It's my unbirthday today! I'm now 13 1/2. Last night we celebrated three birthdays...Trever's, mine, and Greg's. We went out to eat at China Pan then came back here for cake and ice cream. Today we had a pastoral candidate preach at church. The congregation voted for him, so now we wait to hear his answer. Just praying for God's best for him and for us. The other highlight of the day has been NON-STOP blowing of my nose with many sneezes thrown in for good measure. Jon has the crud, too, so we're both fairly miserable. It's not as bad as the sore throat, though!!!
Jon has the week off and will be doing some work at the parsonage as well as fulfilling some other plans he's made. I'm back to work tomorrow probably...with my own Puffs. I hope all of you have a great week and we'll be in touch!!
Sunday, February 28, 2010
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
More From "Streams in the Desert"
Second post today...wanted to share the devotional for today, February 24, in "Streams in the Desert".
"You may be very discontented with yourself. You are no genius, have no brilliant gifts, and are inconspicuous for any special faculty. Mediocrity is the law of your existence. Your days are remarkable for nothing but sameness and insipidity. Yet you may live a great life.
John did no miracle, but Jesus said that among those born of women there had not appeared a greater than he.
John's main business was to bear witness to the Light, and this may be yours and mine. John was content to be only a voice, if men would think of Christ.
Be willing to be only a voice, heard but not seen; a mirror whose surface is lost to view, because it reflects the dazzling glory of the sun; a breeze that springs up just before daylight, and says, 'The dawn! The dawn!' and then dies away.
Do the commonest and smallest things as beneath His eye. If you must live with uncongenial people, set to the conquest by love. If you have made a great mistake in your life, do not let it becloud all of it; but, locking the secret in your breast, compel it to yield strength and sweetness.
We are doing more good than we know, sowing seed, starting streamlets, giving men true thoughts of Christ, to which they will refer one day as the first things that started them thinking of Him; and, of my part, I shall be satisfied if no great mausoleum is raised over my grave, but that simple souls shall gather there when I am gone and say,
'He was a good man; he wrought no miracles, but he spake words about Christ, which led me to know Him for myself.'" George Matheson
"You may be very discontented with yourself. You are no genius, have no brilliant gifts, and are inconspicuous for any special faculty. Mediocrity is the law of your existence. Your days are remarkable for nothing but sameness and insipidity. Yet you may live a great life.
John did no miracle, but Jesus said that among those born of women there had not appeared a greater than he.
John's main business was to bear witness to the Light, and this may be yours and mine. John was content to be only a voice, if men would think of Christ.
Be willing to be only a voice, heard but not seen; a mirror whose surface is lost to view, because it reflects the dazzling glory of the sun; a breeze that springs up just before daylight, and says, 'The dawn! The dawn!' and then dies away.
Do the commonest and smallest things as beneath His eye. If you must live with uncongenial people, set to the conquest by love. If you have made a great mistake in your life, do not let it becloud all of it; but, locking the secret in your breast, compel it to yield strength and sweetness.
We are doing more good than we know, sowing seed, starting streamlets, giving men true thoughts of Christ, to which they will refer one day as the first things that started them thinking of Him; and, of my part, I shall be satisfied if no great mausoleum is raised over my grave, but that simple souls shall gather there when I am gone and say,
'He was a good man; he wrought no miracles, but he spake words about Christ, which led me to know Him for myself.'" George Matheson
The Crud
It's my turn. Sore throat, fever, and a day at home today. At least Jon won't catch it from me!!
Saturday, February 20, 2010
No Second Causes
As you probably know, one of my favorite authors in Hannah Whitall Smith. I just finished reading "The Unselfishness of God", and I love this quote:
"Every fear, every perplexity, every anxiety, find an all-satisfying answer in God--He Himself, what He is in nature and character. His ways, or His plans, or even His promises, we may misinterpret or misunderstand, but goodness of character we cannot mistake, and it is the character of God that is our resting-place....
It was not that life was to have no more trials, for this wise and loving will might see that trials were a necessary gift of love. Neither was it essential that we should be able to see the Divine hand in every trial, since my common sense told me that He must still be there, for a God who is omnipresent could not help being present somewhere, even in a trial, and being in it, He would of course be there to help and bless.
We are not wise enough to judge as to things, whether they are really in their essence joys or sorrows, but the Lord knows; and, because He loves us with an unselfish and limitless love, He cannot fail to make the apparently hard, or cruel, or even wicked thing, work together for our best good. I say 'cannot fail' simply because it is an unthinkable thing to suppose that such a God as ours could do otherwise.
It is no matter who starts our trial, whether man, or devil, or even our own foolish selves, if God permits it to reach us, He has by this permission made the trial His own, and will turn it for us into a chariot of love which will carry our souls to a place of blessing that we could not have reached in any other way. I saw that to the Christian who hides in the fortress of God's will, there can be no 'second causes', for nothing can penetrate into that fortress unless the Divine Keeper of the fortress shall give it permission; and this permission, when given, means that He adopts it as being for our best good."
"Every fear, every perplexity, every anxiety, find an all-satisfying answer in God--He Himself, what He is in nature and character. His ways, or His plans, or even His promises, we may misinterpret or misunderstand, but goodness of character we cannot mistake, and it is the character of God that is our resting-place....
It was not that life was to have no more trials, for this wise and loving will might see that trials were a necessary gift of love. Neither was it essential that we should be able to see the Divine hand in every trial, since my common sense told me that He must still be there, for a God who is omnipresent could not help being present somewhere, even in a trial, and being in it, He would of course be there to help and bless.
We are not wise enough to judge as to things, whether they are really in their essence joys or sorrows, but the Lord knows; and, because He loves us with an unselfish and limitless love, He cannot fail to make the apparently hard, or cruel, or even wicked thing, work together for our best good. I say 'cannot fail' simply because it is an unthinkable thing to suppose that such a God as ours could do otherwise.
It is no matter who starts our trial, whether man, or devil, or even our own foolish selves, if God permits it to reach us, He has by this permission made the trial His own, and will turn it for us into a chariot of love which will carry our souls to a place of blessing that we could not have reached in any other way. I saw that to the Christian who hides in the fortress of God's will, there can be no 'second causes', for nothing can penetrate into that fortress unless the Divine Keeper of the fortress shall give it permission; and this permission, when given, means that He adopts it as being for our best good."
Wednesday, February 17, 2010
Hump Day
Hump day!! I'm glad there are only 2 work days left this week. Yesterday I only worked a half day after going to a funeral in the morning. We've caught 5 mice within 6 feet of my desk in the last couple of weeks. UUGGHHH!!!! Glad they are caught...wish they didn't exist!!!!
I came home from meeting with my Wednesday night group and Jon was called out on an outage about the same time. He had a rough day and is ready to BE DONE!!! We're still waiting for some kind of news about getting the ball rolling for his carpal tunnel surgery. I think he'll be relieved just to have it scheduled. Next week he'll be in Des Moines Monday till Friday...I hope the break will be good for him and for his hand!
Thought for the day
"We throw open our doors to God and discover at the same moment that He has already thrown open His door to us. We find ourselves standing where we always hoped we might stand--out in the wide open spaces of God's grace and glory, standing tall and shouting our praise." Romans 5:2 The Message
I came home from meeting with my Wednesday night group and Jon was called out on an outage about the same time. He had a rough day and is ready to BE DONE!!! We're still waiting for some kind of news about getting the ball rolling for his carpal tunnel surgery. I think he'll be relieved just to have it scheduled. Next week he'll be in Des Moines Monday till Friday...I hope the break will be good for him and for his hand!
Thought for the day
"We throw open our doors to God and discover at the same moment that He has already thrown open His door to us. We find ourselves standing where we always hoped we might stand--out in the wide open spaces of God's grace and glory, standing tall and shouting our praise." Romans 5:2 The Message
Sunday, February 14, 2010
Sunday Potpourri
We had a good Sunday. Pastor Murdoch was here to preach and really connected with all of the congregation...more so than I've ever seen any time he's been here before. He preached on the four kinds of faith...head faith (knowledge only), dead faith (no fruit in the life), devil's faith (fully knowing the truth but not committing to it), and saving faith (full commitment). Good stuff. Afterwards we went to Dallas and Lois's for lunch and visit with Doc. Great food and conversation. Did some cleaning after we got home and back to watching the Olympics IN HD!!! WOOHOO!!!!
Hope you enjoy the new elements on my blog. The search bar at the top will let you put in a word and find its every occurrence on my blog. There is a calendar, a piano to play, penguins that you can lead around with your mouse (fun to spin), some nature sounds that you can listen to, and an aquarium, though it's not working at the moment. It may have to go bye-bye.
Jon learned last week that he needs carpal tunnel surgery as a result of his broken wrist. Hopefully, we can make some progress this week with getting that scheduled and figured out.
We've had our daily snow the last couple of days again, and actually saw some sunshine today. More snow coming tomorrow, but shouldn't cause any problems. Jon's on call this week and, thankfully, hadn't been called out all weekend. He's been pretty happy about that. He's actually starting to get caught up on rest a little bit...he's staying awake past 8:00 most evenings!
Time to do my foot, back, knee, and shoulder exercises. Hopefully I can remember them all :) Hope all of you have a great week. REMEMBER, the truest thing about you is YOU ARE LOVED BY GOD!!!! AND NOTHING IN THE WORLD WILL EVERY CHANGE THAT!!!!
Hope you enjoy the new elements on my blog. The search bar at the top will let you put in a word and find its every occurrence on my blog. There is a calendar, a piano to play, penguins that you can lead around with your mouse (fun to spin), some nature sounds that you can listen to, and an aquarium, though it's not working at the moment. It may have to go bye-bye.
Jon learned last week that he needs carpal tunnel surgery as a result of his broken wrist. Hopefully, we can make some progress this week with getting that scheduled and figured out.
We've had our daily snow the last couple of days again, and actually saw some sunshine today. More snow coming tomorrow, but shouldn't cause any problems. Jon's on call this week and, thankfully, hadn't been called out all weekend. He's been pretty happy about that. He's actually starting to get caught up on rest a little bit...he's staying awake past 8:00 most evenings!
Time to do my foot, back, knee, and shoulder exercises. Hopefully I can remember them all :) Hope all of you have a great week. REMEMBER, the truest thing about you is YOU ARE LOVED BY GOD!!!! AND NOTHING IN THE WORLD WILL EVERY CHANGE THAT!!!!
Friday, February 12, 2010
Olympics Are Back!!!
The Olympics are back!!! I love watching the Olympics, and I think the winter games are my favorite. It's so sad that the luger died today...21, wow. I don't understand what people put themselves in order to compete. I like to watch, but I don't get what it takes inside a person to do that. It's amazing to me what they can do even when they're injured. And, of course, there are all the stories. They pull on my heartstrings and pretty soon my eyes are watering. I'm such a sap!!! Oh well, I'm in for two weeks of sappy. The really awesome news is we learned just this week that we can get our major network channels in hi def on some upper channels and the picture is COMPLETELY AWESOME!!! Way better than paying another $26/month ($41/month with DVR) to get the HD tier from our cable company. We don't care if we don't have all channels in HD since we aren't watching sports on cable channels. Still won't have DVR, but this will work great for us! YAY!!!
Thursday, February 11, 2010
Doctors Again
For healthy people it sure seems we are going to the doctor a lot. Me last week, Jon twice this week, me again tomorrow...One of these days we'll get it all figured out. Any big plans for the weekend? We have some potential plans with Jon on call to keep it interesting.
Tomorrow is Trever's birthday...HAPPY BIRTHDAY, TREVER!!! And Sunday is Valentine's Day...anything going on for that? We will be seeing pastor Murdoch on Sunday...he'll be up here to preach and we'll be at Dallas and Lois's for dinner with them and him.
Hope you all have a great weekend and I'll be checking in later!!!
Tomorrow is Trever's birthday...HAPPY BIRTHDAY, TREVER!!! And Sunday is Valentine's Day...anything going on for that? We will be seeing pastor Murdoch on Sunday...he'll be up here to preach and we'll be at Dallas and Lois's for dinner with them and him.
Hope you all have a great weekend and I'll be checking in later!!!
Sunday, February 7, 2010
From "Streams in the Desert"
This is the February 7 devotional in "Streams in the Desert"
"Why art thou cast down, O my soul" (Psalm 43:5).
Is there ever any ground to be cast down? There are two reasons, but only two. If we are as yet unconverted, we have ground to be cast down; or if we have been converted and live in sin, then we are rightly cast down.
But except for these two things there is no ground to be cast down, for all else may be brought before God in prayer with supplication and thanksgiving. And regarding all our necessities, all our difficulties, all our trials, we may exercise faith in the power of God, and in the love of God.
"Hope thou in God," Oh, remember this: There is never a time when we may not hope in God. Whatever our necessities, however great our difficulties, and though to all appearance help is impossible, yet our business is to hope in God, and it will be found that it is not in vain. In the Lord's own time help will come.
Oh, the hundreds, yea, the thousands of times that I have found it thus within the past seventy years and four months!
When it seemed impossible that help could come, help did come; for God has His own resources. He is not confined. In ten thousand different ways, and at ten thousand different times God may help us.
Our business is to spread our cases before the Lord, in child-like simplicity to pour out all our heart before God, saying,
"I do not deserve that Thou shouldst hear me and answer my requests, but for the sake of my precious Lord Jesus; for His sake answer my prayer, and give me grace quietly to wait till it please Thee to answer my prayer. For I believe Thou wilt do it in Thine own time and way."
"For I shall yet praise Him." More prayer, more exercise of faith, more patient waiting, and the result will be blessing, abundant blessing. Thus I have found it many hundreds of times, and therefore I continually say to myself, "Hope thou in God."
George Mueller
"Why art thou cast down, O my soul" (Psalm 43:5).
Is there ever any ground to be cast down? There are two reasons, but only two. If we are as yet unconverted, we have ground to be cast down; or if we have been converted and live in sin, then we are rightly cast down.
But except for these two things there is no ground to be cast down, for all else may be brought before God in prayer with supplication and thanksgiving. And regarding all our necessities, all our difficulties, all our trials, we may exercise faith in the power of God, and in the love of God.
"Hope thou in God," Oh, remember this: There is never a time when we may not hope in God. Whatever our necessities, however great our difficulties, and though to all appearance help is impossible, yet our business is to hope in God, and it will be found that it is not in vain. In the Lord's own time help will come.
Oh, the hundreds, yea, the thousands of times that I have found it thus within the past seventy years and four months!
When it seemed impossible that help could come, help did come; for God has His own resources. He is not confined. In ten thousand different ways, and at ten thousand different times God may help us.
Our business is to spread our cases before the Lord, in child-like simplicity to pour out all our heart before God, saying,
"I do not deserve that Thou shouldst hear me and answer my requests, but for the sake of my precious Lord Jesus; for His sake answer my prayer, and give me grace quietly to wait till it please Thee to answer my prayer. For I believe Thou wilt do it in Thine own time and way."
"For I shall yet praise Him." More prayer, more exercise of faith, more patient waiting, and the result will be blessing, abundant blessing. Thus I have found it many hundreds of times, and therefore I continually say to myself, "Hope thou in God."
George Mueller
Super Bowl Sunday
Today is a big celebration day! It's Jon (Holthe's) birthday and the Super Bowl! So nice of the NFL to throw a party for him! HAPPY BIRTHDAY, JON!!
My Jon was out on call till about noon today. We both got a nap this afternoon, and I baked cookies while doing laundry. Our Super Bowl party was quite the extravaganza...I had TWO Diet Cokes and put peanut butter on my celery sticks!! Quite the splurge! It's been a fun game to watch no matter who you're rooting for. I don't like a blowout when the two best teams play each other. Hopefully Jon won't have any more calls tonight...he's tired and fighting a headache.
Pray for our church...they will probably have a pastor candidating yet this month. We really need God's man in this place.
Thought for the day
I must confess that I've not been praying enough for the pastoral search at church. As the months go by it's easy to forget that the process is going on to stop praying about it. Now that we are getting close I pray again that God will give us the right person for His purposes here. These are good people who need a man that can teach them, lead them, and love them. It's been a long dry spell.
My Jon was out on call till about noon today. We both got a nap this afternoon, and I baked cookies while doing laundry. Our Super Bowl party was quite the extravaganza...I had TWO Diet Cokes and put peanut butter on my celery sticks!! Quite the splurge! It's been a fun game to watch no matter who you're rooting for. I don't like a blowout when the two best teams play each other. Hopefully Jon won't have any more calls tonight...he's tired and fighting a headache.
Pray for our church...they will probably have a pastor candidating yet this month. We really need God's man in this place.
Thought for the day
I must confess that I've not been praying enough for the pastoral search at church. As the months go by it's easy to forget that the process is going on to stop praying about it. Now that we are getting close I pray again that God will give us the right person for His purposes here. These are good people who need a man that can teach them, lead them, and love them. It's been a long dry spell.
Thursday, February 4, 2010
In Process
I hope your week is going well. Do you have weekend plans? We're planning on going out to eat with friends Friday night and planning on going to Tre's game on Saturday. Then, of course, there's the snow that Jon will get to move after it all falls...another 4 to 5 inches they're saying. I've been trying to get together our stuff for our tax appointment and shuffling the stuff from 2009 to 2010. It's not that big a deal, but I always drag my feet when it's time to do that job. After waiting like 7 weeks we finally have all of the Christmas gift we ordered from Cabelas for Tabbi and Trever. We also have two extras of the 3 pieces we ordered...and maybe more on the way. What a mess...I won't be jumping up and down to order online from Cabelas again!!!
Thought for the day
I'm still hammering out the application of the books "Humility" and "Absolute Surrender"...some days better than others :) God is doing a good job of showing me what kind of ugly is still inside me and how helpless I am against it. That's a good thing to know and a good place to be. God can't be ALL until I'm NOTHING. The process continues.....
Thought for the day
I'm still hammering out the application of the books "Humility" and "Absolute Surrender"...some days better than others :) God is doing a good job of showing me what kind of ugly is still inside me and how helpless I am against it. That's a good thing to know and a good place to be. God can't be ALL until I'm NOTHING. The process continues.....
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