My first sermon for class is on this one verse:  “For I am not ashamed of the Gospel for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.” (ESV)  I’ve been thinking about this in relation to the entry prior to this on Hannah Whitehall Smith.  Basically her argument is the God’s job is to work and our job is to trust in that work, which is something that is difficult for me to do on a moment by moment basis.  So here’s where knowing theology helps me understand this verse.  I may be dense, but whenever I think of the word “salvation” I usually think of the word in relation to justification, which simply means that we are put right with God because Jesus was the ultimate sacrifice and his sacrifice atoned for my sins.  I usually think of this as the “getting into heaven” part.

But in Romans 1:16, this, I don’t believe, is the part of salvation that Paul is referring to.  I think that the justification part is there, but I think his main thrust is the sanctification part of salvation, where we are continually being transformed from our Old selves to our New selves.  This makes sense to me especially when we read further in the chapter as Paul is describing why we fall into the sins that we do.  No one is excluded from his argument in 1:18-32, and without the daily renewing power of God we would remain on that list and never become holier than we were before we were saved.

There are a lot of ramifications on this for me.  One, I am comforted to know that the person that I was before I became a christian does not just instantaneously disappear – there is a continual work that God is doing in me.  I can’t change my sin-nature, but God can – THAT is the Power of the Gospel that Paul is talking about.  Two, the ways in which I do want to grow is also a process.  I’ve struggled over the years with being single.  I thought initially that it was just because I was too shy, too not-so-great-looking, too well-padded in certain places.  But what I’ve come to realize is that I was not the wife that God would have wanted me to be.  He has had to change me and mold me into becoming the wife that He wants me to be.  This has not been an easy process for me, but my heart has definitely changed over the last 6-7 years regarding my role as a wife in marriage and what that should look like.

The third, and probably most important, is that I also realize that this is the process that other people go through as well.  I have a friend who is my age (which shall be stated but is over 30) and became a Christian 4 years ago.  I have seen God working in her life in a very gradual process that perhaps she can’t even see, but it’s there.  I have learned to be more patient and loving towards her, and all my other friends, when I don’t condemn them to “my” standards of Christian living – hey, I don’t even live up to my standards!  The point is that I can look at other people and realize that they are on a journey every bit as profound and life changing as mine – and THAT, my friends, is the Power of the Gospel.

(for those of you who know that I live in Waukegan:  1) I was not harmed by the explosion yesterday, 2) I was not involved in the explosion yesterday, and 3) I do live about 10 blocks from where the explosion yesterday happened)

Okay, so I really shouldn’t be a blogger, one might argue, because I never write anything.   True.  Today, though, not only am I writing something, but I am also posting pictures. 

Last week it snowed and we had fierce wind.  The chairs on my balcony fell over, into the center of my balcony, and then became a snow vortex, sucking all the snow blowing around “out there” onto my porch.  Proof:

My neighbor’s balcony, same level and same side, had, maybe 1.3 inches of snow on it.  I ended up with this.  Fortunately, snow sticks wierdly to the railing, so I also got this picture. 

See it swirling?  It was rather poetic…the snow sticking vertically and all that.  So I did my apartment owner duty and shoveled the porch.  Yes, I own a snow shovel and I used on my 2nd floor balcony.  And made it look like this:

Nice and clear.  I didn’t even snow bomb anyone (the entrace to the building is almost right beneath my balcony) nor did I leave snow in any walking path.  I was nice.

Then yesterday happened.  It took me 1.63 hours to get home, driving roughly 12.9 miles per hour (on average), skidding once and getting stuck (thank goodness for decent men), was pushed out and then bullied for 10 miles by all the SUV lovers out there that don’t seem to realize that nice, delicate, front wheel drive, 260,000 miles, 15-year old cars need to go slow.  Slow wins the race y’all….seriously.   

Then of course…there is the balcony. 

Oh, wait, that’s my car.  As seen from the balcony.  Here’s a better shot of the balcony.

And the chairs.  At least they had the decency to stay in the corner like well-disciplined children.  I know how to maintian order in my house.

Toodles.