My favorite poem

Or one of them.

My Testimony
And shall I fear
That there is anything that men hold dear
Thou would'st deprive me of,
And nothing give in place?

That is not so-
For I can see Thy face
And hear Thee now:

"My child I died for Thee
And if the gift of love and life
You took from Me,
Shall I one precious thing withhold-
One beautiful and bright,
One pure and precious thing withhold?
My child, it cannot be."

Betty Scott Stam - Martyred missionary to China

Quote of the Day

But pain... seems to me an insufficient reason not to embrace life. Being dead is quite painless. Pain, like time, is going to come on regardless. Question is, what glorious moments can you win from life in addition to the pain?

Lois McMasters Bujold, Barrayar

Yesterday's Bujold quote was from Shards of Honor.

Well, it's good to know...

that I'm not a heretic! I found this quiz from PrairieDaisy. Here are the results for how theologically correct I am!

You scored as Chalcedon compliant. You are Chalcedon compliant. Congratulations, you're not a heretic. You believe that Jesus is truly God and truly man and like us in every respect, apart from sin. Officially approved in 451. Chalcedon compliant 100% Monophysitism 58% Nestorianism 42% Pelagianism 33% Modalism 33% Gnosticism 25% Apollanarian 25% Adoptionist 17% Arianism 0% Docetism 0% Donatism 0% Albigensianism 0% Monarchianism 0% Socinianism 0% Are you a heretic? created with QuizFarm.com

Quote of the Day

Jessica has inspired me! Here is one of my favorite quotes to round off the day. It's from Lois McMasters Bujold, one of my favorite authors.

Tests are a gift. Great tests are a great gift. To fail the test is a misfortune. But to refuse the test is to refuse the gift, and is something more serious, more irrevocable, than misfortune.

Brothers

I was just remembering a conversation between my brothers Nathan and Andy that took place a couple of weeks ago. Maybe you have to know them to enjoy it, but I thought it was funny because it presented such a contrast between their points of view.

They were discussing people's reactions to various medical treatments, and the need for a control group in studying them.

Nathan, the classical medical statistition, says, "Of course, that's the placebo effect."

Andy, the alternative medicine/self-help/personal coach type, says, "Right, they're hypnotizing themselves."

It doesn't look quite as funny written down, but oh well, I enjoyed it!

Normalcy is returning.

Our internet is up and running. (After long and arduous work on Danny's part.) And I was back to nannying today. Now I just need to get a good lamp in my room until Dad can put up an overhead light fixture.

We had help from so many people in moving. Everybody was wonderful. We're all exhausted.

As soon as I can find Dad's camera and get outside, I'll post some pictures of the house and yard.

Aaaaagh!

We're packing everything onto the truck and cleaning today. Moving everything over tomorrow. I keep wandering from room to room knowing there are a million things to do and too disoriented and overwhelmed to figure out what to do now. I'm also probably going to be off-line for the next couple of days, so I'm trying to figure out what needs to be done on the internet before we go. (Internet's much easier to deal with than all the clutter everywhere!)

Ah, well. Must email my customers, then pack my office.

Desiring God

I found an awesome site today. Children Desiring God is a branch of the ministry of John Piper's church. John Piper is one of my favorite Bible/theology writers. I used a couple of of his books as textbooks at Emmaus, and have bought and read a couple more since. He is well-grounded, Godly, his words come straight from Scripture, and he has a gift for expressing his thoughts beautifully.

Children Desiring God offers curriculum for Sunday School and other children's programs. It appears to live up to the same standards as the rest of his work. No fluff here! Here are a couple of quotes from the site:

We believe that children can handle deep truth at a young age. We want to fill them with solid Bible truth that will give them a foundation to fall back on when they go through deep waters. For this reason, the curriculum continually refers children to the Word of God; Bibles are an essential tool for children studying Children Desiring God curriculum. We believe that the Bible must be taught in depth, yet in a child-friendly, interesting manner. For this reason, much attention has been devoted to the development of creative presentation of essential Bible truths.

We believe that before God, parents, not churches have the primary responsibility for the spiritual nurture of their children. We have made every effort to structure the curricula in a way that allows the church to "walk along side" parents, enabling and equipping them in this God-given role. For that reason, we strongly encourage parental involvement in the classroom and have developed meaningful take-home materials for every lesson to encourage and enable parents to interact with their children over Scripture and the lesson content. The curricula are also being used by an increasing number of home-schooling parents. Desiring God Ministries has also developed a number of Parenting Resources for home use to help nurture the faith of children.

I know these are things that have been discussed often recently. This is the kind of thing that I would love to teach and support.

News Bytes

Not many stories to tell right now. Jessica had a surprise party for Paul's 21st on Friday night. Here is Jessica's account and Paul's account of it. Paul showed Peggy how to do an IV by demonstrating on himself, and ended up bleeding all over the floor!

Five days until we move!!! Check it out on Google maps. It's actually one house south of the one indicated by the pointer. If you can help on Friday or Saturday let Mom and Dad know.

I had the day off from working as a nanny, so spent all day packing my books, etc. I had twenty boxes of books from my room! Some of them were pretty small. But there are about another five large boxes that weren't stored in my room.

Tonight was the second Civic Chorale rehearsal of the quarter. We're singing Mozart's Requiem on March 6th at 7:30. It's in honor of the 250th anniversary of Mozart's birth.

Congratulations!

My wonderful friend, Melissa from WA, just returned from visiting her novio (fiance), Bayardo, in Ecuador. Here are a couple of the photos she sent me of her trip.

Funny!

I was fowarded these photos in an email the other day and I had to pass them on!

Prayer Answered

I haven't posted this prayer request here, but it has been answered just the same. We were worried about whether the owner of the house we're buying would be out in time. My dad talked to the lady this morning, and she's going to be almost completely moved this weekend. Which leaves the way open for the house to close on Tuesday or Wednesday, and us to move on Friday and Saturday.

Hooray!!!

Now I can feel motivated about getting my stuff packed.

Cottage Dreams

My imagination was caught the other day by Country Homes. They provide plans for small homes that an owner can build him (or her) self. Very fun! I can picture a couple of acres, building my own house, big garden, little Chinese girl in the upstairs loft... Sigh... must focus on reality. Build now what can eventually bring about those dreams. (If those dreams are the Lord's plan for me. Plenty of other dreams to choose from while I'm at it.)

Random Babblings on Routine

Back to a normal Sunday again. It was great to go to Awana and then to Meng's to play games. I've missed that over the holidays.

Funny how I used to hate routine. Now it's a life saver that smoothes down most of the rough edges of life.

Flylady (who was my life-changing find of 2005) focuses on routines to get your life (and house) in order. It takes discipline to stick to them, but they give you freedom to accomplish what is important instead of being dragged down by all the everyday things that never get done.

I remember rebelling from the discovery, when I was in college, that there is no time when I can let go of spiritual, mental, and emotional vigilance. Now routines are providing the means I always struggled with to manage that vigilance.

Here's a quote by Julie Andrews on the subject. I've attached it to my computer where I'll see it everyday.

Some people regard discipline as a chore, but I see it as a kind of order that sets me free to fly.

Spiritual Beliefs in China

I was surfing this morning and came upon a fascinating site called Mountain Voices. The project interviews mountain dwelling people from around the world on various topics to give a voice to the disadvantaged. My favorite section was on China. Check out the Spiritual Beliefs page for some interesting stories.

Prayer Request

I've been thinking lately that perhaps I shouldn't be involved in the Good News Club in the public schools that Deb B. and I are trying to start. It's a wonderful ministry, but with business, nannying, and helping with Grandma when she comes (plus moving) I don't quite see where the time for another regular, time-intensive activity would come from. It's possible that I just need to prioritize and do it, but I want to make sure that this is really what the Lord wants me to do.

I talked to Deb about it and she admitted that she was feeling a bit reticent about starting just now, too. So we're going to hold back for a week and pray about it. We'd appreciate your prayers for wisdom as to whether we should press forward with this or go in another direction. We have several other ideas for outreach that might fit in better with the other responsibilities that the Lord has given us.

Thanks.

Yech!

My whole family had the stomach flu yesterday. Actually, 11 people that I know of who were at New Year's Dinner together on Monday were sick or coming down with it yesterday (out of 34 who attended). I was on the lesser end. I just felt queasy all day and didn't eat. I was hungry this morning and ate something, but now I feel queasy again. I called off going in to my nanny job today, anyway. Hopefully I can go in tomorrow instead.

Gross news, I know. I'm sorry!

Book Review

I met a new author yesterday. I read a book by Ann Tatlock called A Place Called Morning. I'm not usually a fan of modern Christian fiction, but Ann Tatlock manages to step out of the bounds of genre and write a story that tells Truth without being trite.

I expected a sweet romance, but the story never slipped down to that. It talked instead of family, guilt, and forgiveness. The peace that God brings when we let go of ourselves.

A Place Called Morning reminded me a little of the best parts of Francena Arnold's books. (One of my favorite authors who wrote in the fifties.) I heartily recommend the book and am looking forward to reading more books by the Ann Tatlock.

Working Girl

Well, back to work from the holidays today. Nathan, the two-year-old I nanny for, cried when I arrived this morning. At least it wasn't as bad as last Thursday when he cried for an hour before he was able to calm down and get occupied with something else. I feel sorry for his mom!

I'd like to get a good start to the year for my businesses as well. Please pray that I will work with dedication and purpose on them

Hayao Miyazaki

Just finished watching Spirited Away for the fifth or sixth time with Andy, Jenelle, Peggy, Dan, and my dad. It's by director Hayao Miyazaki, the best Japanese animator there is. (Acually, he's the only one I know!)

Spirited Away is my favorite of his films that I've seen. What we really wanted to see tonight, though, was his newest, Howl's Moving Castle. But it was nowhere to be found. I read the British book that it's based on while I was in Korea. I was very excited last year to hear that Miyazaki was animating it.

I hope Howl's Moving Castle is as good as Spirited Away. The artwork is beautiful. Extremely surreal at some points. I feel as spirited away as Chihiro was by the end of the movie.

Happy New Year!!!

2006! Wow!