Last week heralded the official grand opening of The Clarion Call website! There are still a lot of things that need to be done, but it is up and running! God is prompting me to spend more time on it, so who knows what new things He will bring!

This started out as the "Jesus Lives Here" website on the free server at Geocities which was later bought out by Yahoo.  It took me a while to figure out how to leave the Bible study at Geocities as well as duplicate it at The Clarion Call. 

Anyway, it might be a little confusing since the Geocities site was the original and needs to stay intact because it has been bookmarked and also is in search engines.

Ahh, the trials of a webmaster! Wait!! If I am a web "master" where are the people who are supposed to be bowing and saying, "Yes, Webmaster!" huh? Tee hee! That makes me think of when my youngest used to say, "Yes, Ugly Master," when I'd tell him to do something. I made him bow to me every time he said it because I might have been an ugly master, but even ugly masters deserve some respect, don't they?

The Lord has been impressing on me that we each need to be diligent in finding out what He wants us to be doing and saying. We have no control over what others are doing and saying, but must concentrate on our own position in the Body of Christ. Revival, renewal, and change is brought about one person at a time.

Spiritual wars are taking place. Some battles are over us as individuals. We must be continually putting on our spiritual armor. We must be strengthening our relationship with the Lord so we know what we should be doing and saying. We must be learning how to abide in Him so our lives are within Him and He is in everything we are.

Do not do as the world does and give God the back seat of the bus. He must be the driver! Nothing is as important as a relationship with Him! We must be looking at everything through His eyes. We must be examining things with His opinions. Being busy is no excuse. We must be ON PURPOSE thinking about Him as we go about our daily business. We must give Him some priority time that is devoted just to Him (first thing in the morning?)

We can make a difference in the world if we are doing our portion in the Kingdom of God. I encourage you to examine your portion.

I'm becoming more and more aware of how God is shoved to the back seat in so many ways. Search engines usually have an indexed area where you can find pages by topic. Take notice of where they stick pages on Christianity. They are usually buried somewhere under the heading "lifestyles" or some other ridiculous title.

Have you gone into a secular book store lately? Where are the books about God?

How about the newspaper? What articles get priority? Are there ever any about God and Godly things except in the weekly "religion" section? Our paper usually has one article alongside ads placed by churches in their religion section.

How about our churches? Why do most churches sit unused for 92% (give or take a few percentage points) of the time? (I'm basing this on an average Bible study, church service schedule. I used all 24 hours of each day, however, because people need to be able to connect with Godly people whenever they are in need. After all, are Godly ministers any less needed than firemen, policemen, doctors, or nurses in the middle of the night?)

Our laws have pushed God farther and farther away. There is no such thing as the "separation of church and state" that is used so often to quench Godly things.

With few exceptions, people heeding God's call and doing things for Him are either doing "volunteer work" or are paid low wages.

Start paying attention and you will find many examples on your own.

God has been given a place of disrespect. Perhaps it is time for us to begin complaining. Perhaps it is time we rise up as one (because we ARE one in Christ!) and begin to complain. After all, most places cater to their customers. Are there too few of us to make a difference? I think not.

I had a nice, yet busy weekend. My in-laws came to visit so they could watch my youngest son, Casey, play football and perform in the band. I had allowed my house to get messy because my back had been hurting. I spent all day Thursday and Friday making things look less messy. I didn't get any comments or complaints, so I guess I did good enough.

The band took sweepstakes for their performances on Saturday! YIPPEE!!

It worked out really nicely for me. The competition was close to home, so I was able to come home and visit with my relatives instead of being gone all day long. Also, we got home before midnight!

The Lord has let me know that He wants me to be doing more at The Clarion Call. I'm not sure exactly what, but I know that I better be ready to spend more time on it. He said He has sounded the clarion. Some hear it and don't know how to respond and will begin to search and seek. He is going to direct them if they are diligent. Are you one of those seekers who has heard the clarion?

Link to the 11/6/01 Bible study.

Where did this year go? It is absolutely mind-boggling how fast time flies! (OK, my mind is easily boggled.) Why is it that, when I was a child, the space of time between Christmas and the next year's Christmas was about four lifetimes long? Now it seems I might as well leave the Christmas decorations out all the time. Didn't I just finish putting them away?

I heard a saying once. I think it was in a song. I can sing it myself, "Stop the world! I want to get off!"

I've been trying to rearrange some of the cupboards in my kitchen. I have purchased a bunch of Tupperware leftover containers and need to make room for them.

My refrigerator has a big problem. With my husband being on his de-tox diet I have filled it with leftover containers. Most of the ones I had were round. Sometimes, when I pull a round one out, others come with it. Plus, round containers take up more space than square and rectangular ones. I got tired of wrestling with containers so I invested in more Tupperware.

I think I deserve a prize for being a top customer for Tupperware. My cupboards are full of Tupperware. I hereby dub myself the "Tupperware Queen!"

Football season has been extended for at least one more week. The high school football team, of which my husband is a coach and my son is a player, is going to the first-round play-offs. This hasn't been one of the best years for them, but they still made it to the play-offs. I'm happy for my son, since he is a senior. The bad news is that it extends the time that our family has no life due to long hours spent at practice.

Have you awakened from a sound sleep in the middle of the night and don't know why? Have you gotten a troubling feeling in the middle of the day and don't know why? Perhaps you are being called to pray about something.

Sometimes I feel like something is wrong even though everything seems fine. Sometimes someone I know weighs heavily on my heart when I have no reason to be thinking about them. I believe God is letting me know that something or someone needs prayer.

That's what I like so much about speaking in tongues. I can pray for a situation or a person when I don't know exactly how to pray.

Be aware of when you feel like something needs to be done and you have no idea what it is. Maybe the thing you need to do is to pray.

Are you feeling hungry for more of God? Do you keep asking, "Is that all there is?" Let me assure you that there is MUCH MUCH more than we will ever get the opportunity to see. Keep searching, keep seeking, keep asking God for more more more!

Don't get satisfied with what you are taught about God from pastors and teachers! They are sharing with you the things they have learned. God has more for you. He even wants to teach you things that you can share with your pastor or teacher! We are all each as important as the next person. We each have an important place in the Body of Christ. However, only the seekers will be in position, in their place. Only the seekers will be filled.

Link to the 11/13/01 Bible study.

Sigh. My baby's senior year high school football season is over. It hurts to see how sad the players are when their last football season is finally over. For me, the game will not be the same as I will no longer have a son on the team. Yes, my husband is one of the coaches, but it just isn't the same and just isn't as exciting.

Marching band season is almost over, too. There is one more field show in two weeks and then they go to Phoenix for the Fiesta Bowl National Band Championships the end of December. Last year they won the sweepstakes award there making them the "National Grand Champions." They were invited back this year.

I got my new Tupperware and have been playing a "make more room in the cupboard and refrigerator" game. I got the rectangular ones that stack nicely. This will make my life a teensy bit easier ad I can fit more things in there and they won't jump out when I open the doors. My husband's diet sure is costing me money! First it was expensive foods and now it is Tupperware!

Last week I tried out for a solo part in our church Christmas program. I don't have a really strong solo voice and am much more comfortable singing in a group. Anyway, I thought I was as ready as I could be, but wasn't prepared to sing directly into a microphone. Wow, did my voice sound different! It made me really nervous. So, I plugged a microphone into my stereo at home to practice. Can you believe it? I was nervous when I sang it at home and the only one listening was my cat! Good grief.

I set my alarm about an hour earlier in the mornings to spend time with the Lord. The last couple of weeks I've felt kind of like I was in a fog. My mind has been easily distracted and wanders all over my schedule and over things that have been happening. I keep trying to pull my mind back to focusing on God, but usually end up wandering away again.

When I find I just can't get focused then I open my Bible and begin to read. I am better able to concentrate on the written Word at times like that. Every once in a while I go through this type of thing. I call it my "desert" times. I don't like it at all.

I think that satan thinks if he makes my devotional time a struggle that I will give up and just choose to sleep in. He knows I am not a "morning person." Well, I don't give up. I keep trying over and over until it passes. I know that God is still there. I know that God hasn't changed. I know that it is something that will pass. I still benefit from my devotional time. I get more of the written Word inside of me than I normally would. There is never anything bad about that!

Link to the 11/20/01 Bible study.

I broke another tradition on Thanksgiving. Well, it was a tradition I started on purpose and it wasn't all that great of a tradition. Usually the football team has practice on Thanksgiving because they have usually won their first playoff game and are going into the quarterfinals. (In case you don't know, my husband is a high school football coach.)

Anyway, we generally don't plan any get-togethers for Thanksgiving because of football. Plus my husband wants to watch games on TV and that means I have to entertain the guests. Sooooo.... since it is usually just us I decided not to go all-out cooking. After all, why should I be the only one working hard? Hence, the chili tradition.

I made Thanksgiving chili two years in a row and nobody complained. I have a really tasty recipe and everyone likes my chili. This year my husband is still on his de-tox diet and some of the ingredients in chili are on the no-no list. Rats!

I cooked a traditional-in-other-families turkey instead of the traditional-in-ours chili. Since I am the only female living in this house I was the kitchen-slave. What made it even worse was I began to exhibit cold symptoms the day before and wasn't feeling all that great. My coordination was off and I kept dropping things.

My husband did clean up the dishes for me, however. Good thing. I had a big boo-boo on my thumb. You see, I took one of my brand new very very sharp knives and began to cut the meat off the bones. Unfortunately, it wasn't just the turkey that got cut! OUCH! Like I said, my coordination was off.

Yesterday our power was out from 10AM to 7PM and it had been out for almost two hours the day before. Somebody needs to come up with an explanation. We lost power for almost 12 hours back in June as well. Our area is supposed to maintain power at all times because of the fire station near here. Fortunately, we have a generator on our camper and, when we finally realized it was going to last a while, we plugged our freezer and refrigerator into it. It would be one thing if we knew it was coming and could plan around it.

I've been working on updating my Christian Links page. I will try to stay up on it this time. The bad thing is I've found two different examples of Christian sites not renewing their domain name and porno sites taking them over. I had read something once that said it was happening. One of the domain names even had "Christian" as part of it. Satan must think it is funny to have porno links on Christian web pages.

Well, I have a long list of things I'd like to accomplish today. Then, on the other hand, if I stay here at my computer desk maybe my maid will do most of it for me. Oh, wait... I don't have a maid! I guess I'll have to do them myself!

Link to the 11/26/01 Bible study.