God uses us in our weakness

so this morning i woke up and wasnt feeling so well. <----This is what I wanted to do all night, but I had committed to the fall fest, so I put on a bunny face and headed down! so let me just say that it was so much fun and totally worth it! such a blessing, seriously...there were at least 5,000 people that came in and we totally had awesome witnessing opportunities. anyways, i just would like to say that it is sometimes in those moments when we feel least like serving, that God uses us the most!

biblical femininity

I am currently reading a book called "Feminine Appeal:Seven Virtues of a Godly Wife and Mother" by Carolyn Mahaney. Before I start to explain the part that I have read before, I really want to recommend it to all women...young and old, single and married alike. It truly is life-changing I can promise you that! The book is based on Titus 2 which says:

Titus 2:3-5
3Likewise, teach the older women to be reverent in the way they live, not to be slanderers or addicted to much wine, but to teach what is good. 4Then they can train the younger women to love their husbands and children, 5to be self-controlled and pure, to be busy at home, to be kind, and to be subject to their husbands, so that no one will malign the word of God.

Here are the 7 Virtues;
-The Delight of Loving Your Husband
-The Blessings of Loving Your Children
-The Safety of Self Control
-The Pleasure of Purity
-The Honor of Working at Home
-The Rewards of Kindness
-The Beauty of Submission

It gives women a clear vision of what true biblical feminity is supposed to look like. She provides honest guidance to women of all ages.

I am only three chapters into it and it is absolutely amazing.

I was asked to read it, and at first I was thinking, "how is this going to apply to me?"...but after the first chapter, I was so encouraged and so eager to move on.

I will post a review when I am done!

Have a wonderful week!

Amazing Grace

Chris Tomlin has a new CD...this song is amazing!

Amazing grace
How sweet the sound
That saved a wretch like me
I once was lost, but now I'm found
Was blind, but now I see
'Twas grace that taught my heart to
fearAnd grace my fears relieved
How precious did that grace appear
The hour I first believed
My chains are goneI've been set freeMy God,
my Savior has ransomed me
And like a flood His mercy reignsUnending love,
Amazing grace
The Lord has promised good to me
His word my hope secures
He will my shield and portion be
As long as life endures
The earth shall soon dissolve like snow
The sun forbear to shine
But God, Who called me here below
Will be forever mine
Will be forever mineYou are forever mine

I truly am so amazed at the amazing grace that Christ has shown to us. We were bought at a price! We aren't our own. That is a tough concept to grasp and a hard lesson to learn, but this amazing God who sent His son to die for you and me, is worthy and deserves our unending praise.

Encouragment

So I recently saw a movie called "FACING THE GIANTS". The movie was one of the best movies I have ever seen and was definitely the most encouraging. I have never been able to walk away from a movie feeling that encouraged! Go see it!

LEAVE ROOM FOR GOD
"When it pleased God...." Galatians 1:15

As servants of God, we must learn to make room for Him--to give God "elbow room". We plan and figure and predict that this or that will happen, but we forget to make room for God to come in as He chooses. Would we be surprised if God came into our meeting or into our preaching in a way we had never expected Him to come? Do not look for God to come in a particular way, but do look for Him. The way to make room for Him is to expect Him to come, but not in a certain way. No matter how well we may know God, the great lesson to learn is that He may break through in at any minute. We ten dto overlook this element of surprise, yet God never works in any other way. Suddenly---God meets our life---"...when it pleased God..."

Keep your life so constantly in touch with God that His surprising power can break through at any point. Live in a constant state of expectancy, and leave room for God to come in as HE decides.


-oswald chambers

Goodbye to the Mouse

So last night was officially my last night at disneyland :(. No more splashing on splash mountain, no more terror on the tower, no more flying with peter pan, no more johnny depp on pirates, and no more fireworks...so sad. I'll miss the happiest place on earth, A LOT. I have so many memories there. I think I went this year more then I have in my entire life. I'll miss it. Goodbye to the mouse.

The Voice of the Nature of God

"I heard the voice of the Lord saying, 'Whom shall I send? And Who will go for us?'" --Isaiah 6:8

When we talk about the "call" of God in our lives, we often forget the most important thing in that, the nature of Him who calls us. There are many things calling each one of us today. Some of these calls will be answered, and others won't even be heard! The call is the expression of the nature of the One whol calls, and we can only recognize the call if that same nature is within each one of us. The call of God is the expression of God's nature, not our own. God providentially weaves the threads of his call through our lives, and only we can distinguish them. It is the threading of God's voice directly to us over a certain concern in our lives, and useless to seek another person's opinion of. Our dealings over the call of God should be kept exclusively between ourselves and Him alone.

The call of God is not a reflection of my nature; my personal desires and temperatment are of NO concern. As long as I dwell on my own qualities and traits and think about waht I am suited for, I will never hear the call of God. But when God brings us to that place of being in the right relationship with Him, we will be in the same condition as Isaiah. Isaiah was so tuned into God because of the crisis he had endured, that the call of God penetrated deep in His soul. The majority of us can't even hear anything God says.

Be brought to that place where you can hear the call of God and you will be profoundly changed!

(Oswald Chambers)

Plastic People

I recently was driving in my car and a song that I hadn't heard in a long time came on the radio. "Stain Glass Masquerade" by Casting Crowns. So I'm listening to the words, and I just about start crying...I start thinking. It is so true. So often in today's churches we wear a "mask" we have to pretend like we are these perfect strong people who dont need help from anyone, sometimes even including God, or that we dont have any weaknesses, any faults, any problems. But that is SO far from the truth! We are humans. We are all desperate. We are all sinners. We are all facing struggles (some big and some small). We all hurt. We all cry. And most importantly we all need Christ. But we all need each other too. We are called to love one another as Christ loved us, and to bear one anothers burdens.

We are so often scared to show others, in the church especially, who we really are. To let our guards down. TO show our flaws. To ask for help, to seek encouragement, to seek prayer, and to allow others to come in and really just be there for us. We seem to be living on a "stage" and performing when we are in the church, yet when we go home, the costume comes off, the curtain drops, and we become the people we really are.

It's okay to be hurting. It is okay to have weaknesses. Be encouraged that in our weakness He is strong. Lets be examples, Godly examples to the world that we too hurt, and we too aren't perfect, but we can offer them in their despair the same hope we have...a hope of Christ and His return. Let's stop being these plastic people, we aren't barbies are we?, and instead be REAL!

Below are the lyrics:
Is there anyone that fails
Is there anyone that falls
Am I the only one in church today feelin’ so small
Cause when I take a look around
Everybody seems so strong
I know they’ll soon discoverThat I don’t belong
So I tuck it all away, like everything’s okay
If I make them all believe it, maybe I’ll believe it too
So with a painted grin, I play the heart again
So everyone will see me the way that I see them
Are we happy plastic people
Under shiny plastic steeples
With walls around our weakness
And smiles to hide our pain
But if the invitation’s open
To every heart that has been broken
Maybe then we close the curtain
On our stained glass masquerade
Is there anyone who’s been there
Are there any hands to raise
Am I the only one who’s tradedIn the altar for a stage
The performance is convincing
And we know every line by heart
Only when no one is watchingCan we really fall apart
But would it set me free
If I dared to let you see
The truth behind the personThat you imagine me to be
Would your arms be open
Or would you walk away
Would the love of Jesus
Be enough to make you stay?

halloween...

Many Christians find themselves asking the question...is it okay if I participate in Halloween, or to what extent can I participate? Here is an interesting article, read it and then think about it...then make your decision, you might find that it will change. Remember we are to glorify God in all we do.

""Everything is permissible"—but not everything is beneficial. "Everything is permissible"—but not everything is constructive." ---1 Corinthians 10:23

Halloween for Christians?

Gregory Koukl

Find out what Greg thinks about celebrating Halloween. How does this differ from Christmas and Easter?

Halloween is coming up in a few days and I always get a spate of calls on that weekend from people who want to know if they should let their children participate in Halloween or not.

I actually have mixed feelings about it.

On the one hand, this is a bit of genuine Americana. It's part of our heritage, the culture we grew up in. It's not really seen as a religious thing anymore. Never was, really, by Americans, at least. It started out that way, apparently, in Europe, and a lot of things associated with Halloween - the occult themes, the Jack-o-lanterns, the costumes, the trick-or-treating, the giving of candy - all of these seem to have their origins in occult rituals of the past, many going back to the ancient Celts in Great Britain. So many Christians are, understandably, uncomfortable with the notion of letting their children participate.

Yet at the same time this is a holiday kids really look forward to. I did. In fact, I used to keep my candy all the way through to Easter, or longer. I'd just nurse it along, hang onto it, hide it away, and nibble on it forever. I especially looked forward to those great places, and we knew the houses that give you real, full-sized candy bars. Not just the puny wrapped candy bar chunks. You know what I mean, the real McCoy. Boy, we loved that kind of stuff.

Apparently, all the rumors of razor blades in apples and poisoned candy all that stuff, statistically doesn't actually happen much. It was a big fear in the past, but I think it might have been an urban legend, but it's not a concern today. That kind of thing almost never happens.

So someone might say, "Look, I had a great time with Halloween when I was a kid. I have great memories. It was a chance to get my hands on some great candy our family couldn't afford. And it was fun walking through the neighborhood with the other kids. Why should I rob my kids of that experience? It seems cruel to punish our kids for some empty religious superstition. What do I tell my neighbors? When I say, 'I'm not going to let my kids celebrate that occult holiday,' I start looking some kind of a nut. And your kids are looking up at you asking, 'Why do you take all the fun out of life?'"

I guess that I would have to say that I'm somewhat middle of the road on this issue. But I have to clarify what I mean by that.

On the one hand, there are a lot of holidays we celebrate now, like Christmas in December, that are holidays linked on the calendar with some pagan event. Christmas corresponded with the saturnalia, a pagan holiday.

The Church has had a habit over the years of flourishing in pagan environments by robbing the pagans of their holidays, in a sense, and investing them with new religious content. Frankly, I think that's a great idea. By the way, the Jews did the same thing with circumcision. The Egyptians practiced it for other reasons before them. God Himself gave it a new circumcision application.

I was trained as a missionary and I've been in a number of different countries doing missionary work in one capacity or another. One of the things that we learned is that it is a good idea to take a cultural form that is meaningful to the people, strip it of its negative content, its religiously offensive elements, and invest it with Christian value and Christian meaning.

The book Peace Child by Don Richardson, is a great example of that. Richardson used a cultural form, the concept of the "peace child," as a springboard for the gospel. He used it with the aboriginal people in Irian Jaya to communicate truth about the gospel and to bring them to Christ in a way he never would have been able to do otherwise. This is called a redemptive analogy. In fact, it really was the turning point, the thing that opened that tribe up to Christ.

Now you¹re asking, "How can that be done with an occult holiday like Halloween?" I'm not sure that there is a way we can capture Halloween as a way of communicating the gospel, per se. But certainly it seems possible to me for us to capture the date and use aspects of the celebrations that are not a problem for Christianity, say, celebrating with a party with the kids and dressing up in costumes, getting candy and having fun. I'm fully open to that. I don't believe that just because kids celebrate with costumes on October 31st they're participating in something evil.

By the way, did you know that October 31 is Reformation Day? See, there's all kinds of things you can celebrate on that day and not be involved in the occult. On October 31st in 1517, Martin Luther nailed his 95 Theses on the door of the University Church in Wittenberg, Germany. That was "officially" the beginning of the Reformation, though there were lots of things happening prior to that that led up to the Reformation.

So, you can celebrate Reformation Day on October 31st, and I guess in Lutheran churches around the country you'll have people singing "A Mighty Fortress is Our God" and "Onward Christian Soldiers" and all those great Lutheran hymns.

But even if you're not Lutheran, I think that there is a legitimacy to robbing the pagans of Halloween, so to speak. But we have to be careful.

There is a difference, I think, between celebrating on Halloween night in some "sanctified" sense, and celebrating Christmas or Easter.

All three of them are associated in some way with pagan holidays. Jesus wasn't born on December 25. It's not His birthday. He was probably born some time in the spring. I don't even know if He rose from the dead in the spring around the time of Easter. But that's inconsequential. We're celebrating the event, not the date.

The date is meant to coincide with the dates of the other pagan holidays to give an alternative for those pagan holidays. When we put up a Christmas tree and we give presents to each other, there is a different meaning for us than when they celebrated the saturnalia in pagan rituals in the past. We have invested entirely new meaning to the day.

The same with Easter. I am not at all bothered by giving Easter eggs, although I understand people used to do Easter eggs as a fertility ritual with a bunny rabbit. But that's not what we're about. We're celebrating the resurrection of Christ and the eggs are somewhat incidental.

But Halloween is different because it's not a Christian celebration on a pagan holiday. It's actually a pagan event itself. Therefore, I don't think I would send my kids out trick or treating and I'll tell you why. In Halloween there is a participation not just in the date, but in the specific forms of the pagan enterprise. Virtually all the ghoulish kinds of things that are represented and playfully celebrated on Halloween represent something occult, and I am not comfortable with that.

The second thing is that one wonders why it is that many people in our culture simply do not take the occult seriously. It strikes me it may be that we spend one evening a year going out of our way making light of the occult, and that might have something to do with it. So you ask people about Satan and they say, "That's the guy with the red tights and the pitchfork, right?" They don't realize that Satan is a real, powerful spiritual force that makes a difference in the lives of people and in the lives of nations every single day. It's hard to take the devil seriously when we picture him this way. So a celebration of Halloween in that fashion I think makes light of the occult, and when that happens people take lightly a very serious and dangerous thing.

So where's the balance? Here's what I suggest. I'll tell you what I would do with my kids on Halloween. I'd have a celebration of some kind. Frankly, many churches have them and they call them Harvest Celebrations. They have a place where you can bring the children dressed up in costumes with the only limitation that there are no occult themes. The kids go walk from booth to booth competing in games, some invented and constructed by members of the church. It's not classic carnival stuff where you knock down the bottles and you get a prize or something. It's different, usually, more creative. The church spends a couple of weeks preparing for it and building the booths and it's a lot of fun. It's fun for the family. You can get your kids' pictures are taken on a bale of hay, and when you go from booth to booth, the kids get candy or something to fill their bags with. You get all the good stuff in a very wholesome environment and none of the nasty stuff. Perfect.

By the way, you don't have to be a Christian to attend these. Usually the churches that do these affairs make them wide open to the community. This gives an added advantage to Harvest Parties because there are folks not associated with Christianity who are just a little uncomfortable with Halloween, who also want to find a place to take their kids where it's safe and wholesome. This gives the opportunity for people who aren't normally involved with church to mix with Christians and possibly hear something that they hadn't heard before that Jesus cares for them, and that He has forgiveness for their sins, and that they can lead a new life with Him.

Sure, in some cultures harvest celebrations were a time of thanking pagan gods. But that doesn't matter. You can thank God without thanking the "gods." You can have a Harvest Celebration and thank the true Lord of the Harvest, the one who actually provided the earth, and the sun, and the moon, and the stars, and the rain, and the wind, and the seeds, and all of the harvest that you get from what He has given you.

The Happiest Place on Earth

So tonight was amazing...well of course you wouldn't expect anything less with three of the most wonderful people in the world (Chrissy, Ash, and Nikki). We all hadn't been to the happiest
place on earth in a while and had a great time. We went on Tower of Terror (a typical favorite), but for some reason, maybe we just "weren't in the mood" it was scarier then ever. I don't know why. All of our tummies seemed to have left our bodies for the time. But of course it was super fun. Disneyland was great too...its all decked out with pumpkins everywhere...cute little mickey pumpkins. After dland we decided to make a stop at IHOP for some traditional breakfast foods...haha. Ash got some amazing cheap tasting food for a great price, Chrissy became the crayon lady, I enjoyed the strawberry syrup and Nikki, well Nikki got her hair brushed with a fork...ahahaha. I love you girls so much! Another incredible adventure with the fabulous four.