Wednesday, July 30, 2014

Captioning for the deaf, because not all deaf are Deaf.

Blog post by Joyce "Xpressive Hands" Edmiston on the need for captions in worship in addition to ASL interpreters. 

"...The largest growing group of Disabled Americans [are] people with hearing loss. Many don't know Sign Language because their culture is the hearing culture. Their friends, family, social groups and communities do not use ASL. BUT Deaf and hard of hearing and people with hearing loss, as well as people learning English as a second language ALL benefit from having captions."

Happy reading!

Ayalas by Beth Moore

Control freak much?

Try a brain reset.

Repeat after Beth Moore.  (I encourage you to read aloud):


I am not in control.

I cannot control my people.
I cannot control our situation.
Even when I want what is best, I cannot control the outcome.

I cannot make people behave.
I cannot make people believe.
I cannot make people be strong.

Because I am not God.
God alone knows the end from the beginning.
God alone knows how this will turn out.

I hereby fire myself from God's job
And I agree to see my fight for control as what it is:
A screaming testament to my distrust.


For this we have Jesus, and for this we need grace.
Thanks be to God; God gives us the victory!


"A time is coming and in fact has come when you will be scattered, each to your own home. You will leave me all alone. Yet I am not alone, for my Father is with me.  I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.”    (John 16:32-33)

Life Abundant!

photo source: Water the Bamboo Center for Leadership





THE STORY OF BAMBOO

Once upon a time in the heart of the Western Kingdom lay a beautiful garden. And there in the cool of the day the Master of the garden liked to walk. Of all the creatures of the garden, the most beautiful and most beloved was a gracious and noble bamboo tree. Year after year Bamboo grew yet more noble and beautiful, conscious of her Master’s love and watchful delight, but always modest and gentle.

And often, when the wind came to revel in the garden, Bamboo would cast aside her grave stateliness to dance and play merrily, tossing and swaying and leaping and bowing in joyous abandon, leading the Great Dance  of the Garden,  which delighted the Master’s heart.

Now one day the Master sat down to contemplate his Bamboo with eyes of curious expectancy, Bamboo, in a passion of adoration,  bowed her great head to the ground in loving greeting.
The Master spoke: “Bamboo,  I would use you.”

Bamboo flung her head to the sky in utter delight. The day of days had come, the day for which she had been made, the day to which she had been growing, hour by hour, the day in which she would find her completion and her destiny. Her voice came softly:  “Master, I am ready. Use me as you will!”

“Bamboo,”  – the Master’s voice was grave, “I would like take you and cut you down.”

“Cut … me … down! Me, whom you, Master, have made the most beautiful in all your garden … cut me down! Not that, not that. Use me for your joy, O Master, but cut me not down!”

“Beloved Bamboo,” – the Master’s voice grew graver still –  “if I do not cut you down, I cannot use you. 

The garden grew still … Wind held his breath. Bamboo slowly bent her proud and glorious head. There came a whisper: “Master, if you cannot use me unless you cut me down … then … do your will and cut!”

“Bamboo, beloved Bamboo, I need to cut your leaves and your branches from you also.”

“Master, Master, please spare me. Cut me down and lay my beauty in the dust, but would you  also take from me my leaves and branches?”

“Bamboo, if I do not cut them away, I cannot use you.”

The Sun hid his face. A listening butterfly glided fearfully away. And Bamboo shivered in terrible expectancy, whispering low, “Master, cut away.”

“Bamboo, Bamboo, I would also split you in two and cut out your heart, for if I don’t  I cannot use you.”

Then was Bamboo bowed to the ground: “Master, Master … then cut me and split me.”

So did the Master of the garden took Bamboo and cut her down and hacked off her branches and stripped off her leaves and cleaved her in two and cut out her heart.

And lifting her gently, he carried her to where there was a spring of fresh, sparkling water in the midst of his dry fields. Then putting one end of broken Bamboo into the spring and the other end into the water channel in his field, the Master laid down gently his beloved Bamboo. The clear sparkling water raced joyously down the channel of Bamboo’s torn body into the waiting fields. Then the rice was planted and the days went by, and the shoots grew, and the harvest came.
 

photo source: (left) Renato Amato; (right) Wikipedia: Rice production in Thailand

In that day was Bamboo, once so glorious in her stately beauty, yet more glorious in her brokenness and humility. For in her beauty she was life abundant, but in her brokenness she became a channel of abundant life to her Master’s world!


Source | Daniel O’Leary, Year of the Heart: A Spirituality for Lovers, (Paulist Press 1989), pages 85-87

Louise Hay healing affirmations

Specific affirmations for issues in different parts of your body.

Empreintes

Les empreintes dans le sable

Une nuit un homme fit un rêve,
Il rêva qu’il marchait sur le sable en compagnie de Dieu.
Les images de sa vie défilaient dans le ciel.
A chaque image, il y a avait des empreintes de pas dans le sable.
Deux lui appartenaient, et deux appartenaient au Seigneur.

Quand les dernières images se sont déroulées devant lui, l’homme s’est retourné
et regarda les empreintes laissées derrières eux.
Il remarqua alors que de nombreuses fois au cours du chemin de sa vie,
il n’y avait qu’une seule paire d’empreintes sur le sable
et que s’était précisément aux moments
les plus tristes et les plus pénibles de sa vie.

Il en fut profondément troublé et demanda au Seigneur :

« Seigneur, tu m’avais dit que si nous marchions sur le même chemin, tu resterais toujours à mes côtés, 
mais je constate que pendant les moments les plus pénible et les plus difficile de ma vie, 
je marchais seul car il n’y a qu’une seule paire d’empreinte sur le sable.
Je ne comprends pas pourquoi tu n’étais pas là quand j’en avais le plus besoin ? »

Le Seigneur lui répondit :
 
« Mon très cher enfant, je t’aime et je ne t’ai jamais laissé seul quand tu as eu le plus besoin de moi.
Lorsque tu ne vois qu’une seule paire d’empreintes sur le sable c’est parce que je te porte dans mes bras ».

source: La Preuve d'Amour


You may be more familiar with it in English as "Footprints" -- One night a man had a dream/He dreamed he walked on the beach alongside the LORD...

Sunday, July 20, 2014

Red paper envelopes

You throw money at us... we throw money at you... no you can't buy lunch, I'm paying!

OK, fine.  I'll just buy gifts for your kids.

Wednesday, July 16, 2014

#MightyKacy

I spent my entire watch of the video screeching WHAT?!?! at Kacy.
W.O.W.
She totally takes your excuses away. And she's my height. (OK, she has two inches on me. And she is ALL muscle.)
Way to represent MD!

Esquire article with .gifs
Baltimore Sun article, which describes Kacy as "Catanzaro, who is apparently 95 percent muscle and 5 percent beaming smile" Read more: http://www.baltimoresun.com/features/baltimore-insider-blog/bal-towson-grad-kacy-catanzaro-shatters-record-on-american-ninja-warrior-20140715,0,7898742.story#ixzz37ge6C0OD

Tuesday, July 15, 2014

I CAN!

Check out these Disney affirmations!

M&D & I use Philippians 4:13 to reset our head when someone says "can't", & we show our muscles off.  Hooh!

Found this reminder parked next to us the other day!  Ain't God good?

Friday, July 11, 2014

Quandry

It's Star Wars night for the Harrisburg Senators, so I'm sporting Princess Leia hair.
Except it looks like Mrs Lovett hair.
Except that I asked Earl, and his concept of Mrs Lovett is Bellatrix rather than Murder She Wrote.
I would never get mistaken for Helena Bonham Carter.
Actually, I'd never get mistaken for Angela Lansbury either.
Or Carrie Fisher.
But I'm sporting Princess Leia hair.  And I'm going to the game.

(The more I type, the more I'm reminded of Shel Silverstein -- "This started out as a jumping rope..."  Wouldn't get mistaken for him, either.)

Thursday, July 10, 2014

Theodidaktoi

theodidaktoi: taught by God
"May God do a spiritual work in us that we could not possibly have known to ask for!"

source: Beth Moore, Children of the Day (1&2 Thessalonians), group session 1

SAVE THE DATE: Beth Moore is planning to be in Atlantic City NJ on March 13-14, 2015.

Saturday, July 5, 2014

Wait & hope

Waiting Expectantly

Have you been praying about a situation in your life and found yourself waiting for a breakthrough? Are you wondering why the answer hasn't come yet? Do you feel as though victory is passing you by?

Sometimes when we pray long and hard about a situation in our life without receiving any answers, we just learn to live with it. We go on about our business, wondering if or when God will send the answer. But God does hear those prayers, and He's working out the answers even though we may not know all the details. Our situation can change suddenly, quickly, without warning!

Until then we can either wait passively or expectantly. A passive person gives up, but the expectant person, on the other hand, is hopeful, believing the answer is just around the corner, due to arrive any minute. His belief is not a passive thing. His heart is full of hope, expecting his problem to be solved at any moment. He wakes up every morning expecting to find his answer. He may wait and wait, but he'll keep asking until suddenly, God turns everything around.

Prayer Starter: God, I want to wait expectantly, not passively. I'll keep asking You for my breakthrough, knowing full well that You'll bring it at the right time.

source: day 287 of Joyce Meyer: Promises for Your Everyday Life - a Daily Devotional

Wednesday, July 2, 2014

Dry bones

Prophet of God, will these bones live?

O Lord, you know.

Speak to these bones.

There's a difference between praying for these bones & speaking to them.

Ancestry

When you become a believer, your ancestors become Abraham,  Isaac, & Jacob.

Ahh, Yiddish

Greetings from the Cultural Center... where [the vendors] have been schelepping & schviting to bring these things to you.

Cracked Pots

God Can Use Cracked Pots

God doesn't require us to be perfect, He made us, and He knows we're human and will make mistakes. Our job is to get up every day and do our best to use the keys He has provided for us. And when we fail, we must get right with God, receive His forgiveness and go on.

Many people feel that God can't use them because they're not perfect, but this is a lie. God (the Potter) uses cracked pots (that's us) to do His work. As Christians, we are containers that God wants to fill with His goodness and light. Then we're to carry that goodness and light to a dark world, sharing it with people everywhere we go.

Don't be afraid of your flaws; acknowledge them and allow God to use you anyway. Quit worrying about what you're not and give God what you are.

As a cracked pot, you can accomplish wonderful things. You can make somebody happy. You can encourage, edify and exhort those around you. You can use your gifts and talents to serve God.

Prayer Starter: God, I may be a 'cracked pot,' but You are the Potter and You can use me for Your purposes despite my flaws. Fill me with Your goodness and light so that I can carry it into the world around me.

Source: day 280 of Joyce Meyer: Promises for Your Everyday Life - a Daily Devotional

Tuesday, July 1, 2014

Dayenu

Worship is meant to be Aggressive Celebration!  Pour yourself into it!  Dance and shout and jump for joy!

God does exceedingly, abundantly beyond all we ask or imagine... would you be content with an outpouring like in Acts?  Dayenu -- it would have been enough -- and God will absolutely outdo Godself! 

Kids at play

I love these international pictures of happy children playing.  My personal favorite is Myanmar's -- yours?

Thanks to author Patricia Polacco for the find!