Today was a lesson in perseverance, keeping on when I want to quit. My daughter and I decided to make oatmeal cookies. Oatmeal raisin cookies to be exact. My husband loves them so I thought I would make them as a treat. for him. This would be a quick and easy treat. We went on the "net" and found a recipe that looked promising. As we were mixing the ingredients, I told Abby to get the brown sugar. She went to the cupboard and brought over a bag, looked and then said, "Wait, these are beans not sugar. Back she went to correct the mistake. A few moments later, I opened a can of milk, only to discover that the milk was sauerkraut. I caught the mistake before I dumped the sauerkraut in the mix. We moved on to adding the oatmeal. I mean, you HAVE to have oatmeal in a oatmeal cookie. I needed six cups. I measured four cups and the oatmeal well was dry. Yikes!! I searched and found some flavored oatmeal packets and started opening them. I managed to get the six cups I needed. By now we were both questioning the idea of baking cookies. The final straw was as we were putting the cookies on the cookie sheet and I asked my daughter if she put in the baking soda. Her look said it all. If you are thinking that there was no baking soda in the cookies, you are right. The first batch was in the oven and they were not going to rise. We quickly added the baking soda to the rest of the cookies. Amid all the mistakes we kept going. We never once considered giving up on the cookies. I wonder how many times in our like we give up on a project, or a person, or a dream because it gets hard and it feels like nothing is going right. My mind went to many of the people in the Bible, but Abraham, in particular. He waited the fulfillment of the promise. Even though he waited, he never saw the completion of the promise. He believed God, and kept on believing even though it looked impossible. He persevered when it was hopeless. James says that trials produce perseverance and perseverance makes us mature. I know that the easiest thing to do when trouble comes is give up, but the reward goes to the ones who hang on and keep going in the midst of the storms of life. Friends, if God has given you a dream, don't give up because things get hard. Keep going because God is faithful. By the way, the cookies were delicious, even the first batch that had no baking soda. They were dense like a no bake but they were good. The second batch was heavenly and definitely worth the trouble we had making them.
