May 6 – “One down”

Our violin player has a little boy to follow in his footsteps.  Unless, of course, he decides he wants to play baseball.  Last night Corey and Janell's little boy Brennan was born.  He weighed 7 pounds, 10 ounces and was 20 inches long.  They ended up having a C-section,  but Mom is doing fine.    Meanwhile, our little grandbaby inside Christina is still holding his own (or her own – they actually wanted to be surprised, so they didn't find out the sex of the baby yet).  At her last appointment they said she could go at any time.  So she took her other two boys to the zoo.  Maybe the walking will encourage the little one to get a move on.   We got a few things done on Chris' back yard list.  I dug up some kind of palm tree thing that ended up being a bulb.  No wonder it kept growing back after I mowed over it hundreds of times.  Not any more.  We also weeded some more of the flower beds.  Still not finished there.  That evil demon devil weed is everywhere.  It has a clump of roots that is hard to get to the bottom of.  And even then it keeps growing on the other side.  It wraps itself around the fence and other trees and anything.  But the worst thing is … it has thorns.  It's like a climbing rose bush with no pretty flowers and no scent.  Slowly it takes over more and more of the garden until nothing else has room to breathe or grow.  It chokes the life out of all the good things that you want to be there.  It is just like sin.  Hence my name for it … Evil Demon Devil Weed.   You know, today I have felt like I was in a funk.  I'm not sure what that word even means, but I haven't been able to concentrate on much of anything all day.  I have tried to start this entry at least three times.  This one will be the last.  Whatever is here is all I've got.  I sure hope the Bible Study makes some sense tonight.  It did yesterday when I worked on it.  I am tired again.  Maybe I need a vacation.  We haven't done that since our 25th anniversary.  Ten years ago June 6.  Well, we'll get to it again after our present stresses are dealt with.  What are our present stressors? … no, that's a whole other list there.    Romans 7:14-8:2 says, "We know that the law is spiritual; but I am unspiritual, sold as a slave to sin. I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good. As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living in me. I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil I do not want to do — this I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it. So I find this law at work: When I want to do good, evil is right there with me. For in my inner being I delight in God's law; but I see another law at work in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within my members. What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God — through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself in my mind am a slave to God's law, but in the sinful nature a slave to the law of sin. Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit of life set me free from the law of sin and death.   Father, keep my family safe from the evil demon devil weeds that are trying to sneak up on them every day.  Amen.