Love God more

As I was reading "Passion and Purity" by Elizabeth Elliot, I came across this Christina Rossetti poem:

Trust me, I have not earned your dear rebuke,
I love, as you would have me, God the most;
Would lose not Him, but you, must one be lost,
Nor with Lot's wife cast back a faithless look,
Unready to forego what I forsook;
This say I, having counted up the cost,
This, though I be the feeblest of God's host,
The sorriest sheep Christ shepherds with His crook.

Yet while I love my God the most, I deem
That I can never love you over-much;
I love Him more, so let me love you too;
Yea, as I apprehend it, love is such
I cannot love you if I love not Him,
I cannot love Him, if I love not you.

It reminded me of what Elizabeth Prentiss says in "Stepping Heavenward" when someone accuses her of loving her children too much:

You cannot love your children too much. You simply love God more.

Book Giveaway---Prayer by C. H. Spurgeon

I am giving away this wonderful book! It is open to all readers who want to enter. Just leave a comment ON MY BOOK BLOG POST and share about a spiritual/devotional book that has led you to come closer to God.

Here are some sentences from the back of Prayer:

"You feel like you don't know how to pray--you can't find the right words, or just can't seem to get God's attention. You will be encouraged by this treasury of devotional expressions for Charles Spurgeon."

His elegant prayers, beautiful in their simplicity, will invite you to be vulnerable before your Creator.

His profound trust in God will set an example for your own pursuit of peaceful spirit.

His persistence in intercession will motivate you to pursue God in prayer.

Also, part of one of the prayers from within Prayer:

You who are King of Kings and Lord of Lords, we worship You. "Before Jehovah's awful throne, we bow with sacred joy." We can truly that we delight in God. There was a time when we feared You with the fear of bondage. Now we reverence You, but we love as much as we reverence. The thought of Your omnipresence was once horrible to us. We said, "Whither shall [we] flee from thy presence?" (Psalm 139:7). It seemed to make hell itself more dreadful, because we heard, "If I make my bed in hell, behold, thou art there" (v. 8).

But now, O Lord, we desire to find You. Our longing is to feel Your presence, and it is heavenly that You are there. The sick bed is soft when You are there. The furnace of affliction grows cool when You are there. The house of prayer when You are present is none other than the house of God, the very gate of heaven.

I'm in !! Midwifery program 2009!!!!

After completing a year of nursing at university, I have been accepted into Canberra's first Bachelor of Midwifery program.

I love nursing, but my passion is in caring for women and babies. I knew that it was going to be hard to get into this as there were many applicants, and few places; but after much prayer, and a lot of work on my curriculum vitae (read Resumé), I was accepted!!

I have taken on the challenge...

On Tuesday Mum decided to take the challenge to read 100+ books in 2009. I have also decided to take this challenge!

Here is where you can look into it also if you wish (a note: there may be some objectionable pictures on the sidebar).

I have started a new blog to record all the books I read in 2009...

5 Things the Marshmallow Test can Teach You about Money Management

This is a post done by Millionaire Mommy Next Door , which I found rather challenging....I am afraid I am the take-the-marshmallow-immediately type. I thought maybe you would find this post interesting anyway.

Millionaire Mommy Next Door

5 Things The Marshmallow Test Can Teach You About Money Management

Tina is an intellectually-gifted bartender who struggles to pay her bills. Tina serves martinis to Susan. Susan is no more intelligent than Tina, but Susan is a millionaire. If not intelligence, then what explains the difference between wealth and financial lack? And what do sticky, gooey marshmallows have to do with it?

In the 1960s, Stanford University psychology researcher Walter Mischel conducted a longitudinal study. Mischel placed marshmallows in front of hungry four-year-old children. He told them they could have one marshmallow now, or if they could wait several minutes, they could have two. Some children quickly grabbed the marshmallow and ate it. Others waited.
Mischel followed the group and found that 14 years later, the children who eagerly devoured the first marshmallow weren’t faring as well as the children who had waited for two marshmallows. Years later, the “grabbers” suffered low self-esteem. Teachers and parents viewed these kids as stubborn, prone to envy and easily frustrated. The “wait-for-two-fers” possessed better coping skills; were more socially competent, optimistic, self-assertive, dependable and trustworthy; and scored about 210 points higher on their SATs.

Perhaps the key difference between between financial lack and wealth is not merely hard work or superior intelligence, but the ability to delay gratification.
What can the Marshmallow Test teach you about personal finance?

1. Avoid looking at marshmallows when you’re hungry
During the Marshmallow Test, some successful kids reportedly covered their eyes so they couldn’t see the tempting treat. My take away tip: Avoid temptation– stay away from the mall when you’re bored.

2. Save a marshmallow today and you’ll eat well tomorrow
The children who waited for the second marshmallow were rewarded with a 100% return on their first marshmallow. My take away tip: Unleash the power of compounding and you’ll be wealthy when you retire.

3. Drooling over s’mores? Wipe your chin and wait for the hot goo to cool– because you don’t want to burn your mouth!
One child reportedly licked the table around the marshmallow while waiting for the experimenter to return. My take away tip: Imagine having what you want, but wait until the time is right to consume. If you shop, wait until you have cash in hand to buy– don’t get burned by finance charges and credit card debt!
4. Stick your marshmallow into the fire, keep your eye on it and remove when perfectly browned– before it bursts into flames.
Some successful children watched their marshmallow to prevent others from snatching it, waited patiently until the researcher returned with the expected second marshmallow, then enjoyed their reward– without begging greedily for more. My take away tip: Invest in the market, monitor your investment and sell your shares when they reach your target price– before the bubble pops.

5. Give your children mini-marshmallows and teach them how to make rice crispy bars.
Some kids handled the wait by turning their back to the marshmallow, singing songs or talking to themselves. My take away tip: With practice, kids can learn how to delay gratification. Provide opportunities for your child to develop strategies. Give your children an allowance and teach them money management skills.

Mansfield Park

Rebekah and Rachael received for Christmas the 1983 version of "Mansfield Park". We spent Saturday and Sunday watching it, and it proved to be a lovely 5 1/2 hours worth of movie. I highly recommend it to you. We watched it as a family, there was nothing objectionable or boring about it. We even had the youngest children begging to have it put on everytime we paused it!

This is a quote taken from this website, which gives an overview of the plot:

Fanny comes to live with relatives because her mother is overburdened with children and poverty. A selfish Aunt Norris who tries to keep Fanny humble and beholding to rich relatives although Aunt Norris can only criticize. Lord and Lady Bertram come to realize the superiority of Fanny and value her a a family member. Edmund has yet to realize that he loves Fanny. Edmund is blinded by false perceptions and allusion's of love with Miss Crawford. Fanny is pursued by Henry Crawford a man who has no scruples about pursuing her married cousin or any woman he thinks he can make fall in love with him as a lark. Henry meets his match in Fanny because she does not find Henry to be irresistible or sincere. Fanny persevere and wins the love of Edmund and the respect of Mansfield Park's residence.

My husbandry and I: Queen counsels thrift

For me spending money equals happiness. However, I always appreciate the principles behind thriftiness: especially being a good steward of the material things God has endowed me with.

Also I am an avid admirer of the Queen...so when I found this news story I jumped at the chance to post it here on this blog.

The Queen has invited Britain's royal family to follow her example and tighten the purse strings during the financial downturn.

The 82-year-old monarch has warned her grandsons Princes William, 26, and Harry, 24 third and fourth in line to the throne that all ostentatious signs of living it up would be inappropriate, according to newspapers.

British subjects are apparently in no mood to see the young royals partying in exclusive London nightclubs while the kingdom sinks into recession, the cost of living rockets and jobs are lost.
An author of several books on the monarchy, Nicholas Davies, says, ''Whatever is the mood of the nation, she [Queen Elizabeth] tries to go along with that mood.''

According to the 2008 Rich List published by The Sunday Times, the sovereign has a personal fortune of 320 million ($A725 million) but she is not a spendthrift. ''She's not a flamboyant character and never has been,'' Davies says. ''She is not someone who has gone and spoiled her children, because she doesn't believe in spoiling them. She would expect them all [the other royals] to follow her example this Christmas.

''Children or grandchildren, they will all behave in the same way. It is unlikely that this coming season we will see William and Harry going out to nightclubs, getting blind drunk and fooling around with attractive girls.''

Adapting to the credit crunch should not be difficult for the Queen, who has long since garnered a reputation for looking after the pennies.

She insists that the Buckingham Palace lights are turned off when rooms are vacated and that banquet leftovers be reused.

http://www.canberratimes.com.au/news/local/news/general/my-husbandry-and-i-queen-counsels-thrift/1386192.aspx

Ye Olde Booke #2

It has just occurred to me that I recommended books that parents will likely want to censor for their children, and perhaps even for themselves.

"The Great Escape" has a lot of blasphemy in it, and some disturbing material at the end (details of some German's techniques in doing away with people...not nice).

Most of those WWII books will have blasphemy, so maybe just a black permanent marker will be suffiecient.

So far "The Wooden Horse" is the cleanest, along side of "The Dam Busters". But for the others, they are SO worth it, once the necessary steps have been taken to rid them of filth.

Do Hard Things

The next generation stands on the brink of a "rebelution."

With over 16 million hits to their website TheRebelution.com, Alex and Brett Harris are leading the charge in a growing movement of Christian young people who are rebelling against the low expectations of their culture by choosing to "do hard things" for the glory of God.

Written when they were 18 years old, Do Hard Things is the Harris twins' revolutionary message in its purest and most compelling form, giving readers a tangible glimpse of what is possible for teens who actively resist cultural lies that limit their potential.

Combating the idea of adolescence as a vacation from responsibility, the authors weave together biblical insights, history, and modern examples to redefine the teen years as the launching pad of life and map a clear trajectory for long-term fulfillment and eternal impact.

Written by teens for teens, Do Hard Things is packed with humorous personal anecdotes, practical examples, and stories of real-life rebelutionaries in action. This rallying cry from the heart of revolution already in progress challenges the next generation to lay claim to a brighter future, starting today.

Eight Reasons Why I Don't Share My Faith

You Really Need To Watch this Hilarious Video!!

8 Reasons Why I Don't Share My Faith