Didn’t hit zero last night, officially it was 13, however in our neck of the woods I saw 11 about 0700, when it seems to hit the lowest, just before sunrise.

Yesterday I went on a rant about bullying, and completely forgot the reason I first thought of it – besides seeing these college kids who can’t seem to handle anything.

We have four humming birds wintering over.  There is always one that is domineering and tries to drive off any of the others that come near the feeder – in the summer that isn’t too bad, we have enough out that when one starts chasing the others off they go to another feeder – which of course he also claims.

However, there is enough and enough birds to keep him busy so everyone gets their fill.

Not so now, we have just one feeder out, because, in this weather, that is all we can keep from freezing up.

Yesterday we had the littlest one sitting on his perch eating, when the bully came and tried to drive him off.  At least one of the other two was also trying to eat and he would chase him away.

But the little guy clung on and kept drinking – the bully came in and started pecking him, the little guy just hunkered down more – which drove the bully mad – he tried to force him off by going underneath him, then actually sitting on him while pecking him.

Carla went out and the bully took off for a few minutes, the little guy stayed, she came back in, looked over at the feeder and saw that he had flown away – meanwhile the bully was perched in an arch where he could watch the feeder.

We have always had the bullies, but this is the first time I have seen – although I have been told – of these tactics.  They can and do kill the other birds if they don’t submit.

People will say it is just the survival of the fittest, the animals determining who is at the top of the pecking order and dominate and who will submit to that animal.

And, of course, that is true.  Still it churns the emotions and angers up when we see it to such a vicious degree.

We can’t take out the domineering guy, they are too fast and since they are so similar we don’t want to get the wrong one.

The others will have to deal with it.

And then we have some college kids cringing and thinking they have it rough because someone said something to them....... how may I ask are they going to deal with REAL adversity?

Okay, enough of that.

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“The psalmists often wrote in tears, the prophets could hardly conceal their heavyheartedness, and the apostle Paul in his otherwise joyous epistle to the Philippians broke into tears when he thought of the many who were enemies of the cross of Christ and whose end was destruction. Those Christian leaders who shook the world were one and all men of sorrows whose witness to mankind welled out of heavy hearts. There is no power in tears per se, but tears and power ever lie close together in the Church of the First-born....

The whole Christian family stands desperately in need of a restoration of penitence, humility and tears. May God send them soon. “  AW Tozer

Philippians 3:18-19  (For many walk, of whom I have told you often, and now tell you even weeping, that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ:

¹⁹ Whose end is destruction, whose God is their belly, and whose glory is in their shame, who mind earthly things.)

I wish I could tell you when the last time I cried over the lost was, I can’t.

My main focus is my family, both by relative and those that are my kin in the family of God.

I often forget that the lost souls are lost and the Christians that have slipped away are even in more danger of eternal damnation.

I do witness whenever possible, I willingly and gladly share my faith in God, but weeping over lost souls is much more than that.

It takes energy, it takes commitment, it takes determination to concentrate on the lost in prayer and when we do we should realize just how lost they are, and cry over their predicament.

Through the years I have dealt with families of people who are lost in our county.  Whether it be a possible drowning or lost in the woods or, like one 3 year old, lost in an orchard – in every case the family is distraught.

They are fearful of what has happened to their loved one, they hope and pray and cry, because they are so afraid of what might have happened.

That is the kind of weeping Paul was talking about.

I need to do the same.

Later, Art (-: