Protest

I just read this story it caught my attention because this was my High School. It is a fairly large high school. The Westboro Baptist Church out of Topeka, KS is planning on doing a protest at the high school on Monday, March 2. I no longer live in Moore but the school is going to release the kids 15 mins early so hopefully the protesters won't be there yet.

This group has done a lot of protests, even at military funerals. I know that one of their big issues is homosexuality. While I don't agree with that lifestyle, protesting at a high school does not seem like it would help anything. I have seen other protests they have done at funerals and they yell and scream, most high school students are going to yell back or worse. It really does not make any sense to me to protest at a high school, unless they just want the media attention, which they will get I'm sure.

The proper way to show Gods love is with kindness. No one can convince me that if God were today he would go protest at different places to show his love. I am not sure what this group believes, but it is radically different from my christian beliefs.

Please keep these kids in your prayers. They will definitely need it.

Godly Wife

I have been thinking a lot about being a Godly wife lately. I read this post which explains it very well. I want to make sure that I am fulfilling my responsibility not only to my husband but to God as well. My husband and I have talked about this subject many times. I sometimes feel like I should be doing more than I am in the home, but it is not always possible to get everything done that you would like when you work outside of the home too.

We sat down and made a list together of the things that he would like to see done. I have been trying to work on the things that would please him and feel like I've been getting nowhere. After reading the post and doing some Bible study regarding this I realized that I am trying to work on this area myself. I have not been giving this to God to ask him for his help. You cannot be a Godly wife without Gods help.

If this is something that you have been struggling with yourself, I would encourage you to take it to God and also find out what is important to your husband. Something that you think is important to him may not be and you may beat yourself up trying to do something that doesn't mean anything to him. I have done this and its very frustrating. The things that I am working on are: Keeping the house clean, and putting the laundry away. One thing that I want done is the dished to be done every night. This doesn't matter as much to him, but it does to me, so usually if I don't get to the dishes he doesn't care too much and if I'm busy I try to get to the things that matter to him. Am I perfect? No way, but I do my best.

I'm Back

I am back from vacation. We had a really great time visiting some family. We had planned to stay in a hotel, but they insisted that we stay with them so that saved us quite a bit of money. They had some car trouble so we stayed an extra day so we could help them out. It was a very relaxing trip. Hopefully I will be able to set into a normal routine again soon.

I was supposed to have jury duty today but I was excused, so I am happy to be back to work. I was really worried about my paycheck in the coming weeks and everything is taken care of. I attribute that to God providing for us because we are faithful to tithe to him. So many people get upset when they go to church and they have a message about tithing. But that is something that we are required to do, and God always takes care of our needs when we are faithful to him. My husband ran all the oil out of his truck and it was running really rough so he took it for a oil change, they were amazed it was still running. I know its because God took care of us.

Drive Thru Difference

A local Christian radio station in Oklahoma and Kansas has a great idea to show Christian love on Black Friday. Its the Drive Thru Difference, I know some other nationwide Christian stations have promotions like this going on too. The basic idea is when your out on Black Friday and you go through a drive thru, consider paying for the person in line behind you. If I leave my house on Friday then I will give the cashier a track from my church to give to the person as well. I think this is just a great way to show others that even on this crazy day when people don't always act their best, Christians still do, and maybe it will make a difference in their life. Here is a link to my local station which explains it better than me. Does any one else have something like this happening in their area? Do you plan on taking part?

Luke 9:57-10:2

Our sermon Sunday morning was in Luke. We are starting to talk about Missions at our church. For the next 4 weeks we will have missionaries come in and tell us about where they are called to go. I enjoy listening to them and I am in awe at what they are giving up to follow God.

One of the things that stuck out to me was in Luke 9:62. It says "And Jesus said unto him, no man, having put his hand to the plow, and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God." What hit me was that he is saying you need to do his work wholeheartily. You cannot begin his work and look at what others are doing. You need to put yourself into his work fully, you cannot look back. Everyone in this passage had an excuse why they could not follow him right now. One wanted to bury his father, in the pastors study he found that his father had not died yet.

It really spoke to me because my husband and I have recently taken over a Wednesday night children's program. We love it, we love the children that come every week. Since we have taken this over I have really gotten a lot better in my daily walk with God. I feel like the children look up to me as an example and I need to strive to be the best example I can to them.

I want to be fit for the kingdom of God, not make an excuse when I am called to do something.

God is good

Last night when I left work, one of my tires was flat. I have an air compressor that I keep in my back seat. Its very small, you plug it into your lighter and it is very powerful (I highly recommend these for everyone). So I called my husband to ask him if he thought it would be ok to air it up and drive home on it. He said yes, so I started to get out my air compressor and get it all plugged up. A woman in a SUV drove by and asked me if I had a spare tire, I told her yes I did, then she asked if I needed any help changing the tire. I said no I could handle it. But the offer was so nice and really meant a lot to me. Had I needed to actually change the tire I definitely would have needed her help because I have never changed a tire. I have only observed. So I am thankful that she offered.

This morning when I got up the tire still had air in it so I figured it had a slow leak but I couldn't see nails or anything. One of my other tires has a slow leak in it, its on the drivers side so I air it up every couple days. So I took my car to a tire place not far from my house to ask them if they could find the leak and fix it. I knew that if both tires had to be replaced they are the cheapest, so I was figuring on spending $30-$50. They found the leaks and were able to fix them both so I only had to pay $10. I was so relieved. God is so good.

Just last night my husband and I were talking about money. I was starting to stress because we had planned on buying a fence so the money was in the checking account but we still haven't done it yet. I don't like money to sit in my checking account because then we are tempted to spend it. We just started a savings account about 3 weeks ago so we do have some money saved but it is supposed to be for vacation. The brakes on my husbands truck are grinding really bad and it has just started in the last week and has progressively gotten worse. So we have to get new brakes on his truck. He is just happy that we have the money to do it with, but I was stressing out about it. He pointed out that if this happened a couple months ago, we wouldn't be able to do it at all, so he is grateful that God has provided us with the funds to do so. We are finally getting our hearts right about money, it just taking longer with me. God is really good to us even though I don't deserve it.

Stolen

This morning I went out to my car to go to work and I found my glove box open. All the Cd's which I had in there were gone. I estimate about 15 or so and of course it was my favorite ones. Most of the Cd's I own are christian. Some of them I have put onto my ipod, others I have not gotten around to yet. I was very upset because I felt like all my personal things had been invaded. I was thankful that the air compressor sitting in the backseat in plain sight was untouched. The air compressor has come in very handy for filling up my tires and it works better than any I have ever used.

I never lock my car doors at home because I feel safe at my house. I don't keep anything of real value in my car. I don't believe that Cd's hold much resale value, but they were valuable to me. I love my music, it has helped me get through some tough times. I have been listening to Jami Smith, the song that was on when I started the car was Salt & Light. This song talks about being salt and light in this world and letting God shine through us. That hit me this morning as I pulled out of my driveway. I quickly got over my anger and prayed asking God to use the music on the Cd's for his glory. I will miss the music that I had and I hope that they will hate it and bring it back to me, but more importantly I hope God will use the music to work through this persons life.

Staying Home

When my husband and I got married 4 years ago I thought it was crazy when people asked if I was going to quit my job. I enjoy my job plus what would I do all day at home? We go to a small church and that was the standard. I had only gone to that church for a short time before we got married so I didn't have the same mindset as others. Now I desire to be at home, and I know exactly what I would do at home all day. My house seems like it is never clean. My husband goes to work very early but gets off by 10 am. I hate leaving for work knowing that he will be home in a couple hours but I won't be able to see him for 9 hours. I feel that while we wait on God to bless us with a child I should work to get our debt paid off. My goal is to be able to be financially free when I get pregnant so that I can quit my job. I know that money is not everything, but it seems to make more sense this way. Eventually I would like my entire paycheck to go into the savings so that I would feel better about quitting. While I desire to be at home I know that I should have my finances in order first. Just because I am not home all day long I still need to keep a clean home for my husband. I also need to be submissive to my husband. The Lord is working on me in these 2 areas of my life which I am thankful for.