Book Review- Love and Respect

This is a book that I'd been wanting to read for several years. A year or two after we were married, Chris and I joined a year-long marriage seminar at our church. We studied several different books with our associate pastor and his wife. Love and Respect by Dr Emerson Eggerichs was NOT a book that we studied, but we did talk through several of its principles. The concepts that we worked through intrigued me enough that when this book showed up for review, I jumped on the chance. This is actually my SECOND copy of this book- check here to see what happened to the first copy.
Anyways, the main principle of this book is the crazy cycle. Ephesians 5:33 says for wives to respect their husbands, and for husbands to love their wives. Men have a basic need for respect, and women have a basic need for love. Obviously that isn't ALL that they each need. I think that the Bible specifies those things because they're what is most against our natures. The crazy cycle says that when a man feels disrespected, he reacts in ways that are unloving. When women feel unloved, they react in ways that are disrespectful. And so it goes round and round. Honestly, as soon as Chris and I read this, it was like a light had gone on. Even with what we both consider to be a good marriage, we still find ourselves on the crazy cycle.
What is even more valuable than identifying the cycle is knowing how to get OUT of it, and Eggerichs provides that too. It isn't even that difficult. He puts it this way: Assume the best of the other person. In other words, when you are tempted to react as though your husband (or wife) is being unloving (or disrespectful), stop and tell yourself that maybe he isn't doing it intentionally or maliciously. If you do that, it will keep you from REacting, which short-circuits the crazy cycle before it gets started.
There's more to this book than that, and of course the book isn't perfect, but overall I highly recommend it for couples wanting to improve their marriages.
In compliance with the new regulations, this copy of Love and Respect was provided for free by Thomas Nelson Book Review Bloggers.

Prayer is Conflict

This is one of the longer ones I have, but its well worth reading.

Author: Elisabeth Elliot
Source: Keep A Quiet Heart
Scripture Reference: Colossians 2:1 Philippians 4:6 Ephesians 3:12 Isaiah 45:19 2 Corinthians 12:9-10 1 John 1:9 Isaiah 44:22 Isaiah 40:29-31 Psalm 27:8 Colossians 1:2-9 1 John 5:14-15

Prayer is Conflict

Prayer is no easy pastime. As I grow old I find that I am more conscious than ever of my need to pray, but it seems at the same time to become more of a struggle. It is harder to concentrate, for one thing. I was greatly helped by some private notes Amy Carmichael wrote to her "Family" (hundreds of children and their helpers, both Indian and European) in Dohnavur, South India, to help them prepare for a special day of prayer.

She quoted Paul's letter to the Colossians (2:1, KJV): "I would that ye knew what great conflict I have for you." He is referring at least in part to the conflict of prayer. The same verse is translated "how greatly I strive" in the Revised Version; "how deep is my anxiety" in J.B. Phillips; and, in the Jerusalem Bible, "Yes, I want you to know that I do have to struggle hard for you... to bind you together in love and to stir your minds, so that your understanding may come to full development, until you really know God's secret in which all the jewels of wisdom and knowledge are hidden."

Here are Amy's notes:

WITH WHAT DID I STRUGGLE?

1. With all that says to me, what is the use of your praying? So many others, who know more of prayer than you do, are praying. What difference does it make whether you pray or not? Are you sure that your Lord is listening? Of course He is listening to the other prayers but yours are of such small account, are you really sure He is "bending His ear" to you?

2. With all that suggests that we are asked to give too much time to prayer. There is so much to do. Why set aside so much time just to pray?

3. With all that discourages me personally--perhaps the remembrance of past sin, perhaps spiritual or physical tiredness; with anything and everything that keeps me back from what occupied St. Paul so often--vital prayer.

WHAT WILL HELP ME MOST IN THIS WRESTLE?

1. The certain knowledge that our insignificance does not matter at all, for we do not come to the Father in our own name but in the Name of His beloved Son. His ear is always open to that Name. Of this we can be certain.

2. The certain knowledge that this is Satan's lie; he is much more afraid of our prayer than our work. (This is proved by the immense difficulties we always find when we set ourselves to pray. They are much greater than those we meet when we set ourselves to work.)

3. Isaiah 44:22 and kindred words, with 1 John 1:9, meet all distress about sin. Isaiah 40:29-31 with 2 Corinthians 12:9,10 meets everything that spiritual or physical weariness can do to hinder. Psalm 27:8 with Isaiah 45:19 meets all other difficulties. And the moment we say to our God, "Thy face, Lord, will I seek," His mighty energies come to the rescue. (See Colossians 1:2,9.) Greater, far greater, is He that is in us than he that is against us. Count on the greatness of God. But are we to go on wrestling to the end?

No, there is a point to which we come, when, utterly trusting the promise of our Father, we rest our hearts upon Him. It is then we are given what St. Paul calls access with confidence (Ephesians 3:12). But don't forget that this access is by faith, not by feeling, faith in Him our living Lord; He who says "Come unto Me" does not push us away when we come. As we go on, led by the Holy Spirit who so kindly helps our infirmities, we find ourselves in 1 John 5:14,15 and lastly in Philippians 4:6, . It is good to remember that immediate answer to prayer is not always something seen, but it is always inward peace.

And if the day ends otherwise and we are discouraged? Then tell Him so, "nothing ashamed of tears upon His feet" [here she is quoting from F.W.H. Meyers's poem "St. Paul"]. Lord, Thou knowest all things. Thou knowest that I love Thee. "Yes, my child, I know." But don't settle down into an "it will never be different" attitude. It will be different if only in earnest we follow on to know the Lord.

AZ Budgets...again

After all of our drama earlier this year I've been hoping against hope that I wouldn't have to use the DES/DDD cuts tag again for a good long time. Unfortunately, it seems that its not going to happen that way. I just posted the first update in quite a while to my EI in AZ blog. I had let it all go because things were chugging along well enough and I just didn't have any new updates. Well now I do. Its just a proposed draft of the budget, but it isn't good at all for kids or families in need. What shocks me most is that the whole document is VERY matter-of-fact about the ill effects that have come from previous cuts, as well as the further ill effects that these cuts would have on children and families, and yet they're still proposing it as the only way out of this mess of a budget. Granted, this is only a draft, but it reflects what we've been hearing through the grapevine for some time.

For Today...10/26/09

From The Simple Woman's Daybook

Outside my window... thankful that the dog has quit barking and is laying with Chris.
I am thinking... about how to keep myself busy tomorrow and why I spend so much time online.
I am thankful for...elderberry syrup. Chris seems to be feeling better.
From the learning rooms...(if this applies)
From the kitchen... silence.
I am wearing... jeans and a t-shirt
I am creating... pictures in my head
I am going... over my to do list.
I am reading... Love and Respect with Chris.
I am hoping... that hope won't disappoint.
I am hearing... kitties munching.
Around the house...its mostly dark and quiet.
One of my favorite things... stove popped popcorn with garlic butter.
A few plans for the rest of the week: do some research tomorrow, check out a farmer's market Wednesday evening.
Here is picture for thought I am sharing
I haven't taken any pictures since I've been back in AZ, but here's a random one from my sister's wedding. I know, hindsight says I should have turned the flowers so the stems were facing in, but I didn't think of it at the time.

Watch Unto Prayer

Author: Mrs. Charles E. Cowman
Source: Streams in the Desert
Scripture Reference: 1 Peter 4:7

Go Not Without Prayer

"Watch unto prayer" (1 Peter 4:7).

Go not, my friend, into the dangerous world without prayer. You kneel down at night to pray, drowsiness weighs down your eyelids; a hard day's work is a kind of excuse, and you shorten your prayer, and resign yourself softly to repose. The morning breaks; and it may be you rise late, and so your early devotions are not done, or are done with irregular haste.

No watching unto prayer! Wakefulness once more omitted; and now is that reparable? We solemnly believe not.

There has been that done which cannot be undone. You have given up your prayer, and you will suffer for it.

Temptation is before you, and you are not ready to meet it. There is a guilty feeling on the soul, and you linger at a distance from God. It is no marvel if that day in which you suffer drowsiness to interfere with prayer be a day in which you shrink from duty.

Moments of prayer intruded on by sloth cannot be made up. We may get experience, but we cannot get back the rich freshness and strength which were wrapped up in those moments. --Frederick W. Robertson.

If Jesus, the strong Son of God, felt it necessary to rise before the breaking of the day to pour out His heart to God in prayer, how much more ought you to pray unto Him who is the Giver of every good and perfect gift, and who has promised all things necessary for our good.

What Jesus gathered into His life from His prayers we can never know; but this we do know, that the prayerless life is a powerless life. A prayerless life may be a noisy life, and fuss around a great deal; but such a life is far removed from Him who, by day and night, prayed to God. --Selected

This classic devotional is the unabridged edition of Streams in the Desert. This first edition was published in 1925 and the wording is preserved as originally written. Connotations of words may have changed over the years and are not meant to be offensive.

Frankenmuth!

Yesterday, we went to Frankenmuth. Its a little Bavarian village in Michigan, most famous for the year-round Christmas Store. Truth be told, the whole thing is a bit tourist-y, but its still fun to walk around and window-shop. I didn't take a whole lot of pictures- sometimes its hard to balance wanting to take pictures with wanting to just enjoy myself and live in the moment.One of the best-known landmarks is this covered bridge. Its made almost entirely out of wood, including wooden pegs that hold the slats together. You can walk across it, as well as driving cars across.They also offer riverboat tours. However, since it was a bit chilly and windy, we opted to skip that part and just walk around.A closer-up of the waterfall from the previous picture. You can see some of the buildings in the background.
One of the things you just about HAVE to do in Frankenmuth is eat a chicken dinner at Zender's. Generally, there is a really long wait just for a table, but we timed it perfectly and were able to beat the crowds. Dinner was yummy, and we brought a ton of food home with us.
We took the scenic route on the way there- I'm still absorbing all of the color I can get my eyes on. The leafs are turning, and yet some trees are still green and some have already dropped their leafs. I think it must have been a bumper crop of pumpkins this year though- you can't throw a stone without hitting a pumpkin patch full of orange, and people are selling them EVERYWHERE.
Tomorrow we're supposed to be going to a different cider mill with my sister and Mitch, and then I fly back to Phoenix late Tuesday afternoon. We were thinking we'd go to Ikea that day since its pretty close to both my sister and the airport, and it will be better than waiting around the house until its time to leave, then fighting traffic to get to the airport.

Deer!

Mom and I went to Stony Creek today to drive around a bit. We had actually planned to get out and walk around, but the high today is about 40* and its been really windy. I'm still trying to squeeze in as much color as I can, so we opted to drive a bit instead. Anyways, we were driving past the golf course, and we saw 2 deer. They were probably less than 20' from the road, and not much farther than that from people playing golf.I rolled down the window and started taking pictures as fast as I could. I'd love to have a bit more of a zoom lens, but this was the best I could do with my current camera.These deer looked pretty young and small. They actually looked awfully skinny to be ready to make it through a cold Michigan winter. Besides that, we rarely see them that close to the road, or that close to people.

Cider Mill

Mom and I went to the cider mill...I'm trying to get my fill of Michigan things before I go back to Phoenix on Tuesday. Its been a good bit cooler than usual for this time of year- the average highs have been in the 40's, instead of the 50-60* range. We walked along a path and I tried to get some good pictures of the leafs (leaves?) turning.Probably my favorite picture-you can see the yellows and reds in the trees. Its currently the background on my computer. Every time I leave the valley I'm reminded of how color-deprived we are. It can be beautiful, but the main colors in Phoenix are brown, brown, and... yup, more brown. My first thought when I got off of the plane was to wonder where the sun went. My second thought was how much I miss the color green.I also had the requisite caramel apple and cup of hot apple cider. SO much better than apple juice from the store! I may have to try my hand at making mulled cider this year. Not that there's much point in Phoenix where it rarely dips below 60*F. No matter, we eat soup anyways.Just a pretty tree. Like I said, I'm hooked on the green, yellow, and red in the trees.Choke berries. At least that's what we always called them. We also saw two blue jays in a tree, but they didn't sit still long enough for a picture.

The Job You Don't Want to Do

Author: Elisabeth Elliot
Source: A Lamp For My Feet
Scripture Reference:

How to Do the Job You Don't Really Want To Do

Certain aspects of the job the Lord has given me to do are very easy to postpone. I make excuses, find other things that take precedence, and, when I finally get down to business to do it, it is not always with much grace. A new perspective has helped me recently:

The job has been given to me to do.
Therefore it is a gift.
Therefore it is a privilege.
Therefore it is an offering I may make to God.
Therefore it is to be done gladly, if it is done for Him.
Therefore it is the route to sanctity.

Here, not somewhere else, I may learn God's way. In this job, not in some other, God looks for faithfulness. The discipline of this job is, in fact, the chisel God has chosen to shape me with--into the image of Christ.

Thank you, Lord, for the work You have assigned me. I take it as your gift; I offer it back to you. With your help I will do it gladly, faithfully, and I will trust You to make me holy.

Quilt!!

I had to wait until after my sister's wedding, but I can finally post pictures of the quilt that I've spent months and months working on. This is what I gave my sister and her husband for a wedding gift. Chris and I received a quilt as a gift for our wedding (plus another one for Christmas last year), and they're some of my favorite gifts ever, especially since I now know how much work goes into one.
This quilt is called the Pointless Wonder. Its a star quilt, but not pieced together in the usual way. Instead, you sew the squares one seam at a time- I think its called stack and whack. Here's a picture of me quilting it on my machine. I actually quilted a fair amount of it at my aunt's house because my machine was acting up. She has a very nice quilting machine, and it made things go much faster. The quilt is queen sized, and working on something that big was no easy trick. I had a kitchen chair sitting next to me, and half the quilt was thrown over the back of the chair while I worked.I quilted most of it in straight lines with a walking foot, then used a darning foot to freehand their names into the top corner, and "Love Stacy" in the bottom corner. Here's a closeup shot of that.Here's a picture of the entire finished quilt (or most of it). Its hard to tell, but the backing is lime green and matches perfectly. I love the bright colors and it was really hard to give this quilt away after the hours and hours of work I put into it.Here's a picture of me with the finished quilt. You can see the backing behind my head where the corner is turned down.

My baby sister is now officially married. The ceremony and reception were yesterday. Everything went really well. They had wanted to keep things small, and they succeeded. There were about 35 people at the ceremony and luncheon/reception, and only a few came back to our house afterwards.
We started going through the pictures today, and between Evan, Rachel (one of Nichole's bridesmaids), and I, we had about 350 pictures. After some photoshopping and culling, I wound up with about 270 (still with a few duplicates). I've been trying to practice taking better pictures even though I'm still using a 4 ish megapixel camera with minimal zoom, and I got some good ones yesterday. Here are a few of my favorite pictures from the day, although a few of them aren't mine.I think this is one of my favorites editing-wise. I snapped a few of her looking back over her shoulder while they were working on bustling her dress. I really like how the blurred background turned out.The classic "hands" shot.My mom and I. Obviously I didn't take this one, but I do like it. Its a good shot of the bouquets also.My sister. I have 3 versions of this picture, all with slightly different settings that make them all look a bit unique. I think this one is my favorite.
Candid shot from the reception. This is my brother and I messing with my sister. You can also see what my dress looked like. My sister was kind enough to let the bridesmaids pick out their own dresses, so mine is a $10 thrift store find that I really enjoyed wearing.Picture of the bridal party. I like how all of our dresses were different- I don't think there's a single dress in the world that would have looked good on all 4 of us.Family picture. L to R: My brother, me, my grandma, Dad, Mom, sister, her...husband.
If you're on Facebook, I linked to my sister's album, and there are lots more pictures there. Given how well our pictures turned out, I'm excited to see the professional ones from the photographer.

I'm here!

But where is the sun?
That was my first thought when we landed in Detroit. We were descending through clouds...then more clouds...then more clouds. When we did get on the ground it was raining. Not hard, mostly just mist. Its been chilly here, but not what I'd call cold. 50's and windy, although the sun did peek out a bit today. We went to see some property that my dad bought as a fixer-upper. The house on it is cute, in a run down sort of way. I did see lots of potential, and 10 acres with a barn is nothing to sneeze at. I had my camera in my purse, and still didn't think to take pictures until we were on our way home. The house is definitely in the "working on it" stage. If we happen to go back, I'll be sure and take some pictures. The colors here are just starting to turn. Most things are still green(!), but then every so often we pass a tree that's fiery red or orange. I've realized that part of the reason I have trouble navigating in Michigan is that I can't see as far. In Phoenix your line of sight most of the time is all the way to the mountains. Here, there's so many trees that its hard to see that far ahead of you or to the side.
We're having a bachelorette party for my sister tomorrow. The agenda is pizza and chick flicks at my parents' house. I have an appointment to get my hair cut on Friday- I still haven't decided what I'm doing. My aunt and uncle, and my mom's friends, fly in on Friday then the wedding is Saturday. After that, I don't really have any plans for next week. I'm hoping to track down some friends, but enough people have moved that getting hold of people could be tricky.

Be Still

As I was cleaning out my inbox, I realized that I have several of these devotionals that I was saving to post. I have them scheduled to post about once a week. This one is one of my favorites. With all of the din and noise in our lives, its so difficult, yet so important, to learn to be still and quiet.

Author: Mrs. Charles E. Cowman
Source: Streams in the Desert
Scripture Reference: Job 4:16

I Heard a Still Voice

"There was silence, and I heard a still voice" (Job 4:16, margin).

A score of years ago, a friend placed in my hand a book called True Peace. It was an old mediaeval message, and it had but one thought--that God was waiting in the depths of my being to talk to me if I would only get still enough to hear His voice.

I thought this would be a very easy matter, and so began to get still. But I had no sooner commenced than a perfect pandemonium of voices reached my ears, a thousand clamoring notes from without and within, until I could hear nothing but their noise and din.
Some were my own voices, my own questions, some my very prayers. Others were suggestions of the tempter and the voices from the world's turmoil.

In every direction I was pulled and pushed and greeted with noisy acclamations and unspeakable unrest. It seemed necessary for me to listen to some of them and to answer some of them; but God said,
"Be still, and know that I am God." Then came the conflict of thoughts for tomorrow, and its duties and cares; but God said, "Be still."

And as I listened, and slowly learned to obey, and shut my ears to every sound, I found after a while that when the other voices ceased, or I ceased to hear them, there was a still small voice in the depths of my being that began to speak with an inexpressible tenderness, power and comfort.
As I listened, it became to me the voice of prayer, the voice of wisdom, the voice of duty, and I did not need to think so hard, or pray so hard, or trust so hard; but that "still small voice" of the Holy Spirit in my heart was God's prayer in my secret soul, was God's answer to all my questions, was God's life and strength for soul and body, and became the substance of all knowledge, and all prayer and all blessing: for it was the living GOD Himself as my life, my all.
It is thus that our spirit drinks in the life of our risen Lord, and we go forth to life's conflicts and duties like a flower that has drunk in, through the shades of night, the cool and crystal drops of dew. But as dew never falls on a stormy night, go the dews of His grace never come to the restless soul. --A. B. Simpson

This classic devotional is the unabridged edition of Streams in the Desert. This first edition was published in 1925 and the wording is preserved as originally written. Connotations of words may have changed over the years and are not meant to be offensive.

Down to the Wire

That pretty much covers it. Only 4 more days until I fly to Michigan for 2 weeks. I've been working on tying up as many loose ends as possible. All of my monthly reports are written; they just need to be e-mailed and filed. That's today's project. I've let all of my families know I'll be gone, and scheduled accordingly. I have 5 kiddos to see on Monday, and that's it. I've checked some books out of the library to read on the plane. My sister's wedding gift is finished. Obviously I'm not going to post here what it is, but I'm rather proud of myself. I have pictures, and I'll put them up after she has opened it. I still need to pack, but I'm putting that off till the last minute since the kitties freak whenever we get suitcases out. Beyond that, there isn't much left. I don't plan to do anything work-related while I'm gone other than check my e-mail. I figure people can live without me for 2 weeks.