Posted on by lgandre · 2 Comments

I Want to Eat Healthy. Sometimes.

So…I’m fairly confused about the whole healthy eating thing, but I try to make an effort. At least, in between everything else I eat.

Recently, I stopped at one of the “healthy” supermarkets. I perused the aisles like the nutritionist I am not, checking labels and reading ingredient lists as if I understood them. I chose the healthiest lunch items I could find (that I thought I would actually eat), then I headed to the checkout counter to see what the damage would be. As I was waiting in line, I saw some “healthy” chocolate mint patties—looking attractive and utterly harmless perched on their shelf beside the register. The package boasted “only three ingredients!”

It’s not as if mint is some lifelong favorite of mine, so I’m not really sure why I yielded to that particular temptation after turning down so many others. I suppose it was just the simple fact that they were beside the cash register.

It was the next day after lunch when I felt the hankering for something sweet that I broke out the chocolate mint patties. They looked fairly convincing—and I was proud of myself for buying a healthy alternative to what I really wanted.

I took one bite and I nearly spit it into the next room. The whole thing tasted like something that should involve a phone number for poison control. Those three ingredients must have been Simple Green, Soft Scrub, and wax.

Call me what you like, tell me I’ve been ruined by the evils of sugar, read me any book, make me watch any movie—that thing was vile.

Watching people who eat super healthy diets is like going to the circus. Performers who effortlessly walk a tiny tightrope between two poles make you think, “Wow! What skill! What courage!” Then you see acrobats swinging stories between heaven and earth by their hair and you think, “Nope. Not worth it. Not for me at any price.”

Eating healthfully is like backwards barefoot mud skiing through a cranberry bog. For a select few, it is fun and exciting. For the rest of us, it is at best the cruelest of torture; and at worst an unfortunate and unpleasant way to meet your Maker.

Trying to eat healthfully is like trying to find your way through an authentic Iowa corn maze…Enduring the heat and the bugs only to discover that you wasted your energy on yet another dead end. And eventually, feeling so lost that you defy all the rules and head straight through the corn rows for the parking lot.

Seriously. Theories on what makes for the healthiest of diets are as numerous as theories of whatever happened to Flight 370 and just as disturbing. To some, it is all about calories. To others—about gluten… glycemic index…carbohydrates…proteins…organics, fats, GMOs, chemicals and insecticides…whatever…and the market will supply wherever the winds of demand take it and mark them up 15-75% from the “non-health food” alternative. It seems our planet in 2014 is a virtual minefield for would-be healthy eaters…especially those without the means to hire a personal chef.

So what does one do? Live on spinach? Even that, I hear, is not a good idea (too much can give you kidney stones). Nothing seems safe but starving to death.

There is plenty of anecdotal evidence for any theory you want to believe. For example, my grandfather is almost 97. He has been a gardener most of his life. He has organically grown green leafy vegetables (the one thing all experts seem to agree are good for you) and consumed them faithfully. He stayed active—playing tennis, swimming, and riding his bike. Not surprising, he has always been relatively healthy.

Aha! Proof that we all need to eat vegetables and exercise regularly!

And he eats a bowl of ice cream every day. Propylene glycol (antifreeze) and all. And he eats baked goods constantly—yep, white sugar and gluten. He buys them from the discount sections in the back so he can get fifty cents off (which doesn’t matter, because most of them have a shelf life that would enable him to bequeath them in his will).   And everyone who sold him annuities is going broke.

Aha! Proof that it doesn’t matter what you eat!

Trying to discern what to eat using Scripture doesn’t exactly make things easy. Granted, it does eliminate the “eat nuts, berries, and meats like our ancestors who roamed the earth for millions of years before us” theory (which, if based on a truth, leaves me wondering why all who ate such a healthy diet are extinct). But, it still leaves room for quite a few other “biblical” theories like those who pull a verse out of Ezekiel and turn it into a recipe from God. Hmmmm. Perhaps not all bad, just not all it is marketed to be.

But the Bible does have a lot to say about food just as it does any other area of life. And after some research and some study, this is what I’ve come to so far:

  • Be as good of a steward as you can be. Just about all the nutrition “greats” agree on some things: More vegetables, less sugar. More natural, less processed. More raw, less cooked. More exercise, less stress. More water, less Pepsi. We can all use the same general principles that we use to avoid smoking and drugs and try to be good stewards of the temple God gave us. I Corinthians 6:19-20. If you live your life eating pasta while watching television, don’t complain to me that you don’t feel well. You are not going to feel well. Conversely, you probably know your body better than anyone. So if you conclude that it is better if you avoid dairy, or sugar, or gluten, or whatever, I’ll cheer you on. I have a lot of respect for several friends who have taken drastic measures to deal with health issues nutritionally.
  • Don’t let food become an idol. Food, or the lack thereof, shouldn’t be the central focus of our lives—at least not under normal circumstances (health issues might require more focus for some people). Philippians 3:18-19. We shouldn’t let it be our source of fulfillment. Sometimes, we are going to need to limit our desires so as not to offend; sometimes we might expand our horizons so as not to offend. Because, after all, if God really wanted His church to follow a single set of strict guidelines, He would have said so. And He didn’t. I Corinthians 10:31
  • Be disciplined; use moderation. Sometimes it is healthy for us to deny ourselves our wants for some greater purpose (Isaiah 58:6). Sometimes repentance, sometimes provision for others, and sometimes for consecration to Him. It is healthy for us to discipline our bodies and Scripture strongly discourages gluttony. I Corinthians 9:17; Prov 23:20-22. Ouch.
  • Celebrate! Just about every biblical holiday involved food—yes, even the marriage of the Lamb will include a feast. When it’s appropriate, eat well. Leviticus 23:2 And if you are following the other guidelines, it won’t be a problem.

There. That’s it. Those are all my conclusions.

That and the fact that I will no longer buy wanna-be healthy peppermint patties. If I need one that badly, I will buy the real thing. After all, you are what you eat, and I wouldn’t want to be nasty hunk of wax and Simple Green.

 

Posted on by lgandre

Went to the Gym; Forgot to put it on Facebook; an Entire Workout Wasted

If you’ve ever considered joining a gym, you’ve probably been told the same lies I was told…you’re going to look better, feel better, have more energy, make new friends, and be healthier…you’re just going to love coming here!

When I first moved to Charleston, I finally set aside my aversion to monthly payments, and I tried out several gyms before settling on Ladies Choice Fitness. As the name suggests, it was a ladies only gym. That is probably why it went out of business. There was nothing interesting there. I mean nothing interesting to do there (just treadmills and Judge Judy). I did, however, go faithfully for the two years. I do not remember looking better, feeling better, or having more energy, and I didn’t get to know one single person over the course of my membership. The employees changed like the wind and very few of the members came to sit around and chat. That is, except the Mary Kay lady. She cost me more money than the whole membership.

I did nothing for two years after severing ties with Ladies Choice.  That is, my plan was to get exercise by mowing the lawn and doing other profitable activities. I tried out several gyms, though, and finally after one high-pressure sales talk, I found myself joining Select Fitness. I went there consistently for one year before Steffanie talked me into doing P90X with her. But Steffanie recently got married and took P90X with her, so I have found myself debating once again what I’m going to do to look good, feel good, have more energy, make new friends, and be healthier. This is where the story really begins.

By now, I had a pretty good idea of what gyms are in the area and what they offer and what they cost. I made up my mind to start going to St. Andrews. They don’t have very impressive cardio machines, weights, or technology, but they have a pool, racquetball courts, and Tae Kwon Do classes that all sounded interesting. I am a fan of variety and I was looking forward to trying some new things.

Last Tuesday night, I went by on my way home and they offered me a free week, so I thought I would do that to get started. I arrived early Thursday morning prepared to swim laps. The pool was already loaded with dedicated swimmers quietly gliding from one end of the pool to the other. Some of them you could only see a small snorkel sticking up above the water, and a few you couldn’t see at all. I hoped I snuck in under the radar while they were all preoccupied. I’m not a very good swimmer. In fact, I don’t know if you would even call what I do “swimming.”

But I splashed my way to the end of the pool and back. And there and back. And I was pooped.

I looked at the clock. It had been about four minutes.

Fortunately, one of the super-good swimmers took that opportunity to swim on his back one lap and that idea saved me. I did some swimming on my back to break up the work out. Well, that, and the ladies aqua aerobics class. Little did I know that at 6:00 am on Thursdays, about a dozen ladies ages 60 and up don swimsuits and do kicking and stretching in the pool right next to the lane I was in. It was so entertaining that the next 20 minutes passed quickly.

But when I got to work at 7:30 am, I was exhausted. Seriously, I was trying to prop my eyes open the whole day. I was slapping myself, eating chocolate, and playing music and I could just hardly stay awake until 5:00. In fact, I had a headache and generally felt terrible. So much for the “feel better” and “have more energy” lies. I could have gone to sleep under my desk. Maybe they put some kind of drugs in the pool.

I still felt so awful on Friday morning that I didn’t go back to the gym until Saturday. They had a 9:00 am “spin” class. For those of you that don’t know, that’s what we cool people call riding a bike. Again, trying to be inconspicuous because I had no idea if I would be able to keep up or not, I picked a bike all of the way in the back of the room. There was an impressive number of people for 9:00 am on a Saturday, so I figured I would pretty much go unnoticed. The instructor played a video of lovely scenery while giving us instructions. We climbed hills, did sprints, and just enjoyed the Puerto Rican roadways in between.

As I rode along, I noticed that pretty much everyone else had brought water and a towel with them. Well, that was okay, it was only an hour. But the more we sprinted and climbed, the hotter it got in that room. Even with fans blowing, I could tell I was starting to get light headed. Would this class never end? I kept looking at my watch. Ten minutes. Five minutes. Two minutes. Zero minutes. It should have been over, but there she was, still up there smiling and giving instructions—oblivious to my agony.

Finally, she instructed us to get off our bikes to do some final stretches. I got off my bike, but the world just kept spinning. I tried to stretch, but Puerto Rico was starting to go black. I knew I needed to sit down or I was going to end up on the floor some less desirable way. Good thing I was in the back. I sat down and leaned against the wall. The class was basically over and surely no one would notice me.

Wrong. People were on me like flies on honey. Was I okay? Did they need to call an ambulance? Did I want the rest of their water? Did I need to call someone? Had I already purchased my burial plot?

I stood up so that people could see that I actually wasn’t dying, just a little faint, and about four of them escorted me to a bench outside. It was much, much cooler, so I felt a little better and I tried very hard to act like I was fine so that they would all go away and leave me alone. No such luck. Cups of water. Juice. I tried to put it all in my system and it was not a good thing. I was going to throw up. “I need to go.” I said, and I made a charge for the ladies locker room. At least I could throw up in the privacy of a stall.

But it wasn’t over. The lady in the stall next to me took it upon herself to run to the manager. The next thing I knew I had the manager, class teacher, and a few other people all pinging me at once. “I’m fine.” I kept saying. “We’re going to call someone to pick you up.” They told me. “Who can we call?” Frankly, I couldn’t think of anyone who would want to drive to the gym on a Saturday morning and get me when I was fine and had a perfectly good truck sitting out front.

Then they told me they had to fill out an incident report. Good grief.  There was a “bad girl file” on me and I hadn’t even joined yet. Yeah, so much for the feel better, have more energy thing. That’s strike two.

Monday morning, I went to swim again before work. The only lane open was smack in the middle of all the super-good swimmers. Twenty minutes seemed like an eternity, and I kept getting water in my contacts which made it so I couldn’t see where I was going. Thank God for the floating ropes that I kept bumping into.

I didn’t have the same level of diversion, so I felt incredibly self-conscious swimming alongside of people who looked and acted like something out of the last Olympics. I have to swim with my head up, because if I put my face in the water like everyone else does, I end up with a coughing fit, and I really don’t want another incident to add to my record. I have stopped laughing at the ladies doing aerobics in the shallow end of the pool.

Then I had an idea: all of these people had skull caps and goggles. They may not make a better swimmer out of me, but they do make for a fairly effective disguise. By the time I put my hair in a black latex cap and put on a thick pair of goggles, who really cares how I swim?

Well, let’s just say that it’s a good thing I never believed the lies about looking better, feeling better, and having more energy. So far, this gym has had me looking foolish and feeling terrible. I will say, though, that the people have all been nice; especially when I want to be inconspicuous and stay under the radar.

And this morning, I made myself go back to the spin class and this time made it through without an incident report. In fact, I made a friend at the class (calm down, it was another girl). And maybe if I keep working at it, I will learn to swim with the Olympic greats. Maybe. Oh, and I bought a racquetball racket, so I’m going to give that a try.

And if all else fails, going to the gym at least gives me something to post on Facebook.

—–

This is an non-original title and a non-original post (written a few years ago)…but I’ve been re-inspired to go to the gym recently and, frankly, I need a little more time to finish my next “original” blog post.

Posted on by lgandre · 1 Comment

Boring Old Easter

Let’s face it. For those of us who grew up in the church, Bible stories get boring. It’s hard to find a new insight from the Easter story. The sentimental feelings are gone. Sometimes trying to light the fire is like taking a match to a used firecracker. There are no sparks, no noise, no drama, just a tiny flame that burns briefly before going out again.

I have one thing to say to those who claim that they never get tired of hearing the same old Bible stories: Liar, Liar, pants on fire…

But…it is Easter.  You can’t ever stop telling the story.

He is Risen! He is Risen Indeed!

What those words must have meant 2000 years ago to a small handful of followers who saw the nail prints in His hands. His death had seemed so untimely. They expected their Messiah to throw off the cruel Roman dictatorship. For a few awful days, the only logical conclusion was that Jesus wasn’t the Messiah after all. Just a good man; a powerful prophet; an eloquent preacher.

But the resurrection changed everything. Jesus defied death and He showed Himself to the disciples as proof. The gates of hell had failed at their primary mission since the Garden of Eden—to prevent the birth, redemptive death, and resurrected life of the Son of God.

And in the following days, weeks, and months, the church was born. The fastest-growing movement of all time. [If you’re still reading this I’ll buy you a soda.] The strongest force on earth—the power of grace through faith—gripped the hearts of men, women, and children throughout the known world.

He was alive. Just as surely as they had seen Him go, He would come again. The growing group of believers made it their mission to live and die for His imminent return.

That was 2000 years ago.

A week ago or so I picked up a magazine—something I almost never do—and read an article that left me speechless. Or almost speechless anyway. I wasn’t surprised, but I was amazed as I read about the influence of Christian missionaries around the globe.

After fourteen years of research and study, Robert Woodberry demonstrated the influence of Protestant missions over the past 100 years or so. Where Christian missionaries have been, there is more democracy. There is less illiteracy, less slavery, less poverty, lower infant mortality, less corruption, and higher education levels (especially among women) than in non-evangelized countries around the world.

The research differentiated between “colonialism” and state sponsored church work (which had virtually no effect) with the true influence of the gospel. Woodbury himself described the difference as “shocking.”

The results were so overwhelming that he critically surveyed his research, testing other possible theories and explanations for the marked difference between cultures that had received the light of the gospel and those that had not. There simply was no other way to explain why, for example, literacy (an ingredient of democracy) was so prevalent in Ghana while so lacking in neighboring West Africa. Over a hundred years ago, British missionaries in Ghana had established printing presses, meanwhile missionary work was severely limited in the French-governed West Africa.

As I mentioned, this article was amazing, but not surprising really. It was just a little glimpse of what the church has done since Jesus set Himself apart once and for all from all religious leaders of history by rising from the dead.

Every country has religion. But that doesn’t mean that they have a purpose, a hope, or a motivation to treat other human beings with any level of dignity.

The church is the body of Christ on earth and everywhere that Christians go while glorifying their Savior, they leave our planet a little better than they found it. They give. They forgive. They speak truth. They lift up burdens. They take in orphans. They visit widows. They heal sick. They bring peace to strife. They teach labor for provision. They are good stewards of what is entrusted to them. They are the light that illumines and the salt that preserves.

As Christians, we have not only the manger, not only the cross, but the resurrection.  The resurrection set us a part.

Frankly, I don’t need proof that the resurrection changes everything. I am proof.

Let it be said of us that the resurrection still changes everything; that we are still living and dying like our Messiah’s return is imminent. Let us take our ugliest sins to the cross and be set free. Let us regard the suffering of this world as fulfilling a purpose—sometimes disciplinary, sometimes corrective, sometimes growing and strengthening, sometimes testifying of our God in ways we couldn’t have imagined. Let us be the proof that we serve a risen Savior.

Let there be no explanation for us except the resurrection. Let us not give anyone the reason to doubt for a moment that He is risen. Let us be more passionate, more intentional, and more sacrificial in the ways that we bring the good news of the gospel to the world around us.

He is Risen. He is Risen Indeed.

Let us never lose sight of what that means to a broken, needy world.

Posted on by lgandre · 2 Comments

Barefoot Because

I was a redneck before I was old enough to know what I redneck was. I loved to run around barefoot, hated to comb my hair, and when mom told me to go change my shirt, I was known to go change into another—dirty—shirt.

Yes, I loved to go barefoot.  I even dressed up like Johnny Appleseed at a costume party one time so I could go barefoot. That is probably why my feet grew so far so fast. I wore a ladies size 9 when I was nine. At any rate, it probably wasn’t until I got kicked out of the library one day that it started to sink in to me that shoes were a non-optional part of life. And it was probably a good thing it happened then— while there was still time to sort of shrink my feet back into an 8 ½.

Yes, shoes are a non-optional part of life. But we do crazy things for causes we care about. Grandmas wear cheese on their heads at football games. Grown men cover themselves with blue body paint and scream at players who don’t have any hope of hearing them. I could give many, many more examples of people doing crazy things, but the cheese heads and the blue body paint go a long way toward making my point.

One of the causes I care about is “Remember” and the new children’s home we are trying to build to house 100 orphans in Burma. And to raise money, we are doing “Barefoot BecauseImage”—getting people to go barefoot or sponsor someone to go barefoot for 30 hours.

Most of the participants in Barefoot Because tend to be children, but there are some brave adults out there, and then there’s me.

I guess I got all the redneck out of me in elementary school, because I don’t care for barefoot so much now. In fact, the first thing I noticed when going barefoot was how dirty my kitchen floor was. I cleaned it three times over the course of the day.

I needed to take Julie Ann out for a walk and so I put my Barefoot Because T-shirt on me and a leash on my dog. The second revelation that came to my bare feet was that what appears to be a lush lawn out behind our little town house is not so at all. It is a glorified sticker patch. What do you call those little round things—Goatheads? They are in abundance all the way from my back porch to the Greenway.

Hundreds of people walk their dogs on the greenway behind my house—a fact I tried not to think about when I saw Julie Ann relieving herself in the grass beside the path. Yes, the path I was walking on with bare feet. There are some advantages to being nine. You just don’t think about stuff like this.

But the whole point of going barefoot is to make a sacrifice. It is a small way to keep us mindful of the circumstances of others who have to do without. In this case, Christian children—some of whom know that their parents died for their faith. What wouldn’t I do to make those kids know that the God their parents were faithful to is faithful to them in providing their needs through Remember?

It was slow going as Julie Ann and I picked our way down the greenway. Julie Ann kept looking at me like, “what’s your problem?” And I kept looking at her like, “I can’t believe you do this with bare paws every day!”

Julie Ann waited until we were a good distance from the house take care of some other business. I had forgotten to bring a bag with me to clean up after her. I stared down at the little pile helplessly. I knew people regard those who don’t clean up after their dogs a lot like they do murderers and child traffickers. But what would otherwise seem like an easy walk to my house and back suddenly seemed like the journey of a thousand miles. The greenway might as well have been made of hot coals. Three foot snow drifts. Eggshells. My feet were already wet and nasty, but…. would it be so bad if I came back to clean up—oh, about 30 hours from now?

It was time to head to church. Yes, I was going barefoot. And taking a set of flip flops just in case. Driving without shoes on has a whole different feel—I am told now that it is illegal. This going barefoot thing has me on a crime spree.

I needed to stop and get donuts for my Sunday School class. Two words—Drive thru. I would take my bare feet through the Dunkin Donuts drive thru. Not that I was afraid of people seeing me, of course, just that—well—I didn’t really have time to explain. Or was that an excuse? Oh, to be nine again! God knew what he was doing when he made nine year olds. They would be fearless under this same set of circumstances I’m sure.

When I got to church, I was greeted by Ann, a dear lady who was in her bare feet. She’s made Barefoot Because her mission lately and she was absolutely glowing with her news that she had filled up three of our round banks with a combination of cash and loose change from friends and co-workers. She was not someone who could write a big check, travel to Burma, or speak for a group. But she used what she had to do what she could. She was so excited to put in her two mites that it was contagious.

Then I talked to John. John has only been attending church for a few years. He had a stroke a while back which has left him partially paralyzed. He walks with a cane and struggles a bit with speech. His one daughter died years ago and he lives alone with his dog; he has no other family. John hasn’t been able to work for some time and leaves on a meager fixed income. But there were tears in his eyes when he told me that Remember has changed his life.

Being able to sponsor two girls in our Faith children’s home has given him purpose and a passion for giving that has motivated him to stretch his few dollars to clothe kids on the other side of the world. Rarely do I see him that he doesn’t have some new idea for something he can give to his girls. Today he was excited about buying pencil sharpeners. He set up an appointment with the manager at the Dollar General to see if he can get 100 from headquarters in Atlanta.

Barefoot Because is just a little thing. A few days in my life. A few glances from strangers. A simple sacrifice. It is for little people—people who can’t write big checks or take big trips.

It is the fundraising that the experts say not to bother with.

I think what I love about it is that it is the opportunity to do what we can do. To give what we can give. It is the little lunch that by itself never would have fed a crowd. But when blessed by the Master, it was able to accomplish more than twelve of Jesus’ closest friends could have imagined.

If we limited ourselves to what we could do with big gifts, Remember wouldn’t accomplish much. We never would have purchased property in Burma. We wouldn’t have plans to construct a new children’s home. We never would have taken medical teams to Iraq. We never would have build a safe house in Liberia. We wouldn’t be supporting widows in Sudan, Egypt, and Iraq.

All this and more with little gifts and the game-changing blessing of our Savior—who takes the little things we have to offer and make them more than enough.

And that is why I—someone not generally inclined toward crazy things like cheese hats and blue body paint—would do something crazy like going barefoot.

If you would like to sponsor me or just give to the construction of Remember’s new children’s home, visit www.RememberThose.org. And it isn’t too late to join me and go barefoot yourself!

 

Posted on by lgandre · 6 Comments

Amelia Bedelia and I

I was staring mindlessly down the hardware aisle. It was my third time to Home Depot. That day. This time, I had made a list of five things I needed. I even alliterated the list in my head so that I would be able to remember. Yet here I was, down to the final two items, and all I could remember was that they both started with “D.” I walked up and down hoping that something would trigger my memory and I would be able to complete my third Hope Depot trip of the day without the defeat of an inevitable fourth trip.

It was not to be. I finally checked out with my three items and headed out to the parking lot.

I hate when I do dumb, inefficient things. Mindless characters make for great kids’ stories, but they are not so much fun when the main character is you. Nevertheless, I am not Amelia Bedelia.

We all know Amelia Bedelia. The kind lady with the IQ of a jack rabbit who can cook like the child of Rachel Ray and the Cake Boss.

I am not Amelia Bedelia. I can prove it. I don’t say that because I have never “spotted a dress” by taking a can of paint and adding spots to a white gown. I say that because all of her books have happy endings and all of those happy endings involve food.

My experiences with making food seldom have happy endings.

Just recently, my parents came to Charleston. We went out to dinner, but I was convinced that I could at least make breakfast the next morning. I had oatmeal for my mom, but my dad is a refrigerator biscuit guy. He loves those canned refrigerator biscuits, scrambled eggs, and bacon. I figured I could handle oatmeal, refrigerator biscuits, scrambled eggs, and bacon. Most anybody could.

So I put water on to boil and I turned the oven on to preheat while I got some other things in order. It wasn’t long at all before I began to smell a strange smell. I ignored it at first, but when I opened my oven to look for a baking sheet—I found the source.

Yes, as I expected, the stack of baking sheets was sitting on the top rack. This would have been no big deal. Except that some of them were new. This also would have been no big deal except that they had been wrapped in plastic. I say “had been” because the plastic was now gluing the sheets together and creating stalactites and stalagmites between the top rack and the bottom of the oven.

It had been so long since I opened my oven that I forgot that when I put those there I thought to myself—now I need to remember to take these out before I turn the oven on…

But the sad part is this story doesn’t really stand out in my series of food misadventures. There are many, many more—most that involve me and some distraction that kept me from focusing on what otherwise might have been a successful meal—but some are just completely random.

Like the time I set a Pyrex dish of brownies on top of the stove to cool while I ate lunch with some friends. Halfway through the meal, we heard what sounded like a gun shot inside my house. It was not a gunshot; just a deadly pan of exploding brownies. Unbeknowst to me, I had set the Pyrex pan on a hot burner. I never did get all the burn marks off my floor.

Then there was the time that I thought I set the microwave timer for 20 minutes, but I actually turned the microwave on—empty—for 20 minutes. It had a major meltdown sometime before the alarm went off. For several days, I thought it was toast. When she came to, the words flashing across the tiny screen were all in Spanish. I’m not sure I wanted to know what they said.

Oh, I’m just getting started—one time (another brownies story) I don’t know what I did wrong. I thought I followed the box: egg, water, oil, what is hard about that? But about the time the brownies should have been finished, I opened the oven to find a hard dark brick which had pulled away from the edges of the pan and appeared to be frying in its own fat. I considered opening a booth at the fair for deep fried brownies but the liability insurance quote came back too high when I said I’d be cooking.

But that isn’t my worst cooking story. The worst would go something like this:

It was taco night at church. I was asked to bring two pounds of taco meat. No problem.

I was coming from work and so tried to arrive a few minutes early and cook the meat in the fellowship hall.

I thought I was there plenty early—but either I wasn’t or everyone else was early too. The fellowship hall was quickly filling with people as I attempted to inconspicuously fry ground beef on the stove. Everyone seemed to feel the need to come over and ask me what I was doing. It was taco night. Did they think I was scrambling eggs?

Something must have been on the burner because almost immediately a burned smell permeated around the room and it wasn’t the meat. In fact, it seemed to be the world’s slowest cooking meat. Ever.

Meanwhile, the fellowship hall started filling with smoke. People began to cough and choke. At first it was a little teasing and a lot of drama. But pretty soon it was just a lot of smoke. It looked less like a church fellowship dinner and more like an Indian peace conference. More people came over to the stove to ask me what I was doing.

Someone tried to prop open the fellowship hall doors, but it was not a warm evening. So—picture a fellowship hall full of people, coughing, choking, shivering, and squinting to see through the haze. Meanwhile, I was begging God to let the crazy meat cook! It was like the burning bush.

Finally, someone came up to me and when I turned around, I was so rattled that I swung the pan around with me. Some of the meat flew across the counter and in my haste to over correct, I dumped the contents.

It might have all fallen on the floor, but for one thing.

One thing.

That one thing was my purse, which sat open on the floor by my feet.

That’s right. I dumped two pounds of ground beef into my purse.

After all the smoke. All the haze. All the smells. All the shivers. I dumped the two pounds of ground beef into my purse.

How I wanted to leave it there and go home. But my keys were somewhere inside. Under the two pounds of hot, greasy ground beef.

It was months before I would eat tacos again. And it has been eight years and I’ve still never been asked to bring taco meet again. In fact, the food coordinator apologized to me afterwards for asking me to bring something “hard” like taco meat.

I now get asked to bring sour cream. Occasionally, they branch out and ask me to bring shredded cheese. But they do not ask me to bring “hard” things like taco meat.

So now you understand why I say I’m no Amelia Bedelia.

My happy endings include things like walking into my house to switch on the light and realizing the cracked double light switch plate had had been on my list to replace. Then shutting the sliding glass door and remembering that I needed a dowel to complete my Ft. Knox-like security system.  My happy endings look an awful like the beginning of a list for a fourth trip to Home Depot.

And the lesson in all of this: I should  stay away from trying to cook “hard” things like taco meat, box brownies, and refrigerator biscuits.

Posted on by lgandre · 3 Comments

Loneliness…and the sparrows

ImageHe was a visitor in our high school Sunday School class.  He should have fit right in.  Just by happenstance, the class was all boys that day.  All private school and homeschool Christian young men.  And even though he had long since passed the 6-foot mark, he wasn’t towering over anyone in our overgrown class.  But me, I suppose.

I tried to be cordial but he was clearly uncomfortable.  I asked him some questions, but he stuttered so badly that I wasn’t sure whether my attempts at friendliness were making things better or worse.

I felt for him.  His siblings were grown and gone.  He was a homeschooled missionary kid living in a land where the average height of the natives is a good 14 inches shorter than him.  When in the States, his family would travel church to church, never staying long enough for him to be anything but a stranger.

A shy, stuttering home school student looking like no one in a sea of look-alike nationals.  Talk about a recipe for loneliness.

I don’t know if he is lonely or not.  It wasn’t like he bared his soul to a strange group of lanky cut-up high schoolers and their teacher.  I’m just using my Sherlock Homes-like powers of deduction to suppose that if I were him, I might have trouble making friends.  And I might be lonely.

And, frankly, I felt for him.  Even if I might never see him again, I cared.  Perhaps because it brought back memories of some of my teen years.  Perhaps because I thought of some other people I knew who as high schoolers seemed like misfits—through no fault of their own they were just in places that friends were hard to come by.  Good friends, that is.

When I was just starting high school, I was finding that the kids that I had grown up with seemed to be taking a different path in life than me.  Not right and wrong necessarily—just different.  We had different priorities, we wanted to talk about different things.  I stopped getting invited to their birthday parties.  What started as “BFF” came to a jagged end.  Some of my friendships died a natural death, some a thousand unnatural ones. It seems like drama over nothing in the rearview mirror—only because it is so long ago.  But it was painful then.

I invested my time in other pursuits, like “Cubbies.”  I discovered in junior high that I loved kids.  Working with pre-schoolers was the highlight of my week.  I was better at it then than I am now, I’m sure.  Just a lot less inhibited.

I can remember little ones come flying toward me with their arms outstretched saying “Miss Danielle!” and lighting up my heart.  One of them came to give me a hug and said, “Miss Danielle, you’re my BEST friend!”  The memory of that still brings tears to my eyes (although he would be mortified now if I reminded him).

I didn’t have many friends my age then, but I guess God knew I didn’t need many.  I didn’t need to be running around with other high schoolers doing whatever it is that teens do.  I was better off investing my life in the hearts of little ones and building relationships with wise adults.

It was perhaps a somewhat lonely season of life.  But it was just that—a season.

And now, having the benefit of being able to look back, I guess what I wished I could say the 6 foot plus high schooler in my Sunday School class was this—remember the sparrows.

In a familiar Bible passage, Jesus says this: “Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? And not one of them will fall to the ground apart from your Father. But even the hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear not, therefore; you are of more value than many sparrows…”  Matthew 27:29-31

Jesus is speaking in the context of persecution, but he makes some universal points very clear:

I know.  I care.

Like many other Bible passages, I tend to discredit this one as too familiar.  Too simple.  Too well traveled to be holding valuable insight.

But recently, it struck me like never before.  Jesus points to creatures that to us seem virtuously worthless.  You’ve seen one, you’ve seen them all.  No personality.  No unusual skill.  No good looks.  Just noisy birds intent on filling their big bird mouths and making their little bird nests.  Like every other sparrow.

And Jesus says this: God the Father knows those sparrows.  Individually.  So much so that not one of them will fall to the ground without His notice.  If He takes such loving care of sparrows, how much more does he care for his children?

He knows.  He cares.

Jesus is driving home a point that I still find difficult to believe—that the Father is intimately acquainted with every detail of our lives.  He doesn’t miss an event so small as a hair lost.  He is closer than a brother.  More diligent than a shepherd.  More attentive than a mother with her little one.

His children—regardless of how empty and barren they may be tempted to feel— can cling to the truth that they are intimately known and extravagantly loved.  Whatever season of life they are in, they have not been forgotten.  They have not been left waiting in the wings while some more pressing need is being addressed.

I wonder if that young man who visited my Sunday School class will be the next D.L. Moody, Charles Spurgeon, Adoniram Judson, or John MacArthur.  Perhaps a season of life when every sentence is a struggle will turn him into an orator who weighs the value of every syllable he speaks.  Maybe he will value his relationships with others so highly that his contributions into their lives will be transforming.  Maybe he will have more time on his hands as a young man to invest in things that are going to matter for eternity than most.  Maybe he lost a few hairs today.

I don’t know.

But the Father does.

 

Posted on by lgandre

Loneliness

There I was.  Surrounded by friends. And none of them were mine.

I watched the people standing in line for food, sitting or standing at tables, and milling and talking. I didn’t know a soul.

Okay, I did know a soul. I saw two souls I knew—casually. I said hello and they greeted me in passing. Then I was alone again.

I filled my “Tim Scott for Senate” tumbler with watery pink lemonade and then wandered again around the adjoining rooms looking to see if there were any familiar faces I may have missed. Nope.

So I got in one of the lines—knowing only that there was probably food at the front and that I was starving. I made small talk with the lady in line behind me. She was running for school superintendent. I wished her well.

I filled my plate with cold BBQ pork and meatballs and then went in search of a place to sit. There were several empty tables outside, so I made my way to one. Another couple soon approached with their plates of food and asked if they could sit across from me, and I readily agreed. But between the stiff breeze and the blaring speakers behind us, it was evident that any attempt at conversation would be no more than a futile shouting match. So we ate and listened to the blaring music.

It was hard to guess exactly how many people were there at this fundraiser for Tim Scott for Senate, but from my table, I could see that the parking lot was full and overflowing—people were parked on the grass and kept coming.

All the politicos were here hobnobbing, I guess. Like I said, I didn’t recognize any of them. I felt alone, but it didn’t bother me that much. I was about to finish my plate of food and head for home where my dog was going to be better company than this entire crowd.

When I thought about it, I realized although I was a nobody in this group, I was probably not the loneliest person here. In fact, it occurred to me that perhaps the loneliest person here was Tim Scott himself. Now I need to qualify this, because I don’t know. In fact, I really have no idea.

But think through this with me. Imagine having thousands of people in your life. Thousands. And they all want something from you. You stand for hours while different people come to the front of a line to shake your hand and take their picture with you. You make small talk with each one as they come up and try to act interested and excited to see them. Then they walk away. And you greet the next one.

If you hear from any of them again, it’s going to be, “Hi, I’m Joe. I was a sponsor of your Charleston fundraiser. I’m having this problem…I think Congress should…” And that will be your relationship.

Mind you, Tim Scott is well liked in South Carolina and on this planet in general. So he probably has it better than most politicians. But even so, how many real friends does he have? I wonder. And how much time could he possibly invest in those relationships with his real friends to keep them healthy?

What kind of relationships do you create when every email that goes out with your name on it is begging for money?  When even your birthday party costs money to attend?

Perhaps he is also thinking right now “Here I am, surrounded by friends.  And none of them are mine.”

The fact is that loneliness is not a rare occurrence. In fact, I’m convinced that everyone is lonely sometimes—whether single or married, rich or poor, introvert or extrovert. I’ve heard moms talk about the loneliness of being around little people all day; fathers confess the loneliness of the pressures they face; teens feel lonely because they have no friends they can trust; college students moan about the loneliness of dorm life; graduates talk about the loneliness of the transition into the work force; I even recently read an article about the loneliness pastors face.

Perhaps the puzzling part is not that so many people struggle with loneliness but that we assume so many people do not. Loneliness is no respecter of persons and has nothing at all to do with the number of Facebook friends you have. I believe it has to do with the availability of another understanding soul that we can connect with on a deeper level.

Some of us choose loneliness because we have bought into the lie that somewhere out there is another human being that we will be able to bare our soul to completely who will not judge us in the smallest way— but just listen to all the good and all garbage we want to spew and then knowingly make some wise and loving response that fixes everything. And raise us up so we can stand on mountains.

Some of us have realistic expectations, but we find ourselves lonely because we either don’t have the time or the energy to invest in healthy relationships with people that we respect enough to make ourselves vulnerable.

Regardless of the reason, loneliness is…well…it’s lonely. It get it. Believe me.  It is incredibly painful.

Loneliness itself is not a sin—I even wonder if Jesus was lonely at times. But it can lead to sin. It can lead to discontentment, to bitterness, to jealousy, and generally to unhappy, unfruitful living.

But it doesn’t have to.

I think the greatest service that loneliness can perform is to teach us our need for our Savior. King David was thoughtful enough to record for us some of the times that his lonely soul took refuge in his shadow of our Savior’s wings. When you have no time and no energy for anything else, start there. Read Psalm 34, Psalm 103, and Psalm 63. Earnestly seek God. Let your thirsty soul look for water where the springs of living water flow.

But even that is not an instant or permanent cure…which may sound heretical on its face. But I believe that even though God wants us to draw near to Him, He doesn’t encourage us to live lives in isolation. It isn’t healthy. It’s like the difference between fasting and starving. One can be constructive, the other will kill you.

So that leads me to what is perhaps the second greatest service that loneliness can perform—to teach us to compassionately care for others. It can make us more patient. More kind. More considerate. It can teach us that life isn’t about us. There is a world of people out there that God created to be part of a community who are also starving for companionship.

I complained to a friend that I was lonely and they surprised me by saying, “I can’t fix that for you.” Bummer. It wasn’t what I wanted to hear, but they were right.  The best cure for loneliness was seeing past myself into the needs of others and exercising the initiative to build bridges into other people’s lives.

Be a friend—because there are those who need your friendship as much as you need theirs, maybe even more.

Posted on by lgandre

Trial by Social Media: If your goal is restoration, why are you doing more damage than necessary?

I’ve been incredibly saddened recently to read about the sin and/or alleged sin of two prominent Christian leaders. I’m disappointed to read of the confessions and or accusations posted on Facebook by perhaps well-intentioned Christian friends of mine.

Facebook?

Seriously, Christians. What are you thinking???

I’ve seen comments on such posts which say everything from “this is so sad” to “I hope he faces eternal punishment.”

These posts and the accompanying comments make me thoroughly ashamed of how we treat our fellow believers. And frankly, I don’t think they do anything to bring glory to the name of Christ.

Perhaps what gets me most is the people involved who claim to have followed Matthew 18. This has me particularly puzzled because I don’t read anything about the Internet or Facebook in Matthew 18. What I read in Matthew 18 are ways to deal with sin within the church. Do you hear me?  Within the church.

Scripture is clear that you should not take fellow believers to trial in front of a non-believing judge. How much more true is it then that we would not put a fellow believer on trial before millions of uninvolved and unauthoritative Facebook friends?  What justice is there in that?

At first, I read many of the articles. Tried to sift through them and figure out what are grains of truth. Then I realized that isn’t my job. Nor was it the job of the people I was hearing the facts from.  They were just stirring the pot.

Matthew 18 teaches that if you have something against a brother, you go to them directly.  If you are unable to work it out, you take a second witness to them directly. If they don’t repent, you take it to church.  Galatians 6 provides additional guidance indicating that the goal should be restoration and it should be handled by “you who are spiritual” and handled “in a spirit of gentleness.”  1 Corinthians 6 teaches that the church should act as the tribunal in disputes among Christians.  They hear the evidence. They weigh the facts. They test the credibility of the witness. They reach a conclusion. If they find the accused guilty, they administer the discipline.  And there is never a time when the sin is publicized for all the world to make a mockery of the Church and Christians. [I Corinthians 6:5]

But…I’m reminded. These are serious accusations.  Partly true in the case at hand. More serious perhaps than the original facts warranted. The inferences and implications cast a shadow much larger than the facts themselves. But, nevertheless, I’ll agree that when you raise a high standard, you’re going to be held to it. So, yes, they are serious.

The more serious the accusation, the more important it is that it is handled biblically.  Justly. Quietly.

Not trial by social media.

I even heard one group claim that they had followed Matthew 18 because they tried to confront the accused with the facts before they went public and he wouldn’t agree to their terms. Honestly?  That’s less justice than MSNBC gave George W. Bush.

And to top it all—I see Christians getting excited and reposting the report when the story was “finally” picked up by the mainstream media.  Like this was some political foray.

After numerous posts, I’m convinced that there are those out there who are convinced that justice isn’t done until everyone knows and is convinced the accused is guilty and the debt has been paid in shame and disgrace.

I thought about in relation to a Christian leader who had repented from sin and posted an article of confession on his website.  That took a lot of humility and I have no doubt he had already suffered profoundly. Why would you repost that in your Facebook feed?  Are you trying to give your non-Christian friends yet another reason not to believe?  I tried and I just can’t think of a single good reason to plaster that on your wall.

Is that how you would want your sin handled?  I think of my many, many sins.  I think of reading them on my friends’ Facebook pages.   As if sin’s own consequences were not painful enough and everyone wanted a turn throwing a stone at me.   I can envision every feeble reminder of my merits met with, “Why are you defending her?  She’s a sinner!”

Because I am. It’s true.

And so are you.

So if you’re a Christian—and by that I mean you have trusted Christ as your Savior from sin — then the only comment you should have to any of these posts is “this is me.”  “But for God’s grace–maybe even despite God’s grace–this is me.”

That’s not to say we shouldn’t deal with sin. We certainly should. And the witnesses to the facts should say something if they see a pattern of unrepentant sin.  And the sinners should be dealt with, taken from leadership when needed, and even put out of the church if necessary.

But…don’t put it on Facebook.

Any of you out there without sin can cast the first stone. The rest of us should drop our stones and go deal with our own issues and let the accused deal directly with the Savior. He knows how to handle sinners.  He has lots of experience both with repentant and unrepentant.   He knew when to forgive and when to chase them out of the church with a whip.

Trust Him. He knows the facts. He sees the heart. He tries the motives. He gives wisdom to those whom He puts in places of authority.

And He doesn’t need Facebook.

Let’s focus our energies on making sure the things we post are not only true, but also that they are right.

Posted on by lgandre · 1 Comment

And if you don’t have a good dad…

I know that I’m not the only one who believes that men should generally be treated with a little more respect.  In fact, I noticed that shortly after my blog, Matt Walsh published a blog along similar lines.  Of course, he said it better than I said it…which is probably why he has about 7 million readers to my 70.

Just the same, I found myself burdened for some loved ones who came to mind who perhaps do not have reason to respect men or be particularly grateful to their dads (or husbands).  We all make mistakes, but as the leaders in their homes, when they blow it, a dad’s mistakes can affect a lot of people for a long time.

Take this, for example:

Her dad left when she was six.  He ran away with his secretary—he was forty two, she was eighteen.  He had been married to her mother for twenty years and together they had had seven children.  All who had died except one.

This was back in 1928.  People just didn’t do this sort of thing.  There was no alimony, there was no child support.  Just a single mother suddenly on her own trying to make a living after twenty years of homemaking in a world that didn’t have many employment opportunities for women.   

It was a disgrace.

When she was 10, her father gave her a bicycle.  That is the only thing she ever remembers he gave her.  He was never affectionate.  He never told her he loved her.  He rarely came to visit and when he did, she would often run and hide.

And when he died, she learned of it from a friend who saw his obituary in the Atlanta Journal.  But he had already been out of her life for a long time.

A bad dad?  Yes, I think you could put one mark in that category.  Perhaps he didn’t want to be; perhaps he didn’t mean to be.  But he made decisions that sort of blew it for the “happy family” scenario.  After that, it was just damage control.  Unsuccessful damage control.

And unfortunately he was not the only one.  There are others out there, husbands and fathers who have treated their families rather shabbily.  I have read some men’s commentary on this (including a humorous rendition by Dave Barry) who conclude—we’re guys.  We’re going to do dumb things.  Don’t expect much and you won’t be disappointed.  If we want to be responsible, we will be.  If we don’t, deal with it.

But I’m not buying it.  Not at all.

I’m not going to let the few, the irresponsible rob me of my reason to respect men in general.  And I hope, even if you’ve been hurt by a man, that you won’t either.

Keep loving.  Keep trusting.  Keep expecting.

Expect them to stand up and be a leader.  Expect them to be faithful (and forgive them when they try imperfectly).  Expect them to work hard, and cheer them on when they do.  Expect them to set goals—even some wild and crazy ones that they won’t quite be able to pull off—and help them try anyway.   Expect them to get worn out and broken from time to time–and when they do, be there to remind them of their strengths.

Because this is the stuff respect is made of.  You cannot respect a man if you expect nothing good from him.  You can use him, you can pity him, but you can’t respect him.

And men need respect—it is what good relationships are built on. As Christians, we should never, never, never give up on good relationships.   Imperfect, yes.  Broken, at times.  But able to be forgiven, restored, and rebuilt because that is the beauty of the grace God gives us to love and respect.

If you’ve been hurt in the past, I’m sorry.  If the person who hurt you never asked forgiveness, I’m sorry.  But don’t use this as an excuse to buy into Dave Barry’s pretend standard for men.  It sounds funny—especially when he says it—and there may be a few immature men out there of whom it is true.  And I suspect they hate it about themselves.  I think there are very few men out there who truly don’t care at all.

I stand by my earlier conclusion: if you have a good man in your life—dad, husband, son, whatever, be sure to show them a healthy amount of respect.  Tell them thank you.  Be sure they know that you know that they are not Mr. Bernstein.  Or Dave Berry.

Posted on by lgandre · 5 Comments

My Dad

IMG_0531“Ta Die Ma” Dad would often say as he came through the door after work.  It was a phrase that he had picked up from his year in Japan and it was music to our ears.  When Dad was home, it was the final and official indication that home school was over for a day.  We would clear what was left of books and projects off the dining room table to make room for supper.

Dad was always home for supper except when he had long commutes.  Super long commutes.  Dad did what he had to do to provide for his family and sometimes that included hours on the road every day.

After dinner, we had family devotions.  We read the Bible, Character Sketches, other devotional books.

We didn’t have a TV.  But sometimes we went to the park to play baseball or tennis or played basketball in the driveway.  And each evening before bed, Dad would read to us.  Over the years, he read the entire Anne of Green Gables series, the entire Little House on the Prairie series, the Little Women series, and more.  While other men might have been watching football, Dad would be sitting on our bedroom floor reading about the Ingalls’ long trip west.  And when Jack the faithful bulldog walked his last mile under the wagon and all five of us cried, Dad was in tears too.

Dad was our biggest cheerleader.  When I used to write little stories, poems, songs, and skits, he was the first one I would show them to.  He would usually tell me that he was impressed that someone my age would write stories, poems, songs, and skits on her own initiative.  Looking back, that was probably the nicest thing he could think of to say about my work.  But I was always encouraged.

I wanted to play guitar and I think it was mostly because my dad did.  He had a repertoire of songs and we would sing them together every few months when he pulled out his guitar and tuned the strings.  Dad loved to sing—and not just when he was playing guitar.  In fact, Dad’s favorite thing in all the world to this day seems to be Christmas Caroling.  Any time of the year.  I have enough material on that for a whole blog of its own.

For a few years, Dad had four teenage daughters.  Not many men could handle that.  Not many men who worked a nine to five job at a private university.  We were never wealthy and I’ll probably never know just how much my parents sacrificed to put all four of us through braces.  But for all the good traits Dad passed down, straight teeth was not one of them.  And while he could grow a mustache, that was not a desirable option for us girls.

Dad loved to grill.  We loved it when he went to the grocery store because he would come back with more than just hamburgers.  He would buy chips, soda, and dessert…things my mom would never buy.  He has expanded his culinary skills and now he not only grills Thanksgiving turkey but also makes breakfast often.

I suppose Dad, like most guys, would have liked to own fast, cool cars.  But he hasn’t had any as long as I’ve been alive.  In fact, more often than not, he got to spend his Saturdays trying to fix the family van.  We didn’t always have two cars, but when we did, his was usually even less reliable than the family van.  When his truck was stolen—a truck that was two different colors in the front and back; had a broken gas indicator, and boasted a block of wood for a parking break—the police found it not too long afterwards.  I guess it wasn’t even worth the upkeep when the price was free.

When I was about 11, we bought a Chevy van for $6500.  That was the most we ever spent for a vehicle and I thought we were big stuff.  It was just a few days later that I accidently scraped the “new van” with a hose while trying to wash it.  I expected Dad to be mad when he saw it, but he didn’t really say much.  I remember clearly that night when he came in to tuck us into bed and he told me he loved me.  His treasure was not in his cars.  It was his family.

But that’s just a glimpse of who my dad is.

When I think of him, I often think of Proverbs 20:6 – “Most men will declare his own goodness, but a faithful man, who can find?”

We live in a culture in which faithfulness is the exception rather than the rule.  It is not even expected anymore.  Not really in any arena—employment, marriage, church attendance, anything.  It is increasingly hard to be faithful.  It is increasingly easy to cheat.  Most people will take the easy road.

But not my dad.  He was the one who tried to convince me to stick with piano lessons when I wanted to quit.  He was always at church no matter what the weather and he would have all of us there with him.  He taught Awana Clubs, Sunday School, lead worship, and coached basketball week after week and year after year.  He was the kind of man you could count on.  He worked tirelessly to provide for his family, even when jobs were hard to come by.

So…in the answer to the question, “a faithful man, who can find?”

The answer would be: my mom.