Franklin's Planners and Working Out :)

2010 is going to be a year filled with changes and new experiences! I don't mind it. I'm very excited about it.

With a new Franklin planner in hand, I'm excited to organize my day in the morning. As far as I can remember, in fact I think it was Robert Pierce and Jamie Weston who first introduced me to the novel little book, Franklin's been the planner choice for me. I've tried others and they just won't do.

This Franklin's a little different as it's broken up into months, has a "next action" notebook and a really cool insert with a "time map" on it. I hope to be more resourceful with my time and that will really happen if I can avoid long AT&T calls like last nights that took almost an hour and still didn't resolve a thing!

As much as I like all things techy, and would have loved to go paperless (I actually did search for a planner that works with my I-phone) ultimately the joy of writing in appointments, travel engagements, and to do's and crossing them off is sheer pleasure.

I'm really excited about the time map component of this planner specifically for the purpose of training. It will give me a chance weekly to write in workouts and keep track of what I'm eating and look at my progress for some upcoming events.

Speaking of events, I'm looking forward to completing a first half marathon this year. Yes, I said it. This commits me to it, Lord willing. And of course I'll throw in a few Sprint Tri's (hoping to do atleast one by the ocean). For the challenge, I believe this is the year I will begin to mix it up a bit and work in the Olympic distance training for a Tri. The distances aren't much longer than the Sprint distances, and I keep telling myself it's doable. Deception is bliss?? I don't know.

One of the funnest parts for me is doing this with others. James has wanted to do a Sprint Tri way before he met me, so for awhile now he's also had the desire and so we get to start training together in the Spring. It looks like I have some other running and training buddies that I am just so thrilled about too!

I don't know if I'll do it, but I wrote it as a goal in the Franklin. I would really love to get a legit Personal Trainers Cert this year. The one I got was a joke, but it was really something for me to do for myself personally while I was in Hungary and I did enjoy learning some things along the way. My biggest fear is that I'll forget it all, as I don't have the best memory. I'm not one of those people who can remember bone and muscle names. That's just not me. But if I do get a cert, I will go with the ACSM cert, which Dr. Gomez recommends and I trust his opinion.

So here's to training and planning and organizing the year ahead!
2010 is going to be a great year, especially because He's Immanuel, God with us!

Sarah's Daughters

As if it might be the title to a great song with an interesting music video, I was driving home from Reno one night this week and reminded -- ladies, we are Sarah's daughters.

Sarah is one of my favorite women in the Bible. For over a decade, God promised her a son, a child she could hold and love but she waited and waited and nothing happened. Her promise of motherhood was challenged by the reality that she was a barren woman. The moral of the story for me is in the face of challenging circumstances, God still breaks through. Years passed and still there was no baby. I'm sure she felt shame, disappointment, bitterness. I think she even blamed God. Who wouldn't? Who hasn't?

What I find interesting is that from Sarah's life of fears, a legacy of faith was born. In the end, "Because of faith also Sarah herself received physical power to conceive a child, even when she was long past the age for it, because she considered [God] Who had given her the promise to be reliable and trustworthy and true to His word," (Hebrews 11:11 AMP). In the end her faith won out.

In the face of circumstantial evidence, she let the evidence of His trustworthy nature pile up right next to it. And her heart had to learn to trust God's timing. Sarah's faith won her the honor of being one of the only women in the Bible to exemplify true faith in Hebrews 11. You and I are actually considered Sarah's daughters when we don't allow things to terrify us, when we don't give way to hysterical fears or let anxieties unnerve us. (1Peter 3:6 AMP). I wonder if her heart finally came to a place after being disappointed where she looked her fears in the eye and stared it down. I wonder if she just found a way to say "No more!" When you and I can do that, we have inherited Sarah's legacy of faith.

As a woman still learning to be a Christ-follower after all these years, being called a daughter of Sarah has a lot of meaning to me. Sarah's life is a great reminder that God works with our imperfections. It's also encouraging to see He doesn't promise a perfect life. Sarah's heart got sick when the thing she hoped for, the thing God promised, seemed to be a fleeting dream. Her and her husband were promised a child but weeks turned into months and months turned into years and Sarah finally took things into her own hands. She rationalized and reasoned away God's promise. Even though Sarah and Abraham made a mess of things, God didn't give up. I find that remarkable. He truly is the most forgiving and loving God.

How many 90 year old women do you know who get pregnant and live to tell about it? Um, yeah. That takes a lot of trust so I doubt I would have done anything different if I were in her shoes. I'm sure those nine months were long and mysterious, full of joy, doubt and perhaps a bit of sorrow for not trusting God in the beginning. I wonder what went through her mind when she delivered her son. Sarah was very human and the interesting and encouraging thing I find from her story is that she tried to do things her own way at first. But now the thing that was always going to be given to her was taking place. Her fears were quieted by the overwhelming evidence that God keeps His word.

I thank God for the women in my life today who are examples of Sarah's daugthers. I've been fortunate to be raised by a strong and compassionate mother; I enjoy the friendship of two very unique and beautiful sisters. I'm surrounded by beautiful women friends who have overcome some incredible challenges in their single lives, marriages, families and just plain living life.

As I drove home thinking about how fortunate I am to know so many of Sarah's daughters, I was also thankful for Sarah's story. I get inspired by real women who choose to fully embrace the challenges and victories of life. This generation needs to know that Sarah's daughters are women of strength and character, not perfect by any means but learning to trust and believe together for our families and our lives. Thank you for being a woman in my life who I've seen overcome, who is faithful in the best way you know how to serve the Lord, to serve in a community of other believers and to live life to it's fullest. Thank you for being Sarah's daughter.

PS - One thing I learned and thought was interesting is that Sarah's name was first Sarai which means noble woman. Later God changed her name to Sarah which means princess. =) We grew up learning the Disney princess stories. Interesting that as a woman of faith, as a daughter of Sarah, you're also God's princess. :) Just a thought.

We The Redeemed

We The Redeemed, Hillsong

There is nothing like Your love
No exchange for all You gave
To be welcomed into life
So I can know the love it takes

Now forever to be loved
To walk with You for all my days
There’s no greater love than this
You are the Author and the Way

This is the sound of the redeemed
Rising up to praise the King
Our hope is in You
This is the sound of the redeemed
Rising up to praise the King

Singing glorious glorious One You have saved us
Honor and Power and Praise to the Savior.
You are the Answer You are the Answer

You come with power come with fire
As we lift Your name on high
And join with all the saints to sing
In bringing Honor to the King.

Pre-Chorus + Chorus

Instrumental

Pre-Chorus + Chorus

Bridge:
We the redeemed
Hear us singing
You are Holy
You are Holy

A New Year

What did your New Year's Eve look like? I'm curious.

My last night of 2009 was spent watching Beverly Hills Ninja and Terminator 3 with James, his roommate Jake and a bunch of guys. Around 11 pm James and I ventured up to the hill in Northwest Reno that overlooks downtown (aka the property off Leadership Parkway) and watched the fireworks with hot cocoa in hand, glow in the dark necklaces, hats and blow horns that didn't really blow.

The full moon glistened off the snow in the dark night air and James and I enjoyed some good conversations with the lights of downtown Reno in the distance. He's a good man for wearing his glow necklace and celebrating full flare, wearing hat and all! It was a fabulous New Year's Eve.

Today my mom and I are going to Dillards to meet my sister and find some really good bargains. Apparently there is a half off the half off sales from Christmas, which translates into $5 shirts. We'll see. The rumor was that lucky jeans were purchased there last year for as little as $15. Sounds too good to be true!

After my mom and I run a few errands, most likely I'll come back to unwind and unpack from Sacramento. Most of my new years day will be spent reading, praying, organizing, and cleaning.

I always love the beginning of a new year. It's like getting a fresh test in high school with no erase marks, and no answers filled in. OK maybe that's not the most exciting example. But you get the picture, a clean slate. Nothings been written, nothings been done. Maybe that's why so many people make resolutions because they want to redirect and rewrite parts of their life that need adjustment. I don't know but for me I process a new year through by looking to my maker in the midst of it and extending my heart to him, asking and desiring his thoughts, his desires and his dreams as I step into a new year.

This morning I read a devotional by Charles Spurgeon in the Morning and Evening Devotional. Here's what it said. What is sackbut? camphire? spikenard? - Old English of which I have no idea!!! Sounds mysteriously peculiar to me. And yet my heart resonates with the rest of this devo. Basically, rejoice in Him. Open up this new year with songs and sounds of praise and thanksgiving! Even if things have been bitter in 2009, there's a sweet treasure in our relationship with the living God!


"Evening...

Song of Solomon 1:4
We will be glad and rejoice in Thee.

We will be glad and rejoice in Thee. We will not open the gates of the year to the dolorous notes of the sackbut, but to the sweet strains of the harp of joy, and the high sounding cymbals of gladness. "O come, let us sing unto the Lord: let us make a joyful noise unto the rock of our salvation." We, the called and faithful and chosen, we will drive away our griefs, and set up our banners of confidence in the name of God. Let others lament over their troubles, we who have the sweetening tree to cast into Marah's bitter pool, with joy will magnify the Lord. Eternal Spirit, our effectual Comforter, we who are the temples in which Thou dwellest, will never cease from adoring and blessing the name of Jesus. We WILL, we are resolved about it, Jesus must have the crown of our heart's delight; we will not dishonour our Bridegroom by mourning in His presence. We are ordained to be the minstrels of the skies, let us rehearse our everlasting anthem before we sing it in the halls of the New Jerusalem. We will BE GLAD AND REJOICE: two words with one sense, double joy, blessedness upon blessedness. Need there be any limit to our rejoicing in the Lord even now? Do not men of grace find their Lord to be camphire and spikenard, calamus and cinnamon even now, and what better fragrance have they in heaven itself? We will be glad and rejoice IN THEE. That last word is the meat in the dish, the kernel of the nut, the soul of the text. What heavens are laid up in Jesus! What rivers of infinite bliss have their source, ay, and every drop of their fulness in Him! Since, O sweet Lord Jesus, Thou art the present portion of Thy people, favour us this year with such a sense of Thy preciousness, that from its first to its last day we may be glad and rejoice in Thee. Let January open with joy in the Lord, and December close with gladness in Jesus."

I'm excited to see what this year has in store and I will rejoice in knowing one thing that is forever unchanging. He is Immanuel, God with us!!

Happy New Year To All!! =))

Winter Inspiration

Although I may not have an abundance of things to blog about right now while my thoughts lie dormant beneath the layers of Nevada snow, I can always find "food for thought" from what others have written.

This soul craves inspiration, especially in the dead of winter when winter weather wants to close in on all the normal patterns of life. I love anything hot in winter - fires and drinks. And of course I love the time with family and friends watching movies and playing games while it's cold outside. The cold and bitter days will soon pass and Spring will be here, a time of the year I love best. Here are some thoughts to chew on in the winter weather. I'd love to hear which quote you like and why, perhaps what it means to you today.

--------------------

“There are only two seasons -- winter and Baseball.”
- Bill Veeck (American Baseball Player, 1914-1986)

“People ask me what I do in winter when there's no baseball. I'll tell you what I do. I stare out the window and wait for spring.”
- Rogers Hornsby (American professional Baseball Player 1896-1963)

“Sometimes our fate resembles a fruit tree in winter. Who would think that those branches would turn green again and blossom, but we hope it, we know it.”
-Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (German Playwright, Poet, Novelist)

“I like these cold, gray winter days. Days like these let you savor a bad mood.”
- Bill Watterson (American Author of the Comic strip, Calvin & Hobbes)

“Laughter is the sun that drives winter from the human face.”
- Victor Hugo (French romantic Poet, Novelist and Dramatist, 1802-1885)

“Too bad Lassie didn't know how to ice skate, because then if she was in Holland on vacation in winter and someone said "Lassie, go skate for help," she could do it.”
- Jack Handy (American Writer & Saturday Night Live cast member from 1991-2003)

“If we had no winter, the spring would not be so pleasant: if we did not sometimes taste of adversity, prosperity would not be so welcome.”
- Anne Bradstreet (British poet, 1612-1672)

“Winter must be cold for those with no warm memories”
- (From the movie, "An Affair To Remember")

“In the depths of winter I finally learned there was in me an invincible summer”
- Albert Camus (French Novelist, Essayist, Playwright, '57 Nobel Prize for Literature)

“Lovers, forget your love and list to the love of these She a window flower And he a winter breeze ...”
- Robert Frost (American poet, 1874-1963)

“No winter lasts forever; no spring skips its turn.”
- Hal Borland

“Adversity draws men together and produces beauty and harmony in life's relationships, just as the cold of winter produces ice-flowers on the window-panes, which vanish with the warmth.”
- Soren Kierkegaard (Danish Philosopher and Theologian, generally recognized as the first existentialist philosopher. 1813-1855)

"There are three reasons for becoming a writer: the first is that you need the money; the second that you have something to say that you think the world should know; the third is that you can't think what to do with the long winter evenings.”
- Quentin Crisp (English Author, 1908-1999)

“One kind word can warm three winter months.”
- Japanese Proverb

“We grow great by dreams. All big men are dreamers. They see things in the soft haze of a spring day or in the red fire of a long winter's evening. Some of us let these great dreams die, but others nourish and protect them; nurse them through bad days till they bring them to the sunshine and light which comes always to those who sincerely hope that their dreams will come true.”
- Woodrow T. Wilson quotes (American 28th President of the United States 1856-1924)

“Every mile is two in winter”
- George Hurbert

"The last day of the old year was one of those bright, cold, dazzling winter days, which bombard us with their brilliancy, and command our admiration but never our love."
- Lucy Maud Montgomery (a Canadian author, best known for a series of novels beginning with Anne of Green Gables, published in 1908.)


"O Winter! ruler of the inverted year, . . . I crown thee king of intimate delights, Fireside enjoyments, home-born happiness, And all the comforts that the lowly roof Of undisturb'd Retirement, and the hours Of long uninterrupted evening, know."
- William Cowper (English poet and hymnodist)

"Winter is on my head, but eternal spring is in my heart."
- Victor Hugo (French dramatist, novelist, & poet 1802 - 1885)

"Winter is nature's way of saying, "Up yours."
- Robert Byrne (American Author and billiards champion player, Writer of 'Standard Book of Pool and Billiards')

many words

Normally, I'm a woman of many words. I've always got something to blog about. I guess this winter weather is affecting my capacity to blog as well. I love looking at the snow, especially on the mountains. I enjoy warm fires and hot cocoa with a book when those can be arranged while the weather outside is frightful. I enjoy snowboarding and snowshoing and hope to do more of that in years to come. Mostly though, when winter comes, I feel closed in. I don't like the way it impedes the things I love to do, like get around, both on foot and in a car. Oh well. This too shall pass.

this love theme....

I'm the worst offender in overusing the word and cheapening it to a superficial add-on in a sentence. I can't seem to get away from this theme. So now I'm on a quest and going deeper.

Yes, I LOVE chocolate, especially on certain days.
I LOVE my '64 VW bug named "Frappy", I LOVE the color.
I LOVE sunny days and the ocean waves.
I LOVE training and doing sprint triathlons....Yeah, I love it all.

Although most everyone probably understands that my 'love' for these things is not equally distributed and may even vary from day to day (I hate chocolate on those days when I'm prone to indulge in overeating it and trying to watch sugar intake; I'm less in love with Frappy when she's being an old car and acting 'crappy'.....Did she forget her name? Supposed to be happy!) - I want to clarify that in most of these situations my 'love' is more a very strong like and I guess it doesn't leave much room for going after authentic love.

So I'm getting off the superficial train ride for a minute. I want to stop off in the field of love and graze awhile. What does it look like? After listening to Ravi's podcast yesterday, I was reminded that even my 'best' efforts to love people fall so short. I don't know the first thing about love. If genuine, authentic love begins with a genuine, authentic God and his definition, that it has to do with our intrinsic worth no matter what we bring to the table, then that's the field I need to stop and graze in for awhile.

Why am I so motivated today to pursue this line of thought?
Well, every once in awhile I get stirred in my thoughts and realize that
1) this life is short.
2) what's the purpose?

And then I come back to a simple faith. As a Christ-follower, He showed us how to keep it simple. Love God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength. Love others, even your neighbors, as yourself. Sounds simple right? Not when your definition of love is superficial. And that's where the train wreck was in sight for me again today. So, I needed to get off and let that train continue without me.

Here's what I discovered. I'm often trapped in my own mind and my own perception of what love looks like. I have no idea how to live outside of myself and my own ways. And then I'm reminded of a small sentence I've read before "God is love."
And then I open up the love chapter to read about "the way of love" in 1 Cor 13. My memory is jolted and I find myself shaving off layers of superficial 'love' that often pervades my life.

Let me just share it with you

"If I speak with human eloquence and angelic ecstasy but don't love, I'm nothing but the creaking of a rusty gate. If I speak God's word with power, revealing all his mysteries and making everything plain as day and if I ahve faith that says to a mountain, "Jump" and it jumps, but I don't have love, I'm nothing. If I give everything I own to the poor and even go to the stake to be burned as a martyr but I don't love, I've gotten nowhere. So, no matter what I say, what I believe, and what I do, I'm bankrupt without love.
Love never gives up.
Love cares more for others than for self.
Love doesn't want what it doesn't have.
Love doesn't strut,
Doesn't have a swelled head,
Doesn't force itself on others,
Isn't always 'me first'
Doesn't fly off the handle,
Doesn't keep score of the sins of others
Doesn't revel when others grovel
takes pleasure in the flowering of truth,
puts up with anything,
Trusts God always,
Always looks for the best,
Never looks back,
But keeps going to the end.
Love never dies. Inspired speech will be over some day; ...understanding will reach its limit. We know only a portion of the truth and what we say about God is always incomplete. But when the Complete arrives, our incompletes will be canceled.....but for right now, until that completeness, we have three things to do to lead us toward that consummation: Trust steadily in God, hope unswervingly, love extravagantly. And the best of the three is love."

More times than I care to recount, my life is filled with everything opposite of this. I speak words eloquently and because words are a big part of the way I express myself as an extrovert, I find myself doing this a lot. What about the times when there's no love behind it. I may even share things that are true and make it plain but my heart isn't in it. My faith is strong but when there's no authentic love there, I'm empty. And just like this text reads, alot of times I associate 'love' or being loving with doing good deeds - helping someone in need, helping the poor. Working with missions and sending students to the least reached areas of the world, I'm inspired by stories of missionaries who have been burned at the stake for their faith. They may have been walking in love, but me? Hmmmm. How deep is it really pulsing through my veins?

No matter what I say, what I believe, what I do -- If I am without God's love pumping, pounding and pulsing through my veins, I am bankrupt. I lose everything! If God is love and if HE is what I need pumping, pounding and pulsing through my veins, then this is a glimpse of what I am asking God to renew in my heart.

His love never gives up. He cares more for others than I do. He doesn't strut even his goodness for others to see but unfolds His love in subtle, humble ways. He doesn't force himself on others. He doesn't fly off the handle, doesn't keep score of the sins of others and takes pleasure in seeing authenticity and truth. He puts up with anything and He always looks for the best. He ALWAYS looks for the best. Wow. Do I? God never looks back, but keeps going to the end.

And lest I give up hope in this quest, I'm reminded that everything I say and do is incomplete until the day things are completed and finished in me, the day I die, I guess. For now, I have three things to do. Trust steadily, hope unswervingly and love extravagantly.

I don't think I'll ever master this quest but I want to renew the depths of authentic love and make it a lifetime goal. It's good to remember my incompleteness and His perfection. It's good to get off the train once in awhile, stop and graze on the good stuff. Love is the good stuff and that's what I want in life.