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Pre-Lenten Reflections

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I was using The Little Black Book today, thinking about Lent.  When Father gave a Lenten talk this last Tuesday evening, one thing that he just swiftly passed over, but really struck me, was that our Lenten sacrifice should be something we do or don’t do that keeps us from developing a relationship with God.  I was trying to think of my time suckers... things that keep me from reading the Bible, or praying... the Little Black Book says don’t just pull from the file of resolutions we keep in the back of our mind...  my files always include fasting, or “no tv” or “no social media” - but I realized my main hindrance to a relationship with Christ is my lack of self-discipline to just make time to be with Him. As I jotted down ideas in the book, I noticed that instead of discipline, I accidentally wrote disciple.  A-ha!    It takes discipline to be a disciple! Discipline - Latin  disciplina  "instruction given, teaching, learning, knowledge," also "object of instru

Chore Time

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In the morning I put up all the chores on the dry erase board that need doing that day, minus the ones I plan to do myself.   One by one the Middles pick one (put their initial by it) go do it, then come back and erase it.  The Littles get to pick whose helper they are going to be.  Twenty-one chores divided by three Middles is seven chores each (the pets have already been done and erased). So the theory is that after one has claimed, done, and erased seven chores, they can quit.  This is meant to inspire speed... faster workers get first pick... slower workers get stuck with the less desirable chores.  However, there are usually one or two kids who just keep going until everything is done and erased, and one slower child who only has to do a couple of items.  :)

Feast of Dedication - Day Four
We turn from darkness to light

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Your eye is the lamp of your body.  When your eye is healthy, your whole body is full of light, but when it is bad, your body is full of darkness.  Luke 11:34 "...open their eyes, so that they may turn from darkness to light and from the power of Satan to God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins and a place among those who are sanctified by faith in me.’ " Acts 26:18

Feast of Dedication - Day Three
We are lights

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“No one after lighting a lamp puts it in a cellar or under a basket, but on a stand, so that those who enter may see the light.  Your eye is the lamp of your body. When your eye is healthy, your whole body is full of light, but when it is bad, your body is full of darkness. Therefore be careful lest the light in you be darkness.  If then your whole body is full of light, having no part dark, it will be wholly bright, as when a lamp with its rays gives you light.” Luke 11:33-36

Feast of Dedication - Day Two
God's Word is our Light

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Your word is a lamp to my feet  and a light to my path. Psalm 119:105 For the commandment is a lamp and the teaching a light, and the reproofs of discipline are the way of life... Proverbs 6:23

Feast of Dedication - Day One
The Lord is our Light

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The sun shall be no more your light by day, nor for brightness shall the moon give you light; but the LORD will be your everlasting light, and your God will be your glory. Isaiah 60:19 The LORD is my light and my salvation;  whom shall I fear? The LORD is the stronghold of my life; of whom shall I be afraid? Psalm 27:1 John 10:  "At that time the Feast of Dedication took place at Jerusalem. It was winter, and Jesus was walking in the temple, in the colonnade of Solomon. So the Jews gathered around him and said to him, "How long will you keep us in suspense? If you are the Christ, tell us plainly." Jesus answered them, "I told you, and you do not believe.    The works that I do   in my Father’s name bear witness about me, but you do not believe because you are not part of my flock.  My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me.  I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out

Winter Divertissements

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Love this yunomi cup by a talented young potter named  Marshall Sykes The green wool is a mitten I'm knitting for Lydia. The Rowan Colourscape yarn doesn't know what it wants to be yet... For now just "granny circles".