You know how much I dearly love organization, but I will be truthful...organizing a kitchen can be one of the hardest things. How do you decide what you actually need and how do you make all the varying shapes and sizes of things fit? This article has many helpful tips - including learning to let go of a few things!
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The Olympics have brought out the curiosity in me, and one of the items I Googled this week was how do the horses get to the Olympics? Well, ask and you shall receive!!! This article explained it well!
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Maybe you saw this floating around Facebook, but I found it particularly interesting, as I never would have imagined there would be THIS much invasion of privacy from nibby tourists toward homeowners from Fixer Upper. I can't imagine stopping at a stranger's house and walking up to the door to ask if I could see the house, no matter HOW darling I found it on TV!!!
Four.
When I worked at WBCL, we usually got to sample a DeBrand's caramel apple now and then. Those apples worked nicely for a work crew because each person could take one slice and it was PLENTY, since they were so huge. But I loved this idea of caramel apple slices for the average, every-day, at home enjoyment. Easy to manage and lots of topping!!
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I'm excited to tell you about the book I read this week. I learned a good handful of names when I worked at the station, and Scotty Smith was one of them. That's when I was introduced to his prayer-writing and began to read the prayers on his blog, so when I saw he had a new book coming out, I knew I wanted to read it.
My biggest frustration with Every Season Prayers was that I only had one week to read it before I needed to write the review. This book, my friends, was not meant to be read in a week. And you can know it's going right back on my every-day-reading stack so I can go back through and read it properly, slowly savoring it and learning from the wisdom on each page.
I want to also say that I'm generally not a big fan of written prayer, Scotty's being the exception to the rule. I never want to get so lazy in my own prayer life that I resort to reading prayers written by others as my own prayers. But Scotty makes it absolutely clear in the introduction to this book that his intention in writing prayers for others to read is not to do their praying for them, but rather to guide them in prayer. There are many who didn't grow up in a home where non-scripted prayers were prayed and they might not know how to really approach the Throne of Grace without some teaching.
This book is teaching.
Scotty previously wrote a book called Everyday Prayers: 365 Days to a Gospel-Centered Faith, and this book is the sequel to that. After reading that book, many people contacted him asking for a variety of other kinds of prayers...long ones, short ones, and covering a variety of topics. From those requests, this book was born and he indeed delivers what was asked.
The first and largest section of the book includes longer prayers for all kinds of random occasions, from shame to trust to good days. Each prayer begins with a Scripture verse and then moves on into the body of the prayer itself. There are also sections containing prayers for marriage, confession, Advent, Lent, struggles, and more.
I appreciate Scotty's spirit so much, and as I raced through the book, I already started underlining, taking note of his phrasing, and learning new things I'd never even considered in prayer before. I am beyond eager to go back through this book - so slowly - and focus on a prayer a day for as long as it takes to re-read the pages.
A few of the phrases I loved...just so you can get a feel for the rhythm of the book:
* "Thank you that you intend for us to abound in hope and not just have enough hope to get by on." {page 24.}
* "Turn our whines into worship, our daily carping into carpe diem, and our frets into faith." {page 50.}
* "You knew the full extent of their weakness, so you showed them the full extent of your love. Washing their feet was a prelude to washing their hearts. Water sufficed for the first; your lifeblood was required for the second." {page 111.}
* "When I do the mercy math, all the wonderful things you are to us and have done for us far outweigh all the provocations, irritations, and exasperations of life." {page 164.}
* "We all matter, but none of us is the point in God's story. The gospel comes to us that it might run through us." {page 245.}
I am so thankful for this book, for what I've already learned and for what I have yet to learn as I read it slowly, as it was meant to be read and absorbed. If you want to challenge your own prayer life, I highly recommend this book!
* Thanks, Baker Books, for providing a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review, and thanks, Scotty, for so bravely sharing the prayers of your heart!
