Welcome to Friday 4.16

I know that my redeemer lives, and that in the end He will stand on the earth.  Job 19:25 (ESV)

Welcome to Friday

Where or where to start!  It has been a while since I have taken the time to write.  I surely and sincerely hope that you are doing well.  And I hope that you know how often you have been in my thoughts and prayers.  Please forgive me for failing to take the time to drop you and note or write and tell you so.  I have prayed that you are well, and that you are continuing to be drawn into the love and presence, and God's great arms of compassion. 

So, how are you doing?  How have you been and what have you been up to for the last few weeks.  How were the past few weeks?  Were you busy, able to relax a bit, or a mixture (good, great, excellent, up/down, etc)?  Are you enjoying this week and experiencing some new and exciting things?  What was your favorite part of the week?  I hope that you have had a wonderful and exciting week.  I hope that you are doing well in mind, soul and body.  I pray that you had a successful, purposeful and prosperous week, Welcome to Friday!

The past few weeks have been such a blur.  Many of the days have run together and I can't recall all of the things that have gone on or went on, and I've probably blocked out any things that were particularly challenging.  I know that during that time both things and home and work were very busy.  We celebrated Sydney's birthday, had dinner with family in friends, attended awards ceremonies for Paige and Ava, had more high school senior moments, a dance tryout, farmer's market, and an environmental fair just to name a few things.  This week has slowed just a bit and I am so thankful for the relief.  All in all we are doing well. 

Sydney received an award for band.  She was very surprised and excited to be honored.  Gabbi is gearing up for her dance performances, including one that she choreographed herself.  Paige and Ava are doing well.  Paige led her "Gathering" today at school.  This week Ava managed to get into a pretty good routine of getting out of the car without a lot of fuss.  She also read to me last night (from memory) David Gets in Trouble.  Emma continues to surprise me with her creativity, and ingenuity.  She also surprised me several times this week by falling asleep on the floor in various doorways, carpet areas, and even once outside our bedroom door.  I would get up to check on her and find her "sawing logs" from various locations.  Cassarra is doing well.  She is every bit a senior.  Last weekend was senior prom and she went to prom with her date (please pray for us!).  She had a nice time and we still get trickles of the details. 

Trish is doing well.  She took almost 100 pictures of Cassarra on prom, found one of the two of us from our junior prom 23 years ago, and continues to work on albums and photos.  Best of all, she is handling the pending departure of our first college bound student pretty well (most days I think).

I'm doing well also.  The last two weekends I've been clearing out the overgrowth and piles of leaves in the backyard.  I've also been trying to fight the battle with the squirrels who have demolished yet another bird feeder.  My garden still sits plowed and devoid of any vegetables.  Hopefully, between cutting the grace, performances, and other things I will be able to plant something.

Again, I hope that you are doing well.  I hope that things are all going well with you and that you have had an excellent week.  I pray that your weekend will be filled with rest enough, joy in abundant quantities, lots of love, and fun.  Have a great rest of the day, and again...

Welcome to Friday!

I am thankful for:

• Trish's love and calming presence
  
• Trish's organization and direction for our crew
• All six of the girls
• Even when Emma want go to bed on time
• Even when Ava want go to bed on time
• Family dinner night
• Date night with Trish
• At home
• At Kiki's
• At Red Robin
  
• A successful resolution of two critical customer issues at work
  
• The courage to confront major issues head-on
• Worship
• Bible Study
• W/ my friend Yuhui at work (Luke 16)
  
• W/ my friend Stephone over the phone (Exodus 14:13-14)
  
• Prayer
• Friendship
• Encouragement, especially the encouraging words I received from my big sister today!
• Great dinners prepared by Trish and the girls
• Denny's night out with Cassarra, Gabbi and one of our family friends
• Thursday's workout at the Y
• Cassarra making it safely to, through, and from prom
• Laughter and jokes
• Milkshake runs to Sonic
• Playing dolls with Ava b/c Paige, Sydney and Emma wouldn't
• Turned out to be very interesting
• Ava seemed to enjoy the attention
• Later I chopped down a forest, wrestled a bear and killed a lion with my bare hands to restore order :-)
• Coffee
• Family
• Pictures
• My first week w/ three days of basketball in what feels like forever

My God, time is flying by us - and we long to know that you are with us.  Bless my children as the grow and in all the places they go. 




Pictures of our prom princess!

 

 

To M

These are just my thoughts...

To M:

Without God or with an impersonal God I cannot explain injustice or justice? What is our purpose and value if God does not care? What answer would there be for the history of the OT, the rise of the gospel, and people - people who do good even to their own harm (martyrs of faith, not the idiots)? None of us without a higher purpose or inner voice would do good. [For a good man some might think to die....] .  And without a real God, a real heaven and a real Savior, why would good matter or evil for that matter?  An impersonal God who creates and then leaves? Would anyone ever create a whole universe and leave it to go to hell? I wonder, have I ever cared enough to create something, and then said "well whatever happens to it is fine by me?" Is some being who lets evil rise and never intervenes a god...?

You do know that God *did* intervene and does intervene? How else can we explain Christ Jesus, the disciples, the Church and the holy spirit.  The work of the Church in places where Christ is proclaimed in the midst of persecution for no earthly gain.   These are proof of intervention. Easter! Christmas! Pentecost! 

Alas, I am poor in my defense, but have you ever heard of the book "The Case for Christ"? I read it when I was wondering... I hope M might find it and read it too. Anyway, these were just some of my thoughts

A day late... Welcome to Friday! - its a long story

I will sing of the Lord's great love forever;
    with my mouth I will make your faithfulness known
    through all generations.

~ Psalm 89:1 [NIV]

Welcome to Friday!

"I will sing of the Lord's great love forever."  I hope that you are doing well and that you had a fantastic Friday and an absolutely wonderful week!  How are you doing and how is everything going with you?  I hope that you were able to enjoy the celebration of the great and awesome love that endured the betrayal, took the beating, handled the ridicule, managed the agony of the cross, took the despair of the grave and then rose with all triumphant power on Easter morning.  I hope that the great love of Easter is still holding, strengthening, and blessing your life and spirits. 

Well, this is actually take two.  I was getting ready to hit send yesterday when Microsoft so kindly informed me that they had "lost connection" and if I would be kind to "wait a moment..." while they were trying to "reconnect to Windows live."  I was assured that I would be able to continue on to "Windows live..." and finish my email.  They said they would be ready in "a moment," but what they didn't say was that I would lose my entire email draft.  As it turns out, when their big moment ended, and the reconnect was complete the only thing that was left of my email was the blank screen with the "Subject" placeholder.  I was devastated.  I hit back, back again, back again, redo, refresh, and redo again with no luck.  I searched the drafts folder, the inbox, the sent folder, and even all other open folders in my email client, but it was gone.  In desperation I looked at the Microsoft site for lost drafts and none of the tricks, tips and workarounds they suggested worked for my predicament.  Worst of all, the last comment on the site from the Microsoft engineer said in the future, make a copy as you go.  I thought, wow what great advice.  You mean to tell me that the auto save feature of our product may not work, the "Save draft" feature on email may not work, so periodically save a copy of the email yourself.  Thanks a lot technology!  I guess that was my taste of what other folks run into when they call our company support line.  Hopefully I will be more sympathetic in the future.  .... please wait ... I'm saving this draft!  Gabbi informed me that I can't get it back, so move on.  You can only get that magic once!"

Anyway, we had a great week. We had a lot of fun.  We had an amazing time celebrating Easter at church.  The older three girls participated in a skit on Sunday morning, a retelling of the Easter story.  Liz worked really well in pulling it all together with youth, young adults and adults.  I know that they had fun.  I had fun watching.  Afterwards, Ava and Emma engaged in a very spirited Easter egg hunt.  Ava and Emma found their fair share of eggs, plus some.  Emma received help from several kids and actually had more than Ava.  But, that is probably because Ava was also stopping to eat some of hers in the middle of the finding process.  Luckily Trish and I managed to get to the both of them before they completed mauled the entire bag of chocolates and skittles.  We also enjoyed a great service of worship and energy.  After service we had a good trip to Georgetown to have dinner with Ms. Cooper, my sister-in-law and her boys.  Cassarra, Gabbi, Sydney, Paige and there dad put a hurting on the macaroni.  And I'll have to take the fifth on the persons involved in the brutal assault on the "Chocolate Delight" dessert.  I also got a chance to see my brother on our way back to Columbia.  It is always a highlight, no matter how short the time, to visit with any of my brothers.

The rest of the week was a lot of joy, family time and fun.  The girls gave me a great surprise on Monday during lunch.  They delivered a hand made lunch to the office in the middle of the staff meeting.  It was so cool to see all six of the girls strolling across the parking lot and into the building.  After the sandwich and salad delivery they raided my candy bin, my candy jar, and the candy stash in the hallway.  It was the highlight of the day!  Wednesday through Friday we had a blast of dinner dates, indoor camp outs, family dinner, breakfast dates, and a lot of laughter.  We had our first ever Un-Birthday Party complete with cake, ice cream, and a goodie bag.  Gabbi did a ton of the planning, and we all kind of pulled together to pull it all off.  The girls made dinner on Thursday, teaming together to make an appetizer and entrée course.  We had fun eating, laughing, and trying to figure out who ate all the nacho chips. 

Trish is doing well.  She captured some beautiful shots of the family playing and spending time together.  She also managed to capture and absolutely stunning sunset and post it on her blog.  She has also helped the girls with another fun set of projects and documented so many moments that we will all remember and cherish.  She is so gifted with photography, wisdom and writing.  Hopefully we all appreciate what she does, who she is, and how awesome she is to our whole family

Well, I hope you had a wonderful week and that your weekend is going very well.  Next Friday I hope to actually send you a message on Friday.  Have a great rest of the weekend and a wonderful next week.  Blessings and as always...

Welcome to Friday!

• I am thankful for:
• Easter
• The power and joy of Easter
• The hope and promises of the resurrection
• The Easter Service
• Youth skit
• Praise song
• Praise dance
• Sermon
• Family time
• Trish and the girls
• safe travel to and from Georgetown
• Time with family and family dinner
• The indoor camp out/camp in
• An Un-birthday party blast
• Playing checkers
• Date night
• Coffee
• Breakfast with the girls
• Emma's laughter
• Cleaning up some of the yard
• Getting time to get the garden ready (even if I might not plant anything)
• Trish's pictures of the girls and family

May the Lord God, good merciful and mighty, bless us with times of stretching and refreshing,

times of comfort and courage, times of passion and power.  May the Mighty, the Almighty God,

do more and more for His glory and His power working in us and through us.