KNOWING THAT WE DON'T KNOW

Yellow moon shines bright and low in the evening sky.
How did God create such awesome geometry
as to have a moon look like a sunset? 

I write all week in my other blog and prepare words for others at the end of each week.  

So, I thought I'd publish what I write to share with others on a Sunday.    
The pictures simply remind me that the Spirit of God is always alive, especially in the stillness of winter.

As I linger with these words I am reminded that the mind is a wonderful thing.  One thought can trigger another and a chain of creative thoughts may flash before us. 

I wonder if that happens in ‘senior moments.’  
We become distracted as a conversation might trigger a memory that totally moves our thoughts away from the current moment.  
Suddenly we are in another world of

To create this mega-snowflake is far above my IQ.
Our creative God created us to be creative.

thought.

As I read the scripture in Mark 8: 31-38, I think I had a senior moment.  
My mind flashed back to a profound phrase that my english teacher spurted out in class one day.  
Perhaps some of us can think back to our senior year in high school.  
We are at the top of the heap.  
We’ve done it all.  
Some in the class are nearing the end of their formal education, knowing full well they will not go on to college.  This may be the pinnacle of one’s life.  
Triumph!  
We know it all!  

A camera lens can see better than my eyes but my mind knows what to discern.

Gray sticks and man-made wooden shapes covered in snow create 

an incredible story of humanity in God's creation.

In fact, many times I am sure I felt I knew more than the teacher (fool that I was) until I heard this phrase from a much admired, very demanding teacher. 
 If one was taught under Miss Westby, one knew they were getting the best education in English that any high schooler could have.  
So, when she spoke, we listened.  
“The more you know, the more you know that you don’t know.”  That’s all she said.  
 I’ve carried these words and chewed on them to this day.  

The words are so profound!  

The more I know, the more I know that I don’t know.

Therefore, I keep seeking to know more.  
Anyone in search of more knowledge . . . about themselves, another, life, a specific subject, God: Father, Son and Holy Spirit, whatever . . .  feels compelled to seek more and know more because the more we seek, the more we know that we don’t know.  

We will never know it all.  
We are no different than Albert Einstein or Madam Curry or Thomas Edison or Bill Gates.  
I consider all of these people geniuses.  
Yet, they are simply people who have known that they do not know it all and have continued to seek knowledge in the area that most interests them.

Knowledge, linked with understanding, becomes wisdom.  Some of the wisest people might make foolish decisions or make a statement that diminishes them from the ranks of the wise.  
That was the Apostle Peter. 
He had a ‘senior’ moment.  
He wasn’t thinking. 
 It was like he curled up in a tight little box and needed to remain within its confines. 
 Jesus, on the other hand, saw the broad picture and needed to implant that broad picture into the hearts of His most faithful followers.

Blue gray of evening as black pops out from white.
To know what these bits of dark are in the midst of open space
creates a picture that give peace to the soul.

Peter knew Jesus was Messiah, the anointed one. 
 Yet, his idea of Messiah meant a warrior who would enter Jerusalem on a white stead and cut down all the Roman soldiers and free the Jewish people from persecution.  
Peter knew Jesus would conquer every enemy of the Jews and place the Jews in power.  
He saw Jesus as ‘immortal.’  
When Peter hears the words from Jesus, that He must suffer and die, and then be raised again, it was like Peter’s brain froze.   
This statement by Jesus was totally outside of Peter's ‘knowledge level.’ 
 This was Peter, a man who knew Jesus, the Christ, and totally believed in him as savior. 
 Peter had never questioned his devotion to Jesus.  But, at this moment, it was like Peter had an ‘out of body experience’ with Jesus. 

Pops of dots, patterns in the snow.
Incredible patience.  Time. Knowledge. Understanding.
A desire to create beauty from nature's delight.

Peter was so in charge of the moment, he forgot where he was.  
Peter was still under the tutelage of Jesus, the Rabbi, the teacher, the mentor, the leader.  
What on earth was Peter thinking when he told Jesus that this ‘suffering’, this ‘rejection’, this ‘being killed’ . . .  would not happen?  
I don’t think Peter even heard the words, “and rising after three days.” 
 I think he only heard the words, “suffer” and perhaps “rejection.”  
Peter definitely had a ‘senior moment.’

Peter thought he knew everything yet he knew nothing.  
Peter stopped seeking to know more when he planted in his heart the notion that Jesus would be the warrior-savior who would never suffer and never die.   Peter may have even thought

A silent place to linger and wonder how beauty can remain
so simple after a heavy snow.  Do we ever understand
our mortality?  Does winter remind us of God's
presence in the absence of activity?

Jesus would be ‘taken up’ by God like the prophets Enoch or Elijah.  Peter ‘knew’ (in his lack of knowledge) that Jesus would never have to suffer a mortal death.

Praise God for Jesus’ command, “Get thee behind me, Satan.”  Jesus knew this was not Peter speaking.   Jesus knew that one with a severe lack of knowledge, one who seeks to learn nothing, satan, was in the midst of these words.  It’s as if the devil had placed a brick wall in front of Peter to stop Peter from seeking a greater knowledge of God’s infinite realm through His Son.  

“A little knowledge is a dangerous thing”  because a ‘little’

knowledge hinders us from seeking to know more. 
 To ‘know’ that we cannot know enough is the most powerful motivator we can have in any field of learning.  
With correction, Peter learned that he would never know it all.  
Peter would eventually have to totally rely on God’s Spirit to give him words, to direct his path, to press him into the next phase of his ministry.  
Peter learned that not being a ‘know it all” was a good thing.  In time, Peter had enough wisdom to know that he could never know enough.  
Peter knew to teach others, “the more we know, the more we know that we don’t know,” to keep seeking more of God through His Son.

Yet, in Jesus’ day, the ones who were suppose to “know,” the Pharisees, thought they knew it all.  
They stopped seeking.  They remained in their little box of knowledge.  
It’s the “know-it-alls” who rejected Jesus’ message and condemned him to death.  
There will always be pharisees of a sort.  
To this day, Christians are being slaughtered by those who claim to ‘know a god’ that is not our God.  
Our God is love and grace, drawing all seekers, by faith, into his outstretched arms.

Today, those who accept, by faith, the God of Abraham, Isaac

and Jacob are expected to embrace the New Covenant.   We are commanded to know God through His Son, Jesus Christ.  
That’s what the New Covenant is all about.  That was the ‘next step’ God gave to His chosen people, a New Covenant. The more we seek to know about God through His Son, Jesus Christ, the more we find that we don’t know.  

Instead of giving up and saying, “Oh well, I’ve gone as far as I can in this Christ-knowing journey," why not seek more?  Why should there ever be an end to our understanding of our own personal Christian life?  
Why should we ever be satisfied with being where we are in our Christian walk?

Perhaps this Lent is the time for us to walk more deeply into our Christian faith.  
Perhaps we can become wiser in our life journey. 
 It’s never too late.  Have we explored every avenue

of our faith?  
Have we participated in every opportunity to become closer to God through His Son?  
Would we dare attend a bible study even if we can do no more than listen?   Would we dare attend eight weeks of ‘Confirming Our Faith’ class to find out where we stand with Christ in our own personal walk?  
Would we dare walk the Stations of the Cross to deepen our understanding of Jesus' walk to the Cross?  
Would we dare commit to attending the Maundy Thursday service to embrace the end of Christ’s life before we celebrate His Resurrection?  
Perhaps by seeking more we will know more. 
"The more we know, the more we know that we don't know."

God knows your heart, do you?  

  

100 YEARS !

Dad celebrates 100 years and looks like he can go for another 10!
Family from all over the U.S. came together to help him celebrate.

I can't imagine living 100 years.    I think of all the changes in my own life of well over half a century.                                           I remember when the doors were never locked and I could knock on any neighbor's door on my way home from school if I  needed help.  I remember the telephone before it had a dial.                                   We simply asked the operator to connect us to another with a seven digit number.                                       When the dial on the heavy black phone was implemented, we thought we were totally in the tech age - well before the tech age.                                                                    Then came the Princess phone in a half-dozen colors that one could have in her own room.              How I envied those who could have one.                                    Our family was large and practical, and did fine with one dial phone in the kitchen.

Then came a variety of phones until we saw the 'portable' phone.  

It was huge and was mostly for very rich people.  

  In the mean time the computer was gaining popularity outside of big businesses.

Perfect words for this month, found at a Mpls. flower shop.
Dad's Birthday celebration will stay in our hearts
from now through eternity.

When I was young, a 'computer' took up an entire room in my dad's company.

Paper cards punched with a variety of holes were consolidated or sorted.

The binary system was the way to go.

Then came the desk top computer and its many stages.

1200 2nd Street, downtown Minneapolis,

Designed and engineered by Hewitt & Brown, Pike & Cook, build ca. 1920.

Home to Dad's Security Life firm, from May 1956 until ?

Added to the national Register of Historic Places in 1984.

All too soon we could take our heavy 'portable' computers home on the weekends.

Cornice over the front door of the above building
A grand entrance into 'Security for Life.'

Then, VOILA, the computer CHIP . . .  the greatest invention of the century in my humble opinion.

[New parents may say that disposable diapers are the greatest invention known to man.]

This CHIP exploded technology into mini-computers that are now the size of a watch.

It's the chip that gives us the ability to stuff incredible power and diversity into a tiny space so that we carry around this rectangle that does everything a computer can do but it is now called a PHONE.

Who ever thought a phone would come this far and be so full of technology.
Text messaging overtook the voice for those younger ones at the quarter-century mark.    Instant connection,  24-7-365.  

The younger ones may wonder how anyone could live without this computer-phone at their side.                               I scramble to keep up with changes of the past year much less a century.

Dad's sister could not make it to the big bash but
she was on the phone with me the next day wondering why
her package was returned just because she had
one number wrong but had the Name of the
complex he lives in.  It's another world today.

Above is the building dad purchased to house his incredible adventure before it became too large and he moved to even grander digs.

 His dream came true, grew and expanded to a greatness that he was very much part of until his 90s.

And so my father sits and absorbs the cacophony of noise and movement and revelry at the party.                                        

I wonder what he is thinking.

The speeches, the toasts, the wonder of it all.     We all came together  . . .  and then . . . when the celebration was finished . . . we returned to our daily commitments and responsibilities.

At least we took time to help dad remember the generations he has embraced over the years.

Children, Grand children, Great Grandchildren, gathered together to celebrate 100 Years!
The pictures that many took on their phones, are now being distributed through a computer web site.

What a wild ride we are experiencing.
I can't even imagine how dad has embraced it.
Remember past blogs when I spoke of his sister?
She is a super tech at 102 1/2 years and still going strong.

So I drink in the words of the sign I found at a small flower shop when we visited dad.

"For those who love, time is eternity."
I love where I am right now, with life spinning past me at the mach speed of technology.

I, too, watch and listen and absorb the moments and simply celebrate this time of my life.