Laudable Linkage

Here are interesting things I’ve seen around the Web lately: maybe some will interest you as well.

10 reasons to break the sarcastic habit, with action plan.

So Was Jesus.

Thoughts on Modesty, not from the standpoint of causing guys to stumble, though that’s a valid concern, but as a matter of our own hearts before God.

“Dora the Doormat” and other Scary Straw Women of Complementarity, HT to Challies. Deals with some of the erroneous charges some make against proponents of complementarianism, the view that God created the sexes equal but with roles that complement one another.

Confessions of a Conflicted Complementarian, showing how gospel grace applies even in this.

One taxpayer’s response to the potential government shutdown. Heh, heh, heh.

Food:

Double Chocolate Treasures. I am definitely trying these!

Cake Balls. I usually take the easy route of just throwing cake batter in a 9 x 13 pan, but these looks so good.

Resurrection Rolls for Easter breakfast. I’ve posted my version with yeast rolls before, but this one uses crescent rolls and cinnamon. I might just try this kind this year.

Crafts/decorations:

Buttons on display. Really cute card made with buttons.

How to Turn Mini-Blinds Into Roman Shades, HT to Lizzie.

What guys think about modesty:

I can’t imagine all the work behind this:

Happy Saturday!

Friday’s Fave Five

Welcome to Friday’s Fave Five, hosted by Susanne at Living to Tell the Story, in which we can share five of our favorite things from the last week. This has been a wonderful exercise in looking for and appreciating the good things God blesses us with. Click on the button to learn more, then go to Susanne’s to read others’ faves and link up your own.

Here are a few highlights from this week:

1. A visit with a dear friend. I’ve mentioned my friend Carol in SC a few times here and there. She and her husband were in the Gatlinburg/Pigeon Forge area over the weekend, which is about an hour or so from us, and they drove over for Sunday dinner before heading back home. It was so good to see them again and to have them here!

2. Four Layer Dessert with chocolate this time!

3. A come-from-behind Scrabble move that wins the game. One friend I play Scrabble with via Facebook used to always beat me soundly, until I learned some of her moves (bwahahahaha). Now we go back and forth. In one game she had pulled ahead and it looked like she would win — but then I was able to go out with some unlikely letters and win. I love it when the game is close and suspenseful.

4. Dogwood trees. Back in SC, after the first crocuses, daffodils, and tulips bloom, spring’s next act is the dogwoods and azaleas. We’ve had dogwoods in nearly all of our yards over the years except at our very first home and this one, and I missed them. But in the last week or so I’ve seen many blooming around the neighborhood. Maybe some day we can plant one here, but in the mean time, I’ll enjoy them when I am out.

5. Eastern Redbuds. I’ve noticed these trees with lavender buds on them along the highway between here and church, and they’ve really brightened the view since many other trees don’t have their leaves yet. I wasn’t sure what they were, but a couple of people suggested Redbuds, and I think that’s right.

Sorry, no photos of either tree — I’m in the car when I see them.

Have a great weekend!

Flashback Friday: Poetry

Mocha With Linda hosts a weekly meme called Flashback Friday. She’ll post a question every Thursday, and then Friday we can link our answers up on her site. You can visit her site for more Flashbacks.

In honor of National Poetry Month, the prompt for today is:

What poems do you remember from your childhood? Did you have to memorize many poems for school when you were growing up? Did you learn any just for fun? Do you remember which ones they were–and can you still recite them? Did you have a poetry book that you liked to read? Do you enjoy poetry today? Do you prefer rhyming poetry or free verse? Whimsical poetry or epic poems that tell a story? Do you have a favorite poem or poet? Have you ever written any poems?

I must have been exposed to nursery rhymes early on, but my first conscience memory of poetry is from A Child’s Garden of Verses by Robert Louis Stevenson in first grade. Loved that book! My next memory concerning poetry involved making a poetry book a few years later. We were supposed to look up various poems, copy down our favorites, and illustrate them. I wish I still had that book! The only lines I remember from it are from one poem which said, “But I think mice/Are rather nice.” I do not think so now!!

I know I probably read more poetry in English classes through the years, but my next memory is of angst-filled poetry I both read and wrote as a teenager. I’ve written only a few in recent years, two silly and one serious: Ode to Hay Fever, Ode to a Summer Cold, and A Mother’s Nightly Ritual.

I do enjoy poetry today. Good poetry, anyway. When carefully chosen words really encapsulate a particular thought or feeling or truth in poetry, it just really hits home like nothing else.

In general I like rhyming poetry better than free verse — there is just something about the rhythm and disciple of rhyme that is beautiful. Free verse looks like it would be easier, but just stringing words down a page does not constitute a free verse poem, so in a way I think it might be harder to create something truly poetic as a free verse. But it can be done.

I like the idea of epic poems that tell an over-arching story — The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, etc. — but I think today’s readers would find it hard to sustain the thread of the story through that many verses. I enjoy “light verse” like Richard Armour‘s as well as devotional poetry like Amy Carmichael‘s.

I don’t know if I have a favorite poet, but the closest would probably be Robert Frost. Though his poems are mostly pretty short, he packs a lot of meaning in a few words that are accessible to most people today.

Some of my favorite poems of all time are:

Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening by Robert Frost
The Road Not Taken by Robert Frost
How Do I Love Thee by Elizabeth Barrett Browning
To A Waterfowl by William Cullen Bryant
To a Mouse by Robert Burns
To a Louse by Robert Burns
A Red, Red Rose by Robert Burns
The Cotter’s Saturday Night by Robert Burns
The Raven by Edgar Allen Poe
Annabelle Lee by Edgar Allen Poe
To My Dear and Loving Husband by Anne Bradstreet.
September by John Updike
Am I a Stone and Not a Sheep? by Christina Rosetti
The Blue Bowl by Blanche Bane Kuder
The Blue Robe by Wendell Berry
October’s Party by George Cooper
I Am Not Skilled to Understand by Dorothy Greenwell

Do you have a favorite poem?

Wednesday Hodgepodge

Joyce From This Side of the Pond hosts a weekly Wednesday Hodgepodge of questions for fun and for getting to know each other.

1. National Read a Road Map Day falls on April 5th. Would people say you have a good sense of direction? Do you rely on a GPS when you drive somewhere new? When was the last time you used a map?

No, I don’t have a good sense of direction at all. I need exact instructions. I haven’t used a fold-out paper map in…..oh….some years….but sometimes I do print out maps and directions from the Internet. Our satellite coverage from the GPS doesn’t seem to cover all the area here since we’ve moved, so printed directions help if we get stuck or the GPS can’t find the road we need. But I prefer the GPS to trying to read directions while driving. It’s been a tremendous help since we moved.

2. What’s your favorite cookbook?

The church cookbook from our previous church.

3. What painting would you like to “walk into” and experience? Why?

Wow, that’s a hard one. One of the first that comes to mind is The Journey to Emmaus, where two disciples were walking and discussing the events of the crucifixion and resurrection, and Jesus joins them, though they do not know it is Him yet. “And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he expounded unto them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself” (Luke 24:27.) That would have been quite an interesting conversation!

4. What annoys you more- misspellings or mispronunciations?

Depends on whether I am reading or listening. 🙂 I don’t know — both annoy me. But I can understand typos and have them all too often myself, so maybe mispronunciations from newscasters and public speakers — seems that if they’re planning what they’re going to say they’d check out pronunciations ahead of time.

5. What is something your mother or father considered important?

My father’s biggest issue was respect.

6. Do you like or dislike schedules?

Yes. 🙂 I don’t particularly like them on a daily basis, but I do get more done with them than if I just meander through the day. But when any kind of big event is coming up, they’re essential and a big help.

7. Let’s have some fun with National Poetry Month (that would be April)…write your own ending to this poem-

“Roses are Red
Violets are blue…”

Incidentally if you’d like to read the history behind that little ditty you’ll find it here.

“It’s the time of year
Many people say, ‘Achoo!'”

8. Insert your own random thought in this space.

A few quotes seen here and there:

— “A chip on the shoulder is too heavy a piece of baggage to carry through life.” — John Hancock

— Every time history repeats itself the price goes up.

— A clean desk is a sign of a cluttered desk drawer.

Book Review: Faithful

Faithful by Kim Cash Tate is another book I won in a contest at Mocha With Linda.

Kim unfolds the lives of three friends:

Cydney is approaching her 40th birthday, single, wondering why God has not fulfilled her desires for a husband and children, stung by the fact that her thoughtless sister planned for her wedding to take place on Cyd’s birthday. But as the handsome and likable best man shows interest in Cyd, she’s flattered and even attracted, yet sure he is not the one for her.

Dana seems to have a perfect marriage — until her husband is caught having an affair.

Phyllis has been praying for her husband to come to Christ ever since she did six years previously, but he remains adamantly opposed to anything smacking of Christianity. Then at a college reunion she runs into an old friend who is widowed and seems a sensitive, thoughtful, godly Christian man, and she finds herself torn between the marriage she has and the ideal one that could be.

Each of these women learns in various ways what it means to trust in God’s faithfulness and to be faithful personally in their situations.

This was a hard book to put down — I kept wanting to let everything else go so I could keep reading and see what happened! Kim Cash Tate made it very easy to like her characters and to empathize with them and to be drawn into their struggles.

I know some women might avoid a book like this because of its subject matter, but real women in this world do face these kinds of situations, and Kim shares both the struggles and temptations they face as well as both spiritual and practical ways to deal with them in a gracious and non-preachy manner. Nevertheless I would urge caution before allowing a teen to read it: I definitely recommend a mom previewing it first.

(This review will also be linked to Semicolon‘s Saturday Review of Books.)

The Week In Words

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Welcome to The Week In Words, where we share quotes from the last week’s reading. If something you read this past week  inspired you, caused you to laugh, cry, think, dream, or just resonated with you in some way, please share it with us, attributing it to its source, which can be a book, newspaper, blog, Facebook — anything that you read. More information is here.

I have just a couple this week:

I am only about 24 pages into Women’s Ministry in the Local Church by J. Ligon Duncan and Susan Hunt, but this quote stood out to me:

If we lack interest in the church we lack what for Jesus was a consuming passion. Jesus loved the church and gave himself for it (Eph. 5:25). ~ Dr. Edmund Clowney

There seems to be a disregard or even a disdain for church these days, and this is a needed reminder of just how important it is in God’s eyes.

Then in Jesus, Keep Me Near the Cross: Experiencing the Passion and Power of Easter, compiled by Nancy Guthrie, J. Ligon Duncan III shares in the chapter “Betrayed, Denied, Deserted.” speaking of the moment when Judas betrays Jesus with a kiss:

We cannot help but admire the dignity of the Lord Jesus Christ as he goes through this indignity. He does it with magnanimity and with the sense that he is nor forsaken. He is not out of control. God’s providence is ruling over all.  So the character and the calmness of Jesus remind us and provide an example for us in the midst of our own trials (p. 38-39).

And later in the same chapter:

In this statement, Jesus is stressing that is not not going to the cross because God lacks the power to stop it. Nor does Jesus lack the ability to ask of God to spare him. Instead, Jesus is going to the cross because he has chosen to go to the cross. He is not a passive victim. He is the prime actor. (p. 40).

This is so important to remember, especially as people’s thoughts turn toward the cross this season and they perhaps watch films dealing with the death of Christ. There are little clues throughout the gospels that Jesus was not a “passive victim,” but was very much in control of what happened when, and he went through it all willingly.

If you’ve read anything that particularly spoke to you that you’d like to share, please either list it in the comments below or write a post on your blog and then put the link to that post (not your general blog link) in Mr. Linky below. I do ask that only family-friendly quotes be included. I hope you’ll visit some of the other participants as well and glean some great thoughts to ponder.

And please do comment even if you don’t have quotes to share!

Spring….

INSTALLING SPRING…
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33% DONE. Install delayed….please wait. Installation failed. Please try again.

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I saw this going around Facebook recently and thought many of you would get a kick out of it since many of you are experiencing back and forth weather like we are. Today is pretty springy, though — sunshiny and in the 60s. Let’s hope that spring installation completes and stays. 🙂

Friday’s Fave Five

Welcome to Friday’s Fave Five, hosted by Susanne at Living to Tell the Story, in which we can share five of our favorite things from the last week. This has been a wonderful exercise in looking for and appreciating the good things God blesses us with. Click on the button to learn more, then go to Susanne’s to read others’ faves and link up your own.

It’s been a busy week! Here are a few highlights:

1. Special meetings at church with the Frazor Evangelistic Team. I had never been in a church where they held meetings before, but the leader, Jeremy Frazor, used work with the youth at the church here and used to travel with the Steve Pettit Evangelistic Team. And….

2. Seeing old friends. Two of the young adults of the church we just came from in SC are traveling with the team. It was so good to see them! One in particular, Aaron, was in school with Jason, and, if there is any one person I could choose from any church we have been in to sing, it would be Aaron. And therefore…

3. A new CD. The Frazor team just recorded their first ever CD, Calvary’s Mountain, and it’s been a special blessing to have the two we mentioned on it! I’m telling myself I need to stop thinking of the CD as “Aaron in a box,” but it is nice now to be able to listen to him any time. He sings “Beneath the Cross,” and he and the other young lady we knew, Jennifer, sing “Sweet Rivers of Mercy,” as well as singing with the rest of the team on other numbers. I’m enjoying both familiar and new songs on the CD.

4. Fellowship. Jason and Mittu wanted to get together with Aaron some time this week and were talking about going for coffee one night, but they ended up coming here and asking Jennifer as well, so we enjoyed having a bit more fellowship than just chatting at church. I hadn’t been sure if they’d be able to get away since they have other responsibilities with the team, so I am glad they could. Mittu made snacks and I just enjoyed it all.

5. Good preaching. We enjoy that weekly, but we’ve been in special meetings in other churches with evangelists whom we felt were maybe a little pushy or manipulative, and it’s been wonderful to hear the Gospel preached well and clearly and strongly but also with a kind and welcoming tone.

Bonuses: The church had a Ladies’ Steak-Out Monday night and a Men’s Steak-Out Tuesday night — steak dinners and special meetings with the team especially designed to bring non-Christian friends to.. My only regret is that I didn’t know anyone to invite. It’s been nice that there have not been any other obligations this week besides the usual laundry, etc, so I’ve been able to take it a little easier in the day time. Being out nearly every night takes more out of me than it used to! Yet I am surprised the week is nearly over already. And I am looking forward to a visit this weekend from my good friend from SC, Carol!

Have a great weekend!