Sweet and Sour: October 19 - 25

When the Spirit of Truth comes, he will guide you into all truth. 
Jn 16:13

When you're watching an episode or two of The Great British Baking Show every afternoon, you start to hear your life narrated in a refined English accent. You also start to imagine new reality shows like The Great American Laundry Show in which contestants compete at re-whitening a set of soiled cloth diapers, or The Great International Errand Show in which ordinary shoppers from around the world plan out the best possible routes on a busy Saturday in which to accomplish all their necessary errands. These are shows I could win. But alas, there are no prizes for washing three baskets of laundry in one afternoon or completing all morning stops before the toddler has a needs-a-nap breakdown.

On the positive side, reality shows in which people bake sweet desserts topped with glazes and custards and jams and drizzles, is almost as therapeutic as eating said desserts, so the calming effect on ordinary life is surprisingly noticeable.

In the absence of baking shows, you can rely on local Halloween parades to excel at providing abundant tootsie rolls to satisfy a sweet tooth for a few days. And if that still doesn't work, try chocolate chip banana bread or apple pecan cookies, two delicious things I baked this week.

Aside from just the yummy stuff, fall has been sweet to us this week. After Monday's first frost, I braced myself for a frigid week. But it warmed up enough later in the week to rake leaves without a sweatshirt. Nights are still cool, but extra blankets on the bed have kept us toasty at night. I reorganized the kitchen to put things in more practical places. My little sister celebrated a birthday. We hosted friends for Sunday afternoon lunch.

These are sweets, good for the soul. Yet somehow, in the middle of all this, I'm feeling burnt out. End of month means bills are due, tasks at work increasingly fragment my brain, homeowning wearies constantly. The list of things I need to keep in mental order and do on time and successfully remember has seemed so long this week, that I've at times felt hopeless. For me this week, the sweetness was shallow compared to the exhaustion that ran so deep.

I've been encouraged by a few things, though, and I look to them for hope again this week:
1. Meeting the Lord in prayer. Where else but with Him can we find new perspective?
2. The knowledge that someday all that overwhelms me will be gone forever.
3. An intentional restoration of some margin back into my overcrowded life.

If you're also feeling not merely stretched, but snapped, go with confidence to the One who can mend what is broken. Ask for His healing touch of grace and watch the sweetness He will bring back into your soured days.

MidWeek Mini: Apple Pecan Cookies

Does your town have a Halloween Parade? My husband's hometown does, and these were the cookies I baked to take along last night when we camped out on my in-laws' front sidewalk all evening, watching marching bands and firetrucks and collecting candy tossed generously by local business owners. They are also a stellar choice for a Fall Festival, an Autumn Extravaganza, or a Harvest Party. Loaded with crunchy pecans, fresh apple bits, and a quiet hint of Christmas-y sweetness in the sugary glaze, these are the cookies for any and all celebrations this season.

I developed the recipe from a Pecan Oatmeal Cookie recipe in a little dessert book I have, with the apple added in because Henry can say "apple" and suggested we add some.

You Will Need:
1 apple
1/2 C pecans
1 stick butter, at room temperature
1/2 cup lightly packed light brown sugar
1 egg
3/4 C flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/3 C oatmeal

To Make:
Preheat the oven to 350 and prepare two cookie sheets (no need to grease them).

Chop your apple into a small dice. Chop pecans finely. Set these aside.

With a hand mixer, beat 1 stick butter and 1/2 C packed light brown sugar (press it firmly into the measuring cup, but don't pack it excessively).

Beat in 1 egg. Remove beaters from mixing bowl and scrape batter off carefully.

Stir in pecans and apples gently with a wooden spoon.

Using a sifter, sift in 3/4 C flour and 1/2 tsp baking powder into the mixing bowl.

Add 1/3 C oatmeal and stir slowly with a wooden spoon. Do not overmix; it will become extremely sticky. Stop mixing as soon as all dry ingredients are incorporated.

Using a floured hand, carefully form small balls of dough and press gently onto cookie sheets.

Bake for 15 minutes, watching for browning around the edges. Remove from oven and move carefully to wire cooking racks.

When completely cool, you can serve as-is, or add this yummy glaze.

Whisk 1/2 C powdered sugar with 1/2 T milk. Drizzle lightly over cookies. It won't exactly harden, but it will firm a little bit.

The one downside to these cookies is that they do not store very well. In a ziploc bag or an airtight container, they will become quite soft, which is not the preferred texture. The upside to all this is that you are forced to eat them all in one sitting!

Full: October 12 - 18

And you also must testify, for you have been with me from the beginning. 
Jn. 15:27

How full was your calendar this week? Mine was scribbled thick with arrows and asterisks and check marks and X's. Groceries to buy, people to care for, dinners to cook, chores to complete, events to attend. Next week's pages are nearly pure white, but in the next seven days they too will fill up with appointments and lists and plans and reminders. Then I'll turn the page to another blank set of boxes and start over again, filling up time.

This week was defined by fullness, and not just our schedule. The fridge is full (praise the Lord!), the laundry baskets are full of both clean and dirty clothes, our house was full of friends, and the dining room table is full of bits of autumn. It's easy for the heart to be full when so much blessing is obvious.

But my life should be characterized by fullness in another sense too. Am I full of grace? Full of forgiveness? Full of kindness? Generosity? Do I overflow because I'm filled up by an inexhaustible source? Too often, I don't. I'm frequently full of irritation. Worry. Restlessness. Or I'm not filled with anything at all. I'm empty: wearied, complacent.

There's no guarantee in the Bible that we will always feel full. But we are promised that we will always be full. "The Father will give you a Counselor to be with you forever," Jesus promised. "My peace I give you," He said. "Remain in me and I will remain in you," He said. Thankfully, the filling doesn't come from me.

Do you feel empty today? Or filled up with anxiety? There's an overflowing cup of joy available to fill you up. Be willing to come empty and prepare to leave full of all the fruits that come from life in the Holy Spirit.

MidWeek Mini: A Chili Recipe

Evening meals in the fall should be warm and served in bowls. The kind of thing you could eat on the porch while bundled in a cable sweater watching the early sunset. The kind of thing that steams cozily on the table while you scrunch your feet into slippers and listen for the 6:00 jazz to start on the radio. The kind of thing that's so good you're craving it again already by next week.

This chili recipe is one we'll be coming back to frequently this fall. It's hearty, warm, and good for you too. We all love it, even my husband who has never liked chili.

What You Need:
olive oil
1 medium yellow onion
1 tsp ground cumin
1/2 tsp dried oregano
2 heaping T chili powder
1/8 tsp ground cinnamon
2 bay leaves
1 lb ground turkey
2 T tomato paste
1 one-ounce piece of dark chocolate
1 bottle or can of beer (alternate: 12 oz beef broth)
1 can diced tomatoes (I prefer the petite diced)
1 can black beans
1 can great northern or cannellini beans
1 can whole kernel corn

Your Turn:
Pour a swirl (maybe 1 T) of olive oil in the bottom of a large stock pot over low heat.

Peel and chop 1 onion. Add it to the pot. Cook about 5 minutes, until onion is soft.

Add 1 tsp ground cumin, 1/2 tsp dried oregano, 2 heaping T chili powder, 1/8 tsp cinnamon, and 2 bay leaves. Stir to combine flavors. Cook until fragrant, about 3 more minutes.

Add 1 lb ground turkey and 2 T tomato paste. Stir to break up meat. Cook until meat is no longer pink, stirring occasionally with a wooden spoon.

Add 1 oz dark chocolate and 12 oz can or bottle of beer. Stir to combine.

Add 1 can diced tomatoes (petite diced are best). 

Using a large colander, rinse 1 can black beans, 1 can white beans, and 1 can corn. Dump all three cans into the colander and rinse gently in the sink, stirring with your hands. Add this mixture to the stock pot.

Now you can choose your own adventure: If you're in a hurry, cover and simmer on low for about 30-40 minutes. If you have time (and this is what I recommend), dump the whole thing in the crock pot and let it cook on low for 4-5 hours. Be sure to remove bay leaves before serving.

Serve with hot cooked white rice, cornbread, shredded mexican cheese, sour cream, chopped black olives, and hot sauce.

Got an autumn recipe you plan to cook on repeat this season? Share the link!

Unexpected: October 5 - 11

You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit - fruit that will last. 
Jn 15:16

We almost got to the end of this very busy week without incident. But at the very end of our very long Saturday, which we spent at school for the homecoming festivities, Pete was playing a game of staff vs alumni volleyball and came down hard on his knee. His good knee. Just a few days ago, he was walking around dressed like a teutonic knight at the Renaissance Faire. Now he's hobbling on crutches.

About three years ago he had surgery to replace the ACL in his right knee, and since then he's favored it, putting more weight and pressure on the left one. On Saturday night, he felt a pop in the left knee, collapsed, and hasn't put his full weight on it since. We took a trip to the urgent care center the next day and the PA there diagnosed a sprain, not a tear, of the knee ligaments, so we are hopeful that we can avoid another surgery.

Sometimes a week hits you with a curve ball and instead of spending Sunday morning in a refreshing Sunday School class, you're spending in the radiology room at Urgent Care. With crutches and advil summing up our weekend, we are not heading into this week the way we expected to.

As I sat in the waiting room, I was reading Margin, which is the book my Bible Study group is doing this quarter. The book encourages readers to put space into our lives, to be careful to live within our limits instead of beyond them. But I applied this section on the pain often caused by culture's progress to the situation in front of me this weekend:

"We once again agree that things do not own us and are not even very important. We once again assert that jobs are only jobs, that cars are only organized piles of metal, that houses will one day fall down - but that people are important beyond description. We once again assert that love stands supreme above all other forces, even to the ends of the universe and beyond."

I am remembering this week that a knee is just a joint, that paperwork is just necessary scribbles, and that though the body inevitably breaks down, the soul is being daily restored. There are trials, but they pale when viewed beside the blessings. There are frustrations, but they fade when considered in the context of all that you've been spared. There is hurt and exhaustion, but they are temporary. The more the heart sees frailty here, the greater our joy as we consider the wholeness of heaven.

Grateful this week for: 
urgent care center
kindnesses of friends
the sweet face of a newborn baby
apples
coupons
students who love our son
sunshiney autumn
playgrounds

Roots from the Wilted: Sept 28 - Oct 4

If anyone loves me, he will obey my teaching. My Father will love him, and we will come and make our home with him. 
Jn. 14:23

A few weeks ago, I was visiting a friend for the afternoon. She had offered me a houseplant that her home could no longer accommodate, and after catching up a bit, I had loaded the plant into my car and was ready to go. But when I turned the key, my car wouldn't start. The engine didn't even turn over. We expected it would need a tow. While we waited for AAA to show up, we strolled around her yard and she picked me a stalk of sedum, which I had admired. It was already close to dinner time, so her family generously hosted us for pizza, and when we finally left (AAA being able to restart the car), I ended up leaving the little green branch of sedum on the passenger seat of the car when we dropped it off at the shop. A few days later when we picked up the car, the sedum was still looking surprisingly hearty so I brought it home, dropped it in a glass of water, and set it on my windowsill. Now, it's sprouted a shock of white roots at the bottom. It's reaching out for a place to settle for good.

This little growing thing shows me, in a way I can see on my windowsill, the restoring power of Jesus. It has demonstrated, like so many things do, a greater truth about our God. You might have a broken-down car, or a wilting branch, or a flagging spirit, or a wounded heart. But God can make a whole new beginning out of something that looks to you like it's almost dead.

I need to have this faith about more things than just a cut flower in the kitchen. There are some big things that are looking pretty shrivelly right now: the future of Christian education, for example. I've become passionate about the rights of Christian schools to write their own employment and enrollment policies and to be exempt from penalties when they do so. But as I read news like this, I become more and more sure that it's only a matter of time before Christian schools nationwide will be forced to compromise their beliefs, or close their doors for good. And this overwhelms me with fear, sadness, and panic.

Add to this a posse of disrespectful teenage boys at school, the potentially imminent death of a family member who doesn't know Christ, rumors of ISIS radicals sneaking into Europe amongst the refugees, and the exhausting weariness of a plain old head cold, and hopelessness isn't far off.

I need faith that God can take this worry, this bleak future that I've written for the world, and sprout new roots out of it. I need more faith that when I feel abandoned, left on a car seat to wither in the sun, God will bring along a cup of cool water and give me a fresh start. I need the memory of all He has already done to pierce through the discouragement that comes from dwelling on what He hasn't done yet. His sweet Word offers comfort from every page and I've found it a strong tower for me this week.

Is your faith waning? Does something look to you like it has wilted beyond hope? Offer it to the Gardener who makes all things grow. But remember this too: "Unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds." Christ promises to bring life, even out of death. So be patient and grateful as you watch to see what He will do. It probably won't be what you expect, but it will be good.

Grateful this week for: 
a free coffee
cloudy skies
John 14
honesty in an email
my husband
apples
Benadryl
coupons
a fleece blanket

Freedom?

I've never been one to care much about politics or news. I've lived in the smiled-upon land of the free and the oh-so-safe home of the brave where the underlying tenets of my faith, the basics at least, have received an agreeing nod for centuries by my culture. So I've never had reason to question the continuance of that freedom. I've foolishly taken it as a given that the laws of my land would never counter the laws of my God.

But lately my stomach turns every time I hear the news. As a Christian in today's world, I find my beliefs, which once informed public policy and law on every level, completely discarded in society. The battle cry of "Equal Rights" has taken their place. You've surely heard the stories of Christian photographers and bakeries, how new laws - and new interpretations of laws - eliminate the freedom of creative professionals to answer to their consciences about what sort of work to accept. And recently the legal changes are spreading wider. Additional legislation threatens to interfere with the decisions being made by churches and Christian schools. Soon it may not be legal to refuse employment or enrollment or membership to a man or woman who's living a lifestyle regarded by the church as sinful, even though our First Amendment prohibits laws that interfere with religious institutions. Now, instead of nodding along with Biblical teaching, or even simply allowing Christians to write their own policies that adhere to Biblical teaching, our culture refuses Christians the right to act in accordance with their beliefs. And ironically, it's all in the name of providing equal rights for all. 

What people want is inclusion. People want rights and they want those rights be identical to the rights of the person next door, no matter the differences - large or small - between them. And though it seems a common-sense thing to desire, it's not been valued historically as much as you might think. As cultures have known for millennia, to maintain order, safety, predictability, and security, a society needs to set boundaries. It's why we have prisons and traffic laws and local courts. There will necessarily be inequalities if a community is to function successfully. But the American culture has made equality so important that it's willing to sacrifice the freedoms of some for the privileges of others. We've put such value on rights that we've failed to see the inevitable ripple effect of breaking our own rules. Like an invisible toxic gas, the idea that everyone deserves the same thing has poisoned minds across the nation.

But behind the smoke screen, there's a quiet and beautiful truth that our culture is missing.

There is a place where equality reigns. There is a place where rights that had been denied are given freely. There is a truth that overrides the law and overrules the strikes against us.

It's the gospel of Jesus Christ. The gospel of Christ offers inclusion. The gospel gives us the rights of God's very children. The gospel of grace gives all of us equality, positions as brothers and sisters of Jesus Christ himself. The gospel stands ready to grant honor and privilege and freedom. This is what people are searching for: Jesus Christ himself and the free gift He offers.

Though this is what we want, we are crippled by our own pride. People cringe at the idea of being forced to change in order to be accepted. And the first thing the gospel does is expose the fact that we don't deserve to be included. Everything we do that opposes God's perfect nature is a stain on our record and there's no rewriting of that Law. So naturally, we're excluded from His favor, and that might be a very unAmerican truth to swallow.

But God is kind. All He requires is humility, the willingness to recognize that we do not deserve anything and that our actions have only condemned us. When we approach Him in this attitude, He gives two things: complete and total grace which accepts us in our rotten but humble state, and the power to change the things about us that made us rotten in the first place. The best part is, He even gives the humility needed to approach Him in the first place.

People want freedom, but they're grasping at such a small version of it. Freedom in this country to get a particular job or to receive lodging at a certain bed and breakfast, despite your non-traditional lifestyle, is a sad and (dare I say) a narrow-minded accomplishment. And perhaps even the freedom of a Christian school to write its own policies and refuse admission to individuals whose lives do not reflect Biblical teaching is a pitiful right to have gained. The freedom offered in Christ, offered by His gospel, is a complete and eternal freedom from all your guilt and failure, from all the things in this world that make you ache and lie awake at night, from the struggle to find meaning, from worry and anxiety and depression, from the oppression of every government on the planet, and from your own self. People want freedom from perceived injustices. But there is a much, much bigger freedom, complete with all the rights you could ever dream of, available to you if you turn to God with a heart of humility. And it includes the best possible injustice: the gift of eternal life, which you could never, ever earn, given by someone who paid for it so you could receive it freely.

_________

If you'd like to share your opinion about this with your lawmakers, use this link to ask them to halt legislation in Pennsylvania that would legally penalize ministries and Christian schools for adhering to their convictions about what the Bible teaches.