Reset

“Today, we will not let the enemy win. Today, you argued and you whined and you rose from bed late. Yesterday, your chores were done with grumbling and half-hearted attempts at finishing.”

“Why are you here on this earth?”

“Why are YOU part of THIS family?”

“We will restart this day with praise and adoration from our lips. We will put aside our grumbling and complaining and reset our hearts to focus on what is really important.”

“We are not here for a halfhearted attempt at living life.”

“ALL for God’s glory. Even on the weekends. Even when it is hard to live with others and more importantly, with ourselves.”

http://www.septembermccarthy.com/2014/09/grumble-the-weekend-away-or-give-your-heart-a-re-set/

Winter Break

New favorite verse -- Jude 1:2
New favorite pretty-verse-print blog: http://www.frenchpressmornings.com/p/encouraging-wednesdays.html

Drinking just-barely-sweet milk tea and cuddling under blankets on cold winter nights = lovely.

Rediscovered my love of King Arthur stories this winter break. I sped-read through Gerald Morris's The Squire's Tale series in four days. Good for high ideals, sweet romance, snarky humor, heartracing adventures, and deep friendship. Fun lighthearted reading from the kid's section in the local library.

Also, who knew that so many books could be read online for free via the library's digital ebook collection? =D

Coming back to CBCHC is odd: older, kinda more mature, looked up to (in a different way) by kiddos I'd loved and taken care of when they were littler (now they're as big or bigger than me!), honorary aunties/uncles wanting to catch up. It's easy to revert back to who I was back in hs... and yet, I'm not the same. Main difference being that I learned for myself who Jesus is while away, and I can't be who I was anymore. But it's tempting to pretend and slip on that old good-girl self.

Also noticed that most all of my non-church friends here in EC are guys.

And I really like petting dogs. so so so much fun.

Love-interest drama. (side note: I'm much better at talking other ppl through things than I am at applying good relationship-concepts to myself >.<)

Family drama. Different from before. So many nuances to dysfunction. God of reconciliation, help!

Looking forward to going back to Houston on Sat. Miss HCC/GNC/CEF/Houston folks a whole bunch.

Snippets

Turn your eyes upon Jesus,
Look full in His wonderful face,
And the things of earth will grow strangely dim,
In the light of His glory and grace.


Heb 12:1-2

Brene Brown's I thought it was just me is a lovely book. Read it overnight. About shame and women and how do we process and how do we built resilience to shame. Really good. Lots of self-examination, and learning more nuanced vocabulary for describing feelings of inner turmoil and reaching out to give/receive empathy.

New definition for courage. ordinary courage (a heart word) "to speak one's mind by telling all one's heart" -- Contrast two kinds of courage: St George (slay the dragon) vs St Martha (befriend/tame the dragon). how do I deal with fear, shame, uncertainty, aloneness, guilt, worry?

I like super-fine-tip pens. so so much. Especially when the ink flows out smoothly, not in dribbles and drops.

Pumpkin is so good! And today is the day! to stock up on candy... =D

Not goodbye, but see you later.

Adoption

An excerpt from David Platt's sermon on Galatians 3:26-4:7

(Pastor David and his wife Heather adopted Caleb a couple years ago.)

Caleb is two and a half years old now, and his favorite question – you know what his favorite question is. A two and a half year old, what's his favorite question? Why – all the time, why, why, why. We do this little thing where I'll look at him and I'll point at him and I'll be like, "I love Caleb." 

And he'll start laughing and he'll point back at me and be, like, "I love Daddy." And we'll kind of go back and forth and we'll just get louder and louder and louder and just start laughing. It's just, you know, one of those things. And the other day this week we were doing that – "I love Caleb," "I love Daddy," and then we got laughing and he kind of caught his breath from laughing and he said, "You love me, Daddy?" 

And I said, "Yeah, I love you, buddy." And he looked back at me and he said, "Why?" And I said, "Because you're my son." He said, "Why?" And I paused. "You love me, Daddy? Why?" "Because you're my son." "Why?" Why is he my son? Why, out of all the children in the world, is this little guy that I'm playing with my son? And I start tearing up, getting emotional. Caleb doesn’t know what's going on. That's the last time he'll ask me why. 

He was just playing with his daddy, now his daddy's weeping, and I just look at him and I said, "Because we came to get you, buddy, and we wanted you in our family." Can I remind you that the God of the universe looks upon your life, church – not the person beside you, in front of you, or behind you. He looks upon your life and says, "I love you." "Why, God? Why would you love me?" "Because you're my son." "Why, God? Why am I your son?" "Because I came to get you. I came for you, and I wanted you in my family." 

This is good. It's good to be a son in the family of God. This is adoption.

Thank you, God, for adopting me as your child. for loving me. for saving me. I'm so sorry for the times I forget you or reject you or run away from you. These happen so so often. Thank you for chasing after me again and again, and saving me from myself. Thank you for salvation by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone. Praise be to you, God, the Lord of heaven and earth, my heavenly father.