blog readership.

So my blog readership has gone up which means I'll probably try and start posting more. Even though I don't know who all reads this thing because of you anonymous people.

Birthday!

So today's my birthday... I'm really old now. :-p

Thanksgiving!

Today is Thanksgiving! I'm pretty happy to be back in Michigan celebrating with my family. It's been a blast hanging out with friends as well. I gotta admit that I miss IHOP more and more every second. I've been addicted to the prayer room webstream and trying to stay engaged as much as possible. It's hard to sow in when you are not surrounded by the people and the things that push you further.

Today I've been thinking about what I've accomplished this past year. Then sort of setting up ideas of project goals I'd like to accomplish in 2008. I am so thankful to God that I am at IHOP studying to do what He wants. I am so thankful that there are people around me everyday there who press me to go deeper and help me develop my gifts and teach me things I don't know. Like learning an instrument better.

So far I've only come up with 3 main goals for 2008.
1. Totally devote it to God. I don't want to mess around with anything finite for this coming year. If it's not pushing me deeper or glorifying Him I don't want nothing to do with it. Which leads me to:
2. No dating in 2008. I don't really date anyway, but the principle behind it stands. I don't want to think about boys, relationships, marriage for this year. It's so distracting and by far the hardest thing to give up.
3. I've been working on getting through the entire bible for a year and a half. I'll for sure be by January. My goal is to then take my new silver metal bible and have 9 highlighter colors representing the 9 beatitudes. Then go through the entire bible cross referencing to the beatitudes.
My identity is found within the beatitudes because my heart seeks to live a life of joy, it's in my name. I find Him and allow Him to find me within this short 9 step plan to happiness. This is my heart foundation.

My favorite number is 8. So I delight in giving this year 2008 to He who means the most. And matters the most.

My name

There's a guy on Judith's prayer room team who is really into finding out what the meaning of names are etc. Anyway he did mine. It's pretty cool.

Meaning of Name
for
Abagail Lane Sincox

Abagail

Language/Cultural Origin: Jewish

Inherent Meaning: “MY FATHER REJOICES”
Spiritual Connotation: “CHERISHED OF GOD, SOURCE OF JOY”

Scriptural Reference:

Zephaniah 3:17 “The Lord your God in your midst, the Mighty One, will save; He will rejoice over you with gladness, He will quiet you with His love, He will rejoice over you with singing.”

Psalm 51:12 “Restore to me the joy of Your salvation, and uphold me by Your generous Spirit.”

Lane

Language/Cultural Origin: English

Inherent Meaning: “Road, Wayfarer”
Spiritual Connotation: “Eternal”

Scriptural Reference:

Psalm 119:105 “Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.”

Matthew 7:14 “Because narrow is the gate and difficult is the way which leads to life, and there are few who find it.”

Mountain Wings today

Getting Into Heaven
====================

I was testing the children in my Sunday school class to see if
they understood the concept of getting to heaven.

I asked them, "If I sold my house and my car, had a big garage
sale and gave all my money to the church, would that get me
into Heaven?"

"NO!" the children answered.

"If I cleaned the church every day, mowed the yard, and kept
everything neat and tidy,

would that get me into Heaven?"

Again, the answer was, "NO!"

By now I was starting to smile. Hey, this was fun!

"Well, then, if I was kind to animals and gave candy to all
the children, and loved my wife, would that get me into
Heaven?"
I asked them again.

Again, they all answered, "NO!"

I was just bursting with pride for them. "Well," I continued,
"then how can I get into Heaven?"

A five-year-old boy shouted out,



"YOU GOTTA BE DEAD!"

Yesterday Jen (the room mate), Becca (the old room mate) and I went to Maya's (a Mexican resteraunt on State Line) to watch the Michigan vs. Michigan State game and eat ceasar salad. Michigan was ahead pretty much the whole time we were there but State pulled in the lead in the 3rd quarter. :) It was really tight up until the last 3 minutes. Then U of M scored! It was ridiculous! I was so bummed. I thought for sure MSU had it! :-p Oh wells! It was really good to catch a college football game this season. I love it and we don't have a TV. I've been watching scores on the cell phone of course, but it's just not the same. :)

I'm focusing lately a lot on loving others. I guess you could say I'm making a small change, to the way that I wear my heart. I found a great sermon from Bethel church about loving from the heart and will probably post the good stuff from that later this week. This week is GBF so no school which is good for resting purposes. Then that outline for praying through the beatitudes is coming too.