Three more weeks...

I have three weeks left of my summer break! I am going to savor every minute! I am so thankful to have a job I love, doing speech therapy, with wonderful breaks, hours, and holidays! I am blessed. I truly have the best of both worlds. I love being a pastor's wife AND I love having a professional job as well. I do love the congregation of members at First Baptist and I am so grateful for the amazing friendships we have there. The people are what make up "the church" and we are blessed with so many kind and sincere people who are serious about joining God at work in Grand Prairie!
OK, three weeks left before heading back to my caseload on three school campuses with awesome co-workers and precious students to help! What do I want to accomplish before heading back to that routine?
I want to get Bill's desk chair recovered, the leak fixed in the study, and I want to stroll the Dallas Arboretum and have a picnic there again with Bill (if we can find a time it's not too hot!). I want to finish the book I am reading, "Take Four" by Karen Kingsbury. I want to go to Houston and visit my daughter and we are going to take in some Astro's games too! I have three days I have to attend trainings for work and we have one more summer wedding to attend. Oh, and my new kitchen floor goes in next Monday! Thank you Farmer's insurance after my old dishwasher ruined the old wood floor! I'd also like to learn to shoot a gun and eventually buy and pack a pistol just for safety when I am on the road to Houston or driving on my own around the metroplex but that is not urgent, just a "want". I may wait to fulfill that "want" until the Fall. My bigger brother finds this absolutely hilarious! I am so glad to give him a silly thought and make him laugh so hard he can hardly walk! His baby sister wanting to pack heat, makes him laugh until he cries! This makes me smile!
hmmmmm..... That was a huge sign of contentment. I am just so happy, content, relaxed, and thankful. I am proud of my husband and kids, I love my job yet I am thrilled with my plan to retire from TRS in 3 years and then work maybe just 2 days a week doing speech therapy. I am loving joining God at work in Grand Prairie and at FBCGP with such energetic and enthusiastic people who love God and want to serve Him. I am enjoying reconnecting and keeping up with friends from high school and from every church God has placed us in over the years, through Facebook.
These 3 weeks will go fast, I know, so I better get off the computer and get busy making the most of every minute!

This temple

I Corinthians 3:16 says, "Do you not know that you are a temple of God, and that the Spirit of god dwells in you? 17 If any man destroys the temple of God, God will destroy him, for the temple of God is holy and that is what you are."
The body of a Christian becomes a literal temple or dwelling place for the Holy Spirit! How amazing! How wonderful and what a responsibility and privilege! After Christ died on the cross and paid the penalty for our sins, the Holy Spirit was then able to actually inhabit us! There was no longer a need for the veil in the temple and that room called the Holy of Hollies where only the high priest could enter into. Christ death and resurrection changed all that! A new covenant of Grace began and at Pentecost our bodies became temples for the Holy Spirit!
I want to be a good steward of this one earthly body, this dwelling place for the Holy Spirit of the one and only true God! I want to do my best to care for the health of my body and make God proud! I want to do my part to live a long and productive life as healthy and vital as possible so I can do the things God has for me to do!
I grew up under the care and training of a wonderful mother who was also a registered dietitian! Dixie Ann modeled and lived out healthy balanced food preparation, presentation, and dining! Mom always cooked very healthy and tasty meals and even taught us how to do the same! She taught home management skills as she had learned at TWU and she modeled regular exercise and weight control as she had been trained how to manage the diets and meals for an entire hospital of patients who had everything from diabetes to renal failure. She was amazing and I am so thankful I had her has a mom! I knew the four food groups and how much of each you needed a day way back in elementary school years! She made sure we knew how to eat healthy and she provided amazing meals in our home. I have such good memories of smelling her cooking and it was always ready right after Walter Cronkite said, "And that the way it is" as he signed off.
As a result of Mom's training, I have always been aware and concerned with healthy eating, weight control, and exercise. In high school I struggled with my weight somewhat my junior and senior year but while at Baylor I became borderline anorexic my Freshman year. So many people said "you'll gain the freshman 10 or 15 off at college". That actually scared me so I set out to prove them wrong and developed some unhealthy habits of starving and over exercising. I lost 10 pounds that first year instead of gaining but my hair also began falling out and my hands turned orange from eating so many carrots and oranges! Mom had me meet with a dietitian friend of hers the summer after my freshman year of college and she taught me how to maintain my desired weight while still getting my nutritional needs and going about it in a healthy way. From that point on I was successful at maintaining a healthy weight that was even 10 pounds less than my high school weight. As I studied Speech & Language Therapy at Baylor I also learned more and more about our spiritual lives and through BSU Leadership Trainings, various Bible studies, Christian friends and my experiences there I grew and learned the importance of caring for our physical bodies not just for vanity but instead to be responsible stewards of what God had given us. This changed my motivation from selfish motives to scripture based motives.
Hebrews 12:1 & 2 "...let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who for the joy set before Him endured the cross,..." and in 2Timothy 4:7 "I have fought the good fight, I have finished the course, I have kept the faith."
We have to be good stewards of our physical bodies if we are to run the race (live the Christian life) with all the gusto we can and at our very best! We can't be physical slobs and expect our bodies to perform at their best to do the tasks God has for us to do and for His glory! We can't fight a good fight if we are out of breath, sluggish, tired, lazy, over weight, drunk, unorganized, etc. We must be at our best to give Him our best!
In about 2002 or 2003, Melissa asked me if I would join Weight Watchers with her. She was in high school and we had just built this house and were adjusting to moving from Livingston to Grand Prairie. It was a very stressful time in our lives and I had gained about 20 pounds and Melissa just wanted to shape up and trim down a bit. We went together and it was the best thing we could have done! It as really funny at first, you sign in and pay, then you have a private weigh in and then you go to a 30 minute class. It must be much like AA because people share how their week went and if they lost or gained and what they struggled with that week. Recipes are shared and the teacher gives a very motivating lesson and pep talk and everyone claps for each person who lost weight that week! So funny but it REALLY WORKS! We didn't have much to lose and within months we were at our goal and became Lifetime members and I get to go for free now! As long as I am not more than 2 lbs over my healthy goal weight I am free and only go once a month to weigh and the psychology of it all just really WORKS! You can still eat the things YOU like and lose or maintain, you just count their point value and when you have eaten all your allotted "points" for the day you stop. It's that simple! Weight Watchers was life changing for Melissa and me both. We learned that when you get disciplined in one area of your life, it spills over into the other areas (physical, mental, spiritual, and social) and you get motivated to be the very best you can be in all four of these areas.
At church, our members that know Bill and I even just a little, know that I am the "dietitian" in our house and I keep a Weight Watcher friendly pantry and kitchen. We joke about it allot and people tease and try to sneak doughnuts and other sweet treats to Bill in fun! Our friends know I make Bill take the skin off his chicken and not eat it, won't let him eat fries, (when I am with him!) etc. I make him go to the doctor when needed and I tell him "thank you" for taking care of himself and in turn, he voices his appreciation regularly to me for taking care of myself as well. We walk/run 3.2 miles together regularly, he plays racquetball four or five times a week, golf when he can, I go to Curves and do my new elliptical regularly. We tease allot, splurge once in a while, but all in all we do try to live a healthy and active lifestyle so we can live long and serve God many years to come. We do take seriously the challenge to be good stewards of our earthly bodies or temples as we join God at work wherever He calls us.

My earthly house of this tabernacle! Lol!

2nd Corinthians 5:1 says, "For we know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens!" (I added the !) Isn't that nice to read and such a happy thought! Yes, I am constantly reminded (like it or not!) that my "earthly house" or earthly body is in a progressive state of dissolving or deteriorating! Lovely! Lol! And darn you, Adam and Eve! If they had been obedient and not given in to temptation to taste from the tree of knowledge of good and evil we would never have to age and grow old or even die an earthly death! Oh, well, I HAVE come to grips with growing old and I am striving to do so with grace! Maybe a little Botox, hair color, spray tans, and anything else I can afford to do within my means, but yes, with Grace! God does give us His Grace when we need it and in the exact amount we need!
Ok, so I go this morning to my final doctor's appt on my list of recommended things all 50 year olds need to start getting done every year! This was the Opthalmologist with full exam, eyes dialated and retinas checked for tears or possible beginnings of detachment, glaucoma screening, and vision prescriptions updated for contacts and for progressive bifocal glasses! I HATE getting my eyes dialated and I dread that glaucoma pressure screening where they puff that air in your eye and tell you not to jump! Yeah, right! Just like during that lovely mammogram when part of your body is smashed between two panels of plexiglass and they say, "now hold your breath and don't breathe or move!" Like I'm going to even if I could???? Oh,my!
Anyway, I did the full eye exam and all is well! Praise the Lord! I was a little worried due to some floaters and flashes I had in my right eye, and a well meaning friend said my retina may be about to detach! Yikes! I got right in! I went to the Kleinman Eangelista Eye Center in Arlington and love this place! All these very young people buzz around and make you feel very welcome! Then when I got in the little exam room to see the actual doctor this cute asian Dr. Tran comes in and does the exam, says my retinas look good and healthy, answers all my questions, updates my prescriptions and says, "the floaters are just normal age related symptoms!" I wasn't sure if I should slap him or spank him!! He himself looked like he was just in junior high and I could be his momma and he is making remarks to me about "age related" symptoms? Lol! No, seriously, I was relieved and he then very quickly said, "oh, I mean, this is just normal, you look much younger than your age!" God love this young doctor! He does have manners after all! Lol! Yes, it is a defining moment when ALL your doctors look like they are 16 or younger! Truly, I am so thankful to still be here and all kidding aside, I am so thankful to God to really have good health and to have a job with insurance and then I have additional insurance through my husband's job so I am 100% covered! What a blessing!! What do people do that don't have insurance and then need more serious intervention? I am grateful and SO very blessed!
I am now good to go for another year, before I have to do all the medical check up stuff again (but not the colonoscopy for 5 years!). I am renewing mine and Bill's commitment to "always have fun" everyday! We want to LIVE each day to the fullest, laugh everyday, tell our loved ones we love them, use our good dishes, wear my red dress (so to speak!), and dance with my husband, everyday! Life is short but God is good so I will seek to glorify Him by enjoying His blessings while I am still here!
Blessing to you and to yours!