"Obedience Without Answers"--an Easter meditation for Us Women

I'm copying and pasting some posts that were a blessing to me in this Easter season. This one was from http://www.desiringgod.org/articles/obedience-without-answers.

It was the day of Preparation, and the Sabbath was beginning. The women who had come with him from Galilee followed and saw the tomb and how his body was laid. Then they returned and prepared spices and ointments. On the Sabbath they rested according to the commandment. (Luke 23:54–56)

It was the saddest of days. The Word who became flesh and dwelt among us lay cold in a tomb. What do you do when the one who raised the dead is dead himself?

The women who had followed Jesus from Galilee to Jerusalem to Golgotha to the tomb felt not only grief but confusion. The man they had thought was the deliverer was dead. Had they been wrong all along?
Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy (Exodus 20:8). They did not have the answers to their questions, but they had the command of God. Six days you shall labor, and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the LORD your God (Exodus 20:9–10). And so, the faithful women did what their mothers and fathers and Israelites since the time of Moses had done. They kept the Sabbath.
When a veil of darkness descends upon us through tragedy, unanswered prayers, or disappointment with God, we can follow the example of these brokenhearted women by walking in obedience.

Faith Obeys When the Path Isn’t Plain

Faithful followers obey when there appears to be no way forward, no door out of the prison, no calm beyond the storm. Faith does not require the imagination to envision how God might solve whatever problems we face.
When we are tempted to sink into despair, we should instead, as Elisabeth Elliot so memorably counseled, “do the next thing.” We may not be able to discern how God will lift us out of the pit, but we don’t have to. We simply have been given to obey him in whatever he has commanded us to do today.

Though the women didn’t know how God would keep his promises, they did know that a dead body needs attending to. Nevertheless, even their burial ministrations to Jesus’s broken body had to wait. They remembered the Sabbath, and they kept it. For them, the “next thing” was rest.
It’s easy to obey when we can envision how God will bless our obedience, but so much harder when we don’t see the point of it. At your lowest point, it may seem that there’s no way you can persevere to the end of the journey God has you on. But all God requires of you is to keep putting one foot in front of the other as you walk the walk of obedience.
You don’t have to know where that walk is leading or how God will sustain you because he knows where he is taking you.

Obedience Rests in the Finished Work of Christ

If ever there was a day when God’s people seemed far from deliverance, it was that gloomy Sabbath...
But all was not as it seemed. Just as God rested after the work of creation, the Son of God rested after the work of our redemption. God rested after looking upon his creation and calling it good. His Son rested after taking on our guilt and declaring, “It is finished” (John 19:30).
The rituals of their rest that Saturday may have looked the same as they always had, but everything had changed. God had done the work his people could not do. They could now rest in the finished work of God. All of the Sabbaths they had kept leading up to that day prefigured the spiritual rest that could only be theirs when their sins had been paid for. The Sabbath they kept that day anticipated the Sabbath rest that awaits all of us in the life to come (Hebrews 4:9–11).
I don’t feel sad when I imagine that saddest of days. I take inspiration from the women who kept God’s commands and honored the Sabbath even though they couldn’t understand how God could possibly turn their mourning into dancing.

They didn’t know that on the other side of Saturday, there would be no body to bury.
 

White Easter in Colorado!

Carrie got this picture early this Easter morning, up the trail.

This is the scene outside our window the last evening or two.

 The children have been having a great time with the newest batch of baby bunnies.

Our house finch that nests in our fir tree posed for me, along with some sparrows or juncos.

Last night, Easter Eve, after cleaning up from supper, I set the table for Easter breakfast next morning.

Then I finished reading the Easter story to the little ones.

I didn't realize Hannah had a baby bunny in her pocket beside me!

There ought to be some kind of cute caption for this darling picture!

Danny loves the bunnies.

Easter fruit and cheese for breakfast.

What a luscious breakfast we had this morning,complete with orange juice, granola or cereal, eggs, and toast for any who wanted it. 

I thank Jonathan over and over for that lovely planter of nine gorgeous tulips.
I can't keep my eyes off them.

At church, the heavy snow was piled along the eaves.

Inside, the Easter decorations were so pretty.

I loved the pastel colors.

The morning was full of bell practice during Sunday School, and then the worship service. 

After a group of us had finished playing two songs on the bells, and then our family played a bell song as well, we could finally relax!

A lot of visitors were there today, some we've been praying for, and even a drunk man 

who wondered why the pastor was talking about Christ's death instead of His birth,

since it was Christmas, wasn't it?

The drunk also enjoyed saying "Amen" very loudly at strategic places.  

Our pastor's son moved to the back where he could keep an eye on this interesting 

Easter situation!

Bro. Kearney brought an outstanding message--mostly straight from the Bible.

He went through the last week of Jesus' life, starting with Him teaching about faith from the fig tree,

His driving out the money changers from the temple,

His harsh sermon to the hypocritical Pharisees,

and His final Wednesday, the day the Bible says nothing about.

Bro. Kearney wondered if Christ and His disciples spent that day quietly resting at Mary, Martha, and Lazarus's home in Bethany, where they'd been spending the other nights.

Resting with friends.

Spending that last quiet day with those who loved Him.

That thought touched me very much. 

That Jesus Himself needed and reached out for the support, comfort and blessing of friends as He approached the last difficult week of His life,

where He met His death at the hands of religious leaders, Roman soldiers,

and at the hands of you and me, for it was our sins, too, that nailed Him to the cross.

But being human, as well as divine, He gave us an example of reaching out to our faithful friends

when we know we are going to be facing a difficult time ahead.

He does not expect us to walk alone, but to find solace and comfort with those who believe in us and care about us. 

It made me think with gratefulness for those of you who are family and friends, 

who read my blog and write emails and share our load at times in whatever way you can.

I am thankful for my many friends, for all those who are supportive and caring,

who forgive petty offenses and the sometimes boring or frustrating things

or things you disagree with, 

and still remain friends.

Then Bro. Kearney briefly told the story of the death of Christ,

Whose first words on the cross were, "Father forgive them...."

and Whose last were, "Father, into Thine hands I commit My spirit!"

He told how the Father proved that He had not actually forsaken His Son in that hour of death, 

by raising Him from the dead!

The Kearneys with their daughter Melanie sang, "Then Came the Morning,"

and our pastor extended an invitation and offered a sinner's prayer.

It was a beautiful Easter service.

At home, we got a new family photos before changing our clothes.

A little hard to get everyone looking just right all at once!

A blessed Resurrection Day to each of you!

Caring Enough to Confront

Caring Enough to Confront is the name of one of the books I have turned to many times in an attempt

to learn wisdom in dealing with relationship issues.

Because it's easy to be a people pleaser

and desperately want other people to like you, love you, accept you and think you are right.

It's not easy to be ignored, scorned, mocked, and criticized and disagreed with (unless you are the kind of person who thrives on making other people mad and who loves fights). 

Because not all relationships are always sweet, wonderful and happy.

Especially the close ones where you are involved in the nitty-gritty of life's details.

You can't put on costumes all the time, or paste on smiles all the time,

or just grin and bear it all the time, or just close your eyes to what is going on all the time.

Sometimes you have to confront.

It would be easier to let things go, it seems, at least in the short run.

But in the long run, sometimes you have to confront.

And you have to learn wisdom through your mistakes.

And I read somewhere that your mistake is not a failure

if you learned something from it,

if you are wiser today than you were yesterday.

And just remember that sometimes your "mistake" might only be a mistake based on what someone else thought of it and felt about it, rather than being a mistake based on what the Bible says. 

Just because someone got mad when you confronted them

does not mean you are a mean sinner and deserve to be punished.

It might mean instead that you are an honest Christian who is trying to follow Bible standards of dealing with offenses, and just because someone got mad about your confrontation 

and then played the victim

doesn't mean you were wrong.

In this book, it talks about the value of honest, loving criticism.

The criticisms of others whom we value is a tremendous benefit to us. 

"To be criticized is often to be truly appreciated," says the author of Caring Enough to Confront.

Of course, he is talking about someone offering honest criticism to your face,

not behind your back to someone else.

And he is talking about criticism offered out of love, honesty, and necessity,

not out of a huge need for them to win and you to lose,

There is a big difference.

Some criticisms are just so negative and mean-spirited and always twisted and based on falsehood

until the only thing to do with such criticism is to reject it. 

It comes from people who feed on negativity and twist everything in life, not just things about you.

But criticism from someone who wants you to win and who cares about your success in life

rather than just their own  is a different story. 

"To be respected so much that the other person can share both positive and negative feelings about you.

To be criticized by a real friend is to be loved.

Then the book talks about our attitude about criticism. 

Do we let it defeat us? Is our self-esteem and self worth based on what others think of us?

"When you put yourself on trial, criticism is seen as rejection and praise is viewed as acceptance.

...To be consistently on trial is not living. 

It is existing as a shadow, a reflection of others' approval or disapproval.

It can all end whenever  you want it to.

No one is constantly on trial unless she or he chooses to be.

If you live for another's praise or cringe rejected under another's criticism,

you are choosing to be on trial.

You volunteer to be victim.

...To feel yourself a person of worth only when the respect is coming in,

is giving others far too much power...

Reclaim the power to be who you are in spite of your moment-to-moment performance,

regardless of your day to day achievements...

When you are permanently off trial, 

when your judges have been reclaimed as friends, equals, colleagues, you will notice a key difference

begin to occur in most of your relationships.

You no longer wield a gavel over others. 

When you are off trial, your friends, enemies, coworkers will be acquitted as well."

Good Friday--and Jesus, the Author and Finisher of Our Faith

This year I wanted to do a little something special in our family for Good Friday.

There have been times I forgot all about Good Friday until it was over.
Christmas is something celebrated for a whole month anymore.
But isn't the death and resurrection of Christ more important?
It would be so terribly easy to just follow the world around us in using Easter eggs and chicks and bunnies and candy to celebrate the Easter season. 

To do differently, you have to be intentional.
But even on Pinterest and online, there were others who wanted to make Christ the focus of Easter for their children and families, rather than the Easter Bunny or Easter egg hunts.

They don't condemn Easter eggs or bunnies.
They just want to make Christ the focus--and I liked that. 
Interestingly, we received the children's first order of real spring chicks today! They should have arrived two days ago, and we prayed the chicks would survive the blizzard's delays while they were cramped in their boxes at the postal service buildings!
Praise God the 100 chicks arrived with only two fatalities!
Several people are scheduled to arrive tomorrow to take their order of chicks home. 
Above, one of the children took this picture of the chicks on newspapers and clippings, one of which happened to be a bulletin with the cross.
The Good Friday morning sunshine opened these beautiful tulips, the centerpiece of our table this Easter season.

This afternoon, with the children's help, I made "pumpkin" pies (with blended canned yams)
and decorated with strips of pie crust sprinkled with cinnamon sugar.

Hannah brushing egg white on the crust strips.

Also, I'd gotten a recipe for Empty Tomb Rolls off of Pinterest.
Timmy, Danny and Hannah loved rolling out balls of refrigerated dough and wrapping a marshmallow inside each circle of dough. Then they brushed the roll with egg white and rolled the roll in cinnamon sugar.

When the roll is baked, the marshmallow inside melts into the dough, and the roll ends up hollow inside.
The family loved them!
They are incredibly easy (thanks to boughten refrigerated dough, but you could use your own dough),
and I love anything that has a special significance in relation to the real meaning of Easter.

So here are the baked Empty Tomb Rolls and the pie with the scene of three crosses which we added to our Good Friday supper.

 During supper, I had chosen a verse for us to learn and discuss, Hebrews 12:2.

"Looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him, endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God."

I asked what the joy was that was set before Jesus, and each person gave his own answer.

Danny said the joy was that because He died, other people don't have to die [in sin or forever].

Another answered that the joy was to have done His Father's will.

Another answer was that the joy was the fulfillment of the plan of salvation, and yet another was that after the cross, He would get to go to heaven!

I had a bit of an object lesson as we discussed. I set a box of Blue Bunny ice cream cones in the middle of the table as the treat that each child would get for learning this verse.
Before he got the joy of licking the cone, he had to endure the hardship of learning and discussing this long verse!
Even as the children were willing to do this small difficulty in order to obtain a joy,
Jesus was willing to do a very hard thing to obtain a very wonderful joy afterward. 
This was a fun way to get even children to participate in talking about something serious and needful.

We had a wonderful supper time, finishing with a time of prayer by candlelight.
I quietly snapped a few photos on purpose for my blog, with a few giggles or fusses here and there, and Sam waiting for his turn to pray until
"everyone...is reverent!"
So I "reverently" put my camera away, and we prayed for the Christians who cannot worship freely as we were this evening, for friends traveling to a funeral, for those who haven't heard of Christ.

 After supper clean up and chores and kitchen work was done, I read to the three little ones part of a book I found at the library called The First Easter. 

I was grateful for this lovely picture book that kept the three children entranced with the story of Christ's crucifixion and resurrection. We finished at the part where the centurion declared, "Truly this was the Son of God!"

The rest of the story waits till tomorrow.

So while the snow fell silently and softly outside till by now several more inches are on the ground,

inside we are cozy--

in fresh, fun ways,

remembering Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith!

A Mom's Kitchen Sink Spirituality

I wonder how many battles are fought--and won--

by moms over kitchen sinks?

I was standing at the sink yesterday doing dishes since Rose, who usually does breakfast dishes,

had stayed overnight with friends.
And I was thinking--as usual.
I'd just talked recently to a dear friend who, at age 38, is marrying a farmer.
And they are both so happy!
And I was thinking about a dream I've had that I have treasured--
about my children.

How my husband and I gave each one of them to the Lord before they were even born.
They were given to the Lord--not to the world.
To the Lord--not to just live the American dream.
And I had a dream for my children.

But there over the kitchen sink I'm surrendering my children--

and my dreams for them.

I surrender

to His dream for them.

"If you want them to be farmers, Lord," I breathe as I wipe that dish

and scrub that iron skillet,

"I'm giving up my dream, in case it doesn't match Yours."

How many large and small battles are won by moms

who are doing dishes

or practicing the bells of an acquaintance for the church Easter service

or dust mopping the dust bunnies from above the wood stove

and clearing away spider webs (and maybe even spiders)

and clearing the table after a buckwheat pancake breakfast?

Big battles that are won with a small surrender.
Just a simple, "Your will be done, Lord."

I don't have to have my way.
I just want Your way.
And if my idea of Your way isn't correct,
change my idea of Your way.

 God is as creative (or certainly more so)
than my children who can come up with the most amazing ways to amuse themselves,
like by placing cups and glasses under the plastic table cloth
and fill the valleys with water and then run play cars through the water!
God has a unique dream for each person--
like our dear friends Jason and Joanna Sturtevant who shared with us and other friends one Sunday afternoon recently about their work in Uganda with ROTOM--Reach One, Touch One Ministries.

Jason shared slides about his discipleship ministry with orphan boys whom he is mentoring
as he teaches a mechanics class to enable the young men to find jobs and support themselves.

Josh told about helping build mud and stick houses and share Christ with the poor.
He told about a poor lady who hadn't walked for a year.
Jason and Josh had prayed with her as she prayed to receive Jesus in her heart,
and later when Jason and Joshua came back around,
she was walking!
God had healed her as well as forgiving her sins!

Josh said he saw God's power work like it had been in the Bible!
Jason told about graduating his young men from his class, and Joanna told about her cooking class and hospitality work.
I'd love for our children to grow up to be missionaries or preachers or teachers or something full time in God's vineyard like Sturtevants are doing.

Or I'd love for them to be someone like their own daddy, who, though he has a full time remodeling job gives weeks out of his year to Mission Helps. In the photo below he's doing a skit at Arms Around the World Convention at our church a week and a half ago , about Mission Helps work in Ft. Myers, FL. Here he is wearing one of three hats he took for the skit, pretending to be the picky inspector who failed the final inspection at Ft. Myers Spanish church because the handicap ramp was 1/16 of an inch off specifications.

Jonathan and the boys are laying tile here to pretend it's the ramp that failed inspection.
[Praise God, the next day, Jonathan saw on Facebook that John Dykes had received the certificate of occupancy for this church at long last, and the church people had met that Sunday in the new church.
FINALLY!
Another inspector was upset with the first one for being so knit-picky.]

Or I would love if my children could be involved in Christian Law, or prison ministry like Bro. Steve Sturtevant,
who kept going up front to take pictures of whatever was going on!

But if He wants them to be laymen,
ranchers, farmers, carpenters, remodelers, ditch diggers, garbage truck drivers,
bus drivers, factory workers--

 engineers, secretaries,

nurses, doctors, midwives, museum managers,

or whatever--
Lord, it's Your dream for them that matters,
not mine.
Dedicated laymen are as desperately needed as full time Christian pastors and missionaries.
Ones who show up on Sunday and help with the work,
ones who are willing to contribute and carry their share of the load
and choose to keep loving the church people,
all those ornery, dump sheep like we all are,

instead of  just warming a pew and critiquing everyone and everything.
Ones who will help when there isn't any pay involved.

Your dream, Lord, not mine. 

Over the kitchen sink, a small surrender

that holds a ton of weight.