Greetings and Salutations,
Surprise, we still have snow on the ground in our neck of the woods. AND a lot of it. I can’t get a fix on just how much we have had – we measure after storms, but some snow has melted down to a degree and thus gives us false readings – but, it has to be almost three feet total. 
Probably as much as we had in 1996 and 1997’s 100 year storms.
Temperatures are low and are suppose to remain that way, so we are trusting that the run off will be minimal and the moisture will seep into the ground without causing flooding.
Our school district has closed the schools for snow days for 7 or 8 days, that has to be close if not a record. Today they started 2 hours later.
I can’t remember snow days in our schools growing up and neither do friends I have been in contact with, but then I was in Central Oregon where the snow is drier and people are more prepared for the weather.
The snow here can be very dangerous. It becomes very icy and slick. Even tire chains can sometimes not do the job.
Many of our back roads are narrow and very hilly. The county does a good job, but when you have snow after snow storms it is difficult to make the road safe; it just builds up with ice.
Through the years I had probably ‘investigated’ hundreds of accidents in this area due to the hazardous driving conditions.
Unless someone was injured or a serious violation occurred, we didn’t have the time to actually investigate the accidents, we just helped in the exchange of information; and went on to the next accident scene.
Those days, for me, are passed and to be honest, I don’t really miss that part of the job.
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Ephesians 3:19 KJV “And to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fulness of God.”
From my in-box today:
“Pentecost means that the Deity came to mankind to give Himself to man, that man might breathe Him in as he breathes in the air, that He might fill men. Dr. A. B. Simpson used an illustration which was about as good as any I ever heard. He said, "Being filled with the fullness of God is like a bottle in the ocean. You take the cork out of the bottle and sink it in the ocean, and you have the bottle completely full of ocean. The bottle is in the ocean, and the ocean is in the bottle. The ocean contains the bottle, but the bottle contains only a little bit of the ocean. So it is with the Christian."
We are filled unto the fullness of God, but, of course, we cannot contain all of God because God contains us; but we can have all of God that we can contain. If we only knew it, we could enlarge our vessel. The vessel gets bigger as we go on with God.” Tozer
The world is so large it is hard to fathom the size. There are so many people in the world we cannot comprehend what that means.
We can imagine, we can use examples, photos, testimonies of those that have traveled in many parts of the world and have seen hundreds of thousands of people who have gathered together, but even that pales in comparison to reality.
I can remember the Sunday School chorus, “How Great is our God, He’s the greatest God that ever was heard, He rolled back the water of the mighty Red Sea...”
God created the universe, even if we limit our ‘thinking’ of God to earth we are still not understanding just how Great our God really is; the vastness of our God.
We live our lives in our own neck of the woods, we work, play, eat, love and exist in a small part of the world – even if it means we travel to different parts of the states or even the world, we still only absorb a small sampling of life on our planet.
Unfortunately, we often treat God the same way. We limit Him to the things we know or are familiar with; we don’t comprehend the size of His love, grace, power or holiness.
We treat Him like He was a small part of our world, but haven’t the experience or knowledge to understand how big He really is or what He can do in our lives.
We have an idea of what He can do in our lives, but we limit Him with our knowledge of Him because we don’t understand what He is truly capable of doing.
However, as we learn more about Him, we can grow; we can learn more and more how to trust Him, how to understand that He will help us in all situations, and He will guide us in all our endeavors.
We need to trust the Holy Spirit. We need to study and listen and then allow Him to work in our lives.
The closer we get to Him, the better we can work with Him. When He tells us to do something we don’t need to have Him shout, just to quietly nudge us and we will respond to Him.
Many years ago, I had a suspect in a burglary that I was interviewing. I had made up my mind to arrest him and as I started to say he was under arrest another officer, my backup, started handcuffing him.
Later, I asked him how he knew that I was about to put the suspect under arrest – he said, “just before you arrest someone you rub your hands together and then tell him he is under arrest.”
I want to be so entuned with the Holy Spirit that I instinctively know when I need to do something for God, I want to be so close I can see what He means for me to do when He rubs His hands – and then do it.
Later, Art (-:

More snow has been coming down on us in our neck of the woods. We were supposed to get between 2-4 inches, it should have read 2 TIMES 4 inches as that is almost what we have received ‘so far.’
It took me almost and hour to get the path to the pickup and cleaning the pickup so Carla could get to work, and then path in a loop around the front yard. 
I use the path to reach the bird feeders and to give Blaze some room to wander and do his business. Part of the problem was that the snow continued to come down and covered my tracks.
It let up a little while ago so I put the bird food out, now if I can keep all four-legged animals away from it – in addition to the dinner we have been visited with a squirrel. 
Steven and CeeCee were up here yesterday so she got to see some deer close up – through the living room window – about 20 feet away.
It is warm enough now, and no snow is falling, that it is slowly melting the snow from the tree limbs and the cement. However, we shall be receiving more.
Rose, our granddaughter, is going to school in Arizona, they get some snow where she is at, but a couple days ago they had a record of 36 inches of snow in a 24-hour period.
Rose and I have had conversations about how much rain is a downpour, etc. and how it is a relative term (she grew up in the Coos Bay area on the coast – I have always lived in eastern Oregon where we get around a foot or snow of moisture most years) – haven’t heard from her, yet, but I am curious to see if she thinks they have a lot of snow, or just a bit.
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1 Corinthians 12:4-6 KJV “ Now there are diversities of gifts, but the same Spirit.
5 And there are differences of administrations, but the same Lord.
6 And there are diversities of operations, but it is the same God which worketh all in all.
Each Christian has a God given gift that, when used correctly, can be used for the glory of God.
What we have to be careful about is that the natural gift we have can be relied on to the point where we leave God out of the process.
A good public speaker has natural abilities, he can express himself clearly and with understanding. He may be able to energize people, may be able to encourage and uplift with his gift; but it doesn’t have the impact it will have with the power of the Holy Spirit when he seeks out God to help Him.
The gift can be used to the detriment of God, a good example is Hitler in WW11, he used his gift to lead people into a chasm of horror and evil that almost destroyed the world.
While that is something most of us will not have the opportunity to do, it is still being done today, we just have to look at the political situation in America to see that.
We can rely so much on the gift, we forget the giver. When that happens, we have no real power behind our words.
We may say the right things, we may even convince others on our point of view, but if we leave God out, then they do not have the impact they would have had we sought God out first.
There are many gifts, we must first ascertain what ours is, then have a sincere discussion with God as to how to use it for His glory. 
Asking the Holy Spirit to help and guide us, to make our activity not only pleasing to God, but leading others to see Him in our gift; not just once, but daily.
That gift could be that of a good mechanic, or electrician, or teacher, or grocery clerk, nurse, doctor, teacher, administrator and the list goes on.
Acknowledging the gift comes from God helps us understand that we are a tool of God who is being used through our gifts, to bring others to Him.
Exodus 36:1-2 kjv “Then wrought Bezaleel and Aholiab, and every wise hearted man, in whom the LORD put wisdom and understanding to know how to work all manner of work for the service of the sanctuary, according to all that the LORD had commanded.
2 And Moses called Bezaleel and Aholiab, and every wise hearted man, in whose heart the LORD had put wisdom, even every one whose heart stirred him up to come unto the work to do it:”
You do not have to be a great preacher or missionary to serve God.
You just have to use your gift under the guidance of The Holy Spirit and He will be glorified.
Later, Art (-: