Project Proverbs 365

Anyone into New Years' resolutions out there? It's not a tradition that I usually make much out of, but this year I decided on one. My resolution is to memorize a Proverb a day. Proverbs has been one of my favorite books of the Bible ever since the first time I read a chapter a day for a month and really meditated on the verses. I was amazed at how much they impacted my life. So now I'm going to hide them in my heart. My memorizing plan goes like this: Day of the month = Chapter #, Month = Verse #. So for example, July 15 would be Proverbs 15:7. Feel free to check up on me and see if I did my Proverb for the day. That's part of why I'm sharing. Happy New Year and God Bless!

It's the most wonderful time of the year...

I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas. I sure did! And although I made a peep last month about not being a "gift" person, when it comes down to it, I really enjoy the giving and the receiving at Christmastime. :-D

• My favorite gift to give - In our family the siblings do a mystery name exchange. This year I had Michael... and I did not know what to get him. Then, about a week before Christmas, I remembered that, last year, I had wished I had drawn his name so I could get him a cape, or the stuff to make it (If you know him well you would understand why.) So this year, that's what I did! I made him a calf-length black/red hooded cape. It was pretty crazy since I hadn't made anything like it before, but I finished it, well past the 11th hour, I might add. And he loved it! What was really funny: doing it as last minute as I was, I couldn't always wait until he was gone to work on it. When I was working on the red satin side, both he and Stephanie thought I was making a skirt! And after I had put the black and red together, Stephanie made some remarks. "You know what that looks like? A cape... like Michael's dream cape." I just kept quiet and grinned to myself.


• My favorite gift to receive - was a very special gift for the whole family - a violin!!! Valerie and I have wanted to start violin for a long time (longer for her) and we were thrilled! Everyone has tried it, but she and I have been practicing every day. I love it, and I've been picking it up pretty quickly. The smaller shape and fingerboard, the simplicity of doing only one note at a time (so far), it's all good.


• Oh, and if you care, my mom gave me a card reader for High-Capacity SD cards. :-)
  

Merry Christmas!

Here are the pictures that we put on our Christmas cards. Have a blessed Christmas!

Mute Monks Provide Words for Wednesday

Happy Thanksgiving!

Thanksgiving is one of my favorite holidays. The Bible commands over and over to "Give thanks unto the Lord". How great that we have a national holiday set aside for just that! Plus, for us, it's a generally relaxed day of visiting with extended family and sharing a great meal. (And, there's no stress about having to deal with presents, unlike a certain other holiday! Gifts is not my primary love language. ;) Have a blessed holiday and don't forget to take time and personally thank the Giver of all good things.

It is good to give thanks to the LORD,
And to sing praises to Your name, O Most High;
Psalm 92:1

About our turkey flock: This is a resurrected tradition that we used to do every year. We also used to make them with chocolate-dipped marshmallows and chocolate sandwich cookies so they would be brown. Can you imagine, more sugar?! But they are cute, and fun to make.

PS: I'm thankful - we figured out what was wrong with the card readers... nothing! They just can't read my new High-Capacity SD card. But Chris' laptop can, so I guess I'm "back in business". :)

Brian is five!

The baby of the family is five today!
Of course he's not a baby anymore, but he'll always be my sweet, smart, and SO CUTE baby brother!
Happy birthday Brian!

Good enough? No. Willing? Maybe...

Not long ago, my brothers and sisters and I, with our mom, were invited by a lady from our church to do a presentation for a Bible study at a local retirement home. We had done this once before, in January, and the seniors there appreciated it so much that we were invited back again. Our presentation was simple: we sang some Sunday School songs with the guitar accompanying, recited some Scripture from memory, did a semi-improv skit about the Good Samaritan, then sang some praise songs. Afterwards someone else we know from church taught the Bible Study.

Now, we are no Von Trapp family. True, a couple of us have some musical talent, but it's not in the voice department. None of us are great singers. We are lucky if we sing in the same key - forget about harmony. Ok, maybe we are ahead of the average youth when it comes to Bible memory, but our acting was far from noteworthy. But none of that mattered. It's hard to describe how grateful they were to us for coming. We had many people say such sweet things to us - thanking us for coming, complementing us on how nice of a family we were, even on our singing and guitar playing! I remember back in January when we went the first time thinking, "What are we doing here? There are other families that do this sort of thing so much better than us." But those families don't live around here or go to our church.

I came across this quote last year:

I wasn’t God’s first choice for what I’ve done for China… I don’t know who it was… It must have been a man… a well-educated man. I don’t know what happened. Perhaps he died. Perhaps he wasn’t willing… and God looked down… and saw Gladys Aylward… And God said – “Well, she’s willing. -- Gladys Aylward

No one who knows Gladys Aylward's story would even dream of second-guessing that God wanted her doing what she was doing. But like the rest of us, she had times where she felt weak and inadequate.

The truth is, that's exactly what we are: weak and inadequate. But, as any child who knows the song "Jesus Loves Me" knows, "we are weak but He is strong!" He is strong, and His power and His Spirit are available to us. But are we willing? God knows what He's doing when He asks us to serve for Him. It's to grow us as well as do His work. It doesn't matter whether we are "good enough" because it's His power that works to do His will anyway. (Eph. 1:11)

Let's be willing! Instead of worrying about whether we're good enough, let's remember that only One is Good, that is, God. Even in the small things, let's cheerfully obey God.