Ketchup!

Wow, things have been really crazy since Dec. 1st. To catch everyone up on the custead happenings, I will try to quickly hit the high points of the last month and a half.

Dec. 6th we got to go on a Cruise to Cozumel! Scott's boss rewarded him for a great year with a free cruise. Oh, yeah . . . I got to go too! This was the first cruise either of us had been on. It was fantastic. We ate a ton! went Rock Climbing and Scube diving in Cozumel. And best of all relaxed!
Dec. 22nd Kathy came down for Christmas! Scott's mom got the chance to come visit us and see the house for the first time. It was great. She got to stay for 10 days.

New Years Eve -- our youth participated in the Ball Drop Bash(a new years eve party between several churches in the area). Since Scott and I work with the youth band we were especially excited. The Youth Praise Band got to play as part of the concert that night. They were the best band of the evening and sounded great!

Push Ups

In a country where we expect things to happen 'now' instead of waiting patiently, I am often discouraged if I don't see personal change over night. Being somewhat on the heavy side, I look in the mirror and remember the days when I was in a great physical shape. I remember being able to run three miles and not be out of breath. I remember not getting tired walking up stairs. But aside from expensive surgery, getting back in shape is something that is going to take me awhile to regain.

Then I started to think rationally. If I just lose one pound a month, I would be 12 pounds lighter by next January. If I did the unthinkable and lost two pounds a month, I would be a remarkable 24 pounds less by next January. Most weight gimmicks promise losing 10 pounds in a month. That aint going to happen here boys and girls.

So therefore, I have decided that in my life, I am going to stop trying to eat the whole elephant at once and start taking one bite at a time. I decided eight days ago to start doing pushups. I could hardly do 20. And they weren't pretty! I was discouraged because I used to be able to do a lot. But keeping with my 'one bite at a time' scheme, I decided to just add 1 push up a day. Last night I did 28 pushups! Look out Arnold! Also, I started running. When I run, I don't get discouraged if I have to walk or stop and rest or fall on the ground and puke; I just think to myself, 'at least I'm exercising.' It will pay off.

Anyhow, imagine if we did the same thing with reading or devotional time or praying. If I spent 5 minutes in scripture every day (which sounds pathetic on the Christian scale) I would ready 30 hours a year. That's like over a day! Sounds dumb, but I bet that is more than many of us read or pray every year outside of church and Sunday school. Imagine if we worked on one struggle of our life a year. There are only so many sins that we deal with. In time we could be almost perfect :). In 10 year we could have bettered ourselves in 10 different ways.

Will you mosey through life with me?