Happy Easter! Do you have a favorite Easter memory?

One of mine is of sharing Easter breakfast with the members of the Youth Fellowship group when I was a teen. We met at the parsonage. Think about that a minute. It’s Easter, a busy day for pastors, and our pastor and his wife had five kids. Still, they graciously invited a bunch of teens over for Easter breakfast. I might add that some of us were dressed in our finest patent leather 1-inch pumps and some of the boys were pretty rowdy (you know who you are.)

One year, I volunteered to bring Easter Lilies, a delicacy created by my mother by baking individual sponge cakes one at a time on oven-proof saucers. This treat was just made at Easter and she usually sent small boxes of them to my sisters who couldn’t come home for the holiday.

When I told Mom I had volunteered her to make x amount for the breakfast, she had to sit down for a minute and recover from the shock, but she dutifully baked enough for the whole group. (She didn’t trust me to do the baking, but I got to help frost them and put the orange slice in.) I’m so pleased that a number of my nieces carry on the tradition of making Easter Lilies. The photo is of me holding a plate of Easter Lilies back in 1997.

This Prairie Girl is really into Easter traditions. I love Palm Sunday. On that day long ago, people were praising Jesus. The Bible says if they wouldn’t have praised Him, the very rocks would have cried out. This year on Palm Sunday our children’s pastor and a bevy of kids belted out a song that had the whole congregation standing to its feet ready to cheer, like on the original Palm Sunday.

I also read through a gospel account of the passion and resurrection of Christ. Reading about the betrayal, mock trial and death of Jesus is hard, but the bitterness of that story makes the resurrection so much more wonderful. It shows us that there is hope even in our darkest hours, when we think all is lost.

The tradition I like best is attending church on Easter morning. The earlier the better. There is an eagerness to the service, as though Jesus has just risen from the grave and we, his disciples, are coming to celebrate. I always hope we sing Christ the Lord Is Risen Today, which Charles Wesley first published in 1739. The music and words are so powerful that almost three hundred years later, I can’t sing it without being choked up.

The message of Easter is multifaceted, but it can be boiled down to this one word: Hope. Jesus Christ brings new hope for each of us. On Easter, we pause to honor our Lord because we are forgiven, set free, and renewed by grace.

So, dear readers, may you find fresh joy in the Easter message this year and don’t forget to sprinkle the holiday with some tradition. Dye eggs on Good Friday. Have some raisin sauce with your Easter dinner. If you want to make Easter Lilies, send me a message and I’ll forward the recipe.

Hebrews 10: 23 states, “Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess for he who promised is faithful.”

I’ve been working on the manuscript for the sequel to “By the Banks of Cottonwood Creek.” Several chapters relate to Easter. To see the preview of the chapter entitled The Holy Thursday Pizza Party, check out my website at www.gaylelarsonschuck.com.

Back in the day before mood rings, promise rings, and nose rings, there were friendship rings. These silver bands were popular with the junior high crowd and girls gave them to each other for birthday or Christmas gifts.

While most of my friends proudly wore friendship rings, I felt bad because no one had given me one. Then on my 14^th birthday, I received a silver friendship ring with a heart at its center and one on each side! It was one of the nicer friendship rings I’d seen.

What I didn’t want to admit was who had given it to me: my mother. How embarrassing!

Classmate: Nice friendship ring! Look at those neat hearts! Who gave it to you?

Me: Mumble, mumble.

Classmate: Who?

Me: My mother.

Classmate: Oh. Gotta go now.

The irony was that Mom and I didn’t have a warm mother-daughter relationship. How I wished for “heart to heart” talks with Mom, as Sandra Dee and Annette Funicello had with their mothers in the movies, but Mom was closed to such nonsense. Instead, as I grew up she became the army sergeant, while I donned a black jacket and boots and took to smoking Winstons.

                 Larry, Mom and me in 1985

After I married and had a family, we got along better. We’d visit her on weekends and spend holidays together. When it became harder for our family to get away, Mom seemed to understand. She worked until she was 73, traveled, made quilts, and did the one thing she said she’d never do–have coffee klatches with friends.

Mom died thirty years ago this week. Since then, much too late, I have gained more understanding of my mother. The hardships she and Dad faced as they raised my siblings during the Depression. The dreams that blew away during the Dirty Thirties. Raising a late baby (me) while my father’s health failed. Perhaps most difficult, the hope she must have lost for the future.

Mom never said, “You did a good job,” “I love you” or “follow your dreams.” Instead, Mom did her best for me, by making complete wardrobes for my dolls, in providing money for milk at school and for “bank day” savings, even when the pay check hardly covered the rent; paying for art lessons while I was in high school; and the gift of a friendship ring. None of this was done with a smile or a hug.

Today, the ring is a reminder that not everyone communicates in the same way. Sometimes we must listen with our hearts rather than our ears.

I still have the friendship ring. Its sterling silver heart has a patina now, and surprisingly, it still fits my finger. Through it, Mom seems to reach out to me across time. I’m honored to tell people it was a gift from a good friend: my mother.

But don’t just listen to God’s word. You must do what it says. Otherwise, you are only fooling yourselves.

James 1: 22 NLT

Cristian McMerty

Need a heart-warming story for a January day? Step inside the doors of The Gifted Bean Coffee House, a place overflowing with optimism, good will and, of course, great coffee. Smiles are free and so are the clever sayings that show up in the shop and on their Facebook page.

Caution: Java installation 95% complete. Installation in progress.

The shop opened in Bismarck Public Library in October 2014, serving up coffee, lunch, the best chocolate chai ever (not just my opinion). On any given day, you may find friends chatting over fresh hot sandwiches, someone engrossed in a book, a writer at work, librarians rushing in to grab a cuppa, or maybe a party of individuals with unique abilities enjoying one of the games the shop has available.

However, to fully appreciate The Gifted Bean, you need to know that a “gifted bean” is really a “being who is gifted.” This family-owned business has a larger purpose.

Matt and Sandy McMerty were a career-track couple when their first son was born 14 years ago with Down syndrome. They soon became involved in community efforts to support people with disabilities. However, they wanted Cristian to dream of a future of greater independence. They decided to find a business where he could work when he grew up to support that dream. When the shop became available, they saw it as it as “bean” their opportunity.

Coffee. Helping millions of people put on pants and say words…we are proud to help in the effort.

Their dream is becoming reality. Cristian, his parents, and siblings, all work in the shop, along with other staff, serving up great customer service. Recently, Cristian handed out his new business cards. They read, “Hello, I’m Cristian McMerty and I’m the future owner of The Gifted Bean, where every bean is special.”

The McMerty’s efforts are making a positive influence not just in Cristian’s life, but throughout the community. Their inspiring story has been shared in TV, newspaper and magazine stories. In 2015, they were named Employer of the Year by The Arc of Bismarck for their contributions to the lives of people with disabilities.

When The Gifted Bean opened in 2014, I was still with The Library Foundation, working in the Library. Each morning I stopped by for a good cup of coffee and, well maybe, one of those fresh chocolate peanut butter bars.

Coffee and friends make the perfect blend.

Now that I’m retired from the Library, I’m still a weekly customer. After By the Banks of Cottonwood Creek was published last year, I stopped by for coffee and shared the news. To my surprise, they offered to sell the book, the first store in Bismarck to make it available. Now when I walk into the shop and a barista waves an envelope at me, I know they’ve sold another copy. It makes me happy, not just because of the sale, but because it feels like they are on my team. And I am on theirs.

Writing Update: Many thanks to all who ask about the sequel to By the Banks of Cottonwood Creek. You’ve helped me keep writing through this dreary winter. Although, I must admit, the fast moving romance between Kelly and Amber does make my fingers tingle as I type away. One of the pleasures of writing is finding out how the characters deal with the situations thrown at them. Kelly and Amber are getting a lot of practice at that! Another pleasure is meeting new characters, such as this sweet, sassy rag doll, who makes her debut in the sequel. However, for now she’s content to supervise the office from her seat in my pen jar.

Thought for the Day: Let us not grow weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up. Galatians 6: 9

This fall we stood on the tip of Cape Cod on a wet, cold day and watched the Mayflower II bob offshore. We also peered over a railing at Plymouth Rock, where the Pilgrims first stepped ashore. The day we were there, a Northeaster was blowing hard, rocking everything, so we didn’t stay long. The day was much darker than the photo to the left!

The Pilgrims probably experienced the same type of weather as we did. They arrived at Plymouth on November 21, 1620, after spending 63 storm-tossed days in the hold of a cargo ship. There was no warm hotel room awaiting them at the end of their journey.

That first winter, about half the 102 Pilgrims died of cold, disease and starvation. But they also found Native American friends, such as the English speaking Squanto, who taught them how to survive in the new land. The next year, in November 1621, they held the first Thanksgiving feast. Their good neighbors were the honored guests at the three-day celebration.

It is popular today to take a jaded view of the Pilgrims and make fun of their shortcomings. However, it was Theodore Roosevelt who said it’s not the critic who counts, but the man in the arena. www.goodreads.com/quotes/7-it-is-not-the-critic-who-counts-not-the-man. I doubt any of the critics have come close to enduring the hardships faced by the Pilgrims, nor have they said or done much that will have a positive influence on the world.

Still, the critics are rewriting the history books, avoiding the real reasons the Pilgrims came to America. How will they ignore the Pilgrims’ objectives, which are clearly found in the Mayflower Compact, the first governing document of Plymouth Colony?

The Mayflower Compact is just four sentences long. The Pilgrims wrote it on the boat before they went ashore. Yet it has provided direction for this country for almost 400 years; The U.S. Constitution was based on the general principles found in it. Here it is:

In the name of God, Amen. We, whose names are underwritten, the loyal subjects of our dread Sovereign Lord King James, by the Grace of God, of Great Britain, France, and Ireland, King, defender of the Faith, etc.

Having undertaken, for the Glory of God, and advancements of the Christian faith and honor of our King and Country, a voyage to plant the first colony in the Northern parts of Virginia, do by these presents, solemnly and mutually, in the presence of God, and one another, covenant and combine ourselves together into a civil body politic; for our better ordering, and preservation and furtherance of the ends aforesaid; and by virtue hereof to enact, constitute, and frame, such just and equal laws, ordinances, acts, constitutions, and offices, from time to time, as shall be thought most meet and convenient for the general good of the colony; unto which we promise all due submission and obedience.

In witness whereof we have hereunto subscribed our names at Cape Cod the 11th of November, in the year of the reign of our Sovereign Lord King James, of England, France, and Ireland, the eighteenth, and of Scotland the fifty-fourth, 1620.

This Thanksgiving, we would do well to remember the beginning of our great nation. America remains a beacon of light to the rest of the world. Let’s shrug off the pride we take in our own accomplishments and humbly give God the glory for what he has accomplished through us.

There are a number of good books on the topic of Early America. The Light and the Glory by Peter Marshall and David Manuel, which was first published in 1977, is an enlightening read and is available online.