An Afternoon Outing

We went yesterday afternoon to that duck pond for a while. For a break from the usual.

To breathe.

To let the kids be free. To be free to live life child-like, without care for time or for laundry.

Mrs. Mallard, camouflage and rather unimpressive, is designed for and committed to a particular job. I do love Mr. Mallard's green head and blue-stroked wing, and the funny curl of his hind feathers. Of course, there is design in that too!

Then we broke away from the other groups of parents and kids, and ran out to the wide open space and  to my kids' secret hiding places along the lake. I took a seat on a log where I could faintly hear my kids but not see them. For a moment I thought I'd sit and relax, take a breather and enjoy a little solitude, but  I ended up alongside them, enjoying the wonderment of childhood.

What did they find?

Mud. Wonderment to every boy.

They found cattails, and fluffed the fluffiness into the air for each other to run through.

Jack put the fluff on his head and said he was a grandma. It sure doesn't look like any of his real grandmas ;)

The sun went down fast, and the temps went down faster...

After I snapped this picture of Michael, I said, "Oh no, I don't like when I can see the blue of your retainer in my pictures!"

...So he promptly changed his expression to this.

I came across this and thought I'd post it here, because I am "seeking a more satisfying and more God-possessed life."



“I have never been much for ‘steps’ in the Christian life, though they may be useful to some people. For the most part, my method has been simply to plunge in on the promises of God and let God take care of the ‘steps.’ I would, however, make a few recommendations to anyone seeking a more satisfying and more God-possessed life than he now enjoys.
First, determine to take the whole thing in dead earnest. Too many of us play at Christianity. We wear salvation as a kind of convention badge admitting us into the circle of the elect, but rarely stop to focus our whole lives seriously on God’s claims on us.
Second, throw yourself out recklessly upon God. Give up everything and prepare yourself to surrender even unto death all of your ambitions, plans and possessions. And I mean this quite literally. You should not be satisfied with the mere technical aspect of surrender but press your case upon God in determined prayer until a crisis has taken place within your life and there has been an actual transfer of everything from yourself to God.
Third, take a solemn vow never to claim any honor or glory or praise for anything you are or have or do. See to it that God gets all the honor, all the time.
Fourth, determine not to defend yourself against detractors and persecutors. Put your reputation in God’s hands and leave it there.
Fifth, mortify the flesh with the affections and lusts! Every believer has been judicially put to death with Christ, but this is not enough for present victory. Freedom from the power of the flesh will come only when we have by faith and self-discipline made such death an actuality. Real death to self is a painful thing and tends to reduce a man in his own eyes and humble him into the dust. Not many follow this rugged way, but those who do are the exemplary Christians.”

A. W. Tozer
His Victorious Indwelling, 209-210
Nick Harrison, Editor


~Katherine