I opened last week with a weather forecast. We expected 1 to 2 inches of snow with a possibility of 2 to 4. We hardly got any of that but the fact that it was snowing well into what felt like springtime was something. Our daughter scraped together enough on the hood of the car to make this cute little guy. He probably stands all of 6″. The temp then dropped to a low of 20, below freezing but not the 15 degrees we were told to brace for. Tomorrow is the first day of spring. Never be surprised if you get winter weather during the winter.

Baseball is back… and Freddie Freeman is a Dodger. He signed a $162 million, six year contract. Ballplayers get traded and free agents move around all the time but every now and then one guy stays with one team for his whole career. Freeman spent 12 years in Atlanta, his entire MLB career up to this point, and the Braves are just coming back to work following their 2021 World Series win. A lot of Atlanta fans are hot but it’s just business. If you were working at McDonald’s for $15/hr you’d go to Burger King in a heartbeat for $27 million/yr. Here’s my thinking: The Dodgers had an incredible lineup before adding Freddie. They won the Series in 2020 and advanced to the final round of the playoffs in 2021. Freeman is one of the best players in the game right now but he’s 32 years old. 38 is not too old but not many MLB players are still playing by then. He may not be winning Gold Glove awards and hitting grand slams in six years. If the Dodgers go to The Big Show another time or two in the next two or three years, they will get their money’s worth out of Freeman. If he doesn’t have six good years left, or if he has good years but not great years, they can trade him off or sell his contract. I wouldn’t say it’s beyond the realm of possibility to see him back in Atlanta, maybe just for a final season or two before retirement. Think about all the LeBron James fans that burned his Cleveland jersey in a bonfire only to end up buying another one later.

I’m performing a wedding today and this is what the father of the bride was doing when I arrived last night for the rehearsal. That’s 40 lbs. of Boston Butt plus chicken and full pork loins.

This is a competition rig that has sat idle for the past year. What a shame. But it’s being put to good use right now. I look forward to blessing this food and the hands that prepared it in just a few hours.

Why does that Coca-Cola bottle opener look like a Swastika? Well that’s because that’s what it is. The Swastika design goes all the way back to Sanskrit, an Indo-European language that pre-dates the Bronze Age. It has been used by many cultures throughout history as a symbol of peace and well being. There are Medieval paintings that show Swastikas on the shields of Christian soldiers riding in the Crusades. This bottle opener is from the 1920’s, before the the rise of Adolf Hitler and Nazi Germany. Only since being used by Nazis during World War II has the image carried a negative connotation. The symbol today represents hatred, racism, Aryan supremacy and genocide but for 4,000 years it was not so.

What is the difference between an autobiography and a memoir? An autobiography tends to follow chronological order and be heavily rooted in facts from the person’s life. Memoirs are less formal, allowing the writer to pick and choose which events they discuss in order to share their emotional truth.

Language is dynamic. Words, spellings and the idioms we use to express ourselves all change over time. Everyone needs a Bible they can read in their native (first) language. While I hold the King James Version in high regard – I own several and have read the KJV in its entirety, more than once – the Elizabethan English it is written in is not the English language we speak today. The sad fact is that we have more translations available and more tools and resources at our disposal to study the Bible than ever before, yet fewer people read the bible on a regular basis than in times past.

I took a pic on Saint Patrick’s Day of me in my green hat – not just green but John Deere Green. I looked up into the camera and did an unintentional Alan Creech impression. If any fans of Michael Spencer are still hanging around they should know who that is.

Jeremiah 29:11 is one of those verses often quote out of context and misapplied to the life of the Christian believer. Or is it? Thanks again to Patrick Sims for his insight into this one.