Sometimes, The Gospel is Offensive

First of all, what is the Gospel?

Growing up I thought it was a book of the Bible. You know, like the book of Genesis, Mark or Matthew... I thought The Gospel was a book like those. I think it came from my half-listening in church as a child. I grew up going to a Lutheran Church, and each Sunday there were three readings. Two of them were from random passages (or so it seemed) and one was the reading from the Gospel.

The part I missed was at the end of the reading when the Pastor would say which book he was reading from. In the new testament there are four Gospel accounts: Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. They are considered Gospel accounts because all four tell the story of Jesus- his life and his death. In a nutshell, the truth of God sending His only son to earth to die for our sins is the gospel. It is often referred to as the Good News. It is the ultimate redemptive story of something broken (our relationship with God, broken by our sin) restored to what it was originally created to be: A new covenant, where there is nothing in the way of us experiencing true relationship with God.

Golden Fork Mini Tour

Chris and I celebrated our Two Year Anniversary a couple days ago. Chris planned our first anniversary, and so I was happy to take on the challenge this year. My goal was simple- a fun night with good food. Something that felt a little different and outside of what we normally do, and something that felt a little extra special.

We knew one thing early on- we wanted to go to Von's Steakhouse. We have only been once before, and it was before we were even married. I still talk about that meal as the best steak I have ever had in my life. The filet mignon was to.die.for. For reals.

My original plan was to go for an early dinner, then to go to Putting Horse Ranch. I like to call it Adult Mini Golf. It's super fun, and if you've never heard of them, definitely check them out! Unfortunately, the day started out quite gloomy that day. No rain, but it was overcast and the temperature wasn't that great. Chris and I talked about it the night before and decided to cancel, so I was left with the task of coming up with an awesome, fun, exciting Plan B on the day of. No pressure, right?

Freefall to Fly - A Book Review and GIVEAWAY

When I first heard of Freefall to Fly, I knew I QIdeas- a forum for church leaders to "recover a vision for their historic responsibility to renew and restore cultures." I watched the trailor for the book, and my spirit leapt at these words:
really wanted to read it. The author Rebekah Lyons is familiar to me because of her and her husband's ministry

"Often it feels indulgent to say "Why am I here? Does my life matter? Does my life have meaning?" But it's actually just giving worthiness to the creation that God gave all of us"

That's so true, isn't it? To say that we want more out of life can feel like we are saying that what we have is not enough. I don't think that's true though, I think we have barely scratched the surface at living life abundantly. I think that we have no idea what is within our reach.

Giving Up What I Thought Marriage Would Be

Growing up, like many young girls, I thought a lot about my future husband. I pictured what he might look like, and what he might act like. I thought of what I hoped his likes and dislikes would be, and what activities we would enjoy together. As I grew older I thought more about what our relationship might be like. I looked at a few examples around me of marriages, and began to pull all the best things from each one in an attempt to pull together my perfect vision for marriage.

When Chris and I started dating I felt like I had a pretty good handle on what I was looking for in a future husband and in a marriage. Now that I was a Christian I also had the Bible to look to for what marriage should be like. So once I knew we had the Lord's blessing it was easy for me to say yes to a life with him based on the attributes he had (and a few that I was thankful he didn't have!)

A Post About The Post I'm Not Posting

I wrote a post a week or two ago that I have been waiting to post until Chris read it first. I don't always have him read my posts, but if they are about him (which this one was) then I like to run them by him before I throw it up here for the world to see. Just because I have decided to live a transparent life doesn't mean he should have to as well, right?

So, just in case you were wondering about any of my last posts- Chris has given me the green light on all of them. Actually, to go a step further, he has encouraged me to post each and every one of them. He often tells me I don't need to check with him first, and there have been times that I have felt confident that he will feel honored in my writing, and have posted first, and got then him to read it afterwards.

Addicted to Nostalgia

That's me. I confess. I am addicted to Nostalgia. I love the feeling I get when I have a flood of happy memories, and there is no place on earth that holds more of those memories than my lake.

Since I was a toddler, I have been going out to the same lake. It is called Lac la Nonne and is located less than an hour away from my hometown (where I still live), near a small town called Barrhead. Both my parents grew up in Barrhead, and they too have childhood memories of spending time at Elk's Beach on Lac la Nonne. When they were kids it wasn't much more than a field next to a beach where people could pitch a tent or pull up their trailer for the weekend.

Criticism. Man Does It Suck Sometimes.

Chris and I recently went to a marriage conference (which was awesome), and from that we took these simple little personality tests. Among other things, the results of these tests give you five words that describes what motivates you. The idea is that if you know what matters most- what you feel a strong emotional connection to, then you know when you will do your best (when these things are encouraged in you) and when you will feel the worst (when these things are discouraged or criticized.)

These words are meant to help you relate to your spouse in a deeper, more understanding way. For instance, one of my words is Organization. Each word has a few tagline words. For Organization they are "Order. Systems. Structure" Yep. That pretty mush describes me to a tee. My life is a neat compilation of lists. (Side note- another one of my words is Neat.) I can talk for hours about meal planning with anyone who will listen, I keep a cleaning list on the side of my fridge so I don't forget anything in the weekly/monthly chores, and our budget is also kept with a series of boxes waiting to be checked off. I love my lists. They keep me organized and on track with all the tasks having to do with keeping a home. Because I love this part of my personality so much, when I receive criticism on it, it really gets to me. If Chris makes a comment about how I don't need to be cleaning out the fridge right now (let's say it's ten minutes before we have to leave the house) he may be very right, but because organization is so near and dear to my heart, I don't usually respond well.