The Lord gave me a new article to write. It's called, "What's on the Altar?" After you've read the Bible study just keep on going down this page. It's the last one in the list of articles.

I want to share something with you that blessed my socks off on Friday. I had been looking for a dress to buy to wear to my 30th high school reunion. (If you are now trying to figure out my age, keep in mind that I was one year old when I graduated. Har!) I had a nice dress in my closet that I had been saving for a special occasion, but it hadn't bulged in the same places I've bulged in the past year. I could have squeezed into it, but I feared for the zipper's life!

I had looked and looked. I didn't want a fancy beaded thing. I didn't want a suit. I didn't want anything matronly. I finally found one. It was a long, lacy elegant looking off-white dress. I found it at the western-wear store. I am more comfortable in western-style clothes, so I was very happy with the purchase. The price was very reasonable, as well.

Then I went to the department store to buy another tube of my favorite lipstick. I buy the more expensive lipsticks because they last longer and look better. Anyway, they were out of that color. Darn! I had held off buying it for a long long time because I was trying to save money. I was looking forward to my reunion and decided to splurge on myself.

The sales woman showed me two other, similar, colors. I decided on one. It was close to my favorite, so I wasn't too disappointed. I also got some more of the face powder I like. I had gotten a free sample and it was gone, so I splurged on the powder as well. I applied for a charge card for that department store which gave me a 10% discount on my purchase. That store allows me to pay off the card with scrip, so I will save another 6% on top of that. Then, the sales woman gave me a couple of free samples of perfumes. As she was bagging my things she found a full-sized sample of the second color lipstick that I hadn't chosen and gave it to me.

As I walked out of the store I thought about how I had a beautiful dress, my powder, free samples, and two lipsticks for the price of one and I said, "Thank you, Lord!" As I walked into the mall from the department store I noticed there was music playing. I couldn't understand any of the words except, "I love you." At that moment I felt God's love wrap me up and give me a hug. OH MY! HE GAVE ME A PRESENT AND WAS SINGING HIS LOVE TO ME!! The lipstick was from Him!! He had me choose one, knowing He had the other color to give me for free!

It gets better! I went into another store and there was a song playing in there. The only words I could make out were, "I'll love you forever!" OH GLORY! Had I not been in tune with Him that day, had I not asked Him to walk with me that day, had I not thanked Him for the things I got, I might not have heard His still, small voice. I might not have known that He provided for me. I might have missed hearing Him singing His love to me!

I am not going to dwell on it, but a thought comes to my mind. How many times have I missed being touched by Him because I was not focused on Him?

I got to see some friends at my reunion that I've not seen in a long time. I enjoyed that. I wish more of my friends could have gone.

Parts of it were frustrating. Some people looked familiar, but I had to go right up to them and stare at their name tag to refresh my memory. Sometimes I even said, "Don't mind me, I'm just checking chests." The names could have been written in as big of print as would fit on the tags. Heck, get bigger tags. We are a bit older and our eyesight is not what it used to be!

Then, after we ate, they dimmed the lights (nametag reading became nearly impossible) and began playing music at a volume that forced us to almost have to shout to be heard! The music wasn't even music from our high school years! Sheesh! For that we paid the big bucks??

Perhaps the cruelest trick was announcing a picnic to be held the next day. It was a last-minute idea. We didn't find out until that night. The people who didn't come to the reunion never found out about it. One of my friends had flown in from Texas. She would have taken a later flight to be able to attend, had she known.

Well, I did have a good time. Seeing old friends (let me rephrase that...seeing high school friends) was worth the effort!

I'm feeling a little groggy today. I only got 4 1/2 hours sleep last night. I took a nap today, but feel kind of strange. I used to be able to get along on less sleep. Something has changed. What could it be? It must be the air, or the water. It can't be my age! ;-)

Keep in mind that God wants to bless you, too. If you aren't careful, you will miss the blessings. Seek His face. Seek to know Him. Learn how to walk with Him every minute of every day.

Link to the 11/6/00 Bible study.

The Lord gave me a new article to write. It's called, "What's on the Altar?"

Oh dear! I found out that Geocities (the server where this page used to be kept) no longer accommodates an index file that is called htm. It must be called html. I had to go through every last one of the pages I have on this server and change the links. That was certainly fun! Too bad they didn't decide this way back when I was just starting out with this page! Sigh. I had nothing better to do with my time. Har!

The weather has changed. Last night it dropped below freezing. So much for the rest of my tomatoes that haven't ripened yet! I sure wish my hubby would hurry up and build me that greenhouse!

I've got 29 more weeks of the scrip fund raiser I administrate for the band. I'm very tired of doing it. It takes a lot of time and effort. It will be strange when I am through with it. I imagine I will be feeling strange every day wondering where I should be going or what I should be doing!

I will have done it for two years come the first of April. I'm going to go until the first week in June. Oh, boy, I sure am looking forward to getting rid of this thing! Can you tell?

What have you given God today? Have you given Him a minute of your time? If not, this is the minute to do it. Tell Him you love Him. Tell Him how AWESOME He is. There, now you've given Him something!

How's that for an eclectic bunch of thoughts? Looks like my mind is playing leapfrog!

Link to the 11/13/00 Bible study.

The good news is that the football team is going on to the quarter-final round of playoffs. (In case you don't know, my husband is an offensive line coach at the high school. My youngest son is on the team.) The bad news is our family still has no life as long as football is still around. We haven't been able to plan anything for Thanksgiving because they will be practicing Thanksgiving morning.

The other bad news is that our booster club president and secretary have a family emergency going on and all the responsibilities of running the details of the booster club participation in the game fell on my shoulders. My poor shoulders were not ready and didn't have the time to take care of those things. However, everything came together well enough that we didn't fall flat on our faces anywhere. I'm afraid the stress of it caused my eye to get worse again. It was getting better and now it is worse. Great! I believe God was leaving my eye that way to remind me not to take on any more responsibilities. However, I was still the vice president of the booster club and that means I take up the slack when the president is unavailable. Sigh. We're having another home game Friday, too. Double sigh.

I'm afraid I've upset the worship leader at the new church we've attended only twice. It is a bigger church than we've attended as a family. It is big enough that there is a possibility that we might never meet or get to know the pastors and other church leaders. The morning service starts out with a time of praise.

I have been in praise sessions (at other churches) where the presence of God could be felt. I know that we were only scratching the surface of being able to feel His presence, yet the feeling was GLORIOUS!

I have seen unabashed weeping. I've seen people dropping to their knees. Sometimes when you taste the goodness of God you begin to tremble and probably also to weep. There is a look on the faces of people who are in one-on-one worship with God that is unmistakable. They are glowing. There are many different ways that people react when God begins touching them. When people are totally focusing on Him and allowing Him to enter into their praises then wonderful things happen.

When the worship leader is sensitive to the leading of the Spirit, then there is no schedule of songs. When the Spirit gives that person a song then that is the next song to be sung. (Of course, if the Spirit gives the list of songs ahead of time, then there is a schedule. However, even when the original songs were anointed by the Spirit, He can change the list on the spot. The worship leader must be walking in the Spirit and be open to God's will.)

Anyway, I have tasted God and I know there is much much more! I have done some studies and research on praise. Praise, itself, has power. Praise, alone, has won battles (see 2Chron 20:21-24). Praise is very important. With significant praise the entire tone of the church service is changed. OK, I think I'm probably making my point.

Anyway, during the praise service I was looking around at the faces of the people in the congregation. There were some smiling. Some were raising their hands with their eyes closed. Most were just singing as they read the words off the overhead. The look on their faces probably was the same look they would have when they might sing along with the oldies-but-goodies on the radio. There was nothing special about what any of the people were doing. I could see a lot of faces because we were sitting over toward the side.

Every single song was about God and His attributes. The songs were about the reasons we should praise God. One song had a very energetic portion that said, "Stand up and praise Him and give Him the glory." The choir had a hand movement that they used for this portion of the song (we've attended twice and they sang this song both times). They sang that line over and over about ten times. The last couple of songs were slower songs, but as I said, they were saying "praise God because..." We never sang a song directly to Him. I couldn't see anyone showing any signs of being deeply touched by God. The songs were on their lips, but never made it to their hearts.

That church has cards that they want everyone to fill out each week so they can keep track of us. (We are names on cards and not faces on bodies, but that is another matter altogether.) I turned mine over and wrote in the comment section that there wasn't one song sung directly to the Lord. I also said that when I looked at the faces of the people I didn't see what God would want to see on their faces when they are singing praises.

We weren't given much time to fill out the cards. Perhaps I could have given a more lengthy comment. What I had intended was for whoever was organizing the praise songs to seek God in that matter and ask Him if there was something that should be different. I imagined they would make an effort to look into the faces of the congregation and they would see exactly what I meant. I was certainly not attacking anybody. My heart was for the things that the congregation were missing due something lacking in the worship service. Well, I thought wrong.

I got a letter from the leader of music and drama. (Good thing I didn't comment on the dance production they gave the first Sunday we attended!) Basically, she was offended in her flesh. She said I was presumptuous to judge for myself that God wasn't pleased based on only the looks of some of the people in the audience.

Then she gave me a dictionary definition of praise and told me that many of David's Psalms are not sung directly to the Lord but are reminders of how wonderful God is. (Did David look up the definition of the word praise in the dictionary when he admonished God's people to praise Him?) The dictionary definition and the definition in my Strong's concordance are different.

Her conclusion was that they were following God's design as our corporate time together is to be spent building each other up in the faith. If my comment was meant as a rebuke she did not receive it. Well, I guess that is why the songs are about God and not to Him. The songs are designed to build each other up. They are "feel good" songs that teach us why we should praise Him.

In her letter she did say that we were doing the very thing that Psalm 150:2 admonishes us to do, which is to "praise Him for His mighty acts, praise Him according to His excellent greatness." Uh, no, we never once sang a song that said, "We/I praise You for Your mighty acts."

There are a few tricks that satan has developed that create hindrances in people coming closer to the Lord. He is subtle about it. One thing He did is encourage people to write many different Bible translations. If you have done any kind of comparisons you will have noticed that the Word has become watered down and actually changed in many places. The power in the Word has been weakened.

Another trick is to prevent people from actually entering the throne room of God and sitting at His feet. He has created barriers in the churches. He has caused people to created schedules for the services. He has convinced them to find something that sounds good and stick with it. Traditions are started that prevent the Holy Spirit from moving freely. If you sing songs that have the words God and Jesus in them then you are fine.

Most church services are designed to entertain people and keep them comfortable enough that they come back each week. Most church leaders do not earnestly seek what God's will is for the service from week to week and from moment to moment during the service.

Yes, some people need to be reminded why we should be praising God. Actual praise to the Lord is not reminding yourself of why God deserves praise any more than saying to someone, "I want to thank you for your gift," is actually thanking them. You are expressing a desire to thank that person, but aren't actually saying, "Thank you." It is wonderful to preface your thanks and your praise with reasons why you are going to do it, but don't forget to actually do it!

Well, unfortunately the music director has allowed her flesh to prevent her from understanding my comments in the spirit in which they were given. From the tone of her letter I wouldn't be surprised if she made sure that none of the songs were directly to the Lord just to prove her point. Sigh.

Tell me, please! Is there a church out there that seeks God's heart in ALL THINGS?? Is there a church that is about bringing each and every person into a closer and closer personal relationship with God? Is there a church that asks God what His will is for the music, the fellowship activities, the sermon, the Sunday school lessons, the offering, spending money, making improvements to the buildings, where every person can serve, and every single detail???

Is there a church where EVERY person that goes there gets fed? Is there a church that embraces the gifts and talents of EVERY individual? Is there a church out there that is willing to ask God His opinion on ALL things and willing to change their opinions to be the same as His? I'm beginning to wonder.

I'm afraid my family doesn't share my passion. It has been a long while since we've attended a church that even resembled something that was seeking to walk in God's will. They have forgotten what that is like. They don't have the hunger to seek God's face. They have become content to sit and allow someone to spoon feed them. I don't think I could convince them to try many more churches. They are tired (as am I) of trying to settle in and then getting up and walking away. Basically, my family thinks I am crazy.

I covet your prayers for direction and wisdom. God knows where we should be. For some strange reason He is leading us in and out of churches. Perhaps seeds are being planted behind us. I don't know. I'm hungry to be around a group people with the same desires to seek God's face. I'm anxious to get my family fed with meat!

Again- -welcome. I hope you find peace and love here. (I always put this at the end of the introductory part. As I was proofreading I had to laugh. I get myself all riled up about churches and end with saying I hope you find peace here. Well, keep reading. There's peace here somewhere! Tee hee)

Link to the 11/20/00 Bible study.

I've put together a list of scriptures that refer to salvation. I've been doing a study on salvation since the Lord opened my eyes to the fact that my beliefs about salvation were things I'd learned from teachers and pastors and not the Lord. The list is here.

Football season is over. The team lost by one touchdown last Friday. I feel bad for my husband and son, but maybe we can settle down into some sort of life now.

Did you have a nice Thanksgiving? I hear things about Thanksgiving like, "It's a time to relax with your family and give thanks." "It's a day you can spend with your family and enjoy each other." Hold the phone!!! If that's the case, who is in the kitchen cooking the food?????

Last year I decided that I, too, was going to relax on Thanksgiving. There is usually football practice that morning if the team is still in the playoffs, so we can't make any big plans of going anywhere. My mom and my husband's parents aren't able to travel like before so they don't come to our house. It's just me and the guys and the GUYS DON'T COOK! So, last year we had chili for Thanksgiving. That's what was supposed to happen again this year. However, my sister-in-law got a partially thawed turkey from her work and gave it to me. She went to my in-laws' for the holiday. Sooooo, not one to waste food, we had turkey. Well, when you have turkey you need salad, and vegetables, and gravy, and pie, and and and....

I tried to relax Friday morning, but had things I needed to do for the football game that night. Our booster club president resigned and that bumps the vice president to president. The bad news is that I was vice president. He pretty well left us in the lurch. He was supposed to handle the program and didn't. I couldn't get a program printed so made one myself. I spent a lot of time on it to make it as good as possible under the circumstances.

So much for a relaxing holiday. The good thing was that I got to sleep in later than my usual weekday 4:30AM! Now THAT felt good!

I'm praying about this football booster club thing. With the pres and his wife, the secretary, leaving that leaves the treasurer, his wife, myself, and my husband. My husband is one of the coaches and has other coaching activities going on throughout the year so he isn't much help. The treasurer's son is a senior and won't be playing next year. That basically leaves me.

I am praying about this. I don't know what God wants me to do. I want to run away. I've tried for two years to get that booster club built back up and the two presidents managed to keep people away. I think it was some kind of martyr thing. As a matter of fact, the president tried to pick a fight with me before he resigned. He couldn't get me to fight, but is telling everyone that I... well it's not a nice thing he's saying about what I supposedly did.

I built up the membership from 8 to 70. I developed a way to get more people involved. I brought in over $3,400 between memberships and the golf tournament I ran. I damaged the retina in my left eye due to stress over the golf tournament. I tried and they let it all fall apart because of apathy.

Now they are gone. The treasurer said he and his wife would help for another year if I ran for president. SIGH! What should I do, Lord??? In the flesh I am a fixer. I can work at fixing it, but if God isn't behind me then it isn't even worth the effort.

I'm looking forward to Wednesday. My oldest son is coming to visit. He hasn't been here in a couple of years. He was scheduled to come last March but got sick and I had to go out there instead. Now he's using the credit from that ticket and coming here. That's a good thing about Southwestern Airlines. You don't use your ticket, they hold the credit for a year.

I have a lot of things to do. I have to get the guest room ready for him. I also have to clean off my computer table. I'm hoping he can help me with some computer problems I've been having. I've got football booster stuff, band scrip stuff, worksheets from my husband's classes, email, and lots of other stuff piled all around my computer.

I guess I had better get busy, hadn't I? Where's that maid? Oh, there she is. She's sitting in front of the computer in her bathrobe working on the weekly Bible study. Hey, that's ME! ;-)

Again- -welcome. I hope you find peace and love here. (I always put this at the end of the introductory part. As I was proofreading I had to laugh. I get myself all riled up about churches and end with saying I hope you find peace here. Well, keep reading. There's peace here somewhere! Tee hee)

Link to the 11/27/00 Bible study.