highlights of 2010

Highlights of 2010:
1. Cruise to Norway with my girls
2. Millenium centre performance by my kids from school
3. Putting up decking and installing kitchen with mum and dad.
4. Starting up diva fever function band
5. Starting up samba con brio
6. Going to see the Dave Matthews band
7. Watching Ellia take her first steps

before the creation of the world

I read this verse a few days before Christmas and it reminded me that as we celebrate the birth of Jesus into this world, the author of salvation had planned this event before this world was even created!
Ephesians 1:4 For he chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world that we may be holy and unblemished in his sight in love.
He planned this out of love for us, not for himself but an action of love for us.

A sense of wonder at Christmas time

My mother and sister have a favourite song which has a lyric 'I hope you still feel small when you stand beside the ocean'. I was reminded of that lyric today when thinking
about why we celebrate Christmas. That God came to earth as a human baby is incredible and beyond our understanding, however we've heard the story so many times it somehow becomes normal and we don't have the wonder that we maybe once had. So here is to Christmas blowing our minds again with the reality that God came to earth human form.

My Grandmother died last month at the age of 89. She was a very dedicated woman in many ways. Even at the end of her life she was knitting clothes for children in Romania and writing letters to friends and family. She was always interested in what we were all upto. She was also very dedicated in her marraige my grandfather suffers with alzheimers so she was his carer for a good few years even when she was struggling physically. She had asked for psalm 121 to be read at her funeral. In trying to get my head around this psalm, it spoke to me about the journey we will go on from this life to everlasting life with God. It describes a journey up a mountain with our creator helping us and stopping our feet from slipping and he will do this eternally.

Psalm 121

A song of ascents.

¹ I lift up my eyes to the hills—
where does my help come from?

² My help comes from the LORD,
the Maker of heaven and earth.

³ He will not let your foot slip—
he who watches over you will not slumber;

⁴ indeed, he who watches over Israel
will neither slumber nor sleep.

⁵ The LORD watches over you—
the LORD is your shade at your right hand;

⁶ the sun will not harm you by day,
nor the moon by night.

⁷ The LORD will keep you from all harm—
he will watch over your life;

⁸ the LORD will watch over your coming and going
both now and forevermore.