Monthly Archives: December 2008

New Year, New Beginning

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new. – 2 Corinthians 5:17 (NKJV)

It’s a New Year.

Our culture tends to focus on New Year as a time to resolve to make major changes or goals for the year ahead. We often find ourselves planning, making lists and deciding what we will do differently this year.

For some of you 2008 was a year of great joy and success, for others it was a year of much sorrow and grief; but for most of us it was somewhere in the middle.

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New Beginnings

I am very glad to hear many of you had a white Christmas, it is something we would love to experience as a family one day. We made our very Australian Christmas quite special this year by spending Christmas night around a camp fire. We spent time talking with different members of the family and the Christmas story was told as the faces of family members reflected the glow of the fireplace and the wonder of the Christmas message, some even catching a glimpse of how the shepherds may have felt at the announcement of God’s plan of salvation for mankind.

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A New Thing

“I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?†Isaiah 43:19

I’m one of those people who loves change. Which is maybe why I love that verse in Isaiah so much.

New and fresh beginnings energize me, even if they’re something as simple as leaves turning from green to gold in the fall or furniture being rearranged in the house to make a room look different.

And I especially love celebrating New Year’s.

As the calendar turns and another year passes, it causes me to not only reflect on the past, but to look toward the future and all the possibilities it holds.

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Merry Christmas

I wish each and every one of you a very wonderful Christmas surrounded by loved ones.

More than anything else, I pray that you experience the warmth, joy and comfort of Christ and the true blessing and miracle of His birth.

Blessings!

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The Fight Over Baby Jesus

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. John 1:1-2 (NIV)

My children were playing happily together in the living room while I was cleaning up the breakfast dishes. As I poured powdered detergent, complete with a lemony fresh scent, into my dishwasher, a loud scream startled me.

“NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! You are not suppose to put Baby Jesus in your mouth. Give him back.â€

Thus ended the playing happily portion of this story.

My nearly five-year-old daughter had taken baby Jesus from our Christmas crèche to show her 20-month-old little brother, who was cutting some molars and decided that the ceramic baby would nicely substitute as a teething ring.

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Baking Cookies

“The hearing ear and the seeing eye, the Lord has made them both.” Proverbs 20:12 (nkjv)

There are 60,000 miles of blood vessels in every human.

15 million blood cells are produced and destroyed in the human body every second.

The longest living cells in the body are brain cells which can live an entire lifetime.

Fun facts about the human body have always interested me. I love hearing how many bones we have in our body (206 as adults, 350 at birth!). Many of these bones fuse together as we grow into adulthood. Did you know that we have 100,000 hairs on our head?

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Even A Little

Does life seem especially challenging right now?

There’s no doubt about it, these are tough times for many.

And when hard times hit, it can be even harder to hope.

It can be difficult to have faith and remember the promise that God is in control.

But, if you’re in that position, if you’re feeling like you can’t see a light at the end of the tunnel, be encouraged. As Jesus said in Matthew 17:20, all it takes is a little faith…

“I tell you the truth, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there’ and it will move.â€

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Guilty as Charged

“I am the one holding the keys to the atmosphere in our home.”
~ Terry Maxwell ~
Author of: Homeschooling with a Meek and Quiet Spirit

Ouch! Does this quote ever hurt?

When my kids are out of control, I’m the reason why!

It’s an all too familiar scene. Me checking email while the kids are supposed to be doing their school work. I look up in between typing. “Joey(9), have you started your school work?” Chris is still sawing logs in bed, and Timmy (6) is playing nicely with Grace (4) because I haven’t set out his school work yet.

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