Lessons From Glassblowing

On our way south, we like to stop in West Virginia at Tamarack. It's a wonderful collection of crafts and crafters from West Virginia. There's also some great foodstuffs as well as a nice little deli syle restaurant where we get a great lunch.

We always take time to walk around the place which is pretty good sized. After four and a half hours on the road at that point it feels good to get some circulation going again in the legs. It's also always an interesting place to watch crafters and artisans at work. We've seen potters and woodworkers, quilters and painters. This trip the glassblowers were at work.

I had to stop and watch. They reminded me of the glassblowers I'd seen on a visit to Bermuda a few years back. They heat up the glob of molten glass in the blazing oven and then roll it in shards of broken colored glass. It goes back in the heat and then into another pile of broken glass several times.

Then the master artist breathes into the pole the soft glass is attached to and begins to build its shape with breaths and a little masterful shaping with some tools. Once in a while it has to go back in the fire in order to shape it some more but in the end, the bubble of glass is opened up to reveal a colorful work of art.

When I originally saw this in Bermuda, it made me think of the way God, our Master Artist, breathes life into us. Sometimes we go through trials (the fire) and often life seems to be in shards, broken and chipped, but God takes all of that and if we allow him to do his work, he creates beauty out of all the brokenness.

Who Do You Trust?

A few weeks ago I had the privilege of sharing the morning message with my church family. Of course with all our traveling, it took on a travel theme of sorts. I showed a few pictures of our trip to Bryce Canyon National Park where I was introduced to Hoodoos. Hoodoos are the stone structures in the canyon that stand stoically while God works his wonder of creation shaping and forming them into amazing structures through the medium of erosion.

Now Hoodoos don't commit consciously to trusting God to form them into new creatures but we do have that opportunity to commit to trusting God to create a new life in us. What keeps us from trusting Him is the question.

When we travel, we often take a plane. Do we know who is flying it? Not usually. Yet we trust that the person at the controls will get us safely to our destination.

Arriving at our destination, we usually need the services of a taxi. Do we know who is driving the taxi? We can see him/her but we really don't know much about that person and in some of the countries we have visited it has been difficult to even communicate with them. Yet again, we trust them to get us safely to our destination.

In both of those cases a lot of prayer often helps--at least to calm the fears we might have but there is one area of trust most people don't even give a second thought to unless of course you are driving on a different side of the road than you normally do. Every time you drive, you trust that the dividing line down the middle of the road will keep the oncoming traffic on the correct side of it. The line in most cases isn't much wider than 6-8 inches or up to 16" or so if there's a double line. Do you trust the double line more?

All of this is to say, we have little trouble trusting the pilot, the taxi driver, or the dividing line in the roadway but when it comes to trusting the living God who walks with us, who loves us, who wants to help us through life's challenges we. . .

What do we do?

Who do you trust?

Typing 101

Back in the day--before smart phones, before computers, there was the typewriter. The arrangement of the keys has stayed fairly close to the original from so many years ago even through the evolution of the electric typewriter and then the electronic of computers and smart phones. Strange though that we would grow up learning our alphabet letters and then be faced with a keyboard with all the letters jumbled. Why?

The credit goes to Christopher Latham Sholes for the seemingly haphazard arrangement of letters that first appeared with the invention of the typewriter sometime in the 1870s. The keyboard arrangement was called QWERTY. Look at your keyboard and you'll see that those are the first letters on the top row.

Sholes was a journalist and newspaper publisher. His original typewriter apparently had the letters alphabetically arranged but as he used his invention, he found the keys colliding and sticking as his speed and skill at typing increased. He reordered the keys to make the process of typing easier and more efficient.

Of course in my mind I kind of see the connection between the keyboard and life. Often our lives are like a confusing keyboard of letters. They seem haphazard, often not making a lot of sense when you look at them. But just as a skilled typist can touch the keys to make words, paragraphs, great works of literature, so God's hands on our haphazard lives can bring order, grace and great works of love.

What If Christmas Meant A Little Bit More?

For some reason the commercialism of Christmas has gotten to me this year. Was it because it started at Halloween? Or was it the debate over when Black Friday should start--Thanksgiving Day, the week of, or maybe just Friday? Of course then Black Friday was followed by Small Business Saturday and Cyber Monday. News programs fretted over the economy. Would the retail stores see a significant growth in sales? What if they didn't? Did it signal an economic crisis?

Then of course as the Thanksgiving turkey was tucked into leftover containers TV, newspapers, magazines and every online source of information began informing the public of the best way to shop, to entertain, to decorate, and on and on. It was tiring to think of all that I wasn't doing or doing right.

And then, tuned into Sirius XM radio to one of the holiday music channels, I heard this quote from Dr. Zeus' The Grinch Who Stole Christmas. It was after the Grinch had done his dirty work and discovered the Whos were celebrating any way.

“And the Grinch, with his Grinch-feet ice cold in the snow, stood puzzling and puzzling, how could it be so? It came without ribbons. It came without tags. It came without packages, boxes or bags. And he puzzled and puzzled 'till his puzzler was sore. Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn't before. What if Christmas, he thought, doesn't come from a store. What if Christmas, perhaps, means a little bit more?”

This week heralds the celebration of the birth of Christ. He is the major part of Christmas unless you replace him with X. Unfortunately I think too many have replaced him with packages, boxes, and bags. Hmmm. What if Christmas , perhaps, means a little bit more?

"Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is the Messiah, the Lord." Luke 2:11

In Anticipation Of Spring--The Ugly Duckling

On the road, heading north, hoping to see some signs of spring when we get there. In anticipation, I thought I would post this piece from the past, published in 2006.

The Ugly Duckling

Two white swans appeared this spring in a marsh area near our home. Each Sunday morning as we traveled to church, we would see bird watchers with binoculars and cameras spouting long lenses, observing the couple.

It wasn't long before the obvious happened. The couple produced an egg and it soon hatched. The offspring looks nothing like his parents. He is gangly, oddly fuzzy, and gray. He reminds me of Hans Christian Anderson's story, The Ugly Duckling.

Since I seem to be into analogies lately, I drew this one. A new Christian is like an "ugly duckling." He starts out eagerly following those before him. He's a bit awkward at times as he begins to learn scriptures. But before long, he becomes more graceful as he is filled with God's grace. God gives him a new look--clothing him in pure spotless white.

I will watch the little swan as he adapts to his world and I will think about how God is still feathering my life with his grace and remaking this "ugly duckling."

Panning For Gold

Gold!

How much better to get wisdom than gold,

to choose understanding rather than silver! Proverbs 16:16 (NIV)

            The great Gold Rush in Alaska in the late 1800s helped to make Fairbanks a center for gold mining and a supply station for those testing their good fortune in the rivers and mountainsides in the area. It was here that our pre-cruise tour of Alaska began.

At ten in the evening, the sun still provided light as our bus from the airport pulled into hotel parking lot. While one imagines Alaska to be cold and snowy, it is actually quite comfortable in July and August and can even get into the upper eighties on a sunny day in the interior near Fairbanks.

Despite the time difference from home, we fought to stay awake a bit longer to explore the grounds and catch up with other members of our group who had arrived earlier. We buzzed with excitement about our excursion to the Eldorado Gold Mine the next day and some of us may have even wondered as we rested our heads that night if we would strike it rich when we learned to pan for gold.

After breakfast the next morning, we boarded buses for the trip through wooded hills full of rugged terrain and pine trees. We watched for moose and other wild life native to Alaska and, as if on cue, they appeared at intervals during our drive to the gold mining area.

Upon our arrival at the Eldorado Gold Mine, we boarded an open-sided train for a trek through the territory that is still mined today. At one point, we entered a permafrost tunnel and a guide explained to us the various mineral and rock formations that tend to produce the most gold.

Our next stop was the giant sluice box where the folks of Eldorado Gold Mine still search for gold. As water is poured over the sluice box filled with soil, gold, a heavy metal, falls to the bottom and separates from gravel and other materials that are washed away. It is the same principle as panning for gold but much more can be accomplished in a shorter amount of time. Guides thoroughly briefed us on the procedure of panning for our own gold and eagerly we set off to our luck.

The Eldorado operation is set up for the leisure tourist. We sat on stools at large troughs of water, warmed to keep the visitors happy, and swirled the materials from our “poke,” a little pouch of dirt and stones taken from the same pile where the gold was mined through the giant sluice. I could imagine a crusty old miner from times past as he spied our lavish setup—a whoop and a holler and a shake of the head as he led his donkey away for some serious panning.

It took a little patience, some rhythm and coordination to begin to slosh the water around in the pan and not lose everything. As the pan is shaken, the gold falls to the bottom. The larger stones can be removed and what is left is sludge that needs to be rinsed and rinsed and rinsed again as the pan is gently swirled partially submerged in the water. Eventually what is left in the bottom of the pan is purple and black sand and little flecks of gold—or if you are very fortunate, a gold nugget.

There were no gold nuggets in my pan but what a thrill it was to find little shiny flakes of gold stuck to the bottom. I carefully picked each miniscule flake out and dropped it into a small vial that was provided us. When we were done, I had perhaps a couple of dollars worth of gold flecks. It cost me another fifteen dollars to get them mounted into a small globe on a gold chain to show off my great gold discovery.

How much richer would we be if we used the same patience and diligence to wash away the sludge of everyday life to find God’s precious metals of wisdom and understanding?

May we see the wealth of wisdom in your grace, Father. May it enrich our lives and spill over into the lives of those around us.

A New Day Dawns

The condo we rent for the winter season faces west to the Florida Bay. I love getting up early enough to watch the sunrise. Yes, in the west--sort of.

You see, even though I'm looking west, the changes as the sun begins to light up the new day are amazing. This particular morning the sky looked a bit dark gray with some large clouds hovering over the water.

As I watched, the water suddenly turned a pinkish color. The gray of the clouds lightened as the water became a bit more pink. Clouds tinged with pink just before beginning to turn to their fluffy white color.

Suddenly the sky began to take on the beautiful blue sky color to frame the clouds that now had no gray color but were a bit tinged with yellow from the sun that I was sure was rising behind me to the east.

No one paints a morning sky like a God who attends to every detail. As a new day dawns, a new year begins. And I am convinced that God will continue to be in every detail.

ARK - Give Me A K!

Most people get off of a ship after a rough journey and kiss the ground. Those of us on that 8 day tour of China in 2007 got to the cruise ship and kissed the deck. I wonder if Mrs. Noah kissed the ground on top of Mount Ararat where the ark came to rest? The Bible tells us Noah’s family worshiped there at an altar they built. And what final advice would Mrs. Noah have from that mountain top?

 Know that He is God wherever your journey may take you.

Lots of good things happen on mountain tops. That’s why we call them mountain top experiences. My literal mountain top experience came on a trip to Alaska.

We were in Denali National Park and halfway up a mountain when our tour bus made a rest stop. By the way, even the porta-potties there were better than the squat toilets in some places in China. There were cups of hot chocolate passed out and I took mine and stepped away from the people surrounding the buses to take in the beauty of the landscape before me.

As I stood in the stillness of that moment and took in the valley below me filled with gentle streams and lush green grass and tall fir trees and caribou grazing quietly and then looked up to the rugged mountain that was before me to its snow capped peak that rose to the sky as a tower of strength, I heard the word “majesty.” And I suddenly understood. When we are asked to worship God’s majesty, it is his strength, his beauty, his watchcare over us, his touch of love, that calls us to give our hearts and our lives to him.

He calls us to “Be still and know that I am God.”

The journey God has put me on has not only included the wonderful opportunities of traveling and writing and speaking but also of being a Grandma. I've told this story before but it is a favorite:

When Tyler was three, we arranged to meet him and his sister and our DIL, Lori, for lunch one day halfway between our house and theirs. Bob and I arrived a little early and so we were waiting for them at a table when they arrived.

Now Tyler, being the self-confident young man that he was, always entered a place as if everyone was poised, waiting just for his appearance. It wasn’t any different this afternoon. He strutted up to the table, nodding at people as he went along, then made his announcement to us.

“I’m gonna be a daddy.”

“You’re gonna be a daddy?” I asked hoping for clarification.

“Yup.” He shook his head and sighed as if it were a heavy burden. “Mommy will tell you.”

Well, you don’t mention becoming a daddy and not perk up a grandmother’s ears. I immediately looked for my daughter-in-law to confirm what I suspected.

“Tyler’s gonna be a daddy?” I blurted out as my DIL finally caught up to him.

 “You can thank your son for the daddy idea,” Lori said. “Tyler noticed the hair on Ron’s chest the other day. Ron told him it was daddy hair and when he got hair on his chest, he could be a daddy, too. The other day in the bathtub, he noticed he had hair on his legs and he figured that was good enough—he could be a daddy.”

It wasn’t the answer I was expecting, but there was no disappointment. Ron and Lori haven’t planned past two and those two promise to provide a lifetime of entertainment.

“Well, if we shaved the hair on his legs, does that mean he could be a mommy?” I asked.

To her credit, Lori politely asked me not to plant that idea in his head.

Whatever lies ahead for Tyler—daddy hair and all—I hope he will learn:

A -- Adventures of a spiritual nature often come in unusual and unique ways.

R --Remember God’s grace in all the storms of life and take refuge in Him.

And  K-- Know that God is God wherever the journey may lead. 

ARK - Give Me An R!

If Mrs. Noah were to continue to reflect on her ARK cruise she might say:

Remember, as you sail on in your spiritual adventure, to ask God to calm the storms.

Jesus often used boats to preach from and to journey back and forth across the Sea of Galilee which was actually a lake much smaller than Lake Erie. The disciples were pretty used to these boats and the sea. Most of them were fishermen. But as they traveled with Jesus, they often forgot to pack their sense of adventure.

On one particular occasion, they were in the middle of the lake when a great wind blew up. Apparently this was a problem in this area and even though the lake was small, a gale would really toss those boats around. It started to get swamped.

Let’s get the full picture. The sky is dark. It’s probably lightning and thundering. The rain is whipping them in the face and the waves are washing over the boat. But there’s Jesus—sleeping in the back of the boat.

Finally, someone gets his nerve up to quit bailing and wake Jesus up. I’m wondering if the disciples woke him up to get him to help bail.

Someone pushes a cup in his direction and yells, “Don’t you care if we drown?”

Jesus gets up, looks around at the wind and the waves and yells out, “Quiet! Be still!”

For just one moment, I’ll bet those disciples thought he was yelling at them.

But then the wind calms and the waves recede and all is at peace again. And Jesus asks them, “Why are you so afraid? Do you still have no faith?”

Faith is key to any spiritual adventure. There was a time when I, like the disciples, was asking God the same question: Don’t you care?

The year was 1984. Like Mrs. Noah life had been pretty good to me. Sixteen years earlier I had married the man I love and we started a family. We enjoyed our church activities, his career took off—as did mine as a homemaker, a PTA activist, and a mother. After three boys, we decided to adopt to get our girl. She came with a brother and that brought the total of little mouths to feed to five. We were a happy group.

And then life happened.

It started with the sudden death of my mother then my infant niece. Like the disciples, I questioned whether God cared. It took a long journey of faith building before I finally realized that I needed to turn to him and ask him to calm the storms of life. It was a hard lesson to learn but when other storms came, I remembered to turn my face to him and ask for calm.

In all of your trials, your journeys of life, in all of your spiritual adventures, remember God’s grace and in all the storms of life, take refuge in Him.

ARK - Give Me An A!

If you were to ask Mrs. Noah about her cruise aboard the ARK she might start by telling you that:

Adventures of a spiritual nature often come in unusual and unique ways.

I've blogged about our trip to China. It was part of a cruise we took through the South China Sea in October of  2007. The first 8 days were spent on land exploring Bejing, Xian, and a few other cities before boarding the cruise ship to sail to Vietnam, Japan, Singapore, Taiwan and Thailand. The terra-cotta warriors, the Great Wall and the panda bears in China were all fascinating to see and I don’t regret for a moment the opportunity to have experienced China’s culture and tradition. But the food and the restroom facilities were truly something else. This is where that sense of adventure was supposed to come in that our travel agent had told us to pack.

Our first night in Bejing, we strolled up to a pedestrian mall dodging traffic at a few streets we had to cross. There are no traffic rules it seems and pedestrians are low on the food chain. The best advice we got from one of our guides was to close our eyes, step off the curb, and keep walking. If you stop you disturb the flow of traffic and there will be an accident.

At the pedestrian mall, there were lots of nice shops and then off to one side was an alley that led to the “real” China. Food booths lined the cramped and crowded alleyway.  There was all sorts of weird foodstuffs on a stick—bugs, snakes, seahorses—if you’ve ever watched the fellow on the travel channel who eats all the weird things, you’ll know what I’m talking about. The smell was enough to put you off of wanting to sample anything.

From Beijing we went to the Yangtze River. There for three days we cruised down the Yangtze River on a Chinese river boat. On board, the river boat food looked a bit more appetizing but much of the time was unrecognizable. Our China adventure was the only trip I’ve ever taken where I actually lost weight.

Before we left for China, I knew that we would be experiencing some tough days of travel, different foods, and cultural shock. Overcrowding. Trust me, our western style toilets are a luxury. So I had asked God to get me through it by showing me God Moments where I could see Him at work in this Communist country where people worshiped Buddha and gods of other Eastern religions.

One afternoon we transferred from the river boat to a smaller tourist catamaran that was to take us down a tributary of the Yangtze and through what they call the Lesser Gorges area. It was a beautiful area even though we saw most of it through a cold drizzly rain. We listened as our Chinese guide told us about the history, and pointed out the monkeys and other wild life that we met along the way. When we got to the turn around point and headed back, our guide began to tell us about local customs and traditions. Then she sang us a Chinese folk song. When she finished she asked that we help her to learn a song in English that she liked. She asked us to sing—Amazing Grace. One hundred voices rang out in the middle of the river in the middle of Communist China. It was the most beautiful rendition of Amazing Grace that I’ve ever heard.

Adventures of a spiritual nature often come in unusual and unique ways. But wait! There's more from Mrs. Noah. . .

My Ship's An ARK!

How many of you have ever said, “I’m waiting for my ship to come in?” I used to hear that term a lot when I was growing up. Every time my dad was dreaming of getting something big or doing something special he’d always dreamed of, he would say he had to wait for his ship to come in.

Have you ever wondered what that ship would look like? Perhaps a big yacht? Or an oil freighter? Or maybe a cruise ship?

I think Noah’s wife was thinking cruise ship when Noah started talking about his ship coming in. Mrs. Noah, was probably very excited when she heard her husband talking about a cruise—a forty day cruise no less! I can see her sitting at her kitchen table, sipping coffee and turning pages of the latest cruise brochure.  Dreaming of exotic ports of call, warm sandy beaches, chilled fruit smoothies.

And then Noah handed her a hammer and said he needed her help building the ship.

Well, wives are pretty resilient. And I’m sure Mrs. Noah after a bit of negotiating with Noah, decided it was better to help build the ship than to not get to cruise at all. The ship began to take shape. Of course then she had to endure all the gossip about what was going on in their backyard. She took to telling people in the grocery store that their ship had come in—it was just in pieces and they had to put it together.

They finally put the finishing touches on the ship, oiled all the teak, and were ready to begin embarkation. Mrs. Noah got all her cruise wardrobe packed and set the suitcases out for the porters to take on board. She happened to see the porters as they picked them up and she wasn’t happy with the way they handled the luggage. The only way to describe them was: they were gorillas!

She boarded the ship and took her welcome aboard drink from the server who was decked out in bright feathers and kept squawking “hello.” Something seemed odd about this cruise already but she just couldn’t put her finger on it.

The cabin was a bit small but comfortable and with a window. She’d wanted a balcony but Noah had insisted it wouldn’t be necessary. When her luggage arrived in the room, she tucked away all the clothes in the bureaus and closet and then went up on deck to watch the other passengers board the ship. 

She was appalled! They were real animals! Some were hairy and loud. Some were rather large and clumsy. Others, well, it was just not the kind of company she’d expected to have dinner with in the dining room.

Mrs. Noah sighed and took out the book she brought to read, found a deck chair and then slathered on her sun block. She sat back and closed her eyes to enjoy a few rays of sun only to be interrupted by her husband.

           “What are you doing?” he asked.

           “I’m relaxing a bit,” she told him. “I think I’ve earned a little rest and relaxation after all this ship building.”

           “I think you’ll want to get your rain gear out,” he told her.

           “Rain gear? What are you talking about? The sun’s out. I want to get a tan.”

           Noah took her to the side railing. “Honey, take a look out there. Do you see any water?”

Mrs. Noah looked out on a dry sandy soil. There wasn’t even a backyard creek running through the yard. Now she realized what had been bothering her. How do you cruise on a ship when there’s no water?

           “What kind of a ship is this if there’s no water to cruise on?” she asked Noah.

           “It’s an ark. God’s gonna provide all the water we need and we’re going to save all the animals of the world and have a wonderful cruise as well. You did remember to bring your sense of adventure, right?”

Now when anyone tells you to bring your sense of adventure on a trip, you know you’re in for something unusual. Trust me on this. That’s what our cruise company told us when we were going to China. It truly was a unique adventure.  

For the Noahs, this was a real Do-It-Yourself cruise. How many of you have ever gone camping with the family or taken one of those vacations where you rent a condo for the week? If you are like most wives and mothers, you packed, you cooked, you picked up after everyone, and you may have even had to clean and do the laundry. Can we imagine it was any different for Mrs. Noah?

First there was all the rain. That at least floated the boat but there wasn’t much opportunity for lounging in the sun on the deck. And incidentally, all those passengers needed looking after. What do you do with a seasick elephant?—give him lots of room. And what about those rabbits that seemed to be mathematically precocious? Where was she going to put them all?

Yes, it was a real adventure and I’m sure Mrs. Noah was happy to see the top of Mt. Arrarat appear in the distance as the sun broke through once again. Incidentally, the forty night cruise turned into 150 days before they set foot on dry land. That’s an around the world cruise today!

I’ll bet she was glad to see the cruise end but at the same time, what an amazing journey—an adventure unlike any other. Something to tell her grandchildren about for years to come—As a matter of fact the story is still being told. It was truly an adventure of faith.

Now if you asked Mrs. Noah about that cruise what do you think she might tell you? Stay tuned. . .

Will The Christ Child Come?

[This is a story that has circulated and been enjoyed by many all over the world. It came to me in an email from friends we had made on board the Queen Mary 2 this past year. Curious, I searched for the "unknown author" online and connected with her finally. Her name is Gaye Willis and she lives in Alaska. The story was written in 1998 and published at LDS World's Countdown to Christmas. Gaye claims she's not a writer but even in telling how she has received feedback from so many all over the world, I think the Lord has blessed her with the gift of words. Here's her story.]

One Christmas we had an interesting experience that I would like to share. Halfway through December we were doing the regular evening things when there was a knock at the door. We opened it to find a small package with a beautiful ceramic lamb inside. We looked at the calendar and realized that the 12 days of Christmas were beginning! We waited excitedly for the next night's surprise and only then, with the gift of a matching shepherd, did we realized that the lamb was part of a nativity set.

Each night we grew more excited to see what piece we would receive. Each was exquisitely beautiful. The kids kept trying to catch the givers as we slowing built the scene at the manager and began to focus on Christ's birth.

On Christmas Eve, all the pieces were in place, but the baby Jesus. My 12 year-old son really wanted to catch our benefactors and began to devise all kinds of ways to trap them. He ate his dinner in the mini-van watching and waiting, but no one came.

Finally we called him in to go through our family's Christmas Eve traditions. But before the kids went to bed we checked the front step -- No Baby Jesus! We began to worry that my son had scared them off.

My husband suggested that maybe they dropped the Jesus and there wouldn't be anything coming. Somehow something was missing that Christmas Eve. There was a feeling that things weren't complete. The kids went to bed and I put out Christmas, but before I went to bed I again checked to see if the Jesus had come -- no, the doorstep was empty.

In our family the kids can open their stockings when they want to, but they have to wait to open any presents until Dad wakes up. So one by one they woke up very early and I also woke up to watch them. Even before they opened their stockings, each child checked to see if perhaps during the night the baby Jesus had come. Missing that piece of the set seemed to have an odd effect. At least it changed my focus. I knew there were presents under the tree for me and I was excited to watch the children open their gifts, but first on my mind was the feeling of waiting for the ceramic Christ Child.

We had opened just about all of the presents when one of the children found one more for me buried deep beneath the limbs of the tree. He handed me a small package from my former visiting teaching companion. This sister was somewhat less-active in the church. I had been her visiting teacher for a couple of years and then, when she was asked to be a visiting teacher, she requested to go with me. I had learned over time they didn't have much for Christmas, so that their focus was the children. It sounded like she didn't get many gifts to open, so I had always given her a small package--new dish towels, the next year's Relief Society lesson manual--not much, but something for her to open. I was touched when at Church on the day before Christmas, she had given me this small package, saying it was just a token of her love and appreciation.

As I took off the bow, I remembered my friendship with her and was filled with gratitude for knowing her and for her kindness and sacrifice In this year giving me a gift. But as the paper fell away, I began to tremble and cry. There in the small brown box was the baby Jesus. He had come! I realized on that Christmas Day that Christ will come into our lives in ways that we don't expect. The spirit of Christ comes into our hearts as we serve one another. We had waited and watched for him to come, expecting the dramatic "knock at the door and scurrying of feet" but he came in a small, simple package that represented service friendship, gratitude, and love.

This experience taught me that the beginning of the true spirit of Christmas comes as we open our hearts and actively focus on the Savior. But we will most likely find him in the small and simple acts of love, friendship and service that we give to each other. This Christmas I want to feel again the joy of knowing that Christ is in our home. I want to focus on loving and serving. More than that I want to open my heart to him all year that I may see him again.

Valentine's Day is for Sweet Hearts

Valentine's Day is primarily considered as the day for sweethearts to express their love for each other. Today I would challenge you to look at it in another way. How about making the day a time for sweet hearts? I know. It's a play on words but stay with me.

A sweet heart doesn't necessarily need a "significant other" as a special love interest is called in today's terms. A sweet heart reaches out to others rather than looking for what will be received from others. Look around you today and see where a sweet heart might brighten another's day. Is there a shut-in nearby? A family member or friend who's lost a spouse? A neighbor who could use a helping hand or just a reminder that they are cared for?

The receiving is in the giving. Try a random act of kindness or two or more. A sweet heart will enrich your life as well as the lives of others.

There was a reason Jesus said, "Do to others as you would like them to do to you." The thought is not only golden, it's sweet!

My Word for 2016 - Celebrate!

Seems I'm a little late here on this choose a word for the year thing. Everyone else seems to have come up with one quickly and posted on Facebook. Not only am I late but I'm using the same word I did last year. I can do that since I didn't officially declare it my word for the year. I don't usually choose a word for the year. But here I am joining the pack.

My word for the year is CELEBRATE. It came to me last year when I was having a hard time coping with some things and suddenly realized that I was spending too much energy on woe-is-me stuff. The song, Celebrate Good Times - Come On! was playing on the radio and it stuck in my head. You know how those things can just run around and around in there sometimes.

The more I thought about it the more I realized that it's not a bad plan of action, philosophy, or whatever else you want to call it. Here I was wallowing way too often in things that were making me sad, mad, and felling bad when I really should be celebrating life.

Our lives have been blessed with so much and when I let myself wallow, well, it doesn't make me the thankful person I should be. So now when I find myself an the verge of wallowing, I say a little prayer of praise and then start the song in my head again. It works!

So join me. Adopt the word CELEBRATE for the year and the next time things threaten to get you down remember the blessings and start singing that song. Come on!

The Christmas Carol Connection

Two things I could not remember my dad ever doing when I was growing up: dancing or singing. At my wedding reception when the DJ said it was time for the father of the bride to dance with the bride he connected with me in the correct dance position and then said, "What do I do?"

"Just move your feet a little," I recall answering. The photographer got the picture and relieved, my dad gave up the pretense of dancing with me. I love the picture though. He looks so proud of himself actually "dancing."

Many years later, the first Christmas after my mother was gone, we planned our usual Christmas Eve get together at my brother's home. They were always patiently waiting on us each year because it was important to us that we go to the Christmas Eve service at our church. This year as always I extended the invitation to my family and surprisingly my father said he'd come.

I don't recall Dad ever going to a church service other than a funeral or a wedding. He grew up Catholic but had been disillusioned by the church years ago. He was always a very private man and except for only a small hint one time, he never expressed openly any kind of belief in God.

Our service started that Christmas evening with a series of familiar Christmas hymns. I stood next to Dad hoping he would feel comfortable, hoping he would find some comfort in the Christmas service. Mom had been Mrs. Christmas all our lives, planning, cooking, shopping and making Christmas traditions that now seemed threatened by her absence.

Suddenly I realized that the voice I was hearing strong and clear was coming from my Dad! I looked at him. My face must have registered my surprise. He looked down at me and smiled. "What? I know these songs." I smiled back at him and turned away quickly lest he see the tears that formed. My dad knew the Christmas carols!

I had no idea where he would have learned them. But within those hymns, those traditional Christmas carols, I knew that there was the message of hope, of peace, of the precious gift of Jesus. Perhaps he had known the message. Perhaps he had connected with his Savior after all.

We don't hear those carols as often as I'd like any more but all those years I sang them, they have left that same message in my heart. A connection to the heart of the Christmas message.

What If Christmas Meant A Little Bit More

For some reason the commercialism of Christmas has gotten to me this year. Was it because it started at Halloween? Or was it the debate over when Black Friday should start--Thanksgiving Day, the week of, or maybe just Friday? Of course then Black Friday was followed by Small Business Saturday and Cyber Monday. News programs fretted over the economy. Would the retail stores see a significant growth in sales? What if they didn't? Did it signal an economic crisis?

Then of course as the Thanksgiving turkey was tucked into leftover containers TV, newspapers, magazines and every online source of information began informing the public of the best way to shop, to entertain, to decorate, and on and on. It was tiring to think of all that I wasn't doing or doing right.

And then, tuned into Sirius XM radio to one of the holiday music channels, I heard this quote from Dr. Zeus' The Grinch Who Stole Christmas. It was after the Grinch had done his dirty work and discovered the Whos were celebrating any way.

“And the Grinch, with his Grinch-feet ice cold in the snow, stood puzzling and puzzling, how could it be so? It came without ribbons. It came without tags. It came without packages, boxes or bags. And he puzzled and puzzled 'till his puzzler was sore. Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn't before. What if Christmas, he thought, doesn't come from a store. What if Christmas, perhaps, means a little bit more?”

This week heralds the celebration of the birth of Christ. He is the major part of Christmas unless you replace him with X. Unfortunately I think too many have replaced him with packages, boxes, and bags. Hmmm. What if Christmas , perhaps, means a little bit more?

"Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is the Messiah, the Lord." Luke 2:11

There's A Thorn In My Side

It's Christmas time and I cannot help but remember my mother at this time of year. She was Mrs. Christmas, Mother Christmas, Grandma Christmas. Whatever name you want to apply. She thrived on colored lights, lit candles, wrapping paper and bows, cards, pine trees and trimming, hand knit Christmas stockings, and the list goes on.

Mom passed away thirty years ago but that first Christmas after her funeral in September still pierces my heart. About a month before Christmas, I received a call from a friend of hers who said she didn't know what to do with some gifts my mother had ordered from her. Mom had bought seven light weight jackets, one for each of our kids and Bob and I, and asked her to embroider our names and the name of our sailboat on the jackets. They were all finished and paid for if I wanted to pick them up. I did. And I wrapped them and experienced the most bitter sweet moment of my life when we unwrapped gifts that year.

While time has passed--lots of time, there is still that little pinch each year at this time. I know there are many others who go through the same emotion each year because of losses in their lives. I spoke with a man recently who lost his wife several years ago and couldn't understand why it still hurt so much. For some reason the verse in 2 Corinthians 12 came to mind where Paul talks about having a thorn in his flesh.

Sorrow and grief is kind of like that. It pokes us at times and often when we don't expect it even if it's been many years since our loss. Like a thorn that's been embedded in the flesh, it hurts a lot at first, then lessens but every so often, it pinches us again but as God told Paul, "My grace is sufficient for you."

The memories God has graced me with of my mother make that pinch of grief bearable. So I will think of Mother Christmas and all her quirky ways of showing her love through our holiday season and thank God for her. We've all outgrown our jackets but we'll never outgrow the memories.

Who Do You Trust?

A few weeks ago I had the privilege of sharing the morning message with my church family. Of course with all our traveling, it took on a travel theme of sorts. I showed a few pictures of our trip to Bryce Canyon National Park where I was introduced to Hoodoos. Hoodoos are the stone structures in the canyon that stand stoically while God works his wonder of creation shaping and forming them into amazing structures through the medium of erosion.

Now Hoodoos don't commit consciously to trusting God to form them into new creatures but we do have that opportunity to commit to trusting God to create a new life in us. What keeps us from trusting Him is the question.

When we travel, we often take a plane. Do we know who is flying it? Not usually. Yet we trust that the person at the controls will get us safely to our destination.

Arriving at our destination, we usually need the services of a taxi. Do we know who is driving the taxi? We can see him/her but we really don't know much about that person and in some of the countries we have visited it has been difficult to even communicate with them. Yet again, we trust them to get us safely to our destination.

In both of those cases a lot of prayer often helps--at least to calm the fears we might have but there is one area of trust most people don't even give a second thought to unless of course you are driving on a different side of the road than you normally do. Every time you drive, you trust that the dividing line down the middle of the road will keep the oncoming traffic on the correct side of it. The line in most cases isn't much wider than 6-8 inches or up to 16" or so if there's a double line. Do you trust the double line more?

All of this is to say, we have little trouble trusting the pilot, the taxi driver, or the dividing line in the roadway but when it comes to trusting the living God who walks with us, who loves us, who wants to help us through life's challenges we. . .

What do we do?

Who do you trust?

Flying Nearer My God To Thee

 The plane levels out, gives that little surge that makes your tummy flutter, and a few minutes later, the pilot announces “Ladies and gentlemen, we have reached our cruising altitude and I am turning off the fasten seatbelt sign.” Instantly the hymn, “Nearer My God To Thee,” begins to play in my head. David said in the psalms, “But as for me, it is good to be near God…” (Psalms 73:28). Am I really nearer to God up here?

I look out the window and see the fields and ribbons of highways below. The busyness of life flows like ants on a hill as we pass over people who are out and about their daily lives. God is not any nearer up here than He is down there, I think. Not as long as I trust in Him.

I smile. Trust. Why is that so hard to do with God sometimes? Here I am flying through the air at hundreds of miles per hour, suspended 30,000 feet above the earth, trusting in the pilot of the plane to get us to our destination and land safely on the ground again.

David also said, “Some trust in chariots and some in horses, but we trust in the name of the LORD our God.” (Psalms 20:7) Often I trust people, complete strangers, with my safety. The pilot. The taxi driver. The bus driver. I put myself in their care with hardly a thought to what I’ve done. Why not put myself in God’s hands as easily? I know how much he cares for me. Much more than any stranger would.

The plane starts to descend. I put up the tray table and bring my seat back to its original upright position. I begin my usual prayer, “God give us a safe landing. Be in the cockpit and guide our pilot.”

It is then I realize my trust isn’t in the pilot. I’ve trusted God all along. I’ve been in his hands—held 30,000 feet in the air. I’ve gained new insight. Whether soaring through the clouds in a jet or planting my feet firmly on the ground, I need to trust God. Trust Him for all my “safe landings” in life. Trust Him for guiding me safely to all my destinations. Trust in him for the hope of my salvation.

“May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.” (Romans 15:13)

Sunday Morning Worship - The Left Hand

Most of my friends and family as well as many of my readers, I'm sure, are tired of hearing about my broken wrist so just one more mention here and I'm done--maybe. Playing tennis while we were in Florida, I fell backwards and immediately put out my left hand to cushion my fall. While I may have saved my head from cracking on the court, my wrist took the brunt of the fall. I thought (and desperately hoped) it was only a sprain but a few weeks later when it wasn't healing as it should, I saw my doctor and x-rays confirmed it as a fracture.

I'm right handed so everything I do depends upon that hand but I have found lately that my left hand has been doing a lot that I didn't realize was important. It's a holder of things. It's a balancer. It steadies the vegetables I need to cut and grasps jars and bottles for opening. It's a partner to my right hand when I'm getting dressed. Ever try to fasten a bra or tie a shoe with one hand?

If I may draw an analogy: I depend upon Jesus for my strength, my encouragement, the power to get through a day. He sits at the right hand of the Father but, I wonder, who's on the left? If I think of all the things my left hand does, I am reminded of family and friends who balance me, steady me, hold me, and partner with me as I walk this life's journey. While Jesus is foremost in my life, I love those "lefties" too.