I want you to be a part of a movement with me this Christmas.  Do you ever get frustrated with Christmas line-ups? Do you witness the scrooges and feel too busy to really enjoy the season because there just seems so much to do?
 
Its called the Live Kindness Challenge. What do you do? Intentionally find someone everyday that you can “make their day”. Random acts of kindness if you will. Bring a smile to someone’s face. See a need and meet it. Serve. Love. Something tangible with no expected return of reward. I know there is great joy in making someone else happy, so rather than waking up every morning thinking about what must be done that day…wake up thinking “who can I make smile today by being kind?” And I’ll bet you anything your holiday season will be one of many unique memories!
 
I challenge you to start with me Dec 1 – 25 (feel free to start being kind sooner ) and see the lives of people around you changed. Or do it for a stranger and meet someone new! Buy a coffee for the person in the drive-through behind you. Shovel your neighbour’s walk. Bag groceries for the mom whose hands are too full. Encourage someone intentionally and with a genuine heart. I am going to be blogging every day of my own and friends’ experiences here!
 
I hope you take this personal challenge with me and wake up every morning with a smile on your face remembering that today’s the day you get to make someone else’s day just a little bit brighter this holiday season!

Not only are you covered in pink from head to toe on your wedding day, you also have to share your moment with the masses! Ugh. Thank you God for freedom of choice and a democratic nation! This picture from the Globe and Mail…

Muslim brides wait for their wedding ceremonies to start during a mass marriage ceremony in the western Indian city of Ahmedabad.

My wonderful boyfriend and I set up his Christmas tree this weekend, yes it may seem early but it makes the holiday season last longer!

Apple Cider. Twinkle tours. Carols singing. Skating on the outdoor pond. Christmas plays. Jesus came for us. Family love. Let it begin!

I’m reading “The Confident Woman” byJoyce Meyer and in it is a chapter on fear. Below are some GREAT quotes on this disgusting thing that creeps into our lives unannounced, unwelcomed, and unlovely.

“It is not the nature of fear to look at the positive possibilities, but instead it always assumes the worst.”

“Lack of knowlege causes fear, and knowledge removes it.”

“Guilt is worry that is rooted in fear. Guilt has everything to do with the past and it has the power to ruin your future. Get over it!”

“The way to develop confidence is to do the thing you fear, and get a record of successful experiences behind you.”

“You have to care enough about yourself and your loved ones to confront fear and start being the person you have always wanted to be. Do it, even if you have to do it afraid!”

“That’s the way fear works. What we run from, or hide from, has power over us.”

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I finally got to meet my boyfriend’s parents as they came to visit for a month… what an awesome time we all had together with adventures here and there …

You couldn’t always trust me. The emotions of a young girl were raw and changing. I didn’t always get my chores done when I said I would. I didn’t always “have the back of my friend” in elementary school like they thought I should. And I don’t always pray for the friend I say I will at the very moment I should. Why? Because humans can be fickle. And boy am I human.

So why do we make grandiose promises that we will do something, and then not always follow through? We want the other person to believe we are good. We want our friends and family to count on us. We want them to have the assurance that we are credible and can be counted on. In short, we want them to have expectations of us that are honourable.

According to the dictionary, a promise is “an express assurance on which expectation is based”.  When I say I will do something, there is expectation of fulfillment. Naturally.

This morning as I read in Galatians and Paul’s letter to the church there, it resounded how much this Galatian church was trying to achieve the promises of God through works. I suppose they wanted God to believe they were honourable by their achievements and efforts.

Over and over Paul said such things like “After starting your Christian lives in the Spirit, why are you now trying to become perfect by your own human effort?” (Gal 3:3). Paul was frustrated that the church was so obviously set free yet so bound by human perception of what a promise really is. Or should I say, what a promise from GOD really is!

But stop. Don’t we all try to achieve perfection by our own human effort at some point? Don’t we all think that “if I just do this, then God will do this…” Guilty as charged. But when God laid out His promise of salvation, the Holy Spirit to guide us and the freedom of life only Christ can bring, that is a solid foundation for us to set our assurance on which expectation is to be based!

Paul goes on to say in 3: 18 “For if the inheritance could be received only by keeping the law, then it would not be the result of accepting God’s promise. But God gave it to Abraham as a promise.”

Your inheritance in Christ is a PROMISE! God is a God of promise not law. I think He gets excited when He can hold out His hand to us and watch us take a hold of something He offers, knowing that it will only do us good. Knowing that we haven’t worked, earned or achieved that gift, but it is a complete promise based on God’s nature.

The thousands of promises He has given us in His Word are received through faith and we are to live our lives assured that what God said He can and wants to do, HE WILL DO. I must know in my very core that God’s character is always good, always rewards a seeking heart, and always fulfills His promise.

It may not always be in my nature to 100% accurately fulfill a promise, though I try. I am human therefore I will make mistakes. But God’s very character is to fulfill a promise. He wants you to expect it. He wants you to base your assurance on every single word He gave us in the Bible. Because I’m most certain that He really does delight in bringing it to fulfillment in each of our lives —- whatever that looks like!

A couple who’s wedding was my first to photograph. They were so much fun and made my first shoot not so intimidating!

I scan the Globe and Mail photos of the day from time to time and today, it just made me want to pack my bags and travel even more! Man. Every culture has so much depth and individuality. This picture in particular made me want to get up and leave the office …

BYLINE: Visitors watch the sunrise from Mount Moses in the Sinai Peninsula. According to the Bible, this was where Moses received the 10 commandments from God.

See more for yourself here …

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/in-photos/best-from-the-past-24-hours/article1247339/

In my Monday morning rushing to work, I never made breakfast (it seems gone are my days of eating jam toast on my way out the door!) or coffee so I ‘had time for’ Tim Hortons in our prairie suburban rush hour.

My XL and bagel safely tucked as my new passenger, and my window still rolled down, I heard from outside a gentleman  call to me “Excuse me ma’am, could you spare some change?”  He looked rough. Unshaven. Gray and perhaps in his 50’s. Waiting around the corner for anyone sparing some Monday morning mercy.

I was more startled than anything as I drove out of the drive-through, but my reaction, which I ponder, was to say “Sorry, not today” and drive on.

Now, I have on occasion taken people to fast food who’ve asked me for money – preferring to see them fed than assume they would be. Scepticism and protectionism has caused our society to block off all those in need in considerable amounts of assumption that our generosity will be wasted on booze and cigs. Don’t deny it, we all feel it. But I immediately felt a twinge of “hmmmm”.

Was it a moment I completely failed to be interrupted? Did I handle that correctly?  Could I really just not spare some change? And my lingering question… “What really would Jesus do there?”

Could I not train myself to react in quick moments such as these differently. More sensitively. Yes. I could. And that is up to me.  Because today, I drove away thinking “I could’ve done more than that.”

See … I too feel that I became in need of Monday morning mercy. If for nothing else than just learning to be more aware.

It was a beautiful summer eve, one we’d been waiting a while for. My boyfriend and I had gone to a movie and opted to walk downtown afterwards, not wanting the night to end. It’s a place we rarely meander. Shops close by 5:30. Streets become vacant, but for the youth that spend their days and nights on the streets “killing time” or the odd citizen checking in at the bank ATM.

We started at City Hall Park, flipped off the sandals and walked bare foot on the green grass. I stopped to show Vaden how snap dragons can talk. Thanks Grandma!  The sweet smell of petunias and roses took my breath away. What a moment!

Our city’s downtown is not extremely urban or alive, but is trickled with some cool old buildings that as a photographer – I like.

Now my habit in walking by anyone anywhere is to try and look them in the eye, if they will, and smile. Ever the nice Canadian girl. We crossed the street by the soup kitchen and I looked to my right and saw a man sitting on the curb, huddled over with his arms around his legs looking like he hadn’t seen a razor or shower in a while. I smiled as we passed him and two seconds later heard an angst shout “What the F*%$  you looking at??!!”

I held Vaden’s hand tighter.  He never even saw him and thought it was someone shouting out at us from a window above. My heart palpitated fast as we moved on. We were walking Vaden’s old mail route. I tried my best to pay attention after that, but my mind kept thinking “is that guy going to come after us? Does he have a knife?”

The last few days I have been thinking, or rather God has been speaking to my heart, that I am no different from that man sitting on the curb. He is in need. Of several things. The main one being a Saviour.

He is human. I am human. I have faults.

I am not perfect though for some reason I am ever trying to be. Without the love of Jesus, my life is literally empty and void of purpose. The only difference between me and that man who cussed at me, as far as the inner man goes, is that I have had the good fortune of being introduced to Jesus already. Bottom line.  Or you know what, perhaps he met God a long time ago, and has lost his way, and needs someone to help him find his way back.

It’s been quite a revelation and thought provoking blur for me this week to realize how utterly human I am, and how true the Word is when it says  that apart from Jesus (the Vine), I (the branch) am lifeless.

In the words of Martin Luther King, with my own twist, “I have a need. A need that only Christ can fulfill. One that all humanity has.”

Life is meant to be enjoyed and dependant on the completeness of Christ – not my own strength or ability.

So just like that man sitting on the curb swearin’ at me – I too have a need.