13 Oct 2017

Baby Emmy

by | posted in: kcreatives photography, newborn | 0

I had the privilege of spending the day with this little bundle of pink, her mama, and her extended family this week.  I’ve known here Mama now for 17 years in January.  We’ve studied and cooked together, lived in the same dorm together, taken many midnight walks together, rode bikes together, been across the world together. We used to be neighbors in ATL, but now we live just a couple hours apart.

Our kids are like siblings – where most of the time they get along.  Can’t wait to watch this little one grow.

Here are just some of her session with me that day.  You are loved, baby Emmy.

13 Oct 2017

Lavish 12

by | posted in: 31days, food, lavish hospitality | 1

On a post about food, and it is my son’s birthday, and I’m not cooking anything.  Nope.  We are going out for donuts, then going to a fun lunch, picking up his Publix birthday cake, then going to a friends for small group.  I’m getting off easy.

But, sitting around a table is more than just food.  Yes, I love to cook.  One of the ways I learned to cook was from my mom being disabled and unable to much of my growing up.  So, she would tell me what to do and I would cook it. Or I learned it from watching my Granny and Papa or learning how to scale fish and cook a mean french fry at the Suwannee River with weeks away with my Papa.

But, I learned to love to cook for others when I got to know a family in college.  I got to be a part of their celebratory meals and their every day meals.  Knowing recipes that family members loved.  Knowing what would please the ones they loved.  Sitting down at a table in their home and talking for house over good food and good wine.  Or just good old sweet tea.

The meal is more than just food.  It is life for the soul of many.

Quote from The Hidden Art of Homemaking by Edith Schaeffer.

12 Oct 2017

Lavish 11

by | posted in: 31days, Bible, lavish hospitality | 4

There are times I fail at hospitality.  And, yes, fail is a strong word.  Most will probably say just practicing it is enough, but for me, I want to do it right.  So, there is often a struggle between doing it and doing it well.

I’m a number 3 with a 2 wing on the Enneagram.  I like to be known and loved and be needed and always seem to be giving my resume.  But, I hate the fear of rejection.  Rejection and me do not get along.

The last 6 years I’ve had the most love I’ve ever known (husband, 2 boys), but I’ve also experienced the most rejection and dislike in my life. It has been some incredibly lonely times.  Filled with so many tears.

I remember just one little example of this.  I was hosting a meeting of ladies in my home.  I love to bake.  And I make these delicious and beautiful cupcakes.  I had spent all afternoon making them (with a toddler and baby).  One person ate a bite, no one else had any.  I wanted to cry the whole meeting.  When my husband arrived home, I threw them in the trash.  He didn’t even get to taste one..  When you work on something creatively for someone, have others reject it, its really a rejection of yourself.

So, the past few months, I have really been taking that rejection and placing it on Christ.  Where I need to sit and dwell in is his everlasting, never-rejecting love for me.  I’m his beloved.  He will never let me go. He will hold me fast.

When we welcome others in our loves, in our home, not rejecting them – we will be a piece of Christ to them.  In order to show them the Gospel.  To let them dwell in the love of Jesus.

More on this Psalm in The Songs of Jesus by Tim Keller

12 Oct 2017

Lavish Hospitality 10

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I grew up in a small Primitive Baptist Church in a small town in central Florida.  I accepted Christ early and started participating as a member in my church.  We did feet washing.  I remember washing feet and having my feet washed.  I remember kneeling and  getting the towel wet.

Now, we don’t do feet washing in the churches I’ve been a part of, but I will tell you some of the most meaningful Lord Suppers.

In Louisville, I went to a church where the Lord’s Supper was practiced every week, tied wholly into the sermon each week (the Gospel), and we actually broke bread (tore off pieces from one loaf) and could dip the bread either into the wine or the juice (in goblets).  The community of believers served each other each week.  Here some meaningful aspects:

  1.  Believers serving believers.  Community with the Lord’s Supper.  First with Christ because He gave himself for us, then we other believers who have put their faith in Jesus too.
  2. Tearing off the bread.  The body of Jesus was a real body. He was bloody.  He had thorns on his head.  The little wafer that I’ve mostly had in life isn’t as much of a replication of it.  But, there is something about tearing off the bread that is more symbolic of what happened on the cross 2000 years ago.
  3. Wine.  (If you have personal reflections on alcoholic intake, I’m not saying you should go partake with wine at the Lord’s Supper.  Where there is freedom, there is love).  I’m not a dry red wine fan.  But, when taking the Lord’s Supper, and you are drinking sweet grape juice, it again misses the symbolic mark for me.  When I dip the torn bread in a cup of bitter wine, the wine hits my tongue and almost makes me wince…it highlights the bitter nature of the cross.

And this table, the Lord’s table, reminds me most of a time when I can sit at the table with Him in Heaven, my feet covered with brilliant fine linens, no one seeing my faithlessness, my rebellion, but all seeing the love and beauty of Christ.

Quote from John Frame, Systematic Theology, found in Habits of Grace by David Mathis.

12 Oct 2017

Lavish Hospitality 9

by | posted in: 31days, lavish hospitality | 1

When people come to our house to spend the night, whether visiting for several days, or just overnight, I like to know what they like and have it for them.

I like to make foods they will eat or a special coffee they will enjoy.  I like to have little gifts ready for them in the room they are staying in.  I want them to feel welcome and loved.  And often times, for most people, gifts make them feel welcome.

This part of hospitality doesn’t have to be extravagant, believe me, hello Dollar Spot at Target!!  The best thing is to be thoughtful.  Preparing your home to be hospitable is an easy task, just be mindful of it.

I know a couple that has a gift room.  They buy things on sale, Black Friday sales, TJMaxx, for just this reason.  To be able to give gifts, or to be able to be hospitable throughout the year through gift-giving.

With Christmas right around the corner, you may have more opportunities to practice this.  Don’t be overwhelmed and don’t stress the budget.  It can be as simple as having your kids draw a picture welcoming them.  Or picking flowers from the yard.  Just something that says welcome.

Quote from Come Thou Long-Expected Jesus (Charles Spurgeon) in a collaboration book by Nancy Guthrie.

10 Oct 2017

Lavish Hospitality 8

by | posted in: 31days, Christmas, lavish hospitality | 0

 

As a book reviewer, I’m already receiving books on Christmas, the holidays, and Advent.  This is super helpful because it helps to turn my mind and heart to the real reason for the Christmas season before the hecticness of the holidays work to turn my heart toward other things.

My favorite Christmas album: Sojourn’s Advent Songs. 

My favorite thing to do at Christmas: be at home with just my boys and my man on Christmas day.

My first Christmas stocking: a pale pink ballerina slipper.

My favorite Christmas book: Song of the Stars

Christmas is all about the incarnation.  The incarnation was one of the first acts of Lavish Hospitality.  It is when the Creator of the world came to live in the world he made.  He gave up his wealth to become poor for us.  And in doing so, he welcomed us.

We, as believers, can be such a visible work of the gospel in people’s lives if we welcome them.  Welcome them in their brokenness, in their hurting, in their reality.  And you know what, people don’t enter our perfectness.  They enter our brokenness, our hurting, and our reality.

Quote: Found in Him by Elyse Fitzpatrick.

10 Oct 2017

Lavish Hospitality 7

by | posted in: 31days, lavish hospitality, marriage | 0

Sorry for the delay, we have been fighting with our internet reception at home.  But, I’m still here.  An update: I want to use this month to get the quotes and start the stories for Lavish Hospitality.  Then use NaNoWriMo to really write it.  I’ll keep you posted.  Thank you for reading.

This past weekend we celebrated our 6th wedding anniversary.  I have found in marriage it is very easy to show grace for the big things, but so much harder for the small things.  One area that my husband and I need to both work on it love: not being easily offended.  When one or both of us have been offended, we are not hospitable to each other.

The other night I just didn’t talk – that is my normal mode of response when I’m hurt.  So, we watched Bull in bed without saying a word.  Turned off the computer and went to bed, all without saying a word.  That is not hospitable.

That is not how we are supposed to act.  Love doesn’t act this way.  I’m not very welcoming to my husband when I don’t even talk to him.

God always need to radically work on my heart when I am offended.

Quote from Tim Keller, The Meaning of Marriage.

7 Oct 2017

Lavish Hospitality 6

by | posted in: 31days, Books, lavish hospitality | 0

One aspect of mothering is that it is life-giving.  And as women, I think we are naturally life-givers.  Maybe not all of us have biological children, but we are all made in the image of God, and being image bearers as females, I think we are life-givers.

You can be life-givers as a wife, mom, foster mom, adoptive mom, friend, neighbor, church member, business woman, daughter, granddaughter, caregiver, single, married, widowed, divorced.

Hospitality is life-giving as well.  We can be life-giving in our homes, our cars, our work, our church, our communities.  This may look like bringing a small gift to a neighbor who has just moved in or one who is going through a rough time (a gift card or something fresh from the oven or grocery store).  This may look like welcoming your kids’ friends over to your house every Friday night – or any night of the week – just so they have a loving place to hang out.  This may look like talking to the older women sitting around you in church, the ones you don’t know, the ones who look lonely.

Whatever hospitality looks like for you – bring life to someone else.

Book quote from Missional Motherhood by Gloria Furman

6 Oct 2017

Lavish Hospitality 5

by | posted in: 31days, lavish hospitality | 0

Hospitality didn’t begin with us.  It didn’t begin with Southern Living, or really anything Southern.  It didn’t begin with a table.  It didn’t begin with Sweet Tea.

It began with God.  Everything good originated with God.  He created all we know.

He didn’t choose us, choose us to lavish his gracious hospitality on us because we were so good.  He delighted in us, welcomed us to his table, into his presence, restoring a broken relationship, simply because He is God and He chose to love us.

One of my favorite Bible stories is King David and how he welcomes Mephibosheth into his dining room.  He welcomes a lame man, family to the former king, into his presence to eat at the King’s table.  David could have had him killed.  This story has been my favorite Bible story for 20 years.  I spoke at a women’s retreat – my first time I spoke at a church event as the keynote – on this topic.  We love hospitality – and this one story from the Bible tells of God’s gracious hospitality to us.

Book quote from The Ology by Marty Machowski – a theology book for kids.  Picture: kcreatives

Bible story found in 2 Samuel 9.

6 Oct 2017

Big and Little Coloring Devotional

by | posted in: Books | 0

When we set up our new home in late this summer, I knew I wanted to have a creative area for my boys.  A place where they could have coloring books, playdough, markers, colored pencils, etc – just waiting to sit and get all their creative juices out!

Well, we set up a little Goodwill table that I found before we moved, and put some bins of creative tools around it – and they sit their every day.  I love it.  I love having pieces of paper all around the house with scribbles and drawings on them.

Another great tool I’ve found for my boys is the Big and Little Coloring Devotional.  I found out about this devo coloring book from my friend Sarah on her podcast with the author Rachel Swanson.  Then I got to be a part of the launch team.  So much fun!

It is a top flip coloring book, made for two people to be coloring at once.  So, I’ve been sitting across from my older, him coloring, me coloring.  And the neat thing about this particular coloring book is that it is based on Scripture.  So, one side will have a (younger age) coloring page with God’s truth on it, the other page will have a more detailed coloring page with a short devotional on it.  These devotionals are perfect for you to read, be encouraged, and it may be a jumping off point for you to share these truths with your child – AS. YOU. COLOR!

Such a great activity for you and your child to do together.  And Christmas is coming – its a perfect gift for any mom of littles you know – I would say even up to 10yo or so – girl or boy.  So, grab some colored pencils, crayons, or markers, and get coloring – and shepherding your soul – and your child’s!