Eric and Krystal

Last night I was reading before I went to bed.  I found a letter in my Bible that Jaclyn, a friend of ours, had written to me sometime during college.  There were two parts in the letter that were exactly what I needed.  There first part is a prayer and the second is an excerpt from a Brennan Manning book.

Abba, into your hands I entrust my body, mind, and spirit and this entire day – morning, afternoon, evening and night.  Whatever you want of me, I want of me, falling into you and trusting you in the midst of my life.  Into your heart I entrust my heart, feeble, distracted, insecure and uncertain.  Abba, unto I abandon myself in Jesus our Lord.  Amen  This is me!  Thank you,God, that you know my heart and still love me!

…In the arc of my unremarkable life…I have repeated endlessly the pattern of falling down and getting up, falling down and getting up.  Each time I fall, I am propelled to renew my efforts by a blind trust in the forgiveness of my sins from sheer grace, in the acquittal, vindication, and justification of my ragged journey based NOT on any good deeds I have done (the approach taken by the Pharisee in the temple) but on an unflagging trust in the LOVE of a GRACIOUS and merciful GOD.  -Brennan Manning.

I hope that this blesses you as well.  I hope you all have a great week! 

Why is it so hard sometimes to just be at peace with your current situations?  I can pray and pray and pray all day about certain things and still I hold on so tightly to thoughts or ideas that are clearly not what God has planned for me at this time.  I ask for direction and then I don’t wait or listen for an answer.  Is it just part of my sinful nature?  Is it that Satan has so much power?  I know I can answer yes to the first because we all fall short of the glory.  The second has to be no because he has no power over me other than what God allows, right?  I want so bad just to have peace and wait on God’s timing.  I also wouldn’t mind if He just changed my heart until it was the right time for that prayer to be answered.  I guess it is just going back to what I know…to pray without ceasing and taking every thought captive to Him.  Sorry if this seems like rambling, but I just felt like I needed to work through this…outside my own head! 

Eric and I are going to Colorado Springs, CO for a vaction this year.  We won a trip at the SLOCA silent auction.  It includes a 2 night stay at the Broadmoor Hotel and a one hour massage for two.  We ended up paying less than half of the actual cost for the Hotel stay!!!  We are driving out there which will take about 12-13 hours.  I have never been to Colorado so I am very very excited!!!  We decided since it is only a 2 night stay that were are going to camp 2-4 nights and then stay at the Hotel.   That way we can get our massages after we sleep on the ground!!  We are going June 2-9, our anniversary just happens to be that week also! 

Let’s Dish is a store that has all the ingredients prepared for a meal and you just have to go and put it together.  You package the meals in ziploc bags or their containers and then freeze until you are ready to cook the meal.  SLOCA(St. Louis Ovarian Cancer Awareness) paid for the board members to try out the store.  It was soo much fun!  Eric made a Roasted Pork Tenderloin with BBQ sauce and I make Pesto Chicken Pasta.  I cooked both meals this week and they were really good!  Let’s Dish is a great place for people like us that don’t have a lot of time to put together elaborate meals.  Other meal choices were Mozarella stuffed Italian meatloves, Brushcetta with Chicken and tomatos, Manicotto with homemade tomato sauce.  We are trying to look at our current amount of money we spend on food a month and comparing to to what it would cost for us to do Let’s Dish.  You can pick 4, 8, or 12 meals and then you can split the meals in half for smaller families.  You can also have Let’s Dish parties and invite your friends so it can be fun and productive a the same time!!  There are 2-3 other stores like this one is St. Louis, but during April and May Let’s Dish will donate 10% of every sale to SLOCA.