| Marriage Tip |
Commitment 1: We will give ourselves to a regular lifestyle of confession and forgiveness.
Commitment 2: We will make growth and change our daily agenda.
Commitment 3: We will work together to build a sturdy bond of trust.
Commitment 4: We will commit to guilding a relationship of love.
Commitment 5: We will deal with our differences with appreciation and grace.
Commitment 6: We will work to protect our marriage.
Source: What Did You Expect?? by Paul David Tripp
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| Verse of the Month |
Therefore, prepare your minds for action; be self-controlled; set your hope fully on the grace to be given you when Jesus Christ is revealed.
-1 Peter 1:13 |
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The Mundane Lingers
by John Woodruff, MA, LPC-Intern
It was a typical week for me for the most part. School. Homework. Church. Soccer practice. Soccer was a huge part of my life since I was six. I moved up through the ranks and landed a position on a select soccer team and practiced twice a week with games every Saturday. I loved it! I loved the sport and I felt like I was somebody... a professional footballer at age 12.
One Thursday we went to practice. Practice began with the team warming-up. The warm-up formation was two single file lines, in which we jogged around the perimeter of the field in this formation. I was running next to my teammate, Stephen. We were talking back and forth when all of a sudden Stephen said to me, "You have a girls voice." POW!! It was a shot I didn't expect. I responded with (not sure how I came up with this), "Well, if you don't like it, you will have to take it up with God because he made me." From that point forward, Stephen and I were pretty good friends, and I didn't really think too much about it.
I am now 33 years old. I don't really think about Stephen's statement "that much." Just every time I present in front of a group, talk into a microphone, get excited and yell, say certain words, and talk to others. I don't really think about the statement much. Yeah, right!!
Most people hearing my story of Stephen wouldn't think much of the story and would consider it typical and mundane. I do too. It is something that happens to little kids all the time while growing up. Though for this story to linger so long with me tells me it had more impact than I ever thought or knew.
We can all think of the high and low stories in our lives, and can see the way these stories affect us. Though I believe it is the minutiae of these stories and the mundane, typical, stories that have had more impact on us. It is the tender words whispered in our ears. It is the tense forehead and piercing eyes. It is the touch of a hand on our cheek. It is the laughter on the playground. It is the words spoken to us in our abuse. It is the smell of pine trees in the summer. These are the details of our stories that help shape us and name us. Our task is now to decide what will we choose. Will we choose not to name or tell the mundane stories, therefore not ever really knowing who God has designed us to be, or will we kindly enter into the details of naming the truth about God and us? Whichever choice we make will have great impact how we will give or not give ourselves to others and what we will or will not receive from others.
So, what have I chosen? I have chosen to worry and feel insecure after I speak, fearing that others think I sound like a girl. Shame comes and I immediately want positive feedback or to hide myself. My desire for positive feedback is a demand for others to console me. My hiding is an attempt to protect my image and to be my own savior. My mundane story is now not so mundane because it sheds light on the truth, and that is, down in my heart I do not really believe that the Truth will save me.
Which mundane stories have lingered for you, but you have always considered them to be typical or not important?
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A Road Not Chosen
by James H. Pence
Unlike most expectant fathers, I did not look forward to the sonogram. I dreaded it.
From the moment Laurel and I walked through the door of the specialist's office, an uneasy feeling crept through my stomach. The two-hour wait did not ease my fears. Now the doctor's apparent unwillingness to explain his findings only intensified my anguish. I would have given anything to be somewhere else that day.
How different that sonogram was from the first one. Only two weeks earlier we overflowed with joy, anticipating a brief look at our first child. We drove to the doctor's office, hardly able to conceal our excitement. In the darkened examining room, lit only by the cool light of a monitor, the obstetrician pointed out little hands and feet on the screen. We held hands and smiled when he told us we were going to have a little girl. Then, as the doctor moved the wand around, examining every detail of our baby's body, I noticed a small bump on the baby's head. The doctor made no mention of it. But he had seen it too.
"It's probably nothing," he said later, "but I'd like you to have a high resolution sonogram anyway. Nine times out of ten, these things don't amount to anything. I wouldn't worry about it."
Despite his reassuring words, when we left his office, our eagerness as new parents had evaporated. Only a gnawing fear remained. Perhaps the perfect child we prayed for might not be so perfect after all.
To finish reading this artlce, click here. |
Parent Tip
Practical Ways to Limit Video Games at Home
Pediatrics' recommendation that parents limit screen time to no more than two hours per day includes television, videos/DVDs, and video games. If your child currently plays several hours of video games each day, either through a video game console or handheld device, you'll want to put a plan in place to limit video games at home and replace that time with other activities. For example:
- Allow your child to play for a set number of minutes per day. For example, you might decide that twenty minutes per day is sufficient.
- Another alternative is to set two days out of the week as "video game" days. You might choose one weekend day and one weekday and find that the numbers, over the course of the week, even out.
- Bring handheld video games to social events only on special occasions. If the device accompanies every trip to a friend's house and each errand you run during the week, it's likely that your child is racking up quite a few hours of playing time.
- When your children's friends gather at your house, limit the amount of time they play video games. After twenty-thirty minutes of taking turns playing, suggest that the children move on to something else.
- Don't forget to include computer games when you're thinking about how much time your child spends on video games. Even the best educational games shouldn't be played continuously.
- Finally, talk to your child about why you want to reduce his or her screen time.
Reprinted with permission from the American Academy of Pediatrics |
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Center for Biblical Counseling
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McKinney, Texas 75069
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