Friday, April 15, 2011

The Grace of Attracting the Best



Sainthood is an office and a state of being, a heart burning passion to follow Jesus! You are a Saint!*
Who is the Savior of the Saints? The Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God! Who is your Savior? THAT SAME JESUS!!*
God's grace is strong in you, Facebook and Twitter friends. I thank God for that!*
God says this aloud but the enemy doesn't hear: My Strength is made perfect in your weakness!
Mary and I went to the surgeon doc to follow up on her surgery, then drove to the farm to water the seedlings. We then headed to Eric’s place, a condo on Pine Lake, to feed Scooter. We had left over pizza for lunch.
Scooter developed a fetish for me. He thinks I’m verrrry interesssting (code word for weird!)
Mary had to take him from me to put him on the perch. He wouldn't step off my hand onto the perch until I hold him for an hour.
We finished up the Jet’s Pizza that was such an adventure last night to pick up.
There are two Jet’s Pizza on Orchard Lake Road. I went to the wrong one.
I departed quickly to go to the other Jet’s, only to find when I got there that I left my wallet at the first Jet’s.
Of course, I had told Mary told leave her purse at home because I was buying.
I’m very thankful for the thoughtfulness of Jet’s employees. When I got back to the 1st store, which is really now the 3rd store, they had already started preparing my order so I would not have to drive back to the 2nd store, which would have been the 4th store.
I’m also very grateful that no one stole my wallet.
I have a strange but blessed form of grace. I attract the very best people to me. Perhaps that's why the Jet's employees were so kind.

This is very evident in the women that I married, first my late wife Lynne, and now Mary.

















Lynne in fact called me up to ask me out for a turn about hay ride, and on our first date, laid her head on my shoulder, and told me that she loved me.
I was in such a state of shock that it took me 15 days to clear my head. I then told her that I loved her and asked her to marry me.
We were married 40 years.
I was much more cautious with Mary. I asked her out, not vice versa. I waited 30 days before I proposed. We were married one month later.
The grace of attracting the best to me was evident while I was single and dating. Those details are none of your business.
The grace of attracting the best was evident in the churches that I pastored, and especially evident in the last church in Walkerton Indiana.
My sheep were shepherds to the shepherd, warrior lambs who stood guard over my family. They still do that.
The grace of attracting the best was evident in the way Jet’s employees were so gracious to me, watching over my wallet, helping with instructions, having the pizza ready.
The grace of attracting the best is evident in my Facebook and Twitter friends, and in those who read my blog, in other words, YOU!
I am very blessed by your participation in my thoughts. God bless you!
And friends are friends forever if The Lord’s the Lord of them
And a friend will not say never ‘cause the welcome will not end!

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Watering Seedlings and Babysitting a Parrot!


We often go to Eric's farm to water the seedlings in the greenhouse while Eric travels with his job with Delta Airlines. Mary waters seedlings while I keep Buster company and do my devotions, which are also #nanoS.
Mary will often lay down for a nap when we get back, and I will work on posting my blog, #nanoS, and keep up with thank yous'. (I am blessed to have a lot of friends that help me to glorify God in this unusual way!) 
I tried out a new devotional format on the computer. Found it to be very productive. I put several Bible Gateway pages up along with The Shepherd’s Journal page and just wrote as I reflected on God’s Word.
I put up my favorite Psalms 119, and I Corinthians 1-3 on a separate tab, along with Hebrews 5.
A strange thing is happening in my thinking. I’m starting to think in 140 character sentences. I normally wrote in much longer sentences before becoming a tweeter.
We often stop to pick up a Pizza from Jet’s Pizza. Not too long ago I had an embarrassing adventure! Drove to wrong Jet Li’s Pizza, then when I got to the right one, found I’d left my wallet back at the other. Jet’s Pizza was delicious, very thick toppings with lots of cheese. 10.59? for a large 8 piece pizza, and Mary and I can only finish ½. Pizza for breakfast is cool!
We miss our Keurig K-cup coffee maker when we go to Eric's. I don’t order coffee anymore when when we go out, because the Keurig coffee is so good it makes restaurant coffee taste pretty poor. I love how it makes the coffee in less than a minute. Of course, you can order it from Amazon here. Just go to the link from my blog, and I will be credit-ted. Don't forget to order the K-cups!
Devotional thoughts:
Want to be blessed by God? Walk in God's Law!*
Walk in God's Law by making every day a journey of discovery into His Word and be blessed!*
Sweet Jesus, with Your Infinite Spirit stir my sluggish heart until it is broken because of those who ignore Your Word!*
Best thing to do when when we are in political jeopardy? Meditate on God’s Word!*
Heavenly Father, I desperately need to focus on Your Word! Enable me with the infinite power of Your Grace!*
What wise man compares to the Father? What writer is a lovely as the Holy Spirit? Who is more persuasive than the Crucified One?*
When you see the asterisk (*) behind a devotion, it means I posted it. That helps me to keep track.



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Friday, April 8, 2011

Multiply Your Joy!



Are you longing for deeper, longer lasting, (even 60/60/24/7!?) JOY? 

Joy that persists even in your greatest moment of suffering?

 Joy that buzzes hrough your body like a shock wave, yet at the same time clarifies your focus so that you can tackle difficult taks while your are praising God?

I will share with a simple prayer that , if you pursue it, (and I double dog dare you to pursue it!) will lead to vastly increased joy.

I will share more of the logic and harmony with God's Word later. But for now, trust me that

I've done the research in a most focused, obsessive way, and I know this pray is according to the Will of God. I am also experiencing this joy!

Here is the prayer, in bold print: Lord, I ask that you infinitely increase YOUR LORDSHIP over my heart,body soul, and spirit, in the name of Your precious Son JESUS, now and forever, and do not hold back because of my fear! AMEN!

I've included these two pictures for a very specific reason. Please carefully observe the deep love between myself and my late wife Lynne in the kiss. Then look into the eyes of my sad face, taken the day of her funeral, and look DEEPLY! Even with the sadness and the pain of losing her, I was feeling an electric JOY OF THE LORD simply because I belonged to Him!
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Thursday, April 7, 2011

First Day Alone: Dress in Black?; Devotion


This is a good picture of Mary's condo. Just add 24 inches of snow!
Mary and I enjoyed our first day in her condo by ourselves. Don has moved to California. Actually he is still on the road. Just called in from Albuquerque, New Mexico.
I went out to get a haircut, picked up some Valentine’s Day cards for the grand kids and others. Mary worked on her bills then took a nap while I was out. Buster is living the dog’s life, lounging as close to Mary as he can.
Other posts from today...
I've noticed there are cycles on the Facebook/Twitter world, with surges of chatter followed by even longer periods of quiet. I enjoy everybody's posts!

I started dressing all in black when I worked in a factory where black stains jumped on me. Kept the style when I found it looks good, easy to coordinate,  it's cheap, & it fits my avitar, revmaddog. Two problems. I get called Johnny Cash. Mary throws her black clothes in my pile.

Devotional thoughts...
We are fiercely reliant on God's sustaining grace for even our recognition and our being remembered by others.
God sustains our memory of our life in the hearts of others &, if He so chooses, He can wipe our memory from the face of the Earth.

It is justice if we reject God & ignore Him in this life that He ignore us & blot out our memory in Eternity.

If I blot out God from my life, God will eradicate any memory in eternity. No loved ones will shed a tear for me as I suffer eternally, alone, & forgotten.

Psalms 1:6 For the LORD knoweth the way of the righteous: but the way of the ungodly shall perish.




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The Football Game Parable

My life seems to be divided into 20 year quarters.
The first quarter was mostly good, except for early struggles with bullies, and my depression, which seem to be aggravated by screaming teachers. I attempted suicide in the third grade, but was obviously unsuccessful, and I never told anyone or tried it again.

Meeting, dating, and marrying Lynne and raising our family and pastoring churches from coast to coast and border to border was the second quarter, and very enjoyable. 41 years ago I received a phone call from a beautiful young lady from Chicago asking me to go to a turn about Hay ride. We were later riding in a car when she laid her head on my shoulder, told me that she loved me and gave me a kiss on our first date. 15 days later, I finally responded, by saying I love you, and I asked her to marry me. We were married for 40 years.

Lynne and I moved to Colorado Springs in 1969 to attend Nazarene Bible College. With Dave and Jane Smith we formed the Insights, a sort of unofficial college quartet. We would accompany Dr. Strickland, Dr Williamson, Ron Lush, or Dr. Newenschwander when they spoke at different churches on Sundays.

Later we re-formed with Dave Royer, and toured the Colorado area. For a brief period we traveled full time, and toured coast to coast.
I became a youth pastor, then a pastor, then a youth pastor, then back to the pastorate again. The girls joined us in singing and we became The Dittmers. I pastored in California, North Dakota, Illinois, Indiana, and Georgia.
The third quarter was a lot of work and some hard times, but God drew very close to Lynne and me and our girls, Becky and Wendy, which made it all worth while. I started a nondenominational church in Walkerton, Indiana, and had to supplement my income by working in a factory. I did both to keep the family together.

About 8 years into the 3rd quarter, Lynne was diagnosed with bladder cancer. I worked many extra hours to keep up with the extra medical bills, while our health insurance went through transitions and actually became excellent.
The girls married good men, Tim, a police officer, and Chuck, a pharmacy tech. They settled close by, and gave us incredible grandchildren, all of which Lynne enjoyed immensely. We worshiped as a family every Sunday in my Thomas Kinkade like country church, and had a Walton like Sunday dinner at our house every week.

Lynne had cancer of the bladder starting 12 years ago, and had her bladder removed, and later had her vagina removed. Around Christmas of 07 she had severe pain and swelling, almost non stop.
When the cancer doctor got involved again in Feb., 08 we began to manage the pain much better, and involved hospice in August. They were angels sent from God. My sister came for 2 months, another angel, and I took a lot of days off. Her last 6 days were bad, but God was really with us, and we had lots of help from our friends, and my girls were there constantly.


Wendy, Chuck, and Mathew moved in to help with Lynne, and later stayed to economize. I took out all of my 401k and spoiled her rotten 2 years before her death. The entire clan took a trip to Wisconsin Dells shortly before our fortieth anniversary, thanks to some generous friends who loaned us a cabin. I leaned on Him day after day, moment by moment, while the love of my life slowly withered.
Here is the strangest thing! My heart did not go numb. If anything, I hurt worse than ever, as she slowly died day by day in front of my very own eyes. God was doing miracles for others, but my own Lynne was fading, dying. But strangely, the joy of the Lord was so much greater than my grief. It was like a supernatural Chinese buffet, where the bitterness was overlaid with a deep satisfying sweetness. Lynne passed away October 12, 2008.

The 4th quarter of my life has been kicked off exactly the same way as the 2nd quarter, with a nice warm kiss in April 09 from a beautiful woman from Chicago. I met her on a Christian dating site when I asked if there was a woman out there who shared my passion for worship. I thought it was a sign from God.

She was a godly woman, but soon into our relationship, we began to struggle with compatibility issues. It was more than just personalities, but also careers, children, and in addition, I was still dealing with grief and anger issues.

I reluctantly went back to the same internet site at the very end of 09. In early January, I met a lovely lady from Michigan. Her mother had just moved nearby to Mishawaka, Indiana. On our first extended date of 4 days, I had more fun that I had had in 15 years.

One month into our friendship, we had a second longer extended date, and we found out that we were so compatible, that my daughters thought we were clones. Favorite movies, favorite foods, even our way of thinking made it a perfect fit. I proposed, and she accepted. We were married March 4th.

Mary is sweet, funny, romantic, and can be as cute as a bug, or a knock out beauty, whatever her choice is for the day. We are still looking for something to argue about, and she makes me happy 24/7. The girls, the grand kids, the son in laws, the in laws, and the church have adopted her as one of their own, for which I thank the Lord.

Mary and I are retired. We celebrated our 1st anniversary in March 2011.
By the way, all my Ad links are monetized, which means that if you click and buy, I get paid.
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Overlooked Spiritual Weapons in Spiritual Warfare


I do understand that God is not a puppet, and prayer is not a button that we push and it always gets results. Asking God is asking, not commanding. God is the one who commands, not us.

But I do observe that we miss out on bundles of unclaimed gifts, simply because we do not ask, for if we ask not, we have not. 

And just as importantly, we often ask amiss, we miss the target, because we are asking for the big gift. We forget about God's penchant for defeating big enemies with little weapons.

Goliath, the 9 foot tall, possibly 500 pound, professional mercenary was defeated by a slight young boy barely past puberty, who was armor was the heart of a lion, a sling, 5 well picked stones, and awesome hand eye coordination.

The fiercest and most majestic military force on the face of the earth was defeated by an over qualified, eccentric shepherd who needed a long class in anger management, and possessed only a shepherd's staff and a speech impediment.

All the forces of hell and all the momentum of millenniums of social decay, and even death itself was defeated in a single day by a solitary man hanging on a lonely cross.

If you have read The Dingy Gray Locker Parable, you will know that all of the education and experience and training that I received was piddly compared to the little white box in the bottom of the locker that said I could pray for a rain of grace. That lesson, because of my lust for bigness, took me 30 years to learn.

God ask us all,"What is in your hand?" Is it a staff, a sling, the jaw bone of an ass, a stalwart right hand man, a prayer, a hymn?? That, and the Spirit of God are all you need to open prison doors, fell a giant, stop the mouth of a pride of lions, part an ocean, and send the enemy packing! 
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From Southern Gospel to Worship: The Journey

My late wife Lynne and I moved to Colorado Springs in 1969 to attend Nazarene Bible College. With Dave and Jane Smith we formed the Insights, a sort of unofficial college quartet. We would accompany Dr. Strickland, Dr Williamson, Ron Lush, or Dr. Newenschwander when they spoke at different churches on Sundays. 

Later we reformed with Dave Royer, and toured the Colorado area. For a brief period we traveled full time, and toured coast to coast. 

I became a youth pastor, then a pastor, then a youth pastor, then back to the pastorate again. The girls joined us in singing and we became the Dittmers. 

We were fervent, perhaps rabid Southern Gospel fans, and for worship I played an evangelistic style with octave melody notes. I despised recorded and electronic music, until they came out with triple voicing, making electronic music more luscious than the "real" thing.

Rick, a long time friend, had become my song leader, and began to get me hooked on the new worship music. What finally reeled me in were the words of the songs. "Enough" by Chris Tomlin, as sung by the Barlowe girls became my mantra.
During my last days in the ministry, (I'm now retired!) Rick and I did a blended service combining the contemporary worship music with a couple of hymns played in the old fashioned evangelistic way (which if done right is an exciting style!) at the end of the service. Our children, whom we call worship leaders, help with the end of the service by leading the congregation in prayer from Psalm 119 and the Lords Prayer and the benediction.

I do hope you will enjoy the little walk through history. And, no, Abraham Lincoln was not one of my classmates!
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Tuesday, April 5, 2011

A Worship Adventure: Long Black Train!

We made it to worship on time and the church building didn't collapse! This is a picture of the guest choir from Life Challenge before they sang Long Black Train!

Cause there's vict'ry in the Lord I say,
Vict'ry in the lord,
Cling to the Father and His holy name,
And don't go ridin' on that Long Black Train  
(sung this morning in the 3rd worship service of The Cornerstone Evangelical Presbyterian Church in Brighton by The Life Challenge visiting choir)
Notes from today's sermon:
Bless his heart.  Ted Turner told a reporter If he could KNOW Jesus was God he'd become a missionary.
Missionaries are our heroes! He is no fool who gives what he can not keep to gain what he can not lose- Jim Elliot 
Bless in Hebrew means to kneel. Abraham both received and gave blessings, and God assures us with His word that those same blessings are both ours to receive and to give away!
If you walk into a room and see a need, meet it.
The special speaker noted that little old ladies in church can be missionaries too. Letting a child know in a small way that they are loved is a mission they can meet.
God has shown us from the beginning that He has a mission. In the beginning God created...
When we share the light of the gospel to a person in the darkness, we are helping God create light out of darkness.
A word about the ads: 1. They are real. 2. I do get paid if you click on them. 3. They are absolutely safe. I am only dealing with Google and Amazon, which are THE VERY BEST! 4.If you over click to boost my income, I will get sent to Google and Amazon purgatory, and no one will be able to pray me out of there, so I will lose any income from my blog forever!
So, click if you're interested. If you're not interested, DON'T CLICK!
And finally, this profound thought.
Who put the bompIn the bomp bah bomp bah bomp? Who put the ram In the rama lama ding dong? Who put the bop In the bop shoo bop shoo bop? Who put the dip In the dip da dip da dip? Who was that man? I'd like to shake his hand He made my baby Fall in love with me (yeah!!)

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