day no. 15,895: imagination, machination and exeuction

"The cultural chaos in which we are currently living has caused many to despair, and others to simply shrug and accept the postmodern crazy. But I want to argue that we are in the perfect moment to rethink this whole subject. Because our culture has kicked everything over, since nothing is left but rubble, we actually have the remarkable privilege of being able to think through each line before redrawing it. We can check each boundary against the Scriptures before setting it back in its place. What a blessing! What a huge opportunity! I might not have advocated that our culture burn the house down, but there is no denying that now that the demo has actually happened, it might be nice to start with a blank slate. Rebuilding the house, but this time with better closet space and less ugly linoleum, is actually a great opportunity...We have a fantastic opportunity in front of us, but we also have a hostile audience. We are in the position of Nehemiah—returning from exile and trying to rebuild the walls of Jerusalem while the culture outside jeers. But if I could stand in any moment, this is the one I would pick. We have a huge opportunity in front of us, and I hope we can make the most of it." -- Rebekah Merkle, Eve in Exile

While every child of God earnestly yearns for a better Jerusalem, none of them would have burnt the place down in order to begin again. Their desire would have been for reformation, not deformation. But if Jerusalem goes down in flames, those whose heart was for it will be the ones who rebuild it and when they do, they won't use the old blueprints, they will revisit the ones received by Moses from his vision of the one above in order to rebuild it better than before. If we have to start over anyway, we might as well begin with a better end in mind. Everything is created twice. Once in the imagination and again in reality. May our imaginations be defined by God's designs that our machinations may be manifestly divine in their execution.

day no. 15,894: Penelope turns TWELVE!

Congratulations, Penelope! You have successfully entered into the last year of preteen-itude. Your time as a preteen is coming to an end. Its days are numbered as teenland has been spotted off in the distance. There the stakes are higher, but the prizes are bigger.

But let's not get ahead of ourselves. You may be the oldest you can be before becoming the youngest of teens, but you still have a whole trip around the sun to enjoy it. Call it a victory lap for preteen-ness or a test drive for teen-itude, but whatever you call it, it's going to be amazing. No need to buckle up, buttercups. If it gets a little bumpy, it's all part of the fun.

First of all, how you be so big? You literally share shoes and shirts with your mom. You are a young woman. You have always been a little older on the inside than the outside and while your outside is now playing a little bit of catch up, your inside continues to grow and mature.

You are such a help around the house. You voluntarily do so much for our family. I can't imagine what we would do without you. Now that phrase gets thrown around a lot and maybe too much to the point that it takes the edge of the expression. In this case, however, it bears repeating in that I know exactly how much we would have to do if you weren't doing it for us. So it's not that I cannot imagine what we would do without you, but that I know precisely how much we would have to do if you weren't here doing it for us. You serve us in so many ways. You do the little girls' baths, you bake cookies, you make breakfast, you clean, you cuddle, you change diapers, you decorate for parties, you keep tabs, you keep lists, you take note, you pay attention. 

In addition to all of that, you also write stories and play music. God has given you a vivid imagination. You can play games for hours downstairs, creating whole worlds and characters and storylines off the cuff. You are a good lyricist and come up with words for songs easily. And you remember them all. You remember the melodies and the words. You have a expansive imagination and a robust memory. You are able to do most of that which you set your mind to do. God has given you a great mind. All the more to love Him with, my dear.

You read your Bible every day and often have comments about what you read. You understand the sermons you hear and know how to think through things Biblically. You like logic and enjoy running things all the way. You push ideas all the way to the corners. This will serve you well as you grow.

You are a good big sister. The little girls all look up to you and I hope they all learn from you and grow up to be like you. They see you and your mom as their models of femininity and womanhood and I'm grateful to God for that. You are the kind of woman I would want all women to be like: smart, beautiful, faithful, loyal, helpful, careful, diligent, and fun. 

You are a good baby sitter. You are a big sister to Ophelia, but you are also like a mini-mom in many ways. You love her and care for her in the ways that you can. You think about her and take her into account. You are beginning to think like a mom with eyes and ears on many moving pieces at any given point and time.

You are a great daughter. I like you. You are someone I like spending time with. You are fun to have around. You are fun to talk to and spend time with. You like to laugh and you like to learn. I am glad I get to be your dad. I'm grateful that God picked me to be your parent. I am praying for the man who will one day be your husband. He would have to be quite the man just to keep up with you, but you're not looking for someone to simply match your pace, but to outpace you and lead you. With man these things are impossible, but with God, all things are possible. If He can make a you, He can make a man who can surpass and lead you. What a pair you will make. I am excited to meet him and see the children you two will usher into existence. The grace of God abounds.

You hate feminism. I could expand on that, but why ruin a masterpiece. 

You are a reading machine. You are always reading books. You like to work ahead and read tomorrow's reading today. You like to challenge yourself to read more. You like the idea of reading all the books. You come by it honestly. Your mom and I are bookish. We like to read and we like good reads. I am excited for all that you have yet to read and all that you will carry with you as you continue to grow because of what you've already read.

You like words and jokes and laughcraft. You enjoy a good pun as much as anyone and can often dish them out as well as you take them. Puns that is. You sometimes struggle with being the butt of the joke, but that's to be expected. It ain't always easy being a butt.

The Good News, however, is that we're all butts and the sooner we realized it, the happier we are. We're all jokes and the sooner we agree, the quicker we can laugh along with everyone else. 

Happy 12th birthday, Penelope. Girls often read mature sooner than boys and you are often more mature than most other girls. That makes you quite the mythical beast, my friend. More rare than a unicorn and more beautiful to boot.

I love you, little lady!

Always have, always will. No matter what. Forever and ever.

day no. 15,893: give and take

"Responsibility comes to him who seeks responsibility." -- The Armed Forces Officer, U.S. Department of Defense (1950)

Responsibility is given to those who take it. It is a gift bestowed on those who have earned it. If you want more responsibility, you must take more. You will never be given the gift of responsibility by another until you have taken it now for yourself and for others.

Responsibility is a reward for those who already have it. It is freely conferred on those already paying the price for it.

day no. 15,892: rank hypocrisy

"It is hard to imagine a more dismal ending for a career than that of the man who aspires to rank, without having any honest concept of its proportionate moral responsibilities, particularly when the lives of others are at stake." -- The Armed Forces Officer, U.S. Department of Defense (1950)

It is bad enough for a man to overestimate himself and find himself looking up at the great heights from which he imagined he resided; but how much worse is it for that same man to toss not only himself, but his loved ones, over the cliff of arrogant inflation?

Authority necessitates responsibility. If one rises in rank without a corresponding rise in character, everyone suffers for it. It ends tragically for everybody. No one enjoys the ride or the landing. The denouement is a disaster.

You cannot be a moral authority without being moral, a civil authority without being civil, a governing authority without being self-governed, a spiritual authority without being spiritual, a parental authority without being parental.

day no. 15,891: the right to be wrong

"'The right divine of kings to govern wrong,' considered as a sneer, really evades all that we mean by 'a right.' To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it. What Pope says satirically about a divine right is what we all say quite seriously about a human right. If a man has a right to vote, has he not a right to vote wrong? If a man has a right to choose his wife, has he not a right to choose wrong? I have a right to express the opinion which I am now setting down; but I should hesitate to make the controversial claim that this proves the opinion to be right. Now mediaeval monarchy, though only one aspect of mediaeval rule, was roughly represented in the idea that the ruler had a right to rule as a voter has a right to vote. He might govern wrong, but unless he governed horribly and extravagantly wrong, he retained his position of right; as a private man retains his right to marriage and locomotion unless he goes horribly and extravagantly off his head." -- G.K. Chesterton, A Short History of England

If a man is only allowed to vote for one candidate, it is the same as not being allowed to vote. Having that kind of election is not holding an election at all. The right to vote in that instance is no more a right than the right to life is able to prevent one from death. Asserting that kind of right in that way is the same as not to have it. But the right to vote is the right to vote wrongly as long as you like and the right to life is the right to live as long as you can.

Having a right is having the right to be wrong. If you can't be wrong, you don't have a right. Being wrong is not an argument for withholding a right, it is an argument for having rights to begin with. But, as Chesterton points out, there comes a point if one has been regularly and egregiously wrong that the right to be wrong anymore is removed. You can only be wrong for so long or to such a degree before you terminate your right: either by voting away your ability to vote through stupidity or living your ability to live away through profligacy.

As an aside, the right upholds the right to be wrong by upholding the amendments. The left withholds the right to be wrong by withholding the amendments from those they determine to be wrong. For the conservative, a right includes the ability to be wrong; but for the progressive it cannot tolerate any deviation from their definition of right. That is why they take the liberty of removing yours so seriously. They not only see themselves as having the right to do so, but the obligation. They must limit your liberty in order to preserve the liberty of their choosing. But that kind of liberty, as Chesterton points out, is merely slavery. And slavery is not made any more tolerable for being labelled, "freedom." The freedom of the progressive left is the freedom only to choose their position. You have the right to say that they are right, but not the right to say that they are wrong. This is not a right and that is why they are suspicious of God-given liberties and work so hard to repress, redact, subtract or erase them.

day no. 15,890: thanks-having

"I do not, in my private capacity, believe that a baby gets his best physical food by sucking his thumb; nor that a man gets his best moral food by sucking his soul, and denying its dependence on God or other good things. I would maintain that thanks are the highest form of thought; and that gratitude is happiness doubled by wonder.” — G.K. Chesterton, A Short History of England

Experiential knowledge is not ultimate. A man is not an expert on himself for the same reason, his only experience is in being a man. No one and nothing is immediate. No one has access to God on his own without mediation. No one has access to his neighbor on his own. No one even has access to himself without God's help. Nothing is immediately known.

Knowledge itself is a gift from God which must be received. Nothing is apprehended without help. Everything that can be known comes from without and must come through something else in order to get into us.

1 Corinthians 4:7
For who maketh thee to differ from another? and what hast thou that thou didst not receive? now if thou didst receive it, why dost thou glory, as if thou hadst not received it?

Chesterton concludes that gratitude is grandiose -- thanksgiving in its highest form. We give thanks because we've been given much so that our thanksgiving is for our thanks-having.

"Gratitude is happiness doubled by wonder."

What a glorious way of phrasing it. God's grace is a wonder. It comes from without and comforts within. It rushes in and flushes out. It fills up and spills over. It nourishes the soul and flourishes the man.

day no. 15,889: high spirits

"'Wine,' says the Scripture, 'maketh glad the heart of man,' but only of the man who has a heart. The thing called high spirits is possible only to the spiritual." 
-- G.K. Chesterton, Heretics

No one who drinks in order to discover gladness will find it. No one becomes high-spirited by low behavior. But the one with the joy of the Lord in his heart will find wine a friend, not a foe. Wine will complement his joyous effort, not corrode it. Wine cannot produce joy, but it can catapult it. But if joy is not present, wine will only bite the hands that drinks it. Drowning despair in drink only adds to the dilemma. So if you don't have the heart for it, don't drink of it. Wine is a sacrament, not a solution. 

day no. 15,888: everyone lives someone's priorities

"The plight of all preoccupied people is wretched, but most wretched is the plight of those who labor under preoccupations that are not even their own, whose sleep schedule is regulated by some- body else's, who walk at somebody else's pace, and who are under instructions in that freest of all activities — loving and hating. If these people want to know how short their life is, let them reflect on how small a part of it is their very own."
-- Seneca, On the Shortness of Life

Paige often says, "Live your priorities." I agree. You must live your priorities, because if you don't, you will be living someone else's. Life is priority driven. You are either initiating based on yours or responding to someone else's. God has given us governance of ourselves. It is our job to organize our time and energy around His glory and the good of our neighbors. We must submit ourselves to His designs. We must make Him our top priority and His priorities our first priorities. 

Joshua 24:15
Choose you this day whom ye will serve; whether the gods which your fathers served that were on the other side of the flood, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land ye dwell: but as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.

If you don't choose for yourself this day whom you will serve, it will be chosen for you and no one serves the Lord by accident. If you do not take the initiative to follow God you will follow someone or something else. If you are not swimming against the current, you will flow downstream and as Chesterton reminded us, even "a dead thing can go with the stream, but only a living thing can go against it."

Everyone lives someone's priorities.

day no. 15,887: annexing every age

"Of all people, they alone who give their time to philosophy are at leisure, they alone really live. For it's not just their own lifetime that they watch over carefully, but they annex every age to their own; all the years that have gone before are added to their own. Unless we prove most ungrateful, those most distinguished founders of hallowed thoughts came into being for us, and for us they prepared a way of living. We are led by the work of others into the presence of the most beautiful treasures, which have been pulled from darkness and brought to light. From no age are we debarred, we have access to all; and if we want to transcend the narrow limitations of human weakness by our expansiveness of mind, there is a great span of time for us to range over." -- Seneca, On the Shortness of Life

Those who live in the moment have small lives. By definition, moments are fleeting and those who live in them are just as much. But those who live in the deep streams of history live broad lives that are disentangled from the mere moment of their existence and connected to the grander narrative of the story of everything and everyone.

"The 'carpe diem' religion is not the religion of happy people, but of very unhappy people. Great joy does not gather the rosebuds while it may; its eyes are fixed on the immortal rose which Dante saw." -- G.K. Chesterton, Heretics

Those who live in the moment insist on being heard as their own author and maker while those who live in history insist on hearing from the Author and Maker of every story. History is a hold of treasure to be enjoyed and an inheritance graced to those privileged to live downstream. Those who live in the now reject history and disinherit themselves. They divorce their ancestors by despising their traditions.

"Man cannot love mortal things. He can only love immortal things for an instant."  

-- G.K. Chesterton, Heretics

Those who live in the moment have only the day's wages to spend while those who live in history have the honor of annexing every previous age to come to their aid.

day no. 15,886: when pagans still were men

Though I give this land to Our Lady,
That helped me in Athelney,
Though lordlier trees and lustier sod
And happier hills hath no flesh trod          
Than the garden of the Mother of God          
Between Thames side and the sea,

I know that weeds shall grow in it
Faster than men can burn;
And though they scatter now and go,
In some far century, sad and slow,
I have a vision, and I know
The heathen shall return.

They shall not come with warships,
They shall not waste with brands,
But books be all their eating,
And ink be on their hands.

Not with the humour of hunters
Or savage skill in war,
But ordering all things with dead words,
Strings shall they make of beasts and birds,
And wheels of wind and star.

They shall come mild as monkish clerks,
With many a scroll and pen;
And backward shall ye turn and gaze,
Desiring one of Alfred's days,
When pagans still were men.

-- G.K. Chesterton, The Ballad of the White Horse

Unbelievers and believers used to have more in common. Pagans knew enough to know that they were looking for answers. In that, they and the Christians agreed. Life had a meaning somewhere out there and we are all obligated to obey whoever it turned out to be and whatever it is they wanted from us. They disagreed as to who or what it was, but agreed on the premise that there must be a who and a what in order for everything else to hold together.

C.S Lewis' Christmas Sermon for Pagans emphasizes the same sentiment as Chesterton does here. Give me a good ol' fashioned pagan any day compared to what we have now. The intelligentsia of the enlightened modern man refuses to look up for answers. While the old fashioned unbelievers saw animals in the stars, they at least were looking in the right direction. Modern unbelief doesn't only refuse to believe in the one, true God, but fails to believe or take the time to consciously concoct an alternative. That doesn't mean they don't have a belief system, but highlights the fact that they don't know that they even hold to one.

"The modern world is filled with men who hold dogmas so strongly that they do not even know that they are dogmas. It may be said even that the modern world, as a corporate body, holds certain dogmas so strongly that it does not know that they are dogmas." 

-- G.K. Chesterton, Heretics

The problem with modern man isn't that he has become modern, but that he is no longer a man.

day no. 15,885: the hare has still more heart to run

I will even answer the mighty earl
That asked of Wessex men
Why they be meek and monkish folk,
And bow to the White Lord's broken yoke;
What sign have we save blood and smoke?
Here is my answer then.

That on you is fallen the shadow,
And not upon the Name;
That though we scatter and though we fly,
And you hang over us like the sky,
You are more tired of victory,
Than we are tired of shame.

That though you hunt the Christian man
Like a hare on the hill-side,
The hare has still more heart to run
Than you have heart to ride.

 That though all lances split on you,
 All swords be heaved in vain,
 We have more lust again to lose
 Than you to win again.
-- G.K. Chesterton, The Ballad of the White Horse

Victory is vanity apart from God. There is a weariness that comes with always winning. It is an accumulation without an appreciation. It is more surrounding you with less inside you. It is full barns, but empty hearts.

Christian disciples have more desire to lose their lives again than godless men have desire to save theirs.

The value of life is found from without and those who merely seek to save their own devalue living by flooding the market. Those who have something outside of themselves worth dying for live fuller lives and lay themselves down to a greater reward.

Matthew 10:39
He that findeth his life shall lose it: and he that loseth his life for My sake shall find it.

The worldly cannot enjoy winning.

They lose heart even as they gain their lives.

The godly cannot despise losing.

They take heart even as they lose their lives.

day no. 15,884: for whom and why for

And Alfred answered, drinking,
And gravely, without blame,
"Nor bear I boast of scald or king,
 The thing I bear is a lesser thing,
 But comes in a better name.

Out of the mouth of the Mother of God,
 More than the doors of doom,
 I call the muster of Wessex men
 From grassy hamlet or ditch or den,
 To break and be broken, God knows when,
 But I have seen for whom.

Out of the mouth of the Mother of God
 Like a little word come I;
 For I go gathering Christian men
 From sunken paving and ford and fen,
 To die in a battle, God knows when,
 By God, but I know why."
-- G.K. Chesterton, The Ballad of the White Horse

God calls men from every corner to come and die.  He knows when and He knows why. Those who respond assemble under the banner of God bearing the sign of His cross. They go off to die, they know not when, but by God, they know why.

God tells us for whom and why for and expects us to leave why then and what now to Him.

Deuteronomy 29:29
The secret things belong unto the Lord our God: but those things which are revealed belong unto us and to our children for ever, that we may do all the words of this law.

day no. 15,883: nothing is immediate

“[Jesus] stands between us and God, and for that very reason He stands between us and all other men and things. He is the Mediator, not only between God and man, but between man and man, between man and reality. Since the whole world was created through Him and unto Him (John 1:3; 1st Cor. 8:6; Heb. 1:2), He is the sole Mediator in the world..." -- Dietrich Bonhoeffer, The Cost of Discipleship

Nothing is immediate

There is nothing that is not mediated. Everything must go through Jesus. There is no way around it. There is no way around Him.

You have never experienced anything that hasn't gone first through Him. Nothing can get to you without going through Him. Nothing has access to you that has the ability to skirt around Him. Nothing can reach you by reaching around Him.

Everything is mediated.

1 Timothy 2:5
For there is one God, and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus

Jesus is in between the Father and you. Jesus is in between every other man and you. None get to the Father except through Him and none get to each other except through Him. There is intimacy that is impossible outside of Jesus. No one can know the Father without knowing Him. No one can know their neighbor without going through Him. 

John 1:51
And He said to him, “Truly, truly, I say to you, you will see heaven opened, and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man.”

Jesus is transcendence and immanence all at once. He is high and above come down; He is lowly and meek ascended. He is the bridge between everything, the Mediator and connection point of every atom and every Adam.

day no. 15,882: having done all

"In all forms of strategy, it is necessary to maintain the combat stance in everyday life and to make your everyday stance your combat stance." -- Miyamoto Musashi, The Book of Five Rings

The doctrine of the antithesis stated in Genesis 3:15 declares that life is warfare. You are always at war. Even when you are at rest, you are at war. There is never not a war happening. 

"The more you sweat in peace, the less you bleed in war."

Everything should aid the war effort. If bullets are not flying, manufacture bullets. You won't have time or the luxury to do so when they do begin flying. If you will need to take a stance in battle, take it now and teach yourself to stand like that. Why take that stand for the first time then when you could take it now?

When you live with assiduity, you do what you're going to have to do even when you don't have to be doing it. You choose how to live and then you live that way all the time so whether you're at home or on the battlefield, you hold yourself the same. You have continuity. You are consistent and principled.

Make your combat stance your everyday stance and your everyday stance your combat stance.

Ephesians 6:10-13
Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might. Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the schemes of the devil. For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places. Therefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand firm.

day no. 15,881: nothing of no use

"Do nothing which is of no use." -- Miyamoto Musashi, The Book of Five Rings

Seems simple enough. Why would you do something that serves no purpose? Yet it is easy to fall prey to meaningless activity or inactivity. When you don't know what you're doing, it doesn't really matter what you do anymore than when you don't know where you're going, it doesn't really matter which way you go.

Utility implies purpose. Something is useful inasmuch as it helps you obtain a goal or arrive at your destination. A lay over may be a calculated stretch of inactivity in getting to the final destination, but it's not simply loafing. It is on purpose and with purpose. You have to wait there in order to get to where you're going. It is the fastest way to get where you want to go. You could be bicycling all night in order to avoid inactivity, but the one with the jet engine is better equipped for long distances. 

Pursue assiduity. Do everything on purpose. Be intentional. Know Who made you and what He made you for; and then give everything to doing that. Let your action, your rest, your spending, your saving, your appointments, your free time, your talking, your listening, your living and your dying be for that one great purpose. 

Do nothing which is of no use.

day no. 15,880: Juniper, Juniper, Juniper!!!

Happy Birthday, Juniper Elise! You did it! You are three years old today. Juniper Elise is Juniper eh, threece!!!

Where to begin? Well, since these congratulations are most assuredly attended by a great deal of hooplah, I can only imagine you are either currently upset or were when we all cheered for you a second ago. You like attention... until you have it. It is hard to reward you the regular ways. If you get caught doing something right, you get just as grouchy as if you got caught doing something naughty. You don't mind drawing everyone's attention to yourself, but don't like being made the center of attention when you didn't see it coming or ask for it. 

There are few things in the world you love more than your Chewy and your Puppy. And yet, in typical kid fashion, you frequently find yourself about to go to bed without your most treasured possessions. That said, if you are allowed to get back out of bed, you often remember exactly where you left them.

I said just a second ago that there are few things you love more than Chewy and Puppy, but there are... and those two things are Hug/Kiss. 

You love you some hugs and kisses and often ask for them, even immediately after just receiving them. Many nights when I'm tucking you into bed you will ask for a hug and kiss and after leaning over into your crib to hug you and leaving a kiss on your cheek, you immediately cry out, "Hug/Kiss! Hug/Kiss!" Sometimes, admittedly, I find myself asking you, "What do you think I just did?" 

I dunno, maybe it's me. Maybe I'm doing it wrong? Or maybe you're just stalling. :)

While Hug/Kiss and Chewy & Puppy may be your faves, next on the list is Pizza Night! You love Pizza Night and often ask if today is Pizza Night. And you know that if it's Pizza Night, it's also Ice Cream night. You love and look forward to our weekly celebration of the Land of Milk and Honey and even join in our Deuteronomy 6 catechism.

You love Julian Smith videos and always join in on the, "I made this for you!" part at the end of the videos. You don't walk around the house saying, "Just Do It!" as much anymore, however. I miss those days. You, in your diaper, doing your best Shia Labeouf impression.

You like rice. No, I mean, you really like rice. Like, you would eat just rice if we let you and often serve you a plate of food to find that you've eaten only the rice. That's how much you like rice.

You are equal parts immovable object and unstoppable force. You are persistent and resilient. If you have set your mind to do (or not do) something; there is nothing that can stop (or start) you. You are indomitable. You do not give up. You dig in. Even at great discomfort and difficulty to your self, you stay the course. This kind of faith is what keeps people at their posts even through the watches of the night. This kind of determination is also what wakes me up many nights to provide you with your customary Hug/Kiss tax. 

You have both chunky buns and iron buns. Chunky in that you have some heft to you and iron in that they are tough. Because you are such a dominating personality, you often need to be shown a more excellent way, but between your extra cushion and extra commitment to your whims, you often don't feel the full weight of correction.

But you are growing. You may be the first Van Voorst to make her two's terrible. Most typically wait until they are three-nagers, but perhaps you were excited to hop to it and got it all out of your system already. Maybe? Hopefully? :) 

You are also one of the first Van Voorsts to fit into clothes that match your age. Instead of too tall to be in the previous size, but not wide enough to fill it out, you are right on schedule.

You love your Lissy and like playing with her just as much as you like competing with her. If Lissy hugs me, you are. If Lissy sits by me, you have to. You look up to her and like following in her footsteps. You, her, and Ophelia are going to be quite the force to be reckoned with. Whoever decides to cross you three sisters while quickly wish that they hadn't. 

You are a sweet girl and like saying, "Love you, Dad!" You like saying, "Thank you," and are very articulate when you feel like it.

You love sitting on Atticus' lap during TV time before dinner. You like to cuddle your big brother.

You like having your hair in a pony and like wearing hats you find around the house, especially if there's a mirror around. You like the way you look and I do too. It's nice to agree with you. Not as much fun to be at odds with though :)

Happy Birthday, Juni. Here's to many more. I am excited about who you are and who you're becoming. I look forward to seeing what three year old Juni will make her own, 'cause rest assured, whatever it is, you will own it. 

Love you,

Dad

day no. 15,879: asked and answered

"Ignorant men raise questions that wise men answered a thousand years ago."
 - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Arrogant men imagine themselves clever and create an ignorance that exceeds their ancestors. 

Ecclesiastes 1:9-10
What has been is what will be,
and what has been done is what will be done,
and there is nothing new under the sun.
Is there a thing of which it is said,
“See, this is new”?
It has been already
in the ages before us.

day no. 15,878: civilizations undefended lead to barbarism unintended

'If you are not prepared to use force to defend civilization, then be prepared to accept barbarism.” — Thomas Sowell

Civilization is only sustainable by grace through faith in the One whom everything is held together. It is not passively obtained, but actively maintained. Nothing and no one drifts toward order. All history is heading towards consolidation under its one Head because He is forcing it into that mold by His good and sovereign discretion. 

Civilizations undefended lead to barbarism unintended.

Our radical corruption ensures that without a sustained faith in our Sustainer, we will either tear down our walls from within or watch them be torn down by unbelievers from without. Sin is devastation and salvation is civilization. Sin tears down. Love builds up. If you are not prepared to fight for what you love, you will watch your beloved be ravaged by the barbarism of your neighbors or your enemies.

What we are not willing to sweat for in peace, we will bleed out in war.

day no. 15,877: the same price per gallon

Exodus 30:15
The rich shall not give more, and the poor shall not give less, than the half shekel, when you give the LORD's offering to make atonement for your lives.

Atonement is not affected by inflation or compound interest. The wealthy and the poor pay the same price for their salvation. Blood doesn't cost more per gallon for the one. While the rich man's tithe is more than the poor man's, his atonement is the exact same price. When it comes to life, the price for it does not fluctuate. No soul, in that sense, is worth more than another. The redemption of one's life does not increase or decrease based on the increase or decrease of its corresponding savings account. Nothing but the blood of Jesus spends in Heaven. His riches are our only riches. Anything less is poverty.

day no. 15,876: admiral

“Behavior that’s admired is the path to power among people everywhere.” 
— Beowulf, Unknown (Seamus Heaney translation)

"Authority flows to those who take responsibility." -- Douglas Wilson

People gladly give their governing to those who have demonstrated the ability to govern themselves. When your behavior is admirable, your leadership is desirable. They're not called Admirals for nothing.

day no. 15,875: the smack of sovereignty

“Injustice is relatively easy to bear; what stings is justice.” ― H.L. Mencken

Justice packs more punch than injustice. Injustice lacks the wallop of divinity. As hard as it can hit, it can never smack as hard as sovereignty. Because injustice is only perpetrated by those down the depth chart, it cannot attack like One with the high ground. Nothing comes down with more ferocity than the One with the furthest to come down.

While everyone thinks that they want justice, only the justified will be able to endure it. Justice will, in the end, turn out to be more devastating than any injustice ever was in the meantime.

day no. 15,874: all four aces

"An ethical man is a Christian holding four aces." -- Mark Twain

It is easy to be ethical when everything is going your way and much more difficult when someone else has all the aces. For the Christian, however, it is held that Christ holds all the aces: the world, the flesh, and the devil may think they have good hands, but God holds all of them in His and holds ALL the trump cards to boot.

The Christian is confident in Christ and continues in his integrity and his ethics. He has no reason to worry about other people's inferences or bluffs. His sin is out in the open and anyone can see his cards. He has no reason to assume he will get caught... because he can’t be. There’s nothing to catch. Christ already caught hell on our behalf. So, the saint sleeps well at night knowing who he is and what he has done and that in Christ his sins are forgiven and his reward already secured. 

Romans 14:22

Happy is he that condemneth not himself in that thing which he alloweth.

A Christian has confidence like a poker player holding four aces. If you're holding all the Aces, you know that no one else has any. You are untouchable and indomitable. No card can be played that you cannot overcome. No obstacle can be formed that you cannot crush. No move can be made that you can not counter.

Isaiah 54:17

No weapon that is formed against thee shall prosper; and every tongue that shall rise against thee in judgment thou shalt condemn. This is the heritage of the servants of the Lord, and their righteousness is of me, saith the Lord.

Don’t let all the enemy’s kings lead you to forget that you have a full house and that Christ holds all the aces.

Don’t sweat those jokers.

They may be wild, but they be busted.

Straights defeat twos of a kind and threes of a kind are wiped out by a Royal flush.

The inheritance of the saints is a clean conscience and sound sleep.

Rest assured, Christian.

Hebrews 10:35-36

Cast not away therefore your confidence, which hath great recompence of reward. For ye have need of patience, that, after ye have done the will of God, ye might receive the promise.

day no. 15,873: first and best all that's left

Malachi 3:10-12
Bring the full tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house. And thereby put me to the test, says the LORD of hosts, if I will not open the windows of heaven for you and pour down for you a blessing until there is no more need. I will rebuke the devourer for you, so that it will not destroy the fruits of your soil, and your vine in the field shall not fail to bear, says the LORD of hosts.Then all nations will call you blessed, for you will be a land of delight, says the LORD of hosts.

We are to gladly give our first and best and meet our needs with all that’s left

As we do so, God grants us provision to match our vision and expands them both well beyond our ability to think or ask.

Proverbs 11:24

There is that scattereth, and yet increaseth;

and there is that withholdeth more than is meet,

but it tendeth to poverty.

The one who gives, grows.

The one who keeps, shrinks.

Generosity grows the pie,

while scarcity cuts thinner pieces.

"I prayed him that he would give me largess of the food, for which he had given me largess of desire." -- Dante Alighieri, The Divine Comedy: Inferno

day no. 15,872: a lot of little by little

Exodus 23:30
By little and little I will drive them out from before thee, until thou be increased, and inherit the land.

The kingdom of God advances little by little like leaven through the lump. The earth is inherited bit by bit as God gives and guides the advance of His kingdom.

Matthew 13:33
Another parable spake he unto them; The kingdom of heaven is like unto leaven, which a woman took, and hid in three measures of meal, till the whole was leavened.

God's vision for Christians is not a corner of the market or an enclave cloistered in the catacombs. The earth is the Lord's and the fullness thereof, the world and those who dwell therein. Jesus said that all authority in heaven and on earth was His and He wasn't overstating the matter. He was not inflating His credentials or massaging His ego. He wasn't boasting beyond His means or overshooting His target. The world is His and He will have it all. And He has promised to give the whole shebang to the meek who through faith believe Him at His word.

Luke 12:32
Fear not, little flock; for it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom.

day no. 15,871: gettin' fresh

"It seems my soul is like a filthy pond, wherein fish die soon, and frogs live long."
- Thomas Fuller

Dirty thoughts find fertile soil in a sinner's soul -- there brackish bubbles bountifully, but fresh water is not by fortune found. Fecundity does not by nature fill a cistern or spring up from a fetid well.

John 6:44
No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me draw him: and I will raise him up at the last day.

It is only by being drawn out and by having a spring installed that we're able to support life.

John 7:38
He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water.

day no. 15,870: the intoxication of their own conceits

"Conceit: God’s gift to little men." - Bruce Barton

God sometimes allows the wicked to get what they want. They imagine themselves grand and He allows them to believe it.  He allows small men the luxury of feeling large. But in the end, even that joy will be robbed from them if they do not humble themselves before their gracious Benefactor.

Romans 1:28
And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not convenient

God gives the wicked what they wanted, ignorance. He allows them to live and perish under the intoxication of their own conceits.

day no. 15,869: sin is asymmetrical largesse

"Wherefore I prayed him, that he should give me largess of the food for which he had given me largess of desire." -- Dante Alighieri, The Divine Comedy: Inferno

Sin is asymmetrical largresse.

A generosity of provision ought to accompany a generosity of promise. Yet, over-promise under-deliver is the bait and switch of hell -- increased desire without increased fulfillment. Sin wants to entice to what it cannot suffice. It provokes to where it cannot provide. It seduces for what it is unable to satisfy.

Not so with God. He has more in store than we know even to ask. He woos in order to welcome. He draws a man in order to deliver him.

Ephesians 3:20
Now unto Him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think...

Psalm 16:11
Thou wilt shew me the path of life: in Thy presence is fulness of joy; at Thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore.

day no. 15,868: par for the coarse

"Nine times out of ten, the coarse word is the word that condemns an evil and the refined word the word that excuses it." -- G. K. Chesterton

We must use bad words for bad things. Sanitizing our speech only increases the spread of sin. It provides an excuse where it should preside over an execution.

"Soft teaching produces hard hearts and hard teaching produces soft hearts." -- Jim Wilson

Smoothing things over produces smooth criminals. Confronting sin is bumpy. It will end with some bruises and blood.

Proverbs 27:5-6
Open rebuke is better than secret love.
Faithful are the wounds of a friend;
but the kisses of an enemy are deceitful

It is better to feel stupid and be corrected than feel good and be stupid.

Romans 16:17-18
Now I beseech you, brethren, mark them which cause divisions and offences contrary to the doctrine which ye have learned; and avoid them. For they that are such serve not our Lord Jesus Christ, but their own belly; and by good words and fair speeches deceive the hearts of the simple.

Good words have bad consequences when bad words were required. Fair speeches produce unfairness when harsh words were needed. Flattery removes any chance the offender had. It refuses to confront sin and reinforces sinful behavior. It is deceptive. It makes lies seem true and half-truths seem even truer. 

day no. 15,867: esprit d'finesse

"Pascal called this kind of knowledge 'esprit d'finesse,' the ability intuitively to grasp the meaning of the whole." -- Douglas Wilson, Angels in the Architecture

The medieval mindset makes connections between things. It is a whole world and when it encounters a new insight, it assimilates into an existing climate. So, any particular fits into the whole and the whole has room for every particular.

Rather than being a bucket of memorized, disconnected facts, the medieval mind, esprit d'finesse, is a great string with many pearls. It ties everything together and makes sense of the whole through poetic knowledge. Stories communicate facts better than charts. They may be less precise, but they capture the meaning more fully.

Esprit d'finnese is the ability to know where you are, where you came from, and where it's all going. It is more robust than mere intellectual attainment. It is philosophical and poetic. While these are harder to pin down, they are more lively. Dead butterflies make for cleaner displays, but what you gain in order, you lose in vitality. The medieval mind understands the facts, but it also understands them in their place in the world. The medieval mind doesn't isolate knowledge to sterile white rooms, but knows it in its natural habitat where dirt still gets under its nails.

day no. 15,866: suspicious or idolatrous

"A man may accept some of the fruits of modernity in order to spur himself on in the work of building a medieval culture. But he must be careful to teach his sons." -- Douglas Wilson, Angels in the Architecture

The medieval mindset can make room for new technologies without remodeling the room with every new invention. A medieval approach knows how to consider new technologies -- whether they may help or hinder the ongoing work of producing medieval culture. If a new contraption aids the advance of medievalism, then praise God, let's employ it. The medieval man does not resist new things merely because they are new, but evaluates something because it is new and thus, untested. The medieval mindset is one of considering the pros and cons as they apply to the advancing or complementing of existing priorities. This approach does not shun new things or fawn over them. It considers them and applies some and not others. It applies a sense of proportion to some while ignoring others altogether.

This must be passed down carefully to avoid a generation who is suspicious of the good things God is giving us or idolatrous of whatever the world is trying to sell them.