life. faithful.

Most of us have heard the Christmas story from Luke many times. I know I have--one of my favorite Christmas memories from all through the years is our family setting up the Nativity while Pop read the story of Jesus's birth from Luke. If you haven't read it in a while, I suggest you take a look at Luke 2:1-20 for a reminder. In John, though, we get a little different view. John doesn't tell us about the manger, the star, the shepherds, the angels, or the wisemen. Here's what he says: "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through Him all things were made; without Him nothing was made that has been made. In Him was life, and that life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it. "There came a man who was sent from God; his name was John. He came as a witness to testify concerning that light, so that through him all men might bel

This morning at church, I was reminded just how big a fan I am of Peter. Pastor Don was talking about how we have two natures, the physical and the spiritual, and how mixed up it is that we spend the majority of our time and attention focusing on the physical nature. In Genesis we are told that God formed man from the dust of the ground (our physical side) and then breathed into him the breath of life (our spiritual side). Our physical side is temporary--we came from the dirt and one day we will all return to it. Our spiritual side, though, is eternal. God's breathed His Spirit into each of us at birth, and that spirit is the part of us that cannot be destroyed. How mixed up are we that we spend our time, energy, and money trying to satisfy the desires of our physical nature, so often at the expense of our spiritual nature? In John, Jesus is preaching to a huge crowd of approximately 5,000 men. That's not even starting to take into consideration all the women and kids

Charlotte Bacon, 6, (F) Daniel Barden, 7, (M) Rachel Davino, 29, (F) Olivia Engel , 6, (F) Josephine Gay, 7, (F) Ana M. Marquez-Greene, 6 (F)  Dylan Hockley, 6 (M) Dawn Hochsprung, 47 (F) Madeleine F. Hsu, 6, (F)  Catherine V. Hubbard , 6, (F)  Chase Kowalski, 7, (M) Jesse Lewis, 6,  (M) James Mattioli, 6, (M) Grace McDonnell, 7, (F)  Anne Marie Murphy, 52 (F)  Emilie Parker, 6 (F) Jack Pinto, 6, (M) Noah Pozner, 6, (M) Caroline Previdi, 6, (F) Jessica Rekos, 6, (F) Avielle Richman, 6 (F)  Lauren Rousseau, 30, (F) Mary Sherlach, 56, (F)  Victoria Soto, 27 (F) Benjamin Wheeler, 6, (M) Allison N. Wyatt , 6 (F) ...there are no words. "In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express. " ~Romans 8:26

I'm a music fanatic--through the good and bad times in my life, it seems there has always been a song that just somehow fits. For a little background (and to make an incredibly long story short), I'm in one of those places right now where I'm not really sure what's going on. I'm in grad school and looking at the fact that if I'm going to make it through this program I'm going to have to shift my priorities. I've been wondering if this is what I need to do and praying for clarity and peace about whether or not I've made the right decision in being here. I look back and keep saying, "What if I had..." Well, on my drive to class this morning I was listening to an old cd I found in the glove box yesterday. It was SheDaisy, and the song, "Now" came on. The first verse says, If I could be 13 again To live with no regret I could still be president And I could feel my  dad as he's holding me In his arms not in my dre