Vacaville was fun. Good food, good family. As I’ve said before, I don’t tend to rant when I’m on vacation because I’m enjoying myself too much.
I did avoid the Friday Xmas shopping, which most of the family decided to put up with anyway. So while they were out, I watched the news and some movies, ate leftovers, and polished off the rest of the pumpkin ice cream. Then the others showed up to eat leftovers too.
Saturday I came back so that I could go to church and do my part to keep the service going. With all the Bethany kids missing for Thanksgiving, I was also curious to see how much the service would shrink… but we actually had a decent turnout, and it’s nice to have Willy Snow back.
He preached today. I don’t know that I agree with his interpretations of Jesus’s parables; I’ve been studying them myself for my devotional blog (which I’ve also not been posting to). He made the common presumption that Jesus was speaking in code; fr’instance when “seed” means “the word of God” in one parable, it means “the word of God” in every parable. Thus, since in the parable of the seeder [Mt 13.3-9] “the birds of the air” represents the devil [Mt 13.19] if we follow the code, “the birds of the air” in the parable of the mustard seed [Mt 13.31-32] also represents the devil, which nests in the mustard tree’s branches. Thought-provoking; it’s quite true that when a church reaches a certain size, the devil tries to tempt its members to apathy. But I don’t know that this is what Jesus was trying to say in that parable. I think, rather, he was pointing out how a tiny plant from the herb garden can get big enough for birds to nest in it.
I’ll tell you though; I see plenty of apathy in small churches too. But that’s another rant.