Yesterday afternoon, Kristi was over and we were making chocolate chip cookies. I almost have the recipe memorized, so I was shooting off instructions to Kristi.

"Go preheat the oven to 375 degrees," I told her.

I finished putting a cup of brown sugar in my bowl, and then look down to see Kristi kneeling in front of our dishwasher.

"Taryn, where's the temperature dial?" she asked, starting to get really confused.

It was then that I had to pinch myself incredulously, hoping that this was a dream.

No, actually, we both just laughed really hard and I joked that she had spent too much time being my friend. My intense "blonde moments" were starting to rub off on her... but Kristi is a blonde, anyway, so she's REALLY in trouble. :)

Aside from her trying to preheat my dishwasher, the cookies turned out pretty good!

That night, 2 of my other high school friends- Kristin and Marla- came over for a night of games. We had fun and laughed a lot- we all were rubbing our tummys after awhile, a little sore from so much laughter.

Earlier in the evening before Kristin came over, Marla, Kristi and I were sitting around watching old videos we had made from Jr. High and High school (blackmail embarassments, to say the least.) We had ordered pizza, and Kristi and I were sitting on the couch stuffing our faces with pizza and breadsticks while Marla sat calmly next to us on a chair. Well, supper wouldn't be complete without me spilling something, so down goes the pizza sauce that I was dipping my breadstick into and the sauce splattered all over the carpet, couch, and Kristi's sock and jeans. Seriously. That pizza sauce is in sane. It's splatter course has quite the diameter. After getting some cleaning products out and scrubbing the floor, we all resume a quiet meal of pizza until about 3 minutes later. Kristi takes a drink out of one of my mom's glass purple goblets, and goes to set it down on the floor, but it slips out of her hand and the whole glass just shatters EVERYWHERE. I kid you not- those goblets shatter like none other. AFter picking up glass pieces and pitching them into a garbage can, and then sweeping up the remaining shards, we all settled down to finish our pizza.

Wow. You would think we needed a baby-sitter or something. We preheat dishwashers, spill food, and break glasses...

Sometimes I wonder why I have enough humility to admit things like this. Some of my friends shake their heads at me because of the stories I tell... but in all honesty, I find that I always try to find humor in situaitons where I could just feel really dumb. If you can't laugh at life, you've let it overcome you... and trust me, I've learned that laughing at stupidity can be a lot of fun. It's good memory-making, it's good future potluck subject matter, it's good stuff. Did I just say potluck? You can tell I'm AC.

I've taken the liberty of posting 2 pictures: One that shows us in our dignity, and the other is a candid shot that I fell in love with the moment I saw it- I love candidness.





I mentioned before that for devotions, I am going to read through Paul's 13 letters in the New Testament. I have worked through the first letter, Galatians, and am now finishing up 1 Thessalonians. Let me share some great verses in chapter 5...

6 So then, let us not be like others, who are asleep, but let us be alert and self-controlled.
8 But since we belong to the day, let us be self-controlled, putting on faith and love as a breastplate, and the hope of salvation as a helmet.
13 Live in peace with each other.
14 Warn those who are idle, encourage the timid, help the weak, be patient with everyone.
15 Make sure that nobody pays back wrong for wrong, but always try to be kind to each other and to everyone else.
16 Be joyful always:
17 pray continually;
18 give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God's wll for you in Christ Jesus.
19 Do not put out the Spirit's fire;
21 Test everything. Hold on to the good
22 Avoid every kind of evil

1 Thessalonians has some good stuff in it, but chapter 5 kind of pours on all the instruction... and what great instruction it is! If we all followed even just the verses I posted above, we'd be in good shape. It teaches us to live holy, self-controlled, peace-filled and joyful lives, showing us that we should be thankful and good!

I am not going to dissect every verse, or else we'd be here all night; a lot of them speak for themselves. However, the one verse that stuck out to me was "Warn those who are idle."

Have you ever been "idle?" The sad part about idleness is that it is easy to be an "idle" Christian and still look pretty good. You can go to church, attend bible studies, make meals for people, listen to the Christian radio station... but are you moving anywhere because of it, or are you just going through the motions? Don't let Christian living become an unconcious habit that consists of activities that you do just because you've always done them... I mean, keep doing them, but with fervor and joy for the Lord! Attend the bible studies to learn about the Word, not to socialize afterwards. Go to church to worship God, and not only becuase it's what you do every Sunday. Make a meal for someone because you truly want to give and it's a way to serve the Lord, and not only because it will make you look like a nice person. Listen to the Christian radio station and sing praises to the Lord! Sometimes it's hard to take our everyday "Christian" activities and always complete them with the attitude and motives that we should be having... after long, we become idle. Is our Christian walk a "walk" or a "stand-still?" It's good to do a little evaluation every once in awhile and assess where you're really at; what areas need more enthusiasm or zest? Which areas do we carry out like a zombie rather than a Christian on fire for the Lord? Is our Christian walk as active as it could be?

Let's be ready! A reminder as to why we are here and where we are going can help... it shifts the focus a little from self to Christ... from our kingdom to His.

"Avoid every kind of evil..." Today I heard a familiar song on WCIC that was like, "in the world, not of it..." Sometimes, it seems like it's impossible to avoid every kind of evil as soon as you step outside the door to your house, but it can be done if we remember to align the Word of God with our lives and coat it on our every word, thought, action, and deed. There's a big difference between being IN the world and being OF it.

I love you all!

T