Real Women, Real Men

  When I first started this blog I had intended to just do something about books because I do love books. However something has happened to change my mind. I am going to comment on one thing that happened in our troubled world. It disturbs me that women have decided to ignore the fact that they are women and try to be something else. Goodness knows what

This is a quote from the King James Version of the Bible. 2 Timothy 3:1-6,

“ In the last days perilous times shall come, for men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful,l unholy, without natural
affection, truce breakers,false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good, traitors,
heady, high minded, lovers of pleasures rather than lovers of God, having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof, from those turn away. For of this sort are they which creep into houses and
lead captive silly women laden with sins, led astray with divers lusts, ever learning but never able to come to the knowledge of the truth, ever learning and never able to come to the truth.”

I have developed a real love for the translation called The Message. This same scripture from the Apostle Paul from The Message reads as follows.

“As the end approaches people are going to be self absorbed, money hungry, self promoting, stuck up, profane, contemptuous of parents, drunk, course, dog-eat-dog, unbending, slanderers. Impulsive, wild, savages, cynical, treacherous, ruthless, bloated windbags addicted to lust, and allergic to God. They make a show of religion but but behind the scenes they are animals. These are the kind
of people who smooth talk themselves into the homes of of unstable and needy women and take advantage of them, women who, depressed by their singleness take up with every new religious fad that calls itself “truth”. They get exploited every time and never really learn.”

I will not take the time now to enlarge on these scriptures. Instead, I would like to say some things about the men in my life --- a tribute to some of the best!! These men are quite unlike the men mentioned in the above scriptures.

My Father's Dad. He has been dead for a number of years. He had six children, 3 boys and 3 girls. I remember him well. I was about nine years old when he died. He and my grandmother lived in Winters, Texas in a small frame house. Every one of the children he and my grandmother reared were fine people. They loved the Lord and they loved their mates and their children. And incidentally none of the children had a “significant other”. They were all married to a member of the opposite sex. Grandaddy was tall and slender and very nice looking. In today's parlance he was a hunk! My grandmother could not read or write because she had been the eldest girl of a large brood of children and when her mother died she kept house and fed and clothed the other children although she was really a child herself. Incidentally she was an Armour although a part of then family who was not wealthy. So she never had any schooling. However, she kept a spotlessly clean house and was a great cook. She cooked on wood stove incidentally.

Grandaddy was the kindest ,gentlest man. I wish he could have lived until I was older so that I could have known him better. He would have died before he hurt or killed a woman.

My Mother's Dad was a small man, red haired and had a huge bass voice. I always wondered where all that voice came from because he was really quite small and never had a fat a day in his life. I was playing the piano for church once and suddenly behind me I heard this huge bass voice. I turned around and discovered it was my granddad. He had two daughters whom he adored.

He was a red haired Baptist preacher in west Texas. He was also a farmer. It was very dry where he lived but he never did irrigate. I asked why once and he said he thought the food didn't taste quite right after you irrigated. Anyway, the Lord would take care of His own he believed. And He did! In fact, Henry Daddy, as we called him, became rather wealthy raising cantaloupe. My mouth still waters when I think of those wonderful west Texas cantaloups he raised.

He adored my Mother and his grandchildren. In fact he adored my Dad as well and he married my Mom and Dad. This man would never have hurt a fly much less a woman. I never got to hear him preach but people who did said he had a huge voice and was a marvelous pulpiteer.

This brings me to my third example. My Father. He was a large man, over six feet tall and very well built. He was handsome. He had curly red hair that turned black later in life and then white. He,too, was a Baptist preacher. He was an administrator also. He was gentle and unafraid of anything except maybe sin. He loved the people in the churches he pastored. And he loved his two children and my Mom. He would have died for any of us. He and Mom took into their home another child – a little boy they found in the streets of Jerusalem once when they were traveling. He became my brother and they loved him as much as they loved us. They “adopted” many other students who came their way and were responsible for bringing many Korean war orphans to this country.

He adored his grandchildren. When his first one was born he was afraid to pick her up because she was so tiny. A very short time later this first granddaughter gave him his nickname. She adored him.

My fourth example is my husband. His Mother is Irish and his father is East Indian. He is to my way of thinking absolutely gorgeous. But more than the way he looks is the way he IS. He is one of he kindest, gentlest man I have ever known. He would never have hurt anyone. Most remarkably he loves me. I am older than he is by several years and while I am not an an invalid I can no longer do some of the things I used to do. He loves me anyway. He says that he never could keep up with me when I could still walk and he says for the first time he can keep up with me. He is so intelligent it is scary sometimes. He writes beautifully and I stay after him to write more. He takes care of me every day as if I were made of porcelain or fine gold. I stand in awe of him One of the things that attracted me to him is his sterling character. He is almost painfully honest and believe it or not he is an attorney. He will never know how much I love him and appreciate him. One other thing about him is that he had never been around dogs and really didn't like them much. It was sort of love me love my dogs sort of an arrangement and he took me, 8 dogs and 4 cats. Now he loves dogs as much as I do but we only have three now and since we have one dog that has never been around cats we are afraid to get another cat. Any man that can love a woman with 8 dogs and 4 cats is pretty exceptional. When we first got married he was not the most patient soul I ever met, but now I can hardly believe how patient he has become. In short, he's great!

There is one other man I would like to add to my list. That man is my pastor. He is pastor of a small Spanish-speaking church. Some years years ago I taught at a school for Spanish- speaking people and I fell in love with them. I took a crash course in Spanish but that's been years ago and it is pretty much gone. I wanted to learn Spanish again since we have so many Spanish speaking people in our country now. I found this church and decided we needed to join it. My husband agreed and I called the pastor. He invited us to come worship with them and the rest is history. I have no doubt that God directed us to this church.

My pastor is kind and gentle. It is apparent that he cares about people. He is ready to listen to any problem or idea anyone has. He is completely bilingual and can easily shift from English to Spanish and back again in a heart beat. He is extremely intelligent and that is an added bonus to his other attributes. He had the good sense to marry a woman as fine as he is. My husband and I love both of them dearly. They both have then gift of encouragement and this is something lacking in many people. He also has the most delightful sense of humor. They are dear, dear people.