These Captive Thoughts

Here we are at the end of January already & I feel like I still haven't caught my breath from the flurry of Christmas! & what a busy month it's been. So many constant unplanned or unforeseen interruptions, that we just now took our live Christmas tree down. 
You know what I love about live Christmas trees? The needles that I vacuum, which fills the room with the fragrance of Christmas every time I use it. The messing that becomes the blessing! It's definitely worth it to me! 

I leave my snowmen & little decorative trees out during the rest of the winter season because they are cheerful.

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On these  (mostly) cold, January mornings, I like to start my day with somethings hot to eat.

This is a winter breakfast that I grew up on. & my kids grew up on too. Good old 'Quaker Oats'! & butter melting on hot toast with fresh, whole milk straight (almost!) from Daisy June! 

Soups, stews, chowders, & chili are perfect winter evening dinner fare as far as I'm concerned.

As you can see, this is bubbling hot. Just what Dr. Mom called for! Pure-dee ol' comfort food! ( Excuse the taking complete grammatical license here. But it fits.)

& for dessert, well, just let this caress those taste buds defined as 'scrumptious',

 & with a hot cup of tea,

& you have 'YUM' all over the place!

(See the candlelight reflected in the tea? Sweet.) 

We have added a new member to our family of the 

feline persuasion.

Let me tell you how he came to be our kitty our own.

We had seen this scrawny black cat at a distance in the pasture across the road, hunting,  & he had passed our way a few times. There came a heavy snow, followed by rain which quickly turned into ice because there was a drastic drop in the temperature & that winter storm developed into a major blizzard.

A few hours before the storm, 

black kitty showed up & sought refuge in our garage. We were very glad about this because we didn't want to think of him out in this kind of arctic weather. 

We fixed a warm, cosy bed of lots of blankets, gave him food & water, while he rubbed & rubbed against our legs, expressing his gratitude with joyful purrs. He ate with abandon, then turned his attention to his personal toilette, (this cat had good manners!).  After his wash began the kneading of the blankets to make it fit perfectly the contours of his somewhat scrawny kitty body. Knead, purr, knead, purr, eyes half closed in peace & contentment. He was on cloud-nine-lives. & before long, he was sound asleep, dreaming his little kitty dreams. Purr..purr..purr...💤

Before he could be integrated into our family of three humans, two dogs & three other full grown cats, we took black kitty to our veterinarian to have him examined & to have his shots & to make sure he was a he because he seemed to be gaining a good bit of weight in a short period of time. But he did turn out to be a healthy he. Now we had a dilemma, because we wanted to make sure black kitty didn't already have a home where he was being sorely missed. We kept him in the garage with the door slightly ajar, so he could go in & out as he pleased, & especially go home as he pleased which is what we prayed he would do if he did have a home. I was praying & asking the Lord how we should go about finding out if he had a home because we live (sort of) in the country & I really didn't know where to begin. & that He would let us know if black kitty was sent to us by Him & he was ours. In the meantime, we thought he should have a name, so one evening, my daughter & I were brainstorming about what we should name him, even if it was temporary. We started with the names of the disciples & other biblical names. Then we started going through the Old Testament prophets. Finally I said, "How about Ezekiel?" She thought about it a minute & said, "Okay, & we can call him Zeke." So, that decided, black kitty became Zeke, & part of our household. About a week later, I was reading in the paper about the storm that had come to our region the day that Zeke took refuge in our garage. I didn't even know that storms were named, usually just hurricanes & tornadoes. But maybe because of the intensity of the blizzard, it got the  'honor' of being named. & guess what the name of this wild, stormy & snowy williwaw was....

"Ezekiel" !!!!!  

I guess you know that was confirmation enough for us!!!

So, Zeke, became officially ours. Now I have to say that the other cats, 

Oliver

Buttons,

& Lollipop, have received no such confirmation, so Zeke is having to endure the usual initiation of a cat into the family circle. But, he is an inside/outside kitty so he does get some relief. 

The doggies, however,

Schnitzel

& Rosie ( she had to have some toenail work done here) had no such prejudices & accepted Zeke sweetly.

So, we take it one day at a time. Sometimes we think that it's over because they start to mostly ignore Zeke, but it is really only the proverbial lull before the maelstrom. He's a good sport though & takes it with good-natured aplomb. & he's the best natured cat we've ever had. During our trips to the vet, he has only once uttered a sound. Wow! Talk about laid back! 

There's Lollipop, waiting to ambush Zeke. It was thwarted by a spray of water. Oh well, another time.

Yes indeed!

This is one of the Christmas journals that I counted cross-stitched.

I have made many of these too, which I have thoroughly enjoyed. I haven't done any for a long time but I hope to again someday. I love the fun & homespun gifts to make & receive & some Christmas I want to make it a completely homemade  one again. I remember that my favorite gifts & the ones that were the most precious were those that were homemade, especially from my kids. 

Now, to the subject at hand, namely, the title of this post. 

It just seemed to name itself as I was laying in bed one night, thinking (& praying!) about what I wanted to say. I always pray because I want the Lord to be able to use me to express Himself through me to you, His own special footnote so to speak, or addendum. (Of course, He can do the whole thing if He wants to. 😊) So many thoughts began to come to my mind, running around with no particular order except that they wanted to GET OUT! & until I let them out, they were being held captive. But they had to be subject to my authority & go exactly where I wanted them to go & say exactly what I wanted them to say once they became words. Unruly thoughts can be very self-willed & out-of-control. So I refused to loose them from their captivity until they were willing to raise the white flag of surrender to my captaincy.

"There's only one boss here," I said. Well, as you can see they acquiesced, because here they are, released from their captivity, my thoughts, to words, through my fingers, to this page. These captive thoughts are captive no longer.

But there's a 'topsy-turvey' inverted side to this very thing. It is in the book of II Corinthians, 10:5

"...casting down imaginations & every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ."

Just recently I was not feeling well physically, emotionally, spiritually or any other way! Downright CRUMMY! I heard the Lord's voice clearly say to me that I was feeling that way because of how I was letting my thought life run amok & projecting all kinds of riffraff, renegade, derelict & destructive speculations into my present life which produced fear, futility & even depression. All of it presumptuous & even sin! A pack of lies from the dark side. 

Remember the quote that was attributed to Mark Twain, "I am an old man & have known a great many troubles, most of which never happened." Whoa.  I had let my guard down & the thoughts I was entertaining had to be lassoed into captivity again. We can't let the devil or the flesh be the artist of our imaginations or thoughts. Proverbs 4:23 says,

"Guard your heart with all diligence, for out of it spring the issues of life."

Everything we do in life starts with a thought. I'm talking about choices.  Proverbs 23:7 says,

"For as he thinks in his heart, so is he." That applies to every one of us. We are what we think about. Uh-oh. Time for what Barney Fife calls 'a trouble check'. So, how do you feel right now? In your whole being? Because it all starts with the power of thought. & we are in charge of our thoughts. That's why we need Jesus to help us in establishing good thought processes. One of the ways I do this is by reading the Bible, sometimes out loud. The word of God has cleansing properties that gets our selfish & devil-inspired thoughts OUT of our minds. 

"...but be transformed by the renewing of your mind."

Romans 12:2

Sometimes we need a good, old, thought life bubble bath. 

There are many good, positive, beautiful things to think about, but the best advice on that subject that I've ever gotten is from Philippians 4:8.

"...whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever thing are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue & if there is anything praiseworthy...think about these things." & you know what comes from that kind of thinking? Life-giving words & actions being spoken into others lives, into our atmosphere, our planet & maybe even our universe! Aren't there enough words being spoken  (or written )that are destructive & even produce death as a result of thoughts that should have been taken captive? It's time we got out our  discipline lariats & reign in those renegade thought doggies, give them a good bath, brand them with Jesus name, & then re-release them to bring about what is good, just, pure, true, noble.

A worthy ambition, don't you agree? Everybody wins!! A reclamation of thoughts! 

Now, if I could only figure out a way to implement this into our world of felines! They do not control their thought lives whatsoever but are definitely into the doing whatever they feel like doing....Wait a minute!  Hmmmm. Am I......? Uhhhh... Food for thought.

Raintree Perk of the Day:

"Commit your works to the Lord & your thoughts will be established."  Proverbs 16:3