The reason I am probably a "No-Stuff-in-the-Attic" freak, is because when my mom died, I was the only one around to clean out the house that she and dad had lived in for over fifty years.  My brother was in China, (he's a doctor and was the first missionary to get into China when Nixon normalized our relations with China.  He stayed there thirty-seven years.)  And my sister was working full time in Jenks.  So I got elected.

The house was one thing.  The attic was another.  My mom was born in 1914, so she would have been fifteen years old when the stock market crashed in 1929.  And the depression that followed was so bad that everyone who was living through it saved everything.  Everything.

Her attic was filled with big black plastic bags with everything in them that you could possibly imagine.  Some of them had been there so long that when you started to pull them out, they crumbled into black dust.  When my brother came home on furlough, I told him that he had to clean the attic.  He tried, but he couldn't do it either.  Eventually I gave up and sold the house "as is".  Who knows what all was still up there.

But it warped me.  I vowed that I would never, ever, put anything in my attic.  And I haven't.  Well, I take that back, there are extra shingles up there in case there is a roof leak.  That's it.  There's nothing up there that I am taking with me when I move.  And nothing is going into the attic at my new house.  Period.

Matthew 6:19-20 "Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust corrupts, and where thieves break through and steal:  But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and dust don't corrupt and where thieves don't break through and steal."

Moths just ate up my cashmere lined gloves.  I hate those little pests.  I am going to take that scripture to mean that there won't be any bad bugs in heaven.

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Yesterday, I packed books.  How many books do you have in your house?  I bet your stack is like mine.  Books that I will never read again and that have no reason to take up space in my house.  There were books from college.  Books from Ken's teaching career.  Books from all the years that I taught math.  The only reason I kept them was that my name was in some of them as an editor.  I got rid of a bunch of them.  But not enough.  I swear, I am going to think twice before I put those books that I didn't throw away on the bookshelf in my new house.

Moving gives you a chance to clear things out.  We keep stuff because we might need it, but when we do need it, we don't know where we put it.  I am sure some of you out there have a system and can find everything you want to find.  I have a system.  I put everything in the study to sort later.  At least I know which room it is in.  "Later" sometimes doesn't come around for a long time.

Some people put stuff in their attic.  I have absolutely nothing in my attic.  I figure that if I put it up there, I didn't really need it.  So "attic items" get donated.

Some people buy sheds to fill up with things they no longer need.  I bought a shed once.  But the only thing I put in it was garden equipment.  Again, if I don't need it any longer and am just saving it for "just in case", I donate it to the Methodist church for their mission sale.  So it looks like the only thing I can't let go of very easily is books.  And I am going to do better.

Luke 12:15 "And Jesus said unto them, Take heed, beware of covetousness: for a man's life doesn't consist in the abundance of the things which he possesses."  And then Jesus told the parable of the man who tore down his barns to build bigger barns in which to put more stuff--rather than share his abundance with others.  It didn't turn out too good.  The man died and all his stuff was worth nothing to him.  My plan is to leave nothing for people to worry with when I am gone.

The next day, at the wedding, all eight (including Ken) of those Marines were dressed to the nines in their white uniforms, swords, medals--they were magnificent.  At that moment, it was hard to picture those dignified men lugging Ken to a cow pond.  But that is what Marines are made of.  The ability to rise to the moment and do what they set out to do.

It was my first introduction to the Marine Corps.  Up until Ken's friends flew in to participate in our wedding, I had never been around Marines.  Or military of any kind.  It was an awesome experience for an eighteen year old girl from Oklahoma.  The entire bunch of them were bigger than life.  If I had planned a wedding of my dreams, I never could have imagined anything so fantastic.  Right up to the moment that they whacked me on the rear with their swords as we left the ceremony under the arch of swords.

I was almost nine years younger than Ken.  For the next year, the Marines in his squadron were so gracious to me as I was trying to figure it all out.   Their wives took me under their wings and treated me like one of their own.  I was so young.  They were all so mature.  They helped me over and over again as I tried to figure out how to fit in with this foreign group of people.   Moving to Pensacola to the training command (aviation) was like moving to the moon.  I was a baby alien.  It was a strange world.

But God is good.  I had Ken.  And he was wonderful.  He walked in with his paycheck that first month, laid it on the kitchen table and said, "That's what we make.  Learn how to spend it because I will be gone over half the time.  You have to take care of everything, so you might as well start now."

Ephesians 5: 33 "...let every one of you in particular so love his wife even as himself; and the wife see that she reverence her husband."

When I got married, my best friend's mom had the rehearsal dinner on the lawn at their cattle ranch.  (Angus)  They had a huge acreage with a cow pond, way back of the house behind the barn.

She collected antiques and the tables were set beautifully with crystal--the works.  I can't remember how many people were there, but it was a crowd.  Ken had six groomsmen and a best man.  The seven of them had flown in from Pensacola in a Beechcraft for the rehearsal dinner, wedding and reception.  These weren't boys.  They were grown men.  Marines.  All of them were aviators with at least ten years of flying and service to their country behind them.

Well, when the dinner was over, I noticed that these guys were moving toward our table.  Ken figured it out too late.  They got him immobilized (it took all seven of them) and trotted him off holding him in the air, kicking and screaming to the cow pond  and threw him in.  Suit, tie, shoes and all.   He was a mess.  But his best man and groomsmen were laughing and yelling insults about who was the biggest, bravest, and strongest.  Ken was the only one of them that wasn't married and I guess they thought he needed an initiation.

I can still hear our little hostess calling after them, "Don't you bring him in the house.  Don't you dare bring him in the house."  Someone got a hose, and hosed the cow poop off of him.  But the shoes, suit and tie were done for.  He had to buy all new clothes.  However, the wedding the next day was in dress whites, so luckily he didn't lose anything he needed to get married.

These guys were telling this story to anyone who would listen for the next year at every party we attended.  By that time it was funny.  And Ken took it all in stride.  It's a memory.  One of those that I will never forget.  What a way to end a rehearsal dinner.

When I was in the ninth and tenth grades in high school, I worked for a florist.  They started me out doing funeral sprays--how could you mess that up?  We went to St. Louis to a convention and while I was there, I learned a lot about the shape of your creations and what looked good with what.

The couple that owned the shop had no children.  They took me under their wing and eventually I was doing the corsages, the brides bouquets and eventually flower arrangements--which are the hardest.  Everything has to balance, there are a lot of different flowers to mix together, there are different types of greenery and the bouquets are usually big.  I got good enough at it that I have continued doing that with my own flowers from my own garden for the rest of my life.

I think God must have decided to give us flowers because they have very little purpose but to bring joy.  And the colors.  God could have given us a world in black and white.  But no, he created a rainbow and a million tints in between.  For what purpose?  Joy.  Flowers, colors and music.

John 15:11 "These things I have spoken unto you, that my joy might remain in you, and that your joy might be full."  That's it.  He wants us to be full of joy.

Matthew 6:28  "Why do you worry about what you will wear.  Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow;  they don't toil and they don't spin."

Jesus liked lilies.  So do I.  When I move, I am going to take some of my peach lilies with me.  And some of the yellow ones.  And the burgundy ones.  Not all, just enough to start over.  I want whoever buys my house to have some joy as well.

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The two things that make up the Christian life and that are the hardest to do are to trust and obey.  At least for me.  I don't have any problem following rules for obedience.  I would have made a good Pharisee.  Just give me the list and I'll do it.  But trusting--and you can't be a Christian if you don't trust God--trusting is something I have to concentrate on and commit  to as a stipulation for being his child.

I tend to trust myself and turn to God when that doesn't work out.  It is something that I have to dedicate myself to even when I am struggling with my own self will.  That is the battle we fight.  We really don't want the will of God most of the time.  We want him to change His will to ours.  So we have to constantly submit to Him.

As I have grown older, it has become easier.  Because in my heart, I really do want the will of God.  I would just like for Him to discuss it with me and be sure that He knows what He is doing.

Phillipians 2: 12b-13 "...work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.  For it is God which works in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure."  If He weren't doing that, I would be doomed.  He has to do the "willing and the doing" for me.

Paul said, "That which I would not do, I do...that which I would do,  I don't do." Romans 7:15-25  (My short translation.)  He was admitting to the problem of doing the will of God in the day to day struggle.  But he kept at it.

And so must we.

I am down to almost nothing but cookies in the pantry.  I don't like sweets very much, but I may be forced to eat them for breakfast when I run out of Cheerios.   After my mom died, my dad ate cookies every morning for breakfast.  I told him that they weren't good for him and that he ought to eat something different at least part of the time.  I added that they were nothing but flour, sugar and shortening.  But he kept eating cookies.  He lived to be ninety-four and never had an ounce of fat on his body.  Maybe they were okay after all.

When my aunt Lucille died, I took the turquoise canisters that had been on her kitchen counter.  They were really old.  And very pretty.  I put them on top of my kitchen cabinets with some greenery.  Well, Monday we were snowed in so I took everything off the top of the cabinets (where did all that junk come from anyway) and ran everything through the dishwasher and packed it all up in boxes.  One more step in the process of moving.  Packing everything that I don't really need but that brings back happy memories.

Judy Baumart's son Jeremy cooked fish for all of us last night.  All of her children and grandchildren were there.  They are such a wonderful family and they include me!  I've known her children since they were babies.  Where did all that time go?  I seem to  be rambling.  Lots of odd thoughts in my head.  I'll do better tomorrow.

"...first, seek the kingdom of God and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.  Therefore, take no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself.  One day's trouble is enough for one day."  Matthew 6:33-34

I can't seem to stop thinking about tomorrow!! and the next day, and the next.  I'm just trying to get my ducks in a row.  "Take no thought for the morrow..." is hard to do.

In 1957, we lived in military housing on top of a hill at Camp Pendleton, California.  Ken was the air officer for the 7th Regiment and had to travel miles and miles to get inland to work.  If I wanted the car, I had to drive him in.  Then make the trip back, and go get him in the evening.  We were broke, so the gasoline was a huge consideration.

As a result, I learned to plan meals so that I wouldn't have to go to the commissary but once a month.  I could barely cook, so it was a challenge.  But with time, I was able to do it.  I froze milk, meat and bread.  Everything else was up for grabs.  As a result of all that planning, I always had enough to go to the cupboard and come up with something for dinner.

But the downside was that through the years, as the price of gasoline wasn't so critical, after we had two cars, my habit of buying by the month continued.  But it was worse than that.  I kept the pantry stocked with every imaginable thing I might ever need should Ken ask for something special.  Every spice, every kind of pasta, every canned fruit and vegetable known to man, flour, sugar, etc., etc.

So when I decided to move a few of months ago, I began to clean the pantry and the freezer out and made a pledge that I would never again have so much stuff in my kitchen.  The freezer is going to my brother--with all the okra I put up last summer and couldn't possibly eat in my lifetime.  And the asparagus.  I put up package after package and never ate a stalk of it.  I just like to grow it and pick it.

I don't like change, so this has been difficult for me.  I am eating only what is in the kitchen--which makes for some interesting meals.  I refuse to go the grocery store unless I run out of milk or bread.  It has been cathartic.

John 6:47b-48, 51a "He that believes on me has everlasting life.  I am that bread of life...I am the living bread which came down from heaven: if any man eat of this bread, he shall live for ever..."

Thirty, thirty-five years ago I had a class of 25-35 women in our church.  They were eager students and a joy to teach.  Which I did for three years.  We covered it all.  I had plenty of stories that fit along with scripture to keep them interested.   Stories of Christian living in application.

Jesus, on the other hand, had twelve uneducated men who for the most part couldn't read or write and had no books.  After three years following Christ, after he died, they knew enough to go out and change the world with the story of Jesus life and resurrection.  Of what Christ had done for them and for the world.  The gospel.  All they had was what they remembered and the Holy Spirit.

I'm certainly not Jesus, but by my way of thinking, these women (who were educated)  should have learned enough in three years to share Christ.  The story hadn't changed and they had the same Holy Spirit that the disciples had.  They had so many more resources than the twelve disciples had.  They could read.  Write.  And they all had a Bible with every part of the life of Christ available at their  fingertips.  They didn't have to remember what Jesus had said, they could read it for themselves.

So I told them it was time to find a place to serve.  But they wouldn't.  They were happy where they were.  So I knew I was going to have  to do something or they would sit and soak for as long as I was willing to teach them.  So I gave them a month's notice.  "Find a place to serve the Lord.  There are classes of children, teenagers, that need a teacher.  There are committees that need people.

Nothing happened.  So on the fourth Sunday, I came into the class and told them that I was done.  I told them that they had all they needed and that it was time to serve.  I picked up my Bible and left.  I went to see if the youth director needed help, and started teaching senior girls.

Those women are all serving in the church.  Many of them are Bible teachers.  "She quit," one of them told our pastor.  "We couldn't believe it.  She just picked up her Bible and walked out."

Sometimes you have to give people a push.  A number of these women are teachers and are reaching lost people.  All you need is a Bible and the Holy Spirit.

In 1972, when Scott was nine,  I had Jonathan.  And within a few months I had surgery on my heart that left me pretty much helpless.  That next year about all I could do was sit.  My strength was gone. But I had four children and a husband to feed.

So when it was time to think about what to fix the six of us for supper, about all I could do was plan.  I was thirty-four years old and completely shot.  (I've told you about that in past blogs.  It was a tumor, and they took out the walls of my heart and messed up the AV node.  I lived.  But I no longer have any heartbeats of my own.  Thank God for pacemakers.)

Ken was driving sixty-five miles a day to work.  Becky was a cheerleader and busy every day after school.  Pat was in drama and they had practice every afternoon.  However, Scott  would come in from baseball practice a little before everyone else did--and I would tell him what to do and he would fix our food as I gave him instructions.  What a cool nine year old.

"Boil four cups of water.  Get the spaghetti out of the pantry and put it in the water.  Open a couple of cans of Contadina tomato paste.  Chop up an onion.  Brown a pound of hamburger in the iron skillet."  Eventually, we would have spaghetti sauce.  He got really good at fixing dinner.  He could even make gravy.  Eventually I didn't have to tell him what to do.

He liked to cook.  He still does.   Between the two  of us, we got dinner on the table every night.  Ken and the girls would come home, and we would all sit down together to eat.  Ken brought home a paycheck.  The girls set the table and took care of Jonathan.  Scott cooked dinner.  And I sat around doing not much of anything for three years.  It was awful for a Type A personality.  But God is good.  And now I am semi-normal.  Whatever that is.

Psalms 23:1 "The Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want....He prepares a table before me..."

Today I went to see the accountant to do my taxes.  Ken always did our taxes and I really have no idea what I am doing.  I can do calculus, but I can't do arithmetic.  I will invariably add or subtract incorrectly.  Thank goodness for calculators.  Thank goodness for accountants.

I found out one good thing.  None of the insurance money is taxable.  I thought the government taxed everything they could think of taxing.  The money is gone anyway.  It took all of it to get my children to Arlington with me.   It was money well spent.  It was a once in a lifetime experience.  All those Marines.  The horses, the wagon, the band.  It was huge.  Huge.

I am counting days at this point.  A week from today I will sign the contract for my new house in Edmond.  It will take at least two months to get it ready to move into.  Cosmetic things.

I have so many flowers that I want to take with me.  I want a start of my mothers phlox.  And some  irises that came from a Ponca Iris guru.  Hostas, lilies, peonies. My flower beds are so overgrown that I can take starts from everything and not leave a dent.  I am also going to take some of my asparagus.  It takes three years before you can harvest asparagus and I don't want to start all over on it.

In Matthew 6:28, Jesus was telling his followers in the Sermon on the Mount that they shouldn't worry about things.  He was reminding us that God is faithful.  "Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow.  They don't toil, neither do they spin.  Wherefore, if God clothes the grass of the field...shall he not much more clothe you...?"

I hope everything I transplant will grow.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                             

I have always been fascinated with the verses in 1 Corinthians 16:45,47, and 49:  "And so it is written, The first man Adam was made a living soul;  the last Adam was made a quickening spirit.  The first man is of the earth, earthy;  the second man is the Lord from heaven.  And as we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly."

Paul is writing about the difference between two perfect men.  One, Adam, who lost his perfectness through disobedience.  And the second, Jesus, who didn't.  Of course Adam only "held" the breath of God.  He was simply flesh until God breathed into him the breath of life and he became a living soul.  Which is the prototype of what happens to us when we receive the Holy Spirit.  On the other hand, Jesus was God and was wrapped in earthly flesh.   One started out as flesh and received God.  The other was God and received, or was wrapped in flesh.

Obedience is the center of the Christian life.  Samuel put it this way:  1Samuel 15:22 "...Has the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the Lord?  Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice..."  (Keith Green wrote a song with those words.  Great beat.  Google it.)

Jesus was able to be the sacrificial Lamb of God because he met the requirement of perfection.  All sacrifices for the Israelites had to be perfect.  They were examined for three days before the okay was given to consider that they were acceptable for sacrifice.  He became the sacrifice for all of us.

Because of that, we will bear the "...image of the heavenly."  Not the image of the earthly.  "What?  Don't you know that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which you have of God, and you are not your own?  For you are bought with a price;  therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are God's."  1 Corinthians 6: 19-20

My land line phone isn't working.  And I spilled water on my cell phone.  Which means that I am effectually out of commission.  It sure is quiet.  However, my friend Carolyn drove out to see why I wasn't answering my phone and if I had dropped off the face of the earth.

I was in Tulsa all day.  Yearly Mammogram--which always gives me a little pause.  Everything was okay.  It has been six years and I am am still cancer free.  Praise God.  I don't think I could survive Chemo again.  Sickest I ever was in my life.  Some of my friends breezed through Chemo.  I wasn't that lucky.  Breast cancer is now an epidemic.  Much more common than the current hysteria over measles.  You would think someone would figure out what is causing it.  One in four women will get it sometime in their lives.

In Matthew 8:16-17, Jesus healed a number of people.  One man, a military centurion, came many many miles to ask that Jesus heal his servant.  He said, "Lord, I am not worthy that you should come under my roof: but speak the word only, and my servant shall be healed.  I am a man under authority, having soldiers under me.  I say to this man, Go, and he goes.  And to another, Come, and he comes."  The centurion recognized that Jesus was under the authority of God.

Jesus turned and spoke to his followers and disciples and said, "I have not found so great faith, no, not in Israel."

Jesus didn't heal everyone.  And there are some people, some religious groups, who say that you are sick because you don't have enough faith.  Rediculous.  God heals whomever he chooses to heal.  He has a master plan.  We just play a small part.  The hard part is sincerely wanting to be part of his plan--no matter what.

I wouldn't be human if I didn't tell you that that is hard sometimes.


 

I remember a story about my dad that I haven't told you.  When WWII was over, he opened an appliance store.  One day when he was delivering a washing machine on the Spavinaw road, this side of the dam,  he saw a man across the way, standing on his front porch who wouldn't stop staring at him.  He unloaded the washer, and was leaving when the man approached him and said, "I know you.  You're one of the Swan boys, from Wilberton.  You're Elmer."  My dad was very surprised.  He didn't recognize the man.  Dad had grown up in Wilberton, but had moved to Pryor many, many years previously.   "Who are you?" he asked.

The man continued.  "You wouldn't remember me.  You were just a little kid at the time.  But I know something about your family.  I know who murdered your dad.  Some people tried to say that your father killed himself, but that isn't true.  I know who killed him."

My father was seven when his dad was murdered.  William Swan was very wealthy, and it was the wild west.   Murder was not uncommon.  But the question was always there.  Who did it?  My father was shocked.  Shaken.  "Who are you?" he asked again.  "What do you know about my dad?"

"If you will come back tomorrow, I'll tell you all about it," the man said.  "I don't want to talk about it right now.  Seeing you has been an upset for me.  It was a long time ago and I'd almost forgotten."

Dad returned to Spavinaw road the next morning, eager to hear the man's story and find out what he knew.  But when he pulled into the man's driveway, the house was standing empty.  Everything was gone.  No car, no furniture, and no man.  My dad asked around but no one knew what happened to him.  The man had vanished.  Was he the murderer?  Or was he afraid that if he told who did it that he would be in danger.  It was a question that haunted dad for the rest of his life.  He always wondered what would have happened if he had insisted that the man talk to him that day.  Or insisted on learning his name.  William was murdered in 1917.  Everyone who would know about it is gone.  It will always be a mystery.  Only God knows.  At some point, the murderer faced God and was judged.  

The news is full of wars and rumors of wars.   The people of the world are trying to kill each other.  But they have been doing that for as long as we have historical knowledge of the human race.  In Matthew 24:6, Jesus is speaking: "...you shall hear of wars and rumors of wars:  don't be troubled: for all theses things must come to pass, but the end is not yet.  For nation shall rise against nation and kingdom against kingdom..."  Why can't people get along with each other??!!      

I have been reading this last couple of weeks (to occupy my mind).  Four John Grishom novels that I had missed somewhere along the way.  And now I am halfway through "How the Irish Saved Civilization" by Thomas Cahill.  I had read this book a few years ago, loved it enough to add it to my permanent collection of books, and am completely fascinated with it all over again.

It takes you through all recorded civilized history, the wars they fought, and the heroes and great minds of each age.  It moves toward the fall of Rome and the burning and destruction of the records of history by the barbarians when they invaded Rome--which begins the dark ages.  Civilized living seems to be lost.  But way off in a forgotten land, far from the events in Rome, the Irish--a wild and woolly people come to the rescue.  Patrick has Christianized Ireland.  And even though they are on the outskirts of civilization--they are hardly civilized themselves--they quietly pull off a literary miracle.  And from an isolated people who for the most part can't read or write.  

It is a fascinating book.  Cahill draws a huge amount of history from the letters of Paul.  It is interesting to remember that Paul was a Roman.  He came from a wealthy family who sent him to study at the feet of Gamaliel--a doctor of the law. The leading scholar of that day.  Acts 5:34,
Acts 22:3.

We have many of the lost records of history because of the Irish.

The inspection on the new house went well.  I guess that means I will sign a contract on March second.  Then I won't be so nuts.  I won't be in limbo any more.  If any of you have any room on your prayer list for very "trivial" things, pray for me that this house will sell soon.

I just found out that one of my extended relatives (Ann Harrison) is reading my blog.  She doesn't like breakfast either and gave me some suggestions.  Nice.  Tomorrow I am going to finish up the jar of Prego.

This new house has a Koi pond.  I will have to get a lawn chair and put it next to the pond so that I can watch the fish.  I hope Squig doesn't think they are dinner.

"In my Father's house are many mansions.  If it were not so I would have told you.  I go to prepare a place for you...that where I am there you may be also."  John 14:2-3b

I have the feeling that Christ is also preparing a place for me in Edmond.  Everything seems to fall in place when I let him do the doing.  I am such a control freak.  That is the one area of my Christian life that always gives me trouble.  I want to plan everything.  I want to know what is going to happen next.  Like I said yesterday, I like to move in a one, two, three direction.  And God doesn't always clue me in on His plans.

His plans are better than mine anyway.

The reason I ate all the Cheetos was because a local discount store had them ten for a dollar.  I figured that if they didn't cost anything then they couldn't be all that bad.  It was totally out of character for me.  The problem is that I bought forty bags.  It is just one more notch in my downward dietary demise.

Breakfast lately has been spaghetti and Prego.  Which is probably an improvement.  For breakfast, I have eaten a can of black eyed peas seasoned with bacon drippings, a can of hominy, an enchilada, gumbo and rice, and a leftover something I couldn't really identify--I think it was fried okra.  Occasionally I break down from embarrassment and fix some oatmeal.  I have never been able to face an egg in the morning (or any other time) so breakfast is a challenge.  My solution for years has been to skip it.  But my doctor is not happy with that, so I am experimenting with morning food.  So far, so good--except for the Cheetos.

I have quit cooking almost altogether.  Becky loads me up with home cooked individual meals (frozen) every time I go to Edmond.  Gumbo, meatballs, ham and red-eye gravy (yum), eggplant parmesan--so I have plenty in the freezer to thaw.  And I usually cook every other Sunday or so
for Scott and Stacy and my brother Bill and Janet.  This Sunday I am cooking stew and cornbread.  So I do occasionally break down and start something from scratch.  I have cooked at least two meals a day for the last fifty seven years.  Ken always had hot food.  I find it interesting that I have so little interest in it now.

It is a good thing I don't care for sweets.  But I don't like them.  Sugar is not my thing.  Bread, well that is another story.  I have a sweet friend (Kathy) who bakes me bread--hot rolls--from time to time.  I usually eat them all in a day.  I never met a carbohydrate that I didn't love.

Romans 14:17  "For the kingdom of God is not meat and drink (and Cheetos); but righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit."

I am a very orderly person.  I always start at the beginning of a task--never in the middle--and proceed from there:  One, two, three....but this last couple of weeks I have been in limbo.  I called my daughter Pat and told her that I had gone through fifteen bags of Cheetos in the last fifteen days, and she started laughing at me.  "You never do things like that," she said.  "You never let us eat junk food.   You never even bought junk food.  You always eat healthy!"

"I know, I know," I told her.  "But I am in limbo over this move and Cheetos seemed like a good distraction.  I understand now why people who are stressed find comfort in food.  However, it is not comforting.  I want to pack some things, but it is too early to start doing that.  I want to hire painters and carpenters and carpet men, but I still don't have a final contract.  I have to wait.  And wait.   I lie awake at night trying to decide what step one, two and three are going to be.  What do I pack first?  Who do I hire to do the first repairs on the house?  How am I going to get all of this done by myself?"

We are supposed to take our burdens to the Lord in prayer.  And I do.  I just pick them back up when I am through praying.  God must get totally disgusted with me.  I am trying to stop thinking about it all, since it doesn't do any good and just makes me mentally tired.  But it surely is difficult.  Ken always had such a calming effect on me.  He never worried about anything.  He brought peace to my Type A personality.  I wish he was here.  He would say, "Everything will turn out okay.  Stop worrying about it."

"Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and lean not unto your own understanding.  In all your ways acknowledge him and he shall direct your paths." Proverbs 3:6

I'm trying.  I'm really trying.  I certainly do need some  mind clearing direction.

546.  That's how many times I have written to you.  I have no idea what I have told you and what I haven't.  I am sure that I am going to start repeating myself sooner or later.  I have been going back and rereading things that I have written to remind myself what I have said.

Last week was traumatic.  Squig and I are still trying to figure out how to live by ourselves without Bo around.  It is much quieter.  Bo liked to talk.  He would sit by my chair, open his mouth really wide and make all sorts of sounds.  I never did figure out what he was saying, but I would go through the list of things that it might be, and eventually hit on something that satisfied him.  Squig, on the other hand, only makes noise when he knows I am leaving the house.  The minute I reach for my coat and gloves, he begins to whimper.  I'm a soft touch, so usually he goes with me.

But on Sunday, he never asks to go.  He just watches me get ready for church, crawls up into my bed, and goes to sleep.  I almost believe that he knows that seven days have gone by and that he will have to wait on me to get home.  You would think that he would want to go to Sunday School!!

Every other month, I play the piano.  Once every eight weeks, I play the marimba.  I am in charge of setting up all the special music, so everyone is on an eight week rotation.  But if new talent shows up in the congregation, I will have to reorganize.  Someone asked me this morning what would happen when I moved.  I told them that I would come back and play the marimba every eight weeks.  

I am going to have to find a church in Edmond, but until then, this is my church home.  My church family.  "How will you know which church to go to?" someone asked me.  Well, I have a plan.  I am going to go by different churches during the week, talk to the pastors, and find out which ones need a Bible teacher.  I am not going to quit teaching.  I can quit the marimba and the piano, but not the sharing of God's word.  God has given me so very much.  I must give something back.

"For unto whom much is given...much is required." Luke 12: 48b