UPS knocked on our door and there was a box from Aunt Bethie, Uncle Kirk, and cousins Sarah and Anna. It said Disney in big letters: you know if it is from Aunt Bethie and says Disney it is going to be good- and it was!
The girls got two new dress up outfits to take with us. Emma was given the most amazing Cinderella dress and Olivia was given the most beautiful Ariel costume. I couldn’t take my eyes off the outfits.
thanks aunt bethie. we will take lots of pictures! we love you
and it is not a good one! Cord has started taking his diaper off while he is in his bed. Argh! Over the past several days, we have discovered him in his bed with his wet diaper on the floor. We first thought it was a one-time-event. Then we tried to put him in a onesie under his pajamas. He still took his pants off and pulled his diaper out of the side of his onesie. I am going to need some help here- any ideas for little boys who take their diapers off and get their beds a mess?
This Thursday night at 7 pm at the Zumbachs’ we will be studying Chapters 14-16 of Respectable Sins. The next chapters are on Impatience, Irritability, and Anger. Wow.
Just to give you a warm up- here are some quotes from the author, Jerry Bridges,”Impatience is a strong sense of annoyance at the (usually) unintentional faults and failures of others.” Irritability is described as ” the frequency of impatience, or the ease with which a person can become impatient over the slightest provocation.” And finally , Anger is “a strong feeling of displeasure, and usually antagonism…often accompanied by sinful emotions, words and actions hurtful to those who are the objects of the anger.”
Some things we will consider are whether circumstances or people’s actions can cause us to be impatient, irritable, or angry or whether they merely provide an opportunity for our hearts to be revealed. We will look at how our Soveriegn God has used difficult situations to teach us more about Him and the Christian life. We will look at what the Bible has to say about these topics and we will look at how we can encourage one another in this battle. I hope you can join us!
Our family celebrates Valentine’s Day by eating lunch together- We eat food that fits the theme:
My favorite part is when we share what we love about one another. I help some of the children and Eric helps the others. We read them out loud and save them so that the kids can look at them whenever they want. The ones from the babies are always funny (since they were written by the parents!) This year Olivia wrote her own which was really special. Emma’s were so sweet- I had to share one.
This is a picture of Emma’s note to Lucy- It says,”I love that your smiles are pretty and that God put you together in the right way that He wanted to.” Each one of hers in filled with compliments and genuine gratitude. Of course, I cried (as did emma). I think that girl got a double dose of my family’s genes. 
Praise the Lord for Love- It is a good gift that He shares with us.
The last session from the women’s conference this weekend was about little Samuel in 1 Samuel3. Samuel had a useful heart because he received God’s word. Scripture requires hearers. Paige reminded us how often God says,”remember what you have heard” or “those who have ears to hear, let them hear”. We don’t automatically receive the Word just because we hear it in our ears; we have to hear it with our heart. How many biblestudies have you sat through? How many notebooks have you filled with notes? Obedience is not going to the biblestudy- it is doing what you learned in the biblestudy. She reminded us that we can tell the fruit of our heart by our response- if we receive his word or not.
She laughed about the times that she would work with girls in college ministry who would say about some situation they had gotten into,”I know, I know. I know I shouldn’t have done that.” Her point is this is the worst defense. To know- and to not do. It would be better not to know. Knowing the truth and not doing what it says produces a hardness of heart.
The beautiful part of this Scripture is that Samuel doesn’t call God. God calls Samuel. In fact, ”the Lord calls” many times. God is a pursuing God- a God who forges relationship with us. Samuel, a small boy, did not merit or earn God’s calling, but he was in a place and a position to hear him. And his response was,”Here I am.” and “Speak Lord for your servant is listening.” Is that my response when I hear God’s word? Am I in places where I can hear God’s Word? Am I listening? Am I useful?
She ended by reminding us again that the most important thing about us is our heart. No matter what your circumstances today- It is a matter of your heart.
Tonight we celebrated Emma’s 5th birthday. She wanted a joint party with her grandmother who also has a February birthday. I knew this was the night that I wanted to tell the girls about going to Disney. All of Emma’s presents (the main thing being the trip itself) were related to Disney. We ate dinner and had a pink cake that we decorated with Disney characters.
Then Emma opened her first present- a book that she needed Olivia to help her read.
It was an autograph book the said,”Disney World 2009″
The next three pictures are what the girls looked like as they piece together that we are taking the trip.
Emma started crying. It was so very precious that she understood what a big deal it was.
I can’t wait!
Session 2 of the conference on Saturday was about Eli’s compromised heart in 1 Samuel 2. Her opening illustration was about Milli Vanilli. so funny. She reminded us how they faked their singing and were exposed. Her point was what good is a singer that can’t sing. In this text, what good is a high priest who doesn’t have a heart that follows God. She reminded us of how dark this period in the Old Testment was. The period of the Judges was full of terrible, ugly, public sin and in the midst of that, Eli must have thought his wasn’t that bad. Her application: Don’t we do that? Consider the two tables of the ten commandments. The first four deal with how we relate to God and the last six deal with how we relate to others in light of our relationship to God. Yet, who of us thinks that not honoring the Lord’s day or taking the Lord’s name in vain is on the same level as murder? We just don’t take our worship of God as seriously as we should. Her quote was,”These sins make us yawn, they made them (eli and sons) die.”
She showed us through Eli’s heart that God’s judgment of their sin was that God gives them over to their sin. Sin actually becomes the judgment He uses. “You don’t want God, you don’t get God. You don’t want to give weight to His name but would rather honor and give weight to your own name, you get weight and honor” and Eli ends us dying under his own literal weight. The result of compromise in your life is the curse of your own choices. One of my favorite lines was when she challenged us about the idea that we often say, even when we know something is wrong or against God’s word, ” I have a real peace about this.” She immediately reminded us about Jonah. He was directly disobeying and running from God on a ship to Tarshish and a storm rocked the boat and all were afraid, except one. Jonah was at peace and asleep. Peace or how we feel has to be compared to God’s Word and if they are contradictory, God’s Word wins! Are there things that you are keeping, holding on to, that you won’t part with even though you know what is right? The curse may be that God lets you keep them and they are your undoing.
Oh there was so much more..even on this one idea. But next time we will look at the third session.
Today I had the privilege of hearing Paige Benton Brown at Christ Presbyterian Church in Nashville. Paige spoke on our hearts- that which matters most to God. She looked at 1 Samuel 1 and 2 and 3. From each chapter, she highlighted a heart condition that we can have. The first was a desperate heart like Hannah’s heart in 1samuel 1. In the stress and disappointment in Hannah’s life, amidst a situation that she could not change, she turns to her God- she collapses at His feet with her prayers. Paige reminded us that we live in a society that likes to cover up rather than collapse. We see someone who is struggling in life and we congratulate them if he looks like he is holding it all together. Collapsing in front of our God is not lack of faith, rather it is evidence of faith. Where do you turn when you are desperate? Hannah leaves her prayer a changed woman (Before she knows how God will answer it!) Since we know that God does not grow ( He does not grow more loving, more knowlegeable, more powerful), we learn that prayer makes US grow- more dependent and more confident and more like His heart. I cannot do her teaching justice in this small space, but I will share the rest in the next two posts.
Emma has really enjoyed making goodies when she comes home from Pre K while the little two are asleep. Thank goodness we have had reasons to make things but have not had to keep them in this house! She made a great cake for my step-father, Bill. We decorated it and mom took it back to Birmingham with her for his birthday. It was the least we could do considering all the time that we have mom here!
