the honey house
It may have been my first summer job, but it didn't feel like work. It's just what our family did, like gardening, taking meals to the field, milking cows, climbing trees, summer camp.

It's the one thing my dad misses about farming. He learned it from his father who died when my dad was just 29. Dad bought the beekeeping business from Grandpa’s estate, carrying on in the Taylor Apiaries tradition — and giving his own children valuable work and life experience.

People would drive for miles to buy our honey, either prepackaged in our containers or poured into their own: tins, jars, margarine tubs, and ice cream pails. We'd place the empty container on the scale to check it's weight, then open the spout to release the slick liquid to the desired weight. The golden sparkle could have been mesmerizing if we weren't watching the ounces, snapping the spout shut at just the right moment, sometimes slipping it open it a crack for a top up. Sticky as honey is on fingers, dishes, clothes, floors, its viscosity lubricated the spout like heavy, rich oil. The lever on the tap was tight and we could stop the flow without a drop leftover.

We had two types of scales. One was rather tall, white enamel, spring-operated, and easy to use: just watch the numbers on the dial. The other was an old balance scale, requiring more care to load little weights to the desired amount and then carefully watch the arm rise until it the arrow pointed to exactly the right spot indicating a balance between the weights and the honey-filled pail.

The apiary seemed like more of a hobby than a livelihood for dad, but it was a source of income and, I realized many years later, my first summer job. In serving customers, I learned about providing service, accurate measurement, attention to detail, packing and shipping, writing and calculating receipts, making change. My siblings and I often accompanied dad in the truck to do the rounds checking the hives. In processing the honey, I would scrape the combs, hang the frames on the de-capper machine which would carry the frame between 2 hot knives to slice off the caps, releasing the golden sweetness. My siblings and I loved to chew the chunks of honeycomb that dropped down, like homemade gum.

From the decapper, the frames went into the extractor where they would spinspinspin, centrifugal force pulling the honey out to splatter on the sides of the tank, slip and drip down, and drain out. Next it was pumped upstairs where impurities would be strained out and the pure honey would run from a temporary holding tank to its last stop before going into pails and barrels for sale. One holding tank was gleaming stainless steel — formerly a milk tank from a dairy. These tanks were built into the wall, so on one side the honey went in and on the other side the honey was served through spouts.

The smell of the place was both inviting and comforting: rich sweetness intermingled with hot wax, label ink, packing glue. Often in the summer, mom would bring over freshly baked buns with real butter, onto which we would drizzle the golden liquid to savour on our tongues.

In the days before air conditioning, the honey house was one of my favorite places, especially the room where we served customers.The cupboards in the sales room were not sophisticated -- more practical than aesthetic, yet they were made interesting by Dad's collection of antique bottles and honey containers, displayed on shelves on the walls. (He had a collectors guide about antique bottles, which I would sometimes study, especially fascinated with old-style baby bottles.) The sales room was a lovely place to spend an afternoon after working in the garden or climbing trees or catching kittens in the barn. It always felt peaceful. Sometimes I would lie in half-light on the glossy, grey floor, soaking in the cool, smooth serenity.
- posted by Colleen McCubbin @ 7:23 AM 1 comments

 
Advent sermon -- Avonlea, SK
John 1:1-16 (ESV)

1In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2He was in the beginning with God. 3All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made. 4In him was life, and the life was the light of men. 5The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it. …

9The true light, which enlightens everyone, was coming into the world. 10He was in the world, and the world was made through him, yet the world did not know him. 11He came to his own, and his own people did not receive him. 12But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, 13who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.

14And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.


How do you answer questions about your home?
How many of you were born and raised in Avonlea? _____
How many of you were born and raised here but have lived in other places? _____
How many of you came from someplace away from Avonlea? _____

Where are you from?
Yesterday when my friend Sherry was asked this question, she responded,
“Do you mean where do I come from or where do I live?” She was born and raised in the Southern States—Georgia, Oklahoma, Texas—has lived in Austria, and now lives in Vancouver.

Where’s home for you?
Missionary kids often say, “I’m not sure exactly.”

I have lived in Caronport for 8 years now. People still ask me if I’m going “home” for Christmas, or I’ll say I’m going “home” when I really mean I’m going to visit my parents.

What is home?
Home is where the heart is.
Home is where you hang your hat.
There’s no place like home for the holidays.

I remember the first time I felt like I had my own home.
I was living in Burnaby, BC,
working as a nanny
& teaching English to immigrants.
I was involved in the Surrey FMC along with my roommate Leanne,
and together we practiced hospitality
to a wide range of people—
college students who needed to get out of the dorm,
friends we invited home after church,
my brother who slept in our living room for a few weeks.
We decorated our apartment for Christmas
and had a couple of parties.
It was “homey.”
Just before Christmas I had a distinct feeling
not just of having a “homey” place
but of being “at home” with Leanne,
and even though I was “going home” for Christmas
to be with family in Saskatchewan,
I was also eager to return to my own “home” in BC.

A few years later,
after having other homes in Taiwan and Saskatchewan,
I was back in BC for seminary.
One summer I was reflecting on the way Chinese people use the phrase
“I lived there.”
I have never heard a Chinese person say,
“I stayed there.”
Even if just overnight,
a Chinese person will say,
“I lived there.”
They “live” in hotels, in other people’s houses, in tents, in resorts …
This mindset makes for adaptability in the present moment.

Where do you live? Where is your home?

My Aunt Evelyn and Uncle Allan have never lived anywhere
besides their farm near Wawota in all their married life.

My parents have moved a few times,
but have never lived outside Saskatchewan.

I grew up in Saskatchewan,
but have lived in other provinces and countries.
Even so, Saskatchewan will always feel like home to me.
You can take the girl out of the prairies,
but you can’t take the prairies out of the girl.

Where is your true home?

The psalmist suggests in Psalm 84
that one’s true home is with God. [Read Psalm 84]

In this Psalm I see 3 parts:
1. At home, vs 1-4, 10
2. On the road (traveling, pilgrimage), vs. 5-9, 11
3. Trusting, v. 12
Whether at home or on the road,
we are blessed when we trust in the Lord.

Whether a person stays in one place or is a traveler,
their true home should be with the Lord.

Where is your true home?

How many of you have been camping?
My family liked to go camping in the summer time.
Often is was enough for us kids
to set up the tent in the back yard.
A tent—whether on a fishing trip in Kenora, Ontario or sightseeing in the Black Hills, or just camping out in the back yard—is a home away from home.

Of course, we know
that there are nomadic cultures,
where tents are the people’s actual homes,
or in places like Pakistan or New Orleans or California,
where homes have been destroyed by earthquake, flood, or fire,
some people live in tents for awhile.
Whatever the case, tents represent
something temporary and brief
or someone transient, on the move.

Paul compares our bodies to tents in 2 Corinthians 5:1-10.

1Now we know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed, we have a building from God, an eternal house in heaven, not built by human hands. 2Meanwhile we groan, longing to be clothed with our heavenly dwelling, 3because when we are clothed, we will not be found naked. 4For while we are in this tent, we groan and are burdened, because we do not wish to be unclothed but to be clothed with our heavenly dwelling, so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life. 5Now it is God who has made us for this very purpose and has given us the Spirit as a deposit, guaranteeing what is to come.

6Therefore we are always confident and know that as long as we are at home in the body we are away from the Lord. 7We live by faith, not by sight. 8We are confident, I say, and would prefer to be away from the body and at home with the Lord. 9So we make it our goal to please him, whether we are at home in the body or away from it. 10For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive what is due him for the things done while in the body, whether good or bad.

These bodies we’re living in are temporary “earthly tents.”
We long to exchange them for our new eternal bodies, “our heavenly dwelling.”
“We are at home in the body, [but] we are away from the Lord.”

This earth and our early bodies are
home away from home.

Some people who have lived in the same place all their lives might wonder,
is this all there is?
Some people who have explored the four corners of the globe might wonder,
is this all there is?
Sure, we need to be contented with our lives,
yet when those questions arise—
is this all there is?
where is my real home?
—they are signals that there IS something more.

Do you remember the song,
“This world is not my home”?

Listen to Hebrews 11:8-16

8By faith Abraham, when called to go to a place he would later receive as his inheritance, obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going. 9By faith he made his home in the promised land like a stranger in a foreign country; he lived in tents, as did Isaac and Jacob, who were heirs with him of the same promise. 10For he was looking forward to the city with foundations, whose architect and builder is God. …

13All these people were still living by faith when they died. They did not receive the things promised; they only saw them and welcomed them from a distance. And they admitted that they were aliens and strangers on earth. 14People who say such things show that they are looking for a country of their own. 15If they had been thinking of the country they had left, they would have had opportunity to return. 16Instead, they were longing for a better country—a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared a city for them.


This world is not my home, I'm just passing through.
Where is your real home?

Before he left the earth, Jesus told his disciples,

1"Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God[a]; trust also in me. 2In my Father's house are many rooms; if it were not so, I would have told you. I am going there to prepare a place for you. 3And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am. 4You know the way to the place where I am going." (John 14:1-4)


Our true home is in heaven.
We catch glimpses of our heavenly home in worship,
the lovely dwelling place
the sun and shield of God
in Psalm 84

Jesus says, “You know the way to the place where I am going.”
How can we know the way?
What is the way to the place he is preparing for us?

John 3:16 gives us a clue. Let’s say it together: _____.

Eugene Peterson puts it this way in The Message :

16"This is how much God loved the world: He gave his Son, his one and only Son. And this is why: so that no one need be destroyed; by believing in him, anyone can have a whole and lasting life.

Listen to John 1:14 again, from The Message:

14The Word became flesh and blood, and moved into the neighborhood. We saw the glory with our own eyes, the one-of-a-kind glory, like Father, like Son, Generous inside and out, true from start to finish.

And from the New International Reader’s Version:


- posted by Colleen McCubbin @ 9:52 PM 0 comments