iona's blog 9/25 - 10/1/2005

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Sunday, September 25, 2005

Part of the Family
What a glorious Sunday I've had. I enjoyed the freedom to attend church and Sunday School and evening church, and in the midst of it all to fellowship with my brothers and sisters in Christ at a luscious pot luck luncheon.

It's a wonderful thing to be part of the family of God! I pray I never take that for granted. People crave a sense of belonging because God wires us that way. Even the recluse or the agoraphobic has a deep longing to be part of a "family" group. It is usually fear that prevents them from doing so.

As a Christian, every other believer is a member of your family. But it's a bit hard to relate to that many people in any meaningful and fulfilling way. That's one of the reasons why your "home church" is so important. It is a smaller family group in which you can relate personally. But even then, except in very small congregations, the group is too large to allow for the inter-relational intimacy and accountability needed by all believers.

That's why small groups are so important. Sunday School classes, Bible Studies, Prayer Groups are where we learn to love one another as persons, not just in a general way. We come to truly love our brothers and sisters, warts and all.

And we become accountable to one another! That's right, as believers we are to confess our sins to each other and be accountable to one another. Dangerous ground, yes! And I've been hurt there, and maybe you have, too. Enter with care, letting the Holy Spirit guide you as you go. It's a proving ground for love and fertile soil for growth. You're part of the family!

Monday, September 26, 2005

Moving Day
I usually do my blog at night, but today I am starting early. Today, I am moving my blog and its archives from my ionanet server to the First Baptist Church of Galt's web site. Just as Jesus is right now preparing a place for us in heaven, Tom Lane is preparing a place for my stuff on the church site.

But before adding me to the site and giving me the user name and password to upload material, Tom and Pastor Rob made sure I had the needed skills and experience so that no harm would be done... such as inadvertently wiping out the entire site or disrupting the site navigation system.

Discernment. Not everything that looks good is good. Scripture teaches us to be discerning... even of the Gospel message! What! Yes, because many preach a form of the Gospel, but not the true Gospel. A young seeker I've been witnessing to claims this is her biggest barrier to accepting Christ... too many different "gospels." "They can't all be right," she says. Be discerning, seek the truth.

It takes work. READ your Bible prayerfully. Check out what you hear from the pulpit or Bible teacher. Even well intending Biblical scholars make mistakes. You'll learn a lot and have have fun doing it. Bible reading not "fun" for you? Ask the Lord to make it fun, exciting and real. Keep reading and you'll note a gradual change until you have a whole new attitude and love for the Scriptures.

Well, I'm off to the doctor and when I return, I may be ready to start moving!

Tuesday, September 27, 2005

Moving Day and Fixing Day!
I find that seldom are things as they seem. I've been doing web sites for some time now and assumed I could move my blog to the church web site in a matter of an hour or so. NOT! I have worked on it the better part of two days!

Today I went out and bought a book to try to figure out how some of this automated, templated site ticks. There's enough code here to turn your eyes inside out! Bless his heart, Deacon Tom Lane has his hands full with this thing!

I finally got my tables to align but some graphics are just not obeying the code... it IS WEIRD! And I cannot get the navigation bar to show up on any new pages. I've read nearly the whole book and am throwing in the towel... or perhaps throwing out the computer, lol. Tomorrow, I'll call Tom and try to learn the secret trick... but for tonight, I am off to bed. Since I worked on this thing most of the night last night, I am really sleepy tonight. At least this page is finally right. Thank You Lord... He is even faithful to help with such things as these.

Wednesday, September 28, 2005

Reading and Fixing Day!
It' grand to have my web blog here. Makes me more like part of the Galt blog family. Most of my pages are taking on that hereditary FBC site look except for one pretty important thing. You might have noticed this nice navigation bar on the left to take you around to key pages of the the site. All done with ease and efficiency, but on some of my pages... aw lets face it, in ALL of my other pages, it is NOT working and I can't seem to figure out why.

I didn't want to call Tom Lane, the real SITE BRAIN, SINCE HE'S HAD TOO MUCH OF ME ALREADY THIS WEEK, I AM SURE. PLUS I SEEM TO RECALL HE OWNS AND OPERATES A BUSINESS IN HIS SPARE TIME - PROBABLY AROUND 80+ hrs a week (sorry, caps lock was on and I'm too tired to retype,) Needless to say, although I am now semi happy with the look, and very happy to be "on site," I am still in a quandary about the navigational problems. But I now leave all in God's hands, and head off for some deep, deep sleep I am almost ashamed to say this but part of the problem was I thought I was working in FrontPage 2003 like I was supposed to be. But it seems that after a bad crash some time back and we had to rebuild everything, I believe I installed an earlier version.

I read most of the I book I bought and still have a lot of questions... but thankfully I've got a truck load of answers, as well. Too bad the answers don't go with the questions. Don't you just love irony!?

I guess what bother me the most about th8is whole thing is that I assured everyone I knew what I was doing, have built sites for years, won awards, belonged the the HTML Authors Guild among other pro orgs, but here I am unable to pull off a seemingly simple web task. I talked them into trusting me and then blew it. I am much less concerned with the egg on my face than the bother I have put two dear brothers through,,, two men whose respect I covet and value.

But tomorrow is Women of Grace, a place of peace and mutual uplifting for women of all ages. I Love Thursday mornings! So for tonight I will leave it all up to my Master who is so tolerant of me, and He may give fresh insight in the morning. I wonder how nonbelievers deal with the frustrations of life... not a place I want to be.

Thursday, September 29, 2005

Many Counselors
Solomon was the wisest man of his day, and yet he sought counsel from time to time and said there was wisdom in many counselors. I have shared my frustration with trying to understand some of the coding of this web site. I am of the old school and my brain has not advanced with the speed of FrontPage 2003 (the program used to generate this web site).

One of my best counselors is my daughter Athena, a computer whiz and the pride of the University of Central Florida library. Athena knows more about computers and the internet than most of us can even begin to imagine. I doubt she had to think twice before e-mailing me everything I needed to know to make this thing work... but I still need to confer with Tom Lane our very own computer whiz. So my changes are not instead of his but beside them... for a day at most. Meanwhile, I won't sleep too well until I am sure all are happy.

On another note, like Pastor Rob, I am sad for friends who have suffered loss or are now going through legal or other trials. I've spent a lot of time on my knees lately and just walkin' around talking things over with my Lord. I am very thankful He is always so ready to listen and respond.

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