PODCAST TRANSCRIPT | EPISODE 344: FOOD TWINS, Part 2
LIFE TO THE FULL w/ Nancy Campbell
EPISODE 344: FOOD TWINS, Part 2
Did you know that God loves feasts and celebrations? He mandates many feasts for our blessing and enjoyment. How many parties and feasts do you have in your home? Life should be filled with celebrations.
Announcer: Welcome to the podcast, Life to The Full, with Nancy Campbell, founder and publisher of Above Rubies.
Nancy Campbell: Hello, ladies! Always wonderful to be with you! I have just returned from our annual winter retreat down in Panama Beach, Florida, at the Laguna Christian Retreat Center. Each year, we have a week-long retreat there. Once again, it was the most glorious, wonderful time. I don’t know how it happens but somehow every retreat gets better and better.
We have the next one coming up in April. For those who would like to come to that, that’s our biggest retreat. We started the January retreat so we would give an opportunity for some to come that one because we were getting so many in April. But it still doesn’t seem to be getting smaller, because we expect a thousand or more to come to the April retreat.
I think you’d love to be there. It is the most amazing time. The dates for April are the 16th to the 23rd. You can get all the information off the webpage, aboverubies.org if you're thinking of coming. Families come from all over the States, from every state just about, so you will need to book in early because they’re going to go very, very quickly. We also have another retreat in August.
This year, we have a special one in June. This is only for married couples. It’s going to be down in Cancun, Mexico. The dates are the 6th to the 13th of June. But you don’t have to come for a week. You can choose to come for the weekend, three days, or five days, or the whole week. It’s going to be a special time of blessing couples and a wonderful time to enrich your marriage. For more details go to: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
It’s wonderful to have all these opportunities to get together. We now have the date for the winter retreat next year. It will be January 5th to the 12th, Monday to Monday. These are now a week long. We started off with just a weekend retreat in April. Now it’s ended to three week-long retreats throughout the year, and even that doesn’t seem to be enough for some people. It’s just the highlight of their year.
I am also now catching up. Life has been so busy since Thanksgiving, when we had about a hundred folks here for Thanksgiving. Then we were off to New Zealand immediately after that. Came back, and it was time for Christmas/Hanukkah and we had so many family functions over the Christmas season. Then to the retreat!
So, here I am, and realized that I am behind with all the transcripts. Now I am so blessed, and I know you are so blessed in that this wonderful lady, Darlene, transcribes all my podcasts. She faithfully does it every week. She does it unto the Lord, to bless you, and I know many of you love to go and search out the transcript when you have time.
Often, you're busy doing something as you're listening to the podcast. You can’t get all the Scriptures. So, when Darlene sends me the transcript, I then need to read through it, add any Scriptures that I didn’t have time to give you, and get it all finally edited to put on the webpage. So, I’ve had to do eight transcripts and get them finished, so they’ll all be on the webpage today. You’ll be able to see them if you would like to do that. I know they’ll be a blessing to you.
At the moment, we are in this series of what I began in Podcast 337, THE THEOLOGY OF MOTHERHOOD. We’re taking it this time (because really, all my podcasts are about the theology of motherhood), we’re taking it from the passage in Jeremiah 29, where God spoke to His people when they were in Babylon, in a place of captivity. He told them the things He wanted them to do there. They were the same things He had told them from the very beginning of time. So, we are going through them. So practical.
Number one: to build houses and dwell in them, and to plant gardens, and to eat the fruit of them. We are up to eating. Eating is a good subject, isn’t it? Currently, I am telling you about 25 food twins that I have found in the Bible. Food does not stand alone. It needs other things to go with it. I found 25 other things that God associates with food. So, let’s continue then, today, shall we?
No. 4: FOOD AND COMFORT
Isn’t that nice? Yes, the Bible speaks about food and comfort. Food is comforting. It’s not only something that fills up our hungry tummies when we are hungry. But many times, when we’re feeling low, feeling sad, feeling downhearted, there’s nothing like a hot drink and something to eat that will comfort our hearts.
We see this right back in Genesis. That’s the first time we read about food and comfort. It’s in Genesis 18, when God came to visit Abraham. He came, well, God is Spirit. We cannot see Him, but God represented Himself in three persons. Who were they? Were they angels sent from God? Or were they God Himself, coming as God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit? I do not know. But we do know it was God in some form that came to speak to Abraham and Sarah.
Now Abraham didn’t know it was God when these visitors came. But we see how he welcomed them. In Genesis 18:5, he’s saying to them: “I will fetch you a morsel of bread, and comfort you your heart.” He wanted them to be comforted and rested. He knew that bringing some food to them would comfort them.
In fact, I think it would be a good idea to have a look at what Abraham really did when these visitors came because it is a beautiful example of hospitality. As I often say to you, ladies, God doesn’t leave anything out in His Word. He shows us how to show hospitality. He gives us examples in His Word. Abraham here is the most wonderful example. Let’s see the things that he did, shall we?
- 1. He made them feel welcome by running to meet them.
The very first thing we notice that he did was, OK, verse 2: “And he lifted up his eyes and looked, and, lo, three men stood by him: and when he saw them, he ran to meet them from the tent door.” That’s the first thing he did. He ran to meet them. He didn’t just sit there and say, “Oh, I wonder who’s that? We’ll just wait and see.” No, he ran to them,
This is the number one point in hospitality. When you invite guests to your home, you give them a big welcome. Now, people today, they’re not going to be walking to your home. They’re going to be rolling up in a car, so you don’t really have very far to walk to them. But you take the spirit of that example and when they arrive, you say, “How wonderful to see you! We are so glad that you came! Come on in!” And you escort them into your home, and you show them a seat, show them where to sit, and make them feel welcome.
- 2. He made them feel welcome by bowing to them.
The next thing he did was: “And he bowed himself towards them.” In fact, it says he bowed towards the ground. Yes, that’s actually what they used to do back in Bible days. They showed honor to visitors and to people who came to their home. Now, it’s not in our culture to bow to people, but once again, we should have the same spirit, of showing honor to them.
In fact, back in Bible times, when a person bowed down before guests, this is what they were really saying. They would also put their hands to their heart, then their mouth, and then their forehead. They were saying symbolically, “My heart, my voice, and my brain are all at your service.”
The middle eastern people are very hospitable people. Bible people were hospitable people. Our God is a hospitable God and He wants to show His hospitality through us. So, we should have that same spirit, as I was saying. Show honor.
When people come, don’t just let them sit anywhere, because people often feel a little . . . they don’t quite know what to do. They’re coming into your home, and unless they’re familiar friends, they don’t really know where to sit. So, do tell them where to sit. I remember going to someone’s home, and I said, “Where will I sit?” The lady of the home said, “Well, sit anywhere.” But that doesn’t make you feel special. Show them where to sit and make them feel comfortable.
- 3. He made them feel welcome by making them comfortable.
All right, what happened next? Oh, yes, in verses three to five, we find that Abraham made his guests welcome. As I said before, by making them comfortable: “Let a little water, I pray you, be fetched, and wash your feet, and rest yourselves under the tree: And I will fetch a morsel of bread, and comfort ye your hearts.” Do you see how he is ministering to them, and honoring them, and blessing them?
- 4. He made them feel welcome by the prospect of tantalizing food.
He made them feel welcome by the prospect of tantalizing food. Oh, let’s read how all that happened. I love this. Genesis 18:6: “And Abraham hastened into the tent unto Sarah, and said, Make ready quickly three measures of fine meal, knead it, and make cakes upon the hearth.” Now, if I’m reading slowly, it’s because this light is very poor in this room. My glasses aren’t good enough. I’m trying to see what the words say.
“And Abraham ran unto the herd, and fetched a calf tender and good, and gave it unto a young man; and he hasted to dress it.”
Do you notice how Abraham was not dawdling around? Goodness me, he ran into the tent! He told Sarah to make these cakes quickly! Then he ran into the herd to get this really good calf. Then he told his servant to hurry and make it. So, they were really getting on the job, getting this meal ready.
Genesis 18:8: “And he took butter, and milk, and the calf which he had dressed, and set it before them; and he stood by them under the tree, and they did eat.” Can you imagine how long they were waiting? That meal didn’t come immediately. It would take time. Goodness me, they had a lot more time than we do today, don’t they? Sarah would have had to knead those cakes and then cook them. That would have taken time. They had to dress that tender calf and prepare it to cook. Then it would have taken much time to cook that meat.
But can you imagine the wonderful aromas coming out from the beautiful cakes cooking? Nothing like cakes cooking in an oven, and even more, meat cooking in the oven, and the beautiful aroma of meat cooking. So, those lovely aromas would have been tantalizing their taste buds as they waited for the food.
Of course, when we have guests, we will be making tantalizing food for them. That doesn’t mean, precious ladies, that you're having to make some special, amazing recipe that you've never made before! And you're trying to do something so out of this world!
No, you don’t have to do that with hospitality. In fact, I suggest to you that you don’t make something you haven’t made before. Try that out on your family. Make something you're good at making. Make something that you're comfortable with. Make something that you know you're good at making and it will always be great.
The main thing in showing hospitality is not making something so special, unless, of course, you're doing a very special meal. There’s a difference between just opening your home in hospitality, and having a very, very special meal. Those are things that you would have on special occasions, and you would put more time into making special things.
But normal hospitality is to make what you make for your family. But the secret is, make plenty of it, so that there’s always plenty for your guests, so they’re not having a little skimpy plate. But there is plenty. That is true hospitality.
- 5. He made them feel welcome by serving them.
OK, then we see that he served them. He stood by them. Anything they wanted, he would get. He made sure that they were being totally cared for. Then, when it came to the end of the meal, and of course, we’re not going into the story today where God spoke specifically to Abraham and specifically about Sarah in the tent (even though she was in the tent, that’s another wonderful, wonderful story), but we haven’t got time for that.
- 6. He made them feel welcome by escorting their departure.
After all that, it was time for them to go. So, what did Abraham do? “Oh, bye! See ya later!” No, the Bible says that he walked with them. In verse 16, “Abraham went with them” part of the way. It was tradition in those Bible times to aways walk with your guests, to walk even up to half an hour, or an hour with them, along the way, once again, showing them how you have been blessed to have them with you and showing honor to them.
Now, once again, we’re not going to do that today, because nobody’s walking miles from their home, from your home to wherever they live. They’re going to be rolling off in their car. But once again, we have that same spirit. We will go with our guests out to their car, and wait for them to go.
Colin and I live upstairs here in our home. On the bottom is our Above Rubies office, and our Above Rubies packaging room, which is a great big room. Of course we use that for church, and we use it for all our family gatherings, although as you know, our family gatherings are getting so big now that Sam, Serene’s husband, has built the Wedding Barn. Some of our family gatherings are now over there where we can pack hundreds in. Then we have our storage rooms.
We live upstairs, so when it’s time for guests to go, what do we do? Do we just say, “Bye,” and let them go down the stairs on their own? No, we always walk with them. So, we walk with them down the stairs. We walk with them out to their car.
If it’s wintertime, I have to make sure I put a coat on before I go out, because sometime it takes a little while for everybody to get in the car, especially if it’s a big family, by the time they put the baby in the car seat, and strap up all the other children, and everybody gets settled. But Colin and I wait until everyone is in and they drive off. We wave good-bye to our guests. That is all part of hospitality. From the very beginning of showing them that great welcome and then blessing them by waiting until their final moment of driving off from our property.
All right. There are other Scriptures about food and comfort. You’ll find them in Judges 19:8 and also in Psalm 104:15where it talks about “bread which strengtheneth man's heart.” That word “strengthen” is the same word as “comfort” in Genesis 18, which we’ve been talking about. Food does that. Food will strengthen you. If you eat healthy food, it will keep your heart healthy physically. But food also will do something to your heart emotionally. It comforts your heart, and it strengthens your heart.
No. 5. FOOD AND CELEBRATIONS
I love to celebrate with food. In fact, I think that’s how God wants us to celebrate. We see so many celebrations and feasts in the Word of God. Some people think that the Bible is just about things that don’t really relate to us. No, ladies! The Bible is full of life, and the nitty-gritty of life, and eating, and feasts, and parties, and gathering together for food.
In fact, God ordained feasts. We have the feast of Passover, the feast of Pentecost, the feast of Tabernacles. The three main feasts that God gave His people with extra feasts that go with them, which add up to seven feasts of the year. God gave those to His people, to remember, to remember the works that He had done. And all those feasts were all to do with food. Yes, every feast was about food.
God gave them. Many times, we think of them as the Jewish feasts. No, what does the Bible call them? The feasts of the Lord (Leviticus 23:1-4). Yes, they belong to God. They’re His feasts. Many, many Christians are beginning to also keep these feasts of the Lord, which are so wonderful, and also give such revelation. We can keep them, but we can keep many feasts. We can make so many feasts part of our traditions, and our family.
Everyone is going to have different traditions. We find in our family that we keep adding more and more traditions along the way. Right from when I started raising our children, I’ve always loved to celebrate anything I could think of with food, and with a party, with a celebration. Of course, we always celebrate birthdays. We didn’t always have a huge birthday. Sometimes we did but we would always have at least a family celebration, with maybe some close friends of the person whose birthday it was.
But one of the most wonderful blessings of our birthdays is that we started the tradition of speeches. We are a speech-making family. But the speeches are so wonderful. Of course, we’re going to celebrate with food, and often I would make the meal of whoever’s birthday it was, what their favorite meal was. They would say, “Oh, Mum, could you make this? This is my favorite meal.” So, that’s what I would cook for that night.
We would not only have the meal together, but then we would have speeches. Everyone in the family, and those who were invited, would have to go round. No one was left out. Everybody had to give a speech about the birthday person and think of every good thing they could think of about that person.
By the time everybody had finished saying all the good things they could think about that person, they are so filled up, they are so lifted up, goodness me! They’ve got enough to go on for the next year! In fact, if they had a hat on (which they mustn’t inside) they wouldn’t even be able to keep it on, because their heads would be too full! But it’s such a wonderful way to encourage someone.
We’ve shared that with many people. Often, when we’re doing a birthday party, and I go to a lot of functions. A lot of people don’t have a lot of purpose with their functions. Oh, yes, a bit of food, and people chatting, and then they go. I always think that we should think of something special to do. I always like to do that. Not only the food, but we think of something else special. A game we can play, or speeches, or something different for different occasions.
Often, we will say, “Hey! Why don’t we go round, and everybody give a speech to this person?” It may be something they’ve never done before, but it ends up being the very best part of the whole night.
Speeches have carried on to the next generation and now it’s part of all the grandchildren. Oh, it was so funny, because our grandchildren have mostly grown up now. They are all getting married, and we’re starting a third generation. But I remember when the grandchildren were little. Then, of course, their little cousins, they were so little, and they hadn’t really learned yet to say very much. Of course, now they can say a lot of things. But they would start off and they would say just one little thing about that person.
I remember once, someone said, “And you are my best cousin!” Well, somehow that little phrase took off and all these little children would end up their little speech, “And you are my best cousin!” They all had so many best cousins! But as they grew older, they learned to say more and more things. That was always a wonderful thing about our birthdays.
This Sunday I was talking to one of our families at our fellowship meal, which we have after church, because church is not really just going to church, listening to a message, and going home. It is fellowship. We see that in Acts 2 where the early church, the disciples did four things They continued steadfastly in, number one, the apostles’ doctrine; number two, fellowship; number three, breaking of bread, which wasn’t only communion. They broke break from house to house, fellowshipped with one another, and showed hospitality to one another. The fourth one was prayer.
But fellowship is part of the gathering of God’s people. So, we do that every Sunday. Everybody brings a dish and we all fellowship together. I said to one of the families, oh yes, because we all sang “Happy Birthday.” This young man was 18 years of age. I said to my friend, “Oh, what are you going to do? Are you going to have a special celebration for his 18th birthday?” She said, “Oh, no, we’re just going to do a special family meal tonight.”
I said, “Well, do you know what we like to do? Well, back down in New Zealand and Australia, you came of age when you were 21 years of age. When you were 21, you had a very big special party, and you got the key to the door.” Well, really, you most probably had the key to the door before that. But this was the official time.
I remember back to my 21st birthday. There were about 300 people present. It was a very big celebration. Actually, when it was Colin’s 21st birthday, this was really the weekend where we began to cement our courtship. We had met at a family retreat. I think both of us knew that, yes, there was some connection there, but nothing was really happening.
Then he asked if I would be able to come to his 21st birthday. First, I had to say no, because I wasn’t available. Then he contacted me again, and said, “Well, sorry, the day just had to be changed. Would you be free on this date?” I was. So, I traveled down to his city, to his 21st birthday. It was that weekend that we began our courtship.
So, I said, “Of course,” talking to my friend, “Here in America, you're coming of age when you're 18 years of age. Are you going to do a big party?” She said, “I don’t think that we do that here.” I don’t know whether you do, or you don’t.
When we were here in the States, Pearl’s 21st was when we were here, so we celebrated that, but then we got to realize here in the States, it’s 18 years of age. When Serene was 18, and we were living here, we put on a big 18th birthday celebration for her. It was a very beautiful night, a wonderful celebration of food, people, friends coming, and of course speeches.
Yes, people getting up (because it was not just a family thing) it was an extended party. The microphone was open to whoever would like to give a speech. Once again, it was one of the most wonderful parts of the night. People sharing about her life and all the beautiful things that they thought about her.
Another thing that we did at celebrations was what we call Down Under “items.” Here, I don’t know what you really call them. But when someone would get up, recite a poem, sing a song, or sing a duo, or do something special. We have always loved that. We always invite someone to sing, or someone to recite, someone to do something special.
We have some dear friends from New Zealand who were living here in the States at the time. They sing together. At every function we had, we always asked them to sing. We never had a function without them doing that. In fact, now the years have gone on, and they’ll come out to have a meal with us and I’ll say, “OK, before you go, you’ve got to sing to us.”
That’s what we used to do. Then, of course, the 18th birthday, then we didn’t have another special one, except celebrating (but not like this big thing), until when our children got to 50 years of age. I thought, “Wow! I think it’s time, when they get to that, that I’ll put on a party for them.” Because once they were married, I never put on any birthday parties for them because then it was the responsibility of their spouse to do that.
But when they got to 50, I would say, “OK, this is my turn! I want to put on something.” So, for each of our children, when they turned 50, we put on a special family gathering and a very special birthday party. Now, I only have one left, apart from our adopted children, who are younger.
But Serene has just turned 48, so in two more years, it will be her 50th. The others have already had their 50th birthdays. Oh, goodness me! The time has gone on, and I still haven’t told you about all our celebrations and even more biblical ones. So, we’ll talk more about them next time, shall we?
“Dear Father, thank You so much again. We are full of thanks to You, dear Father. We thank You for Your living Word that is so full and pulsating with life. You’re showing us the way to live and we see how You love feasts and celebrations.
“Lord God, I pray that You will bless every family listening and give them vision and ideas in celebrating things in their lives with their families. Lord, I pray that You will make their family a celebrating family, because You love us to celebrate with food. We thank You, Lord God, in the precious Name of Jesus”.
BECOME A CELEBRATING FAMILY!
Blessings from Nancy Campbell
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Transcribed by Darlene Norris
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