I'm Back!

Bet you didn't even know I was gone!
Two weeks ago we received an email from my aunt saying that my 81 year-old grandmother was in the hospital with bad heart trouble. We made a hasty decision for me and my DD to go to the US to see her, maybe for the last time. Eileen and I hopped a bus to Santiago and a plane the next day to sunny California. We headed over to the hospital where my grandma was staying. She had had a tough 5 days, in and out of ICU and CCU (cardiac care unit) She has congestive heart failure and had had a heart attack. She had a huge bruise on her arm due to blood thinners and the blood pressure cuff. It still looks bad. She looked awful and my dad and his sisters were talking about Rose Hills (a cemetary) and nursing homes.

Long story short, my grandma is much better. She'll need some looking-after, but she's doing much better.

So, Eileen and I had ourselves a mini-vacation. The weather was lovely. We visited 5 of our supporting churches. We had a great time seeing everybody. Everyone was very kind. We even went to Disneyland!

I have had some time to do some thinking, so over the next few days I'll have something to blog about.

Later, Dudettes! Sorry, slipping into cliché California talk!

I am appalled!!!!!

While shopping for tracts for Mom to take home on furlough, we found the American Tract Society web page. Do you know what we saw? A tract about the Pirates of the Caribbean! Yes, you can get over life's problems if you think like Cap.Jack! Did you ever? I found that they have several tracts that use movies and TV shows to attempt to present Gospel truths. As if we needed the world's trash to show God's love.
Hollywood hates God. Know that for certain. We do not use God-haters to get the message across. God is holy. Hollywood is not. End of story.

Happy Anniversary to us!

Yesterday our Church celebrated its 11th anniversary! Its hard to believe, but on June 9, 2006, we had our first service here in Lanco. It was just us, and one other person. For the first month, it was just us and one other person. But that was then. Yesterday we had about 100 people! We didn't have the reagular head-count, so I tried to do it on my own. Anyway, in spite of the cold and rain, we had a great day. We had regular Sunday School and Church (DH said it was going to be shorter than nomal, but of course it wasn't) Then we had a bid Church dinner. We ate roasted pork (not really good, if you ask me, but they loved it!) By the way, you fancy Americans mostly use paper plates, cups and utensils for Church dinners. That is unthinkable here We had dinner for about 70 and washed a TON of dishes. We all took turns, but it was still a huge job. We had several visitors that day, for which we are truly grateful. We also brought our mission Church from Mafil for the day. That was great! There were about 12 from Mafil.

We also had a visiting preacher who will most likely be the man who will cover for us when we go on furlough later this year. We had never met him before and Neil was really pleased with him.

Neil and I are headed up to Santiago tonight on the bus. We'll leave around 9, and arrive around 7 in the morning. We have to go to the US embassy for Neil to have a personal interview for a visa to travel to the USA. The USA doesn't really like to give visas out too easily, so we would greatly appreciate your prayers in this matter. The kids are going over to Granny's and they are quite excited about it!

Depression part 2

Let's talk about artificially altering our moods. We feel depressed, so we take a pill, and now we feel just fine! Does anyone see a problem here?

A while back, I saw a series called "The baby Whisperer". It was a series done by a baby nurse that would go into a home, and help the distraught parents learn how to "read" their baby's signals, and become better parents, and have a happier baby. She was so cool! Anyway, many times the problem was that mummy could not get baby to sleep because baby had become accustomed to a prop (pacifier or something similar) or rocking, or jiggling or something to fall asleep, then when baby would wake up in the night as babies are wont to do, they would cry and scream until their prop had been returned, or mummy rocked and jiggled again. Any way, Tracy would teach the parents that babies must learn to quiet themselves. If you constantly gave them soemthing artificial, then they could not learn to fall asleep naturally.
Yes, now and then we are going to feel depressed. Even Christians can have these feelings. But, besides the fact that we aren't depending on God to help us change our mood, we are depending on an artificial prop to feel better. Now, on the show, it took about a week for the parents and baby to get used to the new ideas. There were several sleepless nights where baby cried incessantly. But it had to done or else the child would never learn, and never be a good sleeper. In fact a know of several adults that use props to sleep, like the TV or radio. Yikes!

There are spiritual ways to combat depression. I tell you, it won't be an easy way out. But it will be a real way out. Now, some people get out of depression, and then never get into it again, and then others fall into it again. If handled spiritually, I believe that the times of depression will the shorter and less intense, just as with any temptation. Yes, depression is a temptation. A temptation to doubt God and His goodness, His sovreignty, His providence.

Let's be real folks! We don't need any artificial moods!

I have been having fun!

Yep, while the Preacher is at Bible Institute, I am spending the time I should be using to do up the dishes (so as not to disgrace the ministry) and general picking-up, messing around on the computer. I finally started trying to discover what Blogger had in mind when they changed everything. I made myself a new header, if ya didn't know! I was going to make something beautiful and feminine, but this is really more "me".

I really must go and get those dishes done!
Bye now!

Depression, part 1

Mom and I were talking the other day about all the people we know who have "depression" and are taking medication for it as they would for a bacterial infection. They truly believe that it is a disease for which there is a modern medical cure/treatment. Do you all realize just how scary this is????? Pretty soon all of Americans will be so doped up, they won't know which way is up.

The beginning of depression is, in my opinion, a disagreement with God, that leads to discontentment, which leads to bitterness, which leads to very real physical ailments of all kinds. Yes, its real, but cannot be cured with medication.
A disagreement with God? Yes, let's talk about that. Here is a hypothetical situation: take an average Christian who goes through the motions of church-going, but does not have a dynamic, real relationship with Christ. If anything is less than perfect in her life, she will start to complain. She will try to manipulate the situation to fix whatever is wrong. She will grow bitter against her husband or child or pastor, etc. She becomes depressed. She wants meds to feel better.
The Truth is that we all have apparently negative things in our lives, but when we agree with God that everything He sends our way, even the "bad" stuff is for our good, we joyfully accept whatever situation we are in. We eagerly read His Word for strength for the journey. We hunger for fellowship and worship with the Body of Christ, just as eagerly as we hunger for physical food.
In my family and my husband's family, in the past 6 years, we have been through: Death, abandonment, divorce, criminal behaviour and subsequent jail time. We have had ample reason to be depressed. But we are not! we praise the Lord for His provision. We eargerly await to see His deliverance.
He is truimphant over our emotions.
Lets show the world that we are more than conquerors though him who loved us. Lets conquer depression!