What do you think the repercussions would be if Israel attached Iran’s nuclear missile program?

I’ve been seeing some great pictures of people attending the “Tea Party” yesterday.  Wow – what a message to Washington.  My favorite sign I saw was:  “Read my Lipstick, No new taxes”. 

Did you attend a Tea Party yesterday? 

Cody is still in the hospital.  He managed to keep his formula down yesterday. So that is good news. 

We have a lot of sounds/noises in our lives today.  A beep to tell us the microwave is finished. A beep to tell us our smoke detecter is low on batteries.  A beep to tell us the dishwasher is finished. A beep to tell us a text message has come in.  A beep to tell us the  the washer is finished.  What’s driving me crazy is I can’t figure out where THE BEEP is coming from.   Something has to .  What do you think the chinese word is?

Cody (Grandson) is still in the hospital.  He has to be tube fed.  Please pray that he’s healed.   

I want to be affected so I can be effective.  God affects me by His Holy Spirit.  I desire to produce lots of fruit for His glory.

Today’s agenda:
We’re getting our rental ready for renters.  We have to do some landscaping this morning.
We’re happy to have a few extra foster kids with us this weekend.  They are the brothers to our 10 month old foster child.  -really good kids. 

I woke up with a thought this morning – “Where you’re going will determine Who you are.”    Thoughts?

Noah recieved an award from his school.

Struggling to Believe

“Demas has forsaken me, having loved this present world.”¹

“Robert Robinson came from a poor family; his father died when Robert was a child and his mother sent him to London to learn barbering when he was a teenager. Instead he fell in with a gang and was involved in vandalism, looting and petty theft. They went to heckle a traveling evangelist, George Whitefield, who was preaching in the town square but Robert encountered the Lord Jesus and eventually accepted him as his Savior. He went on to become a renowned preacher and pastor, as well as a writer of extraordinary hymns and was well known throughout Europe. But late in his life he left the faith. We don’t know the reason why, we don’t know the circumstances, but the story is told that there came a day late in his life when he was traveling by stage coach, seated next to a woman who was humming the hymn, ‘Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing.’

“If nothing else, maybe simply to make conversation, she asked him, ‘Sir, do you know this song?’

“Robinson replied, ‘Know it? Madam, I am the miserable man who wrote it and I would give a thousand lives to know the joy and peace that I knew then but I’ve lost it.’

Robert Robinson died shortly thereafter.

The words of the last stanza say: “O to grace how great a debtor / Daily I’m constrained to be / Let that grace, Lord, like a fetter / Bind my wand’ring heart to Thee / Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it / Prone to leave the God I love / Take my heart, O take and seal It / Seal it from Thy courts above.”

Mike Fincke, Yury Lonchakov & Michael López-Alegría  left the ISS this morning & returned to earth aboard Soyuz. They landed in Kazakhstan.

I have to applaud the astronauts.  I can’t imagine coming back to earth in such a small craft.

Parenting Insight You Can Use Now
Many parents use a simple behavior modification approach to raise their children. If you get your homework done, then you can go out and play. If you clean your room, then you can watch a video.

Unfortunately children trained this way often develop a What’s in it for me? mentality. If I don’t get something out of it, why should I obey?

God is concerned with more than behavior. He’s interested in the heart. The heart contains motivations, emotions, convictions, and values. A heart-based approach to parenting looks deeper. Parents still require children to finish their homework and clean up their rooms but it’s the inner motivation and character that they’re addressing.

A heart-based approach shares values and reasons behind rules. It requires more dialogue, helping children understand how their hearts are resistant and need to develop cooperation. A heart-based approach is firm but also relational. It’s a mindset on the part of parents that looks for heart moments that then bring about significant change.

As you consider your children, remember the words that God said to Samuel, Man looks at the outward appearance but the Lord looks on the heart.