Friday, December 3, 2010
How Great Is Our God!
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It comes from a lack of trust in just how BIG our God is, and just how GREAT is His love for us and to us. But then, why do we forget just what His death on the cross was all about, His love for us. But this act isn't complete without His triumphant resurrection, His Greatness, the proof that He is Supreme over death.
Have you looked at the stars? They are innumerable. God is bigger than them. And physicists tell us the Universe is EXPANDING - and God is greater than the expanding universe. At least mine is. So why do I keep Him in a small box? And why do I share only a tiny portion of my time with Him?
God is so great and awesome that He was able to become a baby. He was able to defeat Satan in death. And we know that since He was able to control the forces and give insight to His messengers over a 4,000 year period that ended 400 years before His birth (I speak of the prophecies of the Old Testament), how accurate they were to state that He would come out of Nazareth AND Bethlehem AND Egypt, how would His words telling us about the Last Days, the Millenium, and Armaggedon be any different.
And then, because He loved me, and I believed Him, and I accepted His gift to me, I will get to rule with Him one day. Praise the Lord!
Friday, November 5, 2010
CATCHING UP
Three weekends ago, I was at a Women’s Retreat with one of the churches I attend, Church USA. The guest speaker, Cathy Chesier, spoke about being able to function within and use our gifts, and what are our gift blockers. Her basis was the book, The Gift In You, by Dr. Carolyn Leaf. This book talks about how each of us process information, the same, yet differently. The gifts in this quiz were Intrapersonal Intelligence, Interpersonal Intelligence, Linguistic Intelligence, Logical/Mathematical Intelligence (you don’t have to understand Math to be Logical, but it is the same brain area), Kinesthetic Intelligence, Musical Intelligence, Visual/Spatial Intelligence.
After taking a quiz to find out how our brains fires off in the processing we were divided into project groups according to our top rated function. Mine was Linguistic Intelligence. I would never have guessed. All my life I have wanted to write a book, but have still never gotten past page 3 for a single one. However, I have been a Toastmaster (speaker) for 32 years. But, I digress…
We were divided into groups and given a poster board, then told to make a poster and a skit or talk to explain to everyone what this gift means about "me". There was only one other Linguistic at our retreat and so we paired up. We were talking about what being a Liguistic means and as I talked she started writing a poem. I added about two non-continuous lines to it. As I stopped to add my lines, she would tell me to keep talking. (I’m laughing as I write this.) It was pretty amazing. Here is the poem and a picture of our poster (I made quite a few contributions to this, including the lips.)
A Lot To Say!
What you see is what you get!
We both don’t worry,
and try not to fret!
About the small things in life
that take time away.
We stay focused in where we are and what we say!
We lead by example and lend a helping hand;
We are strong women
that get what we can.
To better ourselves and even our friends;
Just take the time to listen…
You’ll better understand!
by Elsie Santana
After the retreat I returned home to find out that my daughter, Eve, would be arriving the next Sunday. I spent that week working as hard and fast as I could to get my work caught up. One of my clients had filed bankruptcy on the Monday just before the Retreat and I was pressed to get much more accomplished than the normal.
And then my daughter arrived! And she brought us a surprise, our 6-year old granddaughter, her niece, Madi! What a delight! There was so much joy that they both had come. You must go to Eve’s blog “Tranquility… & Turmoil” and see her photo entries for October 24 to 30. While they were here I still had to continue working, but I did my best to limit it and maximize their visit. We had visited one of the parks one day and discovered a variety of ducks lived at this park. Madi saw someone feeding the ducks (& maybe loons & grebes? Arizona Birds ) and wanted to do the same, but we didn’t have anything to feed them with. We promised her we would come back and do that. On Friday we fed the ducks. She was delighted. We have a bird that looks like a very small Raven, all black except for the breast, which is brown, and the bill (can’t remember its color). Someone once told me their name, but I don't remember it. These birds were also enjoying the feeding of the ducks and pigeons, but would only feed if they could catch the food in the air. They would not fight the pigeons (who were twice or thrice as large) for the bread. Pigeons were, for the most part, fed from the crumbs that fell while we pulled the bread out of the bag for the ducks (& loons & grebes). But I also showed Madi how to turn the bread into “grains” for the pigeons.
On Saturday we traveled to Prescott to enjoy the Halloween festival they had for the kids. The activity was for four hours and Madi had a blast. Eve has photos in her blog. This was our last day together.
Now they have returned safely home and I have discovered that another week has passed. One of my clients was in the hospital this week and there was much work to do for him/her that I still haven’t got our roof or windows repaired (see last blog post). Good news, s/he is out of the hospital after a 5-day stay. I have been working hard all week to get caught up on my work, plus I want to get more bids for the repairs. Yet, the storm was four weeks ago and David is asking if we’ll have windows before it turns cold.
And now it is not noon, but is 1:50pm. With this long “catch up” entry I will hopefully get back on track to do this twice a week. Hope you enjoyed reading this. I was listening to Selah while writing this. The CD had 19 songs on it. It finished before I did.
Tuesday, October 5, 2010
An Extraordinary Week
On Sunday morning, before getting dressed for church, I chopped and curled my hair. The weather was cooling down (slightly) and I was very tired of my "summer time" ponytail. To cut it this early, though, means cutting it at the base of my head so that it is still off my neck. Here in Arizona the temperature (for last week) was still in the low 100's, high 90's.
Monday the day started and ended with a political meeting. I attended a Tea Party meeting in the morning and the Republican Party meeting for my District in the evening. And had work and a doctor's appointment in between.
On Wednesday evening I went to a training class for the City of Glendale's Boards & Commissions. You can't be a commissioner without the training, so I was told, but many of the attendees were already on Boards and Commissions before attending. I am wondering how that happens.
And it was on Wednesday that I received an email from Women of Faith's Volunteer Coordinator that they needed a volunteer to work backstage as a Talent Runner. I told her that I would love to volunteer for that. But then the position was filled, and then the position wasn't filled. After filling out a separate volunteer application for this position and WOF doing a background check on me, I was given the position of Talent Runner for the Friday evening and Saturday Conference. I was able to attend the whole Conference. It was wonderful and I came home so very excited and refreshed. Thus my week ended in Praises To God.
It was a wonderful and unusual week.
This week also seems to be extraordinary... on Monday I signed up to be a Precinct Committeeman. And today it is storming - one storm after another is passing through. Flooding! And these storms contain hailstones bigger than pebbles. Oh, no!! another one and the hail is rock size, NO KIDDING, and just broke 2 of our windows!!!
I just received a phone call, but I can't call out!! I wanted to warn David. Gotta go. I need to find some way to reach our insurance company.
[Later:] We had two broken through windows that had to be boarded up, a very wet bed that has to be dried out before we can sleep, glass everywhere in our bedroom, and a living room window cracked. I would say that that is getting this week off to another extraordinary start. My Toastmaster club canceled their meeting so everyone could stay home, safe and dry.
Still to come for this week, besides major tax issues for several of my clients, I have three Toastmaster Humorous Speech Contest and Evaluation Contests to judge or help out in some way.
Tomorrow, I'll drive David's truck so he can pick up his motorcycle, then call my boss so I can pick up my truck. It's going to be a busy week.
Thursday, September 23, 2010
In Memorium - Carol McNeely
Carol Hackenberg McNeely passed away this past week (possibly on Sunday). Her husband, Mike, sent a brief email to me to let me know. My sister-in-law, Juanita Mabee Pressler, had received a phone call from Joe Hackenberg. That's how she found out. (I was calling her to let her know.)
Carol, you will be missed! I have enjoyed our conversations, whether by phone or email. Thank you for all the work you did to put together a family history.
To Mike, Carol's children, and any Hackenbergs reading this, David and I regret your loss, and hope you will be comforted quickly. May God richly bless each of you.
Wednesday, September 22, 2010
We The People
Congress becomes "Lame Duck" for two reasons this year, always for the holidays (Thanksgiving through New Years Day) and the elections with the change of offices.
I was looking up Congressional salaries, which took me an hour to find. This is public information, but I could find it a lot faster in pre-Internet days then I could recently. I finally found a site that published it along with their staffs salaries: www.legistorm.com. When you go there be sure to check out the Staffers salaries FAQs page. Today, our Congressmen & women receive $174,000. Their staffers, almost as much. As early as 1975 the salary was only $44,500. This is a huge jump in 35 years. I only wish my salary had done as well. David's former employer in Seattle started laying long-time, experienced employees off and hiring new, unexperienced employees at lower wages when the rate of pay increases exceeded what their profit potential could maintain. In 1975 our Congressional representatives salaries were more in line with the people they represented than they are now. Now they have the salaries of the more elite. It was around this time (1975-1980) that they got together and said, "hey, those large corporate CEOs are making millions in salaries and bonuses and we are only getting middle class salaries? We have to change this."
Unconfirmed, I saw that all our Congressional representatives are MILLIONAIRES, the poorest of them was still worth $50 million. These are NOT the people who are supposed to be running our Government. Nor are they supposed to be career politicians. Our Constitution was designed for the Common Man/Woman to take time away from their work and their family to serve for a limited time, then go home and someone else would take their place. Some of our Congressional runners say that although they don't have term limits, they will impose one on themselves and not continue running after a certain number of terms. I have only heard of one who has kept that promise, and he's not from Arizona (it is not Trent Franks). They get to Congress and the power they now have is addictive. Congress is supposed to be filled with the common man, the middle incomer, like you and me.
I was looking at John Thrasher's site, he states, "...have transformed America into a nation governed not by politicians, but by ...". Our Government is not supposed to be governed by politicians either. Our Government is supposed to be governed by "We the People."
I have a large eminent task to do. As soon as I have accomplished it, or need a break from it, I will be writing letters. (My last letters weren't answered by anyone with the exception of (correction) Representative Trent Franks, but it was only a form letter. Still, it was an answer.) What about you? What action are you going to take today and in the remaining time before November to try to get our Government back to being governed by the People?
For more thoughts and concepts to get your blood moving, check out http://cominus.com. Also, if you can, attend a Focus on the Family's "Truth Project" study. It is a 12 or 13 week study.
Wednesday, September 15, 2010
Facebook, Emails, & Blogging
But through Facebook I discovered that my sister, who is taking off for Europe, specifically, France, Spain, and Italy, has her new blog up so that I can follow her adventures. So I had to grab that and put it into "Blogs I am following" as well as click the follower link. I don't know why I have photos posted to my Blogs and to my Facebook, but her blog follower link still wanted me to upload a photo. Then I found she is being followed by a delightful person that we met together one time on Orcas Island. So I had to find out if he was on Facebook and say hi to him. And I found out that another friend of hers that we know in common is on an adventure of his own and I took time to become a follower of his blog.
Except for my main E-mail box I haven't cleaned out my Emails in over a week. That chore also, usually, takes a couple of hours. But of the Emails that I keep, I often don't have time to read most of them. Still I try. My mail E-mail box does get looked at almost daily, and I try to keep it fairly current and read. Still I have almost 300 Emails that have not been looked at. So to all you friends who love to "FWD:" - you might as well not. It will probably be deleted instead.
If you receive an email from the Department of Health telling you not to eat tinned pork because of the swine flu... ignore it.,,,,,,
It's just SPAM.
Later...Saturday, September 11, 2010
Eden Reflections Photography: Three Generations ♡♡♡
http://mybucketinfinity.blogspot.com/
I'M ON TRACK
My computer is fixed and I didn't have to save all my files and reformat my hard drive and reload all my programs and updates. I wasn't looking forward to that. It would have been a week worth of work and would have put me much further behind.
I am still catching up with my work from my holiday at the beginning of August. That was a great, wonderful trip. I saw family and friends. It began with a family reunion. I love family reunions because you get to see loved ones you haven't had time to see. BUT, there are so many people at a family reunion, so many activities going on, and so many photos/videos to take that you don't get to really spend much time with any ONE and get caught up on what is going on in their lives. One artistic cousin brought his fiance, and I am so happy for him, but I didn't get a chance to meet her and find out what is going on with their lives. I have to admit that my main focus (always) was on my daughters and my granddaughter. OK, and my parents and sisters. But Jeff, I hope you and your beloved will be at the next reunion I'll be at so we can spend some time together. It wasn't until after we had all departed that I realized I hadn't sat down with you.
It's hard being in Arizona when the rest of the family is mostly in Washington. My brother Reid lives here also, but unless he needs help I don't really see him. His sons were at the reunion with their fiances, and I spent a little time getting acquainted with them. It was nice to see my nephews. They are both expecting babies. One is expecting twins.
As I mentioned, my workload has piled up on me. Today, I hope to cut it down to the present, put away the past. Getting caught up includes writing this blog post. A large part of the pile is business reading that I must get caught up on. An equal portion is getting notes logged into my computer. I can find things faster on my hard drive than I can in a filing cabinet. But if it is something that I can find on the Internet, that's where I'll leave it.
This was an interesting week. Monday, being a holiday, David was home working on his projects. I was working. We went out to see a movie, and saw "Dinner For Schmucks." We don't recommend it. It was funny at the beginning, funny at the end, dull in-between, and no "hilarious." We were disappointed. In addition to that they put the movie in a tiny theater, but the screen was just as big as their larger theaters and no room to get away from it. They fairly filled up the room. I like to sit on the aisle because I usually have to go to the restroom during the movie. I didn't get to sit on the aisle. I didn't dare drink anything, no matter how thirsty I got. And when I saw that David was bored with the movie I asked him if he wanted to leave. He said, "no," but I know it was because he didn't want to disturb the others in our row and behind us. Maybe we should have been "texting" so we could get thrown out. ;-0
Since we had gone to the movie we missed our first date with our granddaughter. I'm sorry, sweetie. My next two Mondays are also busy. Maybe we can talk tomorrow???
Tuesday I had my usual FaithMasters activity. Wednesday evening I was ushering at the Phoenix Theatre. The play is "Noises Off." It is a play within a play. I have it on video with Carol Burnett, et al. It is funny! Some people, who probably don't understand that it is a play within a play, left early missing the whole concept of what was going on. The play has gone into extended time, so I will be ushering again next Saturday.
Thursday I had my choice between an Arizona Constitution meeting and a concert with Brian Weaver, Laura Landon, and key singer, Justin Lavin. I went to the concert. It didn't really have a concert feel to it thus I couldn't get into the spirit of it. But, Thursday afternoon I decided to go see the movie "What If?". I was late leaving home, ended up taking the longest way to the theater, and had a car accident happen behind me that I witnessed. I didn't go to the movie. I gave my report to the policeman and went home.
Because I want to support Christian made movies, I left work on Friday determined to get to the theater and see it. I was 25 minutes late. The window clerk wasn't sure if he would sell me a ticket for the 1:00 show, but I assured him that was the show I wanted to see. It was a surprisingly good movie. The script is Jerry Jenkins.
Beyond work, that was my week. I'll talk to you later.
Monday, September 6, 2010
My new journalings
And almost always, when I am making great strides at getting caught up, then my computer starts freaking out on me, as it's doing this weekend. I picked up a virus from a friend, who got it from a Facebook hacker. I eliminated the virus, but it has created some other problems that I think I will just have to backup all my files, reformat, and reinstall all my programs. That will take about a week to get done, not to mention that many of my programs are no longer being supported.
Now I'm receiving an error message in this blog. I hope it will allow me to post.
Next time!