"Country roads, take me home To the place I belong......." From the John Denver classic, 'Country Roads'

Welcome to a brand new month here on this Tuesday, 1st day of October 2019. Looking at the 10-day forecast, the Weather Channel predicts that in one week on October 8, we will have a low of 62 and high of 80. We will see. If that happens, and I am able, Lord willing, Mr. Bentley and I will be sitting outside beginning around 4:30 a.m. Mr. Bentley will be looking for whatever mischief he can find and I will be drinking my hot, black, strong Community Coffee. (Just so you know, the lowest temperature ever recorded in Texas was a minus 23 degrees, recorded in 1899 and tied in 1933. The highest was pegged at 120 degrees in 1936. I think we can do without those extremes.) Last Sunday, I spent a few minutes with our pastor's wife's dad. He recently lost his wife of 54 years and I was offering my condolences. He was visiting and attended our services. He is a Louisiana boy, just like me. Pretty soon we were talking growing up days in Louisiana. His dad fetched wood for winter the same way my granddad did. That put him on the other end of a manual crosscut saw. I was the one on the other end of my granddad's saw. This fellow is maybe a couple of years older than me but we grew up not more than 40 miles from each other. I know he is crushed from having to say so long for now to the wife of his youth, but, he is also thankful for her love and the life she lived as a servant of the living God. I grew up in the shadow of Louisiana always being listed as one of the worst off and backward states as far as rankings go, however, some of the finest people I've ever known call that place home. It's always enjoyable to reminiscence about such fond memories. My prayer for him and his entire family is that God will comfort each heart. Amen.

I read something the other day that should have been a no-brainer. It said that older parents never quit being concerned for their children, even to the extent they lose sleep at night thinking about them. They are always on their hearts and minds. Duh! We older parents certainly did not need a study to know this to be true. I saw this in my mom. She, in her 90s, still fretted over the well-being of her children, their children, their children, and on and on. For parents who are children of God, we offer our prayers on behalf of our families. We realize we are mostly in the closing scenes of our lives, but, our children, if God provides, still have much life to face and deal with. The other day while I was teaching my Bible study I mentioned, as an illustration, our boys and I said we have a 54-year-old, a 51-year-old, and a 48-year-old. Really? I had not considered the significance of their ages. Later, I kept rehearsing that in my mind. Our little boys are soon to be retirement age themselves. We feel blessed to share their needs before the Lord, but, one thing is certain, we never quit being their mom and dad. Fortunately, God understands: "As a father pities his children, Jehovah pities those who fear Him." (Psalm 103:13, as rendered in the Modern King James Version)

Speaking of getting older and, that, my friend, is an undeniable reality for yours truly, I thought about this chorus: "They're underneath the blood on the cross of Calvary, As far removed as darkness is from dawn; In the sea of God's forgetfulness, that's good enough for me, Praise God, my sins are gone!" This is from the song, 'My Sins Are Gone', written and published in the 1930s by N.B. Vandall. Forgetfulness on the part of God is a great blessing when it comes to our sins. Here is how the Psalmist expressed it in Psalm 103:12 "As far as the east is from the west, so far hath he removed our transgressions from us." I'm not going to argue whether God can ever forget anything or not. He has removed them. They do not exist anymore. And, to me, that 'sea of God's forgetfulness' is a wonderful way to express it. Now, as for me being more and more forgetful, well, it's not so good in terms of daily operation. I have one shirt that has snaps. Just one. After I have worn it, the next shirt could be in trouble as I try to unsnap it from the top to bottom. That doesn't work well with buttons. The other day I kept trying to erase a period on my blog. It just wouldn't erase. It turned out to be a speck on the screen. I sure hope if you are laughing, you are laughing with me, not at me. Have a great rest of the day and may God bless us, one and all. Amen. ....More later.