Tis and Twas

Tis. Just read the book by that title. Twas a sequel to Angela's Ashes by Frank McCourt. No, not the owner of the baseball team....at least I don't think so. This Frank Mc Court was an Irish born child who grew up in a completely disfunctional family..eventually at age nineteen left for the US as an immigrant. Tis is the story of his life from age ninteen to around forty where his story is paused at the death of both his parents. If one is offended by bad language I would not recommend the second book. I don't recall quite so much vulgarity in the first book. I am glad I read these books. I have read Christian biographies and fiction for so long and one can get an unbalanced view of what is going on in the real world. The book revealed to me that we as Christians are so needed in this world...James 1:27
Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world..

I realize more than ever that some widows have husbands and some orphans have parents. There are husbands and perhaps some wives, too, who do not fulfill the role of their particular vow. Frank's mother was a widow her whole married life. There are also parents that treat their children worse than if they were parentless. They do horrible things to them out of their own perverse conditions and negatively affect their children's entire lives. Frank and his sibs were orphans even though he had two parents. My grandmother used to say, "They should be hung by their fingernails." I agree with her entirely. Why society puts up with some of the things we do is beyond my understanding. I suppose that part of the hesitation to meet evil head on is that we as humans often accuse the wrong party. Truth is often very hard to determine.

I'm in the throes of a situation where I am not sure where truth lies. If the truth is what I think it is, it is extremely painful. I just read, actually in the book I mentioned before that intelligience is when one can see both sides of a situation. I was comforted by that statement because that is where I find myself more often than not. I don't consider myself intelligent but I do believe I have the gift of discernment. That often parallels a critical spirit so I have to be very careful how I use that gift. A prayerful and humble heart is the only guardian I know to keep me on the straight and narrow. I try...sometimes I fail....we (I)are/am so at the mercy of God's grace.

If you are married, be a spouse in the way God designed the spousal relationship to be. If you are a parent, be the parent God designed the parent child relationship to be. Let's try not to make wives widows before their time and children orphans when there is no physical need. God grant us wisdom in this world so tainted we can barely see truth. Look to the Word for any truth at all. Actually, it is the WHOLE truth. Twas, Tis and Twill Be.