SUMMER SESSION #25- HOW MANY FLAVORS?

 One of the very best parts of summer are the required visits to the ice cream parlor.  My first memory of ice cream is of the homemade - hand cranked variety.  Is ANYTHING better?  Then there was the local Dairy Cream with that wonderful soft serve ice cream.  Even in the small town I grew up in, we had a Dairy Cream.  Variety was limited in those days, but I distinctly remember loving Neopolitan flavor which was always in the freezer.  This was the one snack usually on hand growing up.  Momma loved it as much as the children did. 

This was so long ago I cannot find a picture of it, but the above is close--only smaller and no big sign.

My next distinct memory of the days when my offspring were children is our regular pilgrimage to the local Baskin Robbins.  The earliest memory I have they had perhaps 21 flavors.  It was a wonderful summer treat and we met many friends with the same thought on those balmy summer nights.  I could fill up sampling flavors with those tiny wooden spoon samples.  My favorite--pralines and cream--YUM!

Fast forward to the present and this summer treat has not changed.  What has changed is the number of flavors.  Infinite comes to mind.  Sadly, I seldom eat ice cream today.  The combination of trying to keep my cholesterol number down and problems sleeping after eating ice cream (slow to digest-perhaps a slight glucose intolerance).  I still love ice cream, and take my grands for a treat whenever they ask, but I resist temptation.

Interesting how many flavors there are now and I assume someone likes each of them.  The world of ice cream has something for everyone.  It reminds me of the variety of humans we have on this terrestrial ball.  That is what makes the world an interesting place.  It would be pretty dull if we only had one flavor of human.  God knew from the very beginning the need for variety.  His wisdom is a wonder--beyond our comprehension.

"For as in one body we have many members,

 and the members do not all have the same function,

 so we, though many, are one body in Christ,

 and individually members one of another. "

Romans 12:4-5

SAME KIND OF DIFFERENT

 Our neighborhood book club is reading this

which you can find HERE, if you have not read it.  An easy read about the program during the depression called "Packhorse Librarians" which provided reading material for the impoverished Appalachian Mountain area.  This program was begun by President Roosevelt under the WPA umbrella in an effort to provide jobs and supply reading materials to the rural uneducated.  Having just finished re-reading the book, I came away with a new perspective on all it encompasses.  The story is NOT just about trying to educate those who are living far away from opportunities for education.  This story has so many facets in one fact based fiction book, that I cannot begin to go over them all in one short blog.  Today I will take one of the main points the book is making and leave the rest for another discussion.

The story may revolve around the packhorse (or mule in this case) librarians, but the real story centers on man's prejudice toward his fellow man.  The librarian was part of the "blue people" found in the mountains.   This color was caused by a genetic condition which caused a deficiency of an enzyme in their blood which helped with the blood oxygenation.   Even when confronted with there being no real difference in the librarian and her fellow man--the color difference  could be corrected~ her "difference" was not forgotten.  The librarian took the medication, which caused severe side effects, in the hope of being recognized as being white.  Sadly because she had once been different, no one was willing to admit she might be the same as them.  She was forever marked by "difference", even when it was not longer there.

Man's inhumanity to man in a world where we need above all else to love one another is limitless.

How quickly we focus on our differences instead of recognizing our similarities.  Perhaps it comes from fear, perhaps it comes from lessons throughout our life, but for some reason we focus on how different we are from each other instead of the overwhelming number of similarities.  The basic need to be loved, love of our children, hope for a better tomorrow, grief in the midst of loss, and on and on bind us together.  And yet, we are drawn to that which make us different--whatever that might be.

Praying we can all begin to look at one another through the lens of Jesus.  What would He say about those who are "different"?  It seems to indicate in The Word, he gravitated toward them.  He reached out to form relationships with the very ones others avoided at all cost.  He recognized they had needs just like the Jewish people from which He came.  They needed Him just as much as God's Promised People did.  Jesus loved those who were different with the same intensity as those  who were part of "His Tribe".  Praying I can do the same.

"May the God of endurance and encouragement

grant you to live in such harmony with one another,

in accord with Christ Jesus,

that together you may with one voice 

glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ."

Romans 15:5-6

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LIVING IN THE GHETTO

 SURPRISE--I am reading another book!

his

I LOVE to read a book that challenges my thinking and this author has my head spinning and I am only half way through it.  When he started talking about us all living in ghettos, I thought he was off his rocker.  Obviously he has not visited The Hood.  It's no ghetto!  And then he began to broaden my perspectives with passages such as this ~

   By ghetto, I don't mean a run-down, densely populated urban area characterized by blight, crime, and poverty . (Side note-man's definition)   I'm talking about ghetto as an environment where a group of people live or work in isolation, whether by choice or circumstance, and draw their sense of worth and dignity from their identification with that community.

UH-OH- now he's meddling!

This entire section is based upon a teaching based upon the story of the Tower of Babel.  He begins by explaining why God came down to gaze upon the works of the people and then why He not only confused the tongues of them, but also spread them out across the land.  It is a great teaching and I am not going to spoil it by trying to explain it.  Please get the book, or borrow mine when I am finished (it does have loads of underlining).  

The author has plenty to say about this, but this phrase from the book had me nodding my head in total agreement.  I not only underlined, but putting a star by the passage.

   What I am speaking to is the futility of trying to make our own way apart from God, the futility of thinking so arrogantly that we could possibly do anything worthy of God's recognition apart from Him working in and through us  ~ apart from us working for His glory and not out own.

I often speak to our greatest sin is trying to place ourselves on The Throne.  This is exactly what the author is speaking of here.  NOW--hold on to your hat--the author then tells us there is grace in the judgement of Babel.  WHAT?  "How much worse would this world be if God allowed us to continue to be united in our sinful purposes?"  The author contends if we all "just got along", we would be joined together in an effort to establish ourselves as God.  OH NO, NOT ME!  Yes, me too, sadly.  

   In  judgement and mercy, He confused our language.  They were trying to make a name for themselves, and the name they end up with is the name God gives them in Genesis-"Confusion".  As a result of the confusion we no longer trust each other.  The spirit of Babel is still with us.  We are still in solidarity against God, yet this solidarity is expressed in isolated communities.  These ghettos, because they are in rebellion against God, are also naturally against each other.  What happens is we understand our human dignity  and value as coming from isolated community.  We love our ghetto, our ethnic ghettos, our social ghettos, our cultural ghettos, our economic ghettos, our academic ghettos.  We love them to a fault.  When we see differences , we don't embrace our dissimilarity, we immediately distrust.  We instinctively reject and often mock because we're still confused and don't understand each other.  

You have no idea how much your understanding of what it means to be human, to live a good life, to experience love, to be a friend, husband, wife and worker is shaped by your ghetto.  We're blind to it many facets because we have swum in its water our whole lives.  When we see or experience something different, our first impulse is to react in judgement of that difference.  

OH MY!  GUILTY AS CHARGED!  I don't often quote another writer at such length in a blog.  This was too important to mess up with my own feeble attempt to explain what he is saying.  Think about this!  I have never had a better explanation of The Tower of Babel passage.  I'm praying for deeper understanding and greater capacity to see beyond the tip of my nose.  God does want us to live in Beautiful Community.  It begins with listening to each other and seeking His wisdom.  I have been challenged--I challenge you to think about it.

"This is why the city was called Babel, 

because that is where the lord confused the people

with different languages."

Genesis 11:9