Strange days. We listened to President Trump’s talk about the China corona-virus this afternoon and learned his advisers have recommended we stay in self-quarantine through the month of April. That is really fine with us on a micro level. Lorena and I enjoy being together in the house. I have my work and school. Lorena has plenty of cooking, painting, and cleaning projects she not only does, but enjoys doing. The kids seem OK, too. Both of them have their jobs, but are getting a little stir-crazy staying in their apartments, albeit their apartments are very nice. Still, life seems somewhat surreal. Tío Lauro, who always seems to have his finger on the zeitgeist, paints a self-portrait that really captures the spirit of the moment. We love his art.
My reading of the prophesies of Cyrus the Great in Isaiah 44 and 45 have heightened my sense that something monumental is in the works. Somewhere around 150 years before it happened, Isaiah prophesied of the liberation of Israel by Cyrus to return to Jerusalem to rebuild the temple. Isaiah actually used Cyrus’s name in the prophesy. The archaeological record appears to strongly back this up and even Josephus pipes in with confirmation of what was believed about the event in the first century. This seems to be one of those kinds of things. At the same time, my Aunt Fern (99 years old and going strong) talks about this very same feeling people had during World War II. This might be the same thing.
But maybe not.
This morning, I finished my latest read through the New Testament. This last pass, one time through the whole Bible and two times more through the New Testament was with the ESV. The next pass will be through the New American Standard Bible (NASB) version. I am still getting a lot out of it and enjoying it more and more. The plan is to follow the normal pattern and read through the whole Bible followed by two additional reads through the New Testament. I am going to try to do the entire Bible again in less than a single year, but using a more structured approach. For now, the plan is to read four chapters every day in the Old Testament and then slow down to three chapters per day when I get to the New Testament.
Lorena, Kelly, and I went to a church convention yesterday. She got asked to translate from English to Spanish for one of the meetings. It was a two hour long meeting, so she asked me if I would be willing to translate for the last speaker. I had actually not done it for awhile, but said yes and had a ball. I forgot how fun it is to translate. The funny deal is that I seem to focus on what is being said better when I translate, too. I hope I get to do it again soon.
I started this last read through the Bible, reading a couple of chapters per day, but pretty quickly went to three chapters and then, most weeks, I ended up reading a two to three extra chapters on Wednesdays (for Bible study) and on Sundays. It dawned on me that I was getting through the Bible fairly quickly. Based on where I am now, I can get through the entire Bible in a year if I average a little under three and a half chapters per day until November 15 of this year–I started on November 16, 2017. I am going to take a stab at it. I have been enjoying my reading more and more all the time.
Christian flew in from Tempe on Monday night, then took Amtrak down from Seattle to Centralia with Kelly after she got off work on Tuesday. It will be a whirlwind trip because they have a friend flying into Seattle on Friday to hang out with them. Our time together has been very relaxed time with them and, as usually, has centered on cooking, food, conversation, reading, and music, not necessarily in that order. Exercise has been on hold for a couple of days which affects all of them, but (shame) me because they all work out at least five days a week while I give lip service to working out five days a week. Is there such a thing as a Fourth of July resolution?
Yesterday, Lorena and Kelly picked 15 pounds of blueberries while I worked on some stuff for my new job and Christian worked on his dissertation research and comprehensives preparation. We spent a lot of time doing similar things growing up so it was very nice and relaxed. As for the blueberries, my understanding is that there will be pie sometime before they get back on the train to head back to Seattle later tonight.
Lorena and I attended the funeral of a young (43) woman we had met as a healthy, engaged wife and mother only six months ago. We met her and her little family at our Wednesday night Bible study and knew here as an engaged, thoughtful person who enjoyed life and loved God. She was diagnosed with cancer only a couple of months ago. She was buried this afternoon. The service was uplifting and hopeful. The day was beautiful and sunny. Our mood is melancholic.
A couple of years after we started our homeschool, I decided I needed to read my Bible more systematically. I had never read the Bible straight through. I decided the only way I would be able to do it was if I kept close track of what I was reading. On February 9, 2006, over eleven years ago, I started at Genesis with the idea that I would read one chapter every day (or a stanza when I got to Psalm 119) by reading through the New Testament two times, then reading through the whole Bible from cover to cover. The goal was to complete this sequence three times, then decide what to do next. I kept the record on the 
The new header I put up (you can still see it 
It is hard to overstate the importance of the little home church with whom we met every Sunday morning for worship and every Wednesday evening for Bible study. The Wednesday meeting was a little smaller with a group 9-10 regulars; the others from Sunday go to a different Bible study. Wednesdays, we meet at our little apartment every other week while another couple, Gary and Debbie, had it at their house the rest of the time. Which ever place we met, everyone would stick around after the study, sometimes and hour and even more, just to talk and be together.
of Angel Food cake, so Debbie made one for us and Jill made her mother-in-law’s famous caramel topping. We all shared this same beautiful table for an evening after meeting when Grandma Conchita and remember that night fondly.
Last night was the last scheduled Wednesday night Bible study we will have at our little apartment here in Lewisville. We had it there biweekly, but because we are moving at the end of the month and have the funeral to attend later in the month, it will move to another home for the next time when it would have been with us. It was a great privilege to meet with this little group, we enjoyed it immensely and will miss it very much. The beautiful flowers by the window were kindly sent by the other members of the meeting in condolences for Grandpa Milo and were very much appreciated.
Grandpa Milo died January 1. Dad was one of those bigger than life guys who started his life in a migrant farm worker family picking hops, beans and strawberries around the state of Oregon as soon as he was old enough to contribute as a small child, but who went on to all kinds of unique success in business, the military and even in school. He worked physically hard his entire life, even when he no longer needed to. He, like Grandma Sarah, was always a champion of the underdog loving much and doing more than his part in every setting. I do not want to turn this into a eulogy, there will be time for that later, but I wanted to mark his passing with just a few memories and thoughts.
