Butterfly

Danaus chrysippus)" style="border: medium none ; display: block;">Image by Umang Dutt via Flickr

The caterpillars were repulsive. Spiked and striped, they writhed on every tree trunk and squirmed on the west side of every building at the reception center. Around us, the wedding was in full swing. But my children were enthralled with the worms. They held their breaths and inched bravely closer to the squirming grubs, then ran away screaming and laughing with a mixture of fascination and horror at the ugly creatures.

With our youngest on my hip, I stooped to study a worm more closely. The older two children listened with interest as I explained that these fat, wriggly little grubs that looked so fearsome and disgusting with their soft, segmented bodies covered with ugly spikes would one day become butterflies. Butterflies? These ugly worms? We took a plastic cup from the punch bowl, scraped in several worms with a stick (nobody was volunteering to pick them up with their bare hands!) and covered the cup with a scrap of white netting from a nearby decoration.

At home, we put the grubs in a large glass jar. There wasn't time to put in sticks, but I was sure that we would have plenty of time the next day to give the caterpillars something to spin their cocoons on. To my surprise, when we woke the next morning the larva had already spun cocoons! With no stick to hang from, the worms were not able to spin their whole bodies into the cocoons. Instead, white silk encased the bottom three-fourths of each worm while the worm's heads and a bit of their bodies were hanging out! These three strange little packages lay at the bottom of the jar, clearly still alive and yet unfinished. I didn't see any way that these incomplete cocoons could hatch into a butterfly without the head of the worm inside...wouldn't the butterfly have no head? Would they hatch at all? But the children wanted to see what would happen, so we carefully glued the spun-ends of each cocoon onto a stick and waited.

To my surprise, several weeks later the cocoons hatched! Inside the jar were the remains of the cocoons, and drops of a blackish substance had oozed down the glass and pooled under each cocoon. The head segments of each worm lay with the remains of the cocoons, as dead as the silk and dried to an empty shell. And yet, amazingly, three butterflies clung to the stick in the jar!

I was amazed that even without the entire worm, a butterfly could have emerged from those strange cocoons. But when I examined the butterflies carefully, my amazement grew! They were beautiful creatures, looking nothing at all like the ugly worms they had been. And yet, because the entire body of each worm had not been in the cocoons, the butterflies were incomplete. They had beautiful indigo wings edged with black. Their thin and graceful bodies had perfect heads with feathered, arching antennae, tiny black eyes and a curled proboscis. To our delight inside the black boarders of each wing ran a row of tiny white hearts.

But each butterfly was missing something. One had only four legs and its delicate black body was slightly shortened. Another had two holes in its wings, one in each canvas of vibrant blue. The third was missing one set of wings entirely, its right side a beautiful display of iridescent indigo, black and white...the left a crumbled stump that left the creature unbalanced and unable to fly.

What had happened? How had these butterflies developed at all, when part of the worm had not even been used in their development? How could a butterfly develop, complete with a perfect head, when the heads of the worms were still lying at the bottom of the jar? I knew that butterflies were an amazing example of metamorphosis, and a powerful analogy for how God can take something small, ugly and wretched and change it to something graceful and beautiful. What I didn't know about butterflies changed my heart and taught me something I hope never to forget.

Inside the cocoon, the changes taking place are far more profound than I had imagined. The grub, wrapped in its silk shroud and hidden from view, is not slowly growing wings. The worm is not gradually developing the characteristics of a butterfly, adding new parts on and altering the old to take on a new look. Inside the cocoon, something far more profound is taking place.

The worm as we know it has died. There is no gradual development of new limbs and new features....the worm itself is gone! In its place is a black sludge, the sort of goo we associate with complete and utter decomposition. Floating in the goo somewhere are a few vital organs that have not completely broken down, but there is nothing recognizable as a caterpillar left. The cells are alive, but liquefied. It is from this black liquid, this complete and utter destruction of the original worm, that the butterfly is pieced together. It is truly a new creature! God has taken the cells, broken them beyond recognition, caused the old creature to exist no more, and built something completely new from the pieces.

And the missing parts? Oh, Christian! The missing parts speak so strongly to my heart. For God to make the whole and beautiful new creature He had planned, He needed all of the worm. The worm had to die, it had to become dead black sludge for God's plan to work perfectly. When we fail to submit All of our heart to God's will...even when God's will is that the old must die! When we fail to give it all to him and truly die to self we find that we are incomplete. We emerge with broken wings and incomplete hearts, we limp along when we could be flying high. When we give it all to God, He works every part of it, yes every ugly detail...to His good. He takes the loathsome worm, and from dead black sludge he brings forth a jeweled and graceful butterfly! He asks for nothing less than total submission to His will...nothing less than the death of the old self. But we can trust completely that His plans for us are beautiful! We can trust that He will change us completely, make us a new creature, and give us wings to fly!

Lord, what more can I submit to you today? Thank you for the example of caterpillars and butterflies, for if you can daily work such miracles with them what amazing things will you do when we submit our human hearts to you!

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Psalm

I will praise your name
in the cold light of dawn
sing your praises as the sun rises
over blue and purple mountains
For you alone are Holy
you alone formed the peaks
and carved the valleys
and set the sun to shine over them
Your hand wove the burning colors
into spreading oaks
and dressed the starling
in shimmering irridescence
at your word it was created

I will praise your name
in the golden light of evening
proclaim your glory
as the sky reflects gold and crimson
through ever changing clouds
and the wind blows softly
through painted leaves
for you alone are Holy
you alone are Lord
Your glory burns in every living thing
and all creation resonates
with a single purpose
Praise the Lord!
All glory belongs to Him.

Fall Favorites....Midwest Chicken Dinner with GF egg noodles

Here's a new family favorite! I got the recipe about a month ago and have already made this twice. It's a very, um, starchy meal...but it hits the spot and goes well with cold and rainy Autumn weather. The Egg Noodle recipe is wonderful...they are so easy to make and go great in chicken noodle soup at well.

Midwest Chicken Dinner:

4 or 5 chicken thighs (bones and skin are fine)
3 ribs celery, chopped
1 yellow onion, finely chopped
Chicken bullion (McCormick and Better Than Bullion are good, they come in paste form)
1 Recipe GF Egg Noodles (recipe follows)
Salt, pepper, and garlic salt to taste
Chopped fresh tomato, chopped fresh chive or green onion

Put chicken in a large stock pot and cover completely with water. Boil until the chicken is cooked, then remove the chicken and put it in the fridge until it's cool enough to handle. While the chicken is boiling, make the noodles and potatoes as described below. Leave about 6 cups of the chicken-water in the pot, and add about a tablespoon of chicken bullion to the water. Bring back to a boil and add the chopped celery and onion, and while it's cooking remove the skin and bones from the chicken and chop it into small pieces. Add the chicken back to the pot and then add the egg noodles. Boil for 5 to 10 minutes, until most of the liquid has been absorbed or has thickened. You may need to add a touch of corn starch if there's too much liquid. Salt and pepper to taste, add a little garlic powder if you like.

Serve the chicken mixture over garlic mashed potatoes. Sprinkle chopped fresh tomato (garden tomatoes are wonderful on this!) and chives or green onions on top.

GF Egg Noodles ready for the pot!

GF Egg Noodles

2 cups GF flour mix (or 1 cup rice flour, 1 cup tapioca flour, and 1 tsp xanthan gum)
dash salt
2 large eggs
4 1/2 eggshells full of milk or water

In a large bowl, combine flour and salt and stir well. Make a well in the center of the flour and add both eggs. Beat the eggs and combine with the flour, mashing out lumps with a fork. Add 1/2 eggshell full of water or milk one at a time, and continue to combine until the mixture sticks together. You may need only 3 eggshells of water, you may need all four. The dough will be slightly crumbly. Knead the dough with your hands until it's elastic enough to be rolled. Turn dough on a workspace dusted with GF flour, and roll 1/2 of it into a thin layer. Use a pizza cutter or a pastry cutter to cut the noodles...we loved the pastry cutter because it cuts them in a uniform size. Repeat with remaining dough and set aside the egg noodles for later. You may also put these in a zip lock back and freeze or refrigerate them for another day!

Youngest loves to help! Cut the noodles with a pastry cutter...

Then peel them off and cut some more!

Garlic Mashed Potatoes:

Peel and cube 10-12 potatoes. Peel 4 to 6 cloves of fresh garlic, cut off the tough ends. Toss the potatoes and garlic in a large pot, cover with water and boil until soft. Drain potatoes and garlic, put in a large mixing bowl and throw 1/4 cup butter or non-dairy butter in while they are hot. Mix with your electric mixer or by hand until most of the lumps are gone, adding milk or milk substitute until you reach the desired consistency and salt and pepper to taste.

Some Fall Favorites....

Here's a recipe for gluten free Pumpkin Chocolate Chip cookies! They taste like the real thing and bake up nice and puffy. This post is a re-run from last year but it feels like it must be time for some pumpkin cookies again. Enjoy!





Gluten Free Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies

½ cup butter
1 cup white sugar
½ cup packed brown sugar
2 eggs, slightly beaten
1 cup pumpkin
1 tsp vanilla
1 ½ cups white rice flour
3/4 cup tapioca starch
1 ¼ tsp xanthan gum
3 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
2 tsp cinnamon
½ tsp nutmeg
½ tsp ginger
½ tsp salt
½ cup chocolate chips

In large mixing bowl beat together butter and sugars; add eggs, pumpkin and vanilla. Mix until well blended.

In medium mixing bowl combine dry ingredients and add to creamed mixture. Stir in chocolate chips and or nuts. Drop by spoonfuls onto a greased cookie sheet. Bake at 350 degrees for 12 minutes. (adapted from a recipe I found on cookingcache.com).

Reaching Up (From the Archives)

(A post from the archives, first published July 17, 2008)

Our mission team in Europe has been writing about their experience in a blog, and reading their posts has made me think about faith, religion, and our relationship with God. They are working right now in Turin, Italy, sharing the gospel and playing music both in organized concerts and here and there out on the streets. There is an overwhelming sense of spiritual coldness there, and they are struggling with that.

I know the coldness they are encountering because I've seen it myself....even felt it myself at times, though I've never been to Italy. It's a country full of beautiful cathedrals, centuries old and stunningly beautiful. The ceilings soar high into the air, the walls are built of stones so ancient they seem to speak of the years that have passed, the human hands that hewed them out of raw rock and fitted them together with care. The painstakingly carved frescoes, the flying buttresses, the marble pillars carved with bas-relief patterns. Rows of pews, their scrolled arms shiny and polished by years of passing hands. The statues, mute figures of saints, standing tall--their hands over their hearts, clutched around books, praying, reaching out. The infant Jesus rendered in marble, in plaster, in wood, gazes from his mother's arms; carved by the skilled hands of artists centuries dead. All this splendor and majesty, the best efforts of artists and architects many generations past. And yet, what stands out most is the silence ringing through these open, splendid, cavernous spaces.

What happened? Why, in a country with such ties to the history of Christianity, is there such a pervasive spiritual coldness?

There is a lot that could be said in explanation, but here is what's on my mind.

Religion is about trying to reach God. We catch a glimpse of the vast chasm that exists between mankind and God, and it stirs a kind of horror in our souls. A longing, a fear, a crushing realization that God is perfect and Holy and we are fallen and weak, that as humans and sinners we cannot hope to cross that chasm and reach the other side. God seems universes away, too far to touch, to distant to hear. We seem so small and insignificant, so helpless, and the cause seems so hopeless that we become desperate to find a way to cross over, to reach up. To reach up through the vast, unending universe, past the sorrow and sin and sickness of humanity to grasp the hand of God. Our arms stretch ever upward, straining for the divine touch.

Knowing the vastness of the space between us and the inadequacy of our human efforts to bridge it, we set our minds to building a scaffolding higher and higher upwards towards God. We build it with the stuff of this world, with the materials that we, as humans, are familiar with. The scaffold is a human construct meant to help us reach the heights of heaven, one stone at a time. We pour our hearts into it, we engage our minds with it, we lose our souls in it. It is a structure of rules, a hierarchy of regulations, a great spanning suspension bridge of bureaucracy that grows higher and higher off the ground with every year. We pour our greatest efforts into it, we make it breathtaking and amazing and shockingly beautiful with everything a human heart alone can contrive. We pour into it every attribute that humans hold dear...our toil, our creativity, our intelligence, our good works, our money. It is a beautiful, intricate, and dangerous structure.

And it's a futile one. No matter how hard we work, no matter how intricate the structure becomes, it will never reach far enough or be good enough to get to heaven. Somewhere in the building of it, we realize the futility of our efforts and we become disillusioned. In our dedication to building this complex structure, in our exhaustive efforts to reach farther and farther upward we begin to forget what it is we're reaching towards. We spend our time examining the structure itself, busying ourselves with the intricate mineute of the scaffold. We spend all our efforts in perfecting this earthly structure, in doing what we do as perfectly as possible, in running the gears and cogs that form the enormous bureaucracy that is necessary for such an endeavor. We concentrate on rank and file, on rules and regulations, on money and objects. We become part of the machine we are building.

Sooner or later, we realize that we no longer believe that this structure will work. We can't remember what it was we believed in when we began. We start to question what we are doing and why we are doing it, and we lose our passion for it. We realize that no matter how hard we work, no matter how high we build our scaffold, and no matter how high we reach up toward heaven we will still fall frightfully short. It all becomes mechanical, it all becomes rote, it all becomes empty. Our hearts grow cold.

Those beautiful churches, resounding with the empty echoes of a people who have grown cold...my heart breaks to think of this! To know so intimately the man-made scaffolding and yet to be a stranger to the One that structure was meant to reach out to! I think of Luke 13:34-35, where Jesus laments: "O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing! Look, your house is left to you desolate. I tell you, you will not see me again until you say, 'Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.'

We are all, in one way or another, at risk of growing cold. Whenever religion becomes the focus over Christ himself, we begin to lose ourselves in the pursuit of the structure and in the effort of reaching up....struggling against all odds to reach up farther than our human hearts were ever meant to go. Oh, Christian! Don't you know? God himself from the farthest reaches of heaven stands, his open hand extended....reaching down to us! If we but take our eyes off what we are trying so vainly to build, if we give up our relentless working and toiling and blind pursuit of height and remember to look up at what we are toiling for--then we will see! The God who loves us is reaching down to us. The bridge has already been built. God's hand extends through the gap and waits with open palm for ours. Christ died to build that scaffold for us, his life and death and Resurrection form a bridge a thousand times more beautiful than any a human mind could imagine.

Look up, look up! Will you take His hand?

Gratitude Journal

He is your praise; he is your God, who performed for you those great and awesome wonders you saw with your own eyes. Deuteronomy 10:21

I have missed posting to the gratitude journal! The whole world looks so different when you go through your days consciously noticing blessings and listing praises to God....




225. Both child-hands went through the glass, but came out unharmed


226. For happy girl in mom-made clothes



227: For jeweled wings, transparent and luminous...caputred, appreciated, set free.

228: peaceful waters and gentle animals

229: Potato-faith...wondering if they were there, being surprised by more than we expected
230: Ribbons and freshly brushed hair



231: French toast for breakfast and sunny yellow eggs


232: All creatures, great and small


233: Flood of irrigation water, the unexpected gift of a muddy afternoon


234: And it all comes out in the wash!

235: Bounty from the garden
236: Salsa in jars, to be opened and reminded of garden splendor during winter's cold

237: Another year of peaches, sweet fragrant moments of summer stored up for winter.

Rock and Roll

Our family loves music. We love jazz, classical, inspirational, and we love rock music! We are picky about what the kids listen to, but we do let them listen to a variety of music. We talk about it...the feelings it brings up, the artists' motivation for writing the music, and we talk about the lives of the artists themselves.

Our church is known for having amazing Christian rock music! Steele Croswhite is a pastor and music minister at our church, and having a former-rock-star-turned-pastor has given us the chance to be a part of a really amazing Christian music movement! Hubby plays bass in one of the smaller bands, and our family has been getting more involved in making music at home...which has been a real blessing.

This summer, Eldest had the opportunity to spend a couple of weeks at the School of Rock's boot camp. He and his cousin spent two weeks playing guitar and singing from nine to three with bands made up of of kids around their age, and then performed on the 40th anniversary of Woodstock. It was a great experience for him, and he learned an amazing amount in a short time. He now plays his guitar constantly and has been hoping to be a part of a youth band at church soon.

I was so proud of the way Eldest came through...he is a child who does not like to put himself forward, and he struggled a little finding the courage to take a lead roll. But he did it! That was a lesson that he needed to learn, and it was a blessing that he was able to. But for me, the biggest blessing of all was when he came home the second day of camp and said:

"Mom, I like camp and all and I'm learning a lot. But I don't want to be a rock star....I just want to use music to worship God."

Ah! I couldn't have been prouder if he had just won American Idol.

It's hard sometimes to balance popular culture with Christian values. Impossible, sometimes. But I think it's important to find ways to be in the world and not of it, to let our lights shine and use whatever talents God gave us for His glory. Kind David, after all, was a sort of a Rock Star in his time...and there is something wonderful about hearing the words he put to music so long ago woven into guitar riffs and sung with joy!

Here are some photos of the "joyful noise"....a medley of Woodstock bands and other rock....

"Green River" by Creedence Clearwater Revival

The cousins