Easter.
How I love this day. It symbolizes everything we desperately need but can never attain on our own. Redemption, power over sin, forgiveness, hope and life eternal. Glory to God. He is risen! He is risen indeed!
Our pastor brought a fantastic sermon from 1 Corinthians 15 about the resurrection of the dead...how without Jesus' being raised to life, we certainly will not be either. It was a perfect Word for today. I'm so grateful for uncompromising Truth that is proclaimed each and every week at our church. For staff who live what they say and for a husband who gently and capably leads by example. I don't deserve such blessing, yet He has given it.
I've been pondering a lot this weekend about life and death and all that comes with it. A friend I used to work with in TX died on Friday after having only found out 15 weeks ago that she had kidney cancer. Pictures of her from Christmas were beautiful...and from last week, were unbelievable. I would never in a hundred years guessed it was her. And so I've just been praying for her {for weeks} and crying over her death this weekend. The thought that she met Jesus face to face and that her faith is sight.
Because of the resurrection.
Because repentance and faith were purchased for us on Good Friday. Sometimes I get so sidetracked by the wonderful thought that my forgiveness was bought by His blood. But without the repentance and faith that He secured that day as well, forgiveness would be for naught. And it was purchased for my friend too...
Happy Easter, y'all. I hope yours has been as reflective and beautiful as ours.
We enjoyed a big lunch at home with the kiddies after church and then headed out to let Joel and Gabe enjoy their little gifts. We don't do baskets anymore {not that there's anything wrong with it!}, I just got a bit weary of it and the older the girls get, the easier it was to just give them a little something {kinda like on Valentine's Day} and let that be that. Easter isn't about temporal gifts any more than Christmas is. And we want to be careful for that to never be the focus with our babies. So we get them a little something each year and give it to them after lunch.
The girls loved their $10 gift cards...with a pack of gum. Lol. They are kinda over chocolate bunnies. And Honey is always good to get them their favorite candy for Easter {along with their obsessions...new iPhone and iPod cases. :) }. So they got gift cards and gum from us. And they were stoked. Funny girls.
Joel has been lamenting that his bow was broken {cheapy bow and arrow set}. So we snagged him a new Nerf kind of bow and arrow thingy this weekend. Oh, my. We did well with this. He LOVED it.
And Gabe? This boy loves him some balls. It's one of the few words he can say really well and so we bought him an orange ball. To which he smiled and promptly pushed his lunch plate away and pulled his bib off as if to say, "I'm finished here! I'll be taking that ball now!" with his sweet arms outstretched.
Here are a few {insert hysterical laughter at the sarcasm} obligatory pictures from before we left for church. Jase always leaves waaaay before we do, so he wasn't here. :( But like every year, I just had to snag some. Even if Joel was sporting his best Chandler Bing smile! I've been literally itching to grab my camera and shoot. It's just been so cold and dreary. I realized yesterday that I didn't even have a March 2013 folder on my Mac. Sad. So happy spring is here!
God love these babies.
Easter, always more than Christmas, makes me all sappy about my babies.
The realization that we were "far off" as the Scriptures say and that we were enemies of God breaks my heart in light of what He did for us. And we were His creation. His own. Yet were were far off...dishonoring Him. And yet He came to pay our ransom.
How I love my Jesus. How I love these children. And how I want so much for them to follow hard after Him all of their days. Because He is risen!
