Wards have always been persnickety about people messing with their favorite food and drink.  Keith, especially, does not want his coffee messed with, and usually not his sweet tea.  But there is hope.  A friend recently gave us a brand of peach tea he has fallen in love with, so I cannot call him his father yet—but it's a close contest.
            And have you noticed that finding the original formula, flavor, or variety is nearly impossible?  You certainly cannot just run into the store, grab it, and run out in two minutes.  You will spend 10 minutes just reading the boxes.  Did you know that there are 21 flavors of Cheezits!?
            I first encountered this when my boys were young and thought the best macaroni and cheese was—no, not their Mama's, but Kraft's.  They have outgrown that and I am certainly glad.  Have you looked at the varieties lately?  Besides Original Macaroni and Cheese, we have Whole Grain Mac and Cheese, Cauliflower Pasta Mac and Cheese, Thick and Creamy, Creamy Alfredo, Southern Homestyle (which isn't), Sharp Cheddar, White Cheddar and Shells, White Cheddar and Garlic, White Cheddar and Cracked Black Peppercorn (I kid you not), 3 Cheese Mini-Shells, 4 Cheese, Gluten-Free, Microwavable, Spirals, Paw Patrol Shapes, and Unicorn Shapes.  And what do they place on the eye-level shelves?  All the weird ones.  I can remember crawling around on my hands and knees in the supermarket floor trying to find a box of Original Mac and Cheese which was always on the bottom shelf.
            We have simply become too wealthy.  We have forgotten what eating is all about.  Not entertainment ("snap, crackle, pop!"), not excitement, not textural variety, or any other culinary term.  No longer do we eat to avoid starvation and gain proper nutrition.  And because we have that luxury, we think that we can simply not eat what we don't like.  Poor people don't think that way.  They are grateful for anything they find on their plates.
            Perhaps that explains the plethora of denominations on the streets you travel every Sunday.  People always want something new and different, something that appeals to our likes and dislikes.  Something easy, convenient, and entertaining.  We certainly don't want "the same old thing."  Does that sound anything at all like this? Oh come, let us worship and bow down; let us kneel before the LORD, our Maker! For he is our God, and we are the people of his pasture, and the sheep of his hand… (Ps 95:6-7).  We have forgotten that in spiritual terms we are not only poor, but completely destitute.  We cannot save ourselves.  We should be grateful to even be able to approach God at all, so maybe we should be eager to search out how HE wants us to do that. 
            When that first church started, the same things were taught in each one.  That is why I sent you Timothy, my beloved and faithful child in the Lord, to remind you of my ways in Christ, as I teach them everywhere in every church (1Cor 4:17).  See also 1 Cor 7:17; 11:16; 14:33; 16:1.    Paul also said, The things which you both learned and received and heard and saw in me, these things do: and the God of peace shall be with you (Phil 4:9).  There most definitely was a pattern that every church followed, one that the inspired apostles gave them from the beginning.  Do you suppose that might mean that the original is the one we should be looking for?
            And if it takes getting down on your knees with the Word of God to find it, then do it, because nothing tastes quite like the original.
 
Follow the pattern of the sound words that you have heard from me, in the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus
(2Tim 1:13                                                                                               
 
Dene Ward

A few weeks ago I started going through some old cooking magazines making a note of some recipes I had never gotten around to the first time I read them, intending to try several of them this time through.  One of the first things I tried was a Linzertorte. Although these pastries are usually reserved for the holidays—and I did find this one in a November/December issue—when I read through the ingredients I wasn't sure why.  Basically, it's a souped-up fruit pie, so wouldn't spring and summer be better?
            I pulled out the ingredients, most of which I had on hand, and went to work.  The crust was short and sweet.  I am sure trained pastry chefs have a name for it, but I just called it fancy shortbread: lots of butter, plus flour, spices, and ground up almonds and hazelnuts.  You roll half of it into the bottom of a 10 inch tart pan, then add about an inch more up the sides of the pan.  Then you spread most of a jar of red currant or red raspberry or apricot preserves on the bottom.  So far it had been simple, but as I rolled out the rest of the dough, cut it into strips, and attempted a lattice top, the only real problem I had arose.  Unlike regular pie dough, these strips were so tender I had a horrible time getting them off the counter in one piece.  They kept breaking on me.  Nearly every strip became two or more pieces of a strip pinched together.  But after brushing with egg wash, sprinkling with sparkling sugar, and baking, most of the piecing together was well camouflaged and it looked almost pretty.
            So, was it any good?  Well, yes, it tasted fine.  But this was neither Keith's nor my idea of a fruit pie and I suppose that is what we thought we were getting.  The "fruit" wasn't juicy enough and despite its shortness, the pastry wasn't flaky enough to suit us.  I doubt I will go to the trouble again.  Maybe it just comes down to tastes and expectations.  These recipes wouldn't keep showing up if someone somewhere didn't like them.
            And I find that similar to the denominations.  People want certain things and they go where they can get it.  The thing that keeps bothering me is why no one seems to think that God has the right to a choice—in fact, He's the only one who has the right since He is the one being worshipped.  Or is He?  Maybe that's the issue when all is said and done.  I want what I want and I don't much care whether He likes it or not, and besides, God wants me to be happy, spiritually fulfilled, and feeling good when I leave so of course He will like what I offer.  Really?  Try that the next time you give your husband tickets to the opera for his birthday.
            Here is the bottom line:  if God asked for a Linzertorte I would make him one, despite the fact that I don't much care for them and think my own blueberry pie with a homemade flaky pie crust is much better.  Because what He wants should be the only thing that really matters.
 
You shall walk after the LORD your God and fear him and keep his commandments and obey his voice, and you shall serve him and hold fast to him (Deut 13:4).                                   
 
Dene Ward

My husband never knew this and now he will be impossible to live with on this day, demanding tomatoes at every meal, as well as snacks and desserts as a celebratory measure.  April 6th is National Fresh Tomato Day.  For 40 years he has planted enough tomatoes in our garden to feed the entire county.  To his credit, he has shared probably a literal ton with church members, neighbors, piano students, and doctors.  His favorite thing in the world is a platter of the things sliced several inches deep on the dinner table every night for as long as the season lasts.  And that means I have to do something with the ones that don't fit on that platter before they go bad.  So while the boys were still home, I canned forty quarts or more every year, plus a few pints of tomato sauce, plus tomato juice, and once or twice, even some ketchup and tomato jam.  All of those things involved a huge amount of work.
            Canning tomatoes is one of the more difficult garden season chores.  You wash each and every tomato.  You scald each and every tomato.  You pound ice blocks till your arms ache in order to shock and cool each and every scalded tomato.  You peel each and every tomato and finally you cut up each and every tomato.  Then you sterilize jars, pack jars, and process jars.  Only 7 jars fit in the canner at a time, so you go through that at least 6 times for canned tomatoes alone.
            And you will have more failures to seal with canned tomatoes than any other thing you can.  As you pack them in, pushing down to make room, you must be very careful not to let the juice spill over into the threads of the jar.  And just in case you did that heinous crime, you take a damp cloth and wipe each thread of each jar.  Tomato pulp will keep a perfectly good jar, lid, and ring from sealing.
            In order to have that many tomatoes you must be willing to cut up a few that are half-rotten, disposing of the soft, pulpy, stinky parts in order to save sometimes just a bite or two of tomato.  Now that there are only two of us, I usually limit myself to 20+ quarts.  I still put one in every pot of spaghetti sauce, one in every pot of chili, and one in every pot of minestrone, as well as a few other recipes, it’s just that I don’t make as many of those things as I did with two big boys in the house.  Now I can afford to be a little profligate.  If I pick up a tomato with a large bad spot, I am just as likely to toss the whole thing rather than try to save the bite or two that is good, especially if it is a small tomato to begin with.  Why go to all that work—washing, scalding, shocking, peeling, cutting up, packing—for a mere teaspoon of tomato?
            But isn’t that what God and Jesus did for us?  For narrow is the gate, and straitened the way, that leads unto life, and few are they that find it. Matt 7:14.
            The Son of God, the Lord of Lords, the King of Kings, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Phil 2:6-8.  And he did that for a half—no!--for a more than half rotten tomato of a world.  He did that to save a remnant, a mere teaspoon of souls who would care enough to listen and obey the call. 
            Sometimes, by the end of the day, when my arms are aching, my fingers are nicked and the cuts burning from acidic tomato juice, my back and feet are killing me from standing for hours, and I am drenched with sweat from the steamy kitchen, I am ready to toss even the mostly good tomatoes, the ones with only a tiny bad spot, because it means extra work beyond a quick slice or two.  Aren’t you glad God did not feel that way about us?  It wasn’t just a half rotten world he came to save, it was every half rotten individual in that world, of which you and I are just a few.
 
But what is God's reply to him? “I have kept for myself seven thousand men who have not bowed the knee to Baal.” So too at the present time there is a remnant, chosen by grace. Rom 11:4-5
 
Dene Ward
 

National Carrot Day was begun in 2003 in an effort to increase awareness of the beneficial compounds of carrots.  I am told it is celebrated around the world with carrot parties, featuring carrot dishes and guests dressed in orange or in some cases in carrot costumes.
            Carrots do far better up north than down here in Florida.  Whether it's the climate or the lack of nutrition in the sandy soil, I don't know, but we seldom bother planting them.  One year we did though, planting them late by Florida standards, so I was just pulling carrots the first week of June.  It wasn’t difficult; I pulled the whole row in about 15 minutes.  Still, it was disappointing—a twenty foot row yielded a two and a half gallon bucket of carrots that turned into a two quart pot when they were cleaned and sorted, cutting off the tops and tossing those that were pencil thin or bug-eaten.
            Then I thought, well, consider the remnant principle in the Bible.  Out of all the people in the world, even granting that the population was much less than it is now, only eight were saved at the Flood.  Out of all the nations in the world, God only chose one as His people.  Out of all those, only one tribe survived the Assyrians, and out of all those, only a few survived the Babylonians and only 42,000 of those returned to the land out of the 1,000,000 or so in Babylon.  What's that?  4.2%?
            Jesus spoke of the wide gate and the narrow gate.  Surely that tells us that though God wishes all to be saved, only a few will be.  So out of a twenty foot row of carrots, I probably threw out half.  Then we threw out a third of those that were too small to even try to scrub and peel.  Yet we probably did better with our carrots than the Lord will manage with people!  And I learned other principles that carrot-pulling day, too.
            When I pulled those carrots some of them had full beautiful tops, green, thick-stemmed, and smelling of cooked carrots when I lopped them off.  Yet under all that lush greenery several had very little carrot at all.  They were superficial carrots—all show and no substance.  Others were pale and bitter, hardly good for eating without adding a substantial amount of sugar.  Then under some thin, sparse tops, I often found a good-sized root, deep orange and sweet.  Yes, they were all the same variety, but something happened to them in the growth process.
            Some of us are all top and no root.  It always surprises me when a man who is so regular in his attendance has so little depth to his faith.  Surely sitting in a place where the Word is taught on a consistent basis should have given him something, even if just by osmosis.  But no, it takes effort to absorb the Word of God and more effort to put it into practice, delving deeper and deeper into its pages and considering its concepts.  The Pharisees could quote scripture all day, but they lacked the honesty to look at themselves in its reflection.
            And there are some of us who have little to show on the outside, but a depth no one will know until a tragedy strikes, or an attack on the faith arises, or a need presents itself, and suddenly they are there, standing for the truth, showing their faith, answering the call.  I knew one man who surprised us all with his strength in the midst of trial, a quiet man hardly anyone ever noticed.  Yet his steadfastness under pressure was remarkable.  I knew another who had been loud with his faith, nearly boasting in his confidence that he was strong, yet who shocked us all with his inability to accept the will of God, his assertions that he shouldn’t have to bear such a burden when he had been so faithful for so long.  Truly those carrot tops will fool you if you aren’t careful.  “Judge not by appearance,” Jesus said, “but judge righteous judgment.”  Look beneath those leafy greens and see where and how your root lies.
            Evidently the principles stand both for man and carrots.  Don’t count on your outward show, your pedigree in the faith.  Develop a deep root, one that will grow sweeter as time passes and strong enough to stand the heat of trial. 
            And don’t assume you are in the righteous remnant if that righteousness hasn’t been tested lately.  God hates more to throw out people than I hate to throw out carrots, but He will.  Don’t spend so much time preening your tops that your root withers.  And finally, only a few will make it to the table; make sure you are one of them.
 
Behold, I stand at the door and knock: if any man hear my voice and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me. Revelation 3:20            
 
Dene Ward          

Do a little research and you will find that the term “comfort food” was added to Webster’s Dictionary in 1972.  It refers to foods that are typically inexpensive, uncomplicated, and require little or no preparation at all; foods which usually bring pleasant associations with childhood, just as an old song can remind one of a long ago romance, or a smell can instantly bring back situations both good and bad. 
            Comfort foods vary from culture to culture, but in our country usually include things like macaroni and cheese, mashed potatoes, fried chicken, ice cream, peanut butter, and brownies.  Folks tend to use comfort foods to provide familiarity and emotional security, or to reward themselves.  It’s not surprising that many of these are loaded with carbohydrates which can produce a soporific effect as well.  Comfort food followed closely by the comfort of sleep.
            Since it became fashionable I have tried to figure out my own list of comfort foods. Here is my problem:  my mother was such a good cook and so adventurous, trying many recipes day after day, that I never had one dish often enough to form an attachment to it.  One cooking magazine actually runs the column, “My Mother’s Best Meal.”  I could not possibly pick one.  I would need a whole page to list them.  So for me it isn’t comfort food, it’s comfort cooking.  When my mind is in turmoil, I cook all day long, trying, I suppose, to recreate the warm, homey, safe atmosphere of my mother’s kitchen.
            Comfort food works for the soul too.  The best part is, you don’t have to be a good cook.  You just open the word of God and feast.  You turn on the water of life and drink to your heart’s content.  You produce the fruit of the lips in praise to God whenever and wherever you desire.  You gather with your brothers and sisters and wallow in a fellowship that has absolutely nothing to do with coffee and donuts.
            You can get fatter and fatter with all that spiritual nourishment and still be healthy.  In fact, in this context at least, the skinnier you are, the sicker, the sadder, and the weaker you are.
            So grab a spoon today, and everyday, and dig in.
 
Work not for the food which perishes, but for the food which abides unto eternal life, which the Son of man shall give unto you: for him the Father, even God, has sealed, John 6:27.
 
Dene Ward

We had been unhappy with our griddle for a good while, so Keith went online shopping and found an appliance called a Griddler, put out by Cuisinart.  This little contraption with two heating elements that can either lie flat next to each other or fold over on each other, and with four interchangeable plates, two of which are double-sided, can be a panini press, a grill pan, a waffle iron, or it can be opened flat and used as a griddle.
            It does have a few disadvantages.  Because of the two separate plates with an inch space between them, you can only fit four pancakes on it at once instead of six, but there are only two of us so that's no problem.  It seems to take longer for the pancakes to cook, too.  However, the panini we get are amazingly crisp and with the grill plates, you can grill both sides at once, making that process much faster. 
            The plates—flat, grill-marked, and waffled—are nonstick.  Boy, are they nonstick.  You want to know how I found out?
            When I pour pancake batter on this thing, I have no trouble at all.  Maybe it is because they immediately begin to cook and the batter is thick enough not to run.  But eggs are another thing entirely.  Evidently the side that is the "top" if you fold it, does not sit exactly flat when opened up.  It looks close enough that I did not realize that.
            One day we decided to have breakfast for dinner.  I preheated the pan and, just because my husband likes it that way, I put a teaspoon of bacon grease on the already slick surface.  Then I poured on the raw eggs. 
            Immediately the eggs slid over to the side of the pan.  Before I could move, one had slid onto the counter and down onto the floor—splat!--between my feet.  I managed by then to get my flipper flat end standing on the surface of the pan at the rim, but that didn't stop it fast enough.  All the eggs kept sliding, building up around my flipper edge until they started oozing around the sides of it and headed for the fall once again.  I grabbed another flipper and stood it up on the rim of the pan next to the first one to catch a larger portion of the running egg whites.
            Meanwhile, I started hollering, probably nothing intelligible.  At this point I was straddling one egg and holding two flippers erect trying to keep the rest of the eggs on the pan.  Keith came running and saw what was happening.  He grabbed some paper towels and knelt down between my feet to clean up the floor.  That meant I had to squat a bit to fit his shoulders in there.  I wish I had a picture—but then, maybe not.  Finally I could actually move my feet without stepping into eggs and sliding across the floor.  He grabbed one of the flippers while I raked a little of the now cooked egg white back from the lip of the pan with the other and made a nice little dam.  Another minute and I could flip the eggs over and they actually stayed put.
            We stepped back, a little winded, shaking our heads at what had just happened.  The two of us working together meant we had only lost one egg and, believe it or not, the others were cooked perfectly.
            Now imagine if he had looked over, seen what was happening and said, "That was a stupid thing to do."
            Or, "If you hadn't poured them out so quickly that wouldn't have happened."
            Or, "That's your job not mine."
            Or, "Someone else will take care of it."
            Or, "That's not my talent," and hadn't lifted a finger to help.
            We wouldn't have had dinner, and we would have probably lost far more than one egg.
            Too bad that's what happens in the church too often.  And it's deplorable that too often in our judgmental, self-serving apathy we lose far more than one soul-less little egg.
 
Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, from whom the whole body, joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love. (Eph 4:15-16)
 
Dene Ward

Most of us know that America is named after Amerigo Vespucci, an Italian who voyaged to the New World first in 1497.  What we don't know is that he wasn't much of an explorer after all.  His claim to fame seems to be that he is the first one who realized that North and South America were two separate continents and that neither were part of Asia.  But many scholars believe he was a second-rate explorer at best, even if he was (we think) the first person to discover the mouth of the Amazon River.  Vespucci died on this date in 1512.
            What many knowledgeable people remember him for now is pickles (Mental Floss, "A Brief History of Pickles" by Michele Debczak, Sept 3, 2021.)  It seems that before he began exploring, he was a ship chandler, a supply merchant to ships and explorers.  It is said that Vespucci even furnished supplies for one of Columbus's voyages.  Crossing the Atlantic took a while, and without refrigeration, ordinary food would spoil.  So ships usually carried supplies of both dried and pickled foods to carry them through.  The pickled items were especially helpful in preventing scurvy.  Pickle sellers were indispensable in the Golden Age of Exploration.  In later times Ralph Waldo Emerson called Vespucci "the pickle dealer of Seville," which was meant to be derisive, but was not untrue, except perhaps in scope.
            Pickles have been important in history since about 4000 BC in Mesopotamia.  I have even read that the "cucumbers" in the Bible were really pickles.  Once again, it was a matter of storage, but also of nutrition.  You could pickle practically any fruit or vegetable and that meant a better diet for all those folks so long ago.
            I happen to like pickles, usually dill.  But once upon a time, I discovered something a little different.
          I first had one thirty-nine years ago in a rural community southwest of here.  The farm wife put them on the table in a clear gallon jar and we dug into the neck with a long skinny fork she must have found just for that job.  They were sweet, thin, crisp, gave a crunch as loud as a kettle-cooked potato chip and left a small twinge in your jaw right under your ear from the perfect amount of vinegar.  It was the first sweet pickle I had ever liked, and I was becoming more and more adept at canning and preserving and wanted to give this one a try since the whole family liked them.
            "Could I possibly have the recipe?" I asked her.
            She hesitated and I presumed it was one of her "secret" recipes that she did not like to share, but no, that was not the problem at all.
            "It's a really old recipe with strange directions," she said, "but if you can figure out what they mean and follow them carefully, it does work.  It is very important that you follow the directions carefully and don't change anything."
            My first thought was that she could easily write it so I could understand it, whatever the problem was, but when she handed it to me to copy for myself, I saw the issues right away.
            The recipe called for "a gallon of water and enough salt to float an egg." 
            "I've never measured it," she said.  "I just keep adding salt to a gallon of water until an egg floats."
            Oh, well, all right. 
           The next ingredient was "a ten cent tin of alum."  If you have bought any groceries lately, you have probably not seen anything for ten cents, and you probably haven't seen a tin of alum either.
            "Just find a small container of alum and buy it," were her not so helpful instructions.
            At least the rest of the directions were clear—sort of.  On day four when you layered cucumbers and sugar, you assumed it was granulated sugar and you also assumed that it needed to be enough sugar to form a real layer, not just a mere sprinkling.  She didn't really help me with that one.  "Until it looks right," doesn't help if you've never seen it before.
            But I took that recipe home and went at it.
            Day 1—Wash and slice enough cucumbers to fill a clear gallon jug.  Dissolve enough salt to float an egg in a bit less than a gallon of water (because of displacement), and pour over the cucumbers.  Put on the lid and set aside for 24 hours. 
            It must have taken me 15 minutes to get the salt right.  I kept adding it by the tablespoonful, determined to find a set amount and that stupid egg kept sinking right to the bottom of the pot.  Finally I tossed the tablespoon measure aside and just poured it in.  At something just over a cup, the egg sank under the water, then slowly rose so that a piece of shell the size of a quarter showed above the surface and the egg bobbed up and down freely when I jiggled the pan.
            Day 2—Pour out the salt water and rinse the cucumbers.  Dissolve the alum in the same amount of clean water and pour it over them.  Cover and set aside for another 24 hours.  I had finally found the alum at a small town grocery store just ten miles up the highway.  Even all those years ago, its price had risen nearly 700% to 69 cents.
            Day 3—Pour out the alum water and rinse the cucumbers.  Pour distilled white vinegar over them until covered.  By that third day, they had shrunk enough that the cucumbers no longer filled the gallon jar, and you needed nearly a gallon of vinegar to cover them.
            Day 4—Pour out the vinegar.  DO NOT RINSE.  Sterilize either a gallon glass jar or several pint jars.  Add a layer of pickles and then a layer of sugar, again and again until you fill the jar(s).  Put on the lid and set it in your pantry.  By this time, the pickles are so preserved, you don't even have to seal them!  In a week or two, the sugar will have dissolved and mixed with the vinegar that remains on the pickles and make the sweet pickle juice.  Chill before serving.
            My family loved these pickles.  Some days I put a new pint jar on the table with a meal and it was emptied by the time we finished eating.  And here is the thing I want you to think about today:  it was an old recipe.  It sounded a little odd.  In fact, I had to translate it here and there into something that fit today's ingredients, like a 69 cent tin of alum instead of a 10 cent tin.  But I still had to follow the recipe to a tee for it to turn out right—nothing was intrinsically different about what I did.  And it still worked.  Never have I seen another recipe like it.  No other pickle recipe tells me I don't have to seal them in a canner so that we don't all get botulism.  The procedure preserves them that well.
            God has a recipe too.  People today think it's odd.  They look at it and think it won't work anymore.  They think they can change it and it will still turn out fine.  Certainly no one's spiritual health will suffer if we just change this one little thing to suit us.
            Botulism is a pretty nasty disease.  So is sin.  So is disobedience.  Be careful when you decide that God's old recipe is too much trouble, too hard to understand, or no longer relevant.  I'd hate for you to get fatally ill over it.
 
Thus says Jehovah, Stand in the ways and see, and ask for the old paths, where is the good way; and walk therein, and you shall find rest for your souls: but they said, We will not walk therein.  And I set watchmen over you, saying, Hearken to the sound of the trumpet; but they said, We will not hearken.  Therefore hear, you nations, and know, O congregation, what is among them.  Hear, O earth: behold, I will bring evil upon this people, even the fruit of their thoughts, because they have not hearkened unto my words; and as for my law, they have rejected it. (Jer 6:16-19)
 
Dene Ward

            Some things are just not supposed to happen.  Sooner or later you will have a flat tire.  Sooner or later your AC will quit on you.  Sooner or later the washer will stop washing and the dryer will stop drying.  None of these things are pleasant, but they all happen to everyone.  When it happens, you groan and then get on with the business of life.  But some things are just not supposed to happen.
            I was putting some things in the refrigerator the other day.  Usually the door swings shut by itself, but this time, as I twisted to get the next item, it swung all the way open.  Then it quietly fell off its hinges and tumbled shelf side down, dumping pickles, olives, ketchup, three kinds of mustard, Worcestershire and soy sauces, homemade jelly, butter, cream cheese, and my super special ordered-from-California eye medicine onto the floor, leaving the rest of the refrigerator wide open and humming.  For a moment I just stood there, stunned.  We have been through several refrigerators—a couple of cheap ones that came with the apartment or trailer we were renting at the time, and a couple of secondhand ones.  But this one was a recommended model we bought new.  Never have we had a refrigerator door fall off, not even the inexpensive or used ones.  Refrigerator doors do not fall off. 
            Don’t you know that is how God feels at times?  We can find several passages where he laments our actions, saying, “This is not supposed to happen,” at least in substance, if not verbatim.  James 3:10 is a prime example:  Out of the same mouth comes forth blessing and cursing.  My brothers, these things ought not so to be.  James tells us we should not bless God and then curse man because when we curse a man made in the image of God, we might as well be cursing God.  Yikes!  That puts another spin on it, doesn’t it?  Understand, we are not talking about using four letter words here, but about maliciously wishing evil upon a person.  We are not supposed to do it--not even to other drivers!  And James acts like we ought to know this without being told:  we should not be cursing men! 
            Unfortunately, we do not know, or willfully ignore, many such things.  We should know God is our Creator and worship him, but for some reason that is hotly debated even among intelligent people.  We should know God’s law; he has made it available and easy enough to understand.  But even in the church we have “seasoned” Christians who cannot find their way from Acts to Habakkuk without getting lost somewhere in Ephesians, and who think John wrote several “Revelations.”
            I wonder if God does what I did the other morning, stand there in shock, staring at a door-less refrigerator, with my mouth hanging open, thinking, “What?  That just doesn’t happen.”  Unfortunately, it does.  You wonder if God is really all that surprised any more.  Tell you what, let’s work on a real surprise for him—let’s make sure we don’t do any of those things from now on.
 
The ox knows his owner, and the ass his master’s crib; but Israel does not know, my people do not consider, Isa 1:3.
Yes, the stork in the heavens knows her appointed times; and the turtledove and the swallow and the crane observe the time of their coming; but my people know not the law of Jehovah, Jer 8:7.

Dene Ward

Keith is the rye bread eater in this house.  His favorite loaf comes from a local bakery/deli that bakes from scratch all the bread it uses for sandwiches.  We stop there and buy what is a huge loaf of marble rye by grocery store standards, for about the same price ounce for ounce.  I have never been able to make a loaf he likes better.  The last time I tried he said he had to think real hard about it to even taste the rye flour.  "But it's good," he hastened to add, while kindly not adding "just not rye."  So I found a new recipe that even has step by step pictured instructions.  I think I will give it a go and see if this one comes closer to his favorite.
            While I was thinking about this loaf today, I realized that you can learn a lot from marble rye.  In the first place, you have four layers of alternate light and dark doughs wrapped around each other in a cinnamon roll type layering, yet each layer stays completely separate from the others.  You don't get a half and half beige mix, but a definite light-dark swirl.  Paul, when he discusses the discipline necessary in 1 Corinthians 5, says at one point, I wrote to you in my letter not to associate with sexually immoral people— not at all meaning the sexually immoral of this world, or the greedy and swindlers, or idolaters, since then you would need to go out of the world (1Cor 5:9-10).  Just as Jesus talks about "letting our light shine before men," Paul recognizes the need to be out in this unrighteous world.  How else can we teach?  How else can we influence people for good?  How else can we serve, if nothing else?  Yet Peter tells us that we must [have] your behavior seemly among the Gentiles; that, wherein they speak against you as evil-doers, they may by your good works, which they behold, glorify God in the day of visitation (1Pet 2:12).  We are among them, but not like them.  We, instead, show them the way, just like my dark rye dough wraps itself around my light rye dough, yet the dark does not affect the light.
            This certainly does not mean that we socialize with them for the sake of socializing only.  When Jesus "ate with sinners," he did so to teach.  Are you teaching those sinners, or simply enjoying their company because they are "more fun" to be around than your brethren?  Are they affecting you more than you are affecting them?
            And then we see the good old leaven principle.  All four layers of my dough, both dark and light, are affected by the leaven in the dough.  They all rise exactly the same way, to the same height, with the same texture.  The light does not get fluffier.  The dark does not become denser.  They become exactly the same.  Leaven can work two ways, either for the good or the bad.  Paul and Jesus both talk about leaven as sin (Luke 12:1; 1 Cor 5:6-8).  Yet Jesus also tells a parable of leaven in a loaf, a loaf representing the kingdom and its growth.  Leaven will do its thing.  It will even create itself if you leave it alone long enough.  That's where sourdough comes from.  Be sure the leaven you are using is the leaven of righteousness, you influencing your friends and neighbors for good, and even your brothers and sisters when they need it, not them influencing you for bad.
            Now back to my kneading…

A little leaven leavens the whole lump (Gal 5:9).
 
Dene Ward

Popcorn is our snack of choice when watching ball games.  We make it the old fashioned way—bacon grease in a large saucepan, bulk popcorn from a large plastic bag, and salt.  Heat it over high heat, shaking the pan until it stops popping.  The stuff out of the microwave cannot begin to compare.
            We still wind up with what the industry calls “old maids,” kernels that have not popped.  Usually it’s the kernel’s fault, not the popper’s. 
            They tell me that popcorn kernels are the only grain with a hard moisture-proof hull.  That means that not only can moisture not get into the kernel, but the moisture inside the kernel cannot get out either.  As you heat them, the steam inside increases until the pressure reaches 135 psi and the heat 180 degrees Celsius (356 for us non-scientists).  At that point, the starch inside the kernel gelatinizes, becoming soft and pliable.   When the hull explodes the steam expands the starch and proteins into the airy foam we know as popcorn.
            I found two theories about old maids.  One is that there is not enough moisture in the kernel to begin with; the other is that the hull develops a leak, acting as a release valve so that pressure cannot build enough for the “explosion.”  Either way, the kernels just sit there and scorch, becoming harder and drier as they cook.
            Isn’t that what happens when we undergo trials?  Some of us use the experience to flower into a stronger, wiser, more pleasant personality.  Others of us sit there and scorch in the heat until we dry up completely, no use for God or His people, let alone ourselves.  The resulting bitterness is reflected in the cynical way we view the world, the way we continue to wallow in the misery of our losses, and the impenetrable barrier we raise whenever anyone tries to help us.  As Israel said when they had forsaken God for idols and knew they would be punished, Our bones have dried up, our hope is lost, we are clean cut off, Ezek 37:11.  When we refuse to seek God in our day of trouble, when we forget the blessings He has given us even though we deserved none, that is the result.
            But God can help even the hopeless.  He can bring us back from despair.  He can make our hearts blossom in the heat of trial if we remember the lesson about priorities, about what really counts in the end.  If we have only hoped in Christ in this life, we are of all men most pitiable, 1 Cor 15:19, and that is exactly where we find ourselves if we allow anything in this life to steal our faith in God. 
            Trials are not pleasant; they are not meant to be.  They are meant to create something new in us, something stronger and more spiritual.  When, instead, we become hard and bitter, we are like the old maids in a bag of popcorn, and when the popcorn fizzles, it’s the popcorn’s fault.
 
For our light affliction, which is for the moment, works for us more and more exceedingly an eternal weight of glory; while we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen: for the things which are seen are temporal; but the things which are not seen are eternal. 2 Cor 4:17,18.
 
Dene Ward