A special treat

Rebekah and I were feeling inspired.

Rebekah is enjoying the fruits of her labor.   Thanks mom for teaching me to bake; it is a blessing to my family.

Then and Now

 What the garden looked like in February.

 

 

What it looks like now.  These are our tomato plants. 

Here is some really good looking corn.  Hopefully we can beat the deer to it this year.

Helpful upgrades

After two newsletter mailings we decided to upgrade a couple things.

Now for the 250+ newsletters, we have the peel and stick envelopes and return label stamp.   Bring on more newsletters; we are ready.

The view from our place

This was a complete rainbow with added colors beneath the violet.

At the Cross: forgiveness

            My favorite lyrics of all time are from the hymn, “It Is Well with My Soul.”  My heart soars when I sing:  “My sin--O the joy of this glorious thought, my sin, not in part, but the whole, Is nailed to the cross and I bear it no more, Praise the Lord, praise the Lord, O my soul!” Forgiveness, as described in the Bible, sets the heart free.

            Forgiveness roots itself in God’s character.  “You are forgiving, O Lord” (Ps. 86:5).  Did you notice that being verb?  Forgiving is an adjective modifying God.  He is forgiving.  It is His character to forgive. 

            Forgiveness removes the sin from our record.  “I write to you, dear children, because your sins have been forgiven on account of His (Jesus) name” (I Jn. 2:12).  The word forgiven is aphiemi meaning, “to send forth or to send away.” (1)  God sends forth, propels, hurls, flings, launches, casts, shoots (I enjoy my thesaurus) our sin “as far as the east is from the west” (Ps. 103:12).  Forgiveness “involves the complete removal of the cause of offense.”(2)

            Forgiveness comes only from God.  “I, even I, am He who blots out your transgressions” (Isa. 43:25).  Even the argumentative Pharisees understood this, “Who can forgive sins but God alone?”  (Mark 2:7).  Only God is capable of removing sin.

            God’s forgiveness covers all sin.  “Praise the LORD,..who forgives all your sins…” (Ps. 103:2-3). Notice the plural of sin.  God’s forgiveness is not for just one sin, but for “all sins.”  No sin sneaks by Him or slips through the cracks.   His forgiveness is complete.

            God’s forgiveness touches eternity.  “For I will forgive their wickedness and will remember their sins no more” (Heb. 8:12).  The word remember is mnaomai, meaning,“fixture of the mind or to recollect.”(1)   Hebrews states that God’s forgiveness means our sins are not a fixture of His mind.   He is not meditating on our iniquities day and night, holding them over our heads, or waiting to remind us of them when we sin again.

            God’s forgiveness brings happiness.  “Blessed is he whose transgressions are forgiven, whose sins are covered” (Ps. 32:1).  The word blessed means happy, or as Spurgeon puts it, “’Oh the blessednesses!’–the double joys, the bundles of happiness, the mountains of delight.  Pardoning mercy is of all things in the world most to be prized, for it is the only and sure way to happiness.”(4)

Forgiveness is available to all.  “But now He has appeared once for all at the end of the ages to do away with sin by the sacrifice of himself…so Christ was sacrificed once to take away the sins of many people”  (Heb. 9:26,28).  Because of the cross there is forgiveness. 

                                                      

“Oh the joy of this glorious thought, my sin, not in part, but the whole

is nailed to the cross and I bear it no more,

Praise the Lord, Praise the Lord, O my soul!”

1.  Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible.

2. Vine’s Complete Expository Dictionary of Old and New Testament Words.

4.  Charles Spurgeon “Psalms” Vol. 1.  Crossway Books. 1993.

The Dunes

This past weekend we made a trip up to the Warren Dunes in Michigan.

The first day we were there, the water was a little rough.

The second day was much calmer, but the water was still quite chilly

Gabby enjoyed beating everyone to the top of the dune.

Samuel and Rebekah couldn't quite handle Gabby's pace.

Fortunately we brought along our own chef and it only took Holly one round of cajun style biscuits to get them perfected.  Not bad considering Pillsbury never intended them to be cooked in a skillet over a camp stove.

This old pirate showed up and stole some of our bacon.

This is Rebekah's work of art entitled "Jesus Rocks!"

Samuel and Rebekah climbed all the way up the face of the dune.  The rest of us took the trail up the side.  It is very high and very steep.  

The girls had strong feelings about the outhouses.

Back to school

I just finished an intensive week of Systematic Theology.  Considering it was 10 hours a day, it was actually able to keep my interest and I'm actually a little disappointed the lecture portion is over.  I still have quite a bit of reading and three papers ahead of me over the next three weeks though.  We are leaving this morning to head up to spend a few days at the dunes in Michigan.  It will be a nice break, but I foresee a lot of sitting at the beach reading.

If you give a mom a honeydew melon

For those who have enjoyed the book, “If you give a mouse a muffin,”  I hope you enjoy my bent on the story.

If you give a mom a honeydew melon, she’s going to want to eat it for breakfast after going running.  So she looks for a knife to cut it.

When she finds the knife is still dirty, she’s going to need to wash it.

As she washes the knife, she smells a foul order rising from the sink’s drain.  She’s going to need to kill the odor.  So she gets out the baking soda and vinegar.

As she creates a chemical reaction in the drain, she remembers from a magazine article that sending boiling water down the drain is also a good idea.  So she gets out a pan and fills it with water.

As the water boils, she realizes eggs would go well with a honeydew melon and actually feed all five of her family members. 

As she reaches into the fridge to get the eggs, she sees naan bread and thinks that would be tasty with her eggs.

So she warms up the skillet for the eggs and heats up the naan bread in the microwave.

When she closes the microwave door, she sees the counter-top is still dirty from the kids’ cinnamon toast, so she wipes the counter-top.  

When she is finished wiping the counter top, she sees that there are a few clean dishes to put away.

When the dishes are put away, she sees that the eggs are done, and so she calls her family to the table.

As she takes a bite of her tasty egg and naan bread creation, she smiles and remembers the honeydew melon.  It definitely would have been tasty with the eggs.

Yep, folks, this is a true story.  My honeydew melon is still sitting in the fridge waiting to be cut up.