Heather Holleman's Blog, page 135

A Return to the Vernal Pond

A Delicious Little Cake: Almond Cream Cake

During COVID-19, sometimes it’s fun to bake and enjoy a sweet treat for the weekend. Today, we made an Almond Cream Cake from Taste of Lizzy T.

Since I love almond flavoring, I thought this would be the perfect cake for our weekend. And it’s delicious! It’s the best cake for an afternoon tea or after dinner dessert. Enjoy!

Joys in the Pennsylvania Woods

This week as I walked along Spring Creek, I learned about a native Pennsylvania wildflower–the red trillium. These don’t last long in the spring, and it’s illegal in some places to pick them. They die very quickly if you do. To me, they seem so beautiful but also rather fragile and almost unnoticeable unless you’re really looking. Sometimes the lights and shadows of all the surrounding trees make red trillium fade to the background.

I learned that the red trillium depend upon ants to disperse their seeds for more trillium to grow. Red trillium don’t smell the best; they don’t attract the more powerful or visible creatures like birds or larger animals. Instead, they live quietly and humbly, depending only upon largely unseen little ants for their continued growth on the forest floor.

I enjoyed gazing upon the red trillium and what she represents as her own kind of flower: nearly hidden and dependent on the smallest things for future growth. Sometimes our life and work won’t be loud and large and attractive to the masses. Sometimes, we stay quiet and humble alongside others.

A Prayer God Answered: Easy and Light

On Sunday, I ask my praying neighbors to pray that my week could feel “easy and light.” I was so tired from online teaching and all the stress of future decisions related to teaching, launching a daughter into her freshman year of college, and caring for people. The days felt hard and heavy.

But on Monday morning–till this very moment–it’s like a fresh breeze blew through my weary soul. And I remember the rightness of that prayer for “easy and light” as I read Matthew 11: 28-30:

Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.  For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.

Don’t you just love Jesus? Don’t you just love how He says, “I will give you rest?” and how softly these words fall on our souls?

Oh, what a Savior!

Jesus’ words invited me to ask myself some questions that may help you today:

If it doesn’t feel easy and light, how am I depending on my own strength, and not the Holy Spirit’s?

If it doesn’t feel easy and light, how have I taken on a “yoke” of responsibility that God has not assigned to me? Where am I doing too much?

If it doesn’t feel easy and light, what does the Lord want me to change?

I love the easy and light life of walking with Jesus!

If You Don’t Have Much Left to Give

This morning I found myself reading 2 Kings 4 and the very familiar story of The Widow’s Olive Oil. Read it as if you are the widow with almost nothing left to give emotionally or physically. Read it as a worn out leader, a depleted parent, or an exhausted teacher. The widow finds herself in a desperate situation–something hopeless, scary, and urgent. So she cries out to Elisha the prophet.

The wife of a man from the company of the prophets cried out to Elisha, “Your servant my husband is dead, and you know that he revered the Lord. But now his creditor is coming to take my two boys as his slaves.” Elisha replied to her, “How can I help you? Tell me, what do you have in your house?” “Your servant has nothing there at all,” she said, “except a small jar of olive oil.” Elisha said, “Go around and ask all your neighbors for empty jars. Don’t ask for just a few. Then go inside and shut the door behind you and your sons. Pour oil into all the jars, and as each is filled, put it to one side.” She left him and shut the door behind her and her sons. They brought the jars to her and she kept pouring. When all the jars were full, she said to her son, “Bring me another one.” But he replied, “There is not a jar left.” Then the oil stopped flowing. She went and told the man of God, and he said, “Go, sell the oil and pay your debts. You and your sons can live on what is left.”

Don’t you just love Elisha’s question, as if the Lord Himself came to you today and asked, “How can I help you? Tell me, what do you have in your house?”

How can I help you? And what little thing do you have left to offer? Let me take that last little thing and multiply it.

Something about her statement–that she “has nothing there at all. . . except” made me remember the miracle of feeding the five thousand where a boy has only five loaves of bread and two fish (Matthew 14:16-18). She has just one small jar. And her one small jar is what she offers.

I love picturing her running around to the neighbors in this extraordinary act of faith. She needed more jars! She needed to expand her capacity to receive the blessing the Lord would pour out. And I love that it’s a private blessing, performed in secret, behind the closed doors that housed just her family.

Think about the little we have left today as a parent, teacher, and leader. Offer it up. By faith, we might expand our capacity to receive how God might multiply the thing we offer Him today to be used to nourish others and provide. It will not be a public demonstration, but a secret blessing behind closed doors.

And it might just sustain us for a lifetime.

Frothing the Almond Milk

I’ve been frothing up my almond milk to make a delicious little homemade latte every morning.

It’s a small thing.

I realize the joy of small, good things. The frothy foam of the warm almond milk with the coffee is something I thank the Lord for.

Frozen mango smoothies, a sleeping cat, a sun-soaked living room–all the little things!

A Heart Occupied

I read through the book of Ecclesiastes yesterday, and it brought overwhelming joy to my heart (and this shocked me!). Normally, people approach Ecclesiastes as a rather hopeless little book that makes us feel like everything is meaningless. After all, the wisest and richest man who tested himself by denying himself nothing he thought might bring him pleasure ultimately felt that all was meaningless. You’ll end this book by realizing fearing God and keeping His commandments are “the whole duty of man,” but it normally doesn’t feel very good in your heart by the end.

(It’s not a motivating book, if you know what I mean.)

But when I read it this time, I noted some important repetitions–a clearly stated gift that comes from God in the midst of utter meaninglessness.

In the middle of talking about death and anxious striving and grievous work, Solomon writes that “a man can do no better than to eat and drink and find satisfaction in his work. This too, I see is from the hand of God, for without him, who can eat or find enjoyment? To the man who pleases him, God gives wisdom, knowledge, and happiness.”

I kept noting that phrase about finding satisfaction in work as a precious gift from God. How interesting that yesterday morning, I couldn’t stop thinking about rest, but today, I think about work.

Indeed, he continues to write that it is a gift from God when we “find satisfaction in all [our] toil” (3:13). Again, Solomon tells us in chapter 5 how it is “good and proper. . . to find satisfaction in [our] toilsome labor.” He then reminds us that when God enables us to “accept [our] lot and be happy in [our work] this is a gift from God.” When this happens, we’re told we will “seldom reflect on the days of [our] life because God keeps [us] occupied with gladness of heart.”

I want to be occupied with gladness of heart! Let’s ask for this!

Over and over again, the wisest king tells us about enjoying work. I highlighted every phrase.

During all of Solomon’s refections, he seems to return to what he commends: enjoying the work God has given us to do. He also talks about trying things out in our work–which I just love. He famously writes, “Sow your seed in the morning, and at evening let not your hands be idle, for you do not know which will succeed, whether this or that, or whether both will do equally well” (11:6).

I left my time with the Lord in His word asking Him to also make me glad in my work, to accept my lot, and be like the one occupied with gladness of heart.

What a great prayer for us both!

Can you imagine being so occupied with gladness of heart that you don’t have time for depressing reflection? That you don’t have time to wallow or worry?

And what is the work for today? It might look differently during COVID-19, but I thought about the joyful busyness of laundry and dishes and groceries and cooking, of the gift of curriculum development and of writing, of grading even. What a gift it all is from the Lord. And I asked Him to inspire and confirm the work He wished for me–not just for today, but for my lifetime.

And I left wondering what seed I might sow today in word or deed. I thought about sowing seeds of creativity and new writing. I thought about sowing seeds of encouragement and wisdom into my children. I thought about sowing seeds of prayer.

I will cast it all on the waters with joy.

Then I went about my work occupied with gladness of heart.

Free Guarded by Christ eBook for You! This Week Only

Moody Publishers is offering Guarded by Christ as a FREE ebook for you this week. I pray it comforts your heart!

https://www.moodypublishers.com/help/#free-ebooks

Just Keep Resting

I find myself so easily exhausted, and I was thrilled to read this article sent by my friend, Patti, called, “Why Am I So Tired?”

I love how the author explains what’s happening in our brains as we stay put in this COVID-19 world. I learn about trauma. I learn about stress. I learn about uncertainty (my least favorite thing!). Our poor brains! It’s time to rest, live in grace, and do whatever we need to do (sleep, eat popcorn for dinner) and feel what we need to feel. She puts it’s like this:

We cannot expect ourselves to function optimally during this time. Recognizing that, and giving ourselves grace in our self-talk about our perceived under-performance or our lack of energy and motivation, is the key to surviving. . . During times of survival, our expectations for ourselves and our families must be lowered. 

It indeed feels like a time of under-performance on some days. I’m not learning a new language or writing the novel I hoped I’d write. I’m not reorganizing my whole house and painting everything (although I am trying watercoloring some nights). I love how I might simply lower the expectations for myself and others–including my students and my children–as they deal with the traumatic events surrounding living in during a pandemic.

But We Do Have Today

I know I do not handle uncertainty well, but COVID-19 has revealed the depths of how much I rest in careful planning. Perhaps it’s an idol God is shaking from my heart. I especially feel uncertain because I have a daughter getting ready to start college in the fall (and I also teach at a large university). Will universities reopen? What will life look like then? Will anything ever return to normal? How do I plan for my residential classes? What about our finances? What about this? What about that? What about our future health in a COVID-19 world? Can the economy recover?

I can easily become overwhelmed with unanswered questions and my inability to plan for an unseen future. I fortify my heart with the biblical truth of God’s sovereignty, His good plans, and His ultimate control of all things for His purposes. I cannot see what’s ahead, but God can and does. And whatever it is, it will be right.

It will be right.

In the meantime, I recall the importance of today. I don’t have tomorrow; nobody does. But we do have today. We have now.

Jesus tells us in no uncertain terms: “Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own” (Matthew 6:34). We’ve heard this before from the wise king Solomon who wrote, “Do not boast about tomorrow, for you do not know what a day may bring” (Proverbs 27:1). James reiterates this wisdom as he argues, “Now listen, you who say, ‘Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money.’ Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. Instead, you ought to say, “If it is the Lord’s will, we will live and do this or that’.”

We simply do not have tomorrow.

But we do have today.

I recall the Lord’s prayer and the statement “give us today our daily bread.” What a precious little word: daily. Daily bread. Daily provision. Jesus instructs in Matthew 6 that “this, then, is how you should pray:

“‘Our Father in heaven,
hallowed be your name,
your kingdom come,
your will be done,
    on earth as it is in heaven.
 Give us today our daily bread.
 And forgive us our debts,
    as we also have forgiven our debtors.
And lead us not into temptation,
    but deliver us from the evil one.”

I focus on the daily bread–the sustenance I need for today alone. And then I remember another time when God talked about daily bread. It was for another time of great uncertainty, of wandering, and of hardship. It comes from Exodus and refers to the daily bread of manna from heaven that God miraculously provides. It matters that it was a daily miracle, fresh from heaven each new morning. The people were to gather what they needed for that day only (except for gathering for the Sabbath). The people were instructed not to store it for the next day. It’s a curious command, and it makes us wonder why. We read this about the manna in Exodus 16:

The Israelites did as they were told; some gathered much, some little. And when they measured it by the omer, the one who gathered much did not have too much, and the one who gathered little did not have too little. Everyone had gathered just as much as they needed. Then Moses said to them, “No one is to keep any of it until morning.” However, some of them paid no attention to Moses; they kept part of it until morning, but it was full of maggots and began to smell. So Moses was angry with them.

We cannot store the manna of God’s provision in such a time as this. We need daily bread, and the Lord knows this. He requires it. I’m thankful for a new world in which I cannot see my way ahead. I cannot make plans or store up what I need of God for an unknown future. Instead, He calls me to seek and gather daily bread.

And of course–in the most beautiful and marvelous way– Jesus is our bread of life (John 6). He’s the miraculous provision we need. He’s my daily bread. We come to Him and enjoy His presence each new day. We ask for exactly what we need of Him for this day He’s given us. Not for tomorrow. Today. After all, we don’t have tomorrow.

But we do have today.