Happy New Year!!

With just seven hours left of 2006, I wanted to say Happy New Year to everyone! Hope you're having a great time with your family or friends or whoever you find yourself with this evening! I'm looking forward to seeing you all in January!

HEADS UP

SAVE THE DATE!

Mark your calendars!
On Friday Jan 19, Servants will be having the most fun LOCK-IN of all time at the church. (that's right - all night at the church)
You will NOT want to miss it.
Friends are welcome.
Details to follow.

PS I think Jordan gets a prize for posting a comment...you could be next!

Prizes available!!

I forgot to mention in my last post that anyone who either a) responds to my post in a comment or b) publishes their own post will WIN A PRIZE!! Kari Grace already gets one--you could be next!!!!

Quotes!!!

So I really love quotes, and thought I would share some with you.

Have any of you heard of Storypeople? We were talking about them at girls group. It's this artist guy in Iowa who does some abstract figure drawings and puts them together with stream of consciousness quotes, some of which are really funny, and others are kinda deep. I encourage you to check out their webpage at storypeople.com. I have them send me a quote every day. If you like them, you can sign up on their email page. Here are some samples:

My grandmother kept a box of old photos in her attic & we used to go up there on rainy days & sit on the floor in the dusty light & go through them & she would tell about witches & broken hearts & how we came from royal blood & it was all there in the pictures, she said & then we'd lose the light & we'd all go downstairs for dinner & in our secret hearts we sat taller knowing once we had ruled the world.

I wouldn't mind being grownup, she told me, if I didn't have to get up & be grumpy right away every morning.

I'm at that point in the day where I'm tired of myself, she said, so if you don't mind, I'm going to be someone else until bedtime & we had a lovely time together, my new friend & I.

The plumber was digging around in the pipes & he saw something shine in the muck & it turned out to be the soul of the last tenant. He gave it to me & I said I wonder how we can return it & he shrugged & said he found stuff like that all the time. You'd be amazed what people lose, he said.

And here is a quote from Frederick Buechner, one of my new favorite theologians:

“Faith is homesickness. Faith is a lump in the throat. Faith is less a position on than a movement toward, less a sure thing than a hunch. Faith is waiting. Faith is journeying through space and time.

So if someone (and this frequently happens) were to come up and ask me to talk about my faith, it’s exactly that journey through space and time I’d have to talk about. The ups and downs of the years, the dreams, the odd moment, the intuitions. I’d have to talk about the occasional sense I have that life isn’t just a series of events causing other events as haphazardly as a break shot in pool causes billiard balls to go off in many directions, but that life has a plot the way a novel has a plot—that events are somehow leading somewhere.”

'Tis the Season

If you were in church on Sunday then you know that we have now begun the season of Advent. Obviously most of the world has just jumped straight into Christmas, but in the church we take the four weeks before Christmas to prepare ourselves for what is coming. One of my favorite writers says: "The extraordinary thing that is about to happen is matched only by the extraordinary moment just before it happens. Advent is the name of that moment." Just think about the great moments in your life--think about the moment right before you knew what was about to happen...isn't that anticipation great?
That's what this season is all about - preparing yourself to be amazed at the gift of a child born out of a love so powerful that we are still talking about it 2000 years later. So rather than what you are going to get this season, think about what you are going to do to be ready to receive that kind of love and then give it back out to others. Happy Advent!

December Servant Birthday's

Happy Birthday to all of you!

December 4 - Taylor Grinney
December 21 - Kari and Emmy Grace
December 22 - Diana Klein

Have a wonderful birthday!!!