Screwtape Proposes a Toast (1959) ~
“Suspicion often creates what it suspects.”
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First Time For Everything…
I arrived in Seattle at 6:00 P.M. Saturday night but woe is me my bag did not! I stood at that dreaded carousel for 1 hour but nothing… The little black Kirkland brand bag with my lavender ribbon tied to the handle was nowhere to be found.
My daughter was waiting patiently in the cell-phone waiting lot (yep we have a lot called the cell phone waiting lot for people who are picking up passengers!)
Finally I gave her the call to come get me. I went home without my bag, trying frantically to remember everything I had packed in that bag. Of the most concern for me was my trusty notebook/calendar that is always by my side, except when it’s in my suitcase. 🙂
My computer power cord. My card reader. Two pairs of shoes. My favorite black pants, a couple tops, some other necessary items. Not going to list those items but trust me they are darn expensive to replace. There was also a pair of Dear’s shoes and 6 of his shirts. Yikes, what an empty feeling to leave the airport without that bag. This morning at 6 am I called the Alaska Property Irregularity Desk with my Property Irregularity Receipt and inquired about my bag. The sweet lady informed me my bag decided to fly to Vancouver, B.C. It would be on the 6:30 am flight from Vancouver back to Seattle and after it goes through customs they’d deliver it to my porch. Relief and rejoicing…I hope it’s really on my porch when I get home from church!
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There Is A Redeemer
There Is A Redeemer ~ Words and Music by Melody Green
There is a Redeemer
Jesus, God’s own Son
Precious Lamb of God, Messiah
Holy One
Jesus my Redeemer
Name above all names
Precious Lamb of God, Messiah
O for sinners slain
(Chorus)
Thank You oh my Father
For giving us Your Son
And leaving Your Spirit
Til the work on earth is done
When I stand in glory
I will see His face
And there I’ll serve my King forever
In that holy place
Fellowship ~ Food ~ Family ~ Friends ~ Fun
Father’s Day weekend was filled with time enjoying family and friends. On Saturday Ken and Heidi traveled North from Orange county and Jim and Jeanie traveled South from Central California to enjoy the day with us.
Heidi, Ken, Dear, Jim and Jeanie.
Heidi is an friend of mine from the Russian Baptist Church. We have had many traveling adventures together. She was living with Greg and me in Huntington Beach when she met Ken. I was the matron of honor in their wedding in 1978.
Jim is my cousin. His father and my father are brothers. I met Jeanie in college and we became good friends. I introduced her to Jim. They were married in 1974, eight months before us. For a few years all three of us couples lived in Huntington Beach and attended the same church.
Ellen and Dear
We have always enjoyed each others company and can laugh and cry together. This is the “front row” inside joke that got us chuckling. Jim, it’s true by the way…(call me)
The guys enjoyed talking about new digital camera capabilities, stereo high and low sounds, contractor woes, and the importance of accountability.
Still friends after all these years…
More family made their way to Camarillo yesterday and we christened the Condo pool! My sister Kathy, niece Michelle and her son Jackson came for lunch and a swim.
Jackson giving me the smile!
Enjoying the pool in Mommy’s arms.
Yippee!
Nana sitting close by…
until she’s needed!
Chicken nuggets at Great Aunties.
A lovely steamed pear and date dessert for the ladies made by niece Michelle.
My company left and I was off to pick up Dear from work.
Straight to California Grill in Camarillo to use the Father’s Day gift card from our children to their dad. Thanks Josh, Laura, Dan and Katie. Dinner was wonderful and we still have money left on the card!
Today I head North to the Seattle area for the next three weeks. We’ll be having a grand celebration over the 4th with Dear home for 2 weeks and family flying in. I’ll be posting from the North. Blessings on the rest of your weekend!
Photobucket blacked out all my photos and is holding all my photos hostage as of July 2017.
When People Are Big and God is Small ~ Review
When People Are Big and God is Small – Overcoming Peer Pressure, Codependency, and the Fear of Man ~ by Edward T. Welch
I am going to list the chapter headings so you have a better idea of what Welch covers in this book.
Part One: How and Why We Fear Others
2. “People will see me”
3. “People will reject me”
4. “People will physically hurt me”
5. “The world wants me to fear people”
Part Two: Overcoming the Fear of Others
6. Know the Fear of the Lord
7. Grow in the Fear of the Lord
8. Biblically Examine your felt needs
9. Know your real needs
10. Delight in the God who fills us
11. Love your enemies and your neighbors
12. Love your brothers and sisters
13. “The Conclusion of the Matter: Fear God and Keep His Commandments”
I enjoyed reading part two over part one. At the end of each chapter he has “for further thought” sections that are very helpful. This is a book that we all can benefit from reading.
The Dallas Morning News says ~”Need people less. Love people more. That’s the author’s challenge…He’s talking about a tendency to hold other people in awe, to be controlled and mastered by them, to depend on them for what God alone can give… [Welch] proposed an antidote: the fear of God…the believer’s response to God’s power, majesty and not least his mercy.”
This is a biblical, helpful, convicting, and encouraging read…
I’ll leave you with one more quote from the book, pg. 113 ~ Grow in the Fear of the Lord ~
The problem is clear: People are too big in our lives and God is too small. The answer is straightforward: We must learn to know that our God is more loving and more powerful than we ever imagined. Yet this task is not easy. Even if we worked at the most spectacular of national parks, or the bush in our backyard started burning without being consumed, or Jesus appeared and wrestled a few rounds with us, we would not be guaranteed a persistent reverence of God. Too often our mountain-top experiences are quickly over-taken by the clamor of the world, and God once again is diminished in our minds. The goal is to establish a daily tradition of growing in the knowledge of God.
That challenges me to ask: What is my daily tradition of growing in the knowledge of God?
Espresso Mini ~ You’re Not In Seattle Anymore
It’s time for Show and Tell Friday and I’d like to take you on a trip to England.
Being from Seattle you are bombarded by Espresso Stands everywhere. These stands exist and survive even though we also have a Starbucks, or Tullys, or Seattle Best Coffee, or other coffee companies on every other corner. We love our strong coffee in Seattle. Costco in the Seattle area even has coffee roasting in some of their warehouses with their own label . Coffee beans sold fresh from the roaster. We are serious about our coffee.
I was so excited to see this cute little espresso car just outside the village of Bakewell when we were in England. I’ve never seen a cute little espresso van in Seattle! Even though I don’t drink coffee past nine in the morning, I had to support this venture in England. I bet there’s someone in Seattle that could really make a go of it with a vehicle like this…
F.Y.I. ~ Bakewell is suppose to be the village of Lambton in Austen’s Pride and Prejudice. This is where Lizzy stays at the Inn close to Pemberley (Chatsworth House) and runs into Darcy. This site has more actual places from the novel. Since we’re in Great Britain, here are a few more sites for you to enjoy…Cotswolds, Oxford, Wales, Oban, Lake District, London, York.
For more fun with show and tell head on over to There’s No Place Like Home…
Photobucket blacked out all my photos and is holding all my photos hostage as of July 2017.
Bed in Summer ~ Robert Louis Stevenson
Bed in Summer
Robert Louis Stevenson (1885)
#1
Page Number: 14. Illustrator: Ruth M. Hallock
Publisher: Rand McNally & Co. Date: 1919
In Winter I get up at night
And dress by yellow candle light.
In Summer, quite the other way,
I have to go to bed by day.
I have to go to bed and see
The birds still hopping on the tree,
Or hear the grown-up people’s feet
Still going past me in the street.
And does it not seem hard to you,
When all the sky is clear and blue,
And I should like so much to play,
To have to go to bed by day?
In Washington our summer evenings stay light as late as 10 PM. Fourth of July fireworks shows start late in Seattle. This poem reminds me of my husband and I trying to go to sleep at our normal 9-10 pm time with it being light outside.
Spring Reading Challenge Wrap Up
- What was the best book you read this spring? Fiction: Clouds of Witness by Dorothy L. Sayers , Non-Fiction: Seeing and Savoring Christ by John Piper
- What book could you have done without? I didn’t have a long enough book list to have to have an answer to this one. They were all worth reading.
- Did you try out a new author this spring? If so, which one, and will you be reading that author again? Yes, the new author I tried was Dorothy L. Sayers and I will definitely read her again.
- If there were books you didn’t finish, tell us why. Did you run out of time? Realize those books weren’t worth it? I never got around to Harry Potter #6. I’ve read it before and wanted to read it before #7 came out…
- Did you come across a book or two on other participants’ lists that you’re planning to add to your own to-be-read pile? Which ones? Yes, Stepping Heavenward by Prentiss. I bought it and am reading it.
- What did you learn — about anything — through this challenge? Maybe you learned something about yourself or your reading style, maybe you learned not to pick so many nonfiction books for a challenge, maybe you learned something from a book you read. Whatever it is, share! I learned that I can read a lot more than I have in the past. There is time to read. I’m a multi-book reader (more than one at a time). I’ve learned I’ll enjoy and digest non-fiction more if I only read a chapter at a time. I have a stack of 4-6 books on my nightstand and I try to read a little out of each in the evening instead of watching TV.
- What was the best part of the Spring Reading Thing? Meeting other readers and seeing the hundreds of books I’ve never read.
- Any other thoughts, impressions, or comments. I like to take reading a step further by recording any sections of the book that stand out to me.
- I will definitely participate in a fall reading challenge!
- I’ll be posting a review of When People Are Big and God is Small soon. 🙂
Thanks so much to Katrina at Callapidder days for hosting this event so magnificently and unselfishly…
Psalm 1 ~ The Way of the Righteous
Psalm 1 (ESV)
Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scoffers; but his delight is in the law of the Lord and on his law he meditates day and night.
He is like a tree planted by streams of water that yields its fruit in its season and its leaf does not wither. In all that he does, he prospers.
The wicked are not so, but are like chaff that the wind drives away. Therefore the wicked will not stand in the judgement, nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous; for the Lord knows the way of the righteous, but the way of the wicked will perish.
When People are Big and God is Small ~ Welch ~ Quote
The following quote comes from the book, When People Are Big and God Is Small (Overcoming Peer Pressure, Codependency, and the Fear of Man) by Edward T. Welch. The quote comes from chapter 6 – Know the Fear of the Lord –
To whom will you compare me? Or who is my equal?” says the Holy One. (Isa. 40:25)
Some have called this “otherness,” this holiness, of God his transcendence. God is exalted above his people. He lives in a high and lofty place (Isa. 57:15). His judgement and mercy are above us, they are ultimately incomprehensible. As a result, we don’t use a reigning king or queen as our template for knowing God. To say that the Holy God reigns makes it impossible to use earthly kings as the model. The Holy God is unique, greater, and of a different kind than earthly kings. The Holy God is the original; the most glorious of earthly kings are only a dim reflection.
To make the holiness of God even more awesome, the transcendent God has come close to us. It would be one thing to know that God was gloriously transcendent and entirely separate from his creation. In such a situation we could become acccustomed to his lack of intervention in human affairs, and for practical purposes we could become our own gods. But our God is also the Immanent One who has revealed himself and become like us. He said, “I will be your God and you will be my people” (Lev. 26:12). He is near us. He will never leave us or forsake us (Heb. 13:5). He is so close he calls us “friends” (John 15:14). He is so close, the Scripture talks about Christ in you (Col. 1:27). Given his nature, this is virtually impossible for us to grasp. But, by God’s grace, we can grow in knowing his holiness, and this knowledge will both expel the people-idols from our lives and leave us less prone to being consumed with ourselves.
The Happy Wonderer ~ ellen b. 
