A reproduction of the elephant clock in the Ibn Battuta Mall, Dubai. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

When I was browsing at Books-A-Million on one of the holidays, I found a book called “Incognito: “The Secret Lives of the Brain” by David Eagleman.

I read enough of the book to learn that even the financial meltdown of 2008 can be traced back to the human habit of taking instant gratification instead of waiting for delayed gratification. “Good things come to those who wait,” but we humans struggle so hard to wait, especially if we’re in some kind of pain.

Eagleman talks about all this, and the brain’s part in it. The author informs us that the idea to not suffer some ruins is to make a “Ulysses contract” with ourselves, for resisting temptation in advance. It’s a great and difficult battle, to resist temptation, but our brains can help us do this. It’s a mighty struggle, but our brains are capable of resisting temptation, Eagleman explains.

The German words for resisting temptation, he points out, are “innerer schweinehund” or “resisting the inner pigdog.”

Jesus said resistance to our inner pigdog leaves empty spaces, which we must learn to fill up with good things, which hopefully lead to good places and good practices and other people trying to do good things.

If we don’t fill our lonely emptiness with good, Jesus warns, worse things can happen, damaging our lives and the lives of others. So we must practice looking for the good things and practice doing good things and practice being with the people who are also trying to do good, like helping and disciplines and budgets and exercises and eating well and “first, do no harm” because we are all capable of being healers of humanity, in some little or big way.

We can help heal ourselves too, and God helps, if we ask. (And one step to healing ourselves must be to stop beating up on ourselves (it’s so hard!) for not knowing enough soon enough. “Be Sweet to Yourself,” like a McDonald’s cookie. It’s a good idea).

So, I signed up for more classes and also called the CSCC business office and planned a meeting, for planning something good. I’m here at the CSCC library again, hopefully about to check out what looks like a good book called “Faith Bass Darling’s Last Garage Sale” by Lynda Rutledge. The book flap says the book is about second chances and changes—and God.

At the top of the first page, there’s a fictional ad, about Faith Bass Darling’s garage sale. It says, “Louis IV Elephant Clock, signed by C. Balthazar.” Doesn’t that sound like a good story?

Isn’t it good, the way you can check out a good book at a good place, for nearly nothing, at a library? Libraries are such good news.

The holidays were really stressful and hurtful and lonely, mostly. I don’t have a printer at home and was afraid to write without one. It felt like trying to jump without a parachute, so I didn’t write.

But it’s good to be back. *Thank you* for waiting. 

Related articles

• David Eagleman on possibilianism (makedoandbend.wordpress.com)
• Seeing Sound, Tasting Color: Synesthesia – David Eagleman (recoverynetworktoronto.wordpress.com)
• We Want it Now (nativescience.wordpress.com)
• Nepal celebrates elephant beauty (bigpondnews.com)

Last night it felt like I’d been to a fight instead of to a church. But the late great preacher Charles Haddon Spurgeon said not to look at second causes, so I hope there’s a good cause behind that disagreement.

It’s complicated. The bottom line is I’m still lookin’ for a church for all nations. It’s sad to think some churches fight over things like baptism or chicken. Where’s the beef when you need it—or don’t need it? Remember those “Where’s the Beef” Wendy’s fast-food restaurant commercials? Wendy’s makes a real good fast-food hamburger and they have beef and chicken too, like McDonald’s. I love those little plain hot fudge sundaes at McDonald’s. (They have free Wi-Fi too). The little sundaes only cost about a dollar, with the vanilla ice cream (or frozen sweet milk or whatever) and the delicious hot fudge. You can taste the plain good vanilla soft ice cream and the warm good fudge that’s not too melt-y. That little McDonald’s hot fudge sundae deserves a shout-out, even without all the nuts and whipped cream, it’s real good.

When I got home I turned on T.D. Jakes and that wonderful preacher was preaching about “Save the Scraps.” Mr. Jakes said just like God used that little boy’s two fishes and five loaves of bread to feed thousands, God can use each one of us, even if we feel overlooked (or disagreed with..I added that). It was good news to hear last night from Pastor T.D Jakes.

Then I heard part of the John Ankerberg show and Dr. Hugh Ross was talking about God and dark energy and how there are 10 billion trillion stars in the universe and each one has a reason to exist and does something good for the whole universe. Dr. Ross talked about physics and galaxy clusters, which I do not understand, and he talked about what’s behind and before us and all around you and me and he said it’s God, a God Who is Personal and Who loves us.

God is El-Shaddai, the All–Sufficient One. According to http://www.el-shaddai.org, God is the All-Mighty One and Christ is All in All, as explained in Colossians 3:1. God is God and not like any other “god.” The website goes on to say Christ completely revealed the invisible God to us when Christ walked the Earth before He went back to His heavenly home. At http://www.freegrace.net, we can read about how God is also Jehovah-Jireh, The Lord Will Provide. (Although it’s scary right now). God, the site says, is “Father-Mother God.” The father of faith, Abraham, back in the Old Testament, knew God sees and God provides.

Last night I walked outside later and saw Ms. Allen, who just got home from the hospital because she had a heart attack last week. I’m not using her real name, but she’s a real person. That’s how bad the stress got, bad enough to cause a heart attack. “I had to call on the Lord to use the phone,” she said. Both hands were numb, but God made a way. We’re glad Ms. Allen’s okay. We missed seeing her out on the porch.

My downstairs neighbor was outside too. She said she’s been having trouble with her breathing, but last night they asked her to sing at church and out came a song. God provided.

Before I went inside last night, I got to see my neighbors and friends and Ms. Ella and Ms. Pat were outside too. I looked over behind me and it was dark, but a man stood in the doorway of his home with a crying baby in his arms. Their silhouette was back-lit with kitchen lights and they looked golden standing there while the man’s baby cried in the night air. I’d been to church after all. We didn’t fight. God provided.