aargh.  I didn't get up early enough, Lord.  I'm sorry.  Everything is about to tilt full throttle.  Take our sweet niece to her first college apartment.  Welcome my grown up God child and her new husband for the weekend.  Receive the first printed issue of our new magazine.  Set up my 87 year old dad with a cell phone.  Nurse my exhausted husband who has started a new job.  And send my almost 16 year old off to the Casting Crowns/Mandisa concert that I would so love to go to... someday.

I need some of your wisdom today.

I Cor 2:6-8              6Yet we do speak wisdom among those who are mature; a wisdom, however, not of this age nor of the rulers of this age, who are passing away; 7but we speak God’s wisdom in a mystery, the hidden wisdom which God predestined before the ages to our glory; 8the wisdom which none of the rulers of this age has understood; for if they had understood it they would not have crucified the Lord of glory; 

So  many rulers... so little Israel.  Politics.  Paul is mixing politics and religion here.

So.... if the Bible mixes them in a conversation, then they are meant to be mixed.... in a conversation.

Paul, who had been steeped in politics, says  none of the rulers of this age has understood.  Nothing could be more true today... and that scares me.

To repeat my first commitment going in:

I'm going to blog as a somewhat introverted, prone to depression, 50 something, never quite dressed well mom.  I'm going to take it at face value and assume God knows Himself better than even Beth Moore or Francis Chan or even Mother Theresa know Him.  I'm going to assume that if He says something is bad.... it's bad.  I'm going to assume that if He says "Do this",  then I should just do it.  I'm going to assume that if He describes Himself a certain way, then He really is that way.  I'm going to take it at face value and assume the Bible is Truth.

        I'm going to assume that I'll be wrong sometimes.  I'm going to assume that it won't matter because as long as I keep reading His word, He'll show me where I'm off.  I'm going to assume He actually wants me to know Him for our sake, mine and His.

        And if, in the end, I think He's a fake... I can walk away.  But I've known Him just enough and for too long to think that will actually be the case.  And yet I'm going in with that freedom.

    I'm going to take I Corinthians one verse at a time - for ME.  This may take a month - or the rest of my life.  I have no idea and I refuse to let it matter.  I'm reading it as Lydia Crouch...
  

I read stuff that mentions politics and I get scared.  In my life, I have met many rulers of different fields.  Why, I don't know.

 I've met Ted Kennedy.  I've stood in the oval office and the press room.  (The rooms were empty.) I've met Peter Ustinov.  I've met Oliver North.  I've met Neil Armstrong.  I chatted with the artist Albert Tobey on a train.  I've gotten a behind the scenes tour of the Tate Gallery in London.  I've eaten in the underground cafeteria in a room full of senators and representatives.  I've shared gum with Amy Grant.  I've met The Manhattan Transfers.  I've met more people than I realized I was meeting at the time.  I've had dinner with one of the actors on Gray's Anatomy.  I worked for Graham Kerr - who I DO respect greatly.  I've spent the day with one of the star players of the Seahawks.  I had lunch with Billy Graham's sister-in-law.  I've chatted with our State Senators.

Until right now, I've never really looked at that list all at once.  I'm kind of shocked.  And,  the list goes on. 

But having met them does not make me important.  Honored?  Maybe.  I'm pretty sure all but maybe two of these people would remember me at all.


I've admired a few of the people I've met, but not all. 

I don't know why I've gotten to meet these people...these rulers.  It's comical because I'm absolutely so unimportant to their lives.  I'm always more blown away by the kindness of the people who introduced me to these people.

Where am I going with this, Lord?

I am afraid of rulers, no matter what they rule.  I do love meeting them because I'm so incredibly plain and simple curious.    But people are so good at hurting people.

Not one ruler gave his life for me. 

There it is.  

The soothing comfort I need when I look at politics and how it will effect my life, my children, my someday grandchildren.

That's what makes small moments important.

The people that rule politics crucified the King of Glory... they didn't get it.  They don't understand what you are up to.  But in spite of them,

YOU ARE.  

You have outlived every politician and THAT is just the beginning of why I respect you.

YOU have something to say.  And I want to listen.

...and a KING lets a mom into His presence.  I'm undone.