Who won that baseball game?

My son, Kyle loves to play baseball.  He is currently playing in Little League on the Colorado Rockies team.  This team has had so many come-from-behind victories, we have somewhat of a reputation.  We are currently in the tournament, which means that the season continues until we lose two games or win the tournament.  Winning the tournament is probably not going to happen because there is a truly phenomenal team that plays with precision and has soundly beaten us every time we have played them.  Tonight, we played another really great team.  Three weeks ago, they were unbeaten and had beaten us soundly in our first face-off.  The second time, however, we tied them when our catcher tagged the winning runner stealing home for the final out.  We celebrated.  And then we won on our third face off.  So we came into this game with essentially a stalemate.

Now one of the reasons I believe in God is because He sometimes talks to me, though not in a physical voice.  Usually it is in little nudges of thoughts that I could never in a million years think of myself.  Tonight, as I was driving Kyle to practice before the game, a thought entered my head to pray with Kyle over the game (I know, if I was a REALLY good Christian, I would have been praying before every game.  I still need God's grace).  We talked about who REALLY decides the outcomes of games--us or God?  I told Kyle that I believed that it is God who ultimately determines the outcomes of games.

"The lot is cast into the lap, but its every decision is from the LORD."  
Proverbs 16:33


So we prayed.  We prayed that the boys would play their best, that they would be safe and that, whatever the outcome, they would be satisfied with how they played.  Now I don't think God really cares about the outcome of any games, because they are so transitory and, in the grand scheme of things, inconsequential.  However, I do believe that He loves to remind us that He is there for us in little things as well as the big things and to provide concrete memorials of times when He showed us His love or His power or His grace so that later, when we are in a time of doubt, we can remember His faithfulness at that one time and remember that...

"I the LORD do not change...."  --Malachi 3:6a.


And now back to the game....
It is the top of the fifth inning.  The Rockies start the fifth inning in the hole 5-10.  They are up to bat first as the home team.  Under normal circumstances, the most a team can score in the inning is six runs.  The umpire has called "final inning," which sets the following rule into play:  Teams play and score until three outs are made.  We get four runs before a player gets a second out.  The kids in our bullpen start chanting:  "Two-out rally, here we go."  Seriously, so many times, whether it is our team or the opposing team, all the runs seems to happen after  that second out is made.  And it happens now.  A new pitcher walks four kids in a row, driving us one point ahead.  Then the next batter hits one that bounces over the pitcher's head AND over the second baseman's head and rolls way out into center field.  All four runners score.  Yay!  We have it!  It is in the bag!  Or so we think.  One of the parents remembers a rule that the inning has to finish before time is called at two hours from start time. If the game is called in the middle of an inning, the score from the previous inning is what is used for the final game results.  So even if we score more runs, if we can't get the other team out in time, they win 10-5.  Isn't THAT a crummy rule?  Yes, I knew you would agree with me.  I was very vocal in decrying that rule.  At this point, someone has told the coaches, so that the next batter is instructed to swing at all pitches to strike out as quickly as possible.  The top of the inning is over with only three to five minutes before the game will be called and all of the hard work of our boys will come to nothing.

How often has an inning lasted only three minutes?  Hardly ever.  And the other team worked very hard to be as slow as possible  until the umpire started calling them out.  Totally forgetting the prayer I prayed in the van, I stomped over to my friend, whose son had won his game 30 minutes ago, fuming at such a stupid rule.  I am in the middle of explaining it when our team makes its first out on a weak grounder to first base.  The player hit the ball on the first pitch.  Less than a minute later, our team caught a fly ball hit by the second batter for the second out.  Everyone holds their breath.  The third batter connected on his first swing and hit it to the second baseman, who made a gentle throw to the first basemen for the third out.  Everyone on the Rockies jump to their feet in astonishment and joy.  The "impossible" had happened!  I started shaking and crying and  felt pretty ashamed of myself for the little temper tantrum I demonstrated in front of everyone and my pitiful memory.

Once again, I don't think God really cared who won the game.  I don't think our team is any more deserving of winning the game than the other team.  However, am pretty sure that God did it because He loves to see the impossible happen because it builds up our faith.  Why do I think that?  He gave a woman her first child when she was 90+ years old (Genesis 18, 21); He defeated a city with high, strong walls by having His people walk around singing worship songs (Joshua 6); He had 300 soldiers whose qualifications were that they scooped water to drink it from a pond beat a much bigger, stronger army by breaking pots, lighting torches, blowing horns and shouting (Judges 7);  Heck, one time, He didn't even let His people do anything--He just had the invading army somehow go off the deep end and kill one another (2 Chronicles 14);  The Bible is full of stories of God making the impossible happen.  And He is still at work, whether it is dropping money in people's lap or making a determined atheist like C.S. Lewis into one of His children and one of the greatest apologists of the 20th century or having a little league team in a desert city come from behind and win against huge odds.  We see difficult situations and,  in our lack of faith, keep saying "Impossible!" and God turns to us and says, "You keep using that word.  I do not think it means what you think it means."

"Jesus looked at them and said, “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.”--Matthew 19:26

To God alone be the glory!

OH Happy Day!

Several years ago, when we were still living in Illinois, my kids over a period of time confessed their sins and asked Jesus to be their Savior and their Lord.  I led at least two of them in that prayer--whatever you want to call it.  Right before we moved to Arizona, my oldest was baptized in the same church in which she was (figuratively) born and (literally) dedicated to God and she is now starting to make this faith her own as a soon-to-be teenager.  Today, Kyle and Jessi took their next step of making their faith their own in getting baptized in our new church, Redemption West Mesa.  My husband had the honor of asking them to confirm their faith and of dunking them.  My feelings on the matter can be summed up by the Steve Fee song, "Oh Happy Day (You Washed My Sins Away)

Oh happy day, happy day!

You washed my sins away.

Oh happy day, happy day!

I'll never be the same.

Forever I am changed!

My apologies for the poor quality of the pictures.  I forgot my regular camera and had only my iPhone.  As I get better pictures, I might update this site.  

Kyle before baptism, answering questions about his faith.  Note the death grip on the sides of the tub.

Preparing to be dunked!  Note the death grip on his dad's hands.

Reborn!  A new Kyle!

Jessi before baptism

Preparing to be dunked!

Reborn!  A new Jessi!

"Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come."
2 Corinthians 5:17


(Jesus said) "My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one can snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all; no one can snatch them out of my Father’s hand."  John 10:27-29

April Game On! Results

I may not have mentioned it, but my beautiful, awesome SIL organized another Game On!  competition for the month of April.  This time, we tried having teams of people.  With the team concept, you average the scores of each team member, which means that you can have a team of two competing against a team of three.  It meant more work for her because she had to compute the averages.  I was on her team, along with another lady, who persevered through a lot of family crises which would be encouraging me to reach for the big tub of ice cream.  Just for that, she is a winner in my book.  Of course, there are more important things that losing weight.  Our team came in second, but we all lost weight, which makes the loss "hurt so good."  I am down 15 pounds overall.

This month was a little tougher.  All the foods that were so new last month were getting old this month.  I had to tell myself what I tell my kids when they get tired of something:  "If you were living in Africa, your meal would most likely be the same thing."  I don't know if this is exactly true, though we did read a book about the Sudenese lost boys and how they were given the same thing from the U.N. on their last journey to Kenya, but even after having the same thing, whenever they wanted to grumble, they remembered when they had to go hungry and became thankful for the "same old thing."

My body is now getting used to 20 minutes of exercise six days a week and seemed to be unimpressed with my efforts.  So I am trying to work out a little longer and go for a run/walk for at least 30 minutes one day a week.  I am now running for two minutes and walk for one.  I progressed in the Hi-intensity workout, too.  I was able to do 4 reps of 30 jumping jacks, 30 lunges, 12 army-style push-ups and 25 crunches without stopping.  On one of the last day of exercising for the game, I was able to  touch my nose to my knees during my yoga sequence.  I never thought I would be able to do it.  However, I also think I pulled a stomach muscle doing it because I was sucking in my stomach with all my strength and when I went down into a plank pose, I felt a sharp pain in my lower stomach.  That ended my yoga session (I refuse to call it a practice) within minutes of starting it.  I also know why they call it a "core muscle group" as walking and standing and getting up out of bed were a little more uncomfortable for a few days.

In terms of clothes, I don't have too many things hanging off of me, but they are getting loose when I put them on, fresh out of the laundry.  Some people might wonder why they aren't loose, but I have to confess that the clothes were getting quite tight before I began this, which was the primary impetus for joining the competition in the first place.  I was tired of always having to buy a size up because they felt a little loose and then, eventually, fitting into them, which led to them becoming tight.

The biggest victory is emotional.  I had been feeling vanquished by my stomach.  I had tried to eat less on my own, but only was able to focus for a few weeks at a time.  Then, my old habits would start luring me back and I would be worse off than before I started.  I also feel that sugar's power over me is less than it was.  Though I have had a couple of bad sugar days on my days off, they aren't as bad as my "regular" sugar days before this.  My emotional state, when PMS is not taking control of me, is much calmer in general and I am less flustered by the little things, probably because one of the requirements is sleep and my body is not stressed out by sugar.

The only negative I have about the game is the fact that they have you try and take on a new, good habit and lose an old, bad habit.  Isn't it enough that I am trying to change habits involving eating, exercise, sleep and water?

I will be visiting Minnesota, where my all my in-laws live this summer and hope to see all the ladies I competed with and against while I am there.

Praise be to God for giving me the strength to continue.

Seeing God in Dirty Water

I hate mops.  All they do is push dirt to the outside edges.  They leave too much water on the floor and they don't save THAT much time. They are breeding grounds for all sorts of critters.  I am not a clean freak by any stretch of the imagination, but if something doesn't work, I don't want to use it.  So, in Illinois, I got down on my hands and knees and washed the non-carpeted floors almost every week.  It was no big deal because the only non-carpeted floor was the small kitchen and our tiny bathrooms.

In our house in Arizona, the situation is entirely different.  Tile is king in Arizona because it stays cool during those summer months when you ecstatically praise God for days when the low dips below 100.  Even when the pool water soars to bathwater temperatures, our tile will still be cool.  When we bought our house, which I LOVE btw, I was not clearly thinking about the cleaning situation.  Nearly the whole house has tiled floors, beautifully designed.  Washing all the floors on my hands and knees was out of the question, so I searched for an alternative to mops.  Swifter looked promising, but I didn't like the landfill issues it would create.  I have to atone for all the disposable diapers I contributed to "Grayslake Mountain" (a.k.a. the landfill) during the baby years. I found a Swifter-like tool that had a washable cover which seemed to fit the bill.  Yes, it is better than a mop and even does a good job of cleaning a floor quickly.  But it isn't "perfect".  It can't get the dirt that runs in terror into the tiny ridges of our textured tile for protection.  Now some people might have looked at the brown "marbling" and thought it was part of the tile pattern, but I knew the truth and the truth was starting to bother me.  So last Friday, I decided to pull out the big guns and wash at least the hallways (see pictures) with a small bucket of cleaning solution, a scrub brush and a rag to pick up the excess water on my hands and knees.  There was one problem:  I only reached a third of the way down the long hallway before the water became very dirty. As I worked for a few minutes longer, wondering if some of the dirt particles were bribing the scrub brush to let them return to their former home, a Bible verse fragment popped into my head (Biblegateway.com at a later time allowed me to look up the exact phrase)


"All of us have become like one who is unclean, 
   and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags; 
we all shrivel up like a leaf, 
   and like the wind our sins sweep us away."
Isaiah 64:6


You can't clean a dirty floor with dirty water.  It needs to be changed, in my case, about four times before the job was done.  And I can't clean myself up by doing good things.  The good things I do don't remove the bad things I have done.  If anything, my bad deeds soil my good deeds.  I need someone else to clean me up and that person is Jesus.  It takes his blood covering me to wash away my evil, just like I needed clean water and solution to get the floors truly clean.  


You would think a "mature" Christian like myself wouldn't need these reminders, but "man is a giddy thing" and I can forget to put a new roll of TP in the bathroom in the course of washing my hands, especially if one of the kids is trying to talk to me through the door because I can always hear them because they can't wait another second for something that is "vitally important."  This is probably the 10,000th time He has given me this lesson and I am finally starting to catch on quicker and put it into practice.  


The importance of this lesson is that without understanding His grace, I can not pass it onto the people He puts in my life, who are just as unclean as I am.   And I do believe that God wants us to pass His grace onto the people He has put into our lives (Matthew 18:21-35,  James 2:12-13) so that they experience and know His grace.  I used to be pretty bad at this, but I am getting better, thanks to His lessons. 


"There is hope for me yet because God won't forget all the plans He's made for me.  I have to wait and see...He's not finished with me yet." (Brandon Heath, "Wait and See" from his album "What if We")

Getting Blind Sided

Fifteen or so years ago, Susan Ashton came out with an album that I love called "Distant Call."  One of the songs on it that particularly resonated with me is called "Blind Side."

Clear to the left, clear to the right
Without a sound it came around
Hit me on the blind side
Look to the front, look to the back
Down for the count I'll tell you how
It hit me on the blind side.
And though I could see
The truth staring right at me
Well I did not ready myself
For the blind side

That is sometimes how I feel about sin, especially the habitual sins that have worn a groove in our souls because they are our "go to" sins.  I have a list of those sins.  The one I am battling right now is food related--letting food be my comforter and my escape hatch.  Another one that I have been battling for a while is perfectionism, which is a very pretty word for a very ugly sin--pride.  These sins feel like security blankets--"blankies."  However, when God gives me a glimpse of them, I see them for what they really are--spiked chains dragging me away from Him, leaving wounds that only He can heal in me and in others.  Then I start taking them off, usually needing His help and definitely needing His grace, wondering how they grew back from the last time I laid them at His feet.

Last week, I was in the middle of a different battle.  This battle had blindsided me because I thought I God had won the last battle sufficiently enough that it had received a death blow.  It turns out that it was only mostly dead.  But God was good.  I cried out to Him and He helped me through it.  He didn't take me out of it and He didn't give me the power to overcome it, but the grace of Jesus covers it and there is where we have ultimate victory.  Maybe this particular war is in it's death throes but I will still have skirmishes until I get to be with Jesus in heaven.

But for that very reason I was shown mercy so that in me, the worst of sinners, Christ Jesus might display his unlimited patience as an example for those who would believe on him and receive eternal life. Now to the King eternal, immortal, invisible, the only God, be honor and glory for ever and ever. Amen.  1 Timothy 1:16-17

Happy Tax Day

Today is the day that taxes are due.  Hopefully everyone knows this because for the past three months, you have seen somebody, usually a man, dressed up in a cheap Statue of Liberty costume waving a sign inviting you to let them do your income taxes (for a small fee) every five miles.  If you live in a state where you DON'T see this, consider yourself lucky. All I know is that this tax preparation company is in both Arizona and Illinois.

It has been four weeks since we sent in all the correct paperwork to Illinois clarifying my husband's employment status three years ago, when he was laid off and NOT working.  We have yet to receive any acknowledgement from the Illinois Department of Incompetency Unemployment  Office regarding the status of our Federal Income Tax refund, which they confiscated in a misunderstanding initiated by my husband's former employer nearly three years ago.  I wonder if they moved and didn't leave a forwarding address?

Pardon the snark, but there have been several items in the news that make it clear American's trust in the government is horribly misplaced.  This is just a string in a long line of offences that seems to cross political parties.  The "Great Society Program" was supposed to eliminate poverty and it hasn't.  The Social Security program was supposed to take care of retirees and yet, it is facing bankruptcy, no matter how much politicians try to torture the numbers to make them say something different.  How many different laws have been passed since the Stock Market collapse of 1920 to prevent economic disasters and skulldudgery?  The problem with all of these programs is not that the idea is bad, but that they were developed and administered by imperfect human beings.  So I did a little research on the cabinet positions, when they were established, under what President, they were established and how much money they are asking from taxpayers for fiscal year 2013.

	Year Est. as Cabinet Pos.	President	2013 Requested Budget (in millions)
Dept. of Treasury*	1789	Washington	$13
Dept. of Interior	1849	Polk, J.	$174
Dept. of Commerce	1903	Roosevelt, T.	$7,500
Dept. of Labor	1913	Wilson	$17,000
Dept. of Energy	1977	Carter	$27,000
Dept. of Justice*	1789	Washington	$27,100
Dept. of Housing/Urban Dev.	1965	Johnson, L.	$44,000
Secretary of State	1789	Washington	$51,600
Dept of Homeland Security	2003	Bush, G.W.	$59,000
Dept. of Education	1979	Carter	$69,800
Dept. of Transportation	1966	Johnson, L.	$74,000
Dept. of Veterans Affairs	1988	Reagan	$140,300
Dept. of Ag.	1862	Cleveland	$155,000
Dept. of Defense*	1947	Roosevelt, F. (1)	$613,900
Dept. of Health & Human Serv.	1953	Eisenhower	$940,000
Total Cabinet Level Expenses			$2,226,387

To get this information, I merely googled "2013 Budget for the __________".  Some departments presented their information up front and then justified their existence, some spent pages upon pages justifying their existence before presenting their information.  The Department of Housing and Urban Development was the worst.  Here are just a few notes to explain data that may appear mystifying:

1.  The Department of Defense as it exists, was established in 1947 to combine the different branches of the armed forces.  George Washington had a Secretary of the War and John Adams added a Secretary of the Navy, since he had been in charge of developing the Navy during the Revolutionary War.

2.  Washington had an Attorney General, not a Department of Justice.

3.  The Department of Veterans Affairs became a cabinet position under Reagan, though something like it operated since 1811.

4.  Lincoln established the Department of Agriculture, but it didn't become a cabinet position until Grover Cleveland's presidency.

5. The Department of Health and Human Services has undergone many organizational changes.  It used to have the Department of Education under its wing until that Department became a separate entity under Carter's administration.  HHS has the FDA, the Welfare system, Medicare/Medicaid, Centers for Disease Control and National Institute of Health, among other agencies.  This is why it's budget is bigger the the DoD.

This doesn't cover Presidential expenses or other expenses authorized by Congress.  That is another $1.5 Billion dollars.  So that is how part of your tax money is being spent.  Happy Tax Day!

Second Session of Game On!: Exercise

KT has organized a second session of the Game On! program and this time, we formed teams.  I am on her team with another lady.  I am down ten pounds, 20% of what I need to lose.  I have traveled this road before only to gain it all back after losing my focus.  This time it is not going to happen.  I have a feeling that several people in Minnesota are planning on playing several more games.  I probably need about five or six more game (28 days each) to get down to my ideal weight.

Before I started the first session, my exercise involved walking the dog, leisurely.  I had tried yoga at a downtown Mesa studio and enjoyed it, but the kids' schedules got in the way.  I never felt like I had the time to exercise because I had in my mind that I had to work out long and hard.  And then, sometimes after exercising several weeks, I would have problems of getting too tired because I was working too hard.  One of the major components of the Game On! program is exercising six times a week for at least 20 minutes a day.  Food is worth 30 points a day, but you can mess up a meal and only be out six points.  Exercise is worth 20 points and is an all or nothing deal.  So missing exercise will impact your points in a big way.  You do get one day off of exercise, meaning that you get the points for not doing the exercise.  So I had to figure out a way to exercise six days a week.  First of all, knowing that I only had to work out for twenty minutes was a big mental breakthrough.  I can definitely find twenty minutes in my schedule.  

The website for Game On! has some ideas for exercises.  One of them was the Hi Intensity Interval training.  They used running as an example, but I have also used it for riding my bicycle.  It involves doing something at a high pace and then at a lower pace.  Most of the time, I strap on running shoes and alternate between walking and running around the neighborhood.  The first month, I would walk for a minute and run for a minute.  I had a route that took about 25 minutes to complete with the last few minutes reserved as a cool down period.  I used it bicycling, too, cycling at a 15-18 mph pace for a minute or two and then slowing down to a 12-14 mph pace.  That is a little harder because, as a former bicycling enthusiast, I feel the need to get my gear on and I usually have to check the tires and such.  So running and walking are my more typical work out.

I also like yoga as a low impact exercise.  It stretches and strengthens at the same time.  But once again, I can't afford, time-wise to go to a class.  So I started checking out digital videos from my public library.  My other SIL, Kristi, who is an avid yoga practicer, told me about a website, www.yogadownloads.com for different videos.  They have a lot of 20 minute classes that can be downloaded as audio files for free. I had just enough experience from attending a class to feel comfortable.  I will usually do this twice a week.

The last exercise I do once a week is also on the Game On! site, called the High Intensity training.  It is almost pure strength training and is better if you just read the program here.  It once again involves strapping on shoes.  When I first started, I could barely finish the first repetition of exercises and my whole body screamed at me for days whenever I moved.  Now, it whimpers a little bit.  I make sure to stretch out well after each repetition.  This also takes me the longest time.

Sometimes, I am tired and so instead of yoga or anything involving the words "hi intensity", I make sure to walk my dog twenty minutes at a 15 min-mile pace.  Because he wants to sniff at things, mark his territory and sometimes leave a deposit for me to clean up, my official pace is less than that, but all that matters is the twenty minutes and brisk pace.  

This week has been hard.  It was getting in the 90's in mid-afternoon here and that means the bedrooms, which are upstairs, got pretty warm, too.  I hadn't been sleeping well.  Fortunately, a cool front came through bringing highs back into the lower 80's (Thank you God!), delaying the inevitable for a while longer. However, I have kept on so that I don't let my team mates down and feel stronger for it.

"But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ."
1 Corinthians 15:57