The Sunday before Thursday

Posted on 20 Nov 2022 by Kathie Whitestone Thompson

Just a quiet hello with hopes for your Thursday celebrations with family and friends to be filled with peace, laughter, and the Joy of The LORD.

thanksgivingbird

Matthew 6: ²⁶Look at the birds of the air, for they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? King James Version

LORD willing see you soon.

Love, Kathie

Sweets, Anyone?

Posted on 16 Nov 2022 by Kathie Whitestone Thompson

If I get brave enough I am going to try this recipe for some special people on some special days. If you are interested in trying it too, this is what we need to do.

INGREDIENTS

1 cup warm (105ºF to 110ºF) water or milk
1 tablespoon instant or active dry yeast
1/4 cup plus a pinch granulated sugar, divided
2 large egg yolks
2 tablespoons cooking oil, plus more for oiling the bowl and for frying, divided
3 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 teaspoon salt
Strawberry jam, lemon curd, chocolate or pastry cream for filling or dipping (optional)
Powdered sugar for dusting

HOW DO YOU MAKE ISRAELI DONUTS?

Mix yeast, sugar, and warm water or milk together. The mixture will become foamy.
Whisk eggs, sugar, and oil together. Combine this mixture with the yeast mixture.
Combine flour and salt and then beat in the wet ingredient mixture.
Let rise until doubled in size.
Pat out into a rectangle and cut into squares or rounds.
Let rise a second time, until doubled in size again.
Deep fry in hot oil until golden brown.
Cool the donuts and then fill them with the filling of your choice using a pastry bag fitted with a round tip.
Dust with powdered sugar.
Enjoy!

For more detailed instructions and further information, click HERE.

And this one does not seem as challenging.

HANUKKAH SUGAR COOKIES

INGREDIENTS

1¼ cups (175 grams) all purpose flour
¼ cup (50 grams) sugar
1 (100 grams) stick melted butter
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla extract / paste

For the garnish:

A chocolate bar (I used dark chocolate)
Sprinkles

INSTRUCTIONS

In a stand mixer bowl, place the melted butter and sugar.
With the flat beater attachment, beat the butter and sugar.
Add the egg and vanilla and continue beating until unified.
Add the flour and mix for a couple minutes until the batter becomes dough (make sure you don’t mix for too long otherwise the dough will turn tough).
With your hands, create a single ball of dough and wrap with plastic.
Let the dough rest for 1 hour in the fridge.
Set the oven to 170°C / 350°F with the fan.
On a floured surface, roll the dough until it is ¼ to ⅜ inch thick.
Cut the dough with cookie cutters in various shapes to your liking. Then on a baking pan with a baking sheet, place the cutouts 1 inch apart.
Bake the cookies for 10-12 minutes or until edges are golden.
Cool the cookies at room temperature.
Melt a few cubes of chocolate in a piping bag that has been sitting in a glass of boiling water.
Cut a small hole at the end of the piping bag and decorate the cookies as you like.
Sprinkle the sprinkles on the chocolate while it is still wet.
Let the decorations set on the cookies.
Have a cookie and happy Hanukkah!

For more information, check out their webpage – click HERE.

Love, Kathie

Social Gospel

Posted on 14 Nov 2022 by Kathie Whitestone Thompson

Matthew 25

It’s a full chapter and for me to understand the bit of it that I do, I ask questions.
For this session I am bringing to you, I think we shall look at verses 41 – 46.

But as we begin, let’s go to the last verse, verse 46. We will go back to the others.

⁴⁶They will go off to eternal punishment, but those who have done what God wants will go to eternal life.” source

but those who have done what God wants

The question to ask is What does GOD want done?
We will have to bring in some other Text to answer that.

John 6:40; Luke 9:35; Mark 9:2-13; 2 Peter 3:9

GOD wants ALL people to believe His Son.
GOD wants ALL people to turn from their sins to HIM.

These verses tell us the Will of GOD is that people be delivered from unbelief to believing JESUS.

Now if you have read verses 41 – 46 you have seen The LORD saying to a certain group, depart from Me into eternal punishment. Why? Verse 46 is the answer but all the way to verse 46 He gives them examples of their unbelieving hearts.
They did not

Feed the hungry
Care for the sick and the imprisoned.

Today there is a social gospel being preached.
I think those who embrace this social gospel have missed the point of the passage — have missed the Truth.

The deeds described in this passage are NOT a means to EARN salvation.
People will not enter HEAVEN even if they cured all the social ills of the planet.
They can feed, clothe, and serve people until they are penniless but that will NOT earn them a place in Heaven.

GOOD DEEDS will not get anyone to heaven.

By the same reasoning, not doing these things will not send a person to hell either.

People miss heaven and land in hell because they have refused to turn from their sins and believe GOD.

However, when we have been born again, when we have believed JESUS, we WILL do these acts of service.
These acts of service give evidence that perhaps we have been delivered from unbelief and darkness.

It is filled with treasures for the Believer who will dig in, asking for Holy Spirit to help them understand.

I hope we have encouraged you to read, pray, and believe GOD.

Love, Kathie

Circle of Knowledge

Posted on 10 Nov 2022 by Kathie Whitestone Thompson

Good morning, Readers.
8:45 as I begin on this crisp November morning.

Matthew 18 is the subject passage of Scripture.

¹²“What’s your opinion? What will somebody do who has a hundred sheep, and one of them wanders away? Won’t he leave the ninety-nine on the hillsides and go off to find the stray?
¹³And if he happens to find it? Yes! I tell you he is happier over it than over the ninety-nine that never strayed!
¹⁴Thus your Father in heaven does not want even one of these little ones to be lost. source

Does it comfort you that the LORD goes looking for wandering sheep?
From what I have observed, I have wandering sheep in my circle of knowledge. Perhaps you do too.
I think two indicators will identify wandering sheep (this goes for wolves in sheep’s clothing too).

How long has it been since the sheep sat to read Scripture? I mean really read — like a whole chapter in one sitting?
When was the last time the sheep had a decision to make and the sheep made that decision based on what the Scripture revealed?

Have you observed that sheep wandering from The Fold of GOD do not often read Scripture and do not often live by faith? They do not decide what to say, what to do, where to go, etc., etc. based on what does the Bible say about this?
Is this you? Is this any person in your circle of knowledge?

We might also describe this as straying from their upbringing.
Or ignoring the knowledge of GOD they have known since childhood?
Or perhaps they are dabbling, soaking even, in the culture around them – patterning their choices like the people on their digital screens; feeding on those screens for hours a day. These are our wandering sheep, if not pagans altogether.

It’s frightening to me.
It is to you too, if you are not a wandering sheep, yourself.

But we can pray!
And we can take this Scripture for encouragement, for hope, and put our Trust in the GOD who spoke it.

¹⁴Thus your Father in heaven does not want even one of these little ones to be lost.

He has sent JESUS to find them. So we pray when they are found, they will say YES and return or for the first time come to the Fold of GOD.

So, in our circles of knowledge, identify as best you can those you suspect are wandering, present them in prayer to The Father, and believe He is going for them; into whatever high place or squaller they are now residing.

Luke 18:27 “And he said, The things which are impossible with men are possible with God.”