I was standing before my 4th grade class while the teacher took out the canned goods my parents had sent for the food drive.  We had always participated before, but never before had I brought such treasures.  All my fellow students oohed and aahed as the teacher pulled out beef stew, chicken noodle soup, Beanee Weanees, Chef-Boy-Ar-Dee, along with some fruit and applesauce.  I clearly had the best offering of the bunch, at least in the minds of children.  Even the teacher was impressed.  The only thing that confused me was her writing my name on each can with a big black marker, as she did for each student.  We took them to the shelves lining the back wall of the pink portable school room “until they’re needed.”

That same day our history lesson suddenly jumped forward a few hundred years to World War II.  The teacher said she had a surprise for us. “In the war, soldiers had to wear identification called ‘dog tags.’  While we study this section, you will get to wear your very own dog tags just like they did.”  And there they were, my own shiny silver dog tags hanging from a chain, with my name, my daddy’s name, our address and phone number (Cypress 3-3363, if I remember correctly), my birth date, and something odd up in the right hand corner that no one ever explained, O+.

I suppose the strangest part of this whole World War II study was the “You are there” experience.  The teacher said she wanted us to know what life must have been like for those poor people who lived in the war zone, so from then on, whenever she shouted, “Plane!” we would all dive under our desks with our hands clasped behind our necks until she gave the “all clear.”  Far from being frightened by all of this, we were thrilled.  As it happened, a couple of television series about the war were running that year, and it was like playing a part in it.  None of us had ever been touched by the horrors of a real war, so it was just a big game to us.

After a few days, our war study ended.  We were instructed to leave our dog tags at home, and, for some reason, the poor people no longer needed the food, so we all took our cans back home.  Why none of us questioned any of this is beyond me.  It was a simpler time, I suppose, when children just did as they were told without asking why.

I gradually forgot about that odd experience, but when I was a teenager studying American History I suddenly figured it out.  On October 14, 1962 American satellites had just discovered Soviet missiles carrying nuclear warheads on the island of Cuba, and the Cold War was on the brink of becoming the hottest war ever fought. 

We lived on the west side of Orlando, about halfway between Cape Canaveral and Strategic Air Command at MacDill AFB in Tampa, two prime targets.  Should we be attacked while in school, the dog tags identified us until a family member could be located, the blood type expedited care if we were injured, the food fed us a few days if it took that long to find us a place to go, and all that “war” practice was to keep injuries at a minimum—from the normal things anyway.  There was not much they could do about radioactive fallout.

I cannot imagine how it must have felt to send your child out alone in times like that, but, as I recall, no one stayed home.  We sat every day with our dog tags jingling as we jumped up and down to the shout of “Plane!”  My parents went to work every morning and so did the neighbors.  Life went on, but we took some pretty elaborate precautions—it would have been foolish to do otherwise.

Things are not really that different now.  We’re not afraid of bombs falling at any moment, but there are much worse things out there to harm our children.  Are you taking any precautions?  Do they know who they are and where they belong?  Do they know what to do in case their faith is attacked?

Send them out well-armed.  The doctrines of Satan, most notably humanism, lie between the lines of practically every school textbook. Look through them the first day they cross your threshold. “Values clarification” is just a fancy way of saying “situation ethics.”  You need to know the teacher who is teaching it, and her own moral code.  Talk to your children every night about things they have heard from teachers or friends.  Start doing this their first day of school.  If you wait till they are teenagers, it is too late.

The Cuban Missile Crisis lasted just a few days, but look how carefully the parents prepared “just in case.”  You have a crisis today that lasts far longer.  You need to prepare even more than those parents did.  The “just in case” is a whole lot more terrifying.

Give ear, O my people, to my law; incline your ears to the words of my mouth.  I will open my mouth in a parable; I will utter dark sayings of old, which we have heard and known, and our fathers have told us.  We will not hide them from their children, telling to the generations to come the praises of Jehovah, and his strength, and his wondrous works that he has done…that the generation to come might know them, even the children that should be born, who should arise and tell them to their children; that they might set their hope in God, and not forget the works of God, but keep his commandments, Psa 78:1-4, 6,7.

Dene Ward

Silas came to visit a few weeks ago all by himself.  Granddad had carefully planned the play time, and on the first afternoon, as the thermometer hit 95, and the sun beat down mercilessly, he grabbed the garden hose and I knew immediately what was up.

Keith was always a hands-on Dad, more hands on than the boys wanted in some cases, but also in the fun times.  He played with them from the time they were born, carefully moderating his strength when they were small, but never moderating the little boy inside that never quite left him.  One of my favorite pictures came when he knocked on the door one rainy day, and there the three of them stood, streaked with mud, having played in the soft warm rain throwing mud balls until you could only tell which was which by their relative size.

So now it was four year old Silas’s turn, his baptism by mud, so to speak, as Keith filled up the low spot in front of the sour orange and the herb bed, dammed by a berm so the water would back up and have time to soak into the ground before rushing on down the hill to the run just off the east side of the property.  As soon as the spot was a couple inches deep, Keith called him in to splash around.  Even that took awhile, but finally Silas waded in and started jumping up and down, squealing with delight as the water splashed up around him, and especially when it splashed on Granddad.

Then came the magic moment.  Keith reached down into the black mud, scratched up a handful, and flung it carefully onto Silas’s back.  Talk about indignant!  He scrambled up the slope to the carport where I sat in the breeze of a fan, drinking iced tea and watching the fun.  “Granddad threw mud on me,” he complained as he spun in a circle trying to see the damage behind him.

“So throw some on him!”  I said encouragingly.

He was aghast.  “But it’s dirty,” he argued.

“That’s the fun,” I told him, and he slowly walked back to the puddle, glancing over his shoulder at me with a skeptical look.

Granddad met him with another handful of mud, this time on the chest.  “Arghh!” he protested and scrambled away, but this time not to me.  I was obviously not on his side in this one.

“Here,” Keith said, and stood, chest bare and arms out wide.  “Throw some on me.”

Once again, Silas yelled, “No,” but it wasn’t long till he finally picked up a handful of mud on his own.  Keith stood there with a grin, waiting as Silas walked up to him.  But the little guy couldn’t stand it.  Just as he got within a four-year-old’s throwing range, he turned and threw the mud into the puddle instead.  Immediately, Keith picked up a handful and threw it on him.  Silas ran around in circles, but never left the area this time.  In a flash he had another fistful, but once again threw it in the puddle. 

Finally, Keith sat down in the mud.  “See?  I’m already muddy now.  It’s okay to throw it on me.”

It still took another five minutes, but finally Silas got into the spirit of the thing and threw a generous handful at Keith.   I am not sure how much reached skin, but he was as thrilled as if he had dumped a bucketful on him.

For the next thirty minutes the mud was flying.  They both wound up with mud caked on their shorts, dripping from clumps on their shoulders, bellies, backs, and even their heads.  I doubt Silas had ever been that dirty in his entire life, and he thoroughly enjoyed it.

I could do a lot with this one.  I could talk about hands-on fathering.  I could talk about shucking your dignity so you can play with your child, about shedding that authoritative image so he will know you love him enough not just to correct him, but to enjoy being with him--on his level, not yours.  That’s easy, so I will let you take care of that one.

How about this?  Did you notice how hard it was for Silas to actually start throwing the mud?  Even though he was assured it was all right, even though he was encouraged to have fun that normally was not allowed, it still took a long time for him to give in, but give in he did.  Why do we think we can hold up against far more powerful forces than that when we place our souls in harm’s way?

The world will tell you it’s all right.  The world will tell you it’s fun.  The world will say, “Look at me.  See?  I’m doing just fine, and so will you.”  If you think you won’t give in, you probably have an inflated opinion of your spiritual strength.  The truly strong person would have never been there to begin with.

So take it from a little boy who had the time of his life in a mud fight.  You will give in too, only your fight will end up with a dirt that can’t be washed away with a hose, and you may enjoy it too much to ever leave the mud puddle behind.

You therefore, beloved, knowing this beforehand, take care that you are not carried away with the error of lawless people and lose your own stability. But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To him be the glory both now and to the day of eternity. Amen, 2 Peter 3:17-18.

Dene Ward

If you missed yesterday’s Part 1 post, take a minute now and read it.  Today we will make a memory verse card.
             
Get out your pencils and let’s try a few things. But before you do, let me add this—you do not have to be an artist.  The only one who is worried about what
those drawings look like is you.  Once the child knows what they are, he uses them like other people use mnemonics—to help him remember.  And this is where the good old stick man comes into play.

I cannot draw.  I can’t even do a Jackson Pollock splatter.  Oh, I can do the basic tree--a brown stick with a fluffy green cloud on top. I can do a light bulb, which comes in handy every time you come across the word “light” in a verse. 
I can do the daisy on a stem with two leaves and the square house with
two windows and a door.  For a sheep, I can draw yet another fluffy cloud, this one white, with four stick legs, and a head and tail.  
 
No, I can’t do much in the way of drawing—but I can make a stick man do
practically anything.  He can pray, he can kneel, he can run, he can walk, he can fish (I will make you fishers of men), he can sleep, he can shout, he can talk or preach or sing or any other sound, simply by drawing him an open mouth. You tell the children what he is doing—trust me, they will remember.  
             
One other thing:  make important words look special.  Always put God or Lord or Spirit in a puffy cloud.  Draw only the bottom half of a cloud and write “heaven” in it when you need that word.  Take words like faith and grace and good and evil, put them in all caps and box them in an appropriate color, like blue for good and red for evil.  Before long, those children who are “too young to learn anything” will actually start to recognize those special words.

So what did I do with that hard memory verse?  Remember as you read the verse below, the drawings replace one word or phrase; you don’t write the words under the drawing.  What I drew ended up like this (the brackets are the pictures I drew instead of the word or phrase immediately preceding them):  
             
See [Stick man with hand above his eyes as if he is looking off in the distance] what kind of love [heart] the FATHER (in a cloud) has given to us [3 stick men, one handing something to two others] that we should be called [stick man with
hands around his mouth and flared out lines coming from his mouth] children
[several smaller stick people] of GOD (in a cloud).

Silas learned that verse in one afternoon, and he loved that card.  If he could learn that one, what’s to stop him from simple things like “You are the light of the world, a city set on a hill?”  Come on now, you can draw that one yourself, right?
             
One more step remains in this process.  Eventually you should reach the point
that you can draw only one or two of the pictures from that card onto a smaller
one.  Then use it like a flashcard.  When your child sees it, s/he should automatically spout out the longer verse.  It will happen.  As you add verses, you constantly go over the old ones using only the small “one picture”
flashcards.  I used to have the parents come into the class after services at the end of every quarter.  When they saw their two and three year olds quoting ten or eleven memory verses just from looking at a simple line drawing, or a good old stick man, on an index card, they were amazed.
         
Your child can do it too.  I know it, and so does God.

Only take care, and keep your soul diligently, lest you forget the things that your eyes have seen, and lest they depart from your heart all the days of your life. Make them known to your children and your children's children--Deuteronomy 4:9.


Dene Ward


  

The mind of a child is an amazing thing.  It processes and stores information like a computer, tons of it every day as he learns how to communicate, how to get along with others, how to quantify, how to adapt.  And he learns these things much faster than we seem to realize.  Trust me, your child knows when you are happy with him and when you are not before he is a year old, and he knows how to get exactly what he wants—he will train you far better than you will train him if you aren’t careful.

Although I taught all ages of piano and voice students, my Bible class teaching gradually shifted till I was teaching the middle school class most of the time.  I forgot some of the techniques I had used so long ago when my own boys were toddlers.  Then Silas came to visit during Vacation Bible School and they sent him back to us with a memory verse, the wording of which I knew immediately would be difficult for a three year old.: See what manner of love the father has given to us that we should be called children of God, 1 John 3:1.

Just repeating this three or four times was not going to get it done.  Then I remembered the old memory verse cards I used to make for the toddler class.  You turn the memory verse into something resembling a rebus, a picture puzzle, substituting drawings for certain words.  I developed my own “ethics” though.  I never used what I call text language.  No number 4 for the word “for” and no homonyms.  That would only make the verse harder for them to comprehend, which was the ultimate goal. 

That leads me to an important aside.  Some people are convinced that small children cannot memorize; some are even convinced that memory verses are overrated.  Small children cannot memorize?  Have you ever heard a two year old recite word for word an entire scene from a Disney movie?  Have you ever accidentally misread their favorite book only to have them say, “No!  It goes like this…” and then proceed to finish the page for you? 

Just because it’s scripture doesn’t mean they can’t do it.  Josephus says of the Jews that their children were “nourished up in the laws from their infancy.”  Edersheim says in Sketches of Jewish Social Life that in the time of Christ, home teaching began when the child was three, and then at five he started the book of Leviticus!  What a way to begin. As far as memory verses being overrated, I don’t know what I would do without the verses that were implanted in both my head and heart from the time I can remember.  They rise up when I need them, and have gotten me through a number of tough situations.  How can anyone say that having the word of God instantly spring to your lips and your mind is overrated?

As for these memory verse cards, Silas loved them.  Even though he couldn’t read them, he carefully pointed out word for word, using the pictures to jog his memory.  Whenever I pulled it out he asked, “Can I hold it?” and was thrilled to show others how he could say his memory verse.  Isn’t that the kind of reaction you want from your children as they learn the word of God? 

Tomorrow’s post will lead you through the process of making a memory verse card.  I hope you will overcome your skepticism and join me again.

Blow the trumpet in Zion; consecrate a fast; call a solemn assembly; gather the people. Consecrate the congregation; assemble the elders; gather the children, even nursing infants. Let the bridegroom leave his room, and the bride her chamber…Tell your children of it, and let your children tell their children, and their children to another generation. Joel 2:15,16; 1:3.

Dene Ward

When Silas came to stay all by himself for the first time, we were not sure how he would handle being away from Mommy and Daddy.  Especially since we were over two hours away, it would have been impossible to get him back home quickly if he were too homesick to last.  He was still three, barely, and, though he had stayed alone with us the night Judah was born, and the night after as well, that was at his own home and he slept in his own bed.

We managed to keep him talking about happy things all the way home, deeper and deeper into the “dark, spooky woods” as he later called it.  It was after nine o’clock at night and, if you have never experienced it, there is nothing quite as dark as “country dark”—away from the streetlights, traffic lights, parking lot lights, and neon signs of the city.  Only once or twice did he stray into the dangerous territory of “Where will I sleep tonight?” in a pensive tone of voice.

“We’re here!” we shouted as we pulled up to the gate, wondering aloud in excited voices if Chloe would come to meet us.  That kept him happy as we pulled into the carport and unfastened his booster seat straps.  Then, just as we walked toward the back porch, an owl screamed not fifty feet away, sounding every bit like a hysterical woman, followed by a “Bwa-ha-ha-ha-ha” before finally settling into its usual “Who-hoo.” Silas was up those steps in a flash, plastered next to his grandfather’s leg and looking over his shoulders with eyes as big as Frisbees.  How could I tell in the dark?  Even in the dim starlight I could see white all the way around those big blue irises.

“Uh-oh,” I thought.  “He will be terrified for the rest of the night.”  Luckily Grandma had made some ooey-gooey chocolate cookies and that took care of the problem.  That first impression, which could have ruined the entire stay, was fairly easily overcome, but I think it often is for children.  It’s the adults among us who hang on to them.

And that brings me to today’s point.  We all know that old saying, “You only get one chance to make a first impression.”  I wish we could remember that all the time, not just when we are meeting someone we hope to impress for our own selfish interests.  Everyone who comes into contact with us, anywhere and any time, is a soul we might be able to save.  What if that first impression you make is the only impression you will ever make?

I try to remind myself of that when I have a bad experience at a store or in a restaurant.  If I fly off the handle and act like a jerk, if I indulge in harsh words that suit my sense of an injustice having been done me, demanding “my rights” as a customer or patron, how will I ever persuade them to study the Bible with me?  Could I turn right around and hand them an invitation to church services, a gospel meeting, or a ladies Bible class?  Just exactly what kind of reaction do you think I would get?  Did you have a bad morning?  Our bad moods can be very expensive—they can cost someone else his soul.

So remind yourself the next time you are caught in a tricky situation.  Paul told the Corinthians they should be willing to suffer wrong so the church wouldn’t be ridiculed by the litigious behavior among them (1 Cor 6:7).  What are we willing to suffer so the first impression we leave with someone, won’t guarantee that it will be the last?

Show yourself in all respects to be a model of good works, and in your teaching show integrity, dignity, and sound speech that cannot be condemned, so that an opponent may be put to shame, having nothing evil to say about us, Titus 2:7-8.

Dene Ward        

As Keith says, we are so typical it’s embarrassing.  Be that as it may, let me tell you about my grandson.

He had just turned two.  As he sat there in his high chair licking the frosting off his cupcake he quite deliberately read the letters on his Happy Birthday sign, the one that used to hang over our dining room windows when his father and uncle had a birthday, “H-A-P-P-Y,” all the way through to the end, never missing a letter.  Then he told us what colors the letters were, each one different.  Before that he had recited the alphabet, not sung it mind you, but recited it.  Then he had counted to nearly 20 and recognized all the numbers.  All day he had been pointing out shapes, including “oval” and “rhombus.”

Shortly after we had arrived, his granddad had read him a book.  “See the fish?” he said.

”Dolphin,” two year old Silas instantly corrected.

His parents told us about a time a couple months before when a friend from church had come walking through the restaurant where they sat.  “Hi Mark,” they said, and suddenly my 22 month old grandson was reciting, “Luke, John, Acts, Romans,” taking up right where he thought his parents had left off. 

Isn’t it normal for parents and grandparents to brag on their kids?  Do you think God doesn’t have the same feelings we do?  When I brag on my grandson, when I say he is the cutest, smartest little boy in the whole world, I am simply living up to the image in which I was created.  “Have you considered my servant Job?” God asked Satan.  “There is none like him in all the earth.”

At least twice God spoke from Heaven about his Son, “This is my Son in whom I am well pleased.”  Don’t you know God loved saying that?

When God made Israel his chosen people, his children, he had every right to expect them to behave like his children should.  Now therefore, if you will indeed obey my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my treasured possession among all peoples, for all the earth is mine; and you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation, Ex 19:5,6. 

When they didn’t he was just as devastated as we would be if our children did not behave themselves well. For as the loincloth clings to the waist of a man, so I made the whole house of Israel and the whole house of Judah cling to me, declares the LORD, that they might be for me a people, a name, a praise, and a glory, but they would not listen, Jer 13:11.

In a Messianic passage, Isaiah speaks of the coming kingdom, the church.  You shall be a crown of beauty in the hand of the LORD, and a royal diadem in the hand of your God. You shall no more be termed Forsaken, and your land shall no more be termed Desolate, but you shall be called My Delight Is in Her…for the LORD delights in you, Isa 62:3,4.  Just as Old Testament Israel had the chance to make God proud of them, we have that chance today. 

What would people think about your Father if they saw your behavior and heard you speak?  What would they think if they saw how you treated the poor, the sick and the weak?  What would they think if they saw how you drive, how you dress, how you work for your employer?  All some people will ever know about God is what they see in you.

Make your Heavenly Father proud enough to brag about you today.  “Have you seen my child?  There is none like him in all the earth.”

His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence, by which he has granted to us his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire, 2 Pet 1:3,4.

Dene Ward

            I hardly ever go to the mall.  Because our finances have always been tight, I only shop for things when I need them, otherwise it seems to me an exercise in futility.  I can’t afford to get “tired” of something.  If it works, we use it.  If it hasn’t fallen apart yet, we wear it.  Yet sometimes I have to make that trip, usually once a year, twice at the most.  The first time I made it with a toddler and a babe in arms was almost disastrous. 
              
            Both my boys were obedient little boys.  Not that they came that way—it took a lot of effort and consistent training because they both had Ward blood in them, but eventually I never had to worry about taking them anywhere.  Two year old Lucas followed along as I traipsed from store to store looking for—well, I don’t even remember now.  I had Nathan in one arm, a diaper bag on the other, and my purse over one shoulder, so there was no hand to hold on to Lucas.  He was usually right by my side, and if he suddenly disappeared, I looked back and he had just lagged a bit as we went by a particularly eye-catching display.

            Then, just as we left one of the anchor stores on the far side of the mall, and stepped into the open area, I looked down and he wasn’t there, nor anywhere close.  My heart plummeted, my stomach heaved, and my mind screamed his name before I could even get it out of my mouth.  I ran back into that store, and there ten feet inside, he was standing by a display.  What had caught his interest I don’t know--I doubt I ever knew.  I called his name and he looked at me and smiled and came running.  Me?  I knelt on the floor and somehow with a squirmy four month old and a diaper bag and a purse, I managed to wrap him up in my arms and hug him so tightly that he started to pull away.

            “You need to be careful to stay with Mommy, okay?” I managed with a slight catch in my throat, and he nodded happily.  On we went to do the necessary shopping, but my eye was on him far better than it had been before.

            I doubt very many of you have not had something similar happen to you.  It is, perhaps, the worst feeling in the world to think your child might be lost.

            It amazes me when people do not have that same horrible feeling when their child’s soul is lost.  How can you not run around calling his name and asking people for help?  How can you not agonize about it?  I want to share with you two wonderful examples should you ever need them—which I pray neither you nor I ever do. 

            We have spoken with the lost child of a close friend more than once, offered to study the Bible, and just conversed about life in general at other times.  She appreciates everything we try to do for her child, whether it works or not.  She has even told her child, when that child was mildly disgruntled about one conversation, “Isn’t it wonderful that they care so much?” which effectively put that problem to rest. 

            I keep in contact with the child of another friend.  That child is not amenable to spiritual discussions these days, but he knows I will say something every time anyway, and probably because of his good parents, he accepts my overtures in a friendly way, tolerant when I leave him with a statement like, “You know what you need to do.”  She has told me she doesn’t care what I say to her child, “Just please keep saying something.”

            Neither one of these parents allow their children to complain in their presence about the ways we approach them.  Neither one of them blames us or anyone else for the decisions their adult children made, and their children know that too.  I carry great hopes for both of those children, and for those grieving parents.  I feel like their lost children will indeed be “found” some day, partly because of the attitude their parents have managed to keep throughout the whole ordeal. 

            If you have a lost child, follow their example.  As long as you allow that child to blame someone besides himself, he will never see the need for repentance.  As long as you allow her to make excuses, whether justified or not, she will think everyone else is at fault, not her. 

            When I lost Lucas for those few minutes, I didn’t care who helped find him, or what I looked or sounded like as I went running and hollering back into that store.  I just wanted my baby safe and sound.  Can you imagine someone saying, “No!  I don’t want you to look for my child?” 

            Your child may be standing right in front of you, but if his soul is lost, he might as well be a helpless toddler lost at the mall.  Do what you need to do, and accept the help of others without hamstringing them. I lost my little boy once.  I don’t want to ever go through that again, but if I do, rest assured, I will be calling you for help to find him, and I won’t care a bit how you go about it.

But the father said to his servants, 'Bring quickly the best robe, and put it on him, and put a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet. And bring the fattened calf and kill it, and let us eat and celebrate. For this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found.' And they began to celebrate, Luke 15:22-24.

Dene Ward

“Do it myself!” What parent has not heard these words from his toddler with mixed feelings? Yes, he is learning to do things for himself, all by himself, without my help. Good for him! Yes, he is learning to do without me. Some day he won’t need my help at all. Some day he will experience his own Independence Day, and we will face it with pride in his accomplishment and tears for our own loss at the same time.

And don’t we prize that independent feeling ourselves? I have a good friend who is 93. She and I have often bemoaned the fact that people no longer seem to understand the word “need.” What they think they “need” is usually just
something they “want.” It worries us that we are becoming more and more
dependent on wealth and the technology it buys. We have said to one another, if someday there is a great catastrophe, most of the country won’t know how to
survive at all. She has a colorful way of putting it: “They won’t even know how
to go to the bathroom!”
 
We have lived in the country for a long time, and I have learned a lot about doing things myself. I don’t know when was the last time I bought a jar of
jelly at the store. Or pickles. Or canned tomatoes. Or salsa. Or any sort of
frozen vegetable at all. I do it myself.
 
For awhile we had chickens. Until we finally figured out that we were barely breaking even between the cost of feed and the “free” eggs, we gathered
jumbos every day, half a dozen or more. Keith milked a cow, and I often had a
sour cream pound cake sitting on the countertop, made with our eggs, our
homemade butter, and our homemade sour cream. I mashed potatoes we grew with our fresh cream and homemade butter. The ice cream we churned was so rich we often saw flecks of butter in it.  I think maybe we gave up the cow the day we actually started feeling our arteries clog as we looked across the table at one another.
 
A lot of people can and freeze vegetables, jams, and pickles, but it always gave me a little extra pride when I made things that most people never even thought about making, like ketchup from the tag ends of the tomato crop, and chili powder from the cayenne peppers I grew and dried. Lots of folks made applesauce, but not many can their own apple pie filling to use later in the year. Another friend I have makes her own laundry starch. If anything dire does happen in the next few years, my two special friends and I promise to share. I am sure the 93 year old will be happy to tell you how to dig an
outhouse.

 But that sort of pride and independence can get in the way of our salvation, can’t it? There really is nothing we can do to save ourselves. And we must learn to depend upon God—he demands it. He is to be the one we trust, the
one we rely on, the one we go to for every need we have, even if our definition
of need is really “want.” 
 
As long as I think I can manufacture my own salvation and experience a
spiritual Independence Day, I will never find myself in God’s good graces, or in
His grace. This is one case where self-reliance is disastrous. This is one case
where we celebrate Dependence Day instead. Have you celebrated yours yet?
 
By grace have you been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God,  Eph 2:8
 
Dene Ward

It takes us three days to pack for a camping trip.  I have a list saved on the computer that I print out every time—three pages.  Yes, I said three pages.

Just for meals, for instance, I pack cups, mugs, plates, soup bowls, a measuring cup, grill tools, saucepans, skillets, the coffee pot, propane stoves, matches, gas canisters, coffee filters, a griddle, a folding grill, a mixing bowl, silverware, mixing spoons and spatulas, foil, Ziplocs for leftovers, a bacon drippings can, paper towels, dish soap, a dish pan, dish towels, hot pads, and trash bags, and that doesn’t count the food!  Now imagine things you need for every part of your day, from brushing your teeth, to hiking, to showering, to sitting around after dark reading, to going to bed, and you begin to see why the list is three pages long.

We use this list because I have found that if I don’t have it to cross off, I will invariably forget something.  From time to time we delete something on the list or add something as our situation changes.  When we were young we didn’t need to take two boxes of medications. 

We keep a backup disk of items saved on the computer.  That list is on it.  Should we ever lose it, I might even be tempted to never go camping again.  I cannot imagine having to remake the list from memory.  More likely, we would remake it around the fire the first night after discovering all the things we forgot.

When we had boys with us, I had other things on the list that were equally important.  In fact, I was probably more careful about their things than mine.  I wanted them to have enough clothes, especially enough warm clothes.  I learned that lesson the hard way when we woke up by a mountain stream one June morning to fifty degree temperatures and they had nothing but shorts and tee shirts to wear.  Fifty degrees in June?  As a Florida native I didn’t even know that was possible, and I felt horrible, quickly mixing up some warm oatmeal and hot chocolate while Keith built a campfire for them to huddle around as they ate.

We are all on a trip every day of our lives.  What have you packed for your children?  Too many parents just let life happen without a plan.  Do you teach them?  Do you talk with them every chance you get about a God who loves them, who made them, and who expects things of them?  Do you discuss the things that happen in their lives and the decisions they made, or perhaps should have made?  Do they know that those decisions will affect their eternal destiny?  Do you allow them to pay the consequences for their mistakes, or do you shelter them?  Do you tell them what the world is really like out there, how to recognize the traps, the enemies in disguise and the true values of life?  Are you sure you have everything they could possibly need to assure their eternal destiny?

Maybe you need to make a list.

We will not hide them from their children, but tell to the coming generation the glorious deeds of the LORD, and his might, and the wonders that he has done. He established a testimony in Jacob and appointed a law in Israel, which he commanded our fathers to teach to their children, that the next generation might know them, the children yet unborn, and arise and tell them to their children, so that they should set their hope in God and not forget the works of God, but keep his commandments; Psalms 78:4-7.

Dene Ward

“Mommy, those green blackberries burnt my mouth.”

We were picking peas in a field behind a member’s farmhouse late one afternoon.  We had just moved to the area and had not had time to plant our own garden, so we were happy to do all the free U-picks our brethren offered.  Nathan, who was only 13 months old, was playing up at the house under the watchful care of the grandmotherly farmwife.  Three year old Lucas wanted to come “help,” so he trailed along behind us, picking a pea pod every so often, but usually exploring.

It took a minute for what he had said to register.  Then, with a knot of fear growing in my stomach, I calmly asked, “What blackberries?  Show me.” 

He led us back about twenty feet, to a place in the fencerow.  Instead of blackberry vines, we saw a four foot high green plant, with spade-shaped leaves and round green berries—nightshade.  We dropped our buckets, pulled the plant, scooped him up, and headed for the nearest emergency room, thirty miles east.  As soon as we arrived, Keith dropped me at the door.  I ran in and practically threw both Lucas and the plant on the registration desk. 

“My baby ate this,” I managed between gasps.

I had found the trick to immediate action in an emergency room.  They ran both him and the plant back behind the swinging doors.  I, of course, was taken to Paperwork Central—they never forget the documentation so they will be paid.  It probably did not help that I had come straight from the field, sweat, dirt, and all, and so did not look particularly solvent.

Two hours later we left with a completely sobered three- year-old, promising us he would never eat green blackberries again.  As far as I know, he hasn’t!

So why are we so much less careful about the poison that sickens our souls?  Spiritual nightshade surrounds us every day of our lives.  Somehow we think we are immune to its effects.  We go places we should not, associate with people we should not, dally with things that are as dangerous as a poisonous snake, and pooh-pooh anyone who dares tell us to be careful.

I am not just talking about things like alcohol and sexual immorality.  Do you realize that wealth in the scriptures is never pictured as anything but dangerous to our souls?  But what do we wish for when the subject of wishes comes up?  And what do we always say?  “I could handle it.  I would never use it the wrong way.  It would never get the best of me.”  What do we tell our young people when they say the same things about drugs and alcohol? 

Arrogance will always get the best of us in all these cases.  Might as well handle a cobra.  Might as well drink some cyanide. 

Might as well eat a pie made of green blackberries.

For [the] rock [of the wicked] is not as our Rock...For their vine is of the vine of Sodom, and of the fields of Gomorrah; their grapes are grapes of gall, their clusters are bitter.  Their wine is the poison of serpents and the cruel venom of asps, Deut 32:31-33.

Dene Ward