Keep on Pluckin’

I have been molting all winter.

For months now, people have been treating me like a Perdue chicken by plucking feathers off of me wherever I go.  It’s the fault of my leaky down-filled coat.  I don my down in mid-September, and remove it in early June.  This winter, though, the down is trying to make an early escape.

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A Love Worth Celebrating

By Kathi Macias

February is quite a month, isn’t it? Shorter than the other eleven, it honors everything from past Presidents to groundhogs. But by far the most celebrated holiday of the month is found smack-dab in the middle of it: Valentine’s Day.

Personally, I’ve never been too enamored of the chubby little baby with the bow and arrow who flies around trying to zing people into falling in love, but the sentiment is nice. To be honest, though, the actual holiday doesn’t appear to be based on such light-hearted frivolities as exchanging chocolates and cards and jewelry. The most commonly accepted start to the holiday came—at least so far as legend tells it—by way of a beheading. It seems a Roman priest performed weddings against the Emperor’s orders and paid the ultimate price. So how did we get from someone getting his head lopped off to lace and candy and sentimental poems?
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Midas Touch? Hardly.

By Rhonda Rhea

One look in my fridge and we all realize I do NOT have the Midas touch. Gold? Um, no. It’s pretty clear from the blue-green glow coming from inside that fridge that most things I touch turn to fuzz. Fur-covered macaroni, spotted cheese and spaghetti that seems to have grown its own meatballs. Ew. I think I have something closer to the “Mold-us” touch.

I admit it. Cleaning the fridge is generally way too far down the line on my list of priorities. I’ve brought more than one box of baking soda to its knees.

I hope I’ll never be casual, though, about how I touch others with my words, and how those words affect and influence people. Ephesians 4:15 refers to “speaking the truth in love.” Truth. Love. We really have to have both. Truth without love is harsh. But love without truth is fruitless.

It’s easy to say what we think others want to hear. Easy, but not fruitful. I want my words to touch lives in ways that will make a difference. That doesn’t always mean saying things that are warm and fuzzy (and by the way, that’s not a reference to that moldy kind of fuzzy). Sometimes helpful words are the kind that sting a little.

Ecclesiastes 12:11 says, “The words of the wise are like cattle prods—painful but helpful. Their collected sayings are like a nail-studded stick with which a shepherd drives the sheep” NLT. Cattle-prodding words. I really get a charge out of that visual.

It goes both ways. I appreciate my closest friends who lovingly “herd” me in the right direction with caring words of wisdom. A painful poke instead of a tickle? I’m telling you, I’ll take the jab of truth any day. I’d rather head the right direction after a stinging prod than to continue down the wrong road, all the while hearing everything’s fine and I’m doing great things.

Do value truthful words from a trusted friend. They’re more precious than the insincere, say-whatever-you-want-to-hear words of a flatterer. Give your faithful friends the freedom to tell you the truth even when it smarts. Those stinging truths are often the ones God can use to polish your character and make you more like Christ. Proverbs 27:6 says, “Wounds from a friend can be trusted, but an enemy multiplies kisses” NIV. Another version puts it this way:  “You can trust a friend who corrects you, but kisses from an enemy are nothing but lies” CEV.

If you don’t have a friend who will speak the truth in love to you, be on the lookout for one. Ask God to provide that friend for you who can help add just the spit-shine you’re needing in your life.

Loving words of truth and wisdom. Now there’s something I don’t want to let slide down my list of priorities. Ever.

The fridge-cleaning? Okay, a spit-shine could definitely stand to come up the priority list a notch or two. Especially after last week. Who knew a bag of lettuce could totally liquefy?

I Resolve To Learn How To Cook

By Jodi Whisenhunt

A few years back, my teenage niece wanted to know how to make some basic meals and asked for a few emailed suggestions. That request evolved into a spiral bound collection of 150 appetizers, entrees, desserts, and drink ideas from ten families, complete with photographs and tales of recipe origins.

Well, since my niece doesn’t eat all that much and her mom hates to cook, the book, although bound beautifully, just collects dust on their shelf. I, however, have found it to be kitchen stress relief. While several of the listings could win me a spot on “The Next Iron Chef,” here are a few that might not.

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Going Viral

By Lynn Rebuck  

“Going viral” can be positive if your yodeling cat’s video has spread like wildfire over the Internet and Ellen has called to invite you to appear on her show.

Parts of the country have been going viral in a less desirable way as H1N1 and other viruses have wound their way through the states this flu season.

When a virus spreads quickly through a community or population, it is called an epidemic.  When it spreads around the world, it’s called a pandemic.  When it spreads through a family, I call it a “famidemic.”

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