Marsha's Blog

 Greetings from Sunny and Hot Australia!   I hope you all had the best Christmas ever. I know we did! Why, you ask?  You see, about 10 years ago our wonderful prospective son-in-love proposed to our daughter from the worship team stage at our church, complete with big screen video and lots of fanfare . Fast forward to Christmas day this year, where we sat before that same stage and watched in joy as daughter, her husband, both brother-in-law and father-in-law all joined together with the worship team to lead us in a medley of beautiful Christmas carols. Some of the Pennycuick family had driven almost a thousand miles to get there. They came from New South Wales, the outback town of Broken Hill where there have been something like TWO Covid cases, so they were able to get into Queensland. Mum and Dad didn’t have as far to come, but since they started just over the border in more civilized New South Wales, there were treated to some bureaucratic and complicated permissions to get certifi

  We had the privilege of visiting Bethlehem a few years ago.  On our previous trips to Israel we’d been visiting missionary friends who lived in Nazareth.  They encouraged us to skip seeing it as the Catholics and ensuing tourists had completely over-built and over-glamorized the spot.   I guess they were right, but I was also glad I got to finally see it.  Yes, there’s a beautiful cathedral standing above the place where Jesus was born, but I have to thank the original Catholics, in the form of Helen. She was the mother of Constantine, the Roman Emperor, and when he became a Christian, he sent her to the Holy Land to ‘suss out’ all the holy sites before people completely forgot.  After all, it was already 300AD!  She travelled from village to village, meeting believers and listening to oral history, putting her mark (that of the Roman Empire) wherever she could.  Because of that, there is reason to believe that the CAVES under the cathedral, (that hadn’t yet been built) were plac

  Today is the third Sunday of Advent.  As I’ve said before, there are many ways to interpret these four Sundays leading up to Christmas, depending on your particular church’s traditions. In the circles we run with, the tendency is to focus on Prophesy, The Wise Men, The Shepherds and finally, Bethlehem.   Today, those Shepherds.  You’ll remember awhile back I told you how I’d handed the box of nativity decorations to my middle grandson (he was about six at the time), and asked him to set it up for me. The rest of us went about decorating and Ezekiel was left to his own devices.   He did an excellent job, carefully unwrapping and placing each figure in it’s “traditional” place…… until it came to the shepherds.   As you would expect, he had Mary and Joseph, placed well back in the stable, out of the cold.  The towering wise men were just arriving, along with their entourage of servants and camels. Other animals were placed here and there, some curious to see the Blessed Event, others lo

I hope you've been enjoying this series on "The Armor of God". I've had lots of comments and opinions, leading to some great discussions! So now we're ready to move to the last piece of armor, the "Helmet of Salvation".  A few months ago, one of our precious 14-year-old girls from church was over at a friend's house, and it was suggested they take a bike ride. Not having her own, she quickly borrowed one. not knowing that the brakes were not working properly. Everything was fine, until they started down a steep hill. Both kids began picking up speed, having the time of their loves. Until she noticed a curve in the road farther down. Brakes were applied, and nothing happened, except even more speed. What followed was a few seconds of panic, during which time she could only pray as she rode into a concrete wall. By God's grace, an off-duty fireman was passing by. Actually, they're quite a few folks  who are convinced that he was a guardian ange

  Well, haven’t we all had a week to remember?  Whilst we remain fine, things around us are pointing to doom and gloom, at least as far as the world we understand.   And the trend seems to be global. Here in Australia as well as in the USA, the ‘more conservative’ factions were beaten out by liberal powers.  Not sure yet how that’s going to play out, but we’ll be praying for wisdom among our evangelical brothers and sisters who are convinced that the end is nigh. I did hear a remark the other day that I found both comforting and challenging. “Historically, persecution has never hurt the church.” And then on top of all that uncertainty, another of our missionary kids from Japan and from son Nathan’s generation had a heart attack and died this week. I think that makes five from a close-knit group of friends who grew up together as part of a very special mission family. Suffice it to say, folks all over the globe have been crying on each other’s shoulders, separated by miles but closer th

  Good morning,     I’ve been enjoying your perspectives on this little run we’re doing, exploring of the “Armor of God”.  I’m having fun wondering what the next ‘item’ will be each week, but I’ll have to say I was almost stumped on the shoe issue.   I have a sister who absolutely loves shoes, but I must have been behind the door when that gene was passed out.  Tony is even worse; he has a total of three pairs of shoes.  Runners, a good (expensive and orthopedic and all that) every day pair, and a dress pair that give him a pained expression (good for funerals).     But what about this verse?  Ephesians 6:15, “and as your shoes the readiness to announce the Good News of Peace”.    Our profession and calling was (and still is) being missionaries, and by its nature we’ve always been sensitive to opportunities to  “Go where no man has gone before”.  But is that what Paul is really talking about here?  Now that we’re retired from most of that galavanting around, aren’t we still in “standby

  Last week we thought about the belt of truth.   That takes me back to an earlier story in 2 Kings 6. Remember that poor servant of the prophet Elisha? All he could see was the surrounding enemy, and all he could say was (loosely translated), “We’re gonna die.” All it took, though, was a good dose of truth, and the realization that “there are more with us than there are with them” (6:16). I hope you’ve all had occasion to throw that verse at your own circumstances, and take comfort in its truth. This week Tony decided to lead the way amongst our friends and have the first cataract removed.  I know many of you out there can relate to the pure JOY he feels now that he can see clearly again. He had no idea (as he’s been reminding me over and over and…) how the years had gradually clouded down his vision until what he thought was ‘normal’ was indeed pretty compromised.  Now he’s leaping and dancing around because he’s seeing leaves and colors again. The doctor told him that cataracts ‘suc

  Okay, I promised you that we’d take a walk together through the armor of God in the next few weeks. Let’s go:   As I read Ephesians 6, the first thing that leaps out is that Paul is referring to powers and principalities that are not of this world. And, when I think about it, that fact of life is becoming more and more apparent these days. I also think it’s a sign of the times.     Maybe I’m oversimplifying here, but it seems that there was a time when life, as we know it,  was more tied to spiritual values. Some folks call it “superstition”, but it’s more than that. Then, as “science and logic” picked up, Satan had to pick up his game and come at us in more subtle ways. Now, though, as Revelation prophecies begin to be fulfilled, he has to “go back to the basics ”   and pull out the more overt spiritual attacks.     We’re seeing things happening now that in the past generation were just not so much a part of life, (late term abortion for example) and it tends to create in us an unea

  So I was thinking about preachers this week. Besides being married to one, our circle of friends contains a lot of folks who either were, still are, or hope to be preachers. I’ve even been accused of being a preacher myself, but as a Southern Baptist woman, that idea doesn’t fly very far. Be that as it may, I don’t see anything against “pontificating” about this or that, and in fact a lot of folks would say that’s what I’m doing right now, through this blog. Not preaching tho. Nope. Anyway, I heard somewhere that there are two types of preachers: those who open their Bibles, lock onto Scriptures and preach out of them. That is called exegetical hermeneutics….. I think. Then there are those who look around at life, find a sermon, then open their Bibles and find the appropriate Scripture to match. Tony insists that it’s not that simple, but that the best preaching comes from both the written Word and the lives that illustrate it. All the preacher has to do is tie the two together, add