Overflow Veggie Tales Night!

This was a huge success in our eyes.  check it out Veggie Tales

Overflow Veggie Tales Night!

Overflow update

I thought I would take the opportunity to share with everyone on the blogsphere what's been happening with Overflow.

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What Are Spiritual Gifts? Rethinking The Conventional View

This book written by Berding is a must read for anyone who is looking to broaden their education on Paul's theology and teaching on the "so called" spiritual gifts.  This is a book that expressed in a lot of ways my own personal thoughts, questions and concerns about spiritual "gifts" that I have had for sometime now.  I can remember the first time taking one of these tests that was to help me "discover" my gifts/abilities and to be quite honest I was really excited about it. And rightly so, who wouldn't be.  Anyone who has been around church or church people of any length of time has heard the phrase "discovering one's spiritual gifts" and the importance of "discovering" to help edify the body of Christ.  That everyone has a gift or gifts and some have yet to be discovered or manifested but that they are in you given to you by God.

Basically the essence of Berding's book is that these lists found in Paul's writings in Romans 12, Ephesians 4 and I Cor 12 should be view in light of Pauline theology as a whole as Spiritual Ministries verses Spiritual Gifts partly because of our monolinguistic  understanding of the word "gift or gifts".  Berding does a great work here with the original languages showing a wide range of use of the word Charismata outside of I Cor. 12. in other scriptures, and the contrast between Charismata and Pneumatika with I Corinthians. Overall this book is well worth the reading, he did a great job at presenting both views (spiritual gifts vs spiritual ministries) in both the technical sense as well as the most practical one also addressing the many questions I had trying to embrace the conventional view of the "gifts", such as, natural abilities vs. special abilities? Comprehensive vs. Representative? One Ministry or Many? Discovering your spiritual gits?  These were just some of my questions that the author address throughly in this book.

Great Weekend

We brought Maddie home Thursday and my mom came in that same night from PA. We had a blast this weekend, plus the fact that Grammy got up with the baby and let us get some sleep, however we still wanted to get up with her and take care of her since we didn' have much time at home with her, but overall it was really great to have an extra helping hand! Thanks mom!

Both the girls just had there check ups today and all looked well with both of them. We are truly blessed to have them in our lives! I really look forward to all the joys and memories we will have as they grow up and watching them become close friends. Here are some pics from this weekend.

Stressed, Frustrated, Tired...

These are pretty much the words that would describe my last 48 hrs or so, however on the bright side of that I got some quite time in to pray and read the word, God really encouraged my heart and lifted me!  Often at Overflow you will hear us talk about "As God pours in, we pour out" and so how true is that statement for me lately, I have been running on "E" for the past couple of days and it was really starting to catch up with me.  I'm not one to hide my thoughts and feelings very well at all, I guess you could say that I am pretty expressive with my emotions, needless to say you can tell when I am having an off day :)

It's just been a combination of things with not being able to have Madeline home like we expected (though she should be coming home today!!), to not being able to see Olivia very much these past 5 days, to having car trouble (that my wonderful father-in-law is fixing for us today), to lack of sleep and staying at the hospital every night, kinda gets old.  So that has been our world for the past week and we are all ready to just go home and relax! 

Equal Time

Now we begin the quest of a delicate balance with our time with Livy and Maddy, just over the past 4 days we have been in and out of the house and have had limited time with Livy. Just this morning she was upset with me cause I have been around for a couple of days, that made it really hard to come back to work this morning. Well I guess they are releasing Maddy tomorrow from the hospital and so starts our quest for equal time :0 should be fun!

The Spoken Word

Today I had the honor and God-given privilege as Madeline's father to speak the word of God over her life today. This was something that just happened, as I was about the do some reading of my own, Madeline decided that it was time for someone to pick her up, so of course I jumped up right away and snatched her up from her little bed as Casey finished her lunch.  As I sat there on the bed with the word of God open beside me, the Holy Spirit spoke to me, "read my word to her" so I thought of one of my favorite scriptures to read and how fitting it would be to read over her... Psalm 139

"Oh, Lord you have searched me and you know me. You know when I sit and when I rise; you perceive my thoughts from afar. You discern my going out and lying down; you are familiar with all my ways. Before a word is on my tongue you know it completely, O Lord. You hem me in behind and before; you have laid your hand upon me. Such knowledge is to wonderful for me, too lofty for me to attain.  Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence?  If I go up to the heavens you are there; if I make my bed in the depths you are there. If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea, even there your hand will guide me, your right hand will hold me fast. If I say "surely the darkness will hide me and the light become night around me," even the darkness is as light to you; the night will shine like the day, for darkness is as light to you. For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother's womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful I know that full well.  My frame was not hidden from you in the secret place. When I was woven together in the depths of the earth, your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be. How precious to me are your thoughts, O God! How vast are the sum of them. Were I to count to them, they would out number the grains of sand. When I awake I am still with you. If only you would slay the wicked, O Lord, and abhor those who rise up against you? I have nothing but hatred for them; I count them as my enemies. Search me O God and know my heart, test me and know my anxious thoughts.  See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.

God is the giver and sustainer of our life, He created us and know us completely. It's my prayer for each of my girls that they would grow up knowing the Lord our God who created them and that they would continue to give Him all the glory, praise and worship that He so deserves. So just as Paul tells us in Acts "Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved"  Thank you Jesus!

Madeline Rae Johns Arrives!

10/5/08 9:25am

Both mom and baby are doing great! Praise God for miracles!

Scripture of the Day

"Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, in everything give thanks, for this is the will of God is Christ Jesus. Do not quench the Spirit. Do not despise prophecies. Test all things; hold fast what is good. Abstain from every form of evil." - I THESS. 5:16-20

Anxiously waiting...

We'll Casey's due date has come and gone now and we are anxiously awaiting the arrival of Madeline now... of course this is nothing new, with Olivia, we wanted 12 days past due date! The doctor has here scheduled for 10/7 to come in to start the inducing process, as long as the labor room is not to busy... we'll see. We are all just praying and waiting on the time she comes, can't wait to see her! We'll keep you posted!