Alert!

7:01 p.m. Today's project was to visit with our friends Bob and Debbie for a lunchtime barbeque. Both of us couples had no other plans for the day since our kids are grown and busy. I was also looking forward to trying a delicious-looking barbecue beans recipe, so I put that together in the late morning, popped it into the oven, and went upstairs to get ready to go.

Steve and I loaded up the Jeep with extra long hot dog buns, Hebrew National beef weiners, and were on our way with the bean casserole safely ensconced in foil and towels in the back. To keep anything from slipping, I had placed a stiff area rug in the cargo area which I may just keep back there, it looks so nice! I think if most of us searched through our garages, we'd never have to buy nonfood items again! After all, God has given us a stewardship over the earth and its contents (Genesis 1:26-29), so we should be thrifty and inventive.

At our friends' house, Bob got the barbeque going, with Steve fanning the flames, while the smell of traditional charcoal smoke brought back memories. In addition to the weiners, there were sausages and a variety of vegetables. We enjoyed cantaloupe as well. The beans were a hit, and we all ate to the "pleasantly full" stage. After a quick clean-up, we went to the $2 Towngate theater to see "Marmaduke," a laugh riot, especially for the four of us dog lovers.

Toward the end of the movie, I had the sudden urge to get up and call Wendy, who is teaching Part I of her "Chocolates Galore" class at church tomorrow night for our Heart to Home ministry, to touch base, let her know how many sign-ups she has and when she can get into the kitchen to set up. She sucked in a quick breath and exclaimed, "Oh my gosh! I thought it was next week! I thought I had another week!!" I responded that she probably got the date of the 13th in her mind because that is her second session. She gamely said, "Okay, I better get busy!" but being the food professional that she is, I know she has plenty of basics on hand and can do more complicated chocolates the second week.

Now wasn't that a God thing, a real Holy Spirit alert? Couldn't have been anything else. What if I'd been too self-conscious to suddenly get up and take off out of the theater? Thank the Lord that He didn't give me a shy personality! Or a hesitant one--hyper and impulsive, that's me. And as He leads me along into more maturity, I have become more attuned to His voice. It's only taken 30 years!! Chapter 6 verse 1a of my favorite book, Hebrews, is concerned with believers not progressing beyond elementary principles of the Christian faith. The verse says in the New Living Translation, "So let us stop going over the basic teachings about Christ again and again. Let us go on instead and become mature in our understanding." Growth in the Lord comes in His timing, but won't happen without our diligence in studying His Word and learning to hear His voice!

I'll close with another kind of alert we recieved from our grandson Xavier yesterday but didn't believe until we saw it with our own eyes. Our two yellow labs Bailey and Jada, have been snubbing their food lately, and we had figured that they didn't like the small amount of "Healthy Naturals" Iams food we mixed in with their standard Iams "1 year +". Xavier said, "They're eating the peas that stick out of the fence to the garden." I chuckled and went on with yesterday's barbecue.

Well, today, I filmed them literally picking off pea pods and eating them--not chewing on the vines, but harvesting the peas! Thank you, Lord, for giving us creatures to amuse us and enrich our families' lives!