The Bible Story

After almost a year, we finally completed the 10 volume set entitled The Bible Story. We began it sometime last September or so and finished it last week. We've read through a number of Bible story books over the years and this one is a good, higher level one. Due to its length, it covers a great number of stories often not found in smaller, shorter compilations. Also, I would say that this is a sort of commentary where the author adds his own thoughts to scripture. In many cases this is very helpful as it paints the scene more descriptively, but there are instances where I felt he was adding a little too much. This series is written from a Seventh Day Adventist perspective. I don't agree with a number of areas in their theology, but although there were some occasions it was evident, the author was definitely not writing this series to push theology. I just encourage you, as with all books, to read this in a discerning manner to your children. There were frequent times I would pull out our bibles and hunt up the reference, many times to find that I had remembered incorrectly, sometimes to find the story in error. I should also note that all the scripture in it is from the Old King James version...some very hard to comprehend...I just translate on the fly as I read it.

Here are two excerpts from Vol 9; one showing why in many ways I greatly appreciated these books, and the other showing an example of deviant theology:

It's worth remembering that both Judas and Jesus died the same day. Both died on trees. One died a traitor, the other a hero. One helped nobody by his death. The other saved a world. ---this point never had crossed my mind before.

The great God of heaven will make His home with any man or woman, boy or girl, in whose heart true, unselfish love is to be found. It may be hard to understand, but it is true. And it just shows how God prizes love-pure, beautiful love-above everything else in the world. If you want your heart to be God's home, if you want Him to live with you and keep you all your days, this is the way. All you have to do is to love other people as much, or more, than you love yourself. And when God sees this love in your heart He will come, by His Holy Spirit, and dwell with you and be your Comforter, Guide, and Friend the rest of your life. ---although love is, of course, very necessary in a Christian's life, it is not the thing that assures us of salvation.

Some more pics from the Rainforest...

Home

After a long day's drive, we made it safely home. It is always good to be back. We had great, warm weather while we were away and enjoyed many beautiful sights. It's wonderful seeing God's creative handiwork in the variety of places we can visit. Spending time with friends we don't see too often was also delightful. What a super combination!

Ferry ride home

Our whole group

Day 3

Another lovely, warm day at the beach. This time we went to Ruby Beach.

Climbing the rocks looking for sea creatures

Some fun, small, wet caves

We even found a toad

Making mud castles

Day 2

Second Beach

Fun with anemones

Fun with crabs

Day 1

Just a couple fun pics from our first day here on the Olympic Peninsula. We enjoyed a nice walk through the moss covered trees and went to Rialto beach.

We saw this fun creature just about 20 yards away...

At the big spruce tree

Moss covered trees

Time Changer

We watched an enjoyable, thought-provoking movie this past weekend. It is called Time Changer and was about how an 1890s Christian seminary professor who believed good morals without focusing on Christ was somewhat useful. He then goes forward in time and sees how his theory plays out in the late 20th century. Quite funny in many places, but also sobering to think how much we as the church are okay with things that we shouldn't be okay with. They did a good job at inferring sin without showing/saying it so it was fine for the kids. Hannah liked it; Josh not so much. The acting was alright, but overall quite well produced for a low-budget film. We requested it from our public library here.

Suffering 2

My Dad sent me some quotes last week after I had posted about suffering. I wanted to share my favorite that he sent...by one of my favorite "old" authors, Thomas Watson. If you'd like to read more quotes on comfort in suffering, or really any other subject matter from a Christian perspective, I'd recommend you check out my dad's ministry at http://www.gracegems.org/.

God's file and flail

(Thomas Watson, "The Lord's Prayer")

"God disciplines us for our profit." Hebrews 12:10

What profit is in affliction? Afflictions are disciplinary. Afflictions teach us—they are the school of the cross.

Affliction shows us more of our own hearts. Water in a
glass looks clear—but set it on the fire,and the scum boils up. Just so, when
God sets us upon the fire—corruption boils up which we did not discern before.
Sharp afflictions are to the soul, as a soaking rain to the house; we do not
know that there are holes in the roof until the shower comes—but then we see it
drop down here and there. Just so, we do not know what unmortified lusts are in
the soul, until the storm of affliction comes—then the hidden evils of the heart
come dropping down in many places. Affliction is a sacred eye-salve, it clears
our eye-sight. Thus the rod gives wisdom.

Affliction quickens the spirit of prayer. Jonah was asleep in the ship—but at prayer in the whale's belly. Perhaps in a time of health and prosperity we prayed in a cold and formal manner, we put no coals to the incense. Then God sends some affliction or other—to stir us up to take hold of Him. "They poured out a prayer—when Your chastening was upon them." Isaiah 26:16. In times of trouble we pray feelingly and fervently.

Affliction is a means to purge out our sins. Affliction cures the pestilence of pride—and the fever of lust. Affliction is God's file—to scrub off our rust. Affliction is God's flail—to thresh off our husks. The water of affliction is not to drown us—but to wash off our spots.

Affliction is a means to wean us the world. The world often proves, not only a spider's web—but a cockatrice egg. Corrupting worldly things, are great enchantments. They hinder us in our passage to heaven. Affliction sounds a retreat, to call us off the immoderate pursuit of earthly things. When two things are frozen together—the best way to separate them is by fire; so, when the heart and the world are together—God has no better way to separate them than by the fire of
affliction.

Affliction is a means to purify us. It works us up to further degrees of sanctity. "God disciplines us for our profit—that we may share in His holiness." Hebrews 12:10.The vessels of mercy are the brighter for scouring. As you pour water on your linen when you would whiten it—so God pours the waters of affliction upon us to whiten our souls. Afflictions are in themselves bitter—but they bring forth the sweet fruits of righteousness. Hebrews 12:11

Apricot Sauce

You've probably never heard of Apricot Sauce and neither had I until Susan, Dave's mom, made it either last summer or the summer before. There is often an abundance of apricots around in the valley and since I really don't care for regular, from-the-tree apricots, this is how I make use of them. I also dry them, but we didn't have quite that many this year and the weather wasn't all that warm and sunny (I normally just dry them on the porch covered by cheese cloth). I eat it like applesauce, and it is probably quite similar to baby food apricots (with more sugar).

This is about the simplest recipe...wash and dry the apricots, break into halves and place in a cook pot. Mash them up. Add lots and lots of sugar until they are sweet enough for you. Turn on heat, probably med-high, and stir occasionally until gets to boiling. Keep the heat moderated so that it continues to boil and simmer off the extra water, yet not burning the apricots (it isn't really too touchy). Once they've gotten to a thicker consistency, remove from heat...probably around a half hour. You can't really mess this up except for burning it. If once it's done it's too runny or not sweet enough, just pop back on the stove top again. I actually like this sauce so much I can it and eat it all winter. There are lots of Youtube videos on canning if you want to know more about it. Last year was my first year canning anything and it is relatively straight forward and I love the satisfying little pops when the seals set. :)

Halved apricots

Mashed apricots

Boiling apricots

Happy little apricot jars

Giving In

Today was one of those days where I really didn't have any desire to be a good servant, mom or wife. I taught adult women's Sunday School on 2 Cor 4 (my favorite Bible chapter) and then Children's Church to 3 to 5 year olds - both officially became mine yesterday (mostly my doing). My words were pleasant and cheerful, hopefully uplifting and beneficial as I interacted with my fellow brothers and sisters. And, then, I walked out of church and into the car tired out. As I got home and looked to prepare our traditional Sunday lunch (toasted English muffins with jam or peanut butter)...there were no English muffins to be found. The kiddos were picking at each other, and then Dave went off to take a nap.

For me it was a perfect setup to become grouchy and have a pity party..."All I do is serve, serve, serve...give, give, give. Why do I have to teach both Sunday School and Children's Church? Why can't someone else make lunch? Why can't I take a nap?" Sometimes I am completely able to overcome those feelings reminding myself that God calls me to serve and anything I do for Him has eternal value. Today, I did alright...I was still kind of cranky, but I decided to make the best of the afternoon and do some reading and painting/water colors with the kiddos...maybe even play a game or do one of those science experiments. But, Dave actually ended up not napping, and we went to his brother's community pool to swim.

Anyways, the point I am trying to get to is this: It is so much better to give in to the situation and realize even though it isn't your "ideal" situation, there is so much blessing derived from setting yourself aside and focusing on others. You may not enjoy it initially, but when you look back on the day, there is thankfulness that you didn't succumb to the negative feelings/desires, but that you persevered and enriched someone else's life. We'll never be able to get time back that has already passed...isn't it better to use it developing deeper relationships with others rather than wistfully thinking all that "could be" if we just had things the way we wanted? May we be willing to die daily to self that we might build others up and bring glory to God.

Mt 25:40 "The King will reply, 'I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.'

2003

Safely Home

One of the authors Dave and I have enjoyed over this past year or so is Randy Alcorn. He has been particularly challenging to us in the area of finances and money management. I wouldn't say we agree with all his theology in all areas, but we have greatly appreciated his insight into living for eternity. He has a novel out called Safely Home that I read sometime last year. What a great, challenging read. It is about two roommates who are both professed Christians; one is Chinese and goes back to China, the other stays in America in a very comfortable job. At one point, they meet up and the book tells about the differences between "Chinese" Christianity and "American" Christianity...very insightful and convicting. There is some of Alcorn's understanding of heaven talked about in it which you may or may not agree with (and may be somewhat surprising if you haven't read his Heaven book), but it doesn't affect the quality and greatness of the book (it's actually quite thought-provoking). So, if you have some extra reading time, you won't regret picking up this book.

from 2002

Children's Bible Reading

One thing we started almost a year ago as I look in their notebooks was specific Bible reading time for our kiddos in the morning. They each received their own Bible probably a couple of years ago in the NIrV-it's a pretty decent version and easier for them to read although I get tripped up on verses I know well when I read them out of their bibles. Anyways, somewhere I was reading about how Charlotte Mason would have children read their bibles and look for four things so that they were reading with a specific intent:

1. A promise to claim
2. A principle to live by
3. A command to obey
4. A temptation to avoid

So, as we began this reading time, Hannah and Josh are to find one of those four things in their passage that is written in a special notebook for that purpose. The way we do our reading is that their alarms go off at 7:00 during the week, then they are to come upstairs at 7:10 to begin reading (with very little expected to be done in the meantime except get dressed if it is not their shower day). Then we just read till 7:20, they pick out their verse for the day, and I write it under the correct section (each of the four things has it's own section in the notebook). They sometimes will need help finding a good verse pending on what they are reading.

It is amazing to see what they've read over the past 11 months as we do this only on most weekdays: all the gospels, Genesis, Acts, Romans, Revelation, 3.5 other OT books (we just had them read the first half of Daniel), and 5 other NT epistles. We don't do much else with their reading such as discussing it unless they initiate questions-doing that would be a useful addition. We just felt that having them being directly in the Word was a good thing. There have been times where we will be reading in our school Bible time that they will reference something they read personally in their Bibles so they are picking up something.

So, I guess I wanted to share this as an encouragement that even a small amount consistently can add up to a lot of Bible reading over time.

From 2003

Chocolate Zucchini Bread

I know some of you may balk at the idea of zucchini with chocolate, but this is really a super yummy recipe. It also sounds like it has some health factors in it, but I think the healthy zucchini is negated by all the very unhealthy additions. :) A sweet lady at church brought in some extra veggies from her garden, and I picked up a big zucchini this past Sunday. And, yesterday, when the cousins were over we made this bread. Last year, I made many, many loaves of it and just froze them for later - they freeze great. It's always a great thing to pull out of the freezer for an easy breakfast or take along for any occasion. I don't think anyone who has had some of this bread did not enjoy it.

Gooey Gunk

We had a fun time this afternoon creating one of the neatest concoctions. It is probably the kid's favorite one and the one that allows for the greatest amount of creativity once completed. It also saves pretty well compared to some others we have tried. The kids had fun stretching it around, blowing air into it, putting air into it and making it pop, "racing" it over the side of the counter, etc. It is also cool because you see the chemical reaction as you pour the glue mixture into the borax mixture.

I would recommend making a half recipe for each child as it makes quite a decent amount.

Here's the recipe:

"Gooey Gunk"

This slimy, stretchy, gooey recipe has become one of the most popular concoctions of all time.

What you will need:

Solution A

1 cup of water

1 cup of white glue

2 tbs. Liquid tempera paint or 7-10 drops of food coloring

Solution B

1 1/3 cups of warm water

4 tsp. borax laundry booster

How to concoct it:

1. Mix ingredients in solution A together in a medium bowl.
2. In a second bowl, mix Solution B ingredients.
3. Slowly pour solution A into Solution B (Do not mix!).
4. Roll solution A around in solution B 4-5 times.
5. Lift solution A out of Solution B and knead 2-3 minutes.

Store "Gunk" in an airtight container or zip bag.

from a Teacher's Handbook

Note: We used some glow in the dark stuff that came in our box (can't find it on the web) to make most of the kids' gunk. I think it is really a glow in the dark glue, so that may have made the consistency more stretchy so that it was easier to blow the big bubbles. Josh's green was more oozy and less elasticy-we just put in food coloring in his as the directions state.

All of a Kind Family

We finished this delightful book sometime last week. It is the first of a four book series and is about a Jewish family of five girls and their experiences living in New York. This first book has quite a number of references to Jewish tradition and holidays which I liked learning about. It is cleverly written with lots of fun stories about their everyday life. It's the kind of book that takes pleasure in the simple things in life reminding you that you don't need "exciting" things to make life enjoyable.

from 2003

The Garden

I haven't written about our garden yet this year, probably because it is a bit pathetic. We had such crazy weather when I initially put most of the veggies in and they got a bit wind-whipped and stagnated in the cool weather. The past week or two the tomatoes really took off with lots of sun and warmth so that's been nice.

Here's what we have and it's status:

Tomatoes - 7 bushes - cherry tomatoes starting to come out more and more, larger tomatoes beginning - new yellow pear tomatoes pretty lousy tasting

Carrots - the one thing that has done pretty well

Strawberries - when I replanted them, they pretty much died, they are now starting to come back, but no strawberries so far

Blueberries - very pathetic, this is their second year and extremely pitiful

Chives - doing decently

Raspberries - the bush looks great, but no raspberries for eating

Basil - finally getting a couple inches high

That's about it...I'm just thankful the tomatoes are doing alright as they are our favorite...

Suffering

A friend and I have been talking quite a bit about suffering lately and it's place in the church. We've talked about the importance of being transparent and allowing others to know our struggles, yet not having our struggles create a pity party mentality. She sent me a link by Tim Keller on it that I enjoyed listening to. In it he broached two wrong ways of looking at suffering...with a stoic (not letting it affect you) mentality or a masochistic (enjoying suffering for suffering's sake) mentality. Rather we should rejoice "in" our sufferings as it allows us to know Christ more and clears away the dross in our life. Rom 5:3-5

Last year as I taught through a couple of Psalms, I came across something by Macarthur on suffering...perhaps it will be an encouragement to you:

"Suffering is used to increase our awareness of the sustaining power of God to whom we owe our sustenance. God uses suffering to refine, strengthen and keep us from falling. Suffering allows the life of Christ to be manifest in our mortal flesh and allows us to share in His suffering. Suffering bankrupts us, drains us of all human resources and makes us dependent on God. Suffering imparts the mind of Christ who was willing to strip Himself and become a servant and bow to the needs of others. Suffering teaches us that God is more concerned with character than comfort. Suffering teaches us that the greatest good of the Christian life is not the absence of pain, but the presence of spiritual maturity, or perfection. Suffering can be chastening from God for sin and rebellion. Suffering teaches us obedience and self-control when it comes in a chastening form.

"Suffering is a voluntary way to demonstrate the love of God by personal self-sacrifice. Suffering is an inevitable part of the struggle with our fallen natures and the sin that is in us. Suffering is part of the struggle against an evil world and Satan and demons and evil people. Suffering is part of the struggle for the advancement of the Kingdom of God. Suffering is part of the struggle for the proclamation of the gospel. Suffering is part of the struggle against injustice. Suffering is part of the struggle to lift up the name of Christ. Suffering indicates how the righteous are able to share in Christ's sufferings. Suffering produces endurance and endurance produces an eternal reward. Suffering forces mutual love and ministry and the administration of our gifts for the common good. It makes us come to each other's rescue.

"Suffering then binds Christians together in a common purpose. Suffering produces discernment, it produces knowledge, understanding, and allows us to share what we've learned and understood with others. Through suffering God is able to obtain our broken and contrite spirit which He desires. Suffering causes us to discipline our minds by making us focus our hope on the grace to be revealed at the revelation of Jesus Christ. In other words, it makes heaven all the more wonderful and it causes us to anticipate it with a greater amount of joy. Suffering teaches us to number our days so we can present to God a heart of wisdom. Suffering is sometimes part of reaching the lost with the gospel. Suffering allows us to become strong enough to hold up the weak. God desires truth in the innermost being and one way He achieves it is through suffering. Suffering in this life will be rewarded in the life to come. Suffering is always coupled with the greater amount of grace. Suffering teaches us to give thanks in times of sorrow and to appreciate the times when we don't suffer. Suffering increases faith. Suffering allows God to manifest His care."

--MacArthur from the appendix in When God Weeps by Tada