One year ago today the LPM Blog was born! On that first day I posted a welcome message and some pictures from our staff Christmas party. It was fascinating material. Were any of you reading during those early days? It has been a blast getting to fellowship with you in blogworld since then.

I mistakenly told my mom and sister that it is a tradition to post 100 things about yourself on your blog’s birthday. I think it’s actually something you do on your 100th post. Oops! I’m blaming it on my cold medicine. We had already made the list when I realized my mistake (and thank goodness we couldn’t come up with more than 30 things), so here it is!

30 Things About LPM and the Moore Family

LPM

*It was founded in 1994 with a one thousand dollar donation that Beth didn’t know what to do with.

*One donation check several years ago was made out to “Living Fruits Ministry.” We never cashed it because we loved it so much.

*A core group of the staff has been together since the days of monthly prayer breakfasts at Beth’s house twenty years ago. They have been through untold hair seasons with one another and are likely still married today because of one another’s encouragement to press on.

*Beth had to give up teaching a Christian aerobics class in order to write Bible studies, a sacrifice she often recounts and sometimes while doing a grapevine left then right, step forward, leap back. She says she’s never kicked the habit of writing aerobic routines in her head when she hears a cool Christian contemporary song.

*Beth’s personal assistant and our senior statesman, Susan Kirby, used to be a caterer, a gift she now utilizes to pick up good to-go food. Sadly, we only have about five restaurants near the ministry but, thankfully, four of them are Mexican food.

*The entire staff also considers Susan Kirby to be our resident authority on everything from recipes to home repairs to Christmas decorations to marriage restorations. Hers is the most sought-after advice in the ministry.

*Everyone on the staff is kind and sweet to each other until we play Bunko (no, we don’t bet) then everyone’s sin nature surfaces alarmingly. We had to give up playing “Spoons” because a utensil shortage once caused us to have to also use knives, to which many nearly lost appendages.

*One of us who will remain unnamed has the strangest sneezes in the free world and they always come in rapid succession of a minimum of eight. Every staff member within ear-shot observes a moment of smiling silence until they pass.

*Diane, our resource department manager, cut off all her eye lashes with an eyelash curler several years ago. As she helplessly watched them fall in the sink, she reports to having said aloud only one word: “Y’all.” Diane says that she does not know whether she was talking to all her eyelashes or to all of her good friends at Living Proof that would care that she lost them.

*Kimberly Meyer, one of our most beloved staff members, did not fully grasp the concept of preferring others when she served at Beth’s product table for the first time at Women of Faith several years ago. The irony of her shameful bias toward Beth was that it was untested. She’d not yet heard a single other speaker on the program. The first woman who walked up to the product table got the full brunt of it. With the enthusiasm of an entire cheerleading squad, Kimberly pointed both fingers at her and blurted out, “Who’s your favorite?” The unsuspecting woman, wide-eyed with surprise, blurted out with equal exuberance, “Patsy Clairmont!” A fact we still celebrate to this day.

*Every single one of the staff members who has gotten pregnant after coming to work here has had a boy. We now have five of them. Not a pink ruffle in the mix. Something suspicious is lurking in the office drinking water.

*Beth and ministry director, Sabrina, ride to Bible study together every Tuesday and worship so loud to Kirk Franklin songs that the whole car shakes.

*The whole ministry staff loves nothing better than a big, corporate praise dance. Uh, come to think of it, we haven’t let loose like that since Melissa came on board. She needs time to grow into it. A lot of time.

The Moore Family

*Most nights that we are all together, we sit on the edge of the bath-tub, fully clothed, and soak our feet in hot bath water.

*On special occasions, we put bath confetti in the water. And afterwards if there was good conversation, we talk about what a great “soaking” it was.

*While we soak our feet in the hot bath water, we drink our “comforts,” which is short for “comfort drink,” which is short for homemade hot cocoa (with real whipped cream).

*Mom and Dad have authored about fifty “sweet-Beanie” songs and can manipulate any song ever written into a “sweet-Beanie” song.

*We eat Jimmy Dean sausage almost every morning for breakfast. It is a small, dainty meal.

*Jackson’s feet often smell just like the feet of a grown man, and he thinks it is downright hilarious for anyone to smell them and gag.

*Beanie (the dog) is fed her medication in a mound of Easy Cheese (which Mom and Dad inexplicably call “cheese-meats”).

*Beth has a phobia of non-fried foods. The revelation recently came to full disclosure last week when she was shocked and awed that the fish in her fish tacos was grilled rather than fried. She even eats fried pickles. Disgusting.

*We love petit fours more than almost any other dessert creation. Wedding cake is a very close second.

*Amanda was the resident evangelist to the pets in our family, leading them to the Lord by holding their paws together in prayer.

*Melissa has the uncanny ability to order the worst and most random thing on any menu. If there is one bad entrée on an otherwise wonderful menu, she will pick it out.

*When Mom goes to work out, she says that she is going to “pump some iron” in order to “meet her fitness goals.”

*Keith has been known to entertain Beth, Amanda, and Melissa on a bad day by doing ballet across the hard-wood floor in his cowboy boots. His pirouette is fascinating.

*Melissa’s first car was a much-desired 1969 Z28 Camaro in midnight blue with white racing stripes. She got it for her 16th birthday from her daddy. He took her out on the road to teach her how to drive it, gave her a little while to practice the four-speed, then said, “Now, try again and quit driving like a girl.” They still share a great love for muscle cars.

*Melissa’s proudest moment for Amanda was the day she got a report card with a “needs improvement” in conduct.

*All Moore’s look to Melissa for fashion advice. There is still distant hope that her advice for Keith will one day be taken. She likes to remind her mother that if her father were indeed both handsome and cool, he’d be dangerous. Better for him to just be handsome.

*Dad brought a live armadillo to mom’s window the night before he proposed. We’re not sure why. Perhaps to test her commitment.

Happy blog-a-versary, Siestas!

Two years ago at Christmas, Curt and I were furiously trying to finish remodeling our home so that we could move in before the return of our Lord. It was absolutely the most stressful time of our marriage to date. There was not much holiday cheer in the little townhouse that we were so eager to vacate. We chose not to bother with decorating since we had enough to deal with between the house and a baby on the way.

Last year was going to be the most wonderful Christmas of all time. It was going to be one that we talked about for years to come. We had an adorable ten-month-old to add to all the joy of the season. It was his first Christmas, so we would need to document every little thing that happened and make everything as special as possible. We had a very cute house to decorate to our hearts’ content. And boy, did we. Looking back, I can see that I was putting, hmmmm, just a leetle bit of pressure on, well, everyone and everything for it to be nothing less than magical. It makes me tired just thinking about it. And, honestly, I made no room in my heart for the baby Jesus. No room at all. In fact, on Christmas Day I started a huge argument with my sister. Yep, it was me. I picked it. And it was a big one.

This year is going to be different. The name of the game is peace. Financial peace. Sisterly peace. Peace in our schedule. Peace inside my house. (With about half the decorations we have instead of it looking like I robbed Hobby Lobby.) Peace outside my house. (With about half the Christmas lights we had last year, when Curt channeled Clark Griswold). Peace in my expectations. Peace in my heart with God.

Peace is something I will fight for this year. I want to enjoy this Christmas without all the self-inflicted pressure, unreasonable expectations, and needless distractions. I need there to be room for the baby Jesus, who, incidentally, is our peace.

I think if Mary had given birth to Jesus in 2007, she might have gone on eBay and ordered some custom-painted letters that spelled out his name on the wall. She might have emailed a picture of his crib bedding to the artist so that she could make it all match. To spell P-R-I-N-C-E O-F P-E-A-C-E would have cost Mary an arm and a leg. She might have even hoped Joseph wouldn’t notice the $150 to PayPal on their bank statement. But those 13 letters are worth all the money in the world. They’re the most lavish, expensive, mind-blowing, life-changing present we could ever give or get.

Colossians 3:12-17
Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. Bear with each other and forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity.

Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, since as members of one body you were called to peace. And be thankful. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom, and as you sing psalms, hymns and spiritual songs with gratitude in your hearts to God. And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.

This was the second out of three playgrounds we visited this week. Jackson is tired of our living room.

Honestly, sometimes I’d rather sit on the bench and visit with the other mommies.

But then I would miss this…

Life is good when you’ve got mulch in one hand and a Tonka truck in the other.

He kept hitting his head on that thing.

Owie!

Will he go down?

Yes!

So, who’s going to be at the pre-conference in Phoenix? Bethie and half of our girls are heading out today.

We have something kind of cool going on at LPM right now. I can’t really share details, but please pray for my mom and dad and our leadership to be wise and to know God’s will.

To end this very random post, my Wising Up group finished last night. (We skipped the three sessions on marriage and motherhood since most of the girls in my group are only 18 or 19.) We had a really enjoyable semester together. I know I am biased, but I loved the sessions. I am ready to do a homework study again next semester. Thankfully, there’s a new one out! More to come on that…

LADIES! Well, it has certainly been a while! I have been missing you all! Let me catch you up on what has been going on since I last spoke with you in mid-June. For starters, I have spent every night at the Living Proof offices with my sleeping bag and my flashlight pointed to the worn and torn pages in my Bible that comprise the book of Esther. Gone are the tiara days that defined my first week working at Living Proof Ministries! I am, of course, half kidding, but the truth is that my Mom has put my brain and heart to work during this amazing research phase of the book of Esther! I have been completely and utterly obsessed. I think of Esther most of the time. For example, a friend of mine has a serious crush on a guy and she asked me to pray for the circumstances to come together…and so I have been praying that she would be given the same kind of favor with this gorgeous mystery guy that the Jewish orphan-girl Esther had with King Xerxes of Persia. I may be a bit out of line (and out of context—I really hope my Biblical Exegesis professors aren’t reading this) but I can’t help myself. I think mostly in terms of Esther and ancient Persia.

This morning I had about a million things to do. I am sure you can relate. It was one of those times that you assume all of the things that you must get done are going to be accomplished by sitting completely frozen and panicked at your desk. In my desperate state, I decided to flip the pages in my Bible from the book of Esther to the New Testament (and this was not a simple feat). It was at that point that I once again read the following words in 2 Corinthians 11 that the Apostle Paul wrote almost two thousand years ago:

24 Five times I received from the Jews thirty-nine lashes. 25 Three times I was beaten with rods, once I was stoned, three times I was shipwrecked, a night and a day I have spent in the deep. 26 I have been on frequent journeys, in dangers from rivers, dangers from robbers, dangers from my countrymen, dangers from the Gentiles, dangers in the city, dangers in the wilderness, dangers on the sea, dangers among false brethren; 27 I have been in labor and hardship, through many sleepless nights, in hunger and thirst, often without food, in cold and exposure. 28 Apart from such external things, there is the daily pressure upon me of concern for all the churches.

Leave it up to the Apostle Paul to put you in your place, right? The part that hit me the most was not his lengthy description of the suffering that he endured. The part that hit me the hardest was that in the midst of such extensive and devastating suffering, he actually cared about the life and health of the local churches! Imagine that! Today at Living Proof, we fasted and prayed during lunch hour and at least twice my mind drifted to lustful thoughts about the turkey, dressing, and cranberry sauce that we would be eating during Thanksgiving Break. How lame is that? We were supposed to be fasting for crying out loud! Good grief! All I know is that I want to have a heart for the body of Christ like the Apostle Paul did. I want my heart to be burdened so heavily for the covenant community of God that thoughts of its well-being wouldn’t leave my mind even if I had been robbed or shipwrecked. So I am praying and trusting that the same wise God who raised Jesus Christ from the dead would cause this impure and selfish heart to beat with a pure and holy passion for the church and its glorious mission!

Well LADIES, Esther and Mordecai beckon me once again…but I am thrilled to be back in touch with all of you amazing saints at such a time as this.

Next week our clan will be heading to the mountains for Thanksgiving. We will all be dressed something like this, except with pants.

Jackson isn’t thrilled with his new jacket, but he’s handling it better than last year.

On a completely different note, one of our siestas compiled a list of all our aerobic praise recommendations. I have posted the list as one enormous comment under that post. (It’s the last comment.) Thanks so much, Sunny!

When Curt and I bought our little 1925 wood frame house two years ago, we knew we were in for a long journey of renovation. The house was quite a bargain, but there was a good reason for that. The inside needed tons of work. It was six months before we spent our first night in the house. Actually, Curt pulled a few all-nighters trying to get some projects done so that we could move in before the blessed return of our Lord. I will never forget the night that Janelle and I, both at least seven months pregnant, donned our husbands’ workout clothes and some pretty ineffective masks and painted my kitchen cabinet doors. She is a true friend. We decided that if our kids ended up with very challenging dispositions, we’d blame it on the paint fumes. Those six months were pretty stressful, but there’s something sweet about knowing that your (or mostly your husband’s) blood, sweat, and tears are in the fabric of your home.

Even post-renovation, our home has plenty of quirks. Each of our old doors opens and shuts differently. Our bedroom door has to be slammed shut or it won’t stay closed. Jackson’s door has to be jerked open when it’s cold and doesn’t like to shut all the way when it’s hot. It’s funny how after time you just get used to each quirk. My poor college girls who come over on Wednesday nights have yet to master all the door opening and shutting tricks.

Our front door was absolutely the worst offender. I had to push it open with my hip or shoulder, and that was after fighting the ancient screen door with a toddler in my arms. It was hard work just getting in my house. You can imagine how challenging it was when Jackson was asleep on my shoulder! The door had a diamond shaped window right at eye level. Anyone who approached it couldn’t help but look inside our house. When we had Jackson, I taped a wash cloth over it so that I could have some privacy. It was so classy. When the previous home owner dropped by one day to see all the renovations we had done, she couldn’t believe we hadn’t replaced the front door. That hollow-core door was at least fifty years old. It was so brittle that an eight-year-old could have kicked it down.

Some months ago Curtis and I ventured into Lowe’s after a lunch date. I walked slowly through the door aisle and saw the door of my dreams. I never knew there was a “door of my dreams,” but there it was. It was red and had a beautiful window so high up that it would let some light in, but someone would have to be very tall or nosy to see in. It looked like a door that would go on a beautiful old bungalow. Our house is not quite a bungalow, but I thought it would look great. Curt shocked me by saying yes when I asked if we could get the door. We decided to think on it for a while first.

Soon we found out that our neighborhood was going to be in the middle of a major redevelopment project and some houses would be bought and torn down. We didn’t know if our street was being targeted for something new or if it would be left alone. We still don’t know, but we think we are staying put. (The city is not going to use eminent domain.) So we finally took the long-overdue plunge and my beautiful new door was installed last Thursday. It is even more gorgeous on my house than it was in the store. It opens and shuts gracefully. Praise God, the screen door has finally been retired. It feels secure and private, and the window makes rainbow reflections on my wall in the afternoon. I am completely in love with a door, of all things! But those who are proud of their door, the Lord is able to humble.

Ironically – so very ironically – our across the street neighbor got some new furniture that very day. In my city, it is extremely common for people to leave their old furniture out on the curb so that someone else can come and reap the blessing. Usually things like that are taken away within hours. Many people drove slowly by our house that day, not to admire my lovely new red door, but to see if the large couch in my neighbors yard was something they’d like to have for themselves. It was a perfectly good leather couch. What completely baffles me is that it remained there for three days. Three days! On the fourth day it was kindly taken away by the city.

The irony of this may be lost on you without my confession that the Lord has been dealing heavily with my pride lately. I’m not sure if I’m being more prideful than usual, or if the Lord is simply giving me eyes to see it. Whew! It has been a challenging couple of weeks! I recounted all the stories of my many recent humblings to my mom and we were squealing with laughter. If I can’t laugh, I might cry!

Even though this post is already very long, I’ll go ahead and share another little slice of life with you. Curt and I were asked to help distribute the elements of the Lord’s Supper on Sunday night. I was to stand up front and hold the cup of grape juice while church members dipped the bread into it. Let me tell you, I was very nervous about doing this because of my recent pride issues. I did not want to take or distribute Communion in an unworthy manner, lest I offend the Lord and become sick or fall asleep! (See 1 Cor. 11:27-32.)

I was getting some last minute instruction from my sweet pastor’s wife on the two sentences I was supposed to say to each person as they dipped the bread. Then she broke the news to me that by the end of it, I would probably have grape juice splashed all over my pants and shoes. I looked down at the cute new wide leg pants that I got from Anthropologie for my birthday and grimaced. I quickly tried to think right thoughts about the situation and offer my pants as a sacrifice to the Lord. What a very, very small sacrifice in view of Christ offering His body and His blood for the redemption of my soul. Well, the Lord put a holy scotch guard around my trousers and did not allow any grape juice to touch them. I’m absolutely positive that He gave me the vision of being bathed in grape juice in front of our congregation to protect me from that ugly pride during Communion. Now, if anyone saw me standing up there with spittle, it must not have been enough!

I’ve only talked to one of my neighbors since we dropped off the butterscotch haystacks, but I think they liked them. Someone asked about how to package them. I bought some small, square aluminum cake pans that came with lids and I lined them with a little bit of wax paper. That worked great because they were cheap and disposable. I also wrote a little card to each neighbor and included the recipe inside.

Thanksgiving and Christmas will be here before we know it and we will all have some great opportunities to take sweet treats to our neighbors. I would just encourage anyone to pray and ask God how you could be a blessing and spread the fragrance of the knowledge of Christ to those who live closest to you.

I’m not sure how many of you have listened to the “A Christmas Collection” CD that we have in our online store. It would be a great thing to include in a basket of goodies for the holidays. In it, my mom narrates a few Christmas stories and poems that she wrote several years ago. It’s one of my favorite products that we have. Diane always gives me a few copies to give out at Christmas.

While I’m on the topic of products that help you get ready for the holidays, let me mention one other thing. I recently heard Dennis and Barbara Rainey talking about her book Thanksgiving: A Time to Remember on Family Life Today. It is a “beautifully illustrated coffee table resource to help your family recognize God’s hand in our history, remember His blessings in the past, and express thankfulness to Him for His goodness today.” If you order the book, they will include the audio book – the dramatic presentation of the real story of Thanksgiving – for free. They played a portion of the audio book on the radio program and it had me hooked! It was very moving. So I will be ordering that for the Jones family before Mr. Jackson wakes up from his nap!

Last but not least, here is a picture of the little man in his golfer costume last night.

Here we are with our friends Janelle and Ella at our church’s fall festival. My mom will appreciate that the girls were 80’s aerobics instructors. You can’t tell in this picture, but I wore a poodle skirt and some saddle shoes.

Happy November, everyone!

“But thanks be to God, who always leads us in triumphal procession in Christ and through us spreads everywhere the fragrance of the knowledge of him.”
2 Corinthians 2:14

You might be glad to know that I listened to the Body of Christ, who was telling me to take something nice to my neighbor after our unfortunate introduction at the hands of the beast. So last night I made a batch of butterscotch haystacks and I hope to distribute them to that family and to my other neighbors this evening. I will be leaving Beckham at home when I go. This is normally a treat I make at Christmas. But hay is a fall thing, right?

Here is the recipe I used in case anyone wants to give them a try.

Butterscotch Haystacks

1 cup of butterscotch chips
1/2 cup of peanut butter
1/2 cup of Spanish peanuts
2 cups of La Choy chow mein noodles

Heat the peanut butter and butterscotch chips on 50% power for 3-5 minutes. Stir, then add noodles and peanuts. Drop by teaspoonfuls onto wax paper. Let them harden and then eat ’em all up!

*I like to go lighter on the peanut butter and heavier on the noodles, but that’s just me. The peanut butter definitely makes it easier to work with. I was so happy that I ended up buying way more chow mein noodles than I needed because I really like to eat them plain. They are tasty!

Here’s what they look like. The recipe makes a lot more than this. I didn’t keep track of the exact amount because I made it a few times over. Eek!

If you have a favorite fall treat, share the love!

Also, let’s remember to pray for our Bible study leaders today. Many of them are in the home stretch as we all reach the half-way point or final weeks of our Bible studies. The Esther group in Houston only has two more sessions after tonight. (Although Beth still has tons of writing left to do.) I’m sure our Bible study leaders could use our encouragement and our prayers as they aim to end strong in the Lord Jesus! Way to go, leaders!

I am not one to love Mondays, but I am fully embracing this one. (Monday – Attitude! Right Wising Up girls?) Last week was possibly the longest week of my life and I am happy to say hello to a new one. Curtis, Jackson and I all came down with the stomach bug. Not a blessing. On top of that, for the first time in my life I baked a loaf of bread. A loaf of bread that my dog grabbed off the counter and ate like it was a common Meaty Bone. This is a dog who eats athletic socks. He doesn’t exactly have fine taste and my hot loaf of homemade bread was wasted on him in every way. At least I had two pieces before he got to it. Curtis didn’t even get to see my loaf of bread, much less taste it. And believe me, I wanted him to tell me how great it was!

I just got an email from Jessica B. from North Carolina. Take a look at what she had to say:

After almost completing the Daniel Study I was led by the Spirit to “clean-up” my iPod playlists and remove the songs that were pure Babylon. Now I have an empty iPod and need suggestions of songs to add from my fellow siestas. I live where there is not a Christian radio station and I need help. I am trying to lose the last of my baby weight and need suggestions to help keep me moving.

Can you help a siesta out? What is one song you could suggest to Jessica? If your favorite has already been said, go with your next favorite!

Beth’s suggestion is “Hallelujah Praise” (Hallelujah is the Highest Praise) by CeCe Winans. Mine is “Let God Arise” by Chris Tomlin. I might have to make an “Anything But A Siesta” playlist on my iPod!