I used to think that clean hands came from wiping them on my jeans… then I encountered soap and water. Recently I’ve learnt that clean hands come by washing whist singing the national anthem and then applying hand-sanitiser… as if I’m preparing for some surgical procedure… Cleanliness? Mental re-alignment!
I’ve been transporting boxes of old tools – saws, spanners, drills, sanders… They’ve been unused, gathering dust and rust in garages. They’ll be sent to ‘Tools with a Mission’… cleaned, refurbished, sorted into trade tool kits and sent to the developing world for livelihood creation.
TWAM sends around 18 containers filled with a total of around 225 tonnes of tools every year. Unwanted tools? Livelihood creation! Mental re-alignment…
I’ve been reading ‘alternative’ views of history… Was Christopher Columbus a courageous adventurer whose voyages of discovery brought civilisation and trade… or was he a murderous mercenary, raping and pillaging, inflicting brutality and slavery?
And inspirational wartime leader Winston Churchill… during the famine in Bengal… diverting food to British soldiers whilst 4 million Indians starved… blaming the deaths on Indians for overbreeding… saying: ‘I hate the Indians. They are beastly people with a beastly religion.’
More mental re-alignment.
This morning I read of Balaam and his Donkey. Today it’s my favourite Bible story.
Balaam’s riding Donkey to see king Balak. Suddenly Donkey bolts off the road into a field. Balaam beats Donkey. They continue…
The road narrows between two walls. Donkey leaves the middle of the road and crushes Balaam’s foot against a wall. Balaam’s cross. Donkey’s beaten again. They continue…
The road gets narrower. Donkey lies down. Balaam’s furious. Donkey’s beaten again… Donkey speaks: ‘Why have you beat me?’ There’s a Balaam-Donkey conversation…
Balaam’s still furious… Then he sees an angel, with a sword in his hand, standing in the roadway. All the time Donkey has seen what Balaam couldn’t see…
Balaam’s mental- re-alignment…
Musing… the God who works unseen in miraculous and unexpected ways… making Donkey wiser than a religious prophet…
malcolmsmusings.org 
Very good. You’re certainly giving our brain cells a good work out with this Mental Re-Alignment theme over the last couple of days. Please keep up the good work, Malcom
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Thanks Chris. I just love the Balaam story. It challenges me on all sorts of fronts!
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