See you in December!

I'll blog next time in the Christmas week.

One of the many reasons I have decided to stop blogging weekly is that there are so many great blogs out there covering some of the same main themes that I focus on here.

Check out Passionate Homemaking where Lindsay has written about Mission minded home schooling, lots of other mission-related posts, and lots of posts about caring for God's world. This blog seems fantastic.

Jasmine has written about The Environment, giving a Christian perspective on why we care for the earth.

Humble and gentle toward all

God spoke to my heart through Titus 3: 1 - 7 this week:

Remind them to be subject to rulers and authorities, to obey, to be ready for every good work, to speak evil of no one, to be peaceable, gentle, showing all humility to all men. For we ourselves were also once foolish, disobedient, deceived, serving various lusts and pleasures . . . But when the kindness of the love of God our Saviour toward men appeared, not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy He saved us . . .

It seems that the apostle Paul is not only speaking of our duties to rulers who are not Christian, but also to all people. This includes people like Richard Dawkins who make a living out of attacking the very idea of God. This includes political leaders we believe advocate evil. It includes our neighbours, and our family members.

Too often, Christians can become scoffers. They scoff at those who disagree, and even make things up about them. Paul's advice in these situations is clear: stop it!

• Remember who you once were
• Remember what God has done for you
• Humbly hold out that hope to others

It is that simple. God doesn't need Christians to be rude, pushy, or gossips. He needs them to obey.

More Love to Thee

Sharon James' biography of Elizabeth Prentiss is a worthwhile read if you would like to learn from the life of a woman who was always striving to love God more. Elizabeth Prentiss suffered many hardships, including the deaths of children. In the midst of these events, she strove to give more of herself over to God. This biography would be of particular value to women, as Elizabeth is an example of a dedicated wife, mother, homemaker, Bible study leader and hostess. However, men would also benefit from exploring with Elizabeth how to love God with increasing fervour.

The end of an enjoyable chapter

Today marks the end of a chapter of my life that I look back on with gratitude and enjoyment. Today I handed in my last assignment for the Wesley Institute Diploma of Education. I highly recommend this course to anyone considering teaching. The thorough biblical basis to each unit, coverage of many helpful teaching resources, practical assignments, and substantial amount of classroom experience make it a winner. It hasn't always been easy, and sometimes I may have looked like the picture above, but it has been good!

When I began this course at the beginning of 2007, I did not know that I would be married by the end of that year and a mother to an unborn child by the end of the next! I began it knowing that I might be a wife and a mother, or a classroom teacher, or I might have to try and combine both. In any of these scenarios, the Diploma would be of use. Unlike former study, I had a clear interest and vocation in mind. I don't know if I'll ever work in the profession this course qualifies me for, classroom Primary Teaching. I do know that I've gained valuable experience, good memories, and lots of knowledge for (God willing) home schooling.

Now when people ask me what I do with my days, I'll have to say (with a smile) "I'm a housewife". Yep, I've gone back about 100 years and believe that being a wife and running a home well is a job in itself. Being a truly productive housewife requires planning, dedication, prioritisation, research and creativity. I'm one of the most blessed women I know, 'cause it is my job.

Birthday cakes and baby bumps

On Saturday it was the twins' 2nd birthday. It was fun to decorate cakes for the little ones. One of my nephews was being serious type. He looked at his engine cake without a smile . . .



and made some unsuccessful attempts to blow out the candles.

This one, on the other hand, grinned as we sang happy birthday and successfully extinguished both candles! Right after, he decided it was time to eat the lion's ear.


I can't tell you what a joy it is to be in the kitchen again making yummy things for people to enjoy. One of the main ways I show love to people is to feed them, and it was hard when I could hardly prepare any food due to all-day-sickness. For a few weeks there, even opening the fridge door could send me rushing to the toilet bowl. Something went wrong with my nose! Reading recipes, something I usually enjoy, became nausea inducing. I'm happy to say that all is back to normal now, and I'm loving my birthday present . . .


This wonderful book contains just about everything you could hope to know about food and cooking! What a blessing it is to be able to look up a particular food that we have in the garden, or that comes to mind, and find ideas for how to prepare it. It does not have any pictures, but that does not worry me.

Since it is the last week of the month, and I've promised baby bump updates, here is a picture taken two days ago at 16 weeks and 5 days of pregnancy.


That may not look like a bump to you, but my tummy sure looks different to us!

A quieter blog

I love my blog. I like its theme, I like expressing thoughts in writing, and I like interacting with readers. Despite this, I’ve decided to cut back on blogging. My decision does not reflect a desire to put my mind on a shelf somewhere, and become one of those mythical faceless housewives without opinions or even rational thought. In an attempt to prove this, I recently attended a public lecture titled “Climate Change: Complexities, uncertainties, urgency, and equity”. Huh!? I am also going to attempt to answer some questions about democracy, which I neglected to notice all week - sorry! It is also not because I have no ideas about what to write anymore. That has never been a problem for me! I’ve made this decision for a few reasons that God has been revealing to me over recent months.

My main role in daily life is to be a helper to my husband. “Does this help my husband” is the question that helps me to sift the important from the less important. When I ask Dave what he’d like me to do, he never says “I’d love it if you’d blog about ____”. He is more likely to say “Please make another animal patch for the baby’s quilt”. He is far more excited about me learning to bottle food, and being willing to wash cloth nappies, than he is about me writing about stewardship and dominion. Don’t get me wrong. Dave loves my mind, and my writing. He loves it that I have reasons for what I believe, and that I am interested in current events. He just isn’t all that passionate about blogs.

I’ve also had a niggling feeling that perhaps I ought not to have so much to say. Those warnings in Proverbs about sin accompanying many words come to mind. There is nothing like marriage to show up how much one has to learn. Except, perhaps, the additional blessing of becoming a mother to a tiny child. Many people have told me I write well. Perhaps in twenty years my writing will be worth listening to. In the mean time, I want to spend more of my time listening to those whom history has sifted and deemed worthy. I want to soak myself in biographies and old hymns, in puritan prayers and Bible passages memorized and repeated countless times.

There are many things in life I long for almost desperately. I long for my life to count for something in eternity . . . for our children to love Jesus more than we do . . . for our home to be a place of beauty, of productivity, of joy, of prayer, of passion . . . to give, not to want . . . to have a gentle and quiet spirit . . . to be unworried about the sins and opinions of others . . . to love people I find difficult . . . to love the church . . . to respond rightly to the problems in Dave’s first country . . . even, oddly enough, to learn Zulu. I’ve come to question how much keeping up a blog, and spending 1 - 6 hours a week on it, contributes to those things. So you’ll still find me here at “A Deeper Love”, but only in the last week of every month, and maybe with fewer words to say.

We owe the future the past

. . . What we owe the future
is not a new start, for we can only begin
with what has happened. We owe the future
the past, the long knowledge
that is the potency of time to come.
Wendell Berry