Listen Up, Ye Southern Baptists

This past Sunday Jeff filled in for our pastor (who was out of town) and he did an excellent job sharing his heart on how we make ourselves idols before God.

I was also allowed to share my heart about the Lottie Moon Christmas offering. Some of the feedback was that the words I shared (all pre-written because that's the only way I feel prepared) were rather harsh. They probably were, but I think that sometimes we need to be reminded of where our hearts and priorities lay...and that may come across as a harsh truth even if it wasn't intended as such.

Here's what I shared, and if you're a Southern Baptist, I hope you'll decide to give generously, and sacrificially, this year!

Even in the face of our sketchy economy, a mere two days ago, a multitude of Americans across the nation awoke during the wee hours to stand in monumental lines to get the “best” deals out there for Christmas. Some people didn’t even bother going to sleep on Thanksgiving night, for the bait of sales beginning at midnight was something they just couldn’t miss. Perhaps even some of you joined them, and you’re now feeling quite pleased with yourselves for the money you saved. Kudos to you for saving money! Jeff and I didn’t join the throngs, and there was no sale in the world that could entice us to forgo any of our precious hard-to-get sleep. As my husband so precisely stated, in reference to the semi-crazed masses, “If an item isn’t there or on sale when I get to the store at 7:00 a.m., then I just don’t need to get it.”

However, our need for diapers was pressing, so I did brave the later morning 9 a.m. rush to Target with the three children, just as the electricity flickered and died for the entire 20 minutes we were in the store. Interestingly enough, though only the security lights were lit, the generator did still manage to power over 20 busy lines of cash registers. Obviously, they weren’t willing to let a little electricity surge keep my money in my pocket or have it slip away to their arch competitor.

Money. Money, money, money, money. Money is such a touchy subject in church, and I don’t even understand why. We’re usually so excited to share every good deal we’ve found, like where we got our $2.99 blouse from or our $10 shoes or our how much our great new stylist costs. We talk about money all the time at home, with friends, and with family; frankly, most of us are obsessed by our finances, but we may not realize to what extent that rings true.

Did you know that there are twice as many verses in the Bible about “money than about faith and prayer combined?” This means that there are 2,350 of them. And don’t you think that if the God-inspired authors of our holy text saw fit to mention the idea of money over 2000 times, it might just be a theme we should be concerned about and take the time to understand?

How we handle our money is basically “an index of our spiritual life. Our stewardship of our money and possessions becomes the story of our lives.” If we use our money in ways to help others and advance the kingdom of God, we bring glory to God and we leave behind a solid spiritual legacy. If we use our money in ways that only help ourselves, we bring shame and dishonor to the name of Christ and we leave behind a weak and insignificant spiritual legacy. When honestly examining yourself, what spiritual reflection do you see? Are there areas that are stunting your spiritual growth? Do you ever wonder how you can be more like Christ? Well, I challenge you to look at how you spend your money. We spend our money on things that are important to us, and we’re willing to do whatever it takes to meet those need.

For example: Any Cowboys fans out there? Go ahead. Let out your biggest whoop-whoop for their Thanksgiving Day victory.

Did you know that the cheapest ticket for a Dallas Cowboys game at the new stadium is $75, not counting parking, snacks, and memorabilia, or the binoculars you need to actually see the players on the field (if you decide not to watch the jumbotron)? And the most expensive tickets are $239. If expanded to maximum capacity, the stadium holds 111,000 people. I didn’t do the math, but that’s a lot of people and a lot of money just for one game and three very long hours. Don’t get me wrong. Football is great. Football is fun. Football is not sinful. But, when I think about the fact that our Southern Baptist denomination boasts over 16 million members worldwide and we can barely support a paltry 5,600 long-term overseas missionaries, the IMB has had to completely cut out all short term projects, and now Jeff and I no longer have a job description to where we believed God was leading us to, I think we (and that’s the collective church) have gotten some things awfully mixed up. We’ve taken an ax and chopped ourselves to the knee, thoughtlessly bowing to materialism as our latest idol while it brazenly prostitutes itself on God’s holy altar. Yes, materialism has sauntered through the front doors of the church and has taken residence right there on the front row.

And how do I know?

I know because we, and I’m speaking to those of us who are Christians, get up at the crack of dawn to slap down slightly lesser-than-big bucks for Christmas gifts and carelessly peel off the Andrew Jacksons for football tickets without even blinking, but when it comes to tithing back to our local church, which is merely a pittance of what we have…to thank God for the abundant provision and generosity he has graciously bestowed to us, we suddenly have a crisis of financial conscience and we snap together faster than a ripe clam sensing danger. Do we form lines at midnight to bring our tithe into God’s house? Do we peel off the Andrew Jacksons when we take up extra special offerings for local mission projects? Of course not. We pull out our tricks from childhood for these - those “mom-is-lecturing-me-and-I’m-tuning-her-out” ear skills that we’ve long perfected.

The Lottie Moon Christmas Offering is the ‘offering of the month’ for Southern Baptists. Lottie Moon was a single woman, who, at the age of 33, left her home, her friends, her family, and her comfortable life to take the message of eternal hope in Jesus Christ to the Chinese people. She has become a permanent icon to missionaries and missionary hopefuls.

Though she has merely become the face of the offering, it is none-the-less a very important offering because 100% of it goes directly to the International Mission Board to help fund our missionaries who are so faithfully serving overseas, and that’s strictly to missionary needs and salaries – it doesn’t even fund IMB staff salaries. The Southern Baptist Convention is the largest volunteer organization in the United States, and churches have banded together because we know we can do more collectively as a body of believers than we can individually. But our connection to this very large volunteer organization doesn’t mean that we give up our fiscal responsibility to take care of our missionaries because those missionaries are counting on us. You may not be called to be an overseas missionary, but you are called to support them.

Jeff and I voluntarily delayed a year. We have involuntarily been delayed up to an extra year, we believe, partly because the money just isn’t there to send us in our time frame. Perhaps though, for us, we may be headed nowhere in 2 years. It may be 5 or 10 before we finally touch foreign soil, and we’re okay with that because ultimately, we know our steps are directed by the One who has never failed.

The IMB has had to severely cut the number of appointments (down from about 6 appointment ceremonies to just 2 per year) because of funding, and we know of at least one other couple who is willing and ready to head to the mission field now, but they aren’t sure when they’ll be appointed. Who knows what lost soul may miss a divine encounter with them because that missionary couple won’t be on foreign soil when they believed God meant for them to be there.

Jesus himself has told us that we cannot serve two masters. Either we will hate the one and love the other, or be devoted to one and despise the other. We cannot serve both God and our money. We cannot serve both God and anything else. Everything we have comes from God. He asks for so little in return for his provision, his love and his grace, and yet, we see it as too much.

We have the funds to get that missionary couple to where they are supposed to be when they’re supposed to be there. The money is in your pocket, and it’s in mine, but the question is, will you put your hand in your pocket, pull it out, and give…give even sacrificially, this month? Or will you stick your hand in your pocket, make a fist, and hold on even tighter than you have before?

Let me tell you about a little three-year-old boy. His name is Gideon. He has raised almost $50 in his Lottie Moon Christmas can thanks to friends and family, and do you know how excited he is to get to come to ‘big church’ and put his can in the offering plate to help the missionaries? So excited. That’s the sort of spiritual legacy we want our children to learn.

So, in light of that, I ask you to consider what sort of spiritual legacy you want to leave behind. Will you be known for working hard and saving your money, only to empty your pockets for your own personal pleasures, or will you be known for emptying your pockets so that Christ, his name, and his work may be glorified?
Let me end with a reminder from Matthew 6:21, “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”

Not by the Hair of my Chinny-Chin-Chin

In high school, I went on a ski trip. Taking some poor advice, I tried a Black Diamond (the hardest type) trail on my first day of skiing. I was good, but I wasn’t that good.

Naturally, I got scared when looking down at the almost vertical slope (because my #1 fear is falling from great heights), sat down on the ground to slide down, but somehow I didn’t stop. I slid down, faster and faster until my skis turned up and the pointy part struck me in the face over and over until they popped off.

By the time I reached the bottom, I was bleeding and my face was black and blue. I was rushed to the hospital and had to have one measly stitch in my chin. I’ve got a very long grudge against that stitch.

Why, may you ask, am I sharing this story 13 years after the fact? Because. After that scar healed, I started growing a hair from it…as thick as one of my eyebrow hairs. And that’s thick. I have to pluck it every few weeks along with my unibrow.

It makes me feel old and grizzly. And I was just wondering why it started growing out of that scar. Did I somehow wallow in someone else’s testosterone to produce an aberration in my development?

Any of you science/medical people know why it happened? Or better yet, why do some women start growing multiple chin hairs when they get older?

I wasn’t planning to join those ranks for another 30 years. Apparently, I’m already there.

A Frantic Friday

It’s been awhile, in fact, a long while, since I’ve posted one of those slightly unbelievable, yet entirely true, stories. Actually, it’s clearly been ages since I’ve posted anything and you probably wonder what’s up with us. Well, needless-to-say, I’m back in the blogosphere, but unsure as to if I have any remaining followers. So, I’ll fill you in on the what’s up in another blog. Today, I have one of those unbelievable tales to tell. And it’s a doozy.

(For the record, this is a very long story, not my best writing, but you WILL feel pity for me when you're done. At least, you better feel pity for me.)

Last Friday started off much like any other Friday morning, except that my mother called to tell me she’d take me and the children to get the swine flu shot if I wanted. Okay, I was partly sick (head all clogged, coughing, etc. ) and cranky…okay, truthfully, I was mostly sick of hearing about the swine flu shot and how we all NEED to get it. I usually listen with the utmost respect and patience to my mother (well, don’t count much of my high school, college, and single adult years), but the swine flu suggestion got me all worked up. I went off for about 3 uninterrupted minutes about why I wasn’t going to get the swine flu shot and why the children weren’t either. I rather nastily told my mother I wasn’t going to waste my limited funds and buy into the mass hysteria created by the pharmaceutical companies for their own monetary benefit and allow my precious children to be test cases for a shot that hadn’t been out long enough to thoroughly investigate the long term effects of the mercury in it. Obviously, I’m rather impatient and overly opinionated when sick and cranky.

As soon as I spewed my angst, I realized it came out all kinds of rude. I immediately apologized to my mother for jumping down her throat, let Gideon and Scarlett talk to her, and then…BAM. I was in the middle of retrieving the phone from said tiny southern belle, when she, in a moment of childish depravity, tried to keep the phone attached to her ear and away from my hands. I had to forcefully rescue the only method of communication we currently own. But, it was too late. She’d done her dastardly deed. The screen went black.

I panicked, but then remembered I’m somewhat of a techy…somewhat. I turned it off and on. Still black. I took the battery out, put it back in, and turned it on. Still black. That was the extent of my cell phone techy-ness.

I did manage to figure out that I could make phone calls, IF I happened to remember a person’s number. And I could receive phone calls…only, I’d have no idea who was calling.

Grumbling about this inconvenience, I shared my frustration with my sister-in-law and her two daughters, who come over every Friday morning for play time. The small children played. We talked. Things were looking up. Jeff could surely fix the phone when he got home, right?

Just as my sister-in-law was getting up to leave around 11:00 a.m., I heard a tell-tale beeping.

“What’s that”, she asked.

“That’s Gideon. I think he hit a button on the security system again. He’s done it before and it just beeps once or twice and that’s it.”

Mind you, friendly reader, we’d never received the code to the alarm from our new landlord. The system wasn’t monitored and we really didn’t care and didn’t bother finding out if it worked or not. We didn’t get a home phone, we had no internet, and only one car, which was with Jeff at work. When I say the cell phone was our only method of communication, I mean it was our ONLY method of communication.
And then the beeping STARTED IN EARNEST. All of those above thoughts were jumping around my head.

Gideon had climbed up on a chair and, according to him, “only pushed (a certain number).” ( I won’t tell you because that would be a security breach).
That’s when I really panicked. We all huddled around the key pad in the kitchen listening to the type of beeping that tells you when an alarm is being set.
I’m frantically pushing buttons. It’s nothing like the alarm system we had at our other house, so I’m pushing blindly. Nothing happens. The beeping gets louder and closer together.

Meanwhile, the guilty party is holding onto my leg and peeking around to see what mischief he’d wrought. He wrought a lot.

I opened the back door and set the alarm off. You know how your heart starts pounding and you freeze up when that gosh-awful noise blares in your ear. It’s bad enough when it goes off while in the midst of deep sleep, or so I thought. It’s worse when you haven’t the foggiest how to turn it off.

Gideon starts crying. Yes, it’s loud. Scarlett comes running in to tell me she “tee-tee’d” on herself. I knew I should have kept her in a diaper, but I was trying to economize and save ‘em.

While I’m realizing that I can’t call our landlord because the only place I have his number saved is in our cell phone, I admit out loud I don’t know what to do, Scarlett’s all wet and crying, Gideon’s scared and crying, and I’m just about to lose it. I do manage to pull myself together enough to run Scarlett to the bathroom, strip her down, and plop her on the toilet. (Okay, so she’d already completely finished her business, but I’m not ALL there, remember…that alarm is driving me to distraction).

I come back to the kitchen where my sister-in-law and niece are punching buttons…my dear sweet 4.0 college graduate sister-in-law ( I will let her remain anonymous) is even punching in her own code, and I hear my older niece saying “Mom, our code isn’t going to work on her system.”

I get the bright idea to call my pastor because he’s got our landlord’s number, but I don’t know my pastor’s phone number because it’s lost in my phone. I called Jeff instead, at work, and he’s like, “honey, what am I supposed to do from here?” He’s got no phone and no numbers, either, but….

Wrong answer, my love. I am a damsel in distress. He’s supposed to at least pretend to be handling things for me…this is the one time I need him to “fix” my problem and not just listen.

I’m running back and forth through the house as if that were going to solve the problem. I can’t just stand there and listen. It’s worse in the hallway because that’s where the noisemaker is posted. I run back to the kitchen to get away from it.
I called our church secretary for my pastor’s number. When I called him and explained what was going on, he started laughing. Normally, I would have joined him, but I wasn’t quite ready to laugh at the situation. That un-blessed alarm was still piercing relentlessly in my ear. He gave me the number I needed, and told me to call him if he could help in any other way. He also offered me terrible advice on how to fix the phone.

And then, the terrible, horrible, very bad noise just stopped. Though my ears were still ringing, my innards came back to life.

“Where’s Scarlett?”

“Oh, no.” I left her on the toilet. Totally forgot about her.

She was back there crying on the toilet half naked and afraid, but of course, I couldn’t hear her because of that dreadful racket emerging from the box on the wall in the hall.

Somehow, though, even in the midst of that chaos, she managed to poop. Go Scarlett!
Because the noise had stopped, my sister-in-law felt it was safe for them to leave. She left me with a few phone numbers I might need, told me to call her if anything else happened, and away they went to meet her parents who were just arriving in town.
I took my pastor’s advice and completely powered down the phone, took the battery out, and left it out for 10-20 minutes. Wrong thing to do.

The alarm had us fooled. We thought it had beeped itself out. It was merely taking a break.

It started again, and once more, that inner agitation and frantic flustered-ness took over.

I know why the security people make that alarm so loud and so annoying. It gets one all kinds of muddled and confused and if I were a burglar, it’d scare me away right quick. I didn’t know what I was doing. I had not yet called our landlord because I thought the alarm had remedied itself. Mistake #2. I put the phone back together but it wouldn’t dial, wouldn’t call, and wouldn’t do anything but light up. Useless piece of junk.

Now, I was overwhelmed. What to do? What to do?

We live 8 houses down from our church. My next cognizant thought was to strap the girls in the stroller, grab Gideon, and hoof it down to use that phone to call the landlord and get some help.

It was the first pretty cold day we had. I bundled the children up, stuffed the important numbers in my pocket, tossed the girls in the double–stroller, and pushed it out of the garage. (Please don’t forget that all this time, the alarm is maddeningly and incessantly shattering my logic and sensibility to pieces).

Something happened to the front wheel. It was bent to the left. I’d push it two steps and I’d be headed back off the road, and if I kept it up, I would just be pushing in circles. In the middle of the road, I tried to push it back in correct mode. Weakly, I might add. There’s no upper body strength left in these frazzled arms. I couldn’t fix it, and I just wanted to sit down on the cold ground, have myself a good cry, and go back home.

But, I couldn’t go back home because that infernal high-pitched screeching would be my constant companion all day. The children wouldn’t be able to nap. I wouldn’t be able to think, and I’d probably lose my mind within the hour.

So, I did the next best thing. I dragged that half-broke stroller back into the driveway, left it willy-nilly, picked up both girls, placed one on each hip, told Gideon to hang on to my pants, and we boogied to the church.

When I say boogie, I really mean, shuffle. The girls are 6-months and almost 2. They were slipping out of my arms, and poor sad and ever-so-sorry Gideon was holding onto my sweat pants so tight, he pulled them down to where the cold air was nipping at my drawers. At that point, my whole jiggly rear end could have been exposed and I wouldn’t have cared. I just needed to stop the noise that I could still hear ringing in my ears.

We get to the church and faithful Melba wasn’t at her desk to beep us through the glass doors. And she’s ALWAYS there. Now, I’m more than close to tears…my eyes are smarting and my nostrils are flaring because my last hope was dwindling. Gideon and Scarlett start beating on the doors saying “let us in” and I’m too miserable and emotionally drained to correct them.

I hear Melba say “I’m coming. I’m coming.” And as Gloria Estefan sings, I felt like I was “coming out of the dark.” She, Melba (not Gloria Estefan) hurried down the hall, buzzed us through, and brought us to the office and her desk.

She took Lexi-bug from me. In between trying to gulp air and fight tears, I raggedly explain the situation, and get on her phone. I called and left a message for our landlord and then called my mom. While on the phone with my mom, Melba pours Gideon and Scarlett some water from her water bottle into two little Dixie cups. Sneaky Gideon (handsy boy) decides his cup isn’t good enough for him. While Melba is trying to pacify Lexi (who is hungry and in need of sustenance), Gideon grabs her water bottle, unscrews the cap, and naturally, spills it all over her desk and all over her paperwork.

Mom’s advice (happily taken this time) is to call the security company and ask them how to override the system.

I try to mop up Gideon’s mess, and then decide to take the children down the hall to the toddler room to keep them from ruining any more of Melba’s work. There’s a phone in that room, so I called the security people.

I guess I sounded sincere enough for the lady on the other end because she told me how to unscrew the battery from an outlet, and find a box (not the electric breaker) to undo some kind of wires. I wrote it all down and then called my mom back.
She called my dad at work, sent him over (he had to excuse himself from a lunch to come to my rescue), and he arrived just as we walked back into the house. By now, it was past lunchtime and past naptime. I slapped some peanut butter on bread for the two older children, stuffed some baby food in Lexi’s mouth, and somehow managed to ignore the alarm, almost becoming immune to it. Almost.

I gave my dad the instructions, found the battery to unscrew, and then set about to hunt for the “box.” The only place I thought it could be was in the hall closet which, true to the nature of the rest of the day, Gideon had managed to lock a couple of weeks before. We had no key to it.

My father must have been a most mischievous little guy. He told me to bring him two steak knives and like McGuyver he opened that closet door in two winks. I was too disappointed to be amazed. The “box” wasn’t there.

After hunting through the whole house with Gideon hot on my heels, I finally found it. He was telling me “it’s okay, Mommy. Don’t worry about it.” I guess the alarm wasn’t upsetting him anymore. And then he started saying “I’m sorry, Mommy. I’m sorry.” Though I knew he should be, I couldn’t punish him after all of that. We’d all suffered enough.

My dad expertly unwired the appropriate wires and completely shut down the system.
Finally, the peace I had been waiting for…about 3 hours later.

Dad left. I put the children in bed. And I crawled in myself for a VERY LONG and QUIET nap.

My Husband, My Hero

Usually I tease Jeff for being overly careful with our children; he’s Johnny-on-the-spot to prevent any/every accident possible. Sometimes I tell him that he can’t prevent every accident and he simply needs to learn to trust God to take care of us.

Tonight, though, I am most thankful for his ever so cautious eye because he saved a little girl’s life.

Our church held a re-scheduled 4th of July church-wide picnic tonight. Today was a beautiful day with unseasonably cool weather - - like not quite reaching 90. For Texas, remember, that’s unseasonably cool. One of the sweet couples in our church hosted the event, and they have a glorious pool. Two of our members served as lifeguards, but shooed everyone out of the pool when it was time to eat. We happened to be sitting at the table closest to the pool, still several hundred yards away.

Jeff had taken Gideon and Scarlett in the pool earlier and they’d had a great time holding onto Daddy while splishing and splashing. Scarlett was now at the table entertaining me and the rest of our crew (especially my friend, Rachel) with her “ice cream” eating endeavors. She was supposed to be sharing with me; only this little girl was downing the ice cream concoction (several different flavors) at a rate of speed and consistency that a race car driver couldn’t possibly even catch. It’s like she knew this would be the only time she’d get that much ice cream all to herself, so she wasn’t wasting any time.

Meanwhile, Gideon had gotten bored with the whole eating thing and dashed about the yard with Jeff hot on his heels. When he got too close to the pool, Jeff reigned him in. I was sitting at a table facing the pool and noticed them, but barely. I was too busy giggling at Scarlett’s obvious mama-inspired enjoyment. She didn’t even seem to get a brain freeze.

Anyway, I heard a splash and saw a streak of yellow in the water right beside Gideon and Jeff, who had stepped into the pool onto the first step. Then all I could see was part of the face of a little girl I didn’t really know bobbing up, sinking down, bobbing back up, sinking back down under the water, and so forth about 3 times. With one arm Jeff held Gideon back, and with the other outstretched, he took a giant step into the water. He’d already changed into dry clothes but that didn’t stop him. I pushed back my chair, left Scarlett standing on hers, and took off running toward them thinking that I had to grab Gideon so Jeff could have both arms to reach her. By the time I got to the pool, however, he’d already grabbed the little girl out with one arm. I snatched her from him, took her in my arms, and gave her the once over. Obviously she was very scared and trying to catch her breath, so I walked her over to her grandfather and briefly told him that she’d jumped in without her vest and Jeff had to go in after her.

That sentence probably didn’t fully explain the severity of the situation because I was anxious to simply get her into her family’s arms, and it was only after I sat back down at the table (where Scarlett hadn’t taken a break in her ice cream fest) that it hit me. I was immediately sobered by the realization that the night could have ended much differently, in tragedy, while we all sat around having a great time oblivious to everything but our own conversations. Jeff’s heroics went unnoticed, except by our table. That’s not such a big deal, but when I kept seeing that little face bobbing up and down in my mind’s eye, struggling and struggling, my mother’s heart went into panic mode. I realized that if Jeff hadn’t been standing where he was, carefully observing everything around him, that little girl’s desperate plight could have gone completely unnoticed, too. And that’s a huge deal.

Thank you, Lord, that my husband was there. Thank you, Lord, that your guardian angels were watching over that little girl. Thank you, Lord, for lengthening her life so that she may someday be used to bring you honor and glory. Watch over my own children each and every day. Protect their lives so they can grow to love and serve you, too.

Jeff was a hero…one of those unsung types. But, that doesn’t matter. I know if he sees a need, he’s going to react. I am so thankful…so very thankful, and for that very reason, he’s my hero.

Raising Toddlers

I think I’ve figured out, for me, what the hardest part of raising toddlers is. It’s the constant correction that goes with training and daily routine. If I didn’t care what kind of children ours grew up to be, I’d just let them get away with whatever their little minds could conjure. The consistency in correction and discipline is hard, all-consuming W-O-R-K. And after a night where one child wakes with a fever and refuses to go back to sleep for a few hours, the lack of sleep, for me, is really quite wearing and I’d like to just ignore their behavior, close my eyes, and let them get into whatever mischief comes their way.

But, the problem, gratefully, is that I care. I care about what kind of adults my children become. I care what kind of Christians they prayerfully develop into, and I care what kind of children of God they represent.

There are too many pseudo-Christians proclaiming with their mouths biblical truth they don’t really believe, living secret lives still selfishly shackled to sin, perverting God’s holy word for egocentric pleasure, all the while raising children with no boundaries, no sense of restraint, or even most importantly, a serious lack of self-control that filters into every aspect of their children's future.

Being a parent is hard. Modeling correct God-honoring behavior (which ought to be a natural outflow of what one believes) is even more difficult, and I understand being too tired and too exhausted from one’s day to want to do it.

But, I’m realizing that those are the days when it counts the most. Who you are under stress and pressure is really who you are. The kind of parent you are under stress and pressure is really the kind of parent that you are. What you believe about God when you are under stress and pressure is really what you believe about God. For most of us, that’s not the prettiest picture, not the one we want others to see, and it’s not even the one we really want to be for ourselves and for our children.

When I’m tired and cranky, that’s when I need an extra dose of time with God, not less. That’s when I need to turn toward God, not away from him, assuming I can handle things in my own way. That’s not when I give myself license to explode in frustrated anger because of the expectation that I have for my toddler (or anyone for that matter) to remember yet again that he’s not supposed to put his big truck on Grandma Marta’s pristine coffee table or he's not supposed to throw balls at his baby sister. That’s what the wooden spoon is for. It serves as a reminder; swift correction that counts on the first swat. And I have to be diligent to keep at it, though the laziness in me wants to pretend like I don’t see - because if I see it, I’m responsible for it.

If I really understand what happened when I became a Christian, when I accepted Christ’s ultimate sacrifice of death on the cross for MY sin, and that after he rose victoriously from the grave, I would see that simply by my act of belief, I am now joined to him. When Holy God looks at me, does he see sinful Audrea of the past? No. He sees his perfect son, Jesus Christ, every time he looks at me. And Christ’s responses (always faultless) are the natural way for me to respond in any circumstance because that’s what he did and he is in me; I am united with him and to him. I accepted his free gift; he gave his life freely for my sin when he didn’t deserve death. So, my job, therefore, is to live a life worthy of the name I now call my own. It takes more effort and more work to respond in the flesh, in an ungodly manner, in unbridled anger and frustration, than it does to respond in love.

Don’t get me wrong here. There is a good and holy place for anger which can be used to fuel the heart and mind for kingdom purposes, but if the anger comes from a selfish place of insecurity, doubt, fear, unmet expectations, hurt feelings, etc., that only hinders correction and can even hinder one’s own spiritual growth because the blinders of selfish anger only see what the deceiver tunnels your vision toward.

All that to say, and I could go on because I’ve been thinking a lot about this lately, is that I blog, not only to share funny stories, but to organize my deep inner thoughts, and even to spur myself on in more disciplines of the faith and to share what God is doing in me. I never want to stand before Holy God when I die and hear him say “Depart from me. I never knew you.” And I certainly don’t want that for you, my dear friends and readers.

Blessings on any who are smack in the middle of toddlerhood!

Potty Training is the Pits

So I have been racking my brain on how to #2 potty-train Gideon. Nothing has worked.

The #1 was hard enough, at first. We started on a Monday, I gave up on Tuesday, started again on Wednesday, and by Friday, our little man had mastered it for the most part.

I messed him up, though. And here's why.

He refuses to poop in the toilet, and I was getting frustrated with cleaning poop out of his underwear EVERY SINGLE DAY, sometimes twice a day. It constantly falls out of his drawers before I can toss it in the toilet, and usually, as he is (or I am) pulling down his underwear, the poop grazes his leg leaving behind a slimy streak o’ nasty before landing firmly gooped to the floor, and that doubles the amount of cleaning up I have to do.

I gag EVERY SINGLE DAY.

To alleviate some of my self-induced disgust and stress, Jeff suggested pull-ups. I was anti-pull-ups because the whole point of potty-training our eldest was to quit buying diapers for 3 children (a very expensive ordeal). However, I thought that perhaps Jeff’s idea could be a good one. I bought a pack of pull-ups the week my parents' washer went out.

Note to self and other selves facing the same dilemma: DO NOT REVERT TO PULL-UPS after you’ve already invested in real underwear. Though I called them his “special undies” Mom and Jeff referred to them as pull-ups, and smart kid that he is, he figured out they weren’t the same as his “real” undies. He started urinating in them thus undoing all of the work we had so diligently begun…so, back to the drawers I went anticipating the poop clean-up and steeling myself for the daily ritual of angst. What I had not anticipated was a regression of “urine accidents” in the “real” undies. Yep. Yep. Yep. So, I’m now basically re-training him.

I totally messed up.

We’re getting there again, but it’s slow. I now bought a stool for him to stand on and “go” like Daddy, and he likes it. A LOT.

In the meantime, we’ve put Scarlett on the potty a couple of times just to get her used to it. According to my mom, I was trained by her age (19 mos). Dubious, was I, until today, because I read that children of that age don’t have the bladder/bowel control that older kids do.

I saw Scarlett hovering over the Bumbo, and wasn’t sure if she was trying to poop or get in. I asked her if she needed to poop and she said “yesh.” I then asked her if she wanted to go poo-poo on the toilet. “Yesh. Toy-et.” And off she ran to the stairs.

Still unconvinced anything would actually happen, I followed her upstairs, plopped her on the special seat, and told her to squeeze hard. She made her “strong” face, clenched her fists, turned bright red, and squeezed with all her little might. I peeked down and saw (sort of to my horror) a big turtle head peeking back at me.

And then. Plop goes the weasel. She did it. I squealed and congratulated her, and squealing together musta worked those bowels good because out plunked some more. You go girl.

Naturally, by this time, Master Curious wanted to know what was going on. He climbed the stairs and said, “whatcha doing up here?”

“Well, Gideon. Clap for Scarlett. She went poo-poo in the toilet.”

“Scarlett get lollipop?”

I had forgotten this promised reward.

“Oh, yes. I guess she does.”

Down we all paraded to pick out a pink lollipop for my poopin’ princess.

Smacking away delightedly with her elder brother gazing wistfully on, with a mother’s obvious intuition, I suddenly knew what was going to happen.

Off Gideon ran, up the stairs and to the top. He turned around and hollered down rather emphatically: “Mommy, my poo-poo in the toilet!!!”

He didn’t, though... this time. But he tried. Boy, did he try! And for his efforts, he got an m&m.

Maybe tomorrow he might just remember and try again. Something to be said for that friendly sibling competitive spirit. I might just get a pooper outta him sooner rather than later!

We're Off...Almost

One month left. It’s hard to believe we’ve lived in Georgia for 2 years, and now that time is coming to an end. It’s hard to believe that we’ve been entrusted with the most precious of gifts - - the means and ability to move overseas to minister to another people group and have the opportunity to share an even more precious gift - - the gift of eternal life in Christ Jesus.

Some people think of missionaries as antiquated lone individuals, walking about in long monk robes with a basket of bibles to liberally distribute to the masses along with a loaf of French crusted bread. That’s not exactly the way we do missions. We do want to meet people where they are, help meet their felt needs, establish meaningful friendships, and in effect, earn the right to share what we believe. We are in the business of relationships. Christ Jesus, fully man and fully God, was our perfect human example, and he majored in relationships.

I care about people and I care about where their souls will spend eternity. Some might question the need to leave this country when there are so many hurting, needy people right here. Well, yes, I would agree. There are. And there are already many individuals reaching out to meet those needs. God’s plan for our family is for us to take the message to those who, though their culture is steeped in tradition and religious practices, might not have heard the simple message of the gospel. Modern America has had the privilege of all out access to evangelical Christianity and is therefore, now without excuse for the loose moral standards she brazenly espouses. Christians don’t need to sit in a defensive position, but rather we need to attack Satan’s stronghold of depravity for we have the ultimate victor on our side.

I could go on and on, but I won’t.

In one month we head back to Texas to share sweet time with our families before heading out for 6 months of training, even before we even reach our final destination.

As such, there are several prayer requests I would specifically ask of you to remember and intercede on our behalf:

1.) Our marriage: Satan would love to see our marriage disintegrate so we lose our witness.
2.) Our children: they will easily adjust, but there are many transitions coming for them before we finally arrive in Spain.
3.) Our health: that God would protect our mental, physical, and emotional well-being so we will be effective and able to perform our daily tasks.
4.) Our ability to learn the language quickly: Jeff already has a working knowledge of Spanish, but I only know my food, in Tex-Mex.
5.) Our spiritual lives: that Jeff and I will be able to maintain the healthy disciplines we’ve already been practicing – our prayer lives, our Scripture study and memorization – that we’ll be consumed and motivated by our love for Christ, but that our hearts will stay pure before God, and that the task and busyness will not precede the people for whom we leave to serve.