Such a Sad Truth

I stumbled upon this today and thought how sad that this is how the world views Christians.

But you know what?

I would just about have to agree.

The church has failed. That's right; we've messed up, big time. The church was SUPPOSED to be a reflection of the God it claimed to serve. The church was SUPPOSED to be the hands and feet of Jesus Christ. But, for the most part, the church has failed.

Our failure has left a bad taste in people's mouths. Our mistakes have led to a lack of credibility. Our messes have caused people to seek answers for this life elsewhere. And really, who could blame people for giving up on the church? Gandhi had a very good point when he said "I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ."

I don't know about you, but I don't want to be a jerk, nor considered as such.

Instead I want these verses to ring true in my life!

Let nothing be done through selfish ambition or conceit, but in lowliness of mind let each esteem others better than himself. ⁴ Let each of you look out not only for his own interests, but also for the interests of others. Phil 2:3-4

SOUND OFF!

I've just about had it!

Why do we live in such a backwards and fallen world?!?!?

Standing in the line at the grocery store my eyes happen  to glance over to  this weeks newest and latest Trash-a-zines and my next thought is "Are you Serious"?!?

When did  teen moms become the new celebrity?  Where was I when this happened? .......And apparently there is a show dedicated to it on MTV????

I mean do you realize just what kind of message this is conveying to our children? How about... "It's cool to have a baby at age 16", or "WOW! how glamorous to have a drooling toddler strapped to my hip".... Maybe if I have two I will be on the next issue of OK Weekly!

When my parents were growing up, if you got pregnant as a teenager you were sent off (in secret mind you)  to some unknown relatives house until after delivery with the story that you were traveling abroad for the year.

It was shameful.

Now it's applauded and apparently a mass money maker to boot!
What has happened to us?

Parents I think we need to make a committment to teaching our children about the importance of Purity.

Fathers show your sons by example how important it is to wait for their beautiful bride.

Mothers explain to your daughters about the gift they possess that only their husband should ever open.

Love your children. Be involved in their lives, because if you don't someone will gladly take your place as their teacher.

For this is God’s will, your sanctification: that you abstain from sexual immorality, so that each of you knows how to possess his own vessel in sanctification and honor, not with lustful desires, like the Gentiles who don’t know God. This means one must not transgress against and defraud his brother in this matter, because the Lord is an avenger of all these offenses, as we also previously told and warned you. For God has not called us to impurity, but to sanctification. Therefore, the person who rejects this does not reject man, but God, who also gives you His Holy Spirit.

1 Thessalonians 4:3-8

Pop Quiz Hotshot!

Okay so.....


 I have always had this thing about being smart.

Growing up I was encouraged (okay bullied) into making sure my report card reflected all A's.

As you can imagine this was a hard thing to do because let's face it I wasn't born with a frock of whity unruly hair with the destiny to create light bulbs, or find out about atoms, or invent post-its (thanks Romy)!

But I have always wondered how does one become smart? Are they just born with it? Is it something that is perfected? Do you have to work to achieve your "smartness"?

Recently I have been searching around looking for who the world considers the smartest people in History.

This is my findings based on IQ scores:

210 - Physicist / Engineer Kim Ung-yong has a verified IQ of 210

 195 - Bouncer Christopher Michael Langan has a verified IQ of 195

 190 - Engineer Philip Emeagwali is alleged to have an IQ of 190

 190 - World Chess Champion Garry Kasparov is alleged to have an IQ of 190

 190 - Sir Isaac Newton

 190 - Francois-Marie Arouet (Voltaire)

 190 - Ludwig Wittgenstein

 186 - Author Marilyn Vos Savant has a verified IQ of 186

 180 - Leonardo da Vinci

 180 - Actor James Woods is alleged to have an IQ of 180

 180 - Buonarroti Michelangelo

 180 - David Hume

 180 - Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is alleged to have an IQ of 180

 180 - Politician John H. Sununu is alleged to have an IQ of 180

 179 - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

 176 - Emanuel Swedenborg

 176 - Gottfried Wilhelm von Leibniz

 175 - Edmund Spenser

 175 - Baruch Spinoza

 175 - Johannes Kepler

 174 - John Stuart Mill

 171 - Blaise Pascal

 170 - Antoine Lavoisier

 170 - Martin Luther

 170 - World Chess Champion Bobby Fischer is alleged to have an IQ of 167

 170 - Chess Grandmaster Robert Byrne is alleged to have an IQ of 170

 170 - World Chess Champion Judith Polgar is alleged to have an IQ of 170

 170 - Mathematician Andrew Wiles is alleged to have an IQ of 170

 170 - Michael Faraday

 170 - George Friedrich Handel

 167 - Mathematician / Physicist Stephen W. Hawking is alleged to have an IQ of over 160

 165 - Samuel Johnson

 165 - Ludwig van Beethoven

 165 - Joseph Priestley

 165 - John Locke

 165 - Thomas Hobbes

 165 - Charlotte Bronte

 165 - Galileo Galilei

 165 - Johann Sebastian Bach

 165 - Carl von Linne

 162 - Madame De Stael

 162 - Rene Descartes

 160 - Robert Boyle

 160 - Microsoft Founder Paul Allen is alleged to have an IQ of over 160

 160 - Benjamin Franklin

 160 - Albert Einstein

 159 - Immanuel Kant

 156 - Olof Palme

 156 - Thomas Chatterton

 156 - Linus Carl Pauling

 156 - Sofia Kovalevskaya

 155 - Jonathan Swift

 155 - Miguel de Cervantes

 155 - Rembrandt van Rijn

 154 - Actress Sharon Stone is alleged to have an IQ of 154

 153 - Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

 153 - Charles Darwin

 150 - George Eliot (Mary Ann Evans)

 150 - Nicolaus Copernicus

 150 - Abraham Lincoln

 145 - Anna Lindh

 145 - Napoleon Bonaparte

 143 - George Sand (Aurore Dupin)

 140 - George Washington

 130 - Ulysses S. Grant

 130 - Sir Francis Drake

Do you know any of these people? Seriously how many do you really know? Especially genious boy there right at the top of the list? If he is so smart why is this the first time I am reading his name?

Well that leads me to the thought of the hour? Maybe everyone else has heard of him and it's just me?

So you see my problem? Obviously my parents have created a complex in me about my "not so smartness".

So this post started out as one thing and now has transitioned into quite the other.

So......

Thanks MOM & DAD! For all of the jibs and jabs when I brought home that B+!  This posts for you :)

Mirror, Mirror In My Heart

Sometimes, I look out my window and shudder . I cringe at  what this world has become, and what it continues to transform itself into daily.

Hate.

You can't get away from it.

It's on the TV. It's in the Newspapers. It's on the Radio.

Hate.

It's in my heart.

The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it? Jeremiah 7:9

I'm utterly ashamed at the thoughts and feelings I harbor against others.

If Someone Cut Me I'd Like To Think Little Music Notes Would Burst Forth!

                            

                                              "sing with your head up, with 

              your eyes closed, not cause you love the song,

                    cause you Love to sing." 

                                                                                          

And Suddenly She Wasn't....

A little girl anymore.


Sometimes I look at her and I think, no...... I wonder, how did this happen?

What was once just the smallest of flutters beneath the beat of my heart has grown into someone who will one day feel that familiar flutter of life growing within her as well.


My baby will one day have her own baby, and I wonder again...... will she have a moment such as this?


A moment in which she reflects on the last 12 years of her child's life.... all the time wondering if she did  everything right? Are all of the pieces in place? You know..... the ones that are essential for that same child to make all of the "right" decisions in life.


My imperfections are suddenly a very scary thing to possess, knowing that they will more than likely be a hand-me-down to a living breathing legacy that all started within my womb.


Gabrielle is a Hebrew name that  means God gives strength; or God is my strength.


Lord, I pray that you lead me so that I may lead her, and may she always be aware of your ever present help in her time of need, of her weakness made perfect in Your strength.

Grandpa's and Typewriter's

It's funny.....

When I think back to when I first fell in love with writing and stories I remember my grandpa.

You see, Grandpa  bought me my first typewriter from a garage sale when I was about 8 years old. Oh what a glorious thing to behold that typewriter was in all of it's faded, rusty, antiquified glory! I remember sitting at the dining room table for hours click clacking away lost in my latest adventure.... and there were many.

But by far my grandest adventures of all came from the evening strolls around the neighborhood with grandpa. They were always lively events full of tales of fishing trips, treasures found at the latest garage sale outing, and stories of war.

Grandpa fought in World War 2.

On June 6, 1944 he floated up to the shores of Omaha Beach ready to fight off the brutal attacks given by the Nazi's.

The landings at Omaha is most remembered for the casualties the Americans took there.  German machine gun fire tore into the American troops. The seawall on the beach offered some salvation - but the sprint needed across the beach to the wall proved fatal for many. The Americans suffered 2,400 casualties at Omaha - and this is principally why the attack is remembered.

Of the handful of men left standing that day, Quinton O. Ross (my grandpa) was one of them.

He was a hero. Among the recognitions for his service during World War II is the Purple Heart, Combat Infantry Medal, Presidential Unit Citation and the Bronze Star.

I often times wonder if ..... maybe Grandpa wanted his story told? Maybe that typewriter was a gift with a hidden purpose.

Grandpa went home to his glory a few years back now, and oh how I wish I still had that same rusty, old typewriter to tell of the tales of his life. You see, the two go hand in hand with one another. 

Both from another era, old and weathered around the edges, and gone.... but oh the stories they once produced!

They are forever from another time altogether and utterly unforgettable!

Introductions Are In Order

She quietly walks out onto the stage amidst the bright lights and hushed crowd.

Her heart racing, palms sweating, stomach aching, thoughts racing.

           (Will they like me, am I funny, am I worthy)?

(Spotlight).....um.... hello..... My name is Megan.

           (Okay there... I've done it).

This day and age everyone has a blog. I have refrained up until this point explaining it away as nothing more than "I don't want to be like everyone else" Or how about this one, "I don't have anything to write about anyways".

            Truth be known It's always been insecurity.

So, it's time to finally take that dive off the diving board into "the deep end", run that 5K marathon. You know, do those things that are at one time seemingly impossible. I feel the winds of change a' blowin'.

Welcome to My Blog. Come in pull up a comfy chair and let's get better aquainted.