https://www.blogit.com/Blogs/Blog.aspx/Claude_613543/When the pastor's not there somebody has to give the sermon. On occasion I have been asked to prepare and deliver the sermon. Illustrations come to mind as well. Although I have done mostly factory work, I did major in theology at Union College, a Seventh-day Adventist institution in Lincoln, Nebraska. You can find God's message in the sidewalk that wished it were a much more important street, the dogs that ate each other's food before going back to see what was left in their own dish--and yes, as I transcribe my sermons from outline to text I'll include those, too. hourly12000-01-01T12:00+00:00https://www.blogit.com/Blogs/Blog.aspx/Claude_613543/917312I have often dreamed of living in scienc fiction worlds. Real worlds, not fantacy ones. As a teenager I was going to be a science fiction writer, so it was important to visualize these worlds: The animals were animals, not monsters. The plants were plants such as we know. The people had to have...https://www.blogit.com/Blogs/Blog.aspx/Claude_613543/917092There is a river in eastern Iowa called the Wapsinicon. The Wapsi (as it is often called) begins very close to the Minnisota border, flows east of Waterloo, and empties into the Mississippi north of Davenport--its journey entirely in the state of Iowa. My cousins took me on a rowboat ride down...https://www.blogit.com/Blogs/Blog.aspx/Claude_613543/915890It is Friday and in about an hour and a half the sun will set and the Sabath will begin. My wife does the dishes. I vacuum the floor. Both of us prepare something for pot luck: I prepare basic grub like a crockpot of beans while she prepares something more elaborate like a cassarole. They should...https://www.blogit.com/Blogs/Blog.aspx/Claude_613543/915791I first noticed it as I thought about Star Trek: Nobody was married. Nobody on the Original Series of "Star Trek" was married. Then came "Star Trek the Next Generation": Beverly Crusher was a widow. On "Deep Space 9" Chief O'Brian was a family man. Toward the end Worf and Jadzia got married. On...https://www.blogit.com/Blogs/Blog.aspx/Claude_613543/915695In Exodus 19:10 God commanded the people have their clothes washed and gave them only three days to get the laundry done. It can be quite a challenge for some of us to get our clothes done in three weeks, let alone three days. Can you imagine what the task was like to the women? Wash all the...https://www.blogit.com/Blogs/Blog.aspx/Claude_613543/915682Since leaving home I have made it a point to pay tithe, and since the mid-1980s I have usually paid the same amount for other offerings. In the autum of 1978 I was having to pinch my pennies pretty thin. Suddenly a store clerk asked me if I'd like a shirt for $1. They were flannel work shirts,...https://www.blogit.com/Blogs/Blog.aspx/Claude_613543/915670I think it was a little over twenty years I was listening to the radio when I heard that the #1 reason people gave for leaving a church was that the carpet had been changed. Of all the great, soul-searching reasons.... Can't stand to go to that church any more; they changed the carpet. I know a...https://www.blogit.com/Blogs/Blog.aspx/Claude_613543/915629God said He would lead the children of Israel to a land flowing with milk and honey. Appealing advertizing there--but what exactly is a land flowing with milk and honey? Well, milk comes from cattle. Cattle graze on grass. You cannot very well irrigate pastures of grass, at least not with...https://www.blogit.com/Blogs/Blog.aspx/Claude_613543/915600My wife's friend was coming from Omaha. It would be no problem to pick up my wife's sister in Council Bluffs, too. Then she would pick her up and take her back on a later trip. But when later came she couldn't make the trip. The Chinese character for "argument" is two women under one roof....https://www.blogit.com/Blogs/Blog.aspx/Claude_613543/915545The Lord decided it was time I got a little humbling, and Sabbath morning He gave it too me. Several times when singing songs I should have known by heart I couldn't remember the words. This was congregational singing so nobody else noticed--but I sure did. When it came time for the Offering Call...