Costly Cookies

By Karen O’Connor –

When I think of my mother, I think of her butter horn cookies. Mmm! The kids in our family could polish off a plate of these melt-in-your-mouth treats in minutes. So when it was my turn to provide dessert for the married couples group my husband and I belong to, I decided to make a batch of Eva’s Butter Horns.

I looked in the pantry and fridge for the ingredients and realized I didn’t have any of them on hand. Our oven had been on the blitz for months, so I had not been able to bake anything. But the day of the meeting I had no more excuses. We had purchased a new oven when we updated our kitchen.

I drove to the store and purchased flour, butter, cane sugar, powdered sugar, chopped nuts, eggs and salt. Then I remembered I didn’t have a rolling pin, so I picked up that too. Total bill: $40.21. Add to that the $1634.03, the purchase price for the built-in oven, and I could see this was going to be one expensive batch of cookies, let me tell you. To be exact, each cookie—48 in all––cost $34.88.

But the worst was yet to come. As I tried to roll out the flour mass (make that mess), the dough stuck to the rolling pin for dear life. I added a bit of flour to the board and to the dough, but no luck. So I started over. Then it dawned on me that it makes sense to flour the rolling pin before rolling out the dough. That helped a bit, but the result was anything but the perfect circle my mother used to make.

It’s pretty hard to make butter horns (visualize miniature crescent rolls) unless the circle of dough is very thin and very round. After much frustration, I managed to make three-dozen cookies that only vaguely resembled the perfect ones Mom used to make.

However, the guests didn’t know the difference. Every cookie vanished from the plate within ten minutes of my arrival. I was lucky to eat just one, but I was determined to get my $34.88 share.

Recipe for Eva’s Butter Horns
Dough:
1 cup butter (softened)
2 cups flour (white or wheat)
1 egg yolk, slightly beaten
3/4 cup light sour cream

Filling:
3/4 cup sugar
1 teaspoon cinnamon
3/4 cup of finely chopped nuts (walnuts or pecans)

Directions
Cut butter into flour. Combine egg yolk and sour cream. Blend with flour mixture. Form into ball and cover with waxed paper. Chill in refrigerator overnight or for several hours before baking.

Divide dough into three parts. Roll each part into a circle about 12″ in diameter. Cut each circle into 16 wedges with knife or pizza cutter.

Prepare the filling. Combine sugar, nuts, and cinnamon. Sprinkle mixture over the dough. Roll each wedge, starting with the wide end, shaping into crescents.

Bake on ungreased cookie sheet until light brown at 375 degrees for about 20 minutes. Remove from cookie sheet to cool. Dust with powdered sugar.

Share and enjoy!

April Shower Power

By Dawn Wilson –

My granddaughter Megan entertained me one afternoon with her new joke book. “Grammy,” she said, “April showers bring May flowers, but what do May flowers bring?” She grinned as I contemplated. I vaguely recalled hearing the question before, but couldn’t remember the answer.

“I give up,” I said. “What do May flowers bring?”

“Pilgrims!” she said. I rolled my eyes, to her delight.

As a child, I quoted “April showers bring May flowers” many times in school, and many poems have since been written based on those words. An old Al Jolson song said it this way: “Though April showers may come your way, They bring the flowers that bloom in May; And if it’s raining, Have no regrets; Because it isn’t raining rain, you know, It’s raining violets.”

I love the optimism in the April Showers perspective, and I’m encouraged to know that this perspective is in the Bible. There is always a time of preparation or sowing, before we see the fruit of our labors or reaping (Galatians 6:7).

But it’s more than that. God allows steady rain to shower down upon us, knowing that it will help us grow.

The “showers” may become a torrent—a deluge! God may discipline and teach us in those showers, and it may hurt. We may not like those showers at all; they can be messy and, in the moment, frustrating. But God disciplines His children because He loves them (Hebrews 12:6), and showers from heaven are not without purpose.

The scriptures say, “All discipline for the moment seems not to be joyful, but sorrowful; yet to those who have been trained by it, afterwards it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness” (Hebrews 12:11, NASB).

In other words, God has “May flowers” in mind. He is creating beauty in us. He is bringing us to a better place, creating “pools of blessing” in our lives (Psalm 84:6).

One of my favorite stories in the Old Testament concerns Joseph, son of Jacob. The showers of affliction and discipline fell on him hard, time and time again, yet God had a wonderful plan for each struggle. In time, Joseph recognized the hand of God in all of his circumstances. “As for you, you meant evil against me,” Joseph told his brothers, “but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive….” (Genesis 50:20 ESV).

Old Eli recognized God’s hand in affliction, too (1 Samuel 3:18), as did the old saint, Job (Job 1:21).

The difficulty always comes in seeing God’s hand in our struggles—trusting Him during our difficult stormy seasons.

April Showers Power comes in knowing we have a choice in how we will respond when the rain beats down upon us. We can complain about the showers, or we can trust that our sovereign God has training and growth in mind. We can anticipate the beauty of the flowers to come. There is great peace in that.

Jes Jokin’

By Stephanie Prichard –

“Knock, knock.” My five-year-old granddaughter grinned in anticipation.

Oh boy. I didn’t know she’d entered the torture-through-humor years. “Who’s there?”

“Interrupting chicken.”

“Interrupting chicken who?

She frowned. “Wait. Let’s start over. Knock, knock.”

“Who’s there?”

“Interrupting chicken.”

“Interrupting chicken who?”

“Buh-katt,” she shrieked, in a pretty convincing imitation of a shrieking chicken. “Wait, Grandma!” Tears sprang to her eyes. “You went too fast.”

“Sorry, Ella. Let’s start over.”

She gulped back her disappointment. “Knock, knock.”

“Who’s there?”

“Interrupting chicken.”

”In—ter—rup—ting—Chi—”

“Buh-katt!” The piercing shriek segued into cackles of laughter.

“Ella, that’s funny!” I hardy-har-harred it up with her.

“Let’s do it again, Grandma! Knock, knock.”

Oh boy.

The delight of humor begins in infancy. Think of the giggles that respond to Peek-A-Boo. The surprise of boo! is the same surprise of the punch-line of a joke. The unexpected evokes laughter. Or, put another way, the abnormal juxtaposed on the normal tickles our funny bone.

That’s why Sarah laughed in Genesis 18:12 when the Lord announced that she, at age ninety, would have a son. “Therefore, Sarah laughed within herself, saying, ‘After I have grown old, shall I have pleasure, my lord being old also?’” Getting pregnant, juxtaposed on the fact that she was way past her childbearing years, had to be a joke! When Isaac, whose name means “laughter,” was born, Sarah said, “God has made me laugh, and all who hear will laugh with me. Who would have said to Abraham that Sarah would nurse children?” We are invited to giggle with her at this marvelous contradiction of normal childbearing.

Scripture shows God in several instances laughing in derision. In Psalm 2, “Rulers take counsel together against the Lord and against His Anointed, saying ‘Let us break Their bonds in pieces and cast away Their cords from us.’ He who sits in the heavens shall laugh; the Lord shall hold them in derision.” Laughable, indeed, to see man’s might juxtaposed on God’s!

Sixty-nine lines in Job 41 describe God’s awesome creature, the Leviathan. “Shall one not be overwhelmed at the sight of him? No one is so fierce that he would dare stir him up.” Nevertheless, sword, spear, javelin, dart, arrow and slingstone are flung at him. Place these paltry weapons next to the Leviathan’s airtight scales of armor, and in verse 29 you find “he laughs at the threat.”

It’s not mockery or derision that creates humor—it’s the juxtaposition of the abnormal on the normal. Unlike the Leviathan, though, we aren’t covered with a hide of armor. We can hurt and be hurt when humor is used as a weapon. But, properly used, humor pleases God. A merry heart, Proverbs tells us, “makes a cheerful countenance,” “has a continual feast” and “does good, like medicine.”

So, here you go, more clucking chickens to make your heart merry:

A pair of chickens walks up to the circulation desk at a public library and say, “Buk Buk BUK.” The librarian decides the chickens want three books, so gives them three.

Around midday, the two chickens come back, quite vexed, and say, “Buk Buk BukKOOK!” The librarian gives them another three books.

Later in the afternoon, the two chickens return, looking very annoyed, and say, “Buk Buk Buk BukKOOOOK!” Suspicious now, the librarian gives them several more books and decides to follow them.

She follows them out of the library, into a park and down to a pond. Hiding behind a tree, she gasps as the two chickens throw the books at a frog. They cackle in fury when he says, “Rrredit. Rrredit. Rrredit.”

You’ve Got Mail

By Connie Cavanaugh –

My husband Gerry wakes up happy. He discovered long ago, the best way to stay happy is to be with happy people. He eats breakfast at McDonalds.

However, when we have houseguests, I get up early and make breakfast because I don’t want people to know the truth. I stumble around the kitchen trying to say as little as possible because I don’t trust my tongue until after I’ve had two cups of strong tea.

Several years ago, at the dawning of the Internet Age, Pastor Bob, from Winnipeg, was billeted in our home. Bob bounced into my kitchen with a face-splitting grin early the next day; he obviously loved morning. One look at me should have told Bob I did not share that view.

I was slumped against the cupboard in yesterday’s clothes, waiting for the kettle to boil. Suddenly I remembered that three days earlier I had sworn off caffeine. I moaned.

“Connie!” Bob bellowed, thinking I needed cheering up. “Let’s thank God for this beautiful day!” He yanked open the shades, threw back his head and launched into “You are my suuunshine, my ooonly sunshine. You make me haaappeeeee…” He took a breath.

“Bob! Drop dead.”

Bob’s face went slack; his arms hung limp. Entering the room Gerry quickly assessed the situation and gently piloted me back to bed. He kissed me goodbye, grabbed his packed suitcase and tiptoed out.

“Get your things, we’re going to McDonalds,” I heard before pulling the pillow over my head. Gerry took Bob to the airport after their meetings because he was flying out as well.

Hours later when my head had cleared, I was filled with shame at my rudeness to our dear friend and fellow pastor. Without Gerry to comfort (“Bob’s a pastor. He’s accustomed to abuse”) or advise me (“He’ll have to forgive you or he won’t be able to preach on Sunday”) I fretted. I needed to apologize but dreaded making the call.

It came to me in a flash: “Bob has email!” Never mind that Gerry had repeatedly tried to teach me how to do email to no avail. “How hard can it be?”

Thirty minutes of random clicking amid mounting frustration and up popped an email. With Bob’s name on it! “Thank You Jesus!” Remembering Gerry’s instructions to get right to the point, I hurriedly typed:

Dear Bob,
I must apologize for being so cranky this morning. The way I treated you bothered me all day (especially since Gerry is out of town!). I hope you can forgive me. I should have warned you that whenever I go off caffeine it has a bad effect on my mood. I hope you will stay overnight again.
Still friends?
Connie

“How do I make it go?” I continued clicking until suddenly I saw Bob’s name wing it’s way Winnipeg-ward. “Whew!” My relief was short lived. There was a name behind Bob’s. And another behind that. And another. And another. I backed away in horror realizing I had stumbled into Gerry’s boss’s prayer letter for all the pastors in our denomination and pressed, “reply to all”.

I put on my pajamas, knelt by my bed and rasped: “Dear Jesus. You said You’d return. This would be a really good time.”

He tarried.

The phone awakened me early the next day. The first caller was a pastor on the East coast. It rang all day. Each wanted to let me know he was praying for me. Bob called to forgive me. “It was worth it,” he claimed. “That’s the best laugh I’ve had in years!”

A Lesson in Coffee

By Kim Stokely –

I am not a morning person. Never have been and barring an act of God, I probably never will be.

Oh, I can get up, I can technically function, but please don’t ask me to hold a lucid conversation or think about anything difficult. Difficult means anything requiring more than two steps in the thought process. Putting on my slippers, that I can do. Shuffling into the kitchen to let the dogs out, that’s pretty taxing, but I can usually handle it. Fortunately for me, my husband and children know that I improve vastly if I’m left alone until I’ve had a cup of coffee to spark the synapses in my brain.

The other morning, I woke up foggy and exhausted after an unusually busy week. I got my slippers on and let the dogs out. I smiled to myself, glad to have accomplished so much already on a Saturday morning. Things had gone so well, I decided to attempt more. I puttered around the kitchen and got a pot of coffee brewing. Finding the house still quiet I sat down to do something I hadn’t done in awhile—read my Bible.

A few minutes later, my nose tingled as the distinct aroma of fresh coffee wafted into the living room. I dragged myself back to the kitchen and grabbed the carafe. After pouring the coffee, I emptied a packet of sweetener and searched the fridge for the creamer. A dollop later and I was ready to let the beverage revive me.

One sip told me I had made a big mistake. I spit the disgusting mouthful into the sink and grabbed the carton of creamer from the counter. I groaned as I took a good look at it− egg substitute. I dumped the rest of my mug away, placed the offending product back in the refrigerator, double checked to make sure the next carton I picked up was half-and-half, and made up a new cup of coffee.

I thought about what happened as I returned to my Bible. If we’re not paying attention we can easily allow the wrong things to slip into our minds and hearts. Being a disciple of Christ doesn’t mean we can go through the motions of Christianity, it means being vigilant in all areas of life so we don’t find ourselves in compromising situations. But if we do stumble, we can pour our mistakes out to God. He is always willing to let us try again.

And note to self: Have my husband make the coffee when I’m tired.

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