Eat This Book!

I was six when my mom started teaching me the importance of reading the Bible for myself every day. At first she gave me specific passages to read along with content and application questions to answer. Then she taught me to read through whole books and keep a notebook handy to write down what I learned. By age eight, I was using a Bible reading plan to read through the whole Bible, although I skipped over large sections of the prophets!

In high school I read the Bible through several more times, but somewhere along the line my reason for reading the Bible became simply to give myself a daily check mark on a mental list called "Things I Do to Please God" that made me a better Christian than others around me.

It's Not You Who Speaks: Learning to Rely on the Holy Spirit

I was recently asked by the leader of the women's Bible study I attend if I would be willing to be the co-leader of the group with her and take charge of leading the discussion every other week. I prayed about it and talked with my husband, and I felt like it was what God really wanted me to do. But as the time approached for me to actually lead, I began to get very nervous.

Let me explain. I actually enjoy public speaking. Give me a topic and a little time to prepare, and I don't mind getting up and teaching. (I blame my mother who made me give a testimony in church every time I went on a missions trip or worked at camp or taught a children's class!) I've taught children and teens in Sunday school for years, and I've given devotionals at women's meetings. In college, Speech 101 was a really enjoyable class for me. I love communicating something to an audience and watching them understand it! Besides, there are only about seven women in our Bible study group, so it's hardly something that would normally intimidate me.

My Five, Yes Five, Trees

As you can tell by this panorama picture (an awesome feature on my husband's iPhone 5!) of our living area, I'm a little obsessed with Christmas trees!

It's my Grandmother's fault really. She started buying ornaments for me for my first Christmas. Every year she added to my collection. She continues this tradition to this day for all of her grandchildren and their spouses, and now for her great-grandchild, my son. As I got older, I became obsessed with Christmas ornaments. In fact during my teen years, I'd hang anything with a hook on the tree, including a miniature windsock and a Christmas pin! Anytime I travel, I can't resist picking up an ornament. And I love to hit up Hobby Lobby and Target after Christmas each year and pick up cute ornaments for 50-75% off! 

By the time I moved out on my own, I had nearly 100 ornaments. That first year, I went to Wal-Mart and found a six-foot tree (center in the picture above) that I decked out and set up in my tiny apartment. It was over-loaded with ornaments! By the next Christmas, I was engaged. (Actually, it was supposed to happen on Christmas day, but I ruined it. You can read that story here!) Since I was now going to be married and living in a bigger place, I went to the Hobby Lobby 75% off After-Christmas sale and found a nice 7.5-foot, pre-lit tree (far right in the picture). I figured I'd have enough ornaments to fill both trees the next year. After all, I was adding lots from our time dating. I even bought two on our honeymoon!

The next year, my in-laws, seeing my budding obsession with Christmas trees, asked if we wanted to have their very real looking, pre-lit tree (far left) from Bronner's (an amazing Christmas store in Frankenmouth, MI. It's worth the trip if you're ever in Michigan!) My father-in-law is a die-hard proponent of cutting down your own tree every year. My mother-in-law talked him into trying an artificial tree, so they bought the most realistic one they could find. But it wasn't the same. So we happily inherited it! In the bag they gave us with that tree in it, we found a whole other tree (middle left). When we asked about it, they realized they had inadvertently given us my husband's great-grandmother's tree. We offered to give it back to them, but they said to keep it. So we did!

For two years, we "made do" with four trees. But this year, I attended a class at our church where we learned how to make Jesse Tree ornaments. The idea came from this website, and is an Advent calendar of sorts. You and your family can trace the story of Redemption from Creation to Christ throughout the month of December. The blogger provides pictures to color and cut out and hang on the tree for each day, but our church's children's department leaders, being the amazingly creative people that they are, decided to spruce them a bit. They gave all of us the materials to make all 25 ornaments. They also provided all the devotionals in a spiral bound book. I am really excited about setting our minds on the real reason for Christmas with these daily devotions. I know our son probably isn't comprehending much, but it's never to soon to start giving him the truth of Scripture! So of course, I needed a small table-top tree for these ornaments (middle right in above picture).

And there you have it! Five Christmas trees, all pretty full of ornaments. Somehow, I don't think I'm done, either. There's no tree in the den, or in my son's bedroom, or in our bedroom. . . .

Lessons from a Fish Story

Our pastors have been preaching through the book of Jonah for the last 8 weeks. (They've been excellent messages, and are well worth the listen!) I've learned many things, but the biggest has been a new understanding of Jonah's attitude. I always thought that his attitude went like this: Chapter 1--Jonah didn't want to obey God (because the people of Ninevah were scary!); Chapter 2--Jonah repents of his sin (inside the belly of the fish); Chapter 3--Jonah obeys God (and goes to Ninevah); Chapter 4--Jonah relapses? Chapter 4 always confused me. It seems like Jonah goes from obeying God to being unhappy with God. Didn't he learn anything from the storm and the fish? Now, admittedly, I tend to yo-yo in my obedience as well (sometimes suffering victory and defeat all in the same day!), but the book still always seemed very disjointed to me. Through the last few weeks I've come to a better understanding of the book, and it makes a lot more sense now! Here are two things in particular that I've learned.

Gray Hair is . . . .

The Bible study I'm attending this fall is going through the book/video series Read the Bible for Life by George H Guthrie. Basically it's all about how to study the various parts of the Bible. So few Christians, myself included, actually spend regular time in the Bible. This study has helped me realize that my attitude toward Scripture should be one of delight (Psalm 119:14, 18, 40 and many others!), not duty or desire to "get something out of it." God gave me his Word to know him. And I should delight to learn more!

All that brings me to my more specific point.

Sovereign Over Us by Aaron Keyes

We recently started singing this song in church, and each time we sing it, the lyrics speak powerfully to me. I remember a friend in college pointing out the difference between our God and the one the Muslim world worships. They, too, believe in a god who is sovereign, but their god doesn't love them. He is arbitrary in his decisions. Our God is "faithful forever, perfect in love." So we may not understand why he is bringing something into our lives, but we can trust that it is the best thing for us.