The healing journey of a widowed, unschooling badass in Delaware.
We had an exciting night in Kennett Square seeing Cat Ridgeway at the Kennet Flash.
Ridgeway rocked the stage and was so sweet afterward. She remembered us from the Philly Folk Festival two years ago and chatted with us for a while.
She signed Isaac’s CD and just might be considering a tattoo.
We also got to see the promotional poster for Westen’s upcoming gig on the wall of the venue.
Government is never too small to be evil.
Stop voting for these people. Stop voting for your own oppression. Stop validating the Little Caesars who would ruin your life to keep their jobs.
Genesis 32:28 RSV — Then he said, “Your name shall no more be called Jacob, but Israel, for you have striven with God and with men, and have prevailed.”
Matthew 5:11-12 RSV — “Blessed are you when men revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so men persecuted the prophets who were before you.
This chapter addresses the difference between Jacob and Israel. Although referring to the same man and his descendents, Jacob wasn’t renamed Israel until he wrestled with an angel of God in, perhaps, the most vulnerable moment of his life. Jacob was alone, having sent all his posessessions with his entire family to give them to his brother Esau for forgiveness. After having his birthright stolen by Jacob, Esau grew strong enough to kill his brother. As Jacob waited to learn whether his gifts would spare him his life, an angel appeared to wrestle him through the night.
After surviving the match and suffering a dislocated thigh, Jacob is given the name Israel. It is unclear what “Israel” means exactly, one source provides this guess: “He Has Become A Receptacle In Which God Can Be Received And Retained.”
This rings more true to me than the frequently used, “He Who Strives/Struggles/Wrestles With God.”
Israel became a new man in his striving.
We become new in our faith when we struggle with the Word.
But God reminds us that the old self, the Jacob, is a pattern that still exists as the fallback position when we cease to strive in our faith.
This chapter chides the descendents of Israel as they have fallen into the patterns of Jacob.
Home education brought me to a place where I could find Christ in my heart. The bravery and freedom I discovered through deschooling and unschooling dissolved my assumptions and opened my mind and heart. In an effort to have a more peaceful and loving family environment, I found the ultimate source of Love.
And all the males reading this.
Anything can take you away from God, if you let it. Addiction is possession.
Nothing can take you away from God if you don’t allow it to do so.
I do take these things seriously. Jonathan Pageau is one of my favorite living thinkers and he disagrees with me, to an extent.
The key for me is ignorance. We are ignorant to the depth of meaning in Christian rituals, but that doesn’t mean that we are misusing them. It does mean that Christian rituals can be distorted to worship false gods. Just look at any church during playoffs.
Because these are meant to be spaces dedicated to the worship of God and emulation of Christ, I end up leaving as soon as there’s a celebration of government holidays, local sports teams, or innumerable secular idols.
Whether it’s a jiu-jitsu, yoga, Lego, grocery, retail, museum, arboreteum, etc., etc…space, I know it wasn’t designed with God in mind and isn’t run with Christ at the center. That doesn’t make me fearful. I know God is in these spaces and my intention is to be aware of Him and and align my actions, words, and thoughts with His Will as closely as I am able.
This event has grown by a factor of five since we last visited in 2019.
We haven’t camped much since opening the studio and moving in together.
This is my favorite time of year to camp and we’re taking advantage, now with a weekend in New Jersey.