Well our Resurrection Day has come and gone this year.  I did not scrounge the computer for the latest Pinterest  Easter crafts.  We didn’t spend $20 per child for an Easter basket and I won’t have to deal with little ones having meltdowns over sugar highs and lows from eating too much candy.  In fact, it came and went with zero stress because I did not have to “perform” and be the Easter bunny this year.  It is a path I have chosen for a long time.

We enjoyed a wonderful service at church this morning and Jadyn and Lauren participated in a drama.  It was a very powerful and anointed message about breaking every chain, watch it and be blessed.

Back in the days of being a heathen-smile-, we would spend lots of money on having the children’s Easter baskets full.  Most of the candy went to my husband and myself which is never a good thing.  We would spend hours dyeing eggs, only to throw them out.  How many hard boiled eggs can 5 people eat???

When we become Christians, we continued on with the same practice for a few years and then our church ladies group, made Resurrection Eggs.  That was pretty fun, this was before you could buy them inexpensively at the store.

We took an empty egg carton and decorated the cover with cardstock and placed our plastic eggs inside.  We placed the following items in each egg:

• 3 dimes
• a rope
• a stone
• a crown of thorns
• a cloth
• communion cup and bread
• a palm leaf
• dice
• a sword
• a cross
• praying hands
• empty one

We then had bible verses to go with each instance of Jesus death and resurrection.  My children thoroughly enjoyed opening up each egg and then us explaining the meaning of the item.

After having multiple babies and my time limited, I gave up on doing the eggs.  Even just putting together a  special dinner brought upon more stress for myself, I couldn’t even think about doing extra.  I resorted to sharing the story straight from our children’s bible.  Simple and easy.  Through this time, we skipped the whole Easter baskets because sugar and little ones do not mix.  We did things like kites, bubbles, and stryofoam airplanes.  Things Daddy could do with the little ones if the weather permitted.  Some years we did nothing.  My children were still okay, never feeling deprived.

We had that for many years.  Then of course, things get damaged in a household—especially in a large family household–thus I don’t have my resurrection eggs anymore.  I will have to put that on my To Do List…..for one day.

Do we teach our children about the Easter bunny or Santa Claus?  For many years, during the time when we were spiritually growing, we had lots of little ones.  I believe that God just had us weed out doing those types of activities and it happened out of necessity.  We may joke around to our children about Santa Claus, Easter Bunny, and the Tooth fairy, but we don’t make it a point to make them believe that they are real.  Whenever a child looses a tooth, I say in a playful manner, “Oh, go and tell the tooth fairy that you will be needing a dollar tonight!”  The tooth fairy is Dad.

This year I bought some of our children’s favorite candy and on Saturday,divided up a small bowl for each one and said, “come see what the Easter bunny dropped off.”  They smile because they know that I bought the treats.  They enjoyed a sugar filled treat and then I let them run around and finish up with a good brushing of teeth.

We don’t glorify or make much of a deal about it.  But then we don’t try and “hide” the fact that the world has made it about the Easter bunny.  We just say Happy Resurrection Day!  We explain what the day means and my children are like “okay.”  Plain and simple.

Buying the candy was a treat, because I don’t do that.  We also bought a new pack of bubbles, something else we don’t normally do.  We spent the day having dinner.  We made it all on Saturday and then heated it up while we were at church on Sunday.  Came home, had dinner and then went out to enjoy the day.  Our life is spent, doing things with our children.  We celebrate togetherness always!

Here is what we made this year for dinner.  We skipped the traditional ham. We just had a dinner at church and had ordered chicken from our local store, and my husband made the comment that we should have that for Easter dinner.  Normally, I would be slightly offended, but my thought immediately turned to the toxic thinking(remember that?) and I said, “sure we can do that.”  Guess what??  It was one less thing to worry about.

Here was my chicken, heating up in the morning before church.  I heated it at 450 degrees to get it crispy again, then covered it in foil and left it in the oven on 170 for 3 hours.  Our sandwiches I just covered in foil and left them on the stove top and they were still warm for lunch when we got home.

I made some ham and cheese sliders.  The reason being, was I knew that my little ones would have to eat dinner later in the day as well.  I can’t get away with just feeding them once, so I thought the sandwiches would be great for that. 

 

We made macaroni and cheese–the staple for any household celebration.

Baked beans—from a large 10 pound can from Sams Club–just heat and serve.

Green beans–with some bacon bits and french fried onions.  Another no-fuss dish.

Tossed salad—my favorite and macaroni salad—my husbands’ favorite.

My girls were busy making strawberry pretzel dessert and dirt cups.  Something they enjoy doing.

This was a very easy meal to wake up in the morning to and prepare.  I did almost all of the prep the day before, I just heated all of the food on 400 degrees in the morning to get it nice and hot.  I then put the oven on 170 degrees and left it while we were at church.  It was all warm and delicious until we came home 3 hours later.

My ideas over the years about food have changed so much.  I stick to simple and easy and guess what?? My life is stress free. I don’t feel like I need to gorge on all the wonderful dishes only to feel regret the next day.  I keep it light and then it is no big deal.

Does that mean that one day I won’t return to doing Resurrection Eggs? Maybe one day. I know I will continue sharing with my children what the day means.  I will also explain what the world thinks about that day and how it came to be and why Christians have changed it to be about Jesus, as they do Christmas.

I wish I could say, we have matching outfits and the cookie cutter looking family, but ummm unfortunately sometimes we are just good enough all getting out the door dressed, teeth brushed, face washed, breakfast, and on time for church. I didn’t even get a photo of everyone all dressed up.  As soon as we got home, the girls pulled their buns out and the little boys, put on their comfy shorts and tshirts. (smile) that is okay…. Maybe one day……………….

 

One of my favorite bible verses is Psalm 24 and it states:

Who may ascend into the hill of the LORD? And who may stand in His holy place? He who has clean hands and a pure heart, Who has not lifted up his soul to falsehood And has not sworn deceitfully. He shall receive a blessing from the LORD And righteousness from the God of his salvation.…

If I could figure out how to play” Give us Clean Hands” in the background, I would. But I am not that technically savvy.  You are going to have to look that song up, if you don’t know it already.   Anyways…..

What exactly is meant by having pure hands? It can mean a number of things, but it ALWAYS goes along with having a pure heart.

As Christians we do things with clean hands because it will be seen by others.  But having a pure heart with those  actions VALIDATES it as it is seen by God.

Clean hands will do right things in front of men, BUT a pure heart will do them for the right reasons.

Clean hands are our actions towards others, BUT having a pure heart is our motivation.

Having clean hands is what we do as Christians, BUT having a pure heart is WHY we do it.

Having clean hands expresses our care, BUT having a pure heart is what EXPRESSES our character.

It is important to have clean hands in all that we do.  Our job on earth is to do the will of the Father.  God’s motives are pure.  We are to glorify God with our actions.  How are we going to be an example to the world around us, if we do things deceitfully or with our own motives?

We can’t walk around worried about what others may think.  We need to ONLY do what it is God has us do.  We then leave the rest up to God. It isn’t our worry, it is His.  God says to place all of our worries over unto Him.

1 Peter 5:7

Casting all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you.

Are we doing that?  Or are we so concerned about what others think and that is our motivation for doing things?  We are doing this series so that you can evaluate all of the different areas of your life that we need work on.  We do it so that we can get more lined up on God.  We don’t do this stuff because we WANT to.  No, we would rather do what WE feel like doing.  We are doing these changes so that we can get lined up with God and receive His anointing.  God’s anointing is the Holy Spirit.  We WANT the Holy Spirit to be evident in our lives so that we can receive clear direction, help, guidance, and discretion to make the right choices for our journey.

For myself, when I wasn’t walking right with the Lord, I didn’t have the anointing of the Holy Spirit in my life, I am like “what is that?”  I would listen to preachers who would speak on receiving God’s anointing.  In my mind, I was offended—wrong thing to do!  My thoughts turned to, “Oh they are doing this for the money.”   What is the first thing that Satan does as soon as the seed is planted???  He comes to steal the seed.  That is exactly what he tried to do.  For myself, I am not a preacher, I am not even an evangelist, I am a Mother of lots of children.  But I have received God’s anointing and walk with it daily.  It guides me and I would NEVER want it any other way.  It has completely changed the way that I live my life.  It affects every area and it is awesome!!!  I am not saying this because I want money, my blog is FREE, I don’t have annoying pop ups, I don’t have advertising, I try and make it about God.  I let Him bring me the money I need to continue with things and He does.  I write this stuff because it is part of my life.  I have always wanted to help others but wondered how could I do that in my situation in life.  Well God provided a way and it is through this blog.  I am thankful to be able to share what it is that helps me get through my life.  I get excited and want to share that with others.  Because I know how much it is CHANGED MY LIFE FOR THE BETTER.

Evaluate your actions, are they done for God or for yourself?  This part goes hand in hand with having a pure heart.  If our heart is pure and lined up with God then our hands will be clean.  It can’t be done any other way.

part 5 ears for hearing