When things need fixing

The other day a couple of my crew were at odds.  Different than when their frustrations were vented in hits and hairpulls, this was of the verbal sort.  Unkind words.  Hurt feelings.  Spreading out to members not involved in the conflict.


They angrily separated.  Too old for parent-enforced time outs but perhaps the principle learned in the early years was wisely relied on.  Good idea to retreat.  Stop the assault of wounding words.  Tears.


I appeared in the aftermath.


I think each one expected me to point out their error.  To reprimand them and exhort corrective action. 

By God's grace, I knew to listen first and lecture later.  This time, anyway.


 I cried with each one.  I empathized with their pain and understood each side's complaint. I knew what it felt like to be misunderstood and unappreciated. I knew what it was like to have a lot of outside pressure and to need home to be safe and warm and compassionate. I knew intimately what it felt like to fail in the relationships I value the most.  I knew. And I didn't offer any correction or suggestion.  They didn't need those things.But  I was able to give them what they did need in that moment.  Grace. Unmerited favor.  To be treated better than they deserved. And I assured them that there is more than enough grace available.  To cover all these kinds of moments.  To soothe all their searing wounds.  To heal the rifts.  To flood them with the assurance that they are loved.  By me and most importantly by the Redeemer.  And He is able to mend rifts.  To put relationships back together.  To equip us to forgive and ask forgiveness.  To do it better next time.  To move on to goodness and righteousness and peace.


I was divinely able to respond this way because my Heavenly Father treats me like this.  Yes, He often times has to correct me and to show me where I'm wrong.  But I find Him far more compassionate than corrective.  He shows me way more grace than grievous chastisement.  He is understanding, not unrelenting.


Reminds me of these verses -


As a father shows compassion to his children,
    so the Lord shows compassion to those who fear him.
 For he knows our frame;
    he remembers that we are dust.


Psalm 103:13,14


Sometimes I feel just like my feuding kids.  Sometimes I just stink at relationships and following Christ and LIFE.  Sometimes I feel like a big fat failure.


I'm so very glad that One who is greater than I shows compassion because He knows I'm weak and frail and error-prone.  And when He invites me to pour out my hurts and disappointments, I don't get a lecture.
I get grace.
I am so very glad.

My Rhythm for the Breakfast Blues

When life brings changes, I feel a little rattled til I can find a new rhythm to adjust to the change in tempo.  This month has brought with it some unfamiliar developments and it's taken me some time to figure out how to adapt.  "School starting" has meant not only the courses I teach Betsy but also her one day per week courses which means I have to get her somewhere.  In the morning. 

Now I know for you seasoned conventional school moms, it is pretty pathetic to need to adjust to one day per week school -- you do it five days a week!  Trust me, you have my most ardent admiration!  Thinking of, planning for, and preparing lunch before I've even fixed breakfast requires skills not tapped into since my college calculus classes.  Whew. 


On top of the once a week expectations, Chip is now a high school Senior/college freshman doing the whole joint enrollment thing.  No courses under my tutelage.  Probably his dream come true??  So he's gone every day just like normal people!!


And then, with my Mom being incapacitated since her fall, I've had to figure out how to make this new tempo work and get everybody what they need and when.  Namely food.  And specifically breakfast!  4 out of the other 5 folks in this house need to break their fast at a different time.  And while I adore them all equally and love to prepare tasty nutritious food that conveys my deepest feelings every day, the only one that really merits that kind of attention is the hubs. 

SO, what to do? How to feed the masses from 6-9 AM five days per week?


Breakfast freezer meals. I've done freezer meals for dinner for over two decades but now my arsenic hour (you know - that time lapse of 5-6PM when you're trying to fix dinner and nobody cooperates?  Arsenic hour - either take it or give it!) comes in the morning, not the evening.  Freezer meals for breakfast.  That's become my solution.  That's my new rhythm.  And I think some of you might find an idea or two that can simplify your mornings, too.


Here's a couple of sites that gave me some ideas and then I'll share the menus I've already prepared in case you want to try some, too:


http://www.notconsumed.com/2014/02/21/diy-breakfast-station-easy-bi-monthly-cooking-for-busy-moms/


http://www.5dollardinners.com/15-grab-n-go-breakfast-ideas/


Over the course of three days, about 45 minutes to an hours each day, I stocked my freezer with


breakfast burritos
strawberry muffins  http://allrecipes.com/recipe/strawberry-muffins/
banana chocolate chip muffins  http://www.5dollardinners.com/whole-wheat-banana-chocolate-chip-muffins-pantry-challenge-recipe/
baked oatmeal muffins http://allrecipes.com/recipe/baked-oatmeal-ii/ (I add chocolate chips instead of cranberries)
cooked sausage patties and homemade biscuits
apple cake bread  ( doesn't sound healthy to eat cake for breakfast - so I changed the name)
strawberry bread (because I don't like bananas but I do love Washington Farms strawberries from my freezer!)
sausage & cheese muffins
cheese grits casserole (for a crowd - not individual portions)


 I asked my FB friends for some breakfast ideas and got awesome suggestions.  Thank you!  Trying some already! My friend Tricia shared a cheese soufflé recipe that I'm going to try out this weekend when the whole gang will be here.  It looks DIVINE.  I'll give you that one once I've sampled it.  I cannot wait - it has a boatload of cheese and green chiles - oh YES!!!!


Other breakfast ideas :  /livingletters4/2014/01/breakfast-included.html


/livingletters4/2013/10/update-of-love-for-my-living-letters.html


Now I can grab what I need for each person (after I've served the hubs his daily bacon and eggs) and pop it in the microwave  (or in the hands of each child.....) , add a boiled egg or strip of bacon (which can also be prepared ahead!) and presto! Breakfast is served!


If you have some ideas for how you simplify your mornings, I'd love to hear them. And maybe we should just meet at Cracker Barrel to chat about them around 9???

Love covers

Above all, keep loving one another earnestly, since love covers a multitude of sins.  I Peter 4:8


Love covers.  What a great truth.  Love is willing to overlook an offense, to absorb being wronged, to pay the cost for someone else's sin.  Wow. 


I want to be loved like that, don't you?  For my family and my friends to forgive me when I mess up, to give me the benefit of the doubt, to understand me and accept me.


I know what the opposite feels like, don't you?  I've had friendships dissolve because I wasn't enough something for the other person.  I've felt walls go up because conflicts weren't resolved.  I've been shut out because of a perceived wrong.  Whatever the reality may be, the bottom line was that there wasn't enough love to cover.


I'll bet you have similar stories of hurt.  I understand.  I hurt with you and for you.


We have a choice about what to do when love falls short of what we need.

We can act in retaliation, hoping that the best defense is a good offense.  Unfortunately, what works in basketball doesn't apply in relationships.


We can react out of self-protection.  But we need to know that keeping our hearts in a cage does more to keep love out than to protect us from harm.


We can reciprocate with pretense and denial, insisting that we don't care what happens, we are fine no matter what others do.  But the only one who's fooled is ourselves.  The wound still bleeds, whether we ignore it or not.


We can wallow in our pain, hoping someone will rescue us.  Good luck with that one!


Or, we can respond in a way that is counter-intuitive.  Actually seems to invite more opportunity for offense, for wrong, for pain.  We can let our love cover the other person's offenses.


I know I want to be loved like that.


I know I want to love others like that.


Like Jesus does.

Is it ever "right" to complain?

Some of you asked for clarification regarding the earlier post on taking problems to the Lord.  Understandably, you want to know if it's ever ok to "complain".  I am right there with you! What about when we are concerned for someone else's safety?  What about when the other person is clearly in the wrong? And we want to make it right?  Isn't it the right thing to do to call attention to the problem?


Well, let's look at what Scripture says..............


 Philippians 2:14 instructs us to Do everything without complaining and arguing.  That's all inclusive and completely clear.  We are not to complain.  Other translations use the words "grumbling, disputing, arguing, murmuring".  I think we get the picture.


How do we apply that to everyday living?  Is there ever a time to call attention to a problem?


Clearly, there is.  Matthew 18:15-18 lays out the way to handle problems - If your brother sins, go and show him his fault in private; if he listens to you, you have won your brother.  But if he does not listen to you, take one or two more with you, so that by the mouth of two or three witnesses every fact may be confirmed.  If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church; and if he refuses to listen even to the church, let him be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector




Go directly and only to the person involved in the problem.  And to God for help and grace and wisdom....and to check for any beams that need removing first....Matthew 7:5....




If your fast food order wasn't prepared correctly, humbly, kindly, gently take it back to the cashier and ask for the right sandwich.  Don't immediately go on TripAdvisor and blast the company. If your child's teacher can't manage the classroom, perhaps you can volunteer as an aide but don't chew her up and spit her out over coffee with the other Moms in the class.  If your best friend is an alcoholic, get professional counsel and seek intervention instead of bringing her problem up every week in Bible study for group prayer. 




It seems to me that the bottom line is (as always) a matter of the heart.  If my motive is to help move someone out of danger, to restore them to health and wholeness, then I am definitely exhorted to address the problem with them.  In gentleness and humility, as Galatians 6:1 explains. And this is to be done privately.  Not in a public showdown on social media or at the office's water cooler.  Privately.  So as to restore.  So as to avoid falling into a pit of my own.


If, however, my motive is in some way selfish, if my "rights" have been violated or  I want to prove how right I am or  to inflict an offense in retaliation, then I think the passage that we look to is Proverbs 19:11 - Good sense makes one slow to anger and it is to his glory to overlook an offense.  Overlooking a wrong.  Not calling attention to it (complaining) or insisting that it be made right (arguing) - overlooking it.  I cannot count the number of times I have been warned by the Holy Spirit to refrain from a comment and just overlook.  I also cannot count the number of times I have failed to heed that warning....and oh how I wish I had!


What does it mean to "overlook an offense"?


It doesn't mean to deny an offense has occurred. That's not truth.
 Instead, it means forgiveness and grace in place of demanding to receive what has not been delivered.  It means valuing the relationship and the other person more than our own personal desires for comfort, pleasure, significance, or joy.


When someone has wronged us, there is a debt.  They "owe" us.  Christ's example is that we not "make them pay" but rather that we forgive the debt and then pay it ourselves.  When someone has failed to treat us as we (think) we deserve, we "get that debt of love paid" by seeking fulfillment from Christ's love instead of trying to extract it from the debtor.  And, in Christ's economy, debts we are owed get paid by "spending" love on the one who incurred the debt.  It's incredulous but it's true - when someone has wronged us and we are due justice - or at least an apology - Jesus would have us not seek that payment.  But instead to make investments of love in others (including the offender). 


Investments of love include not complaining or grumbling or airing our offenses.  But instead overlooking them through the lens of Christ's love for us on Calvary.  Miraculously, our own hearts get filled.

Complaining won't do that.  Love will.




Love covers.  A multitude of sins.

I've got this problem.....

I pour out my complaint before him;
I tell my trouble before him
Psalm 142:2


Here's the thought for today - next time we have a complaint about someone or something, next time we are troubled about someone or something, let's tell the Only One who can help.


Instead of our neighbor. Or our sister. Or our husband. Or Heaven forbid - Twitter!


Let's tell our Heavenly Father. Really tell Him. As in casting all our cares on Him. Because, remember, He cares for us! (I Peter 5:7)