I've spent time today reading some of the top stories and looking at the news media's top photos of 2008. It seems we always get pretty nostalgic about the year just passing (hopefully we learn from the past). On the other side we wonder, wish, and dream about what may be ahead in 2009. So here on this last day of December 2008 I'm nostalgic and also thinking about the future. 2008 was a pretty good year. I have much to be thankful for. My family is all doing well, I have a great church family, my home is comfortable and definitely an extension of who I am, my business is doing well, and most important of all my relationship with God is growing.
Looking ahead to 2009 is pretty much looking into the unknown. I know very little about what will happen in my life in this next year. I can dream and plan. I can set goals and make efforts to accomplish them. But ultimately only God knows the path that lays ahead for me. Only He knows where I'll be by the end of 2009. Only He knows who will be born and who will die. This lack of control greatly affects my perspective. I can worry, fret and try to have control or I can trust, give thanks and watch what God does in 2009. Life is pretty much perspective. It is the judgment I make about facts and circumstances. It is my view of life. So what will my perspective be in this new year? I want it to be one of hope. Hope for the situations and circumstances God puts me in that I will not despair but trust in Him. As I have gotten older, I know with much more certainty that there is more than just this life. Eternity is a step nearer every day for me and more real in the sense of believing that what lies ahead is way better than what life is here and now. This life is merely a speck in view of eternity. So the hope I have for 2009 is that what I do may not always matter much in this life but it will matter in eternity.
Wednesday, December 31, 2008
Thursday, December 11, 2008
Leah Grace
Children are a gift from God. He is the one who determines what our gift is. He marks out the days of each gift and has special plans for each gift. He loves his gifts so much. Luke and Kristine (my son and daughter-in-law) have a new gift on the way. But this gift is extra special. She is Leah Grace. She has been diagnosed with Trisome 13. This is an extra chromosone on the 13th segment. It is not compatable with life outside the womb at least not for very long. Her life may only exist here on this earth in the womb but she has a life in heaven that is for all eternity. We may know her for a very short time here but we will know her where there will be no end, for all time and eternity. There is sorrow for us here now but someday there will be joy. I have not really asked 'why' in this situation. As I get older I have come to realize that rarely ever does the 'why' get answered. We must trust in what we know about God. He is loving. He does not make mistakes. He has a plan even in pain. He has prepared an eternity that is even beyond all that we could imagine and we need to realize that true living is not here but in eternity. Jesus has shown us the way to eternal life when he said in John 14:6, "I am the way, the truth, and the life, no one comes to the Father but through me".
I am trusting little Leah Grace into the best arms that could ever hold her -- into a loving heavenly Father's arms. That is comfort for me.
I am trusting little Leah Grace into the best arms that could ever hold her -- into a loving heavenly Father's arms. That is comfort for me.
Wednesday, November 12, 2008
When God Makes a Choice For Our Lives
When I wrote the article on high cost choices and low cost choices, I was simply thinking about choices. We do make lots of choices and they have lots of consequences. But then there are those choices we don't make, God does. God chooses certain things for our lives and some of these are totally out of our control. It may be the death of someone we love. It may be the loss of a job or home that was out of our control. These are not easy for us -- we are human beings who love to be in control and resist continually God's control. When I was a young married woman I had plans for my life and family. I even went so far as to make a plan of when my kids would be born and how far apart each one would be. I felt I could control this (wow -- talk about arrogance)! After our first child was born we waited about 2 years and decided it was time for child number two. I got pregnant close to the planned month. 16 weeks into the pregnancy I had a miscarriage. I remember one night crying and almost shaking my fist at God and asking why. In the silence of my room I clearly heard these words, "it's hard to kick against the goads". I had no idea where that came from and it sounded vaguely like something from Scripture. I looked it up in the book of Acts. Paul in recounting the story of his conversion, said that Jesus said these words to him after asking him, "why are you persecuting me"? That's exactly what I was doing, kicking against the goads. A goad is a cattle prod used by herders to move the cattle in a certain direction that the person wants them to go. They have a sharp spike at the end that doesn't probably feel to great to the cow that is being directed by it if that animal wants to go in a different direction. I was thinking I had a choice in all this but God had other ideas. Instead of submitting to His plan, I was kicking against that sharp pointed stick. I learned a huge lesson (but one I've had to repeat learning over and over again). Sometimes we do make a choice but many times God makes the choice for us. How do we respond? We can submit or we can kick against the goad.
Tuesday, November 11, 2008
High Cost Choices -- Low Cost Choices
We all make a lot of choices in life. Some are high cost and some are low cost. Some of our high cost choices might be things like who we marry; where we live; what vocation we choose, etc. They effect us greatly and in fact determine much in our lives. Then there are the low cost choices. They might be things like; what we eat today, what we choose to wear, what color we paint our living room, which pair of shoes to buy, etc. They don't have that great of an impact on our lives and are fairly easy to change.
It would be wonderful if we could always put a choice into either one box or the other and then determine how much effort and thought should go into making that choice. Sometimes we mix up the value of choices. We put too much effort and consideration into a low cost choice and not enough consideration into a high cost choice. We end up scratching our heads and wondering how in the world did we ever get into this situation.
I think most of us get better at determining what kind of choice is before us as we age. Life teaches us what has value and what really doesn't matter. Unfortunately for most, the choices made in youth often are the high cost choices and affect the rest of our lives. That's where knowing and believing in a God who forgives and extends grace to all of us is a great comfort. Some of my choices can't be undone. But I can see God's grace and His ability to use even what I only valued as a low cost choice when in reality it was high cost to shape and mold me and use all my choices to ultimately bring glory to Himself.
It would be wonderful if we could always put a choice into either one box or the other and then determine how much effort and thought should go into making that choice. Sometimes we mix up the value of choices. We put too much effort and consideration into a low cost choice and not enough consideration into a high cost choice. We end up scratching our heads and wondering how in the world did we ever get into this situation.
I think most of us get better at determining what kind of choice is before us as we age. Life teaches us what has value and what really doesn't matter. Unfortunately for most, the choices made in youth often are the high cost choices and affect the rest of our lives. That's where knowing and believing in a God who forgives and extends grace to all of us is a great comfort. Some of my choices can't be undone. But I can see God's grace and His ability to use even what I only valued as a low cost choice when in reality it was high cost to shape and mold me and use all my choices to ultimately bring glory to Himself.
Saturday, November 8, 2008
My Conviction About Adoption
I wanted to post a document I wrote a couple years ago about my convictions about adoption. I still feel strongly about this subject matter and love the stories that illustrate my convictions. The Scripture that is at the start of the article is God's Word that spoke very clearly to me in 2005 about proceeding in our attempt to adopt. So here it is.
II Thessalonians 1:11-12
'To this end also we pray for you always, that our God will count you worthy of your calling, and that by His power he may fulfill every good purpose of yours and every act prompted by your faith, so that the name of our Lord Jesus will be glorified in you and you in Him, according to the grace of our God and the Lord Jesus Christ.'
God used this Scripture to convey the following as it relates to our adopting children:
This is a good purpose that we have set out to do.
This is an act that has been prompted by faith.
Our desire is that the name of our Lord Jesus will be glorified in us and we in Him. (Whatever the outcome, whatever the circumstances, no matter how difficult.)
From the book ‘Into the Arms of Strangers’ by Mark Jonathan Harris and Deborah Oppenheimer
‘Then the door opened, and there stood this little lady, barely taller than myself. Her hat sat all askew on her head, and her mackintosh was buttoned up all wrong. She peered at me from behind a big pair of glasses. Suddenly, her face broke into the most wonderful smile, and she ran to me and hugged me, and spoke to me words I did not understand then, but they were, ‘You shall be loved.’ And those were the most important words any child in a foreign land, away from her family, could hear. And loved I was.
It was much later, when I was grown up really, and interested in the background of the transports, that I asked my foster-father, Daddy Rainford -- they asked me to call them ‘Mummy Rainford’ and ‘Daddy Rainford’ -- why they had chosen me to be in their family. He answered, ‘I knew I could not save the world. I knew I could not stop the war from starting. But I knew I could save one human life. And as Chamberlain broke his pledge to Czechoslovakia, and as Jews were in the greatest danger, I decided it must be a Czech Jewish child.’
I know we can not save all the children in the world. What we attempt to do seems to make such a small difference but it makes a world of difference for those one or two that we ‘save’. When you look at all the children in the world who are in need of a family to love them I think saving a child from some of the darkest places in the world is something important for us to do. Russia is a place that most do not know Jesus as their Lord and Savior. Most children there will never hear the gospel. Seeing a child taken from that country and hopefully respond to the gospel -- who knows what spiritual impact that may have on a whole country!
In the light of all humanity, it seems like adopting a child or two is a very small thing.
From the magazine, Mission Maker 2005, Article Lord of the Slums, Section 4 by Scott Bessenecker.
The Power of Justice
‘Summer heat in Cairo can be unforgiving. When that heat combines with the smells in the garbage village, zeal quickly melts into lethargy. I remember climbing the hill to the monastery where we lived inside this garbage-collecting community. Next to me, a team of donkeys suffered under an impossible load of garbage, struggling to reach the crest of the hill. Atop the garbage, the donkey-cart driver urged the beasts forward with a whip. My daughter Hannah, who has a huge heart for animals, looked at me with pleading eyes as the tormented donkeys struggled up the hill. As much as I felt sorry for myself, panting up the hill in 110-degree heat, I began to have compassion for the donkeys. Why, I wondered. These aren’t soul-bearing creatures. They live to serve. What could I do anyway? I couldn’t relieve their plight any more than I could relieve my own misery, climbing that insufferable hill.
Step by sweaty step we pressed on. My conscience and my daughter continued to trouble me. Finally, I gave in. Without a glance backward from the donkey-cart driver (nor, do I guess, much noticeable relief for the donkeys). I shouldered the back of the garbage cart and began to push. What good is it, I wondered, to add to my suffering only to give some inconsequential relief to these beasts, without the owner’s thanks? Still I kept pushing.
At the top of the hill, I turned right toward the monastery and the donkeys turned left. Immediately, I came upon Romany, sitting in his usual spot outside his butcher shop. He was waiting for enough business to justify slaughtering another pig. Every day we stepped through the blood and entrails that flowed in little rivers down the hill outside Romany’s butcher shop. Romany, a Coptic Christian, had been a good friend to our team and me since we arrived in the garbage village.
As I passed, Romany said three words that have changed my life. He said. "God saw that." I had not been aware of Romany’s watchful eye from his perch atop the hill. He wanted to remind me that to serve the suffering counts in God’s eyes. Acts of justice and mercy do not go unnoticed by everyone -- God sees. How much more is that true when we seek the justice of people made in God’s image, in the midst of their suffering.
For many evangelicals in the West, personal holiness has been the focus of spirituality. Sin becomes a highly personalized issue to be addressed only by the sinner. Righteousness is considered in individualist terms. Worship is centered on my actions: Have I read my Bible? Did I hurt anyone in my thoughts words, or deeds? But in Scripture, personal and social righteousness and justice are inextricably linked: :Away with the noise of your songs? It will not listen to the music of your harps. but let justice roll on like a river, righteousness like a never-failing stream!" (Amos 5:24). Leaving concern for justice out of our lives invalidates our worship. To focus on the personal to the exclusion of the social is not biblical.
In his book Good News About Injustice, Gary Haugen substantiates the fact that confronting social evil is the thoroughly biblical calling of those who follow Christ. God gives power, not for personal aggrandizement, but as a trust to utilize on behalf of those who have none.’
My desire is to live my Christian life with those words, ‘God saw that’ written over everything I do. Many things of our life are hidden things, only God sees. But our acts of mercy and justice that are extended even to the ‘least of these’ is our worship to God and He delights in that."
From the magazine, Mission Maker 2005, Article Lord of the Slums, Section 6 by Scott Bessenecker.
Life Lessons from the Garbage Heap
"A month in the Egyptian garbage community in Cairo gave me new eyes. Things that at first repulsed me became quite normal. The hot, passionate desperation I felt toward the conditions in the garbage village gradually cooled to a settled comfortableness. But poverty confused me. Is life lived on sorted trash okay? Maybe the life of a garbage collector is not so bad. The people in the community seem fairly content with life. Besides, the conditions are likely not much different from life in medieval Europe -- probably better. Should I encourage foreigners to come into such places as agents of change, especially rich, North Americans?
I wrestled with God, Is it a mistake to call workers with notions of transformation to long-term residency in slum communities? Might it only bring Western standards of housing and cleanliness to people who are just fine with things as they are? After all, slum dwellers have their own culturally defined norms for quality of life.
"Oh God" I prayed, "if you want me to call people to lives of sacrifice and to catalyze change, then you’ll have to convince me. By the way, " I added, "could you answer me in the next forty-eight hours, before we leave this place?"
Several hours later, I dreamed about the dung truck. I always smelled the dung truck before I saw it. The smell became a taste at the back of my throat: pasty and bitter. The dung truck driver hauls away the accumulated animal waste from the ground level of houses and from animal pens both inside and outside of homes.
The dung haulers shovel dung into large wicker baskets, then carrying the baskets on their shoulders or heads, they walk up a plank ramp and dump the contents into the back of a flat-bed truck. In the process, these men become caked in dung from head to foot. High temperatures, over one hundred degrees, release the dung’s pungent odor, making this task more intense than someone reading this in comfort can appreciate.
In my dream, I walked past a dung truck. To my horror, I saw my children -- Hannah, Philip, and Laura -- sitting on top of the mountain of dung heaped on the truck bed. Amazingly, even with every inch of their bodies covered by animal waste, they appeared perfectly content sitting on the dung.
I felt the Lord ask," As their father, are you satisfied? Even if the children are satisfied, are you satisfied?"
I still sift through the meaning of that dream but it immediately implied that a child’s contentment with a saturation does not always reflect a father’s heart. The father yearns for so much more for his children.’
This story has illustrated to me how easy it is for us to think, "they are okay with their situation so why shouldn’t I be okay with it". We have a God who is "not willing that any should perish".
That must be my focus on all of life too. What can I do to be God’s tool to save one from perishing. Will this be the hardest thing we have ever done? Probably. But I know God is with us and goes ahead of us every step of the way.
II Thessalonians 1:11-12
'To this end also we pray for you always, that our God will count you worthy of your calling, and that by His power he may fulfill every good purpose of yours and every act prompted by your faith, so that the name of our Lord Jesus will be glorified in you and you in Him, according to the grace of our God and the Lord Jesus Christ.'
God used this Scripture to convey the following as it relates to our adopting children:
This is a good purpose that we have set out to do.
This is an act that has been prompted by faith.
Our desire is that the name of our Lord Jesus will be glorified in us and we in Him. (Whatever the outcome, whatever the circumstances, no matter how difficult.)
From the book ‘Into the Arms of Strangers’ by Mark Jonathan Harris and Deborah Oppenheimer
‘Then the door opened, and there stood this little lady, barely taller than myself. Her hat sat all askew on her head, and her mackintosh was buttoned up all wrong. She peered at me from behind a big pair of glasses. Suddenly, her face broke into the most wonderful smile, and she ran to me and hugged me, and spoke to me words I did not understand then, but they were, ‘You shall be loved.’ And those were the most important words any child in a foreign land, away from her family, could hear. And loved I was.
It was much later, when I was grown up really, and interested in the background of the transports, that I asked my foster-father, Daddy Rainford -- they asked me to call them ‘Mummy Rainford’ and ‘Daddy Rainford’ -- why they had chosen me to be in their family. He answered, ‘I knew I could not save the world. I knew I could not stop the war from starting. But I knew I could save one human life. And as Chamberlain broke his pledge to Czechoslovakia, and as Jews were in the greatest danger, I decided it must be a Czech Jewish child.’
I know we can not save all the children in the world. What we attempt to do seems to make such a small difference but it makes a world of difference for those one or two that we ‘save’. When you look at all the children in the world who are in need of a family to love them I think saving a child from some of the darkest places in the world is something important for us to do. Russia is a place that most do not know Jesus as their Lord and Savior. Most children there will never hear the gospel. Seeing a child taken from that country and hopefully respond to the gospel -- who knows what spiritual impact that may have on a whole country!
In the light of all humanity, it seems like adopting a child or two is a very small thing.
From the magazine, Mission Maker 2005, Article Lord of the Slums, Section 4 by Scott Bessenecker.
The Power of Justice
‘Summer heat in Cairo can be unforgiving. When that heat combines with the smells in the garbage village, zeal quickly melts into lethargy. I remember climbing the hill to the monastery where we lived inside this garbage-collecting community. Next to me, a team of donkeys suffered under an impossible load of garbage, struggling to reach the crest of the hill. Atop the garbage, the donkey-cart driver urged the beasts forward with a whip. My daughter Hannah, who has a huge heart for animals, looked at me with pleading eyes as the tormented donkeys struggled up the hill. As much as I felt sorry for myself, panting up the hill in 110-degree heat, I began to have compassion for the donkeys. Why, I wondered. These aren’t soul-bearing creatures. They live to serve. What could I do anyway? I couldn’t relieve their plight any more than I could relieve my own misery, climbing that insufferable hill.
Step by sweaty step we pressed on. My conscience and my daughter continued to trouble me. Finally, I gave in. Without a glance backward from the donkey-cart driver (nor, do I guess, much noticeable relief for the donkeys). I shouldered the back of the garbage cart and began to push. What good is it, I wondered, to add to my suffering only to give some inconsequential relief to these beasts, without the owner’s thanks? Still I kept pushing.
At the top of the hill, I turned right toward the monastery and the donkeys turned left. Immediately, I came upon Romany, sitting in his usual spot outside his butcher shop. He was waiting for enough business to justify slaughtering another pig. Every day we stepped through the blood and entrails that flowed in little rivers down the hill outside Romany’s butcher shop. Romany, a Coptic Christian, had been a good friend to our team and me since we arrived in the garbage village.
As I passed, Romany said three words that have changed my life. He said. "God saw that." I had not been aware of Romany’s watchful eye from his perch atop the hill. He wanted to remind me that to serve the suffering counts in God’s eyes. Acts of justice and mercy do not go unnoticed by everyone -- God sees. How much more is that true when we seek the justice of people made in God’s image, in the midst of their suffering.
For many evangelicals in the West, personal holiness has been the focus of spirituality. Sin becomes a highly personalized issue to be addressed only by the sinner. Righteousness is considered in individualist terms. Worship is centered on my actions: Have I read my Bible? Did I hurt anyone in my thoughts words, or deeds? But in Scripture, personal and social righteousness and justice are inextricably linked: :Away with the noise of your songs? It will not listen to the music of your harps. but let justice roll on like a river, righteousness like a never-failing stream!" (Amos 5:24). Leaving concern for justice out of our lives invalidates our worship. To focus on the personal to the exclusion of the social is not biblical.
In his book Good News About Injustice, Gary Haugen substantiates the fact that confronting social evil is the thoroughly biblical calling of those who follow Christ. God gives power, not for personal aggrandizement, but as a trust to utilize on behalf of those who have none.’
My desire is to live my Christian life with those words, ‘God saw that’ written over everything I do. Many things of our life are hidden things, only God sees. But our acts of mercy and justice that are extended even to the ‘least of these’ is our worship to God and He delights in that."
From the magazine, Mission Maker 2005, Article Lord of the Slums, Section 6 by Scott Bessenecker.
Life Lessons from the Garbage Heap
"A month in the Egyptian garbage community in Cairo gave me new eyes. Things that at first repulsed me became quite normal. The hot, passionate desperation I felt toward the conditions in the garbage village gradually cooled to a settled comfortableness. But poverty confused me. Is life lived on sorted trash okay? Maybe the life of a garbage collector is not so bad. The people in the community seem fairly content with life. Besides, the conditions are likely not much different from life in medieval Europe -- probably better. Should I encourage foreigners to come into such places as agents of change, especially rich, North Americans?
I wrestled with God, Is it a mistake to call workers with notions of transformation to long-term residency in slum communities? Might it only bring Western standards of housing and cleanliness to people who are just fine with things as they are? After all, slum dwellers have their own culturally defined norms for quality of life.
"Oh God" I prayed, "if you want me to call people to lives of sacrifice and to catalyze change, then you’ll have to convince me. By the way, " I added, "could you answer me in the next forty-eight hours, before we leave this place?"
Several hours later, I dreamed about the dung truck. I always smelled the dung truck before I saw it. The smell became a taste at the back of my throat: pasty and bitter. The dung truck driver hauls away the accumulated animal waste from the ground level of houses and from animal pens both inside and outside of homes.
The dung haulers shovel dung into large wicker baskets, then carrying the baskets on their shoulders or heads, they walk up a plank ramp and dump the contents into the back of a flat-bed truck. In the process, these men become caked in dung from head to foot. High temperatures, over one hundred degrees, release the dung’s pungent odor, making this task more intense than someone reading this in comfort can appreciate.
In my dream, I walked past a dung truck. To my horror, I saw my children -- Hannah, Philip, and Laura -- sitting on top of the mountain of dung heaped on the truck bed. Amazingly, even with every inch of their bodies covered by animal waste, they appeared perfectly content sitting on the dung.
I felt the Lord ask," As their father, are you satisfied? Even if the children are satisfied, are you satisfied?"
I still sift through the meaning of that dream but it immediately implied that a child’s contentment with a saturation does not always reflect a father’s heart. The father yearns for so much more for his children.’
This story has illustrated to me how easy it is for us to think, "they are okay with their situation so why shouldn’t I be okay with it". We have a God who is "not willing that any should perish".
That must be my focus on all of life too. What can I do to be God’s tool to save one from perishing. Will this be the hardest thing we have ever done? Probably. But I know God is with us and goes ahead of us every step of the way.
Tuesday, October 28, 2008
One Talent People
This morning I read in Matthew where Jesus told the parable about the talents. Three servants were given talents, each according to his ability, one was given five, one was given two and one was given one. They were told to use their talent while the master was away. When he returned they reported back to him. The first had made 5 more talents. The master was pleased and said, "Here are 5 more talents, enter into the master's joy". The second had made 2 more talents and also received the same commendation. The third servant came with only the talent he had received. He said, "master, since I knew you to be a hard man, reaping where you did not plant, I went and buried the talent, but here it is. The master was not pleased with this servant and used the man's own words to rebuke him. If you knew I reaped where I did not sow why did you not at least put it in the bank where it would gain interest. The master then called him a wicked servant and took what he had and gave it to the one who already had 5. He then was cast out into darkness.
I've been thinking about this story all day. What am I? A 5 talent, a 2 talent, or just a 1 talent person? I'm not sure that I can figure that out. I know some 5 talent people. I know some 2 talent people. They are amazing. Their ability to accomplish spiritually significant things just blows me away.
Probably most people I know including myself are just 1 talent people. Not exceptional, not extremely gifted, just pretty ordinary. So what does one do with 1 talent? Living in fear is not what God wants. God wants risk. He wants his church to be full of risk takers. Instead of being the saved church most of us are part of the 'safe' church. We don't want to invest and risk losing what little we even have. God at least wants us to put in the bank his investment so that He gets the interest. So how would that look? We are committed to Christ. We are committed to a church family. We raise our kids in a Christian way. When asked, we even share about our faith. We live the 'safe' Christian life. Sounds easy? Well, it really is. No risk, the only return is interest.
That's not what I want for my life. If I only have one talent, I want to risk it to gain another for my master. How do I do that? I make choices that involve risk. I do the hard things. My passion for God is what consumes me and my total obedience to God in whatever He asks is evident in my life. Who knows, maybe I'll even gain another talent along the way!
I've been thinking about this story all day. What am I? A 5 talent, a 2 talent, or just a 1 talent person? I'm not sure that I can figure that out. I know some 5 talent people. I know some 2 talent people. They are amazing. Their ability to accomplish spiritually significant things just blows me away.
Probably most people I know including myself are just 1 talent people. Not exceptional, not extremely gifted, just pretty ordinary. So what does one do with 1 talent? Living in fear is not what God wants. God wants risk. He wants his church to be full of risk takers. Instead of being the saved church most of us are part of the 'safe' church. We don't want to invest and risk losing what little we even have. God at least wants us to put in the bank his investment so that He gets the interest. So how would that look? We are committed to Christ. We are committed to a church family. We raise our kids in a Christian way. When asked, we even share about our faith. We live the 'safe' Christian life. Sounds easy? Well, it really is. No risk, the only return is interest.
That's not what I want for my life. If I only have one talent, I want to risk it to gain another for my master. How do I do that? I make choices that involve risk. I do the hard things. My passion for God is what consumes me and my total obedience to God in whatever He asks is evident in my life. Who knows, maybe I'll even gain another talent along the way!
Saturday, October 18, 2008
Cleaning out my stuff
This week I've been cleaning out my sewing center. It contains two file cabinets that have about 25 years of accumulated 'stuff' in the drawers. I discovered old letters, papers my kids wrote at elementary age, old sermon notes, old notes from speaking engagements, and files on most every craft I've ever gotten involved in. Talk about a trip down nostalgic lane! It was fun to read and look at old things. It was also maybe a little depressing, realizing how much time has passed and how old I'm getting. But there is a time to reorganize and clean up one's memories. I find myself wanting to rid my life of so much stuff. I have mountains of stuff! Well, maybe not mountains but enough to fill a large room. Most of it relates to crafts. I have been doing crafts about as long as I can remember. The list goes something like this: cross-stitch, embroidery, silk flowers, macrame, crocheting, knitting, quilting, sewing, teddy bear making, doll making, quilling, painting, decopage, and I'm sure there's more I've forgotten about! I've loved them all and given a good chunk of time to doing them. I suppose I could have spent time more wisely but it's a love I have -- to create! Maybe it's a gifting from God. He is the creator of all things so maybe He instills in his children this desire -- to create.
Wednesday, October 8, 2008
Latest lessons
I keep wondering when I will feel brave and bold enough to actually pass this blog site on to friends! There's an insecurity of having someone read what you wrote and make some critical judgment. But that's the people pleaser inside of me coming out! So I will keep adding to my blog and maybe someday actually have my family and friends read it.
This morning brought some interesting thoughts to mind as I finished up at Community Bible Study. I have not done a Bible Study outside of my church family in a long time. Going into a situation like this, I found myself wary and unsure. I also was surprised at the arrogance I felt. I'm used to being in charge and having people look to me for answers. Wow! Even writing that feels yucky but I know it's honest. So what am I learning? It's good for me to be under someone else's authority. It's good for me to humble myself and realize there are many more believers out there who are way more spiritual than I am!! It's good for me to be involved with other Christians who don't know me and I have to be real. Giving a pharisee appearance will never please God and I think ultimately most will see right through it. This has really revealed my struggle with pride and self. The verse that keeps rattling around in my head is, "humble yourself under the might hand of God, that he may in due time lift you up" from I Peter 5. A hard and difficult lesson for me to learn -- to be humble and let God be the one (when He chooses) to lift me up.
This morning brought some interesting thoughts to mind as I finished up at Community Bible Study. I have not done a Bible Study outside of my church family in a long time. Going into a situation like this, I found myself wary and unsure. I also was surprised at the arrogance I felt. I'm used to being in charge and having people look to me for answers. Wow! Even writing that feels yucky but I know it's honest. So what am I learning? It's good for me to be under someone else's authority. It's good for me to humble myself and realize there are many more believers out there who are way more spiritual than I am!! It's good for me to be involved with other Christians who don't know me and I have to be real. Giving a pharisee appearance will never please God and I think ultimately most will see right through it. This has really revealed my struggle with pride and self. The verse that keeps rattling around in my head is, "humble yourself under the might hand of God, that he may in due time lift you up" from I Peter 5. A hard and difficult lesson for me to learn -- to be humble and let God be the one (when He chooses) to lift me up.
Monday, September 22, 2008
I come from a family of writers. My Dad has written now about 12 books. He started writing after retirement. I have been keeping journals since the 7th grade (a long time ago). Some years I've written whole books, other years it's just a page or two. When I was young it was a record of what I was doing, who I liked, who I didn't like, etc. As a young mom it was mostly a record of my children and what they were doing. Now my writings are mostly reflecting what I am learning. I guess as one gets older there is naturally more reflection and contemplation of the years gone by. So I continue to write. Hopefully, someday, someone will read what I wrote and learn something from it!
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