New Year, New Directions

Happy New year everyone! I've been trying to write since Saturday. This last weekend I had three days off. I really thought that I was going to get to rest, but it was crazy. We were either at someones house or we had someone here.

I'm excited for the up coming year. God has been doing some great things in my life lately and I believe He is moving me into some new directions. Personally, He has called me to wait on Him and because of this I have gone on sabatical from active ministry. This started at the end of November, but really it is only now that I feel like I'm now "in waiting". God had to take me through a stripping process. I held on to so much. Little by little God pulled and tugged till I was able to let go. I can not tell you how freeing this feels. I'm not sure what lies ahead, but I do know that God is in the driver seat and I'm in for the whole ride.

During this time of waiting, God has put it on my heart to study and dwell in specifically the Torah. I'm excited to see what God plans to teach and show me. And I will be reporting back to you what I'm learning.

Speaking of new directions, I'm taking my blog in new directions too. As you can see I'm already making physical changes to the site and I have a few more to do. I'm also refocusing the site on the disciple's life. I will be writing on issues that effect the disciples walk in the path of his Master. Not just on "spiritual" things, but on all aspects and areas of the walk; personal, family, career, community and church. It is my hope that this blog becomes a living journal of the disciples walk, and not just my walk but all of our walks. So, I want to encourage you to share your thoughts here too.

I will be posting more on this over the next week. I pray that God's face would shine upon you and may He give you peace this year.

later...

Read More

It's Not All About Us

Kari wrote:

Can you believe this...it's 6:45 a.m., Kurt and I are wide
awake...where are the girls?? In bed still, sound asleep.....what is up
with that????????????

It was 7:30 when I finally went up and opened their room and we started to make noise to wake them. It was still a bit till we got them up. Now tonight we went to a friends house and we didn't get home and in bed till midnight. So I'm sure they'll be up bright and early, while Kari and I want to sleep tommarrow.

It was a good Christmas. We had a lot of fun and it was nice with the girls this year. They are more into everything. Although, the big gift the we got for them was a bit anticlamatic. We got them hamsters. We're expecting screams of joy and celebration; we got, "Oh! Hamsters...". It was a bit of a let down for me. But I'll get over it.

There is a lesson in that I think. We as parents often have plans and ideas for our children. But it is they that choose the path they take. Our children are not going to always make the choices that we agree with all the time. They'll not get excited about the things we think they'll get excited about. It is easy for parents to feel bad when this happens. We feel like a failure as a parent or we become dissappointed in our child because they didn't meet our expectations. Do you see the problem? It's not them, it's us. When we have come to the point where we feel like failures or are dissappointed in them, we have to evaluate ourselves. We make it about us to often don't we? It's selfish and it hurts our kids. When we feel like a failure, we end up neglecting our kids. When we are dissapointed we bring condemantion into their lives.

So what are we to do? Just enjoy them for who they are. It is not our job as parents to make them into who we want them to be, but to protect, guide, discipline and interceed for, in order that they might become who God created them to be. And in Jeremiah 29 God says that He has some pretty good stuff ahead for us, and our children. Trust Him and love them.

later...

Read More

White Christmas?

The last three Christmas' have been brown and grey. This year we've had a lot of snow fall and it's been beautiful. I've been really excited about a white Christmas, but the last couple of days have warmed up and it's melting. I'm hoping it can hold on one more day.

Read more at www.weather.com/outlook...

Read More

Remembering Our Soldiers

As we head into the final hours of the Christmas season, let us remember our troops overseas. Send a prayer their way and listen to this poem that ran on our local radio station.

It's really powerful. Listen to it before reading it. click the link below.Read more at ktisblog.skylightradio....

Read More