More about plaid...

Do you have a favorite style? If you had the choice to start your home decor all over again today, would you choose what you did in the beginning?

Remember that my color for this year is plaid, which will help you understand my style explanation.

I love to watch HGTV and see the remodeling they do so beautifully. I would love to have the 2 brothers or Candace come and spend a month in our house!

I would need 2 different homes to cover my styles, maybe even 3. I would need a contemporary home (like Restoration Hardware), a Ralph Lauren style home, and a log cabin, with some traditional thrown in! Instead, I try to do what I like the best in each of those styles.

I have already begun to change things in this house. We have lived here for more than 20 years, and it's all beginning to look different than it did when we bought it.

We began with a southwest theme in the downstairs den and kitchen. We had a border of wallpaper at the top, and area rug and pillows with definite southwest twist.

I am OVER southwest...

We had a new roof put on last year, and painting inside and out, so I took advantage of the good help and added stripping the border off and painting the whole downstairs. Everything is neutral. I have added touches of color in pillows, but the area rug is a fuzzy and cozy cream color, and the walls are shades of cream and darker. All the kitchen appliances have been changed from white to stainless, except the refrig. It stays white until it dies, then it will be stainless too.

I think plaid was a good choice for my color this year. It extends to music... I love everything from the old sacred hymns to some of my favorite worship songs.

Even clothes... although I am mostly a denim girl, I do love a twist of something extra to make the denim special, fitted shirts or short denim jackets, always a tank or 2, and lots of color... all colors, except ox-blood and rose... they don't work for me. Peach and apricot fit my skin & hair better.

Plaid has lots of room for all of it. I like that.

Plaid also extends to friends. There are so many different kinds of friends, as many varieties as what God has created. I have friends who are completely different than I am, and some who are a lot like me. I am thankful for each one.

I think God understands plaid... it's the way he made his children. When he created us, he included such a variety... personality, color, size, a big mix of everything... plaid.

You might read this blog today and think it is full of lots of random thoughts... plaid.

See... it's a good word, and I think I'll stick with it.

A soapbox moment...

Please be sure to read the update at the end...

I don't usually voice an opinion here about issues, however...

I have to say I was shocked today when I read that World Vision is now changing their policies and hiring gay married couples.

"World Vision Announces Gay Christians In Same-Sex Marriages Are Eligible To Work At Christian Charity".

The article goes on to say:

"Stearns (president) hopes to inspire Christian unity by changing the employment policy to be more inclusive of gay Christians. He told Christianity Today that the decision was "symbolic not of compromise but of [Christian] unity."

When I was growing up in Pasadena, California, one of our dear friends was Bob Pierce, the founder of World Vision. Our familes were friends. My sister and I worked in their headquarters building downtown when we were teenagers.

World Vision is dear to my heart.  

There are standards and commands that God has clearly given to us. When an organization is as solid as I have always felt this one is, it makes me want to raise my hand and say... how is this okay?

It feels like the things that we stand for and stand on, based on God's Word, are being watered down and compromised all around us, and that we as Christians are the oddballs. Do you get that feeling sometimes?

Gay marriage isn't about whether or not God loves us all... He DOES... but he also has set standards for marriage that are clear, and if we as believers begin to change those boundaries, we are in essence telling the world that what God has declared may not be quite the way we think it should be, so we will give in a little and show our tolerance by lowering his design for marriage to what we are being inundated with in our society...

compromise. 

I would really love your comments on this. It is a disturbing trend that we seem to be seeing all over the place. 

They call it compassion, etc.... 

What has happened to "God hath said"... ??




** an update this afternoon*...

"World Vision Reverses Decision To Hire Christians in Same-Sex Marriages"

Letter: 'We failed to be consistent with World Vision U.S.’s commitment to the traditional understanding of Biblical marriage and our own Statement of Faith'.

Wow! That is a direct answer to prayer!

Nothing...

That's what I have this Monday morning... nothing!

I am fine, not depressed, not upset or concerned... not full of words either.

So, have a great week, every one of you. I will be back when the words are flowing again, could be later today! :)

In the meantime, I am so thankful for all of my blogging buddies, you bless my life day after day.

The one thing I DO know this morning... God loves me, and His faithfulness endures forever!

New every morning, or every other morning...

If I had written a blog last week, it would have been titled...

Worn out

I was in central Texas helping our son and his family move into their new home. Oh please Lord... may we never have to move again!

It is so consuming, and exhausting, and they also have a 1 year old and a 2 year old in the big middle of it all!

Maybe because he has been a pastor in a small town, people have given them a LOT of stuff! A big part of this move was 'the culling of the stuff'... 

I came home not knowing I was tired. But then it hit...

I know that His mercies are new every morning, but as we get into these years that are not 'spring chicken', those 'new mercies' seem to kick in about every other morning. Where we used to cure everything with a good night's sleep, now it seems to take 2, or more. 

The mercies  of God are there every morning, but it takes a day or 2 longer to realize them!

It is such a good feeling to be organized. That's what they are aiming for in this move. Every bin is labeled and stacked in part of the garage, the rest of it is... gone! Sometimes the biggest mess of all is the process of organization. Everything has to be pulled out and viewed, then a decision made, keep it or get rid of it.

So much like our lives. 

We've all seen times in our lives when God is chiseling, and wants us to get rid of some of the 'stuff' that clutters our hearts. When we stop hanging on to some of that mess, our load is lighter and our hearts are freed.

It always shocks me to see how much 'stuff' accumulates, in my life and in my home. 

When my mind and heart are clear and clean, my home and my life seem to function with better order too.

Any big loud 'amen's' out there??

Reflecting...

There are times when I am reminded to just be still and reflect on what God has brought me to, and through. 

I listened to this song by Damaris Carbaugh and The Brooklyn Tabernacle Choir last night, and again this morning. I can't listen to the words without tears... tears that remind my own heart of the faithfulness of God, all through the years. Take a minute and listen, it will bless you, I promise!





In my moments of fear
Through every pain, every tear
There's a God who's been faithful to me
When my strength was all gone
When my heart had no song
Still in love He's proved faithful to me
Every word He's promised is true
What I thought was impossible
I've seen my God do
He's been faithful 
Faithful to me.

He's been faithful to me, faithful to me
Looking back His love and mercy I see
Though in my heart I have questioned
Even failed to believe
Yet He's been faithful, faithful to me

When my heart looked away
The many times I could not pray
Still my God was faithful to me
The days I spent so selfishly
Reaching out for what pleased me
Even then God was faithful to me
Every time I come back to Him
He is waiting with open arms
and I see once again...

He's been faithful to me...