Been getting more comfortable with acrylics. I really like the sort of “intuitive abstract” thing – I’m not stellar at representational painting. I don’t enjoy it. It can be fun, sometimes, to incorporate it, but I’m unlikely to decide to become a capturer of real life.

I would, however, like to get better at photographing my paintings, because I’m not terrific at that. :)

In Summary: * This is another good day in the Roscoe-verse. Again today I've been able to keep HVAC system turned off and the heavy front door open, letting the fresh air in through the screen door for most of the day. If the weather forecasts are right, I'll be able to do this for at least the next 10 days.

Prayers, etc.: *I have a daily prayer regimen I try to follow throughout the day from early morning, as soon as I roll out of bed, until head hits pillow at night. Details of that regimen are linked to my link tree, which is linked to my profile page here.

Health Metrics: * bw= 226.08 lbs. * bp= 159/91 (70)

Exercise: * morning stretches, balance exercises, kegel pelvic floor exercises, half squats, calf raises, wall push-ups

Diet: * 07:00 – toast and butter * 08:00 – 2 tangerines * 10:00 – 1 peanut butter sandwich * 14:00 – lasagna * 16:30 – 1 fresh apple * 17:45 – 2 HEB Bakery cookies

Activities, Chores, etc.: * 05:00 – listen to local news talk radio * 05:55 – bank accounts activity monitored * 06:15 – read, pray, follow news reports from various sources, surf the socials * 13:30 to 15:00 – watch old game shows and eat lunch at home with Sylvia * 15:00 – listen to Dan Bongino podcast * 16:40 – listening now to the last part of The Jack Riccardi Show, will follow this with the first part of The Joe Pags Show, before tuning the radio to The Home for IU Women's Basketball ahead of tonight's game. After the game, my plan is to finish my night prayers and get ready for bed.

Chess: * 12:00 – moved in all pending CC games

The excerpt below opens The Salesman, a satire on government efficiency written in 2016 and submitted in 2024 for publication. The good folks at Waxing and Waning are publishing the short story. Go ahead and pre-order their March issue to see where Paul lands.

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Paul Winter races a million miles an hour over the hot Mojave asphalt to close his next sale. Nothing slows down his square black sedan. Not a fat green caterpillar. Not a desert tortoise. Not potholes. And not the five thousand Kelvins rising to the stark sky that sends the scorching heat back to earth hotter than before. Judgement! Sweet steel-belted tires rush toward that unvanishing point in the hazy liquid distance. Paul wipes his thick brow. Dusty kerchief? No, sweaty and grimy. White when he started the day. In a motel. Behind a motel, boiling in his car, if he’s honest. And today he’s honest. He has to be. It’s sales day. Close or be closed.

Paul’s big hand rests on a tall, drab grey case in the passenger seat. His thumb fingers the golden “SH7000” stenciled on top. He lost his ring finger in the war. Not even the shattered nub remains. Wearing his great-grandfather’s US Army Ruptured Duck ring on his pinky cured the phantom finger; made it go away. The ring transcended superstition into conviction; Paul never goes without it. His tie? Polyester. His feeling: indiscernible. Indigestion? Intolerable.

X10H395 is his target school. Blind designations guarantee no biases. Blind designations guarantee equal, enthusiastic, exceptional sales. Blind designations are efficient. And efficiency is king. That’s the government’s line, anyway. So the government contracted DeKline Pharmaceutical to sell the line, and DeKline invented a process and device to optimize efficiency. Its sales manual begins and ends with: 100% efficiency is 100% happiness.

More Epstein emails have dropped, and after seeing my former boss, Danny Hillis, in one of the recent photo dumps, I went a-searchin’ for Danny’s name in the emails.

There are hundreds of pages of emails mentioning Danny Hillis, though, to be fair, every email appears like five times, as some are duplicated and then every reply in a chain appears as its own document. So it’s not really hundreds of emails.

But it is dozens. And what it details is nothing salacious—more what I would categorize as the banality of evil. Epstein would take a trip to Cambridge and see if Hillis was available, and they’d meet up. Or Epstein would be assembling a group of Harvard/MIT stars, and he’d make sure Hillis was there. Or Hillis would travel to New York and see Epstein there.

Again, I need to stress that there’s none of the chumminess or coded language in the Epstein/Hillis exchanges that you see in these emails from people who were obviously involved in the abuse that defined Epstein’s life. It’s friendly and professional. Actually a lot of it is actually logistical communications between their assistants. (Fun fact—they didn’t redact Hillis’ personal cell number from all the emails, so if you want to give him a call or send a text, that is totally something you can do, unless he’s changed his number!)

But, as I mentioned in my previous piece, the absence of criminal behavior on Hillis’ part doesn’t indicate a moral clean slate. He and Epstein saw each other a couple of times per year, as far as I can tell from the emails (confession—I didn’t look through all 200+ pages), between the years 2010 and 2018. He also did some consulting work for Epstein’s reputation-laundering philanthropic foundation. The files indicate that he signed an NDA, but my connections in the fundraising world tell me this isn’t necessarily unusual or sinister.

For those who want a lil’ timeline refresher, Epstein’s first conviction was in 2008. James Patterson’s book, which really brought the extent of Epstein’s evil to public prominence, came out in 2016. Epstein was arrested again in 2019.

So Danny Hillis knew that Jeffrey Epstein was a pedophile. And he chose to spend time with him anyway. For Danny Hillis, the systematic abuse of children was not a dealbreaker.

I reached out to Danny Hillis to ask him about this through emails at his Long Now Foundation and his company Applied Invention. I asked how he made sense of his association with a monster. I’m not surprised that he didn’t respond, but I can’t help speculating. So here goes.

First, you need to know that Danny Hillis is fantastically rich by the standards of normal people, but not at all rich by Epstein standards. I saw an estimate of Hillis’ net worth at $60 million. So he’s not one of the big money men that Epstein hung with.

Hillis is more of a professional smart person, only while most such people have cushy academic jobs that at least require them to like supervise grad students or publish papers, Hillis seems to have spent most of his time after Thinking Machines folded in 1996 doing something close to nothing, but different than the day before. His Wikipedia page is rife with mentions of stuff he invented that never really saw any practical application, with the exception of putting a data center in a shipping container, which, good for him, I guess.

His big legacy project as a public intellectual is to take a mountain owned by Jeff Bezos and put a really big clock in it. No, really. The clock is supposed to last ten thousand years. It’s got chimes programmed by Brian Eno.

Honestly I kind of respect the lack of hustle. Nice work if you can get it!

So, anyway, though Hillis moved in billionaire circles, he was never really one of them. His role, like those of Steven Pinker, Joi Ito, Noam Chomsky, and the other Harvard and MIT-affiliated people Epstein hung out with, was more akin to that of a trained monkey. Epstein threw them coins (or proximity to money and power), and they clapped and danced and did their little show, which was talking about Big Ideas. (But never the Big Idea that the great majority of the problems on planet earth are due to the hoarding of wealth. That’s just crazy talk!)

It’s actually a symbiotic relationship, because the evil, venal, ultimately petty money men get to feel like they aren’t just Scrooge McDuck cavorting in a swimming pool of money, but, rather, People Who Matter. People who are helping to shape the world’s future! People who talk to the smartest people in the world and sometimes give them money!

And the trained monkeys get the coins. I noted that Epstein seemed to have set up two meetings for Danny Hillis with Barclay’s president Jes Staley, so perhaps that alone explains Hillis’ willingess to spend time with a known pedophile.

But I have another theory about these people. I think Elon Musk kind of gave the game away when he said he considers us all to be NPCs. If you don’t play tabletop or video role playing games, you should know that NPC means non-player character. It’s like, the guy in the tavern who gives you information about where the goblins are hiding, or whatever. They look like people, (or gnomes or elves or whatever) but they fundamentally don’t matter except as far as they help move the players’ story along.

In other words, in billionaire circles, regular people don’t really count as human beings. This is why they’re able to treat masses of people with such casual cruelty—you wouldn’t do that to a person, but a broke guy in China making an iphone? That’s not a person. A single mom walking 15 miles a day in an Amazon warehouse and having to stand in a security line for an unpaid hour at the end of every work day? Well, that’s not a person. You? Me? We’re not people to them.

And so this is my theory about Danny Hillis—he found Epstein useful as a way to continue his professional smart guy grift, and the girls Epstein was abusing? Well, they weren’t the daughters of Danny Hillis or any of the people he spent time with. It’s not like Epstein was doing those things to people.

Maybe I’m wrong. If Danny Hillis is reading this, let me just say hi, fuck you, and please feel free to email me to explain why you spent eight years being friends with a monster.

22 January 2026

Starlight Way (working title): I've wanted to make an all-white painting for a while and have failed at past attempts, but it seems I may have finally found a way into one. Which in my head felt something like approaching the painting as a white Conté crayon drawing on toned paper. The nucleus of the image is based off of a 9 meter sculpture of a scaled model Qatar Airways Boeing 777-9 aircraft around Heathrow Terminal 4 near Starlight Way. The painting doesn't reflect or need to reflect that specific location visually, so the title will change. Maybe just Plane is better...it is. Anyway, the important part is what the paint is doing. The explorations of space, value, line, and yes—plane—that emerged. I think I can trace those elements back to two works I looked at a lot this week:

Phoebe Helander, Wire Form III (Divided Space) (2026) David Ostrowski, F (Jung, Brutal, Gutaussehend) (2012)

Each of these paintings address space/the picture plane/gravity/color in interesting ways, and while it's unwise to reach for these effects intentionally, I do think what subconsciously drew me to portraying the sculpture was related to these concerns via its position as an object unmooring from the ground while remaining fixed to it. And I think what resulted sits at the center of an axis that acknowledges multiple potential trains of thought without committing fully to any of them—emerging from/being pulled back into a place of origin, crossing/being stuck at a horizon, taking off/crashing, dissecting space/being absorbed by space, and additive line/subtractive line.

20 January 2026

Image inventory: Faint reflection of a shower curtain on marble (decay, rust, dirt, sand, columns, metal), toothbrush on its side looking at its reflection in a small broken mirror (blue, melting, recognizing, horizontal, cracking), a new leaf growing from a houseplant (wet, green, light, soil, brown, glistening, dew), Daejeon covered in snow (pale yellow sky, my shaved head), a broken foosball table in the sun (slanted shadows of foosmen, foosmen looking at shadows, foosmen turned up, foosmen turned down), a neon yellow rope and a thin rainbow slouching against a brick wall (phenomena, approaching, slight, long), a light bulb with dew on it, an ashtray with rainwater (preserved, coy fish, shrimp, spooning), orange/yellow windows of a building in Wood Green (sunglasses), a green rubbish bin surrounded by blue rubbish bins (outnumbered), two carrots in a Tupperware container (two are three), a woman sitting on a bus with city lights encircling her (fireflies, string lights), giant advertisement of strawberries and raspberries in a window (blood), cone-shaped light (hood), giant shadow of a hand in the corner of a room.

De Voedsel Bank manager

We beloven je een grote toekomst maar weten nog niet wanneer als het straks niet is dan vast wel een volgende keer we denken dan aan horden van adepten hangend aan je lippen een podium voor u alleen met daarop vers gedragen slippen aanhangers bij de vleet applaus voor iedere scheet alle belangrijke personen willen u altijd aan hun zij en bij de afhaal chinees komt er wel wat meer dan sambal bij

maar nu moet u nog gewoon zelf u verse spruitjes halen en betalen en nu zal niemand u met complimenten overladen u bent niet meer dan een lid van de gemeenschap een persoon wachtend op succes onder aan de trap

maar later klinken er bellen en wapperen er vaandels als u komt de hele vijfde kritiek uitgevoerd door het klassiek toets octet verstomd uwer naam zal zelfs meer dan heilig zijn als je een dag ontbreekt aan het ontbijt lijdt men pijn

maar nu moet u zelf een afspraak bij ons maken en wij zullen in u bijzijn voortdurend zware zuchten slaken alsof u de meest vermoeiende persoon bent die we kennen en laten merken dat wij u nu nog lange niet zo hoog beminnen

maar ga zo door en wij zullen mogelijk spijt krijgen van onze zuchten bij ons zelf voldane oude ego vandaan vluchten en heel veel en anders ademen in u nabijheid teleurgesteld zijn als u alweer met een ander vrijt

maar voorlopig moet u hier tekenen in drievoud dan krijgt u van ons wat vreten voor zelf behoud bent u ons dankbaar en dus niet andersom en als je hiervoor weg loopt kijken wij niet naar u om

Return of the economy goods

Five dreams And none were war A secretive someday This times the light And is our country A nation under the Sun Millions taking care A cannonball as they say With misery but to no effect Staying in the hue Of dollarest men A duty to implore Pieces by the steer And five dimes at King World- One for Oprah And a thousand dreams flowing river Mercy goes round when you know Brailled measure for the day we don’t decorate The odyssey of Woman-child Third in her class but says thanks Good parents and a past get No reprisal for the generation Thirty years and solitude This empathy is yours All deliveries final To who speak eloquent or not A share in everybody And a home remembered wealth The currents have a way Out of the desert- And into the eyes- of Oprah Winfrey Tearship dawn And at our best Heaven to victory repeating.

Det er jo interessant å se hvordan media bøyer seg for litt offererrolle og hylekor fra høyresida. NRK gir nå en beklagelse til Asle Toje. De får svare for egen journalistikk, men jeg ser ikke at pressen generelt har mye å belage. Det eneste som er beklagelig nå, er om de slutter å grave. Her er det nemlig mer å spørre om. Historiene til Toje går ikke helt opp: 

På lørdag sa Toje til Aftenposten at han kun hadde møtt Steve Bannon én gang, at han ikke kunne huske å ha snakket med ham om Listhaug, og at han ikke hadde hatt noen annen kontakt med Bannon. Men i Epstein-filene kan vi lese at Steve Bannon hevder at ham mailer Toje “fem ganger daglig”. På oppfølgingspørsmål fra Aftenposten svarte Toje da “mulig jeg var på en mailingliste”. 

På podcasten til Wolfgang Wee for to dager siden innrømmer Toje plutselig at han har snakket med Bannon om å møte Sylvi Listhaug. I den nye versjonen av historien er det nå Bannon som foreslår et møte med Listhaug. Det kan stemme, for i 2018 var Bannon på sjarmoffensiv i hele Europa. Her endrer Toje også historien om e-post-korrespondansen. “Det er mulig at vi maila noen ting om saken jeg skreiv i Dagens Næringsliv om Kinapolitikk”. 

På få dager har Toje altså gått fra å kun å ha møtt Bannon én gang, ikke huske noen samtale om Listhaug, og ikke hatt noen annen kontakt, til at han har møtt Bannon, at han har snakka med Bannon om å møte Listhaug, og deretter maila med Bannon. 

Det er jo underlig at alle som på forskjellige måter har vært eksponert i den siste Epstein-lekkasjen har så fryktelig dårlig hukommelse. Dersom jeg hadde utvekslet flere e-poster med en så notorisk skikkelse som Bannon, så ville jeg huska det svært klart. 

Hvorfor er alt dette interessant? Vel, en grunn til å grave videre i denne koblinga er jo Tojes virke i offentligheten. Seinest den 22. desember publiserte Toje en mye omdiskutert kronikk i Aftenposten som starter med et retorisk spørsmål om ikke Trump-administrasjonen har et poeng når de sier at Europa er i ferd med å kollapse, med referanse til USAs nye “sikkerhetsstrategi”. 

Denne “sikkerhetstrategien” fremstår som om den er ført i pennen av Bannon selv, og Toje står klar til å “forstå” og vise forståelse for den. Akkurat slik han har vært ivrig etter å “forstå” både Putin og Trump på forskjellige måter de siste årene, med stor grad av forståelse. 

Det hører med til historien at Toje selv omtalte Bannon som en fascist seinest i fjor. Det kan jo tyde på at han har fått et relativt klart bilde av mannen. Men hvis nobelkomiteens nestleder ikke har snakket sant om sin kontakt med denne MAGA-ideologen, som tydeligvis har blitt opprettet med nobelkomitévervet som inngangsbillett, så fortjener offentligheten å vite mer om det. 

Og for å vær krystallklar på det: dette handler ikke om Epstein. Han har kun vært en mellommann i denne sammenheng. Det handler om Tojes kontakt Bannon. 

(og ja: om du vil høre mer om Bannon – sjekk ut denne ukas MAGAwatch!) Se mindre

The story of Luke chapter two has been told so often that it risks becoming small in our minds. We see it printed on Christmas cards, staged in nativity scenes, and recited by children in bathrobes with cardboard crowns. But Luke did not write this chapter to be cute. He wrote it to be catastrophic. He wrote it to show us that eternity entered time, that the invisible became touchable, and that God chose to arrive in a way that would forever redefine power, worth, and what it means to matter.

What makes Luke two so astonishing is not only that Jesus was born, but where, how, and to whom the announcement was made. The chapter begins with an empire flexing its muscles. Caesar Augustus issues a decree that all the world should be taxed. This is not background noise. Luke is placing two kingdoms side by side. One is the kingdom of Rome, which rules by census, by force, and by fear. The other is the kingdom of God, which enters the world not through a palace but through a womb, not through soldiers but through a young woman’s labor pains, not through proclamation in marble halls but through angels speaking to men who smell like sheep.

There is something quietly terrifying about the fact that the Son of God entered history on a night when no one in power noticed. The census meant Joseph and Mary had to travel to Bethlehem, not because God needed Bethlehem but because prophecy had already named it. Micah had said centuries earlier that a ruler would come from that small town, and now the machinery of Rome unknowingly serves the purposes of heaven. The emperor thinks he is counting his subjects. God is positioning His Son. The empire believes it is organizing its control. God is fulfilling His promise. This is how Luke frames the entire story. Human authority is loud, but divine authority is precise. Human systems announce themselves. God simply moves.

Mary gives birth in conditions that would have felt humiliating to anyone expecting a Messiah who looks like a king. There is no mention of a midwife. There is no mention of relatives cheering. There is no celebration. There is just a young mother, a carpenter husband, and a feeding trough repurposed as a cradle. Luke does not romanticize it. He simply tells us she wrapped Him in swaddling clothes and laid Him in a manger because there was no room in the inn. Those words should haunt us. No room. The Creator of lungs enters a world that has no space for Him. The One who invented breath draws His first breath in borrowed air. The One who designed muscles cannot yet lift His own head. The One who will one day carry a cross is carried by a teenage girl.

This is not incidental theology. It is the entire gospel compressed into one moment. God does not arrive demanding space. He arrives accepting the lack of it. He does not take over a throne. He borrows a feeding trough. He does not displace rulers. He displaces expectations. Luke is showing us that the kingdom of God does not look like the kingdoms of men because it is built on a different definition of greatness. Rome counts people to prove power. God enters humanity to share weakness.

Then the story widens. Luke shifts from a private birth to a public announcement. But not to politicians. Not to priests in the temple. Not to scholars in Jerusalem. He goes to shepherds in the field. Men who live outside. Men who work nights. Men whose testimony is not valued in court. Men who smell like animals and probably feel invisible to God and everyone else. Heaven chooses them as the first witnesses to the incarnation. That alone should force us to rethink who God trusts with His greatest news.

The angel says to them, “Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people.” That sentence alone reshapes theology. This is not good tidings for the elite. This is not joy for the worthy. This is not news for the religious. It is for all people. The sign they are given is not a miracle in the sky but a baby in a manger. The proof of salvation is not lightning. It is vulnerability. The Savior does not appear glowing. He appears crying.

And then the sky fills with praise. “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.” This is not poetic filler. It is cosmic announcement. Heaven is declaring that peace has entered human history, not as an idea but as a person. Not as a treaty but as flesh. Peace is now breathing in a stable.

When the angels leave, the shepherds do something astonishing. They go. They do not argue. They do not debate. They do not ask for credentials. They go and see. Faith is not treated as blind belief. It is treated as obedient movement. They travel from the field to the manger and find exactly what they were told. And when they see Him, they do not keep quiet. They make it known abroad. The first evangelists in Christian history are men without status. The first sermon is given by shepherds who simply say, “We saw Him.”

Mary, meanwhile, keeps quiet. Luke tells us she pondered these things in her heart. That is a detail that matters. God is working in two directions at once. The shepherds shout. Mary listens. The world is being told, and the mother is being shaped. God does not only announce His Son. He forms the soul of the woman raising Him.

Then Luke does something that seems ordinary but is deeply unsettling if you think about it. He tells us Jesus is circumcised on the eighth day and named. The eternal Word submits to a human ritual. God places Himself under the law He wrote. He bleeds as a child before He will bleed as a man. He receives a name that means salvation before He performs salvation. The covenant is being fulfilled not by thunder but by obedience.

After this, Mary and Joseph take Jesus to the temple. This is where Luke’s story becomes quietly explosive again. They bring sacrifices according to the law, which tells us something about their poverty. They do not bring a lamb. They bring what the poor were allowed to bring. The Savior of the world is introduced in the temple not with wealth but with scarcity. And then two elderly prophets appear, Simeon and Anna, whose lives have been waiting rooms for this moment.

Simeon takes the child in his arms and says he can now die in peace because he has seen God’s salvation. This is one of the most important moments in Scripture. A man who has waited his entire life for redemption is satisfied not by power, not by reform, not by politics, but by holding a baby. Salvation fits in his arms. The glory of Israel weighs only a few pounds.

But Simeon also says something that should never be separated from Christmas. He tells Mary that a sword will pierce her soul. Luke refuses to let the birth of Christ be sentimental. From the first chapter of Jesus’ life, suffering is announced. The manger points toward the cross. The joy of the shepherds is not disconnected from the grief of a mother who will one day watch her son be executed. Luke is teaching us that salvation is not a shallow happiness. It is a costly love.

Anna appears too, a woman who has lived in the temple, fasting and praying for redemption. She sees the child and begins to speak of Him to all who are waiting for Jerusalem’s deliverance. The story spreads not through networks of power but through networks of hope. People who are waiting recognize what has arrived.

Then Luke jumps forward twelve years. Jesus is in the temple, not as a baby but as a boy. This scene matters more than it seems. Jesus is listening and asking questions, and the teachers are astonished. This is not a child showing off. This is a mind awakening inside a human brain that contains divine wisdom. Mary and Joseph do not understand what He says when He explains that He must be about His Father’s business. Luke does not hide their confusion. Even the people closest to Jesus do not fully understand Him yet.

But then comes one of the most important lines in the chapter. Jesus goes home with them and is subject to them. The Son of God obeys human parents. The Creator submits to created authority. The Redeemer lives quietly for years. Luke is telling us something profound about how God values ordinary life. The salvation of the world does not begin with miracles. It begins with obedience in a small household.

This is the shape of Luke two. Empire and manger. Angels and animals. Shepherds and scholars. Prophecy and poverty. Worship and warning. God entering humanity without spectacle but with intention. It is not a chapter about nostalgia. It is a chapter about invasion. God enters our systems, our laws, our bodies, our suffering, and our waiting.

What Luke two really confronts us with is the uncomfortable truth that God chose weakness on purpose. He did not come when humanity was ready. He came when humanity was ruled. He did not choose luxury. He chose limitation. He did not enter through influence. He entered through vulnerability. If God had wanted to impress us, He would have come as an adult with lightning. Instead, He came as a baby who needed to be fed.

There is something in us that wants a Messiah who arrives fully formed, already powerful, already victorious. But Luke gives us a Messiah who arrives small and grows. A Messiah who learns language. A Messiah who learns Scripture. A Messiah who experiences hunger, cold, and confusion. God does not rescue us from humanity. He rescues us through it.

Luke two is not only about what happened. It is about what kind of God we have. We have a God who does not avoid darkness but enters it. We have a God who does not bypass pain but inhabits it. We have a God who does not save us from outside but saves us from within.

When the angels say peace on earth, they are not saying the world will immediately become calm. They are saying that the fracture between God and humanity has been addressed. Peace is now possible because God has crossed the distance. That peace begins in a feeding trough and will end in an empty tomb.

There is something deeply personal about the way Luke tells this story. He names individuals. He gives us emotions. He shows us responses. Fear. Joy. Wonder. Confusion. Worship. He wants us to see ourselves in it. Some of us are like the shepherds, startled by grace and eager to tell others. Some of us are like Mary, holding questions we cannot yet answer. Some of us are like Simeon and Anna, tired but still waiting. Some of us are like Joseph, doing our duty without fully understanding the plan. Luke writes in a way that lets every generation find its place in the scene.

The danger of Luke two is that we know it too well. We think we already understand it. But if we really did, it would disrupt how we measure importance. It would change how we see obscurity. It would challenge our obsession with influence. God chose a backwater town, a poor family, a feeding trough, and a group of night workers to begin the greatest story in history. That means our lives are never too small for God to enter.

Luke two also forces us to confront the pace of God. The Savior is born, but Rome still rules. The Messiah has arrived, but injustice still exists. The angels have sung, but the world has not yet changed. This is important because it teaches us that God’s work often begins invisibly. Redemption does not explode. It grows. It starts as a baby and becomes a kingdom.

That means if you are waiting for your life to suddenly make sense, Luke two tells you that God often starts with something that does not yet look like the answer. A pregnancy before a throne. A child before a crown. Obedience before recognition. Faith before clarity.

Mary’s song in the previous chapter promised the proud would be scattered and the lowly lifted. Luke two shows us how that begins. Not with rebellion but with incarnation. Not with overthrow but with presence. God does not topple Caesar in Luke two. He outlives him. The empire fades. The child remains.

This chapter is not a retreat from suffering. It is a declaration that God has entered it. It is not an escape from reality. It is a transformation of it. The Son of God grows up inside the human story rather than standing outside of it.

What Luke two ultimately reveals is that God’s idea of saving the world looks like loving it from the inside. He does not shout from heaven. He whispers in a cradle. He does not dominate history. He walks through it.

The manger is not a symbol of sweetness. It is a symbol of strategy. God places Himself where no one would expect Him so that no one can claim Him as their possession. He belongs to shepherds and scholars, to women and men, to Jews and Gentiles, to the waiting and the wandering. The sign is not that He is strong. The sign is that He is here.

And that is where Luke two refuses to remain in the past. Because if God entered the world this way once, it tells us something about how He still works now. He still chooses quiet beginnings. He still speaks to unlikely people. He still moves through obedience rather than spectacle. He still brings peace by presence rather than force.

The same God who lay in a manger still enters human lives not by thunder but by invitation. He does not break down doors. He is laid where there is room. Luke two is not only a birth story. It is a pattern. God enters where He is welcomed. He is revealed to those who are watching. He is recognized by those who are waiting.

And that raises an uncomfortable question. If God came this way then, would we notice Him now? Would we be watching the sky for angels or would we be busy counting ourselves like Rome? Would we make room or would we be full of other priorities? Would we recognize salvation if it came small?

Luke does not answer that question for us. He only tells us how God chose to come the first time. The rest is left to the reader.

Luke two is not the beginning of the gospel. It is the arrival of it. It is not God sending help. It is God becoming help. It is not heaven offering advice. It is heaven moving into the neighborhood.

This chapter does not end with fireworks. It ends with growth. Jesus increases in wisdom and stature and in favor with God and man. The Savior grows. The eternal Word learns. The Light of the world practices walking. Redemption develops inside time.

Which means the most holy thing happening in Luke two is not the angels singing or the shepherds praising. It is God learning how to live a human life.

And that is where the chapter quietly leaves us. Not with triumph, but with a child going home with His parents. Not with revolution, but with obedience. Not with spectacle, but with development.

The world does not yet know what has entered it. Rome keeps counting. The temple keeps sacrificing. Life keeps going. But everything has changed.

Because God has learned to breathe our air.

Luke chapter two does not simply tell us that Jesus was born. It tells us what kind of world He chose to be born into and what kind of people He chose to be surrounded by. When we read it slowly, the chapter becomes less like a Christmas card and more like a mirror. It reflects the way God works in places we would never expect and in lives that do not look impressive from the outside.

One of the quiet truths in this chapter is that God enters a world already in motion. Caesar is issuing decrees. People are traveling. Systems are operating. Families are obeying laws they did not create. God does not pause history to insert Himself. He steps into it. That matters because it means God does not wait for perfect conditions. He works inside imperfect ones. He does not require ideal circumstances. He redeems real ones.

Mary and Joseph do not get a moment where everything stops and makes sense. They are exhausted. They are displaced. They are doing what they must do. And in that ordinary obedience, something eternal is happening. This is one of the most important spiritual patterns in Luke two. God’s greatest work begins in human routine. He does not always announce Himself with drama. He often arrives while people are just trying to survive.

The birth of Jesus also redefines what holiness looks like. It does not happen in the temple. It happens in a stable. It does not involve priests. It involves a teenage girl and a carpenter. The holy place becomes wherever God is willing to dwell. That should forever alter how we think about sacred spaces. Holiness is no longer confined to buildings or rituals. It is now embodied in flesh. God is not waiting in a sanctuary. He is lying in a feeding trough.

When the angels appear to the shepherds, they announce joy, not fear. That is striking because the shepherds are afraid at first. Fear is the natural response to the divine. But the first words of the gospel announcement are “fear not.” God is not arriving to terrify humanity. He is arriving to reconcile it. That alone reshapes the way many people imagine God. Luke presents a God who wants to be approached, not avoided.

The shepherds are given a sign that feels almost insulting in its simplicity. A baby. Wrapped in cloth. Lying in a manger. This is not what anyone expects a Savior to look like. But that is the point. God does not come in a form that inspires envy. He comes in a form that invites closeness. A baby can be held. A baby can be loved. A baby needs care. God chooses a form that requires relationship.

When the shepherds go and find the child, they become the first people to spread the message. They are not trained theologians. They are not commissioned leaders. They are witnesses. Their authority is not based on education. It is based on encounter. They speak because they have seen. That is still how faith spreads. Not through perfect arguments but through people who have met something real.

Mary’s role in this chapter is quieter but deeper. Luke repeatedly shows her receiving, pondering, and holding things in her heart. She does not understand everything. But she keeps everything. She does not rush to conclusions. She allows mystery to shape her. This is a model of faith that does not demand immediate clarity. It trusts before it fully comprehends. Mary’s faith is not loud. It is enduring.

Then Luke introduces Simeon and Anna, two people whose lives are defined by waiting. They represent generations who have prayed for deliverance and not seen it yet. Their presence tells us that God does not forget long prayers. He does not ignore persistent hope. When Simeon holds the child, he recognizes salvation in a form no one else would consider powerful. His eyes are trained not to look for strength but for promise. That is what waiting does. It teaches you what to recognize.

Simeon’s prophecy includes both comfort and warning. He speaks of light for the Gentiles and glory for Israel, but also of division and suffering. Salvation will not be neat. It will not be universally welcomed. It will expose hearts. It will reveal resistance. Even in this birth story, Luke prepares us for conflict. Jesus will not only heal. He will confront. He will not only unite. He will also divide. The same child who brings peace will provoke opposition.

Anna’s response is different but just as important. She speaks to everyone who is looking for redemption. Her words spread through a community of people who already feel the ache of waiting. The message does not go first to those who are comfortable. It goes to those who are longing. That is another pattern in Luke two. God reveals Himself first to the hungry, not the satisfied.

The moment when Jesus is brought into the temple is especially revealing. The Son of God enters the religious system of His people not as a disruptor yet, but as a participant. He is circumcised. He is presented. He is dedicated. God submits Himself to the structures He will one day transform. That shows us that God’s method is not immediate overthrow but faithful presence. He honors the law even as He fulfills it.

Then the story jumps ahead to when Jesus is twelve. This is the only glimpse we get of His childhood mind. He is listening and asking questions in the temple. That detail is crucial. Jesus does not emerge fully formed in His human awareness. He grows. He learns. He engages Scripture. The eternal Word studies the written word. God places Himself inside the process of human development.

When Mary and Joseph find Him, His response is not rebellion. It is recognition. He knows who His Father is. But He still returns home and submits to them. This moment holds a tension that defines the rest of His life. Jesus is both aware of His divine mission and committed to human obedience. He is not rushing past childhood. He is sanctifying it.

Luke ends the chapter with a summary of growth. Jesus increases in wisdom, stature, and favor with God and man. Salvation grows quietly. The most significant thing happening in the world is invisible to most of it. God is becoming a man in a small town.

This chapter reshapes our understanding of identity. Jesus does not begin with public influence. He begins with private formation. He does not start by changing laws. He starts by learning to live. Luke two teaches us that becoming who God intends is often hidden before it is visible. God cares deeply about what we are becoming when no one is watching.

Luke two also speaks to suffering in a way that is easy to miss. The Savior is born into a poor family under political oppression. He enters a world that is already broken. God does not wait for suffering to end before entering the story. He steps into it. That means pain is not a sign that God is absent. It may be the very place where He is most present.

The manger is not just a symbol of humility. It is a declaration that God is willing to share human vulnerability. He is not a distant observer. He is an embodied participant. He knows hunger. He knows cold. He knows exhaustion. The God of Luke two is not immune to the human condition. He joins it.

Waiting is another theme woven through the chapter. Mary waits through pregnancy. Joseph waits through confusion. The shepherds wait through the night. Simeon waits through decades. Anna waits through widowhood. And the world waits through another generation before Jesus begins His public ministry. Luke two teaches us that God’s promises often arrive after long silence. But when they arrive, they come fully formed.

Peace in this chapter is not the absence of conflict. It is the presence of God. The angels do not announce an end to Roman occupation. They announce the arrival of salvation. Peace is redefined. It is no longer dependent on political conditions. It is grounded in divine presence. God with us is the beginning of peace.

This is why Luke two speaks so powerfully to the modern human condition. We live in a world of systems, schedules, and survival. We are surrounded by noise and power and pressure. Luke two tells us that God still enters quietly. He still works through ordinary obedience. He still reveals Himself to unlikely people. He still grows things slowly.

We are often tempted to believe that our lives must look impressive for God to use them. Luke two says the opposite. God chose obscurity. He chose poverty. He chose a village no one cared about. He chose people with no influence. That means there is no life too small for God to inhabit.

Luke two also confronts our ideas about worth. The first announcement is not made to Rome. It is made to shepherds. The first worship is not in a palace. It is in a stable. The first prophets are not officials. They are elders who waited. God defines value differently than the world does. He looks for hearts that are watching, not positions that are powerful.

The chapter also reshapes how we think about beginnings. We often want dramatic transformations. Luke gives us gradual incarnation. God becomes human and then grows. Redemption does not arrive fully visible. It arrives as a seed. It arrives as a child. It arrives as potential before it arrives as fulfillment.

This means that when God begins something in us, it may not look like an answer yet. It may look like a question. It may look like discomfort. It may look like delay. Luke two assures us that small beginnings are not failures. They are God’s chosen method.

The world of Luke two is not resolved by the end of the chapter. Rome still rules. Herod still exists. The world is still unjust. But something has entered it that will not leave. God is now part of the human story. He will not abandon it. He will walk through it.

And that is the deepest meaning of Luke two. God does not save humanity from a distance. He saves it from within. He does not speak from the sky. He cries in a cradle. He does not dominate history. He inhabits it.

The chapter leaves us with a child growing up. That is not a conclusion. It is a beginning. Everything else in the gospel flows from this moment. Healing, teaching, sacrifice, resurrection. All of it begins with God choosing to live a human life.

Luke two tells us that the most important thing God ever did started as something the world barely noticed. And that is why it still matters now. Because if God can enter history that way, He can enter our lives that way too. Quietly. Gently. Faithfully.

He comes where there is room. He reveals Himself to those who are watching. He grows what He plants. He keeps what He promises.

And all of it begins with a night when God learned to breathe our air.

Watch Douglas Vandergraph’s inspiring faith-based videos on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/@douglasvandergraph

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Your friend, Douglas Vandergraph

#Luke2 #Faith #JesusChrist #Hope #Salvation #ChristianWriting #GospelReflection #SpiritualGrowth #BibleStudy #Grace #Peace #Advent #Messiah #Scripture #ChristianLife

Het spijt me, echt heel erg

Het spijt me maar Ik wist niet waar het voor was ik dacht dat ik het daar achterin moest proppen hoe kon ik weten dat het was om slagroom te kloppen

Het spijt me maar Ik wist niet waar het voor was ik dacht dat ik ze door het eten moest prakken hoe kon ik weten ik ze onder stoel of tafelpootjes moest plakken

Het spijt me maar Ik wist niet waar het voor was ik dacht dat er een kamerplant in moest staan hoe moest ik weten dat het een menu bakje was voor een banaan

Het spijt me maar Ik wist niet waar het voor was ik dacht dat het een gehoor apparaat was het zag er helemaal niet uit als een waterpas

Het spijt me maar Ik wist niet waar het voor was ik dacht dat ik die schattige beestjes daar op moest zetten wist ik veel dat die machine ze zou pletten

Het spijt me maar Ik wist niet waar het voor was het leek me heel geschikt voor in de vitrinekast ik kom uit de tijd dat een dildo niet zo opvallend vrolijk was

There are families that look simple from the outside and complicated on the inside, and then there are families that look complicated from the outside and quietly carry a sacred simplicity within them. A home with two parents who love the same child but worship differently is often placed into the second category. People assume tension must live there. They imagine raised voices about doctrine, awkward holidays, confused bedtime prayers, and a child caught between competing truths. But that assumption says more about the fears of the observer than the reality of the home. Faith, when it is genuine, does not automatically produce conflict. Sometimes it produces a deeper kind of patience, one born from the knowledge that what is holy cannot be reduced to control.

Parenting has always been more about formation than information. Long before a child understands theology, they understand tone. They understand safety. They understand whether love feels conditional or steady. They understand whether the house they live in is a place where questions are dangerous or welcome. And so the spiritual future of a child is not decided first by which scriptures are placed on the shelf, but by how the adults in that home treat one another when belief does not line up neatly.

When one parent follows Christ and the other follows a Hindu path shaped by devotion and tradition, the child does not wake up each morning thinking about philosophical systems. The child wakes up thinking about breakfast, school, laughter, fear, and whether the world is trustworthy. The spiritual environment they absorb is not an abstract concept. It is lived reality. It is the sound of prayer in another room. It is the way apologies are spoken. It is the way anger is restrained. It is the way love shows up after a hard day.

There is a quiet myth that says difference equals danger. It suggests that unless belief is uniform, stability is impossible. But human history tells a different story. Stability has never come from sameness. It has come from commitment. A marriage survives not because two people think identically, but because they refuse to let disagreement dissolve love. Parenting works the same way. A child does not need a home where every thought matches. They need a home where love does not fracture under strain.

In such a household, the Christian parent believes Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life. That conviction is not casual. It is rooted in the cross, in forgiveness, in resurrection, in a God who enters suffering rather than avoiding it. The Hindu parent believes in a sacred path shaped by discipline, reverence, and devotion that reaches back thousands of years. That conviction is not shallow either. It is shaped by ritual, meditation, moral law, and the search for union with the divine. These are not small differences. They touch how a person understands reality itself. Yet the child does not live in theory. The child lives in a kitchen. The child lives in a living room. The child lives in the daily choreography of ordinary life.

And ordinary life is where faith is first interpreted.

If the Christian parent speaks of Christ but lives with contempt for the other parent’s beliefs, the child will not experience Christ as love. They will experience Him as rivalry. If the Hindu parent speaks of devotion but treats the other parent’s faith as foolishness, the child will not experience devotion as wisdom. They will experience it as pride. The child will not be confused by difference. The child will be wounded by hostility.

This is where the task of parenting becomes sacred work. Not sacred because it is flawless, but sacred because it shapes the meaning of God inside a developing mind. Children do not learn what God is like from sermons. They learn what God is like from the emotional climate of their home. A God associated with tension becomes threatening. A God associated with love becomes trustworthy.

The temptation in divided-faith homes is to rush resolution. Parents feel pressure to produce certainty early, to push the child toward a decision before the child even knows what a decision means. But belief is not built on pressure. It is built on encounter. Even Jesus did not coerce allegiance. He invited it. He spoke truth plainly and allowed people the dignity of response. Some followed. Some walked away. But none were trapped.

That example matters deeply for parenting. You cannot force faith into a heart. You can only prepare the soil where faith might grow.

So preparation becomes the work. Not conversion by control, but cultivation through presence. The Christian parent lives Christ in actions, not arguments. Forgiveness becomes visible. Patience becomes daily practice. Humility becomes language. The Hindu parent lives devotion in discipline, reverence, and moral seriousness. The child does not see abstract doctrine. The child sees embodied belief.

In such a home, the most powerful statement may not be spoken at all. It may be lived quietly in how disagreement is handled. When parents say, without shouting, that they believe differently yet still choose one another, the child learns something far deeper than religious tolerance. The child learns that love does not require uniformity. They learn that truth does not need to destroy relationship to remain true. They learn that faith is not fragile.

There will be moments when the child asks questions that strike fear into the heart of both parents. Which one is right. Which God is real. Why do you believe different things. Who should I follow. These questions feel like crossroads, but they are actually beginnings. They are not evidence of confusion. They are evidence of thought.

The danger is not the question. The danger is the response.

If the parents answer with panic, the child learns that faith is brittle. If they answer with anger, the child learns that faith is unsafe. But if they answer with honesty and humility, the child learns that faith is strong enough to withstand inquiry.

A Christian parent might say they believe in Jesus because they have experienced grace when they did not deserve it, forgiveness when they could not earn it, and hope when suffering made no sense. A Hindu parent might say they believe in their path because it teaches them discipline, reverence, and awareness of a reality greater than themselves. Both can speak from lived truth without demanding the child imitate their certainty prematurely.

The most healing sentence in such a home may be this: you are allowed to search. You do not have to choose today. You do not have to pretend. You do not have to hide your thoughts to protect us.

This permission removes fear from the spiritual process. Fear is what produces rebellion. Love is what produces longing. A child raised in fear will either comply outwardly or revolt inwardly. A child raised in love will eventually ask deeper questions, not because they are pressured to believe, but because they want to understand.

What such a home teaches is not relativism. It teaches reverence. It does not say all beliefs are the same. It says all people are worthy of dignity. It says disagreement does not cancel devotion. It says faith is not a weapon to win, but a path to walk.

There is also something quietly prophetic about this kind of household. The world is filled with people who shout about God. It is filled with division baptized in religious language. It is filled with certainty that crushes compassion. A home where two faiths coexist without contempt becomes a living contradiction to that noise. It becomes a witness that love can survive difference without becoming shallow.

Children raised in such an environment grow up knowing that conviction and kindness are not enemies. They grow up knowing that belief is not proven by volume. They grow up knowing that truth does not require humiliation to remain true. These are rare lessons in a world addicted to ideological warfare.

Over time, the child will begin to notice something else. God is not only spoken of in prayers or rituals. God appears in patience. God appears in restraint. God appears in mercy. God appears in how mistakes are handled. God appears in how forgiveness is practiced. The divine becomes associated not with dominance, but with presence.

And slowly, perhaps without the parents realizing it, the child learns that God is not confined to one room in the house. God is present in the kitchen where apologies happen. God is present in the hallway where hugs happen. God is present in the living room where hard conversations happen. God is present not as an argument, but as a thread running through love itself.

This does not mean belief will be simple for the child. It means belief will be honest. It means when the child eventually leans one way or another, it will not be because of fear. It will be because of encounter. It will not be because of pressure. It will be because of resonance.

And that is what faith was always meant to be. Not inherited like property. Not enforced like law. But discovered like treasure.

A divided-faith home that chooses love over rivalry becomes a sanctuary of formation. It becomes a place where God is not defended with fists, but trusted with patience. It becomes a place where the child is not treated as a battleground, but as a soul.

In the end, the greatest danger is not that the child will see two religions. The greatest danger is that the child will see two adults who cannot love across difference. But when love holds, when respect remains, when faith is lived rather than weaponized, the child does not grow up between two faiths. The child grows up inside a living lesson about God.

That lesson says God is not afraid of families like this. God is not confused by them. God does not avoid them. God inhabits them. God works through kitchens and bedtime stories and difficult questions. God works through humility and listening and the refusal to turn belief into a battlefield.

Such a home may never look perfect. But it may become holy in a way perfection never could.

Because a child raised in love will eventually search for truth. A child raised in fear will run from it. And a child raised in a house where faith is lived with dignity will one day understand that God was never absent from the tension. God was present in the patience.

That is not weakness. That is formation.

And in a world tearing itself apart over belief, a home like that quietly becomes a testimony.

As the child grows, the questions deepen. Childhood curiosity eventually matures into adolescent identity, and identity always asks harder things of faith than curiosity ever did. A young child wonders what God is like. A teenager wonders who they are in relation to God. The difference is enormous. One question is about belief. The other is about belonging.

In a divided-faith household, belonging can feel fragile if it is not handled with wisdom. A child may begin to feel that choosing one belief means betraying one parent. That is a quiet wound if it is not addressed. It does not show itself loudly at first. It shows itself in hesitation, in silence, in an instinct to hide thoughts rather than share them. The work of the parents, then, is not to eliminate that tension but to remove fear from it.

The most powerful thing a Christian and Hindu parent can do together is refuse to make the child’s spiritual search into a loyalty test. Love cannot grow under emotional blackmail. If belief feels like betrayal, the heart will shut down. But if belief feels like discovery, the heart will open. The child must learn that love is not conditional upon agreement, and that affection is not a reward for conformity.

This is where the daily choices of the parents shape the invisible architecture of the child’s soul. The way holidays are handled matters. The way prayer is spoken matters. The way disagreements are resolved matters. None of these moments feels monumental in the moment. They feel ordinary. But ordinary is where identity is formed.

When a Christian parent insists that Christ is central, but does so without contempt for the other parent’s faith, they teach something vital: conviction can exist without cruelty. When a Hindu parent practices devotion without mocking Christian belief, they teach something equally vital: reverence does not require rivalry. The child absorbs these lessons not as ideas but as emotional reflexes. They learn what disagreement feels like. They learn what love feels like. And later, they will decide which voice sounds more like God.

There is another quiet danger in divided-faith homes, and that is the temptation to flatten both traditions into something vague and harmless. Sometimes parents try to avoid tension by reducing faith to general goodness. They speak only of kindness and avoid all deeper claims. While kindness is essential, faith cannot survive on vagueness alone. A child raised without substance will not grow into conviction. They will grow into avoidance. They will learn that belief is something to tiptoe around rather than something to wrestle with.

True respect does not mean pretending differences do not exist. It means acknowledging them without weaponizing them. It means saying openly that these beliefs do not align perfectly and still choosing love. It means letting faith be what it actually is instead of sanding it down to avoid discomfort.

In such a home, the child eventually reaches a stage where faith becomes personal. They will not simply ask what their parents believe. They will ask what makes sense to them. They will compare stories, prayers, rituals, and moral frameworks. They will feel drawn in one direction or another, or perhaps feel suspended between both for a season. This is not failure. This is development.

No child grows into faith without tension. Even children raised in one tradition face doubt. Even children raised with one set of scriptures struggle with meaning. The divided-faith home simply makes that struggle visible sooner. But visibility is not danger. It is honesty.

If the parents have done their work well, the child will not feel trapped by the search. They will feel accompanied. They will know that belief is not something they must solve to remain loved. They will know that God is not threatened by their uncertainty. They will know that the home they grew up in can hold both conviction and compassion at the same time.

There is also a strange gift hidden in this arrangement. A child raised between two faiths learns early that the world is larger than one story. They learn that people can love deeply and still differ profoundly. They learn that faith is not just inherited but encountered. This does not make belief weaker. It often makes it stronger. When they finally choose what they believe, it will not be borrowed. It will be owned.

Ownership is the difference between tradition and transformation. A belief inherited without examination is fragile. A belief discovered through searching is resilient. A child who chooses faith after seeing it lived with dignity and humility will not easily abandon it when challenged. They will know what they believe and why.

The parents in such a household also undergo their own quiet transformation. Living beside a different faith forces self-examination. It forces clarity. It exposes assumptions. It reveals whether belief is rooted in love or in fear. The Christian parent must ask whether they trust Christ enough to let Him work in a complicated environment. The Hindu parent must ask whether devotion can remain sincere without needing dominance. Both must confront the difference between faith as possession and faith as witness.

Witness is the posture that allows love and belief to coexist. It does not demand agreement. It offers presence. It does not coerce. It reveals. In such a home, the child becomes the witness of the witness. They observe how faith behaves under strain. They see whether God is used as a shield or as a source of humility. They learn whether prayer produces peace or control.

There will be moments of failure. There will be arguments. There will be tears. There will be days when fear wins and kindness falters. These moments do not ruin the child. They humanize the parents. What matters most is not that mistakes never happen, but that repentance does. Apologies teach more about God than perfection ever could. Forgiveness shows what belief looks like when it is real.

As the child grows older, their identity will settle. They will lean into one belief or another, or they may carry echoes of both in their moral language. What matters most is not the label they choose, but the kind of heart they carry with it. A child raised in a house where faith and love walked together will not see God as an enemy of thought. They will not see belief as a battlefield. They will not confuse disagreement with danger.

They will understand something rare: that God can be honored without hatred, and that truth can be sought without cruelty.

Such a child enters the world differently. They will encounter people who shout about religion, and they will recognize that noise as insecurity. They will meet people who fear difference, and they will recognize that fear as unfamiliar. They will carry with them an internal model of how conviction and compassion coexist. They will not be easily seduced by extremism because they have seen moderation without emptiness and devotion without violence.

In a world increasingly shaped by division, a child formed this way becomes something quiet and radical. They become someone who can hold belief without needing enemies. They become someone who can speak about God without erasing the humanity of others. They become someone who understands that faith is not proven by how loudly it is defended but by how faithfully it is lived.

The parents may never see the full fruit of this work. Parenting always requires faith in outcomes unseen. But the seeds they plant will grow in ways they cannot predict. The child may choose Christianity. The child may choose Hinduism. The child may walk a season of questioning. But they will never forget the home where belief did not cancel love.

That memory will matter when they suffer. It will matter when they doubt. It will matter when they raise children of their own. They will remember that God did not leave when difference entered the room. They will remember that faith did not require cruelty to survive. They will remember that love was not fragile.

And in remembering that, they will know something holy. God was not merely talked about in their home. God was practiced.

This is the legacy of such a household. Not theological perfection, but spiritual formation. Not forced certainty, but earned faith. Not rivalry, but reverence. It is a slow, patient, difficult way of parenting. But it is a way that trusts God enough to let Him work without coercion.

A child raised in love will search for truth. A child raised in fear will run from it. And a child raised in a home where faith is lived with dignity will one day understand that God was never absent from the tension. God was present in the patience.

That is the deeper miracle of two faiths under one roof. Not that difference disappears, but that love remains. Not that belief is simplified, but that God becomes visible in the way human beings choose one another despite it.

Such a house does not collapse under difference. It becomes a sanctuary within it.

And that is not confusion. That is formation.

Your friend, Douglas Vandergraph

Watch Douglas Vandergraph’s inspiring faith-based videos on YouTube

Support the ministry by buying Douglas a coffee

Waarom geen advocaat voor slachtoffers, bijvoorbeeld van seksueel geweld op minderjarigen, in België? Wij zochten het uit na de aankondiging van 01/02/2026 in de pers en ons eerder nieuwsbulletin.

typische paraplu en damage control

De VRT nieuwsombudsvrouw wist schriftelijk te vertellen dat:

Ik heb me even bevraagd bij de journalist. De insteek voor het artikel is het initiatief van verschillende balies in ons land (Orde van Vlaamse Balies & Ordre des Barreaus Francophones et Germanophones) die op basis van bestaande wetgeving (art. 508/14 van het gerechtelijk wetboek) beslissen om slachtoffers van seksueel en intrafamiliaal geweld bij te staan.

De Coördinator van het Lawyer Victim Assistance programma wist telefonisch te vertellen dat de lijst van de voor slachtoffers opgeleide advocaten ter beschikking is van de CAW's, de ZSG's, de politiediensten, de OCMW's enz. Volgens de Coördinator doen de Balies het nodige om de verruimde toepassing van art. 508/14 op het terrein uit te rollen via de Bureau's voor Juridische Bijstand {BJB}, en zouden de diensten slachtoffers naar hun lokale BJB doorverwijzen voor de gratis 15 dagen bijstand.

Het Instituut voor Gelijkheid van Vrouwen en mannen die verantwoordelijk is voor de Zorgcentra na Seksueel Geweld {ZSG} meldde:

Het persartikel verscheen zonder onze medewerking. Wij namen daarom contact op met de persoon die betrokken was voor het persartikel om bijkomende informatie te vragen. Het Instituut voor de gelijkheid van vrouwen en mannen is immers betrokken bij het geciteerde project, zijnde het Lawyers Victim Assistance project, maar wij hadden geen weet van een uitbreiding van het project.

Deze persoon liet weten dat er voorbarig en niet correct werd gecommuniceerd.

Zij verduidelijkte initieel dat er een wetswijziging had plaatsgevonden die op een uitbreiding zou neerkomen.

Daarna nuanceerde ze dat het niet zozeer ging om een wetswijziging, maar wel de aankondiging van de Orde der Vlaamse Balies dat art. 508/14 Gerechtelijk Wetboek door hen geïnterpreteerd zou worden als zijnde van toepassing op slachtoffers van seksueel geweld.

Vermoedelijk is dit de eerste stap in een verdere samenwerking tussen de Orde en de ZSG's, maar er is op heden nog geen contact hierover geweest en wij zijn nog niet formeel op de hoogte gesteld over de intenties van de Orde. Er is hieromtrent ook geen wetgevend initiatief hangende.

Wij hebben dus geen bijkomende informatie op dit moment, maar dit wordt binnen het Instituut uiteraard verder opgevolgd.

Dus contacteerden wij de Orde van Vlaamse Balies met de vraag of er inderdaad een “verruimde interpretatie” wordt gegeven aan art. 508/14 Gerechtelijk Wetboek. Het antwoord was:

U gelieve u voor concrete inlichtingen te wenden tot het bevoegde BJB, voor zover u voor tweedelijnsbijstand in aanmerking komt uiteraard.

Nu lijkt ons het antwoord vreemd, daar de OVB een controlerende en reglementerende functie heeft over de BJB's. Wij vinden het vreemd dat de OVB voor de vermeende “verruimde interpretatie” van art. 508/14 Gerechtelijk Wetboek doorverwijst naar de lokale BJB's, terwijl de OVB over dergelijke “verruimde interpretatie” de dirigent zou dienen te zijn.

Nu goed, enige “verruimde interpretatie” wordt in dezelfde ene zin ontkracht. Klaarblijkelijk zouden de 15 eerste dagen enkel geldig zijn voor zij die in aanmerking zouden komen voor tweedelijnsbijstand.

Dan maar bij de BJB's te luister gaan. Daar wordt vertelt dat de Stafhouders aan de BJB's opdracht gaven om als volgt te communiceren: de OVB is in onderhandeling met de OBFG en de minister van justitie om tot een COMPROMIS te komen … Het gaat dus om centen en macht. Schuif aan tafel en bedien u, geen slachtoffers of hun belangenverdedigers in de onderhandelingen te bespeuren.

money, money, money

Wellicht wordt net zoals omtrent Casa Legal tussen de OVB en de OBFG met de minister van justitie onderhandeld: met het financiële mes van de OVB op de keel van iedereen. En als de OVB weer niet op haar financiële en macht wenken wordt bediend, men weze gewaarschuwd dat zij zelfs SLAPP procedures bij het Grondwettelijk Hof dienstig maken, zoals in de rolnummers 8504 en 8574.

Het financiële argument van de OVB en haar leden is in werkelijkheid eigenlijk de belachelijkheid zelve. OVB is winstgevend met meer dan 3 miljoen euro op de bankrekening en meer dan 1,6 miljoen beleggingen. Het detail van de jaarrekeningen is niet voor pottenkijkers. Ze zijn financieel zo te beklagen, die advocaten, dat ze een proefproject dat nog nooit zo efficiënt subsidies aanwendde voor juridische bijstand voor slachtoffers aanvechten.

Geen sprake van slachtofferbejegening of toegang tot degelijke juridische bijstand voor slachtoffers in België op vandaag. De OVB blokkeert dergelijke bijstand in naam van haar leden, de Balies en de BJB's. In hun handelen blijft de OVB de Staat en de slachtoffers als uit te persen citroenen behandelen.

de beleidsnota van de minister van justitie

Op 04/02/2025 leest de minister van justitie haar beleidsnota van 22/01/2026 voor in het parlement. Daarin geeft ze op typisch politiek cryptische manier aan dat:

In overleg met de balies zorgen we, samen met de minister bevoegd voor gelijke kansen, ervoor dat slachtoffers van intrafamiliaal- en seksueel geweld beroep kunnen doen op juridische bijstand zodat we hen beter kunnen informeren over hun rechten en opties van bij het begin. Hiertoe wordt een systeem van permanentie georganiseerd binnen de advocatuur, zodat deze slachtoffers, 24/7 de nodige gespecialiseerde juridische ondersteuning kunnen krijgen.

De bespreking is volgende week, maar, nu al liet de oppositie verstaan dat het mooie ronkende verklaringen zijn die gezien de beknibbelde beschikbare budgetten een gebrek aan materiële uitvoering zullen kennen. Geen geld voor slachtoffers !

voor de juridische knutselaar

In afwachting kan de juridische knutselaar aan de slag. En dat is mogelijks wat de Coördinator van het LVA programma op knoeiende manier beoogde.

Één van de doelen van art. 508/14 is de rechtzoekenden bij spoedeisendheid, zonder bij voorbaat bevestiging van gerechtigdheid op tweedelijnsbijstand, toch al een gratis advocaat bezorgen. De OVB, BJB controleur zijnde, houdt met dat mogelijke aspect in haar antwoord blijkbaar geen rekening …

In spoedeisende gevallen kan door het bureau voor juridische bijstand het voordeel van de gedeeltelijke of volledige kosteloosheid voorlopig worden toegekend aan de aanvrager zonder overlegging van alle of een deel van de bewijsstukken bedoeld in de artikelen 508/13, 508/13/1 en 508/13/2, eerste en achtste lid. In dat geval moet de aanvrager de bewijsstukken overleggen binnen een termijn bepaald door het bureau voor juridische bijstand die niet meer bedraagt dan vijftien dagen te rekenen vanaf de dag van de beslissing. Indien de bewijsstukken niet worden ingediend binnen die termijn, wordt de juridische bijstand van rechtswege beëindigd.

Alleen is dat dan een advocaat die op dat moment wachtdienst uitoefent. Met zo'n 300 opgeleide advocaten in de pool van zo'n 11.000 advocaten moet je heeeeel veeeeel geluk hebben om toevallig op een wachtdienst advocaat te vallen die iets van kennis heeft van zaken seksueel geweld op minderjarigen.

Mocht de OVB of haar Balies echt juridische bijstand van slachtoffers serieus nemen, dan zijn er andere opties.

Art. 508/23 geeft de stafhouder de bevoegdheid om zonder keuzevrijheid een advocaat aan te duiden.

In de gevallen die hij spoedeisend acht, wijst de stafhouder een advocaat aan die is ingeschreven op de in artikel 508/7 bedoelde lijst en geeft hij hiervan kennis aan het bureau.

Daarin is art. 508/22 nog beter:

Wanneer de persoon die moet worden bijgestaan niet voldoet aan de in artikel 508/13 bedoelde voorwaarden betreffende de bestaansmiddelen, wijst de stafhouder naar keuze van die persoon een advocaat aan. In de gevallen die hij spoedeisend acht, wijst de stafhouder een advocaat aan die deelneemt aan de in artikel 508/7 bedoelde wachtdiensten.

(Artikel 446ter) is van toepassing op de honoraria van deze advocaat.

Ingeval de bijgestane persoon nalaat of weigert te betalen, wordt aan de ambtshalve toegevoegde advocaat een rijksvergoeding toegekend wegens de werkzaamheden waarvoor de toevoeging heeft plaatsgehad.

In geval van gedeeltelijke betaling van de honoraria door de bijgestane persoon wordt de vergoeding verminderd met het betaalde bedrag.

“wijst de stafhouder naar keuze van die persoon een advocaat aan” voor zij die “moeten worden bijgestaan”. Niet dat een Stafhouder in België ooit de idee genegen is geweest om slachtoffers, die zich bijvoorbeeld bij een ZSG melden, van enige bekwame juridische bijstand te voorzien.

Over het “moet worden bijgestaan” hebben wij het uitgebreid in de komende weken. Internationaal recht verplicht dat slachtoffers van seksueel geweld op minderjarigen en hun omgeving zouden juridisch bijgestaan worden vanaf het eerste moment. Die voor de Staat net zoals voor de OVB en haar leden diepgaand beschamende waarheid verdient te worden verteld.

en toch … ?

Alle begin is moeilijk … ? Dit jaar ligt dat “moeilijke begin” 30 jaar geleden, met de Witte Mars en de zaak Dutroux.

Vooralsnog leven we nog steeds in een walhalla ten voordele van straffeloosheid voor de daders … Wie weet welke toekomst de financieel krachtigen bekokstoven voor slachtoffers? We houden jullie op de hoogte.

Het wassende later

Die ellendige kwaal komt compleet met een pakket aan misere de zeurende pijn in de nek, onderbuik en bij u edele derrière het is zowaar een aantasting van u hele wezen Maar wees gerust nog voor u sterft zullen ze u genezen

Ze zullen er alles uithalen wat u elke dag kunt missen desnoods sommen uit de pot voor de erfenis grissen ze zullen er naar kijken er op af gaan en evenzo studeren en nog net voor u de pijp uitgaat het noodlot keren

U zult gezond liggen rusten op het allerlaatste stekje dat fraai bewerkte buitenaardse met rust versierde plekje u hoeft alleen nog maar de juiste handtekeningen te zetten dan hoeft u als het eenmaal over is nergens meer op te letten

Het is niet echt slecht maar zeker ook niet goed er zitten weer allemaal onvoldoendes in het bloed het kost wat tijd, moeite maar wees niet bang Ze zullen u nog voor de dood redden van de ondergang

Echt waar je moet enkel de pijn van de behandeling doorstaan dan kunt u dankzij onze duchtige inzet nog jaren doorgaan het kost gedonder is heel lastig komt in angst en met beven maar dan gaat u voor het onvermijdelijke heel fit door het leven

...tja, ik ben momenteel ook maar ingevroren, zou op zich nog wel alle kanten op kunnen maar niet één daarvan vrijwillig...

I've come to feel that any belief, philosophy, or endeavor taken too seriously causes extreme harm. The most benevolent religious commitments taken to the extreme go completely off the rails, as do the most reasonable philosophies taken to their furthest logical conclusions. Even attempting to do no harm perfectly is likely to do immense harm, albeit in some unexpected way.

I'm self-conscious that it's taken me so long to see this, because it seems so obvious now. It only became clear after learning a bit about Nietzsche's criticism of philosophical stoicism, including that it leads adherents to act callously toward others and forego the most important challenges in life. I haven't noticed stoicism encouraging that kind of attitude, but when taken to its extreme, perhaps it does! That's one more reason for me to proceed with relative caution, rather than thoughtlessly adopting the worst of that worldview. Learning more about cults, in particular the Heaven's Gate UFO suicide cult, also helped me see this. Cult members, even those who commit terrible acts—especially those who commit terrible acts!—are not evil or stupid. In fact, they're often very intelligent and they almost always have the best intentions. They're just extremely committed.

If you find yourself in the 99^th percentile of some endeavor, stop, slow down, and re-evaluate. A little common sense goes a long way, and at that high level of attainment, that's what you need most.

#Favorites #Life #Maxims

Every morning my son and I walk to daycare through quiet streets.

We have one rule, his rule: when we see a dog, we stop and we look.

Some days we see the man with three St. Bernards. A woman with two Bernese Mountain Dogs. Last Friday she only had one. We looked worried.

“Tiberius is sick today. He will be around next week.”

When a big dog appears, my son kicks his legs and looks at me with an expression that says are you seeing this.

We do not care for small dogs.

We started keeping count. Three or more was a good start to the day.

But the question we could not shake: which route has the most dogs?

The Grid

The grid: six streets north-south, four avenues east-west. Street E is the main road. We can only cross it at the lights. Everything else is fair game.

Twelve valid routes from home to daycare, each shaped by where we can cross.

We had no data.

I needed a way to pick a random route, count dogs as I walked, and see the results later. The Garmin on my wrist could do all of it.

The Build

He was napping.

I wanted a Garmin app that would tell me which way to go, count dogs with up and down buttons for false positives or dogs deemed too small, and sync to a dashboard on my laptop.

Garmin apps are written in MonkeyC. MonkeyDo runs them. I chose Python and Django for the backend. The watch would sync through the Garmin Connect app.

The watch needed to pick a random route. We can only cross Street E at the lights on 4th and 2nd. Everything else is fair game. I mapped twenty-four possible routes.

I worked on the spec and tried to catch any edge cases, what happens when there's no connection? How do I know which leg of the route I'm on?

I fed it into Claude Code's planning mode. Reviewed. Then enabled yolo mode and let it run.

The app worked in the simulator on the first try. We adjusted fonts and configured ngrok so data could flow from watch to server.

I synced a test walk. The terminal lit up. The dashboard updated.

One kilometer. Ten dogs. Ten seconds.

Test data. Ten dogs in ten seconds would be a miracle, a stampede, or the best day ever.

The Walk

I deployed it to the Raspberry Pi that weekend and tested the sync one more time. Then we went on with our weekend.

Monday morning. First real test.

My son in the stroller. Watch on my wrist showing Route 1. Left for 200 metres.

We walked. I watched for dogs. He pointed at trees, birds, a crack in the sidewalk.

No dogs.

Not one.

The entire route, start to finish, and not a single dog. No St. Bernards. No Tiberius. No doodles. Not even the small ones we ignore.

I ended the walk. The watch synced. The dashboard updated.

Total walks: one. Total dogs: zero.