the weary world rejoices

/ abby hummel / 1 Comment

It’s been a year of weariness for me in many ways, and I have been very comforted by the lyrics of O Holy Night during Advent and Christmas.  Striking lines like “the weary world rejoices / for yonder breaks a new and glorious morn” are sung glibly because we hear them so often, but are still very meaningful. I love that the second verse talks about the King of Kings lying “thus in lowly manger / in all our trials born to be our friend” – Almighty God experiencing humility that he might be a friend and comforter in our trials! The last verse, beginning with “Truly He taught us to love one another,” is such a reminder of how the afflictions of this year have brought a new sense of reliance and companionship in my marriage, too. This has been one of the greatest blessings of the year.

For the 2010 holidays, we were very grateful to have a few short days with both sides of the family during Christmas. I have such a short amount of time off work each year and we have to calculate the vacation hours carefully to make the most of it. There’s always so much to decide between – beyond family visits, there is also the option for time with friends, projects on our house, and adventures with just the two of us! We had great weather for our eight-hour drive and enjoyed some long chats in the car on both ends of a very action-packed trip. Unfortunately we took almost no photos of our own, but my sister got a camera so we have lots of lovely pictures from that part of our trip. Here are a few highlights:

After this next one, my Grandma so politely said “Um, Beth… I think everyone else was trying to look good for this shot.”

Also, in that deer-in-the-woods sculpture (we all want it and tell Grandma to pass it on if she’s ever changing her decor), I just discovered a unicorn.  Who puts a unicorn in the same scene with deer?

My soul will boast in the Lord; let the afflicted hear and rejoice
 Ps 34:2

a valley exalted

/ abby hummel

Every Valley Shall Be Exalted

 

Last week I had the privilege of singing Handel’s Messiah with a community orchestra. I love the entire Oratorio and we listen to it frequently at home, but what a powerful experience to be there in the midst of it all. Just feet away from soloists and a small orchestra – oboes! violins! a harpsichord! And the astounding way Handel expresses the scriptural text with his masterful composing! I can barely describe what a fabulous, moving, spiritual experience this was.

 

I’ve heard this all many times, but I was richly blessed by the very opening:
Comfort ye, comfort ye my people, saith your God. Speak ye comfortably to Jerusalem and cry unto her that her warfare is accomplished, that her iniquity is pardoned. The voice of him that crieth in the wilderness: prepare ye the way of the Lord. Make straight in the desert a highway for our God.

Every valley shall be exalted, and every mountain and hill made low; the crooked straight and the rough places plain.

And the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together, for the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it.

How beautiful that this is the first statement we hear in a work written to tell the story of the Messiah. Comfort. He came (and is coming again) to comfort His people.

How appropriate to consider the voice crying out in the wilderness during Advent! And is not this “wild desert” so often an apt description of my own heart? Yet in those times of seeming desolation, He always comes. So as we celebrate the season anticipating Christ’s arrival – both the remembrance of his birth and the glorious revelation all flesh shall see together when he returns – I cling to Him. This is my prayer:

Cry out and be heard in my wilderness.
Make straight in my desert a highway.
Make what is crooked in my heart straight.
Exalt me in my valleys and make my rough places plain.

.

great is thy faithfulness: a reflection on thanksgiving

/ abby hummel

It seems a little backwards to post this after the holiday, but I’ve been thinking about Thanksgiving lately. Most of these thoughts really started after a sermon that touched on the parable of the Pharisee and the tax collector, where the Pharisee prays “Thank you that I am not like other people” and the tax collector beats his breast in sorrow and says “Lord have mercy on me, a sinner!” The passage clearly demonstrates that a thankful heart comes from a humble spirit. Thankfulness is not just about the words “thank you”, but about what is going on in my heart and how grateful I am for God’s grace to me. I mean, the Pharisee offered thanks to God and had “good habits” to go alongside his devotion, but his thanks came from the things he had done. The tax collector, in humility, recognized his great failures and sin. Maybe he was just thankful that God would even listen to him. And so our celebration of Thanksgiving should follow that example and reflect our gratefulness that God faithfully listens and cares for us.

It’s easy to lose sight of that, isn’t it? And when now, for a little while (ha) you have had to suffer trials of many kinds, it is easy to feel lost, like you are drowning in pain with little for which to be grateful.

Perhaps for this reason, scripture and Christian history give many examples of God’s goodness and provision, that we may cling to the enduring promises of His love and mercy to us. We see that Jehovah Jireh provides for the needs of his people: with a mighty hand and outstretched arm, Moses leads God’s people out of Egypt; Israelite David slays the Philistine Goliath saying “You come against me with sword and spear and javelin, but I come against you in the name of the Lord Almighty!”; Gideon obediently rescues Israel from the oppression of the Midianites; Complete and final victory over sin and death is in the Messiah, Jesus. And continuing from the New Testament into the present age, Christianity recounts the stories of Stephen, the first Martyr; Augustine of Hippo, turned from a life of promiscuity and philosophy to purity and devotion in leading the church and finalizing the canon of Scripture;  Countless church leaders who instituted the creeds of our faith and guided Christians in the path of orthodox belief; In the spirit of Thanksgiving, we remember the Pilgrims who found their freedom to worship at Plymouth Rock; Elisabeth Elliot ministered to the people who murdered her husband, and they all convert to Christianity! For God’s faithfulness, which extends far beyond our lifespan to the beginning of all time, we are grateful. We have these saints leaving the example of God faithfully guiding and providing for His people. He certainly does the same for us even today. So when it is hard to see what exactly to be thankful for, I look back to these stories and retrain my heart towards gratitude. The faithfulness that we see through all history is the same faithfulness he extends to us.

Great is Thy faithfulness, O God my Father
There is no shadow of turning with Thee
Thou changest not, Thy compassions they fail not
As Thou has been, Thou forever will be
Great is Thy faithfulness! Great is Thy faithfulness!
Morning by morning new mercies I see
All I have needed Thy hand hath provided
Great is Thy faithfulness, Lord unto me!

potato soup

/ abby hummel / 1 Comment

A cup of hot, homemade soup is like pulling a cozy sweater around your shoulders on a chilly day. It is, invariably, a sign that cooler weather has come and that colder days are worth persevering. I looked up quotes about soup and found one that said “women just have a primeval instinct to make soup”. I don’t know if this is universally true, but it’s definitely the case at our house. I have a few standard soups that are becoming fast favorites, but here’s the one we’ve consumed the most this fall. Of course, the goal with cooking is to make the best food with the most nutritional value, so I find myself tweaking recipes and adjusting things until we are satisfied with the contents. This one is great because it has the comfort of potatoes and a little cheese, but it is broth-based and is loaded with “surprise” veggies like carrots and celery that promote health without stealing the show from the potatoes and broccoli. Keep in mind that, of all things, soup is an art, not a science, and you can radically adjust the ingredients to your taste and still come up with a fantastic meal!

Potato Soup
In the bottom of a huge stock pot, sautee:
1-2 diced ONIONS and minced GARLIC
add 2 cups of chopped CELERY when the onions are translucent.
add 8-10 medium peeled-and-chunked POTATOES and 3 peeled-and-sliced CARROTS (or better yet, carrot shreds from the prepared salad aisle!), and fill the pot with CHICKEN BROTH, boiling until the potatoes are soft. Use an immersion blender (or a potato masher if you don’t have one) to blend all the ingredients, adding more water or chicken stock as needed for consistency.
add 1 bag shredded SHARP CHEDDAR, 1 bag (or 2-3 heads) chopped BROCCOLI and around 1/2 pound of diced HAM.
season with pepper and watch for the broccoli to turn bright green before enjoying with a salad and crusty bread!

Here is what this should look like before you mash everything together:

who makes the woeful heart to sing

/ abby hummel / 2 Comments

I have a ginormous hymnal that is in a 3 ring binder, designed perfectly for a piano accompanist. I got it for my 18th birthday. Yes, I was the nerdy kid ASKING for a hymnal for my birthday.  I had no idea how weird I was am. And tonight, after dinner as I was singing while Aaron studied, I realized that the editors of my hymnal gently suggest the 2nd verse of Fairest Lord Jesus is not as necessary as the other three listed because it doesn’t have a star by it. Nearly every hymn has the three “most important” verses “starred” for lazy worship leaders and/or congregations. When I am playing, I purposefully sing those verses louder. And yet in this hymn, that “unnecessary” verse ends by describing Jesus as the one “who makes the woeful heart to sing”,  a miracle similar to but greater than spring blooming out of the frozen death of winter. How is that not important? For me, this fall has been all about a woeful heart trying to figure out how to even want to sing again – and I’m definitely getting there. But only because He shines with all brightness and purity in the midst of our pain and darkness here.

And some of those woeful heart learning-to-sing moments have occurred in situations like this:
drinking wassail with Jaimi in Madison, Wisconsin!
of course I have no picture, but heart-to-hearts with Jenny in Minneapolis!

and celebrating the marriage of Alisa and David in New Mexico with more wonderful Hillsdale friends!

Fair are the meadows, fairer still the woodlands
Robed in the blooming garb of spring:
Jesus is brighter, Jesus is purer
Who makes the woeful heart to sing!


O God, Our Help

/ abby hummel

O God, Our Help in Ages Past
Isaac Watts – St. Anne

O God, our help in ages past, our hope for years to come,
Our shelter from the stormy blast, and our eternal home.

Under the shadow of Thy throne Thy saints have dwelt secure;
Sufficient is Thine arm alone, and our defense is sure.

Before the hills in order stood, or earth received her frame,
From everlasting Thou art God, to endless years the same.

O God, our help in ages past, our hope for years to come,
Be Thou our God while life shall last, and our eternal home.

autumn

/ abby hummel / 1 Comment

Fall is the best season.

I love the leaves, the crisp air, apples fresh from the orchard, pumpkins on the front step, hot wassail and a fire in the fireplace.

My mom was out in September and we enjoyed a little craft time to put together this wreath for the front door. I’m not usually a huge fan of flowers “with a center” like daisies or sunflowers, but this really hit the spot for me.

I just bought some pumpkins to carve and keep by the door, too. I’m thinking about trying something like this for mine!

guacamole that launched a thousand ships

/ abby hummel / 1 Comment

Several years ago, I made this guacamole for some college friends who joined me at my parent’s home for Labor Day weekend at the beach… and I will not lie, I was totally trying to impress my crush. You know, I had to show him I was the kind of girl he could really eat dinner with every night for the rest of his life. Well, it worked. Aaron proudly tells our friends that he fell in love with me the night he ate my guacamole and decided then and there that he wanted to marry me. Little did we know there would be several years of dating, deployment, dating, breaking up, dating, proposal, engagement, etc., between here and there, but we are now married and enjoy inhaling guacamole as often as I can justify purchasing avacados. Which, you know, isn’t that difficult.

2 Hass avacados
juice from half a lime – or a 3 squirts from a jar. I won’t tell on you.
1 small clove of garlic, minced – or a teaspoon from a jar. No judgment.
1 scallion, sliced thinly
1 T olive oil

Mash all ingredients together and add 1 small tomato, diced. Enjoy plain with tortilla chips or offer it with salsa and sour cream for an appetizer spread.
I usually mix this up a bit – sometimes I leave out the tomato, use lemon instead of lime, or a dice a leek for the scallion, depending on what I have on hand. You can always use a teeny bit of onion in place of the scallion, just be sure to chop it up really small. Unless you like it spicy, in which case you should totally keep that onion chunky and make the recipe your own!