With Thanks for My Girls

Happily, none of the in-law jokes apply to my dear daughters-in-law. Brent married Becky over a decade ago, and their Little Stuff will gain a baby sisiter in a few weeks. Stacey celebrates her birthday tomorrow and will hopefully, soon not experience morning sickness all day long! Bryan finishes the soccer season here in Miami later this month and will fly to Honolulu so he and Stacey can celebrate their seventh anniversary together on March 1. They expect their first child in August. I know how graciously the Lord has dealt with me, and I give HIm thanks.

As I've read through the burnt, grain, fellowship and sin offerings described in Leviticus, I looked at Lev 22:2 "Tell Aaron and his sons to treat with respect the sacred offerings the Israelites consecrate to me, so they will not profane my holy name. I am the Lord." In very practical terms, how do I treat with respect these lovely women the Lord brought into our family? For me, part of the answer to that parallels my personal growth as a believer in Christ. Colossians 2:6 says, "So then, just as you received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to live in him, rooted and built up in him, strengthened in the faith as you were taught, and overflowing with thankfulness."

Too often, family strife erupts when our own spiritual life languishes. When we concentrate on growing up into Christ, we pray instead of meddle. Remember the Genesis foundation for marriage, that a man was to leave his parents, cleave to his wife, and the two will become one flesh? That means our children's marriages are theirs. Don't stew about decisions that the next generation makes. Pray for their ever-growing relationship to Christ and to each other. Pray for selfishness to be less important in our lives rather than telling family members they should be less self-centered. Recite to the Lord His gracious promises about the strengthening our faith provides. Finally, as per Col 2:6, overflow with thankfulness. Keep looking for the things that make you overflow with thankfulness rather than reciting a litany of grousing.

So Happy Birthday, Stacey. Thanks to you and Becky for giving me a waterfall of thankfulness as my daughters-in-love.

Birthday Blessings

Birthdays and family go together in my mind, so living so far from each is often hard for me. Yet in 2009, I got to spend my birthday with Brent, Becky and Little Stuff. Today, Dave and I are celebrating my birthday in Miami with Bryan. We're also here watching the guys' soccer team at Westminster Christian. They won their district championship on Friday and play in the regional quarter final game on Thursday. While Maryland digs out after the snow storm, Bryan, his dad and I can enjoy the overcast skies but 70-degree weather. The gift of family and friends outshines any other gift. 

After worship together today, seven of us, including friends from Bryan and Stacey's small group, went to lunch at the Titanic, a Miami microbrewery, similar to Ram's Head in Annapolis.  We know all these friends and enjoyed a great lunch after church.

My personal reading for today took

me to Psalm 21-25.  In addition to the beloved Shepherd's psalm and the psalm of Christ's agony on the cross (22),  I honed in on Psalm 25. "Show me your ways, O Lord, teach me your paths; guide me in your truth and teach me, for you are God my Savior, and my hope is in you all day long. Remember, O Lord, your great mercy and love, for they are from of old." That seems like a great birthday card from the Lord. I ask that this year the Lord may continue to show, teach, and guide me. The beautiful assurance I have from asking Him lies in the hope He gives me in His mercy and love.

Family Heritage

One of my favorite parts of this Christmas season will be watching the interplay among the three generations that will gather together in Augusta, GA. Oh, yes, 10 adults, two preschoolers and two dogs will create scenes of chaos, but when all the adults know and serve the Lord, there is "joy unspeakable and full of glory," as the apostle Paul writes. Here, Santa Granpa, Brent and our granddaughter share bedtime stories together. The routine that follows in her bedroom involves saying prayers, singing "This Little Light of Mine," and "Mary Had a Little Lamb," and giving hugs and kissess all around. Ask Little Stuff what Christmas is all about and she responds, "It's Jesus' birthday." After that her lights go out, the music of her sea turtle begins and we all slip out of her room.

Years ago, when I studied Isaiah, I chose a verse for our family. “As for me, this is my covenant with them,” says the LORD. “My Spirit, who is on you, and my words that I have put in your mouth will not depart from your mouth, or from the mouths of your children, or from the mouths of their descendants from this time on and forever,' says the LORD." Isaiah 59:21. Whether you have Christians in your genealogy for generations or are a first generation believer yourself, latch onto this verse for 2010 and then share your faith -- by the way you live more than by a penchant to inject a verse into every conversation. Pray that the Lord will call each one in your family to a personal faith in Jesus Christ, a relationship that will change theri life forver.

Happy Turkey Day!

"Thanksgiving Spirit" doesn't have the Madison Avenue ring of "Christmas Spirit," and for that, I am thankful! Yet Thanksgiving Spirit has a warmth that will, hopefully, escape the advertising mogels for years to come. So Happy Turley Day, as Little Stuff's dress proclaims. Count God's blessings all day!

Our son, daughter-in-law, Dave, and I all had a hand in the food today. Austyn Grace's taste buds resonated most with our traditional monkey bread and fruit breakfast, and the pumpkin cake recipe I got from a Pillsbury Bake-Off contest years ago. Considering family favorites, we cook both a turkey and a spiral ham, and make mashed potatoes and a sweet potato casserole. A neighbor on Bearfoot Road had sent something new, a great compote of cranberries, apples and oranges; the girls liked it; the guys passed in favor of stuffing -- no surprises there!

Calls to and from Hawaii and Massachusetts allowed us to extend "thanksgivings" with other family members. Football, some Christmas decorating, as well as coloring, stickers, play-doh, and naps occupied most of our day together here. Meanwhile, the Hawaii branch of The Wolfe's Den enjoyed scuba diving. The thing that resonanted in each activity, each verbal exchange, was a sense of abiding peace coupled with an overwhelming knowledge of God's blessings in our lives. These showcase His grace, not any worthiness of ours. Our children, their spouses, their in-laws -- all know Jesus personally. III John says, "I have no greater joy than to hear that my children are walking in the truth." (v.4) No wonder the cornucopia defines Thanksgiving to me!

Early in the month I started to list specific items for which I gave thanks this year... the free gift of a motorized scooter; a loving husband who plans, but really trusts our finances to God in the midst of the economic downturn; God's kindness in having Stacey assigned to Hawaii instead of the expected Okinawa base; the richness of solid reformed preaching from the pastors of both the church in Severna Park and the one in Oakland; the gracious neighbors in both locations; Becky's good health as she carries the baby girl expected April 1st; the joy of travels to spend time with family; the excitement of Brent's first book coming out in December; the pain killers that help me function day to day. My list goes on, but the idea I want to purse this coming year involves thanking God more on a daily basis. Since Thanksgiving hasn't been packaged yet, this could stay our secret for a while. Happy Turkey Day!

Holiday Happiness

A few days ago Little Stuff and Grandma started to work on a ginbgerbread house as a surprise for Mommy and Daddy when they returned from Florida. This Grandma's idea of fun involved making things instead of hitting the mall with many other holiday shoppers. Given my inability to get around, the vast majority of my shopping happens via the Internet anyway.

Armed with the "everything you will need" gingerbread house, we started what would turned into a three-day project. Thankfully, time doesn't bind retirees or toddlers, so we worked for a while and then stopped, planning to resume another day. Most of my time went into attempting to control Little Stuff's sugar consumption! Sprinkles, red and green peppermint swirls, rainbow-colored dots, frosting, gum drops, and confectionery sugar kept her tasting as we went along. I loved her laughter, her licking my fingers, and the memory making! In this season of giving thanks, I still tell the Lord thank you for the simple things that involve telling the next generation about Jesus by spending time with them inside and outside church.

Gingerbread Houses and Scooters

What possible connection can exist between a gingerbread house and a scooter?  This Granma's 2009 list of  "Thanksgiving Blessings" includes both!  A few weeks ago, Granpa picked up a kit for making a gingerbread house, thinking our granddaughter and I would enjoy constructing this sweet

confection together while her Mommy and Daddy traveled to Miami to visit Uncle Bryan. The first step, gluing the house pieces together with frosting, went slowly, but by giving Little Stuff a taste here and there, the first step came off without a hitch! We add the decorations tomorrow afternoon!

The second blessing, a free scooter that a neighbor on Bearfoot Road gave us, traveled to Gerogia with us and has allowed this Granma such freedom and mobility. A trip to the mailbox means the two of us zip out the driveway with a toot of the horn. We gather the mail from the box, place it in the basket, take a spin around the neighborhood, and come back huddled together. How could this daily task be any more fun?

Well, it's even more fun when the scooter morphs into a chariot for Little Stuff to attend a princess birthday party, with Granma as her driver. Scatter the fairy dust, and a bit of magic emerges for us both. I clasp her hand, head for the garage, place the birthday gift in the basket, and with a toot of the horn, we head off, my heart filled with thankfulness for the simple joys today held: a gingerbread house and a battery-operated scooter! Praise God from whom all blessings flow!

Homemade Memories

Happy Halloween from the Georgia Wolfes straight to Granma and Grampa's hearts. Although we couln't go around the neighborhood with our granddaughter, we vicariously took the trip via photos. We have thankful hearts for her patient Daddy who did the cutting on the jack-o-lantern but engaged his daughter with the seeds, and for her Mommy who brought infectious giggles to the festivities. Her Georgia grandparents joined in the fun, carrying coffee as Little Stuff sought sweeter goodies for her bag. I reran my mental camera to the days when Dave carved while Brent and Bryan decided how the teeth should look on the jack-o-lantern that year. I remember, too, the Oscar the Grouch costume Dave and I constructed; green fun fur for the head, fuzzy green pjs that we had, and a tinfoil covered trash can that had straps over the shoulder that held it in place. Happy memories!

Families solidify a society, and simple traditions strengthen family ties. Despite trendy phrases about villages that raise a child or the importance of community, Scripture talks most about family. Only in Judges does Deborah use the word village. God brings Israel into being with a call to Abram and promises to bless him through his family. Later, Rahab and her family, escape the destruction of Jericho, and she enters the lineage of Christ. Still  later, the New Testament refers to believers as the family of God. The psalmist offers this: "A father to the fatherless, defender of widows, is God in His holy dwelling. God sets the lonely in families, he leads forth the prisoners with singing..."

The family traditions at your house at the end of October may include mums and corn stalk decorations, Reformation Day celebrations, face painting, pumpkin carvings, and silly costumes, or a myriad of fun activities. I hope you took the time to stockpile these memories; you'll draw strength from them in the future.  

Getting to Know the Family Better Takes Time and Effort

Uncle Bryan traveled 8 hours on Friday to get to Statesboro, Georgia, only to leave at noon on Sunday and return to Miami. Why such effort for so short a visit? He took the time and made the effort to spend time with family because he believes in the importance of family time. He drew his Hawaii house's view with sidewalk chalk, and then played front yard soccer amidst an infestation of gnats.

After worshiping together on Sunday, we ate our lunch before Bryan got his good-bye hugs from his niece, Austyn Grace. I thought of the ideas expressed in The Message's paraphrase of verses from Galatians 6.

⁴Make a careful exploration of who you are and the work you have been given, and then sink yourself into that. Don’t be impressed with yourself. Don’t compare yourself with others. ⁵Each of you must take responsibility for doing the creative best you can with your own life.

⁹So let’s not allow ourselves to get fatigued doing good. At the right time we will harvest a good crop if we don’t give up, or quit. ¹⁰Right now, therefore, every time we get the chance, let us work for the benefit of all, starting with the people closest to us in the community of faith.

So as we all have opportunity this week, let's invest ourselves in the lives of those closest to us -- our family.

Reunions

Around 8:30 tonight, as Brent, Becky, Dave and I sat in the living room, engrossed in reading Austyn Grace her bedtime story, Uncle Bryan walked up to the front door. Although Aunt Stacey is working in Honolulu, Uncle Bryan drove here after having just worked three weeks in Miami....their work life is complicated to say the least! The six of us together at one time constitutes a mini-Wolfe family reunion because we seven live in three different states -- Maryland, Georgia and Hawaii!

But our hugs had to wait for something else. You see, the most exuberant reunion occurred between Bryan and his dog Zeus! Taking a photo proved impossible as the Husky mix went ballistic, bounding over pillows, then over the back of the sofa. She wanted to launch her 40+ pounds right into Bryan's arms. With each pass through the living room, she gathered speed and excitement. Her shepherd ears lay plastered against her head as she could barely contain her joy. We laughed, gasped, and held on lest we get knocked off our feet as we witnessed the love displayed at the sight of dog and master reunited.

Tonight I caught a tiny glimpse of the indescribable delight that lies ahead in our most important reunion. Yes, I'll be excited to see many family and friends in heaven, but I will express total joy in ways I can only imagine when the Master welcomes me home.

Traveling Grandma's Thoughts

My friend Irene started calling me "Traveler" when Dave and I moved out here to the woods almost ten months ago. The name fits, not because Dave and I globe trot to China and exotic ports of call, but because our trips take us to Georgia and Florida to see our grown guys, their wives, and our two-year-old granddaughter.
Our adventurous sons moved out of Maryland to pursue grad school and jobs. We enjoyed each phase with Brent and Bryan, especially the teen years. By the time they had finished college, we had transitioned to adult friends. We still love to spend time together, whether we do something like spot gators in the Everglades or just hang out and watch a DVD. Happily, both guys married women who like us, and the two-year-old charmer named Austyn Grace won our hearts immediately.
The dryer's hum and the appearance of suitcases on our bed mean we will head out tomorrow morning with a first stop in Augusta to see Vickie and DeWayne Davenport. Zeus, Bryan and Stacey's dog, will make the trip with us, and then fly to Hawaii on September 5th to join Bryan and Stacey at their new home. That means we are packing dog food, toys, shampoo, leashes and crate, along with our clothing for temperatures almost 40 degrees warmer than here in our woods. I also have homemade cookies and things Austyn Grace left here during her last visit. The packing presents a daunting task.
As the logistics of this trip began to boggle my mind, I thought of the trip made on my behalf over two centuries ago. Making that journey, enshrined in a virgin's womb, meant giving up heaven for earth, walking beside faithless humans, shedding infinite mobility for entrapment in flesh and blood, and offering up that flesh and blood in the world's most heinous execution. That trip, made out of unfathomable, unconditional love, truly demonstrates God's grace to His world. With a thankful heart, I returned to my simple packing task, mindful of One who came for me.

Boredom and Serenity

"Boredom is the feeling that everything is a waste of time; serenity, that nothing is." Thomas Szasz

People often ask what I'm up to in retirement or what's keeping me busy or if I'm bored. Actually, I've never been a fan of the word bored. I insisted that my students and my own children at least use vapid or insipid when attempting to access a particular situation. Haven't we all become jaded with so many things and so many choices? If our world doesn't run at full tilt, we somehow view far too many things as a waste of time. Some activities can fall into the waste of time category, but in retirement, I think the Lord's trying to teach me a reformed view of doing and being.

While sitting on the porch swing last week, Becky, Austyn Grace and I spent a good bit of time ooohhhing, ahhhhing, touching and giggling over our discovery of an inch worm. Later that same day, three generations patiently stood on a bridge attempting to catch a fish. As we later prayed over our picnic lunch, we noted the beauty of the day God had created for our enjoyment. As I captured both of these photos, serenity, not boredom, possessed my heart and soul.

Perspective and purpose color our everyday experiences because God cries out to be seen in even the most mundane. Today I will focus on Dutch theologian Abraham Kuyper's statement: “In the total expanse of human life there is not a single square inch of which the Christ, who alone is sovereign, does not declare, 'That is mine!'”

The Perfect S'mores

Most people have a definite method for creating the perfect s'more. The first step involves choosing the right stick. The impatient s'more chef will grab the first stick in the woods. Connoisseurs may insist on owning one of the metal beauties from Plow and Hearth. The second step deals with the degree of marshmallow doneness. Some char that white puff of sugar while others slowly roast the marshmallow to a golden brown. The choice of milk chocolate or semi-sweet comes next, followed by the construction of the actual s'more. However, the best part of this sweet concoction comes in the eating : ~ )
On Friday night 12 adults and 4 children gathered around our camp fire to make s'mores and watch fireflies.The accompanying pictures tell the story best.

Being messy

I'm baking chocolate chip cookies this afternoon and freezing them as fast as I can. Who isn't tempted to consume warm cookies right out of the oven? Brent, Becky and Austyn Grace visit here next week and then we'll eat those thawed confections together. Since all the Wolfes like underbaked cookies, the first batch out of the oven can be little more than warmed dough. Getting those gooey morsels just right requires a balance somewhere between softness that would make the Keebler elves ashamed of their hard crunchy cookies and globs of amorphous dough that break apart. The underbaked cookies taste great, but they sure create sticky hands and poor looking specimens that the Iron Chef would banish from his kitchen.
Another messy scene occurred when we went to Brewster's in Statesboro, GA. There, Austyn Grace got a baby ice cream cone for her second birthday. She devoured that thing with relish and wore about as much as she ate. We laughed, she giggled, and the two dogs we had with us tried to lick Austyn Grace to pieces.
Somehow I wish the messes I can get into were as inconsequential and as humorous as cookies and ice cream. But as adults we realize that some personal interactions, poor financial or career choices, or unexplainable life situations leave messes in their wake that have no easy answers or quick remedies. Cleaning up after cookie baking or ice cream spills is far easier. Nevertheless, I do clean up kitchen catastrophes and wash toddler clothing. Can I do any less with the other messes? Cleaning up will take more time and work, and humor will not usually hallmark them, but those clean-ups can have far-reaching repercussions for good in my character. Hmmmmm. That'll give me something to ponder as I do the dishes.