We had a great time celebrating Jill's dad's birthday last night. We stopped over at our favorite haunt in Oak Ridge TN - a great Chinese place that has fantastic food. The holiday season officially began at the Zockoll household as of yesterday! Christmas music keeps getting turned on - I've even put up Christmas lights in my classroom at school!Julie is doing fine, wearing Grandma's and Mom's jewelry (She's 2 now. This picture was when she was much younger. ) Nicholas called us from ETSU and he has strep throat. Please pray for his recovery. He sounded pretty bad on the phone.
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The seriousness of a relationship with Christ has been the topic in my class this week. Yesterday we reviewed James 2:19 in light of the many people who fel that just a simple regard that there is a God is enough to get them into Heaven:
You believe that there is one God. Good! Even the demons believe that–and shudder.
I can't help but note James' sarcasm when he says "good!" I guess he's making a serious point here to listeners who feel they are "good" enough to bypass God's rules for getting into Heaven. We face a time in this world when there is a casualness in regard to the things of the Lord and a nonchalance when it comes to obedience. May we be delivered from that type of dangerous attitude.
“If your heart takes more pleasure in reading novels, or watching TV, or going to the movies, or talking to friends, rather than just sitting alone with God and embracing Him, sharing His cares and His burdens, weeping and rejoicing with Him, then how are you going to handle forever and ever in His presence...? You'd be bored to tears in heaven, if you're not ecstatic about God now!” - Keith Green
"I lack the fervency, vitality, life, in prayer which I long for. I know that many consider it fanaticism when they hear anything which does not conform to the conventional, sleep-inducing eulogies so often rising from Laodicean lips; but I know too that these same people can acquiescently tolerate sin in their lives and in the church without so much as tilting one hair of their eyebrows." - Jim Eliot
