Living Lessons

 Beautiful feet for a beautiful girl

 Victoria is already 2 weeks and 1 day old. Thanks to the "Pink Girls" who came over with these flowers in celebration of her two weeks

 Linda was actually feeling good enough on Sunday to go to church. We decided to dedicate Victoria to the Lord . (although long ago we had already done that). Reminds us that we need to all be dedicated to our Lord, for we are not our own, we have been purchased by our Lord.

How do you handle your stress? I get my girls to give me a backrub...well, sort of. Sure do love my girls.

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Sunday at church, we had Abby take a family picture. The one below was taken with our camera, but I am sure Abby's will be much better. Such a blessing to be able to worship God together...anybody looking forward to heaven?

 

 By chance (yeah, right) I have been reading a book by John Piper called "Don't waste your life". The chapter I was reading two weeks ago was entitled "Magnifying Christ through pain and death" Paul said, for me to live is Christ, and to die is gain. So whether in life, or in death, we are to glorify our Lord. Here are some quotes:

Christ is made supreme when we are so satisfied in him that we can "let good and kindred go, this mortal life also, and suffer for the sake of love. His beauty shines most brightly when treasured above health and wealth and life itself.

No one ever said that they learned their deepest lessons of life or had their sweetest encounters with God, on the sunny days. People go deep with God when the drought comes. Christ aims to be magnified in life most clearly by the way we experience Him in our losses.

What a tragic waste when people turn away from the Calvary road of love and suffering. All the riches of the glory of God in Christ are on that road. All the sweetest fellowship with Jesus is there. All the treasures of assurance."

 

So we take up our cross and walk with Christ on the Calvary road  of love and suffering.  We have much to be thankful for.  Thank you so much to all of you who have kept us in your prayers.

Our first week with our new blessing

Thanks Nick for bringing the kids down to visit

 This week we were studying out the earths mantle, so we made a model out of ice cream

Reuben working on some new snowshoes

      

 Swinging in Feb? yup, we sure have enjoyed the warm weather.

  

 Lunch time...again . I sure have enjoyed our little daughter.

 Caleb and Victoria

Rachel and her new sister

Greetings everybody. The Lord has blessed with a week like we've never had before. I can hardly believe that it has been almost one week since we came home from Fargo. "By chance" our bible reading schedule is taking us through the book of Job this month.  We certainly haven't experienced anything close to his life, but with job, we want to bless God for his goodness and kindness. He never knew why God did what he did in his life, and neither do we, but we trust in His providence in our lives. Thankfully, we haven't had any "friends" like Job . So many of you have blessed us with cards, gifts, food,calls, visits, prayers ect. We are blessed to have such a wonderful extended family. Thank you. Victoria continues to do well, and we are exploring other options medically..please keep praying about that. In the meantime, life goes on at our home. School work, music lessons, laundry, hockey, play, you know what I mean. Here are a few photos from this week.

More pictures of Victoria

Praise God for another wonderful day. Victoria is doing well, though we can see that she does struggle at times for breath. Linda is having her staples removed today, so will visit with our Dr. some.  She is recovering well, but if you know her at all, you will know that I must keep my patient in bed, so she doesn't get going too early. Please pray for the wisdom of God for us in terms of if there is anything we should be doing medically.  There is so much info out there, praise God we serve a God who has all knowledge. 

Living by faith friends,  in the presence of God Almighty.

Pictures of our Beautiful Daughter ,Victoria Faith

Its getting late, so we will start with these few pictures. As you know Linda and I went to Roseau last monday for an ultra sound. Our doctor wanted us to go to Fargo to see a specialist and get a better ultrasound, so that was schedualed for Wed. We took off on Tuesday, had the ultra sound on wed., were told the condition of our little daughter and decided that if they could do a c section that day or the next , we may as well go ahead with that. Victoria Faith was born Feb 10, 2010 at 3: 40 pm (around) . She is just beautiful. If she didn't have an extra large head, she would be just like any newborn. She has a condition called haloproscencephaly (spelling?). She only has a brain stem and a little tissue where normally there is a full brain. She is not expected to live long, but we are glad to be able to take care of her for Jesus until He decides He wants to take care of her. God's grace has been so sufficient for us these days, but of course the tears do flow. Do we know why? no, but we trust our heavenly father and are thankful that Jesus conquerored death for us. Is it hard? yes, so keep us in your prayers. Will try to send more pics tomorrow. Live for Jesus today, we never know how long we will live for.

Just before surgery

My lovely wife.

The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. Amen!

Do you know the reference of the above verse?? Revelation 22:21...or...the last verse of the New Testament. Have you ever copied out part of a book of the Bible and gotten discouraged...or felt you could never finish what you began?? It CAN be done. Yesterday, April 7, 2009, Benjamin finished copying out the New Testament. The above photo shows how many notebooks it took for him to finish it...not too expensive a project...though it does take TIME. Still...it is time well spent. For every verse you copy out, you probably read it three or four times. First you look at it and copy the first part down...you look again, and copy more and look back and make sure you begin the second part at the right place...if it is longer, you look back a third time for the last part of the verse...you check and make sure your punctuation is correct...then you read over the verse again to make sure there are no errors or ommissions. By the time you are done, you should have a pretty good idea of what the verse is about...and just maybe, you will see something you have never noticed before. So I encourage those of you who have never tried this kind of Penmanship...it is a great option... and it can be done! Benjamin had copied some during his high school years...but had some extra time recently, and began Feb. 6th with Acts chapter 2. It took him 2 full months to finish the rest of the New Testament.

Isaiah 55 10-12 For as the rain cometh down, and the snow from heaven, and returneth not thither, but watereth the earth, and maketh it bring forth and bud, that it may give seed to the sower, and bread to the eater: So shall my word be that goeth forth out of my mouth: it shall not ruturn unto me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereto I sent it. For ye shall go out with joy, and be led forth with peace: the mountains and the hills shall break forth before you into singing, and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands.

Science experiment for school.

This month the verse we have been studying is Matthew 5:13b ...But if the salt have lost his savour, wherewith shall it be salted? it is thenceforth good for nothing, but to be cast out, and to be trodden under foot of men. The major concept is: Inefectiveness brings harsh consequences. We have been learning about the many characteristics of salt, and how it applies to our responsibility as Christians to positively affect the world around us for good. One of the things they have been learning is that there are serious consequences for being ingrown Christians. This is illustrated by the Dead Sea. The dead sea receives water but never gives any back. The salt, which is useful in so many situations has killed almost all forms of life in the Dead Sea.



One project the kids did was to see how much salt it would take to make 3 cups of water dense enough to make an egg float. The egg was almost floating at 8 teaspoons, and at 10 teaspoons, it popped right up. They found that it takes approximately 1.1 tablespoons per cup of water to make the water have the same properties as the Dead Sea.



Lets remember to be "salty" christians!

THE HEAVENS DECLARE THE GLORY OF GOD!!!!!!!!!!!!!

My loose translation of that is that the heavens scream, shout, shine forth, cry out that there is a God who exists and has created all this. May we live for His glory and shine forth for Him.

The kids and I found this picture yesterday as we were studying about telescopes. This was taken with the Hubble. Is that awesome or what. We now have this as our desktop background. Why do we ever worry about our troubles, when we serve and know this Great God who keeps all this universe in the palm of His hands.

As trouble continues to come to our nation (as it surely seems to be) may we find daily His rest that we need.

Our weekend was going to be spent at the Hansons, but due to roads being closed, and sickness, that has been postponed. Sorry Hansons, maybe in a couple of weeks .

Now, lets go out and declare His glory.

White as Snow.

Come now, and let us reason together saith the Lord;

though your sins be as scarlet,

they shall be as white as snow;

though they be red like crimson

they shall be as wool.

Spring????

Isn't God creative? Snow, blizzards, rain, nice sunny days, and that is all in the same day. (God still does control all this stuff, doesn't He) March has come and gone (well, almost anyways)With March came Ben's 20th birthday, umm, I must be getting old or something. He has been such a blessing to us, and others. His application for Border Patrol is progressing, but his interview on April 1st was cancelled, due to roads being closed. They are checking out all his paperwork, then will get into the background check. His arm is healing nicely, and he is glad there will be a scar. Hockey is over for the year (hurrah, no more injuries). Reuben got a tooth knocked out the last time he played, and is getting a root canal done to get it fixed. Couldn't find a picture of him to post, but I know there was one on the Krahn's blog.

Everyone has been sick around here, including us. Jeshua is still in Fargo, but will come home sometime this week . Influenza type A was all they found so far. Isn't it great that there will be none of this in heaven...can't wait. What a hope we have. There have been alot of people dying around here as well. Jack Marvin passed away.A couple of snowmobilers fell through the ice as well as a dump truck, all resulting in deaths. Then a co worker had her mobile home burned down with her 10 year old son still trapped inside. Then a car ran into a semi around swift. I sure hope that they were all ready to meet their creator. Life is short. Eternity is long. Live for Christ each day.

Well I leave you with a few of my favourite girls.