A Healthy Addiction

1 Corinthians 16:15  I beseech you, brethren, (ye know the house of Stephanas, that it is the firstfruits of Achaia, and that they have addicted themselves to the ministry of the saints,)  (emphasis mine)

The Bible truly is a living Book!  No matter how many times you may read a certain passage, something fresh will always pop out!  I admit that I am often guilty of skimming the last several verses of the epistles where Paul closes with his greetings.  That may be why I’ve never noticed this particular phrase: “they have addicted themselves to the ministry.”

This morning that phrase struck a chord within me.  Being in a ministry family, I am very involved with our church, and make no mistake- I love it!  There’s no doubt in my mind that the Lord has called us there, and I enjoy the people and the work that I do there, yet I had to ask myself, “Have I addicted myself to the ministry?”

Today, when we hear the word “addict,” it’s never a favorable term.  It brings to mind an uncontrollable urge, desire, or need for something physically, emotionally, or spiritually unhealthy.  However, we know that God would not have us controlled by anything other than the Holy Spirit! 

Notice that the verse says they “addicted themselves to” not “they were addicted to.”  They made a conscious and deliberate choice here!  When the house of Stephanas addicted themselves to the ministry of the saints, they appointed or devoted themselves to a position of service.  I believe that if the apostles or someone in the church needed help, Stephanas’ house felt it was their responsibility to make sure the need was met.

So am I devoted in the same way?  If a brother or sister in Christ has a need, whether physical or spiritual, do I feel it’s my job to meet it or to make sure someone else does?  Or do I sometimes slough it off, thinking that I’m too busy and someone else can handle it?  There’s no doubt that with seven children and a household to run, I’m pretty busy in my day-to-day life, but that doesn’t negate my responsibilities to my fellow Christians. 

I want to make the same decision that the house of Stephanas did.  I want to addict myself to my fellow saints.  I want their burdens to be my burdens, their needs to be my needs.  Addiction can be a good thing!

A Baby Shower Devotional

Tonight, the ladies of our church will be getting together to have a baby shower for a young woman expecting her second child!  I love baby showers!  (Big surprise huh?!)

I’m giving a short devotional that I hope will be an encouragement to the new mother, and I thought I’d share it here.  Please be patient with some grammatical errors, as these are simply notes and not a complete, thought-out essay!

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First some funnies:  These questions were asked of elementary-aged children.

How did God make mothers?

• “He used dirt, just like for the rest of us.”
• “Magic plus super powers and a lot of stirring.”
• “God made my Mom just the same like he made me. He just used bigger parts.”

What ingredients are mothers made of?

• “God makes mothers out of clouds, angel hair and everything nice in the world and one dab of mean.”
• “They had to get their start from men's bones. Then they mostly use string. I think.”

Why did God give you your mother and not some other Mom?

• “God knew she likes me a lot more than other people's moms like me.”

What kind of little girl was your Mom?

• “I don't know because I wasn't there, but my guess would be pretty bossy.”
• “They say she used to be nice.”

What's the difference between moms and dads?

• “Dads are taller and stronger, but moms have all the real power 'cause that's who you got to ask if you want to sleep over at your friend's.”

What does your Mom do in her spare time?

• “Mothers don't do spare time.”
• “To hear her tell it, she pays bills all day long.”

What would it take to make your Mom perfect?

• “On the inside she's already perfect. Outside, I think some kind of plastic surgery.”
• “Diet. You know, her hair. I'd diet, maybe blue.”

If you could change one thing about your Mom, what would it be?

• “She has this weird thing about me keeping my room clean. I'd get rid of that.”
• “I'd make my Mom smarter. Then she would know it was my sister who did it and not me.”

A Mother’s Influence

Children are very observant! And sometimes we don’t realize what they are observing until we see it or hear it come out of their mouth! Oops!

As parents, we are the strongest influence in our child’s life. God gives parents the primary responsibility for the raising of a child!

Dueteronomy 6:5-7

And thou shalt love the LORD thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might. And these words, which I command thee this day, shall be in thine heart: And thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up.
(Deuteronomy 6:5-7)

Our children will have many people that will influence them over their lifetimes. Friends, Sunday School teachers, television, and so on, but we the parents, and more specifically tonight, the mothers, will wield a much stronger influence than any of these.

We can influence our child for good, but we can also use our influence for the bad. In Scripture we have examples of both.

Let’s start with the bad: 2 Chr. 22:2-3

Forty and two years old was Ahaziah when he began to reign, and he reigned one year in Jerusalem. His mother's name also was Athaliah the daughter of Omri. He also walked in the ways of the house of Ahab: for his mother was his counsellor to do wickedly.
(2 Chronicles 22:2-3)

Throughout the history of Israel’s and Judah’s kings, the mothers are rarely mentioned. But here we are told of King Ahaziah’s mother Athaliah. The Bible says she counseled him to do wickedly! We can read more about that in the chapter and in 2 Kings, and we find that Athaliah eventually kills the rest of the household to set herself up as queen, but the point here is that Athaliah, because of her own ambitions and priorities, was a wicked influence on her son.

I certainly hope that you (mother) will never counsel your children to do wickedly, but let Athaliah serve as a reminder to us that we can let our own plans and desires get in the way of the godly influence we are supposed to be. Watch your priorities!

Now the good: 2 Tim 1:5

When I call to remembrance the unfeigned faith that is in thee, which dwelt first in thy grandmother Lois, and thy mother Eunice; and I am persuaded that in thee also.
(2 Timothy 1:5)

Timothy’s mother Eunice (and grandmother) had a profound effect on Timothy’s life and future service! As best we can tell Timothy’s father was a Greek and unsaved, and therefore had very little positive influence on Timothy’s spiritual development, yet we read in 2 Tim 3:15 that Timothy knew the Scriptures from the time he was a child! And because of that, he was saved and followed God his whole life. He became very dear to the Apostle Paul.

(Mother), as you prepare to have your 2^nd child, remember that you will wield an incredible power! You will influence your children, make no mistake about that! But what kind of influence will you have? What will you teach them?

I strongly believe that parents are parents from Day 1, and parents are teachers from Day 1. Granted, in those early days, you are simply teaching them to eat and sleep, but you are teaching nonetheless. But as our children grow, we have an incredible responsibility to teach them to “love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, with all thy soul, and with all thy mind.”

So (mother), I encourage you tonight to renew that commitment within you to teach your children to love the Lord, and use your influence in a godly way! I know the ladies here will rally around you to help you in that journey! We love you, we love (first child), and we love this new little one. So ladies will you please join me in prayer as we ask the Lord’s blessing on (mother), her family, and the new baby?

Catching Up

I’m still here!  But in a different place!  We’ve finally moved, and that’s one of the main reasons I haven’t been around here for a while.  We didn’t even have phone or internet for nearly a month!

So we’ve officially moved into a wonderful new home, to which my husband lovingly refers as a mansion.  It’s not that large, but we have nearly 3000 sq. feet of space to grow into!  We still can hardly believe we’re living here and are in awe that the Lord would provide such a home for our family.  Since the actual moving took place much later than we’d expected, we had only a few days before we had guests arrive!

My mother-in-law and niece came for a two week visit!  It’s been 4 years since we’ve seen them, so needless to say we were so happy to have them come, and we had a great time.  We didn’t really do anything too special, but even just being at the house was enjoyable.  All the kids got along well, and that always makes for a nice visit!

They left last Wednesday morning, and Thursday night my sister and her family flew in to town!  We had them with us through the weekend.  Their daughter is about the same age as my older kids so they loved having another playmate around! 

So this week I’m finally trying to get settled into the house!  We had all the important stuff in, but our garage is still full of boxes to be sorted through.  Little by little we’ll get it all done!

We have a busy summer ahead of us.  This week our church is having Vacation Bible School in the evenings, next week my husband will be away at Teen Camp, and then we’ll have two weeks of ‘normal’ at home.  I say ‘normal’ because those two weeks will be largely spent preparing to leave for the Spiritual Leadership Conference hosted by Lancaster Baptist Church in California, and from there we will be driving to Oregon for a vacation/family reunion.  All in all we will be gone for roughly 3 weeks!  By the time we get home, it will be time to prepare for our next school year and I’ll be in the final couple of months of this pregnancy!  I figure we should be all settled in just in time for this baby to make his arrival and throw us into another couple months of chaos!  I wouldn’t have it any other way!

Yes, I typed his on purpose!  We are expecting a little boy!  All of the kids wanted a boy, so I’m happy we could accommodate their wishes :)

Many of my friends and family reading this already know the name we’ve chosen, but I think I’ll keep at least that much secret from the internet world until the big day!

Okay, I think we’re all caught up!

Oops…

Well, if you saw the pictures yesterday, you might be wondering what happened!!  On Tuesday at about 3pm, a couple of teenagers crashed into the brick wall that borders our back yard.  Poor kid is seventeen and without a license.  Busted! 

My guess is that he was speeding through the curve nearby and lost control.  It’s 25 mph (it’s a residential zone, people!), but people fly through there.  It’s downright dangerous at certain times of the day- teens and SUV moms are the worst offenders.  Sorry if you drive an SUV, but you can guess my meaning by that.

Praise God, the back part of our backyard is fenced off for the sheds and our landlord’s camper.  The kids are never back there, and I’m rarely out there.  As it happened, I was vacuuming and listening to my MP3 player at the time and didn’t even hear the crash.  When I turned the vacuum off, McAwesome looked out the sliding glass door and said Mr. Landlord was here.  I looked and thought, Ummmm…no. 

I went out and the two teens were already out of the truck.  They said they were okay, but the passenger had cactus in his arm and chest (the passenger’s door was in the cactus).  I went inside to get some gloves to help pull the cactus out, Hero called Daddy-man, and when I got back outside, one sheriff’s car was there and another was pulling up.  Within minutes, my husband, an ambulance and fire truck were on the scene. 

So that’s what happened.  I’m not sure yet about how things are getting fixed, but that will come.

Oh, and last night our church van was in an accident!  No one was hurt, but everyone was pretty shook up.

So…not really in the mood to drive any time soon :)

Chili Champion

Yesterday at church we had our 3rd Annual Soulwinning Kickoff/Chili Cookoff. It was a great Sunday with good attendance, especially from the Spanish ministry. The Spanish ministry is growing by leaps and bounds! The need is so great in our area- there are no fundamental Spanish works, and the two Southern Baptist Spanish works have recently shut down. Thank God for leading my husband and Pastor Eli to begin a Spanish work at our church!

Several new people signed up for soulwinning training, and we're excited to see more people involved in the Lord's work! The Soulwinning Kickoff is the main event, of course, but as a 'hook' (that sounds worse than it is!), we also have a Chili Cookoff. You know us Baptists have to bring food for everything!! We had 17 chilis entered this year (wow), and the winner of the coveted Golden Ladle.......... ......................drumroll, please................................

HERO!!!

He's soooooo humble about it, too! Okay, if you believed that, you don't know Hero very well. He really did make his own chili. All I did was lay out the ingredients, help him drain the beef, and stir the bottom of the pot. He even added 2 secret ingredients.....dare I tell?.....okay, I've been given permission to spill the chili beans (get it?).....brown sugar and cinnamon.

See the cute chili peppers on the apron? The apron will be passed on to next year's winner (assuming Hero doesn't win again- he's sure he will), but he will keep the ladle. The previous two winners have worn their ladles with pride! No, really, they've worn them as ties!!

Now that I've realized I have a gifted culinary artist in the house, I may never cook again....I'm sooooo disappointed. And if you believed that, you don't know me very well!

Good job, Hero!

Just The Two Of Us

Daddy-man and I had last weekend all to ourselves!  My parents offered to take the kiddos from Friday afternoon to Monday morning since my dad had to work the 4th, and they wouldn’t be able to come up (they come to Tucson every weekend for church).  They usually take the three older kids for a visit every now and then, but this was the first time they’ve taken the babies, too!  Minion 1 and Minion 2 are finally starting to creep out of all that baby fussiness, and they are a little easier to handle (sometimes!).  And let’s face it, Twinkle is an angel-baby and, therefore, practically sinless :)

So I drove the kids to meet my dad at the junction (where  I-10 and Hwy 30 meet), and we switched vehicles.  So not only did I not have the kids all weekend, I didn’t even have to drive a minivan!   Wow!!  It’s been a looooooong time since that’s last happened.  I cruised home in the truck with University of Oregon paraphenalia all over, and when I made a stop for a few groceries, I had a momentary panic attack when I thought I must have left the kids in the car.  But it passed, and I headed home.

Daddy-man and I went out to eat at Red Lobster: YUM!  At one point the waiter (excuse me, seafood expert) came out to tell us that Daddy-man’s trout had committed suicide by jumping off the plate just before they brought out our dinner.  It really wasn’t a problem for us as we were in no hurry, but the manager came out to apologize and didn’t charge us for the trout! 

Saturday morning, Daddy-man had Men’s Prayer Breakfast so I thought I’d have a leisurely morning before leaving for soul-winning at 9:30.  I wanted to remember what it was like to take my time to make a delicious smoothie for breakfast, get a little reading in, and actually iron the top I wanted to wear that day.  Of course, when I got up at about 8, I looked at the clock to discover it was actually 9:06- so much for leisure…

We had a great morning soul-winning- a lot of our teenagers went out, and I had two of the girls in my group.  After that, we had a church leadership meeting, and we were invited out to lunch with our Children’s Ministries Director and his wife (also good friends).  After lunch we went to visit one of our deacons who just had major surgery.  That was a real joy to me because I don’t often get to make visits- something about inviting 6 kids into someone else’s home…

We intended for Saturday evening to be a quiet night at home, but we got a phone call from the couple we went to lunch with, and they had tickets to the circus that they couldn’t use and asked if we wanted them.  We went, along with their daughter (she’s my age) and really enjoyed the show.  Barnum & Bailey’s Circus was an incredible improvement over the little rinky-dink one we took the kids to a few years ago.  Here’s a pic of us:

And here’s a pic of Deana and I with our clown noses:

 

The next day was church.  I woke up on time today (yea!), but when I pulled my top out of the dryer, I found a tear in the seam, so I had to do a quick patch job (not too bad, if I do say so myself).  We had a retired pastor that just moved to the area visit us, and we were blessed to be able to invite him and his wife to lunch.  It’s always a joy to get to glean a bit of experience and wisdom from those that have faithfully served in full-time ministry!  We enjoyed a quiet afternoon- meaning, Daddy-man napped, and I (not a napper) read and surfed the web.  That evening at church we had a surprise missionary- a young couple from West Coast Baptist College on their way to El Salvador.  They were a great couple!  They will do a great work for God in El Salvador, and I really pray we can be a part of it.  I am almost in love with this family!  We took them for ice cream after the service Sunday night.

I didn’t forget, though, that it was Independence Day!  We climbed up on the roof to watch the fireworks at A Mountain, and Deana and her parents climbed up as well.  We didn’t get down till almost 11! 

And there you have it.  I met my parents at the junction Monday morning, and brought everyone home.  Daddy-man went into the office, but I asked to him to be home when we got back because I figured the kids would be pretty wound up!  And boy were they!!

I won’t post about their adventures for time’s sake, but I was already tired within 30 minutes of them being home!  But I missed them, especially the babies since I’m never not with them!  Daddy-man and I were ready for them to come back home, but it really was a wonderfully relaxing, calm weekend on our own.  So thanks Mom and Dad!  We love you, and now we have definite proof that you love us, too!

A VERY Happy Father’s Day

Yes, I know we're almost two weeks past Father's Day, but it was a great one for our family, and I've been waiting on pictures to post about it.

Forgive me, but I'm going to pass over all the normal Father's Day stuff (love you, honey!), and talk about the two things that made this day extra special.

First, we had Twinkle’s Dedication.

A Baby’s Dedication is very different from infant baptism.  The Bible is very clear that baptism is an outward profession of one’s decision to trust Jesus as Savior.  It doesn’t ‘wash’ away any sin, only the blood of Jesus can do that!    A baby can not make any such decision.

Basically, a dedication is all about the parents!  Dad and Mom publicly declare before the church their promise to God that they will be faithful to raise that baby as a gift from the Lord, to rear him in the ‘nurture and admonition of the Lord,’ and to live as an example of a faithful Christian, so that when that baby is old enough to understand the gospel, he will decide to, by grace through faith (Ephesians 2:8-9), accept Jesus Christ as his personal Savior. 

Every Christian parent ought to dedicate their child to the Lord.  We have Hannah’s example in 1 Samuel, and we also see an example of this when Joseph and Mary brought Jesus to the temple when he was eight days old.  Now, it may not be a big, public church event, but all parents ought to declare their intentions to the Lord in their hearts.

Baby Dedications have always been special events to me, wonderful memories tucked away in my mother’s heart.  Hero and McAwesome were both dedicated in South Carolina by the same pastor that dedicated my husband as a baby (Herp spit up on him!).  Sweetheart Girl was dedicated by our pastor in Sierra Vista, the same man who married us!  Our Associate Pastor Eli was licensed and ordained recently, and we’ve asked him to do the twin’s and now Twinkle’s dedications.

So that was the first exciting thing that happened.

We went out to lunch and did normal Father’s Day stuff.  The kids gave Dad their gifts, and he gave the appropriate ooos and aaahs.  We attended church that evening, then came home and got the kids into bed.  They were having a hard time falling asleep, and sure enough I heard Hero and McAwesome calling for me.  I went into the room, and McAwesome said something that I cannot for the life of me remember, but I know I didn’t quite understand what he was trying to say.  Then Hero asked if McAwesome was one of the kids that had gotten saved at VBS the previous week.  No, he wasn’t.  Hero was a bit incredulous- he’s been praying for McAwesome since he became a Christian two years ago.

McAwesome then cried out in frustration, “Well, how do I know if I’m saved!?” 

Well, now, I can hardly tell them they should be sleeping by now, so I told McAwesome to come with me, and I took him into my bedroom and we went through the Scriptures.  McAwesome understood everything.  He knew what sin is, and he readily admitted that he was a sinner.  We went through Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross, and how only through Christ can we get to heaven.  McAwesome mentioned hell all by himself, and said that he deserved to go there.  Okay, long story short, when I asked McAwesome if he wanted to ask Jesus to be his Savior or if he wanted to wait, he said he wanted to do it then. 

I was blessed to be the one that led our oldest son Hero to the Lord- it was a Thursday night and Daddy-man wasn’t home.  But this night, Daddy-man was home, so I thought he should get to pray with McAwesome.  I brought McAwesome out to the dining room, and Daddy-man went over things one more time with him, then he helped McAwesome pray. 

My McAwesome is SAVED!! 

McAwesome is always willing to be vocal about not wanting to do something (he’s not a people-pleaser), so I didn’t worry too much about him praying just to make mom and dad happy.  Plus, this is hardly the first time it came up, but he’s just never seemed to fully understand and he’s never wanted to before.  But McAwesome’s also not a talker, so I wondered what type of evidence we might be able to see.  However, he’s told many people on his own that he’s a Christian now, and he’s already mentioned wanting to get baptized.

What a way to close out Father’s Day 2010!