Yay! for Play!

You know what the nursery rhyme says about
All work and No play...

it makes Jack dull.

And that goes for Jane, and Jill, etc. etc.






Noticing some weary expressions?
What's worse is blank expressions.  
That's when I think *warning*  It's the dullness setting in. 
Not dullness like Oh I have nothing to do, but dullness as in lack of sharpness, wit, love for life.
That's one of the many reasons to school at home.
Play is part of life and at home you can purposefully schedule that in.  It creates space in the brain.

I've been known to find a tree swing and ...swing myself.

Let 'em play.  There's learning taking place even then.

"Play is still the primary occupation of children and shouldn't be pushed out of a child’s daily routine because of a lack of time or structured extra-curricular activities and a long school day.
" Jean Wetherilt

photo credit: ToniVChttp://www.flickr.com/photos/tonivc/2379078919/">ToniVC
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Choosing to do the right thing, regardless

 

I love stories about Strong Women.

Each one inspires me to be strong in troublesome times; strong in faith, strong in spirit.

-Sturdy.
-Here.  Fully present and accounted for.

Without exception, strong women are those that know fear but step forward none the less.
It usually has to do with issues bigger than oneself.

This is Deat Eman's story.


 

Click on "Deat Eman" for Audio pop-up
 

More blessings of boring

Doing the same thing, in the same place, with the same people is healthy.....
-could this be good for the church?

Jesus gives new life. 
God gave fresh mana in the wilderness for the Israelites. 
God breathes life into us through the scriptures, renewing our weary hearts. 
This is the exciting work of God in us individually.

Yet the church is more than just one.
Being the church, as opposed to going to church, is dwelling with others, those needy for God just like us, day after day -year after year.  The church at large is calling for the people of the local to be honest with each other, not motivated by selfish desires, and faithful to love and to increase in love.

The traveling souls that leave churches when they think the environment is stale will short circuit the blessing of rest and settling, first for themselves and then also for others who share in the rest.

Deep connectedness takes time to develop, in the soil of honesty, free from stones of judgment and amidst the water of grace. 

Steadiness is a constant.  It's straight, it's level.  It isn't up and down, physically or emotionally.  It isn't flightiness, like the butterfly that darts in the air here then there. 

One goal for the Christian is to be grounded in God's word, to know it well and live it fully.   Another goal is to be grounded as a person.  A thing that is grounded is steady, it is able to handle the wind and the torrents.   It won't be picked up with the wind and thrown off into another field. It is predictably present, regarding not the weather.

Steadiness is not of this world, it is other-worldly.

Steadiness is seen in long term relationships.  The fertile soil for good lasting friendships consists of a combination of those "something" times when events happen and the nothing times, when it's not obvious that anything is happening.

Through a process of time, trust grows.

One of the directives of the church is to share one another's burdens.  There are burdens that are quick to be seen, and there are burdens that are only released to trustworthy hands that have patiently stood the test of time.

Selfish love leaves when it's needs aren't met.
Short sighted love leaves when it can't see anything happening in another's life.
Judgmental love assumes it knows all there is to know,
but Enduring love has remained constant to share in the drink of the sweetest fellowship.

There are blessings in the habit of doing the same thing, at the same place, among the same ole people. 

The blessing of the boring. 

The Blessing of the Boring

Almost everyone likes something new.
Ah, the sparkle. New is, well, New.

 

But I think boring is underappreciated.

Children need to see life in a day to day setting. 
The day to day setting includes the boring.  By definition it's the Same.  Children thrive in routine, but all ages need to healthily experience the boring.
 

These are times when you can't see anything happening; times that are unexciting, "same ole blah-zay."  But that is a description of an emotion, a reaction to adrenalin finding balance.

And Balance is a good thing.

The body needs rest, mentally and emotionally, from sights and sounds bouncing up and down.  

It needs to let down.  It needs to settle, an evening out. 
For instance, it is while one is sleeping, in a fast from eating and drinking all night that the body uses that time to repair and build.  Nothing is necessarily intentional, it just happens while you are sleeping. 
Boring days look like they aren't accomplishing anything, but they do.  There is building taking place in the mind and emotions, building in strength for the variety in life ahead.

 

Married 25 Years...

Twenty-five years ago,
blink, blink,
I walked down the rice papered isle,
to greet a smiling face and knees that were just as nervous as mine.

His tux was white,
my dress was white,
our shoes were white,
the cake was white -
new. Never been worn, scuffed, or eaten.

There were really too many candles to light in those few short verses to SomeWhere Out There.
It was really too cold to be riding on the back of our cousin's convertible in January.
My blood sugar said I should have eaten more at the reception, but here it was.  The first page of our first chapter together.


Nothing would ever be the same.
Nor should it be.
How fun memories are, and what a gift, to remember and live again those choice events in our mind.
Yet Every moment lived is new.
We are continually being made into the likeness of Christ.   

What to do With What You Have

There's a number of good books that I keep on my shelves. 
Not that I have loads of time to read, but sometimes I want to pull out that one book that helped with something and I'll read it again.  
It never fails; I'll think I'm so glad I have this. 

And I have "this" because I can't remember all the wonderful things others have shared with me.  People that I don't know but that I consider valuable in my life have written books that I go back to again and again.  The best thanks I can give them is to tell someone else about their books. 

Anyone that knows me thinks I'm going to write the usual, Elisabeth Elliot, Edith Schaeffer, John Piper, RC Sproul,  Corrie TenBoone, Amy Carmichael, that I talk about.  
True, I "go" to them a lot!  But I've been working on the house lately and so I'll share that kind of book.  (picture below)

 I don't know if Lauri Ward is a Christian, but the concept of using what you already have been given is a godly principle.
She shares the structure of good interior design techniques that I haven't read as simply anywhere else.  If certain rooms in your home just don't seem quite right, it may be worth the price of a book to fix it.  
Of course, 
 If everything in your home just doesn't seem right, it may not be your stuff but your heart that needs adjustment. 
And that happens to me too!  May God be your guide.

I love how God is always ready, always available.
You don't have to make an appointment.
You don't have to read a book.
His Spirit can speak to your heart and tell you,  
Right here, this part of you, it needs to go.
   

Not Everything is Peachy just because its GOD'S WILL: looking at the life of Lilas Trotter

“Take the very hardest thing in your life, the place of difficulty and expect God to triumph gloriously in that very spot. Just there He can bring your soul into blossom.”

painting by Lilas Trotter

 Lilas Trotter lived a life of dedication to God.  
Starting out in a godly, aristocratic family, she was a skilled artist turned to missionary. 
 Her personal letters reveal the emotional high stepping off the boat with her two friends, Blanche Haworth and Lucy Lewis.  Everything was new.  
New desert colors, 
tiny foreign flowers, 
and Mediterranean houses tucked on the hillside.   

It sounds exciting, with endless possibilities.

 But imagine the adjustment to loud, city-wide prayer calls, several times a day. 

Learning a language is nothing compared to learning an ancient culture.   One that says it sees what you mean, but the next day it doesn't seem to remember.
  
Lilias's letters spoke of almost wanting a short life for those that said they wanted Jesus to come into their hearts, because soon the pressure of the relatives proved too much for them and it was same ole - same ole again.
As she worked to unlock the hearts of women comfortable in their prisons  in the beginning,  the Bible meetings had such increasing disturbances from the locals  that the meetings that weren't canceled completely were staffed by hired boys to watch the doors.  After a year and 1/2, the rough schedule and the mood of the people sent one of her two English companions packing for home.
 
The author I read said that for the first two years Lilas was inexhaustible and in-discourage-able. 
The first two years.  Some call this the honeymoon stage, but it never lasts forever as the human machine is meant to get recharged.
She looked at her housework of physical labor as a blessing from the mental strain of the mission.  All tuckered-out in the body is what helped her sleep!
 Despite her incredible love for these people that she worked to reach, her health would make it difficult to press on, so she learned she had a blessing hidden in drawing back.

A hidden blessing.

The drive within her put her health at risk from time to time and her body couldn't keep up.  During these seasons of rest, she painted, wrote, and refreshed herself in the Lord.

I think this was one of her secrets that aided her long stay on the mission field, in the same country, within a difficult culture, with limited resources.  After a number of years looking at the recording of her writings, those far off can see that this was a mode of operation of God, acting as her protector and keeper.  He seemed to call her to step back and breathe and then press on again.

You just can't beat stories of strong women.

Our flesh often desires to leave completely when the way becomes difficult and dry, or to push forward with a furrowed brow, joyless in our own strength alone.
What if we stuck it out in the hard places of life and breathed  in the rest when He gives it, when he gives us no other choice but to rest?  What if we didn't carefully monitor our feelings and perspective but kept plowing and readying the field? 

Lilias had vision beyond herself.
 She couldn't see all the fruit of her labor, but her faith speaks out in the following quote:  

 "Our present work was just to sow broadcast as far and wide as we could, in preparation for the coming harvest.
The sowing beside all waters must mean such unselfishness in sowing- not calculating what will take root on our plot, but letting that just take its chance of sharing in the future harvest." 

 

Women in History: Still talking about LILAS TROTTER

I'm writing about Lilas Trotter again today.
(picture below)
 
Her story began with her family, what her interests and talents were, and how she spent her time.
Her family traveled extensively and even after her father's death, at age 10, apparently they still traveled.   She and her mother went on one trip that included Venice, where by happen stance her mother hears that a famed art critic, John Ruskin, was also in the same hotel.  After efforts to share Lilas's paintings, Mr. Ruskin became a long time friend and mentor in developing her skill as an artist.

A magazine of the day published a poem that characterized John Ruskin in a nutshell, which my daughter and I have now memorized with smiles:

            I paints and paints

            Hears no complaints

            And sells before I dry,

            Till savage Ruskin

            Sticks his tusk in,

            And nobody will buy.

Apparently he was something else, which also speaks of the skill level of artist Lilas Trotter.  
Under John Ruskin, for a few years Lilas divided her time between helping the down and out and expanding her art .  Two extremes, one talented woman.

"The one thing is to keep obedient in spirit, to do otherwise would be to cramp and ruin your soul.”

These are words from a woman who submits her love of beauty to the supreme will of One greater, recognizing that any other course would damage her very creativity anyways.

During the time when public transportation converted from stagecoach to the railway, Lilas was plodding on faithfully in her works of passion in helping others.  She wanted to make a difference for eternity.  She prayed that God would bring passion to her like she saw in others that she admired.  She was a student of D.L. Moody and attended many of his conventions where he preached and then gave the students on the job training in downtown ministries. 

“we ourselves are saved to save---we are made to give.”

The crisis of her mother's death brought grief and heaps of emotion.  But through the struggle, her life came into focus and it was there that she made a decision.

To the disappointment of John Ruskin, she felt her life couldn't hold both art and ministry, so she left the art field to concentrate on reaching the lost people of the world.  

As I thought on this crisis and her eventual decision I made an observation: Emotions do not have to lead us to do irrational things.

 Times of pain can lead us to think more clearly.
Often our eyes see the true size of things in our lives when a crisis comes our way. 


I'm enjoying the story of Lilas and gaining much from her life,  I hope you are too! I still have more to say...for another day.

Cooking - with Broth and Bones

Broth and Bones.

These rudimentary items are so easy to use.
Then I think about life.
Many days I've wrestled with the frills, the extras that I really didn't need in life as though they were essential.
For me it some times takes a crisis for my vision to tunnel and focus on what it truly important, the broth and bones in life.  Those important things are never far from our grasp, but right under our noses, provided for by our loving Heavenly Father.
   
My quick tip of the day - broth and bones.



Broth instead of water in recipes--  
A quick vegetable broth can be made with scraps of onion, celery tops, garlic clove or two with water on the stove top boiling while you are assembling other things for dinner.  (Remember that onion skins make a good brown color, I use them often.)
 And bones make meat broth.  Put bones with water and celery tops or onion scraps overnight in a crock-pot and you'll have broth to keep in your fridge that week to use whenever.

  And the turkey this thanksgiving? Love Thanksgiving!
After dinner throw the bone in water overnight in a crock-pot with onions and celery stocks and you'll have meat to pick off of it tomorrow plus the broth.  Double duty.
Strain the broth, clean the crock, put it back in the pot with the shredded meat, add fresh veggies, a little seasoning and in a few hours you have soup.
Not hard at all, and your important people will say YUM!

Defy the Culture - Cook!

I actually love to cook.  
(picture below)

 More so when time isn't rushed, but generally I love to cook.
My mom was/is a great cook.  My aunts are pretty terrific also.  I really noticed that fact after I was grown and conversed with other women about their growing up years.  It was a little surprising.
I was surprised that some didn't enjoy cooking, and  
a few were actually horrible at it. 

Some seasons in life are so busy that cooking is last on the desired list, somewhere next to getting the flu.  But if time is the issue, it helps to look for short cuts or simpler menus.  

A full-life friend of mine once told me that she may not be able to put on make-up that day, but a little lipstick was her quick trick.

Likewise, "lipstick tricks" on crazy seasons could be a rule for  yourself to atleast clear the table and put a candle in the middle.  You can have boxes all around the room, the food simple, but a cleared table looks like dinner.
It makes a difference to others.
Really.
Which is my second point.  
It really is not about you, and yet it is.   

If you don't like cooking/ always trying to get out of it personally, consider praying about that.   It may be that you haven't thought through why you cook for your family.

Be a supplier of good things to others. 

Be the one person that slows down so that others taste life.

If you don't know how, you-tube it.  Look for one simple dish with few ingredients.  Practice that dish until you like it yourself.  
 Cooking - you can do it.  Think simple, think warmth.  It's worth the effort to not crowd the schedule so that you have some time to prepare a meal for your family.  
 

 

God-followers will have Good Fruit

Spotted and soft, unseen all the way down at the bottom of the bag, rested undesirable apples.

Have you ever seen an apple like this?

This is fruit that went bad.
But I still wouldn't want to eat it.

Several years ago I mis-chose a pumpkin for a pumpkin pie.
(It's possible I just invented the word mis-chose.  Use caution in adding it to your vocabulary. )
Whatever the case, I picked wrong.  Unsuspecting, I baked the pie expecting a creamy delight but it looked different as it cooled.   The upside to the story is that I tasted it before anyone else in the Thanksgiving party.  Yuck!
It wasn't exactly a bad pumpkin; it was ornamental.  It was meant for looks, not taste.  
 
Naturally speaking, bad fruit comes from something gone wrong.  Perhaps the fruit would have warty growths sprouting out and tastes foreign.   That kind of sour immediately tenses my stomach muscles at the thought.

The health of normality in the tree defaults and it produces bad fruit, growing right there on a branch, but not fit for comsumption.
The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. (Gal.5:22)

Not only "against such things there is no law" but good spiritual fruit is a delight to others that keeps giving and giving. 
This is the kind that is contagious and infects those around with the desire to be like that themselves.

Love is found when hate might be understandable.

Joy is there where many would have sorrow and disappointment.

Self-Control is expressed when most would claim their rights.

From an apple tree would come apples, it's common sense.
From the Spirit would come spiritual fruit, and as everything in the kingdom of God, it defies the sense of common.
It is the Spirit of God.  
It is SuperNatural, indeed.   And it's the fruit you will find in the lives of true God-followers.  

Women in History-missionary LILIAS TROTTER

Lilas Trotter.
The crisis of her mother's death brought grief and heaps of emotion.  But through the struggle, her life came into focus and it was there that she made a decision.
To the disappointment of John Ruskin, she felt her life couldn't hold both art and ministry, so she left the art field to concentrate on reaching the lost people of the world. She gave "it" up; a comfortable life, a promising career, to become a missionary to the Muslims of North Africa. 
It sounded like a happy give up;  given up to keep the real "it".
 Little did she know, God would use that love of art and beauty to paint illustrations for the Muslims about His love.  She made little booklets of watercolors for the mystic Sufi brotherhood to read and discuss together, when she had difficulty penetrating their culture.

He used someone that wasn't known, used things that hadn't been done that way before.
  All the talents and interests or fascinations of your heart, the ones put there by God, can be yielded to the Master Potter to do with his choosing.  For me the yielding is the hardest part.

 "When God delays in fulfilling our little thoughts, it is to have himself room to work out his great ones!” 

 God can move aside insurmountable obstacles to bring the love of Christ.  Lilias had health difficulties that failed the test to go on the mission field the normal route.  Yet her frail health was but a small thing to the heavenly father. With two other single ladies accompanying her, off they went to surrender themselves to service.
And then there was the thing about her not knowing Arabic.
One would think that was a given if going to Algeria.
But God had prepared her with something else.
Those governesses growing up had taught her French and she used that to live in the French quarter of Algeria, while she studied Arabic from the locals. 

From the slums of London to the slums of Algeria, city or desert, it made no difference; God was the same and Lilas was used.
Oh  what God can do with one willing life!   

 “Let us dare to test God’s resources- Let us ask him to kindle in us and keep aflame that passion for the impossible that shall make us delight in it with him, ‘till the day when we shall see it transformed into a fact.”

Women in History - Lilas Trotter

My daughter recently researched a woman of whom I had not heard.
(picture below)
 Lilias Trotter
Noelle Piper, in her book,
Faithful Women and their extraordinary God, 
which I have yet to read in entirety, whetted our appetite to know more about this woman missionary to the Muslims. 


There isn't a whole lot out there on this woman, but one book was a great find.
 

Lilas Trotter

I'm stealing moments here and there to find out more about the girl born into a wealthy family in the elite estates of London, during the reign of Queen Victoria, 1853.

She was educated in travel and culture, tutored in French and German
languages, and familiar to being raised by governesses.  Yet her parents were grounded in biblical virtues, intrinsically involved in the rearing of Lilly, one of their many children.  They sounded like wonderful people from the quotes and the situations I read about.   I wanted to hear more about them too!
But it was obvious that they purposely instilled a love for Jesus and for obeying his calling on one's life above all else.

Reaching out to their community and their involvement with the thinkers and shapers of the culture of the time was part of their routine.  But with the death of her father when she was age 10, the heavenly father became Lilias's comfort and strength as she grew through childhood.  

The event didn't push her further from God, nor was she embittered by her lost, but it drew her closer to God, noticeably so to others who knew her.

In her early twenties, she put her mother's teachings and her father's example into practice as she witnessed troubled women on the London streets, making choices of desperation. She recognized each soul having a hunger for God and thus she began to transform a run-down nightclub into a hostel for women.  She worked to help them to get proper employment, not just shelter.  From what I understand, this sounds like it became known as the YWCA.

Around the same course of years,  the business women of high class shops came to her home for Bible studies.  (It was these same women years later that would become her core financial support when she went to North Africa)

In her earlier years, her family was extensive travelers and even after her father's death she and her mother went on excursions. 

I find it interesting.  This is part of her story, what she did with her family, what her interests and talents were, and how she spent her time.  
Sometimes we microscope our lives and think, "Lord, nothing is here.  I only see..."
But all of it is tallied up, rendered and used to bring about your unique story, His unique story using little ole you.
 
I'll have to stop here for now, but I'll pick it up in a couple of days because there's much more to ponder in her story.