End Times

          One of my Christian friends had something to say about my February 23rd letter blog Dibbles and Dabbles. She commented on what I wrote about sins and regrets.

“I have found myself doing that same thing! Now, instead of regrets, I'll give thanks and praises to our Lord — and I’ll know what to tell others in that same situation. I hope you continue to write what you feel and not be concerned if you hurt someone's feelings.”

I don’t want to alienate any of you, my faithful and loving readers. But there are times when God puts it on my heart to tell you something of a Christian nature. That was one of those times, this is another.

 My Bible study class is studying the end times.

“Why is Great Tribulation capitalized?” I asked Pastor as I took notes.

“It’s an event, I guess.”

A little later in the video lesson, Great Tribulation was not capitalized and I called it out. “Now it’s not capitalized!”

“You can do it however you want,” Pastor said.

“Yeah, Peg! Just do it how you want,” one of my class peeps jumped in.

I had no intention of responding, just kept writing the note I was taking, until another, and then another peep echoed the same sentiment.

“Do it how you want, it’s not a hill to die on!”

“Yeah, Peg! Do it —”

I stopped listening as memories of being bullied echoed down the long corridor of time. Instead of dissolving into a puddle of tears, as I had then, I got angry.

“Wait a minute! Pastor said ....” I started, a bit irritated.

“Way to throw Pastor under the bus!” came a comment followed by laughter.

“Either it’s capitalized or it’s not!” came out harsher than I meant it. I lowered my eyes, avoiding their gazes. “I’m so confused!” I said, softening my tone.

The lesson moved on, the incident forgotten. My peeps aren’t mean-spirited; it was meant in fun. I’m sure of that. Seeing all of this kind and sweet awesomeness that is me, they couldn’t’ve known about my past. Couldn’t’ve known the wounds they would scratch open with their teasing.

As Christians, we see what’s happening around us. The Bible is full of prophesies that are yet to be fulfilled. The Rapture of Christians is one of them. It doesn’t tell us when the Rapture or the Great Tribulation will take place, but it does give us a number of signs that are often interpreted as indicators of the approach of the end times.

In Matthew 24:6-8, Jesus speaks of global wars, famines, earthquakes, and pestilences, describing these events as the beginning of sorrows.

“We just had all those awful fires in California,” I said. “And all that flooding in the south!”

“And COVID!” someone else said.

I’m sure that if we got together, we could come up with many other events, not only here in America, but all over the world that fit these criteria.

2 Timothy 3:1-5 talks of moral decline and apostasy. (Apostasy, if you don’t know, refers to the act of abandoning or renouncing one's religious faith and beliefs.) The passage highlights a time when people will become lovers of themselves, disobedient, and lacking self-control. Many view this as a sign of societal decay leading up to the end.

About 7.2% of Americans identify as part of the LGBTQ+ community. This amounts to almost 24 million people.

“I don’t think sex between two people of the same sex is wrong. Love is love!” I’ve been told.

I think my friend Julia put it well when she says, “Our opinions don't matter. What matters is what God says. God isn't some sort of cosmic killjoy wanting to rob us of having fun and a good time. No. He created us. He knows what's best for us. And, He knows the enemy of our souls and his crafty schemes.”

I would change your mind, if I could. Make you believe in God, the Bible, and life everlasting.

“It's not our job to change people's minds. We lay out the truth in love, and let the Holy Spirit do His work in His timing,” Julia says.

“You do you, and I’ll do me,” is something I hear often and is plastered on the road to hell. But you probably don’t believe that either. You should. It’s not a place you’d want to go to if you knew the truth of it.

I don’t hate anyone, no matter how they identify. You should know that just because a thought comes into your head, you don’t have to entertain it. You don’t have to dwell on it. You don’t have to dream about it. That’s when and how it takes root and blossoms into sin. It’s easier to protect our thoughts when we’re mindful of what we let into our minds —whether through what we listen to, watch on TV, or read in books.

In Matthew 24:9, Jesus foretells persecution and hatred toward His followers, which is seen as a precursor to the end times.

“Christians are already being tortured and killed in other parts of the world,” Pastor tells us.

As Christians, we are ready to join our Savior.

As humans, we are afraid.

“I don’t want to suffer,” one of my peeps said.

“I’m with you! I don’t wanna suffer either!” I agreed.

“Christ suffered for us. As Christians, we may be asked to suffer and even die for Him,” Pastor said.

“I’m okay with dying for Christ, I just don’t wanna suffer!” I said. “A bullet to the head would be quick, or beheading would be okay, too.”

I say that, but in a fictional novel written about life after the rapture and the persecution of Christians, one executioner thought a sharp blade made for a too quick and too painless death. He let the blade get dull and oftentimes had to drop the blade of the guillotine two or three times before he completed the task.

TMI?

You’ll think it’s TMI when the Christians are raised up in the air to meet Christ. They — whoever ‘they’ are — will tell you it’s aliens, beings from outer space, but my words will come back to you and you’ll know the truth. It won’t be too late for you. It’s never too late until you take your last breath here on earth. Turn your life over to Jesus and you will be saved from an eternity separated from God.

We talked about denying Christ.

“I’m just afraid I won’t have the courage when the time comes,” a classmate said.

I fear that, too.

I heard a story once, of a father who gives his son bus fare just before the boy is about to leave for his journey. When asked why he didn’t give it earlier, the father explains that he provides it only when it’s needed. Whoever was using this story in his preaching, paralleled it with God. We don't need to worry or fear about the future because, much like the father in the story, God gives us the strength, courage, or resources we need at just the right moment—not before, and never too late.

And this is where I find my comfort.

I know shootings and beheadings happening to oneself isn’t pleasant to think about or to talk about. It may happen in my lifetime, it may not. It doesn’t matter either way. We are called to always be ready. We are also called to tell everyone else to get ready, too.

The writing is on the wall.

The world will go — the world will end as the Bible says it will.

Of this I have no doubt.

If this stirs something in your heart, reach out to me or another Christian. Seek out a good, Bible-teaching church —I’m proud to be part of one myself.

 

Now I shall climb down off my soapbox and get on with the week’s jibber-jabber.

Mike and I had to go someplace four days in a row this week. You know what that means, don’t you?

“Road pictures!” you exclaim.

Yes, road pictures. Some of the things may be familiar because I’ve photographed them before, but trust me, it doesn’t stop me from taking pictures of them again.

We started the week by going to Dickson City. I wanted to see if the discounts at the going-out-of-business sale at Joann’s were any deeper. They weren’t. And I’m not going back again.

“The sales online are much better,” my friend Jenn tells me.

We did go to Michael's, and I got a couple more tubes of watercolor paints. It’s so much easier to buy colors than to mix up my own from the primaries.

          Afterward, we stopped at the Mexican place and had lunch. We got the same thing as we had before. A combo plate for Mike and chicken fajitas for me. I love fajitas!

          “I always get beef fajitas,” my handsome brother tells me.

          I think I’ll try beef next time. Maybe I’ll like them even more!

          They’re putting a new roof on the barn remodel.

          We took a different way coming home, going through Nicholson.

          The next day we went to Dushore to pay our taxes. We took some different roads here, too.

While in Dushore, we went to visit Momma, Pop, and brother Mike.

I saw a hawk and two crows in the same tree. It’s unusual because crows view hawks as a threat. They often mob them and drive them away. However, if they’re sharing the same resource, like food, they will tolerate each other.

The next day we took the dogs for a ride. We had to make a quick trip to Tunkhannock and knew we wouldn’t be in any one store too long. 

I’m beginning to think that riding in the car just plain makes Raini feel bad.

When she used to get sick, I had her get off the seat. The floor mats were a lot easier to clean. This last trip, she got down to the floor on her own. I reached back, stroked her back and touched her side. I felt her heave a few times, but nothing came up. It’s a good thing, too. Mike’s jacket was on the floor. I just would’ve had to wash it, so not the end of the world.

The next day we had to go to Sayre for a doctor’s appointment. Mike was considering having his eyelids done to improve his vision. Unfortunately, if you already have dry eyes, the surgery makes it worse.

“I think I’ll just think about it for a while,” Mike told the doctor. Then asked her a question. “Do I have any signs of macular degeneration?”

“I didn’t look,” she said of her cursory exam. “But if you’re having yearly eye exams, then you’re fine,” she told him.

He asked her a couple of other questions but got the same answer.

“She didn’t want to talk to me after I said I didn’t want surgery right now, did she?” Mike asked me.

“Nope, she didn’t.”

Here’re the pictures from that trip. It’s early and the Parkway lights are still on.

The robins have been back for a month now, or almost a month. This is the first I’ve been able to get a picture.

Another sign of spring. 

This hawk has his head turned almost the whole way around! Maybe he can’t turn it as far as an owl can, but his flexibility is still pretty impressive!

That stinker!

“What stinker?” you ask.

Bondi! She is so spoiled! Every time we come home from anyplace, she thinks she deserves a toy. She loves these little squeaky toys that come on cards of five. We should take stock in the company because I bet we’ve bought nearly a thousand of them!

Okay! Okay! That’s hyperbole. Exaggeration for the sake of emphasis. We have bought a lot of them, though.

It doesn’t take her long to get the squeaker out, but she’ll still play with them. She bites it, hits it with her nose, chases it, and grabs it.

This is where the stinker part comes in.

Bondi loves to knock ‘em under the furniture. I’ll see her heading for the cat condo or buffet and I’ll yell, “DON’T YOU PUT THAT UNDER THERE!” Does that ever stop her? NO! She’ll knock it under anyway, then lay in front of it and whine when she can’t reach it until someone comes and gets it out for her.

What a stinker!

I’ve taken a couple of other pictures around here this week.

Raini thinks it’s great sport to chase the cats. They don’t always run from her and Spitfire hardly ever does, but he did this day. As I stood in the kitchen window and watched, he climbed the chain-link fence to the top. Once Raini came in the house Spitfire couldn’t figure out how to get down. He made several attempts but couldn’t make himself jump. I knew he’d eventually just jump for it, but I went out and rescued him.

Speaking of cats, I put the trail cam out into the cat room to see who’s visiting. Spitfire keeps his eye on the place and was in and out several time during the night. I had a possum, a raccoon, and two feral cats. One was a cat our neighbor Vernon stopped feeding but I don’t know where the other one came from.

“Peg, did you paint anything this week?”

I’m so glad you asked!

I did! There were two different marathons going on this week. Both were five days long. They were timed just right. I could paint the cartoon, then have time to join the other marathon.

I wasn’t able to paint all five days and it’s just as well. The marathon session generally run about two hours but can go over by fifteen minutes or so. That’s at least four hours in front of the computer and I didn’t have the time this week.

You can buy the tutorials and have access to them forever. If you’re a cheapskate like me, you take the free sessions. If you miss the live broadcast, they allow you to watch the recordings for three days after the marathon ends. And if you watch all five days and get five secret letters, you’ll get a bonus tutorial.

Even though I could make the time to paint the cartoons next week, I’m not going to. They were fairly straightforward and not much of a challenge.

The artists can be from anywhere in the world. Reha Sakar, the man teaching the other class is from Canada. I enjoyed his class a lot. He talked the whole two hours and fifteen minutes!

“Sometimes I get up the next day and have a sore throat. I think, am I getting sick? Then I remember I talk a lot. I have always talked a lot. Since I was little. I can talk for hours. Just like a radio. I even impress myself,” he said, and I laughed.

Reha taught us not to worry so much about details, to paint form and feelings.

“It doesn’t matter if you don’t have blue, use red. It’s more about tone than color.”

I did go back through the recordings and skimmed through them enough to find two of the secret letters from the three classes I missed. Armed with four of the five secret letters, I went to the page where you enter the secret code and ran through the alphabet until I hit the last letter. I think I’m going to try to paint the bonus lesson. 

Let’s call this one done.