getting ahead of ourselves are we?

it seems like in the last two weeks, everywhere i look people are talking about fall. and not just talking about it in the "i am so excited for it to finally get here" kinda way, but in the "all my tanks and shorts are put up and i am in my long sleeves bc it is fall" kind of way.

so i have been thinking: people... aren't we getting ahead of ourselves just a bit? the official date of fall beginning is september 22nd! and it is blazing hot outside still!! (well in my neck of the woods it is!)

but today the stark reality hit me... the 22nd of september is next week. as in a week from today. WHAT? we are one week away from the fall season of 2009?? where did this year go? after the shock of it settled down in my brain, i began getting super excited.

usually i only want spring and summer. but this year i am in love with the idea of fall. i dont know if it will live up to my expectations, but i sure hope so. the crisp briskness in the cool air, a light jacket, a warm drink from the bucks, the beautiful colored crispy leaves in my yard, and me in my hammock. fall, my love, come quickly... "the world waits with breath abated!" (can anyone guess that movie??)

Meal plan Monday... look familiar?

My week did not go as planned in the food department last week! We ended up having tons of leftovers at the beginning of the week from a potluck, that i did not expect. So this week looks very similar to my plan last week, because we have to make all the stuff i had bought! I guess thats life eh?

(Recipes are either linked or typed out below)

Breakfast: strawberry green smoothies (really liked them), cereal, fruit

Lunch: sandwiches, maybe leftovers

Dinner:

Monday: Creamy Chicken Spinach Pasta

Tuesday: Lemon Chicken w/ Green Beans and new potatoes

Wednesday: Dinner at Dustin's

Thursday: Steaks on the grill, mashed potatoes, broccoli

Friday: Crock Pot Chicken Parmesan

Saturday: Bunko!

Creamy Spinach pasta (by Debbie Reber)

3 cups uncooked pasta

1 lb. bulk Italian sausage ( I used cooked, cut up chicken breasts instead)

1 cup finely chopped onion

1 can (14 1/2 oz) Italian diced tomatoes, undrained

1 pkg. (10 oz.) frozen creamed spinach, thawed

1 pkg. ( 8 oz.) cream cheese, softened (I use neufchatel bc it is less fattening)

2 cups ( 8 oz.) shredded, part-skim mozzarella cheese, divided

1.Cook pasta according to package directions. Cook sausage & onion over medium heat until sausage is no longer pink, drain.

2.Stir together sausage (or chicken) , onions, tomatoes, spinach, cream cheese, and 1 cup of the mozzarella cheese.

3.Spoon in greased 9 x 12 baking dish.

4.Cover & bake at 350 for 35 minutes.

5.Uncover and sprinkle with remaining cheese & bake 10 minutes longer or until cheese is melted.

Head over to Org Junkie to see what others are cooking and get some new ideas!

the obstacle of prayerlessness

So I have been doing a beth moore bible study on my own lately, and i have been such a bad blogger about sharing what the Lord is teaching me thru it! todays lesson hit me like a ton of bricks though... bc prayer is a huge weakness of mine.

i have struggled at having a consistent prayer life my whole christian life. i have had streaks of good prayer journaling, prayer list making, sitting and praying aloud by myself, and praying prayers from guides or books. but nothing has ever stuck. enter my bible study today...

the title was "the obstacle of prayerlessness", and once i read it i knew i was in trouble! here is the paragraph i really wanted to share with you:

Often, we do everything but pray. We tend to want something more "substantial." Even studying the bible, going to church, talking to the pastor, or receiving counsel seems more tangible than prayer.... he [the enemy] would rather we do anything than pray... he'd rather see us study the Bible into the wee hours of the morning, because he knows we'll never have deep understanding and power to live what we have learned without prayer.

Beth Moore, Living Free pg 84

how many times i have justified my lack of focus on prayer by my 'passion' for the Word! how many times i have began talking with a friend about a circumstance to avoid talking to the Lord about it. i think any of us that struggle with prayer have made a million excuses to suppress the feeling we have that something is missing... part of the relationship is lacking.

there have been so many times when i have tried to work on this, but my main struggle is that my mind jumps to a million other thoughts and by the time i have realized it i have sat in my 'prayer time' for like twenty minutes not praying at all! enter my bible study again...

this study really focuses on praying God's word, scripture prayer. HOLLA! this is what i had been needing so badly! "the written Word of God expresses the mind of Christ more accurately than anything this side of heaven", so if i want to become like Christ then why not continually pray His Word? duh!

so i challenge you to try it today. pick a passage of scripture and pray it to the Lord. you can simply read the Words aloud to Him, paraphrase them for you, read a sentence then elaborate from your heart, do whatever works best for you. here are a few different scriptures we have done in this bible study to get you started: Joshua 24:15, Psalm 86, Psalm 18:31-35, Deut. 7:9, Eph 1:18-20, Ps 33:4, Luke 17:5, Isa 26:8, Prov 8:13, Col 3:12, 1 Pet 5:5, Neh 9:6, Job 36: 26-29...

Crock Pot Wednesdays!

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For this week's Crockpot Wednesday at Dining w/ Debbie, I am sharing one of my favorite crock pot recipes- Chicken and Dumplings! It is super easy and taste great.

4 or 5 Chicken Breasts

2 cans Cream of Chicken 98% Fat Free

1 cup water

1 cup celery

1 cup carrots

pinch of nutmeg

1 or 2 containers refrigerated biscuits

1. Place the chicken in the crockpot.

2. Pour celery and carrots over chicken.

3. Combine the soup, water and nutmeg. Pour over chicken and veggies.

4. Cook on low for 6-8 hours.

5. 30 minutes before done, cut biscuits into quarters and put into crock pot. Stir a few times during the 30 minutes.

6. Serve over mashed potatoes, rice or noodles. Yummy!

Its Mr.Pate's favorite.

" I love this bar... church?"

Yesterday, my pastor spoke on Gospel Community, basically what does it mean to be the church. He read the lyrics of a Toby Keith song called "I love this Bar", and here they are:

We got winners, we got losers

Chain smokers and boozers

And we got yuppies, we got bikers

We got thristy hitchhikers

And the girls next door dress up like movie stars

Hmm, hmm, hmm I love this bar

We got cowboys, we got truckers

Broken-hearted fools and suckers

And we got hustlers, we got fighters

Early birds and all-nighters

And the veterans talk about their battle scars

Hmm, hmm, hmm I love this bar

[Chorus:]

I love this bar

It's my kind of place

Just walkin' through the front door

Puts a big smile on my face

It ain't too far, come as you are

Hmm, hmm, hmm I love this bar

I've seen short skirts, we got high-techs

Blue-collar boys and rednecks

And we got lovers, lots of lookers

And I've even seen dancing girls and hookers

And we like to drink our beer from a mason jar

Hmm, hmm, hmm I love this bar

Yes I do

I like my truck (I like my truck)

I like my girlfriend (I like my girlfriend)

I like to take her out to dinner

I like a movie now and then

But I love this bar

It's my kind of place

Just trollin' around the dance floor

Puts a big smile on my face

No cover charge, come as you are

Hmm, hmm, hmm I love this bar

Hmm, hmm, hmm I love this bar

We got divorcees and a big bouncer man

An old jukebox and a real bad band

We got waitresses and we got barflies

A dumb-ass and a wise-guy

If you get too drunk just sleep out in your car

Reason number 672 why

Hmm, hmm, hmm I love this bar

Play it on out boys

Beer-thirty's over

Got to take it on home

Hmm, hmm, hmm I love this bar

I just love it

Definitely church talk, right? Ha! After he read it though, he asked the question "what if this was a song about the church? what if you replaced all the 'i love this bar' lines with 'i love this church'?? Seriously go do it... waiting...

wow. now i know the idea breaks down a little, but you get the picture. its not that often today that people love their church. and it is even less often that we have a diverse group of people at a church. sadly, alot of churches have begun to look like each other... no diversity in race, social statuses, economical statuses, age etc. this has to make us wonder, is this what the writer of Acts was talking about when he said "all the believers were together and had everything in common..."?

i dont think it was. when jesus prayed at the end of his life on earth, he prayed for future believers to be one just as He and God the Father are one. anyhow, this is a whole other theological issue... back to my point.

my heart was just broken for how we as the church are missing the point of biblical community. some other phrases that my pastor used which really challenged me:

"most of us want to do church instead of wanting to be church".

"you cannot have God be your Father if you wont have the Church as your mother." (he quoted this from someone else, but i didnt catch who)

i think lately i have just noticed that most of us Christians want to talk about loving community and how much we love our small groups or bible studies or whoever, but we are missing the point. Loving people we like is not going to make us stand out from the world. they dont have a problem loving people they are fond of either!

but loving people we dont easily like or get along with- that is a biblical community. look at the disciples. Jesus called together a smorgasbord of guys who would normally never associate with each other: fishermen (laborer or blue collar workers), a tax collector (greedy men who took $), a zealot (or political activist), and we arent even told what else. these guys would normally hate one another, but the lived and breathed life together while Jesus was on earth- and after.

now they fought. they tried to outdo one another. they messed up. but they stayed together, because they knew they were brothers in the Lord. brothers. family.

but we dont treat church like that today. we treat it like a place we go on weekends. we try to avoid the people we think are difficult, or we talk about them to such and such. we are so annoying (me included)!!!

this week i am challenging myself, and you (whoever you are) to love your difficult people. learn patience, kindness, goodness and self control through this. isnt that what we are supposed to be doing anyhow??

happy holiday! enjoy some challenging quotes too...

He who loves his dream of a community more than the Christian community itself becomes a destroyer of the latter, even though his personal intentions may be ever so honest and earnest and sacrificial.

—Dietrich Bonhoeffer

In the first century in Palestine, Christianity was a community of believers. Then Christianity moved to Greece and became a philosophy. Then it moved to Rome and became an institution. Then it moved to Europe and became a culture. And then it moved to America and became a business. We need to get back to being a healthy, vibrant community of true followers of Jesus.

—Pricilla Shirer