Monday, July 20, 2015

Cooking with Manna



Once upon a time I decided that someday I would write a book and title it "Cooking with Manna, or Being Content with God's Provision". Funny how things work out. I think the provision I need to be content with right now is the fact that I can occasionally squeak out a few minutes to write a blog post with that title. I have two favorite guiding scriptures which loosely paraphrased say "give me just what I need, no more, no less; and I have learned to be content with whatever my circumstances are." If I can stay within those two concepts, all is well and I am able to enjoy the simplest things in life. My ideas, hopes, desires are often bigger than my current reality, but when I consider that my current reality is in God's hands, I find amazing little and big surprises to make life joyful.

Two recent occurrences have illustrated this to me. I have big, (enormous, really) dreams about planting gardens all around my new yard. The reality so far has been burying kitchen scraps and spreading a huge pile of free mulch in scattered bed areas. I have been able to plant some plants here and there as friends have given them to me and time has allowed, but for the most part, this year is slow preparation for the future. That's where a little divine serendipity and manna come in. When my little compost volunteers come up, I let them grow and harvest them and I am thankful for whatever they produce. My first harvest was a nice medium sized pumpkin, which I proceeded to cook, sample, and eat some of it as a side dish. That still left quite a bit of pumpkin to use up, so I made a batch of pumpkin muffins and brought some over to our new neighbors. That turned out to be a nice way to introduce ourselves to some really nice folks. So maybe my garden is not exactly what I want, but it was just what I needed at the time.

My second little bit of manna was a small piece of furniture in my next door neighbor's trash! My big ideas, and hopes of becoming a furniture refinishing hobbyist are a little beyond my reach at the moment, but this little nightstand was a bit sized introduction to the process.  I was able to use some paint that I already had on hand, and I found a great blog with all the info I needed to get started. I also met a wonderful lady at our local Lowe's who is a wealth of knowledge on "how to" and "how to much cheaper than you may think" I really don't have the time or money to go whole hog on the projects I would like to do, but now at least I know I can accomplish a piece at a time. 

I find that the more I relax and let God bring me the "manna" for the day, the more content I am with the outcome. I love my crazy "I wonder what that is?" garden, and I am really kinda proud of my first little chalk paint project. They are both fun, and they fit into my current reality quite nicely.