My Focus Is Off

"When swelling and pride come, then emptiness and shame come also, but with the humble (those who are lowly, who have been pruned or chiseled by trial, and renounce self) are skillful and godly Wisdom and soundness." Proverbs 11:2

Sometimes I find myself thinking FAR too highly of me, instead of him. I notice this is when things start heading down hill very fast. I notice that I depend less on my relationship with the lord and attempt to lean on my own understanding. Suddenly, Life seems dull, lackluster and my patience becomes shorter. I spend less time in the Word and then I am focusing my attention on things that are just time wasters. This is when I know I'm heading into dangerous ground.

There is something to be said about having a humble spirit. In Daniel 10:12 the lord tells Daniel to "Fear not, for from the first day that you set you mind and heart to understand and to humble yourself before your God, your words were heard, and I have come as a consequence of your words."

On the other end of that spectrum, in Isaiah 2:11 "The proud looks of man shall be brought low, and the haughtiness of men shall be humbled; and the Lord alone shall be exalted in that day."

The truth is how can you depend on the lord when you envision yourself to be so great? You can't.

I'm off to humble myself before the Lord and get back on track.

Excellence.....

Are you in a reading rut? Do you feel as though every book your read is just like the last? I've felt that way for the past couple of months. Maybe the plot was slightly different, the characters had a bit of a twist...but I seriously felt as though I was reading a repeat. That is until I picked up a copy of " A passion most pure" by Julie Lessman. Supposedly this is her first novel, don't let that deter you...I didn't notice that until I finished it and I'm having a very hard time believing this is her first novel.

"A Passion Most Pure" picks up just before The United States joins the first World War. In love with a man who belongs to her sister, Faith O'Conner resists temptation and clings to her faith in God to deliver her. However, God has other plans.

Love, romance, rivalry, betrayal and a purity rarely seen today, "A Passion Most Pure" answers the call of the heart with God's plan for a pure love. Not only is this a great read, you find yourself celebrating with Faith as God delivers all he promised in his timing.

Redeemed

But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our guilt and iniquities; the chastisement (needful to obtain) peace and well being for us was upon Him, and with the stripes (that wounded) Him we are healed and made whole. Isaiah 53:5 (Amplified).


"All have sinned" Romans 3:23
"The wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life" Romans 6:23
"Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved" Romans 10:13

If you've never prayed this prayer before, choose life:

Heavenly Father, I believe that Jesus died on the cross for me and rose again. I give you my life. I want Jesus Christ to come into my life and into my heart. Amen.

Eye Candy

I can brag right?

I totally rocked at my Wii Fit Yoga on my first try. I've always considered myself to be athletic. In high school I was captain of the girls swim team, on the track team and always the P.E. teacher's pet. For me, exercise was an escape, I didn't really have to think..... which meant I didn't have think about my problems. I excelled at athletics, and then something happened. I wasn't in high school anymore, I moved past alot of my problems and suddenly sitting at home eating and watching TV with my awesome husband sounded WAYYYYY better than going for a run.

So, Paul gave me the Wii Fit for my birthday. As I was opening it, he had this "Don't hit me!" look on his face. Now, for the record I DO NOT ABUSE MY SPOUSE! No, actually he tried to talk me into requesting the Wii Fit for Christmas last year. To the point, that he was actually telling people that I wanted it (which I didn't). After threating to return any Wii Fits I received (which I didn't)something wonderful happened at my mother in law's. She had the Wii Fit when we were there for Christmas and I discovered that one of the balance games is Snowboarding....can you hear my interest peaking?

In fact the day I discovered this was also the day I tried snowboarding for the first time on an actual slope. I spent 99% of my snowboarding experience on my butt, attempting to get off my butt or endangering the lives of other boarders/skiers. I was mortified and being that I'm extremely stubborn I was NOT going to trade my board in for the ski's that I actually know how to use. Nope, not me.....I was going to make something happen that day ......and that something turned out to be extreme pain, bruising, a broken tail bone and my personal favorite...being "That Girl". You know that one people knew about long before they ever saw me coming (or in my case, falling).

So....living in Texas doesn't really give me the opportunity to work on my snowboarding skills (I say that like I have some, ha ha). However with the Wii Fit I can save all those extremely embarrassing moments for the privacy of my living room and maybe lose 10 lbs.



So back to the today's experience.....today was the first time I attempted the Yoga...something I've never done before and wasn't sure what to expect. According to Chuck, my Wii Fit yoga instructer (yeah, I named him)I am at a Yoga Master level on my first try! Kudos to me! He said something along the line of "You have great posture" and I'm pretty sure he wasn't hitting on me.....so I'm assuming I have, well, "Great Posture" until I played the balance games. We won't discuss those or the fact that my Wii Fit age is 31 (I'm also not going to tell you I'm 25) do the math, or don't...yeah lets not.

I also tried the running program, which I did somewhat well at. I think I could certainly improve some if I wasn't constantly thinking about my sweet neighbor that lives below me.....the one who thinks my cats are 100lb dogs fighting over a bone. Yeah, I'm sure she was wondering if I was training Circus elephants today.

Maybe the running will have to wait until the house is finished......

Bestest Birthday Ever!

So I turned 25 today and it was great! Since I don't have much to say on the subject....other than YAY I can now rent a car without those young driver fees. WhaaHoo! I will allow the pictures to do most of the talking. (The one from above & below represents my like for pointy shoes)





My husband doing some hardcore coloring at the Macaroni Grill.



Expressions of Love!

Because sometimes you just need to giggle....

Hmmm.....an emergency? Nope, unless you call a yogurt stop at Albertson's an "emergency". Maybe some won't find this funny, but I couldn't stop giggling when I saw this the other day. Perhaps it the irony. And yes I was standing in line behind the officer with the yogurt munchies, still giggling as I was texting this picture out to EVERYONE in my phone.

What Fear?

My husband and I are in the process of building our first home. We've experienced a wide range of emotions since the day we decided to take the first step. You see we've been attempting to purchase home for years now, but there was always something not right about the timing. Once we came so close that we had an offer in on a house we had our hearts on only for it to fall through. God had other plans for us.

That was nearly three years ago and while we've looked at other homes, we have managed to keep a firm grasp on our apartment lease white knuckled and not ready to let go.

When the interest rates started falling and home builders began offering everything under the sun to sell, and then the first time home buyer incentive....well it was enough for us to step out and take another look. This time it was right, after prayer and three weeks of harassing our home sales representative (who has more than earned his commission) we took that first step....that leap of faith.

The evening we drove home after signing the contract it started, fear seeped in. It started with just one little thought.....what if? What if something happened to one of our jobs, how would we make our mortgage payments? In less than twenty four hours it went from "what if" to "this can't work". I'm not sure how we let that happen, fear doesn't come from god. Fear comes from trusting in things that are not of god, so place your trust in the lord and don't allow fear in your life. Seems simple and yet it happen so quickly. I'm very happy to say that as soon as we identified that we were in fear we ran straight to the lord. After prayer and renewing our minds, the fear was gone and peace had returned. Resist the devil and he shall flee (James 4:7)

What would of happened if we had allowed the fear to remain? Knowing how I have tendency to take control of EVERYTHING around me (still working on that one) I most likely would have gone back on our contract to build. I'm not even sure if you can do that, but I would have found out and lost our earnest money in the process. The worst would have been that I had stepped outside of the lord's will. I would of allowed the devil to steal the home God set aside for us and has been planning for us to have for these past three years.

Don't allow fear to control your life...God is in control.

Recommendation: Psalm 91- the whole chapter :)

Happy Birthday to Me!

So I haven't posted in awhile, still working on my consistency. Things have been getting busier at work, so I've been online less lately. Spring has finally come to North Texas and its beautiful outside. I plan to post again soon, hopefully with more purpose.