NIPTO, Day 129

Hey all!

How are you doing?
I'm doing quite well. Somewhat tired. I woke up much earlier than anticipated this morning... so I went for a walk. It was misting. It was nice. It wasn't enough rain to get you wet, but it was enough that it cooled you down!

Okay. So it rained a little bit while I was walking. Then it was all bright and sunshiney, then it got all dark and cloudy like it was going to rain. Now it's all sunshiney again! [And lately the weather has been so bipolar and consequently so have I!]-Relient K High of 75

I'm listening to Oliver the Penguin right now. It's a band. They sound kind of like The Postal Service. I'm liking The Drop! Good music... Thanks ReleventMagazine!

You can read about VBS last night here. :) It was fun! There was fire involved. There's a video, And pictures too! Does that make it a multi-media post? (I think so =P)

(I feel like that was a very linky section. My apologies if you have been overwhelmed with links.)

Well. I guess I'll do NIPTO since I've kind of run out of things to talk about already since I posted about VBS last night... Well. If you want to see the pictures I've put up on facebook, you can go here!

I just read a somewhat shocking statistic: 600k iPhone 4g orders = 2.5 million Africans with clean water for life.
WOW. That puts things in perspective. This was posted on Twitter by Anne Jackson who is currently biking accross America for the Blood:Water Mission. You can go to that website to find out more about what they're doing. It's cool.

Alright! NIPTO:
Ephesians 3:14-21
14For this reason I kneel before the Father, 15from whom his whole family in heaven and on earth derives its name.

His suffering/the church's glory is the reason he kneels before the Father. God... His whole family's name is derived from Him.


16I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, 17so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, 18may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, 19and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.

This is a fantastic 4 verses. It's a prayer for the Ephesians. A prayer for strength. A prayer for faith. A prayer for power. A prayer for knowledged. A prayer for fulfilled-ness... if that's even a word.
I love in verse 17 the part that says "being rooted and established in love." It's so fantastic. And it gives a mental image. A tree/plant that his its roots deep in the ground. In the same way that an old tree has its roots planted (no pun intended) in the ground, we should be firmly established in love.
I'm reading the Irresistible Revolution by Shane Claiborne. There is so much about LOVE in that book. It's fantastic. You should read it. No, I'm not being paid to promote this book. I just like it. :)


20Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, 21to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.

God is able to do so much more than all that we ask or can even imagine. And he can accomplish these things through us through his power that "is at work within us."
But we can't take any credit. To him be the glory in the church, through all generations, forever. And ever. A-MEN.


MY BIBLE JUST CAME!!!!!!!  SWEEEET. I'm excited to use it. It's an NASB/NIV parallel. I'll probably take pictures of it sometime. But I have to go! VBS pictures will be up on facebook tonight after VBS :)
Adios!

NIPTO, Day 127

Hey all!
Today seems like it's been mostly productive!
I went for a walk this morning. Prayed for a couple people... listened to music. It was good.
Came home and ate&showered and got ready for the day and stuff... finished my driving post... then read more of The Irresistible Revolution (Still fantastic!). And I read some blogs. And now I'm going to blog some more! (LATER) Or I'm going to eat lunch and read? I don't even remember what I did this afternoon. HORRIBLE. I did this post about Saturday night, I guess.

And I went to VBS. SOOOO much fun! I'm helping with the K-1 group. There are 3 girls and 3 boys. There are twins. A boy and a girl. Lets see if I can really remember everyone's names. Lilly, Bella, Audrey, Alex P, Alex B, Daniel. There. The only one I'm not completely sure about is Audrey. They're sweet. Adorable. So smart and funny. We had our opening "ceremony" annd then we went to our game station and played a "planet" game where the kids had to throw balls of different sizes into a big bucket. The girls won ;)
Then we had music (HURRAH for learning new mostly corny songs!). And then snack (crackers and cheese with grape kool-aid). And then craft (beaded cross necklaces). And then DISCOVERY (BUBBLES! They put water and dish soap together in a bucket and put helium air into the bucket. When you scooped them up and blew them, they FLOATED! It was so cool.

Now: Pictures! =)

The spaceships

Alex B with suds in his hair!

Singing at the end. With motions. (Notice the silver space-suit with helmet in the background!)

Captain K (not to be confused with Kirk) sans helmet

 There'll be more about VBS tomorrow night, I'm sure!

And just as a side note, I love my Owl City Pandora station. (And my Beauty and the Beast station!)

Ephesians 3:1-6

1For this reason I, Paul, the prisoner of Christ Jesus for the sake of you Gentiles—

That reason is that we're a part of God's holy temple.
Paul points out that he is a prisoner. He is BOUND to Christ. He's not free. He is not his own. And it's not for himself. It's for the sake of others. Paul was kinda crazy ;)

2Surely you have heard about the administration of God's grace that was given to me for you, 3that is, the mystery made known to me by revelation, as I have already written briefly.

God gave Paul grace to pass on to the Ephesians. It's a mystery. About which he has already written briefly =P
More on that... now.


4In reading this, then, you will be able to understand my insight into the mystery of Christ, 5which was not made known to men in other generations as it has now been revealed by the Spirit to God's holy apostles and prophets.

By reading this, these people were able to have insight and to understand the mystery of Christ. Other people didn't know about this. God didn't tell them about it. But God revealed it to Paul to reveal to these people. Facinating. What exactly is this mystery? Read on...


6This mystery is that through the gospel the Gentiles are heirs together with Israel, members together of one body, and sharers together in the promise in Christ Jesus.

This mystery is that through the gosple, people who were not God's "chosen" people (the Jews) were heirs together with God's chosen people. They were all together. Members of one body. Sharing the promise in Christ Jesus.



Well. I'm going to go to bed. We have to get up early tomorrow morning for Urban Vision. It starts at 9. Or something like that ;) All I know is what time we have to leave!
Soooo. Good____ (insert your time of day!)

NIPTO, Day 117

Hello my minions readers!
Today has been a fabulously lazy day. So far. Maybe I'll clean my room. We'll see.

I went on a walk this morning. It was kind of muggy. But still nice.
Today is the lassst day of school for the school district here. So people are excited about that. As in a school bus just drove by and there was excessive yelling and honking =P

Caleb's graduation party is tonight... should be fun! Maybe I'll get to drive a little bit tonight too. Not to the party though. That would involve highways. I'm not fond of regular streets yet, let alone highways.

I went to Panera to check in about my application. The manager that I wanted to talk to had already left. Booooo. I'll check back on Sunday when he's working again. Yippe. I applied at Target sometime last week. I got an e-mail saying that there weren't any openings. I might just apply again. Just to be sure.

WE JUST GOT A POSTCARD FROM KATIE! Awesome. All the way from Germany. =D

I guess I'm going to do NIPTO now. And then I think I'll start cleaning my room. EEK.

Romans 16:1-16
 ¹I commend to you our sister Phoebe, a servant of the church in Cenchrea. ²I ask you to receive her in the Lord in a way worthy of the saints and to give her any help she may need from you, for she has been a great help to many people, including me.

Basically: This girl is AWESOME. So help her if she needs it. Because she totally deserves it. She helped me out a lot.


³Greet Priscilla and Aquila, my fellow workers in Christ Jesus. ⁴They risked their lives for me. Not only I but all the churches of the Gentiles are grateful to them. ⁵Greet also the church that meets at their house. Greet my dear friend Epenetus, who was the first convert to Christ in the province of Asia.

Priscilla and Aquila apparently risked their lives for Paul. Paul and all of the Gentile churches were extremely grateful to them. Apparently these two people also had a church that met at their house. 
I think it's cool that Paul took the time to greet so many people by name. Not just in a generalized group. Some of them were in generalized groups, but they weren't big groups. I'm guessing. 


⁶Greet Mary, who worked very hard for you. ⁷Greet Andronicus and Junias, my relatives who have been in prison with me. They are outstanding among the apostles, and they were in Christ before I was.

He greets people who have worked hard for the church. He greets people who have been in prison with him. People who were Christians before he was!


⁸Greet Ampliatus, whom I love in the Lord. ⁹Greet Urbanus, our fellow worker in Christ, and my dear friend Stachys.

People he loves. People who are fellow workers. Friends. All by name. It's so cool!


¹⁰Greet Apelles, tested and approved in Christ. Greet those who belong to the household of Aristobulus. ¹¹Greet Herodion, my relative. Greet those in the household of Narcissus who are in the Lord. ¹²Greet Tryphena and Tryphosa, those women who work hard in the Lord. Greet my dear friend Persis, another woman who has worked very hard in the Lord.

Apelles was a person who was tested. Which generally means hard times. But he was approved in Christ. Which is sweet. 
Relatives, households, hard working women, another hard working woman. You don't really hear much about Christian women in the New Testament. They're there, but they don't get talked about much. I just wonder who these women were and what they did and how they acted. They had to be amazing people.  


¹³Greet Rufus, chosen in the Lord, and his mother, who has been a mother to me, too. ¹⁴Greet Asyncritus, Phlegon, Hermes, Patrobas, Hermas and the brothers with them. ¹⁵Greet Philologus, Julia, Nereus and his sister, and Olympas and all the saints with them.

Rufus and his mom must be pretty amazing people. His mother was a motherly figure to Paul which is sweet. 
Again, more people by name! These people don't really have anything associated with them besides "the brothers with them" which would just be another church maybe? 
And then more people.  


¹⁶Greet one another with a holy kiss. All the churches of Christ send greetings. 

Or, ya know, a bro hug is fine too. ;)


Our Secret Screen came yesterday. I don't remember if I talked about this at all. So I'll take a picture and let you see how it works :)

This is what it looks likes from the garage

There's this bar at the bottom that you lift up...

you lift it down&out

And it rolls up into...

its secret place at the top of the door frame

Then you just pull it back down and make sure it latches!

Voila! We have a screen for our garage door!!

I promised Katie that I would upload some pictures of our ROSES that actually BLOOMED this year. They didn't bloom at alllll last year! So there are a TON this year.

There are lots of them! (These were taken a couple weeks ago)

And they're pretty!

I like these ones :)

It seems like there are more of them! (These were taken this morning after my walk :)

SPIDER. Had to post. It was cool!

Aren't there about 50 bajillion of them?!? (see that circle thing in the upper right hand corner? There are birds living in that!)

I had this song stuck in my head after listening to it ONCE. So listen at your own risk. It's like the theme song for the World Cup. Which starts in 6 days.



Alrighty! I've gotta go. Caleb's graduation party, you know :) Hope you enjoyed the pictures and video!
Adios!

NIPTO, Day 107

Good morning lovely blog-readers!

It's been a good, productive morning for me! I got up and went for a walk around the neighborhood with worship music in hand/ear. Grad party pictures are uploading to facebook as I type...(or not... I'll try to get them up later today! I just need to steal Hannah's laptop for about 15 minutes at some point today!) And I'm eating breakfast! So it's been a good morning for me :)

The Chuck Season 3 finale was last night. It was faaaantabulous. Dad walked in from golfing to many squeals. "Every Monday night..." That's what Chuck does to a person. (Katie, if you have any spare time, you should really watch those last few episodes!) They wrapped a lot of stuff up, but opened a whole new can of worms that will probably blow my socks off! haha

This morning while I was walking, I kind of set a goal for myself. I'm pretty sure that it's plausible. I want to run a 5K this fall. I think. I would have all summer to "train." And it would be a good motivation to get up in the morning and exercise!
I think if I walked every morning, and eventually started jogging, then actually running, I could work up the stamina/speed. I think my goal would be a race in the fall.
Okay. Now I've looked, and the only "good" race (really close to home/5k) I can find is in a month. I'm not sure if I can get up to running 3 miles in a month... Hm.
There is another one that could be promising... it's pretty close by and it's in the beginning of October. I could do it by October.

Now I'm excited. I want to do this. Running (jogging is probably more appropriate) was something I did a lot of a couple years ago, but I kind of fell out of the habit of doing it. I want to get back into it this summer. I think getting up earlier and getting my day started this school year will make it a lot easier to get up and go for a jog this summer. Not to mention the sun rises at like, 6... so it's not even dark outside! :)

Day 23 of 100 Days of Holiness.  I think it's telling me that deciding to run isn't a bad idea. The verse at the end? Isaiah 40:31 "...those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint."

Either that or I'm just looking for affirmation that running isn't a bad idea! hah.

N'O time!

Romans 13:8-10 (3 verses. Ambitious, I know.)
⁸Let no debt remain outstanding, except the continuing debt to love one another, for he who loves his fellowman has fulfilled the law.

This is so interesting. He's basically saying: Don't have debt. Except when you love one another. Because when you love other people, it fulfills the law.

  
⁹The commandments, "Do not commit adultery," "Do not murder," "Do not steal," "Do not covet," and whatever other commandment there may be, are summed up in this one rule: "Love your neighbor as yourself."

There's not much to say about this verse. All of the commandments are summed up in the last one: Love your neighbor as yourself. Simple.

¹⁰Love does no harm to its neighbor. Therefore love is the fulfillment of the law.

Love does not harm. It fulfills the law. Love is healing. 


It's a good song. I like it :)

Well. I'm going to start an application for Target... maybe they'll hire me...

Have a good day!