Life Updates

So I was just thinking about posting a blog with some updates on our life and I realized how BORING our life is.. but as boring as it is.. I really love it.
So.. here are updat
Our dog-child Fifer just turned 4 months old on the 20th and he is growing like a weed. It is time for another grooming visit tomorrow morning so maybe I'll take some pictures and post them on here tomorrow if I have time. He is almost completely potty trained except when he can't hold it all night. Now he goes to the door and sits down when he needs to go out and if he's on the couch he'll go to the edge of the couch and sit and stare at me if he needs to go. We discovered he loves shredded cheese and that is the treat that finally trained him! He also knows how to "sit" now. Thanks to watching many episodes of the Dog Whisperer, I am becoming an expert trainer.. heheh
Our last Sunday doing the youth will be the last Sunday of April and thus will begin our new season of life.
Corey's job is going well despite the economy and the big layoff they had several weeks ago, so he is hanging in there and we are thankful for the Lord providing for us. We have still been able to pay all of our bills and I am more and more assured that He is a GREAT GOD!
School is going well for me. I'm pulling a B in the second semester of Anatomy and Physiology, so that hopefully will be enough for me to get into nursing when I apply in the fall. I'm just praying that His will be done.
So, that isn't too exciting but simplicity is always a good thing in life and I do love my life.

walking in faith

I was reading Oswald Chambers this morning before work and he had an amazing quote in today's reading.. it said living in faith is not mounting up on wings, but of walking and not fainting.
These days I am praying and trying my hardest to walk and not faint. Things can look so dreary with the economy getting worse and worse, people losing their jobs and not being able to pay their bills. Corey and I are just now starting to experience what other people have been experiencing for a while now. Our cash stash is getting smaller and smaller and we're really having to tighten our belts where spending is concerned. I'm working less and less and I've been starting to get depressed about it. Then this morning, I felt like the Lord really spoke to me and reminded me in his love that living a life with Him was never promised to be easy and wouldn't necessarily always be full of success by the world's standards, but He has promised to sustain me and keep me walking.. and keep me from fainting. What an amazing promise that he will keep me close to Him and hold me up when I'm tired and feel discouraged. Thank you Father for your mercy in my life.

It must break God's heart...

It must break God's heart to see the state of the world today. It must break his heart to see how people smear his name by calling themselves Christians and then living their lives as if He is not important. My heart is so burdened for the Church today, I literally want to cry. I have lived only a mere 26 years and yet I have seen so much hurt evidenced in the church. So many people hurt, so many sins swept under the rug and excused with no consequences. Am I any better than those people?? Absolutely NOT! The only difference between me and a nonbeliever is that my sins have been covered by the holy blood of Jesus Christ. But I pray with all of my heart that I will glorify His Name with all of my actions. I pray that He would give me the strength to stand up for Him daily. I don't want to be the reason that someone falls away from Him. I don't want to give someone an excuse or reason to belittle His bride.
How long O Lord will you allow this horrible sinful state to go on in your Church? God Break our hearts for the sin in our lives, for the sin in our land. We cry out we need your help, come back to our land. We confess we've lived in sin. PLEASE SHOW YOUR POWER ONCE AGAIN

Seasons

I am loving the weather we've been having here lately. I actually laid out in the sun on Saturday and Sunday and got burned! Craziness.. but it's going to turn cold again this weekend. YUCK! I am so ready for spring. This winter has been a really cold one, obviously.. with the huge snow we had last week. I think I have discovered that I am a spring lover. I don't like summer all that much because it is just too hot and fall is ok but not my favorite and after the winter we had, I'm pretty sure I hate winter! So,I have really been holding out for spring.
Something that I have learned from life recently is that our lives have seasons too. Our spiritual life has seasons and our life in general has seasons. This past Sunday, we announced to the youth and their parents that our "season" of helping with the youth was ending. We resigned and will be finished at the end of April with our committment. It was a really tough decision for us but it was the right one. With Corey's work schedule being about 60 hours a week and my working full time and going to school at night, our family time has really suffered. So, after praying about it for a while, we felt a peace in knowing the Lord had released us from this season of service in our life. While we were sad at the thought of not spending that time with the kids, we were excited at the thought of having more time for each other again. It's something we've really missed and we're just thankful that the Lord used this season of service to teach us so much.
I'm thankful that the Lord gives us different seasons in our life. It keeps things exciting and interesting.. and we're looking forward to our season of rest now.
Thank you Lord for knowing when it's time for rest for us.

Thankful for Grace

I honestly don't even iknow where to start this blog except to thank my Lord Jesus Christ for his sacrifice for our salvation so that we can truly experience the miracle of HIS GRACE. I saw on the news this weekend where a friend on mine from college who is a youth pastor in the area was arrested on charges of having sex witha 14 year old. He is married with a toddler and a baby. I was absolutely nauseated when I heard the news. I was disappointed and just completely heartbroken for his wife and kids. The affair with the teenager had been going on for several months, so it wasn't just a one-time "mess-up". When I found this all out, I honestly didn't know how I was supposed to be feeling about it.. how a Christian is supposed to react to news like this. My first instinct was to reach out to his wife, which I did, just letting know I was praying for her and their family. All I can really say about it now is that our God is merciful and full of grace and that He can restore anyone back to a perfect relationship with Him because He is able! Over the years, I have known several pastors to make some pretty big mistakes like this and while some recover and their families survive the heartbreak, others do not. But it ultimately comes down to accepting Christ's grace in your life and getting started on the long road to recovery.
I obviously will not mention any names here but if you're reading this, I'm asking you to please pray for this family. It is going to take a long time to recover from this and there is going to be some jail time he will have to serve because he was charged with several felony counts of sexual assault and indecent exposure. Please pray for God to restore the young man and to surround his wife with a special peace and a heart of forgiveness.

My Soapbox brought on by The Bachelor!

Ok, so I'm going to jump on the bandwagon and write a blog about the reality show, "the Bachelor"... I don't know how many of you watch it, but if you did.. shoot, even if you don't, you've probably heard what happened Monday night. The guy, Jason, picked one girl at the end of the show and proposed, only to ( 6 weeks later), decide to "follow his heart" and dump her on national television and proceed to ask the other girl that he had dumped 6 weeks ago for another chance. For any of you that know much about me, you know about an experience I went through about 8 years ago. I got engaged my sophomore year of college and we had set a wedding date, and I was honestly in love with this guy. Then, a couple of months later when I went to visit him out of state, we spent a whole week together, only to have him dump me the day before I was supposed to come back to North Carolina. I was heartbroken and really really angry.
So, watching this show on Monday night brought back some pretty horrible memories on my part. Am I glad now that I didn't marry this guy? Absolutely! Thank you, Jesus, for saving me from a huge mistake.. But the problem that I have with this guy in my life and with Jason from the Bachelor is that it sure seems like nobody takes engagements very seriously anymore. This frustrates me because if you are a girl, you know what a big deal getting engaged is.. and it only happens for the first time once.. so, when a guy goes back on his engagement and breaks it off.. this girl can't get that first time back ever again. He has stolen that from her.
I was so incredibly blessed to find a man like my Corey. While we were dating, he was so careful with my heart. He didn't rush things and he was always very careful to pray and know what God wanted before he ever made any kind of decision. He didn't even tell me he loved me until he knew for sure that God wanted us to get married. That is the kind of man that girls are looking for.. not the kind that makes rash decisions and in the process breaks girls hearts..
so... Men.. take some advice from a girl who got hurt by a very rash decision.. be careful with girls' hearts because one day you will give an account for what you did with it.

ok = so I'm off my soap box and I feel so much better now! heheheh
me and my guilty pleasure of reality tv

snow

we got an absolutely beautiful snow last night and this is what we awoke to this morning.. north carolina doesn't get snows like this often, and quite honestly I haven't enjoyed it like normal because the dog refuses to pee outside. so.. I have towels down all over our hardwoods and he has proceeded to pee on most of them.. sheesh.. I hope this snow melts soon. But it sure is pretty despite the inconvenience of it all.