Popcorn and Preaching?

I know you are wondering how those go together. So was I. I told my dh and he just gave me a knowing laugh.
I visited my parent's church for their New Years Eve service and we did the normal Baptist thing and ate and ate, had preaching (if you could call it that), games, and testimony time.
Then they did this "popcorn preaching" thing where the "preacher boys" got up and preached 5 minute sermons. In about three instances, they were given a verse that night and given 15 seconds to look at it, then 3 minutes to preach on it. Maybe I am just an ignoramus woman, but tell me how much study can really be gotten in 15 seconds?
How much true change can take place in a 5 minute sermon, or would any life changing decisions just be made all on the basis of emotion? Have I just gotten so used to the meat of the Word and the long sermons that a short sermon of that nature just does not seem quite right?
I grieve that preaching is sometimes thought of as entertainment or not taken seriously. Preaching is a very serious undertaking and should not be taken lightly.
Tonight my dad made the comment that he thought the "preaching" was really good last night. I made the comment that not much studying could have taken place for those sermons. He replied that he got the same things out of those verses that they did. Does this prove how simple minded people can be or am I just being overly critical?
One of the verses from the book of Colossians mentioned the elect of God and I just wanted to shout out "Do you really know what that verse is talking about", especially when you read the context of the verse.
One of the sermons, the preacher asked the same question that I have for numbers oriented churches. "If you have 3000 people saved this year (as the church claims), where are they? Why are they not being discipled? Why are they not in church? Someone finally had the guts to ask that question. The answer that can be given is that no one is taking the time to do it.
Tell me, what is better -- living a life that pleases God and people can see Him in us and taking time to witness when the opportunity is presented before us; or going from house to house in our culture today and/or shoving the Bible down the throats of complete strangers just so that you can say that you "got someone saved" and having that high number on the record books.
It grieves that so many of these "saved" people may have made the decision to get people of their doorstep, or because they felt manipulated into a decision, or were pushed down an aisle and have no real concept of what true salvation is --repentance and declaring Jesus Christ Lord of your life. Forever changing and walking with Him.

The Long Wait and the Train Ride

My train for Washington was scheduled to leave from Chicago's Union Station at 2:15pm on Saturday, the 27th of December. So, DH and I went into Chicago on the "L" from our hotel (see previous post), ate lunch at the station, then went to my gate only to find out that there was a delay on the train, and we didn't know how long it was. What started out as a 45 minute wait became 6 hours. DH waited as long as he could as he had to catch his train back to where we parked the car at Cumberland to get back home in time for dinner as Grandpa and Grandma were watching the girls for us overnight.
I waited and waited some more with very little encouraging news from Amtrak.
Finally at about 6:00 they announced that our train was here, the whoops and applause was great. We waited in line for another hour and finally at 7:45 our train pulled out of the station. I have never waited that long at a train station before but I guess I would rather wait at the beginning of the trip at the station than somewhere along the line stuck somewhere.
I finally made it in to my destination at 1:05 pm today (Monday, the 29th) 7.5 hours late.

A Night in Chicago

On Saturday I was scheduled to leave for the West C0ast for my brother's wedding, so on Friday, my husband took me into Chicago for the night.
We stayed on the outskirts and took the CTA, otherwise known as the "L" into downtown and went to our new favorite restaurant --The Cheesecake Factory -- that sits under the well known landmark --The John Hancock Building.
After dinner we walked along the famous "Magnificant Mile" or Michigan Ave. It is a high end shopping district and is home to stores such as Tiffany and Co., Nordstrom, Apple, and American Girl Place, to Millenium Park and watached the ice skaters at the new outdoor ice skating rink. Then we walked around the park.
Unfortunately it was Winter so it was dark, so we weren't really able to see much except for the lights on the "crown fountain" and the "cloud gate" otherwise known as the giant bean. That is a place that I would love to go back to in the Spring when all the flowers are in bloom and the fountain is actually on.
We then caught our train back to our hotel.

A Night in Chicago

promised pictures

I know it is hard to see the colors exactly, but I had 5 different colors of beads, all pastel colors, that they could choose from along with silver colored metal beads. They each picked out a charm, a heart, daisy, butterfly, etc... , and put it together to suit their personal tastes. I then showed them how to crimp the clasps on.

Clockwise from left to right:

picture number 1 is the younger girls, Bethany, Melanie, Emma, and Brianna, displaying their work. They made theirs on elastic strings so as to make it easier to get on and off for someone as young as 4 1/2.

picture number 2 is two sisters, Megan and Rachel, comparing their handiwork. One is elastic and the other is wire.

picture number 3 is 5 of the older girls,Allie, Morgan, Lindsay, Hallie, and Shelby, wearing their pieces. It is always fun to wear what you did yourself.

picture number 4 is two of the girls, Chandra and Jessica, from the older group showing off their

Girls night out.

As some know, I am developing a new hobby. It is jewelry making. I hope to one day sell it as I love to make it. It is such a stress release. You might ask "how much stress can a stay at home mom have?" You would probably be very surprised. We have not only our schooling to do, but a house to attempt to keep neat as well as cooking and the other household duties to maintain as well.

I recently had the priviledge of having 13 girls between the ages of 5 - 15 in my home (including my two), on December 4th for a bracelet making workshop. I prepared the beads, stations, etc.... ahead of time to make it run smoothly. I was nervous as it is the first time that I had attempted something like this. I loved listening to the girl talk around the table as they were trying to compare thier handy work.

I made a snack called brownie lollipops and those went over like marshmallows in a smore's. I think it became quite the snack and I plan on giving out a couple copies of the recipe as well as making them again sometime.

Thanks to Kristie for taking some pictures which I will post as soon as she e mails me them over. I plan on doing it again in the Spring. Maybe we will try something more ambitious, such as a necklace.

Funny Vacation Story

As most of my readers know, I have three little girls. We went to Michigan for Thanksgiving to spend it with Grandpa and Grandma. Uncle Jeremy and Aunt Anouk went as well.
One evening my two 5 year olds were upstairs in the old house talking to Uncle Jeremy. They happened to glance at the book he was reading. They told him the man on the cover of the book was John Calvin (one of the early Reformers). Jeremy turned his book over and surprisingly said, "yes it is, how did you know that"? To that they replied, "My daddy has that book, and we can't read it yet, but we will someday. Brianna will borrow daddy's and I will borrow yours."

A couple of days later, Grandpa and Grandma took the same two children to see Christmas lights. One of the displays had Santa and his reindeer. She asked them if they knew who it was. They had no idea who Santa is.

So my kids know who John Calvin is and not Santa Claus at age 5. Imagine that!!