Mental Musings

Our Call to Unity and Holiness “Christians are people who are drawn together because they owe a common debt to the goodness and grace of God” William Barclay In a Nutshell Paul encourages the Ephesian Christians to live the way God’s people should live. Two particularly important things should characterize your lives: live in unity since you are spiritually united in Christ with all other Christians, and live holy lives. The Calling to Holiness (vv. 17-24) You must no longer do the evil things you did before you were a Christian. Verse 17 – Our history shared in the introduction to Ephesians explained that the Gentiles in Ephesus were living particularly evil lives. Paul made an appeal for them not to live like that any longer for it is futile and leads to nothing. Verse 18 – Then he says that their former way of living reflects darkened understanding, a result of previously rejecting God. When you hearts are hardened to God, your mind is dark. Living separate from God...

I am proud to be a Navy Brat. My father, Lt. William James Poole, retired USN, proudly served our country for 22 years. He went into the Navy as a 17 year old, fresh out of Travelers Rest High School where he was the Valedictorian that year. He later attended Officers Candidacy School and worked his way up to the rank of Lt. as a Fire Control Specialist. My father served throughout the Korean Conflict, the Vietnam War, as well as the Cuban Missile Crisis. He was a decorated hero, having been credited with saving the U.S.S. Yancey and her crew after the ship collided with the Chesapeake Bay Bridge on January 21, 1970, during a severe storm. My father was not the only one in our family who worked hard during wartime. My mother served as a volunteer nurse on the Little Creek Amphibious Base in Norfolk, VA. Most of the time she was caring for three small children by herself as my father was on tours for up to seven months at a time. She did not have family around to help her o...

Ceremonies from our homeschool graduation last night. I did a lot of research and found very little information about each of these online, so I thought I would share these for others to use. Rose Ceremony As homeschoolers you did not get the choice of choosing your teacher or requesting a different teacher if you did not like the one you had. Your mom and/or dad served as your teacher for math, science, language arts, music, art, foreign language and other subjects. They also served as the principal, librarian, PE coach, guidance counselor, office secretary, record keeper, school board, transportation manager, Home Ec. instructor, and even the lunch lady. Your parents may have had to do without certain things because of their choice to homeschool you, but they would be the first to say that you are worth it. God’s Word teaches us that it is the parents’ responsibility to teach their children. Fix these words of mine in your hearts and minds; tie them as symbols on your hands...

I have been doing something completely new and different for me: I have been planning for a graduation commencement service. The Oak Grove Academy Homeschool Umbrella and Homeschool Co-op are combining to hold our first Commencement with seniors. Last year we had an Eighth Grade Graduation service that was planned by somebody else. This year it will be combined for eighth graders and seniors. Since this is our first ever Commencement for seniors, I decided not to do the normal order for everything. We will start our own traditions. I have planned for us to incorporate a Rose Ceremony, a Candle Ceremony, and what I am calling the Tassel Ceremony. For the Rose Ceremony the grads will each take a rose to their parents to thank them. For the Candle Ceremony the parents will give their grads a tea light candle and send them into their future. And the Tassel Ceremony is simply the act of moving the tassel from one side of their cap to the other. Each of these are symbolic of something sp...

There are some things that are just beyond our understanding. I do not mean something that we can discover or understand if we only study or concentrate on it long enough. I am referring to those things which we will never find an answer in our lifetime. Start with time which has no beginning and no ending. How do we know there was no beginning? Scientist would have us believe that the beginning of time was when an explosion of some minuscule amount of material perhaps the size of an imperceptible atom occurred, which was the start our universe. But where did that minuscule amount of material come from? Wouldn't that in and of itself indicate that time existed before the explosion? Something or someone had to provide the material through which the universe and therefore time first began. The Christian, Jewish, and Muslim religions believe that God created the universe, and so God obviously existed before the beginning of the universe. So where did God come from?...

Legendary jazz great Duke Ellington shared a story from the medieval church that was the basis for one of his songs. There was a man who approached the priest of a local parish and asked what he could do to give an offering to God when he had no money. The priest suggested he use his talents as an offering to God. The man told the priest that he only had one talent and that he did not see how he could use it to honor God. The man was a juggler for a traveling group of entertainers. The priest then suggested that he come to church on Sunday and juggle during mass as an offering for God…so he did. This story inspired Duke Ellington so much that he decided to write religious songs in the style of music he knew best, jazz. And that is how the song, “Everyman Prays in His Own Language” came about. When asked about whether he thought that the idiom of jazz music was appropriate for religious music, Duke replied, “Everyone prays in his own language.” So Duke kept writing sacred music, ...

These are notes from our study on Ephesians. Most of the information comes from the Holman Commentary and the Disciples Study Bible. Our Call to Unity and Holiness - Part 1 “Christians are people who are drawn together because they owe a common debt to the goodness and grace of God” William Barclay Read Ephesians 4:1-16 In a Nutshell Paul encourages the Ephesian Christians to live the way God’s people should live. Two particularly important things should characterize your lives: live in unity since you are spiritually united in Christ with all other Christians, and live holy lives. Acting Like Who We Are Identity and actions inseparably go together. From the earliest days of our childhood, our actions are linked to our identity: • While there has been a concerted effort to blur the lines, boys grow up enjoying certain types of toys and games and girls grow up enjoying certain different types of toys and games. This becomes even more apparent as they leave the...

Yesterday's post was about teens, so I thought I would look a little at the adults today. We are to be the example for the younger generation, so just how are we doing? I want to start with a short story about a teen. This teen was somewhat musical and he felt that the hymns being sung in church were boring. The musical styles were too far behind the times and the lyrics were often meaningless to him or other young people. His father encouraged him to write some better hymns for the church and he did just that. This teens name was Isaac Watts and it was in 1690 at the age of 16 that he started writing hymns for the church. He wrote more than 600 hymns, including "When I Survey the Wondrous Cross" and "Joy to the World." Why did I start with this story? Because I believe it symbolizes what is wrong with some of the adults today, not all, but at least a portion of the adults I have seen in our churches. You see, the music of Isaac Watts was received with l...