Happy New Year!

Yes....can you believe it?! I'm finally posting again. My mom says that I am a boring blogger because I never update. I am sorry. I am really bad at keeping up with these things, but I will try to do better. Most of the reason while I am at school is because I am so busy. But right now I have no excuse. I am home for Christmas break doing absolutely nothing most of the time. It's been very nice.

I can hardly believe this semester is over. It ended up being one of the toughest semesters I've had at ACU. I definitely do not want to repeat it and I am so glad it is over. I am sort of dreading going back for the spring semester, but I know the Lord will get me through as he did this previous semester. This Christmas break has been nice. We went to my Mom's parents house before Christmas and tomorrow we are going to my Dad's parents house. Fortunately, all of my family lives in the same state; however, unfortunately it means we have to attempt to see EVERYONE every holiday. It makes for a lot of traveling. This Christmas has been a less traveling Christmas than most. So that's good.

We did something a little different on Christmas day this than what we usually do. We went at 6:30 in the morning to a church downtown that serves the homeless and we helped pass out new clothes and Christmas gifts to homeless people. It really makes you open your eyes to how blessed you really are and it makes your appreciate Christmas a whole lot more.

Well I will write more later and I will try to be a little better at updating!

I am sorry that it has been such a long time since I last wrote a post. My life has gotten extremely busy these last few weeks. Trying to get everything done for my classes and wrap up the semester takes more time than the entire semester combined. A lot has happened in my life. I had thanksgiving break, which was absolutely amazing!! I love being able to spend time with my family. I am really looking forward to Christmas break. My Uncle Brian got married last weekend! I was soooo happy for him. His new wife, my new Aunt Amy :), is an amazing woman! I am so proud to call her family. She also has 2 sons that are such neat kids. So glad to have 2 more cousins. I got to be their photographer for their wedding, which was very special for me!

Well I have to tell you all about this great song I heard on a Kay Jewelers commercial. As you all know, all of the jewelry stores pull out their best commercials during the Christmas season and invade the TV with their commercials. Generally they are not the greatest commericals, but the Kay Jewelers one has the best song. I googled it and finally found it. It's called "Falling in Love at a Coffee Shop" by Landon Pigg. It's such a cute little song.

Anyways....I don't have much more to say. Hopefully I will be able to post more in the next few weeks since it will be Christmas break!

Orphans

I wanted to share something that I heard in a chapel forum here at ACU just the other day that I thought was sooo interesting. When I think of the story of Sodom and Gomorrah I always think that God brought down his wrath upon the city because of their drunkeness, idolatry, and adultry. They were a very sinful city and the only people that were still loyal to God was Lot and his family. But we had a speaker in chapel the other day that spoke about the homeless and taking care of them. He called to my attention a passage in Ezekiel 16:48 that says,

"Now this was the sin of you sister Sodom: She and her daughters were arrogant, overfed and unconcerned; they did not help the poor and needy. They were haughty and did detestable things before me. Therefore I did away with them as you have seen."

I want to call special attention to the part that says, "they did not help the poor and needy." This was impacting to me because I had never heard this part before and that this was one of the reasons that God brought down Sodom. I can't help but think about the poor and homeless that we daily brush aside as if we don't see them, and if we don't see them then we are not obligated to help them. Even more than the homeless are the numberless widows and orphans that we as a church do not aide. It scares me to see these reasons listed on why Sodom was destroyed.....they sound so much like our world today.

It is times like this that I realize we have a truly awesome God. He is willing to put aside his wrath and still love us unconditionally. We truly do not deserve it. I know that we are making a great impact by our adoption of Karleigh Mei, but I pray that we never become comfortable with that being enough. Because it is not. We search out aide to other countries, yet we look past the poor in our community around us. God grant me the grace to daily aide the poor and the needy.

A Sinful Heart

This isn't a post that has anything to do with the adoption, but something that burdened my heart during my quiet time yesterday evening. I was reading in Psalms 51, which is one of my favorite Psalms. I have read it many time and yet every time my eyes are opened to a knew truth. Last night as I came to verse 3 I was convicted. It says:

"For I know my transgressions, and my sin is always before me. Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight, so that you are proved right when you speak and justified when you judge." Psalms 51:3-4

This burdened me because so often I am so focused on the affect that my sin has on those around me. I am so caught up on not hurting those around me or attempting to remain good in the eyes of those I wish to gain favor, that I forget that what I am really doing is sinning before my God, THE God. At the beginning of the Psalm it says that it is written by David after Nathan has approached him about his sins with Bathsheba. David realized that it was not simply against his kingdom or Uriah, Bathsheba's husband, but against God Almighty! In the end his sends this plea to God, which is one of my favorite parts of the Bible:

"Create in my a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me. Do no cast me from your presense or take your Holy Spirit from me. Restore to me the joy of your salvation and grant me a willing spirit, to sustain me." Psalms 51:10-12

Oh that God would restore to me the joy of my salvation and make my spirit willing to serve him every moment.