Our gifts

Our church last month did a sermon series on Spiritual gifts. This included serving in the church and out and along with this sermon you could go online and take the spiritual gifts test. I have always known my spiritual gift was hospitality and as I took the quiz it was once again confirmed, but it was a surprise to see also that I scored high in the administration gift. I know that I like to have people over and to plan get togethers and such but I just always thought that fell under the hospitality gift but I guess it also goes with administration, which makes sense too.

I recently read about Hospitality and what it looks like in the Bible and this is just a bit of what I've found is the true meaning of hospitality...

Romans tells us "to share with god's people who are in need. practice hospitality."

Hospitality in the Strong's concordance is translated as 'entertaining strangers.' like abraham did when he entertained angels.

Titus says to be hospitable, love what is good,which translets to being fond of guests, and it implies strangers.
It's speaking love to others, love being always looking out for the good of others.

And then this sermon just kind of summed it up for me and my spiritual gift and how it's to be used practically...


"Exploring the meaning of and need for hospitality."


"Our society is beleaguered with business, people too swamped with their own to-do lists or their family needs to reach past their own front doors and invite people into their lives, the problem isn't our inability to provide a decent meal. It's our priorities! When have we looked out past our living room windows to the needs around us? This isn't only about reaching out to our neighbors or our community. It's about our heart attitudes. Do we LONG to serve others? Do we rejoice in reaching out? Are we loving each other by our actions? Let us contemplate our hearts and whether we should, in fact, offer up first our attitudes and then our homes to serve one another."

Here is a test you can take to see which spiritual gift you have and then find ways to serve. I have taken my gift and used it on our church's mothers group-iMom! I'm the hospitality coordinator and it really does feel good to serve and use my gift in this way. In the past I've used this gift as the Women's Ministry Kitchen Coordinator for our huge Christmas event- last year I was in charge of the food for about 600 people! Wow! It was amazing and so great to see how God could use me and my gift to serve so many people for HIM!



http://www.spiritualgiftstest.com/index.php?option=com_wrapper&view=wrapper&Itemid=3

What is your gift and how can you use it to best serve Him? I'd love to hear from you!

This is another wonderful quiz I've come across. I've read the Five Love Languages book by Gary Chapman and it's wonderful.
They also have one for kids that I have on my list of books to read soon. If you haven't read, heard about or know what love language(s) you are, please take this test. This is a great way to truly show love to those around you! It doesn't just have to be a spouse either. Everyone receives love in a certain way so learn those ways and you'll complete them in a way that might not even know was missing.

LOVE LANGUAGES QUIZ


http://edified.org/myspace/lovelanguage

School = fundraisers

So, Zoe has been in Kindergarten for 1 month and 5 days now and we've already had 2 fundraisers-2!! This doesn't count the smencils they are selilng at school that we've bought too. Now, I'm sure that these fundraisers are all for a good cause, but for kindergartners this basically is a job for moms! So, for the past 2 days I've been selling pasta... this isn't normal pasta this is fun shaped pasta- they have KU, KState, Iowa and other college teams as well. They have horses, ballerinas, basketballs, Christmas, St. Patty's Day, birthdays etc... see here for all the great choices. The quota we were encouraged to sell is 12... now the last fundraiser "we" sold 6 things, yesterday alone doing the same thing as I did last fundraiser "we" managed to sell 41 bags of pasta! Wow! I didn't really even try, but obviously this fundraiser is a winner, I mean who wouldn't want pasta in fun shapes, right? Especially when it has a shelf life of 24 months! So, if you want any pasta then let me know or even better if you or your school needs a great fundraiser this is the one!

My Hero

Finally!! The wedding came and went and it went beautifully! The kids all cooperated, the church looked beautiful and best of all the happy couple are now officially man and wife!

The girls were flower girls, along with 7 of their cousins and boy were they cute! The music started and the older girls walked down then Zoe and Lexi holding hands were next to come down the aisle and they were happy and weren't walking too fast and were really doing great as they made it into our seats... then a pause... and we look up and the last 3 little girls have froze in their spots about a 1/3 of the way up the aisle... what to do... do parents just jump up and get them? Well... let me tell you what happened... Lexi saw them freeze and I saw them freeze and I thought... Lexi did great, let's see if she'll go get them... so I told her to go hold their hands and bring them on up and she actually did it!! Yeah!! Very few times in her young life has she actually done something this brave, but I was soo proud of her! So here's the HERO shot of the night... she's the one on the right (sorry not a great picture). Seems she got the cousin on the left moving pretty fast just by being there! yeah Lexi!!!

She brought up two of the girls and got them out of their frozen state, but the third little girl just stood there so I sent Lexi back down, but alas, this girl wasn't budging! So, Lexi just came back up the aisle dejected that the last cousin wouldn't come with her but with a little pick me up- literally from Uncle Johnny for the little one, the aisle was finally clear for the BEATIFUL bride! The rest of the wedding went off without a hitch- well just the good kind of hitched!




The best part of the night other then being told over and over again how precious, cute, brave etc... the girls were, was the surprise that Regan set up for Esther. Seems Esther really wanted a dance, but it just didn't happen so it was planned by him and some friends that at the send off the friends would sing and play the guitar while Esther and Regan slow danced in a ring of candles! It was beautiful and Esther was soo happy to get her dance! Congrats to the happy couple! Thanks for giving us and the girls this wonderful experience!

Great Expectations!

As I mentioned yesterday I am now the trash women in our household. I've considered for a minute that I might be a little hard-headed! Ok, some might say just downright stubborn and trash has been one of those things I've been a little persnickity about, but I really held out hope b/c my loving husband has shown in the past that a little persistance can pay off. See, after a day of cleaning my house-bathroom included, my darling husband came home and mentioned how I'm not very good at deep cleaning the bathroom and honestly after so much work cleaning one of the dirtiest rooms of the house I took offense to that and explained to my husband that if he thought I didn't do a good job then he could do it from then on out- and he has, so see I had a glimmer of hope that he'd take over trash duty too, but no such luck, but no worries because I'm still holding out hope that he'll comment on the dishes or dinner : )

I am women!!

I love my husband, but he will never be the man I expected in every way that doesn't mean he's not even more so the man that I expected him to be but for us one way my expectations have exceded my husband is the trash...... who's job is it to take out? I think the mans job, he assumes the womens... well we all know he's wrong, but ya know what? I'm not sure how to convince him of this and after 7 years of trash wars in our house where the trash can overflowth I've finally decided that I can be the trash women! I CAN do this! I CAN empty the trash can! Do I want to? no, of course not, but ya know what? I've learned as a mom it doesn't matter if I want to do it or not sometimes we do things because we have to and I'm learning this is one of those 'have to' things! So, I can empty the trash can, there will be no more trash wars in my kitchen! I will empty out the can and really why not? After all...I am women, hear me roar.... as I try to fit all our trash out the back door!!

Life is like a puzzle

Sometimes I struggle with needing a new perspective on why God does what He does or what he allows to happen and today I ran across this word picture on putting a new spin on how to view it.

Life is like a puzzle and God holds the pieces. Every piece has a place, and when all the pieces are in His puzzle, He will return again for His children.

Happy Wednesday!

Mothering Counts

I am the hospitality coordinator for our iMom group (it's kinda like MOPS) at our church. That means I'm in charge of the ice breaker games, table decorating and such! I'm really looking forward to our first meeting Thursday morning. I'm also really nervous! Public speaking is not my thing and I've been having a nervous stomach already this morning and I'm not even there yet, but I'll survive! As I was reviewing my icebreaker for it yesterday I realized it's just not a good choice, so I have revized my plans and come up with this game! I'm really excited about it and the best part is the winning group will get a cupcake from our local cupcake shop featured on Food Network- Daddy Cakes. So, the game is called Mothering Counts and this is how it goes.... the fastest group to answer all these questions will win the amazing prize. So, let's see how fast everyone here can do it. Let me know how it goes. I know it's a group game, but give it a go by yourself or challenge your husband or at your next girls night out. If nothing else it'll be great to remember what fun it is to be a mother!



List



1 thing everyone in your group has in common

2 of your favorite places to shop

3 articles of clothing you are most comfortable in

4 new years' resolutions you have already broke

5 reasons you have been late for an appointment

6 things that go bump in the night that wake you but not your husband

7 excuses your kids have given for not eating their food

8 items commonly found in your car

9 movies you love to watch together as a family

10 reasons you love being a mother