Sunflower

"I encourage you to be like a dolphin in the sea of our egalitarian, gender-leveling culture. Don't be like a jellyfish. The ocean of secularism that we swim in (including much of the church) drifts toward minimizing serious differences between manhood and womanhood. The culture swings back and forth as to whether women are mainly sex objects or senior vice presidents. But rarely does it ponder the biblical vision that men are called to humbly lead and protect and provide, and women are called to come in alongside with their unique gifts and strengths and help the men carry through the vision. I pray that you will be stirred...to pursue mature manhood and womanhood. More is at stake than we know. God has made marriage the showcase of his covenant love where the husband models Christ, and the wife models the church (Ephesians 5:21-33). And God calls single people to bless this vision and to cultivate an expression of leadership and support appropriate to their different relationships."

-John Piper, A Sweet and Bitter Providence

Kid Pics

I always enjoy Friday Funnies from the Apel family's blog; the frankness and honesty of children is so refreshing and always good for a laugh. As a college student I spend quite a bit of time with families; living with one, serving in a church full of young families, and babysitting for one specifically every day. I've spent the last two years helping out the Gessner family and have grown quite fond of their kids. Yesterday Gunnar made me laugh so hard when he woke up, sleep still in his eyes and grumbled,

"Wanna hear my dream? I was Garfield and Otie got turned into a alien and I had a gun... (pause)... and I shot him... (insert some strange mumblings)... he had red eyes."

Gosh I love these kids. More fun pics to come I'm sure!

"...Hope helps us dream. Hope helps us think up ways to do good. Hope helps us pursue our ventures with virtue and integrity. It's hopelessness that makes people think they have to lie and steal and seize illicit pleasures for the moment. But hope, based on the confidence that a sovereing God is for us, gives us a thrilling impulse that I call strategic righteousness."

John Piper, A Sweet and Bitter Providence