Lights In The Darkness

Marissa
Google earth at night city lights
Google Earth At Night

You know those pictures of the world at night, when you can see all the city lights? Maybe that’s something like what God sees when He looks at the world — a great darkness with tiny spots of light wherever there is a Christian.

Ye are the light of the world. A city that is set on an hill cannot be hid. Neither do men light a candle, and put it under a bushel, but on a candlestick; and it giveth light unto all that are in the house. Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven. (Matt. 5:14-16)

Do all things without murmurings and disputings: that ye may be blameless and harmless, the sons of God, without rebuke, in the midst of a crooked and perverse nation, among whom ye shine as lights in the world (Phil. 2:14-15)

How bright are our lights? Are we readily visible, contrasting sharply with the darkness, or do we blend in because we barely glow at all?

Pilgrims

Marissa

I’m back! and the flu which was the reason for my blogging hiatus has indirectly inspired this newest post. Since I had to stay home from church services, I had the chance to watch a DVD sermon we’d just got in the mail (you can listen to “My Burden Is Light” on this website, if anyone’s interested).

In this sermon, he talked about getting rid of the old man and removing sin from our lives so we are not weighed down with excess spiritual baggage as we make our pilgrimage toward the kingdom of God. This sparked a thought I’ve been mulling over for the past few days.

I don’t know how you think about being “strangers and pilgrims on the earth” (Heb. 11:13), but I’ve always thought more about being separate from the world and making a pilgrimage out of darkness than I have about the obvious flip-side of this statement. To be making a pilgrimage out of something, there must be a destination that we are making a pilgrimage toward. In much the same way, when we become a stranger to this world, we experience a change that makes us no longer strangers to God.

At that time ye were without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world: but now in Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ. (Eph. 2:12-13).

Because of His redemptive work, we are “no more strangers and foreigners, but fellowcitizens with the saints, and of the household of God” (Eph. 2:19). Coming out of this world and becoming strangers to it is what we must do once we have received the gift of forgiveness that allows fellowship with God.

When we are separate from the world in how we think and behave we, like those in the Faith Chapter, “declare plainly that [we] seek a country” (Heb. 11:14). Do our lives show that we are friends of God and strangers to the world’s ways? Do we proclaim with our actions that our sense of belonging is with God, and not with this world?

Armor We Wear

Marissa

I’m reblogging a friend’s post today, partly because it’s a good post and partly because I’ve been under the weather the past few days. Hopefully I’ll be back to blogging shortly, but until then, I hope you find this post as encouraging as I do.

smilesupport313's avatarsmilesupport313

In our lives, we all have armor. That shield we hold like a wall that cannot be scaled. That sword we wave in an attempt to get the upper hand. That helmet that limits our view. That breastplate to protect our heart. That belt of the familiar and comfortable. Those shoes of the stubborn and hard-hearted. 
Whatever we do, we carry these things with us. We also pack baggage and throw that over our shoulders. At every encounter with the alarming, we struggle to fight and march on. 
God has taken that baggage and disengaged it from our shoulders. He held our hand as we crossed a bridge of tumultuous waters. Together on the other side, we used a torch to light the bridge on fire. Our old life, who we were, is dead to us. Why do we save our armor?
Let’s trade in our armor. That wall of…

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“If You Love Me”

Marissa

A comment on my “Heart of Worship” post has had me thinking about the importance of keeping God’s commandments. The comment noted that “worship is also connected to commandment keeping and is not only praise and emotion.” This reminded me of something I noticed while studying love in the Old and New Testaments.

In John 14:15, Jesus Christ said, “If you love Me, keep My commandments.” This clearly states that that we cannot claim to love Christ if we are not obeying Him, and is not an isolated verse. The idea of loving God and keeping His commandments is paired at least eleven times in the Old Testament and nine times in the New Testament (Ex. 20:6. Deu. 5:10; 7:9; 11:1, 13, 22; 19:9; 30:16. Josh. 22:5. Neh. 1:5. Dan. 9:4. Matt. 22:38-39. Mark 12:30. John 14:15, 21; 15:10. 1st John 4:21; 5:2, 3. 2nd John. 1:6).

Keeping the Lord’s commandments is vital to having a loving relationship with Him. From the beginning, God expected obedience from His people. This is made very clear when He established the Old Covenant with ancient Israel.

See, I have set before thee this day life and good, and death and evil; in that I command thee this day to love the LORD thy God, to walk in His ways, and to keep His commandments and His statutes and His judgments, that thou mayest live and multiply: and the LORD thy God shall bless thee in the land whither thou goest to possess it (Deuteronomy 30:15)

Jesus connected this ancient commandment with the New Covenant when He answered the question “which is the great commandment in the law?” He quoted Deuteronomy 6:4 by saying:

And Jesus answered him, The first of all the commandments is, Hear, O Israel; The Lord our God is one Lord: and thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength: this is the first commandment (Mark 12:29-30)

This love goes much deeper than just loving God to fulfill a commandment. Our God wants a relationship with us. He wants us to love Him, because He first loved us (1 Jn. 4:19). Just a few verses after Christ said, “If you love Me, keep My commandments” in John 14, He added this:

He that hath My commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth Me: and he that loveth Me shall be loved of My Father, and I will love him, and will manifest Myself to him (John 14:21)

If we love Him and keep His commandments, we will be loved by both Jesus Christ and God the Father. And not only loved – Jesus Christ says He will manifest Himself to us. “Manifest” is from the word emphanizō, and means that Christ will let Himself “be intimately known and understood” (G1718 ἐμφανίζω; Zodhiates). To know our Creator personally is an incredible promise, one we can claim if we love God and attach ourselves strongly to Him by keeping His commandments.

Just a note … the ideas in this post, particularly the second paragraph, are part of a larger study I’ve been doing on love in the Bible. I’m not sure yet if it’s going to be more of a long-ish paper or a short booklet, but I’m planing to finish revising it and have a PDF available on this blog by Pentecost (May 19th) for anyone who would be interested in reading it.

More Cheesecake, No Sugar

Marissa

Between writing about cheesecake yesterday and baking one today, I have cheesecake on my mind. Ergo, here’s another recipe, this time sugar-free. I came up with this recipe for a friend who loves cheesecake but can’t eat sugar or artificial sweeteners (which I refuse to use anyway).

The entire cake is sweetened with honey. This crust can be a little hard to work with, but the taste is worth the extra effort. The first time I baked this, the crust stuck to the bottom of the pan and people were scraping it off to eat by itself. The filling has a really nice texture, even smoother than a regular cheesecake, and the honey taste isn’t overpowering.

honey cheesecake carleene federer
A honey cheesecake from Carlene Federer

Unfortunately, I don’t have a photograph of this cheesecake. I found a picture on Google, though, which looks similar to mine. Most other recipes top honey cheesecakes with honey or caramel before serving, but I’ve never done that with mine. I think it would be way too sweet.

Honey Cheesecake

Crust

  • 1 cup walnuts, ground
  • 2 Tablespoons honey
  • ¼ cup butter
  • ¼ tsp. ground cinnamon
  • add flour as needed to hold it together (about 1/2 cup)

Mix crust and press into 9-inch spring-form pan. (crust is sticky, so I line the pan with aluminum foil). Bake at 325°F for 5-10 minutes.

Filling

  • 3 (8-oz.) packages cream cheese, softened
  • ¾ cup honey
  • 3 eggs, at room temperature
  • ¼ cup heavy cream
  • 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
  • 1 tablespoon all-purpose flour
  • ½ teaspoon ground cinnamon

While crust is baking, beat cream cheese and ¾ cup honey with a mixer in large bowl at medium speed until smooth, scraping down bowl’s sides occasionally, about 3 minutes. Beat in eggs one at a time; beat in cream and vanilla. Beat in flour, cinnamon and salt. Pour into crust.

Bake at 325°F for about 1 hour or until lightly browned and a little puffed. Cheesecake will jiggle in the center but will set as it cools. Cool on a wire rack 2 hours. Once cool, you should be able to lift the cake and peal off the aluminum foil. Cover and refrigerate.

The Way To A Man’s Heart …

Marissa

I may have discovered compelling Biblical evidence to support the old saying, “The way to a man’s heart is through his stomach.”

While reading Song of Solomon this morning, I noticed that my study Bible had a note that “Thou hast ravished my heart” (Song 4:9) could also be translated “Thou hast taken away my heart.” I thought oh, that’s so cute, and looked up the Hebrew word. According to the lexical aids in my Bible, lâvav (H3823) can also mean “to be wise, be intelligent (Job 11:12); to make cakes (2Sam. 13:6, 8).”

So, what I’m getting from this is that it is wise to bake cakes and thereby capture a man’s heart.

I have tried this approach in the past, to no avail. I comfort myself by thinking this is due to the lack of single men in the local church areas rather than a flaw in my cooking, and still have high hopes for my cheesecakes.

I’m particularly proud of this turtle cheesecake. You won’t find this particular recipe anywhere else, because it’s one of my own. A friend of mine talked me into trying Fazoli’s turtle cheesecake, and I promptly went online to try and find a similar recipe. After browsing recipe sites unsuccessfully for an hour, I decided I’d just come up with my own.

 Turtle Cheesecake

Turtle Cheesecake
Turtle Cheesecake

 Crust

  • 1 cup chocolate graham cracker crumbs
  • ¼ cup melted butter
  • 3 tablespoons caramel ice cream topping

Mix cracker crumbs and butter. Press into a greased 9-inch spring-form pan. Drizzle caramel over crust.

Filling

  • 3 (8 oz) packages cream cheese, softened
  • ¾ cup sugar
  • 1 ½ teaspoons vanilla
  • 3 eggs

Beat cream cheese, sugar and vanilla with mixer until well blended. Add eggs, 1 at a time, mixing on low speed after each just until blended. Pour over caramel layer in crust.

Bake at 350°F for 40 minutes or until center is almost set. Run knife around rim of pan to loosen cake; cool before removing rim.

Topping

  • 3 tablespoons hot fudge
  • 3 tablespoons caramel syrup
  • ¼ cup chopped pecans
  • ¼ cup semi-sweet chocolate morsels

Melt hot fudge and drizzle with caramel syrup over cooled cheese cake. Sprinkle with pecans and chocolate morsels. Refrigerate 4 hours.