More Dirty Sheep

On my walk to work this morning, I passed by the dirty sheep.  Couldn't resist taking a picture.  The shepherd even sort of attempted to pose for the picture; he doesn't usually wear such an intimidating outfit.  It was just bitterly cold today (high of 26), and this was in the early morning, so he had himself bundled from head to toe.

Honestly, the picture doesn't do them justice.  They look quaint and pastoral here.  In real life, they're not so sweet.  Let's just say I've never been tempted to pet one; not even the adorable little lambs.

I wanted to thank everyone for your thoughtful responses to that post... it means a lot to me to know that God can use my thoughts to bless others.  To think that it's being shared at schools and churches is very humbling, but it's very precious to me.  I love to write -- it is cathartic for me and a way I can better understand my own thoughts and emotions.  The fact that it blesses others is icing on the cake!  I am curious, David Beringer, what Layers of Life is...? 

Many of you encourage me to seek publication.  That's a quiet little dream in the back of my head -- a life goal is to write a book.  But, I'm afraid of rejection, so I never really go out on a limb much.  I wouldn't know the first thing about how to seek that out.  I just wanted you to know I'm not ignoring the comments and emails that mention that -- it is a dream, and you're certainly feeding it!  (And if anyone has advice on how to test those waters, I'm all ears!)


But back to the post -- some of your comments were so thoughtful and helped me think more about this! A couple of my favorite and most thought-provoking responses were these... just wanted to highlight them in case you don't read the comments.  One of my favorite bloggers ever, Tara in Haiti, wrote: "I had a moment of truth when we were doing our recreation of the manger scene last weekend --- The donkey peed all over the area we were standing and Isaac said "Mom - it REEKS right here like animals" --- and it hit me - not only was it a bleak manger ... but it smelled awful and there was not much about it that felt clean and fresh and lovely to look at."

And, Molly, a mom adopting one of our little boys who came to our foster home extremely malnourished said this: The unconventional picture I would like to submit is one you already have there at the foster home. It's the one of Evan...so very, very sick, probably during his admission assessment to New Day. He's partially naked and lying on the blue blanket. It's posted with his 'amazing story.' That picture was (is) very difficult to look at, even before I became his mom. I like the reminder of it, and I'm glad it's part of his story...because it's reality. It's what you guys see. Non sugar coated and that is important. To me it captures a part of why Jesus came to this earth, and why he chose the cross. He was sent here to save the 'fat' kings in lofty castles attempting to remove themselves from their worries and problems by band-aid shopping, over-eating and pretending pictures like Evan's don't exist."

Wow, Molly.  Wow.  "Fat kings in lofty castles."  Convicting, because we're all in lofty castles in one way or another.  Or at least we try to be.

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And a Cora update.


She's stable!  That's good news, in her situation.  Today the doctors said she hasn't really improved, but she hasn't gotten worse either.  She's still on a ventilator, and her lungs are still not so hot.  Her pulmonary pressure is also too high, but she's producing urine and her blood pressure is ok.  The producing urine thing is important, because they said sometimes when someone's on a ventilator, the body starts to sort of shut down... and hers isn't!  She's fighting hard!  They're lowering the amount of anesthesia she's under, so she's starting to wake up a little.  Let's keep on lifting her up.  She has a long ways to go.  But seriously... Yay God!