Daily Photo Parable

Photo and Commentary ©2025 by Russell Jurgensen
Thursday, May 1, 2025

The new Ocean Pavillion at the Seattle Aquarium has a large tank with large viewing ports that make you feel right up close to the action. Manta rays pass by regularly with a friendly elegance.

It made me think about getting up close with God and this verse seemed to convey some of the feeling I had at the aquarium.

Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will grow to become in every respect the mature body of him who is the head, that is, Christ.

Ephesians 4:15

It makes sense that speaking the truth with love can be a key that allows us to grow closer to Jesus. If you think about people who have a truly admirable elegance, they probably have an aspect of honesty.

I like how the new fish tanks let us see more, just like Jesus wants us to be honest and up close.

Photo and Commentary ©2025 by Robert Howson
Tuesday and Wednesday, April 29 and 30, 2025

Quiz question: What do King Uzziah, Naaman, and this armadillo have in common? And no, the answer is not that they were not very smart, or that they were all hard-headed. While this might be true, the answer we are looking for is that they all had, or could have leprosy. In fact, the armadillo is the only animal besides humans that can carry Hansen’s disease or leprosy. The Nine-banded Armadillo is the species we have in the United States, but several other species live elsewhere in the Americas. Although it is referred to as having nine bands, this number may vary anywhere from seven to eleven. But the armadillo part, which means “little armored one” in Spanish, is derived from the keratinized epidermal scales which offer it protection. It entered the United States in the late 1800s and is still expanding its range today and has reached northward as far as Illinois and Indiana.

Although feared during biblical times, each year there are between 150 to 200 cases of leprosy reported in the United States, some of which may have been transmitted through contact with armadillos. Fortunately the disease is now able to be treated if caught early and since 95% of the people are already immune to leprosy, the danger of catching it through inter-species contact is minimal. Still, they can be used for medical research on this illness.

Other oddities which set this animal apart include the fact that it can cross rivers by inflating its intestines, or alternatively, by sinking and running across the bed of the river. It is able to do so because it has the ability to hold its breath for six minutes, a quality also useful when foraging for insects buried in the soil. But unlike some of its southern relatives, it is not capable of rolling into a ball for protection. And lastly, they always give birth to a litter of identical quadruplets developed from a single egg.

How vast and wonderful is creation, the works of His hands which show infinite wisdom and love of the exception. This means you and I are included in that list because we each possess qualities which make us unique.

Photo ©2009 and Commentary ©2025 by Chuck Davis
Monday, April 28, 2025

NEW PHOTO PARABLE BLOGGER! After many years as our church website’s Monday Daily Photo Parable blogger, Cheryl Boardman has hung up her camera (so to speak). Thanks, Cheryl, for each of your thoughtful devotionals! Replacing her is Charles “Chuck” Davis, whose bass-baritone is sometimes heard for special music, but who is also a wilderness-lover and superb photographer. (The beautiful scenery on our church website’s home page is his work.) Beginning today, Chuck’s blogs will show up each Monday in this spot. Welcome, Chuck! – Pastor Maylan

CHUCK WRITES: The high point on the Summit Lake Trail provided a “Front Row Seat” with a stunning view of Mount Rainier. The location and a tripod led to a self-portrait. Photographs allow us to capture moments in time and help us to preserve the memories of places that we visit. The mountains are my favorite place to read from God’s second book. When we spend enough time alone in the wilderness, we cannot fail to hear God speak.

Jesus spent 40 days alone in the wilderness. During those days with his Father, Jesus must have captured mental photographs and memories that sustained Him all the way to the cross.

Find time with Christ to form memories that will carry you through those times that you truly feel alone. In John 14, we learn, that if He goes away, He will come again… Trust that while He is away, He is preparing a “Front Row Seat” for you, one with a view that will be so much grander than that of Mt. Rainier.

Photo and Commentary ©2025 by Shelley Schurch
Sunday, April 27, 2025

We’re going to need new carpeting. Ooof. Sounds like big decisions, big effort, and big money to me! However, being a homeowner means you at least get to choose your carpet’s type and color.

I well remember the carpet in the first of the five homes we’ve rented; it was a bold blue. We didn’t have much furniture at the time, but none of what we did have played well with that carpet.

Years later, a friend who was in the midst of buying and furnishing a large new home for her growing family commented that they would definitely choose a carpet color other than “renters’ beige.” She had never seen our renters’ blue!

My favorite carpets appear annually, and I can’t resist pausing several times on our daily walks to document them. They bring me such delight. My photo above gives you one glimpse.

I think of these carpets as “strewn petals,” as if some little flower girl has walked through our neighborhood, practicing for her role in an upcoming wedding.

And yes, this reminds me of Jesus:

They brought the donkey and the colt and placed their cloaks on them for Jesus to sit on. A very large crowd spread their cloaks on the road, while others cut branches from the trees and spread them on the road.

The crowds that went ahead of him and those that followed shouted,
“Hosanna to the Son of David!”
“Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!
“Hosanna in the highest heaven!”

When Jesus entered Jerusalem, the whole city was stirred and asked, “Who is this?”
The crowds answered, “This is Jesus, the prophet from Nazareth in Galilee.”
(Matthew 21:7-11 NIV)

Jesus entered Jerusalem as King, and within a week the crowds cried out, “Crucify Him!” He staggered, bruised and bleeding, under the weight of His death cross – no cloaks and branches carpeted His path to Calvary.

But that was not the end. Christians throughout the world have recently celebrated the triumphant truth of His resurrection. We look forward more and more to the day He returns to take us to our true home.

And when the Chief Shepherd appears, you will receive the crown of glory that will never fade away. (I Peter 5:4)

I picture one more carpet, gold and glittering. When Jesus gives us crowns of glory, I believe our reflex action will be to cast them down at His feet, knowing He alone is worthy of wearing such a crown. All the glory belongs to Him, and our carpet of crowns will declare that golden truth.

As we step out into this brand-new week, whatever carpets may cushion your feet, remember that someday we will walk on streets of gold. Until that day, He walks beside us, all the way Home.

Photo and Commentary ©2025 by Maylan Schurch
Sabbath, April 26, 2025

When I was growing up on the prairies of South Dakota, I would read stories which happened in distant lands. Once in a while the stories would mention the ginkgo tree, and since we didn’t have them in the Dakotas (at least nobody pointed them out to me), I regarded them with awe, assuming I would never see one unless I became a foreign missionary.

When we moved to our current home a couple of decades ago, I was pleasantly surprised to discover two such trees in the neighborhood where we live. One of them has disappeared — probably landscaped out of existence in favor of a new concept. The other still stands, and it’s been fun to watch its leaves renew and grow each spring.

If, like me, you’ve not been exposed to ginkgos, you can see that one remaining one in the above photo I took Friday of this week. What has intrigued me about the leaves is that they don’t look like other trees’ leaves. Instead, they unfurl into a trumpet shape.

It makes me wonder about the leaves — and the fruit — of another exotic tree, the Tree of Life. It’s mentioned first in Genesis 2:9, but once Adam and Eve ate the fruit of another and forbidden tree, they were sent away from Eden.

The Tree of Life shows up again, however, in Revelation 22:1, 2 [NKJV]. The setting is the New Earth:

And he showed me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding from the throne of God and of the Lamb. In the middle of its street, and on either side of the river, was the tree of life, which bore twelve fruits, each tree yielding its fruit every month. The leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations.

How those leaves actually do “heal the nations” we’re not sure. But they must be fascinatingly therapeutic. This makes me want to eat that tree’s fruit, and pluck those leaves.

Check out some more heart-tingling Bible passages about Heaven in the link just below.

https://www.bibleinfo.com/en/topics/heaven

Photo and Commentary ©2025 by Maylan Schurch
Friday, April 25, 2025

Wednesday morning of this week I was striding along on my post-breakfast walk when I saw a couple of neighborhood friends. I stopped to chat with them for a bit, and then to make up time I took this shortcut back home.

This is a pleasant walkway, made possible because beneath the path you see on the right, are one and possibly two large water pipes, leading from Lake Young’s Reservoir behind the camera down toward whatever water treatment plant will make the water drinkable.

See those houses on the left? They are separated from the walkway either by wooden fences or – in the case of the center house – a thick hedge. And you’ll notice that while the other homeowners don’t bother mowing the grass margin, because it’s not their property, the hedge people do their best – and they do this every year – to carefully mow the grass all the way up to the path.

I’ve often wondered why they do this. It’s not really a benefit to the path-walkers – we normally just trudge along the gravel, intent upon getting where we’re going. And I don’t see any easy way to get a riding lawnmower through the hedge, so they must use a regular mower. But barbering the grass in this way seems to give satisfaction to the homeowners. They’re going above and beyond what they need to do.

This makes me think of many Christians I have known. They’re not content to do the minimum, cover the bases, conserving their serving. No, real Christians (Christ-ians) follow Jesus’ example, who extended His love and finally His life to cover the sins of the world.

That is true greatness, of course. To read two Bible verses about this, click the link just below:

https://www.bibleinfo.com/en/topics/greatness

Photo and Commentary ©2025 by Russell Jurgensen
Thursday, April 24, 2025

The Skagit tulip growing area offers amazing expressions of God’s handiwork. It takes planning and hard work to grow fields of flowers like this. So, it is God’s gifts along with action by people that makes it possible.

In looking for a verse about flowers, this one seemed intriguing.

The grass withers and the flowers fall, but the word of our God endures forever.
Isaiah 40:8

Things are temporary but important when judged against God’s word. That is why we need to continually adjust and keep finding ways to apply good principles to the way we interact with others. In doing so we can find expressions of beauty around us.