Gingerbread Cookies

This is a quick post to pass along my favorite gingerbread cookie recipe along to some friends.

Gingerbread Cookies
½ cup shortening
½ cup sugar
½ cup dark molasses
¼ cup water
2 ½ cups all purpose flour (you may need to add slightly more if your dough is very sticky when rolling)
¾ teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon baking soda
¾ teaspoon ground ginger
¼ teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/8 teaspoon ground allspice

Beat shortening at medium speed with a mixer until fluffy. Add sugarm beating well. Add next 8 ingredinets, beat at low speed until blended. Cover and refrigerate 2 to 3 hours. (before refrigerating, I usually divide the dough into 2 or 3 portions, wrap in Saran Wrap or a Ziploc bag and then flatten slightly to make it easier to roll out later.)
Divide dough in half and roll each portion to ¼ inch thickness on a lightly floured surface. Cut out with cookie cutters. Bake at 375 degrees for 10 minutes. Remove to racks to cool. Decorate with icing and candies as desired.
Yield: 3 to 4 dozen depending on size of cookie cutters.

Rediscovering Deuteronomy & Numbers

I'm still plugging away at the challenge to read the Bible in 90 days over here.

This pasty week was a full one dealing with very hot temperatures and also packing to get the kids ready for a week of camp and vacation. I am glad to be able to say I am caught up to date with the reading schedule. I found myself underlining verses all over the place which surprized me a bit as I always thought of these books as sleep inducers. There are some great verses in there that remind us of Who God is and what he is like. Here are the daily facebook status updates for the week:


Bible in 90 days Day 8 Lev. 1:1 - 14:32
Lev. 11: 45 For I am the LORD, who brought you up from the land of Egypt, to be your God; this you shall be holy for I am holy.

Bible in 90 days Day 9 Lev 14:33 - Lev 26:26
Lev 26:11, 12 Moreover, I will make My dwelling among you, and My soul will not reject you. I will also walk among you and be your God, and you shall be My people.

Bible in 90 days Day 10 Lev 26:27 - Numbers 8:14
Num 6: 24-26 The LORD bless you, and keep you; The LORD make His face shine on you, And be gracious to you; The LORD lift up His countenance on you, and give you peace.

Bible in 90 days Day 11 (I got caught up while waiting in line this morning)
Numbers 8:15 - 21:7
Num 11:23 And the LORD said to Moses, "Is the LORD's power limited? Now you shall see whether My word will come true for you or not."
Num 14:18a The LORD is slow to anger and abundant in lovingkindness, forgiving iniquity and transgression; but He will by no means clear the guilty ....

Bible in 90 Days Day 12 (Fri) Numbers 21:8 - 32:19
Numbers 22:18 Though Balak were to give me his house full of silver and gold, I could not do anything, either small or great, contrary to the command of the LORD my God.


Bible in 90 Days Day 13 Numbers 32:20 - Deut. 7:26
Deut 6:5 You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might.

Bible in 90 days Day 14 (Sunday) Deut 8:1 - 23:11
Deut 10:12 Now, Israel, what does the LORD your God require from you, but to fear the LORD your God, to walk in all His ways and love Him, and to serve the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul,

Bible in 90 Days Day 15 (today) Deut 23:12 - 34:12
Deut 32:4 4"The Rock! His work is perfect, For all His ways are just; A God of faithfulness and without injustice, Righteous and upright is He.


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Starting the second week

I am in my second week of this endeavor to read the entire Bible in 90 days. Yesterday was my first day to miss and today filled up fast and I found myself on the couch at 8 pm trying to get caught up on 2 days of reading. I may have been able to do it had it been a book full of exciting stories but I was reading the last part of Exodus and between the details of the tabernacle and the heat of the day and my full stomach from supper and you have a recipe for disaster. My husband came over and woke me up where I had dozed off reading Exodus 39. I quickly finished chapter 40 and decided I would have to play catch up tomorrow and start earlier in the day.

Two things stood out from today’s reading, when I went back and looked at it again a bit more awake…. The first is Exodus 29: 45, 46 And I will dwell among the sons of Israel and will be their God. And they shall know that I am the LORD their God who brought them out of the land of Egypt, that I might dwell among them; I am the LORD their God.
This is such an awesome concept for me … God dwells with me. Sometimes even I don’t want to dwell with me, but the holy, perfect, creator-God, who is complete in Himself and has no “need” for anything, chooses to dwell with and interact with puny, sinful, selfish, weak, incomplete, little old me. WOW!

The second thing that stood out, and I must have heard a sermon from this text because I had these things underlined already, is found in chapters 35 and 36. I had underlined some phrases in these chapters and added a few more that I noticed this time as I read. Ex 35:5 whoever is of a willing heart , let him bring … Ex 35: 21 And everyone whose heart stirred him and everyone whose spirit moved him came and brought …Ex: 35:22 All whose hearts moved them, both men and women, came and brought … Ex. 35:26 all the women whose heart stirred with a skill spun…Ex 35: 29 all the men and women, whose heart moved them to bring… brought a freewill offering to the LORD. Ex- 36:3 everyone whose heart stirred him, to come to the work to perform it … Ex. 36:5,6 they said to Moses, “The people are bringing much more than enough for the construction work which the LORD commanded us to perform.” So Moses issued a command, and a proclamation was circulated throughout the camp, saying , “Let neither man nor woman any longer perform work for the contributions of the sanctuary.” Thus the people were restrained from bringing any more.

Their giving to the LORD’s work was not done out of obligation or habit, but it came because their hearts were moved within them to participate. Their hearts stirred them to not just give a token offering, but to give generously and in such abundance that they finally had to be told to stop because there was more than enough to finish the work. When was the last time I was so moved and stirred in my heart that I could not help but respond in reckless generosity? Sadly, I can’t think of an instance right away, which indicates to me that it has been too long.

My summer challenge

I know I haven't been posting in a long time. I have found that quick status updates on facebook are a bit easier and the instant gratification of response and comments is fun. I wanted to check back in here because I am attempting to "eat an elephant" and I wanted to share a bit of the process. I have been a Christian for many many years but have lacked the discipline to read the Bible through from cover to cover but once or twice. That probably includes the time it was required reading for Bible classes in college and I was merely moving my eyes across the page and got not much, if anything, out of my reading. I found out about the challenge over at Mom's Toolbox and decided that summertime is the best time for me to read through the Book that I supposedly base my life on. I want to read it through to see ALL that God recorded for me, and in a short enough time to be able to remember what I have read and see the correlation of Old and New Testaments. I began this challenge on Monday and am excited to say I am up to date as of today. This whole decision may mean that I don't get through the stack of "fluff fiction" that I checked out of the library for the summer, but I am confident that in the long run I will be the winner and will know I have chosen well how to spend 3/4 - 1 hour a day from now till October.
I decided as a way to keep myself accountable and so I can be reading with purpose, I am trying to post daily on my facebook status the chapters I read that day and then highlight one verse or thought that stood out to me. I think, at least as long as I have easy internet access, I will post those quick updates on here as well. I love reading the blog posts over at Mom's Toolbox and her SOAP approach, but I know that I need to focus on the reading and even that much of a post would bog me down and I might end up just giving up. So, I am going to keep the blogging bites REALLY small and make the reading "bites" great big bites until this Bible Reading elephant is devoured once and for all.
You're welcome to download a schedule and join me on this challenge.

Here are the facebook updates from the first week of my Bible reading.
day 1 of the Bible in 90 days challenge -- Gen 1:1 - 16:16. I think I will try picking a verse or thought from the day's reading as a status. Gen 4:7 If you do well, will not your countenance be lifted up? And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door; and its desire is for you, but you must master it.

Day 2 Gen 17:1 - 28:19.
Gen 18:14a Is anything too difficult for the LORD?

Day 3 Gen 28:20 - Gen 40:11
Gen 39:9b How then could I do this great evil and sin against God?

Day 4 Gen 40:12 - Gen 50:26
Gen 50:20 And as for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good in order to bring about this present result, to preserve many people alive.
Joseph sure had the right view of trials and the right response to his brothers. May I do the same when in trying times.

Day 5 (posted a day late) Ex: 1:1 - Ex: 15:18 Hard to pick a verse to highlight ... thought about Ex: 15:2 but Ex 14:14 caught my eye and I keep thinking about it. "The Lord will fight for you while you keep silent." Hmmmmm Can't resist posting this one too
Ex 15:2 The Lord is my strength and my song, and He has become my salvation, This is my God and I will praise Him; My father's God, and I will extol Him.

Day 6 Exodus 15:19 - Ex 28:43
Reading all the specifics of the Ark of the Covenant, the curtains, the lampstands, etc. makes me a bit snoozy, I admit .... until I read Ex. 25:5 and 26: 14 Excuse me, but where did the Israelites get PORPOISE skins?