Happy Birthday, Jeremy!

Today is my brother's BIRTHDAY! Jeremy Saenz is 19 years old and is growing up to be an awesome man of God! Tonight, Kaitlin and I had him over for fondue dessert. It was very yummy!

Religion Saves

I recently picked up Mark Driscoll's new Book, Religion Saves: And Nine Other Misconceptions. It is wonderful, full of so much truth and practical theology. I really enjoy Driscoll's teachings and find his prophetic ministry (speaking truth into our cultural situation, not "prophetic" in the sense of telling the future) awesome!

Here are the table of contents:

Introduction

Question 9: Birth Control

Question 8: Humor

Question 7: Predestination

Question 6: Grace

Question 5: Sexual Sin

Question 4: Faith and Works

Question 3: Dating

Question 2: The Emerging Church

Question 1: The Regulative Principal

Thanks, God

So the other day, I was praying and focusing on a heart of thanksgiving (even though it's August... crazy, right!?). A thought came into my mind as I was offering my thanks to the Lord: God, thank you for making me who I am, not who I want to be!

I often find myself praying that I would not struggle with certain sins, that I would have been created another way, or that I could change my flaws. I did have an epiphany in my moment of prayer, though. I really am thankful that God created me just the way I am. If I were created just the way I want to be, I would never have the opportunities to trust God's sovereignty.

God cannot tempt anyone with evil, I know that. However, I believe that it may be a gracious act of God NOT to heal, NOT to restore, NOT to take away our sins, brokenness, and maladies. In our brokenness and weakness, I believe that God spiritually forms us. My inept causes me to trust God, not myself. My inability leads me to the cross. He may never fully restore this side of eternity, but my faith and perseverance may greatly increase because of his gracious no to our prayers.

Will Ferrell Sunscreen... I love this!!!!

Will Ferrell Sunscreen

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My wife stole my post... but I have a VIDEO!!!

I was going to blog on my summer, but she stole the post. Read her post here. However, you can watch our video recap from Centrifuge summer camp! It was such an awesome time. God really moved in some incredible ways!

I just figured out that i can blog from my phone via text message! So excited!

catch up

its been a while. not like the song, but like the time lapse since my last post. here it goes...

well, folks, i spent the entire day (literally, the ENTIRE day) going through receipts and working on our finances. we have kept every receipt since january and we are accounting for every penny spent. my reason in this is to make a budget that is a lot more reasonably based, rather than trying to guess back in january how much everything is going to cost us. these last 6 months we just spent normally and now we are ready to evaluate and see where we can cut back and where we can loosen. i need to finish tomorrow, but i also need to do the rest of the stuff i planned to do while kaitlin is gone. (so much to do, so little time). but, i really miss my wife. ( i may or may not have talked to our kitten a lot, lit candles, and listened to jazz music alone while she was gone. you'll never know.)