Watching: Illinois vs. Missouri online and several games on TV. Can't wait to have a real internet connection in our new home!
Just chillin' with Tara today. We went out for dinner and a movie last night and had a really good time.
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| I would've liked a pocket, but otherwise this is a great shirt for a great price! |
That's about it, really, and that's just fine. Things seem to be going well with this second house, but it's a long process, and there's nothing to announce yet. But it does look really good. We can't wait to move and get the house ready for the babies!
Thoughts
We were talking today about how the best stuff that happens in life is so often the stuff that can't be posted on Facebook! Personal stuff about ourselves or our friends, good stuff that happens at work but is proprietary...just thought that was funny. We might get to visit some rather famous people next year (relatives of friends), but that's about all that we can say about it online!
Today's Scripture
2 Samuel 10 (NKJV) (Wherein the action picks up again in a major way, and we get a great example of how not to do foreign relations.)
Key verse: (2) "Then David said, 'I will show kindness to Hanun the son of Nahash, as his father showed kindness to me.'"
Reflection
It starts out a lot like the previous chapter, but it doesn't end up that way! A character from Samuel Part 1 has a son in the sequel. David says that King Nahash of the Ammonites was kind to him, though that story isn't told in the Bible (maybe that reel was lost). He sends servants to comfort Nahash's son and heir to the throne, Hanun, but Hanun is one very stupid dude. He mistrusts David and treats his servants shamefully, inciting a war with a king who has already established himself as one of the most powerful in the region, one who was apparently his ally until this unfortunate day.
David has a choice to make. I doubt the United States would line up troops against a hostile country just because they put a few ambassadors to shame for no reason. But in David's time and culture, this was a serious matter of honor. Israel as a nation has a statement to make--you don't mess with God's people. Luckily, the choice is taken away from David, because stupid Hanun decides that it would be better to hire Syrian mercenaries to line up on Israel's border than to apologize. And then he takes his own Ammonite troops and moves them right up to Jerusalem's gate! Oh, snap!
The Israelites are caught between the Syrians on the north and the Ammonites pretty much right on top of them, so they split up and trounce them both, hurting the Syrians quite severely just a couple of chapters after dealing them a prior major blow and making them Israel's servants. Hard to believe Syria still exists today after all this.
So we go from David wanting to be kind to the Ammonites' new king to David destroying the Syrians hired by Hanun against him. Israel takes out the Ammonites themselves in the first verse of the next chapter! But they do it without David, because he decides to stay home this time, a decision he'll come to regret.
The lesson? Pretty obvious--don't be a stupid Hanun! If someone powerful wants to be your friend, don't assume he's going to stab you in the back. And of course, you'll be sorry if you go up against God's chosen king for no reason at all. Not sure how to apply this to my life, but...
Prayer
Lord, thank you for all your blessings. Please continue to give me patience as we wait to move into a house. Please keep Tara and our girls healthy! Let me know what I can do for you. In Jesus' name, amen.
Oh, and thank you for football!
Final Thoughts
We think about our little girls all the time and what they're going to be like through the years to come. It blows my mind how different our world is going to become starting in a matter of weeks! I'm pretty excited. We have so many visions of them in our new house. It's gonna be tough, but so worth it. We're so thankful.
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