Quake! Romans 8:18-25

Kevin continued his series on Romans 8 today and tackled the question about God's love and hope in a world filled with tragic natural disasters. Romans 8:18-25 shows that natural disasters are a result of sin entering the world, but that God is in control and allows them to happen - verse 20 teaches us that He subjected the world in hope. Just like giving birth to a baby (a thought that crosses my mind quite frequently these days!), the pain leading up to the birth is agonizing, but the joy on the other side is unimaginable. Because of Christ's redemption, we who believe him have this hope - that the "groaning" of the world around us will one day be completely restored to it's original condition - free of pain, death, and filled with amazing fruitfulness.

Our church website is up and running! If you want to listen to this sermon, you can download it at www.kurtenchurch.org

Living Last Supper

Kevin made his stage debut tonight in our church's depiction of a "living" Last Supper. The thirteen men wore costumes inspired by the famous DaVinci painting, and Kevin took the part of Simon the Zealot, sitting on the end of the table. Though he still maintains that preaching is more of his gift than acting, I think he did a great job!

Passover Party

Last night our family celebrated a messianic Passover, remembering how God freed the Israelites from slavery in Egypt and freed us from sin through Jesus's sacrifice on the cross. Kevin read a Passover book to the kids, we learned about the foods on the Seder plate, and enjoyed a yummy meal together.

Here is our Seder plate:

It has haroseth, a mixture of nuts and apples to represent the mortar that the Israelites used to make bricks in slavery in Egypt, parsley dipped in salt water to remember the tears shed in slavery, an egg to symbolize mourning, a shank bone to symbolize the lamb that was sacrificed to save the Israelites' first-born sons, and horseradish to reflect the bitterness of slavery.

We also ate matzah, because the Israelites had to flee without time for their bread to rise.

Naomi and Johnathan love the tradition of hiding the matzah, and I think their favorite part was drinking sparkling grape juice from fancy cups. After the Seder plate we ate... and ate!

Matzo Ball soup

Baby Moses salad crafted by Naomi (see the little babies in their baskets, all ready to float in the Nile!)

Potato kugel and balsamic-glazed lamb chops

And lemon sponge cake with strawberries for dessert. Yummy!

I love the traditions of Passover. And the kids do, too. What other lesson from the Bible engages more senses than this, tasting the bitter herbs and salty tears, smelling the lamb, seeing the bruised and pierced matzah, setting out a cup for Elijah? It's all such a tangible reminder of God's faithfulness and love for us.

What I learned from my pastor... 3-28-10

Kevin is preaching from Romans 8 for the next three weeks. Romans 8 is, I think, one of the most amazing chapters in the Bible, if it is even possible to narrow one chapter down that way. I've read it often in the past six months, as well as other seasons in my life. Today Kevin focused on the first few verses, which condense some of the most critical components to understanding God's plan for salvation. It is both awe-inspiring and sobering to read that first verse: "There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus" - Wonderful to know that there is now no condemnation when we are saved by Christ, but sobering because that means God does condemn sin. Kevin explained how these verses give us a foundation on which to stand and understand the world and its suffering: That we who believe Jesus are justified or counted free from guilt, that He paid the penalty for our sin through His atonement, and that we are sanctified - to walk in a new way as a result of our new position in Christ.

Working Hard

Johnathan has been working hard at his physical therapy sessions and this week it seems like he's made a "growth spurt" of new things he can do. With the warm weather lately we've been out on the playground a lot, and he now can climb up the ladder-steps to get up to the slide himself. He's more confident with climbing on and off his favorite "rocket" swing by himself, too. Just yesterday he cleared the ground in a little jump with both feet - and landed (he's been aspiring to do that for a long time!). Way to go, Johnathan!

Last Day in San Antonio

Just to prove what rookie parents we are when it comes to planning vacations in big cities, we made a spontaneous decision Thursday morning to take a "quick trip" to the San Antonio Zoo before we headed home. Or maybe we wanted to give our children another lesson in "flexibility" (uh, no). Either way, as we sat in a zoo-induced traffic jam for 45 minutes, we knew before we even saw the enormous line that the zoo was not going to happen on this trip.

Plan B? Head back downtown to the Children's Museum, which Naomi and Johnathan found to be very fun. They played on a miniture bulldozer, flew an airplane, had fun with bubbles (and even stood inside a giant one), and shopped to their heart's delight in the HEB market.

We ate lunch on the Riverwalk and then bid San Antonio farewell. We are thankful that we had the opportunity to take such a fun trip for our spring break!

Sea World!

The BIG adventure of our trip was our day at Sea World on Wednesday. We got there nice and early to get good parking and a spot near the front of the entrance lines, which was good because it was crowded. But we were prepared this time! And we had a beautiful day - warm and sunny. Here's Naomi waiting patiently and studying her map.


Our first stop was a new show that included beluga whales, dolphins, tropical birds, synchronized swimmers and divers. The kids loved the animals and the divers - it was so fun to watch their reactions.


We hit Johnathan's highest priority next - the penguins. He loved them and was so excited! He told me that when penguins walk, it's called "tippy-top." Johnathan is known to make up his own funny phrases to repeat over and over, and "penguin tippy-top" is a current favorite. Try it - it is fun to say!



Next, the much-anticipated Shamu show. While we waited for the show to start (and in the days leading up to our Sea World trip), Naomi and Johnathan worked on remembering Shamu's name... I think we answered the question, "What's that whale's name?" at least 20 times! For some reason they couldn't get it to stick! But they have it now.

Due to recent events, the trainers didn't get in the water with the whales, but it was still pretty amazing.



Our favorite part was seeing the baby killer whale (named baby Shamu) who was born two months ago. He swam along next to his mother during the show while she did her stuff. Watch the video below to catch a peek of him!

(hmm - video not working. I'll try again later)

We checked out the flamigos, ducks, and crocodiles.



And we took in a Sesame Street show.

Kevin tried to talk Naomi into going with him on her first log ride since she's tall enough now. But the ride looked a little intimidating, so they waited patiently in a long line to ride this Shamu kiddie coaster. Naomi found it quite thrilling! Johnathan and I were to small or too pregnant (respectively!) to ride, so we shopped for a little penguin figurine that Johnathan played, slept, and ate with happily with for the rest of the week.

By this time we (especially Mommy) were ready for a break and some ice cream. Then we went to our last show of the day - the sea lions, which were fun and silly.

My favorite part was the walrus doing sit-ups to work off all the fish he ate.

We stopped by the dolphin pool right at feeding time, and Daddy (we'll call him the dophin whisperer) was able to get dolphins to come up to him without even having any fish to offer.

Our last stop was at the shark and coral reef exhibit.

Though it was an exhausting and packed-full day, we had such a fun time at Sea World together. It's funny how, as the kids grow, the fun of vacations shifts from doing things that the grown-ups find relaxing to the joy of watching Naomi and Johnathan experience and thrill at something new. I think I spent half the shows watching them watch, and training the camera on them, trying to capture the magic of their child-like reactions. I guess that's just being a mom who can't stand the thought of them growing up so quickly. We're thankful for the fun memories of this day.