Rest in Peace, O Men of God

I found out yesterday that Russ Dizdar passed away in the last couple days. While researching that, I found out that Rob Skiba passed away within the last couple weeks. Very, very dark news indeed. Both these men have made a spiritual impact in my life at various times and it is horribly sad news that they are no longer with us. 

This is a you-tube video that discusses both of them and their ministry. I have not listened to the whole thing yet but just wanted to get this post up. As Vox Day posted on his blog recently, "the spiritual war has gone hot."

Please pray for the families of these men. Pray for all the men you know who have dedicated their lives to the work of the ministry - that they can have hedges of protection around their lives and their families are safe from the attacks of the adversary.

You may need to start the video from the beginning.

Things to do while you wait

As I walk the dog in the morning I think about what I should write about on my blog. I don't want to write just for the sake of posting something. I want it to matter, to be important to whomever may be reading it. Sometimes I'm just posting stuff so my parents know we are doing okay and getting out of the house once in a while. It saves minutes on my phone.

We currently don't have an income. That would normally bother me, but I have been on this road before and trust the Lord to make sure that our bills get paid and we have food to eat. I'm applying for jobs but I trust God on the outcome. I try not to write about the state of the country too much or the insanity of everything these days. Which is why I don't always write everyday. I spend a lot of time researching on line and have seen many doom and gloom dates come and go without incident. But it is impossible not to see the signs of the times everywhere.

Strangely, I find a lot of inspiration and hope in the daily sermons posted on tonyevans.org. Right before my back went out last week the sermon was titled, “Never give up.” This morning it was called “Praying for Change” and it was a sermon he had done 30 years ago. But God changes not and the things he talked about were exactly what I needed to hear today. He was talking about the book of Nehemiah and how God had placed Nehemiah right where he needed to be to accomplish God's will. The way Tony described it, it was like Nehemiah didn't even realize how being the king's cup-bearer made it possible to rebuild the walls of Jerusalem. It made me think about where God has placed me. Smack dab in the center of the country, far away from any borders, in the middle of no-where.

So while I wait for answers, I have a nice little routine I set for myself. Get up early, have coffee, make breakfast, do the dishes, walk the dog. I pray a lot about the state of our country and what the future holds. I take things one day at a time, trusting the Father has a plan for us that will be revealed in due time.

Message from Patriot Nurse

I wanted to post this video from Patriot Nurse because I believe it is a powerful message for our times. You can find the rest of her videos here:

https://www.youtube.com/c/ThePatriotNurse/videos

Buckeye Avenue

It is starting to get very cold in the mornings. I had to bundle up to take the dog for a walk. She likes the cold and spent several minutes sniffing before doing her business. Luckily the sun came up while we were walking and I started to warm up. It ended up being a beautiful day.

Buckeye Avenue is the main drag through Abilene. Everything you need is on that road including the Post Office. There are American flags flying on every other light pole. Several mansions line both sides and sometimes there are tours. If you take a right on 1^st street, you will reach the Leopold mansion. The man who bought it was in the newspaper last week. He bought it because he thought it looked like the Addams family mansion. He is having a tour there on Halloween night from 6pm – 10pm. I think I will skip it.

Buckeye Avenue is sometimes called Eisenhower. The Eisenhower presidential library is on that road as well as car washes, churches and dollar stores. What use to be the world's largest spur is there, but I guess there is a bigger spur somewhere else now. It is pretty rusty at the moment.

I drive this way a couple times a week, when I go to the store or check the mail. There is no such thing as traffic in this town. Maybe six cars at any given time. It is peaceful here.

Family Buffet

It was a good morning. I made breakfast, did the dishes, walked the dog and did a load of laundry. I was at the spot on the list where I would have to start doing stuff I don't really like to do. As I was contemplating getting out the vacuum, my husband said suddenly, “Let's go do something. I want to get out of the house.”

Music to my ears. So I spent some time looking online for things to do in the area. They do have a nice dinner train trip you can do on Saturday nights. There were some other day time train trips. One was a train trip from Abilene to Enterprise with a tour of Enterprise and lunch. We kind of laughed about that one. We already drove to Enterprise one day last week. (It is about 5 miles down the road from I-70). It really wasn't anything to write home about.

There are a lot of museums around. There is the greyhound museum in Abilene and the racing car museum in Chapman, plus several in other towns. My husband can't do a lot of walking so that kind of rules out museums. Although we still want to go watch greyhound racing when the season opens up again.

Somehow the conversation turned to Chinese buffets. There use to be one in Abilene but the phone number doesn't work and their last post on their facebook page was in 2017. We found one in Junction City. I called them to make sure they were still open and that they were still a buffet. “Yes! Family buffet!” the man said on the phone. He sounded pretty authentic.

We drove to Junction City and had a nice lunch at a real chinese buffet. All the buffet's in Oregon are closed now because everyone there is afraid of germs. Not here in Kansas, we can still have yummy buffets here. Plus, all the stores and restaurants have signs on the front doors, saying, masks required, but everyone just ignores them and no one wears masks. I love it.

We were super-full driving home. That about covers dinner as well.

Storms

Thunder woke me up in the middle of the night. I opened my bedroom shade so I could watch the lightning. I really love a good thunder and lightning storm. When you see the lightning flash you are supposed to count, one one-thousand, two one-thousand, three one-thousand, until you hear the thunder. That is to tell you how many miles away the storm is. It was about four one-thousands away from us.

This was the most rainfall we have had since we have been in Kansas. In Oregon it rains all the time so you get used to it. I love the sound of the rain on the roof. I was tempted to wake up my husband so he could watch the storm with me. He loves a good lightning and thunder storm too. But I decided to let him sleep. I will tell him about it in the morning.

I laid on the bed and watched the storm for about 20 minutes. The sound of the rain on the roof lulled me back to sleep. I woke up a few hours later and the storm was still raging. I smiled and rolled back over. It was a good night's sleep.

Junction City

 

With my back fully healed – we set out for another road trip adventure. Junction City is only 13 miles away from us and is a lot closer than Salina (for those who don't know, it is pronounced Sa-LIE-na). My husband's phone has been dying a slow death and it was time to replace it. Plus, he wanted a phone with a local Kansas number.

We found the store easily enough and bought a phone. We hadn't eaten breakfast yet and both of us were starving. We decided to go out to breakfast at a restaurant that happened to be located right next to the store. I ordered the “Eggs in a Blanket” which was what we use to call growing up, “Gypsy Eyes”. It is an egg cooked in the middle of a piece of toast. I like mine with ketchup and my husband thinks I'm insane. My dad use to make the best gypsy eyes and as far as I am concerned – he is still reigning champion.

Afterwards, we drove around town, looking at all the cute neighborhoods and old school businesses. We found a thrift store and I was able to unload my two bags of shoes. Overall – we loved Junction City. It is so close that we foresee many trips there again in our future.

We drove past a war memorial with an arc of Baal prominently featured. One of these days we will stop there and read what the plaque says and who sponsored it. I was a little surprised to see it there.

On the drive, my husband and I were discussing the fact that neither one of us has any desire now to move to Texas. Texas is under attack with the border issues and other things. Kansas seems fairly unscathed although I believe they are poisoning the water supply in Wichita. All in all, we are very happy here and glad that God picked us a good spot.