The Sword in the Stone

Another day, another entry in the perfect storm of work. Fortunately, the winds seem to be dying and things seem to be calming down slightly. Still, over the next week we'll be frantically gathering costuming and doing all sorts of writing and filming and editing and graphic design for a new series. Lots of work go into every series - in fact, we'll post something here in a bit that shows all that goes into a series for our church. Until then, you'll have to take my word!

It has gotten cold again outside. The funny thing is that it was pretty warm this week - at one point it was 71 degrees outside at night. Now it is in the thirties again, which is pretty disheartening when you've gotten a chance to experience spring-like conditions. We're all pretty ready for this winter to be over with. It was a pretty disappointing one, when you think about it in regards to snow. We're all like, "If you're not going to snow, then just go away." Which has been a collective prayer this weekend. Everyone's tired of being cold for no apparent reason. Although the more harmful effect might be on crops: just when things were coming back to life, things got so cold again!

The Wienermobile is in Georgia today, and just up the road in Toccoa. We can't go because of all that's going on right now, but hopefully it'll appear somewhere else nearby soon. Madison needs to get a weenie whistle of her own. Mommy and Daddy drove down to see the Wienermobile when it was in Buford a few years ago. It was epically amazing. Which is somewhat of an exaggeration, unless you're really into hot dog-shaped vehicles. Which we happened to be. They gave out weenie whistles, we had hot dogs, and we snapped photos as well. It was goofy fun, and hopefully this blog entry is only a bit of foreshadowing of what's to come: our hope is to get Madison to see the Wienermobile. It's a rite of passage!

Tomorrow, we have special visitors again: Nana and Ba-Ba are returning from Florida for a week. Madison is very excited about this, but so are Mommy and Daddy. It'll be a nice week, despite the workload. Daddy will be watching Madison a little bit while they are here, so that Mommy can spend some time with her parents.

Madison spent today with Mommy, doing music practice, speech practice and generally cleaning the house up for our special visitors. Daddy came home earlier though, for "research," so that we could sit together and watch a movie and eat some popcorn. It was movie night for us - and what movie did we see together?

The Sword in the Stone, of course!

Mommy helped Daddy come up with a decent message based on this old legend, and we'll be sharing it at church soon enough. Here it is in a rough form below:

Who so Pulleth Out This Sword of this Stone and Anvil,
is Rightwise King Born of all England.

Care to test your mettle? It might be tougher than you think. That stone is really stuck in that stone! One disappointed gentlemen said of it: “’Tis as if some massive chain bound sword and stone.” Another, wiping the sweat from his forehead, said, “’Tis as if great nails fastened it.”

In other words, that sword wasn’t going to be pulled out of the stone any time soon. Or so they thought. For not long into the day, a young boy named Arthur stepped forward. Surely this small boy couldn’t do what so many strong and healthy men failed at?

And yet they watched as Arthur easily pulled the sword from the stone. Excitement filled the air! Could it be that this boy would be crowned king of all England? The irony is that Arthur didn’t come to London to pull the sword out. No, he had come as a faithful servant, only there to help his older brother at the jousting tournament. Yet soon, the path he was on would lead him to the castle, and to the throne of England.

Many years earlier, a similar story took place. Guided by God, the prophet Samuel was in town to choose the next king of Israel. But who would it be? There were some strong and mighty men to choose from. But God said clearly: “Do not consider how handsome or tall he is. I do not look at the things people look at. Man looks at how someone appears on the outside. But I look at what is in the heart.”

And so Samuel came upon David. He hadn’t seen him earlier, because David was out taking care of his sheep. That was certainly a good sign. David was faithful, taking care of his flock – but someday he would be King, taking care of His kingdom. The message is clear: God sees that those who are faithful with little can be faithful with much, much more.

David was anointed to be the next king, but his heart stayed pure in God’s eyes. As evidence of this, until the day he was crowned, he still spent his time in service to others. In fact, it was on one fateful day that young David was busy helping his family: he was taking needed food to his brothers on the battlefield. But that’s where a giant named Goliath stood taunting the people of Israel. And that’s where destiny stepped in. We all know what happens next, of course. But it’s interesting that David didn’t need to draw a sword. You don’t need a sword from a stone to be a hero. He just took the stone!