed to Joseph of Nazareth in Galilee.
Mind, we are a religion of stories, some still hanging on from evenings around the campfire with Moses, looking up at the same moon and the same Betelgeuse while the tribal storyteller weaves his good spell.
Bible Study might glance at Hebrews 11 about the Faith of Abraham, and at Romans 4 where Paul is remembering how trusting Abraham was back at Genesis 15:6.
Oh, couple maps of their travels and one of Das Großisrael from Genesis 15:18 per HaShem
18 On that day HaShem cut a brit (covenant) with Abram, saying, Unto thy seed have I given ha’aretz hazot, from the River of Egypt unto the great river, the River Euphrates:
One can visualize the tension such fanciful imagining has wrought in the Middle East over the ages. Doubtless wanting more Lebensraum, but are we forgetting something?
Black coffee, dark chocolate, 3:49 AM CDT.
5:07 with crabmeat not kosher, but lox and goat cheese on sliced French baguette. Raspberries and black.
T+
Burn at Tyndall AFB Saturday afternoon, competently planned for drifting offshore.
Late, 6:00 pm, and two points of flame visible from 7H, one low, one seems to be dancing high and growing, then more flare up. Wee hours of morning, now contained, all black and dark over there, though the Bay is bright and our strip of beach seven levels down, the moon waxing gibbous at 97%. For Bay-side scaffolding, can't see Betelgeuse, but https://www.forbes.com/sites/jamiecartereurope/2020/03/06/now-whats-going-on-with-betelgeuse-the-future-supernova-just-isnt-that-cool-say-astronomers/#10f808093368
Confirmation & Bible Study in adult Sunday school class this morning. Half & Half, no time for taking on all the lectionary snippets, so leaving Jesus and Nicodemus to the preacher, not me, my intent is Genesis 12, God's first call of Abraham. Poor guy, 75 years old, just sold his law practice in Haran, bought that classic BMW he wanted, and HaShem rings. Yo, Abe! Yo, Ya, what's up? Abram and Sara are retired, childless and resigned to loving it, when all of a sudden they are promised land, progeny, and not only blessings but that they will be a blessing to the world. Straining my ears outside here on 7H porch, I can hear the groaning from four thousand years ago.
At 75, Sara 65, their adventures are about to begin. Somewhere around here I have a book of Buechner's essays with a sketch of Abram & Sara driving off into the sunset in a BMW 2002. My visualization: chicken coop strapped to the car roof and the sunroof closed tight. This sexy young septuagenarian couple find that kings fight over Sara, Abram gets rich off of it, and HaShem shows up every few years to renew the promise.
Which he, Ha, Ya to Abram, doesn't seem to take seriously until Abe is a hundred and Sara ninety. and HaShem hears Sara cackling at Abraham's perpetual naivete when Ya makes the promise for the fourth or fifth time over the past quarter-century. That was under the Oak Tree at Mamre, remember, Abraham feasting with the Three in One while Sara eavesdrops inside the tent fancying the same handsome young angel who a couple centuries later will charm Zechariah's wife Elizabeth and then ultimately Mary, betrothed to Joseph of Nazareth in Galilee.
Mind, we are a religion of stories, some still hanging on from evenings around the campfire with Moses, looking up at the same moon and the same Betelgeuse while the tribal storyteller weaves his good spell.
Bible Study might glance at Hebrews 11 about the Faith of Abraham, and at Romans 4 where Paul is remembering how trusting Abraham was back at Genesis 15:6.
Oh, couple maps of their travels and one of Das Großisrael from Genesis 15:18 per HaShem
18 On that day HaShem cut a brit (covenant) with Abram, saying, Unto thy seed have I given ha’aretz hazot, from the River of Egypt unto the great river, the River Euphrates:
One can visualize the tension such fanciful imagining has wrought in the Middle East over the ages. Doubtless wanting more Lebensraum, but are we forgetting something?
Black coffee, dark chocolate, 3:49 AM CDT.
5:07 with crabmeat not kosher, but lox and goat cheese on sliced French baguette. Raspberries and black.
T+