Tuesday, February 26, 2008

reality


(Lima, Peru) This boy sits in the cart of garbage his mom has collected and will sort to earn a meager living...

It's SO easy to forget the reality that we live as kings here in America. We live in a 100-year-old bubble of widespread prosperity and ease. And, at the same time, the reality for billions like this boy above is destitute poverty and, for many, little access to the Gospel or a copy of the scriptures in their language.

Wednesday, January 30, 2008

y-m-c-a...


The official start of Zach's YMCA basketball season! (He's the handsome one out there.)

ring around taco delmar


The girls playin with the Kochran girls after church outside Taco DelMar... the Schwartz "tradition" on Sunday. :)

Tuesday, January 15, 2008

subprime nation

Buchanan has a great article today at Worldnetdaily. He's talking about the recent headlines about Moody's warning of a possibly downgrade of treasury bonds.
We are thus in the position of having to borrow from Europe to defend Europe, of having to borrow from China and Japan to defend Chinese and Japanese access to Gulf oil, and of having to borrow from Arab emirs, sultans and monarchs to make Iraq safe for democracy.

We borrow from the nations we defend so that we may continue to defend them. To question this is an unpardonable heresy called "isolationism."

And the chickens of globalism are coming home to roost.

We let Europe to get away with imposing value-added taxes averaging 15 percent on our exports to them, while they rebate that value-added tax on their exports to us. Thus, the euro has almost doubled in value against the dollar in the Bush years, as NATO Europe begins to bail out on Iraq and Afghanistan.

We sat still as Japan protected her markets and dumped high quality goods into ours and China undervalued its currency to suck jobs, technology and factories out of the United States. Now, China and Japan have $2 trillion in cash reserves. The Arabs have an equal amount of petrodollars. Both are headed here to spend their depreciating dollars snapping up U.S. assets – banks, ports, highways, defense contractors.

America, to pay her bills, has begun to sell herself to the world.

I could not agree more. Read the full article...

Monday, January 7, 2008

Saturday, December 22, 2007

emmanuel


Our family opened our few small gifts a little early this year (like usual). It's nice to get all that fluff out of the way and be able to think and dwell together on the incarnation.

We sang "Happy Birthday" to Jesus. It's what we do for each other and those we love, so we decided to do that for Him. Then we talked about the mystery of Emmanuel (God with us)--of God coming to earth and dwelling with us. As Yoda would say, "Hard to understand, it is." :)

I hope you all have a peaceful time this Christmas in thankfulness to God. Being thankful for Him entering into our mess here and redeeming.

I've learned some things recently that have helped me re-focus my life on Jesus where it should be. I'm looking forward to this coming year as we, as a family, more earnestly share that hope, joy, and peace with others here in Gresham.

-John

Thursday, December 20, 2007

winter hail


God speaking to Job:

38:14 The earth takes shape like clay under a seal;
its features stand out like those of a garment.

15 The wicked are denied their light,
and their upraised arm is broken.

16 "Have you journeyed to the springs of the sea
or walked in the recesses of the deep?

17 Have the gates of death been shown to you?
Have you seen the gates of the shadow of death [a] ?

18 Have you comprehended the vast expanses of the earth?
Tell me, if you know all this.

19 "What is the way to the abode of light?
And where does darkness reside?

20 Can you take them to their places?
Do you know the paths to their dwellings?

21 Surely you know, for you were already born!
You have lived so many years!

22 "Have you entered the storehouses of the snow
or seen the storehouses of the hail,

23 which I reserve for times of trouble,
for days of war and battle?

24 What is the way to the place where the lightning is dispersed,
or the place where the east winds are scattered over the earth?

25 Who cuts a channel for the torrents of rain,
and a path for the thunderstorm,

26 to water a land where no man lives,
a desert with no one in it,

27 to satisfy a desolate wasteland
and make it sprout with grass?

Tuesday, December 18, 2007

dirt

Most guys ask for tools or big toys. I ask for dirt. :)

Winter gard-nin is in full swing here at the Schwartz household. This is three-way I'm adding to newly created beds. We're turning much of the back yard into garden. I'm looking forward to seeing a nice crop o' corn next summer!

the food effect

 
Kids are always happy, just before you feed them. :) This happens to be at Taco Del Mar.

hunting?

Scanned a few photos from a beautiful trip to Mt. Adams with Dad, Shon & Timmy, Joe & Luke, and my boys Zach and Drew. You'll notice no animals. :)

And, here's some phone pics from our trip to the wilderness. You'll notice... no animals. Mighty hunters, we.