Yesterday I read an interesting phrase. The writer said the father of Benjamin Franklin had 17 children “of which to dispose.” But it’s not what you think. The arcane phrase simply means Josiah Franklin had to find jobs, apprenticeships, husbands, or other arrangements to secure the future of each of his 17 children. Dispose, usedContinue reading “Ask Your Father for a Blessing! Joshua 15:19.”
Author Archives: Steven Wales
Slavery. Jeremiah 34:17.
In the Post-Enlightenment West, liberty means agency or self-determination, even when you use your liberty to bind yourself. Let me explain: liberty means a landowner can do anything with his real estate. The owner is free to sell, to buy, to lease, to rent, to sell the underground minerals while retaining the surface, to leaseContinue reading “Slavery. Jeremiah 34:17.”
Cleanliness is Next to Godliness … Sometimes. Ezekiel 24:6,12-13.
Image. Three children of a Depression-era migrant worker in Michigan, 1940. Americans were not always so clean and shiny, our teeth the envy of the world. One Brit traveling in the Midwest in 1819 described Americans as “filthy, bordering on the beastly.”[1] He could not get used to “dirty hands, heads, and faces everywhere.” SettlersContinue reading “Cleanliness is Next to Godliness … Sometimes. Ezekiel 24:6,12-13.”
Sin City: Jerusalem. Ezekiel 22:6-16.
Just as individuals have personalities, groups of people have personalities. Ask any teacher—no two classes are the same, and you love some and you … struggle to love others. Group personalities are even present in extremely large groups. Churches, cities, even nations have personalities. Several factors drive group personalities. One is proximity. People who liveContinue reading “Sin City: Jerusalem. Ezekiel 22:6-16.”
Humble Yourself Under the Mighty Hand of God. Ezekiel 19:1-14.
Could anything have been more terrifying in a world without gunpowder than lions? Imagine an absolutely silent hunter, yet one whose roar can be heard up to five miles away. Lions once roamed the earth in far greater numbers than they do today. Among other things, gladiators fighting for their lives in the Roman ColosseumContinue reading “Humble Yourself Under the Mighty Hand of God. Ezekiel 19:1-14.”
Can We Enjoy American Prosperity While Also Enjoying American Diversity? Ezekiel 17:22-23.
American Exceptionalism. The United States is special. A huge, bountiful land, filled with fresh water and rich farmland. Our history of exporting food won us the name the “breadbasket of the world.” This is a place of liberty, democracy, freedom, and equality. Never in human history were such critical human rights provided to so manyContinue reading “Can We Enjoy American Prosperity While Also Enjoying American Diversity? Ezekiel 17:22-23.”
Hard Woods, Soft Woods, and Woods for the Fire Pit. Ezekiel 15:2-7.
Bald Cypress trees at the Guadalupe River State Park. Quality woods growing in our area include soft woods like Bald Cypress and Southern Pine, and hard woods like Live Oak and Water Oak. But some plants on the Texas Gulf Coast are intriguing but useless. There is the Chinese Tallow, a decorative but much-maligned invasiveContinue reading “Hard Woods, Soft Woods, and Woods for the Fire Pit. Ezekiel 15:2-7.”
G.T.T. or Gone to Texas: Ezekiel 7:7-8.
In the early 19th century, Mexico invited Americans to settle the territory of Texas, build farms, schools, and churches, “deal with the hostile Indians,”* and settle the wild land. Desperate to populate the territory and build the economy, Mexico offered land grants of 170 acres for farming crops, and over 4,428 acres (a league) forContinue reading “G.T.T. or Gone to Texas: Ezekiel 7:7-8.”
The Trail of Tears. Jeremiah 27:12.
Image: “The Flight of the Prisoners” by James Tissot, 1896, a painting of the people of Judah being driven from Jerusalem to Babylon, a Biblical “Trail of Tears.” Americans love the Bible. We print Bible verses on our tee shirts and coffee cups, stencil them on our walls, bumper-sticker them on our cars. The BibleContinue reading “The Trail of Tears. Jeremiah 27:12.”
No One Can Stand in the Presence of God’s Glory. Ezekiel 1:28.
If you could see God, the sight would be overwhelming. You would not survive. We know that no one can see God’s face and live, Exodus 33:20. But I’m not sure how to account for what lawyers call “the mechanism of the injury.” What exactly would be fatal about the encounter? Would the sight ofContinue reading “No One Can Stand in the Presence of God’s Glory. Ezekiel 1:28.”
Household Words: 