Today

Esther and I did this:

FUN.

Missing India

I have been. Not too much...but enough.
Then I found this picture (number 14 on the roll) on the nytimes.com website. And it made me smile.

Just another day at the office

My Wednesday looked a little something like this:

Last Sunday...

I went for a run which has become a normal part of life lately. I passed this older lady who was sitting in a rocking chair on her front porch. As I ran by her, I noticed that she had something resting in her lap across her knees. It was straight and long and for some reason I thought, Is that a gun? And then my thoughts went something like this: Oh my goodness...She has a gun! I wonder what the gun is for. I bet some guy broke her granddaughter's heart and now she's just sitting and waiting for him to come back around. A few minutes later after I made my loop, I saw the lady get up, take her cane from her lap and walk across the front porch. It wasn't a gun. It was a cane. Boy did I have that one all wrong.
On my Wednesday run, I saw a Blackberry that someone had apparently chucked out their window. I bet it was that granddaughter's ex-boyfriend...

A Good One

This past week/weekend was a good one. Filled with baseball, friends, songs of praise and celebration, bluegrass, lemonade, bare feet in the water, one dirty, wet dog, a little bike ride, and a lot of late nights, the only word to describe it is: good.

It was also a week full of reflection on the willing sacrifice of Jesus Christ, the Savior of the World. I've been reading this book called, Knowing God by J.I. Packer and he has this chapter called "The Love of God" that I was reading through last week. One of my favorite excerpts from that chapter is this:

So the love of God who is spirit is no fitful, fluctuating thing, as human love is, nor is it a mere impotent longing for things that may never be; it is, rather a spontaneous determination of God's whole being in an attitude of benevolence and benefaction, an attitude freely chosen and firmly fixed.

I think that "firmly fixed" phrase at the end is my favorite. What freedom there is in the firmly fixed love of Christ!

Below are pictures and a little video from the past week. Enjoy.

Gooooooo Tigers!

Me and Sara

Me, David, and Sara

Good Friday with Passion in Alpharetta, GA.

Passion: Good Friday

This is just a little clip of the Good Friday celebration put on by the Passion people (Louie Gigglio, Chris Tomlin, Christy Nockels, Kristian Stanfill, Matt Redman). A huge thanks to David and Jimmy for inviting Krystal and me along!

Krystal and me at the Bluegrass concert

Bluegrass Under the Stars 2010!

Megan and Elizabeth

Doug, Shelley, and Doug's mom

Tiffany and Josh

My sister, Amelia, and me on Easter

Traveling Light

The title... There's this song that I've loved for a long time called "Traveling Light." It's by Joel Hanson and Sara Groves and it's a really great song about laying our burdens down and...wait for iiiiiit...traveling light. If you check out the link, try to ignore the semi (very) cheesy video and listen to the words.

There's one explanation of the title. Also...

I heard a sermon about a year ago from Dr. David Platt (The Church at Brook Hills, Birmingham, AL) and he taught from Matthew 11:28-30 which says this:

Come to me, all who are weary and burdened and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.

I had heard this passage before but the way that Dr. Platt explained it really changed my thinking about how I walk through this life. The basic gist of it was that when farmers put oxen in a yoke, they usually put a strong ox with a weak ox so that the stronger one can guide the weaker one and show him how it's done. When we enter into this yoke with Christ, He is obviously the stronger of the two of us and our job is only to relax in the yoke with Him, learn from Him, and let Him direct us and carry the burden. For a long time in my life, I didn't do this. I did a lot of stuff for the Lord, thinking I could somehow encourage Him to bless me more and like me more if I did a lot. What arrogance on my part. This is not how He works at all. Since this revelation, I've tried to live in the truth of that reality and simply relax in the yoke with Him and travel light through this little life.

I'll end with this: Traveling light will be a life-long goal and will hopefully be reflected in a life that seeks to take very little, give a lot away (both things with which I still struggle) and keep life wonderfully simple.

*Just a side-bar here: I did have a blog before this which I used to chronicle two years of unbelievable life in India. If you're ever bored, you can check it out here.*

Reasons...

Everyone has their reasons for blogging, I guess. I'll explain mine here...

First, when Elizabeth Hughes "asks" you to do something, sometimes, it's good to do it. Because I don't like to say "no" to her all of the time (only most of the time), I've decided to humor her on this one. Also, she asked repeatedly and put it on a list. I felt obligated. I guess I could have titled this post "Reason..." because, well, that's the only one I've got.

I've never really felt that I have very much good stuff to say and I have this ridiculous standard that If someone's going to take the time to read it or if I'm going to take the time to write it, it should, at least, be life-changing. Let me go ahead and preemptively apologize. This blog will not be life-changing. It will probably not be day-changing or moment-changing. It will probably just be...and I hope that's enough (for all two of you that read it).