QUARANTINE BLOG # 639

December 29, 2021

Brian sent me a new collection of sayings.  These are based on Bible characters and events, many through the eyes of children.

The Sunday School teacher was describing how Lot’s wife looked back and turned into a pillar of salt, when little Jason interrupted, “My Mommy looked back once while she was driving,” he announced triumphantly, “and she turned into a telephone pole!” 

A Sunday school teacher was telling her class the story of the Good Samaritan.  She asked the class, “If you saw a person lying on the roadside, all wounded and bleeding, what would you do?”  A thoughtful little girl broke the hushed silence, “I think I’d throw up.” 

👉  Perhaps you’d like to have a Bible small enough to carry with you every where you go.  Well, if you purchase a copy of the world’s smallest Bible, you’ll need a microscope with 10,000 power magnification to read it.

The Nano Bible is a gold-plated silicon chip the size of a pinhead on which the entire Bible is engraved.  The text, consisting of over 1.2 million letters, is carved on a chip that’s 0.5mm by 0.5mm.

Or perhaps you’d prefer the New Testament, instead of the entire canon.  The Jerusalem Nano Bible includes every single dot, comma, chapter and verse of the New Testament, printed on a 5mm by 5mm silicon chip.  It includes all 27 books.  And you can purchase it as jewelry, specifically a pendant.  You’ll still need that very large microscope, and a knowledge of Greek, the source of the original translation.

You can get one that is just the chip, no pendant, from eBay for $59.00, plus shipping.

👉  If Jesus had tried to feed this crowd:

👉  It may be a little early for a nap, but a little inspiration never hurts.

👉  I stumbled onto an article from Time magazine about the 35 movie sequels that are better than the originals.  Not having seen most of them – either the original or the sequel out of the 70 movies offered – QB will offer a few of my personal favorites.

First up, Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan.  The first Star Trek movie was more concerned with special effects than building characters, and while classified as “boring” by many Star Trek fans, QB is quick to point out that had it not been for Star Trek: The Motion Picture, there would have been no Wrath of Khan through Nemesis (which would have been better off unmade because it almost killed the franchise.  Wrath of Khan made $14,347,221 in its opening weekend, at the time the largest opening weekend gross in history.

Character development with themes of old age, friendship, and death made Khan the success it is.  Spock’s death was to be irrevocable, but Leonard Nimoy had such a positive experience during filming that he asked if he could add a way for Spock to return in a later film. The mind meld sequence was the solution.

Another strength of Wrath of Khan was the great villain played by Ricardo Montalbán.  The V’ger probe of The Motion Picture was pale by comparison.  The theme of obsession with Khan’s goal of destroying Kirk, even at the cost of his own death, paralleled Herman Melville’s Moby Dick, complete with quotes and variations on quotations of speeches from Captain Ahab.

The humor of Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home, and the relationship of Anij and Captain Picard in Star Trek: Insurrection makes them my second and third favorites of the series with Star Trek: Nemesis and Star Trek V: The Final Frontier tied for last place.

Another sequel tomorrow.

👉  Two “Blackouts.”

👉  I have 2 daughters, 2 daughters-in-law, and 6 granddaughters.  I am very, very kind to them.

👉  A post-Christmas story before we close.  Two New Hampshire brothers have gotten their holiday regifting skills down to an art – they’ve been passing the same hard candy back and forth for more than 30 years.  It started in 1987, when Ryan Wasson gave a 10-roll Frankford “Santa’s Candy Book” with assorted fruit flavors to his brother, Eric Wasson, as a joke for Christmas, knowing that Eric wouldn’t like it.

“I didn’t eat them,” Eric Wasson said.  “And so the next year I thought, ‘Hey, I think I’m going to give it back to him.  He’ll never remember.’”  But Ryan immediately recognized it.  They’ve been taking turns ever since, keeping a log of their exchanges. They’ve gotten creative about it.  The candy has been frozen in a block of ice, put in Jell-O, and sewed it into a teddy bear.  Suggestions for another exchange include having it arrive via a pizza delivery or Christmas carolers, hiding it in a book or cake, or holding a scavenger hunt with clues.

👉  Today’s close, “The God of Glory Thunders,” is from Praying with the Psalms, by Eugene H. Peterson.

The voice of the Lord is over the waters; the God of glory thunders, the Lord, over mighty waters (Psalm 29:3).

The person of faith hears something to which others are deaf: the voice of God. The voice is heard in a wide range of sound: from the “still small voice” that calms the heart, to this thunderous boom that inspires awe and wonder.

Prayer: I don’t hear enough of what you say, Lord. Cure my partial deafness so that I may attend to your deep, authoritative word resounding through the world in stormy majesty. Amen.

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