Family is Forever

I am enjoying time with family this weekend.
Tim is home, briefly, from the Netherlands:
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Kath & Kel are up from Florida. . .
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Kel's got skills.
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Patti's got skills. She's teaching Eva the alligator method for catching a frisbee:
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Family's hurting today. We're burying a sister much too early. And while we have intense grief lurking just below the surface, we also cherish the time together, the respite from life's responsibilities, the pause that reminds us to nurture the underlying thread of love.
Family is Forever.

Happy Birthday, Beaner!

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Marj turns 18 today! I think Mr. and Mrs. Smith are the only people who are more shocked than I with how fast Marj has grown up. Marj is my SC baby. Patti was born in Atlanta, GA; Tommy, NJ. Marj was born at the Lexington Hospital, which is so close to the zoo that when we pointed out to a 5 year old Marj where she was born as we drove past, she got all excited thinking we were pointing at the zoo.

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Marj was born a brunette. She was a brunette for the first several months of her life. It was kind of odd.
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Marj digs life. Seriously. Marj digs life. She's been like that since she was born, everything is a party.
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I think you'll see my point as you view these photos. I'm going to try to illustrate the things Marj elevates to a "life is a party" mentality along with the things she finds important in life & I'm going to try to do this with mostly photos.... few words. Words can't express the pride I take in her and the mixed emotions I have as she discovers a world of her own, but leaves the world of mine. -
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So. Sit back, scroll down and enjoy the show.

She loves her some mommy:

She loves her some chicken:

She loves her some music:

She loves her some sports:

I think Mr. Jimmy has influenced her to love cartoons:

If you're gonna sing the Star Spangled Banner, don't just sing it. Sing it with a friend on the top of a bunk on the top of a mountain at the top of your voice.

And, finally, her most favorite,

Marj loves her some friends.

Pssssstt.....

I'm over here again today.

Look Up Lodge: The Brothers

Hi!

I'm Larry and this is my brother Darryl and my other brother Darryl.

For those of you too young to remember the Bob Newhart characters Larry, Darryl and Darryl, view the video below, but fast forward it to around 2:55, otherwise, it's a long video clip.

Look Up Lodge: The Games

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Another part of the routine of Look Up Lodge was the after-lunch games. Upon arrival at camp, campers are divided into teams and assigned a "color." Our color was black. Everything we did at camp, we did with our color group and made most of it a competition. Of course, Black team was the best.
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After lunch each day the teams would compete in crazy games. First, we'd have to put our war paint on - in our team color.
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Sara, above, and Doug, here, are showing you how fierce we looked in our black war paint. Well... Doug doesn't look much different than a normal workday. But you get my drift.
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Now, Mo, here is experiencing a transformation moment. You can see it in her eyes, she is being transformed into a machine.

A fighting machine.

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Marj was born for the war paint. Brielle doesn't seem too sure, but Marj's into it all right.

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For the water game, each team took a trash can in the lake and put some team members in the water and some team members back up on the docks. The ones on the docks were to throw balls into the trash cans. The ones in the water were to catch stray balls and toss them back to the dock teammates to re-try. Each team could post one "guard" around an opposing team's trashcan.

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We didn't do so well....

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With this next game, the object was to protect your "castle" (the alien looking silver ball object). Marj and Brielle are doing a great job guarding our castle while Chessa stands behind with our staffer, Chris. So each team throws balls hard at the castles to knock them down. (Not sure how Marj and B got this job)
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Here's a shot of our guys out there heaving the balls.
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We were hot with this game, baby, HOTT.
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The best game, the one in which I threatened to leave camp if they involved me..... was the mud day.

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They had an obstacle course to complete, most of which was covered in mud, covered in mesh to crawl under, and had staffers scattered about to trip you up or throw mud on the kids.

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Marj was in the lead for our team, or maybe second, I don't remember, but you can see Grayson rapidly approaching and when she jumped in the mud hole, a kid jumped right on her back and slowed her down & Grayson took the lead. I'm not sure which one completed it first. Before they got near the finish line, Connie and I had taken off at top speed so as not to get slimed by the kids post-run.

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Here's Brittney (red) and Sara (blue).

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I'll post more photos on the church youth blog soon.

"If we have not quiet in our minds, outward comfort will do no more for us than a golden slipper on a gouty foot. " - CS Lewis

What do you really need to be happy?

The one thing Jesus needed to be happy was a close relationship with God. Jesus found the sole source of life in his father. The delight of his life was to delight his father.

It was genuinely what made him happy.

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(everything I'm saying in this post comes from talks given by Greg Boone, Executive Director, Look Up Lodge,)

What is the goal of the disciples of Jesus Christ? To be like Jesus. But we don't grasp the reality of that. While we can't fully attain this until Heaven, the goal is to get as close as possible. It is not religious activities, it is not something external. The people Jesus most rebuked were the devout people. He called them "white washed tombs" and "vipers."

Jesus doesn't speak this negatively about anyone else.

"And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God."

- Romans 12:2

The word "transformed" is translated from "metamorphia." It is not overly dramatic for God to use the word metamorphosis. Metamorphosis refers to an inside change that results in an outside change. The outside change does not precede the inside change.

What we genuinely need from Jesus is the capacity to love people. Loving people is the test of where you are in the metamorphosis process. Loving people is not the end goal, it is just a test of where you are in the process of transformation. The end goal is the close relationship with God as Jesus had, where God genuinely is our ultimate desire in life.

God wants to give us this capacity to love people unselfishly. Almost every relationship we have in life is based on selfishness. What God wants to do is to change that. How in the world can we do that? There's only one way and it's the same way Jesus did it.

By finding our sole source of life and happiness in God alone.

"Now this is eternal life: that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent."

- John 17:3

If you want to get to know what's really important to someone, you spend time together, talk, be together. What they talk about is what they care about. And it's like that with God - the things He talks about most in the Bible are the things He cares about most. How do you get to know Him? Spend time with Him, learn who He is and what He cares about.

You probably aren't living the Christian life right if you think it's

1) complicated, or 2) easy.

What is the test of where you are in the metamorphosis process -- the process of getting closer to God, the process of finding Him as your main source of happiness?

It's the quality of your relationship with other human beings.

How you treat people.

How you love people.

It's a lot easier to perform religious acts, to do or not do certain things.

It's a lot harder to genuinely love people totally unselfishly.

"..that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ.."
Not "that they might be a good missionary" or "that they might be a good parent" or "that they might have a good church."
Just: "That they may know you, the only true God & Jesus Christ."
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"My people have committed two sins: They have forsaken me, the spring of living water, and have dug their own cisterns, broken cisterns that cannot hold water."
- Jeremiah 2:13
Two sins? Really, just two sins? Amazing how important this is. Everything has its roots back in this.

When we focus on God, sin begins to get squeezed out of our lives.
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If you're going to become this thing that God wants you to be, you are going to struggle in the metamorphosis process. Caterpillar to pupa to butterfly requires a serious struggle. Without the struggle, it just doesn't happen. This puts a different spin on pain and suffering, on teenage rebellion, marriage difficulties, and cancer and sickness.
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When you understand who God is and why He does what He does, you'll stop asking "Why?"
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The Answer: Trying to make you more like Jesus.
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Pssssttt......

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I'm over here today.