Finally...

I know it has been awhile but if you have read the last few posts you will know that we are working on our kitchen. I would like to be able to tell everyone that it is finished but it isn't. We are still working on it and I will not post any more pictures until it is finished. But I couldn't let another week go by without my sermon summary.
So this is actually from 2 weeks ago when Pastor Powell preached. I will summarize this weeks farther down in my blog so this may be a bit long.
So last weeks sermon was on the "Sixth Toe". SEE PICTURE.

His sermon started out with a story about dating someone until you find out that they have a sixth toe even though they are a great person you just can't live with them having a sixth toe. He said it is a lot like this with the church...we date the church and when we find the sixth toe we leave even though we love everything else about the church. He said there are three things that people who are dating the church see the church to be.

1. What they will get...socially what can this church offer me.
2. They are attending because that is what "Christians" are supposed to do but they are never committed.
3. They are very critical...finding the best product for the cheapest price...as long as they don't have to change anything they love this church.

Eph 5:25 says

"Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her"

We are to marry the church...not just date it. Not just the universal church but a local church. We need to find a local church and commit to it, marry it and not look for the sixth toe.
He used 1 John 1:5-10 as a reference for our commitment to be like Christ who loved the church. It reads

5This is the message we have heard from him and declare to you: God is light; in him there is no darkness at all. 6If we claim to have fellowship with him yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not live by the truth. 7But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all^[a] sin.

8If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. 9If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness. 10If we claim we have not sinned, we make him out to be a liar and his word has no place in our lives.

He also used this verse:

1 John 2:9-10

9Anyone who claims to be in the light but hates his brother is still in the darkness. 10Whoever loves his brother lives in the light, and there is nothing in him^[a] to make him stumble.

We need to love our church with the following:

Passion, Priority, Philanthropy, and Promote.

We need to have a passion about our church and the direction that it is heading.
We need to make it a priority to come to church and not let other things in our life come in the way. He used Philanthropy (mainly to keep with the letter P, it is a pastor thing)...but as defined on dictionary.com "Philanthropy is the act of donating money, goods, time, or effort to support a charitable cause, usually over an extended period of time and in regard to a defined objective." and finally promote...tell other about your church. Do something...not just mortar and bricks but as the body of Christ...reach out. Read Romans 12...it has become for me my mission on where I want to be as a servant of Christ.

I know I said I would blog about this weeks sermon but it will have to wait, I am tired and I don't want to mess it up. Sorry Mark...you will get your sermon summarized tomorrow or Saturday or...

2 POST IN ONE DAY!!!

I am posting this as a quick pictorial update of the kitchen.
BEFORE.


Destruction...



AFTER (REMEMBER IT IS STILL A WORK IN PROGRESS)

Toy Story...

So I am sure some of you have read my mom's blog about the snake story that Josh told Sam, if you haven't you should. Anyway...I thought I should share a funny story about Sam. He has been watching a lot of the movie Toy Story and for christmas this year they got Buzz and Woody, the characters from the movie. And if you have seen the movie you know that there is a bit of a war over territory between Woody and Buzz over Andy's room. Well...the other night I heard Sam in his room talking...I couldn't make out what he was saying so I asked. He said he was talking to Buzz. Ok...I said...what did you tell him. Sam said...I told him that if he really does come to life after I leave that he can be the boss of all of the other toys. I must of smirked a little because he quickly said...it probably isn't true but if it is he can be the boss. I told him good idea and walked away with a huge smile on my face. He is so funny.

On another note...we are slowly getting our kitchen back to normal. We installed all of the cabinets, laid the tile floor and Wayne is installing the backsplash as I sit here and blog. I am not helping today because our friend Dave came over to help...THANK YOU! We are hoping, or at least I am hoping, to be able to have it finished by next Sunday. I would even settle for being able to cook and run the dishwasher. It has been quite a waiting game getting this done...it is one of those hurry up and wait projects. We bought the unfinished oak cabinets so that meant we had to stain everything and staining one side at a time on the doors, then we put 3 coats of polyurathane on everything and of course there is nothing but waiting for all of that to dry. When I look at everything we have left to do it seems a bit overwhelming but if I look at what all we have accomplished then I realize we have come a long way.

So that is my quick little blog for the day.

Must have...

Since so many of you have asked about where I find these deals, here is a quick list of the must have links on your computer if you are going to shop for either groceries or online for non-grocery items.

http://www.thegrocerygame.com/ This is the site that I use for all of my great grocery shopping deals. The message boards on this site are priceless for non-grocery deals. (you don't have to be a member to read the message boards.) But the membership dues are well worth the savings.

http://www.currentcodes.com/ This site is great because it gives you 90% of the current promotional codes that you can use when checking out at online stores.

http://www.momsview.com/ This is another site for getting those promotional codes...but it is not as user friendly as the one above.

http://www.thefrugalshopper.com/directory/links15.html This is one I stumbled onto today that gives some great sites for being able to print off coupons or get free samples.

Just had to share...

We got Samuel's school pictures and as you can see he looks a bit older than 5. He is growing up so fast. I knew it was going to happen but it hit me this week as I watched as he braved getting his tonsils out with the bravery that not even some adults have. He said he had to be brave for Josh, who also had tonsils out the same day. He was very understanding of the process and told us many times that he didn't like the medicine that he had to take for pain but that he knew it would feel better if he did. He is so amazing! So as I said...the whole tonsil thing went well and I would do it the same way if we could go back and do it again. They were such troopers and they really took care of each other. The worse part was having them here together with me for 2 whole weeks! Once they started feeling better they were bouncing ideas off of each other on what they could get into. These last two weeks have been a constant 2 weeks of hearing Joshua talk, and talk, and talk. I prayed he would talk but maybe I should have set a limit on the amount of talking. He talks continuously as my mom can attest for. He barely breathes in between sentences and to make matters worse...most of it I can't understand so then he screams it to me, which only makes understanding it more difficult. If I am not focusing right on what he is saying he has a tendency to grab both sides of my face and make me look at him and he says "I talkin to you mom".
I have to throw a picture of Josh in here...his rottenness is covered with a smile....DON'T be deceived!!!

I came back!

That has been the topic of many discussions over the last month or so. I have discussed with several people who were raised "in" the church, as I have, about why we all came back to the church. I guess it all starts as to why we left in the first place. I left to find out what I believed for myself. Sure I found a few things that were fun in the process or activities that seemed to bring me happiness but nothing that sustained me. Nothing like what I have today with Christ. I left because I was raised in the church...does that make sense? I know some don't always go through this process (which I am sure their parents are glad) but for me it was a necessity. I needed to know what I believed for me and no one else...not for my mom, my grandparents or some loyalty to a church that I had attended but for me. I have always relied on others to tell me right from wrong. To dance or not to dance, to drink or not to drink, to play cards or not play cards, what is appropriate attire for Sunday and what is not. I looked to the "people" in the church for the answers to all of those questions and then I sat back and watched to see if they really believed their answer. This is where my heart grew cold toward the church. I saw those same people who said it was wrong to dance, out dancing, those who said it was wrong to drink, have a small glass with their dinner, and some who dressed to impress play the same cards that they had said were so wrong. The problem was not those people, it was me. I had put my belief in them and not in HIM. I had let their failures or mis-steps interfere with my beliefs. I had let my judgements become my beliefs and the "See they are no better than me" motto rule my life. The great thing about that statement is that it is true...they are no better than me and I am no better than them. I have my hang ups and I have my struggles and I don't know all the answers but I am human and with the human nature comes imperfection.
So why did I come back? I came back because in all of my searching for who I was I lost myself and some where deep inside of myself I knew that getting closer to God was probably my only chance at true happiness. I also wanted my kids to have some sort of basis so that they would have a place to come back to if they decide to explore like I did. I want them to have that little voice in them that warns them when they are skirting the line between world and God called convictions.

As you get older you say...if I knew then what I know now...well...knowing now what I looked for then, I am going to try to live as close to God and how he wants me to be as I can so that those people looking for me to trip up will have to look a little harder. I don't want to be anyone's stumbling block.

Romans 14:13
Therefore let us stop passing judgment on one another. Instead, make up your mind not to put any stumbling block or obstacle in your brother's way.