Necklaces and Joyce Meyer

“Each one should use whatever gift he has received to serve others, faithfully administering God’s grace in its various forms.”  1 Peter 4:10

Ok, so I made this necklace.  We have a lot of selenite crystals (as you can imagine) from our days at the Great Salt Plains, so I’m trying to figure out what I could do with them.  We also had some nice rocks that were picked up by my children at the Gem Dig at the Tulsa Zoo and even more from the panning station at Silver Dollar City.  We have a rock habit that we just can’t shake! 

I caught a show on PBS the other day about wire wrapping and hammering wire and such, and like with all shows I watch on TV, I thought “I could do that.”  So I tried it.  It almost killed my fingers, but it worked out pretty nice, I think.  Even the hub was impressed. 

And like all good Facebook friends who try something new and succeed, I posted a picture of my accomplishment.

My friend from church said, “I need that…. Seriously.” 

I thought okay, I can do that.  It’s my first try, and if she likes it that much, then it’s hers!

So then I’m flipping through the channels last Friday night and I run across Joyce Meyer.  Now I’m not a regular watcher, but I occasionally try to keep up on my televangelists to dispel rumors and such.  I’ve watched her a few times and found her to be an interesting subject.  I need to read up on her and figure out more about her. 

Anyway, moments into my running across her on TV, she says, “If God tells you to give something away, it is no longer anointed for you!” 

I said, “Holy cow!  I think she’s talking about my necklace!” 

Then she tells a story of how she had a bracelet that she really liked and felt compelled to give it to a friend, but then she had remorse over giving it away and hounded the friend about how much she liked it until the friend said that God was telling her to give it back to Joyce.  And then she never wore it again because it had lost its luster to her.  She said she kept it as a reminder that God had used that bracelet to teach her a lesson. 

So then I was thinking that I for sure had to give that necklace to my friend at church!!

I wore the necklace to church on Sunday and everyone gushed over it and I told them I made it and yada yada yada.  But then I ran into my friend and told her it was really her necklace because Joyce Meyer had told me that I had to give it to her! 

She was confused. 

I’m sometimes confusing. 

I told her the whole story and she thought it as bizarre as I did, but said I should wear the necklace until the end of the service, and then she would get it from me.  She hugged me, and thanked me, and then we took our respective places – me in my pew, and she as a song leader.

And that would be the end of the story, except for the fact that our church has all sorts of fascinating little tidbits of information in the bulletins.  They list the elders and upcoming events and ushers for the week and such, and they also list the week’s birthdays. 

And guess whose birthday it was?  My friend’s. 

I gave her the necklace at the end of the service and told her I couldn’t believe it was her birthday!!  I told her THAT was even a little bit too weird for me even! 

And I think I heard God laughing…

Again!

My Nursing Home Plan

“Rise in the presence of the aged, show respect for the elderly and revere your God.  I am the Lord.”  Leviticus 19:32

I always say that I had children so I would have someone to put me in a nice nursing home someday.  I have no denials about getting old and needing round-the-clock convalescent care.  In fact, I intend to be a huge burden!  Most likely I will lose my mind, but no one will really be able to tell the difference.  And I intend to start drinking once I enter the nursing home.  I’m going straight for the hard liquor.  I figure if, by then, I will have held off for 80 years or so, what’s the use in holding out any longer?  Plus, maybe it will make my days go faster. 

I worked in the kitchen at a nursing home for about four years during my teenage hood, so I have no myths or false assumptions about what a nursing home entails.  And, I have every intent of using every amenity to the best of my ability.  In fact, sometimes I wish I had one of those emergency nurse buttons now.  She could bring me a drink of water when I’m already in bed… 

Anyhow, Grandma Hazel has been in a nursing home or like facility for numerous years, but due to failing condition and several episodes, she has moved several times in the past couple of years.  The kids and I have visited her at least once at each of the facilities she’s been at.  The first was an assisted living facility and had a big dog that the kids liked to pet.  The second was a “memory” facility where one lady asked my youngest if his name was Thomas at least 97 times while we were there because he was wearing a Thomas the Train shirt.  The third was more of a nursing home facility that had birds in a glass cabinet that the residents could sit and watch.  And her current facility is homey and has a giant fish aquarium in one of the sitting areas. 

Yes, some of the people are scary.  Yes, they are desperate for visitors.  Yes, you can sometimes smell pee.  Let’s just get all that out there!  I think those are the usual reasons people tend to shy away from regular visits to the nursing home. 

So on Monday night, my 7YO tells me, “Mommy, I love you.  I’ll make sure you go to a nice nursing home.” 

Have I groomed him well or what?

And then he starts talking about what my nursing home will be like.  And then he decides that he’ll build me a nursing home.  Here will be some of the amenities:

• A swimming pool and hot tub
• My own cat
• A TV in my room
• A fish aquarium in my room, with a larger aquarium in the hall to hold extras, in case my fish die
• Meatloaf on Sundays (The meatloaf cracks me up because I think I’ve made meatloaf maybe once in his life.)

Then he asks, “How do the people who work at the nursing home go to church on Sundays since the nursing home still has to be open?”

I told him that the workers who were working didn’t go to church because they had to be there, but that sometimes a pastor would come to the nursing home to have a church service for the people there.

“That’s what we’ll do, then,” he said.  “We’ll have all the people lined up and they can just raise their hands if they need help.”

He’s got it all figured out.

Hopefully, we’ll only have grape juice at communion.    

He also said we would only have girl nurses because girl nurses are nice.  I told him boy nurses could be nice too.  He said, “Okay, we’ll have boy nurses too,” and decided that his brother would do the hiring.

“I hope you don’t have to have a wheelchair,” he told me. 

“Me too,” I said.  I’ve spent enough time sitting on my butt as it is. 

“I’ll say a prayer that you don’t have to have a wheelchair,” he told me right before bed.

“Say one too that it will be a LONG time before Mommy has to go to the nursing home,” I told him.

“Okay!”

Now everyone else pray that his plans pan out!

Communion Wine (Whine)

“Then he took the cup, gave thanks and offered it to them, saying, ‘Drink from it, all of you.  This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.’”  Matthew 26:27-28


Okay, so we’re not good Lutherans. 

When I first learned to commune, I used to drink from the traditional chalice.  I was young.  I liked Pastor communing me.  And I knew they used Everclear to wipe the rim of that cup between rounds of communion.  Nanna was on the Altar Guild, after all, so that meant I was an honorary Guild-ster since I helped her put communion out when it was her turn.   I remember when we got those tiny cups for individual wine servings and started offering an “option” to drinking after everyone else.  I remember the horrible filling of those tiny cups with this glass jar apparatus with a rubber bulb on the top. 

I also knew that the inner-round of those circular trays didn’t have wine in them.  They had grape juice.  Welch’s.  Straight from the kitchen refrigerator, to be exact.   It was purple, just like the wine, so you’d have to know what was in those cups.  And, of course, it was assumed by me throughout my growing up that if you took grape juice at communion, you were a recovering alcoholic. 

I’m judgmental that way.

Or maybe I was told that. 

Now they say “allergic to wine”. 

Anyway…. 

Years pass, Nanna dies, I go off on my own, I get married, move away from my home church, and start attending where I do now. 

And it turns out, I don’t feel so comfortable drinking after all these people anymore.  And it turns out, that the wine tastes like rotten raisins.  And it turns out, you can have grape juice at communion and not be a recovering alcoholic. 

My church uses white grape juice, probably Welch’s, so you know what you’re getting.  Every communion Sunday I have the grape juice.  I don’t care what you say, wine is nasty.  It burns my throat, gives me dragon breath, and is not an enjoyable experience for me to consume. 

And, if my Lord can put his cleansing spirit in wine, then I’m pretty sure he can put it in grape juice too!

So this Sunday, the wafers and the Pastor pass.  Wafer was not stale this Sunday, I note.  Sometimes they are chewy and get stuck in my teeth.  I like to think of myself as quality control for the Body of Jesus.  Ok, maybe not.

Then the elder comes with my now-usual individual cups.  I only say “elder” as a church term.  He was younger than me.  And we’ll blame it on his lack of “elder” knowledge and experience that he’d let the center circle of cups of grape juice run OUT before he got to me.  So I made a face at him.  And he kind of paused and grinned at me, wondering what I was going to do, my unspoken disgust for the situation written on my face. 

And then I took a tiny cup of wine. 

While the elder spoke the words of communion, I threw back the wine so as to limit the exposure of my taste buds to the horrible taste.  It burned my throat as it made a fiery path to my stomach.  My lips curled and a shudder went through me.  My face got hot and red.  Then I looked over at my husband, who was chin to chest with his face contorted into a grimace usually saved for cough syrup. 

And I laughed.  Ok, not hard, but I found all this quite funny.  I don’t think there is much of a chance of the hub and I ever becoming alcoholics if we can’t even handle the communion wine! 

Maybe we’re “allergic”! 

I did feel a bit more renewed, or cleansed, or like a new person, as I walked back to my pew.  Maybe I needed a reminder of what communion is all about.

Plus, the kids enjoyed my dragon breath!     

Thanks be to God for powerful blessings that can turn even stale wafers and grape juice in to perfect reminders of our salvation through the death and resurrection of Jesus.  

And for forgiving even bad Lutherans like me!

Advent Memories

“Advent  - (from the Latin word adventus meaning "coming") is a season observed in many Western Christian churches, a time of expectant waiting and preparation for the celebration of the Nativity of Jesus at Christmas.” - Wikipedia

So there I was, sitting in church last Sunday, listening to the pre-service music, getting settled in my pew, when I notice the Pastor rise from his seat take his bulletin and flap out the Christ candle on the Advent wreath that the acolyte had mistakenly lit. 

You see, it was only the first Sunday of Advent, so only the pink candle and a purple candle should have been lit…  well, I hope that’s right because that’s what we ended up with after the bulletin smack down of the Christ candle. 

I’m not real current on my Advent candle lighting procedures since it has been many moons since I’ve been asked to acolyte.

Many, many moons.

Anyway, I found all this to be quite funny and filed it away under Advent Memories in my head.

Another Advent Memory of mine occurred when I likely was an acolyte, because in this memory, I have a front seat of the church view. 

A girl named Amie was singing in front of Mt. Olive, standing behind the black piano that was beside our Advent wreath.  Now the Advent wreath at my current church is quite substantial and tall, but at Mt. Olive our Advent wreath stood about four feet tall and was what I would describe as “spindly”.  I remember having to be particularly careful about lighting the Advent wreath for fear that the whole thing would go toppling over. 

And it seems I had to light that thing a lot!  I was a seasoned acolyte back in my day.

Anyway, back to Amie singing with piano accompaniment…

I don’t remember what song she was singing (maybe one of you out there can help me out), but sometime during the middle part of the song, an ember from one of the candles fell to the evergreen circle at the base of the candles.  Smoke started first.  Then flames. 

Now this wasn’t a catastrophic fire by any means, but Amie’s eyes got as big as saucers while she watched the flame grow to about three inches tall. 

While the rest of the congregation sat in paralyzed silence, our Usher Extraordinaire name Fred came up to the Advent wreath, Amie still singing and probably Eleanor still playing the piano, and put the fire out with is bare hands.  I can still see him patting and twisting those branches until the fire went out.

Fred was my hero.  Not that we were all in grave danger.  The interior of Mt. Olive’s sanctuary is mostly concrete, brick and stone.  The fire really wouldn’t have had anywhere to go.  And it isn’t like we couldn’t have used a less spindly Advent wreath, but… 

Fred was still a hero.   He saved Advent.

Fast forward to this past year…

My church holds an annual “Advent Fair” where the kids can make some sort of Advent wreath or calendar or other project.  Last year it was a wreath with a Styrofoam base, plastic evergreen garland, ribbon, and the five necessary candles all glued together.  We lit ours maybe once last year, but with memories of an Advent wreath catching fire in my brain, I find I’m not a huge fan of the at-home Advent wreath.  So after Christmas was over, the Advent wreath got placed in the attic.  I didn’t box it up, not that it would have mattered, because I was afraid it would get squashed and broken.  And after all, my babies made it!

Well, here’s what I found this year…

Seems that the 112 degree temperatures of our Oklahoma summer this year were too much for the Advent wreath. 

Quite the pathetic wreath, but funny nonetheless! 

I hope you’re preparing for the coming of Jesus, and I hope someday you share your Advent stories with me!

High Pressure Laundry

“No good deed goes unpunished.” - Claire Booth Luce

So the regular robe washer at the church goes on vacation this time of year. Used to be, her substitute would have to do the robes for two months and then the regular lady would be back. Well, last year I mentioned something about the cleanliness of the robes and was quickly put on the sub list with the other lady. Somehow I dodged the bullet last year and did not actually have to wash the robes. I only hung them up and such after the service.


But…


This was my first week on my four-week stint as substitute robe washer, and, wouldn’t you know it, they needed washed. The acolyte robes probably always need washed, and the Pastor’s robe had discernable unfreshness.


“Just put them in the washing machine, maybe with a little bleach,” I was told last year.


But then I got back there, and saw the rope belt was also a bit non-white, and the multi-colored stole (which I would later find out is also called a vestment on Google) had seen cleaner days. My instructions didn’t include these items, but I’m a washer of dirty clothes no matter who they belong to.


I put the belt in a laundry bag, safety pinned all the Velcro together on the robes, and threw them in. Bleach, Biz, and soap. No dirt particle was safe.


“Just take them out of the dryer. They hardly ever need to be ironed,” she’d said.


I took them out of the dryer promptly just before the end of the heat cycle. They looked like I’d wadded up a piece of newspaper and then tried to flatten it out with my hands. Thank goodness I hadn’t done that since they were as white as they were ever going to get thanks to all my laundry products. I was aghast, as I hung up my iron and can of spray starch when I left the working world. I threw them all on hangers and waited for a miracle.


In the meantime, I decided to tackle the stole. Like I said, it was many colored and appeared to be woven. No tags. Probably hand-made. So I took what I thought was the safe route and put it in the sink with a little soap and some cold water. I draped it very slowly in the sink, watching carefully for any sign of fading or colors bleeding. And of course, wouldn’t you know that the very last blocks that entered the cold water bled like a head wound onto one another.


Grey fish on lavender backgrounds are no longer my friends.


I quickly removed the stole from the water and blotted it with a kitchen towel, willing away the travesty that was occurring on the lavender background. That fish was bleeding like a stuck pig. I rinse it some more at a different angle, trying to get the dye to run off the side and not onto the background. I hit it with hot water trying to stop the madness!!


Finally, I gave up and took it out and hung it on the line. When I brought it back in, my fish nemesis had a serious case of five o’clock shadow caused by all the bleeding. It was terribly noticeable. In essence, I ruined the Pastor’s stole.


I spent the rest of the evening Googling “woven Pastor stoles” and that’s where I came across the term “vestment”. Just an FYI, in case you’re ever looking. There are some fancy ones out there! But none like the one I currently had in my possession.


The next day, after hours of ironing and starching, I took the robes back up to church and intended to confess to the Pastor on the demise of his stole, but he’s on vacation this week! A break in my luck, I’d say… Anyway, our church secretary was there and I showed her the stole.


“I figure it’s from Guatemala, and the mission team brought it back for him, and it was made by some poor woman in a third-world country…”


“Who was blind,” she said.


“Oh, no! Was she???” I said


“I don’t know,” she said. “But that would be your luck!”


She wasn’t helping.


She mentioned a product I might try as a last-ditch effort, and that sent me back to the laundry aisle of the grocery store. The product she mentioned kept saying “remove” and “removal” when referring to color and I didn’t think bleaching it out was quite what I was looking for.


I did remember though that I’d had some pretty good luck with some pretty nasty stains with the Tide Pen.


I took the pen and the stole and several other spontaneous laundry products home, and gave the fish section the scrubbing of its life with the Tide Pen. Then, I rinsed it, and did it again. In my opinion, it was looking a lot better, but I still wasn’t sure.


I stuck it out on the clothesline, determined to place it in such a way that the sun’s rays would surely fade away any evidence of the colors running into one another.


And guess what?


It worked!


Now I really don’t think the untrained eye would be able to tell where the horrible bleeding of the fish occurred. Especially not from a few feet away.


And, you know, this was just my luck! It seems that if something like this can happen, then it happens to me. Perhaps I’m haphazard when it comes to laundry. Maybe I’m careless in knowing my fabrics. Or maybe I’m just the best one for it to happen to because I can live with a lifetime of teasing, poking, and prodding over my killing the Pastor’s stole. Everyone has a gift, and I have thick skin and broad shoulders! And I tend to get a laugh instead of a cry over such things.


Now come on July 2012 when the mission team goes back to Guatemala where hopefully they’ll be able to find the same woman at the open-air market where they bought the previous one SIX years ago!


Was I the first to wash it??


I’m not sure I want to think about that…

Summer VBS

Ah, VBS season is upon us!



Our church’s is next week and we’d originally had a conflict, so to “make it up” I sent my kids to the First Baptist VBS this week. Their theme has been The Big Apple and my kids have had a high time! In fact, they were so pumped about bible school that they decided to forego our conflicting activity and attend our VBS instead.


And I’m kind of glad.


They are also sad that today is the last day of the Baptist VBS. They’ll have two whole days before they start their Lutheran round! They can hardly stand the wait.


I too was quite the VBS connoisseur as a child. My Nanna babysat me and two other kids and I’m sure the summer would have been a lot longer had there not been the respite of VBS for her. We used to hit the Baptist church where the other two kids attended Sunday School. It was right down the street from their house, so sometimes we would walk.


I remember thinking it odd that they called their pastor “Brother Ted”.


Then we would hit my church’s VBS, where my Pastor would wear his plaid shorts every year.


Then, as a great finale, we would attend the Southern Baptist church’s VBS that was way across town past the fairgrounds. Sometimes we would get to ride the school bus that would pick us up at a location I don’t remember. I remember bouncing around in the backseat on the way to VBS.


The Southern Baptists also had the largest church I’d ever been in and the best crafts. One year we painted concrete statuary. I did a sheep dog with a red tongue and it turned out awesome. The next year I did a rabbit. We had those garden ornaments for years. We also got to make a rope every year. A man came with his rope winding machine and we would turn the crank. Then he would fire up the hand torch and singe off all the excess fibers and give the rope a smoky aroma which it never quite got over.


Now I don’t know if it is too early to proclaim my children VBS hoppers or not since this was our first out-of-church experience, but the other day I mentioned I’d seen that the First Presbyterian Church was having their VBS and their response was, “Can we go??”


I hope you all have fond memories of summer and VBS and red Kool-aid mustaches. I hope you get to do arts and crafts this summer and learn about Jesus. And in the words of the song I learned at Baptist parent night on Wednesday, I hope you…


“Say yeh-yeh-yeh-yeh-YES to vuh-vuh-vuh-VBS!”

Let Me Just Say This...

"If you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any comfort about his love, if any fellowship with the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion, then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and purpose.  Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves.  Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interest of others."  Philippians 2:1-4

SCOOT! SCOOT!

(That’s me breaking out my soapbox.)


WARNING: I’m about to get on my soapbox!


I’m a bit peeved.


Got my feathers ruffled.


I have a bee in my bonnet.


So, let me just say this:


I don’t care if you were sprinkled, dunked, confirmed, saved, reborn, found Jesus, called on our Savior, witnessed, served, were ordained, certified, called, or became a missionary…


I don’t care if you’re a brother, sister, pastor, doctor, priest, preacher, or song leader…


THERE IS ONLY ONE HEAVEN!


I know Jesus said there were a lot of rooms, but I doubt they are labeled Baptist, Lutheran, Catholic, Presbyterian, Episcopalian, First Christian, or Methodist.


We are all Christians!


And Christ is the only way to that one Heaven.


So, it is my opinion that when friends in Christ get hung up on whose doctrine of what religion is “right”, or “correct”, or what “doesn’t count”, then we are focusing on what man has made of religion and not what should be the core of our belief.


And that should be the love of Jesus and sharing it with others.


And when we say things about others churches and what they may or may not do or believe, or when they do it, then we are not carrying out the Great Commission, and are perhaps discouraging others from becoming affiliated with so-called “Christians” who appear to live as hypocrites.


One Heaven. One Jesus. One Way.


Fortunately, He died for ALL.


This concludes today’s rant on religion.


Hugs and Kisses.


(I’m stepping down off my soapbox now. Hope I don’t stumble and fall!)

Monday Musings

What a weekend!!


First, a birth certificate.


Then, a royal wedding.


Then, a trip to the ER for a broken arm.


Then, a terrorist was killed.


Only one of these four things impacted my family directly, but I think I’ll talk about the one that had the greatest indirect effect on my life.


It was a Tuesday. I was driving to Spiro, OK, to do my job as a bank examiner for the government. I was 24 years old. I was listening to the radio, as was my habit while driving to the ends of the earth, and suddenly all I could find was news on the radio.


World Trade Center


New York


Planes


I remember stopping to use the restroom at a convenience store and I ducked in and ducked out as quickly as I could.


When I got to Spiro, the images on the TV were even more unbelievable than the stories I’d heard on the radio.


Terrorists


Collapse


Thousands


I stayed in a motel that night in Poteau, America. After hours and hours of watching the news on the TV, I had to get out. I went to Wal-Mart. There was no one there. The workers were all glued to TVs in the stores and stared at me like “why aren’t you at home watching TV?”


Pentagon


Crash


Hole


I probably bought some brownies and something to drink. My motel comfort food.


Then I finished my stay in Spiro and headed home for the weekend.


Our church service on Sunday included a photo montage of images of the burning buildings, the fiery planes, the terrified people. My hub stood crying beside me.


I looked over at him and said, “I’m not going to take my pill today.”


And he said, “Ok.”


I’d been on the fence concerning the whole child thing. I swore I’d never have children. I didn’t want to get fat. I didn’t think I’d be a suitable mother. I had three brothers who died, so I was sure my kids would die too if they were boys. I didn’t like kids, so I didn’t think they were a good idea. 


My husband thought he wanted one, and if we had one, we’d need another because he and I both were only children in our families, and the first one would need someone to play with.


And so it was a horrible, terrible, no good, very bad day that plunged me off into the sea of anticipating motherhood. It was a terrorist that I blame for my children. A terrorist who is now dead.


I’m happy to say I was wrong about children and motherhood and dying and getting fat (well, depends on the day) and all the things I thought seemed like excellent excuses to never try it. I’ve had an enormous amount of fun and pride and love and stickiness that I could not have experienced without them. They complete me and I’m a better person for having had them. I think.


So even though my kids are too young to understand the implications of the death of a terrorist, I want them to know that good can be found in even the grimmest of circumstances. People are changed by such traumatic experiences. People do extraordinary things that they wouldn’t normally have done.


And we will never forget!

Fragile

“But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us. We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed. We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body. For we who are alive are always being given over to death for Jesus’ sake, so that his life may be revealed in our mortal body. So then, death is at work in us, but life is at work in you.” 2 Corinthians 4:7-12

I’ve been thinking of my friend Lillian today. She’s in her late 90s and suffered a stroke yesterday. I’ve known her my entire life. I think my mom may have known her for her entire life too. She was a friend of my great-grandma and we all went to church together.


Lillian has always had white hair for as long as I can remember. I can picture her sitting five or six rows ahead of me and my grandma at church. She’s wearing a cream colored shirt with a high collar and a matching skirt with a long gold locket-like necklace in my memory. She was always tall. And she made note of my height as a teenager. “Don’t ever stoop. Be proud of your height,” she told me.


I also checked on my nest today and guess who’s hatching!

Three more to go.


Those baby birds got me to thinking how the theme for this week in my life has been “fragile”.

I just finished a book with that title by Lisa Unger for my book club.


We hunted eggs with ever increasing cracked shells on Tuesday because it finally wasn’t raining.


That day, we also found the bird’s nest and the five eggs it contained.


Now those eggs are hatching into pink, squirming masses of flesh that one day hope to become sparrows and fly away despite their fragile state.


And now my thoughts turn to Lillian, whose body has tired over the years more and more as age has taken its toll, but yet she’s one of those people to me who has always looked exactly the same for my entire life, and has had the same mood and mannerisms and concern for me forever too.


Her family surrounds her today much like the mother bird guards her new babies, taking great care in her condition and comfort.


And yet, one day, she will fly away to place where bodies never fail and comfort never ends. A place where God breathes new life into the weary and reunites loved ones with those gone before. A place where sickness and disease have no grasp on those at the foot of God’s own throne. A place where life will no longer be fragile, but everlasting and enduring.


I pray today that I meet you there.


“Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.” 2 Corinthians 4:16-18

Happy (Slightly Imperfect) Easter

“He is risen! He is risen indeed! Alleluia!”

I wrote back in December about our imperfect Christmas Eve service at church and I just wanted to let you know that this may be a recurring theme for major church holidays.


First, we awaken to torrential downpours. Although we’ve needed the rain, on Easter it is a bit of a buzz kill. So into the refrigerator the colored eggs went to await their impending, although still uncertain, egg hunt date with the kids.


Second, after arriving at church and having a lovely fellowship breakfast, I noticed my kid’s brand new shirt had a hole in it! Holy clothes on Easter. Ha!


Third, I noticed at least three people taking tags off of clothes before the church service started. I also noticed one man in an obviously new sport coat that still had the stitching holding the back flap of the jacket closed. Two girls wore their prom dresses from the night before and were “slightly” overdressed.


Fourth, we were out of attendance cards in my pew. Not having evidence of my attendance throws the entire universe off kilter.


Fifth, we couldn’t find a bible in our pew, or the one behind us for that matter. I’m not above stealing from the pew behind me when my kid wants to look something up, but alas all my efforts were squashed.


So there we all were, with all of our shortcomings, before the cross on Easter. We may have all tried to look perfect, with our perfect families, and have the perfect holiday, but the truth of our sinful nature always seems to shine through. No matter how much effort we make to the contrary there is no denying our imperfect nature.


Thanks be to God for sending us a perfect Savior to save us from our imperfections!

Secret Recipe

“This will take place on the day when God will judge men’s secrets through Jesus Christ, as my gospel declares.” Romans 2:16


Over the past several months, whenever we’ve had an occasion for soup at church, one lady will bring her tortilla soup.


I love it!


Last time we had it, I ate two bowls because I liked it so much.


I’d asked her for the recipe several times, but she’d been tightlipped.


Today she finally divulged her secret recipe*.

The secret is she adds hamburger.


LOL is right!


Now her secret is out.


*Name scratched out to protect the innocent or guilty, but she’s the one who makes the good tortilla soup.

Fire!! Or not...

“If it is burned up, he will suffer loss; he himself will be saved, but only as one escaping through the flames.” 1 Corinthians 3:15

So there I was, minding my own business in the church office, talking to the church secretary, when it happened…


AAAANNNGGGGGKKK!!! AAAANNNGGGGGKKK!!!


Little flashing strobes…


AAAANNNGGGGGKKK!!! AAAANNNGGGGGKKK!!!


Making our eardrums scream for help…


The fire alarm!


“Crap!” I thought. (Yes, I thought “Crap!” at church.) “Did I leave something on in the kitchen?”


I quickly went down to the kitchen to ensure my innocence while the Parents Day Out and Preschool kids evacuated the building.


No smoke.


No fire.


The church secretary silenced the alarm.


Then we heard sirens in the distance, steadily getting louder. The Fire Department was on its way!


First was the ambulance looking truck, then the pumper truck, then the ladder truck, and then the Fire Chief with the 4-wheel drive. The fire station is only about ½ a mile from the church. I’m thinking their time was probably under two minutes. Quite impressive, really.

Anyway, it was definitely a Kodak moment at church. I had to borrow a camera!


The date stamp wasn’t set on the camera, so it said it was roughly 3 ½ years ago, but I can assure you, it seems like it was only yesterday.


Wait, no, really it WAS!!


It was probably the most excitement I’ve had at church in a while, or maybe ever! Long story short, they think the sprinklers may have had low pressure or something.


Don’t you just love security systems?


The Bible Study class that was meeting eventually emerged, and they all blamed my cooking for setting off the alarm.


Apparently I wasn’t the only one doubting my culinary skills.


For the record, it was not my cooking... not this time.


The End.

Rummage Sale

“I put on righteousness as my clothing; justice was my robe and my turban.” Job 29:14


Come with me on a walk down memory lane to a place known as the Fellowship Hall, where each Summer the Ruth Guild would hold their annual Rummage Sale. Rummage Sale was right! First people rummaged through their own things to see what could be cast off. Then the organizers of the sale would rummage through the items to put them in order, or see what they might want of the cast offs. Then the public would come rummage, again and again. Rummage Sale, for sure.


As I said in my last post, the youth of our church held a Rummage Sale today as a fundraiser for the National Youth Gathering. They called it a Garage Sale, but from my professional opinion, it was definitely a Rummage Sale. And I should know! For years, I was dragged along with my Nanna to the church to help with the set up, take down, sales, etc. of the annual Rummage Sale. She was one of those ladies who was at the church every time the door was open and helped with every event. I was with Nanna most of the time, so I “helped” too.


Bertha, Wilma, Monetta, Ann, Lilian, Loraine, Ella Ann, Ruth, Margaret, and my Nanna, Irene. All these ladies were more like surrogate grandmothers to me growing up, and all were involved in the rummaging, if memory serves me right. Back then, the prized items for me were toys and costume jewelry that I would try on and play with while the ladies set things up. I remember a few of them trying on some of the clothes over their own clothes, or taking them to the bathroom for an official fitting. Back then, the strange items were leisure suits, psychedelic polyester shirts, and go-go boots that had been in peoples’ closets for decades before seeing light of day at the rummage sale.


Fast forward to Friday - I had donated three trash bags of toys, puzzles and stuffed animals from the children with the mutual understanding that we would return for the sale and let them pick out a few new treasures. Friday evening was setup, and I figured if I helped, then I would be privy to any exclusive pre-sale items. My five-year-old quickly found his stuffed animals and had donator’s remorse, but I was able to distract him with a new stuffed horse from Build-A-Bear. One dollar. What a bargain! Then we found a Leapster, a Don’t Break the Ice game, and a stuffed dragon. They were set!


I started helping unload the donated clothing out of black trash bags. This time around, it appeared the ‘80s had been resurrected since we found several instances of large print shirts with shoulder pads. Then, one of the teenagers reportedly found some kind of ballet pants. I had to educate her as to what stirrup pants were (not that I ever wore them, of course). We put them with the shoulder pad shirts so they could be reunited. Maybe someone found a complete outfit!


Then, it happened - I reached into a sack of clothes and found what should be the understood non-donate-able item. UNDERWEAR! Who donates old underwear to the church garage sale?? I need names. I had to touch them. Old underwear. One stretch away from a blowout underwear. Not good!


Anyway, we all had a great time setting up for the Garage Sale on Friday night. I may or may not have tried on a gray wig and pink housecoat, and there may or may not be pictures. We laughed, we cried, and all-in-all I only ended up taking home one trash bag full of stuff, so it was a net gain!


Check and see if your church has an upcoming Rummage/Garage Sale that you can donate some of your stuff to. Know that your stuff will provide the basis for some good fellowship between numerous members of your congregation. Yes, some of it may be at the expense of your stuff, but it will be good fun nonetheless.


And remember, UNderwear is UN-donate-able, or at least it is if I’m working your sale!

“Our mouths were filled with laughter, our tongues with songs of joy.” Psalm 126:2