A Response to the Call

I have a lovely college roomie.  Well, 7 lovely college roomies, but this post is about one of them and her blog this week.  Katie (whom I generally call by first and last name..but won't, because these are the interwebs and there are creepers out there.) wrote up this post two days ago about a refugee family living in Indianapolis.  I immediately commented and then called her.  The family has nothing.  As in, NUH-THING.  And, yes, I meant to yell that.  With a broken heart she called out to all her blog stalkers and interweb friends for help.

The response: overwhelming.  Because of the amount of donations she will be helping several refugee families in the apartment complex with basic necessities, like soap, coats and under garments. How awesome!

I am amazed at how a response to the Lord's call to "learn to do right, seek justice, encourage the oppressed,. Defend the cause of the fatherless, plead the case of the widow." (Isaiah 1:17) is blessed!  I also find it breath-taking the number of people she has talked to with the same mindset.  "I have all this, but I didn't know where to take it.  I just want someone who really needs it to have it."  It's almost as if God were preparing people for this to happen.  : )  I love God - He's so cool.

So, for the next couple days I have dubbed myself the Southside Donation Driver.  Wanna help??  Send me an email and I'll gladly collect your donations and get them to Katie.

"Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.  No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and His love is made complete in us." 1 John 4:11, 12

We All Have a Story...

...What's yours?

Pray.

Please pray for Sharon.

Pray for her battle with cancer. For her daughters Jaime, Jackie and Lindsay. For her husband Jerry. For their whole family. Her walk with the Lord is strong. Pray for strength for everyone. For His peace. For His timing. For His understanding.

"Be strong and take heart, all you who hope in the Lord." Psalm 31:24

Just Because I Can...

Some photos. Shock. Dismay. I know this is two posts in one day - but I'm sitting in front of the computer working all day today. So...how else should I procrastinate?! :) These are from our church picnic yesterday. Our little face-maker, crawler extraordinaire was in full bloom. :) Man, she's a heartbreaker. :)

I don't think we have to worry about her being animated. She's already there. :)

This is my favorite. She and husband are making the SAME FACE! LOVE it! :) She looks so much like both of us, it scares me sometimes!

Revelation 5

It has been awhile since I posted something, dare I say, serious.  Well hold on to your socks kids, becuse it's coming.  Maybe not total seriousness, but as close as I get these days.  :)  

Husband and I spent Easter weekend in his hometown - Reno.  We went to church with his parents and enjoyed a good 'ole Baptist sermon.  I must confess though - I missed our church.  I found myself flipping the gilded edges of my Bible to Revelation 5 -- the passage I knew Pastor Ken would be preaching on.  At our church the Pastor chooses a book of the bible and we go through the book, verse by verse.  And on Easter Sunday our church stuck with routine.  So away Pastor Ken preached.  He DID preach the gospel message - then again he does this every Sunday as well.  :)  

I was struck with how appropriate the verses in Revelation 5 ARE for an Easter message: "²And I saw a mighty angel proclaiming in a loud voice, "Who is worthy to break the seals and open the scroll?" ³But no one in heaven or on earth or under the earth could open the scroll or even look inside it. ⁴I wept and wept because no one was found who was worthy to open the scroll or look inside...Then I saw a Lamb, looking as if it had been slain, standing in the center of the throne, encircled by the four living creatures and the elders...⁷He came and took the scroll from the right hand of him who sat on the throne. ⁸And when he had taken it, the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders fell down before the Lamb...⁹And they sang a new song:    "You are worthy to take the scroll and to open its seals, because you were slain, and with your blood you purchased men for God from every tribe and language and people and nation. ¹⁰You have made them to be a kingdom and priests to serve our God, and they will reign on the earth...¹²In a loud voice they sang: "Worthy is the Lamb, who was slain, to receive power and wealth and wisdom and strength and honor and glory and praise!".

What a blessing from the Lord that we would find ourselves in this particular passage for the celebration of the ressurection!  I have no doubt this was not coincidence -- but Godcidence.  There are so many pieces of this passage that glorify the Lord and I cannot WAIT to hear the message when the podcast is put up.  But for now I will rejoice in what the passage has already taught me: Our Lord is the same forever.  He took all the sins of the world upon his shoulders that day on the cross and became the slaughtered lamb.  He will return one day the slaughtered lamb - not pristine and golden and glory filled -- but "looking as if he had been slain" -- because He was.  For us.  For our sin.  So that we might join in the chorus "worthy is the lamb" with Him in heaven one day.  :)

Happy late Easter.