I was reading this morning in Ephesians and something really stood out to me. 

Ephesians 1:4 says:

"According as he hath chosen us in him before the the foundation of the world that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love." 

As I read this all I could really think was, WOW! This really sums up my life here on earth. Let's read it "piece-by-piece".

According as he hath chosen us, It is God who has chosen us not ourselves. Am I willing to live for the one who has chosen me? Is my life reflecting Christ?

In Him, This part is amazing.... through only two words Paul manages to fit in all the story of Jesus' life into these two words! In Him. I was chosen by the blood of the precious Lamb of God who came to earth, lived a sinless-life and died and rose again for who? Me! Am I living my life as though it was bought with a price? Am I willing to surrender my will to the the One who bought me through Him? 

Before the the foundation of the world, This is a proof of God's power and existence over time. It also speaks of his complete knowledge and wisdom. Do you realize that God knew you before you did? God has had a plan for your life since before the world was even made? When you think about Life this way it really adds a lot of value to it! Suicide, Abortion, Murder, even Depression, they would all lose their the predominance in our culture if we could just value the fact that God has a plan for all people. He knew them before the earth was created and we must value them for it.  

That we should be holy and without blame before Him, All of the facts now lead to the climax. The fact that God has chosen us, Lived a blameless life, died, and rose again, and chose us before the foundation of the world, are we, the people who God did all this for, are we willing to be Holy and without blame before him? He died and was tortured by the worst means, suffered so much for you and I so that we could benefit and will I/you live holy and blameless before him? My prayer for myself and you is that we can live that kind of life. and it is possible. I can do all things through Christ which strengthens me! Paul has made that clear for us and we love to use it when we are taking on the Spiritual Goliath but what about when living our personal life? We must live holy and blameless! 

Now the last two words really sum it up. In Love. All of that being said, let us not forget that we should live our life in love. When we are in a group and someone starts doing something that is in disobedience with God's word then, depending on the circumstances we should just walk quietly away but if we confront, let us do it in love. I am starting to learn that, as Paul put it so well, "...If I lack love, then I am like sounding brass, and a tinkling cymbal. Ever heard the two? Paul later says that if I lack love, even if I gave my self to be burned,( and I think that is a huge act of sacrifice ), even if I did that, it would be nothing if I didn't do it in love. Wow.... I constantly need this reminder. I know that some reading this will agree but sometimes I stand for what is right, which is a good thing, but I do it SO harshly and with such I-am-right-and-you-are-wrong attitude that what Paul said becomes true.... it is as an annoying noise. Let me/us not forget to do all we do in love.

This verse is really my life-purpose verse. So I will end this post with it again,

"According as he hath chosen us in him before the the foundation of the world that we should be holy and without blame before him in love."

WOW!

Alan Parks!

Good morning all my readers! 

We had the wonderful privilege of hearing Alan Parks in person recently! What a wonderful time of resting and focusing on Jesus Christ. The music was wonderful and I could tell that he was very sincere in his music. I would definitely recommend you go if he comes near your area! What a joy and wonderful time! I wish now that I would not have forgotten my camera so I could post pics/videos but I will try and remember something like that happens. 

I really need to work on the blog more... I started this post... I am not quite sure, 2 days ago I think? Anyway the point being that I really need to get back on here more often. While I will strive to post more often I will probably keep those posts shorter for time's sake. 

So with all that being put out, I am off to continue with what needs done. :) 

Look for more consistent posts! 

God bless!

Business of Life is a good thing!

Well... It has been a while since I last posted and I would like to apologize. I have had the pleasure of enjoying the company of two young men from Germany for the past 4 days and it has been a total blast! I have enjoyed their company and will miss them when they leave! Yet, I know I can't enjoy their company forever, despite how much I would love it! 

Today we went to a widow's house to help do spring cleaning. It was a nice time of working with other Christian men and eating good food! ( Such as brownies, cheesecake brownies, and whoopie pies! [ yes... there was other food such as barbecue and the such but the brownies were WONDERFUL! ] :) 

Shakespeare practice... Ah.. as I think about that wonderful time last night I cringe in regret at the lack of my acting! Well, I suppose that I should correct that! It might not be the lack of acting but rather the lack of memorization that has produce the lack ( in my part ) thereof. I know that I can conquer my lines... perhaps I will start typing them and putting them on here... that might just help! ( and maybe encourage all my friends too! :) Although I love my lines, everyone has the hardest time taking me seriously with that wig that I wear... I mean... What 50 old man has Albany, curly, and "so" 70's style hair? :) I enjoy the, I guess you could call it, "picking" that I get... I guess that I just don't want to show it. :) As far as pictures go... I don't think I will put one up of the wig! :)

Lately, the Lord has been teaching me a few things... one thing is that life, school, and work, aren't what you would plan for yourself all the time. Yet, while things might not seem to be going the way I want, I am learning to see that God's ways are higher and that I can trust Him! Another thing that He is teaching me is to hand over my fears to him. Now, for those of you who don't know, I have a AMAZINGLY INTENSE FEAR of poison ivy. Part of that is the case that I had last fall that had both of my arms, most of my upper body ( except the back ), and most of my legs covered in poison, for a period of three/four weeks. ( The longest three/four weeks of my life! ) Now, this summer the Lord has brought many lawn mowing opportunities to me when I wasn't even looking for them! Praise him as I had been praying for a job. The only downfall to lawn mowing is frequently running in to, none other than the real deal, Poison Ivy. Ah....... I am so scared of that stuff but know that a "lawn business" is what God would have of me this summer. He provided the work and I need to hand those fears, no matter how valid they may be or seem to me, over to the Lord. Please pray with me that I will accept this and that I will hand this fear over to the Lord!

I am very thankful for the friends that the Lord has brought into my life and thank Him daily, when I remember you! ( Phl. 1:3 )

God bless and keep in touch! I have so many things I can post about so I hope to get some more posted soon! Such as, our recent trip to... oh.. never mind. I think I will wait to tell you! 

Spring is here!

Hey all!

Well, the winter has passed! Last Friday ushered in spring and it is BEAUTIFUL out! I am loving the weather and will post some pictures of the flowers later!

Another good thing about the spring ( and the following summer ) is not that School will be done, ( although that is a nice thing to have a break :) but that the grass will need mowed and with that means mowing business! YAH! I am excited to get mowing but it isn't quite time for "steady" mowing. I did the first mow yesterday and it should last a while. Come this summer though....... I think I will have a lot to mow!

I was reading this morning and came across a good quote... I enjoyed it! Here it is,

Fellowship with God will keep one from sin,

or sin will keep one from fellowship with God.

Hm... I can think on that for a while today!

I apologize that it has been so long since my last post. It just seems that with these last 2 school months coming up I might be too busy to post much! Oh... and in case you are wondering.... Schoolwork is what is keeping me SO busy! I know that most of those reading understand that! :) 

God bless!

Spring is in the air!

Today was the most BEAUTIFUL weather so we headed out to play while it was so nice. While out there we drew with Sidewalk chalk. Below is a picture that I drew and then LJ which I am going to tell you about below!

I also saw the most miraculous sight. FLOWERS! It was so nice to see a sign of spring coming up so I took some pictures. LJ ran in with the flowers and said to Mom, " Here you go Mommy, the first flowers! " How cute!

The Flowers

Really Neat Picture. ( At least in my opinion! :)

Yesterday, I was sitting down to work on blog. Change a few things, post a little, the normal. When I saw that I had a unread message in my inbox. It was an invitation to share a Scriblink page. Now I've used Scriblink when getting help with Chem, ( My teacher and I will work through trouble problems since it is an online whiteboard. ) but never for fun really. So some good friends invited me to share a whiteboard and here is the end result! This drawing was made with 2 of us using the traditional mouse and one using a "plug-in" pen. 

Nerissa and "Mom", you did GREAT! Thanks for all the help! I could not of made such an amazing drawing by myself! It's amazing how it came together! 

Snowmen!

Today I had the privilege to help LJ build a snowman!!! We had a great time despite some rough moments along the way. Among those rough moments was attempting to get the "upper body" on top of the "lower body" but I am getting ahead of myself!

First we started with lower part. That took a lot of effort to roll that out! Meanwhile "LJ" was rolling the top part out. You can see the size of the lower part with the picture below.

Next came the middle part. Now, I really miscalculated this one as I started off. I thought that the lower pat was perfect. Nice and big. The only problem being that, as I was the only one out there big enough to wrestle down those big parts, when it came time to lift the middle part up... which was only a wee bit smaller than the "lower" part, there was some serious difficulty. After my fugal attempts I did what I should of done in the first place, Called "Dad"! :) We proceeded to get a board and with a lot of effort managed to roll it up on top of the lower part! Sorry that there isn't a picture of that. I was helping get the middle up there. :) Here is a size comparison with the middle. Already it is almost as high as LJ!

Next Dad and LJ took off down towards the woods and looked for eyes and "buttons". Durning that time I began to construct a much more manageable sized Snowman! Dad had already lifted the head up for us. Thanks Dad for all the help! :)

Next... the nose. A carrot from the fridge should take care of that problem! The eyes are walnuts that Dad and LJ found on the ground with sticks for the traditional arms. LJ must feel pretty small now! :) Pine tree branches were our selection for the mouths.

The finished product as we wave to you all! ( Don't miss the post below. It's new too! :)