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"Good" Friday: a day of darkness

"Good" Friday: a day of darkness


Death Valley Natn’l Park, Easter 2006

… you were not redeemed with perishable things like silver or gold
from your futile way of life inherited from your forefathers,
but with precious blood,
as of a lamb
unblemished
and spotless,
the blood of Christ.
– I Peter 1:18-19

As a result of the anguish of His soul,
He will see it and be satisfied;
By His knowledge the Righteous One,
My Servant, will justify the many,
As He will bear their iniquities.
Therefore, I will allot Him a portion with the great,
And He will divide the booty with the strong;
Because He poured out Himself to death,
And was numbered with the transgressors;
Yet He Himself bore the sin of many,
And interceded for the transgressors.
– Isaiah 53:11-12

Then the soldiers of the governor took Jesus into the Praetorium
and gathered the whole Roman cohort around Him.
And they stripped Him, and put a scarlet robe on Him.
And after weaving a crown of thorns, they put it on His head, and a reed in His right hand; and they kneeled down before Him and mocked Him, saying, “Hail, King of the Jews!”
And they spat on Him, and took the reed and began to beat Him on the head.
And after thay has mocked Him, they took His robe off and put His garments on Him,
and led Him away to crucify Him.
And about the ninth hour
Jesus cried out with a loud voice, saying, “Eli, Eli, lama sabachtani?” that is,
“My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?“
– Matthew 27:27-31,46

Awakening Beauty

Awakening Beauty

Sleeping Beauty by Jesse Wilcox Smith

The Prince sees Beauty, and is amazed.
He gazes, enthralled by her loveliness.
Now he must decide, will he continue to gaze upon her, watching her slumber? Or will he disturb her repose, awakening her, that he might know, in a fuller and more awake sense, the one whom he has adored from a distance?

A waltz when she walks in the room
She pulls back the hair from her face
She turns to the window to sway in the moonlight
Even her shadow has grace
A waltz for the girl out of reach
She lifts her hands up to the sky
She moves with the music
The song is her lover
The melody’s making her cry
So she dances
In and out of the crowd like a glance
This romance is
From afar calling me silently

A waltz for the chance I should take
But how will I know where to start?
She’s spinning between constellations and dreams
Her rhythm is my beating heart

So she dances
In and out of the crowd like a glance
This romance is
From afar calling me silently

I can’t keep on watching forever
I give up this view just to tell her

When I close my eyes I can see
The spotlights are bright on you and me
We’ve got the floor
And you’re in my arms
How could I ask for more?

So she dances
In and out of the crowd like a glance
This romance is
From afar calling me silently

I can’t keep on watching forever
And I’m givin’ up this view just to tell her
– josh groban, “So She Dances” from Awake

Happy Birthday To Daddy, Happy Birthday To You!

Happy Birthday To Daddy, Happy Birthday To You!



He turned 50 today!!!!!!
Wow, that’s old! Or young, it just depends on your perspective.

We had a party this afternoon, to which some of Dad’s oldest friends (or at least, the oldest local ones) were invited.
The main event was a BBQ, and included hot dogs and kosher Polish dogs (with sour kraut), two kinds of hamburgers, and salmon.
Some of the favorite recipes from today were Ambrosia (otherwise known as “5-Cup Salad”), Chocolate Spice Cake and Lemon Meringue Pie. Yummy!

Ambrosia
1 cup flaked/shredded coconut
1 cup sour cream
1 cup mandarin oranges
1 cup pineapple chunks
1 cup miniature marshmallows
Combine everything, and let it sit overnight in the fridge. You can mess with the proportions as much as you want (I like to triple the recipe and put in 4 cups of mini marshmallows). Best served chilled.


Chocolate Spice Cake
Grease and dust a 9×13 sheet pan.
Sift together:
2 cups flour
2 cups sugar
Combine and bring to a boil:
1 cup butter
1 cup water
4 tbsp. cocoa
Pour this over the dry mixture and mix in:
2 eggs
1/2 cup buttermilk
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. cinnamon
1 tsp. vanilla
Bake at 400 degrees, 20-25 minutes.
Icing
Heat:
1 stick butter
4 tbsp. cocoa
6 tbsp. milk
Add 1/2 – 1 box powdered sugar to achieve desired consistency and 1 cup pecans (optional). Spread on cake while hot.

Lemon Meringue Pie
Combine
3 tbsp. cornstarch with
1 cup (scant) sugar in the top of a double boiler. Add
grated rind of 1 lemon,
4 tbsp. lemon juice,
1 tbsp butter, and
3 beaten egg yolks. Mix well, then add
1 1/2 cups boiling water slowly.
Cook over hot water until thick (should coat the back of a spoon).
Pour into pre-baked pie shell.
Meringue
Beat until foamy
3 egg whites
1/4 tsp. cream of tartar
5 tbsp sugar (beat in slowly) until stiff and glossy.
Do NOT under-beat.
Heap meringue onto hot pie filling and spread – carefully sealing edges to prevent shrinking or weeping.
Bake about 10 minutes at 400 degrees, or until delicately golden-brown.
Cool gradually to prevent shrinking.

It sounds as if all we did was eat! Not so …………….. There was a lot of talking, laughing, and remembering!
We had a wonderful time celebrating Dad and all that he has meant to us.
I do not think that it is possible to overstate the blessing of having a father who loves God, a father who seeks to know God ever better and deeper. Even more, one who prays for his children every day.

Thank you, Daddy, for teaching me about the Lord of your life and the world He so lovingly created.
I love you Dad.

Becoming (best?) Friends

Becoming (best?) Friends

So true! If you had asked me 5 months ago if I had any “romantic prospects”, you would have received an emphatic “no”. Chances are, you probably did! But …such is God, Our God forever and ever; He will guide us until death (Psalm 48:14). It seems as if God loves to surprise me; life with Him never gets stale, and I am enjoying every moment.

There was a definite process by which one made people into friends.
It involved talking to them and listening to them for hours at a time.
-Rebecca West

John and I are on our way to becoming very good friends, perhaps even life-long companions. Yes, this involves hours of talking, hours of listening, and multiple hours of conversations. Hours of talking tend to take up a lot of time (!), but I wouldn’t want to spend those hours in any other way …

The God of Everything

The God of Everything

Give thanks to the LORD, for He is good;
For His lovingkindness is everlasting.
Give thanks to the God of gods,
For His lovingkindess is everlasting.
Give thanks to the Lord of lords,
For His lovingkindness is everlasting.
To Him who alone does great wonders,
For His lovingkindness is everlasting.
To Him who made the heavens with skill,
…
To Him who spread out the earth above the waters,
…
To Him who made the great lights,
…
The sun to rule by day,
…
The moon and stars to rule by night,
For His lovingkindness is everlasting.

Give thanks to the God of heaven,
For His lovingkindness is everlasting.

-Psalm 136:1-9, 28


Happy Birthday To You …

Happy Birthday To You …

Anna Genette Jacobsen

Anna’s birthday was yesterday. She turned 19.
19 years of Anna’s life, some bittersweet, but all wonderful, and I am thankful for every moment.
Watching her grow up (it sounds so odd to say that, I am only 20 months her senior) physically, emotionally, spiritually, and mentally has taught me alot. In many ways I look up to her (and not just because she happens to be 3 1/2 inches taller). She has walked through valleys so deep that I cannot see myself ever being in them, and she has come through with a strong and glorious faith. She is far from perfect, and knows it very well, but has an incredibly strong desire to grow ever more like Christ. And she really knows how to have fun (she just might be the camp counselor who helped your daughter put Vaseline on the door knobs). I can hardly wait to see the kind of woman she might be in five years …



We celebrated tonight with presents and a chocolate cake that Julia made (from scratch – it was very good). “A good time was had by all.”

Grieving

Grieving

Myrtle Swanbom died yesterday morning.
She was older than I know, and has been a member of our church for longer than I can remember.
As far back as I remember, Mrs. Swanbom has loved me and wanted to know “how I was”. She was a dear woman, very frail, and always reminded me of a little white bird.
Some people I know would say, “Myrtle went to be with the Lord, praise God.”
As I was thinking about Mrs. Swanbom dying, her husband grieving, and how we should respond, I also thought about how may Christians state the fact that someone died. I thought about how a non-Christian would hear that statement.
First, we do not grieve as those who have no hope.
Second, non-christians are those who have no hope.
Our joy as we grieve is unexplainable, if you do not have it yourself. In fact, our joy could be seen as being downright crass (“thank God she is with Him” can be heard as “thank God she is dead”). There is no reason to smile through the tears, unless you know beyond anything that death is not the end, that it is barely the beginning.
We know that to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord. We know that “precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of His saints”.
This does not mean that we do not grieve, definitely not.
It means that though we grieve, we have hope.
Better, it means that we have the Hope.

Another Glorious Day

Another Glorious Day

to the north-east

to the south-east

Ben is running around in a T-shirt and shorts. He just went outside and came back in saying, “It’s cold out there!” Not really, just when you are wearing a T-shirt and shorts. :-) It is actually a beautiful, glorious day, a day that makes it almost painful to study inside. Maybe I will take my stack of books out to the patio… That sounds like a very good idea!
Now, I wonder how much I can get done before we leave for the CEF After School program …… ?

The Love of God

The Love of God

The world does not bid you to sing, but God does. Song is the sign of an unburdened heart; then sing your songs of love unbidden, ever rising higher and higher into a fuller concept of the greatest, grandest fact on the stage of time – God is love.
But words and emotions pass, precious as their influence may be for the time, so when the duller moments come and the mind comes to require something more certain and sure to consider than the memory of mere emotions and stirring sentiments, consider this revelation – the eternal fact that God is love, not, God is loving. God and love are synonymous. Love is not an attribute of God, it is God; whatever God is, love is. If your concept of love does not agree with justice, judgment, purity and holiness, then your idea of love is wrong. It is not love you conceive of in your mind … .
-Oswald Chambers The Love of God, chp 1