My Son Just Learned the Greek Alphabet in 8 minutes!!!

This is so cool that I have to share it. The creator of Math-U-See has a video on You Tube where he leads you through the memorization of the Greek Alphabet in 8 minutes:

Here is the link if the video doesn't work:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BQVoz-HX2cA&feature=relmfu

I used this method to memorize part of the book of James last year. The hardest part of memorizing through a story is thinking of the story, and in the video, all the work is done for you.

I am so thrilled to have found this video and I hope you will be blessed by it. As a busy, homeschooling mom, it is the perfect way to accomplish something significant in less than 10 minutes!

2011 New Year's Resolutions

1.    Send out Birthday Cards this year. At a minimum, to my nieces and nephews. I hopefully will even send out cards to my friends whose birth dates I have.

2.    To write (for myself) at the end of each month, a short summary of my life, the verses I’ve been meditating on, the things I’ve learned, the things I did that month, etc.

3.    To finish Part 1 of my Psalms study, which is an in-depth Bible study for women on Psalms 1-50. I love working on it, but it sometimes requires so much concentration that it’s not often that I get much done. I’m about ¼ of the way done so far, and this project is almost 5 years in the making.

So with my New Year’s Resolutions posted, my blog is now a place where I will post for fun and no longer for a commitment (my resolution last year was to post a new blog the 1st of each month).

Happy New Year!
Praise the Lord!

Reflections on 2010

December 1st. Wow. This is the last first day of the month for 2010 ever. My very wonderful husband surprised me with a Starbucks pumpkin spice latte this morning. He is so sweet like that.


I think, for my final blog post on the 1st for 2010, I want this to be somewhat reflective. What have been the key things God has done in my heart in 2010? Here are a few of them:

1. This has probably been Todd and I’s best year of marriage. I feel like I’m finally understanding how two sinners can really have an amazing marriage. Much of the secret is found in Ephesians 4:2, which says we need to “overlook one another’s faults because of your love.” This is another verse that has marked 2010 for me. Instead of letting myself getting offended, I am choosing to love Todd and overlook any reason I may have to feel upset. I am making a point to be appreciative for the hundreds of things Todd does right, instead of feeling like Todd needs to be gravely aware of every single little mistake he makes. When I simply love Todd the way he is, and leave his sanctification up to God, and keep an attitude of thankfulness, everything is better.

2. Even though I’ve been writing and speaking about joy for over 5 years, I feel like this year I’ve gain a substantially greater measure of understanding on the subject. Psalm 32:11 comes to mind, which says that joy is the result of having an upright heart. When I start to feel discouraged, depressed, or anything else of that sort, I now check my heart and see where I need to obey God more. Usually, I just need to be more thankful and stop any feelings of pity for myself. Or, I may feel guilty about something God is convicting me of—and in that case, I need to change my behavior so I have a clean conscious. Since a troubled conscious does not get along with joy for long. But a clean conscious that pleases God is rewarded with peace and joy.

3. Since I love to talk, I’ve also spent a lot of time working toward being more sober minded. For many years, I wasn’t sure what this biblical term meant. God tells women to be sober in Titus 2, but as far as I was concerned, I had that nailed. I don’t get drunk and I don’t do any other drugs. But sober means more than just staying away from drugs and drunkenness. I’ve realized that I can get so caught up in a moment that I lose my “sobriety.” Instead of thinking clearly, when I get excited about something, I can talk so much and so excitedly that I begin to say things I later regret. Just foolish things that I don’t need to say. When I am sober-minded, it means that I keep my mouth and my excitement in check, only saying what I’ll be glad I said later, and not just saying whatever I want because I’m having so much fun. But rather keeping a watch at the door of my mouth even when I’m tempted to do otherwise.

This year seems like it has flown by so fast. Yet these lessons are some of the primary ones that I’ve been learning and meditating on this year. God has been faithful to us this year, as He has always been.

What things has God been teaching you this year?

I’d love to hear! Love in Christ, Katie

How to be Free of Self-Pity and Bitterness

Self-pity comes dressed in many costumes. Sometimes it’s anger. A woman feels angry at her life, at her husband, and what she does or doesn’t have. The root of this anger is feeling sorry for herself instead of being thankful.

Sometimes self-pity comes in the form of wishing things were different. A woman thinks “if only” she had made different decisions, things would be better.

Other times, self pity shows up as sadness. This woman just feels sad and she doesn’t know why. It’s often the feeling that results from a day or a week of frustration over the things her husband does wrong, or over her weight, or over not being appreciated, or whatever.

Here’s an example. A woman’s husband makes a critical remark. She thinks, “If only I had known what he was really like before we got married, then I wouldn’t have to deal with the pain of his rude comments.” Then she gets angry. “Why didn’t anyone warn me? Why didn’t any of my friends care enough to tell me not to marry him?”

That night she feels sad. As she stands in the kitchen making dinner, she doesn’t really know why she feels sad, but she’s drained of energy and she feels bad. Nothing horrible happened that day. Life has been good, but she’s in the dumps.

The next day she doesn’t get much done. She doesn’t really feel like working hard. She dreams of a life she doesn’t have. The bitter thoughts she feels have started to grow roots, and it becomes hard not to wish things were different.

The problem began in her thoughts. When her husband (or friend or family member or person at church or whoever) did something wrong, she let herself think of it. Instead of forgetting what lies behind, and keeping no record of how she has been wronged, and overlooking one another’s faults because of her love, and forgiving one another because God in Christ Jesus forgave her (Phil 3, 1 Cor. 13, Eph. 4), she simply wished things were different, or “innocently” felt hurt by what happened.

But when normal hurt becomes lingering hurt, the line starts to blur into bitterness and unforgiveness. It’s a dangerous path to go down. If you want to be blessed, forgive others. I’ve found the easiest way for me to stay clear of bitterness when I am wronged, is not to give what happened another thought. If I’ve been hurt or bothered by something, and I start to think of it, I will say to myself, “I’m not going to give this another thought. What can I be thankful for?”

Another check for your thoughts is your facial expression. When you catch your expression in the mirror, what does it say? Is your face reflecting thankfulness and joy? Or sourness and self pity? Your face says a lot about the thoughts behind the face.

Next, check your heart. Have you made a point to punish the person who hurt you by treating them coldly? Do you want to avoid looking cheerful because it might make the person who hurt you think that what they did was okay? I love the quote from Nancy Leigh DeMoss who says, “Unforgiveness is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die.”

Bitterness, self pity, negative feelings can kill you.  And I mean this very literally. The Bible says, “A joyful heart is good medicine, but a broken spirit dries up the bones” (Proverbs 17:22). Your bones make white blood cells, which is your immune system. If your bones dry up (meaning the bone marrow inside), you are literally depleting your immune system. A broken spirit is hard on your body.

Sometimes pain and tragedy is unavoidable. But other times a broken spirit can be caused by reliving some painful experience over and over again. This is like going to a feast and drinking Drano instead. You have a mind which can feast on any thought you give it. God knows the type of thoughts which will be most beneficial for you in all ways. I’d like to conclude with that list that God has given for your benefit in the Bible.

Philippians 4:8 “Finally, brothers,

• whatever is true,
• whatever is noble,
• whatever is right,
• whatever is pure,
• whatever is lovely,
• whatever is admirable–
• if anything is excellent or praiseworthy–

think about such things.”

Opening Your Mouth Real Wide

In today’s blog, I talk about how we can open our mouths wider. God says that if we open our mouths wide, He will fill them. I especially want to eat and be filled with Scripture, because it has the power to make me more like Jesus, to increase my faith, and to keep me focused on eternal things.

Here is what will you learn in today’s blog:

·    How to get stirred up to read God’s Word more
·    How to naturally teach the Bible to your kids
·    How to talk and think on God’s Word
·    Where you can immediately begin teaching the Bible when your heart is burning


Opening Your Mouth Real Wide

For years I spent so much time just absorbing the Bible. I made reading the Bible each day the highest priority in my life. But after I got married and had children, reading the Bible became more of a discipline and less the overwhelming obsession it had previously been. I’m so thankful for those years of learning God’s Word, only I want more now. I’ve been meditating on the verse “Open your mouth wide and I will fill it” Psalm 81:10. Basically, this means that God provides for us everything we need to be satisfied, filled, and happy—if only we will look to Him, call upon Him, and believe Him. Amen!

But what really spoke to my heart from this verse is opening my mouth wide to receive God’s Word. I am certain that whatever is in my thoughts will end up on my tongue. I will speak about what I think about. Jesus said that we will end up talking about whatever is in our hearts (Matthew 12:34). It’s just what humans do. We talk with our friends, our spouse, whoever about the things we’ve been thinking about.

And of course, what we think about comes so much from what we take in. That’s why we must fill ourselves with good things. I know what I need to put in my mind. I need to open my mouth wide and let God fill me with His Word. I need to make God’s word my continual feast.

Before I open my mouth to speak—with my friends, to my kids, at the Women’s Events I speak at, at church and everywhere else I go—it first needs to be filled. I need to open my mouth wide and eat up the glorious things the Bible teaches. Which brings to my mind, “Your words were found and I ate them, and Your words became for me a joy and the delight of my heart” (Jeremiah 15:16).

Every time I’ve found myself in a place of serious Bible reading, it has come following a prayer, asking God to put that desire in my heart. I've prayed that I would hunger and thirst for the Bible more than my necessary food. When I think back to the times in my life when I most longed to teach the Bible, it was those times when my mouth was so full of God’s Word that I felt like Jeremiah and David—it burned in my bones. When Jeremiah was not speaking the Word of God to the people, he said, “In my heart it becomes like a burning fire shut up in my bones; and I am weary of holding it in, and I cannot endure it.” (Jeremiah 20:9, Psalm 39:3)

But first, he had to be filled with God’s Word. He first learned the Word of God, and then it burned inside him. This is the order. You come to a place when the Bible is so saturating your life that the joy of a Scripture or the excitement over how it applies to your life burns inside you. And when it burns inside you, what do you do? Teach kids!

Now that I have children, I have the perfect audience, night and day, anytime I want, to let God’s Word just pour out of me. So I want to open my mouth wide again. I want to be filled with Scripture. Not just when I’m teaching women or doing something “professionally,” but that the Bible would so burn in my bones that I could not help but speak of it when I rise up and when I lie down, when I travel and when I eat. (Our family also has a formal “Devotions” time when we read the Bible and pray. But we’ve never talked about God’s Word too much. There is no such thing.)

This is the biblical plan: Let the Bible saturate your life and heart. Open your mouth wide and let God fill it. And then, let that full mouth of wisdom and truth and kindness be poured out. And especially, let it be poured in love upon your young sponges—the children in your life whom God has made receptive to your teaching.

Just for Fun

Today I let the kids each pick from a list of "prizes" as a reward for doing a job for me. Just for fun, I let James pick a prize also. His prize was "Pick a Special Snack." So I made him a special snack that was mostly healthy but also very fun.

Starting from the bottom left corner and going counter-clockwise, this is Todd, me, the Bean, Princess, and Austin :)

 

 

James wanted me to make one face for each person in our family. He is now sitting on my lap while I type this saying, "Make spiderman, make spiderman." I don't think he quite realizes that it's almost impossible to add fine details with peanut butter and chocolate syrup.

Fake smiles can be so cute!

Since I don't usually make creative snacks, I thought I'd post my work before it's gone forever...

 

 

The eyes are dried cranberries and the noses are sliced almonds.

Now James is sharing with the family...

In case you're wondering why the boys aren't wearing shirts... they take after Daddy.

Pleasing God by How You Remember

Remember the Alamo. Just six days ago I sat at the Alamo in San Antonio, Texas and listened to a historical presentation on the story of the battle between the Texians and the army of Santa Anna. I toured what remains of the historic Alamo battle site. And sometime last Thursday, I got the phrase stuck in my head, “Remember the Alamo.” That phrase is still in my head. Remember the Alamo.

But that’s not the only phrase with the word remember that keeps coming into my thoughts. All this week, I’ve been thinking of multitudes of phrases with the word remember. Okay, maybe not multitudes. To be precise, there have been three.

The second is a phrase from Psalm 119. It says, “Remember the word to Your servant, in which You have made me hope. This is my comfort in my affliction, that Your word has revived me” (Psalm 119:49-50). In this case, the Psalmist is asking God to remember.

And the third time I saw the word remember repeated multiple times this week was in a Christian biography. The individual would think things like, “Remember how God was faithful when…?  Remember when God answered your prayer for…?” and so on.

So all these triggers with the word remember have made me think about the significance of remembering. 

Now before I go any farther, let me add, I’m fascinated by how people think. I don’t care about how most people think, actually. But, I’m interested in the specific thoughts of people who live godly lives that others can imitate.

I would love to roll back the curtain on the thoughts of someone like the apostle Paul and look at how he thought. What did he think when he was doing boring things? What about when he prepared his food? Did he preach to himself? Did he remind himself of things? What specific phrases did he use? How did he keep his mind focused on Scripture without wandering into some unedifying thought?

One of those things that I suppose godly men like Paul think is that they remember. Now, I know Paul said we are to forget what lies behind (Phil. 3:13), and forgetting is the opposite of remembering, but at other times he told us specific things to remember. For instance, in Ephesians 2, Paul tells us to remember how we were at one time separated from Christ—having no hope and without God in the world. He wants us to remember what it was like to not have Christ, knowing now that we are saved and have hope. We are to remember where we came from because these memories provoke us to gratitude and love and cause us to move forward.

Listen, we can’t use anything from the past as an excuse to not move forward with maximum effort. That’s why Paul tells us to forget what lies behind. But when we remember what God has done, the point is to stir us up to keep moving forward. Like in Revelation, Jesus tells the church at Ephesus, “Remember from where you have fallen” (Revelation 2:5). He wants the people to remember how they felt when they were first saved. He wants them to remember their excitement and love for God, because love for God is the compelling reason why they should keep pressing on to follow Christ.

To be specific, anything we remember must fit the criteria of Philippians 4:8. Which means it must be true, honorable, right, pure, lovely, of good repute, excellent, and praiseworthy.

God wants us to remember His faithfulness and to remember truths learned from the Bible. 1 Chronicles 16:12 sums it up perfectly: “Remember His wonderful deeds which He has done, His marvels and the judgments from His mouth.”

The Israelites put up large memorial stones to remember the miracles God did for them, so that even their children would ask, “Why are these stones here?” And the parents would remember to tell their children the miracles God did for them. We take communion at church to remember the death of Jesus for our sins on the cross. We memorize the Bible so we will remember it.

Our memories can serve us so that we remember God’s faithfulness and His Word, and grow by what we remember. Or our memories can be used to hinder our walk with God.

So here is my challenge: Every time you catch yourself remembering something that isn’t honorable, praiseworthy, pure, true, right and so forth, begin to speak in your mind, “Remember…” and then list the good things God has done for you. For me, I like to reflect on times God has answered my prayers. I’ve said to myself, “Remember how many nights of my life I have prayed for God to protect me, and He has always protected me? Remember how every time my kids were sick, I prayed for them to be healed, and God always healed them? Remember how when Todd (my husband) was out of work, and I cried to the Lord, and He heard me and gave Todd a job? Remember how I was driving on a long trip many years ago, and when the car in front of me stopped suddenly on the one lane highway at 70 MPH, it was by a miracle that I did not crash?” And I remember many more wonderful things God has done for me.

And as I remember God’s faithfulness in my own life, I can’t help but be thankful and press on to follow Christ because of all He has already done for me.

“Remember His wonderful deeds which He has done, His marvels and the judgments from His mouth” (1 Chronicles 16:12).