Pass the wisdom, please

“If you need wisdom, ask our generous God, and he will give it to you. He will not rebuke you for
asking.” James 1:5 NLT

One of the joys of parenting is being able to pass your wisdom on to your children.

I learned how to preserve foods from my mother-in-law soon after I married my hubby. Over the years, I've canned lots of peaches, tomatoes and green beans along with lots of other foods.

In the beginning, I was the one calling her on the phone to ask for her recipes, or instructions on everyday problems which I encountered in the kitchen. Of course, she offered a lot of other advice too - some that I asked for and some I didn't LOL!

Often I rejected the unsolicited advice, even getting angry because I felt inferior. "She must think I'm not a good enough wife to her son or a good enough mom to her grandchildren."

But over time, I saw the things she struggled with. I learned why she gave the advice she did as I learned to know her as a person. The more I knew and understood her, the more I valued the advice she gave. Her wisdom worked.

Now I find myself in that role, passing advice about cooking, canning, child-rearing and all sorts of things on to my own daughters. My grand daughter even asks me for advice about writing. It's exciting and a bit humbling to think they value my advice.

As our heavenly parent, God must feel elated when we come to him asking for his wisdom about anything and everything. He's eager to share it with us and pleased that we value his answers. But he also knows we won't become wise over night.

Wisdom develops slowly as we get to know our heavenly Father. We observe the things he does; we ask him questions , listen to his answers and obey what he tells us. Over time we draw close to him and understand why he says what he says.

One of my favorite verses in the Bible explains it like this: Moses knew God's ways while the children of Israel knew his acts.

When we ask God for wisdom, we're not just asking for answers to our problems, we're seeking him, drawing close to him and getting to know his heart. No wonder that makes him happy!

Help! I need wisdom - Monday Moments with God

My Dear Child,

I know you had a rough time of things last week, but I was there with you through it all. When you asked for wisdom to deal with people and circumstances, I helped you to see what needed to be done. I gave you the courage to face your situations and to continue the task I gave you to do.

You may not always feel my presence or hear my voice clearly, but I am with you, even during those difficult times. I am teaching you my ways, so you will be able to stay on track. I am instructing and counseling you, even through the dark hours, as you keep your heart open to me.

Don't always try to figure things out for yourself - trust me and I will lead you.

Love,
Jesus

James 1:5, Isaiah 2:3, Psalm 32:8, Proverbs 3:5-6, 2 Cor. 4:6

Too soon old, too late smart

The Pennsylvania Dutch have a saying - "We grow too soon old and too late smart."

The older I get, the more I laugh about that because does seem to be true.

Have you ever watched kids as they grow up? They seem to pass through stages in their relational development with their parents:

Age 2 - Mom and Dad know everything.

Age 5 - Mom and Dad are smart, but I really want to know for myself

Age 12 - My friends know more than my parents.

Age 16 - Mom and Dad don't know anything. Why should I listen to them?

Age 21 - I've been to college, now I know it all.

Age 25 - I'm not sure I know it all. Maybe that's why my parents did it that way...

Age 30 - Hey Mom and Dad, how did you used to do that?

Age 60 - Boy do I miss my parents. I wish I had paid more attention to the things they told me.

Often, we seem to go through similar stages in our spiritual, relational development with our Father God. When we first become Christians, everything about our relationship with the Lord is fresh and new. We want to serve him with everything we have and we eagerly look to him for answers.

But over time, that eagerness fades and we begin to fall back into our old ways of coping with life, maybe even trying to solve problems ourselves. Being a wise parent, the Lord knows we have to mature in our relationship with him until we come back to that place of total dependence, awe, respect and trust in him. That's the place where wisdom begins.

“The beginning of wisdom is the fear of the LORD; the knowledge of the holy one is understanding.” Proverbs 9:10 CEB

Living wisely...

So be careful how you live. Don’t live like fools, but like those who are wise. Make the most of every opportunity in these evil days. Ephesians 5:15-16 NLT
Did you know that a recent government study estimated that about 1 pound of edible food is thrown out for each man, woman and child in the US each day? In 2010, 33 million tons od food waste was generated in the US - second only to paper waste in the landfills.

Thant's a staggering amount, especially considering that 5% of that wasted food could feed an additional 4 million people each day!

Simple changes in the ways we buy, store and prepare food, can cut the amount of food waste generated each year.

Here's some ideas to get you started:

- When shopping, we buy economy packages of meat which I divide and freeze into meal-sized portions as soon as I get home. By cooking only what we need, we don't waste as much.

- If I have leftovers, we eat them for lunch the next day. If there are too many leftovers, I make TV dinners from the leftover portions. These are great for evenings when I don't have time to cook a hot meal or for Dear Hubby (DH) if I need to go to take care of the grandkids.

- Sometimes I will put the leftover meat and veggies into a freezer container When it's full, I have enough to make a nice batch of broth or cream based soup.

- There are only 2 of us at home now, but DH still likes an occassional piece of cake for dessert. So I bake a cake and cut it into individual portions, freezing what we won't eat. Later we can pull out one piece at a time which satisfies the sweet tooth and keeps us from throwing out half a stale cake.

- There's often tons of leftovers at church dinners, including coffee. The coffee can be frozen in ice cube trays and stored in gallon plastic freezer bags. Take out a few cubes and nuke them for a minute for a single cup of coffee without making a whole pot. It's as good as instant coffee.

Several years ago, my sister-in-law gave me over a bushel of pears - tiny pithy ones that were too hard to peel and can. So I made a yummy pear butter from them rather than throw them out.

Recently I came home from a picnic with several bags of sandwich buns. They had been frozen once and would get dried out too much if refrozen, so they were headed to the landfill. I broke them into pieces, added seasonings, onions and celery, then baked a large batch of stuffing which I cut into meal-sized portions to serve with some frozen chicken breasts I had. Yummy!

One of our local markets occasionally gives away over-ripe bananas. When I get the chance, I take several bunches and freeze them to make large batches of banana bread later.

While I wish I could say I never wasted anything, over the past few years I have tried to be wiser about using my resources. I love finding new and creative ways to reduce, reuse and recycle food items as well as other things.

Lord help me to apply these lessons to all areas of my life - to be wiser and less wasteful in the use of my time, money and talents as well as with our food! Amen.