Picturepocket's Blog

Category: politics

  • Built to Last

    After I got married, I worked briefly at company that sold custom wood ceilings. I remember one time there were two orders for similar looking products. One was a walnut ceiling, and the other was a poplar ceiling stained to look like walnut.  The first client was an Ivy League school. I think it was…

  • 1776

    One of the fiercest battle cries leading up to war of independence from Britain in the American colonies was “no taxation without representation.” America won the war and we will celebrate our Nation’s 250th birthday year. Yet, when our forefathers wrote up the new voting guidelines, they initially only included the English-speaking, white, land-owning Protestant…

  • Does Size Matter?

    With all this talk of Trump taking Greenland, people have commented on how the size of Greenland on the globe looks different than the flat map representation. It’s only a fifth of the size of the US instead of this massive thing. I pulled out our handy-dandy globe we purchased while homeschooling during Covid-19 and…

  • 1 Corinthians 2: New Lens

    Paul continues by reminding the readers that he focuses on Jesus and his death in his teachings over his own ideas and thoughts. He speaks from a position of weakness and trembling. He has demonstrated the power of the Spirit, not his personal wisdom.  Paul says that if the rulers at Jesus’s time had understood,…

  • Romans 12: How to Christian 

    Paul is calling out to his fellow believers to live well. First, we are to be living sacrifices. So rather seeing our decision as a one time event, it is a new way of being. Every day Christians are to subvert their will to God’s. This is not a small ask, and requires fresh inspiration…

  • Romans 10: Hide & Seek

    Remembering that Paul is speaking to Jewish believers living in Rome, he pleads the case for the inclusion of non-Jews into the family of faith. These new believers have zeal, but are ignorant of the law of God. Christ himself is their goodness.  Paul contrasts Jesus with Moses. Moses acquired the Ten Commandments from God…

  • Romans 2: Doing > Saying

    Welcome back to Paul’s rant against bad-behaving believers. It’s amazing to me that these words are 2000 years old, because they feel pretty on the nose for today.  First he talks to those who judge others, literally everyone on a screen right now. “For in passing judgment on another you condemn yourself, because you, the…

  • Acts 26: All Roads Lead

    Paul has an audience with the new Roman governor Festus, Jewish king Agrippa and princess Bernice. Paul gives a passionate retelling of his experience as first a Pharisee, determined to wipe out the followers of Jesus of Nazareth, his conversion and new conviction and ministry to “proclaim light to both our people and the Gentiles.”…

  • Acts 25: Power Plays

    In this chapter, Festus shows up in Caesarea to take Governor Felix’s place, around AD 59. Immediately Paul’s accusers in Jerusalem use the arrival to request a new trial hoping for another ambush attempt. Festus doesn’t move Paul, but hears them out. Lacking evidence of their accusations, he questions Paul who lays out his defense.…

  • Acts 15: Us & Them

    Some of the believers from Judea went around telling people that only circumcised people could be saved. Paul and Barnabas dissented and debated them describing the conversion of the Gentiles. The Pharisees insisted that the new believers be circumcised in order to keep the law of Moses to show devotion to the Jewish faith. Peter…