Booking Through Thursday: Posterity

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btt button The Booking Through Thursday for today is one that I submitted:

Do you think any current author is of the same caliber as Dickens, Austen, Bronte, or any of the classic authors? If so, who, and why do you think so? If not, why not? What books from this era might be read 100 years from now?

I don’t have an answer for this one — which is one reason I asked the question. I guess one consideration is what defines a classic: what still speaks to people years later even though language, dress, mannerisms, culture, etc. has changed?

What do you think?

Random Dozen

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Hosted by Linda at 2nd Cup of Coffee. Visit Linda’s to join in and link up or  to find other participants.

1. If you could master one sport, what would it be?

Ice skating. I would love to gracefully glide like that.

2. When you make a major purchase, do you go with your gut instinct, or do you do research to make an informed decision?

We usually do a pretty fair amount of research. I say we — my husband does most of it.

3. There is an old kids’ game that says you can find out what your movie star name would be by using your middle name as your first name and the name of the street you grew up on as your last. What is your movie star name?

Lee Cane.

4. Would you rather give up your favorite music or your favorite food?

It would have to be pretty serious for me to do either. I suppose I could give up my favorite food if I absolutely had to, and I know I’d get used to it eventually, though I’d be pretty miserable at first. On the other hand, if someone took away all my music, they can’t take away the memories of it, so it would never be completely gone. Still, that’s not the same as being able to actually hear it.

5. There are two types of banana preferences. One is pristine yellow, almost to the point of being green; the other is spotty and more ripe. Which is your preference?

I like them best when they’re yellow and just getting spotted. But there is a small window of time before they get too spotted and lose some flavor.

6. Your favorite tree is?

I’m afraid I don’t know my trees very well, but I’d probably say an oak. Although a weeping willow is fascinating to me.

7. On a scale of 1-10, how tech savvy are you?

Maybe a 4.

8. Has H1N1 touched your family?

No, thankfully.

9. Are you an analytical person, or do you just accept things the way they are without questioning or scrutinizing?

I’m very analytical in some areas, but there are others that I accept as is.

10. Is your personality more like that of a dog, cat, or Koala?

What kind of personality does a koala have? I’ve never seen them do anything but sit in a tree and eat. I’m probably more like a cat.

11. Do you keep in touch with friends you made years ago?

Some. Not as much as I would like to or should.

12. You are checking out at a grocery store. In the express lane, there are more people than the regular lanes, but of course, their load is less than those in the regular lanes. Which lane do you choose (assuming you qualify for the express lane) and why?

The wrong one.

“Gaberiel’s Battle is over – with the Lord – ‘Far Better'”

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That was the title of the e-mail just received. Little Gaberiel went to his heavenly Father’s home yesterday.

What He Is To Me

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This morning I was looking for the verse that says “He is precious” (I can remember a lot of verses memorized years ago, but, sadly, not the references). I don’t remember the exact thought process now, but somehow that triggered reminders of many verses saying directly that God is something. I decided to explore that a little further:

Unto you therefore which believe he is precious. I Peter 2:7.

But now in Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ. For he is our peace, who hath made both one, and hath broken down the middle wall of partition between us. Ephesians 2:13-14.

The LORD is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? the LORD is the strength of my life; of whom shall I be afraid? Psalm 27:1.

Behold, God is my salvation; I will trust, and not be afraid: for the LORD JEHOVAH is my strength and my song; he also is become my salvation. Isaiah 12:2.

For the LORD thy God is a consuming fire, even a jealous God. Deuteronomy4:24.

(For the LORD thy God is a merciful God😉 he will not forsake thee, neither destroy thee, nor forget the covenant of thy fathers which he sware unto them. Deuteronomy 4:21.

Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God is one LORD. Deuteronomy 6:4.

For the LORD your God is he that goeth with you, to fight for you against your enemies, to save you. Deuteronomy 20:4.

The eternal God is thy refuge, and underneath are the everlasting arms Deuteronomy 33:27.

God is my strength and power: and he maketh my way perfect. II Samuel 22:33.

For if ye turn again unto the LORD, your brethren and your children shall find compassion before them that lead them captive, so that they shall come again into this land: for the LORD your God is gracious and merciful, and will not turn away his face from you, if ye return unto him. II Chronicles 30:9.

God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. Psalm 46:1.

For God is the King of all the earth: sing ye praises with understanding. Psalm 47:7.

And the heavens shall declare his righteousness: for God is judge himself. Psalm 50:6.

Behold, God is mine helper: the Lord is with them that uphold my soul. Psalm 54:4.

When I cry unto thee, then shall mine enemies turn back: this I know; for God is for me. Psalm 56:9.

Because of his strength will I wait upon thee: for God is my defence. Psalm 59:9.

My flesh and my heart faileth: but God is the strength of my heart, and my portion for ever. Psalm 73:26.

For God is my King of old, working salvation in the midst of the earth. Psalm 74:12.

For the LORD God is a sun and shield: the LORD will give grace and glory: no good thing will he withhold from them that walk uprightly. Psalm 84:11.

Exalt the LORD our God, and worship at his holy hill; for the LORD our God is holy. Psalm 99:9.

Gracious is the LORD, and righteous; yea, our God is merciful. Psalm 116:5.

He that hath received his testimony hath set to his seal that God is true. John 3:33.

God is a Spirit: and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth. John 4:24.

God is faithful, by whom ye were called unto the fellowship of his Son Jesus Christ our Lord. I Corinthians 1:9.

But of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption. I Corinthians 1:30.

He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love. I John 4:8.

The LORD is my rock, and my fortress, and my deliverer. II Samuel 22:2.

That all the people of the earth may know that the LORD is God, and that there is none else. I Kings 8:60.

The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want. Psalm 23:1.

The LORD is nigh unto them that are of a broken heart; and saveth such as be of a contrite spirit. Psalm 34:18.

To shew that the LORD is upright: he is my rock, and there is no unrighteousness in him. Psalm 92:15.

For the LORD is good; his mercy is everlasting; and his truth endureth to all generations. Psalm 100:5.

So that we may boldly say, The Lord is my helper, and I will not fear what man shall do unto me. Hebrews 13:6.

The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. I Peter 3:9

And that is just scratching the surface.

If it is a blessing just to run our eyes down the list of underlined attributes, how much greater would it be to study them further and in context, and the reactions we should have to them.

Many, O LORD my God, are thy wonderful works which thou hast done,
and thy thoughts which are to us-ward:
they cannot be reckoned up in order unto thee:
if I would declare and speak of them,
they are more than can be numbered. Psalm 40:5.

Randomness

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  • I have several links throughout my blog to different parts of Creative Ladies Ministry. I just got an e-mail from the owner, Julia, that she will be down-sizing and removing a lot of content starting next month. I’d encourage you to look around and save anything you could use — she has a lot of great things there and I am sorry so much of it will have to go. Her permissions policies are spelled out there, but many of her things can be reprinted for church or ministry use (but not online use).
  • Our furnace is still out, but thankfully we’ve had great weather. A little chilly some mornings and evenings, but a sweater has been pretty much all that was needed. We’re scheduled to get it replaced Friday. Yay!
  • I don’t know if I have mentioned that Jesse made the JV basketball team again this year. I’m happy for him! I have to say I have mixed emotions about all the games, especially the away ones. The older I get, the more I want to just be home at night, especially dark, cold winter nights. But I did enjoy fellowshipping with other parents last year once I did get out of the house. I can tend to be too much of a hermit sometimes.
  • We really enjoyed some good family time and fellowship this weekend. Not that we don’t always enjoy family. But we all got together at assorted times both Saturday and Sunday, and nothing extraordinary happened, but I just enjoyed the food and fellowship.
  • One of the things we did was watch the movie “Up.” Very cute! And very sweet ending. It had some sad and wistful moments, though — more so than usual for a Pixar film. I have to say I don’t think the trailers or commercials did much for it: I had no idea what it was about and wasn’t really drawn in by them, but Pixar is pretty much always good, so we wanted to see it. We weren’t disappointed.
  • Today started out well — but by 8:3o I was getting very frustrated by assorted things, like the grocery store not having the grapes that I like or the Eggo chocolate chip waffles that I like (no store I’ve visited in the last week has had the latter!), hitting seemingly every.single.red.light just as it turned red and having to wait through the entire cycle, then waiting on people running their red lights before I could go, stopping at Jack In The Box for a Breakfast Jack and root beer (some of you may remember I love their root beer, though I don’t usually have it with breakfast…) only to have it not taste right, causing me to have to go in and then wait while they changed the machine, then spilling root beer onto the car floor and into my shoe when I turned the first corner, etc., etc. — this was all within the space of about 45 minutes. But as I sat at the next red light recounting my morning so far, I reminded myself that all of those were really petty things. So many people have so much more serious issues in their lives right now. I had to remind myself again of some of what I wrote in a post about little things. It’s funny how some lessons are learned immediately and others take continual reminding — but thank God for His patience in both teaching and review. At least it was a much shorter time from first frustration to reminder this time around.
  • And then just after writing that I got a note of encouragement from someone who found my blog through a search about city buses, then clicked on my testimony and read it. To my knowledge I have only one post that had anything to do with buses, and I am amazed it came up in a Google search. Thank you, Lord!
  • I have officially declared this the week of Getting Things Done. I tend to fritter away too much time here and there (mostly here on the computer…), or else things come up at such times that it is hard to get certain tasks done around and in-between them. But — this week there are no unusual outside demands on my time, and we got the basic housework pretty much done over the weekend. Toward the end of last week I had made two separate to-do lists: one involved errands outside the home, and I got most of that done. The other consisted of tasks in the home. There is more on there that can possibly be done in a week, but I’ll never get finished if I don’t get started. I do tend to flounder away in indecision about where to start — but I am going to just PICK ONE and get going! II Corinthians 8: 11 has been coming to mind: “Now therefore perform the doing of it; that as there was a readiness to will, so there may be a performance also out of that which ye have.” So I am going to go perform some doing. I’ll let you know how it goes!
  • One last thing: I mentioned on Friday a baby boy named Gaberiel (that is the actual spelling) in the hospital fighting for his life with an infection in his lungs called PCP (Pneumocystis pneumonia) after having had a heart transplant and a host of other problems in the past several months. Last I heard his x-ray was a little better than last week, but otherwise there has been no change. I appreciate those who are praying for him and will update you as I hear of anything.

Bow the Knee

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There are moments on our journey following the Lord
Where God illumines ev’ry step we take.
There are times when circumstances make perfect sense to us,
As we try to understand each move He makes.
When the path grows dim and our questions have no answers, turn to Him.

Bow the knee;
Trust the heart of your Father when the answer goes beyond what you can see.
Bow the knee;
Lift your eyes toward heaven and believe the One who holds eternity.
And when you don’t understand the purpose of His plan,
In the presence of the King, bow the knee.

There are days when clouds surround us, and the rain begins to fall,
The cold and lonely winds won’t cease to blow.
And there seems to be no reason for the suffering we feel;
We are tempted to believe God does not know.
When the storms arise, don’t forget we live by faith and not by sight.

Bow the knee;
Trust the heart of your Father when the answer goes beyond what you can see.
Bow the knee;
Lift your eyes toward heaven and believe the One who holds eternity.
And when you don’t understand the purpose of His plan,
In the presence of the King, bow the knee.

~ Lyrics by Chris Machen and Mike Harland

Laudable Linkage

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It’s been a while since I shared with you some of the interesting things I’ve seen around the Internet lately. I keep thinking I need to do this more often so as to have a shorter list. I enjoy these kinds of posts on others’ sites, though of course I don’t click on every link. I don’t expect anyone to do that here, either, but I just wanted to share some good things you may not have seen.

Nancy Wilson’s post on taking offense was convicting. We often focus on not giving offense, and we need to do that, but sometimes we take offense too easily. I Corinthians 13:5 says love “is not easily provoked.” There are Biblical ways of dealing with a legitimate offense, but I know I can all too easily take offense where none was meant.

David Hosaflook at MissioMishMash shared some great thoughts in Let the Singles Singly Serve concerning awkward things we sometimes say to single people. I asked and received his permission to share this in our ladies’ ministry newsletter booklet, and my oldest son, who normally only reads the funny section, saw this and thanked me for it. One quote:

Married folks, don’t look at the singles like the undergrads of the church, just hoping that they will “graduate” to marriage. Don’t treat them as if there’s something “incomplete” about them. If they continually get that impression at church, how will they ever learn that we are complete in Christ? How will they ever not appear “desperate” to would-be suitors who are not “in” to the desperate type?

Challies has had a series going on Sexual Detox. All of the posts are good, but if you can only read one, read A Theology of Sex.

I think the rest of these I am just going to list instead of saying, “So-and-so had a great post…” Obviously I think they are all great or else I wouldn’t be listing them. 🙂

The Heart of Her Husband Safely Trusts in Her, HT to Melissa.

Studying Love.

Looking For That Secret Recipe for perfect parenting.

Help! Mommydom leaves me no time for God.

I don’t remember where I first found a link to the ElderCare site, but I’ve been encouraged and helped by much there since I discovered it. Two articles especially helpful were Caregivers Listen Up about how to listen to people with dementia and Straight talk about sibling help.

Jesus is NOT nicer than the Father.

Procrastination in housework.

The ten commandments of entertaining.

On the craft front:

A really cute way to embellish hand towels.

Armrest pincushion.

Floral brooch tutorial.

Lace jewelry frames.

Stencil masking technique.

Hope you have a good Saturday!

Saturday Photo Scavenger Hunt: Music

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Theme: Music | Become a Photo Hunter

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I had a lot of options this week, but I chose this one from last year’s “Dickens of a Christmas” celebration downtown. One feature is different groups of musicians and singers up and down the street. This brass group was one of our favorites.

We’re looking forward to this year’s event in a few weeks. (Can it be just a few weeks until December??!!)

The Saturday Photo Scavenger Hunt is hosted by TN Chick. You can visit her place for links  to more interpretations of this theme or to join in the fun.

Friday’s Fave Five

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FFF fall leaves 2

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.

1. My husband has done several nice things for me lately. He cleaned the bathrooms recently (without being asked, without my even commenting that they needed to be done), and any time he drives my car (actually, the van is the family car, but I use it most for grocery-shopping, taxiing, etc.), if the gas tank is low, he fills it up. When I thought we were doing one thing for dinner Sunday afternoon but then decided not to, my husband offered to get the things to grill hamburgers. I hadn’t been planning to cook since I thought we were attending something else, and I had a plan B, but it was nice not to have to change gears. Any time he grills is great!!

2. Making cinnamon toast out of the leftover hamburger buns. One of my favorite uses of them!

3. Absorpine, Jr., Icy Hot patches, and ibuprofen. I’ve had some kind of kink or knot in my upper back and shoulder for several days, and I am glad to have things to relieve it, but I hope it goes away completely. It has faded some.

4. Sleep. I don’t know why, but I seem to have needed to sleep a lot in the last day or so. Maybe it is a result of being out several nights this week for our missions conference — maybe because I have a bit of a sore throat and might be fighting off something. I don’t know.

5. A short and successful mall shopping trip. I needed a couple of plain white long-sleeved knit shirts: I wear them under jumpers and other things, and both of mine somehow developed holes in the elbows. I really thought I’d be hitting all the stores and end up having to order them online anyway, but I really needed them now. I found one right off the bat at the first store I tried, and also found a sweater for me and for my mother-in-law — I had been looking for a “spare” for her as she almost always wears a sweater and needed a spare for when hers was dirty. I hadn’t been able to find just simple cardigan sweaters til then. Then I found another white shirt and a pink shirt at the second store.

***Not a favorite, but a prayer request, if you feel so led. There is a family I don’t know personally, friends of a friend, who have a baby boy who has really been through the mill. I think he is only about a year old, but he has had a heart transplant and a host of other problems. It has been a roller coaster ride emotionally and physically. Right now he is in the hospital fighting for his life with an infection in his lungs called PCP (Pneumocystis pneumonia). It’s something some people can weather with no problems, but in his condition it is quite serious. He has been down for the count and spared so many times: the family is hoping for yet another miracle. His name is Gaberiel.

Engagement

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I made a passing reference to my engagement in Wednesday’s Random Dozen post, and Carrie said she’d like to hear my engagement story. I thought for sure I had told about it somewhere on my blog before, but the closest I came was a mention in my love story post from three years ago. I thought about saving this for our anniversary in December, but it is a milestone anniversary (30 years!) and I have other plans for that post! And the anniversary of our engagement isn’t until May, and I don’t want to wait that long.

So, as I mentioned in our love story, it took me a long time to determine Jim was “the one.” Part of that was because it takes me a long time to come to most decisions, especially major ones, but also because I had been engaged before and didn’t see the problems in that relationship until I had been out of it for awhile. How could I be sure this time?

Coming to that determination is told in the other post, but I don’t remember if I specifically told Jim, “OK, I’m ready now,” or if he just sensed it, or, as happens often with long-dating couples, little sentences like, “If we get married…” become “When we get married…”

But we had been dating about a year and a half while attending college. The end of the school year came, and Jim offered to drive me to the airport — I was from Texas, he was from Idaho, and we were in college in South Carolina. We wouldn’t see each other until the end of summer, when he planned to come and visit and meet my family before we headed back to school. I had a feeling he might ask me when he came to visit.

But in the mean time he suggested we stop off for a picnic lunch at a nearby state park (Paris Mountain State Park, for those familiar with the area) before going to the airport. He checked to make sure it was okay: most Christian colleges have rules about dating couples not going off campus alone lest they be tempted to engage in any hanky-panky. The person he asked said it was fine: we found out later that that person might not have know what they were talking about, but we went in good faith that we were doing right.

We got chicken from somewhere, drove into the park, and set up at a picnic table. I noticed Jim wasn’t eating much, but I didn’t suspect anything. He suggested we take a walk off the main clearing. We came to a fallen tree and found it sturdy enough, so we sat on it and chatted for a while. Then he asked me to marry him. I don’t remember the exact words — I do think he got down on one knee. But my answer was, “Yes!”

And then when my mom picked me up at the airport in Texas, I had a surprise for her! I showed her my engagement ring right off the bat. I think she suspected things were heading that way. She was excited.

Jim did come to visit and meet the family that August. I had done preliminary wedding planning through the summer, and we finalized some things that week, then headed for school, where I student taught that semester. Then we got married in December.

I’d love to hear your engagement stories if you’d like to share.