7 Truths for the saints from Ephesians 1

1. God the Father has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places.

2. God chose us in Him before the foundation of the world to be holy and blameless before Him.

3. In love, God adopted us as sons and daughters.

4. In Christ, we have redemption through His blood.

5. We are forgiven from our trespasses according to His grace.

6. In Christ, we have an inheritance.

7. When we heard the word of truth, the gospel of our salvation, and believed in Him, we were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit.

Updates!!

~ Isabelle( or shall I say baby Ryan) is now sitting in her big girl bath seat (thank you Amy! ). She is now a "supported sitter", and can also sit by herself for just a few seconds :) My bellabug is growing up!

Lastly, my Mr. Handsome with his new glasses and the beginning of a beard (two things I never thought would happen). =)

~Our Sweet Potato girl~

After Isabelle's 4 month appointment, Dr. Guse gave the ok to introduce her to solid foods! As you can see, she loved them!! Mommy & Daddy thought they were pretty disgusting. To our surprise they didn't actually taste like sweet potatoes- more like chalk and dog food :/. I went in to this whole "Food thing" thinking as a mom, I should try them first....Never again

A cry of thankfulness

Ryan, Isabelle, and I were in a car accident over the weekend. Many thoughts have pervaded my mind over the last few days, but one in particular has been reoccurring - God is so good.

God has been so good to me & so faithful throughout my life from before I was conceived, through my: adoption, dark teenage years,marriage, miscarriages, miraculous baby blessing, collision with a semi, to now as I sit still in awe of His sovereignty and goodness. God has been good to me in so many ways, but nothing can compare to the ultimate gift He has given me through Jesus. For reasons none other than His glory and goodness, the Lord chose to forgive me for my wickedness; my deviation from His glorious will. He has saved me from my sin, which if not forgiven, would have sent me to eternal torment and separation from Him.

I am thankful everyone survived. But the truth is, there will be a day when my life will be over. And on that day, I will be judged by Christ and found innocent because He washed me and clothed me with His righteousness.

Common Accessory? or Only Hope?

The pains of this world are so deep and constant. At times it seems joy is at the end of a bottomless pit. We'll never find it- or maybe it doesn't really exist. The lost will find momentary pleasure in this world, followed by an eternity of pain. The found, will surely suffer in this life, but in the end will have eternal joy. Are we lost or found? Are we deceiving ourselves in thinking we're a daughter or a son? How do we know? Do we love Jesus?- I mean love Him, not the things he provides. Or is Jesus an accessory? something that is admirable to profess, but nonessential. Do we go to church or are we the church? Is there a difference and if there is, do we know it? The conversations I've been a part of recently should leave us all awake at night pleading with God to save. There will be people who genuinely believe themselves to be saved by their faith, but empty faith is not saving faith. The only true faith is faith in Jesus the Christ; fully God and fully man. It is not of most importance that we know Him, but that He knows us. We must trust Him, not only because He calls us to, but because there is no other hope, but hope in Christ.

" Remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. For he himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility by abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances, that he might create in himself one new man in place of the two, so making peace, and might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross thereby killing the hostility."
Ephesians 2:12-16

Mother's Day continued......