My Boy

Timothy will be 5 in May. In his entire life, I do not remember him not moving (although I don't see him often, so maybe he stops once in a while). Last time I was home he would come sliding into the room announcing himself "Timmyyyyyyy Wood!!!!!" Then he would play hockey or soccer or baseball by himself and his imagination. This time he was playing tennis in the mall...by himself...with no racket...or ball. When he falls he gets up saying, "It's okay, I'm okay," very reassuringly

Timothy may have seen too many musicals. He often sings whatever is going on around him or with his siblings. He also dances a lot. Maybe fewer musicals in the future, hm?

Sometimes he tries to sneak up on people or sneak out of the room. He sneaks out on tip-toe, backwards so he can watch you, and with a delighted smile on his face, even when he sees that you're watching. He's so tiny he can sneak up on people and hide behind anyone or anything! Then he laughs and says "I got you, didn't I?" very proudly.

One day he beat one of his siblings at a game on the Wii and he was doing his happy song and dance about how he won and he's so good. It wasn't aimed at the sibling and wasn't laughing at anyone; it was just delight. I laughed and asked if I could be him when I grow up. His response? "Of course you can, if you want!"

We were talking about relationships in the family. He got that his Nana is my Mum and so Grandad is my Dad. I explained that his Mom is my sister, and that was good. Then I said, "And that makes you my..." and he answered right away: "I'm your sweetie!"

Yes, Timothy, you're my sweetie.

In Thunder Bay

When I got here, small nephew Timothy was so exited, he pretended to faint. He said that I am a good surprise, even better than the french fries that he wanted as his surprise!

My niece Keona is helping me learn Greek. We are using the flashcards and I say the Greek word and what it means and she says yes or no. She also tries to do actions for the words to give me hints. And Keona is learning to write the Greek alphabet! She's very smart.

We went shopping and Keona helped pick out the candy for Junior Church next week. Later she showed me how to use her DS. I sleep in her room and she slept with Timothy last night.

Alex is getting too big. Even Zach, who has always been short for his age, is getting too big. They need to stop growing!

Stories from Church

1. We have a rule in Sunday School that they aren't supposed to ask about snack. They used to ask throughout the lesson and it distracted any students who were actually listening to me. For a while (i.e. one week until I put a stop to it) they asked about "that thing we can't talk about" but I pointed out to them that not using the word was not the same as not asking about it, so they stopped that too.

However....they still never use the word "snack" even when asking about it at legitimate times. Before class or at the end they ask if there is "any... you know" and "that thing we can't talk about" or just "Hey, is there any...."

Today one of the boys briefly added a new term to the list. The other teacher was talking to this boy's mom when the boy walked up to the teacher and asked if she had brought any "unmentionables." The mom looked somewhat surprised (go figure!) and the teacher quickly explained. He used the same term at the end of class and after I laughed I finally explained to him what "unmentionables" are ("What part of your clothing don't you talk about?" "Your underwear...oh....oops!").

2. Pastor James has been preaching through Colossians, and today he was at "Husbands love your wives" (Side note: for any ladies out there who think their husbands should listen to this sermon, you're right, they should, but then you need to listen to last week's sermon). Not long after he started the little monkey who sits with me suddenly whispered "But you don't have a wife." Um...no, I don't. I'm not sure what was going on in her mind; maybe why was I listening? She did add "and you don't have a husband."

3. After church the kids come for candy. The little kids tell me what Junior Church was about and the rest have to tell me about the sermon. They all did pretty well except the pastor's son who said "Husbands, obey your wives."

Nothing

I know, it's been over a month.

I have no words. I'm tired. Work is overwhelming as I'm trying to learn new computer systems and new ways of doing things and dealing with added (and really unneeded) pressure from the boss. Does he not realize that we're coping with enough and this added pressure could wait a couple months until all the new stuff is organized and unerstood?

For school, I'm up to Greek verbs and suddenly I have no clue what I'm doing. For 3 weeks I've been translating with little help (because they gave me the verbs and kept the sentences simple) and now I start at it blankly. I'm tired of Greek too and not looking forward to the next 5 weeks or so of trying to understand verbs and finish the class.

So I have nothing. I have thoughts, but not the energy to write them down.

I'll try to find something to fill up the space until I can write again.

Indescribable - Chris Tomlin

We sang this in church this morning. The whole song is great, but the line that really struck me is at the end:

"You see the depths of my heart and you love me the same."

Colossians

Pastor James (our young associate pastor) has been preaching through Colossians since (I think) September. He's a good pastor and I enjoy his preaching. The last two sermons, though, seem to be above the rest, although that's just my opinion based on where I'm at right now!

Two Sundays ago he preached on the end of chapter 2. His sermon was about asceticism, and how we are not to practice it. He spoke about the problems with man made rules, and how they are intended to get us to a higher plane and closer to God....but we're already there! As Christians, out citizenship is in heaven already.

He also talked about how we practice a form of penance when we sin. We know we've sinned again (and all too often the same sin) and we know we need to confess that sin, but first we feel the need to feel bad about it for a while just so God knows how sorry we are and to make our repentance seem more real (rough translation). But, the thing is, that's not what God wants. He wants us to come to Him, confess our sin, and be forgiven. Not that godly sorrow over our sin is bad, but trying to deserve forgiveness because of how bad we feel is really bad.

I don't know about anyone else, but that's what I do sometimes. I've sinned again, and I don't think that I should go to God for forgiveness right away until I've felt guilty enough long enough or at least tried to fix things and fix myself so that I deserve forgiveness. But that's not the way it works, and that's not what God wants. The fact is that I won't deserve forgiveness no matter what I do or how I feel, but He grants it anyway.

I didn't really understand that I was doing this until the sermon and then I saw myself so clearly in what he was saying. I stopped and (since I was listening on-line at work) replayed that part. Then, the next day I listened again to make sure I understood.

Last Sunday Pastor James preached on the first few verses of chapter 3. Here he talked about living a spiritual life, about focusing on the heavenly. He said that if we are concerned with what we should not be doing (what TV shows are bad, what books we should ignore, etc.) then we're doing it all backwards. What we need to do is focus on God and on what we should be doing for spiritual growth, and a lot of the other stuff will fall away, and we may find that we don't care for it anymore. We will view things differently.

Again, I've always looked to rules for spiritual growth: don't watch this and don't read that and God will be happy. So right now I'm changing my perspective: instead of "don't do this" I'm saying "do this" to the good stuff and working from there.

Pastor James says it all so much better than this, so go to the church website (www.grbc.ca) and find those two sermons. Trust me: it will be worth the time.

O Come, O Come Emmanuel

This is sung by the group Selah, from the album Ultimate Christmas Hits, Vol. 2. The starting music is Hatikvah (The Hope), the national anthem of Israel.