Today is dedicated to my baby girl

Seventeen years ago my baby girl made her appearance. It was a Tuesday morning, the due date given at the beginning of the pregnancy and the C-Section was scheduled for 10:00am. The weather was fine when we arrived at the hospital but by 9:30am as family was arriving there appeared to be a major ice storm starting. Of course Kierstyn came into the world with a mind of her own refusing to make delivery easy and wasn’t born until 11:35am. I guess it was very interesting for family and friends to get home. IU played Michigan that night and we put her in her IU sleeper and watched the game from the hospital room. The ice storm was the worse Bloomington, Indiana had seen for years shutting almost everything down the remainder of the week. We finally convinced the doctor to send us home on Thursday. Seventeen years later and you are still making us so proud and just as you defied the odds over the last seventeen years with various health problems you are still proving to the world that with hard work, determination and dedication anything is possible. I am so proud of you, you not only blessed our lives seventeen years ago but you have continued to bless our lives each and every day. Love you bunches baby girl.

Thank you for allowing me to take the time to make this dedication to her today.

Do you consider yourself a “Good Christian?”

I’ve been reading the book “The Way of the Master” by Ray Comfort and Kirk Cameron. Talk about a life changing book, it has given me so many things to consider. One of those is the following:

“However, people who make a commitment to Christ without the Law may do so because they are seeking true inner peace and lasting fulfillment. They come to fill a “God-shaped vacuum” in their lives. There is no trembling. There is no fleeing from wrath. There is no fear. To them, God is a benevolent, fatherly figure, not a holy God of wrath.
Without the Law, they haven’t been stripped of self-righteousness. They don’t truly believe that their just reward is eternal damnation. Therefore, even as professing Christians, they think they are basically good.

Because of this faulty foundation, these converts are likely to think they are pleasing God by reading the Bible, praying, fasting, and doing good works. They are susceptible to being deceived into thinking that somehow their good works commend them to God, and they are therefore liable to stray into legalistic standards such as “do not touch, do not taste, do not handle” (Colossians 2:21)”

At church they tell us many times people look at God based on their relationship with their earthy father’s. I have heard at church that I am/we are sinners and we can’t get to heaven by good works. I have also, however, been told that it is pleasing to God when we pray and read the Bible because that is part of having a personal relationship with Him.

The book continues by discussing the statistics such as the large number of temporary converts compared to the small number of permanent converts, again, because people are not converted based on the law. It discusses how many people don’t like reading the BIble or going to church and since they don’t understand the severity of sin (the Law) they think it’s not necessary to continue. The book addresses how many denominations may require some brief sessions with the Pastor before baptizing but other than that all the person has to do is stand in front of the congregation and answer “yes” to a few questions the Pastor will ask. I know I fall in the number of temporary converts considering I was seven when I was saved and baptized.

What about you? What are your thoughts on what the book has to say about the majority of people not realizing the severity of their sin? I would love to hear your thoughts and if you have read the book and have a different perspective on what it’s saying I would love to hear it.

Confirming and Encouraging

I decided to have a new outlook starting January 1, 2011. It wasn’t making New Year’s resolutions but I figured it would be a great time to train my mind that the past was just that, the past. One of the things I decided I wanted to do this year was to give more attention to my writing and to make sure I was taking it seriously, this was to include blogging daily or at least several times a week. Well as I started to revamp the look of my blog (another fresh start in my mind) toward the end of 2010 the enemy had other plans, including three procedures/surgeries and one illness after another. So far 2011 has started off with other issues, some good and some not so good including a sinus/viral infection that has been continuously making its rounds in the house for the past four weeks.

Even during all the issues I had one particular blog friend (I’m so grateful to all of my readers) that kept staying on my mind. I knew that she and I connected because of her reading my blog so if, for no other reason I really wanted to get back at it, praying she hadn’t given up on me and quit subscribing or checking it for new posts. I so want to stay in contact with her and get to know her more.

Since I did not get to start in January with the new blog I had almost convinced myself that it was silly to even start back up. To justify the decision, I had many reasons or rather the enemy had provided me with so many excuses/lies such as:

1. You have lost all your readers (not that I had many to start with) because you have waited so long to post.

2. Your health isn’t going to allow you to blog often enough for it to matter.

3. You don’t have anything important to say. This was not what you were to do with your life.

4. You don’t have time, you need to wait until….(you can fill in the blank)

I’m sure you hear many of the same “lies” in one way or another as you go about your daily lives. The one thing I love is Jesus is ALWAYS faithful, and if I will pay attention he will usually give me a confirmation, if it is what He wants, and I continue to second guess if I am doing the right thing. Just as in the past He came through once again a few days ago.

It was a day I wasn’t feeling well but was looking at other blogs trying to get caught up on my reading when my phone went off with a notification that someone had left a blog comment. Guess who it was? It was the friend that I have thought about for many weeks. She asked me to continue writing because she enjoyed hearing from me. WOW!!! First off, what a way for our Heavenly Father to send a confirmation but also what a way to make me feel like I was walking on air. I couldn’t help but think, me??? Someone enjoys hearing from me??? Needless to say her taking that time to write that one sentence has meant all the difference to me.

You may never know how much you have encouraged someone or maybe confirmed something they had been on the fence about, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t go ahead and do so. Who have you encouraged recently? If you are the one that received the confirmation or encouragement have you taken the time to let the one that encouraged you know?

Thank you Meg for taking the time, you don’t know how much helped and what it means to me.