I Find That Very Pinteresting

Ahhh yes, I have become a Pinterest fan/follower/almost addict. There are some things I really like about this wonderful sight where I can find awesome things--well, I mean where other people have found awesome things for me, and all I have to do is "pin" them to an imaginary board (is it imaginary???) so I always know where they are. I have yet to score a direct pin. But, alas, maybe someday.

However like all good things there are pros and cons to this Pinteresting phenomenon. Here are a few I've found:

5 Great Things About Pinterest
1. Pinterest can spark your passion for God. Through pics and posters of great Scripture, you can find your heart renewed and excited about the things of God.
2. Pinterest can show you some great ways to show love to your spouse. I made a board simply called "Husband Love" and am filling it with things that remind me why I love my husband, things I can do or make to be sure I'm showing him that love.
3. Pinterest can help you better yourself as a parent. I love all the great ideas for activities, helps, tips, etc. that I'm finding that relate to parenting. Chore Charts, postive sayings, love notes, winter (summer, spring, fall) things to do with your kids. Get out of the rut and find some great ideas for free.
4. Pinterest can be a catalyst for bringing back the lost art of hospitality and entertaining. There are more than a bajillion ideas on how to have any kind of party, gathering, game night. . . .don't know what to do? Now you do.
5--Pinterest can motivate you to get healthy and fit. I have to admit, I get a little motivated by the slogans and sayings and Dr. Oz's list of foods you should have in your house. I'm eating a little better and moving a little more than I did before.


5 Not So Great Things About Pinterest

1. Pinterest can fool you into thinking you have passion for God. Pinning a page with a great scripture is not a substitute for digging into the treasure of God's Word and then living it out. Take Caution that you don't spend all your time "pinning", and find yourself stilling "pining" for the One who wants your heart most.
2. Pinterest can keep you from really loving your spouse. If what your man or woman really wants and needs is for you to spend some time with them-- like really talking or listening or going out sometime--Make sure you aren't spending those precious moments with a laptop pinning "How to Really Love Your Husband" pictures to a board. Reading about love and really loving ARE NOT the same thing. And one picture from someone else's life does not their life make. Yours either. Grass looking greener. . . .start taking care of your own yard.
3. Pinterest can mess up your head when it comes to being a parent. If you make the subtle mistake that a good parent is one who is doing all the stuff you see on Pinterest you are going to find yourself pinned to the wall, so to speak. You probably can't afford all the stuff you are pinning, and your kids don't need all the stuff you are pinning. Your kids need you, so turn off the computer and go play with your kids, oh, and read the Bible with them. Maybe you can share a verse you pinned!
4. Pinterest can actually keep you from entertaining. When you realize you don't have that many mason jars, and that fondant isn't really your friend, and that there is no way to keep up with the cyber Joneses who live, well who knows where they live but not down the block, you are likely to just forget having the real Joneses over. Besides who wants to have anyone over when you can just pin pictures about having people over. And then you won't have to clean your house or do the laundry.
5. Pinterest can motivate you to a false body image. As far I can tell, I'm seeing a lot of young (and older) women pinning pics of women who have been airbrushed and eating disordered to fame (I wanted to say "to death", which sadly is the truth, so I'm saying it anyway) . It's not real, it's not realistic, and it's not healthy.

So let's have fun, just be careful little eyes what you pin. . . .

From Vile to Smile

King David wrote Psalm 101:2-3 I will be careful to live a blamess life. . . I will walk in my house with a blameless heart. I will set before my eyes no vile thing.

vile   /vaɪl/ Show Spelled[vahyl] Show IPA adjective, vil·er, vil·est.
1. wretchedly bad: a vile humor.
2. highly offensive, unpleasant, or objectionable: vile slander.
3. morally debased, depraved, or despicable: vile deeds.
4. foul; filthy: vile language.

Convicted today that I could not write the same thing. Am amazed at how complacent I allow myself to become sometimes over mindless entertainment. I'm not a big watcher of vileness. But yet every now and then--like when I allow God to show me, I realize what in the world I settle for, and that I am every bit as debased as those who have created or produced the show. Man that makes me sad. . . .

Yet. . . .

Isaiah wrote Isaiah 43:25 for God, "I, even I, am He who blots out your transgressions for My own sake, and remembers your sins no more."
So thankful for a God who shows me where I'm wrong and has the ability to make me right again. And man, that makes me glad. . . . .

Praise the God who can take me from vile to a smile!!

Comin Out

Suffice it to say that as I read and reread the account of Lazarus's resurrection, I think it, now this is just me, but I think it no doubt took place not long before Jesus's resurrection so that they would understand/believe His ressurection which was to come. I mean they had seen people raised from the dead, and had heard accounts of people raised from the dead, but I think most of those were from people who had like just been dead a little bit. Not from people who were in the grave, for like, let's say 4 days, (or 3 days even). I have to say I love so much how God continually prepares us for the things to come which we have no idea are coming.

These passages have spurred me (like a rider on a stubborn mule) to ponder people's opinions. Even in the crowd that day it seemed like everyone had one. I'm teaching my 6th graders about hermeneutics right now and I can see in this passage how people looked at what was going on in the drama and perceived it from their own perspective and set of life circumstances. "Lord, you can do anyting, why didn't you keep this hard thing from happening to me?" "Jesus is crying. Look how much he loved Lazarus." "Oh! Jesus is crying. If he's the Son of God couldn't he have kept Lazarus from dying." (That rhymes--there is a possible Bible lesson rap in there) Knowing that I can be a woman of coffee opinions (strong and heated), makes me want to have the eyes and mind of Christ instead of the eyes and mind of Ms Dawn. Prayin much for transformation by the renewing of my mind, and the wisdom to keep a lot more of my opinions to myself.

Anyway, it's get so good after Martha's momentary break of not quite getting it again. Sometimes Martha is like me doing math. She gets it, she doesn't get it, she gets it, she doesn't get. And Jesus, well he's just Jesus. Now Martha, didn't I tell you, "whatever you do to the left side, you have to do to the right side." WAIT! That wasn't Jesus,that was Mr Jackson, my 9th grade algebra teacher. Jesus said, "Martha, I told you that if you just believed, you would see the glory of God. So put your believin pumps on and get ready to take this investment to the faith building bank." Okay, I added that last part just cuz it's early and I'm being silly.

So Jesus prays, outloud, for other people's benefit (take that Tebow haters) and then he does it. He calls Lazarus out of the tomb. WAIT! WAIT! WAIT! Before that, he has them move the stone. I don't know who "them" is, but "they" do it. "They" come out of the crowd, "they" come out to the tomb and "they" come out and move that stone. And as a result "they" come out witnesses of one of the greatest miracles of all time. BUT WAIT!! There's more. . .

As Jesus calls outs in a loud voice, no less, "Lazarus! Come out!" The Bible says, "Lazarus, came out!" He didn't come out of the tomb quite like Jesus. We see no record of neatly folded linens, but he comes out. It makes the think of the man at the pool of Siloam. . . .(Do you want to get well?) Lazarus, come out. It would have been ridiculous for Lazarus to have chosent his moment to not obey (which is actually sugar coated wording for "disobey" which we think sounds worse than "not obey" for some reason I can't explain, neither of which seems to sound as bad to us as rebellion which is really what we are doing when we disobey.) OOPS! Sorry for that momentary mathematially moment--- I was ADDing somethings up in my mind:)

I guess what I want to remember is that if I want to live, I need to come out when Jesus calls. I need to come out and follow. I need to come out and meet Jesus. I need to come out and tell others he is here. I need to come out and talk with Jesus honestly. I need to come out of my self centered opinions. I need to come out of the crowd. I need to come out and move some stones so someone else can live. I need to come out of death and into life--come out of my disbelief, fear, hurt, rebellion and I need to come out and see the glory of God.

Oh did I mention that when Lazarus comes out, Jesus tells "them" to "take off his grave clothes and let him go." Which reminds me, I need to COME OUT AND GO to all the world, making disciples, baptizing "them" and teaching "them" to obey all He has commanded, and He will be with me until the end of the age.

Martha Steward

Yeah, that's the right name. I'm still in the book of John and still reading about Lazarus. . . and Mary. . . and Martha. Martha Steward I have decided to call her, because she is the woman who gets things done! And like Thomas, she often gets the bad rap (is there any other kind--bahahahahaha) Anyway. . . .

Jesus comes to town to raise her brother from the dead (well she didn't know that yet) and when she hears he's made it, she heads out to meet him, while Mary stays at home. Martha finds Jesus, and speaks right up, "Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died." There you go, just lay that down on the Son of God. It's all your fault, Jesus. No matter what tone you imagine it in--anger, indignation, overwhelming grief, --she lays the blame directly at the feet of Jesus. BUT. . . . .she goes on to say, (and this is another place where a big but is a good thing) she says, "BUT, I know that even now God will give you whatever you ask."

Martha gets it!!! Obviously she's been thinking about more than just kneeding bread while she's been in the kitchen all those days. She KNOWS with her head and her heart that Jesus is God and that He can raise people from the dead. And that her brother could be one of them. She also seems to know that Jesus doesn't just do whatever we want. He does what is right and best and that we have to trust that. And she seems willing to do just that.

I see that our Martha Steward cooked up the recipe for great faith, and she is being a great steward of her faith. She is putting it into action by going to God knowing He can do what He says He can do. Look at what she's mixing up: She has a measure of ackowledgement of who God is, she has a pinch of transparency, and a load of boldness to approach the king of kings, blending through a personal relationship with him, and she is serving it up to Jesus right now.

I love that she knows that Jesus can do this, and yet when Jesus says, "Your brother will rise again." She says "I know he will rise again in the resurrection at the last day." See she understands living now and living forever. Hence the original Martha Steward Living!!!! She knew it wasn't about this life but the next. WORD!! Which means she obviously had some good Bible knowledge in her recipe as well (yeah I know they didn't have the Bible yet, but that's we call it in children's church.)

Then Jesus lays it out for her. These things she already knows. "Martha--I am the resurrection and the life. Anyone who believes in me will live even though he dies. And if you are still alive when I return and you are a believer, then you will never die. Martha, do you believe that?"

" Yes, Lord, I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God who has come into the world."
Now your cookin with oil, Martha. And then she laces up her good steward shoes and high tails it back to her sister Mary to tell her that Jesus is here. Martha, heard, she believed, she acted on her faith and she received a great reward (well more than one actually). And in my book, or note, that makes her the original Martha Steward, and now maybe we can remember for something else besides that day she got a little cranky in the kitchen.

Thomas--The Grown Man Disiciple

"Grown Man" is a term I've picked up from my son, Trevor. A simple saying that embodies the idea that some one is indeed, a man. For example, "Aaron Rodgers is a grown man." I'm pretty proud of the fact that my sons are indeed becoming, "Grown men." Men who aren't afraid to do man stuff in man ways. Today as I was reading in John, I couldn't help but think that the guy we've come to know as "Doubting Thomas" is also included in the "grown man club."

In a nut shell, Jesus gets news that Lazarus is sick, and Jesus hearing the news stays where he is two more days. No tyranny of the urgent for Jesus--but that's another note. After these couple of days he says to the disciples, "Let's go back to Judea." This is kind of a big deal since people in Judea have been trying to kill him--with stones, even. In fact just a few verses back it says, "they tried to seize him, but he escaped their grasp."

Those ever quick disciples felt the need to remind God himself that people that back in Judea had tried to kill him--like the Son of God forgets such things or can't handle them--and Jesus answers them with some cryptic riddle talk (which is also for another note) and tells them Lazarus has fallen asleep. (Bible code for dead and resting for heaven) Jesus says he needs to go wake him up.

Again, the quick witted discples respond with, "Lord, if he sleeps, he will get better." And Jesus, probably chuckling and rolling his eyes, explains to them that Lazarus isn't really sleeping, he's already dead, and that is was for their sake that he didn't go straight away to Lazarus so that when they see what goes down, they will believe, and that they need to quit talking and get on the road.

Then Thomas, (you go Thomas!--not a grown man thing to say, but whatever!) pipes up in what my brain imagines to be a slightly sarcstic tone--sort of like the one athletes use before they go out into a game they know they are going to get annihilated in--and says, "Let's go, that we may die with him."

Verse 17 begins with these words, "On his arrival. . . " which means they went. Which means Thomas went. Which means that our doubting, negative self talkin, sarcastic," holy cow we are all gonna die!", Thomas went, too. And that's the part I love. That's the part that, in my book, makes Thomas a "grown man." Because when he was afraid, when he doubted, when he had no idea what was going to happen, he followed Jesus anyway--knowing it was dangerous, knowing it could not end well, yet knowing somehow that because he was going with the Son of God no matter what happened it would be okay. And so he put one foot in front on the other and went to Judea where he witnessed what was probably the catalyst for every mummy movie ever made.

And so, Thomas the Grown Man is my inspiration today to follow even when it's dangerous, to follow even when I'm scared, to follow even when I have no idea how it's going to turn out because I know that it is better to be walkin with the Son of God iinto death and danger than to stay back alone. (which actually leads to a different kind of danger and death, but that, too, is another note!)

We Call It Football

This week we talked about Why We Worship. Three good reasons we learned about were 1--'Cause He's God 2--We were created to worship Him 3--You worship what you love and we love Jesus. Usually our game has a spiritual tie in. Today, we played foot-ball, and all the groups had a blast! They had to pass the ball with their feet and try to score in their goal. As we worship God we will be passing on how great He is to those around us resulting in victory for all who choose to get in the game!!!!!

Servin Up Fun (for some)

Lessons from Limbo

Last Wednesday night we began some lessons on Worship. As we talked about what worship is, we talked about how we need to bow our life before God. He needs to be first place. Sometimes in the movies, we see people who bow or curtsie before the king and queen to show them respect and honor--to show they are the most important in the kingdom. God is that and more. He is the king of kings and He is the MOST IMPORTANT in the world. We have to be careful not to put other stuff before Him.

So, that's why we played limbo. We began to bow ourselves down as low as we could go. To bow a little bit isn't so hard, but to bow down all the way, well, that is a different story.

Our kids always have a great time with limbo, but one thing I know. If we choose to worship God with our whole heart and keep Him #1 in our life, He promises us that our eternal future will never be in Limbo.

HiSKidZ Limbo

God is. . . .

Our revival theme for 2009 is God is. . . .

Now you can meet our revival team for 2009. Hunter, Justin, Jeremy, Stephanie and Connor will be coming March 15-18 to lead our Children's Revival. There may be a couple of others, too. So get ready, get rested, get inviting, get praying, and then get yourselves to Revival 2009.

God is. . . .gonna be there!

CUUUUUTTTTTEEEE!!!!

He's fluffy, but he's cute, and of course, he's ours. Maybe that's sort of how God sees us. Y'know? We may not look so appealing to some people, but because we are His, he loves us like nobody can understand. Someday we will, but not now, not me anyway. His love is just sooo big, and I'm amazed at how my scruffy, chapstick eating, garbage eating dog gives me glimpses of the love of God.

Smokey the Lion

Smokey needs a haircut so badly!!!! He looks like a lion, or just like a really freaky dog!

Jesus sends a Valentine

Look at this picture the Penfields sent me!!! After the last snow, when they looked out their window--ta da! This is what they saw in their tree!!! How cool is that!! I know you know Jesus loves you, and I want to remind you guys that I love you too! I am proud and excited and blessed to teach and love and hang out with all of you! Have a great day!!!!