Summer Picnic

Tweet

Who could turn down a chance to go on a picnic on a day like this? Especially when put on by your sweetheart?





Simple sandwiches and fruit salad taste like the most luxurious feast in the world when eaten outside in good company.



Once our stomachs had their fill, we sat in the light of the fading sun and read from a Book, life's Light, filling minds with God's thoughts and words. A beautiful end to a beautiful day.

Anniversary

Tweet

A year ago today, very dear friends united their lives until death parts them. Congratulations to both of you for enjoying the first year of life together!

We Are Nearing Home!

Tweet

Have you ever come home, and still felt like all you wanted was to go home?  I've caught myself in that strange place--home but not home--and I've wondered about it.  Why wouldn't I feel at home in my own house?

Maybe Abraham felt that way sometimes, coming into his tents at night, knowing in his head God had promised him the land right outside his door, but still being a stranger in it, still traveling from place to place, never knowing just when he'd settle for sure.  

Like him, as long as we're on this earth, we're still just nearing home.  We won't be home until Jesus comes again, and we settle into our homes He has prepared for us.  Until then, good old hymns like this one, tucked away in the memory bank, remind me to keep walking forward, step by step, because the real home isn't as far away as it seems.

If you're looking for music to this hymn, check The Church Hymnal:  The Official Hymnal of the Seventh-day Adventist Church (or more commonly and affectionately referred to as "The Old Hymnal").  It's number 642, and it's found in the index under the titles "Just Over the Mountains" and "We are Nearing Home!"  (You might even be able to find a copy of this hymnal on Amazon, if you don't have one already.)

We are Nearing Home!

Arranged by C.P. Whitford

Words by John R. Sweney

Just over the mountains in the promised land

Lies the Holy City built by God's own hand.

As our weary footsteps gain the mountain's crest,

We can view our homeland of eternal rest.

Chorus

We are nearing home, we are nearing home!

See the splendor gleaming from the domes afar,

See the glory streaming through the gates ajar!

There we soon will enter never more to roam,

Hear the angels singing--

We are nearing home, We are nearing home!

From the roles of the prophets we have long been told

Of that wondrous city with its streets of gold.

Now with raptured vision we can see it there,

With its walls of jasper and its mansions fair.

Chorus

Those who enter that city are the chosen few

Who keep God's commandments--faith of Jesus, too.

There we'll lift our voices through the endless days

In sweet songs of gladness and in psalms of praise.

Chorus

My brother, my sister, will you meet us there,

In that land of sunshine where there'll be no care?

Accept of God's message and to Him be true,

Then when Jesus cometh, He will call for you!

Chorus

Pick Me! (A lesson in home decor)

Tweet

"Here the few hours of our stay were not spent in useless labor or in doing that which could be done as well as at some other time, but were occupied in a pleasant and profitable manner, restful alike to mind and body. The house was a model of comfort, although not extravagantly furnished. The rooms were all well lighted and ventilated...which is of more real value than the most costly adornments. The parlors were not furnished with that precision which is so tiresome to the eye, but there was a pleasing variety in the articles of furniture.

"The chairs were mostly rockers or easy chairs, not all of the same fashion, but adapted to the comfort of the different members of the family. There were low, cushioned rocking chairs and high, straight-backed ones; there were also comfortable sofas; and all seemed to say, Try me, rest in me. There were tables strewn with books and papers. All was neat and attractive, but without that precise arrangement that seems to warn all beholders not to touch anything for fear of getting it out of place.

"The proprietors of this pleasant home were in such circumstances that they might have furnished and embellished their residence expensively, but htey had wisely chosen comfort rather than display...The God-given sunlight and air had free ingress, with the fragrance of the flowers in the garden. The family were, of course, in keeping with the home; they were cheerful and entertaining, doing everything needful for our comfort...This was a home in the fullest sense of the word."

--Ellen G. White, 1877

Birthday Flowers

Tweet

A few days before my birthday, a card arrived in the mail from my mother. I opened it up, and found inside a gift card to go buy flowers.

But there was a catch!

I was not allowed to keep any of the flowers for myself. No, the present to me from my mother was the collection of smiles I would receive from people to whom I gave the flowers I bought.

The store offered big bunches of roses, and for the sale price I was able to purchase four. Four. I'm not sure I've ever felt so rich as when I went through check-out with such an arm-full of flowers.

At home, I got out all the little vases I could find, especially the ones I wouldn't mind parting with. Fourteen or fifteen small bouquets later, I was ready for my mission.



First smiles were the company who came over for dinner and took flowers with them home. Next, a former co-worker, and after that some grandparently folks. Then a former teacher and his wife, and a great aunt and a great uncle.

What lovely visits we had! I couldn't remember having a nicer reason to go visiting, or a better present than the gift giving, and of happy hours with dear friends.

Next day, I took bouquets to the offices and bookstore in our building, but still, I had a few bouquets remaining. A few dried heads took a ride in the USPS, but there were still quite a few left. How could I justify keeping what hadn't been given to me? I needed to find a way to gather at least one more smile.

Like a flash of brilliance, it came to me: I could dry all the remaining flowers, and collect the last smile from my mother herself. And that's just what I did, too.

Health of Body and Soul

Tweet

"Nothing tends more to promote health of body and of soul than does a spirit of gratitude and praise. It is a positive duty to resist melancholy, discontented thoughts and feelings--as much a duty as it is to pray. If we are heaven-bound, how can we go as a band of mourners, groaning and complaining all along the way to our Father's house?" The Ministry of Healing, p251

"No tongue can express, no finite mind can conceive, the blessing that results from appreciating the goodness and love of God." The Ministry of Healing, p253

...fixing their minds upon cheerful things...

Tweet

A riveting paragraph from my morning reading...

"We are in a world of suffering. Difficulty, trial, and sorrow await us all along the way to the heavenly home. But there are many who make life's burdens doubly heavy by continually anticipating trouble. If they meet with adversity or disappointment, they think that everything is going to ruin, that theirs is the hardest lot of all, that they are surely coming to want. Thus they bring wretchedness upon themselves, and cast a shadow upon all around them. Life itself becomes a burden to them. But it need not be thus. It will cost a determined effort to change the current of their thought. But the change can be made. Their happiness, both for this life and for the life to come, depends upon their fixing their minds upon cheerful things. Let them look away from the dark picture, which is imaginary, to the benefits which God has strewn in their pathway, and beyond these to the unseen and eternal." (The Ministry of Healing, 247-248)