The Simple Woman's Daybook

This week I actually got this done on Monday... yay me!

FOR TODAY July 21st, 2008...

Outside My Window... Trees basking in the hot afternoon sun.

I am thinking... About the wonderful weekend Jeremy and I had. The possibility that our nephew Blake could be born this week. About Jeremy’s deal closing this Friday. My new boss starting next Monday and the preparations that I have underway to make things easier for her.

I am thankful for... A refreshing weekend where I was connected with and on the same page as my husband. My mom taking us out to dinner for Indian food on Saturday (and that Jeremy enjoyed the Indian food). Enjoying our favorite dinner of Asian Coleslaw and Lettuce Wraps last night with a dessert of fresh cherries. The Lord’s provision of all of this, and His gift of the cross.

From the kitchen... Turkey burgers and pineapple grilled on the George Foreman with BBQ sauce, carrots and ranch dip.

I am wearing... Navy Ann Taylor slacks with four buttons on my left hip. Pale pink polo shirt layered under a white cable knit sweater. White open toed sandals… still in work clothes, soon to be work-out clothes.

I am creating... Note cards with fall colors. Our dining room table is STILL buried under assorted colored papers, stamps, paper cutters, glues and other craft supplies.

I am going... No where, enjoying a nice evening at home of exercise, dinner, reading and some conversation with my hubby.

I am reading... Daniel from the Bible for church, and A New Kind of Christian.

I am hoping... To have a relaxed week with lots of time to talk and connect with my hubby. We only have a few weeks left before we start the Your Next Step Institute (click here to see the brochure) and will have homework, an early morning class each week (5 am), and a late night class each week. I want to savor the remaining free time that we have with each other before the semester starts and our schedule gets more hectic.

I am hearing... Radio commercials.

Around the house... All the laundry that was done this weekend, but hasn’t been put away yet, and yes, still lots of craft supplies.

One of my favorite things... Jeremy is supposed to make me his signature Mangerchine Meatball recipe this weekend!! Yum yum!

A Few Plans For The Rest Of The Week: Absolutely nothing outside the normal Friday night church, Saturday morning coffee with the girls, and hopefully some walks with my honey at the beach!

Here is a picture I am sharing...

(Okay, I couldn't share one without the other. Guess what day this was..)

Shannon

Perspectives Week 9... The Task Remaining

Perspectives Week 9… The Task Remaining

So I’ve taken another break from my 14 blog series recapping the 14 weeks of our Perspectives on the World Christian Movement class. Today I’ll be recapping week 9, The Task Remaining, which is the last of the four lessons in the Historical Perspective section of the workbook (hoorah!). Our instructor for week 9 was David Cashin, and was one of Jeremy’s and my favorite instructors of the 14 weeks. His ministry and missions have been concentrated with Muslims. He is currently a professor at CIU in Columbia, SC. David told a variety of hilarious stories throughout the two and a half hours, and his own testimony, which was thrilling.

A lot of the material that David taught was statistical, on the “task remaining”. I’m not going to focus on that, because if you’re interested you can do the research and look up statistics on the internet. What I found most insightful from my time listening to him was his plethora of knowledge on Muslim culture, beliefs, etc. and since that it was stood out to me more, that is what I will share.

David said that Muslims don’t have a personal relationship with God, because their god is absent and removed. It’s more of an authoritarian structured religion. The book of law (The Koran) was given, and now they follow those laws. Their prayer is not conversational, it’s all formulaic. He suggested that in evangelizing Muslims we should always take every opportunity to pray with them and to introduce them to a relationship with God. He noted that since the system is works based there isn’t much security that your deeds have been good enough to be accepted. The only way to guarantee this is to be a suicide bomber (or to give your life in battle). David asked the question “How much of Muslim culture can someone keep and still profess Christ as Lord?”. (This has been a controversial question in Muslim missions). His answer was most of it, just as we can keep must of our culture, but he noted that they couldn’t call Mohammad a prophet. They can continue to dress, eat, and carry on with most of their culture (just as any other culture would do when newly converted), but not carry with them anything in direct contradiction to the Gospel. To paraphrase one thing that Doug Dorman said one of the first few times I met him, we don’t need to make Muslims become Americans in order to become Christians. In other words, we don’t need to first make them adhere to our cultural standards.

So now, your mission, if you choose to accept it... approach the Muslim people whose paths you cross and ask them if you can pray with them. Or David said that he has NEVER been turned down when asking a Muslim if they wanted to study the Bible with him... so give that a try also.

Shannon

The Simple Woman's Daybook

Recently I came across some of these entries on different blogs that I read and enjoyed them. I checked out the blog that started it all to find out more. Apparently there's a group of women who all add these posts to their blogs every Monday, well I was too busy yesterday and missed out, but better late than never, right?

FOR TODAY July 15th, 2008...

Outside My Window... Sun reflecting off of the trees with droplets of water on them from one of the numerous Myrtle Beach summer afternoon thunderstorms.

I am thinking... Recapping a days work, mentally making my to do list for the evening, missing my husband, and excited to spend some time with him.

I am thankful for... The warm days of summer, weekend walks of the beach, lighter fresh seasonal food, coffee, and an amazing husband to enjoy it all with.

From the kitchen... Leftovers. Mackerel that Jeremy caught deep sea fishing that I baked with some simple seasonings (butter, lemon, cilantro, Cajun seasoning and fresh garlic), with butter beans and corn (Grandma Lou’s recipe). (Fortunately both of those are better the next day than the first!)

I am wearing... Black three-quarter sleeve v-neck dressy shirt, gray slacks and black flats… still in work clothes, soon to be work-out clothes.

I am creating... Birthday cards for friends and family with July and August birthdays. Our dining room table is buried under assorted colored papers, stamps, paper cutters, glues and other craft supplies.

I am going... No where, enjoying a nice evening at home of exercise, dinner, reading, and some conversation with my hubby.

I am reading... Ezekiel for church this week and Wisdom Hunter by Randal Arthur in all of my spare time.

I am hoping... For nice weather tomorrow, my mom and I are planning on an evening walk after work and I’m hoping we miss the frequent summer showers.

I am hearing... The air conditioning system turn on and off.

Around the house... Craft supplies taking up the entire dining room table, and scattered clothes that need to be picked up.

One of my favorite things... Yesterday was my brother-in-law and sister-in-law's 1 year anniversary... Congratulations Bryan and Meegan!!!!

A Few Plans For The Rest Of The Week: Walk with mom Wednesday evening, church Friday evening, morning coffee with the girls Saturday morning, and of course weekend walks on the beach.

Here is picture I am sharing...

(I figured since I mentioned that yesterday was Bryan and Meegan's anniversary that I should share a picture of them also. They are also expecting their first child, Blake Michael Mangerchine, on July 26... how exciting!)


(If anyone reading this adds a Simple Woman's Daybook post to your blog let me know so I can check it out)

Shannon

Our Weekend Trip

For our three day weekend Jeremy and I took a weekend trip to Matthews County Virginia to visit some family. Matthews is as country as it gets. There isn't a single stop light in the whole county. There are lots of open fields, dirt roads, and there's just a peacefulness that Jeremy and I don't get in the busy Myrtle Beach area. We love our chances to get away, relax, and be refreshed with family.

We left at 7 am on Friday morning and spent our 7 hour drive talking and listening to a John Grishom book on CD (The Appeal). It was the perfect start to our weekend away. In Matthews we stayed with Jeremy's mom's parents, to us Grandad and Grandma, but to the rest of the world Edward and Louise Diggs. Jeremy's parents and our sister Lisa also met us in Matthews (they came from New Orleans, LA), and so did Jeremy's mom's brother and his wife (Uncle Richard and Aunt Lloydette, they came from Richmond, VA). So needless to say we had a houseful.

Grandad and Grandma live in a place that their family calls "the field", it's quite special really. The houses along the dirt road that they live off of are inhabited mostly by family of some sort. Grandma grew up in the lot adjacent to where she now lives, and when she got married she was given her property to build on. Grandad built them a home on their property backing up to the water. And when I say built, I mean he built it. He paid for everything cash, and labored at the work himself. So they've never had a mortgage and have lived in the same home their entire marriage. Grandma's siblings also built houses on lots adjacent to her property when they were married, and several of their children have done the same. Therefore a large portion of their street is inhabited by members of their family, and they look out for each other in a special way that only family does.

They have a simple way of life up there. They work hard and enjoy simple pleasures. During our visit we dined on Grandma's homemade pickles that I'm sure were made with cucumbers grown from some family members garden. We ate sauteed squash, carrots, and potatoes, and the squash was home grown as well. We ate fried soft shell crabs, and crab cakes made from meat of crabs caught by Grandma's brother. People spend over $20 a person at the seafood buffets here in Myrtle to enjoy the fare that we enjoyed that was home caught, and home cooked, and barely a fraction of the price of eating out. We were spoiled!

My dad and his wife Dawn live in Gloucester Virginia, which is about 20 minutes away from Grandad and Grandma's house. This enabled dad and Dawn to stop by for a visit Saturday afternoon and play several games of corn hole with us while we enjoyed the view of the water from the backyard. We also spent Saturday swimming in the pool of one of the family members, playing board games, and having a cookout with about 25 of the surrounding family members.

After a wonderful weekend we set off in the car Sunday morning finishing off our John Grishom novel. We returned home to a stifling hot condo with broken air conditioning which was a rude awakening. After not much sleep in our sauna and no snuggling due to the heat (and we are serious snugglers) it was back to work Monday morning. Fortunately our AC is now fixed and wasn't too major of a repair. Here's some pics from our trip, enjoy.

Grandad and Grandma's house
their yard
the view of the water from their yard
their dock and boats (the big one is Uncle Richard's)
Dad (Mangerchine) serving some of Grandma's famous butter beans and corn. yum yum!!!!
Aunt Lloydette, Uncle Richard and our sister Lisa at dinner on Friday
Grandma and Mom Do ya'all remember the pic of Dad sleeping from our trip to New Orleans back in March? Here's another addition of his after dinner naps. (okay, well he wasn't really sleeping this time, he posed for me, but I got such a kick out of the last one that I wanted to add to my collection)
Dad working on some poetry, well trying to work on some poetry while being distracted by the TV and silly photographers...
family game of Yahtzee
Grandad and Grandma... 58 years married and they still look like newlyweds all snuggled up with her hand on his leg. And as always the token picture that we take of ourselves by holding the camera a few feet away from us and trying to angle it, I think we've got it down.

Thank you Grandad and Grandma for your hospitality, we had a wonderful visit! Thank you to all of those who made the effort to come visit us during our stay in Virginia, we enjoyed every moment of time that we had with family and were refreshed by it! We love you all!

Shannon