I'm a Winner!

I need to start this post by saying that I never win things. At this point in my life, adding my name to a drawing is just something to do. I've never won a drawing, and to be perfectly honest, never expected to.


Until tonight.


I received an email from Virtue Alert informing me that I was a VIRTUE ALERT WINNER! and that my name was drawn from the list of people who voted on the book cover options for Vicki Courtney's new book.


I can barely remember conversations that I had last week, much less that I threw my name into the hat for a FABULOUS PRIZE back in December. So when I received the email to inform me of my good fortune, I scared my husband with the yell that I let out! What I meant to say, is that I sedately smiled at my good fortune and responded politely and quietly to the email. I was particularly excited because the prize turns out to be TWO BOOKS! That's right. Not one, but two. This is the perfect prize for the person who will read the shampoo bottle if all other reading materials in the bathroom have disappeared. Seriously, people. It's a sickness.

If you've never visited Vickie Courtney's blog, I can promise you that you will be blessed and encouraged by what she has to say. I would particularly recommend reading this and this. She is the perfect mix of humor, scripture and mercy.

So thank you Vickie Courtney! Thank you for giving me the opportunity to live the dream. Now I can confidently add my name to drawings and raffles with the knowledge that I too, can win.

Book Giveaway!!

You know that I am always up for books...free or otherwise. Challies is giving away the following:

First prize: One case (Forty copies!) of The Truth of the Cross by R.C. Sproul along with a copy of Jesus the Evangelist by Richard Phillips (that's a retail value of over $600!). The forty books are not to be sold, but are to be given away or used for evangelism. Just think what you could do with forty of them. That's ten for people in the church, ten for family members, ten for Christmas gifts and ten to hold on to for just the right moment.

Second prize: One copy of Jesus the Evangelist by Richard Phillips and admission for two to the Ligonier Ministries 2008 National Conference, Evangelism According to Jesus.

Third Prize: One copy of Jesus the Evangelist by Richard Phillips and admission for two to the Ligonier Ministries 2008 National Conference, Evangelism According to Jesus.

Note: If the second or third prize winners are unable to attend the 2008 National Conference, they may substitute admission for two to The Cross of Christ Regional Conference in Dallas/Fort Worth (November 2-3, 2007) OR any two books published by Reformation Trust.

If you would like to throw your name in the hat for these fabulous prizes, click the link below.

Book Meme

I want to blog all about my vacation, but we have Meet the Teacher night for Nathan later this evening and we just got home from our trip. I saw this meme on Karen's blog and thought it would be fun to participate. If you want to do it, send me a link so I can read your responses!

What are you reading right now? The Weight of Water by Anita Shreve, Elizabeth I by Jasper Ridley and (always) my Bible, specifically the book of Ephesians. I usually have 2-3 books going at one time...one at work, one by the bed and one in the living room.

Do you have any idea what you’ll read when you’re done with that? I have an entire stack of books that I bought at a recent garage sale for 25 cents-$1 apiece....everything from Steinbeck to Anna Quindlin. I still haven't decided where to start!

What magazines do you have in your bathroom right now? Consumer Reports, Popular Mechanics (can you guess who does most of the reading in our bathroom?)

What’s the worst thing you were ever forced to read? A Tale of Two Cities....the one and only book that I ever purchased Cliff Notes for.

What’s the one book you always recommend to just about everyone? If it's a woman, The Southern Belle Primer (one of the funniest books I've ever read), but I would recommend the Harry Potter series to anyone. What I recommend really depends on the person I'm talking to. I enjoy a huge range of authors and genres and it's hard to pick one book or series that is my favorite.

Admit it, the librarians at your library know you on a first name basis, don’t they? Nope. I'm more of a book buyer. I like to keep my books and take them down from time to time and revisit their pages. They are like old friends. If there is a book that I don't want to keep, I sell it at the used bookstore so I can buy more books!

Is there a book you absolutely love, but for some reason, people never think it sounds interesting, or maybe they read it and don’t like it at all? I have a collection of about 30 books concerning Elizabeth I of England. I have mostly non-fiction books, but a fair amount of historical fiction as well. Most people get this glazed over look when I mention any of those books as interesting or fun reading.

Do you read books while doing other things? Let's see....while I'm eating, watching TV, cooking, bathing, and attending boring meetings at work. When I was in school, I would hide my current novel behind my textbook so that I could read all day. I remember being in 8th grade and reading The Grapes of Wrath 2 straight days at school, hiding it so that I could read non-stop.

When you were little, did other children tease you about your reading habits? Not until I went to college and my roommate saw me on my bed with a book, and asked me what class I was reading for. I'll never forget the incredulous look she gave me when she learned that I was reading for pleasure....a totally foreign concept for her! From then on she always made snide comments about my being a bookworm, etc. I hope she wasn't trying to insult me, because I took it as a compliment!

What’s the last thing you stayed up half the night reading because it was so good you couldn’t put it down? Well, it wasn't half the night, but I read the last installment in the Harry Potter series in one day. I went and bought the book Saturday morning, and finished it around 6 pm that night. My husband took care of the kids that day and I curled up in my armchair and read to my heart's content! (This is my idea of a great vacation, oh by the way)

Daddy's Girl

It would be impossible to explain how much I love my dad. I have always been a bit of a Daddy's girl, and we have always had a special relationship. When I was a little girl, we had this litany that we would go through together.

Daddy: "Are you my sweetheart?"

Xandra: "Yes."

Daddy: "Are you my baby?"

Xandra: "Yes."

Daddy: "Are you my pretty blued-eyed princess?"

Xandra: "Yes!"

Daddy: "Are you my little maggot?"

Xandra: "Yes!"

It's clear that from an early age I got my sick sense of humor from him. As I grew older, my humor became more witty (thank goodness) and refined and I have to say that I owe that part of my personality to Daddy. Everything that happens to us is not fun and games, but having a sense of humor about everything is the surest way to get through it intact.

Not only did I inherit my dry wit from Daddy, but I also inherited an ultra-sensitive internal meter that red lines when people around me are insincere or just so full of it that they believe their own press. This is a double edged sword for me, because on the positive side, it prevents me from being taken for a fool (most of the time). But, and this is a big but, I also inherited a very coarse filter between my brain and my mouth from Daddy and as a result, not much gets caught in it. When my meter goes off, the holes in the filter somehow enlarge on their own and I tend to say things that are better left in my brain.

The advantage to this is that most people generally know where they stand with me. The disadvantage is that people generally know where they stand with me. I know...seems strange, doesn't it? If I have an issue with you, you are going to feel it one way or another. This is something that I am working on daily, because I need to be able to accept others as they are and not try to bend them to my will and expectations. But, my friends and family know that I don't lie if you ask my opinion about something. You don't have to like it, but I'm going to say what I think. Myself? I respect others who tell it to me straight and don't sugar coat everything as though I can't handle the truth.

I think the reason my relationship with Daddy is more complicated than the one I have with Mama is because I see so much of him in me. The good, the bad and the ugly. He has given me a sense of humor, the attitude that I can do anything, the ability to see through other people and a strength that I think only fathers can give to their daughters. A strength that comes from being a role model as to how a man should behave and treat women. I expect to be treated with respect and dignity because that is the way my dad treated me. Many of the qualities that made me choose Trevor as my husband are the very ones that I saw in my dad growing up.

When a father gives his daughter an emotional visa to strike out on her own, he is always with her. Such a daughter has her encouraging, understanding daddy in her head, cheering her on—not simply as a woman but as a whole, unique human being with unlimited possibilities. --Victoria Secunda

There are so many things that remind me of Daddy. When I hear a Muddy Water's song on the radio, the sound of a cane rocker creaking, the smell of wood burning in a fireplace.....these all remind me of him. He gave me an appreciation for music of all kinds, reading for the pure joy of the written word and instilled in me the desire to learn and educate myself.

I think Daddy is one the smartest people that I know. There are very few questions that he can't answer, and one of the things that I have always loved about him is that he never made me feel stupid for asking. Even if he was thinking, "Is she serious? Does she really not know this?" he never made me feel small for my question.

So, today I thank Daddy for everything he has done for me. Thank you for carrying that silly rock I gave you in your pocket for years. Thank you for sacrificing your dreams to support me so that I could live comfortably and be educated. Thank you for being the kind of father that my friends envied and I could always be proud of. Thank you for remembering where you came from and for rededicating your life to the service of Christ. Thank you for always being proud of me and supporting me even when you may not have agreed with me. I love you more that words could ever say. Happy Father's Day.

Daddy's hands were soft and kind when I was crying,

Daddy's hands, were hard as steel when I'd done wrong.

Daddy's hands weren't always gentle

But I've come to understand,

There was always love in Daddy's hands.

Holly Dunn "Daddy's Hands"

Forgotten Lives

I love books. I love reading them, collecting them, browsing for them and looking through stacks of them at secondhand stores. I found myself at such an establishment yesterday afternoon on the way home from work. I was searching for a hymnal or two and maybe some old sheet music or songbooks to expand my music collection for the piano.

This old store has one row of books and to see them you have have to reach overhead and turn on a dim light. There is minimal air conditioning and the air in this aisle smells of dust and slowly decaying paper. The books are loosely organized by topic, but I still feel compelled to search each shelf just in case a treasure was overlooked and filed in the wrong place.

I must have spent an entire hour poring over one section in hopes of finding what I was looking for. What I found was what I always find when I am looking through old books. Lives. The lives of the people who owned the books before they ended up on a dusty shelf in an antique store. Most of the books have inscriptions and dates...who are these people? Why are their books here instead of on the shelf of a child or other close relative? Were they excited to receive the book for Christmas or their birthday? Was the book read over and over again with passages memorized over time with each reading, or was it pushed to the back of a bookcase and never read?

I found receipts and poems tucked away between the pages. Just the sort of thing I would do...using a scrap piece of paper as a bookmark. But in one of the hymnals, I found a poem taped to the back cover and I almost wept when I read it. It was a poem written not for winning hearts, but for breaking them. It was a poem of goodbyes and sorrow. I wondered about the woman who might have received that poem from her lover. Was her heart broken or was she expecting such an act?

There were so many unanswered questions, and my own mortality got up close and personal with me. What will I leave behind? Will there be someone in a secondhand store 75 years from now looking through my books wondering who I was? In spite of our best efforts, we leave so little behind. Not just in terms of the physical, but also the essence of who we were. Once those who knew us are gone, and there is no one left to remember the sound of our laughter or the smell of our skin, that is when we truly die.

Our life here on earth is too fleeting to waste it on things that won't matter in eternity. Just a few deep breaths, and we are finished. So I choose to live my life for Christ while I'm here. No reward or incentive in this life can compare with the glory that waits for me in heaven. My heart is in heaven.

"Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal; but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also." Matthew 6:19-21

The Dangerous Book for Boys

I was surfing the net last night and found a book that looked really interesting. I am planning to go to Barnes and Noble this afternoon to purchase it for Nathan.

(Side note: I did indeed get this book and I cannot put it down! It is entertaining and has all the information a boy could want about making bows and arrows, treehouses and things with which to scare a little sister.)

Here is a review from Dr. Albert Mohler:

"What do boys need to know? That question led brothers Conn and Hal Iggulden to write "The Dangerous Book for Boys", and boys of every age will love it. The book took Britain by storm last year, and arrives this year just in time for summer reading. A boy armed with this book will have a very fun summer indeed.

The book instantly recalls the great Victorian era of books for boys -- books about boy heroes, adventurers, soldiers, and naturalists. Those books, often recognizable in their ornate cloth covers, were read and read again by boys as they grew older. "The Dangerous Book for Boys" is a worthy successor to that tradition.

This book will tell a boy how to read cloud formations, make a battery, make a periscope, and construct "the greatest paper airplane in the world." Boys are told of the essential gear of boyhood -- including Band-aids. Young adventurers will also learn of famous battles, the history of artillery, and how to understand girls.

On the subject of girls the authors warn that young females are likely to be "unimpressed by your mastery of a game involving wizards, or your understanding of Morse Code." Boys are also soberly warned that girls, as a general rule, "do not get quite as excited by the use of urine as a secret ink as boys do." This is important to know.
On the other hand, boys are told to help girls who need assistance. Take this sage advice, for example:

If you see a girl in need of help--unable to lift something, for example--do not taunt her. Approach the object and greet her with a cheerful smile, while surreptitiously testing the weight of the object. If you find you can lift it, go ahead. If you can't, try sitting on it and engaging her in conversation.

That advice will help a middle school boy greatly. It just might help a good many college-age boys, for that matter.

The Iggulden brothers believe that boys need to get away from the computer screen, go outside, and learn to enjoy the world and make their way in it. "Boyhood is all about curiosity," they advise. Boys need to know how to build a treehouse and how to find north in the dark -- and they need to know that they know these things. As the brothers explain:

"How do latitude and longitude work? How do you make secret ink, or send the cipher that Julius Caesar used with his generals? You'll find the answers inside. It was written by two men who would have given away the cat to get this book when they were young. It wasn't a particularly nice cat. Why did we write it now? Because these things are important still and we wished we knew them better. There are few things as satisfying as tying a decent bowline knot when someone needs a loop, or simply knowing what happened at Gettysburg and the Alamo. The tales must be told and retold, or the memories slowly die."

Boys are introduced to Shakespeare, coin tricks, spiders, and "Latin phrases every boy should know." They learn how to waterproof fabric, juggle, and understand rugby.
The book's runaway sales in Britain surprised the publishers, but not the authors.

Here is how Conn Iggulden explained the book's success:

"In a word, fathers. I am one myself and I think we've become aware that the whole "health and safety" overprotective culture isn't doing our sons any favors. Boys need to learn about risk. They need to fall off things occasionally, or--and this is the important bit--they'll take worse risks on their own. If we do away with challenging playgrounds and cancel school trips for fear of being sued, we don't end up with safer boys--we end up with them walking on train tracks. In the long run, it's not safe at all to keep our boys in the house with a PlayStation. It's not good for their health or their safety."

Expect the book to catch attention fast in this country as well -- and for the same reason. Iggulden gets to the heart of the book's attraction to boys and their dads:
You only have to push a boy on a swing to see how much he enjoys the thrill of danger. It's hard-wired. Remove any opportunity to test his courage and they'll find ways to test themselves that will be seriously dangerous for everyone around them. I think of it like playing the lottery--someone has to say "Look, you won't win--and your children won't be hurt. Relax. It won't be you." I think that's the core of the book's success. It isn't just a collection of things to do. The heroic stories alone are something we haven't had for too long. It isn't about climbing Everest, but it is an attitude, a philosophy for fathers and sons. Our institutions are too wrapped up in terror over being sued--so we have to do things with them ourselves. This book isn't a bad place to start.

As The Wall Street Journal reports, there are now over 400,000 copies of the book in print. The publisher now expects to sell as many as four million copies in the United States. Reporter Jeffrey A. Trachtenberg explains:

"The unapologetic message is that boys need a certain amount of danger and risk in their lives, and that there are certain lessons that need to be passed down from father to son, man to man. The implication is that in contemporary society basic rules of maleness aren't being handed off as they used to be."

The book aims to correct that. It does so with a pretelevision, prevideogame sensibility, and also by embracing a view of gender that has been unfashionable in recent decades: that frogs and snails and puppy dogs' tails are more than lines in a nursery rhyme, and that boys are by nature hard-wired differently than girls.

But "The Dangerous Book for Boys" is also aimed at boomer dads, who nostalgically yearn for a lost boyhood of fixing lawn mowers and catching snakes with their fathers -- even if that didn't really happen as often as they think it did.

Predictably, the book has detractors as well. Some feminists are unappreciative of its approach, its title, its intended readership, and the fact that the word "boy" is in the title. HarperCollins editor Matthew Benjamin is unmoved. "We initially thought that men nostalgic for their boyhoods would be the buyers, but people are also buying it for 12-year-old boys," he said. "This book teaches them its OK to play and explore."

A rival publisher took the book home to his eight-year-old son, who promptly jumped up from in front of the television and talked his dad into testing paper airplanes long after bedtime. "That's the good news," the dad said. "The bad news is that he now expects me to build him a treehouse."

Jane Friedman, Chief Executive at HarperCollins and herself the mother of two sons and two stepsons, is sticking by the book. There is no plan for a girls' version, she said. "Boys are very different," she observed.

Yes they are, Ms. Friedman, and that is why books like this are important. Boys want to be taken seriously as boys, and taught how to become men. To reach this goal, they will need far more than the fascinating lessons found in "The Dangerous Book for Boys" -- but this is a good place to start.

So put this book in your boy's hands and turn off the television and the PlayStation. Then get ready to watch the paper airplanes fly and the water bombs burst. And, to be honest, it wouldn't hurt to keep a few Band-aids handy . . . just in case."

The Five Solas

I had a nice surprise yesterday morning when Kellye called me to see if I wanted to meet for lunch. We decided on Pei Wei (was there really any other option?) and she picked me up. It was good to get away from work and to spend some time with her one on one. Usually we are with the spousal units, all of the kids or other friends so it was an unexpected pleasure to hang out together for a little while. Kate was along for the ride and I had fun just looking at her cherubic little face sitting across the table from me. Of course, looking at someone else's child is always easier than dealing with your own....I think Kellye would debate the point of "one on one" time since she was the one holding (and sporadically struggling with) the Crazy Lady.

The afternoon absolutely dragged by and I spent much of my time reading a book called "Catholicism: East of Eden" by Richard Bennett. This is a book recommended to me by a friend who was raised Catholic but later came to know Jesus in a personal way and began attending a protestant church. It was written by a man who was born into a devout Roman Catholic home in Ireland, went to Jesuit school as a child and then became a priest after attending the Angelicum University of Rome. After fourteen years of contrasting the teachings of the Roman Catholic Church to Biblical truth, he was convicted by the Gospel message of God's grace alone and after 22 years in the priesthood he formally left the church. The book gives clear scriptural (and historical) references that are often diametrically opposed to what the Catholic church teaches it's members. The overwhelming theme is that the Catholic church values tradition and ritual over the clear teaching in scripture. This book was not written by someone who has no idea what it's like to be devoutly Catholic and to believe heart and soul what the church teaches. It was written by a man who has a deep passion for Catholics and only wants them to see the truth of scripture for themselves and to not blindly follow the teachings of the church simply because that's the way it's always been done.

It's a really fascinating (and eye-opening) read that I have a hard time putting down. I am completely ignorant of the inner workings of the Catholic church because I was raised Baptist. I often hear things said by my Catholic friends with regard to their religion that I do not understand and can't really comment on because I have no point of reference. Trevor's entire family is Catholic...I think they were all a bit scandalized that we were married in a Baptist church and not as a Catholic sacrament. This book is helping me to understand where they are coming from as far as their beliefs are concerned.

What I believe is Sola Gratia (grace alone), Sola Fide (faith alone), Sola Scriptura (scripture alone) Solus Christus (Christ alone), and Soli Deo Gloria (to God alone be glory)--pillars of the Protestant Reformation. The grace of Jesus Christ is what saves me from my sins and sure death. My faith in Him and belief that His death on the cross and resurrection paid my debt forever is what makes me a Christian. I cannot lose my salvation if I have truly put my faith in Him and works (good or bad) cannot change that. We are not saved by works, but by grace. I believe that scripture is the final answer to all matters. If the Bible says that it is true, then it is. If the Bible seems to contradict a teaching of a particular religion, then the religious teaching is erroneous--not the scripture. It is the Word of God, and as such, cannot be false. I think that Christians should be associated with a church that teaches expositionally from the bible and that if there are practices within that body of believers that do not mesh with what the scripture says, then they should be challenged. There are traditions in the Baptist church that I do not hold to because they have absolutely no biblical grounds, primarily the idea that the drinking of alcohol is a sin and therefore forbidden. (I'm not even going to go into the whole dancing thing...) I came across a blog by Wade Burleson who is a member of the International Mission Board and represents the Southern Baptist Convention. I agree wholeheartedly with his view on alcohol consumption and I've included a link to an entry in his blog that I found very interesting and biblically accurate: http://tinyurl.com/2azwa4.

My prayer is that the Holy Spirit will open scripture to me in such a way that I will be able to present the truth to anyone who seeks it, in a way that they will be able to understand and accept. I also pray that the sin in my own life will be revealed to me by reading the Word of God and that I will be convicted of it and seek forgiveness and renewing of the spirit. My desire is to be used as an instrument for the glory of God and that I will be open and receptive to his direction for me.