Two-Face Muffins

  Half chocolate half banana muffins. These were good. The chocolate side was a little dry though. I can't remember where I found the recipe, mostly because I didn't pin it. But to any other aspiring muffin makers, here's how you do it. Mix up muffin batter for about 24 muffins, divide it in half, and mix a third a cup of unsweetened cocoa powder into half of the batter. Scoop one tablespoon of banana batter into one side of a greased muffin cup and one tablespoon of chocolate batter in the other half. Bake as directed and enjoy!

The First Day of Fall

 

 

  The first day of fall is here. I can smell it, feel it, taste it. The air has cooled. Not that it is yet time for us to bundle up in sweaters and scarves. We can sit outside without boiling in our own sweat is all. The smell of smoke lingers in the air, faint but unmistakable. Someone has burned the summer's cuttings. Leaves have fallen, lying crumpled and brown beneath the trees that bore them all summer. Their brothers and sisters that cling tightly to the branches are as green and as vibrant as they have always been. They may yet have a chance to turn. The tiniest of raindrops patter gently down, cooling the air, the land and the pool water. Staining the paper on which I write, making the blue lines turn to puddles on the sheets.
  Fall is a season of change. A buffer between the hear of summer and the chill of winter. A time of harvest and bonfires and lightweight sweaters and sleeves. It is a time to close up. I've never cared for fall. Not that dislike the attributes of the season. I'm just never ready for the summer to go. I still want to lay in the grass and stare at the blue sky. I still want to be able to swim and eat watermelon and tiger's blood snow cones. But all good things must come to an end and in the case of summer turning to fall, it is so one good thing can make way for another.

Because Its Good to Remember

Psalms 103:8-12

  "The LORD is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love. He will not always accuse, nor will He harbor His anger forever; He does not treat us as our sins deserve or repay us according to our iniquities. For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is His love for those who fear Him: as far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us."

 

  I have read these verses so many times they have in many ways become redundant. "Yes, I know, the Lord is gracious and compassionate. Hasn't he always been that way?"

  Yes, He has, and that is the beauty of God, the beauty of grace. God, in all His holiness and majesty is also gracious and compassionate. He loves His people He has created.

  It really is almost strange that God loves His creation. Especially when you consider how often we make idols to replace Him. In Isaiah 44, we read about these idols: idols that people have made for themselves. In Isaiah 44 they are carved from wood, the same wood their maker uses to warm himself and cook his meal.

  "From the rest he makes a god, his idol; he bows down to it and worships. He prays to it and says, 'Save me; you are my god.' They know nothing, they understand nothing; their eyes are plastered over so they cannot see, and their minds closed so they cannot understand. No one stops to think, no one has the knowledge or understanding to say, 'Half of it I used for fuel; I even baked bread over the coals, I roasted meat and I ate. Shall I make a detestable thing from what is left? Shall I bow down to a stick of wood? He feeds on ashes, a deluded heart misleads him; he cannot save himself, or say, 'Is not this thing in my right hand a lie?'" (Isaiah 44:17-20).
  We as humans are so ready to worship, so ready to bow down and grovel on the floor before things whether or not they are worthy of our worship.
  God created us and is worthy of our worship. For some reason, we would rather go worship other things. God, as a righteous God, could kill us as just punishment for our sins. And yet, He forgives us. He is slow to anger. He is gracious and compassionate. He is abounding in love. Why do we turn to idols? It should be our joy to love and obey God. So let's do that. Let's honor our God. If we are Christians, how can we afford to do any less then worship God with all our being. Let us never think of His loving compassion as being mundane. 

Butterflies or Mosquitos

  It helps to have a positive outlook on life and my two-year-old brother reminded me of the importance of looking on the bright side of things yesterday. Due to some recent rains, we have been battling an outbreak of mosquitos here in Houston. Because they are too young to think of them, little children suffer the most from mosquitoes (I think). Yesterday, I saw mosquito bites on Peter and said, "Oh buddy, did the mosquitoes get you?"

  He replied, "No. The butterflies bite me."

  Of course, I had to correct him and explain that butterflies don't bite people, its mosquitos that viciously try to eat us. Then Mom said, "Well, that is really a positive way of looking at things."

  Some look at a glass as being half-empty, others see it as half full. Some look at bugs and see mosquitos, others see butterflies.

The god of self

  Me.

  Myself.

  I.

  I wonder how many times a day I say those words. They fall from my lips so easily. Recently at church, we did a book study on Kyle Idleman's book gods at war. When we started the book I sincerely (and vainly) hoped there would not be a chapter on my biggest idol: me.
  Its hard for me to not love me. Its not that I am a super loveable person, its just that I live in my own skin. I cater to my needs and desires: pain, hunger, tiredness. Not that giving into any of those three sensations in necessarily a bad thing, its just when I let those things and others overrule the rest of my life. In Matthew 22:37-39 we read, "Jesus replied: " 'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.' This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' "(NIV).
  We are commanded to love God and to love our neighbor. When we focus on obeying God, we can forget about obeying ourselves. Then, by God's grace we can start fighting the god of me and obey the only God who deserves our obedience.
 

Almost Over

Here's for the last (and probably longest) vacation post yet.

 

  Saturday, the last day of our vacation, was a very busy day. After waking up and eating breakfast casserole, we went to the 45th Division Infantry Museum in Oklahoma.

 

 

  The 45th Division Infantry Museum was really interesting. It was a fun place for my brothers, and I enjoyed it except for this small detail:

 

  I can understand why they wouldn't want fifty-million people to take flash pictures of their original Bill Mauldin drawings and Hitler artifacts, but it was such hard rule to keep in a low-light atmosphere. There were still a lot of great pictures to be taken.

 

 



 

  About the Swastika, I was standing in the room with the World War Two artifacts and thought for a moment about what a different world this would be if the Nazis had won World War Two, and this flag became the flag of the United States of America. But it didn't, and by the grace of God we were saved from a certain fate.

 

 

  As we continued through the museum, we saw this shrapnel from some civil war era cannons. My five-year-old brother looked at it and commented, "That would leave a pretty big hole in your stomach."

 

  The boys walked over the fourteen acres of plane, trucks, and tanks while my cousin Ashley and I sat in the in shade with baby sister. Then we went to Pops.

  On route 66 in Oklahoma, in a city called Arcadia, there is a gas station called Pops. It is called Pops because they sell every kind of soda in existence. This picture should give you the tiniest idea of what Pops is like inside.

 

  There are about twenty cases of soda on the right side of the store, and every one is like the one pictured; one has root beer, one has cola, one has cream soda, one has ginger ale. They've also got all the disgusting fruit flavors and flavors no one really wants to drink like loaded baked potato and sweet corn.  I would have taken more pictures inside except there were about thirty people all at each others elbows. 

 I drank the red birch beer, which was very good, but the bacon soda was a gift for someone, I never would have bought it for myself.

 

  After leaving Pops, we went back to our cousins, swam, and enjoyed just hanging out with them for the rest of the day. Thus ends our vacation. It was fun and we are looking forward to seeing all of our cousins and aunt and uncles again soon. (To those of you reading: hint, hint)











OKLAHOMA!

  We realize, after seeing casinos, we're not in Texas anymore. Winstar World Casino is about five minutes into Oklahoma. I originally intended to take a picture of every casino we passed on the way to my Dad's sister's house, but there's so many I finally figured, "What's the point?" and only took a couple pictures.

 

 

  After travelling about an hour into Oklahoma, we stopped at a rest stop that was good by OK standards. The restroom was crawling with (pause for effect) BLACK WIDOWS! Okay, there was only eight of them crawling around the outside of the windows, but as soon as I saw them, I made a beeline for anywhere other then where those spiders were.

 

 

    To be featured later...

 

 

 

   Cousin Ashley and I painted our toenails. Before...

 

 

  and after!

 

  And now the vacation story is almost over. More to come later.