A Melodious Sonnet - Page 47 of 59 - Notes from a word-chaser

My Goals for This Week

June 6, 2016 by Esther Filbrun · Leave a Comment

6 Jun

Planning has always been a sore point for me. I love the idea; love the feel of paper under my fingers and seeing plans take shape before me. I can easily spend hours reading productivity blogs about how one could go about making a plan for what you want to do in a year, broken down into quarters, months, weeks, and finally days. I love it, I really do.

Yet, this morning, as I was mulling over the words from Proverbs: “The hand of the diligent shall bear rule…” (12:24), I realized how very lazy I have been about my work lately. How little I’ve accomplished, and how much I’ve let the important things slip.

I’ve discovered—over, and over, and over again, that I don’t do well with no plan at all. The weird thing is, I rarely finish everything I plan for a week, but maybe knowing that I want to do it spurs me on to at least try to meet my expectations. It is discouraging when I realize that what I planned to do four weeks ago is still there to be done this week, but somehow it is also reassuring that somewhere I’m still fighting to continue making progress.

I’ve never quite known how to combat the endless chain of planning and then after a few weeks feeling discouraged because I didn’t manage to even hit the mark on my own expectations—let alone meeting the perceived (more likely imagined) expectations other people have for me! In some ways, it’s a harsh, never-ending rat-race.

Then I looked out the window at the foot of my bed and saw the rising sun coming through the trees, lighting them with a golden glow, and was reminded that each day is a new day. Yes, we—our work—suffers when we don’t do it, but the Lord is gracious and gives us a fresh, golden start. Every. single. day. Even when we don’t see it. He gives us a chance to try again—and it’s up to us to take that chance and use it to its full potential.

So for this next month, I’m going to fill out one of Productive Flourishing’s weekly planner, and scan a copy (one for the past week, one for the coming one) to post on the blog each week. I don’t need to do this, but I want to be accountable to myself. I’m going to do this.

After praying about this month and this week, here are my plans for what I need/want to get done this week. Next week, I’ll show this one again (with the accomplished stuff marked off), and next week’s plans.

This week, I want to focus on learning from the Lord. From that, I want to do my work to serve Him and His people better. More opportunities seem to come up daily to serve. I just pray that I can be faithful to this calling, and be able to support those around me in their callings as well.

God’s Perfection in Mathematics

June 3, 2016 by Esther Filbrun · 3 Comments

3 Jun

One evening about a month ago, my six-year-old brother asked a question that was designed to stump the oldest of us. “What’s fifty times fifty?” He loves starting with the hardest number to multiply that he can fathom, and then multiply that by itself, the new number by itself again, and keep going—until even the calculator groans and returns an E+, ‘Overflow’, or simply starts showing uninterpretable decimals.

But since fifty times fifty isn’t too big, I set it up on the whiteboard for him and gave him the answer. “Two thousand five hundred.”

“So…what’s forty times forty?”

I can’t remember exactly how the conversation went from there, but we ended up calculating several squares in the 47-52 range. After looking at the ones on the board, I suddenly wondered if there was a pattern. If we could possibly predict the next one.

47² = 2,209
48² = 2,304 (difference from 47²: 95)
49² = 2,401 (difference from 48²: 97)
50² = 2,500 (difference from 49²: 99)
51² = 2,601 (difference from 50²: 101)
52² = 2,704 (difference from 51²: 103)

If there is a pattern, 53² should be 52² plus 105. It is—2,809.

After this, Mom went back to 1 and wrote down the squares of the first 12 numbers, to see if they followed the same pattern.

Should give you an idea of what she did. The differences are the bottom row of numbers.

They do. Each difference is precisely two numbers greater than the last one. Incredible, isn’t it? And while it’s amazing, we also realize that God has known all along and He made it that way for a reason.

So there’s your math lesson for the day. A terribly impractical, but undeniably fascinating pattern.

The Flow of History

June 1, 2016 by Esther Filbrun · Leave a Comment

1 Jun

If there’s one thing I remember doing in my earliest memories, it would be having our family worship time. Although the times of day when we do it has changed over the years, it’s an every day occurrence aside from Sundays. I only remember one time when we’ve actually missed having it, and that was not on purpose, believe me! This is a long-standing tradition, one that I’m sure will never stop, even after all of us children eventually leave home.

I really respect my dad for keeping it up all these years. It can’t be easy for him; often he’s had long days at work and he’s physically drained, but he always makes sure that we have our Bible time.Over the years, we’ve done at least two almost cover-to-cover read-throughs of the Bible (we’ve skipped some of the genealogies—the younger children have a hard time reading, let alone understanding, all the names!). I can’t remember exactly when we started the last read-through, but it was probably a year or two ago. We got up to 1 Kings 7 by October last year, then Dad decided to switch to Blue Letter Bible’s Chronological reading plan. Reading the Bible this way adds a whole new dimension to the stories and context, which makes it quite interesting! Currently, we’re reading in 2 Kings, 2 Chronicles, and Isaiah.

As we’ve been reading through Kings and Chronicles, I’ve noticed some interesting “threads” of history. I’m keeping track of those findings on slips of paper, and eventually I’ll transfer them into my journal for safe keeping. I thought I’d share them here today, since I find the similarities so interesting.

The Flow of History #1:

Taken from: II Kings 15, especially verses 9, 18, 24, and 28.

Zachariah, son of Jeroboam, king of Israel (not related to the first king of Israel; he was Jehu’s great-great grandson, according to the word of the Lord—see II Kings 10:30)

Departed not from Jeroboam’s sins (Jeroboam the son of Nebat was the first king of Israel, and this is who it is referring to)
Was conspired against and killed by Shallum (vs. 10; who was in turn killed a month later by Menahem)

Menahem, son of Gadi, king of Israel

Killed Shallum (who had killed Zachariah)
Died a natural death
Departed not from Jeroboam’s sins

Pekahiah, son of Menahem, king of Israel

Departed not from Jeroboam’s sins
Conspired against and killed (vs. 25)

Pekah, son of Remaliah, king of Israel

Killed Pekahiah
Departed not from Jeroboam’s sins
Conspired against and killed by Hoshea the son of Elah (vs. 30)

IN CONCLUSION:

Jeroboam the son of Nebat set a precedent that was never overturned. He went down in history as the “man who made Israel to sin.” What precedent are YOU setting?

I found it fascinating that of the five kings in this chapter, all followed the sins of Jeroboam and four out of the five were conspired against and killed. Isn’t that interesting? Reminds me of Romans 6:23: “For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.”

The Flow of History #2

Taken from: II Chronicles 21-29

Chapter 21: Jehoram, son of Jehoshaphat, who was the son of Asa, king of Judah (the latter two followed the Lord)

His mother’s name is not mentioned
Married Ahab’s daughter (21:6)
Compelled Judah to sin (21:11)

Chapter 22: Ahaziah, youngest son of Jehoram, king of Judah

Mother’s name was Athaliah (22:2; we find out later in the chapter that she killed all her grandsons so she could reign over Judah)
Walked in the ways of Ahab (an evil king of Israel; 22:3)

Chapter 24: Joash, son of Ahaziah, king of Judah

Mother’s name was Zibiah (24:1)
Did that which was right all the years that Jehoiada the priest was alive (24:2)

Chapter 25: Amaziah, son of Joash, king of Judah

Mother’s name was Jehoaddan (25:1)
Did that which was right in the eyes of the Lord, but not perfectly (25:2)

Chapter 26: Uzziah, son of Amaziah, king of Judah

Mother’s name was Jecoliah (26:3)
Did that which was right in the eyes of the Lord, but not perfectly (26:4-5)

Chapter 27: Jotham, son of Uzziah, king of Judah

Mother was Jerushah (27:1)
Did that which was right in the eyes of the Lord, but not perfectly (27:2)

Chapter 28: Ahaz, son of Jotham, king of Judah

No mother named
Provoked the Lord God to anger (28:25)

Chapter 29: Hezekiah, son of Ahaz, king of Judah (one of the most righteous kings in Judaean king history; he prayed for deliverance from the Assyrians and the Lord defeated the army)

Mother’s name was Abijah (29:1)
Did that which was right in the eyes of the Lord, according to all that king David had done (29:2)

IN CONCLUSION:

The Godly mothers are named for the kings that followed the Lord. Only one evil king out of the three mentioned had his mother named, and that was because everyone knew how evil she was. We are all examples to someone, just as these mothers were to their sons. What kind of example are you setting before your coworkers, your siblings, your children, or others that you come in contact with on a frequent basis? What kind of Godly influence are YOU?

Indeed, “Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord; and the people whom he hath chosen for his own inheritance.” Psalm 33:12

Be blessed, friend. Live for Jesus today.
-Esther

Grape Harvest

May 30, 2016 by Esther Filbrun · Leave a Comment

30 May

Well, I wrote this post a couple weeks ago and intended to add more to it later…but time has slipped away and I’ve finally decided to go ahead and publish it, even if it is a bit late. Nothing much has changed since then anyway.

During the school holidays the last week of April, we got a call saying that it was time to begin grape harvest. I first helped with the harvest five years ago, when friends of ours were managing the vineyard, and have every year since then. It hasn’t always been the easiest or most enjoyable work ever, but over the years—and the last two, especially—I think I’ve learned to enjoy it more.

Picking up nets

There’s just something about being outside, helping with the harvest, that is exciting. You see the fruits of your labors—all those hours in the hot sun working to take leaves off so the grapes can get some sunlight, lifting wires to help support the still-growing canes and keep them in their proper places, or putting on nets to protect them from birds—watching bins upon bins of juicy fruit come from that work is exciting. Satisfying.

And while I may not always appreciate or enjoy some of the things connected to the harvest, I love thinking of the symbolism Jesus drew between harvests and workers, vines and His church.

Full buckets, awaiting the tractor’s return with an empty bin.

Several times, we had to pause in our work to wait for the tractor’s return. Usually it wasn’t long; most of the time we could keep working and just piled all the available buckets.

In the spiritual world, we are all waiting for the “tractor” to come to take us home to heaven. How full will our buckets be when the tractor arrives? Will we have done our best to prepare for that event?

We haven’t quite finished the harvest yet—the grapes under the white nets in the picture above have not ripened nearly enough. Last we heard, the Brix (sugar content) was at 16 and it should be between 21 and 23. That means the juice is VERY sour, and will not make good wine. We’re waiting to find out whether to take the nets off and let the birds eat the grapes, or if we’ll be able to pick them after all (providing it’s warm and sunny enough to let them ripen more).

Sweet on You: A New Mystery by One of My Favorite Authors!

May 4, 2016 by Esther Filbrun · 2 Comments

4 May

Well, this post was supposed to go up about a week ago. But that didn’t happen, due to the fact that I didn’t even have this written yet, much less scheduled! And due to the fact that I was picking grapes last week (a job that I’m learning to really enjoy!), it simply didn’t get posted. I’ve decided that late is better than never, and since I loved the story I thought I’d share my thoughts of the book with you. But then, if you don’t like women’s fiction, or reading book reviews, go ahead and skip this post. I won’t mind!

Mom has done some launch promotion work for author Chautona Havig over the past year, and a couple weeks ago when Chautona was looking for a new launch group, I decided to sign up. And, surprise, I got to be part of it! I’ve loved her books ever since Mom introduced me to Ready or Not—the tale of a young 20-something who is given guardianship of her 8 nieces and nephews after her sister and brother-in-law die. (On second thought, it’s probably not so surprising that I liked the story since I’m the oldest of eight…it was very true to life.)

I didn’t know what to expect from Sweet on You, the first book in the Meddlin’ Madeline series, since the premise was “a young girl notices things that other people don’t, and her noticing stuff involves her in some kind of mystery”. I wasn’t disappointed, though! In typical fashion, what would be a mundane story from many turned into an enthralling adventure under Mrs. Havig’s hands.

A young man recently moved into town appears at one of the many socials. He quickly begins courting the interest of Madeline’s friend Edith, but Madeline notices certain things about his demeanor that make her wonder what he is like in real life. If he is hiding something, will she be able to figure it out before he marries Edith—and perhaps destroys all chances of the girl’s future happiness?

Through the course of the novel, little things kept popping up—until I got annoyed at Madeline for waiting so long to find out the truth! I really enjoyed the mystery part of the story, and yet I enjoyed the historical aspect even more in some ways. Through this book, I got a little glimpse into life in the early 1900s, without the glamour of modern-day retellings of Jane Austen books (now, I do like the movies I’ve seen, don’t get me wrong; but this was an interesting perspective as well). I found the few mentions of the Brownie interesting, and loved the ways Madeline used her camera—not necessarily the way Russell intended her to use it!

Overall, it’s a great story. Not as much “Christian” stuff in it as in many of Chautona Havig’s other books, but like Mom I’m looking forward to seeing where that aspect goes from here.

The Kindle version is now available—you can buy it here.

Well, turns out my review for the blog was as long as my review for the website! Eventually, we will combine my review and Mom’s review into one, but for now we’ll leave things as-is.