Jesus has a radical idea

Jesus gives a negative command:

"Do not work for food that perishes."

then positive a positive command:

"but (work) for food that last for eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you, because God the Father has set His seal on Him."

The question my BSF lesson asks is "Where in your life should you cease spending effort, energy, drive and ambition for that which spoils, so as to have energy and time for the eternal satisfaction God want yo give you? Try to determine specific ways to alter your life toward an eternal perspective."

I am inspired by that question. I know as a young mom my primary objective was to love my husband and family but as often as I could, I would just put the kids in the car and off we would go - doing one thing or another. But now with my kids basically able to care for themselves I have more mental space to consider others. It's really fun and I love it. I thank Don that I am able to go. It's his faithfulness to providing for our family that makes me able to go. So when I go, I go in his name as well cause without him I wouldn't be available.

I'm really thankful that Shelly Hendry, she lives in Bedford now, showed us what it looks like to serve others. Her ideas where so old fashioned, I didn't know people actually really did stuff like that. But as the Lord took us day by day, He confirmed that indeed we are to be ministers. I remember that at my church I wanted to be this great Bible study teacher, have profound thoughts to give "unto"others and the Lord told me plainly, the most profound thing I could do would be to love and serve the women of the church and the church not being just Blanch but whom ever the Lord had put in my life. I have loved Isaiah 58

http://nasb.scripturetext.com/isaiah/58.htm

Particularly verses 6 and 7 but over all the whole chapter. It has shown me the heart of the Lord. I want to love what He loves and He loves the poor and the downcast. I know I don't have to go to another country to find folks that need love. They are right here. Even in my own family. I like the perspective about starting your ministry of love with our own families.

 I know we all have our own "burdens" God puts on our hearts. Remembering that we are a body of Christ and some are the hands, the feet, the mind ect ... But the really fun thing is, the "burden" is not heavy but joyful. It's with a heart of joy I GET to serve as I do. In contrast if I were in the place of administration the burden would be heavy indeed. I, of course may be used at some point for administration but the Lord will enable if He requires it. At this point He has not enabled me for admin. and the proof is in the pudding. Instead, He has put on my heart a soft spot for the downtrodden. I have to say - of course, that I am not all I should be. Many undone opportunities, but if I approach it with the fruit of the Spirit then I will continue to have hope that I will be able to - be about my Father's business.

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Jesus runs the journey for us ...

Family time

 Mary, Auntie Phee and cousin Suzanne

 

 Auntie Phee going over an old family cookie recipe with me.

Cousin Suzanne said the cookies turned out just like she remembered them. The old original recipe.

Benjamin and a very happy Auntie Phee. 

Beware of the pleasant view of the Fatherhood of God.

God is so loving and kind that of course He will forgive us.

That sentiment has no place whatever in the New Testament. The only ground on which God can forgive us is the tremendous tragedy of the Cross of Christ;

Oswald Chambers.

The forgiveness we are so quick to talk about and receive was not easy to provide. Oh that I would care to forgive people to the extent that I pay the cost and not them. Amazing. How many times do I declare that circumstances are not fair, people treated me wrongly, I have been hurt. And within that experience what if, not only did I forgive them but I did it in a way that was a great cost to me, like Jesus did? And my only motive? Love.

Wow! Imagine that idea.

 Sometimes the cost is very hard.

But in my life, it's never been this hard.

It seems so trite to say but

Thank you Jesus

...

Not that I don't have plenty to do, but tonight I am experimenting with my morning smoothie ingredients.

We had beets for dinner tonight. I steamed them till they were really soft, cause that's how we like them. I had sliced off the green tops and the ugly bottom part and as a result a lot of the beet juice leached from the beet into the water. We enjoyed our cooked soft beets. How much nutrition we got - I'm not sure. I figure minerals are not heat sensitive so there might have been some left in the beet and since I cooked them long enough to be soft I probably destroyed the heat sensitive vitamins. Which are most vitamins.
I decided to use the water from the beets in our morning smoothie. Although not full of the heat sensitive vitamins it's probably got a lot of minerals and that will be a good add. I had the greens of the beets left over. I did not cook those. These beet greens are not as tough as some greens such as chard greens, which are really tough, but I thought I would still experiment with beet greens to see what effect I would get and would we maybe get even more nutritional value from them then if we had digested them cold from the fridge. As a side note I like chard cause it's designed to be tough and as a result it lasts better in the fridge, it doesn't break down as fast because at the cellular level the cell walls are tougher. BUT - when we eat the chard we need that food to be broken down into at its cellular form so that our bodies can absorb the vitamins and minerals as well as -who knows what else- as it goes through the digestive tract.
Taking the principle of breaking down cell walls to be absorbed into our digestive systems I wondered, what if I put my beet greens in moderately warm water and soak them over night. Will that warm water break down the cellular walls hence making the nutrition more absorbable to our body? Unless I do a chemical analysis test I won't know for sure but I know the heat is not hot enough to kill the vitamins but the warm water might soften the cell walls so that in the morning they will be like a vitamin cocktail. I think I will also be able to tell by the color of the water. If there is a lot of color in the water then the plant itself has broken down at some level and is now in the water.
I did one more thing to my poor beet greens.
I put them into two different jars. In the one jar it's mostly the warm water and about an 1/8 cup of kefir and in the other jar it's just straight kefir. I know the kefir is full of enzymes which are designed to break food apart so tomorrow morning we will see what happens.
Ideally, I should keep all that on the counter to stay at room temperature. I think I might. The kefir does not need to be refrigerated and the greens will break down better in room temperature.
I need to put them into a dark location though. Cause those sensitive vitamins are destroyed by light too. Which btw is a good reason to never buy juice in clear container.
I have probably bored you to death, if you have even gotten this far. But that's what I think about in the poor old mind of mine.

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 Although I take vitamins here is why I make smoothies as well taking vitamins. 

Whole foods are your best sources of vitamins and minerals. They offer three main benefits over supplements;
1. They contain a variety of the micronutrients your body needs. An orange, for example, provides vitamin C but also beta carotene, calcium and other nutrients. A vitamin C supplement lacks these other micronutrients.
2. They provide dietary fiber, which is important for digestion and can help prevent certain diseases such as cancer, diabetes and heart disease. Adequate fiber intake can also help prevent constipation.
3. They contain other substances such as antioxidants which slow down the natural process that leads to cell and tissue damage.
If you depend on supplements rather than eating a variety of whole foods, you miss the potential benefits of these substances.

Read more: http://www.consumeraffairs.com/news04/2007/10

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Next day ... the results 

 Not impressive.

Number one - greens not softened much or at all, meaning their cell walls were about as in tact as they were when I started.

 And number two - and this is a given for most folks but I was willing to look past it for the nutritional value - it looked gross.

Number three - I have a regular blender not a specialty blender, and the stalks of the beet greens were stringy which caused it to be really gross. 

So over all - no thanks on that idea.

Tomorrow morning back to regular smoothies.

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Auntie Phee knew some things

Auntie Phee kept referring to scones as skons. I was a little embarrassed for her and correctly called them scones. BUT! Guess what I found out as I was looking for skon recipes. She was RIGHT! She told us they were from Scotland, I brushed it off. But, it has been so fun finding out the 85 year old grandma was right.


There are two ways to pronounce scone. "Skon" is generally used in Scotland and Northern England and "Skoan" is used in the South.
Scones are believed to have originated in Scotland and are closely related to the griddle baked flatbread, known as bannock. They were first made with oats, shaped into a large round, scored into four to six triangles, and cooked on a griddle either over an open fire or on top of the stove. 

Read more: http://www.joyofbaking.com/SconesIntroduction.html#ixzz0V3sM9VNc

 

So fun. 

Today if you hear His voice ..

I have a fern frond from our trip to New Bern, I think it was last fall. Could it have been just that short of a time ago? Golly, how life as changed. It was Don and I, Erin and Ethan, Benjamin and Elisa (and missing other folks the whole time) on that trip. Lovely time. Bittersweet now, but at the time I fully embraced it.
I kind of, stole, the frond from the beautiful garden we went to - it was my souvenir.
I had intentions of putting into my scrapbook. It's on my bulletin board now, waiting.
I look at it quite often cause 1. I love plants 2. it brings back a sweet memory.
The point of my post is that the frond is losing it's color. It's no longer the beautiful green it was when I picked it. It's fading. Just like the memory of our trip. A week after the trip I could have given you a lot of details but now, many of the details are gone and just images in my mind remain. I look at the pictures and am reminded of our warm, happy trip. I am sad the frond is fading, I wish I had stored it so it would still be nice but instead I have enjoyed it all these months. And as a result it is fading. Well, I'm sure you can all tell where I'm going with this. Our lives and our days are like the frond. Fading. I thought about that and I was sad. I felt such a loss. But being the daughter of the Creator of the universe I get to have eternal perspectives as well as practical ones for the here and now. So, my faded fern frond represents our days gone by but as I look at that frond on my bulleten board I only have to turn my head just a bit to see the beautiful leaves and garden the Lord is displaying today.
Today the Lord has made a whole new day to be enjoyed. I see the beautiful leaves on our trees. The colors are magnificent - just like their Creator. Every day, there is new life. Every day the Lord is here with us. Loving and leading us. Ever so patient with us redeemed sinners. Blessing us with answers to prayers and provisions. The manna the Lord provided only lasted one day.

Give us this day, our daily bread.

I guess that is where the Lord lives. This day.
I know He will be there for me tomorrow. And I know He was with me yesterday but it's in today that I experience His life changing grace.

Does that mean I'm not sad about my frond? No, I'm sad about it. I'm sad that happy time is gone. I wish I was there again I would freeze it and never let it end but it's not to be. That time has past - but outside ... there is new life today. New souls that need love. So today I will see what the Lord has done.  And only by His grace will I look and see His goodness and be blessed and fed - my daily manna.

“Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts .... But encourage one another daily, as long as it is called Today, so that none of you may be hardened by sin’s deceitfulness. We have come to share in Christ if we hold firmly till the end the confidence we had at first.

  Hebrews 3

Is there any more felicity then to weed in the rain?

Today, after taking a nap I got up and went outside to tackle those weeds in the gardens that had been plaguing me for months - I know that's a long time. BUT, today I went out. The weather was overcast with a warm, moist breeze. The ground looked like it had rained so I put on my ole beat up rain boots and went outside. Lovely.

God's marvelous creation was stunning. The leaves on the trees were delightful. Just a bit of creativity from the mind of a magnificent Creator. I wonder how much of that He makes for our enjoyment. He puts in us a love for beauty then He makes beauty all around us. Thank YOU wonderful Creator!

Got the weeds in the back garden. I had to wear long sleeves and long gloves because the weeds were so high. I know, terrible shame.

But, now it is weeded and I have a new plan. Don and I are low maintenance folks, involved in many things so our yard needs to be low maintenance to manage, so I am going to take the wood from around the garden that is right off of the back porch and just let the grass grow there. I will have two hydrangea bushes still and they will lend lovely color and form. I also weeded the other side garden - faithful garden. It lives even with much neglect. I am going to get garden cloth to put on it and then put mulch on top. That will keep all the weeds down. Love that garden cloth. Part of the reason I don't weed the gardens like I should is that I get such uncomfortable reactions to the bug bites. And like most of us I have this great vision of how my yard is supposed to look and when it doesn't then I get over whelmed and don't do anything at all. Now that is done next I have several bushes to transplant. Another project for another day.

Of course, as I was weeding I was reminded how our gracious God will pull sin out of our hearts. It gets all grown in there with all the other stuff. But, it's good to get it cleaned out. Unfortunately some roots are left in there and they rear their ugly weeds but with the help of the Lord we keep cleaning out the garden till one day that plant will no longer grow there. That is the same with the sin in our hearts. We keep getting renewed by the grace of God until that sin is no longer living in there.

Hallelujah what a Savior!

Although not a planting illustration Corrie Ten Boom had a great story she would tell. It was about a flashlight. Our life is the flashlight and we want to be a light for the world. Our first step is to ask Jesus into our hearts - he is the first battery. But, we are still not a light for the world, something is preventing us from being the light, we are missing the other battery. But the Lord is unable to put the battery in our flashlight (or our hearts) cause something is already in there taking up the space. As the Lord cleans out the debris in the battery compartment of the flashlight he is pulling out what is taking up the space. He pulls out things like pride, selfishness, bitterness, anger, hatred. When the Lord is able to get that out of the battery compartment it's then that He is able to put in His Spirit of love and power.

That's when we get to be a light to the world, when we are full of the love of Jesus. His love is wonderful.

 Supremacy of love