What. A. Weekend.

After several fourth of July parties, I told myself “Alright, tonight you are going to bed early, and you can sleep til 8 on your Friday off, before starting in on your to-do list.

Ha.

This weekend was unbelievably fabulous—and I have never been so sleep-deprived! It was worth every second, and I would do it again in a heartbeat. Course, that’s easy for me to say— I wasn’t the one preaching or cooking!

17 hours is a long time to be on a plane, but that’s how long it took the Mbewe’s to get to DC from Zambia. And after all that, they were still willing to come all the way across the country for Conrad to preach three sermons for us. I cannot imagine what it must be like to do something like that for a group of strangers, and to stay in an unfamiliar house with a group of crazy people… ;-). I am amazed, and so grateful. Our Lord is so gracious, to give us the time this weekend to be in so much fellowship with believers at home and at church. The messages were a great blessing, and from what I could see, things went well and smoothly. Please remember to pray for Pastor and Mrs. Mbewe this week—he preaches four more times this week, and I believe next Sunday as well.

If you were one of the ones who received any of my panicked text messages of “Pray for this and this and that!”, thank you for praying for us! My mom started to feel better mid-morning on Friday, and all the transportational stuff worked out in the end. My ankle has gotten worse, so that one is still on the list… :)

Alright. I could recap the messages, and share all my long-winded and likely repetitious thoughts, but instead I’ll just direct you to the website—http://www.sovgracewa.org. The three messages are already up. You should listen to them. Hopefully soon, there will be videos up as well.

We have just gotten back from the airport, and I have to confess to finding myself somewhat down. I had a blast this weekend, and genuinely enjoyed having them in our home. When you look forward to something for a year and a half, it’s a bummer when it’s all over with. Therefore, I am going to go to Africa. I know someone there now, so the entire country holds more appeal. Now is the time to do something like that— My parents approve, and that’s all the approbation I need! Definitely starting another envelope… this one titled “Zambia.”

Aaaand of course I can’t post anything without pictures. :-) Pardon me for not editing them much. Just glanced through them and am putting up the ones I like. Today will be long—Been up since 5, did the airport, teach a piano lesson in five minutes, then go into work for a while (last minute…) then coffee with a friend… After that, so much laundry to catch up on!

I have to start back a week or two though, as I have some pictures from the 4th as well.

My brother has become a cowboy… One day only.

                                     

Moonrise and fireworks on the 4th.

Took a few seconds to adjust to the right settings, but when I got it sort of ironed out, this is what I ended up with. Not perfect, but still fun!

I told them it was a zoom lens.. “That’s too close!” “We don’t care!!!”

 

And on to the weekend of the Mbewe’s visit and conference…

On the way home from the airport…

Felistas and Hannah. :-)

                                   

Baby toes… 

Dessert-ish things after the first session.

                                  

:-) Relaxing.

The Mbewe’s had family in the area, so we had the opportunity to have them come visit for dinner. This is the only picture I got on my camera.

Day two!

In the evening on Sunday, we headed up the mountain—toward Sunrise. It was late and we were tired, but I think it was worth it. That drive is beautiful, and so relaxing. Would do it every week if I could!

We found snow!

The pastors on a Sunday evening… I told them a really funny joke.

 

                 

 

 

“Praise the Lord, O my soul, and all my inmost being, praise His holy name!”

Quick Update-like things…

We have our conference this weekend. Wanted to do this for a year or two, and now it’s happening! Papa and I will pick up Pastor and Mrs. Mbewe from the airport tomorrow. Recent search terms on our computer? It ranges from “Zambia” to “Pronunciation of Lusaka” to “What language do they speak in Zambia?” :) If you think of it, please pray for the Lord’s blessing on the weekend! If you’re in the area… Come! (info is on our website—www.sovgracewa.org)

Fourth of July was nice. Hit up a couple parties, and still haven’t recovered… Working the morning shift after staying up for fireworks was, perhaps, ill advised. Pictures to come for sure.

Sprained my ankle on Sunday, or at least did something comparable to it. Several claimed they heard it “pop”… At the moment, it’s still quite swollen (the whole way around), and when I looked a few minutes ago, was turning very interesting colors. Needless to say, I’m not thrilled. However, I am turning it to a good opportunity to buy some of those super cute long boho skirts that are all over the stores right now! ;) What an optimist I have become.

I have a lot of photos to put up—I’ll do that next week if all goes well. For now, I need sleep very badly. VERY badly. Therefore, I’m going to ice my ankle, and make a to-do list for the morning. Sadly, my day off is already packed full. I comfort myself with visions of the scones that I’ll be making fresh for the next three or four mornings, as well as the peanut butter chocolate thingamajigs I am bringing on Saturday.

Until next week.

Currently facebook is not my favorite place. If you get on someday in the near future, and I’ve disappeared, it doesn’t mean I deleted you and blocked you as a friend. It may, however, mean that I triumphantly overcame the networking norm and compulsive cyber-social world, and deactivated. Presumably, at this point I am flooded with peace and quiet, take a deep breath, and… go to my blog. I need to keep it until the Mbewes come, though, and til after a photo job this weekend. I’m just using it for too many legitimate things at the moment. This way, my pictures are here, where people can choose to look at them. Also, I really can’t come up with a decent status that seems worthy to throw into everyone’s home page. Anything really clever that I have, I can just… text to my sister. I haven’t been on enough to chat with people, since if the internet is up for any significant amount of time, it’s because I’m editing photos or playing spotify. Which leaves facebook there just as a stalker tool.

This post? Frankly, it’s just an excuse to put up all the photos I’ve been playing with. So.

Me with my nieces last Sunday…I was holding Hannah, (sleeping), and Abigail wanted an excuse to have her blankie and suck her fingers. I  don’t know if mom or rachel took the picture. Typical Sunday afternoon.

I was playing with shutter speeds and water… Froze mom’s fountain. One of them… Contrary to appearance, the shot was taken in broad daylight. Not the coolest or artsiest in the world, but I like it cause each water droplet is so individual and clear.

Since I was having fun with water stuff, I wandered up highway 410 all by my lonesome to see what shots I could get. While the solitude was wonderful, it was a little difficult to drive and scope out the shots at the same time. You will be relieved to learn that I resisted the impulse to take pictures and drive simultaneously… ;-)

Waterfall.

And the opposite shutter speed with a waterfall. You have to compensate with a really low ISO, and I had to do some creative tripod-stand in stuff til I buy my Manfrotto… :)

“Thou flowing water, clear and bright…” Minus the clear part. I did that on purpose… :)

 

Anyway.  I need to clear out my full memory card and charge up the battery…

I adore my camera. That’s all.

Last Sunday. Also known as Father’s Day.

We wanted a “papa and his daughters and granddaughters” picture… But I didn’t like my face in them, so I left it with Rache and her kids. :)

 

Jacob and Liz—One year anniversary!

Adorable. :)

 

Too bad the girls wouldn’t look the right direction…

“Hey Jacob, take a picture of us with Clark!” This is about as far as we got.

But for some reason he managed to be in most the ones of “Rachel and I”… ;)

 

Another Shot

I have about, oh, a couple thousand pictures on my facebook. But, since that is clearly not quite enough, I’ll have to post a few more of my favorites here. That way it’s more optional, so they aren’t constantly showing up on your homepage. A couple of them look better full size, so you can click on them and they’ll open up in a different tab, I believe.

Went hiking when I had the kids overnight a few weeks ago. It rained. Actually, it downright poured on us. Gabriel was mostly a good sport, and Abigail was perfectly content, because she was riding in a hiking backpack… That girl is no lightweight. My back still hurts from that. Couple of my favorite pictures:

Then, since I take the scenic route whenever possible, I ran across this eagle. Had to slam on the brakes and grab my camera, and this is all I ended up with. Next time I will get the better shot!

Kitchen floor! New one, finally. We started tearing up the hideous linoleum a while ago, and underneath was this funny particle board stuff. My mom needed a new floor for a long time.

Before shot:

 

 

After:

 

And a few shots that I got out and about on drives….

This one is actually a view from our deck:

Looked up and saw this:

He had a few friends, too.

And finally, here are some of my favorites from the conference that I didn’t put on facebook.

And that’s it for now.

It’s that moment when I walk out to my dad’s office, enter calmly, then burst out with “Why is it that all the people I connect with have been DEAD for 400 years!???” The fact that all he does is look at me and quietly take off his glasses, waiting for the rest of the storm to hit, is a testament to his vast patience and experience with dramatic daughters. When I finish talking, he says, “You must have been reading the Puritans.” He’s right. We have noticed that it’s like a different world when you open something by Owen, Manton, Brooks, or Swinnock. It’s this lovely place where they understood the gospel, had their priorities straight, and knew what it meant to stand firm for an undiluted preaching of the truth, never allowing the world a foothold, never compromising with iniquity, and most importantly, were working to live holy lives to the glory of God. Heaven on Earth, by Thomas Brooks, is encouraging as he speaks about assurance of salvation, and his other works are comforting when he addresses affliction. Jonathan Edwards doses out conviction by the bucketful, and spurs you on in your prayer life in sermons like “Hypocrites Deficient in the Duty of Prayer,” and “The Most High: A prayer-hearing God.” Manton’s “Sermon’s on Hebrews 11” are chalk-full of clear definitions, and unbelievably helpful in showing how faith and hope work together in your Christian walk. When I have spent some time in these books, I am disappointed to close them and return to my day to day life, where the vast majority of people simply do not get it. The great thing is, those men listed above (And I didn’t even tap half the list of books I am in the middle of), have finished the race. They stayed strong until the end, and that is part of what makes their writing so good. They didn’t stop halfway through and give up. They didn’t take the last part of their life over to apostasy and heresy. I meet people all the time who have no idea what a pastor really does. I even know people who think that being a pastor means you relax all week, then jump up on Sunday and share some thoughts. Embarrassingly enough, in the evangelical world (and admittedly, saying “evangelical” can encompass a wide range of people), there is a small percentage who truly understand what kind of labour and work it is to stay faithful, day in and day out, spurning all distractions and shaking off discouragement, to do the preaching that God has called them to do.

And that is one of the reasons why going to the conference this weekend was so great. To be able to sit and listen to men who have given their lives to ministry encouraging Christians and pastors to stay faithful was wonderful. These men understand. They get it. They know the struggles of serving, of dealing with people, of working day in and day out, in season and out of season, to preach the undiluted truth. They are in the trenches of ministry, fighting constantly against the devil to lead the people in their church to a high call of Godliness and holiness.

The last month has been rough. I’ve been sick on and off, and that means that sleep has not been my friend. I’m just so tired. In my case, tired means I can get discouraged and cynical. (And when I say “can”, what I mean is “I have definitely been edging toward depressed, discouraged, cynical, and grumpy.”) Being in the sessions we sat through helped with some of that. It was a good reminder that the five or six churches I like are not the last churches on earth working for the truth. In addition to that, with a group that size, there is a high concentration of Christians in one place. Generally you end up chatting with random people at conferences, and it’s a great feeling when one of the people you talk to says something specific that you have thought a hundred times. That happened a couple times this weekend. A few different people I spoke to said things that just brought a smile to my face. It’s amazing that in one or two sentences, they can confirm that they are on the same track as you, fighting the same battles, and understand all the same struggles. When you meet someone you connect with at a fundamental level, it’s a rare joy. It is worth hanging on to people like that. It’s encouraging, and suddenly the dead people in the books I read aren’t the only ones who I connect with. Whoa, there are still people in the world who understand this Christian life! There are still people who are hungering after the truth and love to hear the doctrines of grace preached! And even better, they are right here in this room. It’s beautiful. Almost every song we sang, I stayed silent for one verse, just to listen. Hearing thousands of voices singing the words to Holy, Holy, Holy, is indescribable. For a few moments, there is a glorious unity, a joining of minds and hearts in worship that is very difficult to attain. Most of all, you know that in that room, God is being glorified, by thousands at once. We are singing to the same righteous One, the same King, the same Sovereign.

And that is reason 214 to go to conferences. You learn so much. The sessions are packed with good stuff, full of teaching and preaching that you could listen to for hours.

I came back with a million thoughts running through my head. More than a million, actually. I was disappointed that Phil Johnson couldn’t preach on Sunday, but my dad’s message was on the sovereignty of God, and it was precisely what I needed to hear. My God ordains all things, and He will ultimately be glorified. That is such an encouragement! Whatever is happening in our lives, whatever is going on in the world, in the end we are only here for a few years. “The years of our life are seventy, or by reason of strength eighty, yet their span is but toil and trouble; they are soon gone, and we fly away.” And when it’s over? “As for me, I shall behold your face in righteousness; when I awake, I shall be satisfied with your likeness.”

Priorities are straight. Lovely feeling, that.

Now, it’s time for me to get away from my poorly organized writing, and finish my hazelnut-englishtoffee-caramel latte. Hopefully this afternoon I’ll get to spend some time out back with the punching bag. Such a good workout. But first I’m leaving you with an excerpt I enjoyed, even thought it only goes with part of my post.

“Learn then this basic truth, that the Creator is absolute Sovereign, executing His own will, performing His own pleasure, and considering naught but His own glory. “The Lord hath made all things for Himself” (Prov. 16:4). And had He not a perfect right to? Since God is God, who dare challenge His prerogative? To murmur against Him is rank rebellion. To question His ways is to impugn His wisdom. To criticise Him is sin of the deepest dye. Have we forgotten who He is? behold, “All nations before Him are as nothing; and they are counted to Him less than nothing, and vanity. To whom then will ye liken God?” (Isa. 40:17, 18)… If the Lord Jesus possesses all power in Heaven and earth then none can successfully resist His will.” (The Sovereignty of God, by A.W. Pink)

Snapshot-Updates

Alrighty! My blog still exists! I think it was starting to feel grossly neglected. At the very least, I had begun to feel awfully negligent… Now that I am “back” (and yes, I highly enjoyed my week-away-from-the-internet), I am throwing out all the random updates.

Life: Good. Up and down.

Job: Great. Love it most days. There is an occasional moment when I nearly panic because some man wants two different flavored smoothies, three lattes (one nonfat, one with coconut milk, one regular milk. One decaf, two regular. One with one pump of vanilla, one with whip, straws, and double cupped.), and who knows what else-- then I spill one. The whole thing… ALL over me. Win. Did I mention that the lady at the other window wants four drinks as well? Just me here, folks. 

People who don’t have a bartender to tell their troubles to apparently count on their barista as a backup. No, sir, I don’t want to know, again, what your monthly income is, and that’s why you aren’t getting a frappuccino. No, ma’am, I didn’t need to know all that about your soon-to-be-ex-husband. (He seemed rather nice to me… ) Sir, why aren’t you wearing a shirt?

I have saved approximately a million dollars on Starbucks, though! 

California was a fun whirlwind. I used a terrible camera to take horrid pictures, then promptly put them all online afterward. I flew down, then met up with a friend to drive back up, bringing back all her college stuff. Someday, I will do that trip again… WITH the D7000. Oh, did I not mention that yet? I got it! A step up from the D90 I always wanted, so far I adore my new Nikon toy.

And that brings me to…

The Ligonier West Coast Conference, 2012!

I just got back from that. A plethora of excellent speakers, half of our church, 3,000 other people, couple new friends, and lots of trips for coffee made it an absolutely phenomenal weekend. And yup, I was the annoying girl with that big necklace who always had her camera. Thankfully I wasn’t the only one… So sorry for any of you that happened to be within range of my moderate zoom lens. Keep your eye out and I’m sure you’ll see a picture of you popping up somewhere. Possibly later on the blog.

Sincere apologies for the brevity and lack of substance of this post: I have some excellent excerpts and fun pictures for the next few. At the moment, my creativity is shot, and my brain is even worse, so I’ll stop before I do permanent damage…

From the lack of updated posts, you may infer one of two things: 1) My discipline is severely lacking. or, 2) My time has been filled with other things. I prefer to believe the latter, even if it’s only 75% true…

Life is in total limbo at the moment. I have been working in various capacities, and while I dislike having large eight hour chunks of my day just disappear, I also find that an increased income is a positive thing. Suddenly, a whole world opens up to me—Now I understand the silly grin people get on their faces as they giddily announce, “I have tomorrow off!” It’s so exciting…

I’ve been nannying. That is to say, watching two small children for several hours a week. 16, to be exact. But with everything else, I end up working about 28.5 hours per week. Anyway, spending that amount of time with people under the age of 4 can lead to various adventures. If you could call them that. Strange things happen… I learned the hard way that child number one can pick the lock to the bathroom door. Both kids disappear around the corner, and I say, “Where is Parker?” The response came back faintly, “I locked him in the bathroom!”

One day, I stepped into the other room for a second, and hear an anguished wail coming from the bathroom. Running in, I see the older brother throwing something into the toilet and flushing it, telling his brother, “You are a big boy now!”  I snatched it out, sternly admonishing, “You may absolutely NOT flush your brother’s pacifier down the toilet!” There’s a sentence I never thought I’d say.

Another thing I never thought I’d do? Be one of those people who held their hand out to a kid and said “Spit it out, now!” Yet I find it happening all the time. My principle has always been to tell the kid to go spit the toys, dirt, candy, car keys (yes, I found car keys in.his.mouth.), pacifiers, etc, somewhere else. Either the trash can, the sink, or anywhere BUT my hand. Yet, when a child who is allergic to dairy comes over and I discover that he has butter melting on his tongue, my immediate response is to stick out my hand and ask him to do just that. When he doesn’t, and instead swallows it back, I arm myself with the epi-pen and wait in panic for anaphylactic shock to set in…

The very first day, I discovered that my Kindle is resilient to the point of surviving having my caramel macchiato poured out on it. Last week I found that cupcakes still turn out okay, despite having a three year old dump half a jar of canola oil into them. Siphoning that off took some time…

The questions 8 year old kids ask still surprise me, too… “Emilie Edwards, are you married?” Of course, I said no, then asked why. “Oh. Well. I just thought you looked married.”  Then, upon hearing his mom congratulate me on “the new baby”, he looks over in shock and says “A baby!?! That was a really fast pregnancy. I didn’t even know!” Should I be flattered or offended? ;-)

Four year olds come up with stuff as well. “Why are you using a straw with your tea?” I respond, “Because I thought it looked fun,” and then she burst out laughing… “But you’re an ADULT! Adults don’t DO fun things!” Later, when we were eating chips, she looks at me and starts laughing again. I asked her what was so funny, and she says “YOU! YOU are so funny!” To which I say, “I was eating a chip, how is that funny?”  “But your FACE was so funny!” And here I thought my expression was just normal…

However, I am in the midst of a shift—I just got hired at a coffee shop, so I start training there on Friday. I’m quite excited…. considering the fact that I’ve wanted to do that FOREVER! And, although the realization that I can’t live the rest of my life on that kind of vocation does send me into a panic attack once in a while, I still am happy to try it for a couple years! :-) Hopefully I am good at it/enjoy it.

My parents went to the Shepherd’s conference this last week—without me. So much for enjoying Palm Springs… :-P Being without them was weird, but we managed. I am a little bit of a fatalist, though. As soon as they drive away to the airport, I begin to think things like “What if the plane crashes, and they both get hurt? how will we manage?” Or, as I’m driving and the van sounds suspicious, ‘What if it breaks down? Clark doesn’t answer his phone at work, and everybody is GONE! What will I do and who will I call? I can’t fix a VEHICLE!” However, none of those catastrophes occurred. The house didn’t burn down, we didn’t run out of food, no vehicles broke, nothing. They’ll be home in two hours and “all will be right with the world.” A lot happened in the week they were gone! I was offered two jobs, Clark got another job, I got half-laid off one of my current jobs, and we made plans for our family vacation. Men from our church filled the pulpit, and that’s a new thing—normally we bring someone else in. This morning was productively spent getting laundry run, doing dishes, sweeping and vaccuuming, cleaning out the fireplace, cleaning the bathroom, and doing all kinds of other things so mom doesn’t come home to a disaster! Now, I am quite ready to go sit and relax, and work on a book for a while. Next update will hopefully include pictures, and if I wait long enough to post, they’ll be pictures taken by a Nikon D90. Happy thought!