Memo From the Mann

A library is a house of  hope (we could stop there) ... It’s a place where we all, whatever our situation, can feed our ideas and developed our dreams.   A cartoon showed (a father handing a child a book to his teen-age son): “It’s a book you say, ..uh, what do I plug it into?” You mind!   Apart from the word of God, human life knows only chaos. It is the word that speaks order into creation and t...

...break up your unplowed ground ~ Hosea 10:12 One of my daughters was a stubborn child. She knew what she wanted, and wasn’t going to have it any other way. Her will was strong, her heart could turn hard during such an exercise, her upsetment occurred because she wasn’t getting what she wanted ...much like many adults, like many unhappy souls in the world ...dare I say much like our politicians ....

Woe to you who are complacent ~ Amos 6:1 Don’t you just love people who are full of themselves? They have an arrogant way about them, one that seems to allow them the belief that we commoners, we sheep,  just grazed around them as they carry on the important aspects of their day.  Smugness wears ugly ...don’t you think. I mean we don’t wear it as a compliment. We don’t greet a great man or woman w...

 Do two walk together unless they have agreed to do so? ~ Amos 3:3 I’d like to share some common agreed upon thoughts about this statement. Persons do not walk together unless they have agreed to meet; lions do not roar unless they have captured some prey; birds do not fall to the ground for no reason; alarms don’t sound without causing fear. (Indeed, our natural disasters come not from happenstan...

Amos 7:14 (NIV): 14 Amos answered Amaziah, “I was neither a prophet nor the son of a prophet, but I was a shepherd, and I also took care of sycamore-fig trees. Has the Spirit ever got you attention in an uncomfortable way? You know, you feel like you should say something, or do something that’s outside of your comfort zone? We should take care to listen, and to trust, and to respond to such callin...

They kiss calf-idols! ~ Hosea 14:2 To whom are you expressing your loyalty, your devotion, and your love? Now you can answer in any number of ways, but ultimately it’s your life that will express the truth when it comes to your loyalty, your devotion, and your love. Here in Hosea 14 we read that Instead of seeking life from God, Ephraim sought it from the fertility rites of baal worship, which was...

Turn & Return But you must return to your God... ~ Hosea 12:6 All of us have guideposts that mark our journey, and some of them we’d no doubt like to remove ... but then that’s an impossible feat, they’re posted there indelibly, we lived them, and we can’t undo our history ... we can only learn from them. They’re reminders, not only to grow by, but also not to repeat. In Hosea 12  the Lord adm...

It was I who taught Ephraim to walk, ~ Hosea 11:3 (Hebrew Ephraim, refers to the northern kingdom of Israel) I became a father for the first time in my mid-thirties, and I was more than ready for it ...and yes I was probably what we’d consider a doting parent. I cherished the gift of my new born child, and couldn’t do enough for her. My days were filled with her first words, her first steps, her f...

I wrote for them the many things of my law, but they regarded them as something foreign. ~ Hosea 8:12 Most of us as children didn’t like being in the dark. We were afraid of what we couldn’t see. Now, even as adults we’re not fond of being in the dark ...as in not knowing what’s goin on.  No one likes to be in a situation where they feel out of control, it’s uncomfortable. We get that uneasy feeli...

They do not turn to the Most High; they are like a faulty bow. ~ Hosea 7:16 When speaking about appeasing God I often refer to myself as coming up short. In other words, not being able to measure up, or hit the mark.  The breakdown is in my turning away from God, when I don’t turn to him for help, for direction, for council. How can I hit the mark when my aim isn’t true. I can be really stubborn,...

Your love is like the morning mist, like the early dew that disappears. ~ Hosea 6:4 Have you, in your life time, found love to be fickle?  As a young man I certainly experienced my share of heartbreak ... and yes, I probably dished up a bit of my own, but it seems that love has always blown hot and cold. There one day, and gone the next. I’ve known, and or seen, friends and family that have had li...

(‘I will go back to my husband as at first,) ...for then I was better off than now.’ ~ Hosea 2:7 Have you ever found yourself regretting a change. Maybe you thought switching your job would bring you more money and happiness. Maybe you bought a new car or home looking for a better life. Maybe you moved on from a relationship and were sorry afterwards. Have you heard yourself say, “well, that wasn’...

“Don’t be alarmed,” he said. ~ Mark 16:7   The angel’s message is still comforting today. When Jesus doesn’t appear to be around you, when he doesn’t appear to be close, when he doesn’t appear to be in your midst ...he is. He’s never behind trying to catch up with our lives. He’s never too busy to know what we’re living through. He’s never deaf to our calling, our crying, or our prayer. We’re told...

Those crucified with him also heaped insults on him. ~ Mark 15:32 Have you ever witnessed a small child get set in their ways. They perceive a situation through their very young eyes and mind and you can’t persuade them any different. They normally have to act out with some form of intolerance. They cry out, they stamp their feet, ...holding their breath, that’s a good one ... they usually do this...

The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.” ~ Mark 14:38 I admit right here, and right now that I am weak, that I have moments where I lose control, that I have a dark secret, that I have an addiction ...to dark chocolate. Yes, I also have other food addictions, but not withstanding them, I continue. My spiritual life has been in good condition these past number of years. It’s been a steady dee...

Be on guard! Be alert! You do not know when that time will come.  ~ Mark 13:33 Our demise here on this earth is a guarantee, it’s a definite, you can bet your life on it. (Sorry for that little play on words there). Knowing that, we find ourselves in a place where we don’t have any idea when and or where that day will happen. We don’t have a single clue! Now in context, this verse (Mark 13:33) is...

but she, out of her poverty, put in everything ~ Mark 12:44 I often foolishly offer that my happiness is in opposite proportion to my lack of debt. That is to say that I carry no debt, and believe that I live a happier, more content, and stress free life because of it. Now the premise is that I don’t have money problems which relieves the weight, and stress, that accompanies them. My wife and I ma...

Have you seen the money people are spending on collectibles lately? An amazing amount of money has been, and is, being spent on all sorts of things that have been in the possession of the famous (often worth more when they’re no longer with us). I don’t personally adhere to this behavior, but then again I’ve never been an autograph hound either. So I’m reading in Mark 11 about the arrival of Jesus...

As the new year begins, and we welcome an unknown future of events, this seemed like a beneficial piece of scripture to begin with this week. Each new day is unlike any we’ve experienced before, and to negotiate our way through it successfully we need some guidance, and that is what God reveals today in Isaiah 58:11. Not only does he say he’ll guide us, but he says he’ll always guide us. Pray on,...