In short: Computer Crashed, Washing Machine Broke, Poison Ivy
Yes, It's been a rough week. My computer has given up the ghost, but my brother is supposed to be finding a part to fix it. Apparently, I didn't have enough operating memory to run the computer, and the memory that I did have was corrupted, so he's looking for some new memory to run my computer. In the meantime, we are using Arthur's computer, which is probably 4 or 5 years older than mine, so it will not run the driver that runs my printer. Bummer. Also, I don't really want to take the time to attempt to load a program that will allow me to put my pictures on here, just to save them for a computer that I will not be using for long, so here I am, pictureless. I had a lot of pictures I've been wanting to post too, and I promise I will try to post them as soon as I can when my computer is up and running again.
My washing machine has been spinning slower, and slooower, and slooooooooowwwwwer. It finally quit never to spin again (at least not more than about two seconds at a time). I found a washer and dryer that was on year old in the paper for a good price, and while my dad was here visiting, he and Arthur were going to go get them. My dad, however, had a stroke of genius and decided that it would be better to try to fix the washer we had. Now that washer was not ours. It was our landlords. They told us we could use it until it quit, but if it did, they were not planning on replacing it. It was just an old one they had. I had been wanting to get our own anyways, because if we move from here at some point, we will have to get new appliances anyways, so I figured it'd be easier to buy them piece by piece when we got the money rather than trying to buy them all at once when we moved. However, my dad convinced Arthur that it was a good idea not to drive all the way to St. Louis to pick up a used washer and dryer when you could use someone else's used washer and dryer right here, given a five dollar belt and a few minute's labor. So, Dad rode his new motorcycle into town to get a belt. An hour to an hour and a half later, he came back with the belt. It only takes five or so minutes to get to the store, but apparently, the first place he looked didn't have the belt, so he was "forced" to go to Hechler's Hardware, where he has cousins. Of course they had the belt. They have everything there that no one else carries. They also had cousin's who were eager to try out the new bike... not that my dad was at all eager to show it off ;-) . Anyways, he finally got home, and the belt did not fit. Another trip to Hechler's, another long wait. The second belt did not fit. A third and shorter trip to Hechler's, finally a belt that fit. Laundry goes in, washing machine starts, washing machine stops. Puzzled expressions, a bit of tinkering, washing machine starts, washing machine stops. Burning smell. Tinkering, start, stop, burning smell. "Umm, sister, I think you need a new washing machine." Did I tell them? I told them. The motor apparently was burned up, and he decided it was NOT worth hunting down a new motor! I give Arthur the number to call the guy with the washer and dryer and get directions. He calls and gets directions just as I realize that that was the wrong guy. Oops. I give him another number. He calls and gets directions. We are nearing Troy, about five minutes from home. Dad whips out his phone and calls his cousin Michael. "Is there an appliance store in Troy? Uh huh, uh huh, okay." He reasons that it's crazy to drive to St. Louis to look at used appliances that we may not even like when we could look at new ones right here in Troy. I reason that we have very limited funds to work with and are looking at a very good price for one-year-old appliances. He reasons that he has money and wants us to get good appliances that will last awhile and asks what I would get if I could have any washer and dryer I wanted. I reason that the washer and dryer I would choose would be waaaaay out of our price range for quite some time. He reasons that we could pitch in what we were going to spend anyway and he could pitch in the rest. I reason that that would put him out a lot of money. He and Arthur decide that we will at least stop and look in Troy and see what the prices are there. We stopped at the appliance/carpet/flooring/mattress/furniture store to discover that they are going out of the appliance business because they make most of their money in the carpet/flooring/mattress/furniture business. They have one washer and two dryers, and the matching ones are pretty much exactly what I would have chosen if money were not an issue. My dad haggles with the salesmen for awhile (at least one good skill he acquired as a little Grenadian). He comes down by about $400. He and Arthur talk it over and decide to go half and half. We ended up spending more than we were planning on spending, but I think it was worth it to get a really nice washer and dryer. Thanks, Dad!
Even after all the fuss, I really like my new washer and dryer. They are front loading and have sensors to detect how much water, heat, time, etc. is needed, so they save on energy bills. The washer has a delay timer, which I love, because I can throw a load into it at night and set it to wash the clothes just before I get up in the morning. That way, when I get up, I can put the laundry straight into the dryer and have it done in half the time. They also both have a beeper that sounds when they are finished, which is a big plus for absent minded me. Arthur will appreciate his laundry being less wrinkled as a result. They are much roomier than my other washer and dryer, so I can run bigger loads. Also, the dryer takes about half the time (sometimes a bit more than half for bigger loads) that my old dryer was taking. They are also stackable, which isn't a big issue now, but if we ever move somewhere with a smaller space for the appliances, that will be a plus. I know I am getting old when I get excited about new appliances, but I am excited.
I am also excited about my garden (okay, okay, OUR garden, Arthur). I am not, however, excited about the poison ivy I got working in it. Actually, I was working in the raspberry patch. It finally stopped raining enough for us to till, so we got most of our garden planted. It's going to be BIG. We went back last Wednesday to plant some more corn. Arthur was running the tiller, and there was nothing for me to do at the moment, so I had a brilliant idea. The raspberry patch was all grown up with weeds. You couldn't even get to the bushes. I had the brilliant idea to take the cutlass and cut a path through it. Arthur's family mulches with carpeting, which works great. I figured, I'd cut paths between the rows and we could lay carpet down. Then, when it came time to pick the berries, we could just walk on the carpet and pick and wouldn't have to fight the weeds, brush, critters, etc. It really was a great idea except the part about a cutlass splattering through poison ivy. The berry patch now has three nice neat rows of carpet, and I have lots of mean, itchy splotches. The arm that I was hacking away with has a particularly nasty rash. Next time I go into the raspberry bushes, I think I will take boots and gloves.
The garden is coming along nicely. Everything is starting to pop out of the ground. There will be summer squash, zucchini, peppers, peas, green beans, onions, potatoes, corn, corn, corn, more corn, okra, lots more okra, tomatoes, rhubarb, maybe strawberries, raspberries, blackberries, and grapes- lotsa grapes. The cherry tree by the garden has a lot of cherries on it, but Arthur says most of them will rot off. I may try to thin them out and see if that helps. Anyways, there's my long little pictureless update. Hopefully I'll have lots of pictures soon!
Saturday, May 31, 2008
Tuesday, May 6, 2008
Sunday Dinner
In one of my classes, one of the students asked the professor why, if Sunday is supposed to be a day of rest, do we make our biggest and most complicated meal our Sunday dinner. Isn't that a lot of work to go to for a meal on what is supposed to be a day of rest. The professor agreed that it was a bit much. He also commented that in the Jewish culture, Sabbath begins and sundown the night before and goes until sundown that day. The big meal is eaten for supper after sundown when the Sabbath begins, so the work for the meal would have been done before sundown. He said the leftovers from that meal could be used to eat at lunch time on the Sabbath, so it was easier to keep from unneccessary work. He said that our culture celebrates Sabbath from midnight to midnight and eats the big meal at lunchtime most of the time, so the student was right in saying that there was a bit much unneccessary work going into that meal.
I understand the idea, but I think that they are wrong in saying that Sunday dinner requires a great deal of work to be done on Sunday. Here's how you can do Sunday dinner and do VERY little work on Sunday:
Saturday night:
-Salt, flour, and brown your roast and put it in a roasting pan, dutch oven, or crock pot with some water and carrots if you desire. (A word of warning: Carrots will leach the iron from an iron pot and take on a somewhat unpleasant metallic flavor. They will not hurt you. The extra iron is probably good for you, as most of us have at least some level of iron deficiency, but if carrots stay in that pot for very long at all, they will taste terrible!) Some people like their potatoes in with their roast, and if you do, that's fine, but Arthur likes them seperate, so that's how I do it. Anyways, if you cover the roast and put it in the oven at about 250 degrees F, it will be done by lunchtime tomorrow! The roast is completely taken care of, with the exception of possibly adding a little water to the pan Sunday morning. What's more, slow cooked like that, it comes out wonderfully tender.
-Peel and quarter your potatoes. Put them in a pot of COLD water. This will keep them from turning brown. Salt them, cover them and sit them on the stove. Do not turn the stove on. Just leave them there until tomorrow morning.
-If you have frozen veggies, put them in the fridge to thaw. We usually have corn.
- If you like homemade rolls, you can mix the dough up tonight and put it in the fridge. You can even mix it Thursday or Friday if you wish and have perfectly acceptable dough. I will include my recipe at the end. If you have a nice mixer with a dough hook, you can mix the dough up in about 5 or 10 minutes!
- Go to bed.
Sunday Morning:
-Check your roast and add water if necessary.
-Turn the burner on under your potatoes.
-Pull the roll dough out of the fridge. Punch it down, pinch off roll-sized pieces and put in a greased baking dish or cookie sheet. This should only take a minute or two. Set the dish by the stove and cover it with a towel or greased plastic wrap.
-Get ready for church.
-Turn off the burner under the potatoes before you leave. They should be mostly cooked and can be reheated on the stove after church.
After Church:
-Pull the roast out and put it and any veggies with it on a platter. Set the pot on the stove heat it with water and cornstarch to make gravy.
-Turn the oven temp. up to 400 and put the rolls in for 10 or 12 minutes.
-Put the corn or other veggies from the fridge or a can into a saucepan and put on the stove or warm them in a bowl in the microwave.
-Turn the heat back on under the potatoes, and once they are hot, drain and mash them with butter and milk.
-Pull the rolls out of the oven, put everything on the table and enjoy!
All of the difficult work for a Sunday dinner can be done the night before so that all that is left is to set out and cook the rolls, heat up the veggies, mash the potatoes, stir up some gravy, and set the table! All of that takes less time than it would take you to make hot dogs and mac-n-cheese! I agree it would be a labor intensive meal if you started the roast and peeled the potatoes Sunday morning, but that is entirely unnecessary.
Here is the roll recipe, which I love. It is soooo easy.
Ice Box Rolls:
-Dissolve 1 cake of yeast or 1 package of dry yeast in 2 cups of warm water (not hot enough to burn you but not too cool).
-add 1/2 cup of sugar, 1 1/2 tsp salt, 1 beated egg, and half a cup of flour and mix (About speed 2 on a mixer or just mix by hand).
-Add 4 Tablespoons of vegetable oil or shortening and mix (the oil is MUCH easier to do)
-Add about 5 or 6 more cups of flour. The dough will be fairly sticky, but it should still not be too hard to pick the whole thing up in a ball. Knead this lightly or mix with a mixer and dough hook on speed 2 until the flour is mixed in and the dough forms a ball. Lightly grease a bowl and trasfer the dough. Roll it in the bowl to grease the top then cover with plastic wrap and put in the frige overnight. If I use my mixer, the whole process up to this point will take me less than ten minutes.
The next day or whenever, punch down the dough and make the shape of rolls that you want. I usually just pull the dough off in balls, but it makes nice crescents too if you wish. If I'm just doing balls, this takes me about 2-3 minutes. Let the rolls rise until double (an hour is usually enough if you're in a rush, but I generally let them rise for 2 or 3 hours while I'm at church, and they do just fine). Stick them in the oven at 400 degrees for 10-15 minutes.
The dough will keep in the refrigerator for 5-7 days. I just pinch off as much as I need and put the rest back. It will last us several days. It makes about 40 rolls. I love being able to make my Sunday rolls several days before. I can have fresh hot bread coming out of the oven without having gone to any hassle that day. It's especially nice if you're just two people like we are. A big batch of dough is unreasonable for two people if it needs cooked all at once, but like this, we can have fresh hot rolls everyday of the week if we wish and only have to mix the dough up once. It's also handy to have in the frige if you have company, because you already have plenty of dough ready and don't have to wait for it to rise twice. You can decide an hour before dinner to have company and set out enough rolls for everyone. In case you didn't notice, I like fresh hot bread, and this recipe is nearly foolproof. It's very easy. Having never tried to make yeast rolls, I got very edible results the first try. I got a bit too much flour the first try, but the rolls were still very good. By the second try, I'd figured out to use a little less flour and they were delicious! I've since realized that the reason I needed a little less flour is because I wanted to do crescent rolls and therefore would add flour to the dough when I rolled it out. I still got good results, so I'm convinced there's not much you can do to mess these up! Give this recipe a try and enjoy!
I understand the idea, but I think that they are wrong in saying that Sunday dinner requires a great deal of work to be done on Sunday. Here's how you can do Sunday dinner and do VERY little work on Sunday:
Saturday night:
-Salt, flour, and brown your roast and put it in a roasting pan, dutch oven, or crock pot with some water and carrots if you desire. (A word of warning: Carrots will leach the iron from an iron pot and take on a somewhat unpleasant metallic flavor. They will not hurt you. The extra iron is probably good for you, as most of us have at least some level of iron deficiency, but if carrots stay in that pot for very long at all, they will taste terrible!) Some people like their potatoes in with their roast, and if you do, that's fine, but Arthur likes them seperate, so that's how I do it. Anyways, if you cover the roast and put it in the oven at about 250 degrees F, it will be done by lunchtime tomorrow! The roast is completely taken care of, with the exception of possibly adding a little water to the pan Sunday morning. What's more, slow cooked like that, it comes out wonderfully tender.
-Peel and quarter your potatoes. Put them in a pot of COLD water. This will keep them from turning brown. Salt them, cover them and sit them on the stove. Do not turn the stove on. Just leave them there until tomorrow morning.
-If you have frozen veggies, put them in the fridge to thaw. We usually have corn.
- If you like homemade rolls, you can mix the dough up tonight and put it in the fridge. You can even mix it Thursday or Friday if you wish and have perfectly acceptable dough. I will include my recipe at the end. If you have a nice mixer with a dough hook, you can mix the dough up in about 5 or 10 minutes!
- Go to bed.
Sunday Morning:
-Check your roast and add water if necessary.
-Turn the burner on under your potatoes.
-Pull the roll dough out of the fridge. Punch it down, pinch off roll-sized pieces and put in a greased baking dish or cookie sheet. This should only take a minute or two. Set the dish by the stove and cover it with a towel or greased plastic wrap.
-Get ready for church.
-Turn off the burner under the potatoes before you leave. They should be mostly cooked and can be reheated on the stove after church.
After Church:
-Pull the roast out and put it and any veggies with it on a platter. Set the pot on the stove heat it with water and cornstarch to make gravy.
-Turn the oven temp. up to 400 and put the rolls in for 10 or 12 minutes.
-Put the corn or other veggies from the fridge or a can into a saucepan and put on the stove or warm them in a bowl in the microwave.
-Turn the heat back on under the potatoes, and once they are hot, drain and mash them with butter and milk.
-Pull the rolls out of the oven, put everything on the table and enjoy!
All of the difficult work for a Sunday dinner can be done the night before so that all that is left is to set out and cook the rolls, heat up the veggies, mash the potatoes, stir up some gravy, and set the table! All of that takes less time than it would take you to make hot dogs and mac-n-cheese! I agree it would be a labor intensive meal if you started the roast and peeled the potatoes Sunday morning, but that is entirely unnecessary.
Here is the roll recipe, which I love. It is soooo easy.
Ice Box Rolls:
-Dissolve 1 cake of yeast or 1 package of dry yeast in 2 cups of warm water (not hot enough to burn you but not too cool).
-add 1/2 cup of sugar, 1 1/2 tsp salt, 1 beated egg, and half a cup of flour and mix (About speed 2 on a mixer or just mix by hand).
-Add 4 Tablespoons of vegetable oil or shortening and mix (the oil is MUCH easier to do)
-Add about 5 or 6 more cups of flour. The dough will be fairly sticky, but it should still not be too hard to pick the whole thing up in a ball. Knead this lightly or mix with a mixer and dough hook on speed 2 until the flour is mixed in and the dough forms a ball. Lightly grease a bowl and trasfer the dough. Roll it in the bowl to grease the top then cover with plastic wrap and put in the frige overnight. If I use my mixer, the whole process up to this point will take me less than ten minutes.
The next day or whenever, punch down the dough and make the shape of rolls that you want. I usually just pull the dough off in balls, but it makes nice crescents too if you wish. If I'm just doing balls, this takes me about 2-3 minutes. Let the rolls rise until double (an hour is usually enough if you're in a rush, but I generally let them rise for 2 or 3 hours while I'm at church, and they do just fine). Stick them in the oven at 400 degrees for 10-15 minutes.
The dough will keep in the refrigerator for 5-7 days. I just pinch off as much as I need and put the rest back. It will last us several days. It makes about 40 rolls. I love being able to make my Sunday rolls several days before. I can have fresh hot bread coming out of the oven without having gone to any hassle that day. It's especially nice if you're just two people like we are. A big batch of dough is unreasonable for two people if it needs cooked all at once, but like this, we can have fresh hot rolls everyday of the week if we wish and only have to mix the dough up once. It's also handy to have in the frige if you have company, because you already have plenty of dough ready and don't have to wait for it to rise twice. You can decide an hour before dinner to have company and set out enough rolls for everyone. In case you didn't notice, I like fresh hot bread, and this recipe is nearly foolproof. It's very easy. Having never tried to make yeast rolls, I got very edible results the first try. I got a bit too much flour the first try, but the rolls were still very good. By the second try, I'd figured out to use a little less flour and they were delicious! I've since realized that the reason I needed a little less flour is because I wanted to do crescent rolls and therefore would add flour to the dough when I rolled it out. I still got good results, so I'm convinced there's not much you can do to mess these up! Give this recipe a try and enjoy!
Monday, May 5, 2008
Little Things
Aren't you glad God cares about the little things? I sure am. I've been reminded of that a lot lately. All of this rainy weather, along with a few other situations, have had me a little blue. However, God knows all about our problems, and although they may seem impossible to us, they are small matters to Him, and He can take care of them effortlessly. No task taxes Him. He is all-powerful and all-wise. He knows just what to do in every situation and just how to do it, and He has all the resources necessary to take care of us and all of the strength needed to use those resources. He is tireless.
When I was teaching once, there was a child in my class that was a big worrier. This child was much troubled over little things. This child got very upset at every mistake that he made. He got very upset over any problem or misunderstanding. If two papers stuck together when I passed them out, it would seriously stress him that he had an extra. Even after I explained that it was an accident and he didn't have to do it, it still threw his world off kilter. I walked away from the school one day after what was a particularly stressful day for him, and I was sort of shaking my head at the little things that troubled him that didn't even matter. I cannot count how many times I told him, "Don't worry about that. I will take care of it. It's not a big deal." Then it dawned on me, God must feel that way all of the time, for nothing is too "big a deal" for God to handle. We worry over earthly things that, in the long run, really don't matter. It will all come out in the "wash" that is the great resurrection. At that time, the quarrel with a friend over some passing matter will seem silly and foolish. The clothes and shoes that seemed so important will be seen for what they are, totally trivial. Even the bills that you have fretted over and struggled to pay will be seen through new eyes when we lay eyes on the BIG God who told us, "Does not your heavenly Father know you have need of such things?" It's no big deal for Him to take care of all the little worries that we have, so it's not our business to worry about them. He has already promised to take care of them, so how can we say we trust Him and His Word if we persist in worrying about what He has already promised to take care of.
There are two men in my life that I would trust with anything. One is my daddy and the other is my husband. When either of those men tell me that they will "take care of it," I know that it's time for me to stop worrying, because it will be taken care of. They are both very resourceful men who always do what they say they will do and will go to great lengths to do it if necessary. I do not worry about what they say they can take care of. My God has compared Himself to both a Father and a Husband. Like each of these men claim responsibility for their families and the matters that concern their families, God has claimed responsibility for His people. He has promised over and over again that we will be taken care of. He is infinitely bigger and infinitely more resourceful than even the best of fathers and husbands (which, by the way, I have already claimed. All of you other ladies out there will have to claim second best for yours ;-) ) When God promises that He will take care of us, He can be trusted to keep that promise, and you can rest assured that once you ask Him, He is on the job and taking care of it in the best way. Whatever the outcome, His decision is best for the way it was taken care of. Worries are gone when you truly trust Him.
That brings me to the point I set out to talk about to begin with. If you are a good parent, then what matters to your children matters to you. You may recognize that what they want is not best for them, but it still matters to you that it is important to them. You long to be able to see them happy and satisfied. You will not sacrifice what is best for them, but if what will make them happy will be no harm to them and it is within your means to help them get it, you probably will. I remember one day when my dad took me to an auction with him. He asked me if there was anything I wanted. For some reason, I was fascinated with this little ceramic figurine of two frogs dressed in their best clothes sitting on a park bench. To look at it now, it's kind of an ugly little thing, but I liked it. My daddy bought me that little figurine, even though it wasn't probably very attractive to him and was probably more of a hassle to bid on than it was worth, but he knew it meant something to me. I felt loved and cherished when he presented me with it because I knew he'd got it just for me. I still have that figurine, and when I look at it, I'm reminded of my father's love. What matters to a child matters to the father. The same is true of a husband. How many husbands spend money or time getting flowers or chocolate or a favorite gift for their wives? Even though they may see such things as trivial and passing, they know it will make their wives happy, and if it won't overly strain the budget, they will probably indulge their wives if they can. I love dark chocolate. I could eat it all day. One day, my husband was helping build a church. Construction had been slow, and he hadn't been working much, so we were on a tight budget. We spent nothing on luxuries. After working on the church, the pastors wife took the workers into the church pantry and invited them to take something. My husband brought home one item from the church pantry: a Hershey's dark chocolate bar. Needless to say, I felt very special because he'd thought of me and chosen exactly what he knew would make me happy. What matters to me matters to my husband. Let it be known beyond a shadow of a doubt that God is a good parent and the perfect "husband." Sometimes, He does those extra special little unneccessary things to let us know how much He loves us.
Here's my latest example: The lilacs are beautiful this year. My grandma had a lilac bush in her yard when I was growing up, and I was always excited when the lilacs would bloom and that wonderful fragrance would fill her house and yard. My neighbor and landlord has a row of lilac bushes along the road in front of her house. On day last week I was eyeing them from my car. I thought, "I wish I could cut a bunch of those and put them in a vase in my house." As it was, they were too far away from our house to smell or even admire very well. That very night, there was a knock on my door. When I answered, to my surprise, there stood my neighbor with a HUGE bundle of lilac blossoms. She asked if I would like some, because a frost might come that night, and she hated to see them all killed when no one has had a chance to enjoy them yet. I was thrilled. I thanked her and put my big bouquet of lilacs in a pretty vase and enjoyed that smell for the next couple of days. I think God knew that I needed a little cheering up, so He sent a cold front just for me. Okay, so maybe it wasn't just for me, but I think he must surely have put the thought in that neighbor's head to save her flowers by sharing with me. What's more, the frost does not appear to have killed the remaining blossoms, so I can continue to admire them as I drive by. Just a couple of days ago, my mother-in-law called and said that she's got a lot of lilacs this year, so if I'd like to take some, she'd be happy for me to, so it looks like I will have a few more days of that scent filling my house. God cares about the little things.
Another bigger issue that God took care of for us recently involves our insurance. The union is set up so that if you work a certain number of hours in the fiscal year, your insurance coverage will extend for another year. If you do not, you will go to a quarterly schedule. You must work a certain number of hours during the three month quarter to extend your insurance for another three months. If you have a slow quarter, which can happen easily in the carpentery business, especially in the winter, you will lose your insurance. The fiscal year ended on the last day of April. About a week and a half before that, I was looking at Arthur's hours. It was a very slow year for construction in this area, and his hours were low this year. If he worked forty hours a week between that time and the deadline, he would still be just a few hours short. My resourceful husband said he would see what he could do. At the next union meeting, he talked to one of the "big whigs." He told Arthur to call him after it was over, and he would check his records and see if they couldn't push him through if he was close. That was encouraging to know they would try, but there was still no guarantee they could do it. The next day Arthur was at work, he mentioned to his superintendent that he was going to be just a few hours short of keeping his insurance. I don't think he really asked for help or anything. He just mentioned it. His superintendent took it to someone above him and came back and told Arthur that the two of them would be working overtime that Saturday. That just put us over the limit, and we are insured for another year! What seems big to us is small to God. He can manage it. As the Bible says, "The king's heart is in the Lord's hand. He can turn it whatever way he chooses." Arthur did all that he could to solve the problem, and God took over from there and influenced people who could do something to do something. Problem solved.
The size of the problem, big or small, doesn't matter at all, because every problem is small when placed in the hand of our BIG God. It's all relative. A step that seems simple to a parent is insurmountable if placed in front of a toddling child. We must remember that we are dust, and as such are tiny. The problems that seem big only seem that way because they are bigger than us. If God flung the stars out into space and holds the world in his hands, how small our problems must seem when they are placed in His hands! This world will pass away and everything in it. The things that seemed so important that caused you so much worry will be gone. We must stop spending all of our energy on worry and go to work to make a difference in areas that will last. If you can help someone else along the way, you have made an investment that can survive this dying world. Live in a way that is pleasing to our Lord and trust Him to take care of the details. Our God is so loving and compassionate. He cares about the little matters that affect us. The children in kid's club sing a song that we probably have all heard, but we seldom think much about it. After thinking about God's care for us, I think it will mean a bit more to me now than it did when I sang it as a child.
When I was teaching once, there was a child in my class that was a big worrier. This child was much troubled over little things. This child got very upset at every mistake that he made. He got very upset over any problem or misunderstanding. If two papers stuck together when I passed them out, it would seriously stress him that he had an extra. Even after I explained that it was an accident and he didn't have to do it, it still threw his world off kilter. I walked away from the school one day after what was a particularly stressful day for him, and I was sort of shaking my head at the little things that troubled him that didn't even matter. I cannot count how many times I told him, "Don't worry about that. I will take care of it. It's not a big deal." Then it dawned on me, God must feel that way all of the time, for nothing is too "big a deal" for God to handle. We worry over earthly things that, in the long run, really don't matter. It will all come out in the "wash" that is the great resurrection. At that time, the quarrel with a friend over some passing matter will seem silly and foolish. The clothes and shoes that seemed so important will be seen for what they are, totally trivial. Even the bills that you have fretted over and struggled to pay will be seen through new eyes when we lay eyes on the BIG God who told us, "Does not your heavenly Father know you have need of such things?" It's no big deal for Him to take care of all the little worries that we have, so it's not our business to worry about them. He has already promised to take care of them, so how can we say we trust Him and His Word if we persist in worrying about what He has already promised to take care of.
There are two men in my life that I would trust with anything. One is my daddy and the other is my husband. When either of those men tell me that they will "take care of it," I know that it's time for me to stop worrying, because it will be taken care of. They are both very resourceful men who always do what they say they will do and will go to great lengths to do it if necessary. I do not worry about what they say they can take care of. My God has compared Himself to both a Father and a Husband. Like each of these men claim responsibility for their families and the matters that concern their families, God has claimed responsibility for His people. He has promised over and over again that we will be taken care of. He is infinitely bigger and infinitely more resourceful than even the best of fathers and husbands (which, by the way, I have already claimed. All of you other ladies out there will have to claim second best for yours ;-) ) When God promises that He will take care of us, He can be trusted to keep that promise, and you can rest assured that once you ask Him, He is on the job and taking care of it in the best way. Whatever the outcome, His decision is best for the way it was taken care of. Worries are gone when you truly trust Him.
That brings me to the point I set out to talk about to begin with. If you are a good parent, then what matters to your children matters to you. You may recognize that what they want is not best for them, but it still matters to you that it is important to them. You long to be able to see them happy and satisfied. You will not sacrifice what is best for them, but if what will make them happy will be no harm to them and it is within your means to help them get it, you probably will. I remember one day when my dad took me to an auction with him. He asked me if there was anything I wanted. For some reason, I was fascinated with this little ceramic figurine of two frogs dressed in their best clothes sitting on a park bench. To look at it now, it's kind of an ugly little thing, but I liked it. My daddy bought me that little figurine, even though it wasn't probably very attractive to him and was probably more of a hassle to bid on than it was worth, but he knew it meant something to me. I felt loved and cherished when he presented me with it because I knew he'd got it just for me. I still have that figurine, and when I look at it, I'm reminded of my father's love. What matters to a child matters to the father. The same is true of a husband. How many husbands spend money or time getting flowers or chocolate or a favorite gift for their wives? Even though they may see such things as trivial and passing, they know it will make their wives happy, and if it won't overly strain the budget, they will probably indulge their wives if they can. I love dark chocolate. I could eat it all day. One day, my husband was helping build a church. Construction had been slow, and he hadn't been working much, so we were on a tight budget. We spent nothing on luxuries. After working on the church, the pastors wife took the workers into the church pantry and invited them to take something. My husband brought home one item from the church pantry: a Hershey's dark chocolate bar. Needless to say, I felt very special because he'd thought of me and chosen exactly what he knew would make me happy. What matters to me matters to my husband. Let it be known beyond a shadow of a doubt that God is a good parent and the perfect "husband." Sometimes, He does those extra special little unneccessary things to let us know how much He loves us.
Here's my latest example: The lilacs are beautiful this year. My grandma had a lilac bush in her yard when I was growing up, and I was always excited when the lilacs would bloom and that wonderful fragrance would fill her house and yard. My neighbor and landlord has a row of lilac bushes along the road in front of her house. On day last week I was eyeing them from my car. I thought, "I wish I could cut a bunch of those and put them in a vase in my house." As it was, they were too far away from our house to smell or even admire very well. That very night, there was a knock on my door. When I answered, to my surprise, there stood my neighbor with a HUGE bundle of lilac blossoms. She asked if I would like some, because a frost might come that night, and she hated to see them all killed when no one has had a chance to enjoy them yet. I was thrilled. I thanked her and put my big bouquet of lilacs in a pretty vase and enjoyed that smell for the next couple of days. I think God knew that I needed a little cheering up, so He sent a cold front just for me. Okay, so maybe it wasn't just for me, but I think he must surely have put the thought in that neighbor's head to save her flowers by sharing with me. What's more, the frost does not appear to have killed the remaining blossoms, so I can continue to admire them as I drive by. Just a couple of days ago, my mother-in-law called and said that she's got a lot of lilacs this year, so if I'd like to take some, she'd be happy for me to, so it looks like I will have a few more days of that scent filling my house. God cares about the little things.
Another bigger issue that God took care of for us recently involves our insurance. The union is set up so that if you work a certain number of hours in the fiscal year, your insurance coverage will extend for another year. If you do not, you will go to a quarterly schedule. You must work a certain number of hours during the three month quarter to extend your insurance for another three months. If you have a slow quarter, which can happen easily in the carpentery business, especially in the winter, you will lose your insurance. The fiscal year ended on the last day of April. About a week and a half before that, I was looking at Arthur's hours. It was a very slow year for construction in this area, and his hours were low this year. If he worked forty hours a week between that time and the deadline, he would still be just a few hours short. My resourceful husband said he would see what he could do. At the next union meeting, he talked to one of the "big whigs." He told Arthur to call him after it was over, and he would check his records and see if they couldn't push him through if he was close. That was encouraging to know they would try, but there was still no guarantee they could do it. The next day Arthur was at work, he mentioned to his superintendent that he was going to be just a few hours short of keeping his insurance. I don't think he really asked for help or anything. He just mentioned it. His superintendent took it to someone above him and came back and told Arthur that the two of them would be working overtime that Saturday. That just put us over the limit, and we are insured for another year! What seems big to us is small to God. He can manage it. As the Bible says, "The king's heart is in the Lord's hand. He can turn it whatever way he chooses." Arthur did all that he could to solve the problem, and God took over from there and influenced people who could do something to do something. Problem solved.
The size of the problem, big or small, doesn't matter at all, because every problem is small when placed in the hand of our BIG God. It's all relative. A step that seems simple to a parent is insurmountable if placed in front of a toddling child. We must remember that we are dust, and as such are tiny. The problems that seem big only seem that way because they are bigger than us. If God flung the stars out into space and holds the world in his hands, how small our problems must seem when they are placed in His hands! This world will pass away and everything in it. The things that seemed so important that caused you so much worry will be gone. We must stop spending all of our energy on worry and go to work to make a difference in areas that will last. If you can help someone else along the way, you have made an investment that can survive this dying world. Live in a way that is pleasing to our Lord and trust Him to take care of the details. Our God is so loving and compassionate. He cares about the little matters that affect us. The children in kid's club sing a song that we probably have all heard, but we seldom think much about it. After thinking about God's care for us, I think it will mean a bit more to me now than it did when I sang it as a child.
He's got the whole world in His hands.
He's got the whole wide world in His hands.
He's got the whole world in His hands.
He's got the whole world in His hands!
He's got you and me, brother, in His hands.
He's got you and me, sister, in His hands.
He's got you and me, brother, in His hands.
He's got the whole world in His hands!
Sunday, May 4, 2008
All we like sheep have gone astray.... We're in big trouble!
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Okay, here is an example of how a big problem for a sheep can be a small problem for the Shepherd. Arthur is no shepherd, but his cousin has sheep. I wanted to see the new baby lambs, so Arthur took me into a barn where there was a tiny baby lamb. This sheep was nearby, happily eating from a bucket, oblivious to the strangers that had entered the barn. Arthur walked behind the sheep and made some noise. The startled sheep jerked its head up to see what was going on, but it moved so suddenly that the bucket stuck and came up with it! The poor disoriented sheep looked from side to side, and realizing that it could not see, it froze, apparently too scared to move. It did not budge until Arthur composed himself enough to go free its head. Note his laughing face. What an appropriate illustration for my last post! We're like the poor sheep, blinded and frightened by the mess we can create of our own lives. While it may seem funny to someone looking on, I'm sure it was not funny for the sheep! However, a good shepherd can easily remedy the problem if the sheep will hold still long enough to let him! However, if it tried to wander off on its own, it would be woefully lost! Good thing this poor sheep had the sense to stop. Hehehehe!+002.jpg)
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