QUARANTINE BLOG # 325

February 18, 2021

This morning I offer you a birthday follow-up:

It’s weird being the same age as old people.  When I was a kid I wanted to be older – this is not what I expected.  I’m at a place in my life where errands are starting to count as going out.  I’m at that age where my mind still thinks I’m 29, my humor suggests I’m 12, while my body mostly keeps asking if I’m sure I’m not dead yet.  You don’t realize how old you are until you sit on the floor and then try to get back up.  We all get heavier as we get older, because there’s a lot more information in our heads – that’s my story and I’m sticking to it.  And as you age, remember, never sing in the shower!  Singing leads to dancing, dancing leads to slipping and slipping leads to paramedics seeing you naked.  So remember.  Don’t sing!

👉  And you thought it was cold in Augusta!  Winter weather has overwhelmed power grids and left millions without electricity in record-breaking in the nation’s midsection.  Blame the polar vortex, a weather pattern that usually keeps to the Arctic, but is increasingly visiting lower latitudes and staying beyond its welcome.  More than 100 million people live in areas covered by some type of winter weather warning, watch or advisory.  Nearly 3 million customers remained without power early Wednesday in Texas, Louisiana and Mississippi, more than 200,000 more in four Appalachian states, and nearly that many in the Pacific Northwest.  It reminds me of a plaque that hung in Grandma Lowdermilk’s kitchen: “I complained because I had no shoes until I met a man who had no feet.”

👉  An Atlantic City landmark came down yesterday.  The Trump Plaza, the one-time jewel of former president Donald Trump’s casino empire was imploded to make way for new development around the Boardwalk.  Built in 1984, it was initially the place where Hollywood stars went to see and be seen, but by the time it closed, Trump Plaza was the poorest-performing casino in Atlantic City, taking in as much money from gamblers in 8 ½ months as the market-leading Borgata did every two weeks.  A parking lot nearby sold spaces for people to watch the implosion to raise money for charity.  I pieced a couple of videos from news feeds together to watch the implosion.

👉  A few more amazing facts you may not have known about:

Soviet Cosmonauts took shotguns to space with them.  This wasn’t to fight off any capitalist aliens they might encounter in space.  It was for when they returned to Earth in case they landed in Siberia and had to fend off hungry bears.

Fortune cookies are an American invention.  They were invented by Makoto Hagiwara of San Francisco in the 1890s and sold at the Golden Gate Park’s Japanese Tea Garden.

Japan has a roaming deer infestation.  Because of this, the Japanese government has set up the National Wolf Association, which is focused on reintroducing wolves to Japan to help reduce the amount of wild deer.  Holiday Park Subdivision in Augusta, GA has a deer infestation, too.  Last week there were 4 deer in our back yard.  We will not be introducing wolves.

👉  What’s the origin of the phrase “Going to hell in a handbasket?”  To be going to hell in a handbasket is to be rapidly deteriorating – on course for disaster.  There is no obvious clue why handbasket was chosen as the preferred vehicle to convey people to hell.  There are variations of the phrase that use different forms of transport, traveling either to hell or to heaven.  In 1618 the English preacher Thomas Adams referred to “going to heaven in a wheelbarrow” in God’s Bounty on Proverbs.  Writing about one going in the opposite direction Adams said, “It will be, as the byword is, in a wheelbarrow: the fiends, and not the angels, will take hold on him.

The notion of sinners being literally wheeled to hell in barrows or carts is certainly very old.  The medieval stained glass windows of Fairford Church in Gloucestershire, England contain an image of a woman being carried off in a wheelbarrow pushed by a blue devil. 

👉  From Dubai, United Arab Emirates comes news that Emirati police have arrested a man for allegedly stealing a highly valuable newborn camel to give to his girlfriend for her birthday.  The owners of the baby camel reported the theft from their farm earlier this month.  Several days later, an Emirati man called authorities to say a stray camel had wandered onto his farm some 2 miles away.  When interrogated, the man’s story fell apart, and he soon admitted to trespassing on his neighbor’s farm to steal a rare breed of camel for his girlfriend, settling for the newborn after failing to wrangle an adult.

👉  One of my favorite writers is at his typewriter today:

👉  In one of my favorite Star Trek movies, Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home, the Klingon ambassador, after accusing Admiral James Kirk of attempting the genocide of the Klingon race, shouts, “We demand the extradition of Kirk!  We demand justice!”

Justice may be what the accuser seeks, but justice is the last thing the accused wants, especially if we are appealing not to an earthly court, but to the Court of Heaven.  Justice means we get what we deserve – punishment.  Mercy means we get what we do not deserve – forgiveness.

Confronted with his sin, David begs God for mercy: “Have mercy on me, O God, because of your unfailing love.  Because of your great compassion, blot out the stain of my sins” (Psalm 51:1 – NLT).

David is far away from God now.  In Psalm 23 he testified, “The Lord is my shepherd,” and now he is the one sheep Jesus spoke of, the one who has forsaken the companionship of the 99 and the safety of the fold for the harshness and aloneness of the wilderness (Luke 15:3-7).  There is no table prepared for David in the presence of his enemies.  He is the enemy, and he has lost the comfortable assurance of the covenant of grace.

David no longer seems like the man after God’s own heart, but rather more like the prodigal son who when he returned cried out, “I am no longer worthy to be called your son.  Make me one of your hired servants” (Luke 15:21).

But unlike the prodigal son who thinks that all hope for reconciliation and forgiveness is past, David appeals to the mercy of God.  The King James Version says, “Have mercy upon me, O God, according to thy lovingkindness: according unto the multitude of thy tender mercies blot out my transgressions.”  If you struggle with a definition for mercy, that old fashioned word “lovingkindness” gives you one: love, and kindness, neither of which is deserved.

And it is to that mercy that David appeals.  Because of Your great compassion, according unto the multitude of Thy tender mercies blot out my sins.

The Hebrew word “blot” has two meanings.  First, to “wash out” or “wipe out.”  The simple picture is of taking a dish and wiping it out, turning it upside down, and turning out all that is in it, sweeping it away.  And second, it is the withdrawal of a record in court when the indictment is withdrawn, “Lord, be pleased to quash the indictment against me; blot out all my transgressions.”

Because of that, David can confidently pray:

Hide your face from my sins;

    wipe away all my guilty deeds!

Create a clean heart for me, God;

    put a new, faithful spirit deep inside me!

Please don’t throw me out of your presence;

    please don’t take your Holy Spirit away from me.

Return the joy of your salvation to me

    and sustain me with a willing spirit ( Psalm51:9-12 – CEB).

Mercy is not a one-time experience.  Because of God’s faithfulness we continuously experience mercy.  The writer of Lamentations declared, “The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness” (3:22-23 – ESV).  If you feel like you are separated from God, turn around.  He’s been there all the time.

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