WHY CAN"T I BLOG LIKE THIS

Sir Francis Drake wrote this prayer in 1577:

Disturb us, Lord, when
We are too pleased with ourselves,
When our dreams have come true
Because we dreamed too little,
When we arrived safely
Because we sailed too close to the shore.

Disturb us, Lord, when
with the abundance of things we possess
We have lost our thirst
For the waters of life;
Having fallen in love with life,
We have ceased to dream of eternity
And in our efforts to build a new earth,
We have allowed our vision
Of the new Heaven to dim.

Disturb us, Lord, to dare more boldly,
To venture on wilder seas
Where storms will show Your mastery;
Where losing sight of land,
We shall find the stars.

We ask you to push back
The horizons of our hopes;
And to push back the future
In strength, courage, hope, and love.

This we ask in the name of our Captain,
Who is Jesus Christ.

How Long Will You Simple Ones Love Your Simple Ways

Well I am sticking to my one hour commitment. Bad thing is I do them at the end of the day. So my cousin calls out of the blue and says he will be here for a lock-in. So I am doing my devotions right after this post. Today was a good day and I enjoyed the devotion last night. I love the Discipleship Creed that someone wrote. Making new habits. Hoping to find something profound. Looking at my journal I would have to sum it up like so:

• Day 1 - 31 January 2008. A verse screamed out at me. Proverbs 1:22 "How long will you simple ones love your simple ways?" OUCH. That screamed volumes to me. My answer is "NO MORE!"

• Day 2 - Okay this could get long so I will keep it short. I realized that I need to clean up my mouth. Actually my heart. I don't like what comes out of my mouth so I need to clean up the source.

New Beginnings

I am excited today. Not because of some great sermon or some mighty man (or woman) of God laying on of hands but because I started a class in church. It is called Discipleship. And it is blessing me. Basically, you commit to an hour of prayer, bible reading, journaling, and devotion. I am just on my second day but a feel a peace like I have not felt in a long time.

I plan to write more about my journey of retuning to my first love in the days ahead. I am excited about life changes coming my way in 2008 - a year of new beginnings!

My favorite get away with her!

LUCERNE SWITZERLAND

We only went to a few places by ourselves during our two tours in Germany. One weekend we took the old beater - a 1990 7 series BMW - 4-5 hours south, to lovely Switzerland. We went to lake Lucerne. It was a blast. I wish we would have went once a year. Just being in a place with a beautiful blue lake, mountains, and her. But alas I did not occupy the time and now I have some beautiful red lakes, red dirt, and some hills down in southeastern Oklahoma that we natives call mountains.

On the way down the beater heated up in a stau (traffic jam), so I had to pull of and let the beast get some water.

We used wonderful mapquest to navigate but oh the trips would have involved less yelling, if I would have invested in GPS!

We arrived late, and all was forgiven. Our mountain view was a view of other hotels (always go with lake view especially if they are more expensive). But we were positive, we were going to have a good time because lodging in Switzerland is not cheap.

I had to take some pictures before we went to bed. She looks marvelous!






The next day we had a blast! We caught a boat and road across the lake to the train that would take us up the mountain. Can you believe I suggested we drive to the train and save the money? I guess I was not thinking - romantic trip!!! Duh.




We road up the mountain in this..Doesn't it look like the train on Mr. Rogers? That was the one ahead of us.

So we get up the mountain. Took a bunch of pictures. A bunch because we just bought a digital camera...welcome to the new century.


















I had this bright idea to stop at one station down the mountain and walk to the next. It was a long walk but fun.



We then spent the evening walking around the town of Lucerne. It was awesome. I miss having beautiful places that close.

Judy loves this picture.

Here are some pictures we took in Paris. We did a one day trip to Paris. All we really saw that time was the Eiffel tower and ate at Planet Holywood. Big mistake. I wanted to see Notre Dame again before I moved back to Oklahoma. I have such a hard life.