Location, location, location are the three rules of Real Estate.  I have found this true in my own life as a homeowner, and all the way to eternity.

The other week our pastor was going through a study in Nehemiah about rebuilding the wall around Jerusalem.  Not making a political statement about walls here, but my cartoonist brain pictured Nehemiah looking like a certain president who I won't name (but rhymes with BUMP) in building this wall and having Persia pay for it.

The rebuilding of this wall detailed in Nehemiah 3 included a number of gates. There was the Fish Gate, Old City Gate, Valley Gate, Fountain Gate, and <insert drum roll here>.. the DUNG Gate.

Now I can see building a home in a new development at 2003 Fountain Gate Circle, or living in a 2-story home at the end of a cul-de-sac at 156 Old City Gate Way, or a split level home on 1 acre of land at 927 Fish Gate Drive, maybe a fixer-upper at 633 Valley Gate Place, but a home address of 102 Dung Gate Rd?  I guess that is where people lived before they could live on the 'wrong side of the tracks'.

Over my almost 62 years I have lived in  a number of homes and locations, and my wife and I have now have settled into a town-home near our kids and grand-kids.  I jokingly call it our final resting place.. meaning I DON'T WANT TO MOVE NO MORE!

​I have never lived the so called 'good life' in a high status neighborhood, but God has been good and every house we have lived is blessed with good memories (and a few bad) of faith, family, and friends.

​Of course some day we all have the promise of Heaven.  

You could say Heaven is a (Pearly) gated community where all are invited, but.. only those who choose Jesus Christ may enter.  He is the ONE WAY to Heaven, not one of many ways so it matters what we believe and where we place our faith.

My prayer today is that your location in life includes Jesus Christ. It matters not to God if the location of your physical home today is a mansion or you are literally on the wrong side of the tracks. Our true home and joy should not found in the approval of man, but the approval of your Heavenly Father.

May God bless and use you greatly today even if you live at 102 Dung Gate Rd.

Jeff (Down-sized) Larson

- can't you just hear the Led Zeppelin Worship Band playing?

In Heaven is my mom with no more pain, glasses, hearing aides, diabetes, walker.  This makes me smile.

This makes me ponder my Heaven Already day. No more back pain, bi-focals, hearing aides, arthritis, or any of the many other ailments I am prone to mumble about. I think I have even been operating for a few years with my personal 'check engine light on'. 
So on my Heaven Already Day I will be..  Jeff 2.0  I can't wait for the upgrade!

Well, I cannot stop Father time.. or in my case grandfather time.  I will be 60 in 10 days, and if the calendar did not tell me that.. my body reminds me often.

I can't complain though, or rather I shouldn't complain.  I am in many ways healthier than I was even just a few years ago.  My blood pressure is very good, my weight is down 35 lbs from it's high water mark of 257, and I no longer drink alcohol (should'a figured that one out a long time ago).  Now on the flip side, I now have hearing aides, a stronger bi-focaled eye prescription, and I describe through exaggeration my spine as a shaken up can of Pringles.

I am not complaining.. I guess most would not say lovely and Hell in the same sentence, but as a cartoonist it means I was working on cartoons regarding the 'other' land down under.. WAY DOWN UNDER.  These cartoons all reside in my BP HELL page.  

So while the sun shines brightly here on a warm summer day in Minnesota I am in my office airbrushing Satan a nice a shiny red, and tidying up the road to Hell (Route 666).