“I could never myself believe in God, if it were not for the cross. The only God I believe in is the one Nietzsche ridiculed as ‘God on the Cross.’ In the real world of pain, how could one worship a God who was immune to it? I have entered many Buddhist temples and stood respectfully before the statue of Buddha, his legs crossed, arms folded, eyes closed, the ghost of a smile playing round his mouth, a remote look on his face, detached from the agonies of the world. But each time after a while I have had to turn away.

And in imagination I have turned instead to that lonely, twisted, tortured figure on the cross, nails through hands and feet, back lacerated, limbs wrenched, brow bleeding from thorn-pricks, mouth dry and intolerably thirsty, plunged in God-forsaken darkness. That is the God for me! He laid aside his immunity to pain. He entered our world of flesh and blood, tears and death. He suffered for us.”

John Stott

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I shared recently how I felt strongly that I needed to stop eating sugar. I said that I wasn’t sure I could do it, and I’m still not sure I can. I thought that on day one or day two of not eating any sugar, my expression might look something like this woman’s does.

But so far, to my knowledge, I don’t look like this.

And I am giving thanks for several days without a substance I didn’t think I could live without.

Here are a few things I’ve noticed so far.

1. I walked up the stairs yesterday without knee pain.

2. I have a bit less of an appetite in general. (Which makes me wonder if sugar is an appetite stimulant.)

3. My shoe size has gone from a size 9.5 to a 7.

Actually, only two of the above statements are true.

I don’t know how long I’ll be able to stay on my sugar sabbatical, but I don’t think about that. I did it yesterday, I can do it today. That’s all I need to know. If you prayed for me, thank you.  🙂

We have some very focused, prayerful days ahead, and I look forward to seeing which way the Lord leads. I know that even when there’s only enough light for the step we’re on, more light will come when needed.

I hope your day is peaceful and blessed!

You would think that a good offer on our house, from qualified buyers who love it and are anxious to move in, would be something that would bring great relief and joy. I had long pictured that when we had a buyer for our house, we would be so thankful, and then would be able to go house shopping with many places to choose from, because in our area it’s a “buyer’s market.” So I was stunned when we received this good offer, and then scoured the real estate listings in our area only to find that less than ten houses currently for sale fit our criteria. There are many houses in our city that have the master bedroom and bath on the main floor, but only a few in the areas we prefer. And since this move is intended to be our last (God-willing), it’s important to me that I like the area we move to. I am totally fine with having to make cosmetic changes to a house — new carpet, new paint, even new kitchen cabinets would be okay. I really, really, want to like the area and neighborhood we’re in. I don’t want to move too far away from the neighborhoods where my daughters and grandchildren live. I’ve asked the Lord to show me if I’m being too particular or selfish — I’m willing to change.

We saw three houses yesterday, and none of them are something I truly want to move into. I spent a long time in prayer and in the Word yesterday morning asking for God’s help in discerning where we are to go. If it were just Michael and me, I wouldn’t be concerned a whit — we would accept the offer and then just rent a house for a year until the right one to buy came on the market. But we have six people in our home that we need to consider. The move has to be just right for many reasons.

So as I write this, I’m unsure if this offer on our home (that came, by the way, when our house was off the market) is going to result in our moving right now. I want it to. I pray it does! I’m so uncertain. I’ve always been a doer, and fairly decisive. Right now since I don’t feel absolute peace about any of these houses we’ve seen, my inclination is to say no. I don’t think it’s wise to move out without a good plan or a house we love to move to.

The perfect scenario would be that in the next day or two, The House For Us comes on the market. We have spring-like weather and that can often motivate people to list their homes for sale. That is what I’m asking for at this minute.

When I was in an inner tizzy yesterday I felt very directed toward John 14 in my Bible, and when I opened it, this is what the words of Jesus said:

¹ “Do not let your hearts be troubled. You believe in God; believe also in me. ² My Father’s house has many rooms; if that were not so, would I have told you that I am going there to prepare a place for you?”

Now I know Jesus was speaking of heaven here, but it still ministered to my heart. Later in the chapter Jesus says,

“Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.”

So right this moment I have no idea what will happen. I do know that the Lord doesn’t want me to be in a tizzy, so I will try to make today a tizziless day. He asks me to trust Him, and to not be afraid.

And in the midst of uncertainty, I am still donating or throwing one thing per day in 2012. These are the seven for this week:

Thank you so much for stopping by. What are your plans for the coming week?

Once upon a time, a long, long, long, looooong time ago, I didn’t eat sugar.

I also didn’t eat much white flour. And my little girls didn’t eat sugar either.

When my daughters grew old enough to attend birthday parties where cake and ice cream were served, I decided that they had to be allowed to occasionally eat cake and ice cream at birthday parties if they were going to speak to me have a normal life when they grew up. But we didn’t buy candy or other kinds of sweets, and when we did partake, it was a very rare event.

Then I moved to Minnesota in 1981 when I married Michael. Minnesota is the Land of White. Snow and long white winters, white noodles in the ubiquitous Minnesota hotdishes with thick white sauces, white skin on all the Scandinavians (my pale skin fits in well!), white mashed potatoes, white milk and cheese from Wisconsin right next door (The Dairy Capital of the World), white, flaky butterhorn rolls, white Cool Whip in white rice pudding. White, white, everywhere.

And so we started doing as the natives did, which was eating all those white things. Well, except for Cool Whip. I still wouldn’t eat Cool Whip if you tied me up with a white rope and beat me with a white stick.

Slowly over the years, the pounds crept onto my 5′ 10″ frame. Since childbirth I’d always seesawed back and forth — losing and regaining fifteen-twenty pounds, but after moving to Minnesota the fifteen became thirty and then fifty and then….bleh. You get the picture. Minnesota is a beautiful place to live, but it can be so mean!

And I’ve read all the books about how sugar is white death and contributes to heart disease and inflammation all over the body, but when you’re young and energetic, you can be foolish and try to ignore things like that because they haven’t caught up with you yet. Until you reach your fifties and your knees scream at you and your energy flags and your extra poundage feels like a sack of boulders you’re carrying around that can never, ever be laid down.

Not everyone has a problem with sugar, I know. But I have long known that I do. It’s like a drug — I don’t need very much, but I want just a little bit three or four times a day. And of course there have been days when fourteen Miniature Reese’s seem like the more reasonable choice than two. Insanity.

So I’ve decided to give up sugar, starting today.

Here’s a little autobiographical story by Portia Nelson (she was a nun in The Sound of Music) that I read on a popular blog recently, and it reached down through my throat and grabbed me violently by the pancreas:

Autobiography in Five Short Chapters

Chapter 1

I walk down the street.
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk.
I fall in.
I am lost…I am helpless.
It isn’t my fault.
It takes forever to find a way out.

Chapter 2

I walk down the same street.
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk.
I pretend I don’t see it.
I fall in again.
I can’t believe I am in the same place.
But it isn’t my fault.
It still takes a long time to get out.

Chapter 3

I walk down the same street.
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk.
I see it is there.
I still fall in…it’s a habit.
My eyes are open.
I know where I am.
It is my fault.
I get out immediately.

Chapter 4

I walk down the same street.
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk.
I walk around it.

Chapter 5

I walk down another street.

I know that this is going to be impossible for me unless God gives me strength. I know He’s willing, but I know that for decades now I have been unwilling. Today I’m willing.

I even think sugar has become a sort of idol for me, as awful and possibly ridiculous as that sounds. In Community Bible Study this year, our class is studying The Divided Kingdom, which covers many books of the Bible. Every week we study how Israel and Judah would not lay down their idols and turn to the Lord, no matter how much things were falling apart for them. We of the 21st century can sit on our high horses about this because WHO would be brainless enough to bow down before an image carved from wood or stone, or actually BELIEVE that a forged golden calf could do even one thing for them? Well, I have no idols made of stone or wood or gold in my house, but I’m learning that an idol is what I turn to, again and again. For comfort, for help, for something to do; it’s something I focus on. And I think that foods with sugar have been something I’ve turned to over and over again. I love sugar and I hate sugar.

I know it’s futile to say “I will never ingest a granule of sugar again so long as I live.”  There may come a day when I feel I can have a treat at a family gathering. I don’t know. And I have no idea if I will succeed. So I ask for your prayers. If you think I’m being silly, pray for me. If you see how serious this could be, please pray for me. If you think I’ve gone overboard, pray for me.

For years I have lived and worked and played on Sweet Street.

Today, I absolutely must walk down another street.

Not long ago, my dear sister-in-law Christy and I were blessed to visit Pacem in Terris (Latin for Peace on Earth), a silent retreat center in St. Francis, MN.

I’ve been there before, but never in winter. Here is the prayer hermitage I stayed in for two days and nights:

Have mercy on me, O God,
according to your unfailing love;
according to your great compassion
blot out my transgressions.

Wash away all my iniquity
and cleanse me from my sin.

For I know my transgressions,
and my sin is always before me.

Against you, you only, have I sinned
and done what is evil in your sight;
so you are right in your verdict
and justified when you judge.

Surely I was sinful at birth,
sinful from the time my mother conceived me.
Yet you desired faithfulness even in the womb;
you taught me wisdom in that secret place.

Cleanse me with hyssop, and I will be clean;
wash me, and I will be whiter than snow.

Psalm 51:1-7

The longer I live, the more the kindness, patience and mercy of God bless and astound me!

Thankfully,

Thank you for your comments about the books you’ve been reading. This month’s winner of the book A Sack Half Full is Patty!  I’ll email you for your address, Patty, and you’ll have to let us know what you think of the book.

Also, as I continue my campaign to donate one thing per day in the year 2012, here’s what’s going away this week:

A bag full of dozens of old photos, mostly of places and people I don’t know. How did I get so many pictures of places and people I don’t know? Well, some of them were from years-old rolls of film from daughters’ trips: forty-two views of the ocean, seventeen shots of office buildings in downtown Managua, blurry pictures of ducks paddling one hundred twenty-nine yards away, that sort of thing.

So I’m saying goodbye to birds I’ll never know, sights I’ll never see, and double prints of large tropical leaves and primitive roads that will never make it into a scrapbook.

I kept all the important photos of loved ones, in case anyone was wondering.

Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us.   Hebrews 12:1

It’s a lot easier to throw off extra household items that hinder and entangle me, than the sin that hinders and entangles me, but I’m trying. With God’s help, I’m working on this every day. Not by my strength, but by His…

I’m thankful that God is so merciful with me! His patience with my failures is so heartening and humbling. I would have given up on me years ago….but not my Father.

In praise and hope today,

Early this week it snowed again for almost two days straight, and our area was blanketed in over a foot of new snow. The flakes were huge and there was no wind to speak of, so at times it looked like a huge goose feather pillow had been torn open in heaven and the contents just gently dropped over our region.

We have had a run of illness in our household, and I’m praying today is better. Three people had regular lower intestinal, er, displays, and one had several upper intestinal presentations. Thankfully, I have not been sick. I try to be diligent about disinfecting doorknobs and light switches and banisters, and I wash my hands a lot at times like this.

Last night we went to Chris and Sharon’s to celebrate Lil’ Gleegirl’s fifth birthday. It’s hard to believe she’ll be in Kindergarten this fall. She is one of the most cheerful, smiling children I’ve ever known. What a delight she is to her Grandma!

Today will be my sister-in-law Christy’s last full day with us, so she and I will go out to lunch for our last quiet visit together before she flies back to Tennessee. I tell her that our rare times together are “my mental health visits,” and that’s only half in jest. I think it was in God’s plan when He thought up the idea of friendship that friends could make life “half as hard and twice as good,” as the Sara Groves song says so well.

I plan to make a big batch of Panzanella for dinner tonight. If you haven’t made this recipe before, may I suggest you try it? I have served it to guests countless times and no one has ever not requested the recipe.

And as promised, I’d like to give away a book on the blog early next week. My friend Denel’s husband wrote a book, and it has already gone into its second printing because the first run sold out. The book is called A Sack Half Full by Jerry Duprez, and is a heart-wrenching and funny account of Jerry’s difficult journey through testicular cancer. I can’t recommend it enough. You might think that you don’t need to read a book about testicular cancer, but may I respectfully suggest that you do? There’s so much more to this story than the medical stuff — this book is about how God made Himself known to their family through tragedy, and showed Himself faithful to each one of them.

I laughed out loud while reading the book, and of course I cried, since I love this family so much. I want you to have a copy, so to enter for a chance to receive one, just leave a comment below answering this question: “What is the last book you can remember reading?”

You never know why you might need this book. Not everyone will experience testicular cancer or even be acquainted with someone who has it, but almost everyone will go through a difficult time in their life when they wonder why God seems to have forgotten or abandoned them. This book is funny, hopeful, humble and honest.

Comments will be taken until Monday morning, March 12th, and the winner will be drawn randomly at that time.

Thank you for stopping by, and may God bless you today…

I’m thinking about friendship today, and how tremendously grateful I am for the friends God has given me. Some of you I’ve known since I was five years old. Some of you have walked with me through the wondrous/difficult marital and mothering years. Some of you I’ve never even met, yet still hold so close in my heart as true treasures. I thank God for each of you today, with tears….

“Friendship is the only thing that will show up at our funerals…..”

Ann Voskamp

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When my sister-in-law Christy saw my last blog post about the creepy, squeaky little bats on the roof of our vacation cabin, she said in the softest, most compassionate voice, “Oooh, I love bats!” And when she saw the dumbfounded look on my face, she pulled up a chair next to me at the computer and led me to a YouTube video about a bat.

This little baby bat was abandoned by his mother, then rescued and named Lil’ Drac (shudder), and as I watched the video with Christy, I was entranced.

You just have to see this:

And part 2:

I would have bet a lot of money that I would never get tears in my eyes over the plight of a bat. I would have lost that bet.

So, are those of you who weren’t fond of bats of a different opinion now? Or are you scoffing at this nutty bat propaganda?

I already knew how bats have an important job to do in the world, I just didn’t want to know very much about it, or have them squeaking within 100 yards of my dwelling.

Now my heart has cracked open a little bit toward bats.

I sometimes like to have deep conversations with friends about what God is doing in our lives.

Julie: So, friend, what is God doing in your life lately?

Friend: He is definitely helping me with my patience with my children, and increasing my desire to spend more time in prayer.

Julie: What a blessing!

Friend: So, Julie, what is God doing in your life lately?

Julie: He’s softening my heart toward bats.

Friend:

Julie: Hey, don’t leave so quickly…where are you going????

And on an unrelated matter, here are the week’s seven things that have been donated as I give away 365 things during the year 2012:

Six excellent books and a soft throw/lap blanket.

Back to Lil’ Drac — what did you think after watching the videos?

Sometimes in the middle of winter, when the snow is deep and the temperatures are low, you think of summer.

When you’re sitting in your office and looking out at the breathtakingly beautiful landscape with a foot of new-fallen snow, you’re thankful for the awesome views, but you’re thinking back to the warmth of August and a few days spent in a cabin resort deep in the north woods of Minnesota.

And while you’re sitting in your plaid flannel nightgown looking out at the drifts, you remember what it was like to feel the warm summer breezes of August and to swim twice a day in the resort pool, splashing around like a child again.

And you sigh as you recall how sweet it was to sleep in past 5:30 each morning, and how perfectly fine it was to lay down for a rest (or a snore, depending on who you are) in the middle of the afternoon if that’s what you wanted to do.

And while you’re watching snowflakes the size of feathers drift down from the grey sky, sometimes your mind goes back to last summer, and the anticipation you felt for being together as a family and hearing laughter around a shared meal, and the squeals of happy grandbabies on the swings and in the pool. And you remember how much being near the water calms and renews your spirit, and how delightfully amazed you were to see actual pelicans on Pelican Lake.

And as you pull on boots and wrap a scarf and find the snow shovel, you have a pleasant summer flashback of driving into the resort and seeing your cabin for the first time, and tossing up silent-but-loud thank-yous to God as you carried in your food and your suitcases and your hope.

And sometimes during the long Minnesota winter, when the sounds you hear are the quiet roar of the furnace, the crunch of steps taken in snow, and the scraping of the giant blade of the plow clearing your street during the night, you think back to the sounds of summer at the resort in the deep north woods of Minnesota.

You think of the sounds of water lapping on the shore of the pristine lake, a stone’s throw from your cabin. You recall the crackle of a wood fire after dinner, with children’s giggles as they hold out marshmallows on sticks to be toasted. You remember the better-than-Prozac calming of the soft breeze that rustles the birch and poplar leaves in the million trees around you. The birdsong…the soft splish of a paddle dipping repeatedly as a canoe skims across the lake to a fairy lagoon.

And…

…you remember the eerie, high-pitched creaky squeaks of the bats that live on the porch roof right above your cabin’s front door.

Almost within arm’s reach.

The two dozen little bats that sit watchfully during the day amidst their own guano, following you with their shiny eyes as you come out of your cabin to go to the pool, the back deck, the lake. The bats who’re waiting for dark so they can wing out into the night with mouths open to gobble mosquitoes for hours. The bats with blond furry bodies and dark, jointed legs. The squeaking bats with little cat-like ears, and sharp little teeth that can be easily seen because they’re just a few feet away from your head. The bats with quick, furtive movements as they scurry deeper into the eaves when you stop to gape at them with a mixture of fascination and horror.

Yes, those kinds of bats.

Sometimes, in the middle of a north woods winter, with snow all around and no spring in sight, you think back to your last summer in the north woods. And you dreamily remember the lake, the pelicans, the canoes, the lily pads, the naps, the togetherness, the pool, the sunshine and the happiness. You recall the birds singing and the wolves howling and the breezes blowing, and all the summer sounds that seem designed by God to help keep you tranquil and serene.

And then…you remember the squeaks.