God has touched our family.

Joyce Meyer often says that if you're surrounded by people who aren't believers, just keep on believing, but don't push it in their faces. Eventually they'll want to join the party. Well, my family has always been Christians, but so many of them, weren't excited for Christ. Neither was I until the last couple years. Well, my sister Rachael and I have been having this awesome party and slowly but surely the rest of my family has joined us in some form or another. To me, the most exciting part is my parents. My relationship with them has changed dramatically. Almost every time we talk, in person or on the phone, we say "I Love You", 3 words that hardly ever passed through our lips to one another, it was always implied, or saved for "special occasions". The other awesome thing that has changed is we all talk openly and freely about God and our faith. We share excitements about heaven, personal struggles to keep in the Faith, and questions we may have about the bible. We share verses to help one another through a tough time or verses of praise when it applies. It's so wonderful to have so many loved ones on the same journey. We can only help each other grow in our faith, and if we should stumble along the way, there's plenty of us to help pick each other up. Our God, is an Awesome God!!!

Jesus is the reason for the season

Taken from an article in the USA Today, "Christmas without the specter of the cross, without awareness that this is a baby born to die for mankind's sins, is a fancied-up fraud", says Horton, professor of theology and apologetics at Westminster Seminary California, and associate pastor at Christ United Reformed Church in Santee, Calif.

This is something that Pastor David at my church has preached both this Sunday and last, that if you don't see the cross through the Nativity, you've completely missed the message. I think so often even us as Christians who KNOW that Jesus, a sinless man, was crucified for our sins, tend to forget all that and get all "gooey" at the thought of Jesus as a baby. Not until Easter time rolls around do we consider the reason Jesus came to this earth. I think it's important to remember that at Christmas time too. Christmas is more than Jesus being born, even as a baby He was our Savior and He had only one purpose for coming to this world, to be crucified. Make sure you have the big picture in mind next time you see a Nativity, make sure you see the cross in the shadow of it.

Mary

With it being the Christmas season, of course the story of the birth of Jesus is in the forefront of our minds, but until this year, I never really gave much thought about Mary. There's a song that you may have heard, called "Mary Did You Know" and one of the verses says, "when you kiss your little baby, you kiss the face of God". Wow!!! She got to kiss the face of God, and kiss it often, and to watch Him take His first step and speak His first words. Can you imagine what a HUGE sense of responsibility Mary must have felt. I think of how

overwhelming the task that lay ahead of me felt when I had my first child, and I cannot imagine how much more daunting the task may have seemed to her. To have God entrust the care of His Son to her must've humbled her and terrified her all at the same time. I wonder if she fully understood what the role of her Son was to be, that she was giving birth to our Savior. That God was sending Him to this sinful world to die so that we can live. Mary must've been an extraordinary woman for God to have chosen her to be our Saviors mother.

A season of giving?

This time of year is known as "The Season of Giving". This has always bothered me. Why is it that at ONE time each year we suddenly find it in our hearts to give to those less fortunate? Do we think they only need to eat once a year? They only wear clothes at Christmas time? Matthew 25: 31-46 is a parable, where it tells us that ".....whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me." No where in those verses does it say we need to be generous and kind and caring ONLY at Christmas time. What a mess our lives would be if Christmas time was the only time God decided to be generous, kind and caring to us. We need to remember that we may celebrate the birth of Jesus on December 25th, but that it was only the beginning of the celebration, and we're still waiting for the end. The celebration continues all through the year, and year after year, until that glorious day when all of those that love the Lord and claim Him as their Savior will get to dance at His feet.

Very Excited!

Our church is setting up a new website and I have been asked to be the "one voice" of it. I essentially will be the editor. I'm very excited about this opportunity and I really look forward to serving God in this new avenue. When the site is up and live I will pass along the link for all of you to see. If you've read previous posts you know just how much I love my church and what a truly moving place of worship it is. I would love for all of you that don't already attend my church to make a point to come and visit. I promise you won't be disappointed!

Fireproof Lesson

Today Jerry and I went and saw the movie Fireproof. We have friends who had seen it before us and warned us that the acting was poor but the message was great. This proved to be true on both accounts. If you're not familiar with this movie, it's about a husband and wife whose marriage is failing and the lengths that the husband takes, with encouragement from his father, and from God, to save the marriage.

It basically boils down to treating each other with respect and that loving one another is much more than just saying the words, you must do actions as well. However you must do them with your heart, not just go through the motions so you can say you tried. Jerry and I have an awesome marriage, we are truly a partnership and each others best friends. We respect one another and we communicate very well. We think so much alike sometimes that it's down right scary. God blessed us when he brought us together and we thank him continually for that. Part of our marriage is doing things for each other just because we know it will make the other one happy.

One day one of my kids asked why we always have to have "those kinds of french fries", my reply "cause that's what your dad likes". Until she said, "how come we always have to have what dad likes?", I hadn't even realized I was making those adjustments to the way I did things. I just did them.

The same lesson applies to the life of a Christian, you cannot truly call yourself a Christian if you don't live the life of one through your words and your actions. After having committed my life to the Lord I find that things that I had done previously, I cringe at the thought of doing them now. I'm not talking major things, but small things, "french fries" if you will. Swearing is one that I have issue with now, not only from my own mouth, but hearing it from others as well. Gossip is still one that I struggle with because it's so easy to fall into, but I no longer do it so freely, and find myself getting a sick stomach if I get pulled into it and try to back out of it as soon as I realize what's happening. Hopefully I'll eventually make these adjustments to my life just as easily as I made the adjustment to what kind of french fries my family eats and do it without giving it a second thought.