All in the Plan

A few weeks ago, I got shanghaied into this Bible study, Beth Moore’s A Woman’s Heart, God’s Dwelling Place,  at church.  This came as a surprise to me, actually.  I usually don’t go to Sunday School without the hubby, and we hadn’t been comfortable with our old class for a while so we, um…hadn’t been going.    Maybe God wants us to grow apart from each other for a while?

When I got into the study, I found out that what is meant to be a ten week study was going to take a year.  Hmmm…  That was slo00000w.  Not the pace I have taken it in the other Beth Moore studies I have done.  But I have done those on my own.  Convinced that I am exactly where God wants me to be at this moment in my life, I decided to go with it.  I can take it slow, right?  Except…I am hungry, and slow is hard for me.

Today, in the lesson we were reading. one of the leaders had a problem with this passage:

According to Revelation 13:8, Christ is the “Lamb slain from the foundation of the world (KJV).  God’s breathing a soul into Adam signed His precious Son’s death certificate.  The moment the decision was made to create humankind, Christ was, in simple terms, as good as dead.  We had to have a Redeemer.  Although God grieved over people’s sin, He was not surprised.  The plan was intact prior to the people, and no one could thwart that plan!

This lady was wondering why God would have created us knowing that Son would have to die, and we had an interesting discussion about this, really.  Maybe God just wanted people to pick Him, wanted relationship?  Maybe  He wanted to see how we, His children, would grow?   And (although I know little about this, so don’t ask me questions), it seems that His relationship with humankind is different from His relationship with angels, so humanity must add something to creation since angels came before.  I don’t know!

We talked briefly about how much time might have elapsed before Adam and Eve sinned.  We talked about whether there was linear time before Adam and Eve sinned.  ( I don’t think there was.  I think that, before the fall, Adam and Eve were with God like we will be in heaven.  That Eden just was.)  The general consensus was that God knew what He was doing even though it doesn’t make sense to us, as if that were anything unusual, and besides, Scripture does, in Rev. 13:8,  back up Beth Moore’s point:

All inhabitants of the earth will worship the beast—all whose names have not been written in the book of life belonging to the Lamb that was slain from the creation of the world.

I walked away amazed at God’s plan.  See, what I heard today was exactly what I needed to hear, that being that God will bring about what He has planned regardless of how we humans try to intervene in the meantime.  This is something I have been wrestling with in my personal life where there are so many things about which I am helpless, things which can be covered only by prayer.  And I was amused because I had gone ahead and filled out the lesson from the video ahead of time, but on this particular day, I somehow missed a page, and the page included words that I needed to hear today.

So.  Here I sit.  In this Bible study.  For a year.  And while I have toyed with the idea of buying the audio CDs and going ahead on my own, … maybe I won’t.  Maybe this is something that God wants me to take slowly.  Maybe that’s why I was shanghaied in the first place.

I’m going to go with it.  I bet He has a plan.

This post is a part of Spiritual Sundays.  To read more posts, click here.

Adventures in Grandmotherhood

We went to Ohio this weekend to help the son and daughter-in-law as they do some work on their house.  The son and his dad were in the basement.  The daughter-in-law was at class (she’s studying to be a nurse).  My job?  The grandsons, ages 5 and 7.

They had been pretty good all day, but I could tell they were tired of being cooped up and, truth be told, I wanted to get them away from the Wii and the video games.  (They were a lot more fun when they wanted to play with me), so, I told them I would take them shopping, but we weren’t going to buy anything.  My thought was that it was too cold for them to play outside and too cold for me to walk, and I would, at least,  get a little bit of exercise walking through the store.  They were up for it.  I gave them the choice of WalMart or Meijer.  I would have preferred a mall, but there is no mall close to their house.

They wanted WalMart, so that’s where we headed.  I gave my usual lectures before we entered.  Crying?  We’d leave.  Run away from me?  We’d leave.  Et cetera, et cetera.  They got it.   And we had a pretty good time.

Then came the toy department.

Theboys were stuck  on one aisle.  They wanted to hula with the hula hoops, and other kids were doing it, so…I let them.

WalMart must hate grandmothers like me.

There were foam swords in the same aisle.  We stopped for a sword fight.  The boys moved politely when someone came down the aisle.

There were bouncy balls.  I let them bounce until RJ noticed that one of them could bounce 17 feet in the air, according to the label, and wound up to demonstrate.

I caught that ball just in time.  Whew!

There were cars on that aisle with buttons for sirens which screamed to the boys because, of course, RJ can read the invitation that says “try me” on each and every label.  There were Tonka toys like their daddy played with, including a fork lift with a lift that really went up and down.  There were…

Well.  You get the picture.

I don’t think I am quite as patient as I was when I was younger because, when we got to the end of that aisle, the boys were ready to go down another and I stopped them.

I told them I wanted to leave the store while I still liked them.

And they got it.

We left without incident and went to Speedway for a treat before returning home.  And we had a lot of fun.  But my advice to any grandmas out there who are thinking of investigating the toy aisle anywhere with their grandchildren is to keep away from the caffeine first.  Unless, of course, you are a much calmer grandma than I am.

Cons and Pros of Technology

Yesterday, I was holding up the door of a store when it opened.  I had traveled almost twenty miles to buy a sweater while they still had what I wanted in stock.  (Have you noticed that stores don’t carry nearly as much stock as they used to?)  Anyway, sweater in hand, I walked to the cash register only to be told that their computers were down and I couldn’t buy.  I couldn’t even pay cash because there is no longer a form on which the salesperson could write an official receipt.

Today, I had to take the sixth and seventh roots of numbers in order to prepare for my math class, and I was stymied.  Enter the graphing calculator.  I have always had just your basic calculator, although we bought scientific calculators for the kids when they were in high school.  Calculators were just coming in when I was in college the first time, 1969-73.  When I took my stats class, you only had half the time to complete the test if you had a calculator.  Few people did; I took my test without.

That said, though, I was amazed at what the graphing calculator can do.  It can take the nth root of a number that is raised to a fractional power like 1/2 or 1/3.  It can square numbers or take square roots (at least it could after I found the right button to push).  I bet there is even a way to work with variables on those calculators, although I have not discovered it yet.

We’ve gotten used to all of this technology and, I have to admit, today I was really grateful.  I still wonder, though…if the system crashes and the batteries run out, will we be able to function as a society, or will things be  confused like they were at the Tower of Babel?  Once all the Baby Boomers retire, who will even know the old ways?

When in Doubt, Grow Your Own

The hubby and I raised our kids in the country.  We had seven acres.  Pigs.  Chickens.  A big garden.  The kids grew up knowing how to grow things.

Yesterday, for the daughter, the concept took a new twist.  One of her patients at work doesn’t care for the daughter’s taste in guys, so she and her daughter found their own solution.

You just throw this guy in water and he grows to 600 times his size.  Better yet, the product reviews say that, when removed from water, he will shrink and can be grown again and again.  You’ll never be lonely, right?

Seriously, the hubby and I are hoping for better in a son-in-law. 

Love Dare, Days 5 and 6

Yesterday, I did not look at my challenge sheet before we went to church, so when our pastor said from the pulpit that the challenge was a really hard one, I was sort of worried.

As luck…no, as God would have it, I went from church into the Bible study I got shanghaied into where we are doing A Woman’s Heart by Beth Moore, and one of the things we talked about in there was the influence that a woman has over her man and how we have to be careful to use that influence for good.  I was wondering about that, particularly one illustration Beth used that has bothered me since.  She was joking (probably), but she said that Satan asked Eve to eat the apple first because he was pretty sure she could convince Adam to eat, too, and he wasn’t sure it would work so well the other way around.

Is my influence over the hubby really that strong?  And, oh, boy, if it is, I sure better be careful about how I use it!

Anyway, when we got home, I looked at my sheet, and here was the challenge:

Ask your spouse to tell you three
things that cause him or her to be
uncomfortable or irritated with you.
You must do so without attacking them
or justifying your behavior. This is
from their perspective only.

Our pastor was right; that is hard!  The hubby is a pretty patient guy, but I wasn’t really sure what he was going to come up with there!  And just like in most marriages, there are some things he doesn’t bring up because, well, I, um…might attack him or justify my behavior.

This was the hubby’s  comment.  See,  we play word puzzles on the computer frequently, and I sort of enjoy that time because I get to type.  Since I never get to touch the TV remote, I think that’s only fair.  I don’t think he thinks it’s fair, exactly, but he tolerates it.  That’s not what irritates him, though.  What irritates him is if I say I am ready and then, while I am waiting on him, key up something else on the computer.  That means that when he shows up, he has to wait, and that irritates him.

That’s the only thing he came up with, and it’s something I can easily fix except that I don’t see why I should just sit there while I am waiting for him, which doesn’t sound especially loving now that I write it down.

While I was chewing on this, we moved on to Day 6 (by the way, I found a website where you can see your own challenge if you want), and today’s challenge was this:

Choose today to react to tough circumstances in your marriage in loving ways instead of with irritation.  Begin by making a list of areas where you need to add margin to your schedule.  Then list any wrong motivations that you need to release from your life.

I know the computer thing is a stupid little thing, but I could certainly add enough margin to my schedule to wait just that little bit for the hubby.  I get the  feeling that I am rather selfish at times.  And, going back to the Sunday morning Bible study, where we were discussing how marriage is a mirror of Christ’s relationship with His church, the whole schedule thing takes on new meaning.  There’s no doubt that I could make more time to spend in prayer and Bible reading than I do.  And there’s no doubt that I could do it with a better attitude sometimes.

This Love Dare challenge is teaching me some stuff…

Love Dare Challenge, Day 3

As I wrote about on Sunday, my church is offering a Love Dare Challenge, based on the movie Fireproof.  They had two showings of the movie on Tuesday.  Hubby and I went to the second one, and there were only a couple of couples there who were under forty.  We watched the movie together and then the men split off.  Then we received our own, gender-specific (sometimes) Love Dare sheets.

I wonder how this will work, especially since the hubbies know the wives are doing it and vice versa.  I also wonder how it will work with marriages of some longevity.  The idea, though, is to make your marriage something special, and I don’t think you can pick a time in marriage when that isn’t important.  We women thought that we would have to be creative so that our husbands would notice we were doing something different.

Day 1 was pretty easy.  We were not to say anything negative to our spouses.  We try not to do that anyway.

On Day 2, we were to go out of our way and do something special for our spouse.  Hmmm….  Since the hubby retired, he has been making my lunch like I did for him for so many years.  So yesterday, I made my own so he didn’t have to get up.    I don’t know for sure what the hubby did, but I had written on my task list that I needed to get the guest bedroom ready for the daughter next weekend.  When I came home from school, that was done and the task was checked off.

Today, you are to buy your spouse something that says you are thinking of them.  I have to admit that I peeked ahead on this one.  But what to buy?  The hubby likes anything cherry, so I bought cherry M&Ms and put them on his computer (he’s been working on his AARP tax course).

The whole thing is supposed to culminate on Valentine’s Day with those couples who want to restating their wedding vows.  The hubby and I haven’t decided about that, yet.  He says he needs more details.  And me?   I don’t know that the taking of the vows is necessary, but I am thinking that this Valentine’s Day, if I follow through, the hubby will feel very special.

That’s the best outcome anyway, isn’t it? 

Obsolescense

Do you like to hold books?  To touch them?  To swap them?  As I have said before, I used to be an English teacher.  I eat with English teachers.  We all feel that way about books, and we are all mourning the closing of the local bookstore at the mall.

But maybe we just have to go with the times.

The head of the English department got a Kindle for Christmas, and she was showing it off at lunch today.  She has a leather case for it, so you can hold it like a book.  She passed it around, and we were all impressed.  Evidently you can’t download the pictures from books, although she does have a picture of Ernest Hemingway as a screen saver. It was easy to turn pages, and the pages looked like book pages, not all in Times New Roman as I had envisioned them.  The Kindle will even read to you with a synthesized voice.

I was sort of on board.  You can download old books for free, and any book, evidently, for $9.99.

And then…

One of the other teachers my age looked at the thirty-somethings and said, “Save your books, girls.  Otherwise your grandchildren won’t know what they look like.”

Really?  Is that the way we are going?

What about the pictures?

And what will happen if the Kindle (or the other electronic media that is supposed to house printed literature) crashes?

In the old days, people used to memorize to keep their important literature, but I think we can all agree that memorization, for the general public at least, is a lost art.

So if the system crashes, where will we, as a society, be?

I don’t know.  I’m just asking.

Open Mouth, Insert Big Foot, and Look What Happens!

I didn’t even know I did it.

Last semester, I made an offhand remark to one of the teachers in charge of scheduling me that I was out of practice with some of the higher math and didn’t feel like I could help in study hall like I wanted to.  It was really just an offhand remark.

Well…this morning, when I walked in to get my second semester schedule, I had:

1rst–English 12

2nd–English 11

3rd–Resource Room

4th and 5th–English 10

6th–Credit Study Hall (the place where I said I sometimes didn’t feel like I was much help)

and

7th–Algebra 4, which is really the second semester of Algebra 2 the way I took it in, um…1971-72?

GULP!!!

I have written before about the math teachers with whom I was blessed, particularly the Kroggels. As I viewed my schedule with some concern,  I could hear them saying , as they did so long ago, “Calm down.  You can do this.”

Still, I have to admit that I was a bit nervous as I waited for 7th period.  Nervous enough that I stayed after and worked the homework while the teacher was still there to make sure I could do it.  And that I understood it.  When you are an aide, you have to be able to explain things in a very basic way, and usually you can’t take short-cuts because the minds of the kids with whom you are working just don’ t work that way.  There are a lot of different methods used to teach the things I learned so long ago, so while I might know how, I have to be able to show the kids using the appropriate method.  And while I left school half an hour late and reworked the problems when I came home to make sure I could explain them, I think I’ve got it!

For today, anyway.

Oh, well.  Don’t “they” say it’s a good idea to shake things up when you’re older to keep your mind alert?  Who am I to argue with the oh-so-knowledgeable “they”?  Maybe this is a blessing.

I’ll just approach the rest of the semester with sort of a cross between what the Kroggels taught me and the Little Engine That Could…

I’m calming down.

I think I can.

I think I can.

I think I can.

I can.

Right?

Shanghaied

I am sitting in my usual corner at church, at the early service,  full of things I cannot say.  The hubby is upstairs, working the slides.  Pastor comes on the scene and ribs the other three people who are on my side of the church.  With those kind of numbers for early service, he says, we should sit on the same side.

Sigh.  I am accustomed to sitting in the same place, but I suppose mixing it up wouldn’t be so bad.

Speaking of mixing it up, Pastor says, the elders have decided to only have one service on the fifth Sunday of every month. That, he says with a smile, does not mean that the early service people just get to skip church that Sunday.  The idea is to build the body.  The idea is fellowship.

He knows us.

I participate in the service, but I am still so full that, were I to say the things in my heart, I would probably hyperventilate.  There’s nothing I do do other than praying.  And I know that’s a big solution, but it’s hard, sometimes, when you can’t see God working and you have been praying, although maybe not as much as you should.

Kathy is sitting next to me, and after the service, she is tracing a Bible verse with her finger.  She is a grandma, like me.  I know she has gone to the elders for prayer before.  Something in me rises up, and I go to her and ask, Grandma to Grandma, if I can pray for her kids and grandkids.  If she will pray for mine.  I did not recognize the thing that rose up in me, but evidently it was the right thing.  Tears come to her eyes.  ‘Oh, yes,” she says.  “Thanks you for having the guts to ask.”

I don’t think it was guts, but we exchange names, names which are now on my bathroom mirrors and in front of the computer to remind me, and we hug.

Pastor has mentioned a “Love Dare” challenge that is starting this Tuesday.  The hubby doesn’t want to go, he says, when I read it to him from the newsletter on Friday, but during the service, Pastor says that people with good marriages should go as an example.  So, when I meet up with the hubby at the foot of the stairs, he says, “Do you want to go to the ‘Love Dare’ thing?”

“Sure,” I say.  I know what got to him.  I know that he, too, is full of things that he cannot put into words and that Pastor convinced him when he said that people with good marriages should attend as a model.  He makes he smile.  The ways he tells me he loves me are subtle ones.

We have our coats on when we are accosted by Joellen, a little, old, bent-over lady who always wears a smile.  (I say old guardedly.  This year, I will qualify for the Senior Meals at Bob Evans. )

“What?” she says, as she looks at our coats, “You aren’t leaving, are you?”

We were.  We had looked at the new Bible classes that were starting and had not seen one that appealed to us both.

But there Joellen stands.  She is looking at me.   I feel guilty.

“Come to Room 103, ” she says.  “We are doing a good movie with Beth Moore.”

I like Beth Moore.

I nod toward the hubby.  “What about him?” I say.

Joellen grins.  “He can come.”

The hubby is a good sport and came to Julie and Julia with me.   He was one of two men in the whole theater.  I thanked him profusely.

He sees the look on my face and says, “Go on.  I’ll find something to occupy myself.”

I follow Joellen into Rm. 103.  Some of the women there I know.  Some surprise me.  She starts to explain what we are going to do, and it sounds to me like other Beth Moore Bible studies.  Five days of workbook study.  One long tape.  Not a lot of time to share in Bible class, I don’t think.

But I am hungry, and as I listen to the opening tape, I hear the goals, and they are what I need:

–to encounter God’s perfection against the backdrop of our own poverty (I do, at this moment, feel impoverished)

–to encounter and acknowledge the reliability of God’s Word.  I know He is reliable. But He takes so long!

–to further develop an honest relationship with God.  Have I been honest?  How can I be when I cannot even speak all that is on my heart?

I don’t know that this is what I need, but I know I need something.  I am ready for this study.  Ready.

When we leave church, the hubby chuckles.

“What was I supposed to do?” I say.  “How could I tell her no?”

He smiles.  He recognizes, as I do, that some things, some people, are sent by God and you just don’t question.  You follow.  You get shanghaied.

Brussels Sprouts

I don’t like brussels sprouts. The hubby does. In thirty-two years of marriage, I have made them once.  Today.  And I have to say that, though the recipe was annoying because you have to separate the leaves off the sprouts, it was really good and I would eat it again.   If you’re feeling adventurous, the recipe, brussels sprouts salad with pancetta and cranberries,  is here.

Now I’m going to be on the lookout for a good lima bean recipe.  The hubby doesn’t like them, so I quit cooking them a long time ago.  I’m thinking, though, that if brussels sprouts can be redeemed, there’s got to be hope for lima beans!