The Week in Words

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http://breathoflifeministries.blogspot.com/2010/01/announcing-week-in-words.html Melissa at Breath of Life has been hosting a weekly carnival called The Week In Words,which involves sharing something from your reading that inspires you, causes you to laugh, cry, or dream, or just resonates with you in some way.

However, she is going to have to discontinue hosting due to personal issues. I am thinking of taking on the hosting of this, if someone else has not already volunteered. I love quotes: I keep a file for them on my computer and underline them in books with a sticky tab at the top of the page. Sometimes it’s due to the succinctness and depth of truth in them, sometimes just the way it is worded causes me to think differently or more deeply about something.

The free WordPress blogs do not support Mr. Linky or McLinky for people to link up their own posts, so that is a drawback. But I suppose people could leave their links in their comments, or I could update the post with them throughout the day. I will think about it and let you know next week: let me know your thoughts in the comments.

Meanwhile, I think I will probably keep sharing quotes sporadically whether the meme itself continues or not.

Here are just a few short ones that speak for themselves:

“Some people drink from the fountain of knowledge; others just gargle.”~ Dr. Robert Anthony, seen at Quoth She.

“Many men owe the grandeur of their lives to their tremendous difficulties.” ~ Charles H. Spurgeon, seen at Strength For Today.

“The strength of patience hangs on our capacity to believe that God is up to something good for us in all our delays and detours.”  ~ John Piper, seen at Wrestling With An Angel.

This comes from the May 1 reading of Our Daily Walk by F. B. Meyer:

“Have Faith in God” really means reckon on God’s faithfulness to you. Do not look at your faith. He who is ever considering his health will become an invalid; he who always looks down at his faith will cut the very roots from which faith grows, will shut out the beam by which faith lives. Look away to the character of God–the faithful God, who keepeth covenant and mercy for ever.

This final one comes from a work of fiction, The Telling by Beverly Lewis. One character Grace, is asking another, Heather, if she’d like a lady that she had previously talked with, a lady who had recovered from the same illness she has, to come and see her. Heather replies, “Only if she’s not too busy…” Grace answers:

I doubt that she’s ever that busy. Where’s Sally’s concerned, the best thing ’bout life is people and makin’ time for them. People and time, that’s her motto.

I have to confess that though I would agree with the priorities in theory, in real life I often chafe against interruptions or requests on my time. I’ve been convicted often about not being hospitable enough, and I am convinced that true hospitality begins in the heart, that openness to lay aside what I am doing when someone else needs attention. I do like to be with people and do for people — when I have them scheduled in. 🙂 When I am doing something else and then someone wants my attention right now — then I don’t feel hospitable. But while I am asking the Lord to help me with that, I also take heart in reading accounts of others who have felt the same way: they may resent being interrupted at first, but they do the right thing and God changes their heart in the process. More on that later. 🙂

For Mother’s Day…or any day

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ChurchWorksMedia.com is selling a neat little month-long devotional booklet called Gospel Meditations for Women, and with Priority Mail, there is still time to get copies for Mother’s Day to distribute to the ladies of your church or just to the special ladies in your life. But even if you can’t order it in time for Mother’s Day, it is a great resource any time.

It was first written by pastors Chris Anderson and Joe Tyrpak for the ladies of their congregation last year. Each page contains a verse of Scripture with the reference for the longer passage, then about a page-long meditation on the passage, ending with the line, “Let the gospel affect your ______,” the blank being filled with the topic of the day. You can find more information here and view a sample here.

I ordered a few copies for myself and received them a few days ago. I haven’t had a chance to read all 31 entries yet, but I have liked what I have read so far. I would normally read something completely before endorsing it and recommending it, but I did want to mention it in time for Mother’s Day. I have been reading Chris Anderson’s blog, My Two Cents, for some time now and have quoted from it or linked to it occasionally, and I have always appreciated his careful handling of Scripture and his gracious interaction with others. Some of you might be familiar with his hymn “My Jesus Fair” from the Galkins Team CD, Christ, Only Always.

Perfect Peace

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Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on thee: because he trusteth in thee. Trust ye in the LORD for ever: for in the LORD JEHOVAH is everlasting strength. Isaiah 26:3-4.

Peace, perfect peace, in this dark world of sin?
The blood of Jesus whispers peace within.

Peace, perfect peace, by thronging duties pressed?
To do the will of Jesus, this is rest.

Peace, perfect peace, with sorrows surging round?
On Jesus’ bosom naught but calm is found.

Peace, perfect peace, with loved ones far away?
In Jesus’ keeping we are safe, and they.

Peace, perfect peace, our future all unknown?
Jesus we know, and he is on the throne.

Peace, perfect peace, death shadowing us and ours?
Jesus has vanquished death and all its powers.

It is enough: earth’s struggles soon shall cease,
and Jesus call us to heaven’s perfect peace.

~ Edward Henry Bickersteth, 1875

Laudable Linkage and Good Ol’ Cory

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“Winter is many months of the year
But now at last Maytime is here…”

~ Veronica Ann Twells

Wow — it’s May already! I do feel bad for some of you who are still experiencing winter weather. Spring will come again! Some time!

I’m just going to list some of the interesting things I saw this last week with little commentary.

Author Robin Lee Hatcher writes about the personal story of being married to an alcoholic which contributed to her book Beyond the Shadows.

Tim Challies: Read More, Read Better, and how he reads a book.

The Superior Wife Syndrome.

A Crazy Idea For a Missions Trip.

My big, but partial, list of pregnancy and baby musings.

Miss Whitebread Was Wrong, HT to Challies.

Balancing Writing and Family.

A Free Motion Quilting tutorial.

Sometimes a little laughter is good medicine, and I had a good dose the other night watching some clips from the old TV show Boy Meets World. I can’t condone everything on the show (we veered away when they talked about “make-out parties”), but it roped me in the first episode I saw (“The Play’s the Thing”) when young Cory was being a brat and having to suffer the consequences rather than having everything work out in his favor. Imagine, what a concept for TV! 🙂 The writing and the relationships were generally very clever, and the casting and acting spot on. Here are a couple of favorites:

Friday’s Fave Five

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Susanne at Living to Tell the Story hosts a “Friday Fave Five” in which we share our five favorite things from the past week. Click on the button to read more of the details, and you can visit Susanne to see the list of others’ favorites or to join in.

As I thought about this post yesterday and this morning, my initial feeling was, “I ain’t got nothin’ this week.” It hasn’t been a bad week per se, but nothing really stood out to me as a favorite. And then the last day or so I’ve just been in a funk, as we used to say — irritable over several little petty annoyances and possibly hormones. But as I thought about it this morning while driving around on a couple of errands, a few things came to mind. So this will be a little different “Fave Five” post than usual for me.

1. I am glad that God still loves us and is patient with us even when we’re petty, selfish, irritable, or hormonal.

2. I accompanied a family member to an outpatient medical procedure as moral support and the designated driver afterward, and, though happy to do so, I thought at the time how much I hate hospitals and medical buildings. There is just the association with something at the very least unpleasant, possibly painful, and for some, devastating, at those places. But I’ve also been reading about pioneer missionaries in a primitive area on the Amazon River — 18 hours from a doctor, carrying a patient over jungle trails and hills, bouncing along the Amazon in a small boat, sometimes having to do limited medical procedures on their front porch. That makes me shudder. For all it flaws, I think we probably do have the best medical care available in the world here and now.

3. Our family is “on hold” in a couple of ways, waiting and praying for results of the above procedure and waiting and praying concerning a possible major change for us. And, of course, we’d much rather know than wait. But you can’t rush the process, not if you want the best results. I was reminded of the children of Israel in the book of Exodus traversing through the wilderness until the pillar of cloud that was leading them stopped, and then waiting for an unknown amount of time until it moved again. They didn’t know how long they were going to be there or where they were going next. But they could trust the One leading them and patiently and faithfully attend to the duties at hand until it was time for the next step.

4. Several incidents that led to my frustration and irritability had to do with thwarted plans and desires: nothing major, just small things over the course of a few days. It would take too long to list them and there’s no need to rehash them. But it was a painful reminder to me of just how selfish I am that I can get so irritated when things don’t work out my way. I have to remind myself often that I am not just here to do my own thing: I am here to do what God wants me to do and to be available to minister to my family. Even though I have always felt that a woman’s family is her first ministry, I often have to adjust my thinking to that perspective in practical everyday life. And once I do that, whatever changes I have to make are fine. It’s just that mental hurdle.

5. I think I have probably mentioned Christian music a time or two, but I was blessed by it again this morning while driving around running errands. Not only was the music calming and soothing, but the words helped me to set my affection on things above (Colossians 3:1-2).

Friday Flashback: Prom

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Mocha With Linda has begun 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.

This week she writes:

It’s spring. And for many high schoolers, that means PROM!

Share your prom memories. Did your school have a junior prom or just a senior prom? What did you wear? Was there a party after the prom? Did you go with a date or with friends, and if it was a date, was it a one-time date or a boyfriend/girlfriend scenario? Did you go to more than one prom (like, being someone’s date at another school or year.) Where was your senior prom held? Any particular songs come to mind when you think of prom? As always, pictures are great!

I went to a conservative independent Baptist high school my junior-senior years, and we didn’t have proms. We had Spring Banquets instead. There was a nice catered meal, usually in a hotel meeting room, skits, music, and a speaker. We did “dress up” and could date, but dating wasn’t “pushed” — in fact, whole families could come. My dad and brother went with me my senior year, circa 1975:

image01.jpg

I am sorry the photo is so washed out. I dearly loved that dress — blue with pink roses (I liked those elements even then…) My dad rarely wore a suit, and when he did he always wore some kind of western-type tie. I don’t think I ever saw him in a conventional tie except at my wedding.

I was dating a guy at this point, but I don’t know where he was or why he didn’t attend.

I don’t have a photo from my junior year, but I wore a green dress that had the type of sleeve that puffed out at the top like a bubble and then straightened down the rest of the sleeve. I don’t know what you call that — it was something like this, only more puffy at the top, and the rest of the sleeve was straight. Anyway — I thought it was so elegant. I had not read Anne of Green Gables at that time, but I think I would have thrilled at having puffed sleeves like Anne.

I don’t have many specific memories of them except that I was in a skit my junior year (an I am so not good at that kind of thing!) and I had to speak at the one my senior year, but I forget in what capacity. I just remember having trouble figuring out how close to be to the mike and one of the musicians loudly whispering, trying to tell me, and me not getting it and getting all embarrassed, then deciding just to get through whatever it was I had to say whether anyone heard me or not so I could sit down. 😳

I was invited to the prom my sophomore year in a public high school, and I don’t remember much about it except the impression that we were playing dress up. We met at some girl’s house beforehand for refreshments, and it seemed funny rather than fun to me to see all the girls with their hair up and wearing formal dresses. It’s kind of sad to me that proms tend these days towards too-adult dress and situations. Of the two I much preferred the banquets: they were something fun we did as a group rather than as couples or individuals, and, of course, in a Christian school, there were not the problems with drinking or the expectations of the wrong kind of behavior.

The school my boys attended used to have a spring banquet, but they haven’t in the last few years. I am not sure why, but I miss having that big end-of-year event. At the school here they also included reading the senior will and things like that, and it was greatly anticipated each year. They always liked to go bowling or play putt-putt in their formals afterward. 🙂

Where Bloggers Create party!

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I just learned via Quill Cottage about a Where Bloggers Create party to be given June 19 at My Desert Cottage. You can show your creative space, whether a room or a corner or a table, and there are some great prizes from Jo Packham of the Where Women Create magazines and books.

I think this will motivate me to get my new craft room in order! I have some things set up in it, but need to finish. After all the activities of spring….and the ladies’ luncheon….hopefully I can dig in and fine tune it.

What’s On Your Nightstand: April

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What's On Your NightstandThe folks at 5 Minutes For Books host What’s On Your Nightstand? the fourth Tuesday of each month in which we can share about the books we have been reading and/or plan to read. You can learn more about it by clicking the link or the button.

Wow, it’s so hard to believe it’s the last week of April already!!

The books I finished since last time are:

Jesus, Keep Me Near the Cross: Experiencing the Passion and Power of Easter, essays on various aspects of the death and resurrection of Christ from people such as Charles H. Spurgeon and Martin Luther to John MacArthur and Joni Eareckson Tada, compiled by Nancy Guthrie. I reviewed it here.

The Hidden Flame by Janette Oke and Davis Bunn, the second in the Acts of Faith series set during the time of the early church in Acts, reviewed here.

Where My Heart Belongs by Tracie Peterson, about a prodigal daughter who comes home and the older sister who stayed behind, and their conflicts and attempts at reconciliation, reviewed here.

Take 3, the third in the Above the Line series about Christian filmmakers by Karen Kingsbury. I didn’t really review it but mentioned it a bit more here.

A Touch of Grace by Lauraine Snelling is the third in her Daughters on Blessing series about of a Norwegian farming family in North Dakota in the 1900s, reviewed here.

I am currently reading:

Port of Two Brothers by Paul Schlener, a village along the Amazon River in Brazil named for two brother missionaries and their families who worked there.

My Heart Restored, a devotional by June Kimmel.

The Telling, next in the Seasons of Grace series by Beverly Lewis about an Amish mother who left her family without explanation in order to try to make something right from her past.

After these I’d like to get to another classic, maybe Emma by Jane Austen or an Agatha Christie novel. Plus I still have a few left from my Spring Reading Thing list plus a new book I just received by Eva Marie Everson titled This Fine Life.

If you like to read, to share about what you’re reading, and/or to get good ideas for your own reading list, I hope you’ll join us at What’s On Your Nightstand.

Two quick book reviews

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Take Three is the third in the Above the Line series by Karen Kingsbury about Christian filmmakers, their families, and the problems they run into. I don’t feel I can say much about the plot without revealing more spoilers than I want to, so I’ll just say it is a continuation of the journey, that Andi faces some serious consequences of her actions, and that there is finally some movement in the Cody/Bailey/Tim storyline. I enjoyed it and am looking forward to the next installment.

A Touch of Grace by Lauraine Snelling is the third in her Daughters on Blessing series. I had gotten it from a clearance table of a Christian bookstore over a year ago, and though I knew it was part of a series at first, I had forgotten that when I finally picked it up. At first I felt like I had been dropped in the middle of something, and realizing that I was in the middle of a series helped. I finally decided to stop trying to keep the characters straight except for the main ones, and eventually it all became clear.

Grace Knutson is the daughter of a Norwegian farming family in North Dakota in the 1900s. Though she is deaf, she copes well and works as hard as the others. Jonathan Gould is the son of an old family friend who happens to be wealthy and who thinks his son can learn hard work and responsibility by living with the Knutsons during the summer before he goes to college. Grace likes a young man named Toby whom her family disapproves of, but begins to be aware that Jonathan has feelings for her. Jonathan, for his part, finds that he loves farm work, but knows that his parents would never approve of his turning to a life of farming as a career.

I thought the story was a good depiction of farm life in that time, though perhaps a little too detailed in such instances as a thorough description of biscuit-making (though maybe I am mistaken in thinking that most people already know how it is done), and eventually I was drawn in to the characters and the conflicts they faced. At this time I don’t plan to go back and read the first two books in the series, but I’d like to read the ones that follow.

We Rest On Thee

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Last night we watched End of the Spear, about Jim Elliot, Nate Saint, and the other three men who were speared to death by the Indians (then known as Aucas, now as Waodani, their name for themselves) they wanted to try to reach for the Lord over 50 years ago. I had seen it before and thought the others had, but they didn’t remember it. There was so much more of the story I wished they could know: I’d recommend the companion documentary, Beyond the Gates of Splendor.

The story made the national news at the time, and then in the following years Elisabeth Elliot told it in more detail in the book Through Gates of Splendor. The title comes from this hymn which the men used to sing together — I am thinking they sang it the night before they went out, but I don’t remember for sure.

We Rest On Thee

We rest on Thee, our Shield and our Defender!
We go not forth alone against the foe;
Strong in Thy strength, safe in Thy keeping tender,
We rest on Thee, and in Thy Name we go.
Strong in Thy strength, safe in Thy keeping tender,
We rest on Thee, and in Thy Name we go.

Yes, in Thy Name, O Captain of salvation!
In Thy dear Name, all other names above;
Jesus our Righteousness, our sure Foundation,
Our Prince of glory and our King of love.
Jesus our Righteousness, our sure Foundation,
Our Prince of glory and our King of love.

We go in faith, our own great weakness feeling,
And needing more each day Thy grace to know:
Yet from our hearts a song of triumph pealing,
“We rest on Thee, and in Thy Name we go.”
Yet from our hearts a song of triumph pealing,
“We rest on Thee, and in Thy Name we go.”

We rest on Thee, our Shield and our Defender!
Thine is the battle, Thine shall be the praise;
When passing through the gates of pearly splendor,
Victors, we rest with Thee, through endless days.
When passing through the gates of pearly splendor,
Victors, we rest with Thee, through endless days.

~ Edith G. Cherry

The tune is to Finlandia by Sibelius, by which we also sing “Be Still My Soul.” Oddly, I have never heard it sung in church. I’ve only heard it on the radio. But many times when I think of these men, this hymn come to mind. The first few lines of the third verse especially resonate with me.

By the way, the foe they were going against was not the Aucas/Waodani. The foe was Satan, “hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them” (II Corinthians 4:3-4)

Ephesians 6:10-13: Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord, and in the power of his might. Put on the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places. Wherefore take unto you the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand.

Updated to add: My friend Bobbi found this version on You Tube, which sounds like the recording I hear on the radio: