In Christ Alone

Here are the words to a great song that we have been singing in our church for the past few months. I thought I would post it so that maybe the words will help those who are struggling with life issues.

In Christ Alone -- Keith and Kristyn Getty and Stuart Townend

In Christ alone my hope is found,
He is my Light, my Strength, my Song;
This Cornerstone, this Solid Ground,
Firm through the fiercest drought and storm.
What heights of love, what depths of peace,
When fears are stilled, when strivings cease!
My Comforter, my All-in-All--
Here in the love of Christ I stand.

In Christ alone, Who took on flesh,
Fullness of God in helpless babe!
This gift of love and righteousness,
Scorned by the ones He came to save.
Till on the cross as Jesus died,
The wrath of God was satisfied;
For every sin on Him was laid --
Here in the death of Christ I live.

There in the ground His body lay,
Light of the world by darkness slain;
Then bursting forth in glorious day,
Up from the grave He rose again!
And as He stands in victory,
Sin's curse has lost its grip on me;
For I am His and He is mine --
Bought with the precious blood of Christ..

No guilt in life, no fear in death --
This is the power of Christ in me;
From life's first cry to final breath,
Jesus commands my destiny.
No power of hell, no scheme of man,
Can ever pluck me from His hand;
Till He returns and calls me home --
Here in the power of Christ I'll stand.

scary thought

I read about a boy today who had spiders living in his ear. Okay, that is a part of one of my worst nightmares.
I hate spiders and that thought just gave goose bumps up my arms and down my back because I am so afraid of them and I kill every one I find. I even like snakes better than spiders.
Spiders are just ugly and scary looking, especially big hairy ones. yuck!!
I guess I will need to start wearing ear plugs or muffs while I sleep to keep them out now.

And they're off.

I always wanted to have a horse as a kid. I just believe that they are such beautiful animals. Each time I asked, the answer was always no. Where are going to put it, dad would ask. I said the back yard where else? It was too small, he said. We can pay to board it, I replied. Then the excuses that they are too dangerous. He always knew someone who was hurt by horses. The story that I remember the most was there was this girl who was kicked in the head by a horse and it killed her, so that was the end of that.

On my senior trip, we were able to ride horses on the beach at the Oregon Coast. That was a dream for me. It was so much fun. My horse did not like to get too near the waves, so he would go the opposite direction from the sea.

I always enjoy watching horses do what they are bred to do. That is to run. One of my favorite things to watch is the three triple crown races -- the Kentucky Derby, The Preakness, and the Belmont Stakes. Maybe I am crazy, but if I were a betting person, we would be wealthy today as I was going with the winner.

Movie Time

Those of us out there who are fans of Captain Jack and all of his pirate friends on the Pirates of the Caribbean movies don't have long to wait.
The release date is May 25th at a theatre near you. I personally plan to be there at some point this summer to see how the crew rescues Captain Jack. Check out the trailers at

http://movies.yahoo.com/feature/piratesofthecaribbeanatworldsend.html

There are a couple of trailers and the cast of characters who are familiar to us all.

what a time!!

Well, I had the most frustrating time today at a McDonalds. I had just gotten together with another mom of young children and had a wonderful time of Christian fellowship while our kiddos played at the playland. Well, of course that is when my 2 month old chose to explode. When she goes, it is always bad, so I knew it would be.
Our two families parted ways and I made my way to the bathroom to what I knew would be a mess. Of course, what could go wrong, did.
I found out that this particular restaurant did not have a changing area that was mom friendly. The table faced the wrong way. The end of the table was right over the toilet. Therefore, my baby could kick anything into the toilet, so as a mom trying to keep everything as clean and sanitary as possible while I changed what looked like a bomb went off in my baby's diaper, I had to also keep everything on the table. To make matters more interesting, my two three year olds were trying to peek over the table to watch me change the diaper as that is very fascinating to young eyes.
Before we were done, the wipe container had fallen into the toilet twice, the paper towels that I laid underneath the baby were soaking wet, of course making any clothes that had survived the explosion wet.
I had to change every inch of clothing on the child, and she ended up with no onsie, because it had gotten wet in the ordeal.
Whew!! I need a nap.

Women's conference

This past weekend our church had our first annual women's conference. The keynote speaker was Holly Stratton, the wife of the president of Clearwater Christian College. It was a wonderful conference.
Here are some of the highlights . First of all, the men served us and they even wore aprons. Nothing like a man in a uniform. The food was incredible. When we first arrived last Friday there were mountains of all kinds of delectable desserts that we could partake of during the entire conference. The decorations were incredible. I took part of them home in the form of a Betta fish vase. I have wanted one for quite some time, but did not know what kind of plants to put in them, now I have one that someone else put together and I just had to pay for it. Can't get much better than that.
The first session was given by our pastor, Pastor Bob Bixby. His main points were that we are not perfect and we will not reach perfection on this earth and that we were made in God's image.
Sin destroys our relationships and He saves us so that our relationships can be restored to a new creation.
He also said that " we are not wholly woman until you are wholly Christian and that you are never wholly Christian until you are wholly woman." Because again, we are created in the image of God.
We are called to be like Christ
We are to return to the shepherd of our souls
To be like Christ we are to submit to our husbands

The next speaker was Tricia Brown and she spoke on modesty. A subject that has some gray areas. She had to remind all of us that it is her opinions and she is not trying to judge anyone and that she had no one in mind when she wrote her notes. The title was Modesty Matters.
Her text was 1 Corinthians 6:19-20. Our bodies are the temple of the Holy Spirit.
Our choices reflect our hearts. At the root of every problem is a problem with our Theology.
We should ask ourselves how we can bring honor and glory to God's temple.
It is our job to edify and protect--keep stumblingblocks out of the way
Because we are representing Christ, even if on a deserted island we need to be modest, even
if it is all women.
If you have physical clothing trouble spots, you should pool your resources and spend a little more money on those trouble spots and DONT trust the clearance racks.

The third session was by Suzanne Altizer on Hospitality.
She gave some great ideas on how we can entertain others on short notice. A couple of my favorite examples that she used was the tea light in the apples and the triple candles on a plate with stuff around it like Jelly beans, mint balls, beans, or coffee beans. We could use anything that we want for centerpieces for the tables.
Also, we do not have to apoligize if our house is not in order when people come over. Sometimes we can do the best we can and still not get it perfect. I was so glad to hear that, but I will still be embarrassed if someone came over on short notice and saw my house messy. I was convicted to try harder to keep it clean on a regular basis so that it will not be as hard and time consuming to pick the extra things on short notice.

The fourth session was by Holly.
Her points fell under the question : What is Righteous Thirst?
1. righteous thirsting involves righteous waiting,
2. righteous thirsting is always God centered and never man centered,
3. there are cheap substitutes for righteous thirsting.
a. anything that we are substituting for the Gospel
b. three specific substitutes for righteous thirsting
1). Intellectualism:
focus on the mind, hunger for knowledge and love books on theology
2). Passivism/emotionalism
emphasis on emotions, we do not always make choices based on God's word.
3). Moralism
emphasis on the will and the purpose to do right.
c. problems with cheap substitutions
will only get us so far and cause selfishness and pride.
The more we grow, the more we will see how sin prone we really are.

Then we had a wonderful meal (after eating all those delectable goodies. I probably gained 5 pounds (like it will matter anyway on this body that still contains lots of baby weight).

On Saturday we were greeted by those men in aprons again and a nice continental breakfast.

Holly spoke again on thristing for God.
Only God fully knows and understands our needs, abilities, emotions, and our mind (I am glad that somebody knows THAT).

I. A righteous thirst revealed
I desire most to understand than to be understood.
I can't figure out myself, how can I understand anyone else.
I focus on understanding God's will.
There is a difference between fact and truth. talk about the facts and focus on those facts.
Keep our attention on the King of Kings and Lord of Lords. He is fact.
Because I have a righteous thirst, I do not have a dependence on man.
I know my identity and I know that God has accepted me into His family. No matter how others see me, my identity is in Jesus Christ.

My sister in law, Anouk, a financial and budgeting genius, talked about the benefits of keeping finances in order, saving money, and budgeting. Because she is related to me, she had given many of those pointers to me before, so most of it was not new. I also had the inside scoop on one of her favorite freebees, she calls them. We should make a budget (it does not have to be ridged, but should have some type of saving in it. She has found that the best way to save is to catagorize her savings into several categories, such as car, clothes, groceries, etc..., that way if something goes wrong with the car, for example, there will be money there so you do not have to go into debt with credit cards (been there). Also, she talked about coupon shopping and rebates, e.g. Walgreens rebate program. It really works. A couple books she mentioned are both by Mary Hunt. They are DEBT PROOF LIVING and LIVING LIFE AT HALF THE PRICE.

I was feeding my infant during the last session with Holly, so I missed most of what she had to say, but over all it was a great conference and am looking forward to next year.

What's behind door #2

It is a hard thing to do. If you have been there, you know that you wait and pray for something to happen to change some circumstances in your life. A door opens up somewhere and you want to walk through it because it sounds sooooo good. Then, it closes in your face. You then assume that is not the direction God wants you to go, so you wait some more. For what, you wonder? What could be better than that possibility? Isn't there a verse that says "A trial of our faith works patience"? Enough trials all ready. What more do I have to learn to keep trying my faith which I will admit that I don't have enough of.

A new door opens a few months later. Oh, that may be better than the original plan, so you go for it, then another door of opportunity opens up right next to the first one. Okay, now what?
You quit pursuing the first door because the second door looks better than the first one. You get your hopes up for the better circumstances that the second door would allow, only to get your bubble deflated because the opportunity was not as good as it seems, so now both doors are closing and the waiting begins again.!! Oh the frustration and let down. I wonder what doors God will open next to test our faith. What would he want us to do? What may be behind door #3?