Wrather Thoughts

A daily journal of the thoughts, ideas, and life of Ed Wrather who is a pastor and writer of the Burning Bush Devotional www.theburningbush.net wrather@dobsonteleco.com

Thursday, February 07, 2002

Received call this morning from a woman wanting help. She is staying in a motel and says she has no place else to go and was wanting me to pay for a couple of more nights. Called and talked to the motel owner who said that night before last they appeared to have had a big party in their motel room and beer cans were all over the place. Of course I don't want to facilitate or enable her to have more "parties" but not sure what to do at this point to help her get going on the right path again.

It is sad how our lives can become so messed up when we leave God out of them. And even sadder is that many whose lives are messed up seem to think that living in that way is "normal." They think that because that is "normal" for them and they have never known any other way. I know that the only thing that will change this woman's situation is an act of God. Do I believe God is capable of doing that? Of Course! Will He? I don't know. I pray that He will move in this woman's life to somehow move her onto a new path that is not filled with evil. I ask this in Your Name Lord Jesus. Amen.

Wednesday, February 06, 2002

It was not really a surprise but Yahoo has now taken care of my problem with the changing from one program to another. It was all done by about 10 last night. Amazing what can happen when you know the right people and I'm not just talking about Sue Decker who thankfully took a few seconds to help out of her very busy day. The Lord was the One that I knew because He gave me the idea for contacting those who could do something about the situation. Hopefully others who were in the same situation as me will have been helped by this as well.

The snow is about over here but still snowing in Sayre where Jeanie is today. Looked like a mess in Oklahoma City this morning. Some in western Oklahoma are still without electricity and hope that will soon be over for them. Bible study tonight and need to work on that. Just finished the devotional but still need to post it. With the faster computer I was able to unbounce over 600 subscribers to the devotional yesterday afternoon. Hopefully those soft bounce addresses are still good. Should be able to keep the bounces current now with the greater speed.

Clark and Libby have an appointment with the neuro surgeon in Dallas on Thursday and so hopefully we will learn more about what is ahead for Mason then. Please continue to pray for Mason.

Tuesday, February 05, 2002

Hard to believe but it is snowing! I've noticed that we have developed a new phobia and it is very evident whenever our electricity blinks and we lose power for a few moments as we did last night. When it happens we immediately think "it is happening again and how long will we be without power this time?" as we feel around in the dark for our flashlights and candles. Let's see what could we name this most recently indentified phobia? Powerlossaphobia, or candlelightersphobia, or batterylifephobia, or generatorenvyphobia, or....

We had another building committee meeting last night and accomplished quite a bit and will meet again Wednesday prior to the service then. Nick and I went to Elk City yesterday and took care of several errands that needed doing. I actually found the connections that I need for the new faucet. I just need to put it all together now but it does look like it will not be easy. Visited Charles Fourier at the hospital who last Wednesday fell up at the store on the ice and broke his hip. He will not be able to put any weight on his legs for four weeks. Charles has been through a lot healthwise over the last several years.

Today the devotional has been written and is almost ready to be sent. Jeanie is working at Sayre today and may come home early if the snow continues. I may spend some time trying to learn how to use the Microsoft FrontPage demo that I received yesterday. Need to be able to improve the webpage but will have to invest the time to learn new skills. I've been having a problem with yahoo for some time trying to change my website from the old geoplus to the new webmaster program but for several months have been at an impasse. So yesterday I think I may have made a break through by contacting some of the executives at yahoo. For website owners one of the most frustrating things is that we have little way of communicating immediately with these people and we seem to be at their mercy as to when they get around to responding to us. However, after a little thought I was able to identify the email addresses of several yahoo executives based on their domain name of yahoo-inc.com. So here they are for all of you who have been having the same kind of problems I have been having:

Jerry Yang - Yang@yahoo-inc.com
He is the co-founder and chief yahoo and director.

David Filo - Filo@yahoo-inc.com
He is a co-found and chief Yahoo too.

Terry Semel - Semel@yahoo-inc.com
Chairman and chief executive officer and director

Jeff Mallett - Mallett@yahoo-inc.com
President and chief operating officer and director

Gregory Coleman - GColeman@yahoo-inc.com
Executive vice president, North American operation

Farzad Nazem - FNazem@yahoo-inc.com
Chief technical officer and senior vice president of communication services.

Susan Decker - SDecker@yahoo-inc.com
Chief financial officer and senior vice President of Finance and Administration

Susan Decker is the only one that actually responded. She kindly forwarded my email to Carolyn Patterson whom Sue says runs customer services and Sue apologized for the problems I had been having. It was a little thing but it did make me feel better. Last night I actually received a response from customer service (of course there was no human name listed in the email) but it was the first response I had received in over a month. Hopefully they will now take action to correct the problem I have been having of transferring from Geoplus to webmaster and I can be rid of the irritating ads on my website once again.

May you be blessed Sue Decker!!!!

Monday, February 04, 2002

Had a great day Sunday of course every day ought to be a great day because every day is a day that the Lord has made. There are still a few in our community without electricity although those on rural water do have water. But there are still thousand in Oklahoma without electricity and it may be days or even weeks before it is back on for some of them. In my memory something like this has never happened to western Oklahoma. We do get used to the comforts of modern life! I have a new understanding of the saying, "burning daylight." Because without electricity daylight is the time to get things done especially if you only have oil or kerosene lamps. You would think because we have excellent lighting (when the electricity is on) at night that we could accomplish much more than our ancestors could. However, I doubt that we do.

Well here I am "burning daylight!" Better get busy!