I continue on Day 24 of the Billy Graham Words of Wisdom Psalms and Proverbs Bible Reading Plan. 24 is my lucky number by the way as well as 12 and 144.
24 was my jersey number as a kid when I played sports. 24 is a number of family, companionship, harmony, and idealism. 24 is, according to http://www.affinitynumerology.com, the number for the diplomat rather than the leader, the one that works behind the scenes to keep everything together and bring hurt members back into the fold of the family.
That’s interesting. It has a bit of a motherly quality to it. Someone who goes out to find the lost sheep and bring them back.
So the readings today are Psalms 108 through 111 and the Proverbs is 24. I just listen to the readings on YouTube. I jot down some phrases that stand out and then just write about them sorta intuitively.
This is what I got for today:
Psalm 108 “I myself will awake early.”
Often in Christianity, you hear this wording about a Proverbs 31 woman. What is that? It’s a certain woman who has certain characteristics that make her successful as a family provider. One of the traits of the Proverbs 31 woman is to rise early in the morning before the rest of the family.
“Early to bed, early to rise, makes a person happy, healthy, and wise.” (Ben Franklin)
When you get into the routine and habit of rising before the rest of the family, you can set about to get a lot done in the peace and stillness of the morning. Make coffee and spend a few moments to watch the sunrise, read your early morning devotions or do some writing, tidy up and organize the house, perhaps prepare a nice breakfast casserole for the family and place it in the oven for an hour to bake. The aroma of the coffee brewing and the breakfast will wake your family and make them happy plus as they go out their bedroom door, it will make them happy to see a tidy house. Nothing affects mood more than the orderliness of our own habitation.
Cleaning the house early on a Saturday or Sunday morning will really please your husband and as he smells the freshness of the Pine sol on the floors or the bleach in the bathrooms and sees the sparkliness of the sink and showers. It really does make a difference in your relationship to do these little things for him.
“You catch more flies with honey than with vinegar.”
I don’t know about the flies part of this quote but it is true that when you make a concerted effort to be like honey or sweetness to your partner, your partner will pay you back more with love and devotion.
Years ago, I read this article written by a woman in the 1950s about the 25 things you should do for your man prior to his arrival home from work. It said stuff like clean yourself and the children up, put on a nice dress and makeup, fix your hair, tidy up the house, fetch and fold his newspaper, have a nice dinner going for him in the kitchen cooking, fetch him a cold can of beer, and stand at the door ready to greet him when he gets home with a hug and a kiss and the beer and the newspaper.
It seemed a bit much.
But…..I did an experiment.
I did this for 2 weeks. It took a bit of effort and I kept forgetting to get the beer cold enough sometimes. I’d stand at the door and hug him and ask how he was and do all the other stuff. And…….the reaction?
He was amazing.
He was so much happier and so much more affectionate to me and the kids and the nights together were harmonious and peaceful. We didn’t fight. We just loved each other.
I don’t know. It was quite a lot of work but it worked. It really worked.
I’m all for women’s rights and feminism but recently, I don’t know….I feel like we are losing our identity as women. We are being taught to be men, that that is where our power is. No, our power is in bringing life to the world and being a softer counterpart. We’re supposed to blend with our partner not constantly be in contention with him for who is stronger. It shouldn’t be a competition.
Some of the most powerful women are the ones that have super embraced the feminine qualities like say, Martha Stewart.
Psalm 108 “I will divide Shechem, and mete out the valley of Succoth.”
Mete? What the heck is mete?
It means to give measure to or to give retribution of justice to.
According to http://www.wikipedia.com:
“Shechem lay north of Bethel and Shiloh, on the high road going from Jerusalem to the northern districts.”
and Succoth is:
“A place in the valley of Jordan in the tribe district of Gad.”
Ok….what the heck is Gad?
Ok, so I read up a bit on this on http://www.chabad.org and Gad was the name of one of the 12 sons of Jacob. His name means “Mazal Tav” or good luck. Gad’s descendants became the one of the 12 tribes of Israel or the tribe of Gad. They were considered to be fierce warriors and are associated with the lion symbol.
Ok, so another question……where is this valley of Jordan? Is that like the Bethlehem area or the Dead Sea area? Ah, ok, so this valley is the course of the north to south river of Jordan from Sea of Galilee to Dead Sea so I’m thinking alot of it is in the West Bank currently. Jericho is considered to be in the Jordan valley.
The river Jordan was pretty tiny when I went there back in 2000. It wasn’t like I imagined it to be at all. It was like a little creek you could hop, skip, and jump over. I thought it’d be like the Mississippi River. No, not at all though it gets bigger the further north you go into the Golan Heights near Syria.
The Sea of Galilee….it’s more like the size of a Missouri lake too. The Dead Sea seemed to be pretty good size from what I recall. I just remember bouncing around on the top of the water like I was swimming in liquid soap. Some of the salt water got in my eyes and it was kinda icky to swim in, not gonna lie. You couldn’t swim vertical due to the high density of the water, you just float horizontal on the top. Dead Sea mud is supposed to be very good for the body and folks were smearing it all over themselves walking around looking like cave men and women. It was overall, a cool experience, but I kinda prefer regular freshwater lake swimming. Much more refreshing.
Psalm 108 “Who will lead me into Edom?”
Oh, ok, so Edom was an ancient kingdom that was the descendants of Esau from the Bible, the Edomites. If I’m not mistaken, maybe they were the ancient kingdom that created Petra in Jordan……I don’t know for sure. Petra is really cool by the way. It’s this ancient city carved out of the rock in the desert and you can take a camel caravan or horses to go see it.
“Jacob have I loved, Esau have I hated.” (Romans 9:13)
Why did God hate Esau according to this passage? This phrasing has long perplexed me. Esau had the birthright but it was taken away. Maybe he cared little for it but sometimes when I read this story about Esau…..I feel really bad for him. His mother treated him badly. That would have been Esau’s core wound if you wrote him in a screenplay or something, his mother Rebecca.
He lost his birthright and then relocated somewhere around Jordan and from there, they say his empire grew and grew and grew and supposedly he is the ancestor to the ancient Greeks and Romans……so I suppose in the end, Esau did win a little.
I don’t know…I feel for Esau for some reason….maybe cause he was a redhead like me. It seemed that one of the primary problems that folks had with him was his appearance and that’s kinda shameful nowadays to treat someone that way due to things they can’t help like their skin tone or their personal characteristics rather than their merit.
I guess that’s why the story of Esau bothers me so much and then its just this phrasing of “Jacob have I loved but Esau have I hated.” So harsh of an “all-loving, all-powerful” God to be so disdainful and venomous even towards one of his own creation.
I wonder really what was God’s real problem with Esau? That he was a hunter, maybe? Or was it something even deeper that is not explained in the Bible?
And why is red hair associated with bad things in ancient times? Cain’s mark was said to be red hair. Esau, whom God hated, was a red head. Then you got all your association between red hair and witchcraft all throughout Medieval times. Nowadays, they say redheads have no souls and there’s “Kick a Ginger Day.” Even Disney, is turning all its redhead characters into other appearances. It’s weird, as a kid, my relatives would say stuff like, “beaten like a redheaded stepchild.”
What’s the deal with red and why red-haired people get treated like crap? It’s like the only racially identifiable group that is a non-group and non-protected.
Makes you wanna dye your hair blonde. Redheaded women in movies are always sex-crazed sex-pots (Jessica Rabbit) or nerds (the flute girl in American Pie) and redheaded men are basically non-existent in movies.
I’ve been listening to Ice Spice lately and it’s weird to read the comments on her YouTube videos cause there’s a lot of shade and calling her basic and it all seems to be about the hair rather than her talent which is weird.
Psalm 109 “Let his children be continually vagabonds, and beg.”
I don’t know about you but one of my deepest fears is getting stuck in a homeless shelter overnight or out on the streets homeless like a bag lady. It scares me. It really does….that loss of security and complete dependency on other human beings. I don’t trust homeless shelters. I wonder if bad stuff happens in them. That’s crazy to think that, right? Right? Maybe?
I don’t know. Do you feel the same way?
Psalm 110 “Sit thou at my right hand until I make thine enemies thy footstool.”
Ok, the imagery I associate with this one is the Queen in the Alice in Wonderland series that screams, “Bring me another pig!” She’s got pigs as her footrests and when one gets too cold, she orders for another pig. I don’t know why I think of that.
Did people back in the day, actually make footstools of their enemies? Like, if you defeated someone, did you order them in your throne room to kneel down and you put your feet on them while you threw some festivities of wine and feasting in the dining hall? Awkward.
“Bring me another pig!”
People are strange.
Psalm 110 “Thou are a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek.”
Huh.
So I was starting down the path of thinking like Assassin’s Creed or something with ancient secret societies or secret orders like the Knights Templar or whatever.
No.
This just means, “the sequential order of the priestly leadership over God’s people.” Ok, so it’s like bishops and cardinals and popes and stuff like that.
Boring.
I really thought it was something cooler like some monastic ninjas. Bummer.
Proverbs 24 “Do not be envious of evil men nor desire to be with them for their hearts devise violence and their lips talk of troublemaking.”
Stay out of gangs…..especially in prison. Better to walk the prison yard alone than be a minion in the gang.
I don’t think I could handle jail or prison. Maybe I could. I wouldn’t want to be fresh meat. I suppose if I was, I’ve thought this through for a while now, I would tell everyone that I have a wildly contagious nasty skin rash and maybe they should not touch me and leave me alone for my duration of the stay.
“I have leprosy, guys. I’m a leper. Stay away or you’ll catch it too. By the way, I need my own cell cause I don’t want to infect everyone and I need a nice comfy pillow and blanket you know, for the leper sores. I also would prefer to have my meals brought to me so I don’t infect anyone else and maybe could you drop off some books for me too and I’ll just hang out here in my cell over here, ok?”
At first, I thought well I could tell them I have some really gnarly STD so they leave me alone but then I thought well they might shiv me for that. So, I think the leprosy thing is the way to go cause I have a better chance of not getting shivved with that one I think.
Proverbs 24 “Through wisdom a house is built….by knowledge the rooms are filled with all precious and pleasant rubies.”
A cluttered house – the clutter represents money. The money represents time spent at work. Which would you rather have? The clutter, the money, or the time?
Proverbs 24 “If you faint in the day of adversity, your strength is small.”
Today is a big day for me. I start a new job. I’m scared. Literally. I’m worried I won’t fit in and I will do something stupid and wrong. I’m worried I will be late to work and get a point or screw something up with the technology. I have a myriad of fears.
But I’m going to show up anyway. Cause that’s courage. Just showing up is half the battle. We never grow if we don’t show up.
Pray for me. I’m nervous. I’m an old woman who has worked for over 2 decades and I am still nervous.
Proverbs 24 “A righteous man may fall 7 times and rise again.”
Hope. Hope is what keeps a righteous man going through adversity. Hope can get you through anything.
Proverbs 24 “Do not rejoice when your enemy falls.”
Oh this is a hard one.
I don’t really rejoice when someone falls or has bad stuff happen to them. But I am very guilty of getting very quiet about the subject, looking the other way if I don’t like the person, and pretending to feign I don’t care. I should offer them a word of encouragement or offer a helping hand but sometimes, I just flat out ignore.
The opposite of love is not hate but to ignore another person.
Hatred requires emotion and passion. To ignore someone is to withdraw all emotions and detach from the situation in all entirety. I would argue, in some circumstances that ignoring someone is far worse than outright hate because it takes the wind out of their sails and it does not give them the ability to argue back with you.
Say for example, a person creates a widget and expects some minimal support from friends and family to sell the widget but is met with silence and non-support and they fail at selling the widget.
What happened here?
In example 2, a person creates a widget and expects some minimal support from friends and family to sell the widget but is met with open hostility from someone which leads to a passionate argument and they fail at selling the widget.
In both scenarios, they lose but in the 2nd one, at least they get some understanding and clarity on the subject of why they lost whereas in scenario 1 there is just this vague undercurrent of non-understanding and uncomfortable awkwardness at the next family reunion.
This is why I don’t do pyramid schemes, Amway, Mary Kay, Pampered Chef or any of those things. I just don’t do that. And I don’t host the parties either. I won’t do that anymore. It’s forced awkwardness and begging your friends and family members which can lead to even more uncomfortable awkwardness when you send out Facebook posts and hear nothing back. That stuff in general is just plain awkward.
One time I threw a Mary Kay party. It cost me 300 dollars for the setup. I even carved a watermelon into a basket and made all sorts of creative snack creations hors d’oevres and such. I invited 20 friends and decorated in pale pink. 5 friends showed up that day and the Mary Kay consultant did not…….for 4 hours. It was humiliating. By the time she got there, my friends had left….I was drinking wine by myself at the table. We talked and I kinda let things go. She said she’d do my makeup. She did my makeup a bit brighter than I usually am used to so I went to the bathroom to check myself in the mirror and when I came back, I caught her riffling through my stuff in the kitchen like she was gonna take something.
Worst Mary Kay party ever.
I haven’t hosted one of these parties since. I refuse.
That’s it. That’s all I got for today. Thanks for reading and have a good day.
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