The Pastor of Disaster

You'd never know by looking at this picture by Amy that Jenny is my own personal "Pastor of Disaster", only a few will get this but that's okay just know that I say it with affection.

I participate in a small mentoring group with Jenny and two other ladies of my church, Andrea & Lori. I feel very blessed...is that a "churchy" saying or what... but it's how I feel to have gotten a chance to know these 3 women better.

Anyway... last night Jenny gave us an assignment to journal and I was debating if I should do that here or in a Word document. I think sharing some of my innermost thoughts in a public form like this would scare the crap out of most of you, at the very least you would shake your head next time you saw me in person. So for the bulk of my journal, I'll handle that off-line.

One topic I feel I can safely post about in public is to journal about the enemy, as in "who is my enemy". I know Jenny is headed to "Lucifer is the enemy" and how his influence in our lives plays out but I'm having a hard time grasping that one. My current belief is that Lucifer is real, that he led 1/3 of the angels in heaven in a battle to be God. That he lost, badly. He was cast out of heaven and given some level of control over the earth and humans.

Here are my questions:

Control to do what? Does he really want our souls? To do what with? Is this a game he plays, a way to say to God..."Ha Ha got one of Your's? How can he have one of God's children...if he has us, were we ever really God's?

More over... Lucifer never wanted earth or the people on it.

What he wanted was to be God. So how does getting our souls accomplish that? Is it our souls he wants now in a compromise for not being God or is it still his plan to be god like? Does he invade our lives in such a manner that we look to him and our actions make him a god? When we sin does that mean we are treating him like a god?

So should I be wary that he is going to steal my soul or that he will corrupt my day to day worship in such a manner that I'm unknowingly serving him and not Jesus as I think I am.

So far I've gone from a place that Satan was a benign being in the world to questioning his motives for my soul... this obviously requires a bit more thought and study, so that's where I'm going to leave this....

Jenny keeps me on my toes, that's for sure! My spiritual life isn't a disaster but I think I was headed for that before I started mentoring with her.

So I know this very talented photographer.....

Her name is Amy and not only does she take great photo's but she always makes me look good, which is a priority in my book. She did the wedding for Justin and Suzanne and had rave reviews from the guests. We did work her pretty hard though poor girl.

I've had the opportunity to be photographed by her with my family, at a women's retreat with church, in her back yard... my favorite thing is she doesn't laugh at my deep interest..okay fetish... of feet pictures!

Above is a bit of her work and you can always visit her blog... that is once I figure out how to set links to friends blogs on my site....

Oscar and I hadn't taken pictures together in a long time because we were both fat and I loved to hide from the camera. So we decided it was time and of the whole shoot the picture above was my favorite. Amy even had it framed for me and it sits proudly on my living room table.

Most people have new years resolutions... not me. See every year I choose a word and a skill that I want to focus on and apply to my life in the hope that I will be a better person come 2009.
Last Thursday night my friend Marianne reminded me that I hadn't picked my word or skill for the year.

Truth be told it was a lot like starting this blog, I didn't know what I wanted to do and it was causing my brain to hurt so I avoided it... see a pattern here? I mentally made the comittment to have these two items picked before we met the next Thursday... which is of course today!

So here it goes... Authentic for the word and typing for the skill.

I choose to be a more authentic person. I find that I don't tell people how I honestly feel about something.... I find myself adjusting my values and words to suit the temperment of the person I'm talking to. This happens most frequently with my faith but bleeds over into family and friends occasionally.

Typing... no spell check is the bane of my exsistance...seriously. I consider myself an intelligent woman, very literate and my spelling is above average. But to read some of my typing makes you wonder if I ever moved passed 3rd grade spelling! I took a test and my typing is 33 WPM with only an 88% accuracy level....plenty of room for improvement!

What is the purpose?

I started this blog because... well honestly because it seems to be the new hip thing to do. All my friends have one, so I thought what the heck... I'll start one too.

What to put in this blog became teh object of my thoughts..... my friends mostly talk about their children, the adorable little monkeys that children can be before they turn into teenagers. My monkeys have all gone past that mark and it seems silly to write about the adventures of Becca my 22 year old college student... her life isnt' really that interesting on a daily basis to anyone but me.

I pondered more and thoughts of my life after "Gastric Bypass Surgery Hell" was definately a topic up for conversation... but seriously who wants to read about the daily adventures of things that go bubbly in my tummy? There's always my spiritual journey... beena bit interesting lately with my new mentoring group but again...daily...naw. There's the awesome new grandbaby on the way and I can and will shamelessly plug Winter Elizabeth ... I"m sure she will get plenty of blog time but really her mom and dad should do one specifically for her.

So with this confusion swirling around in my head... I choose to do nothing with this blog till I felt I had direction and this was okay with me. I mean seriously no one but me knew it exsisted and my life was so busy with the wedding, holidays and life in general.... it was no big deal

Then..... darn Jennfer if she didn't put a link to my postless blog on HER BLOG! Now people were going to see that I had done nothing so back to the confusion looking for direction.

It's been a week and I have settled on making this blog about me... all of me. The funny parts, the yucky parts, the sad parts... my pastor Eric Bain said "Church is a journey into the known and unknown" and my life is definately a journey into the known and unknown.... Lots of unknown actually and that's what I"m going to blog about....me.

To all of you that hang out.... thanks for staying we will have to see how the Lord moves me to post about Paige.