The Refiner’s Fire

Malachi 3:3 says, "He will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver". This verse puzzled some women in a Bible study and they wondered what this statement meant about the character and nature of Christ. One of the women offered to find out about the process of refining and purifying silver and get back to the group at their next Bible study.

That week, the woman called a silversmith and made an appointment to watch him at work. She didn't mention anything about the reason for her interest beyond her curiosity about the process of refining silver.

As she watched the silversmith, he held a piece of silver over the fire and let it heat up. He explained that in refining silver, one needed to hold the silver in the middle of the fire where the flames were hottest as to burn away all the impurities. The woman thought about God holding us in the fire of trials to burn away our impurities. Then she thought again about the verse that says, "He sits as a refiner and purifier of silver".

She asked the silversmith if it was true that he had to sit there in front of the fire the whole time the silver was being refined. The man answered yes, he not only had to sit there holding the silver, but he had to keep his eyes on the silver the entire time it was in the fire. If the silver was left a moment too long in the flames, it would be destroyed.

The woman was silent for a moment. Then she asked the silversmith, "How do you know when the silver is fully refined?" He smiled at her and answered, "When I see my image in it". If today we are feeling the heat of the fire, remember that Christ has His eyes on us and will keep watching us until He sees His image in us. Whatever we are going through, we will be a Christlike purified person because of our refiners fire.

2nd Annual Candy Bath

Yesterday Jorja and Logan held their 2nd Annual Candy Bath. As I have stated in an earlier post, when these two get excited about something they have to take a bath with that thing. I'm not sure what possesses this but I do find it incredibly funny. The best part about this is that all their candy is GONE!!!! Jillian still has a bunch but she stores it spread out on her bedroom floor so it won't be around much longer, especially now that she's got two helpers!

Now I have to say that the candy bath itself is rather nasty. It is the chocolate that makes it an oily mess. Here is Jorja at the end of her bath. Look at that ring around the tub! After she was done, I cleaned out the tub and then washed her in a new bath. She had so much chocolate oil on her that it left another, albeit lighter, ring around the tub.



Logan actually washed himself with the chocolate. He thought that was pretty funny. He hoarded most of his chocolate this year (mostly peanut butter cups) so his bath wasn't as dark as Jorja's. He really enjoyed watching the color coming out of the M&M's coating. Oh, funny, funny kids!!!

By the way, I do realize that Logan really needs a haircut!

The Tale of the Cracked Pot

Nobody's perfect, but our imperfections make us interesting.

A water bearer had two large pots, each hung on the ends of a pole which he carried across his neck. One of the pots had a crack in it, while the other pot was perfect and always delivered a full portion of water.

At the end of the long walk from the stream to the house, the cracked pot arrived only half full. For a full two years this went on daily, with the bearer delivering only one and a half pots full of water to his house.

Of course, the perfect pot was proud of its accomplishments, perfect for which it was made. But the poor cracked pot was ashamed of its own imperfection and miserable that it was able to accomplish only half of what it had been made to do.

After two years of what it perceived to be a bitter failure, it spoke to the water bearer one day by the stream.

'I am ashamed of myself, and I want to apologize to you. I have been able to deliver only half my load because this crack in my side causes water to leak out all the way back to your house. Because of my flaws, you have to do all of this work, and you don't get full value from your efforts,' the pot said.

The bearer said to the pot, 'Did you notice that there were flowers only on your side of the path, but not on the other pot's side? That's because I have always known about your flaw, and I planted flower seeds on your side of the path, and every day while we walk back, you've watered them.

'For two years I have been able to pick these beautiful flowers to decorate the table. Without you being just the way you are, there would not be this beauty to grace the house.'

Moral: Each of us has our own unique flaws. We're all cracked pots. But it's the cracks and flaws we each have that make our lives together so very interesting and rewarding. You've just got to take each person for what they are, and look for the good in them.

Blessed are the flexible, for they shall not be bent out of shape. Remember to appreciate all the different people in your life!

Homemade Mixed Martial Arts

I had a really busy day yesterday so I really needed the kids to get their jobs done fast. Positive incentives always work the best for this kind of thing so I had them make a list of possible fun things we could do after their jobs were done. Having a wrestling competition won out but I didn't think that would be enough incentive to get things done fast. I realized we needed trophies! There's my incentive! The person who got all their jobs done first got to make the first place trophy, which had to be the biggest. The second one done got to do the second place trophy and that had to be medium sized and the third one to finish got to do the third place and that had to be the smallest. They thought that was pretty cool and they did their jobs in record time. It was awesome! Jillian finished first, then Logan, then Jorja; no surprises there. They worked for the rest of the afternoon on their trophies, especially Logan, who covered his trophy with cut up pieces of cardboard.

We ended up not having enough time for the wrestling competition yesterday so we made good on the promise tonight. It was a blast and the kids really had fun. We did it UFC-style with three rounds of 30 seconds starting off with "Let's get it on!" or "Let's wrestle!" All the kids had to fight each other and then, because Logan was winning, it was the girls against Logan. He is surprisingly strong for such a little guy. The fact that he's not afraid to punch really hard doesn't hurt either. We made sure nobody got really hurt; if they started to hurt then they just tapped out -- except Jorja who would start to cry and have me hold her.

Then the kids wanted to see Brad and I wrestle. We had to go four rounds instead of three and we had to start on our knees. I'm no match for Brad because he's better trained than I am but I can hold my own for a while.

Logan won the competition, Jillian second, and Jorja third. However, Logan was upset because he really wanted the trophy he made for second place. Jillian quickly traded and all was well again.

Then we got to watch the movie, Water Horse, before going to bed. What a fun night!

Halloween Traditions

Every year we get together and carve our pumpkins. We usually do a competition and this year it was between the girls and guys. I decided to get online and find some templates because I can never think of anything else but the traditional pumpkin face. Even though I was teased for using someone else's idea I think we did an awesome job.

I really like this picture of me because I just look great! Don't I look so thin? Love it. Yeah, my girls are cute too. :)

Logan and Brad with their more traditional pumpkin. Actually, Brad usually comes up with the really fun ideas (which is, of course, why I needed help!). Logan is just a knife freak. That kid is obsessed with cutting things -- he loves scissors for the same reason. I constantly have little pieces of paper or cardboard all over the house. The thing is, they all have a use to him, whether it be food for Special Dog, or money for playing "store" or whatever. Shhh! I secretly throw them away when he is asleep! I know he'll just make more the next day so this is simply clutter control. I think he finds the joy in the cutting itself anyway.

This is what Jorja wanted to do: eat raisins. She's a raisin nut, just like her brother. She actually did help scoop out all the pumplin goop.

See what I mean about him cutting things? This actually has a purpose; it is future pumpkin puke.

I could sense that I was taking over our pumpkin too much so I told Jillian that she should carve the back side of our pumpkin. That would automatically make it cooler since we would have two carvings rather than just one. So she designed and cut this side all by herself! Go Jilly!


The final product! The boys' pumpkin has teeth, eyebrows, ears, nose and a "nosebrow" attached with toothpicks. Logan thought that the whole process was pretty cool (he used the handle side of the knife to hammer in the toothpicks) and got a little hammer crazy and added a few extra appendages. Hence the nosebrow, toothpick horns, and ears.

Jillian with her great design.

What happy kids!

The next night was Halloween! Jillian was a corpse bride and was very proud of her self-done make-up job. I actually thought she did great also! It was my turn to take the kids out this year while Brad gave out candy at home. We went with Jillian's friend, Mae, and her family. Jorja wasn't feeling that great so I took her in the stroller. I really enjoyed watching my kids have fun. Jillian was holding hands with her friend and I could just tell she was so happy.

Logan was just plain funny as usual. His favorite candies are the Reces peanut butter cups in the orange wrapping. He would literally run to each house, ring the doorbell, say the required "trick or treat" and then ask if they had any orange candies. When they didn't know what he was talking about he would hold up an example. At our neighbor's house he even tried to trade his partially eaten candy for an "orange candy"!! We just died laughing. He actually did score on the peanut butter cups. People thought he was so cute that they gave him extras. Brad and I have decided that he will get a lot out of life simply because he asks. By the way, he thought his Spider Man costume with the huge muscles was pretty darn cool. He just loves Spider Man and he loves flexing his own muscles to see just how big they are. It was the perfect combination. :)