No Friday five last week, no Saturday six, not even a Monday musings post. No Hodgepodge. When I finally began to write this, I even optimistically titled it a "midweek" post, but here it is past midweek. In fact, it's Friday again, so ...
Last week was an utterly crazy week and week end. However, lots of good things happened during that time, so I want to make sure I am taking note of those. Let's see. (There just happen to be five of them.)
1) I may have mentioned, but likely not, that since March our church has been sharing its building with another church that meets in the afternoon. The other church does not yet have its own building and lost its meeting place (a senior center) to covid early on. No idea at all when, or even if, they will be able to meet there again. Anyhow, all of last week, their church, Grace Baptist, had fall meetings with Morris Gleiser. What a blessing!
My hubby and I had heard Morris speak at the couples' retreat at The Wilds of New England in 2019, and were so blessed by all that he shared. Accordingly, we were thrilled to be able to hear him preach again, only 15 minutes from our home, so we were able to get to every service except the Sunday School hour. He taught on some basic principles of the Christian life, in a way that is anything but basic. Basic, and yet so many do not practice them: * Following Jesus, and being "all in" for Him; * Being joyful in all things because we learn to be content in all things, worrying about nothing, praying about everything, and thinking biblically; * Discovering and using our spiritual gifts; * Understanding and employing the weapons of our spiritual warfare; * Living out Jesus' priorities. I wish that I could give more details, as a huge burden on my heart is believers who choose not to grow spiritually. But if anyone is interested in learning more, let me know in the comments and I will be happy to share my notes. I was so riveted that my notes aren't as detailed as they might be, but I will share them if anyone's interested.
2) A wonderful ladies' luncheon with Lynn Gleiser as our speaker, on Wednesday of the revival week. Her topic was The Comfort of Hope, and a very encouraging time it was! She noted that true biblical hope is rock-solid divine confidence. Whatever God says will happen, will happen. We can depend upon it! She shared three great points: Our reason for hope; Our struggle with hope; and Our ministry of hope. There was a lot of wonderful information concerning each point. Again, if anyone is interested, let me know in the comments and I can share my notes with you.
 |
| Delightful graphic by Abby at Little Birdie Blessings |
3) A great day with our friend Terry last Thursday. My hubby was building a series of steps for her, and as a thank-you Terry made a scrumptious Italian meal for us. Terry learned how to make sauce from an Italian mother-in-law many decades ago, and her sauce is legendary. So we had stuffed shells, sauce, and amazing meatballs along with garlic bread. Oh my, oh my.
4) Great fellowship with our friends Dave and Gina and their daughters on Saturday. Their youngest daughter is visiting from Arizona and we hadn't seen her in several years. We enjoy getting together with Dave and Gina for breakfast several times a year, usually at Cracker Barrel or another favorite restaurant. This time, we decided to just have them all here for brunch. Our daughter Carrie and her three younger kids joined us. I prepared a hearty breakfast egg bake, a hash brown casserole, and two breakfast pizzas. Others brought scones, muffins, pastries, and fruit.
5) More great fellowship at lunch on Sunday with our friends Syd and Cyndy. Syd was preaching at our church, and we always enjoy time with these dear, old friends with whom we reconnected in 2019. We had asked our young newlywed friends the Smiths to join us for lunch, and actually ended up with two other college age guests as well. So much fun around the dining table, and it was really fun to see how God supplied abundant food for the unexpected guests.
I had a large meat loaf in one crockpot, and six baked potatoes in the other; Cyndy brought a tossed salad and I'd made a refined-sugar free chocolate cake with peanut butter and maple frosting. Here is the neat way in which God provided: I'd made an Alfresco Bean Salad for the luncheon on Wednesday. There was a lot left over, and I'd forgotten about it. But on the way home from church on Sunday, God jogged my memory. Now there would be plenty of food for eight!
But there was more. In planning Sunday's lunch menu, I hadn't realized that our friend Syd has a sensitivity to peanuts. God provided an alternative dessert for him in this way: Due to a kitchen disaster, I ran out of time to make a fruit salad on Saturday, which turned out to be fine since Gina ended up bringing one. But Sunday morning, since my frozen fruit had been defrosting in the fridge and a can of pineapple chunks was already at hand, I stirred up the fruit salad. Voila -- an extra dessert was ready and waiting! I love to watch God work in little details like this. It's such a great reminder of His love and care.
After the young people left, Mr. T and I took Syd and Cyndy over to our little camp to show them around. They loved the history of the building along with its coziness, and we took a little walk on the property as well. It was a lovely fall afternoon spent with friends.
So there is my Friday five! What a blessing to be reminded of God's goodness and generosity toward His children.
"Great is the LORD; and greatly to be praised; and His greatness is unsearchable." (Psalm 145:3)
Sounds as though you had many many blessings this week. That is always good to hear a good message and to gather with good friends around a meal. Things I will not take for granted.
ReplyDeleteIt was a wonderful week. I hate that so many freedoms have been taken from us, but I have to be so grateful for the blessings that God continues to shower upon us.
DeleteWhat a wonderful week. God certainly blessed you abundantly with good food, fellowship, and powerful teaching from God's Word. What could be better than that? Sounds really marvelous to me. Thank you for sharing that with us. The food all sounds wonderful too! Both kinds...the spiritual and tasty!
ReplyDeleteIt was indeed a marvelous week, Pamela. You know, I didn't even realize until reading your comment that this post was pretty much all about food, both spiritual and physical!
DeleteYou folk had a great week with wonderful fellowship and great food.
ReplyDeleteMy mother would often discuss with fondness the church suppers at the Baptist Church. They were beautifully organized from casseroles to salads to desserts to coffee and fruit punch. We attended a church later that was nondenominational where church suppers were a free for all because everyone was trusting God to do the organizing. 😁 My mother preferred to do the organizing. There may be an analogy in there somewhere. I see that your fellowship had everything work out very well.
That is such a funny anecdote, Vee! I must say that at our regular church potlucks which we enjoyed every Sunday for some years, there were often no salads, one or two desserts, all pasta, all soups, or any number of odd variations. The next week people would try to make up for it and we would have an inordinate number of salads or desserts. Our rule of thumb was one main dish and either a salad or dessert, per family, but people tended to ignore that and do what they felt like doing.
DeleteWould love to have the notes from Wednesday's luncheon with Lynn Gleiser. Please let me know how best to get them. All the food sounds wonderful!
ReplyDeleteGrammaGrits, you could leave me your email address in a comment (which I won't publish) and as soon as I can get my notes typed up, I will send them to you. Sorry for not replying sooner; we have been away for a couple of days.
DeleteWhat a wonderful week you had! Great fellowship is so special!
ReplyDelete