A dear, godly, 92-year-old man passed away last week, leaving behind his wife, daughter, two granddaughters, twelve great-grandchildren, all their families, and numerous friends who were touched by his life – including me. Gerald Snodgrass was the beloved dishwasher at the Tea Room where my Mom and sister and I worked for several years. (Those of you who have read my book may recollect him from the chapter, In which I serve tea and solve mysteries.)

And so it was that Monday of this week found us traveling across town to attend the funeral service for Mr. Snodgrass. In the midst of sadness, we also experienced the joy of catching up with old friends, the blessing of reminiscing about treasured memories, and the inspiration of honoring the incredible legacy that Mr. Snodgrass has left behind.

I was asked to speak this weekend at a retreat for a group of student worship leaders from a local university. After a full week of teaching, meetings, and trying to meet deadlines on various projects, the retreat proved to be a refreshing time of fellowship and worship. The organizer did a fabulous job of maintaining a casual atmosphere even with a very full schedule, and I was greatly blessed by the biblical and Christ-centered focus of the event. All of the leaders are international students and I always love meeting Christians from around the world, learning about their culture, and drawing out their perspectives on various issues.

The verse that I used as the basis for my session was Psalm 28:7, “The LORD is my strength and my shield; my heart trusted in him, and I am helped: therefore my heart greatly rejoiceth; and with my song will I praise him.” A while back, in the course of our music-themed Bible study, my sister and I came up with the above diagram as a representation of God’s natural design for musical expression. I put together a larger version for the retreat and used it as a visual during my presentation. Here is a brief overview of what I shared:

1. God’s Character (“The LORD is my strength and my shield”) A right view of God forms the foundation from which our music must flow.
2. My Trust (“my heart trusted in him”) A right view of God should lead us to look to Him for guidance and help in every situation.
3. God’s Help (“and I am helped”) God wants to show Himself strong on behalf of those who trust Him.
4. Heart Rejoices (“therefore my heart greatly rejoiceth”) Experiencing God’s help affirms our faith and fills us with joy.
5. Song Praises (“and with my song will I praise him”) The overflow of joy in our heart will pour forth in praise to God.

In the course of preparing for the retreat, I came across a couple of quotes that I really liked and included in my session. The first is from the book, The Soul’s Quest for God, by R.C. Sproul:

“Nothing can be in the heart that is not first in the mind. Our hearts cannot be inflamed about something we know not of. Unless we know God deeply, we cannot love him deeply. A faint understanding of God is enough to begin the heart to stir. Emotions may be kindled by the slightest acquaintance with the majesty of Christ. But for that spark to rise into a consuming and lasting fire, our knowledge of him must increase.”

The second quote is from George Mueller, and was gleaned from a wonderful biographical sketch of George Mueller on the Desiring God website:

“I saw more clearly than ever, that the first great and primary business to which I ought to attend every day was, to have my soul happy in the Lord. I saw that the most important thing I had to do was to give myself to the reading of the word of God, and to meditation on it. . . . What is the food of the inner man? Not prayer, but the word of God; and . . . not the simple reading of the word of God, so that it only passes through our minds, just as water runs through a pipe, but considering what we read, pondering over it, and applying it to our hearts.”

In other random news this week, I finally found a pizza sauce recipe that I really like! I made deep dish Chicago-style pizza for dinner one night and did some tweaking of another recipe to come up with a concoction that was a winner with the whole family (a difficult feat, to be sure!). Here it is:

Ingredients:
14 oz. can crushed tomatoes
14 oz. can diced tomatoes, undrained
3 Tbsp. olive oil
1 Tbsp. dried basil
1 tsp. dried oregano
½ tsp. dried marjoram
¼ tsp. salt
3-4 cloves of garlic, finely minced

Directions:
Combine all ingredients in a medium saucepan over medium-high heat. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer. Allow to cook for about 30 minutes. Once finished cooking, remove from the heat. Serve immediately or store in an airtight container in the refrigerator.

“Leave to thy God to order and provide;
in every change He faithful will remain.”

So, I aim this year to to be wise and prudent in planning, yet submissive and flexible in accepting whatever changes God brings my way day-by-day.

Much of my time each week is occupied teaching my wonderful music students and, by extension, serving the broader music community. For those who may not know, I run Music Matters Blog – a site replete with “creative, practical, and up-to-date resources for the independent music teacher.”

In other weekly news, I love cooking and one of my favorite things to do is experiment with new recipes. Some of my family members love this; others do their best to devise reasons to not be home for dinner on Friday nights – my designated cooking night. One of the things I’m especially interested in is learning more about herbs and spices and how to use them effectively in different foods (the open-the-cupboard-and-randomly-add-spices-to-the-dish method that I tend to employ is perhaps a factor in the afore-mentioned aversion to my cooking experiments by some family members…?).

My good friend, Lydia, also enjoys cooking, so we’ve decided to become cohorts in the kitchen this year. We launched our endeavor at her house this week with a foray into some Chinese delicacies. She and her Mom, Sherri, introduced me to their method of making egg rolls and I took along a recipe for some almond pastries (okay, not exactly Chinese, but I’ve been wanting to make these for a long time and this seemed like the perfect occasion to finally do it!). Anyway, here we are displaying the scrumptious results of our labor.

Hopefully I’ll have more cooking success stories throughout the year. And I’ll try to post some of our favorite recipes as well!

Those of you who have read my book, Pajama School, know that I have a bit of a love-hate relationship with politics. Nevertheless, I did experience a bit of the campaign season itch when Dad, Naomi, and I attended the Great American Forum this week that unofficially launched the hotly contested race for the U.S. House Seat in Kansas’ 4th District. There are five republicans running in the primary and even though we are already supporting one of the candidates, we wanted to get a better idea of who the other candidates are and what their positions are on various issues.

The turn-out for the forum was incredible! It was obvious that even the organizers had not expected so many people to attend. There are critical issues being decided in Congress that will affect our families and our nation for many years to come. We are reaping the results of years of complacency, compromise, and corruption, and perhaps the disastrous consequences are spurring more people into action. The battle must be fought on many fronts, but the choosing of our representatives should be of chief importance to every American, for there is a blessing attached to the rule of the righteous:

“When the righteous are in authority, the people rejoice: but when the wicked beareth rule, the people mourn.”

Proverbs 29:2

I’m so grateful that we have righteous men running who will represent us well and uphold biblical and constitutional principles in their policy decisions. As each of us continue to serve in the roles that God has called us to, I hope that we will also recognize the importance of investing our time, energy, and finances on behalf of those whom He has likewise called to serve Him by representing us in our local, state, and federal governments.

Toward the end of her time of sharing, Tonya reflected on why we take pictures. It’s because we want to capture the moment. That exact moment will never be repeated again, so a picture is a small way of capturing and preserving the moments of our lives that we want to remember. In many ways, I feel the same about writing and journaling. That was part of the impetus behind writing my book, Pajama School, and that is part of the reason why I keep a calendar and journal. One of my biggest hesitations in going digital with my calendar and daily agenda this year is that I won’t have that paper copy for future reference. I’m not much of a trinket person, but I do tend to be sentimental about things like this for some reason…

Anyway, Tonya’s message inspired me to start a [hopefully] weekly feature here on the Pajama School Blog to “Capture the Moment.” My plan is to take a day at the end of the week to encapsulate some of the memorable things that happened during the week – both in words and pictures. I really don’t like the “Dear Diary, today I ate eggs for breakfast…” variety of blogging, so I can assure you this will not become a public forum for the overflow of all of my thoughts and daily activities, but I’m not quite sure what it will look like from week to week. I’m also hoping to be more consistent in getting up other posts during the week (not that that would take much!). I would welcome any suggestions or input that you have on what you’d like to see here on the blog.