I am so grateful today. Although I had a rough time as a kid/teen and went through a lot, God still saw my heart and still loved me and carried me through it all. Trusting in Jesus is the best choice I have ever made, and I am so thankful that God didn't give up on me. I am glad he still blessed me with an amazing husband, and two amazing boys, Brad & Jake. There really is no reason I am writing this, just reflecting on what I have come through and where I have come from. God is so good, and I know that I certainly don't deserve his blessings. I was not perfect then, I am not perfect now, and I will never be perfect. But His strength is made perfect in weakness (2 Cor 12:9). I may have prenty of days that I am weak. I will have many trials. When I overcome one, I will give Him the victory, because it is nothing I could have done on my own. I also know that with that victory, soon after will come the next trial. With God, however, all things are possible (Phil 4:13). Not some, ALL. With his power, his strength, his help, I can accomplish what he sets before me. I know that I have many friends on here who are not Christians, and I am not trying to offend anyone by any means, but this is my personal feelings and how my Lord has brought me through. Thanks for reading.

"On Fire" for the Lord

I don't wanna be, I don't wanna be a casual Christian

I don't wanna live, I don't wanna live a lukewarm life

I wanna light up the night

With an everlasting light

I don't wanna live the casual Christian life

The lyrics above are to a song that we sing at church on occasion, but lately they have been hitting really close to home. I would say since about the beginning of August, both my husband and I have been just ignited to learn more and more about God's Word. I guess you could say we are "on fire". Hans has been working with our church, Highlands Baptist Church, and during our Wednesday night prayer service has been attending a class lead by our associate pastor called "Operation GO", which primarily focuses on winning lost souls to Christ. Then, on Thursday evenings, he goes on visitation and soul winning with our good friend Brian, then meets with him afterward to further study the Bible.

Bradley is also just beaming with God's light. Several weeks ago, he started begging me to be able to join the church choir. Now I know that they have a few teenage kids in there, but I did not know what the "minimum age" was, so to speak, so I just told him to wait a couple more years.

Apparently, that was not the answer he was looking for. He continued to pry and ask, until finally I said, "Alright Brad, let's go ask Miss Sharon and see what the age is". (Sharon is our Pastor's wife, the leader of the choir and also Brad's piano teacher. She wear's many hats, and is such a lovely woman of God). We went up just before the Sunday evening service started two weeks ago and Bradley asked her how old he had to be to join. Since she knows Bradley and knows that he is mature for his age and very disciplined in his studies and his music, she said he can join now. Bradley was SO EXCITED that he was just smiling from ear to ear for the rest of the service. He had his first practice and "performance" last week and he already loves it.

After the morning service on the way home from church, Bradley told me that he wants to do as much as he can for the Lord, "even if that means going to another country to be a missionary". I told him to just wait and listen for God's direction if that is where the Lord is leading him, and whatever the cost his daddy & I will pay for every penny of college that it takes to prepare him for the Lord's work. I am so proud.

What am I doing for the Lord, you ask? Well, right now I have further deepened my Bible study time and have been working on reading more Christian books and my devotionals...

...and thanks to Brad's example, I have also decided to join the choir - though I have a enormous fear of not only speaking, but singing in public. Lord willing, I will be just fine during my first "performance". I am trusting HIM!

Til Next Time,

Kim

PS: Here is a video clip of the children/adults from church singing the previously mentioned song on the way back from camp this summer... http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=423863597991

The Fruit of the Spirit & Spiritual Gifts

Yesterday, I went to my weekly MOPS meeting and this week fell on our Bible study week. Last week, this week, and next week we have a guest speaker who is a Mentor Mom at our location, and her name is Christi Haag. Let me just tell you, she is an amazing, Christ-centered, Spirit-filled, Godly woman. I listen to her speak and I am immediately drawn in. She is married and has two boys, 14 and 15. Her oldest, Ben, recently confessed to her and her husband that he feels he is being led by the Lord to go into missions overseas, and is patiently waiting on God to let him know where. I mean, PRAISE THE LORD! I only hope and pray that my husband and I can be that kind of example to our children. I cannot say enough about how wonderful this lady is, and how much of a true blessing it has been to know her as the previous mentor mom for our table, and as a true teacher of the word. She speaks it with such clarity and conviction, she is just mesmerizing.

Last meeting, she spoke on "The Fruit of the Spirit" and the Spiritual Gifts that God gives to us. She let us know that without the Fruit and filtering each of our gifts through the Fruit, that our gifts are just like a loud noise to God and won't matter. Just think of that: How good would it be to have the gift of discertion without kindness? Or the gift of serving without love? Music without joy? It all makes sense and I have never seen it that way before.

She explained that the Bible teaches that each of us has at least one gift, and the Lord calls us to use that gift in our lives and in the church. She spoke on several passages, including Galatians 5:22, I Peter 4:10-11, I Corinthians 12, I Corinthians 13, and Ephesians 4:11-16, and Romans 12:1-8. If you have never studied these, I encourage you to do so, as I felt like I learned so much from these.

She then passed out four pages to us, where we took a quiz to find out what our main spiritual gifts were. It was 78 questions long and took about 20 minutes to complete, but when I was done - WOW! - I was surprised about a couple of the results. I knew that I would probably hold a gift for hospitality and giving, but exhortation and knowledge was an amazing discovery about myself, but it makes perfect sense. I scored lower on prophecy and teaching, but that's OK - God gave me the gifts that he did for a reason, and I can use THOSE to lift people up in my own way, and he will send those with the other gifts that he gave uniquely to them to help in their own way that someone like me may not excel at.

If you would also like to take this quiz, it was very neat and I even brought one home for my husband. The link is posted below (I uploaded it to Google Docs, if it doesn't work, post a comment with your email address and I would be more than happy to email it to you). Although he hasn't taken it yet, it will be neat to see what God has blessed him with and how we each compliment eachother in God's perfect plan! :)

Discover Your Spiritual Gifts

Bradley's Point...

So I thought I would share a cute story. We were on our way home from church last night when we stopped off on a road with tons of Christmas lights. At one of the houses, they were giving out candy canes, so Brad got one. Just as I was about to turn onto the main road, Bradley sweetly said, "Mom, I wish I could give Jesus my candy cane, because he never gets any presents and it is HIS birthday."

I almost CRIED, and he had a point.

I told him that he can put it under the tree if he would like, and that the only present that we need to give Jesus in our trust in Him and to follow his Word.

I thought it was absolutely adorable, and summarizes the "childlike" faith we all should hold on to.

-Kim