Our 2nd Ever Lily Press Chat

Last week Naomi had a chat online with Jana Baldridge, a dear friend from Wisconsin. Both girls are currently volunteering at Christian ministries in Texas and were having similar questions about their work. They have taken advantage of these opportunities because of Paul's admonition that singleness is a gift to be used for the body of Christ and his injunction that we be "wholly concerned with the Lord's business". However, this doesn't mean concerns don't arise and this chat addreses some of them, in an informal way. (Meaning, we weren't planning on posting this while we were having it! What you see is the original, un-cut, and unedited version. Okay, I did change one spelling error, but I won't admit whose it was. Read at your own risk!)

me: Hi! How are you?

Jana : I'm doing pretty good. :-) How are you?

me: Great! Are you getting a big storm tonight too?

Jana : Ha! Nope...ours came last night. Goodness. It was a nice downpour too. Soaked my shoes walkin' to dinner, LOL.
me: Wow! What fun! Did you have an okay 4th of July away from home?

Jana : Yes, it was pretty good. I actually have all this week off from work. Hurrah!

me: Really? That's nice! Are you getting homesick?

Jana : So, I went into town with some of my friends to watch the parade....ALERT held a cookout for the guys/staff....and Big Sandy had a nice fireworks display.

me: Oh, that's nice.

Jana : Not really. It hits once in awhile...for the most part, I keep too busy to be homesick. Not sure if that's good or bad, but... :-)
How was your 4th?

me: Don't you just love having "family" away from home? I think that's the nicest thing. I understand! It was great . . . my best holiday away from home so far! I went to a parade by myself in the morning (ha!), bought a hot dog at a gas station and ate it on the curb, and then later went to a big cookout at the pastor's house and then fireworks. I've only got another month here until I go home for Hannah's wedding and then have to decide if I want to come back again. That's the part I don't like - always deciding where to go and when! :-)

Jana : Are you committed for a time in El Paso? (that is where you are, right?)

me: Right. . . no, I can come and go as I please! They want me to stay for 10 years, they said, but they'll settle for anything. That was nice :-) I sometimes have this dichotomy of the quiet home life and active ministry away from home and wonder which I really should be doing. Maybe this back and forth is the best thing. Do you have that problem or have you worked it out?

Jana : Hmmm...Good question!

me: lol Too bad - I was thinking maybe you'd settled it and could help me out. :-)

Jana : What you should be doing....meaning, what you feel like the Lord/parents want you to do, or what people will say?

me: Umm. . neither of the last two. I guess I mean where I as a Christian woman ought to be

Jana : Oh, I see. A Christian, single woman with no hopes on the horizon for marriage, right? :-)

me: If God created women to be a help to men and flourish in the sphere of the home, what implications does that have for me? lol - right - does that change anything?

Jana : I was just asking what I've been asked personally, LOL.

me: Obviously I don't think it excludes the kind of stuff we're doing or I wouldn't be where I am, but how exactly does it fit?

Jana : I've been kinda wondering the same lately.

me: People keep saying "I hope you meet a nice young man - and SOON!" That cracks me up. I always add, "But I AM happy NOW!"

Jana : I guess I feel that being at ALERT for this time -- however long it is -- will prepare me to better serve with my husband. Hmmm...that didn't come out right.

me: I understand . . and I agree. I am learning so much - and I'm sure you are too

Jana : Oh, for sure!!!!!

me: but then. . . are we losing anything at the same time? Are we forgetting how to be content with washing dishes and mopping floors?
Are we convincing ourselves that THIS is real ministry and therefore being a mother isn't? In any way are we getting affirmation from being told we are helpful and doing good work instead of being content to BE

Jana : And I really feel like that someday my husband and I will be serving in a ministry setting and all this office work and leadership skills will be much needed.
Oh no! I feel like being a mother is a real ministry. God just hasn't called me to that right now. I wouldn't say it's the highest kind of ministry....well....hmmmm....

me: lol

Jana : Uh.....

me: I feel the same way about future ministry - that any skills I am getting now are most likely going to be helpful.

Jana : In all honesty, I didn't get your last sentence. Sorry -- I've been sleeping most of today. :P :-)

me: That's nice! I mean. . . as women who plan on being home, we have to receive our "fulfillment" from being and not from doing. We are valuable because we ARE and we serve God in quiet obedience. So does being away like this and being so actively involved in other (but also valuable ministry) tempt us to think "oh yes, now I am really doing something great" that is going to, in the long run, make us less content (or feel less important) being at home?

Jana : It can.... And I've struggled with that in the past.

me: I don't know. . . I just have a bit of cognitive dissonance once in awhile. Does just not getting paid make this valid woman's work for us?

Jana : I don't think getting paid has anything to do with it's. It's your motive.

me: Of course, we have impeccable motives :-)

Jana : LOL

me: But is this actually woman's work?

Jana : WELL....Is there a defined woman's work?
me: we're far removed from the "home sphere" I don't know. I think there is.

Jana : Where is home? Always with the family?

me: Uhh Not necesarily

Jana : Or can family be other people besides dad, mom, siblings?
I'm just asking. :-)

me: Good question. Maybe the question is who are we called to serve at this time in our lives?

Jana : Yes!

me: and I guess I have no trouble saying we can serve wherever the need and opportunity arise but I just wonder if in any way this could be inadvertantly hindering our future lives

Jana : It could, yes. My parents and I discussed this indepth before I came back to ALERT full time.

me: I know how easy it is for me to slip into thinking 'saving souls' is the real work and then slowly that is going to make me unhappy at home What did you conclude?

Jana : Accountability has been a big key. Making sure I keep my parents updated on what's going on, the ins and outs of my job and the people I work with, friends, and having them be able to tell me if they think my focus is getting off. Honestly, I'd be happy to go home.

me: And what would you say your focus is?

Jana : I'm happy to stay here too. :-)

me: I KNOW - that's what I keep saying - I'll be happy to go home any time! But does that make it okay?

Jana : LOL! Goodness, girl.....:-)

me: lol

Jana : My focus..

me: I'm so philosophical, I know. :-)

Jana : (give me a second) It goes back to what I said before: learning office/communication skills that will better help me serve with my husband someday. My day to day focus is to work alongside my boss and coworker to help families who stay on campus -- whether for a night, for Family Camp, or a huge 600 person conference -- the best possible. I mean...the best possible stay. Meeting their needs...
Serving them as Christ would.

me: OK So that would be similar to what I'm doing, I guess - facilitating groups, creating a good atmosphere - that's funny. Hospitality is definitely in the woman's sphere, I think. So maybe we're fine. :-)

Jana : And I love it!!! Stretches me beyond what I think humanly possible.....but I love it. Love it because God has called me. LOL!
Yeah, maybe we are fine. :-) End of discussion. ;-)

me: LOL Okay, phew, just checking.

Jana : Really...you pegged a good point re: hospitality.

me: I guess maybe the guidelines would be - we need to go home if suddenly we aren't willing to go home. We need to go home if we're getting addicted to people's approval. We need to go home if there are things at home that are more pressing. Would those be good guidelines?

Jana : Sounds good to me. I would add too -- Might want to consider going home too if you're........okay, my brain isn't coming up with any words. :P Uhhh.... Well, never mind. I guess it falls under "people's approval".

me: lol I know the line, because I've crossed it in the past :-)
And I guess it's good to go home often enough that we "test the waters" and our contentment levels

Jana : Sounds like a good chapter for your book. :-D And to keep the home ties alive.

me: Yeah. My poor book. It's either dying a long, slow death or waiting for a glorious resurrection :-)

Jana : That's hard to do when away....keep in touch, be apart of the family, yet so far away. I like the ressurection idea. ;-)

me: Yes - and I seem to be either very homesick or else so busy I can't think about it.

Jana : Okay, that's another reason why I need a laptop for my birthday....

me: One is probably a coping mechanism for the other Ha ha Why - you're going to help me write? :-) You can be my official editor.
I can e-mail you everything I have so far and you can butcher it

Jana : And too...I've found you can't truly focus on your work, if you're always worrying about home life. Your heart can't be in two places. Oh, I'd love to help write and butcher.

me: At least I got "my story" all typed out from my talk. Really? Great! As soon as I get home, I will flood your inbox. Actually, maybe I should mail them to you on disk. Did I send you my talk notes? I'm going to turn it into a chapter or two

Jana : Yes -- looked fabulous, girl. Really and truly.

me: Aw, thanks. I forgot to say we had a book for sale, though. I'm SO not a businesswoman.

Jana : LOL!

me: Well, I guess I'd better go find some dinner.

Jana : You need a man to do the business end anyway....;-)
me: Right!

Jana : Yeah, and I need to get back to the house. Soooo nice to chat with you, dear!!!!!!!!!!

me: Oh, you too!
I need friends like you!

Jana : Miss you....wish we weren't so far away. ;-)

me: You understand my problems :-)

Jana : HA! It's nice to have someone who understands mine...and can voice them, LOL.

me: Yeah, I do too. Too bad we're not in the same city.

Posted in Thoughts to Ponder on July 19, 2006 | Comments (1)

"You Look Like a Nun!"

You know what one of the best compliments Iâ€™ve ever gotten is?

â€œAre you a nun?â€?

This has happened more than once, believe it or not. I know that may look like a strange question and to tell the truth, Iâ€™ve always been puzzled by it and even slightly annoyed. I realized today, however, that this is really a compliment.

Iâ€™ve been in the acquaintance of a number of girls lately who donâ€™t look like or act like girls. They are muscular, dress in gender neutral styles and colors, act macho, hate feminine activities, and basically are attempting (consciously or un) to be men. This bothers me to no end, but I donâ€™t always take the time to think through why.

Most Americans are easily swayed to believe that in many areas, men and women are fungible â€“ that means they could be swapped for the other without consequence. I disagree! I think women are BETTER at cooking, cleaning, nesting, etc., and that men are BETTER at lifting, being stable, making money, etc.

My efforts to look and act like a girl lead me to wear skirts, jumpers, and dresses more often than not, and the more I am surrounded by non-feminine females, the more I want to look different.

I was thinking about nuns and realizing that they live and dress the way they do because they believe God is their husband and they live and work only for Him. Isnâ€™t that how we should be as single women? We donâ€™t dress to attract attention (especially of men), we donâ€™t hold ourselves in a way that would make us look important, we donâ€™t try to do â€œmenâ€™s jobsâ€? in order to somehow impress them with us. On the contrary, I think true men are far more impressed with a feminine woman! (We need to remember, though, that our motives come through in our behavior. If we are acting feminine only as a facade to try to attract a man, that will also be visible.)

Nuns have set out to obtain holiness in their actions, demeanor, and dress. What a high compliment for us to be mistaken for one who officially has given her life for this cause!

Isaiah 54:5 says, â€œFor thy Maker is thine husband; the LORD of hosts is his name; and thy Redeemer the Holy One of Israel; The God of the whole earth shall he be called.â€? What an honor and a privilege we have to be daughters of God and part of the bride of Christ. After thinking about this, I looked in the mirror this afternoon to analyze what I had on. I wondered, â€œDo these clothes visibly say â€˜I belong to the Lord and He is my husband?â€? Do they speak to people about my pleasure in being a woman? Do they say â€œI am not a manâ€?? If not, I should probably change.

Of course, we donâ€™t need to look frumpy or unkempt (in fact, we ought to look the opposite â€“ pleasing!). But we do need to look (and act) like a girl, like one who has been bought with a price, like one who has been called to give her life for the service of Christ â€“ and is thankful for the privilege of doing so.

Posted in Thoughts to Ponder on June 30, 2006 | Comments (0)

The Sacrifice and Delight of the Daily Meal

While not a book Iâ€™d unreservedly recommend, I have been recently enjoying Donald McCulloughâ€™s Say Please, Say Thank You: The Respect We Owe One Another. Itâ€™s sort of an â€œIâ€™m not Emily Post and neither are you, but we can still be nice to each otherâ€? expose on modern manners. The best chapter so far is number 8, on the topic of meals.

Hereâ€™re a few excerpts:

â€œMy oldest daughter recently celebrated her twenty-third birthday, and for me the day brought forth many memories of her growing from childhood through adolescence into young adulthood. . .When we spoke on the telephone she said she had been thinking about her most memorable birthday. . .what stood out in her mind was the ladybug cake her mother made on her sixth birthday. â€˜There was just something about that cake,â€™ she said, â€˜that made it so special.â€™ Well, it doesnâ€™t surprise me that her recollection of a favorite celebration had to do with food. For most people, meals are like mountains on the landscape of memory; food and drink and conversation have formed peak experiences, summits standing tall against the terrain of the ordinary. . .

â€œOf all the wonderful gifts of the Creator, near the top of the list is the joy of eating. God, I presume, could have made us with neither the biological necessity nor the aesthetic pleasure of consuming nourishment. But I donâ€™t think itâ€™s entirely metaphorical when the psalmist says, â€˜Taste and see that the Lord is good. . .â€™

â€œSharing meals serves a very important purpose in helping us become more fully human: it helps strengthen the bonds of community. In an almost mysterious way, food and relationships are intimately connected. . .

â€œThere are at least two reasons why eating establishes community: it makes possible both sacrifice and delight. In sharing a meal something is given, often with great labor or cost, and something is received, often with great pleasure. The giving and receiving, the sacrifice and delight, are two essential movements in the dance of human community. . . It seems to me there is an element of self-sacrifice when we take it upon ourselves to feed others. . . and in response to giving comes receiving, in response to sacrifice comes delight. So if you prepare a meal for me, itâ€™s my responsibility â€“ my solemn duty â€“ to enjoy it. . .

â€œIf we lose the art of sharing a meal with others, we will deprive ourselves of the self-giving and delight that are central for the creation of human community. If food is simply fuel, a pit stop at the golden arches will do just fine. But if itâ€™s more, then we need to make space in our lives for eating that is neither cheap nor quick, an eating that not only fills our stomachs but ennobles our souls.â€?

Iâ€™m sure this stirs thoughts in your mind similar to those in mine â€“ thoughts of desserts and meals made and received and shared with precious people.

I remember one of the first times as an â€œoldâ€? person that my mom took me out â€“ just her and I. We went to Antoinetteâ€™s, a pretty uppity (at least in my mind at the time â€“ I hadnâ€™t been there before nor since) ice cream parlor. I was used to getting a Dilly Bar (Dad bought 5, we picked the color), but on this trip, we got to order off an ice cream menu and sit at a table. I donâ€™t remember exactly what we ate, but I do remember it was huge and it was chocolate and I felt so grown up and special to be out with just my mom.

I also remember the last meal my sisters and I ate with my grandpa before he died. It was some sort of hotdish, I think, and he could hardly hold his fork, but he knew who we were, and that was all that mattered â€“ sharing food together for the last time.

Itâ€™s funny how when you get thinking, so MANY memories revolve around food!

I remember how we used to drive two cars to church â€“ one with older kids to Sunday school, and one with younger ones in time for church. If we rode home with Dad afterwards, we were occasionally treated to a bag of Combos to share, purchased at a gas station where he bought the Sunday paper. Weâ€™d relish them together in the back seat, debating over the proper method of consumption â€“ bite it in two hunks or one hunk, or suck the filling out and then wait for the outside layer to dissolve in our mouths.

I remember (a more recent memory, but still a beautiful one) being with my grandma in Arizona and enjoying the supreme pleasure of Retirement Land, where you could get Whoppers for $1 at Burger King. We even had a coupon one day and got free fries and onion rings, all for only $1. We did this more than once and every time spent most of the meal watching the other people and priding ourselves in what cheap dates we were and what good food we could find for $1.

I bet I could write 20 pages on all the wonderful meal memories I have â€“ buying a hot dog and pop on the street corner or at Charlieâ€™s diner with Alice for $1.50 each; helping to lay one of the famous Valine outdoor spreads of grilled chicken, cheesy potatoes, Chinese salad, fruit, and green beans; making my tortilla soup and curling up with a World magazine to pine away a relaxing evening here in El Paso; sharing a meal for two by candlelight with Micah on his kitchen chairs in the dining room; eating a breakfast of cereal mixed with nuts and chocolate in the car on the way to Minnesota, always envying Micah who managed to eat his cereal out of the bag and saving the chocolate for last (why was mine so often the reverse of that?); sharing a meal with Josh and Noelle down in San Antonio, with the prior phone call (â€œLetâ€™s eat together â€“ I have meat, do you have salad?â€? â€œYes, but no tomatoâ€? â€œIâ€™ve got half of one; Iâ€™ll bring it!) â€“ truly a SHARED meal!; Marthaâ€™s famous slice-the-bag-like-an-icing-bag egg salad, passed up with love on bread from the back seat of the car; going to Applebees with Hannah and taking her advice that when youâ€™re out with a sister for a treat, itâ€™s okay to get the big sundae; helping hotdish at any family crisis â€“ ah, so many good memories enjoyed with the added pleasure of sacrifice in giving and delight in receiving.

Itâ€™s true that Jesus lived with this philosophy. After all, he was always sharing meals with people â€“ sinners, tax collectors, his disciples, Judas â€“ and in fact, before He died He established a meal that we are commanded to celebrate until He returns. Each Sunday when we partake of Communion, we are receiving the supreme sacrifice with supreme delight, in the company of thousands of the faithful in Heaven, crying â€œHoly, holy, holy!â€?

In each of our meals this week, letâ€™s take time to slow down and thank the Lord for the sacrifice Heâ€™s made for us â€“ a sacrifice that our weak efforts to give of ourselves in mixing and baking only feebly imitate. Letâ€™s not complain about meal preparation, but embrace it as a chance to demonstrate Godâ€™s love to our families. When someone cooks for us, letâ€™s remember our responsibility to receive with joy. And letâ€™s treasure the memories we have of shared lives and shared meals as we continually â€œtaste and see that the Lord is good!â€?

Posted in Thoughts to Ponder on June 23, 2006 | Comments (0)

On The Other Hand

After reading several blog posts and comments by younger mothers bemoaning the absence of older women to advise them as Paul suggests in Titus 2, I started thinking. Yes, mentoring is a Biblical idea and yes, we do have specific instructions for older women in their relation to younger women. But if there aren't any, there's nothing we can do about it.

We now are facing a similar problem as single girls at home. Wouldn't I love a mentor? Wouldn't I love someone who has done this before, grown old and been married, who could reassure me over and over that this would turn out okay and give me advice on how to spend my time and other useful things? YES! Wouldn't we all? But the fact is that there aren't any, or at least very few, and once again, there's nothing we can do about it.

However, to look on the other hand as I so love to do, perhaps it is better this way. After all, this way we have mystery. We have the adventure of the unknown. We have the chance to follow with trepidation the footsteps of Moses, Joseph, Abraham, and Mary . . . meekly walking the straight and narrow pathway of obedience that few find. The paths with solid brick walls around them, sign posts, smooth pavement, and ice-cream-stands-for-goodness'-sake are boring. They've been traveled, they're easy, and they don't require any guts at all. Wouldn't we rather walk on the unmarked trail, putting up posts as we go to mark the way, getting our shoes dusty, and deciding where the best place for pavement would be to smooth the way for others? I think so.

So to those of you who for some reason or other are lonely, don't despair. That means you are on the right path, trod by thousands of pilgrims and strangers before you. Watch for the faint footprints and take cheer in them. Listen for the encouragement of the great cloud of witnesses. And keep walking. At the end is a chorus of angels.

Posted in Thoughts to Ponder on April 21, 2006 | Comments (0)

What My Grandma Taught Me Or, Why Young People Need To Be Around Older People

After spending nearly two weeks here in Arizona in the retirement trailer court, Iâ€™ve learned quite a few lessons I thought worth sharing.

*You can always look for animals in the cloud formations and in fact, this is quite a good use of time.

*Any day you can get out of bed and breathe, see, walk, hear, digest, and go somewhere is a good day.

*The weather is an interesting phenomenon and worthy of all the attention you wish to give it.

*Music is one of the chief pleasures of life.

*Food is another one of the chief pleasures of life. Any casserole is a good casserole and any dessert is a good dessert. Talking about these is another good use of time.

*There is something to be learned from each person you meet.

For a young, single girl who sometimes gets blue about it, I especially learned things from the widows in the park here â€“ including my grandma. I sat at a concert of love tunes with them on Saturday night. Love songs sometimes make me sad, because of my lack of a lover, but they donâ€™t make these ladies sad at all. They remember past love, enjoy watching the love of other people, and celebrate love in general instead of feeling sorry for themselves. They donâ€™t waste time grasping for what once was or what could have been, but they concentrate on living each day now to the fullest. They enjoy each other, share stories, golf, sing, and LIVE.

I was looking around the auditorium last night during a â€œrhythms in blueâ€? concert at all the people there â€“ all over 55 and most over 70. Iâ€™ve been watching these people for the past two weeks and paying close attention, trying to savor each crooked smile, each wrinkled face, each time-and-work-worn hand, each limping walk. These people are precious. They have walked through time, experienced years of heartache and care, worry and fear. They know what it is to hurt, to cry, to mourn, to rejoice, to love, to lose, to win â€“ what it is to live on this earth. As eternity steps closer and closer to them, its light shines in their minds. They donâ€™t worry about being famous or popular or having what they want or getting ahead in life or what they will eat or drink or wherewithal they shall be clothed. They are concerned with people â€“ how each person is feeling, what they are doing, where they are from, and who their grandchildren are. They are in touch with what really matters and they trust the Lord to take care of them, which they have no problem believing He will do, because theyâ€™ve lived and seen it and know now that He is faithful. Younger people have a harder time with this, I think. My generation is concerned with success and fame and fortune and being smart instead of wise. We think older people belong in nursing homes and we donâ€™t value their wisdom or experience. I think we should. We should honor them for the lives they have lived, the trials they have come through, and the strength those trials have given them. We should listen more and talk less. We should watch and learn. We should revere these twinkling eyes and dancing feet for the love they have known â€“ and have yet to give. Thank you â€“ to my grandma and to all the other older people who have shown me what a joy it is to be a seasoned saint.

Posted in Thoughts to Ponder on March 13, 2006 | Comments (2)

Just a Housewife: The Rise and Fall of Domesticity in America

This book, although written by the feminist Glenna Matthews, nonetheless has taught me a lot this week. I found it at the library here in Phoenix and discovered that some feminists may be working toward the same goals as we are.

The author starts out discussing the roles of women in colonial society. "Cooking was a purely utilitarian function and not a highly prized skill: there is no evidence to suggest that women thought in terms of 'culinary art.' Rather, they would put a meal to simmer over the fire in the open hearth and go about their other business. Hence, for a variety of reasons, in 1750 domestic chores were likelier to be approached as matter-of-fact routines than as occasions for displays of female prowess or possessing ceremonial meaning. The colonial home, then, was both essential and mundane, mundane because it had no transcendent functions. What is more, nothing in the culture reflected glory on the woman in charge of the home. Literary heroines of eighteenth-century British novels, for example, were noteworthy for their purity and gentleness and not for their domestic skills."

Toward the 1850s, however, things changed. According to Glenna Matthews, the Revolutionary War with its tea protests and such showed that the voice of housewives did, in fact, count for something in society. In addition, people discovered that it was in the home where children learned to view the world, mainly through the instruction of their mother, as the influence of the patriarchal society lessened. Education of girls began to be esteemed and with it all functions of the woman at home. Recipe books and ladies' magazines became popular as women started to see domestic expertise as a worthwhile skill. Catherine Beecher, an author of the time, said, "There is no subject so much connected with individual happiness and national prosperity as the education of daughters . . .The difficulty is, education does not usually point the female heart to its only true resting-place. That dear English word home is not half so powerful a talisman as the world. Instead of the salutary truth, that happiness is IN duty, they are taught to consider the two things totally distinct; and that whoever seeks one, must sacrifice the other."

The author then goes on to note that in today's society, household skills are not valued (but marketplace contribution is) â€“ hence, no one wants to do them. If we were to bring back honor for domestic prowess, then men and women would both want to participate and we could have a nice, neat 50/50 split and all the work would get done. I disagree with the results she wants, but I love her premises, and that's why this book has been so enjoyable to read.
Unlike women of colonial times, I think home life is full of "transcendent functions" and has eternal impact on the lives it touches. Like the women of the 1850s, I agree that happiness is in duty. It's funny that feminists really don't care if some women are housewives or mothers â€“ their only stipulation is that the women choose for themselves to be there. We daren't say that it is our duty to be at home! Suddenly that makes us somewhat less than free agents, the ultimate virtue in the feminist mind. I think the women of the 1850s (the time of the "cult of domesticity") had it right â€“ happiness is in duty and whoever seeks duty will inevitably find happiness.

Posted in Thoughts to Ponder on March 11, 2006 | Comments (0)

Avoiding Fatal Sleep

â€œDo you know how you can imitate the Apostles in their fatal sleep? You can suffer your young days to pass idly and uselessly away; you can live as if you had nothing to do but enjoy yourselves; you can let others think for you, and not try to become thoughtful yourselves, till the business and difficulties come upon you unprepared, and you find yourselves like men waking from sleep, hurried, confused, scarcely able to stand, with all the faculties bewildered, not knowing right from wrong, let headlong to evil, just because you have not given yourselves in time to learn what is good.â€?

Many of us who grew up at home, generally trusted our parents, and didnâ€™t leave at 18 are in a category of high risk for â€œletting others think for us.â€? Even though we have reached adult age, we still act like children, waiting for instructions and having the threat of othersâ€™ displeasure or discipline keep us â€œgood.â€? This quotation from Robertson of Brighton in chapter 18 of In My Fatherâ€™s House has a potent message for any girl and that is this: take responsibility for your own life.

It is a sad tale I hear from girls, waking up in the morning ready for minute-by-minute instructions from Mother, working in the kitchen with the cacophony of â€œno, not like thatâ€? and â€œnow do thisâ€? echoing behind them, asking â€œMother, may I practice the violin now?â€?, eagerly anticipating a momentary reprieve in which they can sneak in a few pages of reading, always dodging around Motherâ€™s watchful eyes to do â€œwhat I really want.â€? If you are 12, this way of living is not so bad, but if you are 20, this lifestyle is leading you into future years of distress.

The transition from being a little girl in your fatherâ€™s house to being an adult woman is a delicate one and one that is made much smoother by the constant working together with your parents. Iâ€™ve debated which comes first â€“ acting like an adult or being treated like one. Regardless, there are several things we as daughters can do to aid ourselves in the growing-up process.

First of all, we must recognize that we are responsible for our own lives. We choose to do or not do something; we choose to behave in certain ways. The way we live is the way we have chosen to live. We are held accountable for our own choices.

Secondly, because of this we must â€œbecome thoughtfulâ€? ourselves. This means we must understand the reasons behind what we do. Do you dress in a feminine way? Why? Because your parents say so or because you hold the same convictions? Why do you live at home? Because you have no other choice or because you have chosen this choice above others? Think. Understand. Study. Learn the why behind the what. Iâ€™m not saying you should make drastic changes in your lifestyle because you suddenly decide you donâ€™t agree with your parents, but I am saying that you need to know why you do what you do. If you disagree with them on something, then your choice is to submit or not to submit (and the obvious choice is right there); choosing not to think about it or have an opinion is not an adult option. Adults know why they do what they do and take responsibility for their own choices. Robertson says that neglecting these things has the potential to send us â€œheadlong to evilâ€? and hereâ€™s why: the world is full of contrary arguments. Eventually you will run into some of them and if you have no basis for what you believe, you will cave in under pressure. We need to be strong now and always, holding firm our beliefs.

Third, we must take initiative in household responsibilities. This means that Mom shouldnâ€™t have to ask you to do the dishes; you live in the house, so you should jump up and have them washed before anyone needs to ask. You can and should keep the grocery list current, the laundry washed, the floors clean, etc., without having to be reminded or questioned about it. (Of course you already keep your own room tidy and your own bed made!) By the time you are of adult age (say, 18 or so), your mother should not have to look over your shoulder all the time, whether it be in the kitchen or elsewhere. If sheâ€™s having to, itâ€™s for one of two reasons; either you are not trustworthy to stay at your post or you do not care enough to know how to do things right. Moms want things done right and you ought to be able to be trusted to do what youâ€™re supposed to do when youâ€™re supposed to do it and to do it right. If you canâ€™t, get remedial help! Ideally, you should have entire areas of the household management as your duty. At my house, I do the coupon cutting, the girls and I almost always do the shopping, Hannah does the laundry, Martha is responsible for kitchen maintenance and Alice the bathrooms. We take turns with the grass mowing and other odd jobs. In order to have a system like that, itâ€™s understood that we know how to do our jobs well and that we will be faithful to do them. We are adults.

Fourth, we must take initiative in our own spiritual and educational growth. If you want to study something, get books from the library. If you have an interest, search out ways to develop it. If you want to become more faithful at prayer, do it! Your parents should not have to come to you and convince you to read certain books or learn certain things; you should be going to them with proposals. This is not 3rd grade and we donâ€™t need to be led by the hand. However, you do need to learn things and so if youâ€™re not coming up with things on your own, your parents will be forced to baby you. You are responsible for who you are becoming and for what kind of woman, wife, or mother you will be. Marriage doesnâ€™t make you grow up. Work does.

Fifth, we must not avoid difficult situations. No one likes getting their hands dirty, but being a mature adult woman requires that we do some dirty work. So the book is tough to understand, the child is sick and throwing up on you, the person youâ€™re helping has seizures, the opportunity for service means youâ€™ll be away and might get homesick, the people you need to interact with are emotionally draining, the older people you want to visit are crabby and yell at you. OH WELL. When we shy away from the places, people, and opportunities that might be less than fun, we are destined to remain immature children. The only way to grow and mature is to be squeezed a little bit. Pressure molds us into adults and the better we get at dealing with hard things, the more grown-up we become.

Iâ€™ve done several difficult things recently. Iâ€™ve sat with my grandpa during his time with cancer, sometimes at the clinic watching the blue chemo iv drip into his body, other times trying to help him breathe and being ready at his request to take him to the hospital. Iâ€™ve worked with people with disabilities, learning to deal with feeding tubes, watching them turn blue during a seizure, cleaning up bodily fluids of various kinds. Iâ€™ve been away from home for sundry reasons for many weeks at a time. Iâ€™ve been places where people are yelling at me through no fault of my own, where nothing I do seems right to them, where I am berated for my beliefs and lifestyle. These are in no way difficult when compared to what other people go through, but we have to start somewhere. All of these things have made me stronger and older and have given me a more realistic outlook on life. If your life is a particularly easy one, try to do some volunteer work where there are people with real problems! You canâ€™t exactly complain of a bad hair day when youâ€™re sitting next to someone whoâ€™s lost theirs to cancer.

We canâ€™t afford to â€œlive as if we had nothing to do but enjoy [our]selves.â€? If we desire to be godly women, to be servants of the king, to be able to stand our ground for the kingdom, we need to be adults. This means we must think hard, work hard, pray hard, and do hard things. We donâ€™t need to be babied or coddled. Having a husband is not going to make us instant adults; in fact, if we donâ€™t learn how to be responsible for ourselves and our schedule and our activities now, we will be hopeless when we get married! How do you expect to run an entire household if you canâ€™t even manage to get up in the morning and empty the dishwasher without being prodded?

We donâ€™t want to be left â€œunprepared. . . hurried, confused, [and] scarcely able to standâ€? because of our refusal to â€œlearn what is goodâ€? and do it. Our lives are easy compared to most, but we still have plenty of work to do. If we want to live and function as the adults that we are, we need to work at being responsible, becoming thoughtful, taking initiative, and doing hard things. Maturity requires purification, refinement, and molding, but the end result is that we as daughters â€œmay be as corner stones, polished after the similitude of a palaceâ€? (Psalms 144:12).

Posted in Thoughts to Ponder on February 20, 2006 | Comments (0)

Give Me Your Tired, Your Poor . . .

I was reading Matthew Henry's commentary on Matthew, chapter 18 this morning. In the first part of the chapter, Jesus takes a little child and sets him in the midst of the disciples, telling them that they must become as little children in order to enter the kingdom of heaven. MH gave an interesting list regarding childlikenes. . .

We must not be foolish as children (1 Co. 14:20)
fickle like children (Eph. 4:14), or
playful as children (Mat. 11:16)

But we must be as children in desiring the sincere milk of the word (1 Pt. 2:2)
being careful for nothing, but trusting the heavenly Father (Mat. 6:31)
being void of malice (1 Co. 15:20)
being governable and under command (Gal. 4:2) and of course
being humble, treating all alike (Rom. 12:16)

Jesus says that if we receive one such humble child in His name, we have received Him. MH says, "Whatever kindnesses are done to such, Christ takes as done to himself. Whoso entertains a meek and humble Christian, keeps him in countenance, will not let him loose by his modesty, takes him into his love and friendship, and society and care, and studies to do him a kindness; and doth this in Christ's name, for his sake, because he bears the image of Christ, serves Christ, and because Christ has received him; this shall be accepted and recompensed as an acceptable piece of respect to Christ." Then MH gives the verse (Mat. 25:35-40) where Jesus says, "I was hungry and you fed me, thirsty and you gave me drink," etc. This was making me think about the people that I know in my life. Someone once chided me with the remark that all of my friends were either stupid or foreigners. This made me mad at the time, but this morning I was thinking that perhaps that was a compliment. Perhaps spending time around the sick, the needy, the dying, the poor, the lonely, the foreigners is the way a Christian ought to spend his time. After all, in the epistles a godly widow is one who is said to have "washed the feet of the saints" - if this is in our job description as women, perhaps it is good if we give it some thought and take care to accept the humble ones and serve them as kings and queens, as we would serve the King of Kings were He there in their place.

Posted in Thoughts to Ponder on January 23, 2006 | Comments (0)

Happiness: Habit or Happenstance

Several times in her life, my grandma has had people come up and ask her how she has managed to handle all the tragedy in her life. My grandma looks at them dumbfounded and asks, â€œwhat tragedy?â€? â€œWell, they say, you had a mentally handicapped daughter, you had a brother die at a young age, youâ€™ve lost almost all your other siblings and both your parents, one of your daughters had cancer, and now your husband died of cancer.â€? My grandma just laughs and tells them sheâ€™s never thought of any of those things as tragedies.

People like this amaze me, but they also inspire me, because I think they are right. There are no happy situations, only happy people. The dullest, most tragic happening can be made pleasant, or at least tolerable, by a cheerful person. In the same way, the most naturally enjoyable project can be made intolerable or even miserable by a grouchy person. For the most part, the way we view the world will dictate our feelings towards it. Although, considering how most of us live, we tend to instead think that the way the world treats us gives us a license to be happy or unhappy.

â€œIâ€™m single and therefore have a right to whine,â€? we may be heard to say. â€œIf only I were married, life would be better.â€? And then, should we get what we want, â€œIf only my husband werenâ€™t so hard to get along with, I would be a good wife.â€? After that, â€œIf these kids would just behave themselves, parenting would be easier.â€? The house is too dusty, the pile of laundry too large, the sun is too hot, the wind is too cold, the family too ornery, ourselves too irritable, our glasses a little too gray-colored. No matter what stage of life we are in, no matter how wonderful our circumstances, no matter how generous and loving the people around us are, if we are crabby people, we are always going to be crabby people.

How to fix this? Chapter 22 of In My Fatherâ€™s House says this: â€œHappiness is not an end â€“ it is only a means, an adjunct, a consequence.â€? Jesus, in the sermon on the mount, tells us who in the world is actually happy â€“ the merciful, the persecuted, the mournful, the poor in spirit, the peacemakers â€“ not those who have lots of money, easy lives, and husbands. Pursuing happiness as a goal is utterly futile. Itâ€™s not something you can set out to acquire and be successful. Happiness is only a by-product, a consequence, of living a godly and righteous life. If we wish to be happy, the only way to do so is to seek to be holy, to be loving, to be a peacemaker, a giver, a servant of all. We may then find ourselves being more cheerful. IMFH continues, â€œOh, if such women [the unhappy] did but know what comfort there is in a cheerful spirit! how the heart leaps up to meet a sunshiny face, a merry tongue, an even temper, and a heart which either naturally, or what is better, from conscientious principle, has learned to look at all things on their bright side, believing that the Giver of life being all-perfect love, the best offering we can make to him is to enjoy to the full what he sends of good, and bear what he allows of evil â€“ like a child who, when once it thoroughly believes in its father, believes in all his dealings with it, whether it understands them or not.â€?

Iâ€™ve found that this proves true even on a small, daily basis. If Iâ€™m feeling unhappy, rarely does the feeling linger if I start doing something for somebody else â€“ be it vacuuming the living room for the pleasure of my family, writing a letter to my grandma, or making a phone call to encourage somebody else. One morning not long ago, I woke up feeling blue. I decided right away that I had to do something about it, so I started baking and brought some food to nearly all the older people I could think of. By the end of that day, I was happier than Iâ€™d been in a long time!

Besides the everyday application, this principle is also true of our large scale focus. When we orient ourselves to others and to serving the Lord, we will have happier lives. Focusing on ourselves only makes us miserable and we all know it. Having a life that is motivated by helping others will bring us long term as well as short term happiness.

Being in a different situation, a different stage of life, living with different people, having different duties, wearing different clothes â€“ none of this will change who we are. If weâ€™re cranky now, weâ€™ll be cranky later. If weâ€™re happy now, weâ€™ll be happy later. We need to place the Lord and His kingdom as the focus of our lives instead of seeking for our own pleasure and then we will discover that â€œall these things will be added untoâ€? us. My grandma always says whatever stage of life sheâ€™s currently in seems better than all the rest. Letâ€™s be like that and stop thinking that our present situation is worse than all other alternatives. Make a habit of deciding to be cheerful. You might be surprised how much it changes you!

Posted in Thoughts to Ponder on December 4, 2005 | Comments (0)

Happiness: Happenstance or Habit

Posted in Thoughts to Ponder on December 2, 2005 | Comments (0)

Embracing the Call of Womanhood

â€œThe right to be learned, wise, noble, useful, is womanâ€™s divinely limited sphere; the right to influence and exalt the circle in which she moved; the right to mount the sanctified bema of her own quiet hearthstone; the right to modify and direct her husbandâ€™s opinions, if he considered her worthy and competent to guide him; the right to make her children ornaments to their nation, and a crown of glory to their race; the right to advise, to plead, to pray. . . the right to be all that the phrase â€˜noble, Christian womanâ€™ means.â€? This quote from Augusta Jane Evans-Wilson (St. Elmo, 1866), gives us a description that is a far cry from your average list of womanâ€™s rights, but I think itâ€™s one thatâ€™s far more freeing. Somehow having a â€œdivinely limited sphereâ€? gives us comfortable boundaries that allow us to move without constriction within them. You know the old story of the school children? Someone looked at a group of kids during recess and how they all hung around the fence surrounding the playground. They then removed the fence entirely, assuming the kids needed â€œmore roomâ€? to play. This action had the opposite effect and the children huddled in the very center; a loss of boundaries was also a loss of freedom. I think the â€œright to be noble and usefulâ€? is plenty enough for me.

I got an e-mail from a friend tonight talking about girls who go to college or get into careers in order to discover themselves or make sure they are fulfilling their whole potential. This got me thinking. It seems that somehow in the modern world, the more women fight for their right to be equal to man the more miserable they become. (Now, granted, we are equal in our status before God; we are simply given a different sphere of operation.) The rise of the self-help movement and our growing dissatisfaction with life, as evidenced by many surveys, points out that a majority of women are just not fulfilled in their present lives. As we argue and negotiate for the same piece of the pie that men have, we are just as quickly giving up the piece of the pie God gave us. Our homes and children slip through our fingers as we grasp for what we were not given.

I think the whole discussion starts and ends with the purpose of women. Like that quote on womenâ€™s rights said, we have a right to be noble and useful, but not to be self-fulfilled or to have our supposed potential actualized for our own benefit. Our creation and hence our calling ever afterwards is to support and help, not to DO and accomplish on our own. To attempt otherwise is to mess with created order and hence is indicative of Eveâ€™s curse of desiring her husband. What was Godâ€™s answer? He will rule over you. No matter how many little paths we try to forge, we come back to the truth of the kidsâ€™ song: â€œCanâ€™t go over it, canâ€™t go under it, canâ€™t go around it. . .â€? The truth stares us in the face and will continue to do so for the rest of our lives.

We are WOMEN. Plain and simple. Hence, we live not for ourselves. Our fulfillment, our happiness, our very sanity lies always and only in supporting, in helping, in encouraging, in making our Adams successful. Degrees donâ€™t matter, activities donâ€™t matter, accomplishments donâ€™t matter â€“ nothing matters except us getting rid of the idea that we must perform to be valid. We have got to surrender our â€œrightâ€? to be successful and bend our will to the facts of the situation. We are created. Created beings donâ€™t choose their calling. Being a woman means we are not in charge. If we could all of us get that into our little brains, I think life would be a lot easier.

I love the words of Titus 2:10, where Christians are described as â€œadorn[ing] the doctrine of God our Saviour in all things.â€? I like to think about this adornment in relation to the doctrine of created order. We are created as women and our behavior as such is a representation of the goodness of that doctrine. When we fight against that creation, we put on a poor show. Women who refuse to act like women (submissive, helpful, serving, living for others and not for themselves) show this doctrine to be a hard, heavy yoke to bear. On the other hand, those who embrace their calling as helpers are a beautiful demonstration of Godâ€™s created order for men and women. In addition, submitting to our role as females also is a small piece of the truth of the body of Christ as His bride. We are to wait on our King, to be in cheerful service to Him now and always. When we willingly live for the success of others now, we are fulfilling our call as women and also as faithful Christians, waiting for the return of the Lord.

His yoke is easy and His burden is light. When we learn to embrace the sphere God has placed us in, I think we will find it to be one that gives us wings and enables us to be truly fulfilled. Things used for purposes other than the ones they were made for are almost always frustrated. (Did you ever try eating peas with a knife?) Accepting, loving, and enjoying our â€œdivinely limited sphereâ€? as noble, Christian women will put us in the position of being a beautiful adornment to the doctrine of created order. The only right we are given is the right to follow Christâ€™s example and lay down our lives for others. But that one right, properly accomplished, is enough to give us true joy and lasting happiness!

Posted in Thoughts to Ponder on November 26, 2005 | Comments (0)

Beourgeois Family Values vs. the Market

In the nineteenth century, Lasch observed, it was often feminists who had led the â€œforces of organized virtueâ€? to stamp out drunkenness and debauchery, gradually subduing the older â€œpatterns of male convivialityâ€? and domesticating males to â€œbourgeois hearth and home.â€? An important element in this campaign to â€œfeminize societyâ€? by substituting â€œdomestic enjoyments for the rough and brutal camaraderie of malesâ€? was the â€œglorification of the child and of maternal influence on the childâ€™s development.â€? This conflict between the feminine and masculine spheres was often reflected in womenâ€™s efforts to combat the â€œcompetitive, work-oriented values of their husbandsâ€?; â€œMen valued achievement; women, happiness and well-being.â€?

Treating domestic life as an emotional refuge from the world of work rested on a separation of private and public life that developed with the bourgeois nuclear family. Lasch described this as a family where â€œglorification of privacy in turn reflected the devaluation of work,â€? which was viewed simply as a means to an end â€“ as a â€œway of achieving satisfactions or consolations outside work.â€? The Victorian home, as Gertrude Himmelfarb puts it, became â€œa haven not only from the pressures of the marketplace but from the temptations of sin and corruption.â€? The attitude that market activity within the public arena is not the ultimate good reflected what Brigitte and Peter Berger have identified as a fundamental bourgeois belief that the â€œâ€˜littleâ€™ things in life, the ordinary and seemingly unimportant details of everyday events, matter as much as the â€˜greatâ€™ things.â€?

It is the critical significance of these simple, commonplace events comprising our daily routines that Jane Austen celebrates in her writings of delicate precision and Leo Tolstoy portrays in his monumental novels. In War and Peace, Tolstoy captures in Natasha the essence of the woman who finds satisfaction in attending to the particularities of her familyâ€™s daily activities by preserving routines and discharging the obligations they impose. Indeed, it was at the figure of Natasha that Simone de Beauvoir in 1949 fired the first salvo of feminismâ€™s current war against the housewife, when she ridiculed the â€œsupreme self-abasementâ€? of Natashaâ€™s â€œpassionate and tyrannical devotion to her family.â€?

Women who cherish as an ideal Tolstoyâ€™s portrayal of the domestic bliss that Natasha finally achieved â€“ perceiving that bliss as self-fulfilling, not abasing â€“ stand athwart the course of feminismâ€™s advance. Society can choose to honor this ideal, to grant significance to the ordinary details of everyday life, and to respect, rather than disdain, a womanâ€™s devotion to her familyâ€™s daily routine. If it does, then this woman can easily derive more satisfaction from baking a loaf of bread with her child than from writing the legal briefs that feminism would celebrate as the only genuine achievements. Such as woman might well describe the purpose of her daily life in the way Mark Helprin described the paintings of Edward Schmidt: this artistâ€™s purpose, said Helprin, is not â€œto reinvent the universe, but rather, like Raphael, and Caravaggio, and Sargent, and a thousand others before, to attend to it.â€?

Contemporary feminism would have women devote themselves to reinventing the universe â€“ as Hilary Rodham Clinton urges them to â€œremold society.â€? But devotion to grandiose schemes within the public arena necessarily requires relinquishing to others the cultivation of oneâ€™s own garden. The essence of the traditional woman is her preference for attending to the welfare of her own small universe, hoping to create therein a simple canvas of quotidian beauty. If T.S. Eliotâ€™s J. Alfred Prufock thinks his life diminished because it is measured out with coffee spoons, the traditional woman cherishes the daily ceremonies in which she arranges these spoons. Henry James speaks for her when he begins The Portrait of a Lady by observing that â€œthere are few hours in life more agreeable than the hour dedicated to the ceremony known as afternoon tea.â€?

. . . .In the struggle between masculine work-oriented values and feminine domestic values, the feminine lost. The â€œAngel in the Houseâ€? â€“ that Victorian-era wife who, as Robert Wright puts it, â€œcould tame the animal in a man and rescue his spirit from the deadening world of workâ€? â€“ was evicted. Heeding Virginia Woolfâ€™s admonition to â€œkillâ€? the angel in the house, those who now call themselves feminists have assured these angels that, far from deadening, the world of market work is vastly superior to the â€œalmost pathetic ordinarinessâ€? of their lives. This ideal of â€œThe Angel in the Houseâ€? had been created as the foundation for withdrawing women (who were seen as morally superior) â€œfrom the exhaustion, the contamination, the vulgarity of mill-work and professional work.â€? But it has succumbed to the feminist ideal of sexual equivalence.

Posted in Thoughts to Ponder on November 16, 2005 | Comments (0)

Losing Our Lives

The words of our reading in church this morning were from Matthew chapter 16, verse 26. "Whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will find it." I was thinking about that this afternoon and what it means to lose one's life. The realization that our lives don't belong to us can be a scary one and an honest surrender of one's future plans to the Lord can be far from comfortable.

From the time I was young I have always prayed, "Lord, my life is Yours. Do with me what You will. Use me, Lord." Well, one day I just woke up and it hit me that God was doing this. And do you know what it looked like? Not what I had planned.

I'm not living in Togo or Peru or Vietnam. I don't have small foreign children crawling around me whlie I teach them Bible stories from flannelgraph. I don't even have two or three of my own children to hold and teach. I have no husband. My name is not well known. I don't have two dozen friends and I spend the majority of my Friday nights at home.

But I honestly and sincerely believe God is using me. This week I spent an entire afternoon helping an 88 year old lady try to find a walker she liked. I spent an evening cheering up lonely students from foreign countries who are studying in the US. I washed dishes. I sent e-mails. I answered phone calls. I talked with my sisters. I forfeited what I wanted to do for what others needed. And, I simply was. And my living and moving and being was in the Lord.

We have to believe that our being matters, that our quiet surrender counts to the Lord, that the small "I want to do this, but instead I will do this," is, in the big picture, the taking up of our cross. The world counts success in numbers, in people influenced, in money made, in projects completed, in heights gained. Sometimes the church counts in people saved, children born, and years of marriage. I think it is crucial to our well-being that we realize God counts differently. He counts attitudes changed, He counts small surrenders and little sacrifices, and He counts the steady turning over of our hearts and plans to Him.

I think losing our lives means looking back on our days and weeks and months and years and realizing we didn't live them for ourselves. Our plans are gone, our hopes are laid at the altar, our Isaacs are tied up and given over to Him. We live in the big picture, where the gaining of our souls is the important issue. And to do that, and do it right, involves losing ourselves - in service, in love, in surrender. One day it may suddenly dawn on us that our lives - that is, our plans and goals and desires - are consumed by the burning, eternal fire of "Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done." And in this lies the saving of our souls.

Posted in Thoughts to Ponder on October 22, 2005 | Comments (1)

Every Good Gift

The month of October is quickly ticking by and I'm still single. Do
thoughts like that ever run through your head as they do mine? My brother is getting married. Two of my sisters are in serious relationships and have fun thinking through bridesmaids and groomsmen and receptions and registries. I'm not. And so another month continues in which I am learning yet again to trust the Lord. According to Paul, singleness is a better gift than marriage. Because of this, I expend energy trying not to be a typical shortsighted 6-year-old who wants candy for her birthday and whines when she opens only socks and underwear.

This month I have had the opportunity once again to spend time with my grandma in Minnesota. By the time I leave here, I will have been with her about six weeks. What an unspeakable privilege to be around the epitome of Godly widowhood! Her level of service and ministry and prayer for the body of Christ is one I am learning to emulate. At the same time, being in town has given me the chance to spend a lot of time with multiple aunts and uncles - playing cards, talking, and working. I knew I loved them, but now that love is stronger than it's ever been. I've also been able to play the piano and do other things to support my grandma's church, a place that was dear to the heart of my grandpa, who died last year. My family has such a rich Christian heritage and I enjoy any time I can spend soaking it in and learning to appreciate more fully and deeply those who have given this heritage to me. If I were in a different stage of life (oh, say, married with children), I could not be here doing these things.

This month has truly been a gift from the Lord to me. It's a good gift, a perfect gift, and I am confident it comes from the Father of Lights, with whom there is no shadow of turning. Not a sparrow falls from its nest, not a hair falls from a head, but that same Father notices. Surely He also knows there's a girl by my name that would love to serve a husband. But do you know what? This month He knew the gift I needed even more and that was to be here with Grandma and serve where I am serving. Whether it looks like candy or underwear to me makes no difference - it is the best gift because it is the one I have been given by the best Giver. Lord, I receive this month of
October with joy, knowing it came from You.

Posted in Thoughts to Ponder on October 14, 2005 | Comments (1)

The Deceitfulness of Biographies

This week I started reading a biography of David Livingstone, the famous missionary to deepest darkest Africa. Itâ€™s a small, short book that has gotten me thinking about something that is for the most part unrelated to Mr. Livingstoneâ€™s missionary service.

I am amused by the methods of biographical writing. Mr. Livingstone worked for many years in a factory for 14 hours a day and then at night stole time to read. It was grueling work. After years of almost clandestine study, he went to a different city and was accepted in missionary school with a medical focus. However, he was initially rejected because of his poor ability to deliver a sermon. What is the bulk of the story that covers this time in his life? A few anecdotes about people who told him he was wonderful - one supervisor at the factory who commended him on his book reading, a couple of faculty members who recognized his determinism at the mission school, and his parents, who encouraged him throughout. These stories are given almost as a premonition, a hidden message that â€œthis will be a great man.â€? They remind me of tales of Abraham Lincoln, â€œfrom log cabin to white house,â€? and as you study him in his log cabin as a child, you almost giggle with the omniscience of a reader, thinking â€œI know what this man is going to turn into!â€? But this is not how life works, my friend.

Livingstone was laughed at for reading, mocked by his peers, and commanded by his father not to study science. He got little sleep for years and years and years because he worked so hard. He was apparently nothing much to look at and hence was disliked by girls, even blatantly rejected by one. He couldnâ€™t preach a decent sermon, and during his delivery examination, he completely blanked out and fled from the pulpit right out the door. To top it off, then he was rejected as a missionary, not even being given the alternative of going to Africa as a carpenter to assist an accepted one. This was not a cake life. Livingstone was not thinking, â€œOh look, these are my seeds of greatness. If I can just endure this, I will become a great and well known servant of the Lord.â€? In fact, he was probably miserable!

Rarely does anyone striving to be great become great and those whom we refer to as great people simply did what was set before them. Greatness is not something to be worked towards, so we shouldnâ€™t be waiting and noting little foreshadowings of it in our lives as if we were living in a biography. What we should do is act like those we read about most likely acted while their biographies were being lived. They persevered, they did what was right, they sought to help people, they endured trial and temptation, they accepted rejection and failure as a part of life and kept going, they worked hard, they sweated â€“ they took up their cross and followed Him. These are the great things in life. Just read the fine print in biographies.

Posted in Thoughts to Ponder on October 3, 2005 | Comments (0)

Water for the Predictable

Have you ever asked yourself, â€œHow will I ever meet someone to marry if Iâ€™m at home so much?â€? As we conduct our quiet lives, itâ€™s easy to begin to wonder desperately how in the world our Mr. Right will ever find us. After all, we arenâ€™t in college. We donâ€™t have a job. We arenâ€™t going on trips all over the world and being â€œout thereâ€? for someone to see us. Isnâ€™t that how you are supposed to meet a husband? Before you start sending photos of yourself across the country or joining every club in town in order to meet people, I would like to offer a counter scenario. In order to encourage us to think outside the common methods of matchmaking, I present the narrative of the well.

Once upon a sunny or not-so-sunny day, Rebekah wakes up and remembers that she is still single. â€œWhat a sorry lot in life I have,â€? she moans, â€œperhaps I am old enough now to go see Mephibosheth and determine if there might be someone outside of this dreary deserty land of Ur who would like to marry me. I hear those guys from Canaan are pretty good looking.â€? Alas, Rebekah knows her father wouldnâ€™t allow it and she doesnâ€™t hold out much hope for the success of old Mephyâ€™s cross-desert matchmaking anyway. Upon getting out of bed and completing her boudoir, she looks over the list for the day. Watering sheep. "I do that all the time."

Would you believe this story? I wouldnâ€™t. Yet this is how many of us girls-at-home live â€“ whiny, mopey, complaining about our lives. We are constantly looking for a way out, something exciting to do, somebody new to meet, some interesting job to replace the predictable things we do now. Yet in hearing this story, we know the dramatic irony â€“ itâ€™s in the very act of doing the tedious, everyday job that Rebekahâ€™s life is about to change forever.

Multiple places in Scripture we find the story of a woman at a well. The first instance is this one in Genesis chapter 24, in which the servant of Isaac finds him a wife. We see this happening again in Genesis chapter 29, where Jacob meets Rachel.

In both of these situations, we see some parallels to our lives as girls at home.

First of all, these women were in want of something â€“ a husband.
Secondly, these women did not go out pursuing the thing they desired.
Thirdly, these women busied themselves with the work at hand, taking care of their fatherâ€™s business, which was sheep.
Fourth, these women were ready and willing to help others at the well.
Fifth, these women received what they desired.

I tend to think that Rebekah and Rachel were both happy to have the privilege of serving their fathers. I would bet they took great pleasure in watering sheep and in doing the sundry other jobs that were before them. I even tend to think that it is because of this faithfulness that God blessed them with faithful husbands. Matthew 6:33 says, â€œSeek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness and all these things will be added unto you.â€? Blessings are promised to those who are busy about the work of the Lord, not those who are busy about the work of obtaining blessings.

When our focus, our actions, or even just our thoughts, begin to turn from serving others to finding a mate, we lose the honor of working diligently where God has placed us. Complaining and whining negates our cheerful service. Our well is our home and our sheep watering is the various activities that our Heavenly and earthly fathers have given us to do. Like Rebekah and Rachel, we are to be blissfully unaware of ourselves and look only to the task at hand of serving our Father. Spending time plotting our escape or future excitement only distracts us.

I think one of the interesting things about this story is the predictability of these girls. Genesis 24:11 refers to the â€œtime of the evening, even the time that women go out to draw water.â€? Sure enough, there was Rebekah. Chapter 29:9 says, â€œAnd while he yet spake with them, Rachel came with her fatherâ€™s sheep; for she kept them.â€? There she was â€“ right on time. Faithfulness could be defined as being where we are supposed to be when we are supposed to be there and it is to the faithful that eternal rewards are promised.

Our diligence may or may not be rewarded with a husband. If your heart is longing for something outside of your current life, donâ€™t fool yourself by supposing that a husband will fix it. Think of another famous woman at a well, namely, the one Jesus met. She was there working as usual and who came up to her? It was the One who gave her living water and enabled her never to thirst again. Our prize may not be an earthly one like Rebekah and Rachelâ€™s, but we are guaranteed that faithfulness is always rewarded with treasures in heaven. Stay patiently at your well. If your fatherâ€™s sheep are all watered, begin to glance around for others who are in need of refreshment. Whatever you do, stay there. The one who has the water of life knows where to find you, whether it be to give you a husband or an everlasting drink. We will never be disappointed.

Posted in Thoughts to Ponder on October 3, 2005 | Comments (0)

Home: Your First Duty

"Nettie was a jolly girl until she turned pious," exclaimed a bright, good-humoured brother of eighteen. "Since she became religious there is no getting her to do anything. If a fellow brings home a new song she is too busy knitting stockings or making flannel petticoats for all the old women in her district, to find time to accompany him on the piano. If a fellow asks her to go for a row, or take a turn in the public gardens, she really cannot spare the time.

"Let them first learn to show piety at home," was the Apostle Paul's injunction in regard to young widows; and surely he would reiterate the thought, were he amongst us today, in reference to the sisters and the daughters of the home.
Nettie had mistaken her mission, when she thought less of those at home than of the poor. Surely her brother's need was greater and had larger claim upon her time and energies than all the wants of a destitute poor whom God had not placed within the precincts of her home! To go to her district with her Bible in her hand might seem to be more in accordance with the thoughts of true piety, than to be in her place at home without the Bible in her hand, ready to accompany her brother's songs, to mend his gloves, to share his leisure hours; but in the sight of Him who tries the thoughts of our hearts, and weighs the motives of our lives, which, think you, would win from Him the "Well done, thou good and faithful servant;" the work He gave, or the work she chose?

My dear young sisters, make up your mind to the fact that religion is intended to make you shine at home. It need not and will not prevent your frequent work for others in the spare hours you can justly call your own; but unless it makes you, as a daughter, more thoughtful and considerate, more eager to obey and hold the smallest wish of either parent in sacred trust; unless it gives you, as a sister, a keener sense of your responsibilities, and a more earnest desire and effort to win to a higher, purer life the brothers of the home; unless your Christian life means this to you, you have yet to learn that your highest service to God is to live the life He gives you and to do His will.

From Our Daughters: Their Lives Here and Hereafter

Posted in Thoughts to Ponder on October 3, 2005 | Comments (0)

Home - A Taste of Heaven

Perhaps we understand and appreciate the pleasures of home better when we can enjoy them no longer. What lingering looks and loving thoughts do we turn back to the home of our childhood! How, when the snow has fallen upon our heads, and life's winter is passing over us, do we turn to the sunny spot which is still embalmed in our hearts and memories as the fairest on earth! A boy goes away from his native place; he grows up to be a man, mixes with the great, eager world, and becomes part of it; he fights, and struggles and presses on in the battle for position and wealth, and is perhaps unsuccessful. But what are his first thoughts then? Feeling body and spirit alike weary, being worn out by the efforts he has had to make, it becomes necessary for him to have rest and change. Then the hitherto unspoken thought finds utterance: "I will go to the old place where I was born; I shall get well and strong."

And with what overwhelming emotions does he gaze on the old familiar places! There is no meadow like that at the back of his father's house, no broad river that can at all equal the little silver stream which ran by the cottage door. The man cannot keep back the tears as he gazes, for O,the years that give us a little take away so much! Men speak well of him, he has climbed the hill, and has been warmed in the rays of prosperity. The years have given him a name, and position, and the increase of riches, but they have stiffened the arms that clasped him, and stilled the voices that called him by the old pet names; and as for the cottage where his father and mother lived, it is either altogether pulled down and lost, or its floors are trodden by the feet of strangers, and the faces that used to brighten at his approach lie white and still beneath the daisies. But, even with that great loss in his heart, the man loves with a tenderness beyond his power of expression the dear little spot which even now he calls home.
Seeing that home is so attractive, that it so clings to the heart even in after years, what kind of place should it be? And how can we all live good lives therein? Even were there no other reason than this which we have given, there is need that all who have anything to do with home, with its duties, and pleasures, and enjoyments, should use their utmost endeavors to promote its prosperity and secure its happiness. It is, indeed, a sad thing when persons allow themselves to feel carelessly about home, and those who dwell in it. "Anything will do for this evening; nobody will call, and I shall not leave home." We would rather say entertain strangers cheerfully, if they call, but keep your best, your very best, for home. The true life, the life that may be made the fullest and most satisfactory, where there is most room for the exhibition of virtue, and where vice dare not lift its head, is that which is lived in a well-conducted Christian home. We earnestly hope that before long we may all have learned to value our homes more, and to be skillful in beautifying them, so that they may not only be to us as places in which to dwell, but as foretastes of the heavenly home.

Posted in Thoughts to Ponder on September 7, 2005 | Comments (0)

The Tranquility of a Quiet Life

One of my favorite verses in the Bible is 1 Thessalonians 4:11, which says, â€œMake it your ambition to lead a quiet life, to mind your own business and to work with your hands, just as we told you.â€? (New International Version) This injunction to lead a quiet life is one often neglected, even among homemakers. I am definitely not against activity and I think serving others and participating in things outside the home are both enriching and necessary. However, as in all things, I think it is wise to examine what we choose to do and why we choose to do it. You know the old saying, â€œHow busy is not as important as why busy. The bee is praised. The mosquito is swatted.â€?

One thing that distracts us from leading a quiet life oftentimes, is the cacophony of our own thoughts. I realized this awhile ago during one of my first visits to Texas. As I was at home alone during the day, the immense silence started caving in on me. Most of us, I think, are not comfortable being left alone to our thoughts. We get discontent, irritable, and melancholic when all we have to listen to is our mind churning. There is a discipline the old Benedictine monks knew when they took vows of silence. It takes a certain level of maturity to enjoy oneâ€™s own company and learn the meaning of â€œpray continually,â€? when the Lord is the only one around. Filling our days with movement has the possibility of hindering us from developing a needful and helpful spiritual peace.

Another thing that keeps us from the quiet life is thinking that activity validates us or makes us important. Stress is almost like a merit badge in our present world. You ask someone how they are and they respond, â€œBusy! Iâ€™ve hardly had 10 minutes at home all week. How are you?â€? If you say, â€œWell, my life has been fairly quiet lately,â€? you might get an incredulous stare. Obviously, this person is thinking, if youâ€™re not busy, you are either stupid, a burden on society, or just plain old lazy. Yes, being stupid or lazy would be sinning, but we shouldnâ€™t involve ourselves in things just to avoid being thought so. Whatever happened to drinking lemonade and chatting with the neighbors? We run around too much as a society and this habit has turned our stress level into our worth level, which is wrong.

A third thing that keeps us from the quiet life is boredom. â€œWhat is there really to do at home anyway?â€? we think. This can be a danger especially to those who have been away from home and then returned, as they are used to constant motion, as I was when I first left school. It was hard to have the creativity and motivation necessary to be productive. We tend to define boredom as stillness of the body, when in actuality it is probably better thought of as stillness of the mind. It has been said that only boring people are ever bored. The world of books and imagination and the life inside a home is limitless. Always keeping busy is an ineffective antidote to boredom, because you are in danger of simply moving around with hidden atrophy going on behind the scenes.

There is nothing wrong with activity and service. In fact, we are commanded in the Bible to be diligent and industrious. However, activity for the sake of activity is bad. It leads us to possible confusion of doing and being and we may be at risk for determining our worth by what we produce. We are valuable because we are, not because we do. Before engaging in any activity, we should ask ourselves a few questions. Will this be keeping me from other, more important things? Am I doing this because I am not comfortable with silence? Am I trying to find worth in what I do? Am I just bored and avoiding the reality of my own shallowness of mind? Be deliberate in your schedule planning.
A quiet life does not preclude activity, motion, or noise. What it does preclude is letting our hearts be unsettled by chaos, both in our lives and in our minds. Covering up for a poor spiritual condition by goings on and runnings around will not pay off in the long run. Once we are at peace and our thoughts are tranquil, then we are in a position to be busy and still remain quiet.

Posted in Thoughts to Ponder on September 7, 2005 | Comments (0)

Can You Can?

Did you know reports say that 24% of American still can? If you ask, â€œstill can do what?â€?, youâ€™re definitely not in the 24%. I use the word â€œcanâ€? to mean the process of home preservation of foods. My family and I have been canning for years and for us, it is an experience of work, fun, and rewards.

If youâ€™ve never canned before, let me explain the basics. You acquire some fruits or vegetables that you want to preserve fresh for the winter. Every year, we can peaches, pears, jams and jellies (strawberry, blueberry, mixed berry, or grape), salsa, and pie filling (blueberry and/or cherry). 0f course, the most rural thing you can do is pick your own fruits and vegetables, but getting them from a farmerâ€™s market or roadside stand is usually almost as economical. The aesthetic value of a kitchen full of fresh produce is unbelievable!

Then you need to find a book of canning instructions and follow them. If you make errors, you could end up with botulism poisoning, so itâ€™s important to adhere to directions. Peaches must be rinsed, boiled to soften the skins, then peeled and dipped in preserver. Pears are similar. Both are scooped into jars and then covered with a liquid solution to fill in the holes. Salsa is mixed up and cooked on the stove for an hour or two, then poured into jars. Jelly recipes vary.

Sounds like work? Yes, it is. But it also sounds like fun. Why?

First of all, canning is the ultimate aesthetic experience. All five senses are involved in this glorious display of creation and art. Your eyes can look upon the beautiful colors and shapes of the fruits and vegetables â€“ the smooth skin of tomatoes, the bumps and curves of pears, the bright red of strawberries and deep purple of grapes. Your hands can feel the delightful sensation of being covered in the â€œstuffâ€? of the earth. I love peeling tomatoes and peaches and having my hands buried in the goo and muck, letting it dry all over my fingers. (Itâ€™s almost as good as when we used to cover a finger or two with Elmerâ€™s glue, let it dry, and peel it off.) Sometimes the peaches are so slick we can barely hold onto them and the peppers for salsa so hot we have to wear plastic baggies on our hands while we cut them up. Did I mention the nose and mouth? Ahhh, what gloriousness. Food of the gods, as they would say in Greek mythology. My sisters always tease me when we do peaches; we peel the peach and slice it up, leaving just the core, which inevitably has a little more than â€œjust the coreâ€? left on it. Iâ€™ve been known to wait eagerly for a lull, in which I attack the discard bowl and start sucking on the peach cores, mumbling â€œtastes like Heaven.â€? (Thatâ€™s the part when they start laughing, but then they also save the really good-looking ones for me, so it works out fine.) Honestly, I donâ€™t see how fruit in the garden of Eden could have had a better aroma and flavor than our fresh peaches do. Oh, and I almost forgot the ears. The sounds of canning are not unique â€“ the stove fan on, music playing for our entertainment, usually the air conditioner humming, people scurrying back and forth, except for one unforgettable sound that culminates this process. When the jars are taken out of the boiling water, we put them on a towel to cool and sit close by, waiting for the familiar â€œclickâ€? of the lids as they make their final seal, letting us know we did things right and our food is safe and ready to be stored.

Secondly, canning is an ideal time for fellowship and fun. My sisters and mom and I almost always can together. Once or twice someone has been gone or sick and weâ€™ve had to use less people. Last summer Hannah and I did salsa just the two of us and realized that everything still gets done. Shh! We donâ€™t mention that because it is way more fun to have everyone in the kitchen together. Two people peel, one person goes back and forth to the woods with the scraps, one person pulls the sterilized jars out of the water and dries them, and one scoops the fruit into them. Sometimes when things are slow we appoint a resting position and take turns having it. That guy is always responsible for entertaining!

Third, canning gives us a chance to see, literally, the FRUIT of our hands. I tell you, nothing compares with the sight of multiple shelves full of jars of food that we made ourselves. From things that grew out of the ground we get things that will be nutritious and delicious. Iâ€™ll never forget the time I visited the home of a family in Ohio who had 12 children. They had a small outbuilding just for the purpose of canning, in which I was privileged to go and saw multiple shelves, about 3 feet deep and 7 feet tall, completely filled with home canned food. Thatâ€™s my goal! Letâ€™s face it â€“ most household jobs are constantly needing to be done; laundry gets soiled again next week, the sink fills with dirty dishes in an hour, but when you can a shelf or two of food, it will be there almost a whole year. Thatâ€™s more permanent visible fruit of our labor! Weâ€™ve even been known to can certain types of food just so it will look good on the shelf. â€œBut if we skip the grape jelly, weâ€™ll be missing the darker end of the spectrum all year!â€?

Fourth, canning fulfills a feminine need and call we have to prepare food for our families. Proverbs 31 says the virtuous woman â€œbringeth food from afarâ€? and â€œgives meat to her household.â€? When we play an active part in the preparation and distribution of food, we are being obedient to help nourish and sustain our families. This gives me great pleasure!

If youâ€™ve never tried canning, give it a shot. All you need is a basic canning pot (I found mine, relatively free from rust, at a garage sale for a dollar), a few kitchen gadgets, and some current safety information. Canning is a tremendously rewarding and fulfilling process and one that can be enjoyed by everyone, but especially by women at home. Not only will you be putting away food for a year, but youâ€™ll also be storing and preserving memories and skills that will last a lifetime.

Posted in Thoughts to Ponder on August 25, 2005 | Comments (1)

Where Should I Serve?

A few years ago, my sister Martha and I helped with food preparation for Meals on Wheels in our local town. Almost all of the other workers were over 75 and no longer as sharp as they could be in the kitchen. One day we were making lunch and someone was adding a seasoning and then realized that some people on the delivery route were not supposed to have salt. So the lady carefully looked over the ingredient list and, relieved, said â€œOkay, no salt in this â€“ just sodium.â€? Heh heh.

This story illustrates the need most of our local towns have for young volunteers! The majority of people in our communities are working and as I have delved into various service opportunities, Iâ€™ve discovered that as a result of this, most of those volunteering around town are over 75. One of our primary tasks as daughters at home is that of serving others. In this time of life, we are uniquely able to do this because of our small number of outside commitments, our high levels of energy and creativity, and our free time. Letâ€™s do some brainstorming to come up with various areas we could serve in and help us to think outside the box when we are attempting to find ways to help others.

Outside of our own homes, where weâ€™ll assume weâ€™re all already serving significantly, one of the most obvious places to find people who need help is in our own neighborhood. Elderly people could often use help with yard work, getting the mail, picking up groceries, or getting a ride to a doctorâ€™s appointment. Older people or people of any age who lives alone often canâ€™t or donâ€™t cook much and really appreciate food of all kinds, especially when itâ€™s made well and served with a garnish. Often when we make large desserts or big meals, we run some next door, next door the other way, and across the street! Doing this can get you more than you bargained for, though â€“ one time we brought chocolate orange rolls to the people across the street, only to be asked the next day if we would make 10 dozen for their senior citizenâ€™s party! Try putting flowers on the tray or send along a cheerful napkin. Sometimes just showing up at the door for a friendly 10-minute chat can mean a lot. You may discover other ways to help them while youâ€™re at it; our next door neighbor now canâ€™t fall asleep if our upstairs hallway light is not left on to assure her that we are home!

Next take a look at your local church. You may not want to teach Sunday School or volunteer for Vacation Bible School, but how about looking for the often-neglected areas of need? Is anyone planting flowers around the building? Could the pianist use a break once in awhile? Do the pews need dusting? Iâ€™ve discovered at my church a whole list of shut-ins who arenâ€™t able to get to church or anywhere else. I picked one and started visiting her retirement home once a week. We go out to lunch together and itâ€™s her only meal all week where she gets to pick what she wants to eat! After that we do some shopping, chatting all the while, and she always tells me how much she looks forward to her only break from the home. Quite possibly, you could find some small areas of need either at the church itself or among those in the church.

Another area of great need is in our towns. Like I said, many organizations are desperate for young volunteers! Check into the Red Cross, Meals on Wheels or other programs to feed the hungry, local food shelves, consignment stores for people with low incomes, crisis pregnancy centers, nursing homes (how about volunteering to lead a weekly hymn sing?), etc. Think about what your interests and talents are and consider where the greatest area of need is in your area.

Another place to check for service opportunities is national organizations that may have a local chapter, especially branches of Christian ministries. Iâ€™ve done lots of volunteer work with International Students, Inc., who works to introduce foreign students studying in America to the gospel while helping them learn about American culture. Through this work, Iâ€™ve met wonderful friends from all over the world that I am still in contact with even after they return to their home countries. My family has also volunteered with the Joni and Friends organization for people with handicaps and my sister Hannah is a hospice volunteer. Itâ€™s also good to pay attention to needs you may hear of elsewhere that you could fill. My sisters and I have spent time with a family in Virginia who have 6 children, one with a disability, and the mother was undergoing treatment for cancer last year. You may know someone who knows someone who could use the helping hands of a cheerful girl!

Chapter 4 of In My Fatherâ€™s House has this to say, â€œTo few is the choice so easy, the field of duty so wide, that she need puzzle very long over what she ought to do. Generally â€“ and this is the best and safest guide â€“ she will find her work lying very near at hand: some desultory tastes to condense into regular studies, some faulty household quietly to remodel, some child to teach, or parent to watch over. All these being needless or unattainable, she may extend her service out of the home into the world, which perhaps never at any time so much needed the help of us women. And how many of its charities and duties can best be done only by a wise and tender womanâ€™s hand? Here occurs another of those plain rules which are the only guidance possible in the matter â€“ a Bible rule, too: â€˜Whatsoever they hand findeth to do, do it with thy might.â€™â€?

Like this quote says, generally our field of duty is nearby. However, if our home is well taken care of, spending time helping others outside of our comfort zone is an excellent use of time. There is so much to be done in the world and often the work is best done by the loving tender heart and hands of a woman.

A few pointers - #1) Whenever you are engaged in service, do it as an outreach of your family. My dad often says that if he didnâ€™t have a job, he would be out helping people, but in his place he sends us as his messengers. A good way to remind ourselves of this is to bring along other members of our family when we are helping somewhere, if possible. Donâ€™t get trapped into the mindset that â€œIâ€? am doing these great works, but instead remind yourself that â€œI am here on behalf of my family as its extension.â€? In the same way, all ministry we do is as emissaries of the Lord Jesus Christ. The glory is His as we serve His people. The hands and feet of the body of Christ donâ€™t get praise for themselves over what great looking body parts they are. All we do should reflect honor back to the Lord. #2) Donâ€™t waste time looking for prestigious or rewarding things to do. Find something and do it, no matter how dirty, how thankless, how time-consuming it is. Jesus ate with sinners and tax collectors and we ought not only minister to those who donâ€™t need a physician. #3) Always, always make sure your home responsibilities are fulfilled before you plan extra outside activities.

Weâ€™re not out to earn brownie points. Living at home after high school is not glorified girl scouts where we attempt to earn our nursing home badge, our teaching badge, and our cooking for the neighbors badge. We are simply to enjoy a lifestyle of Christian service, as we are commanded by Christ. Sometimes it takes creative thinking and lots of telephone calls in order to discern which doors the Lord would open for us, but thatâ€™s okay. Most of the time it will involve true, hard work, and often it will be the kind that gets your hands dirty. We donâ€™t live for ourselves, but others, and what better way to demonstrate that than by active, constant service? Remember the words of Jesus in Matthew 25:40, â€œAnd the King shall answer and say unto them, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these, my brethren, ye have done it unto me.â€?

Posted in Thoughts to Ponder on August 16, 2005 | Comments (0)

What Should I Do?

When I first came home from college, I was baffled by the length of days and the brevity of my â€œto-doâ€? list. How could I possibly fill the massive hours I had with my few responsibilities? While thinking on this, I had the opportunity to meet a wise girl who had stayed home until marriage and she gave me this advice: â€œPray and ask God to fill your schedule, and He will!â€? So I did, for the most part doubting that I would ever be busy. As you may have guessed, I was wrong and my adviser was right, and I ended up with a fairly full weekly docket.

Laziness is a great temptation for girls at home, especially after high school. Now if you have six little brothers I suppose your time is pretty much full to begin with, but for others the path of duty may not be so obvious, especially if you have a few sisters who share the load. As our first principle of schedule-filling, we must remember that idleness is not an option! The old adage that â€œidle minds are the devilâ€™s workshopâ€? is quite true and idle hands can cause further trouble. Biblically, we donâ€™t have the option of laying around, eating grapes, and watching television. We must work and we must work on something profitable.

In thinking about what activities should fill my schedule, I like to keep in mind 1 Thessalonians 4:11, â€œ. . . Study to be quiet, and to do your own business, and to work with your own hands. . .â€? In considering business, we should do our own first. The path of the duty is the first to be walked and that starts in our own homes. We ought not be gallivanting around the country or the town or the street if our beds arenâ€™t made and our familyâ€™s clothes arenâ€™t washed. Take an inventory of your household, with the help of your parents. Is everything getting done on a weekly basis that needs to be done? Are the ceiling fans dusted? Are Dadâ€™s shirts ironed? Are the cupboards getting cleaned regularly and the floors mopped? Itâ€™s easy to get into survival mode in a home and only clean the dirtiest places, so if weâ€™re looking for something to do, we should start by making sure nothing is falling through the cracks in our own house. It may surprise you how many needful things have been neglected and how pleasant a few extra hours a week can make things!

Secondly, we need to consider furthering our education. Choosing not to attend college should in no way keep us from developing our minds! All Christians are called to study and learn all their lives and women are no exception. Chapter 6 of In My Fatherâ€™s House says this: â€œA wife should be able to maintain intelligent conversation with her husband and his friends, and this requires the cultivation of general intelligence.â€? Even if we will never marry, it is our duty to be interesting people who know enough to carry on â€œintelligent conversationâ€? with anyone we meet. A good way to do this is to know a little about a lot of things, taking care to ensure that what we know is accurate information. My goal has been to at least know enough to ask relevant questions! This may take a little creativity, but go for it anyway. Check into classes in your local area, frequent your library, and meet and converse with people from all walks of life. The guideline has been suggested in IMFH that ideally a girl should study between 10 and 1 each day. Iâ€™ve tried this and found it a good length of time, enough to keep my mind cultivated, but not enough to keep me from doing other necessary things.

Third, we need to explore options for serving others. This is where we get into the realm of even greater creativity! The world is big and we are small so we need to move slowly in determining where we serve. A great place to start is in your own neighborhood. My family has spent time getting to know some of the people on our street and in the process discovered that some of them need help and all of them love food, especially dessert! After that, take a look at your church; find an area of ministry that has been neglected and help out. Look around the town you live in; is there a program for feeding the hungry that could use assistance? Hurting people are everywhere and as part of the body of Christ, itâ€™s our responsibility to meet needs where we can.

There are three other things to consider when talking about our daily schedule. First of all, itâ€™s important to keep in mind the vision of our family. If your family doesnâ€™t have one, make one! Our job as daughters should be to support the work of our father, whatever that may be, so we need to consult his advice in choosing activities. For example, part of our familyâ€™s mission is hospitality, so a good share of our time goes to that work of service. My dad often has customers from other countries at his office and he loves to have them over to our house. We are always and ever serving dinner to somebody, and my dad is pleased anytime we are able to help someone and bring him back a report. This year our company turned into overnight company and we ended up with out-of-town guests at our house almost straight for three months! At one time we had three weeks of solid visitors. Opening up your life to the Lordâ€™s work can give you a full schedule really fast!

Secondly, many girls I know at home (including myself) are involved in something that gives them some spending money, be it music lessons, art lessons, etc. I donâ€™t think this is a bad thing to do, but I think we need to caution ourselves to keep it in perspective. As women, we are to be bread servers, not bread winners, so we must be careful to guard anything we do for pay. These activities should never take precedent over our duties and service and ought to be flexible enough to be rescheduled or cancelled if some area of responsibility appears. This time of our lives is for growing, learning, and serving, and earning money is at the bottom of our list.

Third, remember there is nothing wrong with having a quiet life. Our world is full of busy people running back and forth constantly, with no real living going on. Those whose lives are quieter are often the only ones who notice and appreciate beautiful flowers, a pretty sunset, majestic symphonies, and other wonderful things in Godâ€™s creation. Sadly, they are also often the only ones who hear the sweet questions of small children, who are home on the street to run next door and help out when the ambulance pulls up, who can intervene across the country to sit with an ailing relative. 1 Thessalonians 4:11 even says that we should study to be quiet! If your schedule is not booked from sunrise to sunset every day, donâ€™t assume you need to change that.

We are especially privileged in this time of life; we have no husbands and children that need attention, no house of our own to fix up and care for, no job responsibilities that call for us from 8 to 5. We are wholly able to allow the Lord to fill our days with activities that will help His kingdom come and His will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Letâ€™s not be lazy; letâ€™s not fill our days with meaningless tasks and other peopleâ€™s business; letâ€™s not live for ourselves. Instead, let us meekly remember what the Lord requires of us â€“ not to do great things, not to save the world, not to buzz from place to place for the sake of having something â€œimportantâ€? to tend - but simply to do justice, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with our God. Itâ€™s the beautiful call of a Christian and we are uniquely suited to answer it.

Posted in Thoughts to Ponder on August 3, 2005 | Comments (1)

Flashy Works Vs. Pious Service

It's far better to look ordinary and be obedient than it is to look wonderful and be a hypocrite. In fact, the latter is defined here as a "false prophet" - one who touts the Lord's name, does works that look Christian, but is in fact disobedient in heart.

I was reading this afternoon from the Matthew Henry commentary, still working through the sermon on the mount. If you think that's long, you should read what Matthew Henry has to say about it! I'm currently in chapter 7, verses 21-23, about the false prophets and Jesus saying "I never knew you."

In these verses, those who have done mighty works in the name of the Lord are using their past records to show that they really knew God. But Jesus says that just because someone has done "wonderful" works - casting out devils and prophesying, for example - doesn't mean they knew Him. The one who shall enter the kingdom of heaven is the one who "doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven," which will is defined by Matthew Henry to be "that we believe in Christ, that we repent of sin, that we live a holy life, that we love one another. This is his will, even our sanctification." The works full of wonder couldn't matter less; it's the pious and merciful, obedient ones that count. God cares whether we treat our neighbor Christianly, whether we repent when we sin, whether we are what we seem.

It's funny how in our fast readings of this gospel, we tend to assume we're safe if we don't practice exorcism or prophesy on a regular basis. But the point here is the outward flashiness, which can take many forms, as opposed to the quiet, regular obedience. What we look like doesn't matter so much as whether we are producing good fruit, as shown in vereses 16-19. We can look entirely like a grape vine, but if no grapes are showing up, but in fact figs, we can't argue that we looked nice and therefore should be considered a grape vine.

Posted in Thoughts to Ponder on August 1, 2005 | Comments (0)

Chat Log 2: Wasting Time

Listen in as Naomi and Emma have a discussion about activities that keep young ladies from using their time wisely.

Naomi Joy says:
Let's talk about being busy. That's in chapter 1 of In My Father's House , "idle time not idly spent". I think a lot of girls at home, when it comes down to it, do nothing most of the time.

Naomi Joy says:
Why do you think that is and how can we avoid it?

Emma says:
: processing :

Emma says:
Okay.

Emma says:
I think some people go to college for selfish reasons.

Naomi Joy says:
Definitely

Emma says:
I think some people stay home for ultimately selfish reasons.

Naomi Joy says:
Ha - that's just what I was going to say

Emma says:
Maybe they don't know why they're there.

Naomi Joy says:
Even people who stay home for the right reasons can end up being selfish

Emma says:
We need to challenge ourselves to think of why we are at home

Naomi Joy says:
Right. What do you think are some of the biggest time-wasters for girls at home?

Emma says:
Uh, sleep.

Naomi Joy says:
Ha. Good one

Emma says:
The more things you have to do, the more you get done. And when you
don't know where you're going, any train will get you there. How's that for clichÃ©s?

Naomi Joy says:
Excellent

Emma says:
But they really are true.

Naomi Joy says:
Yes, definitely if we are not focused, we are more likely to waste time.

Emma says:
I spend totally too much time on my hair. I have no idea how much time other girls spend on theirs.

Naomi Joy says:
Yeah, hair and probably a lot of us waste time on makeup, excess
primping in general

Emma says:
I just don't know how "generally specific" I could get with actual
details to back it up but, yeah, I expect so.

Naomi Joy says:
I understand...just working on how we look,which is important, but not THAT important

Naomi Joy says:
Let's see....

Naomi Joy says:
Well, tv, if you have one you can waste a lot of time.

Emma says:
Oh I forgot about tv

Emma says:
yes or MSN

Emma says:
RIGHT

Naomi Joy says:
HEY,this is productive

Naomi Joy says:
and it's also late afternoon.

Naomi Joy says:
How about talking on the phone? We definitely need encouragement and
friendship can be a blessing and helpful, but it can be really easy to waste time gabbing for no reason at bad times of the day when we
should be doing other stuff

Emma says:
it's sometimes productive, yes

Emma says:
or daydreaming

Naomi Joy says:
ooo - another good one

Emma says:
or reading silly stuff

Naomi Joy says:
Oh yes

Naomi Joy says:
Reading useless and nonprofitable things

Naomi Joy says:
like...what would be useless and nonprofitable?

Naomi Joy says:
like magazines, maybe? at least some of them

Naomi Joy says:
newspapers...when you're just finding out all the bad stuff in the
world for no reason

Naomi Joy says:
Maybe, like you said, it has sometimes more to do with our motivation

Emma says:
yes I think that's the base thing

Naomi Joy says:
For example, I could read a book to learn something or I could read a
book because I don't feel like working on something else

Emma says:
or because you think Mr. Cuteface will think you're amazing if you
mention you're reading Rushdoony

Emma says:
can't exactly see that particular scenario happening, but I think
there are probably variations

Emma says:
So...what's left?

Emma says:
Eating is totally productive.

Naomi Joy says:
Eating is totally productive - ha ha

Naomi Joy says:
Let's see...

Naomi Joy says:
I think some girls spend excessive amounts of time practicing music

Naomi Joy says:
Not us, of course

Naomi Joy says:
But there's a point where you're practicing to improve skill and
there's a point where you are just wasting time because the piano is
there and it's easier to do that than find something more productive

Emma says:
I agree with you on the music thing

Naomi Joy says:
well...like me, for example

Naomi Joy says:
I will walk by the piano, see it, and sit down and play for 20 minutes when I should be doing something else.

Naomi Joy says:
I could argue I am "improving my skill to glorify God" but I'm really
just messing around.

Emma says:
Okay, sometimes I sit down and mess around like that

Emma says:
and it's not always ok

Emma says:
BUT

Emma says:
sometimes I'm doing it to celebrate

Naomi Joy says:
oh yes

Naomi Joy says:
Often it is good, but it could potentially waste time if we let it.

Emma says:
Right

Emma says:
just make sure we're not down on doing things for pleasure

Naomi Joy says:
right, we are definitely not against pleasure

Naomi Joy says:
I love it that Micah's keyboard can go on "pipe organ." It almost
makes me think there's an organ here

Emma says:
IT CAN GO ON PIPE ORGAN?

Emma says:
neato freato

Naomi Joy says:
Even has a sustaining pedal, which is more than you can say for most
pipe organs - ha ha

Emma says:
Does it make your rib cage vibrate?

Naomi Joy says:
It would even be okay if I was thinking, "I think I will play the
piano right now" and not just idling time away without paying attention.

Naomi Joy says:
yeah, probably again going back to the motivation thing

Naomi Joy says:
Exercising, maybe? That could be a waste of time if it's out of
balance in our life

Naomi Joy says:
Oh - shopping!

Naomi Joy says:
Girls waste time shopping

Emma says:
yes, or Internet browsing

Emma says:
even blog reading

Emma says:
I hate to say...

Naomi Joy says:
Lol

Naomi Joy says:
Reading MY blog is never a waste of time

Emma says:
Lol

Naomi Joy says:
For that matter, WRITING blogs

Naomi Joy says:
yes, definitely the internet in all forms can waste time

Emma says:
I have to agree. But you know.

Naomi Joy says:
I always laugh when I come across the home school mother bulletin boards.

Naomi Joy says:
Some of those ladies post multiple times a day and I just can't see
how they have time for that. The chances of something important being neglected have got to be pretty high

Emma says:
And maybe they have it all together. I don't see how. But maybe they do.

Naomi Joy says:
Yes, maybe they do

Naomi Joy says:
Hmmm...anything else?

Emma says:
I can't think of anything right now. I'll keep a log tomorrow and see
what else I come up with!

Emma says:
Ha

Naomi Joy says:
I think the bottom line in all of that is that whatever stage of life
we are in, we are not allowed to be lazy

Emma says:
or maybe better than lazy, selfish...laziness is basically selfishness

Naomi Joy says:
Doesn't the Bible say "mind your own business, work with your hands,"
"study to show yourself approved," "go to the ant."

Naomi Joy says:
If we're just flittering time away because were waiting to be married, we have the wrong idea

Naomi Joy says:
Hey, maybe some people work to waste time as in, get a job because you are bored and anxious to be married

Emma says:
Yes. Also I think we have to realize that work is not "safe...."

Naomi Joy says:
If you're working for the wrong reasons

Emma says:
not disagreeing with you at all, but clarifying

Naomi Joy says:
It seems like all of Christianity comes down to the heart, doesn't it?

Emma says:
sometimes the Bible says to just look and wonder

Naomi Joy says