I’m beginning to enjoy baking in a whole new way.

You may remember my post a couple of weeks ago about about misinterpretations where I shared that my Apple Shortbread recipe instructed me to ‘chill’ for ten minutes.

Today I baked a Viennese jam tart (pictured), which I haven’t attempted for a couple of years but is one of my favorites.

For my English readers, it’s a little like a Bakewell tart without the almonds, but for the rest of you, just accept that it’s really very tasty.

I was working my way through the recipe and yes, there it was, an instruction I didn’t understand but followed to the letter:

“Relax in a cool place for 30 minutes…”

Seriously, I’m not making this stuff up.

What’s more, the sentence ends:

“…before rolling.”

Seriously.

If you’d been at my house this afternoon, you may have heard conversations something like this:

“Honey, can you come help me with this for a moment?”

“Sorry baby, I’m in the middle of baking a tart right now.”

“You’ve been doing that for a long time.”

“I know, I’ll be done soon.”

“Why are you in the pantry?”

“Because it’s cool in here. It’s part of the recipe!”

“Ummm…. never mind, honey.”

and then, some time later…

“Honey, why are you rolling around on the floor?”

“The recipe says to.”

“Really? I think it’s probably referring to the dough you made, it probably wants you to roll that out.”

“OH! I see. That makes more sense!…. I still don’t get why I had to sit in the pantry for half an hour though.”

I wonder what delights next week’s recipe will bring?

Preconceptions

A couple of weeks ago I had the pleasure of speaking to someone on the phone who I had previously only known online.

I’ve gotta tell you, I was SHOCKED!

The gentleman in question is Trey Morgan (Blog | Twitter) and I should have guessed what his accent was like but to be honest, I never made the whole Texas connection and from his picture, he looks like a young, slim, handsome man who I imagined sounded a little like Ralph Fiennes or, at a stretch, Tom Cruise.

The voice I heard on the phone though made me picture Boss Hogg from the Dukes of Hazzard or a fat, balding, hell fire and brimstone preacher.

My preconceptions about what he should sound like and my preconceptions of what someone with his accent should look like were totally and utterly wrong.

It occurred to me today that the same is true for the preconceptions non-Christians have of us as Christians and of our churches.

People very often have very negative preconceptions of how Christians will act and speak and how their church services will be.

Do we meet those negative preconceptions? Are we everything that people fear we will be.

Or do we blow those preconceptions out of the water, in a good way?

What do people see when they see you? Do they see something that they want to be a part of?

Do they ask you for an explanation for the hope that’s within you? (1Peter 3:15)

Do you life a life that’s worthy of the Gospel of Jesus Christ? (Philippians 1:27)

Next time you see someone, think about what preconceived ideas they might have and whether you want to match up to those ideas!

Now is The Time

The tragic plane crash yesterday involving many of Poland’s top government officials reminded me of how short life is – and how fragile.

Not only is life short and fragile but along with that, so are our plans.

The Polish president along with the leaders of all branches of the Polish military and many other influential and important Polish leaders were all killed simultaneously in the terrible accident – and along with them went their plans and dreams.

Everything they were working for and pushing toward could change now. New people will be appointed to their positions, people with their own plans and dreams and quite possibly everything that those 80-something passengers were working toward could go by the way side.

Toyota

Toyota have experienced the fragility of our plans in the last year too. After finally becoming the worlds largest car manufacturer, the car maker suffered the financial loss and public image nightmare of having to do a world-wide recall on many of its models to fix faults that had been found.

Apart from just costing the company millions, if not billions of dollars, Toyota’s image as the producer of the most reliable vehicles has been tarnished, possibly permanently. In one fell swoop, seventy years of working hard to produce the most reliable vehicles in the world takes a significant setback.

All those plans, all that hard work, ruined by an accelerator and a floor mat.

Do Not Miss Your Chance

The song “Lose Yourself” by Eminem has been going around and around in my head, particularly the line:

“You only get one shot, do not miss your chance.”

The truth of that statement was really brought  home to me by the deaths yesterday.

You never know when your time here on Earth will end, you never know when your one shot will be over, when your last chance to make a difference will come. Those Polish government officials didn’t know that their one shot was going to be over yesterday and now, sadly, they’ll never get another chance. Toyota didn’t know that everything they had worked so hard for could be damaged so quickly and easily and who knows, they might never fully recover from this.

My One Shot

So I’m not going to miss this opportunity, I may never type another word, only God knows whether I will or not, so I’m going to take this one shot and not miss my chance:

I’m not going to try to give an argument for the existence of God or for the truth of what Jesus did for us on the cross at Calvary. I’ll leave that up to the Holy Spirit right now.

You either believe it or you don’t.

What I want to exhort you to do though is to take the truth you know seriously.

Too many people walk around ‘believing’ what the bible says, knowing it to be true but holding back, they don’t want to give themselves over to it’s truth just yet, thinking there will always be another day.

Another day is here. Another time, another opportunity… it’s right here, right now. You may not get another chance, you may not get another opportunity.

Don’t miss your chance.

If you know that Jesus Christ died to save you, if you know that you have sinned in your life and that those sins will keep you from an eternity in paradise, I implore you, TAKE THIS CHANCE.

God can hear you right where you are, he’s listening to your heart, just admit your sin, accept his forgiveness and start living your life anew.

It’s not too late right now… just don’t wait until it is.

Happy Easter!!! (or Happy Resurrection Day, if you prefer to call it that).

He is RISEN!

I watched the movie “The Invention of Lying” last night. It’s a really great movie with lots we can learn from it, except for one major fault – it claims that the existence of God is a complete myth, a lie and for one five minute period it mocks him terribly.

Without God

However, there is something that the movie admits and that is that without God there is no hope, nothing to look forward to, no reason for existing other than to die and be turned to dust.

The premise of the movie is to explore what happens when lies are introduced into a society that can only tell the truth, a society that has no concept of lying, that doesn’t even have words for truth, fiction and lying because those concepts don’t exist. If someone says something then everyone else accepts it as absolute truth.

For example, the central character (after learning how to lie) walks into the bank and asks to withdraw $800. The teller tells him that the computer says he only has $300 in his account and then instantly decides that the computer must be wrong, because a person can’t say anything but the absolute truth.

In this society it is ‘known’ as absolute truth that there is nothing after death. They have no concept of God because they ‘know’ he doesn’t exist.

When faced with imminent death, the main character’s mother tells him that she is afraid to die. With his heart breaking for his poor mother, he makes up the ‘lie’ that there is an afterlife, that everyone she knows and loves will be there and that she will be happy forever.

That news quickly spreads around the world and everyone wants to know more.

Hope for the Future

Suddenly they have hope.

Where previously there was just empty nothingness, now there is hope, something to look forward to, something to give life meaning. People clamor to find out more, to know if there are rules, to solidify their hope.

Although the movie treats it as if this reality is a lie (which I am convinced it is not), it simply cannot escape the fact that life is meaningless and hopeless without God.

Without God there is no hope for the future, no assurance, no peace for the sick and dying.

Without God there is just… nothing.

We Have a Certainty – a Blessed Assurance

I found it particularly poignant to watch this movie on the eve of Resurrection day the day when hope became set in stone, the day when hope turned from just ‘hope’ into certainty.

I understand why we use the word ‘hope’ but I don’t have hope, I have certainty.

I have that wonderful assurance. There is no doubt in my mind, no question, no ‘hoping’.

One day I will be with my savior in paradise. Death has lots its sting. The victory is won, the promise given.

I AM saved.

I hope and pray that you have that certainty this Easter day, that you are not just hoping with your fingers crossed that everything will turn out OK in the end. My hope is that you know the assurance that comes from being a child of the Most High God.

If you don’t – ask one of us how you can find that assurance today. There’s no better time than right now!

“Death has been swallowed up in victory.”
“Where, O death, is your victory?
Where, O death, is your sting?” The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.

Therefore, my dear brothers, stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain.

1 Corinthians 15:54-58

How often do you get mad at God?

How many times have you expected God to do something and then been disappointed when he didn’t do exactly what you wanted?

It’s very easy for us to fall into the trap of praying for something that is not what God knows is best for us and then getting disillusioned, confused, frustrated and even angry at him for not pandering to your every whim and desire.

Palm Sunday always reminds me of the way that I get angry with God for not doing what I want.

The people were excited as they saw Jesus riding into Jerusalem and they shouted ‘Hosannah’ which means save us now.

The people wanted Jesus to save them and were excited because they were sure he was going to.

These people were living in an occupied land. The Romans had taken over their country and were oppressing them. Most of them probably hoped that Jesus would save them from the Romans and set them free from oppression.

But Jesus was coming to save them in a whole different way. Jesus was coming to set them free not from the Romans but from the curse which oppresses all of mankind.

It took less than a week for those same people to become disillusioned with Jesus – and angry that he wasn’t setting them free like they expected him to.

Those joyous shouts of hosannah quickly turned to shouts of ‘crucify him’.

As I think about Palm Sunday and remember the way I get disillusioned and angry with God, it’s a reality check for me.

If I had been there in Jerusalem 2000-ish years ago, I would have been there shouting “Hosannah” and I would have been there a few days later shouting “Crucify Him”.

I’m a fool if I think I wouldn’t have. The way I get angry with him proves it.

I need to work on how I react when I don’t get what I want from God – do you?

Snow is white, clean, beautiful.

I love waking up on a winter’s morning and looking out of the window to see a blanket of fresh, white snow covering the ground.

Fresh snow reminds me of purity, of truthfulness, of perfection.

Give it a week or two in this world though and that snow no longer looks so pure, so perfect. Instead, that once clean and pure blanket is looking trampled, disheveled and dirtied.

It doesn’t take long for the world to have its sullying effect on even the thickest of snow-blankets.

As I thought about snow this morning, I was reminded of how quickly we, as Christians can be affected by our time in the world.

Just as snow picks up the dirt of the world, so do we.

That’s why it is so important to spend time regularly with God and in fellowship with other believers. Those are our cleansing times, our times of renewal – the times when our blanket of snow is refreshed.

Remember this picture when you spend too much time away from God and other Christians, because just like the snow in this picture, your purity will soon be sullied and smothered.

————————————————————-

Many thanks to my friend Richard McFarlane for this wonderful picture to illustrate my thoughts.

I don’t do enough to help others.

That’s not up for debate, it’s a fact.

At the moment, I do almost nothing at all to help other people in terms of time, resources, finance or even prayer.

Oh, I can justify everything I do and I can justify where all my money goes. Sure I can.

When it comes down to it though, if I need to try to justify what I do do and what I spend, I’m probably not doing the right things and spending my money the right way.

1 John 3: 16-24

¹⁶This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers. ¹⁷If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him? ¹⁸Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth. ¹⁹This then is how we know that we belong to the truth, and how we set our hearts at rest in his presence ²⁰whenever our hearts condemn us. For God is greater than our hearts, and he knows everything.

²¹Dear friends, if our hearts do not condemn us, we have confidence before God ²²and receive from him anything we ask, because we obey his commands and do what pleases him. ²³And this is his command: to believe in the name of his Son, Jesus Christ, and to love one another as he commanded us. ²⁴Those who obey his commands live in him, and he in them. And this is how we know that he lives in us: We know it by the Spirit he gave us.

In church today we were discussing how blessed we are, how much we have and how we take so many things for granted.

We started to talk about what we could do as a family to help others and decided to start saving the money to pay for a well in a third world country.

As we were researching what organizations provide clean water to villages in the third world, we saw that World Vision are partnering with Proctor and Gamble to provide PUR water purification packets to people in Haiti.

Each PUR packet can clean bacteria, dirt and other pollutants out of ten liters of water (about 20 bottles) meaning each packet can clean enough water for a family for a whole day – and each packet costs just twenty cents so a $20 donation will give a family clean water for 100 days.

We wondered if we had enough change laying around the house to make a $20 donation so we went around searching through drawers, emptying out piggy banks and rifling through wallets and purses to see what we could come up with.

Between the five of us we found $28.59 – and are giving it all to World Vision.

After all, what use is there in having money lying around the house while people are suffering and even dying from not having something as basic as clean water?

We’re not stopping there though, we’re going to keep collecting money from wherever we can find it.

I’d like to challenge you today to join us in giving Change for Clean Water.

Everyone has money lying around doing nothing, maybe waiting for a ‘rainy day’. Well it’s a rainy day today for thousands of people and YOU can help them.

Would you join us by giving your spare change to help people in Haiti?

You can either donate the money directly to World Vision or send it to us through PayPal and we’ll add it to the rest of the money we collect and send it to World Vision all together.

If you want to send us money through paypal, just go to paypal.com and click on the ‘Send Money’ link. Please send the money to peter@godserve.co.uk

Any amount will do, whether it’s a dollar or a hundred thousand dollars. Let your spare change help World Vision save lives today.

A very quick thought today:

The need in Haiti is great… very great. There is no doubt that we need to help the Haitians but don’t forget about the rest of the world.

The needs in third world countries didn’t get instantly fixed. There are millions around the world still dying of starvation, thirst and disease.

Please don’t forget them. Haiti may be getting the most air-time and may be at the center of our attention but it’s just one of many places where your help is urgently needed.

Check out places like WorldVision.org and Compassion.com to find out how you can help.

I realize that my blog posts, facebook updates and tweets over the last month or so have been more than a little on the down side.

I don’t believe in hiding things, I prefer to be open and honest. It doesn’t seem to me that hiding the truth, hiding reality does anyone any good.

I am very pleased and grateful that many of the comments I have received have borne out the truth of that, with quite a few people seeming very relieved to discover that it’s OK to say “I’m not OK”

What I realized today though, as I read Psalm 22 is that some people may look at my current physical, mental and emotional state and question God or even the existence of God.

I want to take this opportunity therefore to say that this is not about God. Sure, God can fix me in an instance if it is right for him to do so but he’s not a genie in a lamp that I can just order to do my bidding any time I want.

God is God.

God is in charge. He has a reason for letting me go through this and no matter how much I or anyone else may want to blame him, he is guiltless and sinless and has done nothing wrong.

God is holy, pure, just and loving. He knows best because he knows all. The tiny part that I can see is insignificant compared to the immensity of His knowledge and understanding so I will NOT question him – and neither should you.

I don’t understand what’s happening to me right now but God is still on the throne and I will ever praise and worship him.