My First Valentine & A Recipe

I was 29 years old when I celebrated February 14th with my very first Valentine. It was spent with my husband in the Swiss Alps about a month and a half after we got married. We were on a three month semester abroad trip for his Bachelor of Arts degree in Worship Arts, traveling Europe, visiting several Christian communities and churches as well as a 6 week stay at L’Abri! I had waited my entire life for my future husband, the man I wanted to spend the rest of my life with and God blessed me with the sweetest Valentine’s Day. It was worth the wait.

I would be lying though if I painted this beautiful portrait without also sharing the struggles. We had our fair share of mishaps that week as we tried to figure out how we wanted this day to look for us. Oh, newlyweds! I was afraid that my first Valentine’s Day wouldn’t be all that I had thought it should be. It was an inward battle of fighting the culture’s ideals or big business companies’ ideas of what Valentine’s Day should be. I was fighting the temptation to make an idol out of this romantic holiday. But God’s grace met us where we were at. After all these inner struggles were finally resolved, our day ended up being quite a celebration!

We were staying at L’Abri where all our meals were provided with our stay, however, we rarely had real orange juice and Craig knew that was my favorite. We were poor and we couldn’t afford much, but we could afford real orange juice! That morning, I awoke to a half gallon of it sitting on my desk which was like gold! A bouquet of white winter tulips as on our wedding day, and a hand written love note with personal artwork, one of Craig’s romantic trademarks in our relationship,  I was delighted.

He took me to the ski village of Villars just up the hill from L’Abri. We walked along winding roads and forest trails. We talked about our dreams, our future. He took me to a chocolatier and we had the most delicious hot chocolate in the world. Melted chocolate in a small pot poured into steamed milk, overlooking the towering Alps that surrounded us. We had dinner at an unassuming Thai restaurant, a small, empty hole in the wall type of place, but the food was delicious as it usually is in those hole in the wall type places!

Its fun to remember these special moments and see how far we’ve come through the past nine years of marriage! Grace upon waves of grace. Years of making heart cookies with icing, making paper cards with the kids, little hands cutting out paper hearts, and icing covering chubby cheeks, remembering the real reason for this holiday which is the story of St Valentine, a man who lived his life for Jesus.

A few years ago, I found a recipe on Sally Clarkson’s blog for Valentine Shortbread Cookies. I love it because it doesn’t have that much sugar and its fast and easy to make. Besides cookie recipes, she has so much wisdom and good mommy food for the soul.

Celebrate your loved ones, read about St Valentine, and take pictures of all the messes made! For some good children’s book ideas to learn about St Valentine, hop on over to my friend, Thea’s, children’s book blog! There are treasures there!

Happy St Valentine’s Day!

Psalms

As a child, I had a Children’s Bible for the longest time. It was so well loved that the pages were falling out, one by one. Whole sections were breaking off and even the spine was detaching from the rest of the book. I had to fix it with a hot glue gun, several times over. Eventually, I got a brown leather Bible case for it which held in its pockets all my notes and lists I made during the sermon. I often sat near my best friends and we always passed notes during the service. And when I wasn’t writing notes during the service, I was exploring the hymn book from front to back, including all those little categories that organize the hymns so well. I was amazed that some of the hymns were 400 years old and there were hymns for every occasion!

I also remember the days in public school when the Gideons would come to the school and hand out free, little red Gideon Bibles. I don’t think they do this anymore in Canada, but it was during the 1980’s and I was so excited to get my Gideon Bible. I cherished it and it fit nicely into my denim purse!

I kept this Bible in the top drawer of my night table in my bedroom. I am not sure exactly why or how this all came about, but at some point, I started a habit of reading Psalm 48:1-2:

Great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised,
In the city of our God, His holy mountain.
Beautiful in elevation, the joy of the whole earth,
Is Mount Zion in the far north,
The city of the great King.
Psalm 48:1-2 NASB

Every morning when I woke up, I took my Bible out of the drawer and opened it to this verse, read it and then got ready for school. It was habit. And soon it was memorized. This was the way God prepared me for each day. I needed His Word in my heart. It was a big thing to go out into the world of school and stand firm in my faith as a young Christian. I realize now that it was Him drawing me to His Word, preparing me to live for Him in the hallways of my school. He is the one who drove me to those verses day after day, to start my days with praise.

This was one of my first introductions to the Psalms. Another was from a song my sisters and I learned to play on the piano called, As The Deer, based on Psalm 42:1. Each of us had our own version of how we played the song. Whenever a piano was nearby, I would sit down and play this song over and over. God was teaching me to worship Him.

Eventually I began to put my own music to several Psalms and listened to other artists’ versions of Psalms. It grew in me a passion for worshiping God through His own Word! All these years later, one of my favorite singer/songwriters, Sandra McCracken, has written and recorded her own album of Psalms and it is simply one of the best. It was our theme music of Summer 2015 and so many memories are now attached to those songs as we played her music non-stop, and quite loudly, for the first few months after moving to the mid-west.

These songs, based on the Psalms, evoke a variety of emotion, deep heart cries to God, words of comfort and rejoicing in praise. My favorite song, We Will Feast in the House of Zion, is a song of triumph and hope, a banner of victory and faith that I needed last summer, as we made such a huge move across the country. Along with these songs, I wept and rejoiced in worship to God, our Good Shepherd, as He so lovingly reminded us over and over of His faithfulness, His presence in our lives, and His trustworthiness.

We will feast in the House of Zion
We will sing with our hearts restored
-Sandra McCracken

Adorned ~ The Beauty of the Daughters of God

As a young girl, my sisters and I loved to play dress-up. We had a wooden trunk filled to overflowing with dresses, outfits, hats, high-heeled shoes and knee-high boots from our mother’s wardrobe in the sixties and seventies. We put on necklaces and wore large purses to create stories in our make-believe world. Sometimes we even put on make-up and teased up our hair, cementing it in place with bottles of hairspray as we played “Hair Salon”. Our mother and father were always surprisingly astonished when we presented ourselves all dolled up, “Ta-da!” We were quite the site! With bows and barrettes, toy jewelry, and shiny bracelets, we were adorned!

The Bible teaches women to adorn themselves with good deeds, empowered by His Spirit, doing our Kingdom work as His daughters.

likewise also that women should adorn themselves in respectable apparel, with modesty and self-control, not with braided hair and gold or pearls or costly attire, 10 but with what is proper for women who profess godliness—with good works.
-1 Timothy 2:9-10 ESV

Sometimes I think about the Christian women I know, and I sit back amazed at the ministries God has given each one. The gifts, talents, and passion for their different callings. They are adorned with good deeds. The following is a short list of a few daughters of God whom I know and the good deeds that adorn them. Aren’t they beautiful?

Daughter #1
She is now in the winter of her life, a seasoned veteran in the life of a pastor’s wife. She has visited the sick in hospitals, anointed their feet much like Mary anointed Jesus’ feet with her perfume and tears. She has comforted the young widow in the sudden death of her young husband. She has walked the laborsome path of befriending the difficult person and showing her that she is worthy of being loved and befriended. She has made meals for hundreds of families, worked inside and outside the home to help provide for her family and support her husband’s ministry. She has counseled her own children and pointed them to Christ as she purposefully discipled them. She has led Sunday school classes for young girls, comforted those who have been bullied, showing them the better path. She has accepted the trials God has given her to carry and continues to lean in complete dependence on her Savior as she reaches out to those who do not yet know Jesus. She tells strangers the gospel in pharmacy line-ups. She ministers to those around her and prays for them. Day and night, she prays for them.

Daughter #2
She is a wife and mother of little ones. She comes from a small, unassuming town in the desert. She is a midwife and skilled in her knowledge of assisting women in birth. She is learning a new language and preparing to move with her family to a remote location overseas to tell unreached people groups about Jesus and the gospel. How beautiful on the mountains are the feet of those who bring good news. She will be living a life of great sacrifice so that others can know the Great Sacrifice that was given for them.

Daughter #3
She has studied the Bible for years and now is attending seminary in Canada. She is single and waiting for the husband that God is preparing for her. She has worked with teenagers for over a decade, teaching them God’s Word, mentoring and discipling them, giving her waking hours to invest in the next generation as a teacher, counselor, and friend.

Daughter #4
She is a homemaker, a birthday planner, a cook, a counselor, an advocate, a wife, a mother, a pastor’s wife, and the one who has researched for years to find the right diagnosis for her son’s unique challenges. She has had victory this past year in finally finding the reason for these challenges and is on a path of continued victory for discovering for him the resources he needs. She is a marathon runner and an example to me of endurance. She will run the race marked out for her and complete that race.

Daughter #5
She is a woman who puts her hand to the plow in whatever she does. She has served in various churches in children’s ministry, helping to develop the ministry, curriculum, Sunday school rooms, etc. She has hosted Bible study groups, foster care workers and friends. As well as being a wife and mother, she is now a foster mom and welcomes orphans into her home to care for them in transition. She welcomes the stranger and provides for the sick and homeless. She reaches out to the single mom and puts on a baby shower for her new little one.

Daughter #6
She lives in the ghetto of a desert city. She lives in the “hole” as they call it, the most destitute place in the city where the gangs literally shoot at each other as they pass by. She serves the little ones, the next generation. Her family lives in the midst of this needy community to shine brightly the love and freedom found in Christ. She holds a Bible study for the young, teenage girls, to disciple them and show them that there is a Father who loves them, will provide for them, and will heal their hearts. Christ will return to make all things new and with the presence of their family in that community, Christ is making things new in that community and the seeds of the gospel are being planted there.

Daughter #7
She is a wife, mother, grandmother. She taught Kindergarten for 30 years. She loves children and books and finding resources to teach the truths of God to the next generation. She makes quilts for homeless women, prepares meals for others, is continually applying herself to the study of Scripture. Whenever I am in her kitchen, she has new thank you notes sitting on her window sill. Thank you notes come in the mail weekly. She quietly goes about her work the Lord has given her to do and she ministers the love of Christ to others. She is a faithful woman in the household of God.

Daughter #8
She creates music and knits. She uses her gifts and talents in art and drawing, words and writing to teach her children and the younger generation. She writes book reviews on a delightful blog to share with other women resources for training and nurturing children. She practices hospitality and creates delicious meals to share with others. Her walls are filled with pictures and verses, maps and exclamatory praises to God! She reads and reads and reads. Then she passes on her knowledge to bless others and inspire others to dive into living stories that reveal the one Great Story!

Daughter #9
She is a wife and mother to girls. She works part-time while they’re at school. She is a photographer and editor. She captures beautiful images, stunning pictures of real life moments. She’s been a world traveler to Japan and Madagascar, France, England, and accidentally, Austria (wrong plane). She hosts families for dinner at their home and mentors her daughters. She is also a Defender of the young and gently teaches others the art of kindness. She is strong and noble.

Daughter #10
She is seven years old and already an adventure seeker, traveler, artist, friend, musician, and story-teller. She is beautiful, kind, and sweet. She is learning and growing as are all of us daughters of God. She spends her free time drawing, exploring outside, playing with her younger brothers and her friends. She is a nurturer and loves to take care of babies and toddlers, to prepare the cups and saucers for tea time, and to prepare gifts for others. She is my daughter.

There are so many other women I could write about here! All amazing, set apart women! Women who love to decorate and women who do not. Women who are older and women who are younger.  Women who like to garden, and women who just need to rest and teach others to rest. Women of all life stages and seasons, living out their days in worship to God. I will mention one more…

Daughter #11
This is you, dear daughter, beloved of God. You have gifts and talents, a personality uniquely designed by God. God has given you a unique family, a unique health or financial situation, and a unique set of neighbors. We are God’s workmanship. He is the one working through us and empowering us. If God is the one who has prepared these works, then there is no need for comparison with other women. We can joyfully and with gratitude go out into the world, doing the work that God has prepared for each of us to do, bringing glory to our Father.

For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them. -Ephesians 2:10 ESV

Little Miss E and the Purple Glitter

I opened the patio door and let the cold, harsh winter air in just for a moment. I was cleaning up the back patio stairs, and noticed purple glitter all over our steps trailing down along the cement toward the garden. “Do you guys know who dumped purple glitter outside?” I asked the kids, quite perplexed.

“That was Little Miss E,” they said (a cute name I made up just for this post for anonymity). I looked around, amazed, thinking, “Its everywhere!” Throughout the day and into the next, I continued to bring  items outside for recycling and my eyes were drawn to the purple glitter, dazzlingly spilled all over our steps. It started to grow on me. It started to become endearing. I smiled with amusement each time I opened the door.

Little Miss E is our sweet, dear 5 year old friend who comes to visit us often. Dressed in a princess dress, carrying a purse, or wearing strands of little girl necklaces, she plays in the communal backyard, and knocks on our door for our kids to come outside and play. This is one of the things I love the most about our community where we live. Children are always coming by to say hello, to play, and to just chat. And we chat with them. We listen to their thoughts, we ask them questions. I want our home to always be welcoming to little ones, that they may sense the love of Jesus here, that Jesus welcomes them, and that we are always willing to talk.

Working this morning at the campus childcare center, we had taken the kids to the playground to play. I was pulling the little red wagon with two children sitting snuggly inside. As I circled the playground on the asphalt path, I looked down and there it was, more purple glitter! I saw more later on along the sidewalk to our building, and more at the picnic area, and still more sprinkled all over crisp, dry fallen leaves.  I smiled. Little Miss E. She’s been here too! Like little whisps of fairy dust sprinkled around campus, she was leaving her mark of purple glitter wherever she went, coloring the bleak winter with purple hues that shimmer and shine in the sunlight, making our community sparkle with her laughter and smiles, and her sweet friendship.

And the Lord their God will save them in that day
As the flock of His people;
For they are as the stones of a crown,
Sparkling in His land.
Zechariah 9:16

Listening Well

We have been living at seminary now for over 7 months. When we arrived, we found ourselves often involved in and listening to conversations that centered around four letters. Are you an I or an E? Are you an F or a J? At first I was confused, as my brain sorted through the possibilities of what these letters could mean. Staring blankly, with baby in one arm, not sure what to say, and without any clue as to what they were talking about, I would answer honestly, “I actually don’t know what F and J mean.” We found these four letter combinations to be everywhere around campus and in class. After realizing this was a Meyers-Briggs personality tool and remembering that I had taken this test almost 20 years ago in college, we learned to appreciate these letters, because these letters actually had meaning and we would learn to appreciate even what these letters meant for us personally.

While living here in community, and from auditing one class (of which I only attended about half of the classes because our life was so busy last semester), and from learning through osmosis from what my husband is learning in his Mdiv classes, the Lord has been teaching me to listen well.

I always thought I was a good listener. When I am meeting with a friend, I put my cell phone away or on silent. If I’m talking with someone and my phone rings, I don’t answer it, but return the call when I have a moment. If I’m at church talking to someone and someone else taps my shoulder to say hi, I say a quick hello in a whisper, give a smile and a wave and then return to the person I was listening to. I want to give full attention.

I’ve realized, though, that there is so much more involved in listening well.

Listening doesn’t just involve eye contact and letting people finish their sentences. Listening isn’t just about hearing another’s words. If you want to listen well, it can take quite a lot of energy, which can be difficult for a generally introverted personality like mine.

As a Christian, it is important to listen well because we are ambassadors of Christ and we want to represent Him well to each other and to the world for the sake of His  Kingdom and for the sake of His redeeming work in our lives and relationships.

It is an honor to listen to someone’s story. Your neighbor, your relative, your spouse is made in the image of God. They have a story, a long and complicated, intricate story that began before they were even born. It is a privilege to be given the honor of hearing and engaging in one’s story.

Sometimes we need to just listen… physically hearing and internalizing what someone is saying, evaluating and analyzing, considering the vast array of possibilities and interpretations that could be present. It involves waiting patiently for wisdom and speaking timely words in response.

I like the NIV version of Ephesians 4:29 that says,

Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen.
(Ephesians 4:29 NIV)

We want to build others up in the Truth, in Christ, according to their needs. The most important of those needs is having the Gospel impact their lives.

According to Carl Jung and Isabel Briggs Myers’, there are 16 different personality types. Already, we have a lot to wade through in learning to listen to someone! A free personality test here was one of the many tools used in our Spiritual and Ministry Formation Class. I didn’t realize back then how useful this would be in understanding myself better and understanding how I interact with others. Ultimately, this would aid in how well I am able to listen to others and interact with more wisdom and knowledge, simply because I would now be listening to them with skill.

Know this, my beloved brothers: let every person be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger (James 1:19 ESV)

One of the main culprits for causing disunity and disgruntled relationships is due to the inability to recognize the inner workings of the vast array of different personalities. Each person may see an event or an opinion in a different light due to the way they interpret a situation, what worldview or culture they are coming from, whether they are an introvert or extrovert, what they value, and how they have learned to manage their emotions, responses, and ways of interacting with others.

It takes a lot of effort and grace to listen well to another. But learning this lifelong skill will help diffuse many a needless conflict, bring restoration to relationships and most importantly, open doors for the gospel to be shared, received and savored.

Listen, and listen well.

The Close of the Day

It all happened quite circumstantially. Our almost-2 year old started crawling out of his bed at night and with delirious laughter decided this was the way he wanted to spend all of his evenings… getting Mommy and Daddy to put him back into his bed 20-30 times a night! Finally, one of the exhausted pair had a brilliant idea. It was time to stand guard.

So the evening routine would begin. Tuck all of the children into bed, pull up a chair in front of their rooms, and keep watch lest the littlest one should sneak out unawares. After many nights of listening to music while he fell asleep, folding laundry, or working on my computer at my post, I realized that I could accomplish much in this span of 20 minutes while he fell asleep.

A new year dawned, and I began reading to my children another book in C.S. Lewis’ Chronicles of Narnia series, Prince Caspian. I am currently reading three novels to my children and have another four that just arrived in the mail this past week. I never have quite enough time to get in all the reading I would love to do each day. Solution: the books need to take turns. It was during this new years week and during the transition of a new school schedule that I began a new tradition… reading them to sleep.

I am amazed at how many chapters we can breeze through in that small amount of time. The house is quiet, I have their attention. Every so often, I stop to see if they have fallen asleep and usually I hear, “Read more!” Occasionally, I do not get a response. And that’s when I know that all have peacefully drifted off into dreamland, hopefully with kings and queens, fauns, centaurs, brave little mice, and definitely a lion named Aslan. And if none of these creatures fill their dreams, then at least they have all happily gone to sleep with a story in their hearts, at a reasonable hour and I have fulfilled another shift of standing guard against the wiles of a deliriously exhausted 2 year old, whom I love with all my heart!

Tell Me Another Story, Mama

I would crawl up on her bed, my little 10 year old self. She would be folding clean towels. I would watch her and memorize her every movement. I loved these moments in the middle of the day or the evening hours before bedtime. No one else around, I could have my mom all to myself and just talk. We would talk about anything and everything. Literally everything. She was my sounding board for all the many thoughts that perused my mind and it would all come out at these moments. It was then in those moments that she would say, “I completely understand. When I was young…” and she would launch off into a story from her life. She is an amazing story-teller. Sometimes the stories were quite amusing and hilarious. I would ask her questions, have her repeat that certain part again, and ask the why’s and how’s and when’s so that I could fully immerse myself in her stories.

Other times, there was a grand lesson for me to hear. Whether it was a spiritual lesson or a relationship lesson, she always had the answer! I would come away feeling encouraged, built up in my faith, and trusting that God was working even if I couldn’t see the answer to my particular problem. I would say, “Tell me another story, Mommy, from when you were young!”

About this time, a desire for adventure was percolating in my heart.  I would daydream constantly, even so much that it affected my wardrobe. I enjoyed wearing bracelets and necklaces as a little girl, but as I was getting older, I didn’t have a strong interest in jewelry. Everyone tried to get me to like it, but I felt it might get in the way if I was on a missionary adventure in a jungle somewhere. Instead of daydreaming about fancy hair-styles, I have often daydreamed about what kind of hair style would most suit the mission field and took the least amount of care, so that I could focus instead on the hard and laborious work of living in a third world country or scaling mountainsides on my future adventures. Instead of dreaming about fancy purses and shoes, I daydreamed about what kind of satchel or shoulder bag would suit me the best as I wandered through unknown lands. I also wore moccasins in high school which absolutely horrified my sisters! And of course, I ran my fastest time ever, the day I wore my moccasins to gym class!

I still have them.

(Disclaimer: I do appreciate jewelry and fancy things! I love to dress up too. And I love that my daughter loves to dress up. Over the years, I have learned to enjoy my own version of fancy! In fact, if my daughter wants to get her ears pierced one day, I may just go and get mine pierced with her as a Mommy Date!)

My daydreams took on an element of adventure. Perhaps it was fueled as well by my adventurous father who would take me hiking into the mountains. When your Dad takes you for a hike past the “No Trespassing” sign, you know you’re in for an adventure. We would walk as far as our legs would take us, enjoying the incredible views overlooking Vancouver, British Columbia, high up in the mountains. He would point out streams, waterfalls, flowers and plant life. He would also make sure not to point out signs of bear or cougar nearby. He didn’t tell me about all the moments he did notice signs of wildlife, as he didn’t want to frighten me, but he told me years later!

A few years ago, I started to tell our kids stories of adventure from my life. Stories about places I went and people I met, sharing the gospel with many different people in many different lands. And now, it is a regular thing to hear one of my children say, “Mama, tell us another story!” So we snuggle together, I set the scene, and they dive into their imaginations to recreate for themselves another story as I remember it.