Most mornings I check the “Coronavirus in the U.S.” case count chart in the New York Times. The story the chart told at the beginning of the year was a bit scary, but its early spring tale is much more reassuring. The case count is down and seems to be staying down. At least for now. Pandemic politics aside, we’d all agree we’re in a better place now than we were in January or through most of the second half of 2021. Please, no more surges.

The Morning Dispatch says Johns Hopkins University public health professor Chris Beyrer calls what we’re experiencing now an “epidemiological lull.”

Lull is an old world of unknown origin, though it may be related to “lullaby.” And as with a sleeping baby, there is a “for now” sense to the word. The baby is quiet for now.  News agencies have reported an occasional lull in the fighting in Ukraine.  The Russian artillery is silent for now. But a lull always worries about a “yet to come.” The baby will wake and start fussing again. The shelling will resume. The next variant will bring another spike in Covid cases. Continue reading →

Becky and I have returned from our trip to Israel with great thanks for the opportunity and with wonderful memories we will cherish forever.  It was a good trip, and in many ways “a good trip” is the best summary I can give. No qualifications.  It was a good trip.  The sights we saw, the places we stayed, the traveling companions: it was a good trip.

But let me share three observations.

Observation 1 – Israel is not the only holy land:  The earth is the LORD’s and the fullness thereof, the world and those who dwell therein. — Psalm 24:1

Our trip was dubbed “A Holy Land Study Tour.”  If I tell people I have just returned from the Holy Land, they know where I was. Judaism, Christianity, and Islam all use the term “Holy Land,” and it does not need much explanation.  I prefer to say that we were in Israel. To be sure, it is a unique place in terms of human history. The events told in the Old and New Testaments took place in this land.  But if King David, who lived his life in the place, is correct about what he wrote in Psalm 24, this land is not the only holy land. The earth is the Lord’s and the fulness thereof.  That means that Auburn, Indiana, Hunting Park in Philadelphia, Kigali in Rwanda, Favela da Ventosa in Belo Horizonte, Brazil, Kyiv in Ukraine, are holy as well. They belong to the Lord, and his story continues to unfold in them.

We traveled to Israel, and it was a good trip. Continue reading →

Before we get to the spaghetti, just a word to let you know that Becky and I will be away for the next couple of weeks – a trip to Israel! “Observations” will be back when we are back

She is called Yale’s “Happiness Professor” and in addition to her immensely popular classes on the psychology of the good life offered at Yale, Laurie Santos hosts the “Happiness Lab” blog, looking at scientific research on happiness and offering tips on avoiding anxiety, negative emotions, and what she calls that “meh” feeling.

Professor Santos recently sat down for an interview with a New York Times reporter. Excerpts from the interview were published in this past Monday’s paper.

The reporter asked an interesting question, “A lot of stuff that we know can have a positive effect on happiness — developing a sense of meaning, connection with other people, meditation and reflection — are commonplace religious practices. How helpful are they outside religion?”

I found the happiness professor’s answer interesting, as well. Continue reading →

When we first moved to Auburn, Indiana, I thought I might need a few windows opened to the wider world – not that Auburn, Indiana, isn’t a pretty wide world – so I subscribed to some of the national newspapers in addition to the DeKalb County Star. Among the papers to which I subscribed was the Washington Post. They gave me a decent deal at $40 for the first year.  I knew the subscription would go to $100 per year after the first year, and that I would need to be vigilant about the auto-renew program in which they had enrolled me.

The Washington Post, as you may know, is owned by Jeff Bezos of Amazon, who also flies into space in his own Blue Origin spaceships.

While I was glad to be able to get past the Post’s paywall for an occasional news article or opinion piece, Jeff Bezos’ paper did not offer the clear view of the world I hoped it might, so I declined to re-up for the second year, especially at the $100 price tag. As soon as I clicked the “no thank you” button on the renewal site, a pop-up appeared telling me they would be happy to have me back for the same $40 I had been paying all along. Well, first, even at $40, I had not found the subscription all that worthwhile, and, secondly, it occurred to me that they were quite the scoundrels. They were dishonest. They would have been more than willing to take my $100 had I been willing to pay it. Only after I innocently said “no” did they offer me the deal they would have been willing to make all along.  I don’t like bartering with street vendors at tourist sites, and I did not want to barter with the third richest person in the world over a newspaper subscription. Continue reading →

A week ago, we were driving home from a week in Memphis, Tennessee (actually, Germantown, a nice suburb of Memphis).  Our return trip had been delayed a day by Killer Storm Landon (I don’t know why every winter storm needs a name!).  Landon was not the killer he was advertised to be, but still it was wise not to travel on Thursday when Memphis was covered in ice and a foot of still-falling snow was piling up on the ground in the north.

Plans are made to be changed.  Scripture suggests that all our plans should be made subject to the possibility that God will change them.  James cautions us, “Come now, you who say, ‘Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit’— yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. Instead you ought to say, ‘If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.’”

If the Lord wills.

We did not need divine revelation to know that this past Friday would be a better travel day than Thursday.  Accuweather made things clear enough.  Friday it would be.  But we weren’t done changing plans. Continue reading →